《Monster》 Adams Character Sheet
Spoiler: Spoiler
Spoiler: Spoiler Name: Adam Freeman (Adam) Race: Human (Lesser Monster) Alignment: Lawful Neutral (Chaotic Evil) Class Level: Shadow Monk Lv 1 (Nightmare Lv???) Height: 1.83m (1.9m) Age: 16 (10) Gender: Male (N/A) Weight: 73kg (13kg) Eye Colour: Jade (N/A)
Strength: 9 (18) ------------- -1 (+4) HP - 15 (53)
Dexterity: 11 (22) --------------- +1 (+6) Mana - 32 (143)
Constitution: 10 (19) ----------- +0 (+5) AC - 11 (18)
Wisdom: 11 (10) ---------------- +1 (+0) Initiative - 11 (16)
Intelligence: 12 (25) ------------ +1 (+8) Base Attack Bonus: +1
Charisma: 8 (4) ------------------ -1 (-3) Chat Log:Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Skills
Shadow Strike I
  • A gathering of the power of shadow within your clenched fist, increasing the overall power of the attack in the lower levels, and increasing the unpredictability of the attack with Mastery. Abyssal corruption seeps from this ability.
Shadow Footwork I
  • A special movement technique unique which utilises shadows in the environment to silently move without breaking the shadow pattern of an area, thus allowing the individual to be concealed from large to mid distance observation in the early levels. Mastery allows the user to form an optical illusion when moving, seeming to be one with the Shadow and making optical and audial detection impossible. Abyssal corruption seeps from this ability.
Shadow Concentration I
  • When casting [Shadow] spells, the concentration of the individual becomes nigh unbreakable, and the only way an opponent can stop you from casting a spell is by disabling your voice box or inflicting [Silence] upon you. Abyssal corruption gradually builds up in your body as this skill is used.
Spells
Shadow Bolt I
  • A concentration of the pure power of Shadow. Similar to other [Bolt] spells, however this one has the added bonus of being composed from the insubstantial shadow, and thus being impossible to block through physical means. Abyssal corruption composes part of the bolt, significantly increasing damage.
Feats
II Shadow Meditation
  • Exceptional Shadow Monks may meditate on the path of Shadow. They can understand a few of the profound concepts related to shadows such as covertness, lethality and insubstantiality. Through meditation they can gain some modicum of control over the shadows. The power of a Shadow Monk always depends on how much of their environment is composed of Shadows. However, for [Shadow Monk]''s that have this trait, the environmental advantage is magnified many times over.
Prologue - A Monster is Born Adam was making his way home from work. It was a Thursday today when he had his shift at a supermarket in the city. Now he was on the train, it was late at night so there wasn''t anyone else in his carriage. He just looked out the window of his carriage to enjoy the scenery. A small stream, some houses, a small forest, then through a tunnel. Oh, there was also a full moon tonight. Soon, the window of the carriage started to be covered in droplets of water, distorting the sight outside. Adam started to get a sinking feeling in his chest, a steel hand clasping his heart. "It is probably motion sickness"... ''Yes, Adam.'' ''Of course, it''s motion sickness.'' ''It''s just motion sickness, Adam...'' ---- Sarah was having a normal day in the office, it was almost 6 o''clock so she was having a coffee by the window of her company''s office. A short black, not that she liked the flavour, but she needed the energy to get back home without falling asleep on the bus. "Bye Sarah." "Bye." The last co-worker left the office and shut the door behind him. The main lights of the office were turned off since everyone else had already gone home. Sarah looked down on the street from the large windows that were the trademark of 21st century office edifices. A hubbub of activity. Antlike people chaotically moving in a harmonious set of movements.Love what you''re reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on. It was a relaxing sight. Then a few droplets of water fell upon the window, gradually becoming a downpour. She sighed, she''d probably have to wait a bit for the rain to stop. However, suddenly she felt a bit under the weather, wearing a sickly expression. Sarah went to the restroom, just downstairs from that floor. The lighting in the staircase was turned on, highlighting the ugly concrete slabs in the service staircase. Making her way to the restroom, she went inside the second unisex lavatory, since the first one was in use. As soon as she entered she started vomiting on the washbasin, her auburn hair getting tangled on the front of her face. After about a dozen more seconds she finally composed herself. However, looking down, a puddle of a deep crimson liquid was slowly creeping towards the soles of her feet from the lavatory next to her. In fact, now that she had stopped vomiting, she noticed that a metallic scent pervaded the lavatory. Blood Sarah felt the blood drain from her face as she staggered out of the lavatory. The lavatory next door was open. Open not as in unlocked, but wide open. And beholden to Sarah was her co-worker. What was left of him anyways. ''Mutilated'' would have been an understatement, some limbs so eviscerated that they were nothing but bloody clumps of stringy flesh. Sarah would go to the emergency exit, run to the street and call emergency. That''s what she wanted to do. In reality, her mind and body disconnected, almost as if her soul had left her body. Then, she felt It. Powerful hands clasped around her head, forefingers holding the temple on her head and thumbs digging into the back of her head. The word ''powerful'' didn''t suffice. Sarah felt the sheer power behind this grip to be equivalent to an industrial vice. This vicelike grip simply held her head for a moment. Sarah felt a searing heat pervade her body, sear her throat, asphyxiate her lungs and clasp her heart. Her sight blurred and soon everything faded to darkness after a moment of agony. --- Adam woke up. It wasn''t the nice kind of waking up in the morning, but rather the one you have after a long night of drinking. It was still night time. How could he tell? Simple, the first thing he saw were the stars. Getting up to move around, he found he was in a small clearing of a forest. Now, this wasn''t the type of forest miles away from civilization like in Europe. In Australia, cities were built with ample vegetation integrated into the cityscape. What was unusual was what he was doing here, seeing as the last thing he remembered was passing out in the carriage. However, those things were at the back of Adam''s mind right now, since a much bigger anomaly required his attention.
*Level Up*
Why was there a blue screen in front of him? Also... Why was his shirt stained with coffee? Chapter 1 - Coming Home
*Level Up*
*Select a new Feat*
[Awareness] -Be more aware of your surroundings, understand your environment and exercise control over the six mortal senses.
[Killer''s Instinct] -It comes second nature to you, the look in a man''s eyes. With a glance you can read his glazed eyes like an open book, see the solitude in them. That man won''t be missed.
[Unarmed Proficiency] -The use of the limbs is near limitless, allowing a combat style that exercises great control over the opponent, and to dispatch with the least use of force.
... This... It seemed like a certain tabletop RPG he enjoyed playing with his friends for a while when they were meant to be studying in the library. Sure, right away he could tell a few differences from it, such as the selection of feats or the fact that one didn''t gain a level simply by waking up in the middle of a forest. Wait... Maybe this was some sort of character creation, were he rolled for his initial stats and chose his class? No, then he would have chosen his class or rolled his stats first, not jumped straight to choosing his feats. What the hell were these feats anyways, was he some sort of Dark Monk? Before Adam could continue with his soliloquy a rustle in the ferns nearby the clearing broke his concentration. ... Well, it did a bit more than break his concentration. It scared the living hell out of him. Two beady eyes curiously looking at him from the ferns. ... A bloody possum. Then it sort of hit him. Sure, he was probably in a reserve or something, but he was in a forest, in the middle of the night. Should he call triple zero? Should he implement his survival training from cadets and establish a survival shelter? All of a sudden the familiar blue gums seemed ever so slightly less familiar, and every bit more threatening. This wasn''t some normal and safe forest. It was an Australian forest. Sure it was probably in the middle of suburbia but there were probably a couple dozen species of lethal spiders. Just because someone lives in Australia doesn''t mean they have to understand their own ecosystem after all. Then from somewhere in the darkness he saw a light. A bright blue radiance, a flashlight. Hence from the ferns stepped forth a man. A kindly looking middle-aged man. A holstered gun by his side. Bright blue uniform under a black tactical vest with a walkie talkie attached to it. It''s a cop. "Adam Freeman is it?" The police officer had a raspy, almost grating voice which contradicted his kind looking visage. Adam was still in a state of surrealism so he just slowly nodded dumbly. The police officer let out a deep sigh and pressed a button on his walkie-talkie. "Officer Harvey here, I got the kid. Over." Officer Harvey received a reply. However, Adam couldn''t make out what was being said as the signal was slightly distorted, but that didn''t seem to matter too much to the policeman. "Acknowledged. Out." Then Officer Harvey turned to look at him and sported the kind of smile you could only find on your favourite uncle. "You''re safe now." "Um, What." Adam couldn''t help it. First he wakes up, fantasizes about some blue boxes and gets saved by Aussie Uncle Sam here. What is even happening? After briefly explaining to Officer Harvey how he woke up in the middle of the forest, of course omitting any of the details on that blue box business, he finally got some light shed on the situation.The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. "I see, well you see mate. You''ve been missing for the last week and your last seen location is 20km''s from here. You vanished without a trace and if we hadn''t found you today we would have declared you dead." "Wait, where are we?" "We are at Ku-rin-gai." Adam sucked in a breath. Ku-ring-gai national park wasn''t exceptionally far away, but it was quite big, not exactly your neighbourhood vegetation. "Now Adam, are you positive you have no idea how you got here? Anything after you were on the train back home?" "No." "Well, there''s nothing for it. Looks like a kidnapping to me, albeit a strange one. Adam are you allergic to nuts?" "No..." "Well then, here take this, you must be famished. Although it seems your kidnappers must have fed you, since you''d be dead if you had gone almost a week without food or water." Officer Harvey gave Adam a nut bar, then they started making their way back to the police station. Outside the forest was the highway, with a couple unmanned police vehicles parked on the verge. "Carl, you''re gonna have to take a ride back with Tony, I''m taking the kid to the police station." Officer Harvey spoke into his walkie talkie. Officer Harvey moved to the door by the backseat and gestured towards it to Adam. ... On their way back Adam got to see more of the Australian bush, tall eucalyptus trees, towering cliffs and one wallaby off the verge. "Officer Harvey, has anything been happening during the week I was gone?" By this point other cars started to be seen in the highway. "Well, there''s this event that people are calling the Second Renaissance. Some people are starting to get these blue boxes start to appear in their vision. Although right now only a few people have gotten them, these people are starting to show extraordinary abilities." Unbeknownst to Officer Harvey, Adam slightly shifted from his seat when he mentioned the ''Second Renaissance'' and his pupils constricted when he mentioned ''blue boxes''. Only to focus sharply when he mentioned ''extraordinary powers''. The rest of the car trip continued without conversation. The car had reached the police station and Officer Harvey parked in one of the many parking spaces available in the front. Adam was about to get out of the car when Officer Harvey put a hand on his shoulder and stopped him. Turning around, Adam was met with his resting face, the look of someone asking their last question. "Adam. Before you go, you wouldn''t happen to know anyone called Sarah would you?" "No... Why?" Adam slowly replied, puzzled by the question out of the blue. Officer Harvey looked as if he was evaluating Adam for a second, performing a judgment. His eyes imperceptibly flashed with a hint of something. "No... nothing. Just that a homicide case happened on the same night as your disappearance. I was wondering if maybe the cases were linked. As in the perpetrator may be related to the victims. Well, just stay safe Adam, let''s go in." Just like that Officer Harvey left the car. Leaving Adam to stand dumbfounded for a while. What did he get involved with? Homicide? Adam felt cold sweat stick to the back of his neck, thinking about how close he was to dying. Death. It made Adam shudder at the mere thought of how close he was to being sent there. ... Once in the police station he had to wait for his mother to arrive before being interviewed on the case and providing an official statement to the police. "Thank you for your time Mrs Freeman, you might receive calls from us in the coming days in relation to the case." "No thank you Officer Schmidt, without you I wouldn''t have ever seen my son again." That was my mother. The one that fit the perfect image of a mother finally reunited with her son after a period of turmoil. Shortly after they made their way back to the car. Her mothers tears meticulously cleaned with an impeccable napkin she always carried with her. The trip home was silent, not a word was said to one another, in stark contrast to the warm and loving woman in the police station, this one was about as talkative as a man hanging from the gallows, about as warm too. They got home and his mother immediately went upstairs, probably to work from home. The living room was impeccable, except when he got to his room. It looked exactly as he left it as, a disaster, and it had stayed like that for the last week. Tired Adam went downstairs to get something to eat. Looking in the fridge there were only cans upon cans of iced coffee. ''What a surprise." He thought in a mental monotone tone. What did he expect, some prepared dinner for the son that had been a victim of kidnapping for the past week? Was it even dinner time? Looking up to the clock he saw the time. 4am. ''Well that explains why a certain someone doesn''t feel very talkative.'' He mused. ''Not that it would have been any different.'' ''After all, it''s always the same.'' ... Adam sat outside a bench by a convenience store. He was eating a prepared sandwich allong with a ''Monster'' energy drink. Normally at this hour he would be asleep. It was winter right now so the sun wouldn''t rise for another few hours. However he just woke up a couple hours ago from some sort of kidnapper induced coma. That and his unhealthy gusto for energy drinks were probably contributing towards his eerie amount of energy at this ungodly hour. Well, might as well get on with something he has procrastinated for long enough.
*Level Up*
*Select a new Feat*
[Awareness] -Be more aware of your surroundings, understand your environment and exercise control over the six mortal senses.
[Killer''s Instinct] -It comes second nature to you, the look in a man''s eyes. With a glance you can read his glazed eyes like an open book, see the solitude in them. That man won''t be missed.
[Unarmed Proficiency] -The use of the limbs is near limitless, allowing a combat style that exercises great control over the opponent, and to dispatch with the least use of force.
It had sort of disappeared when he didn''t focus on it however as soon as he thought about it he saw the blue boxes again. ''Well, no use thinking about the why, might as well choose one.'' [Killer''s Instinct] was immediately crossed off the list, that left it between [Awareness] and [Unarmed Proficiency]. ''Wait a second, six senses?'' It was most probably curiosity about this ''sixth sense'' that made him pick [Awareness].
*New Feat Acquired*
[Awareness] -Be more aware of your surroundings, understand your environment and exercise control over the six mortal sense.
Almost instantly Adam felt an acute headache. He felt completely cut off from his senses, he couldn''t detect anything. Not even his self. He only had a vague sensation of consciousness, his awareness of his existence. Adam didn''t know how long this absolute blindness lasted for since he had no measure to tell time. It could have been a mere instant or an entire century. However at some point he focused on his feeling of himself. His awareness of the self. Slowly, but surely it started expanding. He could ''sense'' the bench he was sitting on. Then he could detect the sandwich and his spilled energy drink on the pavement before him. Then, all of a sudden his senses awoke. If a scientist were to ask him what the big bang looked like. He would reply that it was an explosion of colour, an explosion of existence. Concepts such as time, perception and life conceived for the first time. This was what was happening to Adam right now. A blindness conceived from the splendour of a new perspective. Adam checked out his body. He found that he could see further, much, much further. When someone hears about how eagles have extremely good vision, they simply accept it. Unable to understand however what it would feel like to see a small mouse from a distance measured in kilometres. Now Adam understood. Before, the sky looked bleak, with nary a star to be seen. However now, it was an explosion of small, bright, lights. He also found he could smell many things now. Smells he had never detected before. It felt almost as if before his nose was blocked by a 40 degree fever, however now it completely healthy. All of his senses were now incomparable to how they were before. If this was a Chinese novel, the difference would be described as between Heaven and Earth. He also tried out his ''sixth sense''. A tinging feeling spread out from the centre of his body. A wave of sensation spread out from him. He found he could make out the shape of objects using this method. However these were inanimate objects. Then Adam turned to look to his right, there was a possum there, hiding in the bush. Adam slowly guided his ''sixth sense'' towards the possum, to see what would happen. ''Of course, Adam would regret that later on.'' As soon as his ''sixth sense'' made contact with the possum, Adam was filled with all sorts of information. An image of a small nest with baby possums in it being groomed by their mother. An image of the mother possum lying on the pavement, her skull split open by a human''s stick. An image of flight, running away from a terrifying feline. An image of hiding within the bush, seeing a human collapsed upon a bench, Adam. Adam felt all sorts of emotions through this bond. Fear, Insecurity, Shock. If Adam felt them, he would have been scared no doubt, however this was different. It was like he was feeling them through a television screen, much like how one watches a war documentary, numbed to the horrors of war through the glass screen. However, all those sensations were the least of Adams problems. Along with the sensations Adam felt a strong desire. A desire to feed on those emotions, a desire to twist this being psychologically. Henceforth, it felt like Adam''s body went on auto-pilot. Acting upon instinct, with his consciousness simply laying back to enjoy the show. Firstly his ''hand'' morphed into some sort of whisk made of transparent, long white tendrils. Then the tendrils slowly made their way to the possum, which was completely frozen in fear. As soon as the tendrils made contact, Adam began to understand the emotions of the possum. He relished in them. He twisted the possum''s fear into a deep seated hatred. The possum visually began to struggle, it''s eyes became bloodshot. After a few minutes the blood vessels started bursting. Adam slowly put down the possum with what was now his normal hand. Looking at what was before him, he could see the bloated corpse of something. It''s head had twisted and it''s hands had morphed into multiple limbs. Sickly green blood was slowly oozing out of it''s open mouth. Adam looked at it''s eyes. They were entirely black with a green pupil, the same sickly green he had seen in it''s blood. On the reflection of it''s eyes he could see his face. Or lack thereof a face in fact. He was still himself, however for his face there was a lack of distinguishing features, just a blank slate of white skin. What had he become? Almost as if on cue, the blue boxes appeared.
Name: Adam Freeman (???) Race: Human (Lesser Monster) Alignment: Lawful Neutral (Chaotic Evil) Class Level: N/A (???)
Strength: 9 (18) Dexterity: 11 (22) Constitution: 10 (19) Wisdom: 11 (10) Intelligence: 12 (25) Charisma: 8 (4) Spells: [Nightmare Absorbtion] Skills: [Awareness] Chat Window: Admin: Adam Freeman has connected
Chapter 2 - Awakened What was he...
[Lesser Monster]
[Chaotic Evil]
Those two terms seemed to resonate within Adam. ''"What did this mean..." he would ask himself.'' Was he both a human and a monster at the same time? Then he thought back to what had just happened. What he had done to that possum. He was a monster. Not because of what he did. Because he loved it. --- Adam was back in his room, an abode which was more or less tidy. Sprawled on the bedsheets, Adam stared at the ceiling. It was all he could do. Stare... Stare... Kill... He kept replaying the events in his mind, the terror within the possum''s eyes. The terror gradually twisting into a hatred so foul it would put Shylock to shame. The hatred coursing through the possum''s bloodstream, eventually warping it into a fell creature. The corpse at his feet, soon overlayed with that of a human. He was thinking too much. The ugly plastered ceiling of his room became the canvas of his twisted and macabre imagination. Then, a blue box was painted upon his canvas. The chat log.
Chat Log
Admin: *Congratulations Users* Admin: *You constitute among the first Terrans to become part of the ''Interrealm Management System''.* Admin: *The purpose of this system is to facilitate the growth of a realms populace in order to eventually allow it to join the Multirealm and be amongst other greater realms, such as the forsaken realms or Shadowrealm.* Admin: *The realm will significantly change with the growth of magical creatures and reagents, along with the introduction of magical disasters.* Admin: *Furthermore, other realm''s factions may impose their influence on the Terran Realm. Be advised that your alignment is representative of your true nature and thus proof of alignment is required to join a faction. Due to conflicting ideals between alignments, factions pertaining to a certain alignment will almost certainly find a certain nemesis. Provided below is an alignment table.*
Lawful Good Neutral Good Chaotic Good
Lawful Neutral True Neutral Chaotic Neutral
Lawful Evil Neutral Evil Chaotic Evil
Admin: *That is pretty much it for the introduction, as a gift for being your realms first pioneers to be selected by the system, you will all get a gift. Furthermore, it will be especially suitable for your class.* Item received: *Class Stone* Item received: *Twilight Candle*
... Adam didn''t question it anymore. He who thinks dies a regretful life. Always pondering upon a problem, as soon as they solve one, they will be preoccupied with another that takes its place. A cycle forever repeating until that mans death. More importantly, why did he get two gifts? ... So much for not asking questions anymore. Never mind, this is probably because he technically has two classes, although one of them is called ''not applicable''. Maybe he ought to thank the [Lesser Monster] inside his body for allowing him, two classes. The gift notifications disappeared and in their place were now two objects. A smooth white pearl and a short black candle. The white pearl was a very peculiar item, it was probably the so-called [Class Stone]. Upon its surface was reflected the moonlight flooding in from his open window. The black candle, however, was a different story. The design on the candle was intricate and upon the candlestick were figurines of coiled serpents carved. Eerily, the eyes of the serpents seemed to constantly be looking at him wherever he turned the candlestick. This must be the [Twilight Candle]. Having had enough of observing, Adam reached out to touch the [Class Stone]. As soon as his hand touched the stone a blinding light filled the room.
System Log
*Calibrating* *Determining Player... ID: Adam.FreehillTSYD *Determining Total Class Levels ... Error *Error override... Authorized *Determining Stats... Complete *Listing eligible classes... - Rogue - Common Grade 2 - Wizard -Common Grade 3 - Cleric -Common Grade 3 - Ranger -Common Grade 2 - Sorcerer -Common Grade 5 - Monk -Common Grade 4 - Dark Monk -Common Grade 4 - Specialised Wizard: Illusionist -Common Grade 4 - Specialised Wizard: Necromancy -Common Grade 5 - Terror Sorcerer - Uncommon Grade 5 - Terror Assassin - Uncommon Grade 4 - Terror Monk - Uncommon Grade 4 - Dark Sorcerer - Uncommon Grade 1 - Assassin - Uncommon Grade 1 *Determining most beneficial class* Choosing [Terror Sorcerer - Uncommon Grade 5] *Warning: System Override* Choosing: [Shadow Monk - Rare Grade 2]
*Level Up* -Shadow Monk Level I-
*Choose New Feats*
[Shadow Escapade] - You are being chased, the odds are insurmountable. Your pursuers chase you to a shaded alleyway. It''s a dead end. However, they find nothing there.
Profound Shadow Strike - The symbol of membership to the Order of Shadow Monks, the [Shadow Strike], is renown for its unpredictability and it''s versatility in frontal and incognito combat. However, your [Shadow Strike] is different. Whenever you form a fist, the imperceptible power of shadow gathers around it and strengthens it in many covert ways.
Shadow Meditation - Exceptional Shadow Monks may meditate on the path of Shadow. They can understand a few of the profound concepts related to shadows such as covertness, lethality and insubstantiality. Through meditation, they can gain some modicum of control over the shadows. The power of a Shadow Monk always depends on how much of their environment is composed of Shadows. However, for [Shadow Monk]''s that have this trait, the environmental advantage is magnified many times over.
Well... At least he now had a class. Not even getting into this weird system override business, it turned out he really was some kind of Dark Monk. This is fine, totally fine. Monks are a really exotic class to play because of their inability to use armour or weapons. A monk would require a really high agility in order to make up for their lost AC from being unable to wear armour. Moreover, as a melee class, they would also need a high strength ability score in order to survive melee combat. However, this shortcoming was made up for in their special abilities which would cover many miscellaneous needs. Normal monks would often have abilities to stun their opponent and overwhelm their opponent in melee combat with minimal risk of taking damage. There were also [Monk Orders] which would grant differing abilities at a certain cost or requirement such as being unable to multi-class or being locked at a certain alignment. At least this was how it worked in a certain game Adam used to play before he was ''kidnapped''. Well, if there''s doubt, the blue box is always there to help. You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
*Class: Shadow Monk*
Description: The Order of Shadow Monk is a reclusive organization within the vestiges of the civilized realms. The profoundness of the law of shadows, the main tenet of the order, only allows those of the [Chaotic Evil] alignment to train under it. The origins of the organization first began from the thirteenth disciple of [The God of Shadows], Thollius Sableskin the Drow. His devotion towards the dark goddess allowed him to found a new class. However, [The God of Shadows] betrayal towards the [Divinity] cursed herself, her Disciples and all militant, monastic and priestly orders in service to her to the Abyss. Henceforth, all members of her Church were confined to the abyss. This made all classes in relation to [The God of Shadows] be abyssal in nature, thus allowing them access to the abyssal skill tree and evolution option, however forever confining them to the abyss and be hunted by the [Divinity] whenever they set foot on the mortal plane. The Abyssal Nature of [Shadow Monk] has corrupted all the divine abilities of the class, thus making them infinitely more evil in nature. Moreover, the class evolution has been cut off from the previous ones and instead branches into the [Abyssal], [Astral] and [Demonic] trees. Feat Selection: X I: Hidden II: Shadow Meditation III: Hidden IV: Hidden V: Hidden VI: Hidden VII: Hidden VIII: Profound Shadow Fist IX: Hidden X: Shadow Escapade Class Advancement: Level I: +2d4 HP + 2, + 1 feat from a selection of 1d4, +4d10 Mana. Level II: +2d4 HP, +2d4 Mana Level III: +2d4 HP, + 1 feat from a selection of 1d4, +2d4 Mana Level IV: +2d4 HP, +2d4 Mana Level V: +2d4 HP, +2d4 Mana Level VI: +2d4 HP, + 1 feat from a selection of 1d4, +2d4 Mana Level VII: +2d4 HP, +2d4 Mana Level VIII: +2d4 HP, +2d4 Mana Level IX: +2d4 HP, + 1 feat from a selection of 1d4, +2d4 Mana Level X: +2d4 HP, + 1 feat from a selection of 1d4, +2d4 Mana Note: Lv 10 is the lv cap, after which you can choose to undertake an advancement quest. Skills: Shadow Strike I A gathering of the power of shadow within your clenched fist, increasing the overall power of the attack in the lower levels and increasing the unpredictability of the attack with Mastery. Abyssal corruption seeps from this ability. Shadow Footwork I A special movement technique unique which utilises shadows in the environment to silently move without breaking the shadow pattern of an area, thus allowing the individual to be concealed from large to mid-distance observation in the early levels. Mastery allows the user to form an optical illusion when moving, seeming to be one with the Shadow and making optical and audial detection impossible. Abyssal corruption seeps from this ability. Shadow Concentration I When casting [Shadow] spells, the concentration of the individual becomes nigh unbreakable, and the only way an opponent can stop you from casting a spell is by disabling your voice box or inflicting [Silence] upon you. Abyssal corruption gradually builds up in your body as this skill is used. Spells: Shadow Bolt I A concentration of the pure power of Shadow. Similar to other [Bolt] spells, however, this one has the added bonus of being composed of the insubstantial shadow, and thus being impossible to block through physical means. Abyssal corruption composes part of the bolt, significantly increasing damage.
''Now this was helpful.'' Everything was more or less how he expected it, except for his so-called ability to cast spells, which monks couldn''t do in games he played. Then again, this wasn''t a game. The knowledge of the skills became natural to him immediately after getting the class. Adam understood the theory behind executing each of the techniques. Spells, however... Spells were, different. They were composed of a [Magical Formula], not a mathematical formula, but rather a poetic one. It was composed of some sort of enlightenment, or understanding of a concept. As soon as he gained the class when he thought about the [Shadow Bolt], he instantly saw the lack of matter it held. The inconsequentiality of shade, the slowly creeping shadow constantly avoiding the rays of light. Then an individual gave vocal, or visual, representation of the [Magical Formula] for the spell. This would often be through some sort of chant or magic circle. Since the method would be representative of the magic formula, [Demonic] magic would often have an insidious looking magic circle that radiates blood-red radiance, or an extremely wicked chant. Whereas [Light] magic would have a comforting feeling within its magic circles and chants. This new discovery gave something to take his mind away from the late possum. Firstly he got up from his bed, it was no easy task mind you considering how messy his sheets were. He was about to try out [Shadow Footwork I] in his room, however, the amount of clothes and miscellaneous items on his floor made him rethink whether or not this would be a wise idea. Those eleven points on [Wisdom] were paying off after all. He was going to bend down in order to pick up a pile of clothes when he realised something. It was sometime around five in the morning right now, sunrise was still a long way out and his blinds were tightly shut. What Adam was trying to say, was that there was no light in his room whatsoever. Yet, he could clearly feel the outline of shapes within the darkness, the position of everything. This amount of cognitive perception went beyond mere [Awareness]. It was almost as if he had become one with the shadows, and thus knew everything about them. The peaceful harmony within this darkness of his. The unknown suddenly became his familiar friend whom he met back in primary school. It welcomed him, it embraced him. This eternal harmony, it was a peaceful atmosphere, all by himself. Were someone to disrupt this newfound friend, he would only feel slightly murderous. Adam was entranced in his epiphany, subconsciously he started exercising [Shadow Footwork I] around his room, his feet were seemingly a slow movement, but, his movement speed was moderately fast. His movements were shaky and stiff in the beginning, however, as time passed his stiff limbs became more fluid and his jerky movements became more imperceptible to the human eye. ... Adam was in marvel at his wonderful room, it had gone from being the place he slept to becoming his home. Something he never felt too strongly before, however, he now knew that this was a home. His home. Then it shattered. An intruder subtly destroyed his shadowy haven. From within a gap in the blinds, an elusive ray of light sneaked it''s way through. A single ray within the darkness, some may have found solace within it. But not Adam. Adam felt resentful, this ray of light dared to intrude upon his domain of solitude and darkness. Then something living came, a brusque hand brazenly opened the near-forgotten door to his room. His mother entered the room, sporting a scowling face, almost as if she already knew what he had done wrong, judging his every sin and dismissing his every good deed. Her mouth opened and started speaking whatever nonsense she always spoke whenever she addressed him. Adam couldn''t care less. That scowling face became the object of his resentful wrath. The scornful words coming out of her mouth her dimmed to Adam''s ears, becoming unintelligible words. No, that''s not right, he could make them out. "I hate you! How could you have done this to me!" "Jess, please understand, it hurts me too, but you don''t respect other''s feeling." Adam''s room was overlayed by an image a middle-aged man and his mother arguing. The middle-aged man held a striking resemblance to Adam. This scene was strangely familiar, so damnably familiar! ''Isn''t this scene ever so familiar, Adam'' Adam appeared next to Adam. Well, he wasn''t Adam, It was Adam. It didn''t look at all like Adam. White hair, featureless face and body, all in a sickening white shade. It may not have looked like Adam at all. However, he knew. In essence, it was Adam. No question needed to be held between them, they both just looked upon the scene before them. Adam''s father stormed out of the house, he later flung himself in front of the train that Adam usually takes to and fro work. Adam''s mother stops crying immediately after he leaves the house, she takes the handkerchief that she always carries with her, the very same one she used to dry her tears in the police station hours prior, and did the very same. Then she calmly walked over to the phone, just like it was any other day, without any sign of trepidation whatsoever. She picked it up and dialled a number, then placed the phone on her left ear and sported the most lustful smile Adam had ever seen. "Hello, sugar." Adam turned to see his other Adam. It was looking at him, he couldn''t see it from its featureless face, but he could feel it, its smile, that damnably wrathful smile. Then it''s voice echoed in his mind, it wasn''t the first time it had spoken to him he realised, he just didn''t notice before. ''Kill her, Adam'' Chapter 3 - Overcoming Murder Adam looked down at his handiwork, laying at his feet. Her corpse was mostly intact, however, that was slowly changing. A sickly green infection was rapidly spreading throughout the body. It broke down and decomposed her body, eventually making it seem as if there was nothing there. The bloodstains and detached limbs on the floor underwent the same ''decomposition'' the main corpse. No, it wasn''t that there was nothing there. It would be invisible to the naked eye, however, he could see it. He could feel it. A corruption emanating from the doorway in his room. Eternal condemnation that unspeakable sins were committed in this very place. Adam thought through what just happened. The events that unfolded just now. "Kill her, Adam" Adams body didn''t change like last time, proof that what just happened wasn''t done by the hands of ''Adam'', it was done by him. The responsibility of taking a life weighed fully upon his shoulders. Firstly, shadows imperceptibly gathered on his hand, his mouth uttering fell syllables. Then, it was simply released. Directed towards the shocked face of his mother. After that, it was over. It was messy, real messy. Adam just sort of stood there. His eyes were fixed on the spot were his mothers body had just been. ''He doesn''t know it, but his jaw is hanging wide open.'' He could now hear him, talking like some commentator in charge of his life. No, he knew what it was, it may as well be the designated commentator in charge of his life. After all he had been with him since before he could remember. No, that wasn''t right, he had been with him since he could remember. Adam instinctively knew what ''it'' was. How could he not know, in fact, he had know all this time. Since before the so-called ''second renaissance''. After all, he had conceived it. Born from his fear. Ever since his father stepped out of that door, ''it'' was always asking ''why?''. He remembered standing beneath the staircase when he witnessed that, hidden under its shadow. He remembered both of them, simply asking ''why?''. What was it all for? His mother was a ''good'' mother. She paid for his private schooling. She paid for his external tutoring. She paid for everything he ever needed and anything he ever wanted. She gave him a relaxed upbringing. However, there was always something missing. Maybe if he didn''t remember that day, he would perhaps think that joyful smile of hers was in fact genuine, or that she was a generous mother However, he did remember, he distinctly remembered the many times he was home alone, sometimes for weeks on end. Whenever she came back home, heavily scented with perfume and alcohol. Never was there a word of greetings, it was a cold life between the two of them. It was such that the house was constantly pervaded by an unsettled atmosphere, as if some choking event could occur at any moment. Well, now he was here, and she was gone. This seemed to lift a great weight off his heart, only to be replaced by another. This wasn''t the guilt of taking a life. It was worry over the consequences. ''He should probably forge some sort of alibi in case the police came knocking on his door. Maybe he should go to the police station and file a missing person report.'' Adam walked downstairs and served himself a bowl of cereal, the blinds were wide open in the living room and the rays of the morning sun flooded in. It no longer picked at Adam''s psyche, however the light was still annoying so he closed the blinds and sat down on a half dilapidated couch from yesteryear. ''His mother frequently left the house and left him by himself, maybe he could say that the same thing happened now, except that she never came back.'' Adam enjoyed the cereal in the dimly lit living room, gazing at the familiar scenery of his living room. The ceiling was plastered, giving a gritty concrete texture. The walls were completely bare save for the white wallpaper and a framed black-and-white portrait of his father and mother during their wedding. The portrait was aged, the edges of the picture slightly yellowed. His father had a beaming expression, whereas his mother had the same expression she always has when out in public. With very prominently curved lips. ''If that''s going to be my story, then I should wait a couple weeks before filing the missing person report. That way I can make it seem like this is just like any other of those times when she leaves.'' The furniture in the room was old and dilapidated. A coffee table with a taped up leg, an old TV, a rugged Persian mat. An inconspicuous brown carpet covered the flooring of the room, littered with the occasional coffee stain or two. ''That will be good since the police will have no choice but to believe me. I have no apparent motive, there is no corpse to perform an autopsy on and she only works as a casual. It would be suspicious if I were to email the convenience store about my mother not going to work anymore. This way I can make it look like she got up and left one day.'' Adam finished eating his cereal and he went up the stairs and opened the door into his mothers room. He never remembered going inside it actually, the last time he saw it was back when his father died. The bed was neatly done up on a corner of the room. A makeup cabinet on the other side held some baubles such as a necklace or some earrings. Her handbag strung over the chair to that cabinet. The only other feature of worth was a window looking out to the street. They... He lived in a townhouse so it wasn''t all that spacious compared to the typical Australian dwelling. Well, it was probably time to get to work. He opened up his late mothers hand bag and went through the items inside, a smartphone, a padded wallet, a drivers license, some cosmetics and a deodorant. It wouldn''t matter if he went through these types of things since they were personal items that she would have taken with her if she went out. He got out about three quarters of the cash in the wallet and placed them it on the coffee table, then he took out a piece of paper from his study and wrote a note using his mother''s handwriting. It wasn''t too difficult, before his father died, his mother made sure to teach him how to write. He was only too familiar with how her writing looked.This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. ''Adam, I''ll be gone for a while, expect me back in a couple months. On the table I left enough money for a week or so, as for the rest, you''ll have to depend on your own savings.'' - Mother It was crucial that this note looked as realistic as possible since it would probably end up in the hands of the police at some point. The handwriting had to be perfect, however, fingerprints wouldn''t matter too much since he could reasonably claim that he picked up the letter while reading it. After that he got a thick black garbage bag and dumped the handbag alongside a few items of clothing into it. Then he filled the top of the bag with the general rubbish in his household. The result was the typical, albeit slightly larger, household garbage produced in a day. Adam stepped out while holding the garbage bag as far away from himself as possible. It was already daylight and a few people in business attire were headed for work, along with the occasional school uniform in the crowd. Adam dumped the black bag inside the general rubbish bin. Flawlessly. If Adam could see ''Adam'' right now, he would find him to be smiling approvingly, somehow, even without a mouth. Once Adam was inside the house he collapsed on his bed. He wasn''t physically tired, however he was emotionally exhausted. He detested his mother, however did that alone warrant her death? He decided not to think about it. His mind turned towards his school life. What day was it today? He was kidnapped on a Thursday, and it had been a week since then, it should be a Friday. Should he go to school? Would someone that had been kidnapped return to school on the first day? Adam sighed, he was getting paranoid, too careful. If he heard sirens he would probably tense up. School wasn''t all that bad, before it was an escape from his house, moreover it didn''t demand much apart from consistent effort. His friends weren''t half bad either. Adam looked at the time, 8:45. Would the school accept being busy covering up a crime scene as a legitimate excuse for being late? Well, he would go anyway, he''ll just tell them he overslept from being exhausted from ''traumatic events''. Well, now that wouldn''t be too far from the truth. Would murdering one''s own mother be considered a ''traumatic event''. Adam put on his uniform and readied his stationary. Then he stepped out through the front door. There was only about two people on his street. Both of them heading to work. Minding their own business. Adam walked a couple blocks to the train station, slowly the streets started filling up with people until there were a few dozen people in Adam''s vicinity. The sun was shining overhead and heating up the asphalt on the road. Adam''s shirt was slowly getting wet since it was between his back and his bag. The people around Adam were directing their gazes on the lights, waiting for the green man. Adam felt, detached. Everyone had that same boring look on their faces, focused on living life. He felt like he couldn''t pretend to be amongst them. He felt like he stuck out like a sore thumb, almost as if he was advertising that he was a killer. The lights changed and everyone started walking. Adam was still in the sidewalk, in his own daydream, only reacting about a couple seconds after everyone had already started crossing. Adam eventually got to the train station. It was underground and very well ventilated, much to his relief. However, the people that Adam saw were the same, innocent. Yet he was guilty. It sort of ticked him off, what was the difference. A clear conscience was just that, everyone else had one. Why couldn''t he find his own inner peace? Adam tapped his Opal1 into the entrance to the train station, only to be met with ''insufficient funds''. That''s right, he never tapped off last Thursday, therefore all the money in his account would have been spent. He would have to walk then, it was only a thirty minute walk after all. Adam was a local to the area so instead of taking the busy thoroughfares, he took shortcuts through the national reserves and small parks. He was walking past a secluded and unremarkable park when he saw an unusual woman on the swing in the playground. She was completely white. She donned some sort of white jumpsuit with white metal plating acting as greaves and bracers. Her hair was thoroughly white, unlike the white hair of ''Adam'', instead of unnerving someone it would entrance them. She carried nothing on her apart from her person, which was strange at this time. Adam would call her a cosplayer or such, except she felt too natural to be wearing a costume. It almost felt as if she was completely comfortable wearing such a strange attire in public. Well, what did that matter to him. He had bigger matters to worry about. He eventually made it to the school. He entered through the back entrance and signed in at the office. The school was relatively big so the office workers didn''t recognise him. Strangely they told him he was marked down for leave so he wasn''t issued a detention. ''Well, his school isn''t half bad. They probably got word from the police about my missing status.'' The hallways of the school were empty since it was the middle of class time, therefore Adam quickly made his way to English class. When he entered through the front door his classmates and teacher were slightly surprised. They clearly didn''t expect him anytime soon. The teacher quickly approached Adam. "Well Adam, we didn''t expect to see you here today. Are you sure you should be at school?" "I''m fine sir, I had a good nights rest yesterday so I feel ready to resume school." Even Adam himself was surprised at how he lied straight through his face without even a change in tone. "Well, if you feel fine then, you may take a seat next to Caleb." Caleb? There''s no-one that goes by that name in this class? Adam turned around and was going towards his usual seat, only to find it occupied. Occupied by a short, pudgy faced teen with ginger hair. This guy must be Caleb, probably at least, since he didn''t remember him at all. Well, this guy was sitting where he usually sat, that was a quite bad first impression, through no fault of his own of course, but it irked him off. A break in the routine. Then again, his routine wouldn''t really be the same after today. Adam sat down next to Caleb and the lesson continued on. It was an analysis about creative writing techniques, which Adam couldn''t care less about. The Caleb looked at him and nudged him in the shoulder. "Psst, hey, are you a fan of [The White Vigil]?" Adam turned to look at him with a puzzled and slightly annoyed expression, ''this guy, why is he talking to me?'' "Sorry?" "[The White Vigil], you know, that vigilante group composed of awakened individuals from the [Chaotic Good] alignment. The ones that smite evildoers and beasts which threaten mankind, I heard that there are a couple of them living near this area." A vigilante group composed solely of [Chaotic Good] people, moreover apparently given free reign by the authorities, Adam couldn''t help but feel the nape of his neck slightly shiver when he connected these dots together. What sane government would give vigilantes free reign, they must co-operate with the police in this case, surely? Just as Adam was making this slightly frightening revelation, a scream was heard in the campus, followed by a few other screams, then followed by the lockdown bell. Usually when this bell rang the class would erupt into a hubbub of conversation, taking their sweet time to get under the desk. However, this time the entire class was silent, not solely as a result of the screams but it also seemed as if it wasn''t their first time experiencing this. Then the screams suddenly stopped, by this point the faces of the students and the teacher were completely ashen, some people in the room outright fainted. For a while nothing happened, all that could be heard was Adams own heartbeat and the rapid breathing of Caleb next to him. Then, they heard it. A scratching sound on the door to the room. Nobody in the classroom dared to move. Then the scratching of the door suddenly stopped. The teacher took back his breath and slightly sighed, then the door was smashed apart. It flew in through the front door. It looked like a magpie. However, it was bigger, much bigger. It stood at about two metres tall, its feathers looked incredibly resilient and the talons were completely black, gleaming in the dimly lit classroom. Overall, it looked quite terrifying. Adam was fairly confident he could kill it though. He distinctly remembered the strength of his [Shadow Bolt I] when he used it earlier that morning, it directly distorted through any physical items of the opponent and tore apart their insides. Therefore the armoured feathers of the evolved magpie would do jack to stop him from killing it. Adam concentrated the shadows around him into his left hand, the room was very dimly lit and he was only one amongst the crowd. The environment was to his advantage and the magpie would likely not target him first, despite having no combat experience, all he needed to do was shoot it when it was distracted. Surely that wouldn''t be too difficult. Then, the unexpected happened. A white whirlwind charged in from the doorway and smashed into the magpie, directly shattering its skull into a few dozen pieces. That was quite the feat considering that the feathers around the magpie''s head looked the strongest and Adam estimated their defensive strength to be equal to that of steel plates. Maybe he could kill the magpie, but he couldn''t kill ''this''. Then, the whirlwind dissapeared, and in its place stood a young woman. The same woman that he saw in the park earlier that day, she stood in front of the classroom and sported a magnificent smile. Adam didn''t like that smile, it was too perfect, too much like a certain someone he used to know. The entire class was silent, they were all shocked. They didn''t break out in a cheer or profusely thank this hero, they just stood still and in shock. Nobody was brave enough to move after seeing this. Then, someone stood up. It was Caleb. He pudgy figure stood out in front of the classroom, the upper pant of his clothing could be distinctly seen to be wet. He was trying to talk but he ended up constantly stuttering. Then he took a big gulp and finally said something. "A-are you from [The White Vigil]?" The young women smiled even brighter and responded in a melodic tone. "Yes, junior member Sera of [The White Vigil] ... Chapter 4 - The White Vigil Bares its Fangs [The White Vigil] ''What sort of joke is this?'' ''Of course there would be a bunch of awakened vigilantes, there simply had to be when the world went to shit.'' Adam set his bag down on the aged bench in a park on the way home. School was cancelled for the rest of the week due to the monster attack. Adam thought it should have been longer but apparently monster attacks were considered too common nowadays. Adam didn''t think that society had suffered such a huge hit from the increased ferocity of the wildlife. Adam could now understand why the government let the vigilantes have free reign, they didn''t have a choice. Considering the amount of good this group was contributing to society, the amount of backlash the government would receive for illegalising this group couldn''t possibly be tolerated by the government. Adam could see it now, this world was going to slowly becoming a world ruled by the awakened. It had only been a week since the first awakened appeared and yet the factions already held this much influence and sway over society. Now that Adam was thinking about how ineffective the government was at controlling the situation, he was quite surprised the police found him at all in the forest. The forest was quite large and easily covered a few thousand acres. It was also quite lucky that he wasn''t attacked by any monsters while inside the forest. It was almost as if they were specifically looking for him, not just for the missing person report but for another reason. ''Wait, missing person report.'' How could he have missed it, it was right in front of him and he had been thinking about the subject for quite a long time, yet he couldn''t see it all this time. His mother wouldn''t have taken the time to file the missing person report. If not her, then who did? Adam decidedly got up from the bench with a start and turned around, now headed towards the police station. He caught from the corner of his eye a man who was startled at his sudden movement. He was wearing a blue business attire with a red tie, now that he thought about it he saw this guy walking outside his house when he left for school. He probably lived nearby where he lived. Or maybe... He was being followed. Adam took in his face for the split second in which he was startled. He had a neat complexion, lightly tanned skin, a stubble forming on his chin, lightly combed-over black hair and wearing circular glasses with a blue rim. Overall he looked like a young office worker. Adam took action within that split second, he casually put on his bag and headed towards the police station. ''Should he go to the police station, if he really was being followed, who could it be?'' Could it be the government, could they have discovered his recent murder, or could they have connected him to the murder of Sarah, like Officer Harvey told him in the car before leaving? No, it couldn''t be just because of this, the police force has many bigger matters to care of rather than looking into the singular murder of an individual. The amount of unrest caused by the recent monster attacks would have the police force distracted. They should pay much less attention to crimes caused by individuals or they may ignore them entirely. Adam decided to take a detour to the police station and pass by the abandoned part of town, in order to hopefully confront whoever was following him. If he confronted them, he would alert whatever organisation was after him, however, it would be worth it to gleam some information on whoever was following him. Chances were that there wouldn''t be any risk to his life since he was an awakened, even most small arms didn''t have destructive power comparable to his shadow bolt. Adam had reached a suburban district afflicted with urban decay. Surrounding him, were relatively tall abandoned factories whose walls were covered in graffiti. It was completely abandoned. The time was five o''clock, the sun was hanging over the horizon, casting the shadows of the facilities upon the concrete pavement. It felt strangely comfortable, yet there was an aura of suspense within the air. This was the place, secluded and sufficiently away from society. If those following him were going to act against him anytime soon, they would do so here. Adam went inside one of the buildings, it was very dimly lit from the translucent wall panels near the ceiling of the building. Now that he was in here, his advantage would be maximised in combat, even if the enemy had a gun, they would not be able to get a shot off before he struck from the shadows. Actually, the police knew where he lived, they could have confronted him at any time, then were they just monitoring his movements? Adam was about to step out from behind a container and continue his way to the police station when he heard a single step. A single one. The sound of the step resounded throughout the silent factory. Then another step was taken. Followed by another. Adam took a peek at whoever was taking these steps from the shadows. There was a man. He was middle-aged, however, his hair was already whitened. His complexion was relatively rough, not someone to be messed with. Squinting eyes, on the lookout for him. However what was most surprising to Adam wasn''t this man''s fearsome looks, but rather his clothing. Or more specifically, uniform. A uniform from [The White Vigil]. Same as the suit he had seen on Sera, a complete jumpsuit with metallic greaves and bracers coloured white. The only difference was that this one had an armband around his right arm depicting a white sword and a crescent upon a black background. At his waist was a cavalry sabre, yet again completely white. This man let out an aura of righteousness and conviction which Adam found completely suffocating. There wasn''t even a need to ask him. He knew. This man was out to get him. Somehow, they found out, and now they were out for blood. The man stopped in the centre of the warehouse, a fair way away from Adam. Meanwhile Adam was slowly making his way out of the warehouse. He knew that he first came here in order to confront whomever was following him, however, this guy was just a tad too intimidating. When he was about to take his next step however, the man spoke. "[Detect Evil]" A small wave of light pulsed off from the man and spread throughout the warehouse. For a while, nothing happened. Then, some red lights started appearing on the floor, they were his footprints, and they were headed straight towards him. The man turned to look at him, however surprise flashed across his eyes once he saw him. "This is... unexpected." He slowly stated. "At first, I thought you were a monster, simply going off by the amount of evil that pervades you." "However, you are a man. A human, like me." This... Man, was walking towards Adam. Is this how he found Adam, this ''[Detect Evil]'' spell? No evidence of a crime committed. No witnesses to testify against him. His solemn words against someone''s speculations. And yet this spell simply spelled the word guilty. This was unfair. No, this must probably be karma. ''Karma''s a bitch'' The man kept walking towards Adam, should he make a break for it, he was quite young whereas this man seemed middle-aged. He should be able to outrun him. Maybe I could gleam some information from him? "Stop there." Adam warned the man in a surprisingly low voice. The man stopped, although seemingly not from his warning but rather his own will. "Now, what are you?" He asked me, in a completely flat tone. ''What?'' I thought. "What?" I responded. Even as he was speaking he drew his sabre and swung it in an overhead blow towards me, all within a split second. I was distracted from his question and didn''t have much time to think. In the end I used [Shadow Footwork I] to sidestep the attack towards the right.This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it. The man continued talking as he kept swinging his sabre in my direction with considerable skill. The strength, precision and skill behind each blow was impressive to say the least, it would realistically cut straight through sheet metal with that strength. "Your aura is so malevolent, I simply refuse to believe you were once a human like me. Even if you are a human, this sabre of mine will cease your evil existence." Adam once again dodged using [Shadow Footwork I], his movements themselves weren''t half bad, however he didn''t have any combat experience or instincts whatsoever. He was barely hanging on whilst pulling off some acrobatic manoeuvres which Adam never thought would be possible for him to accomplish, in fact, were it not for him practicing [Shadow Footwork] all night he probably would have been cut down by now. [Shadow Footwork I] has been upgraded to [Shadow Footwork II] Immediately, Adam saw another level of smoothness to his movements that he couldn''t achieve before. However, if things went on as they were, it would only be a matter of time before he was taken down. Adam saw that the man didn''t seem to have a footwork skill, only a skill with which to strike. Therefore he decided to take a risk and change up the battlefield. Within that split second, Adam came up with plan to kill this man before him, and a plan after that in case the first failed. Adam pulled off a backflip and momentarily disengaged from combat, only to land atop a box, from whence he scrambled up a mountain of empty crates. The peak of the crates reached up to the steel scaffolding of the factory, which luckily didn''t have any safety railing, therefore his plan B would have a higher chance of succeeding. Once Adam made his way atop the scaffolding, he slightly staggered when he looked down, almost falling off but catching himself on the floor of the scaffolding. The floor was so far away that his eyes formed tunnel vision from looking down, he estimated the height to be around twenty metres. If someone fell from this height, they would die, no matter the circumstances. Adam gathered his nerves and steeled his resolve, he hid behind a part of the steel scaffolding and peered through a gap in-between to spy upon the vigilante. He was about three quarters of the way up the mountain of crates, his plan might work. A shadow bolt formed in his hands and Adam readied himself to take another life this day. He willed the bolt forwards, and it flew truly towards the vigilante. Could it be this easy, that man seemed like a hardened veteran. Were it not for his footwork, he would have been slain by now. Quickly, the shadow bolt struck the back of the vigilante, however, unlike the shower of blood he expected, a barrier of light seemed to form behind his back and blocked the bolt. The vigilante did stagger slightly forwards, another curious thing Adam noted was that a blue bar formed in the corner of his vision. It had about a sixth of it gone and detailed a twenty-seven over thirty-two, it was probably his mana bar. The vigilante seemed shocked at the attack and strength from the shadow bolt, his eyes constricted as he put up his guard. Adam sighed at his failed attempt to outright murder him, that light barrier must be some sort of magical defence. However, Adam wasn''t at the end of his rope yet. While the vigilante was climbing up, instead of continuing to probe him, Adam practiced [Shadow Strike] for the first time. Similar to Shadow Bolt, he gathered shadows on a part of his body, however, instead of willing the bolt to fly towards his opponent, he struck the metal scaffolding with his fist. A loud thump sounded, he would need to switch hiding spots after this but that wasn''t a problem. Instead the fist shaped imprint in the steel spelled good new for him. Adam hurried towards an ambush spot in the scaffolding with a good view of the vigilante climbing the mountain of crates. Adam also tried applying [Shadow Strike] to his feet and it worked quite well, now it would take a bit of luck to implement plan B. Afterwards, Adam turned his attention towards the vigilante. He was almost upon the top of the mountain of crates. Adam quietly armed two shadow bolts in both hands, the mental strain of losing almost half his mana was made apparent in the dulling of his sense. Adam started to feel real tired, however, he persevered. He aimed one of the bolts towards the handhold which the vigilante would most likely reach for, the other one aimed towards the box under him. With luck, the vigilante, deprived of his foot and handholds, would topple down the mountain of crates. With a twenty metre tumble, at least he would suffer a couple broken bones, at best he would break his spine and render him incapable of movement. Either way, it would only be beneficial for him. Then, the promised moment finally came, the vigilante was finally atop the mountain of crates and reaching towards the scaffolding, however, instead of going to hold the handhold that Adam had aimed for, the vigilante leant towards the side, in an attempt to do some sort of somersault around the scaffolding. Panicked, Adam threw both shadow bolts. The first one hit the crate just as he planned before. However, the vigilante had already jumped off by the time it hit the crate. The second one was rapidly redirected by Adam towards the vigilante himself. Although it wouldn''t cause any damage, the ballistic shock would be enough to nudge his body, possibly foiling his manoeuvre and sending him plummeting to his death. Time seemed to slow as the shadow bolt flew towards the vigilante. It veered of course from his torso, however it aimed at somewhere even better. One of the arms latched towards the scaffolding. The vigilante seemed to notice the bolt approaching his arm, his eyes flashed with unwillingness to die in this place. ''If you hadn''t come here seeking your death, I would have left you alone.'' The bolt struck true, the grip of the right arm was blown right off, even if it didn''t cause any apparent damage, the loss of balance from the vigilante would have been fatal. Once his arm was blown completely off, the vigilante''s right arm was desperately latched towards the scaffolding, his face showing an unsightly expression, however, that soon disappeared and was replaced with an unyielding resolve. His right arm, which was desperately latched towards the scaffolding, suddenly burst forth with an amount of energy a man is only capable of exerting in the face of death. His right arm twisted unnaturally as it thrust his torso above the scaffolding and above it. The vigilante landed heavily atop the scaffolding. His chest heaved up and down while wheezing sounds emerged from his throat. Adam had to admit, he had to take of his hat in respect to this guy for pulling that off. Well, it also meant something else. Plan A failed. Time to execute plan B. Shadow Bolts from a distance wouldn''t penetrate his magical armour, however they couldn''t prevent the kinetic force from the attack from pushing him. This would prove his downfall. Adam hid behind some of the scaffolding, undetectable within the shadows. The vigilante was walking along the treacherous scaffolding, his right hand hanging uselessly by his side while his left hand firmly held the sabre. He probably pulled some tendons on his right arm when pulling off that stunt, leaving his arm worthless for the rest of the fight. If Adam knew how to fight in unarmed combat, he estimated he would be at an advantage in a head to head fight right now. However, Adam didn''t know how to fight with his bare hands. He didn''t know any martial disciplines with which to draw reference from either, all he knew was [Shadow Footwork], however that only contained knowledge on the stance and footwork of an individual. This meant that Adam had to find an opportunity to ambush him, no matter how terribly positioned or postured his attack was, with the power of [Shadow Strike] and the element of surprise, he was sure to at least land a hit that would knock him off balance and send him down towards his death. The vigilante was pacing around the scaffolding warily. The knuckles of his left hand were completely white in their grip of the sabre. His paces were slow and steady, exceedingly vigilant. The clack of his metal greaves upon the steel scaffolding made a constant and sharp sound. Rapidly becoming a rhythm that set the tempo of the combat. Adams heartbeat aligned itself to the timing of those footsteps, his pulse becoming sharp. His senses were magnified to their extreme, beyond the limits of the usual [Awareness]. He extended his sixth sense to encompass the entirety of the vicinity. He could feel the age in the rusted metal mesh beneath his feet, the drops of sweat forming on the back of the vigilantes neck and the adrenalin rushing through his aged body. He could feel himself standing shoulder to shoulder with someone, with himself, with ''Adam''. Their respective figures superimposed within his mind, ''Adam'' was whispering to him, the secrets of combat. No, this wasn''t combat. This was the secrets of the hunt. A terrifying hunt which revelled in the despair of the prey. The vigilante was turning the corner, although he was vigilant he failed to notice Adam beside the rusted scaffolding. His back was completely exposed towards him. The poise that man held was extremely peculiar, his back was semi-coiled, as if ready to strike out at a moments notice. His breathing was becoming rushed and his eyes were frantically searching all around his surroundings, almost as if he knew that he was somewhere next to him. ''Adam'' was whispering to him. It told him, the time was now. It guided his feet to swiftly stalk forwards, he was directly behind the vigilante by this point. ''Adam'' was guiding the shadows around him towards his fist and his right foot, eventually reaching the maximum amount of shadow he could compress around his body. Adam felt this effect was too great for his level of [Shadow Strike I], this must have been [II Shadow Meditation] coming into play. Then, it told him to strike, and he did. His fist was heading towards the nape of the vigilante''s neck. It was glistening wet in the dim light of the warehouse, the beads of sweat had merged to form a layer of sweat covering his skin by this point. His fist was sent smashing straight into it, then the light shield appeared to save the vigilante''s life. With the light shield in place, his vertebrae managed to survive being outright broken, however, he still suffered great shock from being struck there and stumbled forwards. This was the moment that ''Adam'' was waiting for, his right foot extended outwards and crushed towards the vigilante''s right ankle, which was the one closest to Adam at that point. With his ankle crushed, the vigilante lost all strength in his legs and fell down through the scaffolding, he was about to cleanly fall through when his right hand caught onto Adams ankle at the last possible moment. Adams heart skipped a beat, however it was lucky for him that the vigilante used his right hand to hold onto his ankle. With the broken tendons in his right arm, the man couldn''t exert enough force to firmly grip his ankle and the only result his willpower got him was a pitiful cry of pain. As the vigilante''s hand slipped off the railing, he plummeted the height of twenty metres. Perhaps luckily, or unluckily, the man happened to fall onto a broken off piece of rebar pointing upwards, effectively impaling. The shield of light wasn''t much good at this point and the man was impaled through the heart, instantly killing him. Adam took a moment to look upon his corpse. It was arched backwards from the point in the heart, through which the rebar penetrated straight through. The corpse slid down about halfway through the rebar before it eventually stopped at about three metres above the ground. Adam had once again taken a life, not even twelve hours since taking his first. ''Perhaps, people around him simply had a knack for dying.'' He mused to himself with a wry grin. However, in all seriousness, this wasn''t at all like the first time he killed. This felt significantly different. He felt more natural, as if it was the natural order of things. He didn''t even revel in the joy of surviving a harsh fight, rather, he was already thinking of how to make his tracks disappear from the crime scene. Adam was already facing himself with several choices, to disguise the scene as a monster attack or to hide the corpse so as to force the police and [The White Vigil] to treat this as a missing person case rather than a murder. Both sides had their advantages and disadvantages. For example were he to hide the corpse Adam would gain a chance to loot the body, whereas if he disguised it as a monster attack, he would have to leave the vigilante''s weapons and whatever caused that white light to come out, however, in exchange he would be able to wipe clean the traces of his involvement in this incident. Adam decided to see what the vigilante had on him before making any decisions. He took the vigilante''s armband and wrapped it around his hands before touching anything which he might leave at the scene. Firstly he looked at the man''s sabre. It resembled a sabre which one would find in a light cavalry division during the Napoleonic Wars, the hilt and scabbard were completely white with the guard being intricately fashioned in the style of a French rapier. Otherwise it seemed to be a completely normal sabre. Adam immediately decided to leave it behind since there wasn''t anything special about it and he didn''t have any safe connections to sell stolen goods to. Further search of the body proved useless apart from the presence of some sort of glass crystal in the shape of a sphere. It was very peculiar since no impurities could be seen within it. Adam reached out to touch the mysterious crystal. The moment that his hand made contact with the surface of the crystal ball, a series of notifications and windows appeared within Adam''s vision.
[The White Vigil] Christopher Ford, Hunter [DECEASED]
Shield Energy: 0/100 Location: 264719379017 Mission: Exterminate evil precence(s) within the local area. Reward: 100 - 30,000 contribution points
''This... looked like some sort of ID of [The White Vigil] faction.'' Wait, there were more notifications in the corner of his screen.
*Level Up* Shadow Monk lv II *Level up delayed until end of combat*
''Until end of combat?'' Adam thought over why it still said this if he had already killed the vigilante. "Well, well, well. What have you got there, Adam." A lively voice called out from behind him, shocking Adam not only because he was found at the crime scene, but because they knew his name. Turning around as quickly as he could, he saw a silhouetted figure against the entrance of the factory. From the outline could be made out the figure of a trench coat, as well as the gleam of a pair of glasses and a wickedly twisted smile. Chapter 5 - Names Wesley, Leo Wesley The man in the trench coat slowly walked towards Adam. His pace was similar to a carefree swagger in his own neighbourhood. Adam could now see the mans facial features and complexion. His face sported a black goatee and black hair blasted back1. His trench coat was the typical light brown colour and he was wearing matching pants and shoes. He was wearing some rectangular Ray-Ban glasses which glistened in the dim lighting of the factory. His left cheek had an ugly scar running from the chin to the glasses he was wearing. This meant that the scar went right through the left corner of his mouth, hence he described this mans smile as ''wickedly twisted''. This man had reached Adam by this point, stopping about a metre in front of him. He simply stood there, sporting his wicked smile as he sized up Adam from top to bottom. Adam started getting uncomfortable, there was definitely more to this man than first met the eye. Firstly, he knew his name. Secondly, he was right in front of him, almost as if he knew he would show up here. Then again, it was probably the aura that this guy exuded. It practically screamed ''Crooked Cop!''. As if done sizing Adam up, the man got out his wallet and showed the inner side to Adam. "My name''s Leo Wesley. Commander Leo Wesley." The man briefly informed in a gruff and low tone while waving his Australian Federal Police officer ID in front of Adam as if it was an old toy. The officer then continued, not even giving space for Adam to query his sudden intrusion into his most recent crime scene literally seconds after it had been committed. "Now you see matey, you''re in a bit of a pickle here." Commander Wesley looked Adam in the eye in the same manner an uncle would reprimand his nephew. "You seem to have upset the order of things lately, and [The White Vigil] seem to be paying a certain amount of attention to the actions a certain little friend of mine is currently undertaking." Commander Wesley gave a little pause for effect. "Now you see Adam, if [The White Vigil] were to hear news from a certain little bird I know that you''ve been here causing a ruckus and enjoying your usual activities then they wouldn''t exactly take this lying down." The Commander gestured to Christopher''s corpse with a little smirk. Adam unsurprisingly started to feel threatened. That feeling when you are being backed into a corner, with [Awareness] Adam could find many shifting shadows in the corners of the factory, no doubt wielding various small arms, pointed at him doubtlessly. This... Man. Adam couldn''t get a measure of him. Commander Wesley seemed to generate a threatening atmosphere by merely smiling, the kind of smile you have when you have finally relieved a thorn by your side that had been present for far too long. "What... Do you want?" Adam spewed these words from his clenched teeth, he was scared. He feared what this man could do to him. Commander Wesley raised his eyebrows at my question, then casually pointed at a certain part on his ID that seemed quite conspicuous. Adam swallowed the saliva that had formed in the back of his throat and spoke again, this time much more naturally. "What do you want, Commander." A light had formed within Adams eyes, he had already decided that he didn''t like this guy. Commander Wesley seemed to not notice anything and continued with an extremely righteous tone. "Now, whoever murdered this man before us must be an evildoer beyond saving." "However, how shocked would the community be if they discovered the killer to be another righteous faction. Say the [Night Watchmen] were found to have committed a series of murders against members of [The White Vigil]." "Wouldn''t the two factions go to war, irrespective of the governments authority?" An evil glint could be spotted in the corner of Wesley''s glasses as he performed his villainous soliloquy. However, what did they need Adam for? "Now, your part in this is very special. [The White Vigil] already knows you as someone whom has killed various of their members. If they link your appearance to the [Night Watchmen] then it will only be mere moments before an all out war is sparked between the two factions of good alignment. ''Various? What?'' Adam was confused when he heard the Commander claim that he had killed many other members of [The White Vigil]. However he just went along with it for now. "Now, I believe that you will go along with what we say for now, won''t you, Adam?" Commander Wesley stated since he already knew the answer. Of course, that was the only answer which Adam could give at gunpoint. ... The Commander had ''offered'' to escort Adam home, and ''offer'' which he ''gratefully accepted''. On the way home, Wesley told many thing to Adam regarding the task the AFP would assign unto him, his responsibilities and the reward which would eventually come to him with the completion of the mission. The ID cards of [The White Vigil] members were tracked by their organisation, thus Adam left all the gear from the vigilante in the factory, which was left to the AFP to clean up. Adam also learnt a lot more about the state of the world after [The Second Renaissance]. Firstly, Adams speculations were right. In fact, they were far too conservative. In developing countries which the government didn''t command prestige from the populace, factions and awakened organisations had already become the ultimate power there. This led to the rise of countless city states which weren''t recognised by the current world powers. The situation was such that even in Russia, many provinces had ceded independence, although they were only the regions which had almost non-existent infrastructure rather than key industrial regions, they still managed to threaten the status of Russia as the biggest country in the world. The fighting in the middle east had escalated out of control, forcing the UN peacekeeping forces there to be withdrawn by their respective countries. Thus after a week of fighting the regions insurgent and militia forces had fallen and the lawful evil faction [Enter Sandman] had established de facto control.If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. The entirety of Africa had almost lost all semblance of governance with awakened warlords redefining the geopolitical borders within the continent, only a few stronger countries managing to maintain most of their strength against the turmoil such as South Africa, Egypt and Ethiopia. With Algeria and Nigeria having already seceded into multiple city states. Southeast Asia managed to roughly maintain its semblance of governance, this was only possible with nations like Australia, China and Indonesia directly influencing the running of the other countries to the point of deploying their troops in their soil for peacekeeping, thus these three countries became the biggest players in Southeast Asia. However, the evil awakened organisations and factions had been driven to piracy within the region, thus establishing various pirate fleets and essentially cutting off trade to the rest of the western world. This hadn''t shown many effects thus far, however, since trade with China had become nigh impossible, the prices for many common goods would skyrocket in the west. In Asia, China and N. Korea had managed to quell separatist movements because of their experience in quelling dissidents in the past. However it was a bloody affair and both countries were under fire by the international community. S. Korea and Japan were undergoing a certain amount of turmoil, however their society still functions normally as before. Eastern Russia is basically a conglomerate of allied states collectively referred to as ''Svobodnaya Kommuna'' - The Free Commune. More to the West, looking towards India. Considering the socio-economic situation in India, one would expect it to immediately fragment into anarchy, however a lawful good faction [The Golden Palm] which backed the government gained public support and steadied the country to become the most powerful country west of the Himalayas and East of Turkey. South America was currently in the middle of an all out war. When the awakening first happened, the leader of Brazil had become corrupted by a devil from a lawful evil faction and led Brazil in a conquest of South America. Argentina was the first country to be annexed because they were unable to mobilise their troops in time to respond to the Brazilian advance, this was due to them taking advantage of the corruption within the Argentinian bureaucracy and bribing several key officers. The rest of the countries in South America, in emergency, formed the South American Union. The frontlines were fought by Chile, Bolivia and Peru. Thus the union was led by these three countries. The union also gathered the support of the lawful neutral faction [Scales of Balance]. The war was currently well underway and hadn''t gathered any international intervention because of the events happening with the awakening. In Central America, the drug cartels immediately got a hold of awakened troops and supplanted the government. This resulted in the lack of bureaucracy within the region and the creation of a drug haven. The drug trade is currently in full operation with estimates that around a quarter of the nation''s population is currently involved within the actual production and smuggling of drugs. In North America, the United States allowed the awakened organisations free reign in return for keeping to lawful activities. This policy has so far been effective in keeping the country together, however, there is intra-faction violence between factions daily on the streets. The situation has basically swept out of control for the law enforcement to do anything by themselves. In Canada the emergence of a neutral evil faction [Winter Knights] has terrorised the populace. Managing to raid various outlying villages and towns, the group had already demonstrated their effectiveness in evading government forces and suppressing the growth of other factions. In fact, the reach of the [Winter Knights] was rumoured to have spread from Alaska, since no news had reached the public regarding the Alaskan state, moreover, nobody could contact anyone living in Alaska. It almost seemed as if all the people in Alaska disappeared. In Australia, the situation didn''t differ. Under pressure from monster attacks and the evil factions, the government had succumbed to allowing awakened factions free reign. The strength of the factions differed but on the east coast, the biggest factions were [The White Vigil] and the [Night Watchmen]. They had gathered enough support from the public as for them to support their vigilante actions, despite their harm to a peaceful society. The armed forces were fully deployed within Australia, this meant that the reservists were also forced to maintain the peace within Australia. The fact that monster attacks happened despite this was reason enough to warrant the need for awakened factions to control the amount of monsters. However, the government wasn''t satisfied with the growing influence from factions and thus established ''Operation Monarch''. This was were Adam fit in. He was meant to engage with a group of vigilantes from [The White Vigil] while they were training their new recruits. The plan after this was to let a few of the recruits escape ''accidentally'' while the AFP would plant evidence within the scene that it was the [Night Watchmen] were responsible for the attack. Adam also learnt that Commander Wesley was the one in charge within the AFP in regards to handling the awakened organisation and factions. This clearly demonstrated the governments stance towards these organisations thus far. The convoy of black cars had finally reached Adam''s residence by this point. Before going into his house, the commander stopped Adam. He handed him a brown envelope with a little smirk. "This is just a taste for things to come, Adam. It pays to be our friend." ---- As soon as Adam stepped through the door to his house, the smile on Wesley was wiped off his face, only to be replaced by a very serious expression. The agents nearby the commander also sighed with relief, as if they had just managed to preserve their lives by the skin of their teeth. Wesley could still feel the cold sweat within his clenched fist, he had a flashback of what happened a mere four nights ago. The government was still in disarray regarding the awakening, not sure how to respond upon it. All they did was dump the responsibility on him and a few other officers from the Army and the State Police, made to be scapegoats. This case was to be the first action by the AFP in combating the monsters. Wesley led a score of awakened to a plaza within one of the northern suburbs. At first, one could hear the sounds of other cars within the freeway from within the Armoured Vehicle, however, slowly that sound turned into the distant screams of people. Eventually the screams also stopped, the only thing Wesley and the officers within the Armoured convoy could hear were the engines of the vehicles they were in. After a seeming eternity of that nerve-wracking silence, the Armoured Vehicle convoy finally stopped, the officers within all rushed out off the vehicle and formed a defensive perimeter. They surrounded an old office building, a building which seemed to be composed of cracked and bloodied glass. Everything until that point was just his men complying with orders. He entered the building alongside the score of officers with him. The entrance was exceedingly ugly, it seemed to be composed of concrete slabs. Every now and then he would see the corpse of a vigilante. They all had been torn apart. The blood was sprayed throughout the passageway in front of them. There was sometimes blood on the ceiling, sometimes on the wall. The floor was starting to pool with blood. His troops reached a point in which appeared to be the lavatories of the edifice. The door to one of the stalls was suspiciously covered in a crimson dye. Before the stalls lay the corpse of a young woman, her head having been viciously ripped from her shoulders. Going further up the staircase, the number of vigilante corpses they had seen numbered at about a dozen by this point. They eventually reached an office from which they heard the sound of fighting. Entering into the room for the first time, there was only one thing which Wesley could think of, ''How could there be so much blood?'' Everything was crimson, splayed corpses were toppled atop all the desks, bloodied weapons littered the ground. In a corner of the room was a young man whose face was covered in blood, he had bright, white hair and was dressed in a casual school uniform. There were at least a dozen vigilantes surrounding him, fear could be felt from their eyes, none of them were willing to step forwards and take that step towards that man, almost as if doing so would spell certain death. Then, the youth moved forward, a seemingly simple swing of his arm. It casually slapped the cheek of the vigilante closest to him, his head spun three times around and tore off from his torso on the fourth, an incredulous expression plastered on his face. Immediately the vigilantes broke their ranks and ran, some of them so terrified that they jumped out the windows. Then, the youth extended some sort of tendrils from his left hand, they were bright white, the same colour as his hair. The fastened around the people escaping and dragged them towards him. The constricted vigilantes were screaming in pain, some sort of corruption seeping into their bodies from the tendrils. He wasn''t sure which officer was the first one to turn an flee, but he wouldn''t blame them. He would rather thanks them. If it wasn''t for them, they may all have been stuck dumbstruck looking at the... Youth. Until it was their turn to be viciously eviscerated. That... Young man, was the young man they were talking to just now. ----- Adam stepped into his house and felt a great tiredness overcome his body, he felt like walking up to his room and collapsing on his bed, the time was already eight o''clock in the afternoon and it had been almost twenty four hours since he had slept. He took the stairs up to his room and started undressing to prepare himself for bed, however, when putting his hand into his pocket he found some cloth fabric inside. Adam took it out and displayed it before himself to see what it was. It was entirely black with the exception of a vertical sword and crescent which were coloured white, this was the vigilante''s armband. Adam had forgotten he had put it inside his pocket, so he decided to leave it inside the drawer he never uses. Adam opened the drawer and was about to put the armband inside when he stopped. Inside the drawer, were lots of armbands, easily numbering in scores. They were all some sort of white insignia upon a black background. Most of them were covered in blood too. Chapter 6 - Buying Clothes A beam of light traversed the dusty atmosphere. It seemed to light up a dark space, a sombre atmosphere. A murder happened in this room, a murder of first degree, an utterly vile act, accomplished only by the most heartless members of society. A caste so wicked, they are shunned from the rest of society, an ever-present cycle that only perpetuates the act of murder within a community. This was Adam''s room. A single size bed, right next to a window covered with dirty rickety blinds. Adjacent to the bed was a modest desk designed purely for utilitarian purposes, it''s capacity for storing seemingly endless documents widely apparent. A white closet facing the window, adjacent to the door. Little would a visitor know that the drawer second from the bottom on the desk held a score of bloody armbands, trophies of felled opponents. Or that the white closet next to the door had quite recently bathed in the blood of a mother. Perhaps, even if they knew, they would still be shocked to know that the brown haired youth currently sleeping in the bed was the one which carried out all of these unspeakable acts. It was still early in the morning. The blinds were within Adams home, dust was beginning to form on the surfaces of the furniture. The peaceful atmosphere was broken by an alarm clock, the typical alarm tone rang out from Adams phone on his desk. He slowly stumbled out of bed and turned the alarm off. He took a cold shower on the morning, humming a moody tune to while washing his body in the cold water running down. Adam cupped his hand while in the shower, a pool of water slowly filled up within his hands. No, it wasn''t a pool of water, it was made of blood. Adam could feel it, the hot blood running down his back and matting his hair. Embracing him. The curtains of the shower were not curtains anymore, but an endless black expanse. Then, he felt a deep voice speak out from behind him, a voice he hadn''t heard in years, one which he never thought to hear again. His father. "Are you happy with this, son?" He softly stated from behind him, it sounded exactly as he remembered. Adam was in shock, and yet, before he knew it, the black expanse had disappeared. Plain plastic curtains surrounded him, cold water was running down his body, his hand were clasped together holding a pool of water. His body temperature was still quite cold, no indication that he had ever made contact with the hot blood. In fact the only difference was the fact that cold sweat was also being washed from his back at this moment. ---- He put on a dotted white shirt tucked inside black pants and black leather shoes. He combed his hair backwards and to the left. He went downstairs and prepared a simple breakfast of some honeyed gruel and a glass of orange juice. He sat down on the couch and ate in silence. He finished his breakfast and washed the dishes, he put on his jacket and went to work. The street outside of his house looked the same as always, except that it was a Saturday. Instead of seeing middle-aged men going to work he saw a few people walking their dogs. The route he took this time was the same as when he headed to school since he was headed towards the train station. There weren''t that many people on the streets and the sun shone overhead in the sky, thus making for quite a beautiful day. Adam felt it to be a very nice day today, the illusion in the shower shoved to the back of his mind. He quite enjoyed the peaceful walk to the train station since it was full of trees and cast a pleasant shade over the footpath. It was summer since the grass was verdant and the trees seemed full of vitality. It was a very nice escape from the recent events that had happened. Now that he thought about it, the few events in his life were critical as to how his life would play out in the future. Killing his mother... If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it. Murdering a vigilante... Being approached by Commander Wesley... Coming face to face with his ''collection''... Sorry, ''their'' collection. Adam had already reached the train station and boarded a carriage by that point. The carriage was completely empty, just as that time a bit over a week ago. The walls were completely vandalised. The correct term was vandalism and not graffiti since the majority of it was just tagging. Adam just sat by the corner of the carriage and looked outside the window, exactly like that time. The train ride this time was quite calm, nothing strange was happening like suddenly feeling nauseous and falling unconscious. Adam was starting to feel a bit bored until a notification sounded out from his phone. Adam dug inside the pocket in his jacket to look for his phone. Feeling an unfamiliar object, Adam pulled it out in curiosity. It was a smooth brown envelope. The envelope that Commander Wesley gave to him last night. The sealed border easily came undone and revealed the contents inside. A stack of hundred dollar notes. From looking at it''s thickness, there were at least a couple thousand dollars in there. Adam picked up his phone and dialled the number of his boss, dismissing the notification that one of his webnovels had updated. "Hey, Mark, yeah, I just wanted to call real quick to say that I''m not coming to work anymore, bye." Ignoring the shouting voice in the speaker of his phone, Adam ended the call without the slightest hesitation. His boss wasn''t an asshole. But he was his boss and Adam worked as a junior office worker on the weekends, no junior office would ever like their boss. Before he knew it, Adam had arrived at Town Hall Station. By reflex, Adam left the station within minutes, but he realised he didn''t have to go work anymore. Adam just sort of stood there in front of the train station, wondering what to do when a group of commuters pushed him out of the way since he was standing in front of the exit. Adam was aware that they were behind him, except that his mind didn''t register that he should have probably moved out of the way. He had a mind blank. Being shoved out of his reverie, Adam decided to look around the city if there was anything he should get. As Adam strolled through the city, he came across a poster on the wall, it was an advertisement for a Men in Black film. The actors were stylishly dressed fully in black and white. Then, Adam decided to go buy some clothes. --- Inside a store, he got the closest items he could think of to the men in the poster and went to try them on. Adam didn''t exactly know how to wear a suit so he just copied how the men dressed in the poster and made the same pose in front of the changing room mirror. A black suit over a plain white shirt and black tie. Polished black leather shoes and black pants. It didn''t look half-bad to Adam. He decided to keep the clothes on and take them to the checkout straight away instead of packing them away and buying them normally since he rather liked this new look. As soon as Adam arrived in the checkout he garnered the attention of the bored salesman immediately. As soon as the salesman laid his eyes on Adam a strange expression could be seen on his face. "Hello, I was wondering if I could buy these items please?" Adam asked with the most posh accent he could think would befit the clothes he was wearing right now. The salesman didn''t answer immediately and kept looking at Adam with the same strange expression, then, after a while, he coughed lightly and awkwardly informed something to Adam. "Sir... Maybe you should try tucking your shirt in?" The salesman pointed to the ends of the shirt which were sticking out from under the black suit. After a moment of helping Adam put on the suit properly, the salesman also noticed that Adam wasn''t wearing a belt. "Sir, if you come this way I can show you a selection of belts that would go very well with your suit." Once everything was done and finished, the salesman charged Adam a sum of $1,600 dollars for all the items. Then Adam bid farewell to the salesman with a sombre expression since he had literally gotten helped into putting his clothes on. "Yes, my condolences sir." Adam turned around with a quizzical expression at the salesman''s word choice. "Um... Sir, aren''t you going to a funeral in this attire?" The salesman asked in an awkward tone. ... ... Adam turned around and left this shop, he made a mental note to never go nearby this store in the future. When Adam left, the salesman sighed and sat back down at the checkout, he slowly shook his head at the strangeness of his latest client. By this point Adam was back to wandering the city with his new look, many people looked at him with eyes that seemed to pity him. With Adams attire combined with the depressed look of his resting face, he truly looked as if he were attending the funeral of his greatest friend. Shrugging it off, Adam continued around his tour of the city, when he saw another poster. This one was a Chinese martial arts movie, a Wuxia film. It featured a young Chinese man dressed in Daoist robes exchanging blows with another young Chinese man dressed in a Tang suit. It seemed like a fun film, so Adam entered the theatre in which it was being featured in. Inside the cinema were hardly any people, it would be a bit of a stretch to say a dozen people were in the audience seating watching the movie. The film started off with a street fight between a group of triad thugs and the main character, needless to say, he was beaten miserably. Then the main character ran across an old man collecting rubbish in the street, from this old man the young main character learnt martial arts. When the movements were demonstrated by the old man, Adam felt a familiarity with the way the old man moved, the doctrine behind the movements were the exact same as for Shadow footwork. Adam could see whenever the old man struck that he drew the force from his core and stabilised the force within the blow with his stance. This old man wasn''t an actor, he was an expert. Throughout the rest of the movie the details of the plot all felt blurred out to Adam, all he could focus on was the movements of the martial artists. The refinement of their techniques was clearly apparent to Adam, even when conveyed through a screen rather than face to face. Adam exited the theatre still in a daze. All he could see was the beauty of the movements of the old man. Whenever he advanced it seemed as if his body was in perfect harmony, moving synonymously with his palm strike. Whenever he parried a blow, it seemed as if he used a tenth of his strength to redirect a blow infinitely heavier. All Adam could think of was the martial arts of the old man. If he knew how to move his body this way, wouldn''t he be unstoppable? He would have caught the vigilantes sword within his palms and killed him effortlessly, no need for running around without an aim. Then, Adam found himself before a hall, it was wide open and spelt three words on the top. ''Goju-Ryu Karate'' Chapter 7 - Meeting Mr. Li Adam didn''t like this, he didn''t like this at all. He couldn''t see from his left eye, and the right one made out a blurred out figure in front of him. Adam could taste the metallic scent of blood in his mouth and his limbs expressed a fiery resistance to any change in the status quo of his body, instead laying on the wooden panelling, defeated. ''Why did he walk through those imposing gates?'' ''Why did you walk in there, Adam?'' ''Adam'' was whispering in his mind like always, seconding his every decision, then questioning it later. He felt like an old friend. A very old friend that was privy to everything about him. Nevertheless, he wasn''t being any help right now. There was a man in front of them dressed in a changpao, the robes were coloured black with golden decorum running along the edges. The man looked down at him, the same look with which he looked at Adam when he first arrived in the Dojo. This made Adam look back at when he had entered through the gates only moments prior. The first amongst the things he noticed were the sheer number of people inside, there were many, easily numbering in the hundreds. They all stood atop the wooden panelling in a perfect formation and practiced a series of strikes. Their movements synonymous with each other and bordering on perfection. They were all dressed in white and sported a myriad variety of colourful belts. The people near the back had white, yellow and green belts whereas the people near the front had brown and black belts. Facing the huge cohort of people was a group of about a dozen people demonstrating the same series of movements. These people were wearing the same black belts as the people near the front except these ones had differing numbers of gold stripes at the end of their black belts. Then, after Adam walked in, was the moment when he met the man in the black changpao. His face was extremely wrinkled and had a long white beard reminiscent of a Daoist scholar. His eyes held a cruel glint within them as he watched the karate practitioners. He had turned towards Adam and saw him approaching, then the old man in the back robes approached Adam "Why are you here?" He asked in broken English. Without even waiting for an answer the old man proceeded to strike forward with an open palm. Then, Adam went into automatic combat mode and retreated backwards using shadow footwork. The old mans eyes became slightly raised when he saw Adams footwork, then he proceed to land a palm on Adams chest at a speed multiple times faster than before. The speed was fivefold the speed demonstrated by the vigilante when swinging his sword yesterday. The strike had held power which an old man shouldn''t wield and sent Adam flying backwards through the air, that was the beginning of the trashing that Adam got when he walked through those door. Now was near the end, he was already beat up to the point that his will to fight had been broken. "Damn, just stop." Adam could only force these words through his wheezing throat, they sounded pitiful. If only Adam were a bit less beat up, he would find that the rest of the Karate practitioners had surrounded the man in the black changpao and Adam, a hostile glint within their eyes being unilaterally directed towards the old man in the black changpao. Then, an old practitioner with a tough face and oriental features stepped forward, the black belt holding his white karate-gi held six golden stripes at the end. "Mr. Li, what do you think you are doing in our Dojo?" This old practitioner spoke in practiced English, near fluent, in contrast to the broken English of Mr. Li. The old practitioner held a challenging expression, he feet slid into a formidable stance which seemed like an iron fortress. Mr. Li turned around to look at the old practitioner, then he slowly approached him. "You, you have the face to stop me?" Mr. Li showed an incredulous expression as he stared down the old practitioner.Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. Then, the old practitioner made a move. He stepped forwards and punched out with a clenched fist, a rigid stance was evident in this form. It wouldn''t have been wrong to say that this strike was like an iron fist, hard and brittle. Adam could see that the level of this fight was many levels above that of the one between him and the vigilante. If the vigilante had to fight against the unarmed practitioner, Adam had no doubt in his mind that he would lose miserably. Then, Mr. Li stepped backwards, much faster than when he had been beating up Adam. This caused the practitioner''s fist to lose all strength as it struck the air. This didn''t mean much however since the old practitioner now had the momentum and stepped forward again with the other leg, the same strike, the same iron mentality. Mr. Li stepped forwards this time, less than half a metre between their faces. The practitioners strike had missed him completely, the speed and bravery demonstrated by Mr. Li in advancing towards an attack left the practitioner in shock. Mr. Li extended his right arm around the practitioners extended fist and pulled it towards his right, the practitioner attempted to lift his back leg and knee Mr. Li in the stomach but Mr. Li was faster and he kneed the man in his stomach instead. Were it any normal person they would have doubled over and relieved their breakfast on the floor, however, this man simply clenched his teeth. However, it didn''t matter since Mr. Li formed his left hand into knuckles and crushed the practitioners neck, knocking him unconscious. Mr. Li then let go of the practitioners right hand and let him topple to the floor, the whites of his eyes could be seen and a trail of blood was dripping from his open mouth. A shocking silence pervaded the entirety of the hall, all the practitioners held their breath. Only to be broken by Mr. Li. "What gall, to dare prevent me from educating my disciple." ''Disciple?!'' ''What is a disciple?'' The practitioners all had shocked expression, then they turned to look at Adam with the same spiteful look they had given Mr. Li in the beginning. "Now, come with me, disciple." Mr. Li kept speaking in broken English and grabbed Adam by his earlobe, dragging him away to the entrance. He didn''t have the strength to call out for help from the rest of the practitioners, however, by the look of it they probably wouldn''t help him anyways, telling from the look in their eyes. Adam, being dragged across the ground, found it extremely hard to stay conscious, especially since he considered the fact that his brand new suit must be near ruined by now. Slowly, his eyes narrowed into mere slits, the last thing he could see was the back of Mr. Li''s head. --- Mr. Li walked through the streets holding onto his unconscious disciple, he hadn''t taken a disciple in before. The only experience he had in teaching disciples was what he saw from his own master. He was a nasty old man, always cuffed him on the ear whenever he made the slightest mistake in his footwork. He reminisced about the old days back on the mountaintop in Manchuria. His master was a decrepit old man near the end of his longevity at almost one hundred and forty years old, his home was a humble cottage on a mountaintop surrounded by bamboo stalks embedded into a thick layer of snow. It was a great place to practice his own way. As a young child he was extremely frail and sickly, by the age of three he was orphaned and by the age of six he had stolen for the first time. He remembered the first time he looked for his master, he was beat up by the dominant gang of street ruffians in the street, most would have given up, however, he was different, we wanted strength. He scaled the mountain in which the renown martial artist was rumoured to live for the majority of a day, he started climbing on the morning of the day after he was beat up and arrived at the top at sunset, his chest heaving up and down from the utter exhaustion he had felt. Then, he saw his old master sitting cross legged atop a boulder in the middle of a frozen pond. He had hurried forth and kowtowed repeatedly, begging for the old master to accept him as a disciple. After three hours, the old man had opened his eyes and beckoned him to come close. He yet again rushed over, only to fall into the pond as the ice cracked and sent him crashing into the icy cold waters. After a profuse struggle, he made it back ashore, shivering and freezing from the strong gale atop the mountaintop. Looking back, he saw that the old master was still beckoning him forth, as if nothing had happened, he could swear that if he died from freezing then he would simply be left as a frozen corpse under his pond. At the thought of this, a bubbling anger emerged from his throat and he prepared himself to cross through the thin ice yet again. It took him many times, in the beginning every single time he stepped on the ice he would fall through, however, as time passed and as the number of near death experiences increased, he learnt to shift his weight from foot to foot. He started developing a footwork with which to cross the icy pond without breaking the ice cover. He still distinctly remembered the smile the decrepit old man gave him when he crossed through that icy pond and stood before him, and then his acceptance of a new disciple. Mr. Li remembered this most fond memory, it all came down to developing his own style of footwork. The entire basis of any martial doctrine was based from its footwork, it was the most vital component since it was the foundation that allowed one to exercise power over the opponent with ones own techniques. This was the reason why he was so shocked when he saw the young man in black dodge his first strike with such beautiful footwork, it seemed to be such an imperceptible movement which would easily be missed in even the most intense combat scenarios. What he found even more shocking was that he didn''t seem to know any techniques, he was a blank slate with which to learn martial arts, he was a bit old but his marvellous movements more than made up for that. He decided then and there, this young man will inherit his style, whether he liked it or not. ... Adam couldn''t sense anything, it seemed as if he existed, yet couldn''t perceive anything at all, just like that time when he got the [Awareness] feat and was rendered blind beyond every sense for an unknown amount of time. ''...'' ''Hey, Adam?'' ''Adam'' started talking to him again, it was weird that he didn''t notice until now that ''Adam'' sounded like a seven year old version of him, although his voice had a certain something to it that gave it another notch of eeriness. ''What?'' ''You forgot to level up.''
Level Up
New feat available at level three
Health and Mana modifiers Health - 3 & 1, +4 Health Mana - 4 & 4, +8 Mana
... Well, he forgot to level up... What else was there to it. Perhaps if he had not fallen unconscious, he would have forgotten to level up until god knows when. ''Thanks Adam.'' ''...'' Adam somehow felt that he wasn''t all that amused. Well, at least he didn''t miss out on anything he could have used earlier in the day, or did he? Adam was still within this groggy yet not so groggy form of unconsciousness, and ordinary person wouldn''t be able to maintain awareness within an unconscious state but for some reason Adam could, he theorised that it was so because of ''Adam'' being inside his head, thus allowing him to maintain a separate consciousness awake within the body. While Adam was in the middle of theorising and ''conversing'' with ''Adam'' he suddenly felt a head-splitting headache in his head. It figuratively sent Adam reeling on his knees, everything around him was blurry, then, he could see. There was a wooden roof above him, built in an A-frame fashion. He tried to turn his head but was only met by a searing flare of resistance from his neck. The pain felt surreal to him, it felt distant and far-away. His body was asleep, Adam could feel the thousands of needles digging into his skin, the dull pain was pulsating, permeating itself throughout Adams skin. Slowly, the numbness went away and it was instead replaced by a terrible ache, every single one of his limbs was sore. Adam barely managed to turn his head and look at his surroundings. Around him were wooden pillars and fences, they were coloured white, outside, he could see occasional patches of greenery on the face of a stone cliff. He was in some sort of gazebo. "You are awake." Adam turned further and saw the cross legged figure of Mr. Li. This man who called him his disciple, what did he have in store for him? Adam couldn''t even bother thinking by this point, ''Adam'' had also gone quiet. What was the point in resisting anyways? Adam got one more careful look at Mr. Li before he fainted again. Slightly fat face riddled with wrinkles, protruding brows with furrowed and slanted eyes, a long beard of white starting from the sideburns and ending at the chin, carefully combed so as to hang down like silk strands. White hair on the top of the head, combed backwards in a neat fashion. A black changpao with golden rims in decorative floral patterns, his attire almost seemingly made for sitting cross legged. What did the figure of this man, silhouetted against the setting sun, plot for him? These were Adams last thoughts before he succumbed to the pain being borne by his body. Chapter 8 - Call Me Master Adam sat back against the wooden panelling that acted as a wall. His back was covered in sweat, it made the white shirt he was wearing uncomfortable stick to his back. His jacket was unceremoniously dumped towards the side, clearly ripped in multiple places and covered in a thickened sort of dirty dust, the type of which you find in a dustbowl. His pants were similarly dirtied, however, thankfully they were spared from any profuse ripping. His belt had multiple brown streaks besmirching the glossy black leather surface, the belt buckle was no longer a shining silver but a battered metallic object. Adam would want nothing more than to enter the sweet embrace of sleep at this moment in time, from his rolled back sleeves could be seen a great many red marks, the prophetic herald of unrestrained bruising. If he had a mirror, he would find similar marks around his face and a very inflated left brow. "Get up." He said. It was getting repetitive, every time he wished to lie down he would get pulled back up for another round of beatings by Mr. Li. Another damnable beating by this man, Adam could swear he would die if he was pulled back up one more time, this time he refused to stand up, instead sprawled on the floor and leaning on the wall. He just felt so tired, the worst thing was that ''Adam'' was just standing by, almost as if his life wasn''t in any danger. Adam closed his eyes, he just wanted it to stop. Adam lost himself in the bliss of the hard wooden floor, his body ached but at least he wasn¡¯t being hurt anymore. He thought back over his life so far. A man talking to his primary school teacher, the man resembled Adam in many different features. His mother preparing a delicious dinner, his father reading the newspaper by the side. His father in a business suit, heading off to go to work. Two sombre men dressed in black suits, much like the one that he had been wearing hours prior. A letter in his hands which the two sombre men had given him. A tearstained letter. A tearstained letter detailing condolences regarding his father''s death. ¡­ Mr. Li couldn''t have been more aghast to find the work ethic from his new disciple. He couldn''t even spar with him for more than two strikes, the first one of which was a probing strike. No matter what Mr. Li tried, this arrogant young man refused to stand up, just because he had gotten a few bruises here and there. He sighed and took a long look at this failed disciple, cowering on the floor like a whimpering stray. Mr. Li had held great prospects for this young man, perhaps he could have even surpassed him with his amount of martial talent. Adam was still sprawled on the floor, until he suddenly had the nerve to close his eyes, just doze off to sleep right in front of him. Mr. Li snapped and was about to perform the seventeen kicks of defection on him when Mr. Li suddenly spotted a tear form on the corner of the young man''s eyes. Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there. It wasn''t one to be formed from immense physical pain, but rather, emotional pain. Mr. Li could see much of his own life within the tear that this young man had shed on the floor in front of him. He resigned himself to a sigh and determined that this young man should maybe deserve a second chance, simply from the virtue of being kindred spirits. Mr. Li held the young man''s arm and lifted him to his feet, then he led him to a wooden well in the courtyard of his home. The young man was shaken from his sleep, his tears were still smothered around his eyes. However, instead of finding an expression of complacence, he found an unyielding spark of anger within the greyish green pupil of his eyes. A spark of utter rage, one that promised a deep-seated enmity with the world. Mr. Li smiled, perhaps there was some hope for this unwilling pupil just yet. Mr. Li lifted Adam with both of his arms, then he threw him into the well. Swiping his sleeves, he closed the cover of the well to the sound of a body being plunged into a body of water. ¡­ Adam had gone past the point of panic, by the point that he realised that he would be thrown into the well he was already calculating the best way to survive. Thankfully his heightened [Awareness] didn''t require him to be in a sound physical condition, in fact it even worked while he was unconscious as he seemed to predict when Mr. Li would suddenly grab him. When he was falling into the well, he used his heightened perception to observe his surroundings. The walls of the well were made of coarse cut stone, mould and foot holds prevalent all around them. The water was about six metres from the surface of the well, it seemed to have a low level of turbidity as it was quite clear in the low level of light. Under the surface of the water the well went on for another ten metres until it reached a stone bed covered in some sort of algae. A number of critters seemed to have made this place their habitat, three lotus flowers were in the process of blooming within the well, a frog sat in a corner of the well, sitting atop one of the lotuses and preying on the mosquito population. When Adam had plunged into the water the only thing he could feel was a biting chill penetrate into the deepest recesses of his body. A stinging sensation seemed to tentatively emanate into his body, similar to when one''s body is falling asleep, however a thousand times more painful, feeling more like icy needles digging into his skin. He had to get out of here, he would die if he did not. This would be the first time there was a real threat to Adam''s life, that time with the vigilante wouldn''t count because he had the entire situation under control. Inside this well however¡­ Adam could very well imagine the cold stone walls of this place becoming his watery grave. Maybe within a few decades, all that would be left of him would be a cleanly picked skeleton the colour of pure alabaster, of course, inside the soggy remnants of his funeral clothes. The darkness was another factor that would have been the final straw that broke the camel''s back for any other man. Any other individual would have broken down into inconsolable sobbing at the peril of the situation within the absolute darkness. However, for Adam, the darkness was his only comfort. The embrace of an old friends throughout difficult times, that was what he needed now. Most humans would be afraid of the dark because historically they were the most vulnerable during night time, mere prey to be slaughtered at the whim of the hunters of the night. However, [Shadow Monk] had changed him, he was no longer mere prey to be harvested at the coming of night, now he was one of the hunters on an instinctual level. This brought him to his current situation, he had to get out of the water immediately, he didn''t know enough technical knowledge to see that he would get hypothermia if he stayed in the water for an extended period of time, but his mind intuitively told him that it wasn''t good. There was a handhold in the cobbled wall next to him, he reached out for it and managed to pull himself out of the water with one hand. His body seemed to weigh as much as concrete, worse, slippery concrete. At wouldn''t be an exaggeration to say that it took a herculean effort to pull himself out. Then, he slipped back down again, his lip smashed against the rocks, letting a stream of metallic taste flood his mouth and trickle out through his lips. This wouldn''t work, it handhold was at an incline in which it made it impossible for someone to hang on for more than two seconds. His mind seemed to be working three times as fast as it usually did, he was able to spot trends, formulate numerous routes in which to stay out of the water. Settling on one, he finally tried once more to pull himself up, then, instead of hanging on as much as he possibly could he pushed outwards and leapt towards the other side of the wall, finding a small measure of footing in the lotus flowers due to how closely linked they were. He fell down again, however, he persevered, he tried time and time again until he lost count. His entire body felt as if it had gone above and beyond multiple times, yet, whenever he applied himself he found that they always found something more to power them, to propel them that extra mile. It may have taken hours, however, he found himself about a metre above the body of water and in a secure position in which both his feet were solidly placed in opposite footholds, allowing him to finally gain some small measure of rest. Thinking back, before he had gotten the [Shadow Monk] class he would have never been able to force himself to do a tenth of the effort he had done in the past few hours. He may not have noticed it but levelling up seemed to grant an overall increase in his strength, it fact, the difference was as much as that between that of heaven and earth. The current situation continued on for another two days. He was sometimes forced to lower himself so as to drink water, from the well. In the beginning his body had felt as if it was going to tear apart, however, it slowly began to adapt. His body felt less sore and instead found some small measure of comfort whilst being strenuously exercised. He began to move in many ways he would have found impossible prior to being dumped within the well. However, the human body had a limit. Even one that had been levelled up multiple times. He was suspending himself against the cobbled walls when the hatch to the well opened up and a rope was thrown in. He eagerly reached out towards it, only to find that it wasn''t attached to anything. Both he and the rope dived into the well. ''You aren''t making it easy for me, aren''t you old man?'' ''Adam'' was laughing this time, strangely enough considering that it had stayed quiet all this time. Holding down a lungful of air, he dived into the bottom of the well to pick up the fallen rope. Within ten minutes, he had attached it to the multiple handhold in the well and used it to climb out, luckily it was night time so he wasn''t blinded when he climbed out. Mr. Li was standing a few metres in front of him, looking at him in an insulting manner. "Ten minutes!" "Every time you are late to one of my lessons, that''s how long we will spar." Adam didn''t have enough time to register what was being said to him before Mr. Li had appeared before him, thrusting a palm towards his solar plexus. Adam wasn''t about to allow a repeat of last time and dodged backwards once more, however this time he formed shadows around his fists and copied the movements of Mr. Li that he had used yesterday. It was a clumsy attempt, but it was an attempt which worked. He had managed to parry the first couple of strikes. Mr. Li''s pupils constricted when he saw the shadows around Adam''s hands, but he shockingly responded by allowing a blue light to radiate from his palms. Mr. Li was an awakened too! Moreover he also seemed to have taken a variant of the monk class. Mr. Li only seemed to be getting started, he advanced further with a flurry of attacks in which his own improvised techniques couldn''t seem to handle very well, if not for the fact that Shadows were disguising and making his movements hard to follow, he would have been felled already. Then again, as the aura of Shadow seemed to boost his own attacks, Mr. Li''s aura similarly boosted his own. The movements of his hand were constantly flowing, never stopping, an endless current of inexhaustible attacks. Furthermore, every single strike seemed to chill his arms, to the point that a layer of frost had appeared on the surface of his skin. Furthermore, the extent of his techniques seemed all encompassing, almost as if he was only playing with him. "Remember young disciple, the first lesson I''ll give you, never be late!" Henceforth, Adam was never late, not even for the most trivial of things for the rest of his life. That was also around the time that his body couldn''t hold up anymore against Mr. Li and succumbed to unconsciousness. Chapter 9 - Disciple Adam didn''t go home. Instead he stayed with the ruthless man who called himself his master. Sure, staying there was painful, very painful. However, staying at home was equally painful. At least here he was getting stronger, and had someone to confide in, someone who he knew was always striving to make him better. Not once did he go to school, and the people of the government hadn''t contacted him. He still had a few belongings which were kept inside Mr. Li''s house outside of the well. That''s right, he was back inside the well. After beating him up yesterday, Mr. Li asked him about his class and the shadows which had covered his hands during the fight. Thereafter, he dictated that Adam would become nocturnal. "Your strength lies in night time, it is foolish to be tired when one is at their optimal fighting capacity. From now on, at every sunrise you will be locked inside the well, only to be let out at every sunset." During night time, Mr. Li taught him, he showed him how to punch, how to move, how to think. He demonstrated how to disarm an armed soldier, the easiest and most effective ways to kill a human. Not once did he give Adam a weapon, only allowing him to use his hands. "A weapon is rigid, it is but an unsophisticated piece of wood or metal used by cowards. The true way to fight is to use one''s hands, we were born with them, they are the most valuable limb of any warrior and the most familiar tool for any artisan." He showed Adam the myriad possibilities with which to kill using one''s hands. The ways to block a sword without being cut and catching a flaming arrow without being hurt. Adam saw Mr. LI do all these things, things which were impossible for any man, things even awakened would scoff at being told of someone doing them. Nevertheless, it went without saying that Adam tried to do all of these things too, emphasis on tried. He didn''t succeed on the first try, nor the tenth or the hundredth. In fact, whenever he tried to block a sword his palm would end up slashed, or whenever he tried to catch a burning arrow his hand would be burnt. However, as the weeks and months passed, his hands grew calloused and progressively took less damage. His internal clock adapted to a nocturnal lifestyle and his body grew accustomed to constantly exerting itself, even when sleeping within the well. His muscles slowly took a well toned shape throughout his body, granting him explosive power beneath his naturally lanky and thin build. Not only did his body adapt to a harsh and nocturnal lifestyle, but his combat techniques advanced by leaps and bounds. Mr. Li taught Adam his own martial discipline which was called Han Shaquan, roughly translated to Cold Evil Fist. It was a style which revolved around the concept of cold and death, strengthening the mind and body with the Yin element in water and darkness. Just as Adam had hardened his body and willpower through living inside a damp well and practicing the Cold Evil Fist under the moonlit nights. Adam could feel a certain resonance between his class and this martial discipline, almost as if the innate power over shadows helped Adam gain an understanding over the Cold Evil Fist at an accelerated rate compared to others. These were Adam''s gains over the past few weeks under Mr. Li''s care. Now, he was beckoning him over to the dilapidated pavilion in his courtyard. Standing before him, Adam felt a certain sense of anticipation coming from deep inside himself. Usually Mr. Li would just tell him to practice in the courtyard after a quick demonstration, but today was different. Mr. Li took up a wise pose once Adam had settled himself down in front of him and gently coughed into his clenched palm. "Adam, you have improved greatly in the Cold Evil Fist style. In fact, you have one of the greatest rates of progression I have seen in young initiates. If you weren''t pampered by the comfort and complacency of modern society perhaps you could have been unparalleled in talent. Now, I can confidently say that your skill has progressed enough to the point in which I can accept you as a formal disciple of the Cold Evil Sect."
You have been invited to join the Cold Evil Sect by Master Li as a Disciple of the Cold Evil Sect and Direct Disciple to Master Li. [Accept] [Decline]
A glint appeared in Mr. Li''s eyes as he gave a knowing smile, he knew that Adam had just received a notification. Adam couldn''t be more shocked, who exactly was Mr. Li? From this message he seemed to belong to a faction called the Cold Evil Sect, but was he even from Earth? Or was he one of the few awakened from other worlds who travelled here in order to set up factions?You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author. But, the latter was impossible! It was supposedly extremely difficult for foreign awakened to enter earth, nigh impossible in fact. Then, who was Mr. Li. Looking up at Mr. Li, Adam held a wavering glint within his eyes. Distrust and confusion were evident within them. To this complicated glare, Mr. Li simply sighed and then responded to Adam, almost as if he could read his mind. "Adam, I am in fact from Earth. From Manchuria actually." "Long ago I was simply a street rat within a small town, however, in one moment on the verge of death, I was visited by an old man in black robes. He told me to climb a mountain and seek him upon it''s summit. I almost died multiple times on the climb to the summit and when I finally reached it I begged to become his disciple. I knew that there was something wrong with this old man, something otherworldly about him, almost as if the very world seemed to reject him. However, I still kowtowed before him and planted my bloodied forehead upon the frigid snow of that mountain peak." At this point Mr. Li had raised his voice to a shout, his eyes widely opened and intensely focusing on him. "I did what I did for one reason, and one reason only. I wanted power, I wanted a power to bend anything to my will, a power to pull myself up against any adversary, even if that adversary is society itself." The light in Mr. Li''s eyes seemed to dim down at this point, he gave the paved floor of the pavilion a solemn stare. "Most children my age were shielded from the harsh realities of life while they grow up, but then foreigners invaded my town and committed countless atrocities, the vast majority of my generation was orphaned in the first months of the invasion and many more were born from the sins of these foreign soldiers." "Countless people died and it wasn''t very long before I found myself alone within a sea of unfamiliar faces. Then, I resolved myself to not be swept into an early grave by this human tide and instead struggled for survival." Mr. Li then looked at Adam deep in the eyes, looking through his every secret. "That''s what I saw in you , boy. A boy that didn''t belong anywhere, a boy with no-one to take care of him, a boy surrounded by a sea of unfamiliar faces." The dilapidated pavilion seemed to shatter before Adam''s eyes, Mr. Li fading into blackness. A green field stretched out before him. It was the middle of the day and the sparse tree cover was negligible. It should have been scorching hot but it was an overcast day with the haze of rainfall in the horizon. The green field was laid bare with small stone structures, some the shape of crosses and others the shape of rectangles. The sparse stone erections upon this green plain evoked a choking aura of solemness, it felt as if every single cross held a pair of eyes which judged his every action. He was back in his fathers graveyard. The last time he visited it with his mother was after they received the letter informing them of his death. Since a body couldn''t be found they simply had to conduct the funeral in an empty grave. Adam looked into the grave which had become so familiar to him in his nightmares, it had a small crack running along the centre of the marble slab. Small patches of moss thrived throughout the small grave and the pot which held the dead flowers was chipped at multiple places. Adam looked into the name plate of the grave. Then he rubbed his eyes and looked into it again. ''Here rests Catherine Freeman, mother of Adam Freeman and wife of...'' ''Adam'' smugly walked up until he stood beside him and put an arm across his shoulder, the disgusting tentacles at the end of ''Adam''s'' arms coiled around Adam''s left arm. "Wasn''t this what you wanted, Adam? We did it. Together!" The picture frame at the bottom of the grave held an estranged face, it''s lips were twisted upwards into a charming smile. Her eyes withheld a glint of kindness, a kindness which made Adam throw up on the cracked marble slab which constituted the surface of his mothers grave. The vile substance which forced it''s way up Adams throat was a glowing and insidious green liquid, the very same one that consumed the corpse of his mother when he had murdered her. It was the essence of abyssal corruption left behind by the Shadow Monk class. The corruption made it''s way through the cracks in the marble slab and began eating away at the grave, causing a green gas to rise out from the grave and the marble to start bubbling and melting away beneath the corruption. Adam turned to look at ''Adam'', its featureless face was clearly smiling despite the lack of a mouth, its white hair had lengthened to the point that it covered the upper half of his face and the entirety of his upper back. It turned to look at Adam and beckoned him to look inside the grave. Complying, Adam turned his head with an expressionless face, only to find the cover of the grave to have been completely dissolved. Inside the tomb lay a pool of blood in which various eviscerated limbs lay floating on the surface. Each separate piece of flesh was exactly the same as he had left it when he had killed her, the ravaged and decapitated head of his mother looked up at him with a smile from the very pool of blood which constituted her corpse. Her head had the same smile that was captured in the picture atop her grave. Adam forced his gaze away and looked at ''Adam'' again. It also seemed look at him, as if happy of what he had done. If this was her mother''s grave, then were was his father''s? ''Look behind you.'' Adam once again looked at him, at first he saw nothing apart from graves as far as he could see. Even in the very distance he could only see graves. Except for a moving grave, one which was walking away from him and looked like a man which Adam knew very well, however, Adam knew better than to think it was real. ''Adam'' was beside him, it was more than enough proof to constitute that this scene was taking place inside his mind. Looking back at ''Adam'', Adam raised his voice to speak. "Why are you doing this, my father is dead and my mother doesn''t even have a grave to mark her passing, just as it should be." "Adam, this is our mothers grave, when we killed her I took it upon myself to erect this little grave in her memorial." Adam started feeling a sense of disgust coming from deep inside him. This monster called itself his brother, the worse thing than this is that its true. Just as Catherine gave birth to Adam, it also gave ''birth'' to ''Adam''. Both she and his father gave birth to ''Adam'' when they parted, just as they gave birth to Adam when they came together. Then, looking back, at least his mother had a grave, however much he despised her. ''Adam'' seemed to look all that less insane and a tad bit more appealing. "Then, why did you manifest our father there? He''s already dead." ''Adam'' just looked at him for a long while, eventually a thin red line formed from the bottom of where his right ear would have been and ran across to where his left ear would go. Then, the line seemed to split apart and give way to a gaping abyss that covered half of ''Adam''s'' face. The inside of this abyss was pitch black despite the large amount of light entering, it was as if the inside of ''Adam'' was purely composed of darkness. The gaping maw that covered half of it''s face also seemed to resemble something, it almost looked like... ...a smile. It seemed it could no longer compose itself and had to give away a devilish smile. "Adam, what are you talking about, I haven''t even seen our father before, how can I manifest him?" Adam found his jaw slackened, staring, dumbfounded, at ''Adam''. He quickly gathered himself together and turned around to look at the lonesome figure in the distance. Only to find that it was long gone. ''Hey, maybe you manifested him here, after all, this is your mind and he is dead.'' Yes, of course, he must have subconsciously made up his father within his mind, however, despite ''Adam'' ''comforting'' him, Adam couldn''t shake the feeling that someone had witnessed what happened here, that his father''s spirit somehow knew what he had done. Adam couldn''t withstand the sheer guilt that got caught within his throat, his face contorted into an unsightly expression when his back had turned away from ''Adam''. Then he breathed in for four seconds, held it for another four seconds and exhaled for seven seconds. His face had returned to the usual blank and cold-hearted expression, it suited a lonely man wearing a dirty black suit in a graveyard. Then, the graveyard seemed to plummet into a single point in front of him, a singularity so to speak. The distorted figure of ''Adam'' was waving him goodbye with his tentacles and his mothers grave was repaired to the point which it had been when he arrived here. Now, he was back in the dilapidated pavilion, in front of Mr. Li, receiving an invitation to join the Cold Evil Sect. Back to reality. Adam looked at the invitation again, it promised power, it promised strength. ''Adam'' was urging him on, his mind was urging him to accept it too. However, something held him back, a picture frame seemed to pass by his mind, it was very brief, in fact a momentary scene within his consciousness. It was an old photo within a wooden frame, it was usually held up in his mothers room before she tossed it in the trash one day. The background was a beautiful rose garden, decorated with intricate balustrades the colour of ivory. Two people were contrasted against this picture perfect background, a man and a woman. The woman had long and attractive light brown hair, a face devoid of the imperfections wrought about by age. The man had a firm jawline, protruding eyebrows, dark brown hair and sapphire eyes. His face was clean shaven and emanated a very powerful, yet gentle, aura. Like that of a chivalrous knight, a man that has great power and a noble cause. The man was wearing a black tuxedo whereas the woman, Catherine, was wearing an white wedding gown. This picture, brought about a terrible ire within Adam, it was exactly what it looked like, picture perfect, an utopia of it''s own. However reality differed from this greatly, oh ever so greatly. That seemed to be the last straw that held back Adam. His eyes held a glint of great desire, a desire for power, a desire to be unfettered by the chains of fate. With this desire Adam reached out his hand and accepted the invitation to become a disciple of the Cold Evil Sect. A resounding voice echoed out within Adam''s head when he accepted the invitation, a voice recited by millions of others before him. Unconsciously Adam muttered along with them. "No matter what sin I shall commit, what atrocity I will conduct or what evil I will achieve, I shall not shy away from the attainment of power for the mere protection of my conscience." "With a frigid conviction, I shall strike down the enemies of the sect. With a nefarious mind, I shall scheme against my opposition. With patience, I will strike in the most opportune moment. "Face is of no consequence, Pride is the root of complacency. No matter how many defeats I shall endure, the last victory is the greatest." "Henceforth, I, with my body, mind and soul, commit myself to the Cold Evil Sect and take up the position of Disciple." Mr. Li had a wide smile on his face, his eyes glinted with the promise of fulfilling a deal, the same one you would get from a father when he attended the 18th birthday of his son. Not that Adam would know this, of course. Chapter 10 - Leaving Master Li Adam spoke these words from the very depths of his heart. Therefore, when the ritual was finished the frosted shadows surrounding Adam were channelled into Adam through his seven apertures. Adam couldn''t hold back a primal scream from erupting within his diaphragm as immense pain permeated throughout his head, originating from the seven apertures. Adam''s legs couldn''t support his body anymore and toppled beneath him, however the power being channelled into his body held his body up, only increasing the strain inside his head. Adam''s feet were uselessly dangling about half a metre above the ground as the power lifted Adam higher and higher. Mr. Li was in front of Adam, seemingly shocked by what was happening. Clearly this wasn''t part of the usual ritual of indoctrination into the sect, perhaps the Shadow Monk class had some sort of resonance with the foundational principles of the sect and caused some sort of unknown reaction. Nevertheless, Adam was currently in another plane of agony, changes could be seen to his physical body and perhaps this magical influence was also morphing Adams soul. His prior uniform tan throughout his body became pale white, the sort of whiteness that would put a traditional Eastern escort to shame. Adams eyes became hollowly greyed, almost as if he had become blind and huge eye shadows appeared under his eyes. His body temperature was rapidly dropping. In fact, frost had already begun to form around his mouth and nose, suggesting that it had already dropped below zero. The metamorphosis continued for another ten minutes, until the magical influence was completely absorbed within Adam''s body. Adam had fainted by this point and collapsed upon the floor like a puppet with it''s strings cut. Mr. Li still seemed to be in some sort of epiphany until the sound of Adams body collapsing on the ground broke him out of his reverie. Slowly walking over to Adam, Mr. Li grasped a bucketful of water which was conveniently placed inside the dilapidated pavilion and splashed it across Adam''s face in a very dignified manner. ... Adam felt as if he was one amongst many, a mere component of a device. A device much, much greater than himself. He felt as if he was chanting alongside millions of other disciples alongside him. Then, the epiphany of the whole was gradually terminated. When Adam could perceive the world again the first thing he noticed was some sort of fog had encased him. It didn''t seem all that concentrated, however, Adam couldn''t see past it despite possessing heightened awareness. This brought forth the point that the fog was beyond ordinary. Adam had mere moments to analyse the strange fog before it began to roil towards him. Slowly at first and then with increased speed. The strange fog formed seven separate snakes of the gas substance and approached his head. Then, Adam began to wish he had fainted. The seven trails of fog entered through his eyes, nose, mouth and ears. The first thing he noticed about the fog was that it was chillingly cold, it felt comparable to the time that he accidentally touched liquid nitrogen. Adam could sense his eyes freezing over, sending his nervous system into a meltdown. It took ten seconds before the chill pervaded his vertebrae and he lost the function of his nervous system. Adam''s consciousness was forcibly dragged to his subconscious immediately after that happened. The graveyard was the same as he remembered it, forecast and bleak. ''Adam'' was nowhere to be seen, therefore Adam only had insidious gravestones for company. Adam slowly walked over to his mother''s gravestone and began to contemplate what had just happened. ''The fog seemed to hold the same attributes as that of the Cold Evil Sect, then perhaps it was connected to the initiation ceremony for the sect.'' ''However, this fog was clearly harmful, was I not considered a worthy disciple or was I simply unlucky?'' Adam continued to ponder about his most recent misfortune whilst a tendril of fog gathered but a couple metres behind Adam, of course, unknowingly. It coalesced into an ice sculpture. The ice sculpture was extremely lifelike and held features similar to Guan Yu from ''Romance of the Three Kingdoms''. A long, flowing beard and a tough face. The ice sculpture was wearing dark blue Daoist robes which seemed completely beyond ordinary, with a visible aura of cold constantly permeating from the Daoist robes. When the ice sculpture was completely formed it simply stood waiting behind Adam in an extremely dignified pose. He waited for about five minutes, all the while in which Adam was completely absorbed in his own thoughts, not caring to look up and find the moving ice sculpture. Seeing that Adam had no inclination of moving anytime soon, the ice sculpture seemed to run out of patience and lightly coughed into the clenched fist of it''s left hand. Then again, awaiting an immediate response from Adam, the ice sculpture resumed it''s dignified position. However, Adam was far too absorbed in his thoughts to be disturbed by a mere light cough. In fact, he did hear it but simply dismissed it as part of his imagination. After all, this was his subconsciousness and the biggest haven to his sanity, how could anyone possibly intrude here? If the ice sculpture had the normal biological functions of a regular human, the tendons around their jaw would inadvertedly slacken and let the lower half of their mouth would drop in utter disbelief at this moment. After figuratively composing itself, it coughed once more, albeit much louder this time. The slight cough produced by the ice sculpture seemed extremely shrill. It sounded like ice grinding against itself, it made a sound that would raise the hairs on one''s skin. Adam was startled from his thoughts as he hurriedly turned around, only to be met with a magnificent ice sculpture. The sheer splendour emanating from this ice sculpture was so great that blue light seemed to be emanating from it''s gaze. The ice sculpture was dressed in magnificent Daoist robes and it''s facial expression was extremely solemn, gazing into the faraway distance. Adam was completely shocked, he felt utterly overwhelmed by how profoundly mysterious and regal the ice sculpture looked. In fact, he felt an irresistible urge to bend his knees and kowtow to the ice sculpture in all it''s splendour.You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story. Kowtowing upon the ground, Adam didn''t dare raise his head to look at the ice sculpture, the pressure being released by the ice statue was completely terrifying. The status quo was held for six minutes, the same amount of time that Adam had ignored the ice statue when it had materialised behind him. Throughout the entire six minutes Adam had cold sweat pouring from all of his pores. Then, the ice statue dictated before Adam. It''s voice had the same grating quality as when he had coughed earlier. "I... am Sha Lengfeng." Adam could hear the ice sculpture speaking in Chinese, however he could still understand the meaning of his words in English. "You... are Freeman, Adam." Adam didn''t know much Chinese, but he knew enough about Eastern culture to know that they referred to full names with the surname first. "I am a Patriarch within the Cold Evil Sect from the Sha family, I am the one in charge of the Thirteenth Sect Division and by extension, twenty three planets." "Now, Adam, your planet, Earth, is very special one. Countless factions are attempting to gain supremacy over the surface and your planet would have already become a barren wasteland if it wasn''t for the limitations on planar teleportation of faction soldiers." "You may be wondering why I am telling you this, after all, your status as a disciple doesn''t warrant you the right to even see me. However, your martial potential is extraordinary, in par with the geniuses of the Cold Evil Planet in fact. Therefore as the patriarch in charge of the war effort on Earth, I have decided to impart some martial insight upon thee, in the hopes that you can become a competent leader for our faction in the future." Adam was feeling conflicted right now, when he mentioned the words ''martial insight'', Adam was ecstatic. However, he couldn''t help but feel utterly terrified at Patriarch Sha. He had entered his subconscious from another planet, how was that possible? At the same moment, Adam began to feel slightly dizzy, and he was thrust back into the real world. The first thing he saw once he arrived at the real world was a slew of notifications.
Congratulations You are now a disciple of the [Cold Evil Sect]
Congratulations You have gained the title of [Disciple]
[Disciple] Requirements: Join an [Eastern Faction], Be taken in as a disciple under a [Master] of that Faction. Effects: Martial techniques are learnt at a slightly faster rate
Congratulations You have achieved [Practitioner] proficiency in a martial discipline. [Cold Evil Fist] One of the core martial legacies of the Cold Evil Sect, it is an unarmed fighting style that focuses on deceptive and ruthless hand techniques, primarily a variety of clenched fists such as the Praying Mantis Fist.1
Congratulations You have been promoted. You have attained the position of [Chosen] "Merry Christmas, Adam. Hopefully you live to see the next one." - Game Master
Congratulations You have gained the title of [Chosen]
[Chosen] Requirements: Be recognised as a Chosen within the sect by the members of the senior generation. Effects: Martial Techniques are learnt at a considerably faster rate. Your position as Chosen allows you to command groups of disciples and demand respect from elders within the sect.
Congratulations Level Up (III) +7 Hp +6 Mana New Feat Available Choice Selected from; I, VII, VIII, X
(I) Shadow Form This is the fabled peak of Shadow Monks. Reaching the level required to use this technique doesn''t only require hard work but also heaven defying fortune. [Shadow Form] allows a Shadow Monk to become ethereal for a limited amount of time. While the monk is in [Shadow Form], his physical attacks instead damage the enemies soul, thus bypassing their armour and instead testing their magical resistance. The abyssal corruption of the class has allowed the Shadow Monk to corrupt someone soul whenever he touches them in Shadow Form.
(VII) Unarmed Proficiency The use of the limbs is near limitless, allowing a combat style that exercises great control over the opponent, and to dispatch with the least use of force.
(VIII) Profound Shadow Strike The symbol of membership to the Order of Shadow Monks, the [Shadow Strike], is renown for it''s unpredictability and it''s versatility in frontal and incognito combat. However your [Shadow Strike] is different. Whenever you form a fist, the imperceptible power of shadow gathers around it and strengthens it in many covert ways.
(X) Shadow Escapade You are being chased, the odds are insurmountable. Your pursuers chase you to a shaded alleyway. It''s a dead end. However, they find nothing there.
Adam didn''t hesitate, he lucked out to get the highest ranked feat for his class on the third level, he immediatelly picked [Shadow Form]
Congratulations Level Up (IV) +5 Hp +7 Mana
Congratulations Level Up (V) +5 Hp +3 Mana
Congratulations Level Up (VI) +3 Hp +6 Mana New Feat Available Choice Selected From; VII
(VII) Unarmed Proficiency The use of the limbs is near limitless, allowing a combat style that exercises great control over the opponent, and to dispatch with the least use of force.
Adam didn''t have much of a choice and picked [Unarmed Proficiency], it was his bad luck that he would roll four sevens in a row, but this skill would complement his combat power nicely. Adam stared at the messages that appeared before him, the sheer number of good things they said at a cursory glance immediately left him in a good mood. Casting away the last vestiges of fear which Patriarch Sha had inspired within him. He gained four levels merely by gaining the Patriarchs favour and gaining proficiency in the Cold Evil Fist? This was utterly ridiculous. The good kind of ridiculous. He skipped entire power levels in the span of ten minutes, right now his strength couldn''t be compared to that of before. Adam was in the middle of revelling in his bliss when he was suddenly splashed with a bucketful of water in the face. Taken by surprise, Adam almost accidentally inhaled a mouthful of it and was reduced to a coughing fit whilst laying on the floor in a foetal position. After about half a dozen moments Adam could finally breath steadily, add a dozen on top of that and he was back to normal. It didn''t take long for Adam to orient himself as he found Mr. Li looking down on him. Adam didn''t bother asking why he had thrown a bucketful of water on his face, Mr. Li was like that, an unreasonable man. If he told you that West was East then West was East, else you''d make him angry, and nobody want to make Mr. Li angry. Mr. Li then dictated to Adam, the way that he always talked. "So, you are Chosen." His eyes held an emotionless expression, almost as if a Chosen were no better than a stray dog on the side of the road. "Yes." Then Mr. Li smiled once more, it wasn''t a joyful smile but rather one that you would make when you are making fun of somebody. "Ahahahahahaha, do you know what the title of Chosen affords you?" Mr. Li asked in a tone which implied that he already knew the answer. "It allows me to comprehend martial arts at an increased speed as well as allow me to command disciples from the sect." Adam responded slowly, not sure where exactly Master Li was getting at. "Good, and do you know how many disciples of the Cold Evil Sect exist on Earth?" Master Li continued asking with the same tone, the mocking smile on his face becoming broader and broader. At the same time as he asked this question, a spark of revelation was lit inside Adam, a very dark forecast as to where this conversation was heading. As if revelling in the growing mix of disappointment and anxiousness within Adam, Master Li slowly raised his right hand and raised his index and middle fingers. Then, he pointed towards himself and Adam. This slow and immaculate movement dashed all of Adams hopes at being some sort of important figure within the sect. "Ok, how about you make yourself useful. You have become strong enough, how about you go to the Karate Dojo we first met in and humiliate their practitioners?" Master Li''s smile and his ''negotiating'' tone clearly indicated to Adam that Master was doing anything but negotiating, therefore he had little choice but to pack his things and head of outside the mountain. This would be the first time he had left Masters house in the past few months, since he had arrived here. Before he left, Master Li stopped him and gave him something more suitable to challenge an entire cohort of Karateka''s in. It was a sinister black changpao, much like the one that Master Li wore except that it didn''t have any golden frills on the edges. It was something that you would find on the main antagonist in a Wuxia film. Perfectly suitable on a ruthless martial practitioner, albeit Adam wasn''t quite ruthless yet. Adam made his way down the mountain and turned on the old smartphone that he hadn''t used in what seemed ages. The smartphone took about half a minute to turn on, good, it still had enough battery. At least enough to call a taxi, he could have called a Uber but he didn''t have the app installed and didn''t have the need to save that extra bit of money to boycott going for a traditional taxi service. No doubt Master Li thought he would sprint thirteen kilometres to the dojo and challenge them all straight away, but why would he arrive unprepared and tired when he could stop by his home for a couple hours, have some lunch and strategize on the best method to beat Karate practitioners in a fight. With this cunning albeit lazy mindset, Adam set about doing his things. The taxi that picked him up was a long black limousine, something unexpected considering he called the first taxi company that appeared on a google search, however all it meant was that he would have to pay a ''few'' dollars more. Getting on the back seat of the black limousine, Adam found that the drivers ''cabin'' was separated by a black glass panel and that the passenger compartment was laden with all sorts of champagnes and sweets. Moreover he wasn''t the only passenger. In fact, a very familiar young man was sitting on the opposite corner of the passenger compartment. This young man had a black goatee, black hair messily combed backwards and a gleaming pair of glasses. He was wearing a trench coat and had an old fashioned pipe held in-between his forefinger and index finger. With his advance perception, Adam could also see that this young man had a gun holstered underneath his trench coat and attached to his belt. It would also be interesting to note that the belt buckle had a certain name inscribed on it. ''Leo Wesley'' Chapter 11 - Making New Friends Adam sat down on the seat and rested his body on it, completely at ease. He wasn''t worried at all about the fact that Leo had a gun, with his current speed Adam was confident that he could murder Commander Wesley ten times over before that gun cleared leather. Wesley squinted his eyes at seeing Adam relax himself, as if unhappy that he was apparently letting down his guard. Nevertheless, he took out a few folders worth of documents out of his right pocket. "Adam, were have you been? Do you have any idea how many resources and manpower we wasted looking for you?" "Then, just as we had given up, you just show up in the middle of god damn nowhere." Leo seemed to be quite angry at this moment. The composed kind of angry, the one that you would get from a professional diplomat, attempting to lay the fault and guilt on you in order to maintain a higher negotiating advantage. However, this tactic would prove futile against Adam. Who would possibly expect any strategy arising from social tact to work on an individual with a total charisma value of 6. A value which accurately represented how much he cared about whether or not he gave Leo any trouble for the past few months in which he was under the care of Master Li. Commander Wesley took the pipe to his mouth and slowly inhaled for exactly five seconds, after which he lowered the pipe exactly to where it had been before and exhaled all the smoke, it came out in a perfect ring which slowly expanded outwards, accurately demonstrating his ability as a skilled smoker. The whole time he was looking at Adam, a glint in his eyes that demanded an answer, a satisfactory one. Adam looked out the window, it was a clear day but the tinted window dampened the colours of the outside. The car was still in the national park, a magnificent mountain range extended beyond to the horizon, these must be the Blue Mountains. Looking outside, Adam slowly responded. "Leo." Commander Wesley''s face contorted slightly as he heard Adam address him by his first name. "You just need to do your thing. You tell me what needs to be done and I go ahead and do it. I do my own thing and you go off and do your own thing." Adam was still calmly looking out of the window. Leo simply looked shocked. His jaw was hanging loose almost as if he couldn''t believe that Adam had just said that. Then, he reached out from his seat to shirtfront Adam. Only to stop. A deadly stop. Leo''s head was already halfway through the cabin when he found the sharp end of a skewer, which was used to hold together a burger in the snacks table, softly pressing against his neck. Adam was still calmly looking outside the window, towards the distant horizon. He didn''t even need to look at Leo to judge where to point the skewer since his [Awareness] allowed him to perceive everything in this room perfectly. If Leo wasn''t shocked before, he certainly would be now. He opened his mouth to speak but found that nothing came out. Instead he closed it and took a deep breath. The whole time not moving from the position in which a skewer was pointed at his Adam''s apple. He exhaled and unmasked his face as a broad and extremely sincere looking smile was revealed to Adam. "My, my. This was just a misunderstanding. You see I had just wanted to clarify a few terms of your employment. But I believe it''s all cleared up now." Adam lazily turned to look at him. "Any more misunderstandings which you seem to have no lack of?" Leo''s facial expression didn''t change whatsoever, he seemed very experienced in matters of intrigue. Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. "Of course not, I have all the terms of the agreement here with me, along with your first assignment." "The terms are as such, you will be paid a monthly salary of twenty-thousand dollars for virtue of being a special operative operating under the crown. This is in addition to the payout for Projects, Assignments, Missions and such. Work related expenses will be provided for by the crown, as such all weaponry, training and ammunition you may require can be requested through the military." "You will be required to undergo SAS training. The most elite special forces in the Commonwealth and in fact the World. Since you will be operating alone we can forgo the signals, patrol and squadron induction training. This will mean a course of eleven weeks ." "So, it''ll be two and a half months in military training?" "Yes." Adam wouldn''t be too enthusiastic about this, his body had progressed to the point in which he would probably be able to handle it. However, one shouldn''t underestimate the brutality of the SAS training regime. It would still prove to make him stronger though, so he would still go along with it. Commander Wesley seemed to continue despite seeing the obvious reservations in Adam''s eyes. "You will begin tomorrow, so you had better pack your things and expect us to pick you up. Before you ask, this is non-negotiable. In return for allowing you free reign we will have to keep you in a tight schedule. On the bright side this training counts as your first assignment so you will be getting paid for these two and a half months." Adam kept his cool composure, but inside he felt like crying. He had an entire cohort of people to beat up, couldn''t this wait a while. ... No... I''ll manage, I don''t need to compromise when I know I can achieve something. "Leo, can you pull over at that Chinese looking building for a couple minutes. I need to do something." Leo was confused but complied with Adam. Before he knew it Adam was standing before the wooden gates of the Goju Ryu Karate training place. The last time he had been here was a few months ago. It was also the first time he had met Master Li. Back then Adam had wished that he had never opened this door, but now, now Adam wanted to test out how strong he had become. Taking a step forwards, he put both palms on the gate''s doors and slammed them outwards. Literally barging into the place, if he was going to offend someone, he may as well thoroughly offend them. The crashing door let out a resounding BOOM as they swung inwards and smashed against the stone walls. There were about three dozen practitioners inside the courtyard this time, a significantly lesser number than before. However they were all at least black belt and they were sparring with each other. A spar in which Adam had resounding success in disrupting, as evident by the few dozen pairs of eyes curiously looking at him in hostility. A tall Asian young man with Japanese features stepped forward to receive Adam, at first he had an expression that said. ''What the hell are you doing?'' But as soon as he noticed that Adam was wearing a sinister black changpao that hostile expression was replaced with one that almost seemed like an oxymoron. It said. ''How dare your kind set foot in here, take one more step and a year from now will be the anniversary of your death. But, don''t actually take that step forward, you see, I am a righteous person and don''t feel like fighting evil today. If I were afraid of you then may heavenly lighting smite me from the surface of this world.'' However the last part of that expression disappeared when the Japanese man saw that Adam wasn''t an old Chinese man with an extremely long white beard and a terrible sense of humour. He stepped forwards and took a low stance. If he remembered correctly this one was called Ge-dan. Adam walked forward a few more steps and took a neutral stance with [Shadow Footwork]. It allowed him great manoeuvrability and manipulation of his techniques, however it lacked great destructive power. Although it didn''t matter since he didn''t want to kill them. His feet were about thirty centimetres apart, facing outwards and heels up. His palms were in front of him, bent forwards in a thirty-five degree angle. His right foot and right palm were slightly in front of their left counterpart. This stance should be good, this posture was passable according to the standards of Master Li. The young Japanese man was now roughly five metres in front of him. His fellow practitioners were watching on with a judgemental expression, they were treating this intrusion as an honourable challenge to their martial discipline. The young man took a wide step forward and executed a roundhouse kick towards Adam''s body. The judgement of the distance was perfect as the ankle would strike just under the protection of Adam''s arms, into the side of his stomach. From the looks of how much force this kick had, it would likely land someone out of action if they were struck by this. The roundhouse kick in Karate is a favoured technique by many practitioners. It allows for a pre-emptive strike outside the range of someone''s hands, destabilises the opponents stance if they choose to block it and give the initiative to the practitioner. Let alone the fact that it packed great power, this move was a vital instrument in most Karate practitioners. Of course, this wasn''t any problem for Adam. His neutral stance was specialised to move anywhere at a moments notice. The footwork in most Japanese martial arts emphasised a solid structure which allowed explosively attacking forwards at a moments notice. Kendo and Karate are good examples of this. However it would be difficult and slightly awkward to move sideways or backwards with this footwork technique. That is the advantage that lay in Adam''s [Shadow Footwork]. It was designed for evasion and lightning quick strikes, with a flexible footwork that allowed one to retreat omni-directionally. Adam stepped backwards in the time span that it would take the average human to blink just as the kick was about to land on him. The young man was surprised at this, firstly because he hadn''t encountered anyone that could move backwards with such ease and secondly because it caused his roundhouse kick to miss. Normally a practitioner would simply lower the kicking foot and take a Ge-Dan stance so as to stabilise their position if they miss, however, Adam dodged at the last possible moment and caused the kick to go much further than his body. This made the practitioner become of balance and slightly turn their back towards Adam. Of course, the first advantage of his stance was freedom of movement, the second was lightning quick attacks. He would be a fool to let this opportunity go by, thus, Adam took two steps in the time it takes to blink three times. This placed him right beside the young man. Adam decided to take him down with a combination of a sweep and a hand chop. He swept the outstretched right foot of the young man and caused him to fall backwards. While he was still falling backwards Adam could see the fearful face of the young man. His hair had become bedraggled and cold sweat had formed at the young man''s brow. It didn''t matter since Adam sent his right hand chopping into his solar plexus. Causing the young man to almost black out from the pain and accelerate his fall backwards into the stone pavement. Pkkk! It was a loud, yet muffled sound. The sound of a clothed man hitting the ground very hard. Adam looked down at the first person he had dispatched for the day, his eyes were blanked out and drool was coming out of the right side of his mouth. He was out cold. Looking back up, he saw the surprise faces of all the practitioners when he had dispatched the young man in one fell swoop. Then, they were replaced by faces of anger until a young man walked out of the temple inside the courtyard. He was Adam''s age, and yet everyone was looking at him in respect. His features were fair and sharp, reminiscent of Oda Nobunaga. His belt was black without any golden stripes on it, however, by the look on everyone''s faces, it seemed that his belt didn''t determine his skill. The practitioners around Adam seemed to part for the young man like how the sea had split for Moses. They took their positions on the sides of the courtyard and ceremoniously sat down on their knees, as was traditional in Japan. This was the first time that Adam could get a clear look at the young man, not through a sea of people. His face was fair and sharp, his bearing lofty. He seemed like the Emperor of a Divine Kingdom, not a practitioner in some dojo. He spoke out in English. Surprisingly he spoke perfect English, better than some natives and without any accent at all. "What is your name, worthy opponent?" Adam was surprised at the gall of this kid that was his age, surely someone that was around his age couldn''t possible be as strong as he was. However, Adam kept his thoughts to himself, he didn''t respond since he had built up some small amount of prejudice against this guy. Seeing Adam''s silence, the young man smiled, if he was offended the he hadn''t shown any signs of taking offense at Adam''s silence. "I am Ito Toshihiro. I believe that you should know this since judging from your clothing, Old Man Li has sent you, hasn''t he?" Taking Adam''s prolonged silence as an affirmative, Toshihiro continued. "Seeing as you are probably the disciple of that old man, I should tell you about my history with that old man. Three years ago, when he first came by, he thought that this was a Buddhist temple and wanted to recruit a disciple from this place. Seeing me, he exclaimed at my latent talent, telling everyone in the dojo at how well suited I was for practicing the martial path. Then, just as I was about to accept him as my master, he realised that we weren''t a Buddhist temple when someone came in with a Karate-Gi. After we explained to him that we were Japanese, he burst into a fury and seriously injured the majority of everyone here." "Ever since then, he comes by every year and breaks out in a rampage. Now I am not sure what reason he has that we have made him so angry, and I assume that you are here for the same reason." By this point in time, Toshihiro had reached the bottom of the stairs, he took a normal stance with his fists spread apart and lightly clenched. From the natural position in which he stood, Adam could tell how formidable an opponent Toshihiro would be. Toshihiro then extended his right hand forwards, in an open palm. This only meant one thing in the martial world. "Come!" Toshihiro proclaimed. Chapter 12 - Adam vs Toshihiro Ito Toshihiro extended his right hand with a slight incline towards the right, a signal that he was giving the initiative to Adam. Of course, Adam wasn''t the type to honourably decline this gesture. Within a split second he was before Toshihiro, his left palm extended upwards in a chopping motion. It wasn''t aimed at anywhere in particular, it was simply a probing attack. Adam was confident that he could dodge any frontal counterattack against his probing strike, regardless of how fast it came. However, to Adam''s shock, he lost on this exchange of moves. Adam''s palm was about to strike Toshihiro when he suddenly flew into a flying kick from his stationary position. ''Not good!'' Adam had to hastily block the flying kick with his outstretched left hand, allowing it to take the brunt of the impact. Adam hastily retreated backwards and flexed his injured left hand. He looked at Toshihiro''s hands, only to see them glowing with a golden aura. The sunlight from the open courtyard reflected off it and gave off a blindingly regal feel. Toshihiro opened his mouth to speak. "I know you are an awakened, Old Man Li wouldn''t have chosen anybody else as his disciple! Now, show me your true power if you hope to win!!!" Toshihiro shouted towards Adam. Toshihiro discarded all pretence of appearance, rushing forwards with his golden palms in an aggressive stance. If Adam managed to block this then he would certainly land a critical counterattack. However, this stance showed how confident Toshihiro was of his attacking power. No doubt this was an insidious tactic to make Adam attempt to block this blow. Toshihiro was taking advantage of the fact that Adam didn''t quite know how powerful his strikes were when he used the his Golden Palm Style technique, however, from the way Toshihiro seemed to be moving, it looked like those golden palms were in fact quite powerful. Of course, Adam wasn''t the type to jump headfirst into a trap. If you were to scheme against him he would lead you on and make it look as if he fell for it, only to turn the tables at the last second. Toshihiro had already closed the distance between them, he pulled his right hand back to perform a basic punch into Adam''s body. Normally this move would be hardly threatening in a fight between martial practitioners, however, this time Toshihiro had his [Golden Palm Style] to strengthen his attacks. Adam didn''t dare to take this attack lightly. Doubtlessly, Toshihiro expected him to dodge considering this was a fairly rigid strike. However, Adam chose not to dodge since it would basically mean handing the initiative over to Toshihiro, something Adam was unwilling to surrender. In a split moment Adam had formulated a simple strategy with which to counter Toshihiro''s attack. Toshihiro''s hip was slightly turning to the side opposite of the coiled fist, a sign that he was about to unleash his strike. A textbook punch from someone of this level would be equivalent to being hit with a hammer, perhaps a sledgehammer if Adam took into account the golden aura surrounding Toshihiro''s golden fists. If Adam couldn''t block this blow directly, or dodge. Then there was only one option. Adam''s injured left hand was extended in a palm, it was twisted into a grappling position. Adam used his injured hand because the move he was planning to execute wouldn''t involve a great clash of kinetic energy, instead the mere redirection of force. His left hand swerved in-between the two of them. It was at chest height between the two. Toshihiro''s fist had already left it''s coiled position and was well on it''s way to Adam''s upper chest. Adam''s left hand twisted unnaturally and caught onto Toshihiro''s forearm from the inside, the forearm of the attacking hand! Adam pulled it towards him while slightly shifting it towards the left, making it miss him completely and pass by his left shoulder. Adam only grabbed the forearm and didn''t make contact with the golden skin so he couldn''t measure the density of the golden hands. If they turned into solid gold or merely took a gilded texture, only Toshihiro knew. Seeing his initial attack miss, Toshihiro attempted a textbook karate counterattack and attempted to pull his attacking arm back while at the same time coiling his other arm into a position for an elbow strike. Toshihiro chose to use an elbow strike because the two had already entered close range melee combat, in which most punching and kicking techniques were too impractical to be used. Thus the choice of combat manoeuvres was limited to grappling, kneeing, elbowing and head-butting. Of course, Adam practically foresaw that Toshihiro would do this, it was the most effective attack in this position. Which was why he prepared for it. Firstly he clenched his left hand so as to prevent Toshihiro''s other hand from pulling back, lessening the strength of Toshihiro''s elbow strike technique since he couldn''t perform hikite1 to lend extra strength to his blow. Furthermore Karate techniques depended upon using hikite in order to lend strength to the other hand. This meant that Toshihiro was startled and his stance was destabilised after futilely attempting to leverage strength from the ground to smash the elbow against Adam.Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author. This meant that Toshihiro was placed in a dangerous position, however, he decided to carry on with the attack lest he lose the initiative. To Adam''s shock, Toshihiro''s attacking elbow began to take on a golden lustre, promising a heavy blow if this would land. Toshihiro had made up for the lost strength by applying his aura to the attacking limb! Adam thought to himself in shock. ''So his awakened technique isn''t limited to applying strength to the hands?! Is it limited to the arms or is it any part on his body?'' Nevertheless, Adam didn''t have much time to think of possible ways to use this newfound knowledge as the elbow was well on it''s way to Adam''s face. It was a good thing Adam prepared himself for this exact outcome, apart from the golden sheen coming off from the opponent''s elbow. Adam bent his knees at a ninety degree angle, putting him well below where the strike would hit. Then, taking advantage of the opening wrought about by Toshihiro''s raised elbow, Adam smashed his own elbow into Toshihiro''s left ribcage. As soon as Adam heard a cracking sound form from Toshihiro''s ribs he retreated backwards, allowing a breather for the both of them. There was a distance of about seven metres in between the two of them. Toshihiro was glaring at him hatefully. He was also slightly leaning to the left, as if injured. It looked like his ribs really were broken, much to Adam''s delight. This would only make the rest of the battle easier. If Toshihiro was a second rate ''villain'' in any other novel, he would be screaming and shouting obscene curses at Adam, except he wasn''t. He was critically analysing Adam''s every move. This battle had long since reached the point of life and death. Toshihiro began pacing to the right, Adam paced to the left in order to maintain the centre of combat in the middle of the courtyard. Toshihiro was playing mind games now, injured and at a slight disadvantage in a frontal combat he began to make attempts to unnerve Adam by pacing around him. Doubtlessly Toshihiro was imitating Miyamoto Musashi''s shameless tactic of arriving late and unkempt to a duel in order to unnerve the opponent. On the 13th of April, 1612, Miyamoto Musashi fought his first duel against Sasaki Kojiro in Funajima Island. Sasaki had arrived extremely early to the duel and prepared himself for the oncoming fight, however, seeing that the appointed time had came and gone, he started to worry that Miyamoto had forgone the duel, deciding to simply not show up. By the time that Sasaki was at his wits end, Miyamoto showed up with a wooden sword. Seeing this, Sasaki couldn''t hold down his nerve and immediately charged Miyamoto to end the duel once and for all. However, all the waiting had deteriorated his mental state and fighting spirit, allowing Miyamoto to easily kill Sasaki with the wooden sword. Toshihiro was attempting the very same tactic here, attempting to unnerve Adam, trying to force him to reveal flaws in his stance. Well, if he could play that game, so could he. Knowing fully well that he was in the middle of combat, Adam tore a strip of cloth from his pants, the lower seam. He displayed it for Toshihiro to easily see. His opponent was clearly confused as to what he was doing, trying to decipher which trick Adam was playing at. Then, in one fluid motion, Adam used the piece of torn cloth to cover his eyes and tied it around the back of his head. Tied to the back of his head like a bandana, it wouldn''t come off unless a great amount of pressure and effort was used to tear it off. Toshihiro had a blank expression on his face, he couldn''t register what had just happened. What had Adam just done? Did he just blindfold himself?! In the middle of a fight?! To the death?! Toshihiro couldn''t accept this sequence of events. It wasn''t that he was some second rate antagonist but rather it was all just too incredulous to happen in the middle of a fight. In all of his years pursuing the martial Dao, not once had he seen anything such as this. Therefore, his mind immediately aligned this event to the closest thing that it looked like to him. Disregard. Insult. Utter disregards and insult of his combat ability. Toshihiro lowered his head and looked at the ground for a few seconds. His cheeks were becoming flushed and his eyes started to become bloodshot. His fists were lowered to his sides, quivering from the sheer shame he was suffering. He was fighting with his very best, and the opponent disregarded him. Almost as if he was but a stepping stone on his path to power, not a formidable opponent with whom to fight. There was no greater shame to Toshihiro than this, his clenched fists slowly relaxed as an unyielding gaze swept over Adam. If Toshihiro couldn''t receive proper respect from his opponents, then he would force them to recognize his martial prowess. On the other side of the courtyard Adam stood solemnly with a blindfold around his eyes, alike to a lonely hero facing a great adversary. Adam had blindfolded himself, however, this was a calculated risk. There are three systems of perceptions. Proprioception, exteroception and interoception. Interoception was the perception of the body''s organs, such as hunger and thirst as well as the beating of the heart. Exteroception was the perception of the outside world through the five senses. Proprioception was the perception of the self, the awareness in the movements of the body. Adam had taken the [Awareness] feat a long time ago. When he first took it he sensed a great change in his Exteroception, however, this wasn''t the limit. Every day inside the well and every night when training Adam found his senses adapting to the improved awareness. When he was hungry, he learnt to supress the pain in order to complete difficult tasks. He learnt to control the rate at which his heart beat, allowing it to beat once every five seconds and slow his metabolism to a crawl. He also learnt how to see without light during moonless nights, he learnt how to perceive his surroundings with the shifting tapestry of sound and developed his sixth sense to see unknown threats. With the pinnacle of the three systems of perception, Adam could achieve a realm of martial prowess which was incomparable to his prior combat state. Pushing the sensations of his body to the limits, he entered a Zen-like state. The world seemed slowed down to his view, the lack of eyesight did nothing to bar the influx of sensory information. This caused his cognitive functions to overload and perceive everything at a slowed rate, the same slowed motion which people at deaths door had reported seeing. Toshihiro was charging him, his golden palms gathering the light energy in the area into themselves. He wanted to end this in a final exchange of martial techniques. A gust of wind happened to fall over the courtyard in the moment of this exchange. With the fresh wind of spring came the fallen petals of cherry blossoms. To Adam, they seemed to float in the air because of his slowed perception. They danced in a peaceful tumult of suspense, the petals created a perfect contrast and audience to the conclusion of this duel. The sun hung overhead, allowing the petals an enrapturing contrast of shade and light, causing a swirling flood of white and grey on the stone pavement of the courtyard. Adam was in a true epiphany, he quietly admired the floating cherry blossom petals and the dancing light around him. He had no plan to counter Toshihiro''s attack, an attack which seemed incomparable to all of his prior one''s combined. Toshihiro seemed extremely slow to his perception, although in reality he must have been mind numbingly fast. Then, Adam let his own body guide his actions. He used his greatest trump card which he hadn''t used in the fight yet. Gathering the power of shadow around his hands, the swirling mass of cherry blossom petal shadows gathered into a single point. His index finger. The golden light around Toshihiro intensely reacted to the abyssal power of shadow, it intensely grew in power. It seemed like a burning sun, incomparable to burning magnesium. The light seemed to permeate throughout the entire courtyard, in fact, had Adam not blindfolded himself then this light would have rendered him permanently blind. Then, Toshihiro struck out. His whole body had shockingly turned completely golden, only his eyes retaining their original substance. They were completely red, not only from rage but apparently from the huge strain his body was put under in utilising this forbidden technique. Adam was completely at ease, he stood directly in the path of Toshihiro''s golden fist. Then, a golden explosion shook the courtyard and shattered the stone pavement. Cherry blossoms covered the entire fighting scene so none of the spectators could see the outcome of the fight. However, another gust of wind took away the majority of the cherry blossom petals and a shocking seen could be seen within. The spectators knew Toshihiro''s power very well and thought that the young western man couldn''t hold a candle against him. However, before them, they saw Toshihiro on his knees. His body was back to it''s fleshly form, his right hand was covering his left eye and his face was extremely pale, a symptom of severe shock. Adam stood before him, he was completely unruffled and even his hair was still neatly combed in the face of this explosion. He stood upright, not in any martial stance whatsoever. However, his right hand was outstretched in front of him. It was pointing towards the position in which Toshihiro had been standing in before he fell on his knees. His right hand''s index finger was extended outwards, blood was dripping from the tip of the finger onto the fallen cherry blossom petals. Then, from Toshihiro''s covered left eye, an imperceptible trickle of blood crawled down from the gap in between the ocular cavity and the nasal bridge. Adam still had a distant look in his eyes, and, under the shocked gazes of everyone, walked to the gate and left. From the swinging doors, the karate practitioners could be seen rushing towards Toshihiro to check for his health. Whereas the person in question had fallen backwards to lay face up on the floor. He looked up at the sky, his clothing was tattered and his hair was bedraggled. The place where his left eye should have been was no more, instead, a shadowed cavity filled it''s place. If one were to look carefully, a glimmer of green light could be seen deep within the bloody hole. The perpetrator of this injury was outside the temple by this point. His mouth was curled in a smile. Not the cold one that he usually showed but a genuine smile. He wasn''t happy because of his victory, but rather because of the unforgettable scene within the cherry blossoms. Then, from his peaceful stance, Adam suddenly got a coughing fit and used his right hand to cover his mouth. The spontaneous coughing fit ended shortly, however, looking at his right hand, Adam saw a stain of blood upon it. He could also feel the blood beginning to pool within the recesses of his throat. Toshihiro was a difficult opponent. Chapter 13 - Leaving Home A crow cawed in the dim lighting of sunrise. The wind was still. The trees were quiet. The only sound that could be heard was the cawing of crows. The cawing of crows and the creaking of an old metal swing. Adam was on the swing, lazily swaying from front to back. Pensively, he thought about the outcome of yesterday''s duel. Toshihiro had used all of his strength in that final strike, and had Adam not used Shadow Form at the last possible moment he would have been destroyed in body and mind. Shadow Form took a decent chunk out of his mana pool, 15 points, but the complete immunity to physical attacks was well worth it. The problem was that it couldn''t defend against attacks of magical nature, and thus he still sustained damage from the golden aura going through his body, shattering his constitution and forcing Adam to cough out blood. In the future, he would have to avoid frontal confrontations such as this. His strength lay in ambushes and such, not in an open duel. Lying within his pensive thoughts, Adam was unaware that beside him a little girl had begun swinging on the swing beside him. The girl looked to be about seven years of age and everything about her was white. A white dress, white shoes, white socks, white hair, white eyes and pale white skin. Only the pupils of her eyes was a deep, dark colour. It was a captivating shade of black, a shade in which someone could fall into an eternal reverie from merely gazing at it. The girl started humming slowly, the tune was joyful in the beginning. Hearing the song, Adam''s pensive thoughts subconsciously turned to his early childhood. His father heading to work everyday. His mother preparing his lunch in the morning. Playing in the kindergarten during the afternoon. Sitting down beside the canal, enjoying the cool summer breeze and the moist sensation of wet grass. The little girl beside Adam continued humming happily, until, on a sharp note, she stopped. She began humming after that, but it wasn''t the same joyful tune. This time she hummed something you would find in a tragedy. Adam''s thoughts similarly turned towards the recent happenings, memories within an office building which seemed estranged to him, almost as if he was but a mere spectator within someone else''s body. He seemed to be some sort of monster, long white tendrils instead of arms and a pale membrane covered him. He saw someone, then that someone was no more. They were gone, nothing more than a streak of blood on a wall. He saw someone else, this time in some sort of toilet. They suffered the same fate. Both times the monster which Adam inhabited used it''s white tendrils to enter through the seven apertures of the peoples heads. From where it seemed to consume their darkest fears. Adam could feel the consumption of nightmares. It felt satisfying, yet also exhilarating. It filled him with the undue joy of an addictive sin. The adrenalin from doing something inherently evil, the morbid curiosity of looking through the deepest and darkest nightmares of those people as if they were a delectable dish served at a five star restaurant. However, the mere act of consuming a meal requires one to tear away the packaging and discard it. Adam found it funny how he simply thought of them as packaging, it seemed his moral compass had gone awry. Then, Adam saw that another person entered the toilet area. A brunette office worker carrying a small cardboard cup of instant coffee. ... The little girl beside Adam was humming the tragic tune, the whole time her profoundly dark pupils were glued on Adam. A pitiful expression seemed to appear on her expression, almost as if she could read Adam''s mind right now. ... Adam was still in his pensive thoughts, however, his sixth sense managed to detect something. It told him that whoever or whatever it was, it was a grave danger to him. Jumping from the swing in a fluid motion, he landed on a knee and rolled backwards. He turned to look at the swings, this was because his sixth sense detected that the danger was right next to him. However, all that he could find were two swings. Two slowly swaying swings, creaking against the sporadic cawing of crows. ... Adam made his way back home after the unnerving encounter. He still wasn''t sure what it quite was that triggered such a reaction from his sixth sense but decided that the safest course of action would be to leave the playground. It was already dawn, Leo had told him that he would be picked up at midday to go to the military facility.The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Adam had originally gone to the playground in order to set his thoughts straight, but he ended up arriving home even more confused than before. Nevertheless, he decided that his immediate goal should be what was presented before him, and that was completing this eleven week training. Inside his home, Adam prepared a cup of camomile tea to drink. The furniture inside the house had gathered copious amounts of dust from the months in which it had gone untended. Abandoned cobwebs could be seen in the corners of rooms. The iced cans of coffee still sat inside the fridge, miraculously not having gone off yet. His room stayed as he had let it, rumpled sheets stop his bed. A chaotic array of useless papers stacked on his desk. A broken lamp standing uselessly atop said papers. Had it been a few months prior Adam would have cleaned this place up. But now, Adam was determined never to come back to this place. It contained too many painful memories for him, far too many to ever be habitable to Adam again. Adam took the time in the last hour before being picked up to quietly sip his last cup of tea in this place. He tilted the cup towards his mouth, only to see the bottom of the cup within the poor lighting of his home. He turned to look at the clock instead. Ten-to-twelve. He made his way to the fridge and pocketed a can of iced coffee, he put on his favourite coat and took all the house keys with him along with his phone and charger. Making his way out of the front door he spotted a sleek black car escorted by a pair of black suited men. They sported aviators and had black earpieces beside their bald heads, giving away the occupation of the two bodyguards. Making his way to the car, Adam saw the senior of the two men speak into his earpiece, doubtlessly reporting to his superior. At a conversational distance to the car, the other bodyguard addressed Adam. "Mr. Freeman?" Adam looked up into his own reflection within the bodyguards aviators. Adam''s attire was casually tidy, however, his expression expressed a certain kind of emotional lethargy. "That''s me." Adam replied in a monotone voice. The man behind the aviators cracked open a professional smile, one that you would use when meeting a business partner for the first time. "Mr. Freeman, we would ask you to follow us into the car please." Adam quietly consented and stepped in through the door which was held open by the bodyguard. Within a few dozen seconds they had already started the engine and were well on their way to their destination. The military facility was located in the countryside, a great distance from any train station or airport. Therefore the trip would have to be made by car. The scenery outside the window of the car quickly gave way from residential housing to industrial factories and warehouses. Long plumes of smoke were constantly being pumped out from the long chimneys of the large factories in the distance. Further away from the city centre could be seen heavy police and vigilante presence within the streets, a result in the rise of monster attacks and activity from evil factions. The industrial quarter of the city was quickly passed by and it slowly gave way to agricultural landuse. Most of the farmsteads were abandoned this far out of the city and the livestock was reduced to skeletons within their prairies, their corpses likely picked clean by the voracious nature of monsters. Adam had known that Monsters had turned human civilisation upside down, however as a city dweller, he was never confronted face to face with the reality of the situation. He only saw one monster make it''s way into the suburban area, and that was his school. He had never seen the situation in areas which were prone to be infested with monsters. As the car continued to drive along the dirt road, less and less farmsteads could be seen. One of the houses was even burnt down. Adam didn''t want to imagine what kind of monster could burn a house. Then, Adam saw the corpse of a monster laying by it''s side, multiple gunshot wounds had penetrated into it''s flesh. So many in fact that the monster couldn''t be identified as being of any species. Adam began seeing more and more monster corpses, and occasionally human corpses. The majority were soldiers, some where awakened. Adam could tell because they were wearing a special uniform that gave away their faction. The bodyguard that was beside him opened his mouth to speak for the first time since getting inside the car. "Mr. Freeman, we are nearing the frontlines now, we may encounter a mishap on the way to the military base. In the case of a scenario in which we get separated happens, I have been ordered to provide you with this radio and a map alongside basic navigation tools so that you can make your own way there." The bodyguard showed Adam how to use these tools, such as the compass and how to take a bearing from his current position. Sufficiently satisfied that Adam had learnt enough about navigation, he gave him the small kit to carry around his shoulder and went back to looking out for monsters. The journey continued uneventfully for another two hours until certain distinctive sounds were heard in the distance. A series of short, sharp bursts exploded within the nearby woodlands. They resembled gunfire and the shooting continued for a prolonged amount of time, about three minutes. Adam''s bodyguards couldn''t hear the sound because it was too far away, however Adam could hear it as a result of his heightened awareness. Informing the guards of the shooting in the distance, the faces of the two guards fell beneath their expressionless aviators. The one that was driving immediately accelerated, going well past the speed limit. The other one turned to Adam to explain. "It is highly likely that a group of monsters broke through the combat perimeter, thus making it''s way here under fire. Any monster that can bypass the frontlines is by no means an ordinary existence. It is in our best interest to leave the vicinity of the encounter." The car kept accelerating for another ten minutes or so. Adam nervously looked through the windows in the direction that he last heard the gunfire. Then, more sounds of gunfire broke out. This time the gunfire was much closer than before and the guards could hear it clearly. However, the gunfire wasn''t accompanied by any shouting. The soldiers fighting the monsters were well trained and could operate in the field through the sole use of field signals. However, the incessant gunfire sounds were soon accompanied by the screams of dying men. Everyone inside the car tensed at this time. The guard in the passenger seat took out a sidearm from his holster and opened the window on his side of the car, preparing to shoot at anything that tore through the woodlands to the side of the car. Then, the gunfire suddenly stopped. It was silent, everyone inside the car looked at each other hesitantly. The car continued on in silence, the eucalyptus woodlands around them drawing ever nearer. Then, some distance behind them, a tree fell. It was followed by rhythmic thumping on the ground. It sounded similar to that of a galloping horse, however the strength beneath each hoof beat possessed more than enough power to crush a car. It was slowly growing louder, a sure sign that it was gaining on them. The rear view window of the car wasn''t aligned properly so Adam couldn''t see what monster was behind them, however, judging from the terrified expression of the driver it was to Adam''s interest not knowing what was behind them. The second guard leaned out of the window and let loose a few shots, however that proved to be a futile endeavour as the galloping behind them persisted. Afterwards, the guard leaning outside the window suddenly disappeared. To the driver, it would have looked like he simply vanished, but to Adam it was a completely different story. A flash of grey blurred past the window and dragged the guard with it, leaving only a momentary blood cloud in the place where he had been. Adam was absolutely shocked at the speed of this monster, even his heightened awareness only saw a mere flash of it''s movement. It would be absolutely suicidal to fight against it. The car turned a bend at a critical juncture and before them was a military checkpoint. Multiple soldiers manned the stockade and let loose a barrage of gunfire upon the beast behind them as soon as it was visible. Clearly these men were prepared to encounter the beast here. Adam had been in dangerous situations in the past year, but this one was by far the most terrifying. Fearing for his life, Adam braced himself against the handles on the side of the car. This proved to be an action with good foresight as in the very next instant the back wheels of the car gave way. This allowed the monster to immediately reach them. The first sight of the monster that Adam saw was a giant grey hoof jutting through the roof of the car and into the driver seat, turning the driver into nothing more than a cloud of blood. It was also the last sight Adam saw as the car toppled sideways and violently collided onto a tree in the side of the road. The great shock thrust Adam into unconsciousness. He was about to go into his subconscious space when ''Adam'' appeared at the last second, he mockingly nodded at Adam before walking behind him, as if he was taking control of their body. Without ''Adam'' in the subconsciousness, there was no substance behind maintaining the nightmarish world, therefore Adam lost all sense of self while unconscious. In this state ''Adam'' could take complete control of their body, but Adam wasn''t worried about that. As far as he was aware both he and ''Adam'' were one and the same, their nature was the same, if not their appearance. When Adam came to he was leaning on the trunk of a tree, some distance away from the car, or what used to be a car. Now it was just a warped and torn chunk of steel, droplets of blood visible on the remains of the drivers seat. He immediately made it his goal to get to the stockade, only to see it in flames. The flames were dying down by the time Adam got there, the charcoal remains made it apparent that the flames consumed structures and people alike. Everything was destroyed, the multiple military vehicles were little more than blackened junk and the soldier''s rifles were damaged to an inoperable degree. In the middle of the stockade lay the charred body of the monster. This one couldn''t be compared to the one which Adam had seen back at his school, it easily reached a height of two stories and the width of one. The shape of the monster resembled that of a rhinoceros crossed with a horse. Thick leather plates covered the entirety of the creature''s body and a single twisted horn protruded from the forehead. A once glorious silver mane grew from the top of it''s head to the nape of the neck, a mane which was now reduced to ashes. The feet were easily the height of a story and jointed backwards at the kneecap to end in tremendous hooves, much in the same way as a horse. The monster was dead, not from the flames that conflagrated atop it but rather an internal injury. Adam could tell this because copious amounts of blood were pulsing through the seven apertures of the monster''s head with every beat of the creature''s dying heart. The monster could barely breathe, it clearly wasn''t reduced to such a state from merely fighting the soldiers. It must have been fighting with ''Adam''. Adam found himself shocked at this scene. What power could ''Adam'' possibly hold so as to slay such a beast? From appearances this monster could stomp over a tank, let alone a puny individual of flesh and blood. It was at this moment that the dying beast gave a long wheeze with it''s final breath. A jet of blood sprayed from it''s mouth and landed on the matted earth in front of it, painting the soil a dark crimson colour. With that final breath Adam gained a notification. *Level Up* Nightmare Lv9 *Choose one new feat* *Feat Chosen* Just as the feat selection appeared a white tendril appeared from Adam''s forehead and chose one, this action takes a long time to describe however the actual time this took was a tenth of the time it takes a normal human to blink. The timespan was so small that even with heightened awareness, Adam was unable to make out the feat selections. Not knowing what to make of this, Adam sighed. At least he now knew what ''Adam''s'' class was. A cool sounding name such as nightmare must have a very strong class, a class which could slay a beast such as the one before him. Not tarrying in the least to mourn the dead, Adam set off on the dirt road. His destination, Fort Stalwart. Chapter 14 - Old Acquaintances The crisp smell of burnt earth flared in Adam''s nostrils. The heat haze in the distance was mesmerising to Adam''s eyes. The road seemed to stretch endlessly into the distance, no end in sight. According to the map provided by the late guard, the perimeter of the fortress was exactly thirty kilometres from the stockade, easily more than a three hour walk through flat terrain. Right now he was approximately ten kilometres to the base, but he encountered a problem. Within the shimmering haze in the distance stood the faint outlines of fighters. The fighters were shooting at each other from behind cover. It looked like a firefight between factions, the uniforms of the people were dirtied by the grime of combat so Adam couldn''t make out the allegiances of the combatants. In response to this, Adam decided to bypass the vicinity of the encounter, opting for a safer detour through the forest. Sticking to the shade beneath the sparsely populated trees and the occasional mounds of red earth proved to be beyond easy for Adam, allowing him to walk right past the group of combatants with them none the wiser. Adam believed this to be an isolated incident of discord between factions, however, another kilometre further up the road he saw more signs of combat. A few corpses by the side of the road, scorch marks on the trees and scattered bullet casings leaving their imprint on the red dust of the road. Adam decided to take a look at one of the corpses more carefully. He had a white jumpsuit with metal shin-pads and bracers. On his left arm was a black armband, very similar to the one on the late vigilante from a few months back. These people were from the [White Vigil]. Seriously, what was up with this faction? Why did anything near him have to involve it? Checking a corpse from the opposing faction he noted that she was dressed in some sort of strange black armour, judging from the colour of the armour and the fact that they were fighting a good faction he deduced that they must be some sort of evil faction. He also discovered two other things. One was that most of the vigilantes were armed with swords and light firearms, while only a minority of the villains were armoured with the strange black armour, suggesting some sort of hierarchy within that faction denoted by their gear. The majority of the villains were dressed in a variety of black attire, the only distinguishing factor being that they all covered their faces. The evil faction was armed with light firearms and spears. The seconds thing he noted was that the corpses belonging to the villains faction were vastly lesser in number, suggesting one of two outcomes. Either the villains faction managed to surprise the White Vigil in an ambush and determined a great battle advantage. That, or they are overwhelmingly superior in combat ability to the vigilante''s. Adam''s opinion tended towards the former because he had firsthand experience in the combat prowess of the vigilantes. Moving on from the small battlefield, Adam set out on his journey once more. Deciding that the road was no longer a safe route, Adam took another detour through the wilderness. This took him across many rock outcroppings and grass clearings on the route to the fort. At one point of his journey Adam arrived at the summit of a mountain. All around him were small brushes native to the Australian outback. By this point he was within three kilometres of the fort and he could see it in the distance from the peak of the unnamed mountain. It was a towering monstrosity of concrete and scaffolding, reaching up into the sky and grasping the very clouds. Modern cannons lined the sides of the towering fortress, clearly designed for taking down otherworldly enemies, or at least formerly otherworldly. These cannons were now aimed at a host of figures clad in black. This host easily numbered in the thousands, suggesting that it wasn''t a force fully composed of awakened but normal people as well. The reason for this was that awakened were extremely rare. In the entirety of Australia you''d be hard pressed to find more than four thousand. Accompanying the faction clad in black were huge monsters, the very same ones which had attacked Adam and his convoy earlier. These ones numbered in the scores and they were currently charging towards the walls of the fortress. The cannons fired and turned hundreds of the men into dust with every shell fired. However, the sheer amount of soldiers attacking the fortress made it seem like extinguishing a blazing fire with a cup of water. The beasts fighting alongside the evil faction smashed multiple holes into the wall and climbed into the fortress through the scaffolding. The attacking army followed after the monsters and brandished their weapons against the defenders on the wall.This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it. As for the defence, the vigilantes lead the front with their melee weaponry whereas the soldiers used a combination of heavy and light arms to repel the besiegers from a distance. This led to a bloody deadlock between the two factions on multiple areas in the scaffolding. Soldiers, Vigilantes and Villains died by the score every few seconds within this bloody battlefield, only to be pushed off the platforms by their comrades to make space for more combatants who were entering the fray. Adam gazed at the battlefield with complicated emotions. He looked upon the defending soldiers with some measure of sympathy whereas he delighted in the demise of the vigilantes with schadenfreude. After all, why should he hold sympathy to people that had once tried to kill him? Watching the battle suddenly seemed to be a very tiring thing to Adam. The cause may have been the intense fighting in the distance or the long trek to this mountain, but none of it mattered as Adam took out the iced coffee in his jacket and popped the cap off. He craned his head backwards and put the mouth of the bottle between his lips, taking a long draught of iced coffee in the process. While he was drinking he heard a sound. A sound apart from all the fighting in the distance. A sound which was relatively close to him. Anybody else wouldn''t have heard it, however, this was Adam and you couldn''t surprise Adam. Adam jumped in the opposite direction of the sound, landing in a low fighting stance. At the same moment in which he jumped a flash of steel appeared nearby him, originating from a girl clad in the white uniform of the White Vigil. This girl was the very same Sera which Adam had met back in his old school! She seemed not to recognise him, and apparently took him to be an enemy from how she took a combat stance immediately after her surprise attack missed. Adam smiled confidently. A year from now she could have beaten him, but not now. He prepared to take a stance when the can of iced coffee in his hand suddenly split in two, dropping the rest of the liquid on the rocky ground. Shockingly Sera had managed to cut the can of iced coffee in her surprise attack! It was important to note that when Adam was dodging, the can of iced coffee in his hand was in the place where his neck had been. Adam looked at the cut can in shock, slowly dropping from his hand as it lost strength from the physical shock. It seems I have to retract what I said, you can surprise Adam. If only in extremely rare cases. Sera saw that Adam was surprised and didn''t let go of that opportunity to attack. Her confidence was further bolstered when she saw that he didn''t have a weapon with which to defend himself. This attack was extremely quick, an overhead slash with a cutlass which would cleanly cut through a small tree. However, if Adam was done in by an attack of this calibre then his master would probably commit suicide from the shame of teaching such a useless disciple. Adam turned to the left, dodging by the smallest of margins and surprising Sera with the amount of control he could exercise over his body in a combat scenario. Not leaving a gap for Sera to bisect him with the cutlass, Adam grabbed onto the forearm of the arm which held the cutlass and pulled it towards her. Sera, not familiar with fighting against unarmed combatants, couldn''t defend against this and was pulled towards Adam. Seeing how useless Sera seemed to be when fighting against him, Adam retracted his former surprise and replaced it with scorn. He raised his other hand and chopped at her neck, rendering her unconscious. Sera dropped to the floor in unconsciousness and failed to get up. Adam utilised one of his Master''s techniques for incapacitating a human, if Sera could manage to stay conscious when struck with this technique then Adam couldn''t possibly have been a match against her in close combat. Having dealt with Sera, Adam turned to look at the battlefield in the distance. The fighting had progressed immensely by that point in time. The base of the fortress was now the final resting place for thousands of souls, the ground was painted a crimson red and acted as the base for multiple pyramids of corpses. The besieging army had progressed upwards the scaffolding, pushing the defenders back and forcing them to surrender ground to the enemy. Then, near the base of the scaffolding, a group of vigilantes and soldiers went unnoticed by the attacking army which was already halfway up the scaffolding. They set down what looked like explosives in the base. Adam immediately saw what they were trying to do! They were attempting to destroy the scaffolding of their own fortress in order to send the entire enemy army plummeting to their deaths! This tactic was the same as carving out a pound of one''s flesh in order to ensure the demise of his adversary. It was a tactic which was not only ruthless to the enemy, but to oneself. Adam felt like congratulating the commander of the defending forces. He must have no small amount of resolve in order to be willing to sacrifice so much for the sake of victory. The only problem Adam could identify with this tactic was the method that they would use to light the explosives. If the soldiers at the base of the scaffolding set the fuse then they would essentially be committing a suicide mission. Surely the soldiers of the fortress wouldn''t be blindingly loyal to such a degree? The soldiers were finished setting up the explosives and retreated a fair ways away after erecting a high visibility target with a flammable container attached to it. Was it? Maybe? The method for activating the explosives... Adam turned to look behind him, and saw a still unconscious Sera. She notably had a sniper rifle slung across her shoulder. ''Well, there goes the fortress, and your military training.'' It seemed like Adam had inadvertedly doomed an entire fortress by exercising self-defence. Adam took a moment to analyse whether this event would be harmful or beneficial to him. On one hand, his arduous military training would be postponed. He would allow a big blow to befall the White Vigil and would wound up back in Sydney. On the other hand, the one to suffer the most from losing the fortress would be his employer, the Government. That meant that his backing would lose a significant portion of it''s power. Furthermore, he would fail the assignment given to him by Leo. Thus losing out on the payment. A very big payment. Yep, it was probably in his interest that the fort stay in Government hands. Therefore Adam took the sniper rifle and took a shooting position imitated from various action films he had watched in the past. Surely it wasn''t that hard to shoot a target three kilometres away with an impromptu sniper who has never held a gun before. Yep, his enhanced awareness allowed him to relax his breathing and steady the crosshair until it wasn''t moving from the target. Now he should just shoot. Right? Adam pulled the trigger and expected a great amount of recoil but in the end nothing happened. "Is the sniper jammed?" Adam wondered to himself. All of his experience in watching action films didn''t prepare him for this. In the movies they usually just stood twenty feet apart in an abandoned pueblo inhabited by tumbleweeds. They would count to ten, then flick the revolver on their waist with a fluid motion and shoot the other guy. Clearly, that was quite different from shooting a sniper rifle. Deciding to look back at the situation on the battlefield, Adam was startled at the great change in the combat situation. The attacking army had discovered the defender''s ploy to blow up the scaffolding. However, instead of retreating they curiously only sent one man to defuse the bombs. Currently he was fighting the entire bombing squad. Alone. The bullets directed at him simply ricocheted from his tan skin and swords split apart after striking him. He single-handedly massacred the entire squad and set about defusing all of the bombs. Adam dropped the rifle on the ground and lay down on a rock. He had all but given up by this point. He closed his eyes and listened to the sounds. Fighting in the distance and beeping of animals nearby. Beeping? Adam opened his eyes and looked around but couldn''t quite find the source of the intermittent beeping. Before long, he realised it was coming from Sera. Specifically, her right pocket. Turning her over, he retrieved the beeping object. It was of a peculiar design, a spherical ball of plastic with a flashing light on one end and an enticing red button in the other. Adam pressed it without hesitation. BOOM!!! Chapter 15 - The Grandmaster BOOM!!! A thunderous crash soon followed after the explosion. A disgusting collision of metal, concrete and flesh. The entire collapse took about fifteen seconds, after which, there was silence. A complete silence befell the battlefield, everybody held their breath. Adam wasn''t sure who started, but someone began cheering. Soon, he was accompanied by his fellow soldiers and within moments the entirety of the fortress was cheering in the distance. They weren''t cheering for the bloodletting on this day, or the merits they would receive from this battle. They were cheering because they survived. Adam looked on at the fortress, ''former'' fortress. The bloodied scaffolding lay collapsed at the base of the battered walls. Strangely, Adam felt really detached to the death in this place. Maybe he had grown used to it? Or perhaps darker things were afoot within Adam. He gave one last look at the unconscious Sera, before deciding to leave her on the summit and make his way to the fortress alone. It was a short walk, albeit through scarred terrain. He couldn''t help but get a strange feeling in his chest as he walked amongst the bloodied corpses of the combatants. It must have been a lonely sight, a singular figure desolately striding past mounds of strewn corpses. The guards looked at him strangely, his black clothing suggested that he was a villain. But why would he be walking towards the fortress? Was he driven insane by the fighting and desired nothing more than to end it all? The guards couldn''t care less as they pointed their weapons to Adam, telling him to surrender himself. Adam stopped ten steps from them and produced some documents provided for by Leo. The guards were well trained. One of them advanced while the other had his gun trained on Adam. After a shallow perusal of the documents and matching of a photo ID did the guards put down their guns. "Mr. Freeman, the commander of the fortress has been awaiting you. Corporal Davidson will guide you to the command room." A soldier stepped forward and gestured for Adam to follow him, then immediately set out at a brisk pace. The soldiers were strictly professional with civilians and didn''t mention anything regarding the recent battle. Even the Corporal which was guiding Adam didn''t say anything as he led him past the metal gates. The pair walked in silence, especially since Adam wasn''t particularly inclined to a gregarious and outgoing personality. As the pair reached the gate, Adam could finally appreciate the immense infrastructure which was named Fort Stalwart. Even in it''s damaged state, the structure inspired some sort of awe-inspiring presence. It was something about the towering parapets, outlying cannons and irregular arches that gave the fortress an impregnable feel of chaos. Almost like Howl''s Moving Castle. Walking past the metallic portcullis, the dozens of soldiers by the gate turned their eyes up from whatever they were doing to look at the newcomers. A multitude of gazed were directed at Adam. Some were filled with curiosity whereas others were filled with grief. Adam saw a soldier on his knees beside a pile of body bags. Tears didn''t stream down his face, no, he was far beyond the point of merely crying. He simply looked at the mass grave of unnamed soldiers before him. A harmonica was pressed between his two lips, playing a slow and solemn version of ''It''s a long way to Tipperary''. Further along the fortress Adam saw towering structures acting as barracks, able to house thousands of men at the very least. It wasn''t long before the Corporal led him inside the central edifice of the fortress. After a twisting and coiling set of concrete stairways and catwalks, they finally reached the central room. In the centre of the fortress, it was the most reinforced room from bombing and ground assault. It was designed with defence in as the biggest priority with multiple checkpoints and metal gates at every turn. Guarding the entrance were two soldiers, to whom the Corporal saluted to before handing Adam over to them. They opened the door and ushered Adam inside. The command room looked extremely old fashioned from the outset of it. A large circular table lay in the centre with a regional map of New South Wales, the state in which Sydney was located. The map itself was riddled with little flags of different colours, surely representing the different factions and organisations vying for control within the region. The rest of the room looked like a typical bunker, concrete ceiling, walls and floor, a variety of computers by the sides of the room manned by logistics personnel. The area with the table was elevated above the rest of the room, surrounded by metal railing and accessible from the corners with small concrete stairs. Beside the table were a variety of civilians. Some were young and energetic whereas others were old and listless. In front of the group of people which numbered about a dozen, stood two old men.Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon. One of the old men was an elderly man in military uniform. His face had a long white beard, bald head and clear glasses which showed a weathered face while his body was slightly hunched back. The rank slide on his uniform featured a crown, a diamond and crossed arms while the name tag on his uniform read Moriarty. The other old man, in contrast to Moriarty, was clean shaven and stood upright. His white hair was neatly combed to the side and properly trimmed. His white uniform implied that he was from the White Vigil, however the design was unlike any that he had seen before. It was completely crafted from a white metal, featuring some sort of heavy full plate armour with a thickness of at least five centimetres. An armour which couldn''t possibly be worn by an average human, and Adam knew he was anything but an average human. His sixth sense told him that the civilians on the other side were all awakened of at least some measure in power. However, he was confident that none of them couldn''t hold a candle to Ito Toshihiro. Moriarty was just a regular human. However, the old man in the white armour. He was strong. Stronger than anything he had seen before. Something made him believe that this man could have taken down that man who slaughtered the bombing squad from before. Taken him down without breaking a sweat, Toshihiro too, and maybe him. That was how strong the old man seemed to Adam''s sixth sense. ''He should be able to crush a man with the mere strength of his aura.'' Adam found himself think. Taking his place beside the rest of the people there, Moriarty gave him a knowing gaze while the old man from the White Vigil looked at him for an unusual amount of time. Settling down, Moriarty raised his voice to speak. A voice which Adam found to be frail, yet oddly reassuring. "Everyone, as the highest ranking officer of the Australian Defence Force, General Moriarty, I welcome you to Fort Stalwart, the core of the Australian Defence Force in the country. Firstly, I must apologize for the disturbances a few hours prior. This is the norm ever since the awakening last year, in which criminal elements of society have banded together to promote terrorism and anarchy within the nation." "These very criminal elements, are the reason why you people are here right now. Under the government, we have strived to develop an effective counter-insurgency force which is designed to target criminal activity from awakened." "Currently, this project is the most classified endeavours in the nation, and everyone present in this room today is directly involved with the project. You will have been briefed prior to this that you will undergo the most elite training our country can provide. This is because you will be the people, the men and women that will eventually become the A Force." "You may be wondering why I have invited Grandmaster Galloway of the White Vigil with us today. The reason for this is because as the biggest awakened vigilante organisation in Australia, they will be providing special training for the awakened personnel on top of the elite military army." At this point, General Moriarty stopped talking and Grandmaster Galloway stepped up to speak. His voice was surprisingly charismatic and kind, yet firm. It gave a ''Don''t worry comrades, we will persevere'' vibe. "I am Grandmaster Galloway, the figure in charge of the White Vigil. I look forward to training each and every one of you in the near future." He seemed like a man of few words, but when he spoke, he spoke with a firm and convicting tone, one that wouldn''t allow anyone to ignore him. Seeing as the Grandmaster''s speech was completed the General dismissed everyone, assigning a lieutenant to guide the group to their quarters. As Adam was making his way with the group, much to his surprise and the General''s, he was stopped by the Grandmaster. As he was watching the group go, he suddenly called out to one young man. "Young man there, come here." His voice was kind, and yet it implied that it was an order." General Moriarty was perplexed as to the situation, but seeing that he had stopped Adam the General started to get cold sweat forming on his pores, afraid that something was amiss. Adam walked to the Grandmaster with heavy trepidation weighing down his every step. Not only had he been responsible for the disappearances of their members, apparently he was also of the evil alignment, allowing them to see the true nature of ''Adam'' inside of him. Then ''Adam'' started talking to him as he walked towards the Grandmaster. "There shouldn''t be trouble this time, your alignment is true neutral. The only reason they found you with detect evil was because I had recently awakened with you, and thus my evil aura was detected. Now that I have had the greater part of a semester to concentrate and hide it, it should be invisible to any but the most intensive of soul searching techniques." Although it had helped him calm down, it also sparked a bunch of questions for ''Adam''. What were soul searching techniques? How did he awaken? How did you concentrate your aura inside of me? Nevertheless, ''Adam'' was a useless companion. Speaking only when he deemed it necessary. Then, Adam was before the Grandmaster. He looked at him, and he looked back. Then, in shock, Adam realised that this man didn''t look human at all. His eyes held a deep, black hue within the pupil. A hue which would seemingly forever exist, as long as the stars and the dark frontier of space. In fact, had Adam seen the little girl by the swing this morning then he would have noticed that they had their pupils seemed the same. His complexion was fair, much too fair or a man of his age and his posture was too straight. In the midst of being shocked at how inhuman he looked, the Grandmaster spoke. "What''s your name, boy?" His voice was extremely kind, the one you would expect from a grandfather. Adam felt strange, couldn''t he just tell that from the roll of the awakened being trained? Inadvertedly, he turned to share a look with the General, just for a split moment. Seeing him nod, nod so slightly that it was imperceptible for anyone else, Adam went ahead and told him his full name. "My name is Adam Freeman, Grandmaster." The Grandmaster''s pupil dilated slightly, ever so slightly. Adam could feel the man stop breathing momentarily, just for an instant like a flickering light. His eyes thoughtfully looked at Adam for a while. Then he smiled, just an honest and goodhearted smile. "It will be a pleasure training with you, Adam." Then he dismissed him, making him try to catch up with the rest of the group. However, as soon as he left the room General Moriarty came out and ushered him over to talk with him. Adam, knowing his position, went over immediately. He brought him to a desolate hallway, devoid of any soldiers or vigilantes. Then he spoke to him in a hushed voice. "What was that about, do you think he knows?" Adam slowly shook his head. "Maybe, he called me out specifically." Adam''s mind went back to when he was talking with the Grandmaster, specifically the disguised surprise that he expressed, only visible through his heightened awareness. The General seemed to be paranoid of this, and rightly so. If the White Vigil knew what the true purpose of the project was then they would immediately fall out with the government, becoming one of those ''criminal elements'' which the A Force was designed to eliminate. The General continued. "Adam, I am sure it was extremely clear in the briefing which we gave you before coming here, but I must emphasise how crucial this operation is and how critical it is to not be compromised. For now you are required to blend in with the rest of the new trainees, but soon you will actively initiate your assignment with support from out other Awakened Forces." Adam smiled and reassured the General that he would absolutely not fail, after all, this was the assignment that he came all the way out here for. Adam made his way to the quarters of his fellow ''trainees'' under the escort of two guards. That was right, the entire A Force project was simply a ruse to destroy the White Vigil. Although General Moriarty wasn''t exactly lying when he said that everyone inside that room was directly involved in that project, because they were. Adam and the soldiers were the conspirators whereas the Grandmaster and everybody else was but a mere victim. When Leo had given him the brief of the documents, it stated a very different mission than the one which he had talked about in front of his subordinates. It took him to Fort Stalwart, a fortress jointly manned by vigilantes and the army. In which his job was to infiltrate the White Vigil and facilitate their elimination. Walking down the corridor, Adam found some futility in all the struggle currently happening between people. The faction were locked in combat, the government was conspiring behind the factions. Extra-planar forces were competing for Earth. They all had conflicting interests on the surface of this planet, some were hidden interests such as why the extra-planar forces wanted Earth so badly, and others were in the open, such as the governments struggling to maintain de facto control over their sovereign territory in the face of change. Well, it didn''t matter too much to Adam. He was lost, much like one of those cherry blossom petals, taken where the wind willed it. Adam was very much the same, taking the route fate had left for him, and if that route made him rich in the meanwhile, then why not take it? Chapter 16 - I am seeking my path! Adam settled himself into the quarters assigned to them, no hint of his true purpose expressed on his poker face. The rooms assigned to them were next to each other, a total of four rooms for three people each. The room design was simple with three single-size beds next to each other, separated by a nightstand in-between all of them. A small restroom was attached to the room, fitted with the minimal necessities. The women in the group were taken to another part in the barracks, thus the only people in these four rooms were the young and middle aged men who were present during the welcome speech in the command room. His fellow trainees were already assigned rooms by the time he got here, therefore we was left with the third bird in the fourth room. The room''s number was 503-04 and was occupied by two other guys in the training group. The one on the first bed was called George Meltos. He was a blond young man, 22 years of age and with a fair face to match. He seemed the gregarious type, prone to partying until late. Whereas the one on the second bed seemed to be the polar opposite, with wrinkled forming at the sides of his mouth and whitening hair combed backwards. He was the oldest man in the training group, looking to be in the late fifties. His immediate nature seemed to be more inclined to be introverted. His name was Francis Durand. It was in the evening, and the group of trainees were given approximately fifteen minutes before they were introduced to a military lifestyle. Adam, having a lack of items to settle down with, decided to rest on the bed for the remainder of the fifteen minutes. However, this perfectly sound and logical plan was ruined by George when he decided to initiate ice-breaking activities. "Hello everyone, my name is George Meltos and I come from Newcastle. We are you guys from." Adam wrinkled is brows, not quite appreciative of the extroverted gesture. What was the use in getting to know each other when one could use the time resting. The old man softly sighed, then spoke too. "I''m Francis, I was born in Versailles and came to Australia fifteen years ago." Adam noted that Francis'' accent was moderately thick, giving away his French heritage. Although the accent itself didn''t impede his fluent English and instead added some mysterious touch to his presence. They both turned to look at him, George with his bright blue eyes and Francis with a slightly bemused expression, a bemused expression which seemingly masked a distant expression in his eyes which implied that there was much more to this man than met the eye. Adam sighed, not a soft one like Francis but rather one of defeat. "I''m Adam." Adam''s short sentence perfectly portrayed his view of ice-breaking activities, a waste of time. George looked slightly taken aback by Adam''s straight forwardness. Francis simply let on a small grin. George looked as if he was about to attempt to change to topic of the conversation when the a bell rang. That was the signal for the trainees to form up outside the quarters. With only a momentary hesitation, the group composed of strangers to each other made their way outside, gathering with the rest of the group. The majority of the trainees were composed of young adults between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five, although older people were present such as Francis. Nobody in the group particularly stood out to Adam. It was instead Adam who stood out from everyone else. A cold expression on his face coupled over with the Grandmaster paying special attention to him, even an utter moron would know that there was more to Adam than first met the eye. Feeling multiple gazes from his fellow trainees, Adam maintained his cold poker face and was indifferent to any inquiries addressed to him by the other awakened. The situation continued for another minute or so until an officer came by and took them to their first lesson, explaining what it would be on the way there. "Firstly, we have to determine your physical capabilities as well as your metaphysical activities which are directly linked to your elevated status as awakened. The training facility within the fortress, which we are heading to, is designed with cutting edge technology to measure the combat capacity of awakened personnel." "The way this exercise will be completed will be with your roommates, who will form your small team fro the remainder of the training. Each room group will be assigned a single slot within the facility to complete their assigned exercises by the end of they day. Those groups which fail to do so within the allocated time will continue their exercises until they are finished, even if it''s by three in the morning." Nobody in the group complained, how hard could it be to complete a series of exercises designed for three people with essentially the greater part of six hours. They made their way past the multiple concrete structures within the fort to arrive at a non-descript concrete bunker with an entrance leading down into the ground. Saluting the guards, the officer opened the doors and led the group inside.The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. As the group crossed the bunker''s doors, most of them gasped as they were subject to the Police Box effect. Also known as ''It''s bigger on the inside!''. The officer didn''t care to explain and soon led the group past multiple metallic instruments and machinery at which they could only guess the purpose of. Eventually, they reached an array of eight capsule looking machines. Once there, he turned and addressed the group. "What you see here is the third iteration, and first functioning model, of the Awakened Compatible Immersive Virtual Reality Module. Or ACIVRaM for short. The main function of this capsule is to create a fully immersive virtual reality which properly incorporates an individuals awakened abilities within the virtual reality space, this allows you to gain experience, train and engage in simulated combat at no risk to one''s health." Many of the members of the group expressed surprised expressions at that statement, although some withheld speculative thoughts about such claims. Adam wondered how they managed to integrate the system which was made available to every awakened within the Immersive Virtual Reality provided by the capsules. "As you can see, there are eight capsules here, and there are eight small teams present. You will find that your room numbers have been allocated to the capsules. All you have to do is decide upon someone to immerse themselves first and then the technology personnel will run the simulation." Seeing as the introduction was concluded, Adam made his way to the capsule which was in the far left while everyone else was searching for their capsule. Seeing Adam moving so decisively, George and Francis decided to follow him. Once at the capsule, the group of three was besotted by an awkward silence as to the subject in nominating someone to go first. ''Perhaps the icebreakers were a good idea?'' ''Shut up ''Adam''!'' Irritated by ''Adam''s'' tactful remarks, Adam immediately decided that he would go last. This resulted in a scenario in which George was drawing in breath to speak just as Adam stepped back and said. "One of you guys go first, I''ll go last." George was mildly surprised, however, Francis looked thoughtful for a second before following Adam''s lead and stepping back. This caused George to be dumbfounded, what was wrong with his teammates? Did a cat get their tongues when they were children? He merely shrugged and hoisted himself inside the sheening metal capsule in a surprising feat of athleticism, laying himself at rest inside the moderately hard white cushions which acted as insulation. The officer, seeing as group 503-04 was finished first, went over and gave the signal for the technical staff nearby to start the simulation within their capsule. Adam watched as the capsule sealed shut and flickering lights and metres fluctuated. When the capsule sealed shut a second metal sheet covered the first and sealed itself atop that. Adam mused that it would take Toshihiro''s final strike against him to break through this metal capsule. The other groups followed shortly after, their capsules undergoing a similar process. Seeing as everyone else was waiting, Adam decided to sit down in a corner of the room and meditate while he awaited his turn within the capsule. Meditation was a method of training the self which Master Li had demonstrated to Adam back in his courtyard. It involved a specific breathing pattern and posture in which the mind was set at ease. This allowed one to calm down the stray thoughts in one''s conscience and mentally attune themselves for battle. He got some weird looks from the other groups, however they let him mind his own business as a result of the icy aura being figuratively emanated by Adam''s character. Other groups, but not his own group. Francis came down and sat next to him with his legs out in front of him. He took out a small leather gourd and drank from it, it seemed to be vineyard wine from the smell of it. He turned to look at the operating capsules, while speaking to Adam. "Don''t you sometimes wonder how it all turned like this?" His voice held a solemn tinge in it, as if he kept a great tragedy close to his heart. Usually, Adam would have pretended not to hear him, however this old French man intrigued him and thus he decided to indulge him, if only momentarily. "Are you talking about the awakening?" Francis simply shook his head slowly. Taking another sip of wine, he continued. "No Adam, I am talking about everything. The social values of our old society, the value of righteousness and rule of law. It has all been turned upside down in this world in which the numerical value of one''s level determines their status within society. Either as that of a slave or a king." Francis seemed to spit out the word ''king'', as if some deep seated despise and contempt was held within the meaning of that word for Francis. Francis'' words seemed to light a candle of reminiscence within Adam. Before the change, what had he stood for? His life was comfortable, if unhappy. Rule of law provided a reliable measure of security for all citizens. However, when it was gone and replaced with the uncertainty of strife, Adam didn''t particularly feel anything. He had lost all feelings of parental affection, no familial connection with whom to stand by and forced to stand on his own two feet, turn himself into his own fortress. No, Adam didn''t regret losing the certainty of every day life to the awakening. In some warped and twisted measure it set him free. Free from seeing the reminder of a happy past which was called his mother every day. Free from the suffocating atmosphere of his room. Free from the constraints of his defective conscience, allowing him to break past the restraints of civilised society and setting of on his own road. Perhaps, this was why he took to Master Li so readily. He had been like a floating piece of driftwood to a drowning man, a salvation for a lost cause. After murdering his mother, he had no objective, nothing to strive for. Master Li had changed that, he allowed him the strength to stand on his own two feet and gave him the philosophy to choose his own path in life, wherever it may lead. Adam turned to look at Francis and responded, taking all of his experiences in the awakening to account. "The awakening brought conflict everywhere, however, it also brought a directive purpose, a single objective. In a pursuit of strength, it is only natural that those with conflicting interests clash, often to the death. In my opinion, the awakening granted a new system for us, a system in which we can cast the expectation which were inflicted upon us by society into the abyss and forge our own path ahead, whether it take iron and blood!" Francis seemed surprised at that statement, not expecting something such as that from someone so young. He didn''t speak for a while, slowly ruminating over what Adam had said in his mind. In the time that it would have taken a sandglass to turn, Francis finally raised his head and asked Adam a question with an imperceptible glint in his eye. "And what is your path? Young Adam." Adam already knew the answer to that question, he knew it when he joined the Cold Evil Sect, he knew it when Patriarch Sha had promoted him into a chosen, he knew it when Master Li had sent him out to defeat Ito Toshihiro. "I am seeking my path." Adam''s tone was a paradoxical mixture of confidence and uncertain. A certain sense of confidence from an uncertain future, such was the conviction behind Adam''s words. He could feel ''Adam'' grinning at his words, although he seemed to grin at almost anything. Francis let out a smile, he opened his mouth to speak. "Adam, I think we might become closely acquainted during our stay here." Adam smiled, in his head he thought that this old man wasn''t as annoying as George, and subconsciously began to like his demeanour. Adam opened his mouth to speak, only to be interrupted as the capsule which belonged to another group rapidly opened. From the unsealed gas, a pale figure coughed and collapsed on the floor, showing symptoms of shock. Everyone in the group was alarmed, they were told they would be doing exercises in there, but what exercise could have caused this to happen? The officer in the room stepped forwards and motioned the medical staff to carry away the unconscious individual, then he resumed his position. Unwilling to approach the intimidating officer, the trainees could only dreadfully wait for their turn inside the capsule. After this incident, Adam turned to look at the capsule which belonged to Adam''s group lying on the left side. Before this it was a mere curiosity, however, it now represented a challenge. The best way to find one''s path is to overcome challenges. Chapter 17 - A Good Man George was hurriedly running down an baroque hallway, droplets of his blood marking the path that he took. He came upon a circular stairwell, intricately carved and decorated, demanding attention. An attention which George couldn''t care to give as he vaulted over the balustrade in an act of desperation, an act which would warrant him a six metre fall. He had landed roughly, eliciting a sharp scream of pain from his throat. His ankle was sprained. It doesn''t matter, keep going. One step in front of the other. *You have levelled up* *Level 3 Knight* You have gained a feat This feat seemed slightly foreshadowing... He kept limping through the dark hallways, the empty bedrooms flashing past his peripherals. As George got closer and closer to the exit he felt a great weight being lifted from his heart, he turned the corner that would lead him to the front entrance of the baroque manor. It was there, just as he remembered it. For a moment it seemed like the most beautiful door he had ever seen, the peeling paint and etched claw-marks on the heavy set oak door seemed to be but superficial flaws in front of a wonderful concept called freedom. He grasped the door knob with his left hand and hurriedly turned it. George was ecstatic, he could finally leave this place. However, as soon as his hand made contact with the door knob a gnawing fear began to eat away at his heart. The door knob seemed to be slightly loose, but George dismissed the fear as he turned the bronze door knob. *Clank* The door knob turned, then fell away from it''s slot and thunderously crashed on the wooden floor. As the door knob fell, so did every organ in George''s body as the blood visibly drained from his face. Standing in shock for a good moment, he picked up the fallen knob with a blank expression. Then he tried putting it back inside the door, futilely trying to fox it. The knob clanging against the bronze parts inside the door was the only sound to be heard in the manor, that and the heavy, almost sobbing, breathing that came out of George. He failed putting it back once, he tried twice. Thrice. He kept trying. It was on his thirteenth time that as he was about to insert the knob inside, a pale and rotting hand smashed through the small gap left behind by the door knob, knocking the door knob from George''s hands. The rotting hand was bleeding a viscous white substance inflicted upon it by the wooden splinters of the door, however, it trashed against the door in oblivion of it''s pain. George was startled aback and fell on his back, sparking another wave of pain from his sprained ankle. It was then that Adam heard a strong tapping sound, a rhythmic beat upon the wooden staircase, produced by the heel in a woman''s boots. The blood from George''s face seemed to drain further to the point that he was indistinguishable from a zombie, his heart wanted to break free from his ribcage with how much it was beating. In fact it was beating so much that his chest constricted in pain. The sound of the heels smacking against the wooden panelling of the manor seemed to grow ever nearer. George frantically overtook his shock and looked for something, anything. He found the door to one of the many bedrooms slightly ajar, promising a sure delay from certain death. He crawled towards it, ignoring the growing pain in his ankle. For every centimetre he crawled forwards the sound of the heels seemed to grow ever nearer and the frantic thrashing of the rotting hand seemed to grow even more chaotic. He was almost there, the sound of his beating heart seemed to drown out all the noises in the area. His eyesight was becoming purple, his peripherals were already blackened. Blood started dropping from his nose, a testament to how his body was destroying itself in such panic. Then, he heard a click. George realised he had stopped moving. He looked around, expecting to have died, instead he saw the usual decor inside a guest''s bedroom. He was on the floor, leaning against a shut door. He had made it. When that thought passed through his head, it seemed to physically deflate him. He almost fainted then and there, the only thing keeping him awake was the flaring pain from his ankle and chest. It seemed to be an eternity in which he struggled to control his breathing. This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there. Then, when he had finally settled down, he noticed something. It was too quiet. There was no trashing coming from the entrance door, no heels slapping down on wooden panelling. Then, as a promise being kept, a knocking sound rang out from the locked wooden door of the guest room. Each knock was perfectly timed and sounded the exact same, knocked in the same spot by a hollow glasslike object. Accompanied with the knocking came a girlish giggle from behind the door, it was a pure laugh that someone would let out when they played a little prank on somebody. It continued, every five seconds came three knocks upon the door. Each time the three knocks carried more power, an amount of strength impossible to any hollow glasslike object. The vibrations from the door carried into George''s body, shaking his organs. George was too tired to feel anymore, he wanted to put an end to this. The wooden door began splintering, with numerous splinters breaking off and revealing a white wedding gown beneath the gaps left behind. George unsheathed his sword, an unremarkable work of steel designed for slashing, parrying and stabbing. Right now, he had no strength left to let alone swing it once, but perhaps he could use his new feat. In his mind he thought ''Last Stand'' and he felt the frail grip on his sword grow stronger, he felt the darkness around his eyesight recede to the peripherals ever so slightly. The splintering door kept splintering, showing even more of the gown behind the door. Clearly it wouldn''t allow for another three knocks before it gave way. *CRASH!* The splintered door thunderously gave way, disturbing the dust which had collected inside the room since the last time it had been used. The dust covered the entire room, not allowing any visibility. However, it soon came to settle down on George. He was leaning on the side of the bed, his head hung against the mattress. His two hands were extended in front of him and holding onto the pommel of his sword. It was an interesting thing for a swordsman to hold a sword by the pommel, unless they were aiming for one direction and one direction only. That direction seemed to be the case as the blade of the sword shimmered in the pale moonlight flooding in from the window, illuminating the pale crimson blood which ran along the blade as it entered George''s heart. ... Adam''s eyes constricted as he saw their capsule opening up, showing the unconscious features of George. George was the last one of the first eight people to leave the capsule, meaning that their team was already lacking behind the others. After George was taken away by the medical staff to be woken up, Francis stepped forwards to go second just as he had agreed. Or he would have, if Adam hadn''t put a hand on his shoulder to stop him. Francis didn''t take offence or gratitude at this gesture, expressing his neutrality on whoever went second or third. Simply nodding his approval to Adam, Francis stepped back and allowed Adam to go next. Adam mentally thanked him and entered the capsule without hesitation. He rested himself upon the white cushioning inside the capsule and relaxed his body as he had been told before. Then, the sliding door of the capsule closed in on itself, sealing shut. Ventilation shafts opened up in front of Adam''s mouth and frosted over the window of the capsule. The entire experience was slightly claustrophobic but it didn''t kill him. The next thing he knew, everything was white. It was only him, and the white expanse. Then everything darkened until it became black, it wasn''t the type of darkness which signified lack of light but rather a black shade being inflicted on the scenery. A green grid was laid down on the blackness, an irregular grid that allowed the topography of the area to become visible. The hilly grid then started being populated by cubes, trillions upon trillions of miniscule coloured cubes which appeared in a completely chaotic order. The shifted in-between each other for about fifteen seconds before they started settling down into shapes. The cubes became smaller, more rounded, until everything suddenly fit together. It became a false reality. Adam was standing on a cobbled road which was falling into disrepair, as evident by the thriving moss and vines spattered on the cobbles. Present on either side of the road was a grand European broadleaf forest, appearing tall and forbidding when contrasted against the pale shimmer of the full moon. Standing on the middle of the road, Adams moment of indecision was interrupted by a notification. *New Quest* *Go down the road* *Reward: Going down the road * Adam thought to himself that the acquisition of the quest didn''t seem entirely in line with the military. Perhaps this was just some sort of medium by which the system could exercise itself in IVR but not in direct control of the military. As soon as his thought process reached that point, Adam''s caution against this trial was kicked up a notch. The military was harsh, but predictable. Anything under the control of the system was beyond his knowledge and thus stepping into the unknown. Gathering his wits about him, Adam stepped forwards and set down the cobbled road. ''This place, isn''t normal.'' Adam stopped. Rarely had ''Adam'' spoken warnings, and if he did then Adam should probably caution against them. ''I sense a familiar calling to this place, some sort of abyssal corruption.'' Adam looked at the cobbles of the road in deep thought. If this place was affected by abyssal corruption then it would be unprecedently dangerous. Adam didn''t know much about abyssal corruption. Only that it was the residue left behind by the abyss, a banished plane in which all things chaotic and evil lurked. If this place had the influence of the abyss upon it, then it would be wise to promptly leave. However, the officers in charge of this ''simulation'' seemed to have ''forgotten'' to tell them a way to leave apart from completing the task or failing. Seeing as there was no fail criteria in the quest, then it would be moderately safe to assume that death was required in order to fail this simulation. Seeing as he had no choice, Adam resumed his trek through the cobbled pathway. The looming trees on either side of him were foreign and alien to him, very different to the eucalyptus trees he was used to back home. The shadows they cast on the road were the only comforting factor. Shortly after, a neat column of smoke rose in the distance, approximately five kilometres from his location. Figuring that it must come from a chimney, Adam made his way in it''s direction. A thirty minute trek yielded results as, next to the cobbled road, a small hunting lodge was humbly located. The entire place gave off a comely feeling. The tannery situated by the lodge, the loose chickens which wandered outside the door, the simple architecture behind the log structure. *Quest Updated* *Enter the Hunter''s Lodge* *Reward: Some shelter for the night* Adam didn''t need shelter for the night, or shouldn''t have at least. However, as soon as the quest updated, a sudden wave of drowsiness hit him. It seemed as if his internal clock was shuffled and rearranged by the whims of the system. Seeing no use in hesitating, Adam stepped to the heavy oaken door and knocked heavily on it. Shadows flashed across the torchlight visible from the windows and hushed whispers were aroused in alarm. Adam could clearly make out what they were saying. "Who is that? Pa?" "Pa! I wanna see who it is!" "No you don''t Karl, let pa open the door for the visitor." "But Pa!" "No buts!" Adam sensed a strange atmosphere behind this oaken door, an atmosphere unfamiliar to him. He sensed some sort of strife between the family inside, but it was a different type of conflict to the one he was used to. It seemed... Light hearted, for lack of a better term. The heavy oaken door opened to an Adam who currently wore a complicated expression. Inside the lodge stood a tall and heavy set man. The torchlight from inside flickered against his blonde beard and shimmered to his blue eyes. His facial structure was hardy and scarred, albeit gentle. His attire was a simple white tunic and black greaves accompanied with hairy and barefoot feet so thoroughly calloused that it wouldn''t have surprised Adam if those feet could block a sword. However, none of that mattered to Adam. What mattered was the broad smile plastered on this man''s face. A smile which promised a firm and strong friendship, it was directed at Adam. Adam found himself speechless, he couldn''t talk. This man, it had been a long time since he had seen such a firm smile. It was different from the smiles which he was used to seeing in everyone. The fake plaster which everyone smeared on their faces to appear civilised in modern society. Just like his mother, or Sera back in the school, they were all fake smiles practiced from birth. This man showed none of that, it was hardy one. It promised that this man was someone you could count on. Even seeing as the stranger to his house was rendered speechless, the man didn''t shed his smile. Instead he invited him inside, without even a word. Dumbfounded, Adam walked inside. He saw a chaotic scene within, three children gathered around a rickety wooden table throwing rejected pieces of their dinner everywhere, keeping the selected one''s in their plates for consumption. The torch sconce by the wall illuminated the entirety of the room and the various doors leading to other parts of the lodge. Beside the table was an empty chair. The man showed Adam to the chair and told him to sit down. Adam just let himself get led along, before he knew it he was seated amongst the three little children with a plate of roasted venison in front of him. Then, the children all quieted down as the man sat at the table and brought his two palms together. All the other children mimicked him and put their hands together, squashing the pieces of food stuck between the webbing of the hands. ''What are they doing?'' Adam asked himself, unknowingly clasping both of his hands together in the same fashion. The man then began speaking with a strong German accent. "We give our thanks to the lord for the food in front of us." The little children repeated after him. Then, the man continued with a small smile hidden behind his clasped hands. "We also thank him for our guest tonight." The little children turned to look at him and repeated after their old man. "We also thank him for our guest tonight." Sang out a chorus of immature voices. "Amen." He softly proclaimed. "Amen!" The children excitedly shouted. ''Amen.'' Adam quietly mouthed. As soon as those magic words were spoken it seemed to trigger a mental switch in the father and his children as the ravenously dug into their dish, almost to the point of throwing aside all etiquette, almost. The plate sat in front of Adam, untouched. "Why?" He softly asked the man. The man quizzically looked at Adam through the mountain of food on his plate. "Why would you allow a stranger to dine in your table, under your own roof?" Adam continued. The man smiled, displaying the choice selection of meat hammered in-between his teeth. "Let me tell you a story, young man. For the past month a hunter and his family had to survive on a subsistence diet, going through many hardships as a result of a long winter. One day, he finds an elderly white elk laying down upon a snowy prairie. The elderly white elk notices the hunter, it understands the killing intent the hunter holds for it. However, the white elk didn''t prance away from its would be killer, it instead lowered it''s head, showing the veins upon it''s neck to the hunter." The man stopped eating by this point, looking at Adam as he continued the story. "The white elk was giving it''s life to the hunter, willingly. In disbelief, the hunter quickly slashed the elks neck and covered the corpse in a cloth to drag it home. But, instead of heading home and avoiding predators that would have smelt the blood, he decided to fall on his knees beside the corpse of the elk and go into prayer." "He thanked the lord and the soul of the dead elk for feeding himself and his children, he apologised for taking it''s life and reassured the lord that he wouldn''t sell corpse off but use it to strictly feed himself and his family. He was ending his prayer when he felt a solemn voice speak in his ear. ''Karl'' it said, ''Your family has gone through much hardship, they should eat the entirety of the elk by today and let all strangers who knock upon your door partake in the feast as well.'' The man finished speaking and went back to eating without abandon, leaving Adam to his own devices. After the dinner, Adam was making his way outside when the man stopped him. "Young man, if it doesn''t trouble you much you can stay here for the evening. However, we regretfully can''t allow you to stay the night-" The man was still speaking when one of his kids interrupted him. "What about Ma''s room, Pa?" At the mention of his wife, the man seemed to stiffen up. Adam didn''t mind, he made his way out and thanked the family for letting him dine with them. Closing the door behind him, Adam could hear sorrowful sobbing behind the oaken door. Sobbing which would be easily explained by a carefully tended gravestone by the back of the lodge, a gravestone which simply stated. ''My wife, and mother to my three children.'' Adam made his way from the friendly hunting lodge and continued down the road with a full red moon shining overhead. ... Karl was sobbing in the dining room, in front of his three children. All of his life he had been a good man and devout Christian. He visited the church in town every Sunday and never missed an opportunity to donate to the church what his measly earnings could afford. His upright lifestyle eventually led him to marrying a beautiful and clever woman, and eventually starting his own family in the outskirts of the village. However, for all that he wanted to be a good man, he was cursed since birth. At first, the curse had taken away his parents and all of his sibling. As things progressed, he was forced to live in the outskirts in the village for fear that the others would find out about his curse. His whole life, he thought he could contain it, keep it under control. All until that fateful night six months ago, the curse took his beloved. Ever since then, he prayed to the lord every day to find out an answer to stop this curse. Never had he given Karl a sign, not once. Until this morning. He told the stranger that knocked on their door the first part of his conversation with god, but he concealed the rest. He asked him to leave after partaking in their own little feast because he didn''t want him to get caught up with this. He still remembered the exact words spoken to him. ''...partake in the feast until then, but do not let them dwell, lest they be caught up in the inevitable tragedy that shall take place after your last supper.'' The hollow and solemn words echoed out in his mind, clouding his thoughts. His children behind him were finishing the last of the food on the table, the last of the food left within the household as he looked out of the window. Outside the window, looking to the starts, lay suspended a grand red sphere. A crimson red moon. A peasant would call it witchery, an astrologer would proclaim it a foreboding omen and a learned man would dismiss it as mere superstition on natural phenomena. However, the red light which flooded through the window seemed to enter through his every pore, changing his rationality and building up in his core. It formed, quickly manifesting into something which escaped through his windpipe. And then, it was let loose. *Aaaaoooooouuuuuuu!* Chapter 18 - The Crimson Citadel Adam was making his way down the road when he suddenly realised something strange. Looking up to the sky he saw that the moon, which was meant to be silver coloured, was instead crimson red. At the same time of this discovery, Adam could hear a wretched howl in the distance. *Aaaaoooooouuuuuuu!* The howl seemed to pervade throughout the woodlands, sinking into the earth and Adam''s consciousness. Tugging his coat closer to himself, Adam set off at a brisker pace, keen to reach the end of these strange woods which unnerved him so. Luckily for Adam, it wasn''t long before he saw what seemed to be the fringe of the woodlands. Sparse plantation of trees and the occasional homestead. It was around this time that a heavy fog beset Adam''s surrounding, clouding the shapes of objects around him. Adam looked at his watch and noted the time. 1:13 a.m. Much too early for morning fog, suggesting an unnatural cause for this phenomena. Continuing on, he saw homesteads and cottages become ever more prevalent, eventually becoming more numerous than trees. Half of the residences had their doors and windows boarded up or wide open, revealing numerous cobwebs. Everything was deathly still, too quiet for a normal village. Usually you would at least hear a few people snoring, or moving beneath their sheets. However, there was none of that in this still village. Then, a grinding noise could be heard in the centre of the village. The clatter of chains and the splashing of water, an odd combination of sounds which Adam knew too well. Making his way to the centre of the village, an area which seemed to be some sort of plaza, he arrived in front of what he knew would be there. A stone well, made entirely of cobbled river stones and wooden reinforcement. Beside it stood a hunchbacked figure holding onto the chains which led to the recesses of the well. *New Quest* *Ask for direction from the Town Mayor* *Reward: A direction * So, this figure before him was the mayor of this small settlement. Well, it wouldn''t be good for his wellbeing if he just paced around doing nothing, so he approached the hunchbacked figure. At first he didn''t even turn to look at Adam, only focusing on pulling the heavy metal chain. Only after about three minutes of pulling did he tie the chain on a stake of wood beside the well and turn to look at Adam. This surprised him, how could someone pull a bucket from a well for over three minutes, how deep must that well be? Anyways, this question was thrown to the back of his mind as he opened his mouth to speak. However he was stopped as he looked into the hunchbacked figures face. It was covered in a cowl and a course veil was draped across his face, covering every bit of it. The figure simply gave Adam a short gaze before it pointed towards a cobbled road which lead outside the village, a cobbled road so overgrown with vines that it seemed to blend into the forest around it. In the distance, Adam could faintly make out a large towering shape at the end of that road. Towering parapets and towers made up the majority of that shape. Adam turned to look at the mayor once more, however, he was gone. It wasn''t the first time someone had disappeared on him like that, but by the looks of things it wouldn''t be the last. Ultimately deciding to turn his back to this strange village, he set out on the road again, towards the towering structure in the distance. Too late did Adam realise, only when he was in the road, that he couldn''t sense any heartbeat or breathing from the hunchbacked figure. When he exited the main centre of the village, the fog surrounding Adam seemed to strangely intensify. It grew in strength to the point that it even impeded his vision and gathered behind him, almost as if blocking his way back. Making nothing of this, Adam continued on. He was already on full alert by this point and prepared to fight at any moment. The road to the structure was uneventful, albeit eerie. The broadleaves around Adam seemed to blacken the further he went along the road, the leaves turning the same crimson colour as the moon. Eventually, he reached a point in which he could clearly see the edifice. It was a towering grey stone structure, a miracle of masonry and engineering. The wall was fifteen metres high and slanted outwards, he crenellations atop the towering wall were intricately decorated with gargoyles and manned by shadowy figures with what appeared to be crossbows. Behind the walls appeared to be a huge central structure which branched off countless parapets and balustrades, the very epitome of magnificence and wealth. The tallest tower stretched unto the dark clouds within the crimson sky, creating an extremely ominous atmosphere surrounding this citadel. Adam mused that the overall atmosphere would match that of a game in ''Call of Cthulhu''; Red Moon - Check Crimson Sky - Check Guarded Summoning Ground - Check Inexplicably Eccentric Locals - Check Inexplicably Strange Circumstances - Check Seeing as the entire place was entirely out of place, Adam turned to look at the entrance. It was a towering mass of metal and wood in the shape of a gate, guarded on either side by what appeared to be halberdiers in black plate armour and red arming doublets. *New Quest* *Talk to the guards* *Reward: Entrance into the Citadel* Yeah, he wasn''t talking to the guards, not alive anyways. Beside these certain halberdiers lay ten corpses, the corpses of the people which had gone before him in fact. Well, that''s ten of them, there''s still four left considering that George''s body isn''t here. It didn''t matter much to Adam, but it didn''t seem like those guards would let him through just like the system suggested they would. Therefore, Adam devised his own strategy of talking to them. He used shadow footwork to run across the murky moat which surrounded the citadel, no doubt containing various species of lesser krakens if Adam''s imagination was let loose. Although running across a water was a tricky manoeuvre, it wasn''t all that hard to accomplish with shadow footwork and before he knew it he was already leaning against the wall of the castle. He sneaked behind one of the guards and gathered shadows around his index finger, allowing it the greatest penetrative power he could muster and used it to punch through the black steel bascinet which guarded the guards spine.This novel''s true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there. Adam was surprised at how hard the steel was, much harder than ordinary steel. Henceforth he would call the material blacksteel. The guard dropped to the floor, just as expected. Adam bounded to the other guard in order to properly utilise the element of surprise. But was instead surprised as he found a halberd pointed at him instead. These guards must have been trained extremely well. This man just lost his friend from out of nowhere and he was ready to fight within split second?! Well, it made no difference as Adam grabbed the halberd and pulled the guard towards him, sweeping the neck underneath the closed bascinet with a chop, cleanly decapitating him. Although Adam noted two strange things. Why was the neck so easy to chop through with his hands? Sure, he could do it but it should have taken a lot more effort. Also, why was the blood white? Adam''s answer was answered as he noticed a body behind him shuffling just as the one in front of him collapsed. Turning around in a whirl of motion, he was met with a horrifying sight. When he had punctured the blacksteel bascinet of the guard earlier, it had been completely blown off. Now, he saw a rotting mass of maggots and white blood making for a sorry excuse of a face. What was the first, and best response in this scenario. Adam killed it, again, although he made sure to not touch it with his hands. The appearance of the undead guard startled Adam to be sure, but he wasn''t surprised anymore. Unlike back at the village, he actually did notice that these two had no heartbeat, and thus was prepared for a horrifying revelation. Although the appearance of the undead didn''t seem all that horrifying to him for some reason, perhaps it was because he was used to sharing his body with ''Adam'' but it didn''t impact his psyche at all. The only change he implemented in his strategy was to bind his hands with white tape, so that he wouldn''t get some sort of infection from hitting the undead if injured, and to prioritise ripping them apart over targeting their meridians as he had done with the first guard. He had targeted the back of the neck, an attack that should have disabled a human body with practically no effort, but it didn''t seem to affect the undead at all. Anyways, moving on to greater things, Adam turned his attention to the blue screen which was bugging his vision since he finished the guard off. *Quest Updated* *Meet the Countess* *Reward: Getting to know her * Looking at how things were going, he wasn''t sure their meeting would be quite as friendly as the system suggested. He may as well go ahead and do it then. The first obstacle in his path, a huge gate made with heavy oaken wood and reinforced with blacksteel, it would prove to be an impossible obstacle for even the most elite of armies. It was solved with a quick use of Shadow Form, easily slipping past the grates in the gate. Inside, the castle was merely a collection of wooden buildings which constituted the stables, numerous smithies and other crafting workshops required for the ordinary feudal military organisation. The courtyard was completely devoid of guards apart from the entrance to the central structure. The majority of guards appeared to be manning the walls or patrolling the hallways and parapets of the keep. With the lack of heavy security, it was as simple as a walk in the park for Adam to climb to the third story of the keep and enter through an ajar window to a guest room. The only complication being that he wasn''t quite sure how the undead would detect intruders, thereby forcing him to minimise everything that could possibly give him away. This included regulating his breathing, heartbeat, temperature and sound, the only change on the outside being that he had padded the soles of his boots with a black fabric so as to move silently in the stone halls of the keep. The room he arrived in through the window turned out to be guest room. In here Adam could see the corpse of another trainee wrapped within the bloodied sheets of the bed, although the perpetrator of this deed was nowhere to be seen. Making his way to the door, he leaned outside the window while being careful of keeping to the shadows. Although it was ultimately a useless endeavour as the entire hallway was falling into disrepair. Let alone having lit torch sconces, the frescoes on the ceiling were peeling off into the floor and the stone walls were crumbling. The only semblance of security being the regular patrols of undead halberdiers, numbering three apiece, and the occasional walking undead wandering through the ruined keep. It seemed like the walking undead weren''t really part of the security of this castle, but were rather unfortunate victims to said security who later became undead. There also seemed to be some sort of difference between these ones and the undead halberdiers as the halberdiers tended to move quickly and execute complicated techniques with their halberds whereas the walking ones tended to not do much at all. It was merely a point of observation as Adam made his way through the keep. The majority of undead didn''t detect him and the one''s that did were promptly rid of their undeath. As Adam gained more and more experience fighting the undead he noticed that he was promptly filling up his experience bar, coming ever closer to level seven in [Shadow Monk]. In one particular instance he walked into a room which locked the door behind him and three full complements of halberdiers rushed in through the other entrances to ambush him. It was peculiar because they didn''t seem to expect him but rather were told to rush into this room if the door locked itself, in other words it was a trap. He didn''t break a sweat, simply dancing around the undead he evaded the swipes of all their halberds with all manner of acrobatics, all the while attacking them during opportune moments. In no time at all the entire three complements was reduced on one soldier. This was when he was surprised, he finally heard a voice in this place since leaving the hunting lodge a few hours prior. "Who are you, to be able to defeat eight Ghoul Guards in combat and not suffer any injury?" The voice seemed like some sort of hallowed croak, almost as if the guardsman was simply using the body''s deteriorated voice-box as a foreign medium of communication than as a natural instinct. Adam smiled, if they could talk then they could solve a problem of his. Namely, where the Countess was inside this tower. Now, if he learnt anything in this place, it was to be as direct as possible. "Where is the Countess?" The Ghoul Guard looked at him incredulously. It seemed that it wouldn''t be as easy as that. Then, the ghoul began laughing uproariously, his hallowed laughter echoing down the halls of the keep. "Ahahaha, You!" He pointed at Adam while almost doubling over from laughing so hard. "You, you want to find the Countess?" He was almost falling over by this point. It took a moment before he composed himself and spoke in a serious tone. "Nobody finds the Countess, the Countess finds you." Well, that was helpful. Although perhaps he could skirt around the question? "Where is the throne room?" "The top of the keep." Good, Adam liked that, short and concise. Now he could get to work silencing this guardsman and making an escapade from the dozens of guardsmen which were no doubt making their way here. The guardsman sighed, almost as if he guessed Adam''s thoughts. "You are a funny little human, you my think you tricked me, but you are never leaving this room alive." "What makes you say that?" "My title from maxing out a 1st tier class called ''Head Guardsman, Royal Halberdier''" Oh, that probably would be enough to stop him. Albeit momentarily. The Royal Halberdier took a single step, perfectly synchronising it with a sweep of his halberd to create a flawless strike. This level of technique with a halberd would have taken an eternity of continuous practice within live battlefields to polish and improve upon. It was too bad that the nature of the halberd was meant as a defensive weapon, rather than an offensive one. The Royal Halberdier''s skill with the halberd almost bridged that gap, almost. Adam used shadow footwork and essentially teleported behind the guardsman, only to face a horizontal sweep of the blade. Adam evaded it by vaulting over the incoming blade and jumping atop the Royal Halberdier''s head with a flying kick, knocking him to the ground and snapping the bascinet off, revealing a strangely intact human face. It was just like a regular human apart from the extremely pale tone of his skin, a pale tone which would have made him a successful model in Australia. It was too bad that this lovely face would be exposed to his fists. He advanced on top of him and kicked his halberd away, then he gathered the shadows in the room into his fist. The Royal Halberdier was struggling and thrashing the whole time, demonstrating strength that would have torn apart a lesser man, but held futilely against Adam rigid body. Then, he punched out towards the Royal Halberdier''s mouth once he felt that the shadows had sufficiently gathered around his clenched fist. In the last split moment, the Guardsman did something unexpected and opened his mouth out wide, allowing two razor sharp fangs to extend outwards from his gums in a fashion similar to snakes. The two fangs tore through the white wrapping and the calloused skin around his hand like a hot knife through butter, digging deep into his knuckles. It was painful, but the strike had already been unleashed and little could be done to change it as it continued into the man''s face. At first, it tore off the fangs which had attached themselves to his hands, then it broke the jaw and thrashed the throat. Afterwards it smashed the skull and ultimately left a bloody smear on the floor in place of this man''s head. *You have been afflicted with [Lesser Vampirism]* Or should he say Vampire. He quickly removed the two fangs and endured the pain after bandaging it with the Vampire''s doublet. Then he turned to look at the effects of Vampirism. *Vampirism* *A disease which slowly afflicts the body and mind of the victim, turning them into bloodsucking nightspawn who grow stronger by drinking from the flesh of their kin.* *Initial Effects;* *-Aversion to Sunlight* *-Weakness to Wood* *-Weakness to Silver* *-Weakness to Fire* *-Recuperative effect from drinking blood* *-Possibility to Cure Vampirism* *Effects at Final Stage* *-Death by Sunlight* *-Strength in the Night* *-Critical Weakness to Wood* *-Critical Weakness to Silver* *-Critical Weakness to Fire* *-Aversion to objects in the shape of a cross with one side slightly longer than the other for no explicable reason whatsoever.* *-Inflicting Submissive Vampirism* *-Restore Health, Mana and Stamina from drinking blood* *-Only fresh blood sates hunger and thirst* *-Supernatural Physical Abilities* *-Increased Magical Skills in Blood Magic, Death Magic, Black Magic, Shadow Magic, Ice Magic, Mind Magic.* Hmmmm This seemed like a problem, death by sunlight was a problem. He would need to get this sorted at some point, but now he had an updated character screen Name: Adam Race: Vampire Alignment: True Neutral Strength: 12 Dexterity: 15 Constitution: 11 Wisdom: 12 Intelligence: 13 Charisma: 6 He would definitely need to get this sorted. Anyways, it didn''t seem like much of a setback for now, considering that this was apparently an abode made for vampires. The lack of daylighting in the architecture was explained by this, although there were a number of wooden and silver objects inside the castle suggesting that it was only put under Vampiric proprietorship only recently. Putting these thoughts aside, Adam turned to look towards the task at hand. Bandaging his injured hand, he stood up and started heading towards the central staircase. *Level Up* *Level 7 Shadow Monk* *+5 Mana and +4 HP* It looked like the experience from killing that vampire was sufficient to pull him to the next level, giving him some much appreciated mana and hp. It was timely considering that he was about to confront the countess, a mysterious individual in which he was cultivating an increasingly rising suspicion that they might be a vampire. ''Well, he would know soon enough.'' Adam thought to himself as he stood in front of a double set of heavy oaken doors. Inwardly thinking that oaken doors must be very popular in this region, Adam used shadow form to slip through the bottom gap in the doors. He was already so close to his goal. He was not going to give away his presence by merely opening a door. Behind the doors was a luxurious living room. The wallpaper was a dull shade of red, showcasing a great amount of wealth alongside a hidden promise of danger. Masterfully crafted furniture was made from sable wood and ebony, atop which were displayed myriad curiosities in which one could indulge their eyes upon. These curiosities ranged from simple baubles and trinkets to occult candles and human skulls. The entire room gave off a feel similar to that of a madman, albeit a classy and wealthy one. The owner of this room was currently seated upon a red satin couch, letting her body sink into the malleable texture of the couch. The short wedding gown, which was also composed of satin, lay loosely on her delicate frame and the white locks of her hair hung loosely by the side of the couch. This person must be the Countess. *Quest Updated* *Kill the Countess T-T* *Reward:* *Title: Killer of the Noblesse* What was this change? The system actually gave him an accurate directive in this quest and gave him a reward of substance, not just empty promises that arose as consequences of the quest? Adam paused beside the door, something was amiss. It wasn''t just the strange normalcy of the system, but rather something in the room. He couldn''t quite place what it was, the Countess was relaxing upon the couch in oblivion of her imminent demise, the guards outside the door had been dispatched and the furniture within the room was... The furniture Vampires were meant to elicit some sort of weakness in front of wood, and yet this room was so full of it. In fact, he had just gone through a wooden door in shadow form. He couldn''t tell if shadow form inhibited the effects of a weakness but there should have been at least some reaction. As soon as Adam starting seeing the flaws, discrepancies and queerness in the room the space around him seemed to warp. It wasn''t quite like entering and leaving his subconscious space but more like someone tearing space as one would tear wallpaper, revealing the bare wall beneath. The room was quite different now. The main structure was maintained however the wallpaper was replaced with a sheening red glass which covered every part of the floor, walls and ceiling. The entire room was bare in exception of the Countess standing in the centre alongside three slumped figures and a huge object. The slumped figures appeared to be the stronger one''s amongst the trainees. It was too bad that they weren''t strong enough to face the Countess. The Countess didn''t seem to be aware of his presence, busily doing something with the trainees. A pool of blood was forming at her feet and she tore apart the limbs of the corpses and attached them to a... Mass of flesh. There was no other way to describe such an object, it appeared to be composed entirely of blood and limbs from many different creatures and people, held together by shoddy stitching across the leathery seams of the skin. It stood three metres tall and appeared extremely monstrous. The only part of the thing that wasn''t made of flesh and blood was a small picture frame which was slotted into the face of a human. The silvery frame contained a detailed painting of a dashing young man in noble clothing which appeared to be very aged, at least centuries in age. The Countess was humming a merry tune as she worked on this. Adam couldn''t make out her face beneath the locks of white hair that flooded past her visage, however he could tell that she was innocently smiling. The whole situation was extremely strange to Adam, however he had grown used to gore and wasn''t too affected by it. As a result he quickly took stock of the situation and analysed what he could use as an advantage. Doubtlessly, the Countess must be a fully fledged vampire, therefore she must possess supernatural strength at this moment. Especially so considering that it was currently night time and that the vampire from before appeared to be subservient to her, indicating a huge disparity in strength and/or position. It also meant that her weaknesses to wood, silver and sunlight would be exponentially strengthened. However, this wasn''t an advantage that he could utilise considering that the room was devoid of any of those materials. He also noticed that the material which composed the room wasn''t just glass, it appeared to be some sort of crystal of a much denser nature and that the red hue around the room was caused by the residual blood which seeped into the crystal. Taking all of this into consideration, Adam realised that a prolonged engagement with the Countess wouldn''t be to his advantage, and thus used shadow form once more to creep alongside the bloody streaks on the floor which provided some small measure of shade from the ambient lighting of the crystal. He carefully made his way until he was directly behind her. Then he reached out and clawed through her heart. Adam''s hand met virtually no resistance as it directly penetrated through to the other side and clutched her heart within the grasping claw. Obviously, he wasn''t about to make the same mistake he made with the ghoul and assume that she was dead. Thereby he formed a second claw with his other hand and tore the vertebrae out from under the head. Only then did he let the corpse drop down to the ground. Except it didn''t drop to the ground, it splashed to the ground. Adam saw the body of the Countess transform into a massive pile of blood right in front of him, slipping around his clenched fists and arms. Then, some distance away from him it gathered and reformed into the Countess once more. When the blood gathered, the white dress around her reformed along with her, exempt of the blood stains which had littered it priorly. The hair was now neatly plaited backwards instead of hanging over her face, thus letting Adam see her face for the first time. It wasn''t merely a shade of white, it was inhumanly white. Her eyes were crimson red, the playful visage of a predator displayed within them. The corner of her lip was ever so slightly curled upwards. "My, oh my. You sure seem to be an interesting toy." Her lips smacked together when she pronounced the word ''interesting'', accentuating the ''i'' sound in the beginning in a sadistic manner. "Walking through my halls unseen and uninvited, you sure surprised me." The tone of her voice expressed genuine praise, honestly shocked that she had been surprised. "Seeing through the illusions within my illusion room, you are surely not like my other dolls." She gestured to the mutilated corpses in the room. At this moment her grin crested to it''s biggest, showing a manic smile and a sudden flash of movement. "Which is why you will make for a very interesting toy to play with!" Chapter 19 - A Delectable Dish The Countess dashed forwards at a speed invisible to the naked eye. Adam could barely parry the attack with his arms, suffering a long slash down the side of his arm. The attack was so quick that Adam could barely discern that the damage inflicted was caused by a series of long claws which extended from her fingernails. After the short exchange the Countess leapt back and licked the blood from her hands, only to stop when the blood entered her mouth and take on a serious expression. "This much abyssal influence... How is this possible?" Adam took advantage of the pause in combat to check his wellbeing, his health was down by about a quarter and his mana was down to fourth fifths due to using shadow form earlier. This would be enough to keep fighting, he leapt backwards and began casting shadow bolts on both hands. His mana could easily afford to cast a few dozen shadow bolts and it''s strength was comparable to that of a firearm. The rationale behind this move was that the Countess possessed great melee capabilities, enough to put Adam at a disadvantage in a close combat scenario. Therefore, if he couldn''t engage in close combat he may as well fight from a distance. However, for all his planning, Adam couldn''t understand how the Countess reformed from blood once she had died. Was it an ability? How many times could she do that? Was she free to manipulate her body into blood at a moment''s notice? The uncertainty behind this eerie ability unnerved Adam as he prepared to fight. In the moment of his hasty retreat, the two formed shadow bolts at his hands were sent in an arc across the room. The two bolts made a straight arc into the heart and right lung of the Countess respectively. The Countess attempted to sidestep the two projectiles, however, the nature of the bolts made her misjudge the trajectory and distance at which the bolts were from her and resulted in one tearing through her forearm. A chunk of flesh was torn off and the wounded area took a slightly green tinge. The Countess was momentarily surprised at this turn of events, however she merely grabbed the slumped figure of one of the trainees and drained them of their blood. This made her body glow slightly red and reformed the torn flesh so as to make it look like no damage had been sustained at all. Adam stood dumbfounded, she could recuperate damage like this? How was he meant to fight against her? The Countess rushed against him, swiping with her claws and attempting to grab hold of him. Luckily, Adam could maintain a pace at which she found some difficulty in doing so. This resulted in a momentary stalemate between the two. Adam was struggling to find a way to win this fight. Chipping away at her health in a battle of attrition wasn''t a viable option since she would just heal it away. Killing her outright in one attack was impossible since she was currently forcing Adam to go on the offensive, this resulted in a situation in which if Adam wanted to attack the Countess then he would have to let on of her strikes hit him. Furthermore, from the sheer strength behind her attacks, Adam would be torn apart before he could even initiate a counterattack. No, there was a way. If he used [Shadow Form] at the precise moment in which she would strike him, he could allow the strike through and land a fatal strike on her. This manoeuvre would require timing which was precise to the smallest denomination of time. If he was off by even a fraction of a second then he would be immediately torn apart under the relentless attack from the Countess. Having a plan in mind, Adam thought about which organ to strike. He had to take into consideration the fact that any damage given could be replenished through drinking blood, therefore it would have to be quick and fatal. Adam sharpened his gaze as he mentally committed to this strike. His mind went into the same accelerated cognition which he used against Toshihiro because he would need every millisecond of precision which he could muster. His feet slightly shifted to the side so as to stop retreating backwards. The Countess was only a step behind him and caught up in an instant, unleashing a deadly strike from her right hand towards his neck. If this attack hit then it would essentially anchor her hand into his spine, allowing her to grapple him to the ground and cannibalise him. The strike seemed fast even in Adam increased cognition. Before he knew it the strike was already before him with a mere thirteen centimetres between them. It was about to hit his shoulder blade when he activated [Shadow Form] at the last possible moment. To Adam''s surprise however, the Countess'' claw began glowing with red light just as it struck Adam''s shadowy form, cleaving a line through him. This was a measure of pain which Adam, or any other human for that matter, had ever experienced before. His soul felt as if it had been ripped apart, sending a crushing headache into him and shaving away the majority of his mana. Nevertheless, this pain was nothing compared to the prospect of death. Thus Adam managed to concentrate and strike out at the Countess. His hands formed two different claws and tore into her throat, capturing her trachea and wrenching it from the neck. Without the frontal part of the neck then the Vampire wouldn''t be able to heal and thus he could control her in a battle of attrition. However, that plan had been scrapped since he just found out that she could harm him whilst in his [Shadow Form], therefore Adam was sent spiralling backwards in a dance of evasive manoeuvres which became increasingly harder to execute. Cold sweat began forming at the nape of Adam''s neck, not because the short fight was physically strenuous but rather because he was out of trump cards to pull against this adversary. It was only a matter of time before he died against the Countess'' onslaught, and his time was running out. An unyielding gleam arose in Adam''s eyes as the Countess kept pressuring him into a corner. He wasn''t the type to stay and fight to the end, and thus he suddenly used the last of his mana to activate [Shadow Form] once more and attempt to escape the battle. The Vampire Countess simply smiled at Adam''s attempt to escape and swiped her sleeve at the thin air, allowing the entirety of the residual blood within the crystal to gather in front of her and flood the room in ambient light. This forced Adam out of his [Shadow Form] and violently thrust him to the wall, causing him to cough up a mouthful of blood. Once again, Adam found himself slumped against a wall. The first time it had been against his teacher and now it was against someone who would likely kill him. The Countess in the middle of the room was slowly walking towards him while mouthing something. Her lips moved but Adam couldn''t hear what she was saying, the rush of blood coursing through his veins and bleeding into the floor from his wounds alongside the rapid contraction and expansion of his lungs were the only sounds which his throbbing eardrums could discern. In fact, he could faintly hear her in the background, like a buzzing fly within a raucous marketplace. Utterly insignificant. His eyes hung listlessly, emptily gazing at the silver frame of the young man stitched to the flesh statue, not taking in the detail but rather listening to the dying sounds of his body. The Countess was approaching him, words rolling of her bloodied tongue as naturally as breathing. He could even make out some of what she was saying. Something along the lines of ''Abyssal Power'' and ''Absorption'' and ''Resurrection''. Either way, he knew that today would end badly. Then, a faint and hallowed voice spoke to Adam through the side of his consciousness. ''Or would it?'' He thought as he turned his attention to what Adam had to say. ''Adam, I have a way for you to live past this day." The hallowed voice of ''Adam'' seemed extremely enticing at this moment, not any different to that of a sweet promise. ''But...'' He continued. ''We will need to become closer, much closer than what we are now."This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there. "What... Do you mean?" Adam mumbled beneath the constant pain in confusion, apparently interrupting the Vampire''s soliloquy at this moment. "Right now, there is me, and there is you. We may be one but right now we are separate." Adam didn''t understand what ''Adam'' was trying to say, he wasn''t making any sense. However, his line of thought was cut-off as he saw from the corner of his bloodied sight that the Countess was once again advancing upon him, murderous intent clearly displayed in her eyes. "Whatever you need to do, do it now!" Adam shouted within his consciousness, however he could only mumble the words through the intense headache he was suffering. The only thing that Adam could make out was the terrifying face of the Countess advancing towards him with a wicked smile plastered upon her face. That and the small smile which Adam let out once he received Adam''s approval. "Don''t worry, just relax and trust your instincts." These were the last words which Adam could hear being softly uttered by ''Adam'' before he felt a strange sensation wash over him. It was similar to that time in which he took the [Awareness] trait, however fundamentally different. Instead of pain and a loss of sensation, Adam could feel a refreshing fell overtake every organ in his body. Almost as if before he had been shackled beneath a million iron chains and now he had been set free. Every organ in his body felt as if it could cut through steel just like a hot knife going through butter. The sheer potential power which Adam could feel around his fingertips made him intoxicated on this sensation. He lifted his hands, only to see a mass of white tentacles which resembled that of a horsetail whisk, the very same one which he had seen on the night when he first awakened. ... In this moment, the approaching Countess had stopped dead on her tracks. Her usual malicious grin had contorted into a mask of terror as she took in the monstrous appearance which Adam had adopted. The ball of blood hovering beside her faltered and splashed to the crystal floor, tainting it a crimson shade. However, she wasn''t afraid because of Adam. No, she was afraid because of the change which had been wrought about by Adam. The Countess could sense the concentration of abyssal influence within an area, which was how she could tell that Adam had a disproportionate amount of such influence in his body. The reason she became afraid was because she witnessed a catastrophic change in the flow of abyssal influence, suddenly congregating inside this room. The effects of the abyssal influence were making their mark inside the room. The shapes within the room began distorting and changing into a green hue of colour. This included the red pupils of the Vampire Countess as they slowly began to glow into an iridescent green colour. She saw that the prey wasn''t doing anything after the change and was about to finish him off when a cacophony of ear screeching screaming rang out from behind her. Turning around, she saw that the huge mound of flesh began twisting and turning and from every orifice was ejected a putrid stream of bile and corruption. All the mouths sown upon it were twisted in a horrifying manner as they hoarsely screamed sounds which were impossible to utter for mortal creatures. Furthermore, the silver portrait was being slowly incorporated into the body of the mound of flesh. "NOOOOO! MY HENRY!" The Countess ear-splittingly screeched as she dashed in his direction, tearing apart at the flesh in an attempt to save the portrait. An endeavour in which she succeeded at. She grasped the portrait and swiftly jumped backwards to tear away from the rotting mound of flailing flesh. However, when her hands grasped the edge of the portrait they burst into white fire and began to melt away at the skin, a burn which elicited a white smoke to rise from the wound. Were the Countess in her normal state, she would quickly retrieve her hand and nurse the inflicted injuries. But right now she was crazed by the influence of the Abyss, reacting only to her innermost desires and ignoring all pain. Her hands melted away and dropped the portrait on the floor, cracking the frame and allowing the painting to catch on fire as well. The Countess hysterically screeched as she saw the man depicted in the painting becoming no more than a pile of ash. She futilely attempted to pick it up with the stumps of her arms but only managed to extend the extensive burns across her body. Only when the entire portrait had turned to ash did she quiet down, two streams of tears running down her pale angular face. Her green iridescent eyes listlessly hung on the spot in which the ashes remained, not even budging when a bloodied boot which was padded in black fabric stepped on them. The blank look upon her face was replaced by a cloud of blood as countless white tendrils tore apart through her flesh. She knew that the prey had began moving towards her, but she didn''t worry. She was far more concerned about losing her precious Henry than fighting with some petty mortal. This was because she was an immortal, someone far beyond the reached of mortality and surpassing the limits of death. This was her privilege as a Blood Lord, a High Vampire amongst the ranks of the Blood Nobility and the threshold of a second tier class. Her method to immortality lay in two things. Firstly was the unlimited lifespan granted to all complete Vampires, a lifespan unlimited due to their nature of absorbing lifeblood as a survival staple. Secondly was the immortal body granted to her by the Blood Lord class, a body which could indefinitely revive with full health, mana and stamina as long as a drop of blood was present in the vicinity. The second nature of her immortality was why she was so confident that the prey couldn''t harm her, therefore she waited patiently until he killed this body so that she could finally grant this thing the death it deserved for causing her to lose Henry. She felt the tendrils invade her body and tear apart her insides, therefore she knew that the body was dead and was currently awaiting her resurrection. ''Any time now'' She thought. However, seconds turned to minutes and minutes turned to hours. Eventually Angelica tried to open her eyes. Only to stop in shock. ''Angelica... Who is that... Why did I call myself Angelica?'' The Countess had lived for centuries, long having forgotten her mortal memories. And yet, here was a fragment of her past resurfacing. "It''s nice, at least I now know my name." Angelica thought as she once again willed her eyes to open. The flood of colours shocked her very soul. This was a scene she was very familiar with. It was the morning of her wedding. She was currently in the courtyard of the keep. Joyous guards lined the parapets of the citadel in ceremonial attire, celebrating the wedding of the young mistress of the citadel. Red and white flower arrangements lined the white stone walls of the main courtyard as rose petals littered the gleaming marble floor. On either side of her were dozens of merry nobles, all of them with gleaming smiles upon their faces and they would have been chatting uproariously too were it not this certain time of the ceremony. In front of her was a white pathway carved into the marble, leading up intricately carved steps and towards a mesmerising white pavilion which housed a tall and solemn figure dressed in the ceremonial attire of a bishop. She took one step after another while her left arm was linked against the one of a tall and handsome young man, the very same one which was depicted in the picture! Everyone was looking at Angelica and Henry with a gleam of approval within their eyes, encouraging them on to take the few more steps onto the altar. However, beneath her veil two streams of tears had formed at the corners of her eyes. It wasn''t because she was dissatisfied with the marriage to a commoner, or because she didn''t love Henry. Quite the opposite instead, she was thoroughly infatuated with him during their very first meeting. It was because she knew what would happen next, the end of the wedding would come soon. Sooner than anybody here would know. Before she knew it she was standing atop the elevated platform, gazing into the face of her beloved Henry from behind the thin satin veil. The bishop be their side mumbled words which couldn''t be heard above the Henry''s dazzling face. The only thing she heard was a short word which seemed sweeter than anything in the entire world as they parted Henry''s delicate lips. "Yes." He uttered, not in a proclamation to everyone in the wedding but just to her. Her heart felt as if it was soaring high above the clouds, only to plummet below the deepest of hells as a sounds of scuffling in the entrance could be heard. She closed her eyes in resignation as the sounds of the nobles abruptly standing from their seats filled the main courtyard accompanied by shouts demanding what was going on. The clash of steel could be hear both near and far as the guards in flowered uniforms were downed by masked assailants in the distance and the nobles and elite guards in the courtyard drew their blades from their scabbards. Flames burst in the distance and magicians engaged in combat and a concentration of mana gathered inside the courtyard as the nobles called upon the power of their classes to gather strength around them, eliciting a response and raising a spell formation inside their area of the keep. Soon, everything was silent as the nobles and elite guards nervously brandished their weapons looking towards every entrance to the courtyard. Henry held her with one arm as he protectively brandished a cutlass with the other. Her father, the King, raised his Warhammer far above his head and issued a royal decree to call all the remaining guards to the courtyard. However, nobody came, not even the royal magicians which had been heard fighting outside earlier. Eventually, a cohort of masked figures dressed in black flooded the courtyards from all the windows and doors facing it, putting great pressure into everyone there. The assailant were greatly skilled and could easily defeat the average Barons within the nobility, all of which were at least level five in their class. Before long majority of nobles within the kingdom had been butchered alongside the rest of the royal guards, leaving only the three grand dukes, the King''s personal guards, the bishop, three paladins, the King himself and both Henry and herself. All of them apart from herself could be called influential and powerful figures in their own right, able to defeat scores of men single handedly. However, they were now surrounded by unknown assailant. Angelica felt a great sorrow overtake her as she knew this was then end, this was when she dies back in her life, and doubtlessly this nightmare which she had dreamt far too often would end the same. An arrow would make it''s way from the window overlooking the keep and pierce her heart, instantly killing her. Then, a century after, she would awaken as a true vampire and grant unlife to the dead bodies of all the inhabitant of this ruined castle. She awaited the fate arrow, only that it never came. She saw the King desperately shout to Henry and gave him a magical item. "Henry! Take this and run away with my daughter! We will hold them off for as long as possible!" Henry took the magical talisman and cracks it, surrounding them with blue light and leaving only a fading image of the courtyard for Angelica to see. A fading image of a swordsman bringing his sword across her fathers neck. Then, everything white as the teleportation ended. Looking around herself, she saw that she was atop the summit of the local Cathedral, it''s highest point. It overlooked the entire cityscape which was currently in the middle of being sacked. Citizens were being run down and impaled upon the spears of men clad in black. Currently the area around the cathedral was devoid of the pillagers, however it was deserted as the city guards had already been broken and fled into the alleyways of the city. The only friendly faces nearby her were the faces of the solemn temple guards and Henry standing alongside her. Angelica was still in shock at having averted death, so much so that she looked at the sky and straight into the blazing sun shining overhead. It was a clear day devoid of clouds, allowing the sun to shower even the darkest corner of the cityscape with light. Were it not a dream, Angelica would currently be turning into dust and scattering into the wind, however, now she was human. If only temporary. She turned to look at Henry, wanting to urge themselves on in their escapade when she suddenly felt a great pain clasp her heart. She looked up to see the shocked faces of the temple guards as they attempted to draw their weapons before being cut down under a hail of arrows which seeming appeared from nowhere. Then she saw Henry smiling, the smile comforted her before she something amiss. His delicate lips were curled slightly too much, enough to give a foreboding feeling deep within Angelica''s heart. She looked down again, to see a familiar cutlass running into her body. ''That isn''t right'' she thought as the blood being pumped through her arteries began leaving her body. ''That isn''t right'' she thought as the sun began burning up her skin, causing it to ashen up and disperse in the wind. ''That isn''t right'' she began to see as Henry''s insidious face was burnt into her memory. ''That isn''t right'' she saw as a mass of white tendrils surrounded her, until she was no more. ... They felt an inexplicable exhilaration as they gave in to their instincts. They saw a woman in front of him, and she seemed so very enticing, something which was perceived to be so irresistible that they began going insane from not having it. Therefore, they took her. It was incomparable to that time in which they took the office lady or the possum. This time the sheer magnitude of her feelings seemed incomparably vast. They sheer amount of insanity hidden deep within her brain became a delectable dish, a dish which became even better once he seasoned it properly. They could sense her terror, her fear building up as they consumed her. To them these things were like music to their ears, much in the same way as when a restaurant hires musicians to play for their customers as they are enjoying their dish. The conclusion to her nightmare was in particular so very great that it resembled a magnificent dessert to finish of their full meal. Of course, once one finishes eating their dish, it is only good manners to wipe the dishes clean and discard the disposable cutlery. However, whether it was unfortunate or not, it seemed like all of their favourite dishes were sealed in disposable packaging. No Chapter Today
Hiatus
Hello Hey guys, long time no see. If you hadn''t known by now, this novel is pretty dropped (not sure if I announced it before). Anyways, if I did, I feel like I need to offer a better explanation. School. Yep, things were starting to get a bit hectic for year 11, and fortunately I did get quite good results but, especially with the last year of high school, I need to keep a sustained and constant effort in studying. Which brings me to the next point. For my studies, I am currently taking extension 2 English, so I wanted to ask you if you guys thought there were any scenes in this short-lived little book that stood out amongst the trash (if there were any) so that I could refer them to my mentor.Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. Also, I was thinking of creating another fiction thread for the development of my major work, which is meant to be a 5-6k short story, so that you guys could provide any feedback. (Honestly, go ballistic with the feedback, permission to take off the sugarcoating behind your criticism, I''ll need it if I want to improve) So yeah, comment thought below, also sorry again for never finishing this story, especially since it was like one chapter before finishing.