Unbalanced: A LitRPG Adventure (Class Shift Book 2), page 32
Tim weighed his options. He still wasn’t a match for Magnor in a physical fight, but that didn’t mean he had to give in. The Ogrian had to be bluffing. Sojourners were hard to kill. Even if that was some type of grenade, it would have to instantly kill Kayla, or he would be able to heal her. Even looking at her now, her initial wound was mostly healed, and she was struggling to her feet.
Tim counted the cool down and then summoned Celestial Chains to bind Magnor, who shook his head and said, “Too little, too late.” Magnor’s thumb flicked a switch on the sphere in his hand, and then he flung it at Kayla. It exploded just as it reached her, and the world seemed to move in slow motion. Tim watched as a sphere of absolute blackness opened up at Kayla’s chest.
It was only two feet across, but that was enough to completely envelop her torso. In an instant, she had been whole; now she was a head, two arms, and two legs lying on the ground. Tim could barely believe what he had seen. He was pretty sure he was screaming, but he couldn’t even discern what he was saying. Something inside of him broke, and he leapt for Magnor as a gray mist enveloped him.
Tim stumbled -- or he would have, but his body wasn’t here. He recognized this place. At first, he had thought it was something outside of himself, but now he knew better. His sense of things had grown. He was inside his own soul. That was why time didn’t seem to mean anything here. But that didn’t matter. Time did mean something to Tim. He wanted to end Magnor. He had failed to protect Kayla, but he wouldn’t fail to avenge her.
He didn’t even need to look at class options. Emotion surged through him, and he knew what he was. The trick with Ephemeral wasn’t that he was one thing and then became something else. No, just as with the trials of the Book of Names, he had already experienced them all, but the memories were locked inside his soul. In the same way, he was all classes at the same time. He simply had to choose one to be now, one which would give expression to his outrage.
Rage- that was it. He was a berserker now. It felt so natural. He didn’t even bother to look at the options. He accepted the course of the Rager as his primary and was auto-assigned the Brute as his secondary.
As such, his power expanded the greater his rage. That worked. He was ready to Hulk out now. With his current rage, he gained +6 to Hardiness and +4 to Flexibility, with -4 to Acuity and Sagacity. He didn’t care; that would stack well. He pushed past the class notifications and saw that he had 33 stat points to assign. He slammed them all into Hardiness. There was no way he was going to let this murderer win because he wasn’t strong enough.
Hardiness: 80 (+19 consumption, +6 rage)
Flexibility: 30 (+4 belt,+4 cloak, +4 consumption, +4 rage)
Acuity: 22 (+4 mask, +4 hat, +8 consumption, -4 rage)
Sagacity: 15 (+4 mask, +5 consumption, -4 rage)
CHAPTER 43
EVOLUTION
The gray mist parted before Tim’s mind as his body went through a spontaneous change. Pain rippled through him as he transformed faster than ever before. He swelled to be almost seven feet tall. His body ripped with muscles. His arm expanded but only was barely able to stretch with him, leaving small gaps between the custom-made plates.
Tim felt alive, and he was seeing red, literally. Magnor stumbled backwards with a grim expression on his face. He pulled his shield up. His class was the ultimate melee defender to match Tim’s ultimate melee damager dealer. The rage threated to take Tim, but while he used it for the power he gained, a part of him realized that he still had to fight wisely.
He stepped forward, thrusting the sword he pulled from his soul pouch. Magnor lifted his shield to take the blow but cast a shadow with it. As Tim’s foot hit that shadow, he stepped into it and then out behind the Ogrian. All his momentum continued, and the sword thrust with it. The blade hit the back of the traitor’s armor, which was strong, but less so than the front breastplate. A guardian never turns his back to the enemy, so they trade strength in the back of their armor for more upfront.
This time, it worked against him, as Tim’s tremendous power drove the blade into his back. He missed the heart but punctured a lung, as evidenced by the almost immediate expulsion of blood from Magnor’s mouth. The guardian tried to pull himself forward, but Tim lifted with the blade and twisted the blade inside him. No normal man could have ripped flesh and armor so casually by twisting his wrist. Tim had passed normal, though. As his rage grew, his Hardiness continued to increase.
Tim lifted his boot and kicked Magnor off his sword. The Ogrian fell forward, and Tim continued forward, driving his blade into the back of one knee and then the other. He wasn’t taking any chances. Magnor had to pay. He heard Alin shouting something but didn’t care. The sound of blood rushing through his veins was the only thing that he heard.
Magnor didn’t give up but tried to roll over. As he did, Tim kicked his axe away from him. Then he drove his blade into the shoulder joint. A weak, one-armed shield bash wasn’t enough to stop him, but Tim dropped his sword and grabbed the shield with two hands. He twisted it using his entire body to overwhelm the wounded man’s one arm. Then he flung the shield away. He watched as Magnor fumbled to reach the dagger on his belt with his off hand.
Tim stepped over and picked up Magnor’s axe. It was an exquisitely crafted weapon, which felt perfectly natural in his hands. Yes, this was the weapon of a berserker. He would need to switch his skills out. He took a practice swing and saw the fear in Magnor’s eyes. The man feebly tried to throw the dagger he was holding, but Tim knocked it out of the air.
He swung the axe downward then and took Magnor’s other arm at the elbow, eliciting another scream of pain. A moment of clarity filled Tim as he looked down. “You killed her. You didn’t have to. We were a team.”
“I was… following… orders,” Magnor said between coughing up gouts of blood.
“That is the beginning of some of the world’s most horrific acts.” As Tim spoke, he swung the axe down again and buried it in Magnor’s skull, splitting it wide open. Even that wasn’t enough to kill him, but Tim didn’t want him dead. Sojourners are magical creatures, as he had learned, and Tim wanted to consume him.
He activated the Crucible and felt the power flow into him. The customary notification came, but this time, Tim got another option.
You may choose:
20% of victim’s XP
As a fellow 1st gen, you may take victim’s trait.
He ignored every other option. XP was important, but how many times would he get an opportunity to take a trait? Without second-guessing himself, Tim finished absorbing his blood and took the Stone Body trait. The rush of the kill threatened to overwhelm him as he felt his Hardiness double. A quick glance at his stats showed that the trait didn’t double the Hardiness he gained from Consumption, but that would have been cheating. The feeling was still one of overwhelming bliss.
He might have been lost in that euphoria but for a feral growl. He looked up and saw the unrestrained fiend had just finished off the bound fiend. It, too, must have been caught up in the excitement of consumption, but now it looked to Tim and thought it saw its next meal.
A part of him wanted to rail against it. How dare it think it was his equal? His old form might have been weaker, but watching Kayla’s corpse be magically ripped apart had driven all the weakness out of him. The Ogrians, or at least their patron, had named themselves his enemy. They might not be at the top of his list, but he knew who was, and this fiend was standing in his way. More than that, it had valuable XP that he needed to reach level 25.
Tim picked up the battle axe again and charged at the creature. It might still have more HP than him, but now he was over a thousand HP. His body was bristling with power. He couldn’t be stopped. The fighting was fierce, and Tim didn’t hesitate to let the rage take him. He instantly grew in power, and he let his hatred make him strong. One, two, three blows removed three limbs. He didn’t care that it cut deep furrows into his skin with its claws. He knew he was coming out on top. Then, when the fiend could neither fight nor escape, Tim fell onto it.
His huge hands grabbed its head and slammed it again and again into the ground until black ichor was flying everywhere. Crushing his foe before him was therapeutic. Then he began to suck its life essence from it. It briefly struggled but was no match as he pulled harder, and in an instant, he felt the power surge in him. Another 26,408 XP, which easily pushed him into level 23. He raised his head to the sky and shouted a cry of victory, then laughed as he got the notification about the 16 stat points he had to distribute.
Tim didn’t do anything with them for the moment as he saw Alin trying to help heal the remaining sojourners. The myemar backed up when he roared at them, but that would only last so long, and his fellow guild members were on their last legs. He needed to remember that he was human, just like they were. Even if Kayla was gone, he still needed to save these others.
Tim walked up to the portal. The voice was speaking even more clearly to him. “It isn’t too late. I’m not angry with you. You have proven yourself to be worthy. Now seize control of your destiny.”
Tim ignored the whisper within his mind. He reached out with both hands and squeezed on the portal. This time, it wasn’t with the might of his muscles but with his trait. Ephemeral changed so many things. With it, he was able to close this portal. He felt a presence pushing against him, but it wasn’t enough. He would not be denied.
Tim raised his head up to the sky and screamed out his fury and pain. The portal began to shiver, and then he felt it pulling. Apparently, the guild wasn’t completely helpless without him. It was connected to all the myemar. Why it was done like that was beyond him, but maybe the answer would become clear when he reached the Abyss. There was no doubt that he had to go there, but he wanted to go on his own terms, not by walking through that portal. Maybe it was sheer defiance on his part, but he wouldn’t give the one who was ultimately responsible for Kayla’s death the satisfaction.
He let flashes of black light rush past him and saw the entire army of myemar being slowly sucked into the portal. As they came past him, he swept his axe through the oncoming streams of light. It disrupted those streams, and he felt like they were being destroyed, but he couldn’t say for sure. Even if it was only in his mind, he enjoyed feeling like they were being destroyed.
After a few minutes, the portal collapsed, and he fell to his knees. This time, there was no hellshard. Maybe that was why it had to be bound to the myemar. He didn’t know. He didn’t care. He felt empty despite having won.
Tim looked over and saw the brunette hair that covered the back of Kayla’s head. He dreaded walking over to gather her remains, but figured it couldn’t be helped. He stalled for a minute longer by assessing the axe he had gotten from Magnor. It clearly was magical because it had grown in his hands until it fit his size as a two-handed battle axe.
Rugen’s Defender Axe
Wt: 6.5
Offense: 8-20 Requirement: Hardiness 30, 1st Gen, Level 18
Passive Effect: 100% faster when being used to block a blow
Passive Effect: +4 damage, +6 cold damage
Active Effect: Shearing the Sheep- costs: 20 mana, allows the next blow to deal double damage so long as the target is lower level than the wielder.
Impressive. Tim hated that it bore the name of what he now believed to be a traitorous patron, but it was definitely the most powerful weapon he had yet owned. Tim looked up and sighed. There was nothing for it but to grab Kayla’s remains. She deserved that much. It wasn’t like he could change what had happened to her.
Then a light bulb of hope went off in him. No, it couldn’t be. He didn’t want to get his hopes up. But, perhaps, just maybe he would be able to change her fate. That was what his power did, it changed the world around him. He raced over and gathered all of her. Then he began concentrating as hard as he could. Nothing happened. There just wasn’t anything to grasp on to. He couldn’t feel even a bit of residual energy inside of her. Whatever had destroyed her had sucked all that energy out of her; maybe it had even sucked out her soul.
Hmm… no, Tim couldn’t take another disappointment now. He carefully wrapped her remains, and then he shoved them into his soul pouch. Maybe the future would reveal a way. For now though, he mumbled to himself, “Control is an illusion.”
As he spoke, he felt a presence watching him. But there wasn’t any of the normal mockery in that presence. It maintained a quiet vigil with him as he wept in the bloody dirt.
CHAPTER 44
SAYING GOODBYE
Powers and a new life in a world full of magic were great. In many ways, it was all that Tim could have ever dreamed about on Earth. There, his life had not felt like it had any meaning, but now, it was exactly the opposite. He had purpose galore. The question was which purpose would he follow.
Cal-Dakota wanted something from him, but every time that Tim thought he figured out the mysterious patron, he realized he didn’t know as much as he thought he did. Semona clearly wanted him to be her champion of humanity. Thinking of her, Tim looked at the notifications he had gotten from her.
You have completed the requisite quests, and now Semona, Patron of Wisdom, wishes to offer to become your patron. You have learned a bit about the history of the patrons. You have broken the immediate threat presented by the myemar and now know who the real enemy is. It is too risky to leave matters to chance. Before you decide, though, here are your rewards from completing the two quests she gave you:
Enemies of Humanity V- Reward: 4,061 XP.
Bracers of Potency
Wt: 1.0 (each)
Left Side: +8 Sagacity
Right Side: +8 Flexibility
Set Bonus: +100 Mana, +100 HP
Can There Be More Than One?
Reward:
New Trait: Might of the Righteous. When on a mission to avenge the death of allies or prevent the death of innocents, all damage dealt is increased by 25%, and all damage taken is reduced by 25%.
He got a new trait, which, given his current purpose, was most welcome. He saw how it was laid out as bait. Semona wanted him to petition her to become his patron. He expected she wanted him to be her herald. Neither Azmarin nor Semona explained what that meant, exactly, but he didn’t trust either of them. If push came to shove, he would trust Semona before Azmarin; but then again, Azmarin was more upfront with him, even if he was essentially trying to get Tim addicted to his destructive power.
Of course, the idea of trusting Azmarin had flown out the window once Tim laid Kayla’s death at his feet. He didn’t know what Azmarin had wanted for sure, but anything that required the death of innocents couldn’t be good.
Speaking of trust, as impossible as it seemed, Tim was finding himself trusting Cal-Dakota more than any of them. The patron was smug and arrogant, as well as downright frustrating, but for all intents and purposes, he was letting Tim forge his own path.
None of that mattered now. He had failed to see an enemy. Tim wasn’t sure how he could have, but he just felt like he should have. Sure, maybe Magnor had gone all Order 66 on them, but Tim felt better if he blamed himself. Kayla was dead because of his failure. That was the personal price he had paid. Truthfully, he also blamed Alin. He couldn’t even bear to look at the Asmarian.
At least he had managed to prevent a deeper price for all the world. Maybe because of what he did, there would be fewer widows and orphans. Maybe it balanced out some of his mistake. Of course, “prevent” might be the wrong word. He had kicked the can down the road. Nothing had been truly solved, not yet.
The threat was still out there. Whether it was Bal’drock or Azmarin, he didn’t know. But Tim did know two things. First, he knew to his very core that the end of this lay in the Abyss. It was the only S-ranked dungeon in the world, and there wasn’t a team anywhere who could keep up with him going there. Yet, he knew he needed to go there and put an end to this.
Tim found it hard to get motivated to throw away his life for a world he barely knew. That was sure to be the fate of anyone who walked into the Abyss alone. His skin wasn’t golden, and his eyes weren’t hourglass, so he had no chance there alone. Nor could he bring anyone with him. The one adventurer whom he might have trusted enough to bring was just beyond his reach. Truthfully, though, she hadn’t been powerful enough. None of them were.
It was the second thing that he knew that forced his hand, though. He might not care enough about this world, but he did care about a few friends. He had a few friends: Simon, Reggie, and the other Silver Eagles. Even some of those adventurers at the border, such as Marcus. Those people deserved another day. The truth was that if he didn’t go, fiends would keep appearing. Even if he kept defeating them, they would eventually kill the people around him that he cared about. He couldn’t risk that for Atticus and Cecelia. So, off he went to find a way to do the impossible. There might be a target painted on his back, but if he was deep in the Untamed Lands, at least no one else would be hurt.
This time, at least Tim took the time to prepare properly. He went to meetings with the generals, guild officers, and even Caesar. He was offered essentially anything he wanted if he could stop this threat. Caesar’s daughter, riches, palaces, and slaves were all dangled in front of him. Tim didn’t bother to tell them that he didn’t want those things - well, maybe the riches. All things being equal, having money is always better than not having money. But people who offered those other things made him sick.
That was fine, though. Tim knew he wasn’t doing it for any of them. After a few days of planning, the first fiend attack occurred. It struck at night while he was alone. The battle was short but brutal. Then a couple more days passed before the next attack. By the end of two weeks of planning, they were starting to come every day, and some guards got hurt in the last one. They were only trying to do their job, so Tim felt sad for them.
