Congratulations! You have SUCCESSFULLY Raised Gnoll Triple Masted Galleon as a Construct Revenant at the cost of 3/5ths of one Soul Point! Construct includes 74 24-Pounder cannons, 450 revenant seamen integral to the functioning of said ship, 780 barrels of gunpowder & 5000 24-pound shells & canisters. All ammunition shall regenerate in full after every battle or after a full 24 hours have passed!
You have successfully raised 4 Galleon Constructs and 1 Maritime Underlord for a total cost of: 5 Soul Points.
Congratulations! You have achieved Rank 75 as a Master Necromancer.
All Galleon Constructs have been given into the care of Maritime Underlord: Shipy.
Bunbun gave her master floating in the air a high five when the last of the formerly fleeing ships and its desperate crew sunk into the briny waters… before reemerging less than a minute later, splintered masts and ruined decks replaced by pristine perfection and an eldritch sheen; panicked sailors and pleading gunners replaced by far more powerful versions of themselves who understood the virtues of silence and just how warm and welcoming it felt to be connected to their old bodies once more. Most importantly, they were now truly one with the ships they loved like never before.
“Awesome, Fearless Leader! We now have our own little maritime fleet and you’ve broken past the Level 74 Bottleneck without having to slaughter and raise a cool million goobers!”
Eric grinned. “And it only cost me 5 Soul points. Ha ha. No, seriously, it’s okay, Bunz. It had to be done, and I can feel that it really did help my growing mastery of the Necromantic arts. Most especially, where my own province begins, just a hairsbreadth past where dwarven constructs or Artificer skills and classes end. And that’s a grayer area than most people will ever acknowledge or admit to.”
Bunbun sighed. “Fair enough, Fearless Leader. What’s important is that we enhanced our own abilities and defanged our foes.”
Eric’s eyes twinkled, gentle smile turning to a look of sheer hunger as he gazed off at the shoreline. “Don’t worry about the appetizer, good buddy. We’re about to make it all up with the main course.”
Bunbun’s purring form, now melted puddy in her master’s gentle hands, turned to an excited squeel. “Ooh! It’s the conquest part of our hero’s journey! Fuck knows we journeyed long enough, and we’ve already played the hero of New York, which means there’s only one thing left to do!”
Eric chuckled happily, eyes twinkling. “Yup! We’re going to take bite out of crime and chew up all those delicious gnolls until only sweet prime real estate is left.”
“And with three million friends that we could summon in the blink of an eye…”
“Friends that we’re not going to use…”
Bunbun gave an animated nod, before freezing, giving Eric a strange look. “Yup! Friends that we’re…. What?”
Eric snorted, look of good-natured bloodlust replaced by one of fond bemusement.
“You can sense it, can’t you?”
His familiar’s scowl turned to a wince. “Oh. You mean a certain crimson wound in the night sky right over Manhattan that looks like a fucked up eyes slit?”
Eric dipped his head. “Yup. I can feel it like a heavy pressure in the air, can’t you?”
His familiar furrowed her adorable brows before blinking in surprised disbelief. “Wait… wait! That’s… that’s why we’ve been fucking around with ships we totally don’t need instead of tearing through those orcs… gnolls? Whoever we’re gonna be tearing through like nobody’s business! Besides hitting that sweet, sweet Level 75 as a Master Necromancer, I mean.”
Eric nodded. “Exactly. I’ve been doing my best to get a sense of just how thick the air feels and if my own arts are adding to that sense of pressure.”
Bunbun stiffened. “Shit. I just thought… Spiky!”
Eric reassuringly stroked his familiar’s ears. “No worries there, Bunz. You’ll note my near mile-sized stegosaurus has been making like a mountain and between you and me, I think he’s perfectly happy just to feel the sun’s warm caress against his scaly skin and take in the delightful sense of the living world. Believe me, he’s quite happy just to chill and do his thing, without making any ethereal waves whatsoever.”
Bunbun furrowed his brow. “Wait. That means…”
Eric sighed. “Exactly. The pressure’s real. These five double deckers are as far as I’m pushing things, and I think our maritime vessels… air vessels now, being a half step between Construct and Revenant thankfully cushioned us quite a bit.”
Bunbun dipped her head. “So no raising fresh troops in Connecticut. Got it!”
Eric nodded. “Which isn’t the worst thing in the world.” He kissed his fist. “It just means that we do things the other way.”
The air rang with shouts, roars, and oddly festive cheers.
“Ooh, it looks like were here, Eric. Stamford, just like when we took that road trip, two years back! Only it’s looking… hmm… surprisingly festive for the post apocalypse?”
Eric flashed a hard smile as he peered down at a heavily fortified UCONN campus and more specifically at Mill River Park, strung up with colorful pavilions, minstrels and jugglers, outdoor grills and food stands, even an area set up for crafting folk. And at the heart of it all was a primitive looking keep from which Eric could feel the faint pressure of a rift.
“Well shit, Bun. It looks like they made it a Renaissance Fair!”
Bun nodded. “Kinda like Freetown. An earlier incarnation, I mean. Only… they’re obviously limiting access to their rift. Maybe it’s actually better than dirt poor and filled with death traps? That… and it’s a bit more slave collary.”
Eric frowned, noting that at least half the folk down there were wearing either bronze or iron collars. Surprisingly, they didn’t look beaten to within an inch of their lives. Though their attire was a bit more threadbare than some… that could be said of all of them not wearing crude assortments of poorly tanned rawhide armor or actual sheet iron mounted onto PVC and the like.
“Yeah, it reminds me a bit of Junk Town. Limited resources, a few crafters just starting out… but obviously something is supplying their food. And I do sense a few communal farms further into the city ruins.”
Bun nodded. “Strange, though. You know what I’m not noticing very much of?”
“What’s that?”
“Neither gnolls nor orcs. Just some very weekly pinging human crafters and a handful of delvers that I seriously doubt are over level 30.”
Eric blinked. “Wait, is that actually the baseline of the world?”
“The regions that aren’t serving as the linchpin of offworld politics, overpowered settlers, or enhanced by the mad territory revelations of yourself?”
Eric nodded, earning a shrug from his familiar.
“Honestly, I have no idea. It is sort of a mystery to be solved though, isn’t it?”
Eric smirked. “You’re right. And I don’t hear any alarm from the five flying galleons pointing several hundred cannons down at them.”
Bunbun snorted. “Yeah, you never struck me as the casually bombard the civilians type of guy, Eric.”
“True. So, let’s go down and have a look for ourselves, shall we?”
With that, Eric leaped off the prow of his ship, disguising himself as best he could with the help of a certain gold ring, earning a snort from his familiar.
“Seriously, Eric? You’re doing that with your skill set?”
“What? You think all I’m good for is killing things?”
Eric sighed, brushed back his mop of mud brown hair, straightened his threadbare suit, and slipped free of the rustling trees he had leaped down amongst to stroll casually into the lively central market of what he sensed was the hub of both UCONN and Stamford.
He winked at his familiar. “Time I gave my Diplomacy another workout, isn’t it?”
Bunbun rolled his eyes as Eric adjusted the fedora on his head so his beaming confidence was no longer hidden as he approached the bored looking guard with his head in a book, sitting on the wooden bench that seemed to be the entrance to what Eric supposed was the town proper.
Besides his book that left him completely oblivious to Eric’s presence, the youth was equipped with little more than a poorly tanned rawhide vest and the half-decent looking spear at his feet.
Eric scowled, not exactly impressed by what a quick glance revealed.
Levi Knapp – Level 9 Conscript. St 18 / Vit 16 / Fin 14 / Quick 20 / Per 15
Congratulations! Identify is now Rank 3! (And your target didn’t even notice. Someone should really practice more!)
Eric forced an easygoing smile onto his features. “Excuse me, you would be Levi, right? I don’t suppose you can point me to the office of whoever’s running the show here?”
A bored-looking Levi glanced up from the book he was casually reading to get a good look at Eric’s countenance before lurching back and toppling right over the bench with a look of surprise and horror upon his features.
“Good god, man! What the fuck happened to your face?”
Eric felt his warped cheeks redden.
Bunbun howled with laughter. “Tell him what he looks like. Go on, tell him!”
Levi blinked at the bunny, his look of horrified confusion turning to a smirk as he gathered up his spear and dusted off his leggings. “Did Karen put you up to this? Is this one of her illusions? Okay. You look like your stuck your face in the giblet fryer before trying to fix it with the Skydragon character editor.”
Eric froze with dismay.
Bunbun positively cackled. “I told you, Fearless Leader. But no. You think just because you can slaughter thousands and take down Silver-Tier assholes without breaking a sweat that you’re also an artist? Ha! I wouldn’t trust you to boil an egg or draw a stick figure!”
“Okay, no need to take it that far,” Eric huffed, before forcing a chuckle. “Yup! Got me! Karen... such a practical joker, right?”
Eric then darted away as fast as 2900 Quickness would allow, which basically meant that he disappeared, Levi’s snort still ringing in his ears.
“Karen and her fucking illusion magic. Yeah, you got me, Karen! I put the book down, see? The rabbit was a nice touch!”
Eric cleared his throat, approaching the fair from the Broad Street entrance to Mill River Park, this time going for a natural look, momentarily forgetting what that entailed when the air range with an unexpected message.
Contender Eric Silver has entered Stamford Territory!
Warning! Eric Silver is AT WAR with ALL local Gnoll factions!
Bunbun sighed when the casually strolling adventurers were suddenly glaring about in panic, holding their spears or Danish axes like their lives depended upon it, with no other weapon types in evidence.
Eric winced. “Shit.”
His familiar gave him a look. “Really, Eric? You could have entered as literally anyone, so long as you accepted your absolutely absurd 40 Appearance which helped you score how many times in the last 24 hours?”
Eric cleared his throat. “Alright, let’s try this again?”
At that moment a wild-eyed man who must have been near seven feet tall burst through the panicked crowd, glaring Eric’s way and jabbing a finger in his direction. “You!” He declared. “I challenge you do a duel, outsider! Let’s see how you—”
The man who couldn’t have been older than twenty blinked in surprise when his axe was in Eric’s hands, the blade just a millimeter from his neck.
The crowd grew still at the sight, air slick with tension.
“He just took out Vince so fast, I didn’t even see it!”
“Fuck, Vince is a Twentieth level Berserker!”
“He’s an idiot. Rich drilled damned protocol in all our heads. We form up and defend as a group!”
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Vince took a shuddering breath, beads of sweat forming on his brow. “Yeah… I just meant to first blood? And yeah, you definitely beat my ass,” he said with an anxious chuckle.
Eric just looked at the man. “Seriously?” He threw a disparaging glance at the now fully gathered group of maybe ten classers, knowing better than to waist a good minute scanning everyone’s level, but not a one was even as high level as the Berserker at his feet. All of them were in basic gear, and they all looked dismayed at just how easily one of their own had been taken down.
He then pulled a startled Vincent back to his feet, carefully, and handed him back his axe.
“So, yeah, that just happened. Now if it’s all the same to you, I’m happy to let you all live your lives in peace without embracing a fucking slaughter…” The girls among them blanched and stepped back behind the men, the latter staring at Eric with worried post-grad eyes filled with pained resolve as they shifted instinctively, placing themselves before their obvious partners.
Eric forced a grimace, ignoring the anxious byplay. “If you wouldn’t mind pointing me in the direction of whoever’s in charge?”
“That would be me.”
Eric turned, raising a single eyebrow at the wryly smiling woman radiating a faint aura of arcane artistry, for all that she looked like a very handsome forty, though quite fit, and still wearing a well-tailored suit without a single thread out of place.
The woman dipped her head with a self-effacing smile. “The names Professor Kip, Lord Silver. How can we help New York’s emissary today?”
Eric furrowed his brow, blinking in surprise. “The gnolls put you in charge of Stamford?”
The woman flashed a tired smile. “Considering that I’ve managed to double their food harvest and profit in just a few short seasons... yes. They’ve permitted me to manage this region however I see fit. Which, as you can see, is far more… festive than the shockingly brutal methods in common use before.”
Eric winced. “Fair enough.” He cleared his throat. “I don’t suppose you’d have any interest in a smooth transition of power? I’d be happy to offer you all access to the richest economy in the entire northeast, including multiple Wealthy Tier dungeons blessed with Adventurer’s Paradise and Promise of Adventure, with access to a Tier II ascension pod and what will soon be a legendary Arcane Academy. We have high-end living accommodations, and with a single oath that effectively amounts to an oath of nonaggression with my family everyone else starting fresh in New York, you all can—”
“I accept!” The woman immediately cried out, the now two dozen adventurers all immediately nodding their heads before they all groaned, more than a few passing out.
“Yes, finally! A way out of this hell hole!” Cheered one pale-faced youth before carefully holding the girl groaning against him. “Jules? You okay, babe?”
“Fuck, Mitch. That Asshole administrator claimed a whole fucking level!”
Mitch winced. “Yeah, hon. I know. But damn, does it feel good to finally be able to get out of here!”
Eric soon found himself facing dozens, then hundreds of hopeful bright-eyed citizens.
“Is it true that New York is now filled with food and single elven girls looking for adventuring boyfriends?”
Eric smirked at the wide-eyed kid asking such an otaku question.
“You damn well better believe it!” He winked. “And they find nothing hotter than upright, courteous young men who work hard toward acquiring Elite classes and leveling up as carefully as they can.”
“Seriously?” Asked a girl named Sue.
Eric chuckled. “Actually… with New Arcadia having seven million Sylvan dreamers... any number of them are youths looking for adventure and soon to be headed to Ashland in the hopes of finding out if they have a future beyond the family farm... and maybe find an attractive young partner to fall in love with and take back home when they get tired of the perils of Delving… yeah. Probably. Men and women both. So, if you’re looking for a Sylvan partner in life, you just might find them in Ashland and Arcadia, if nowhere else.”
If anything, the mood of the crowd grew even more excited. “Fucking fantastic! Okay, can we all agree that Stamford is this cat’s? Fucking awesome let’s—shit, he’s glowing.”
“Of course he is,” One teenage girl huffed. “He’s a Contender, and we just gave him our territory. Because fuck the gnolls. Now back up, in case he starts crackling with lightning or shouts…”
“There can only be one!” Snarked Bunbun, crimson lightning crackling from between her ears as a shuddering Eric savored the sweetest and most pain free Conquest of his life.
Congratulations! You have successfully claimed Stamford Territory! Strength and Vitality have both increased by fifteen points! Soul Reserves have increased by five points! All boons further enhanced by all applicable modifiers!
How do you wish to shape this realm?
Eric closed his eyes, sensing the wondrous potential burgeoning within the territory, and gently beckoned it forth.
You have embraced your gifts to the fullest and have blessed these lands with Gentle Fortunes, Nature’s Bounty, Arcane Currents and Heaven & Earth Spiritual Energy!
Congratulations! You have forged another agricultural mecca!
Bonus boons in effect!
Indestructible rail lines and train stations now connect all the major populations centers of Stamford to New York State’s transit system!
One lucky adventurer has JUST been infused with the Conductor class!
Your latest Flying Scotsman awaits her passengers!
The air filled with awed curses and whoops of wonder and laughter.
“Smell the air. It’s absolutely saturated with magic and wonder!” Hooted one wide-eyed youth.
The girl named Susan was gazing at Eric with genuine awe. “Faerie. You’re a faerie prince and you just transported us to a faerie realm!” She declared, pointing at the massive groves of apple and walnut trees rustling their leaves from either side of the lush bed of wildflowers they were now presently standing upon.
The professor and former administrator for Stamford smiled with wonder and relief, tears in her eyes. “It’s beautiful. I can feel it, how healthy and free the land is. A fitting farewell as it leaves my senses forever.”
Several of the youths gave her sympathetic smiles, and it warmed Eric to see that, whatever bullshit the gnolls had put them through, this professor truly had treated her former students like a denmother, truly doing the best she could for them and the citizens of this territory that she could.
He gave her a gentle look. “The slave collars?”
She flushed, looking acutely embarrassed. “I… we have no good way to remove them. And so long as we made absolutely no mention of it, the gnolls didn’t care what we did with them so long as food production met their quotas. So, we simply treated them like the unfortunate survivors they were.”
Eric took a deep breath, a weight easing from his shoulders as a shrill whistle from behind him brought a smile to his lips. “First class transportation to The Big Apple, Ashland, Freetown, and New Arcadia heading out shortly. So gather your families if you have them, pack a lunch or some of the fruit and nuts hanging from all the trees around us, ha ha, and get ready to embrace the first day of what will hopefully be happy and healthy and very long lives.”
He was surprised by the wordless hugs several young men and women gave him, the gratitude in their eyes bringing an unexpected lump to his throat.
“Thank you. Thank you so much!” Cried a teary-eyed girl named Beth. “This… this is everything we could have hoped for.”
The boy by her side nodded. “Just being able to breathe easy, no longer being trapped between the gnolls and that madman Song ruling New York… yeah. It feels good! It’s just…”
Eric blinked, realizing he was being an idiot. But with a simple squeeze of his will... “Sweet! Okay, I just made sure that you’ll find full color brochures highlighting everything that Freetown, Ashland, and New Arcadia have to offer anyone who wants to really kick ass as adventurers… or embrace a happy quiet farming slice-of-life adventure for awhile. Or you can go high tech in Freetown. Choice is yours… and have a safe trip!”
Eric found himself grinning like an idiot as the train filled up with passengers, the Train Engineer none other than Levi Knapp, the original Conscript guard, who looked a hell of a lot happier with his present class.
“I know it’s stupid after I went to college to be an electric engineer, but what I really wanted to do when I was a little kid was ride across all the states, watching the forests and fields fly by as a locomotive driver.”
Eric grinned his heartfelt approval. “An awesome dream. And now you can do it while leveling up an Epic class!”
Levi’s eyes widened wonder. “What are the odds that would ever happen?”
“Pretty high, when your on team Eric!” Bunbun happily quipped as the train pulled away from the station, now full of happy passengers and countless families ready for a fresh start, even as countless othes stayed behind, eager to make a fresh start homesteading in Stamford, Eric’s interface happily informing him of the hundreds of newly awoken professional farmers and herders awakening from the dream of their lives, thanks to Eric’s increasingly potent boons so dramatically transforming the land all around them.
Bunbun gave a pleased smile. “You did good, Fearless leader.”
“And I didn’t even have to kill anyone!” He said the latter with a certain amount of wonder. “I mean, sure, I had to disarm a single idiot, but even he happily boarded the train!”
Bunbun nodded, before giving him a knowing look. “You know the rest of the territories probably won’t go this smoothly, right? And if we’re going to hit Boston in time to race over to get lectured or caught up in more Blue Corp bullshit by first light…”
Eric sighed. “Yeah, I know. No time to stop and smell the roses. But fuck if I won’t grab some apples!”
Shortly thereafter, Eric was taking to the skies once more, and much to Bunbun’s surprise, Bridgeport was another absolutely bloodless win, the excitement on so many faces as they headed off to see all that New York had to offer them on their shiny new train more than worth the near worthless Conscript levels that many were actually better off replacing with something better in Ashland.
New Haven, regrettably, didn’t come quite so easily to them.
“Die, motherfucker!” Roared the wild-eyed Berserker lashing out with a pair of hooked steel blades, his entire body radiating a class-specific protective ward making it clear that the man’s all assault combat style wasn’t quite as suicidal as it might otherwise be. The roar of the bloodthirsty crowed in the underground arena made it clear that there was only one outcome they expected in this fight, the sands already dyed crimson from all the blood shed that night alone.
The crowd roared.
Steel tore through the air.
And a single crack left stunned silence and looks of stupefaction upon the gobsmacked and bloodspattered faces of thousands of onlookers as their now headless and completely frozen champion crashed to the sands, shattering in a thousand icy pieces that didn’t strike the cheering idiots at all.
Doom Strike has Critically struck your foe for CATASTROPHIC Damage! Your foe has frozen into ice that has NOT sprayed the crowd with supersonic icy shrapnel sure to butcher them all, for Ice knows its master!
Eric cracked his neck, gazing coldly at the crowd full of bloodthirsty and broken men and women, soulless eyes filled with bitterness and despair taking what comfort they could from any death not their own.
“Anyone else?” Eric calmly asked. “Or is your asshole coward of an Administrator ready to surrender New Haven?” He flashed a cold smile “Or should I just kill you all and raise another seven thousand for my undead legions?”
The last casual threat broke through the crowd’s dismayed murmurs as the air rang with a contemptuous, lugubrious voice, a bloated countenance that reminded him so much of Nari’s own, sneering down at him through the reinforced and heavily warded glass walls sheltering clearly exclusive boxed seating overlooking the roaring masses below.
Eric frowned at the sneering man, noting the half dozen purple-eyed mercenaries surrounding the smirking Administrator, pretty sure that not one of them was an earth-born Terran.
“Eric Silver, daring to threaten a duly appointed Terran Administrator? Ha! As if I would have anything but contempt for the wayward Contender in violation of over a dozen Counsel Edicts, to be taken into immediate custody or shot on sight on every major continent!”
The man flashed a cold smile, before the air warped and twisted with the emergence of a quivering document of blackened skin and screaming souls that Eric just knew would flash right out of the warded box seats, the minute the man let go.
The man’s eyes glinted evilly. “I here by present summons for your immediate—”
“Gotcha, motherfucker.” Eric chuckled coldly as the man’s words warped and slowed to a crawl.
The nearest guard smirked at the foolishly grinning boy below. “Does that idiot not realize that his time’s already up?”
The woman beside him chuckled coldly, giving a quick glance over her Mark II Deathblaze.
“Idiot should have stayed in New York. All he’ll find here is—”
She blinked in surprise, for some reason unable to register the hand that had just blasted through her chest as the room behind her exploded in shouts and screams and ice so bitterly cold that she felt herself freeze to bitter despair before the agony of the massive hole in her chest could even register.
“No! Impossible! Contracts are sacred! You cannot—”
Phoenix Strike!
A final flash of impossible heat seared the overwhelmed mercenary’s thoughts, all her fiercely held hopes and dreams reduced to a silent scream as fiery heat was replaced by endless darkness and then nothing at all.
Congratulations! You have successfully claimed New Haven Province! You have drunk deep from the bounty of your conquest and enriched your body with +15 Strength and Vitality and +5 Soul Reserves, modified by all applicable boons!
You have granted New Haven the boons of Gentle Fortunes, Nature’s Bounty, Arcane Currents and Heaven & Earth Spiritual Energy! Another farming mecca has been forged!
Note! You have earned no Cultivation levels. You have earned no Skill Ranks.
Your foes are utterly helpless before your WRATH!
You have successfully claimed New London!
You have successfully claimed Newport!
You have successfully claimed Providence!
Congratulations! You have claimed 6 Territories in less than 3 hours time!
Strength and Vitality have now exceeded 3100 points!
Your power level is now equivalent to a standard Rank 31 Silver!
Path of Endless Bounty is now Rank 21!
Eric came to himself over the mangled remains of more than a dozen offworld elites who had actually thought that they stood a chance against the calmly smiling would-be diplomat determined to claimed Providence for himself.
How wrong they had been.
Regrettably, the Contender radiating such ripe potential had used an odd power of her own to Shadow Walk through rustling woods half a world away when she saw just how savagely the so-called diplomat was tearing through her mercenary contingent.
He blinked, only then recalling the absolute horror in the girl’s eyes. Recalling as well his wild demonic grin reflected in her gaze as he gleefully used Burst of Strength to literally tear apart one panicked mercenary after another.
Fifteen hardened Bronze classers.
All of them pleading for mercy in the end.
He had showed them none.
Yet not even the most savage, brutal, or clever melee kills had earned him a single cultivation level, even if his 3rd Tier core saturation had improved by the smallest of margins.
And if Eric were honest with himself, he was just a tiny bit horrified by what he had done to his opponents, invading offworlders or no, and was relieved to let the human girl go.
Somehow, he knew she would never willingly cross paths with him or his again. It was practically a promise in the ether.
Nonetheless, the wonder of seeing a once-ruined city blossom with fresh fecund life as beautiful orchards and bountiful fields sprung into existence all around him as if they had always been did much to sooth his savaged conscience as he took a deep breath of air gloriously ripe with the sweet tingle of magic and spiritual energy and wonder.
Yet none of that could quite allay the unexpected spike of dread twisting in his gut from a message he most definitely didn’t want to see.
“Um… Eric? I think we sort of have a problem.”
Eric groaned. “I know.”
WARNING! Your Spiritual Energy is now 56!
BE CAREFUL, Body Cultivator! The wise warrior balances resilience with bountiful reserves!
