Eli POV

______________________________

"That's what happened" I said as part of the puzzle fell into place. The attack of the eldritch beast must have been some sort of anti-life based spell.

Mages, mana. It just hit me that what he was talking about in such a serious tone was magic. Like it was just some sort of natural force like physics. Those diagrams also made a lot of references that I would have sworn had belonged in a video game but with all of the precision and seriousness of a technical worker.

My curiosity was floored but the squad of necromancers coming to collect their 'sample' made me push forward.

So, when the attack came into this world it 'only' wiped out the people in this temple whose remains were the scattered robes laying everywhere while leaving everything else untouched. But what power did I have that would have been reduced by the summoning?

I quickly checked the two long bumps on both sides of my spine leading up to the shoulders and sure enough they were still there. The two extra brain chips were nanomachines that self-healed and would power off the fat and energy of my body. But then I put my hand down to my thigh and felt the Ai chip there. This illegal chip gave me mathematical and memory abilities well past what the natural limits of this body would allow. This increase was many times the allowed 32.8% increase to mental power and far beyond what regular humans could do. I couldn't wait to get the statistics uploaded into a data base to retrieve the information it held.

At least, it should have those abilities. For some reason since I came here, I hadn't gotten any help from it. More disturbingly, the regular and not illegal brain chips weren’t working either. I worked through the book again to see if it held the answer. It was stressed that in using the spell, called the lure, only the first thing coming through would have its power reduced with warnings of what would follow if multiple objects were pulled at the same time. Was that the problem with the chips?

Looking further there was some references to a manual this guy was provided before starting work. It turns out that souls captured from the beyond make bodies based on the users most stringent and desired self-perceptions. So that would explain why, despite my anti-social tendencies, my looks still transferred over, I mused as I looked into the mirror opposite of me. That praise from people unknown and unsolicited compliments still wormed their way into me in spite of my best efforts. I also spent countless years making and hiding the illegal brain chip and it would take more than the cosmic forces of the universe to make me part with them.

Rubbing the back of my head in deep thought, a sensation more horrifying than what I could have imagined was felt in this moment. Panicking I ran over it again and again but to no avail. There was nothing but smooth skin and the small telltale bumps of the original mind chips. Where was the connector?

The connector was similar to the brain chips but was solely focused on doing the leg work of translating human thought into code and vice versa. This is what allowed the brain chips to interact with my brain’s neurology and co-ordinate between each other. Without it the chips were just three highly advanced tumors that couldn't be removed.

The memory of them removing the connector before my execution flashed before my mind. Could… Please no. Please don’t tell me that less than five minutes without it caused such a drastic change in my self-image. Whatever my pleas, my continuous rubbing on the back of my neck only confirmed my suspicion.

A guttural scream like that of a pig being slaughtered reverberated throughout the temple and the vast cavern beyond it. Some of the undead began knocking on the door but gave up after my scream stopped a solid 10 seconds after it began. Panting, crying and sobbing were parts of but not necessarily the total of the miserable display that I put on while still confined in this chair.

Sometime later, I finally brought myself self back to the now darker, colder, and meaner universe I was in.

'All right Eli, let’s get up off the floor and get on with it' I mentally kicked myself into action. I headed down the stairs and into the right and left passageways. In one was a barracks with beds, and a latrine. After finding nothing of use I decided to head towards the kitchen again. It had a large storage area which seemed to hold a lot of general supplies, not just food in the back section of the kitchen further beyond the pots and grills. I decided to take a leather knapsack and fill it with loaves of bread and dried nuts with berries. 'I guess meat was a luxury they couldn't afford' I thought as I scolded the dead men and their enigmatic masters for their cheapness.

I thought about taking the book and dagger, as well as an assortment of other armaments, but going out into the unknown world carrying the weapons and armor of a necromancer cult who was unpopular enough to have to hide with such elaborate means, might evoke a negative reaction from the locals. Also, I currently had no real understanding of the mechanisms that they used to bring me here or this magic that they had mentioned. For all I knew, there could be some equivalent of tracking device embedded in all of their gear. I was just praying that a simple knapsack and food wouldn't merit such measures.

Donning the sack and heading out to the iron double doors exit, I slowly opened one of the doors. I half expected the zombies to shamble in, but they couldn't seem too care less about my presence now that I had the hood. I looked out over the mass of corpses and saw some of the zombies going down into some depression in the floor. Carefully shifting my way through the repugnant mass, I gradually came down into a smaller chamber with a steep ledge higher than three men standing on top of each other. When I finished shimmying up the ladder on its right side, I saw a wooden door sticking out against the bare brown wall of the cave.

Gently pressing against the door, I peeked out through the crack but my vision was blocked by a thick layer of vines. Thinking it over, I decided that anyone who knew about the operation here would certainly know I wasn't the man that was supposed to have this robe, but if I ran into some one didn't know about it my attempts at disassociation would probably fall flat if I was wearing garb that had all the signs of malevolent work. Skulls on the chest and shoulders with the occasional blood stain in the lighter red of the robe, or maybe it was all blood faded to different degrees, did not tell a tale of a peaceful wanderer. The decision made, I tossed the robe to the side and headed out into the great wide world beyond.