Quest Received

  Quest Received

  Quest Received

  Quest Received

  Quest Received

  Quest Received

  Quest Received

  Quest Received

  ***

  Across the multiverse, a hundred quests were handed out to ascenders with perfectly matching qualities. These quests came from multiple sources, unknown to most but the Greater System—which facilitated these operations—and the most powerful beings in the High Realms.

  Not all these quests were aimed at killing Keynes Kid. There was a balance to them that was always maintained, either by the Greater System’s requirements or simply because the beings in the Higher Realms kept each other in balance and check. Every intervention from the Higher Realms created a counter-intervention.

  How exactly the Greater System decided what qualified as a counter-intervention or who was allowed to execute it was a secret known only to the Greater System itself. This alone made predicting the consequence of these unexpected quests impossible.

  Despite its unprecedented scale of the quests, there was another event that seemingly went unnoticed but its repercussions had potential for a greater upset than anyone could imagine.

  A certain ancient Level 75 projected his avatar to a spaceship traversing the void between stars. He appeared on the bridge, before the captain of the spaceship and the ruler of the fleet that followed it.

  The captain froze. Its dark tentacles protruding from the side of his alien face and his shoulder blades ceased moving. Its black beady eyes stared in utter disbelief at the incomprehensible being clad in fabrics none of the captain’s race had used for millennia. Their True Skin was superior to any material they had encountered so far. Its disbelief deepened upon discovering that the being wasn’t of the captain’s race, the vrell, or any other race the vrell had conquered or annihilated.

  Was this an assassin contracted to kill him? If so, by who and by what means he had managed to enter his personal spaceship? The formations embedded in the ship’s hull were of the highest order capable of blocking teleportation skills and Talents alike. Frankly, because of that, the spaceship had very little means of defending itself while the intruders were inside.

  It wasn’t by an error but a design, the captain, Varak, was the strongest of the vrell, which itself stood above any other known ascender race.

  That was why Varak regarded the intruder without a shred of fear.

  “Which clan-ship sent you?”Varak asked, his tone icy. He didn’t appreciate when others trespassed on his territory. He had killed countless vrells to make a point already. A costly endeavour, given how expensive rising a new Vrell was. The vrell were few, but they were powerful… A thought crossed his mind. A terrifying as well as impossible thought. Could the intruder be above… Level 10?

  No. This isn’t possible. Level 10 is the cap of progression. Not a single vrell in history had broken it. To think that some other lowly race had such an ascender was blasphemous.

  Before the intruder answered the question, Varak’s spiritual sense checked them and found nothing as if they didn’t exist. Is this a projection or maybe a psychic creation? He wondered.

  “I come with an offer,” the intruder said, ignoring Varak’s question and dispelling the notion of being a mere visual projection.

  “Impertinence,” Varak hissed, while his tentacles twitched, a sign of annoyance. He would have said more but his body froze as if overtaken by an outside force. Even his mind ground to halt. Like an inanimate statue, he could only watch and listen.

  “I want you to gather all vrell’s fleets and jump to a certain galaxy where you will destroy every single planet in the very specific star system. Do it and you will be rewarded beyond your imagination. Fail me and I annihilate your race as you did countless others.”

  Varak regained control of his body. His tentacles converged behind his back, a sign of submission. He didn’t know how but he knew that every word uttered by the intruder had been true with capability to fulfil the promise and threat. Strangely, Varak didn’t feel fear, just an urge to fulfil the order.

  “I transferred coordinates to your spaceship’s computer. Make sure to wipe the human race from existence.”

  With that the intruder vanished without a trace. Varak remained rooted in place, not by a foreign force but thoughtfulness. Despite the absurdity of the encounter, his mind was calm and clear. A god had given him a task and he was going to fulfil it. His confidence inflated as he started making plans to bring the other fleets into his fold. The act of extinction he was tasked with by the god required an utmost devotion.

  Eventually, Varak moved. Step by step he reached the main computer and placed his hand. Tentacles from his right shoulder blade expanded like a vine, twisting around his arm until they, too, touched the surface of the main computer. The black glass reacted to touch. The uniform blackness was broken and green patterns appeared on it. Coordinates to the said star system in another galaxy were there.

  A wave of relief washed over him as he made calculations. They would reach it in another decade at the full burn with maximum jumps allowed by the structural integrity of the spaceships.

  His mouth split open revealing a set of sharp teeth. When it came to extermination of other races, the vrell had no equals.

  Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

  ***

  Keynes was back in the rift in a blink of an eye. Before he knew it, reality itself crashed on him; temperature, pressure, smell, sounds. All of his senses were ambushed by countless stimuli at the same time. The magnitude of the change was so distinct that he suspected that the void had had none of that and had operated on a different set of rules, despite the fact that he’d had functional eyes, ears and mouth. But my body was made out of light, he reminded himself.

  It was a bizarre experience but it got quickly forgotten when he noticed Kora and Persephone on their four, vomiting. He was next to Kora in an instant; dropping to one knee he placed his hand on her shoulder.

  “What happened? You okay?” he asked, while a thousand thoughts crossed his mind. He didn’t understand what could have brought a Level 8 and Level 6 to this state. There was nothing on the planet capable of such a feat, while the rift was only Level 1 and it had been cleared hours ago.

  When Kora only shook her head, Keynes considered asking Persephone but she looked equally bad so he decided against it. Instead he asked Alice.

  Alice, what the hell is going on?

  Spiritual Companion is currently not available.

  What the fuck?

  His knee-jerk reaction was panic. Utter, absolute panic. This was far from normal. Alice had been silent or distant in the past but he had never received a System message saying she wasn’t available. Did he mess up during his ascension? The number of rewards he had received was insane even without a point of reference. Could this somehow fuck something up? Or maybe it was the doing of the representative of the Greater System?

  Luckily, his mind immediately calmed down thanks to his newly evolved [Pure Body] skill. Its passive effect filtered out harmful emotions, leaving Keynes clear-headed but not indifferent like when the Emotional Affliction debuff had affected him.

  Regaining clarity of mind, Keynes followed his intuition and did the next logical thing; checked his two friends with his spiritual sense. If there was anything wrong with them, he would see it in their spiritual energy. His spiritual sense extended to Kora and like standing near a place struck by lightning, his vision went white. Even before his mind stopped rattling, he realised what had happened to him; the sheer amount of information blinded him. It looked like his sensitivity to spiritual energy had skyrocketed to new heights.

  He had stumbled but his body regained balance before he even registered the sensation of vertigo. And it was equally swiftly forgotten when impressions imprinted on his mind made themselves known to him; Kora had undergone some serious changes. Her spiritual matrix looked different, evolved, but Keynes didn’t understand what these changes meant or how they had happened. Wait a second, he could see her spiritual matrix. That was new for him. While a spiritual core could easily be observed if not properly obscured, the spiritual matrix was a different matter altogether. Keynes had seen his spiritual matrix but not of other ascenders. This got him thinking just how much his spiritual sense had improved. He filed this question for later as it wasn’t a priority. He still had his other friend to assess.

  Keynes turned to Persephone and checked her with his spiritual sense, but cranking down the sensitivity to not blind himself, and found a very similar story there. Whatever had happened to Kora also had happened to Persephone.

  Okay, I think I need to get to the bottom of this, he mused to himself as he considered a way to help them. Despite all the rifts they had delved, they hadn’t found a single [Heal] spell or an item with healing properties. He was aware that the girls had sorted through the items and spells but Keynes hadn’t been interested as the attribute mastery got harder the stronger he got so he had stayed away from anything that could make him more powerful.

  His disinterest with items and spells was his weakness but his worry was washed away by his friends’ blooming spiritual auras. Not only were they potent but also healthy. Healthier than ever.

  He sat down between them, his legs crossed.

  Surprisingly, Kora was the first who got her bearings and fell on her back while her chest heaved with deep, steady breaths. Keynes used [Purify] on her, removing every single stain that existed on her body and clothes.

  “You okay?” Keynes asked again when he heard Kora’s breathing slow down.

  “Fine…” Kora muttered, her eyes closed. “Mostly.”

  Keynes’s eyes flicked to Persephone who, mimicking Kora, fell on her back. He also used [Purify] on Persephone, to what she didn’t react. The two women lay in silence for a few moments while Keynes sat, wondering what had occurred here.

  “I feel better now,” Kora said, sitting up. She quickly closed her eyes, lay down and added.“Nope. Vertigo.”

  “Fuck sick,” Persephone murmured. “What have you done to us, Keynes Kid?”

  Keynes had an odd feeling about her comment but then he realised why and what it meant. Persephone wasn’t aware of what had happened to her. That made him crack a smile. Should I spoil the surprise? Nah. He wasn’t going to do that. It was safe to assume that Kora too, like Persephone, was clueless about their spiritual changes.

  “No idea what you’re talking about,” he replied with a smirk, which both women picked up, but didn’t seem to have energy to call him out on, yet.

  As for what happened, Keynes began forming a hypothesis. It revolved around the very idea why Kora and Persephone were here. They hoped to gain insight from his ascension. At this point, insight was one of the most elusive concepts of the System known to Keynes. They had found a lesser rift orb of insight early on and had used it but had gained next to nothing. Well, that wasn’t right. They learned that their idea of insight was flawed. Keynes expected that the lesser rift orb would act the same way like the orb of insight he had received upon his ascension to Level 3. That wasn’t the case.

  Putting aside the topic of insight, which in Keynes’s opinion wasn’t capable of altering a spiritual matrix, Keynes mulled over a different idea. Could a special event cause side effects to those who witnessed it from a close proximity? His hypothesis was rooted in a hunch, albeit a strong one. It didn’t explain the mechanism of the process but maybe they’d be able to recreate it at a smaller scale, like someone else reaching Fourth Degree.

  Something like this was a distant possibility as the attribute mastery required a very specific mindset, but Keynes was excited about the idea of observing a rise of new Perfect State ascenders, though he had the Lem AI’s warning at the back of his head about creating a potential threat for himself.

  The next stretch of silence was eventually broken by Persephone. She remained on her back.

  “So what are you waiting for? Spill the beans.”

  Keynes raised an eyebrow, glancing at Persephone askance. She could clearly see him where he sat with crossed legs between the two women. His internal debate was short and decisive.

  “Check for yourself.”

  “Check what?” It was Persephone’s turn to stare at him with a confused expression.

  “Inside.” Keynes pointed a finger at his chest.

  For a split second, both Persephone and Kora eyed him without comprehension, then it dawned on them. Their eyes gained a distant look of someone checking the System.

  I didn’t mean to check the System… eh.

  “Holy fuck!” Persephone shouted while Kora mouthed silent profanities. Both looked gobsmacked.

  Okay… maybe checking the System notification has merit.

  “So?” Keynes’s eyes flicked between his friends, his curiosity burning a hole in his stomach. “Don’t torture me like this…”

  “See for yourself,” Kora and Persephone said at the same time.

  The System messages appeared before Keynes. His hypothesis just got a hell lot more serious.