Enter System, page 21
part #1 of Natural Laws Apocalypse Series
Jayden rolled his eyes.
“A Karen?”
Marc nodded.
“Don't worry about it,” Conner said. “I'm a police officer, or at least I was, don't know if there are any of us left now. But you've got my authorization to take it if the intent is to supply the people you're bringing back to your Safe Zone.”
“His Safe Zone,” Jayden said, jabbing at thumb towards Marc, “But yeah, that's why.”
“Then you're all good. Now you said you were going to use both your groups to guard us heading back there?” Conner asked.
Marc nodded.
“Yeah, let's go,” he said, increasing his volume to be heard over the Karen who was now screaming about corrupt cops.
* * *
Conner stopped dead at the exit to the school.
“What the hell happened out here?” he asked.
“The System did,” Marc replied. “It's making everything that isn't adjusted to it decay at a hyper fast rate.”
“That explains my pistol then,” Conner said, glancing down at his holster. “I'm not sure I'd even trust it now. I was going to clean it once I got it back from the kobolds, but it's nasty.”
“Yeah, that'd be it. Someone tried to shoot me recently and a just a little pressure outside the barrel managed to make the whole thing blow up in his hand.”
“Little pressure,” Jeff snorted. “I've seen those shields take a full strength blow with a sword and not give.”
“Shields?” Conner asked.
“Long story. I'll run you through it after we give you the introduction to how things work in the new world. It'll make more sense then and it leaves me more alert for threats now. But... How are you with a rifle? Scoped AR-15, in this case. I can let you use that on the way back and increase our firepower a bit,” Marc said.
“I'm a decent shot, no marksman or anything, but good enough that I have, or at least had, my own rifle at home. I'm wondering what shape that's in though with how my pistol looks.”
“Then here, use this if we get attacked. Just don't shoot any of our people, okay?”
Marc pulled his AR-15 out of his inventory, made sure the magazine in it was full, then handed over a spare magazine as well.
“Hey, this looks like Professor Cavanaugh's rifle,” Conner said.
“That's because it is. I'm his son. He was out of town when the shit hit the fan and his rifle is better than mine so I chose to Systemize that one instead of my own.”
“Systemize?”
“Like I said, after the introduction.”
“Well, at least that explains his armor,” Conner said, gesturing towards Rob, “and your shield. They're both Roman, aren't they? A bit of a buff like your dad?”
“Not by choice,” Marc said. “But when you've got two hours to pick out armor? That's the only armor we had hanging around the house.”
“Oh, that, well, I picked my vest, but I've got no idea where it is now,” Conner said.
“It was on one of the kobolds. The big one. It went all the way down to his ankles,” Jeff said from nearby.
“Any chance of going back to get it before we get too far away?” Conner asked.
“No need,” Jeff said.
A body armor vest, looking somehow more solid than what Marc was used to seeing from those, flew over and hit Conner's arm.
“Jeff, did you steal body armor off a kobold and not tell us?” Marc asked.
“Hey, I figured we might find the owner. Besides, that one was a pain to kill, I actually had to aim for the back of his neck instead of his torso. I was afraid the strike might get misdirected by the vest otherwise.”
“Well, we did find the owner. Thanks for returning it. But really, I need to keep an eye out now. We haven't seen much but kobolds in the streets, but we have also run into a few other monsters and who knows where they'll show up,” Marc said.
Then there was mostly silence, except for the sound of walking feet, the occasional complaint, and an ongoing diatribe from Karen that Marc was finally managing to tune out.
Marc didn't see it coming. He'd refreshed all his spells though, worried about escorting this many unarmed and unarmored people through the streets. That was all that saved him when an arrow came shooting out a second story window. It struck his Arcane Armor and just dropped to the road beside him.
As Marc glanced down at the arrow to see that it wasn't anything modern, Conner stepped between him and the window that had held the archer that fired at him. The police officer dropped to a kneeling position and aimed the AR-15 towards the window, peering through the scope. A moment later another arrow came flying out and Conner squeezed the trigger, twice.
Moments passed and then Conner spoke up in a confused voice.
“Um, what's this mean? I have a message in my vision saying that I've qualified for a class. It gives me several options: Warrior, Protector, or Guardian.”
“You might want to just minimize that notification for now until you get the background lesson I've been talking about. You can minimize it like a computer window, just by thinking that you want it minimized, or saying that out loud,” Marc said. “It's giving you class choices based on actions you've taken. Since it was a fight and you used a weapon, they're warrior based choices. I think there's something to do with intent in the choices also. Warrior is a generic fighter type, Rob took that. I don't know what the Guardian or Protector classes are though. You can think of reading the help on those and it will probably be available to you. Same thing there, you can also just say it out loud if you can't call it up by thinking about it.”
The group had stopped when the attack went off, but now they started moving again. The people they'd just rescued hadn't been in any sort of rush before, but they were making better time now. The Karen kept complaining as she repeatedly fell to the back of the group, obviously not wanting to put any effort in towards keeping up with everyone else.
Jeff came trotting up a minute later and handed Conner a bow and quiver.
“You can have those if you like. You hit the thing, but it wasn't dead yet, so I took care of that and looted it.”
Conner looked over the bow and arrows.
“Got a use for these?” he asked Marc.
“Definitely in the future, if not immediately. Are you sure?”
“Yeah, I'm sure. I wouldn't know what to do with them,” Conner said, handing the items over to Marc who dropped them into his inventory.
“Damn, inventory is almost full up,” Marc said. “I need to check the help on that.”
While he had all the basic help files tucked away in his head from his Research skill, he'd discovered that aside from bulk downloading them to the master pad, if he wanted to actually know what they said, he had to call them up in his memory.
“Huh, there are items that we can use to increase inventory slots,” Marc said. “I should've known, really, that's common to most of the games. The basic ones are just like Systemized pouches, satchels, and backpacks. But they've also got extra-dimensional holding items. Those are lots more expensive from what the help says, but probably worth it if we can find some. Otherwise we just need to either Systemize some packs, or get them from the shop and that'll increase the number of inventory slots on the person wearing them.”
“So, what was it that shot at me?” Marc asked Jeff in a low voice.
“Some sort of mini-elf. But the outdoorsy type, not the pale ones. All tanned and with tribal style tattoos or something like that. I didn't see signs of any others, so hopefully it was a one-off,” Jeff replied.
Marc nodded and turned his attention back to their surroundings as they walked.
* * *
When they got back to the Safe Zone he took care of assigning each of the new people as a resident first. Discovering that he could access the Safe Zone screens up to about twenty-five feet outside the wall, he just had them go by one at a time and assigned them as a resident as he got their names. Even the Karen.
Whose name is actually Karen? What kind of sick, twisted parent would name their child Karen nowadays. Admittedly, she probably had the name before it became derogatory, she's old enough, but still, did she have to live up to it? Marc thought.
Once they were all listed as residents, Marc asked Rob to track down Al so he could give them the rundown on how things were going now.
“Here, I need to give this back to you before I don't want to. Your dad knows his guns,” Conner said, returning the AR-15 to Marc.
“Yeah, I just hope I can get the rest Systemized before they fall apart.”
“Marc, did you bring them here?” Jeff asked.
Marc shook his head.
“Why would I?”
“Didn't you notice? The forced decay is absent in a Safe Zone. It won't return them to normal unless you Systemize them, but you can keep them from falling totally apart and restore them later,” Jeff said.
“Crap, why didn't you say anything about that?”
“Didn't have a chance yet. I just finally noticed last night,” Jeff replied. “Do I detect a quick run to your house coming up?”
“Assuming it's still standing, yeah. If I could've saved those and didn't my dad will kill me when he gets back,” Marc said.
If he gets back, a little voice in the back of Marc's mind said.
He ignored the voice. If anyone of the older generation would be able to adapt to things the way they were currently, it would be his dad, and his mom too for that matter. At least that's what he kept trying to tell himself.
“Yeah, let's take that big old flatbed style hand truck from the basement. We can just put the gun safe and all the ammo cases on it. Rob, would you help? If we aren't strong enough to pull it, you will be.”
“I can help,” Rob said. “Just give me a couple of minutes to grab something to eat. I don't know why, but I'm starving all the time now.”
Marc took one look at Rob and realized how much the other man had bulked out in the last few days.
“I'm guessing it's because you're a growing boy?” Marc said with a smile.
“What?”
“Rob, look in a mirror while you're in there. You're doing a slow motion version of the Hulk's change, just not going green with it,” Jeff said, obviously having noticed the same thing that Marc had.
“Oh,” Rob said. “Yeah, that'd do it. I remember having to eat a lot more during football season too, so it makes sense.”
Since they were going to be here for a few minutes, Marc went to the shop pedestal and checked on his auctions. They'd closed now and he stared at the bids he'd gotten.
Twelve gold for one and ten for the other? That's like two and a half to three times their actual weight in gold. I guess there is a collectibles market for gold coins from Earth, he thought.
He immediately purchased the recycling machine he'd been eyeing, then withdrew the rest of the gold he'd gotten from the auctions as coins. Tracking down the rest of the group he gave them each four of the gold coins, explaining that they'd picked up extra loot before and he'd sold it off and was splitting the proceeds, after purchasing the machine he needed to expand the Safe Zone.
Finding a small group of volunteers, Marc handed over the manual for the recycler and asked if they'd start with close sources of metal, wood, and stone since he had another errand to run. Since they were volunteers, looking for something to do, they agreed. The second group of adventurers were going to keep an eye on them while they worked the machine too and that made Marc feel a little safer with asking them to do it.
Finally, his group took off, the hand truck with them. It didn't take long to get back to his house, although the deteriorating asphalt slowed the hand truck down. Loading up the rest of the guns and ammo was quick, even with them moving cautiously due to the house's deteriorated state. Before they left he grabbed a few other things he thought his parents would want when they got back.
When they get back, not if. When, he thought.
The run back to the Safe Zone was uneventful and as they entered Marc got to see his recycler in action. The volunteers pushed it up to the side wall of a house that was in worse shape than his own had been and then turned it on. As it ate its way through the house, stacks of mostly wood, along with a few ingots of metal, were deposited out the rear onto a platform the machine provided for it. There was no stone, or very little, until the recycler got to the foundation and then piles of stone blocks appeared amidst the wood and metal.
Well, looks like that's idiot proof. Hopefully we don't manage to develop a better idiot that can break it, because it was pricey, he thought.
* * *
Chapter Sixteen
Once they were ensconced back in the Safe Zone, Marc sat down in his apartment.
Alright, I've still got those two stat points and a skill point, no wait, two skill points to use, he thought. Let's see where I want them. Stats.
Marcus Aurelius Cavanaugh
Class: Arcane Bulwark/(hidden class English Major)
Level: 5
Experience: 1372/4000
Health: 280
Mana: 275 (+10)
Stamina: 290 (+12)
Endurance: 15 (+7)
Body: 7.0 (Strength:6, Constitution: 9, Agility: 6)
Mind: 9.6 (Intelligence: 13, Willpower: 7, Aptitude: 9)
Social: 5.3 (Charisma: 6, Personality: 5, Allure: 5)
Skills:
Short Spear (melee weapon)(3)
Shield Bash (2)
Research (1)
Analyze (creature) (1)
Mana Manipulation (4)
Meditation (2)
Creative Writing (1)
Spells:
Mana Dart (4)
Arcane Armor (2)
Phantom Shield (1)
Crenelate (1)
He pondered his stats for a moment.
Okay, I'm not going to worry about Allure. I don't think getting handsome is going to help with much here. Not Personality either, although apparently that could use some help too, but I still haven't looked at the help on Creative Writing yet. The Lair core drove that completely out of my mind. Help Creative Writing.
Creative Writing:
This skill is used in conjunction with written orders. When the skill-holder writes out orders longhand the recipients of the written orders will have an increased chance of interpreting the orders correctly as well as an increased chance to successfully perform them as written. The chance increase begins at 5% per point in the skill. The percentage added per point begins to drop by one percentage point after five points in the skill, finally ceasing at a skill rating of twenty where the bonus will be 70%.
The Creative Writing skill also makes additional skills available to learn: Scribe, Calligraphy.
Marc stopped cold for a moment, considering how that could affect the Safe Zone.
Hey, I could post written standing orders. Or write out orders for people that volunteer for duties. That's not as useless as I'd thought it would be when it first popped up. I wonder what Scribe and Calligraphy do?Help Scribe.
Scribe:
This skill allows the user a chance to pen spell scrolls. The user need not know the spell to pen it, they may copy a spell from a scroll, but if it is a spell the user knows they receive bonuses to the attempt. Base chance of success is 50%, adjusted by spell difficulty. More powerful spells will decrease the chance of success. Various skills may increase the chance of successfully Scribing a spell scroll. Increasing the user's skill in Scribe will increase the chance of success as well.
Marc's eyes widened. It was something he'd thought might be a problem, having to rely on scroll drops and teaching spells in person, but this was a way around that.
I wonder if you can teach skills the same way you can spells? he thought. Because having people penning spell scrolls, even if they can't cast the spell themselves, would be an incredible power boost. Get all our Mages a good variety of spells and maybe even sell a bunch in the shop? I'll be taking that one.
He quickly used one of his skill points to learn the Scribe skill, blinking as the knowledge settled into his brain. It wasn't quite painful, but very close. The discomfort faded quickly, although it once again made him conscious of the buzz in the back of his mind that had been there since he'd received his hidden class.
I'd managed to dismiss that from my mind before, so hopefully I can again. Strange that selecting a skill to learn makes me notice again, but not automatically receiving one when I level. I wonder if leveling stuff is already shoved into the mind when the class is taken and then just unlocked at the appropriate level. That would explain why adding English Major was so painful if that's the case.
Once his head had cleared, he pulled up the help on the other skill Creative Writing had offered.
Help Calligraphy, he thought.
Calligraphy:
This skill allows for writing in a more decorative fashion. The skilled Calligrapher will be able to add a hint of emotion, emphasis, and additional knowledge by use of the skill, thereby increasing the effectiveness of written skills. Those with the skill Scribe will require the skill Calligraphy in order to pen higher power spell scrolls since the additional emotion, emphasis, and knowledge imparted by Calligraphy is necessary to communicate the correct way to cast these more powerful spells.
Marc shook his head.
I'm going to want that one eventually too, he thought, but I've only got one more skill point at the moment and I think I probably ought to use it on a skill for my main class. We still don't have that additional DPS person so I need to strengthen my own fighting capability.
Leaving the choice of his other skill point on hold for the moment, he looked at his actual stats instead of skills.
Probably Agility. That's going to increase my chance to hit and it's one of my lower stats, if you don't count the social stuff. I need to increase my Charisma too, if we're going to keep expanding, but to expand we'll probably need to fight more.
