Savage Webs, page 19
part #2 of Apocalypse Cultivation Series
His unique situation had helped him survive this ordeal, but now he had no idea where his monster evolution was heading. And now he was really close to a Reforged Body too. He’d been shooting to become a Vampiric Ghoul Lord. Now he had no idea where his evolution might go. There was nothing even resembling whatever the hell Conophta had been in his goddess-given evolution information.
Oh well. At least I’m alive.
He was also probably lucky that the mysterious new tree had not attacked him while he’d been helpless. Then again, maybe it hadn’t been luck. He felt a resonance with the tree, a kinship. Ignoring strange things happening was really not smart anymore, not after everything he’d been through.
Jake stood on shaky legs and bowed to the tree, his fist cupped in his other hand. “Greetings and thank you for your service when you were in your past form. I am about to claim this building and I plan to share it with you. As long as this place belongs to me, you will be safe to the best of my power.”
The tree’s exposed roots twitched. Its trunk disappeared in the ceiling. Jake wondered if there were any branches and, if so, if they would have moved too. He held the bow for long enough to clearly convey goodwill before stumbling around the bunker-like dwelling. As he walked, he slowly regained his strength, walking more normally.
A cultivator’s body at the peak Gold level of Body Refinement was very resilient, after all.
It turned out that Conophta’s home was a lot bigger than Jake had thought. The room he’d been in had really been more of an antechamber.
The entire structure was built to Conophta’s massive scale. Jake had no idea how many square feet the house might be. There was an entire wing of guest rooms, what looked like enough to house half an army and their families. A well-appointed gym with what looked like simple weights as well as modern gym equipment occupied a space next to a truly massive sparring or training area. There were even private rooms that could be great for magical study or cultivation. Each was different, some entirely made of rock, or steel, or wood, and others with their own small, enclosed gardens.
There were two large libraries. Jake didn’t have time to go through them. Now that he was waking up and firing on all cylinders again, he had a small but growing worry that he might be too late to make it back to the portal on Earth to return to the Murim world. Time on this world obviously moved a lot faster, so there was still hope. But Jake figured there was a big difference between taking a few minutes to check out his new house versus spending a full day, or a week, or even longer going through the libraries.
The second library in particular held a collection of obviously magical tomes that Jake was itching to check out. He avoided the temptation and kept exploring.
Every room had subtle lighting that was nicely done. Jake caught sight of little constructs darting here and there as they kept the entire place spotlessly clean. The climate control seemed to be handled by stones in the ceiling corner of every room that either warmed or cooled, respectively. Art hung on the walls, most of it showing scenes of endless plains under two suns.
Conophta might have been Jake’s enemy and had served an evil god that was chummy with Ahriman, but the champion had had great taste.
Jake found the home’s power center through a hidden trapdoor under a rug. One good thing about Conophta being so large was that Jake was able to find the secret rooms and hallways much easier.
The room containing the building’s heart was deep below the room above. Jake descended over fifty feet down, then down a hallway, through several thick doors that easily opened with a push.
“Wow,” said Jake. As a cultivator, he might not have appreciated what he was seeing, but as a mage, it was absolutely astounding.
The chamber looked like it had been a natural cave, but now there were pylons and magical scripts in each corner and one in the middle of the ceiling. Spells were engraved in every wall and on almost every surface. A purple crystal hung in midair, turning slowly.
However, Jake immediately recognized the roots that had tunneled through the solid rock of the ceiling. He’d seen many that looked exactly like them back in the Web Burrows. His old sword, the new tree, had somehow gotten its roots all the way down here. When Jake examined it more closely, he saw something incredibly curious.
One of the tree’s roots had touched a portion of the spellwork on the wall and was very clearly drawing energy from it. Or maybe something even more complex was happening.
“Is it…cultivating the power?” wondered Jake aloud. It looked like the tree was drawing in power, cycling it, and returning at least some of it back to the crystal. Maybe it was actually joining with the power source or with the home itself. “Weird.”
Jake walked up to the control panel and examined it for a while. At first, the symbols written next to some of the mystic readouts meant nothing to him, but slowly, like his brain was waking to new understanding, the writing gradually made sense. His Champion status could be downright convenient at times like this.
Of course, he probably would have been fine without it. There were only so many ways to magically power a magical construct, no matter how complex, and even fewer ways to channel that power in an efficient and meaningful way.
But now that he understood the writing and better understood the room itself, Jake swallowed. If Conophta had still been alive, the doors he’d just been through would not have opened so easily, and if he’d made it to this room, he likely would have been blasted to atoms. The security was actually very good. He was somewhat surprised at first that the building had defaulted to being ownerless upon its master’s death.
Maybe someone else would be along eventually to try claiming it, like maybe Conophta had a will. That was a cheery thought.
Jake made a face and stopped stalling. He cut himself, cycled his cultivation base, and dropped blood on a control crystal at the same time he injected his energy into it.
He felt a resonance–first with the crystal, then with the structure and its surrounding area, then again with the tree.
Jake’s instinct to be respectful to the tree had been correct.
He moved out of the power center back up to the main house. As he left, every heavy door closed behind him, and he knew this time they would not open with a push.
Now that the house was his and he understood how good the security was, he was glad he hadn’t taken anything before, at least not to be labeled as a thief by any hypothetical security systems that monitor for it.
But now that he was officially the new owner, Jake went from room to room, throwing anything into his storage that he thought might be useful later. He didn’t empty out the entire armory, though, just half of it.
Most of the furniture was too big for him, but he decided that if he came back, he’d replace it with stuff more his size, so he actually took most of the furniture too.
That done, he headed for the garage-like entryway. He bowed once to the tree as he passed and sensed a calming power run through his body. On impulse, he said out loud, “Guard the house when I am away, please.”
Then he facepalmed. He’d forgotten all about Bloom! The wooden sword had turned into a tree and was so crazy, Jake had forgotten to find out what had happened to his divine weapon!
He found it where Conophta’s missing body had been. The tree’s roots had moved all around the area, filling it, but had not actually come in contact with the sword anywhere. “Excuse me,” said Jake. He was only half surprised when the roots actually moved slightly, giving him a bit more room to draw out his weapon.
It seemed even a potentially sentient, mysterious, energy vampire tree was wary of Blooming Honor. Jake stowed the sword back in his storage.
In the garage, he explored another two rooms that he hadn’t seen before. One of them held tools of all kinds; it was basically a mystical workshop. Most of the tools were too big for him, but he could still use them. The second room held vehicles.
He checked on the clay bat before even examining the vehicles, but it was still damaged and regenerating.
Luckily, some of the transportation options here were human-sized. He wondered what the story was behind that, and just as quickly decided he might never know. Jake selected a flying vehicle, kind of like a motorcycle with mini wings.
Then he mentally keyed open the garage doors. As they opened, he got his first view outside in weeks, at the roiling sea of power and the clashing illusions.
Conophta hadn’t expected Jake to have any way to return home, but there might be a way.
Chapter 28
Jake called up his interface from the Mini Map, enhanced. He’d checked it before, while restrained and being pulled to this place, but sure enough, it was still working perfectly.
The weird chaos of this planet and its many illusions might be able to confuse even some of the most powerful warriors, and probably the highest technology, but it didn’t fool Jake’s map. As always, it had recorded wherever he’d been, creating an easily accessed map in his head.
So Jake had some transportation and navigation. The problem was going to be ignoring his senses.
Oh well, no time like the present, he thought. Standing and staring at the absolute insanity of this world was not going to accomplish anything.
Luckily, the little flying machine Jake had found was very simple to operate. It had a lever for altitude, and wouldn’t go low enough to scrap against the ground once it was turned on. The steering was simple, and the throttle was a basic dial. Jake was able to get familiar with the controls before even leaving the garage.
Traveling ended up being much easier than Jake had imagined. He just blocked out what his senses were telling him and focused on his map. It had even recorded his altitude at the time the reading had been taken. Following the path back that the restraints had dragged him on was almost stupidly easy. It was a pretty much a straight shot too.
The only weird part came about halfway back. He almost missed it because he was so busy not paying attention to what was happening around him in order to stay focused. This had, ironically, required that he not pay too much attention to the map too. He’d remained focused by being unfocused.
In his mental map, he noticed that his path to his new house had taken a dog leg. Instead of a straight line the entire way, it turned into a half circle in the area coming up.
Jake only briefly thought about it, deciding to continue to follow the path instead of cutting through with a short cut. He knew nothing about this planet and literally could not even see where he was going. It was a risk to deviate from the path and follow the flight path he’d taken in, but an even bigger risk to ignore the dog leg and go through.
Who knew what the minotaur might have been avoiding?
Luckily, there were no more incidents. The path continued straight as an arrow back to the area Jake had first entered this place. When he arrived, he felt a sense of nostalgia even though he hadn’t even been conscious for an entire day yet on this world.
Hopefully, I’m not too late, he thought. As if to mock his sense of urgency, it was not immediately obvious how to open a portal back to Earth.
Now that he was on the ground, the area directly around him was not nearly as confusing and unsettling as it was in the sky or from a distance.
Jake finally found magitech hardware disguised as rocks that would help form and maintain a hole between worlds.
Suddenly, the enormity of the situation, his growth in power, the fact that he’d survived, was returning to Earth, just all of it came crashing down all at once. To calm his mind, Jake slowly did stretches, then moved into some kata.
When he was ready to start thinking rationally again, he searched the area for more clues about how to activate the portal. There was a small, panicky thought in the back of his mind that there was a risk the portal might send him on a one way trip to one of Ahriman’s worlds. Jake stopped to think about that.
He looked around at the world he was on, apparently full of nothing but chaos and illusions. Even though Jake didn’t need regular food anymore, he still needed to kill monsters for sustenance. Staying here would mean a death sentence. Even if he found some food stores or monsters to kill at his new oversized house, his days would be numbered.
With that thought, Jake pulled a pen and paper out of storage to make a note for himself.
Figure out how to store food in storage.
That done, he got back to thinking again. The problem about where the portal would lead was not one he could solve with his limited information. Ultimately, he decided that he didn’t have a choice. All he could do was hope for the best and be ready for anything…if he could get the damn thing to work in the first place.
Then he got back to work.
Finally, using a combination of magic know-how and his memories of actually coming through the portal, he was able to piece together that this was a fixed-location transportation area. But most importantly, he realized that he was not powerful enough to use it yet. At least not fully in control.
If he could force the system to reactivate, it should open to the last place it connected to, though. At least he thought so.
Jake sat cross-legged and tried not to let his sense of urgency make him do anything dumb. Finally, after going through everything in his inventory and all of his abilities, he came across a rather simple, if out-the-box solution.
Phoenix Piercing Talon.
Every stable teleportation gate like this one, no matter what power was used to create it, functioned sort of like a door through subspace. Jake had never been powerful enough of a mage to use this sort of magic, but prior to learning cultivation in his past life, he’d been fascinated by the subject and studied a lot.
Each transportation “door” had a lock, and the necessary key was more complex based on the complexity of the door, the lock, and whoever opened the portal in the first place.
Jake had a hunch that this gate had actually been created in secret by the late Conophta. It had taken a lot of raw power to craft but was crude, inelegant.
After a few exploratory probes to test his theory, Jake was pretty sure he could actually open the portal again. Good, he thought.
There was only one more thing left to do. He settled down and left an imprint of the world on his supernatural senses, and also allowed his mind to point to his new home, bonded to him through his linking with its power crystal. That done, he pulled a stone out of his storage that he’d imprinted with his own unique energy. He placed that carefully near the portal area.
Maybe he’d be able to find this place again in the future. He hoped that when he was more powerful, the option might present itself.
Finally, there wasn’t anything else to do but activate the portal. Jake shoved a thin thread of Phoenix Piercing Talon into the “keyhole” of the working. He focused on keeping all of the technique’s destructive force focused on a tiny point in the far distance to avoid damaging anything. Then he slowly expanded the technique, filling all the nooks and crannies necessary to create a “key.”
It worked.
The air shimmered, and the next thing Jake knew, he was in between moments of time again.
This time, he instinctively understood that he could choose to ignore the moment between time, just blink it away. He wondered why he hadn’t ever reacted this way to being transported between realities, but realized it’d always been done by a god or Faceted, or other powerful being before. This was the first portal by a lower level mage he’d taken that he knew of.
In the time between moments that seemed to last forever, Jake meditated again. This time, he deepened his understanding of shadows but still could not quite get any further. Unlike when he’d been enlightened about Phoenix Piercing Talon and Veil Piercing Phoenix Eyes, he still didn’t even know the actual name or structures of any techniques. Of course, Jake was also painfully aware that he didn’t know the true name of the great Dao that formed the foundation of his Phoenix techniques.
Unlike the last time he’d reappeared in the physical world, this time, he knew it was about to happen. There was no delay; he immediately fell into a defensive stance, summoning Bloom to his hand.
There was no attack, but he startled a woman carrying a box so badly she fell on her ass with a squeak. Her mouth opened and closed a few times after Jake looked around, trying to get his bearings. He was definitely back in Locust Grove. Good. Then he checked his internal clock.
You’ve got to be shitting me, he thought. About four days had passed since he’d arrived back on Earth. In fact, dawn was coming soon, which would technically make it the four-day mark, as supernatural entities tended to measure things.
The odds of being back on the dot like this were astronomically low. Then Jake realized that four days was an odd amount of time for a goddess to give in the first place. Gods and other supernatural entities liked single days, three days, six days, seven days, and a fortnight. Any other time limit, in days, was very rare.
Now Jake suspected that Morrigan had had an idea that all of this, or something like it, might happen. It was an extremely uncomfortable thing to think about.
The woman who’d dropped the box on the ground, an attractive black women in her thirties, suddenly found her voice and shouted, “The Grim! It’s the Grim, he’s here!”
Another person, a teen girl, came running from behind one of the nearby stores. She goggled. “Are you okay, Justine?”
“Don’t mind me, get James! On your radio!”
“I left it with my tools.”
“Then go to your tools and call James on the radio! The Grim is here! Hurry up! Sprint!”
The girl took off like an arrow.
Jake furrowed his brow in confusion and tried to look a question at the woman on the ground, but he’d forgotten what he looked like. His slight frown must have looked horrifying. The woman paled and gasped. “Please, Mister Grim, we know what you told James and we saved them all! It’s…thank you for all that you have done. We would never betray you. I swear!”
