‘Aim low. Aim high.

Your strength in giving or taking will bring temporary peace.’ (Arvald, the Fourth)

The Beast of Babel withdrew its tail from Mars. The beast cantered, seamless. It hugged Venus, the planet. Its tails sprouted far and wide, above it, to its left and its right. The creature’s mouth was huge, with protruding fangs and spiraling innards.

There was no one that came.

I intensified the electro orb – white in color - in my hand. The white orb vibrated, like an engine. When I stopped the vibration, the orb rotated at its new speed, without the sound. It was similar to a car accelerating downhill, only to remain at a fixed speed.

The beast flinched. Its talons got swept from under it. I heard clangs as the Beast of Babel attempted to reclaim its movements. The creature heaved. It became illuminated. A bloody halo appeared above its head. Berries sprung from the halo, and became thorns. It grew in size. The red of its skin appeared to be in a superfluid state, stretching out without coming off.

Any matter that escaped was recaptured. In its legs’ stead, a thousand feet supported the beast’s body. The creature was made of webs and distinct concentrations that manifested disorder. In the next instant, these were rallied together. The beast’s eyes flickered between red and blue.

It was unaffected by my electro orb.

The creature screeched. Its red eyes bulged. Scenes from the past flickered through its eyes. I saw people die. I saw people pray. I saw people raise their hands to the sky. I moved to my right. The creature side-stepped to obstruct me.

I rushed some meters back. I opened my sash, took out a grenade, and pressed the button. I flipped the grenade on my hand, grabbed it and threw it at the Beast of Babel. ʺElectro Shield,ʺ I said. I walked away.

The beast followed suit. The grenade did not travel far to hit its mark.

The ensuing explosion happened closer. It ripped off 564 health points, leaving me with 536/1100 health points. That accounted for my 0.11 Lumen resistance, towards fire, in particular. The Electro Shield granted me another 0.15 resistance. I wasn’t sure about the effect of my physical resistance.

That one was currently at 0.14.

I looked at the Beast of Babel. No damage indication came up. The halo shone a bright red. The beast stomped forward. Its talons became flints of metal. The beast observed me with its red eyes. Bloody tears fell down its jaw. It swung its talon at empty space.

A gash appeared under my ribs. ʺThis can’t be real,ʺ I spat.

It was a game. It was obviously real. ‘A test for stress tolerance.’ I thought, like I discussed with Nina. Was I going to die without my body realizing it?

Power Quest – Rank C

Rule 1 of Existence – Destined Darwinism

ʺAll of us are granted a certain reality. We all grow in the shadow. Fighting with open eyes in the dark in the only way forward.ʺ

- Defeat the phantasms of Babel.

This is a power quest. No power quest can ever be declined or accepted. The result is decided based on the situation. This is a branch of the main story mode of Life of No Legacy.

Please exit this area if you don’t feel ready.

"The brighter the light, the greater the shadow," someone said. It was a man, with a monkey’s mask. The label above his head read ‘Spawn 1 of Beast of Babel’. That was a long name.

A katana materialized in front of me.

Katana

A katana is a Japanese sword. It has a curved, single-edged blade. Its guard can be circular or squared. You can hold it with both hands. It was used by the samurai in feudal Japan. The katana has made an appearance in Dark Souls one. It breaks easily, maybe.

source: wikipedia

The man wore a dark red garb. "Why are you here?" he asked.

I exhaled and grabbed the katana. It had a squared guard. Its handle felt cold against my hand. Its weight was nice. Electricity sizzled through the blade.

Humans liked combining regulation of challenges with qualia. This was as much a goal as it was subject to entropy and physical death. Augmented reality was the natural outcome of a museum. I had watched the design of Royal Lucretius’s museum. Virtual reality was the natural outcome of gaming. I experienced it. Multi-questing in-game still sucked. It prevented hyperfocus.

Many things prevented hyperfocus.

No. It was fine. I was simply outdated in my aspirations. A sound execution of faith resided in a sound history or story. A sound history or story resided in a sound theory. I was the fool for ridiculing games. I was simply a materialist. ‘Survival is nice,’ I thought. I was not wrong. There was no such thing as sinless fun. There was fun that you yourself decided was right. You only trusted your body to evolve to suit your fun at the expense of whatever sacrifice, for any specific ‘status’ in survival.

We began to like ourselves. We began to like the causality of the universe all while disliking the obstacle, the enemy, which did not make us ourselves.

System Notification

Your only weapon for this trial should be the katana. If not, you will have to start again.

I swung the katana around. I had no real-life sword-fighting skill. Sure, there were a few brazen stick-fights. I did watch game protagonists use the sword many times. I couldn’t wrap my head around the combos though.

I stared blankly at Spawn 1.

Spawn 1 threw a boomerang. The boomerang came just short of touching my face. I stared ahead, with mute expression.

It was raining. I could hear the water droplets hitting the windows. The sun had shone brightly yesterday.

In a corner of the room, a pink-skinned humanoid materialized. It had gray rags for cloth and banged its head against the wall. The creature was similar to the ‘hollow’ (Fextralife, 2018) in Dark Souls 1. I jogged to the humanoid. The word ‘hollow’ indeed appeared above its head. He reminded me of ‘Gollum’, that fantastical creature in the Lord of the Rings series, who met the hobbit.

The hobbit was a halfing. Hobbits had half the average human height. They did not wear shoes. They lived in homely subterranean houses, which were usually built into the sides of hills.

The characteristic memology around Gollum was that he had a certain ring, which he called ‘my precious’, which was stolen by the hobbit. Gollum had been obsessed about that ring. You could picture a nice, miffed baby face for him. There was nothing to say about it, since it was a mere feature, depending on the circumstances for age or either gender.

In Dark Souls I, hollows lamented either in front of New Londo Ruins, where ghosts wounded you or in the checkpoint you got to after getting past the Red Dragon. The Red Dragon was a boss of the open-world, rather than one inside a fog room, in Dark Souls 1. One of the beast’s spiked tail drove into the hollow’s head. Another hollow was summoned. He was met with the same fate.

The third hollow was left untouched. The beast racked against itself temporarily. It exhaled.

Something hit my head and fell. I turned to see that it was the boomerang.

"You don’t know yourself," Spawn 1 said.

"Neither do you," I returned. "Let’s have a spar. We’ll see who gives a shit first," I joked.

"Well said," Spawn 1 said, taking out another boomerang. I walked up to him. My sword clanged against his. I held on. I gained higher ground. The monkey mask stared back at me. The tension subsisted for one minute.

Spawn 1’s guard broke. I slashed at his body. I slashed again. Spawn 1 laughed. From the bottom of his heart, he laughed. He had a good-looking monkey mask. Before I could take it off, Spawn 1 disintegrated.