Chương 39: Chapter 17 — Elsewhere

Raine Talis stowed her spear as the final guardian of the Platinum Rank Trial fell, fading back into the ground. It had taken quite some time for her and Leese to chip through the incredible bulk of the hulking stone golem, all while avoiding the stone spikes and flechettes that erupted from the walls of the rocky chamber. The finale for Leese's trial had been easier, as they had simply been able to cut through the swarm of amphibians that had been created to challenge them.

Not that the Ascension Trial was nearly as difficult as it was meant to be, not with the advantages Cato had bestowed on them. At every rank they were far more powerful than they were meant to be, and with the combat algorithms he had gifted them every fight was made transparent. Even the most confused combination of flying stone and unstable terrain had been easily navigable, and the two of them had only taken a few glancing hits.

Without those advantages, it was obvious why people didn't tend to take the trial more than once. Being cut back to the vulnerable early ranks was an insane risk for most, especially for those who had spent decades or longer at Platinum in order to reach the Bismuth Trial. For her and Leese, the trial was actually easier than their normal delving. Leese had ranked up first, so now it was her turn.

Raine walked to the pedestal that had risen from the ground where the guardian had fallen as Leese fidgeted behind her, plucking the trial token from where it hovered just above the slab of stone. The disc of multicolored, crystalline material glittered in her hand, almost vibrating with essence, and the portal back to the trial ground opened in front of them.

She held onto the disc, following an impatient Leese through the portal to the dais where they had both used their Platinum Estate Tokens to start the trial almost a week ago. Raine slotted the disc into the dais, and the stone platform rumbled, rising from the ground to reveal a staircase leading down. Now knowing what to expect, she headed inside without hesitation, with Leese just behind her. There were no enemies, merely a vast and cavernous hall, at the end of which was a rippling pool of fiery liquid.

For Leese, it had been a frigid blue, some sort of liquid ice, a material wrought out of pure essence that matched their chosen Skills. This was the reason why only one person could ascend at a time; not only was the pool only enough for one person, but almost no party was served by multiples of the same affinity type. She could feel the heat radiating from it as she approached, but it wasn't scorching like lava or fire. It was something soothing, resonating with her own Skills.

"It's pretty intense," Leese warned, hovering at the edge of the pool and restlessly pacing the border.

"At least, it was for me. I can't imagine fire is much different than cold."

"Probably not," Raine agreed, taking a breath.

"Right, here I go." She strode down the broad steps into the pool, feeling the fire-aspected essence wash through her. They had learned there was no point in undressing, and the essence wasn't entirely physical anyway. It flowed straight through armor and clothing and even her body, the liquid trembling and beginning to swirl around her. Her essence senses were almost blinded as the fire poured into her, suffusing blood and bone and scale, every nerve feeling like it was aflame and yet, it wasn't quite pain.

It was something else, a profound shift throughout her entire body. Then time suddenly slowed, the vortex frozen about her, waiting as the System asked one simple question: what Skill embodied her transcendence? The two of them had Yaniss' wisdom to draw on, and they both knew that the choice was a profound one. It would affect how they viewed the world, what appealed to them, perhaps even their basic nature. So there was really only one option — a movement Skill.

Offensive Skills would drive them to ever more combat, and defensive ones only made sense if they had something to protect. People like Yaniss, who chose sensory Skills, became strange and esoteric, but movement Skills infected Bismuths with wanderlust. Which was exactly what they were doing anyway. Between Cato's gifts and Yaniss' knowledge, they had managed to upgrade their movement Skills to S-tier, the pinnacle versions that provided them with a wealth of different options and techniques.

At such a tier, not only was the Skill effectively multiple lesser Skills combined, it also was nearly as powerful as if it were a rank higher. [Khuroon's Fiery Stride set as Ascension Cornerstone] With one final blaze, she was remade. The essence bloomed around her, new life and energy flooding through her veins as she broke the bonds of mortality and became one of the System's true elite. She dropped to her feet in an empty pool, brimming with vitality as she took her first breath as an immortal.

At long last, she was Bismuth. Instead of stepping out of the now-empty pool, she invoked her Skill and turned into fire itself, blazing out and racing around Leese in joyous circles. She had never thought that she'd see this day, and even if they'd come to it by roundabout means it was a truly momentous occasion. Leese giggled and shifted into her ice form, blizzard following wildfire as they returned to the surface.

The protective dome that had cut them off from the world turned clear, letting them see the sky, and the dais itself glowed as it sank back into the ground. [Housing Token Upgraded: Personal Domain] Raine reformed herself, reaching out to snatch the upgraded token from the air and feeling the options when she held it. While she could still establish an estate on any world she wished, there was now the option to create a smaller domicile unmoored to location.

Something perfect for the pair of them, as they wouldn't have any fixed abode for a very long time indeed.

"We did it!" She turned to show off the token to her sister as Leese condensed out of the Skill-driven snow, receiving a grin and a flash of a matching token in response.

"I never thought we'd get here," Leese admitted.

"Let alone consider that we'd be able to keep going."

"It does make me wonder how well Cato's gifts will keep up now," Raine said, though she could tell that nothing about the ascension had dampened the superior feeling of modified biology. The capelet that was part of her body had lost none of its perception, and the combat algorithms still hummed away in the back of her mind, giving her almost prescient clarity of thought.

"We can find out," Leese said, turning in the direction of the planet's capital city, where the portals lay.

"We can finally go to the core worlds."" Cato? We're back, and we have our estates," Raine sent, knowing that even if the war had not gone well, it shouldn't affect his ability to talk to them so far from the front.

"We can pick up our lizards and go the core worlds."

"Everything went well?" He replied almost immediately, as if he'd been waiting for them the whole time. Which he probably had been; it was hard sometimes to remember that the Cato around any given world was actually a separate person from the versions of Cato on other worlds. He always felt like the same person, and knew the same things, but he wasn't a single consciousness stretched across the System.

"Perfectly," Leese confirmed.

"We'll need to do some sparring to get used to our power and figure out what to put in our new Skill slots, but there weren't any issues. How'd it go on your end?"

"So-so." Cato sounded glum.

"Not as well as I would have liked. Turns out that it wasn't as simple as taking one world. Best that you not go out that direction for a while."

"What did you do?" Raine asked curiously, hardly able to imagine the complications at the level above conquering entire planets.

"I had to cut off almost twenty worlds from the System," Cato said, and Raine blinked slowly, her tail curling of its own accord.

"What?" She demanded.

"How? Why?" She knew, intellectually, that such a move was a mere skirmish in the overall campaign, but actually hearing that Cato could casually sever a score of planets at one time, including fighting gods and high-rankers, was an entirely different thing.

"Turns out that just shutting down the planet wasn't enough, and the annexation still happened. The portal still opened, so I had to fight that, and then I needed to pull the defending forces away, so I just invaded the entire area," Cato said, as if the ability to invade a score of planets was only to be expected. A good reminder of who exactly their patron was.

"That's more dramatic than I expected," she admitted cautiously.

"Were you really ready for that?" Cato kept her and Leese up to date on at least the general shape of what was going on, but all the details and to some extent the true scope was beyond them. Their role was to be ahead of his great works, to open up new worlds for Cato to liberate.

"Sort of. Maybe I shouldn't have done it, but if I'm not going to save worlds the System is exploiting then why am I here?" Cato sounded exhausted, which Raine didn't think was actually possible. It wasn't like he was confined to a physical body.

"Do you still need us to go to the core worlds?" Leese asked. Raine had no idea what they'd do if Cato decided to change his mission, or theirs. They'd spent so much time bent on the task, and even their Bismuth choices reflected a future of spreading Cato's influence. The idea that he might be having doubts was more than a little terrifying.

"Oh, absolutely," Cato reassured them.

"If anything, it's more important than ever that I manage to spread out. There's no telling what the scope of the fallout of this will be. Just let me resupply you."

"With our new estates we can carry a lot more than before," Leese said.

"We have entire buildings, now." Raine hadn't yet actually established her mobile estate, but Leese had, and it was the same building and plot of land a normal estate would have been — but it was inside an opaque dome, the entrance to which they could conjure and dismiss at will. They would be able to store months or years of supplies and huge stocks of the special Cato-spears within easily enough.

In fact, she had to remind herself that supplies would stretch far longer, as neither she nor Leese needed food or drink simply to sustain themselves anymore. It was mostly for enjoyment, barring any major healing, which made Cato's provisions even more appealing. She knew most of what he provided had actually been created by other versions of themselves, experimenting outside the system, but it was far easier to just think of it as something Cato did.

"I'll drop down a care package in a few hours, then," Cato told them.

"Getting your pets back will take longer, though. They're still a few dozen worlds away."

"Let's get out to a clear space and we can sort out our estates," Leese suggested, and Raine nodded agreement. Leese had set hers up, but that wasn't the same as thoroughly exploring the options. Movement was essentially as simple as thinking about it; at Bismuth Rank her movement Skill was practically instantaneous, and in a flash the two of them were a thousand miles away, on an island in the middle of the ocean.

She invoked her Estate Token, choosing the personal domain option, and felt something akin to a new Skill settle into her. With a simple effort of will an arch of fire appeared, leading to a completely blank circle of earth inside a white dome. It was only once inside that the System presented options to her about what buildings to place, and where, as well as grass and trees and sky. The customization oddly reminded Raine of some of the things she'd seen in Cato's station.

His options had been far more limited, but changing the colors of walls and the displays of windows had been simplicity itself. It made her wonder how many similarities there really were between what Cato was, and what the System was. Not that she didn't believe what he told her, but at times it felt like there was more moving in the heavens than Cato would admit. For the moment she just selected a relatively simple, open villa, with more windows than walls, and a brilliant summer sky.

The surroundings were just grass, and pragmatically there was room for dozens, or even hundreds of the huge packages Cato would drop from the sky. It was nice enough, but something about it left her unsatisfied and she wasn't certain why.

"I think I'd just rather be off," Raine confessed to Leese, stepping back through the archway onto the island. The surroundings were merely Silver level and the monsters beyond irrelevant, their Bismuth level essence signature frightening everything away.

"Absolutely," Leese agreed, her tail flicking from side to side.

"I want to see what the core worlds are like!" They weren't kept waiting long. Soon enough, they were treated to the familiar sight of Cato's packages drifting in from the sky, an entire swarm of them angling down toward the island. Instead of waiting for them to arrive, she and Leese flashed out themselves and began plucking them from the air. With their spatial bags linked to their estates, they could stow the cargo directly as soon as they touched it.

"Leave one for a moment so I can talk to you," Cato sent.

"I need a relay since there's no FungusNet out here." Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

"You could probably put a relay or something inside one of our estates," Leese suggested.

"Maybe even a version of yourself? I know you couldn't use it all the time, but it'd be something."

"Hm. I can put a FungusNet node there, but while a full frame is tempting I'm afraid that putting System-jamming inside a System space would draw attention to you that you wouldn't want. A big neon sign to the gods or something."

"We definitely don't want that," Raine agreed, effortlessly hefting one of the packages. It had to weigh nearly ten tons, and within the cradle that held the parachutes it appeared to be an almost seamless oblong of metal.

"This is new."

"Now that you're Bismuth, you can just fly to the edge of System influence and hurl a much larger package out," Cato told them.

"So each of these is the version sixteen or whatever we're up to of the Cato delivery mechanism. Should work even in places where there aren't moons, so long as there's something out there, and will get me up and running much more quickly."

"That will be easier," Raine agreed aloud, though with their new movement Skills, finding a handy mountain wouldn't have been hard.

"I think we'll want to go straight for the core," Leese said, glancing at Raine for confirmation.

"At least to see it. Then we can circle around the inner worlds and maybe head back out to the frontier on the other side."

"Yeah, I really need to know what I'm dealing with when it comes to the higher rank places," Cato agreed.

"The more time I have to plan and prepare, the better."

"To the core, then," Raine said, already itching to go.

"To the core," Leese agreed.

The city absolutely reeked of fear. Eishe Suun, née Raine Sunac, completely understood why. Even if Sunac itself hadn't been included in Cato's campaign, it was close enough to hear from everyone who had fled from the invasion and the terrible orbital weapons that he had been forced to employ. There were even whispers of the invader killing a god, and while those were swiftly crushed by the various Priests and Paladins, Raine knew that not only was it true, their patron had killed two.

She had no idea what else had happened once the portals had closed, but the fact that so many worlds had vanished at once was enough of a shock. Most of those at lower ranks didn't know much beyond the confines of their birth world, but the portals were an ever-present reminder of the greater System. With Cato's actions, that reminder had become rather more immediate with the [Crusade] quest spreading to everyone within dozens of portal links or more. [A Crusade! The being known as Cato has invaded the System! Travel to the Frontier, where the following worlds may be in danger: …] The list of worlds included Sunac, as well more scattered around in the vicinity of Cato's invasion. Raine knew that Cato had actually allowed his forces to be beaten back on many worlds, to give the illusion of overextension and to draw people to the areas where they were "winning," rather than the nodes he was actually interested in taking.

She'd joined the simulation wargames for that decision, and knew that feigning that kind of weakness would help in the greater scheme of things, but down on the ground there was no sense of triumph. At least not among the lower ranks.

"I'm not sure it's a good idea to start any propaganda here," Leese sent to Cato, her transmitted voice echoing in Raine's head despite being on the far side of the city.

"People are too shocked, too scared — and the quest is bringing in more and more offworlders. Anyone that would be willing to listen are going to be cowed by all the high rank fighters."

"I definitely don't want to incite any civil wars," Cato mused.

"Maybe I should start further away. Or perhaps start anyway, just to sow the seeds. I need to let people know there's a peaceful option." They had run some simulations, but the problem was that there were too many unknowns for any real accuracy.

"If you're going to start, do it now," Raine said. She was of the opinion that Cato needed to be as aggressive as he could, because that would be more understandable to those raised within the System. A soft, subtle approach would only confuse the people he was trying to persuade, and give the higher ranks more time to work.

"Right. I suppose if there's one thing I can thank the System for, it's universal literacy." Raine snorted softly, though she'd been raised in a reality where even on a fringe, nothing world like Sydea, reading was as basic a function as eating, breathing, or fighting. Finding out it was a learned skill outside the System had been fairly bizarre, though the benefits of multiple languages made the tradeoff worthwhile.

"If you're going to start with propaganda, I think the food angle is probably the best, at least here." Leese said. The pair of them had found that, since everything was purchased from the System, there was actually little variety in food and drink, especially at the lower ranks. Even though most people could pay for their meals, there was a difference between that and having food as delicious as the culinary experimentation that she and Leese had managed.

Food abundance wouldn't do much for people above Silver, but Copper and Silver encompassed the bulk of people anyway, and they were the ones least empowered by the System anyway. The elites would require a different sort of persuasion, if they could be convinced at all, but there were also relatively few of them. For most worlds of the frontier there were merely thousands of Golds, scores of Platinums, and anything above was in the single digits where it existed at all.

"Easy enough, all I need—" Raine stopped listening to Cato as the feeling of a divine presence pressed down on the capital city. A moment later, a rent opened in the air and a trio of Azoths came through, which was terrifying enough, but worse was that two of them looked familiar. Not the specifics, but the general form was quite similar to Cato's human frame. In fact, they almost looked related.

"Cato? I think you should check out what just arrived."

"Oh," said Cato, as stricken as she'd ever heard him.

"Damn."

"Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the worlds," Cato muttered, which was inane and he knew it, but he'd not been having the best week. The annexation had been, frankly, a disaster, putting him into a no-win situation and forcing his hand. The lack of proper planning meant all those innocents on the handful of worlds he had rescued from the System would be going through a hell of a tougher time than he'd intended.

Despite seventeen worlds being removed, only two System-gods had tried to defend any of the worlds, and they had both gone down like chumps to the final iteration of the particle beam cannons — though the collateral damage was nearly unimaginable. He didn't think of his operation as being part of the No Fun Allowed war that had driven the System off Earth, but he certainly wasn't enjoying it. Especially not with his cousins showing up.

Morvan and Kiersten were the same as when he saw them last, familiar faces on those ridiculous retro-Chorian bodies; an over-popular, flash-in-the-pan celebrity novelty trend that had come and gone years before Cato had transitioned into being fully postbiological. With them was a neopredator frame that Cato wasn't familiar with, though it looked somewhat like some kind of megafauna wolf.

Not that there were any markings that could identify the person, since vacationing as a neo-predator was something that had been fairly common for years. Seeing them was, ultimately, not a surprise. It was only logical that the powers that be would seek out the Earth-origin people to confront an Earth-origin threat, and at some point those selfsame powers would make that connection. Or perhaps the various Earth types who had actually found the System to be preferable recognized what was going on.

Even if they'd left before the conclusion of the No Fun Allowed war, Cato wasn't exactly hiding his origin and it was certainly no secret the portal to Earth had been closed. He wished that he was experiencing the encounter with his fellow neo-humans as a memory transfer or reconciliation after the fact, but confronted with the event he had no other choice. He had to send down a frame to talk to them. It wasn't like his presence was a secret anyway, even if he'd allowed his forces to be defeated on Sunac.

The orbital factories were likely still visible to anyone of Azoth rank if they knew where to look, vast dark forms occasionally occluding the stars as they drifted out beyond geosynchronous orbit. The last time he'd been on Sunac's surface it had been inside a warframe, but if he wanted to make contact with his cousins he'd have to take a different tack. It definitely wasn't something that he wanted to delegate to any version of Raine or Leese.

Morvan and Kiersten had been bloodthirsty, half-crazed maniacs when he'd last seen them years ago, and as much as he hated to admit it there was nothing he wouldn't put past them now. Under the circumstances he simply selected a remotely-piloted human frame. The only ones on Sunac who would even recognize the human species were the ones he wanted to talk to, and they probably wouldn't pay attention to a random Copper trying to get their attention if he weren't obviously human.

The exponential growth of power within the System didn't encourage someone at Azoth to even notice the lower ranks. He aimed a drop pod for somewhat outside the city where the other neo-humans had shown up, though he had to keep close surveillance. If Bismuths had easy teleportation, then Azoths had something better and couldn't be relied upon to stay in one place. Half of him actually hoped that they'd move onward and he wouldn't have to deal with it, but he had no such luck.

"They're acting oddly, even for Azoths," Raine observed, watching from a safe distance as the trio casually walked up to random people to ask questions. It wasn't really a risk for her to keep an eye on Cato's fellow neo-humans so long as they were in the city, as a group of Azoths were the center of attention no matter what. At Silver, Raine's cover identity didn't even stand out from the rest of the people crowded into the capital city.

"They have a different attitude," Cato said.

"I'm not sure I completely understand it, but it's more like the System is an afterlife, or the best possible game, rather than something to be taken seriously. I'm not sure how much they even see the lower rankers as people."

"Some of that isn't much different from regular Azoths," Yaniss put in. She'd been rather more reticent since the annexation war, spending more time digging through the public databases, but curiosity had drawn her out from her aestivation once again. He actually had no idea what her biological instance was doing, but trusted that the Ikent version of himself would keep an eye on her.

"For them, everyone lower ranked is just ephemeral."

"Seems short-sighted," Cato said, though he knew his perspective was skewed as well. The concepts of mortality and aging, life and death, were entirely different for him and the culture where he grew up. Radical longevity of whatever sort wasn't something everyone could handle, but access was widespread enough that lifespan was effectively a personal choice. He returned his attention to the drop pod containing his remote frame as it came within a few miles of the city.

Despite riding the line of being subsonic, the trio all looked in the direction of the drop pod, and Morvan crooked a finger. There was a flash of light and suddenly the pod was floating in front of the Azoth trio, robbed of all its momentum without any sensation of inertia from within. Cato took a breath of the bottled atmosphere within the craft and opened the manual door to exit the pod.

"You," snarled Morvan, in System language.

"I'm afraid so," Cato admitted, in his original tongue, but none of the Earth types reacted to it. Up close, both his cousins looked just different enough from the last time he'd seen them to seem faintly wrong. Whatever changes had been wrought by the System were subtle but noticeable; a difference in the way they carried themselves, the expression behind their golden eyes.

"Why are you here?" Kiersten demanded, also in the System language, crossing her arms and scowling in a way more reminiscent of a teenage girl than someone who was at least theoretically an adult.

"Not content with ruining the fun on Ahrusk?"" Fun?" Cato had to catch himself to keep from being carried away by his incredulity. He almost, almost, couldn't believe the utter selfishness of their perspective.

"No, this has nothing to do with you." Which was at least half a lie, as if it weren't for the way the System had utterly corrupted them, he likely wouldn't have had the conviction to commit to his campaign.

"Then why are you here?" Kierstan waved her hand, a convulsive movement with enough energy to send a shockwave sweeping through the city center. Those who had remained to see what the Azoths were doing left in haste, movement Skills sending people blurring off in all directions.

"Because somebody has to be," Cato told them, spreading his hands.

"Someone has to stop the System. How many people did it kill on Earth? Do you know? Do you even care? And Earth is hardly its first or only victim."

"None of your business," Morvan said scornfully.

"Not like you're any better, invading, what, forty planets? Since when did you find the guts? You were always a backline caster before."

"This isn't a game," Cato said with some exasperation. It seemed like the pair had gotten even more disconnected from reality since he'd last seen them.

"These are real lives at stake, millions or billions of them."

"And they're not yours to control," rumbled the third member of the trio, the neo-predator that Cato didn't know. The analysis software running back in the orbital facility suggested that he had committed to the divine path, given the stylistic flourishes of the barding he wore. With the way they'd arrived, it was likely that a god was watching through his eyes at that very moment.

"Nor anyone's," Cato replied stiffly, frowning at the gigantic pseudo-wolf.

"I'm giving them more choice, releasing them from the slave-brand of the System. You know as well as I do what it destroys. It erases people and cultures and languages, it destroys choices and futures. The only possible response is to remove the threat, not just to Earth, but for God knows how many civilizations across the universe that the System might destroy."

"The refrain of the busybody," Morvan sneered.

"Stepping in where you're not wanted and taking on the burdens of people who neither want nor need you. You're not a savior, you're just someone who can't stand people having fun."

"Do they look like they're having fun?" Cato pointed at the cowering, fearful Coppers and Silvers, though in the end, it didn't actually matter what the human residents of the System thought. They were the outliers, the ones who had thrived in an apocalypse based on murdering everything that moved.

"Anyway, this isn't about you. This is about removing an existential threat to all of reality."

"Really?" Morvan scoffed.

"We know you. If you're trying to contest the System, you're going to be the one who's going to have to kill a lot of people, and you don't have the guts."

"Yes, really." Cato stared at Morvan, wondering when his cousin had become so abrasive. Morvan had always been the aggressive one, a tank or a berserker in the games they'd played, but he had been lighthearted about it. No longer.

"You don't think I would have come here if I wasn't willing to commit to it?"

"Probably?" Kierstan shrugged.

"You're just a copy, it's not like the real you isn't back on Earth still." Cato winced. His cousins had been profoundly angry to find out, after emerging from the Summer Civilization, that their original reality had been digital. They'd never been entirely comfortable with many aspects of postbiological existence and simply didn't understand others at all.

"Look, Keirstan, Morvan. This isn't a game, for you or for me," Cato said, hoping against hope that he could reason with them at least a little.

"I'm here because what happened to Earth shouldn't happen to anyone else — and the people in the System should have a choice of how they live their lives."

"You're not planning on giving them the choice, though, are you?" It was the neo-predator again.

"The gods showed me visions of you. Orbital bombardment, mass combat — you're taking away the System even though the people don't want it."

"I can't allow evil to stand because I'm not willing to endure the cost," Cato told them, voice rougher than he intended.

"And I'm willing to shoulder the responsibility that requires, all the work and care to keep people safe even after the System's gone. But who's responsible for what the System does?"

"You should just leave well enough alone!" Morvan sneered, ignoring the question as Yaniss made some quiet noise of understanding over the comms.

"But you won't, will you? You're going to sit there, and you're going to ruin things for everyone because you think you're better than the rest of us."

"I—" Cato began, but Morvan refused to be cut off.

"Well I tell you what, mister Cato, we might not be able to push you out of these systems if you're already in the orbitals, but we sure as hell can make sure you regret trying to take any others." Morvan sneered.

"Now get the hell out of here and leave us alone." He raised his hand and Cato's frame vanished in a flash of System-induced fury.