Chapter 55 – Earthborn Tournament

“You have consumed a kill and gained 1 Strength.”

“You have consumed a kill and gained 1 Strength.”

“You have consumed a kill and gained 1 Strength.”

Only three of the five kills gave him the bonus, but nevertheless he enjoyed eating parts of his kills and would have done it anyways. The fresh livers, hearts and limbs were especially good. It took them a little bit longer to get to where they were going, but Ashe was looting the corpses and Rivia was performing her ritual ‘Absorbant Soul Sacrifice’ on the last two idiots left alive.

The two men left had been hog-tied with their own rope and were severely beaten so they wouldn’t struggle, and deep oozing gashes along their foreheads were testament to the blunt trauma that had been dealt to them to keep them docile.

The demoness had already stripped naked like she’d done before the couple of other times she’d performed this unholy ritual, a sight appreciated by the few onlookers from the outskirts who’d not been part of the attack on Trey’s party. She took the pouch filled with light-blue chalk and created the circle around the two victims while Trey, Atharost and Napoleon sat feeding on a corpse nearby to watch.

Then came the more intricate markings, the last of which was a throne of flames - Alkir’s signature marking and the one designating the soul sacrifice to go to her. With a beaming, glorious smile shot Trey’s way, as if to say thanks for letting her perform another sacrifice in her evil goddess’ name, the priestess knelt and began muttering.

Lifting her arms out to either side and exposing her breasts to the sun, she began speaking just as she had those times before. The chalk began to blaze, turning from blue to crimson flames of hellfire.

“Alkir, Mistress of Darkness... hear the prayer of this one undeserving servant… a kindred spirit, one of the faithful damned...”

The flames hissed faded words that only Rivia could understand, and she smiled at the dark presence blossoming from just overhead while holding in her right hand the Acolyte’s Infernal Dagger of Sacrifice.

“Take this soul as an offer of tribute from my master and I. May you feed on it to satiate your everlasting hunger, may it dwell in your realm of darkness evermore. Please bless us for the offering we give thee, and send us your favor. We are your humble disciples, great one, and we ask you to guide us in our daily lives so that we may become closer to your grace. Glory to your will, and may these wretches further strengthen you in their passing!”

The dark presence expanded, encompassing a wide area all around them for a few moments to fade the sun’s rays and chill their bones as the dagger plunged down into the first man’s chest. Green mana flowed out of the blade and into the victim, and he shuddered violently as she repeatedly stabbed him while laughing gleefully.

Trey couldn’t help but chuckle himself, and then caught himself in the act. He thought this was funny? That was strange… but it was definitely true. For whatever reason, he found this all hilarious.

That wasn’t normal.

Sithis agreed. ‘No… it isn’t normal. You weren’t overly bothered by killing before, but unless you’ve been put under my own influence you’ve never found it hilarious. Strange… don’t you think? Perhaps it is Talsh’Noc’Un’s influence this time… you should ask him about this later.’

The dagger plunged down hard into the next bound man’s chest, sending blood splattering across her body. The victim convulsed and shrieked through the gag in his mouth while writhing as the demoness twisted the blade twice before yanking it out violently and sinking it into his throat. He gargled, convulsed again, and then slowly went limp.

Rivia’s maniacal laughs filled Trey’s ears and she looked like the happiest person alive as tears of pleasure streamed down her face and onto her chest to mix with the blood of her victims. She was one with her goddess in that moment, she felt Alkir’s touch, and to her… that’s all she could ever ask for.

Two tiny lights appeared overhead as their souls were gathered by the ritual for transport. The dark miasma tainting the otherwise sunny day expanded and contracted repeatedly around the site of sacrifice just like the last time, just before the tiny lights let out horror-filled shrieks and vanished. The miasma disappeared too, and then all was back to normal.

“Your minion Rivia’s skill Absorbant Soul Sacrifice has increased by 1 level. Your minion Rivia has gained 1 overall level. Your minion’s ritual has been completed. You have gained 4 strength and 1 vitality stat points from this sacrifice. You and your minion Rivia have gained further favor with the goddess Alkir, Mistress of Darkness.”

Trey did a slow clap that was followed up by Atharost’s own clapping. Napoleon however just stood there eating a finger and watching Ashe as she continued to loot bodies like nothing interesting was going on nearby.

“You grew a level just off that? I’m surprised.” Trey flung the arm he’d been chewing on off to the side and relinquished his demonic facial features to resume the handsome, scarred, semi-human ones he usually wore. Brushing his brown hair up off of his horns and wiping the blood from his face he trot over to where Rivia still sat crying tears of joy after feeling Alkir’s touch yet again.

“You good?”

Rivia nodded happily and sniffled. “Yes, I am… good, as you would say. This is why I was able to grow a level so fast.”

She stood up, and held out the dagger she wielded while displaying the status information of the item for him to see again.

Acolyte’s Infernal Dagger of Sacrifice

Item Tier: (9) Grand

Damage: 82

On Hit Effect: +20% additional dark mana damage on strike

Bonuses: +34 Dexterity

Requirements: 48 Faith, Dark Attribute

Durability: 589/589

Special: Experienced gained by sacrificing to the higher powers is tripled.

Trey scratched his head and pushed the weapon back into her hands. “Oh yeah, tripling that XP really makes a big difference. It’s like you just killed 6 people instead of 2. Nice!”

He patted her on the head like a good pet and bade her to get her clothes on, then yelled over at the girl who was quickly becoming a very good friend of his. “Ashe! Find anything useful?”

“Not much other than a couple dozen gold, silver and copper.”

“How much?”

“About 800 copper’s worth. They were pretty poor and their equipment is shit.”

So about 800 dollars then. Not too shabby, but a lot less than he’d expect considering there were more than twenty of those sons of bitches.

“Almost done?”

“Yeah almost, I’ll be good after this next check.”

“Hurry it up! I told Brae we wouldn’t be late.”

Trey cleaned himself up while waiting for Ashe to finish, cleansing his skin and sighing at the mess he’d made with his clothes again. This is why he usually bought black garments, but it was still disgusting to be drenched in blood.

Their journey to the docks didn’t have any further incidents. It took a little while longer having to go around on the outskirts of the settlement though. By the time they finally made it to where the galley was parked, they were definitely late.

“YOU’RE LATE!” Brae yelled out from the ship’s railings.

Trey just shook his head and trudged along the beach towards their destination. The cog had somehow been detached in the past couple days and they’d added onto their crew for more manpower, considering their recent successes for more gold to hire with and the larger ship needing more people. The mast in the center was still broken off, but the other two masts in back and front were still sail-worthy as were the rowing stations below.

Trey strut down the dock that had been repaired in a half-assed attempt at best, and he had to jump over some gaps to clear a piece in the middle that he himself was responsible for screwing up when he blew those men away in a bath of hellfire days before. Coming to the ramp walking up to board, he passed by quite a few unfamiliar faces.

“How many men did you hire on?”

Brae was giving Ashe a slow once-over due to her new features, but he didn’t bother asking how it happened. “We have 42 including myself, not including your group if you ever choose to come again. Most of them are the slaves we freed but a few are people from the slums.”

Trey chuckled and shook Brae’s hand in friendship. “Of course I would come again. I also appreciate you taking us today, we’d have had to hire another boat otherwise.”

The scarred captain waved dismissively and turned around for them to follow further along the deck towards his quarters. “It’ll be a good opportunity to see how fast the ship can sail without the central mast, and without the cog stuck to its side.”

“What happened to the cog?”

“We sold it, or what was left of it. Used the money for repairs here.”

A parrot flew over and landed along the railing to curiously watch them just before they disappeared into the back cabin. Passing by the stairs leading down and then through the next door, they came into Brae’s quarters and shut the door behind them.

He’d changed it up a bit. The splendid velvet bed was still there, but the center of the room now had a large map of Ornthas and the islands surrounding it. It was quite detailed and labeled known settlements in the islands of the Lawless Lands as well as ruins in the mainland of Ornthas.

Brae motioned towards the map and turned around to face them on the opposite side of the table holding it. “Show me.”

Ashe was first to approach the table, and a couple seconds later she’d identified the island they were supposed to be meeting the other warlocks and summoners on. She pointed. “Here.”

Brae folded his arms and narrowed his eyes. “There aren’t any settlements there. Are you sure that’s the place?”

Ashe looked to Trey, her fox ears perking up.

Trey clarified with a nod. “Yes. She’s right, that’s the place. It’s supposed to be out of the way… this particular group is very careful not to let their secrets out to just anyone. All of their meetings are done far from the settlements. At least that’s what I’ve been told… but this will be the first time attending after being invited.”

“Ok… sounds a little fishy but it’s your neck on the line. I’ll keep my ship afloat just off the coast in case we need to make a break for it… in the off chance you’re somehow killed. Sound fair?”

“That’s fair. You’re doing this for free after all.”

Brae nodded and walked over to pour himself a drink of wine from the pitcher on his desk - another addition to the room since acquiring the war galley. “Alright, now that you’re here we can set off within the hour. Feel free to help yourselves to rations down below in the storage rooms, it’ll take a couple days to get there.”

***

As his vision finally cleared and the headache went away, Trey found himself in a cylindrical semi-translucent container placed within a plain stone room full of 50-80 similar containers. Each container had another person in it, and they were all either recovering from the pain the same way he’d done – or were already standing up and looking about their surroundings.

Where the fuck was he?

Some of the others were trying to speak or yell, but Trey couldn’t hear what they were saying. The containers they were in were soundproof. He checked his surroundings again, catching the eye of a scared-looking little boy with sandy-blonde hair. If Trey had to guess, he was only about 8 years old… and to his amazement, he was wearing a superhero T-shirt.

A T-shirt? What the fuck?

Trey immediately raised his eyebrows. Was this kid an Earthborn too?

A grating noise came from his right, left, front and back, as four stone doors each about twenty feet wide opened across the large square room. Light trickled into their large enclosure, showing a vast area of swampland and marsh spreading out for as far as the eye could see in all directions.

That’s when the notification screen popped up.

================================================

Participant ID: 54TJ3N9

Participant Name: Trey Bon

Hello Participant! Congratulations on being randomly selected for the very first-round trial run for Earthborn tournaments. Your body has been transported from your previous location into the tournament’s location in the Labyrinth Worlds, and you will be returned from this secluded area whenever the tournament ends – if you win.

Along with this individual tournament, 400 other tournaments in secluded locations are also starting up as we speak. Each tournament has its own individual set of rules and boundaries. Please review the tournament rules and details, and expect to be released from your enclosure starting within the next 10 minutes.

Tournament Name: King of the Hill, The Spree Infested Marshlands

Tournament Rules and Details:

There are six different starting locations within these spree infested marshlands, including this one. There are 360 Earthborn enrolled in this specific tournament. Time has been sped up in this area by 10 times over, so although your bodies have disappeared from your original spots – you will undertake and complete this tournament, or die, at a much faster rate than time lows in your place of origin prior to the tournament. You will not be able to kill one another while still inside the starting area, though spree creatures will be able to kill you even if you choose to stay. Anyone who tries to break this rule will instantaneously be killed. LOOT: Weapons, potions, armor and other loot may be found in randomly placed chests around the marsh and pyramid. You may keep what you find even after the tournament is over. NERFS: Resurrection spells or miracles have cast times doubled. During this tournament, all XP gains are disabled. PRIMARY OBJECTIVE: There is a flat-topped pyramid in the center of the swamp. At the top of this pyramid is an All Spirit altar that has been tainted by the spree. Your objective to win this tournament is as follows: touch the pyramid’s altar, keeping physical contact with the altar for a total of 2 hours. You may leave the altar if needed and then come back to resume the time accumulated, and time accumulated may be monitored in the top of your HUD. While you are in contact with the altar, the spree taint will disappear, but you will attract nearby spree to your area while you do – and they will attempt to kill you. WINNING PRIZE: Every living member of the winning party will acquire very valuable items unique to them. These prize items will take into account your class, levels, abilities and estimated growth patterns. PARTY LIMIT: Parties must be created prior to leaving the starting areas. You may complete the tournament as a singular person, or as a party. Parties may have up to 5 other Earthborn registered and may not be adjusted after the initial team has been formed. POWER RATINGS: A new feature concerning POWER RATINGS has been incorporated into your individual status pages, and is a trial run of likely things to come in the future for the outside world before Beta ends. When compared to actual levels – these power ratings are more accurate descriptions of how the All Spirit views your prowess, as opposed to the overall combat levels which are a representation of your accumulated experience. You are able to show your power rating to other participants outside of being identified by a skilled identifier, so use this to your advantage when putting a team together. OPTIONAL OBJECTIVE: If your party kills 8 other Earthborn participants, your party members each acquire a stone that may instantaneously teleport them from the tournament and back to where they came from. If you take this option, you forfeit the prizes at the end for winning. Killing your own party members does not apply to this kill number. IMPORTANT NOTICE: If you are still alive when the Tournament ends and have not taken the optional objective to teleport out, you will be left here in the spree infested marshlands as time resumes to a normal pace. SPREE WEB RUNNER QUEEN: There is one special spree unit here in the marshlands called a Web Runner Queen. This creature is far more powerful than all of the other spree in this area, and is living somewhere near the pyramid. Killing this creature will result in an automatic tournament win, though this is by far the hardest option to achieve when trying to escape this event. Remember, this is the OFF cycle, so all deaths are permanent! Good luck!

================================================

Trey rubbed his eyes a couple times, rereading it a second time and letting his jaw hang slack. “You’ve gotta be fist-fucking me… So this is what it means by ‘Death Game?’ Utterly ridiculous.”

All around him, other people in their individual mana-pods were also coming to the same realization he was: There was a good chance they were all fucked. Looks of despair or fear crept over many of their countenances, while others just looked dumbfounded.

There were a few of them that looked either though, and most of these people looked to be better equipped than the rest. A couple mages with casting staves, a dark-skinned ranger, and axe wielding mountain of a man… there were a few others too – and they were already actively searching out the other pods to scout out early for potential party members.

It was strange to think that all these people were also from Earth, there were so many of them… but he couldn’t dwell on it now.

He tried summoning his minions ahead of time, but it didn’t work – with a notification popping up stating that he had to wait until he was out of the containment cell to do so. Sighing to himself, Trey just slumped down against the mana-created wall of his cylindrical cell and waited while tapping his finger. He couldn’t allow himself to stay here… that was for damn sure. He’d either have to kill 8 other people… which was certainly the easy way out, or he could actually follow through with the tournament and try to win it.

The choice was a simple one. Not only did he really dislike the idea of killing people he didn’t know, who were likely innocent, but he also really wanted to see what kind of prizes the prompts were talking about. ‘Very valuable items unique to them’? Sounded enticing. Sounded like a way to get ahead of the curve. He was relatively certain that he’d have some competition at this point of progression since the Earthborn waves started coming, but considering the tom-fuckery he’d been through and how fast he’d grown – he highly doubted there would be more than a handful of other people here who could realistically take him on.

He did take particular notice of a combination of items in the tournament rules and details though. First, it said that when touching the altar – it would attract nearby spree. Second, it said the spree web runner was living near the pyramid. 1+1=2, the spree web runner – whatever the hell that was – would likely be something you’d have to kill in order to complete this tournament.

Trey was already pre-planning: considering whether or not he should wait somewhere on the pyramid’s perimeter and watch for the thing to come out – using another group as bait – when the mana wall encompassing him abruptly vanished and he felt on his back with a thud.

Grumbling to himself and rubbing the back of his head, Trey promptly sat up to the sudden shockwave of sound as people started conversing with one another in panicked states of confusion or disbelief.

“Jesus Christ…” Trey muttered, getting onto his knees and then standing up with an irritated grunt. “It really had to just disappear like that without any warning…”

The people milling about him were getting louder and louder, speaking to one another about their new power rankings, levels, abilities, classes, and trying to impress one another to find good partners before they were taken up. No one wanted to be left behind in this forsaken marsh full of enemies, or worse… dead. The noise was beginning to emphasize the headache he’d gotten after slamming his skull against the stone floor, so he turned to the nearest wall and headed over while rubbing his forehead.

Then he abruptly stopped, remembering what he’d seen earlier, and turned around.

His eyes fell to the kid with the super hero T-shirt. The little boy was standing nervously, alone in the big room of scary people that all ignored him – and his eyes were welling up with tears while staring at the floor. The poor kid was even shaking slightly.

Sighing and grudgingly walking back, Trey came over to stop next to the child with folded arms. “Hey, kid. Need a group?”

The little boy looked up, taken aback by Trey’s appearance a bit, and wiped the tears out of his eyes with a nod. “You want to be on my team?”

Trey inwardly kicked himself for having a heart, this was going to be a real detriment to winning… but he smiled reassuringly and bent over to offer a hand. “As long as you don’t mind that I look scary.”

The kid sniffled and gave a wary smile, then shook Trey’s hand. “You do look kinda scary.”

Trey chuckled and stood back up, then motioned for the boy to follow. “Let’s go stand along the edge, I need to summon my minions… and it won’t be so fu-“

Trey held his tongue, curbing his poor language in the presence of the child. “-it won’t be so noisy. What’s your name?”

The boy was bumped to the side by larger gruff-looking man as he passed by, but caught up a second later after wading through the crowd. “Brody.”

“Brody? Good name.”

“What do you mean by minions?”

They came out of the crowd to one of the walls nearby an open door, giving Trey a better view of the swamp. It smelled like shit, there were reeds and moss-covered trees everywhere, with swarms of insects in abundance. The sounds of what Trey assumed to be crickets intermixed with occasional croaks from amphibians, but Trey wasn’t able to see any of these so-called ‘spree’ anywhere.

However, he was able to see the pyramid off in the distance. It was enormous with Mayan-style architecture, a couple miles off to Trey’s right.

“My class allows me to command demons.” Trey replied, turning back around to look at the boy as Brody’s eyes went wide.

“Demons?” Repeated Brody, awestruck. “Aren’t they evil?”

Trey chuckled and pointed to his horns, then his tail, and then his eyes in rapid succession. “Are you surprised?”

Nearby, a screaming match between two men erupted into shoving – one heavily armored and wearing a flanged mace, and the other was wearing a plain robe with no weapons at all. Trey’s attention was taken away as the armored man slammed a fist into the robed man’s face – then he drew his mace and was about to swing when a flash of light lit up the room.

The heavily armored man crumpled to the ground, dead before he hit the floor, never to rise again.

“That prompt wasn’t kidding about not being aggressive to one another in the starting area.”

The voice was a woman’s from immediately behind Trey, and he turned around to see a plump, slightly rotund redheaded woman with pigtails. She had a small wand at her hip and had a mage’s robe on.

Upon noticing her, she extended a hand with a twinkle in her eye and a friendly smile. “Hello chap! My name is Ruby! Nice to meet you.”

Trey raised an eyebrow and shook her hand in turn, with Brody curiously watching the armored man’s corpse not far off – lacking understanding of what had happened.

“Trey is the name. Nice to meet you as well Ruby. I assume you’re looking for a group?”

Ruby widely smiled and nodded, then she glanced at the boy… and her smile faded slightly. “Yes… we are.”

She motioned to three others who were standing back behind her at a slight distance. One was a tall African man, heavily muscled with a huge club. Then there was another scrawny-looking mage with glasses who’d just started balding, and another woman wearing priestess robes.

“We already have four… and were hoping you’d be our fifth. I can tell you’re not one of the newbies… and you’re likely a warlock if I had to guess. Am I right?”

Trey frowned. “Infernal summoner.”

“Infernal summoner?” Repeated Ruby with a curious raise of her eyebrows. “Interesting. I haven’t even heard of that class before, but then again… the mages’ guild I’m a part of doesn’t deal with… black magics. In fact, they’re outlawed where I’m from, nasty rumors about the users… Anyways, none of that is important right now. We need to survive, and we can only have five people in a party before we leave this starting area.”

She leaned in closer, whispering so Brody wouldn’t hear. “It’s unfortunate, leaving the kid behind, but it would be the smart thing to do. He’ll just hold you back, there’s no reason to die trying to be valiant. I and the rest of our group are all experienced, we’re going to try and win this thing.”

The woman’s logic was sound. Trey’d admit it, but he knew he couldn’t leave Brody behind. Just couldn’t do it. He may be a killer, and sometimes he was a selfish asshole, but he wasn’t a downright terrible person. Brody still had his innocence, and Trey wasn’t going to just leave him to die.

Ruby could tell he was internally analyzing the situation, so she pressed the situation as another group of five left out the front door and began to run through the marshes – splashing through the shallow waters towards the temple. “A lot of the people here don’t even have classes yet. They’re as good as dead, or as good as left behind and then dead. No one wants to stay behind, but if it’s us or them – let’s choose us. Yeah? Look, you can take a peak at our power ratings and compare to the others here. I know we don’t have much to go off of because it’s a brand new addition to this game we’re all stuck in, but we’re all above average. That much was easy to figure out. Most people here are somewhere between a power level of 3 and 10. Go ahead and look at the trash left behind if you don’t believe me, but we’re the outliers here.”

Ruby quickly accessed her status screen and made a few motions with her hand before a notification popped up in front of her. It only had a single thing to show, but was available for everyone else to clearly see.

============================

Ruby Nuttle’s Power Rating: 132

Utility: 13

Attack: 111

Defense: 8

============================

Trey’s brow furrowed, and he glanced around the room. That was a new option – being able to share their basics like that out in the open without showing the status screen. Other people were also showing their power ratings to one another nearby. He saw a 5, 16, 8, 19, 45, 3, and a couple of others of similar numbering. He tried to identify one of the ones he saw as a “5” power rating, but the status pages hadn’t changed.

Name: Earthborn Woman

Race: Human

Class: None

Level: 2

HP: 100/100

MP: 100/100

SP: 100/100

DP: 1/1

Trey frowned. The identification of power ratings must be limited to the ‘Identifier’ class like all the other stats, attributes, abilities, and other bullshit.

The tall, muscled African man came forward and crossed his arms. In a deep booming voice, and a thick accent, he gestured to Trey with a nod. “I too can show you my power rating, but I want to see yours first. Ruby is getting ahead of herself, we don’t know how strong you are.”

Ruby rolled her eyes and turned her plump head with a grunt. “Just look at him Alade! LOOK at him! He’s obviously not a newbie!”

“I still want to see it.” Alade, the African man said. He waited patiently by, expectantly, as Trey looked him up and down.

Trey eventually shook his head, and for curiosity’s sake he pulled up his status page. Then he pulled up his minion’s pages, and a small grin spread across his lips.

If they were the outliers, he wasn’t going to have any problems here.

“What’s so funny?” Alade asked, frowning as he did. “Are you going to show us your power rating or not?”

Trey raised an eyebrow and closed his status page. “Sorry guys. I’m not up to par, and I’m sticking with the kid. Find someone else, I’m sure y’all won’t have a problem getting another member.”

Ruby frowned, and Alade scoffed while the two others in the background wore disappointed looks.

“He’s weak. I told you.” Alade shook his head in disappointment. “Come on. Let’s find someone else.”

The other three began to leave, and but Ruby gave Trey a long hard stare before she loudly sighed and turned around to walk away with her new companions.

Trey watched them go with a sad smile, and felt a tug on the sleeves of his cloak. He glanced down and caught Brody’s gaze as the child let go. “Yes?”

Brody’s lip quivered, and his eyes began to water again. “They wanted you to leave me?”

Ah fuck. He hated it when kids cried. “No! Nope they were just talking to me about something else.”

The crowds were still mulling about, but upon scanning the area he caught three people standing still as statues staring directly at him from about ten feet away. One was an old man with scraggly white hair and glasses, but despite the age he looked to be in good physical shape. The second was a young Chinese woman with a bow and arrows in a ranger’s outfit, and the last was a shirtless guy who looked like he’d gotten straight out of the marine corp with a short sword strapped to his side.

The old man, upon finally making eye contact with Trey after staring a good while, smiled and approached to stop a few feet away. “That was a courageous thing you did. They would have been a good party for you to join, they were some of the best ones here.”

Trey folded his arms and pursed his lips. “Really. How would you know that?”

The old man smiled and clasped his hands behind his back after smoothing down his brown tunic and adjusting his glasses. “I’m an identifier, and I can see what the power levels of everyone here are after I concentrate hard enough… That’s why I can also tell that it would be foolhardy not to at least try to convince you to join MY group. As you can see, we only have three. You can take the boy with you, I’m sure it won’t hinder you as much as that mage had believed.”

Trey let on a small grin and let the tension in his shoulders relax. He addressed all three of them as he spoke. “Perhaps I’ll join… What are your names, what are your classes, and what are your power levels?”

“Vye.” The old identifier held out his hand and they shook hands. “I don’t have a very high power rating, but that’s not what my class is designed for. However, I’ve been hired on by adventurer groups before and knowing an enemy’s weaknesses or abilities is a huge boon. I’m sure if you choose to come along, I’ll be of some use to you.”

============================

Vye Jerini’s Power Rating: 20

Utility: 18

Attack: 1

Defense: 1

============================

The young Chinese woman stepped up next, keeping her eyes on her status screen as she worked to pull up her power rating. “My name is Lue. I’m a ranger.”

============================

Lue Lang’s Power Rating: 36

Utility: 4

Attack: 29

Defense: 3

============================

Next, the ripped shirtless guy wielding a shortsword and a sporting a crew-cut strut over with a confident grin and held out his hand. “Tyler Jack. Nice to meet ya bro! My class is ‘gutter fighter,’ it specializes in close combat. Unfortunately I left all my armor behind! I was in the middle of a training session when I was pulled here. Kinda scary shit, yeah? And, honestly I’m a little impressed with what you did. Choosing to try and protect the kid when you could have gone with that mage. I don’t have a lot to go off of, but I didn’t see anyone else over a power rating of 100 here other than her so far. You must be a pretty nice guy.”

============================

Tyler Jack’s Power Rating: 40

Utility: 0

Attack: 25

Defense: 15

============================

Trey glanced over at Vye, who just grinned even more widely as they held eye contact.

With a snort, Trey chuckled and pulled up his own status page. A moment later, his power rating was displayed for the others to openly see. He didn’t know whether or not it was something he should be proud of, or if it was something that was impressive in the outside world, but here… amidst his other Earthborn counterparts… he could safely say he was in a good position to take the tournament for himself.

============================

Trey Bon’s Power Rating: 409

Utility: 39

Attack: 280

Defense: 90

============================

Lue and Tyler both immediately exchanged a look upon Trey’s power rating being displayed, then glanced Vye’s way.

“Is that really good?” Tyler asked curiously, scratching his head with a frown. “I mean…”

Lue folded her arms. “I don’t buy it. The new power ratings must be messed up somehow, there’s no way you’re that much higher on the scale than we are.”

Trey shrugged, watching another group of five start out into the marshes. Then another went, and another. “We’d better get a move on if we want to win this. I’m assuming none of you want to stay here forever and want to get back to the friends you’ve made.”

Vye’s eyes narrowed. “So you’re with us then?”

In response, Trey sent them all party invitations. Their HUDs lit up, and they quickly accepted the prompts. Instantly, their HP, MP, SP and DP points all lit up next to their names along the left top-side corner of his vision, with the last one of them to be Brody – who was also a level 1.

Not that he expected anything different from the kid.

====================================================================

Is this the party you wish to create and keep for the remainder of this tournament?

Yes?

No?

====================================================================

Trey selected yes, and as the others did the same - they were locked in.

In a blur of shadows, Talsh’Noc’Un materialized from shadowform to float next to Trey with a sinister hiss. “Master… it appears… we are not on Nagochus… anymore…”

The others of their party were all startled by the abrupt appearance of the huge, simmering greatsword, but were equally surprised when crimson light began to flood the ground next to where Trey stood in the image of a pentagram.

“No shit, sherlock.” Trey replied while he continued to summon his strongest demon – Atharost. 30 seconds ticked by and the ifrit burst into existence, flames erupting from his body as he looked around in confusion.

Then his eyes found his master, and Atharost put on a deep frown. “Where are we?”

The other earthborn gawked, all except Brody.

“Is that one of your demons?” Brody asked, wide-eyed and delighted.

Atharost slowly let his gaze settle on the tiny human, and he folded his arms in disapproval. “Who are you, little man?”

“We’re in some kind of tournament set up by the All Spirit I think.” Trey waved a dismissive hand as he summoned Napoleon next. “My fucking luck, right?”

Soon after, and as Atharost continued to examine his surroundings, the primal imp appeared next. Rivia was next. Tyler in particular gaped at Rivia with his jaw slack, and Lue was rather taken with Atharost, while Brody and Napoleon had immediately hit it off as well.

Vye’s eyebrows raised as he examined each of these new minions with increasing delight, and the others found themselves in a similar state of mind as Trey pulled up each of their power levels as well.

============================

Atharost’s Power Rating: 602

Utility: 58

Attack: 443

Defense: 101

============================

============================

Rivia’s Power Rating: 207

Utility: 157

Attack: 40

Defense: 10

============================

============================

Napoleon’s Power Rating: 342

Utility: 81

Attack: 196

Defense: 65

============================

They still had nothing to really compare it to in the past, but they were all significantly higher than anyone else here. So without waiting any longer, the five Earthborn and three demons set off into the swamplands with Napoleon scouting ahead.

None of them knew what to expect… but whatever had been in their minds, it wasn’t what they found.