Chapter 170 – The Priests Battleline

Tom bowed his head, overwhelmed by the clashing emotions. The fluttering of uncontainable joy he felt on behalf of Baptiste and the depressing reality not of the wador’s plan, but of its implications. It was like a collision of two hundred metre high tsunamis creating rip tides and swirling crushing currents beyond comprehension. 

It was great.

No, it was the opposite. This was the end of existence.

But… but… the hope the wador would bring to the diminished civilisation had to be comparable to the dawning of an item which was capable of tongue tieing a million dollar lawyer delivering their career defining closing argument.

It was the devil revealing that there were no green shoots of potential because he was already in hell.

His emotions were thrown through the blender without caring for the fragile mind that existed in his skull.

Tears ran helplessly down his eyes as he alternated between feeling all encompassing grief and smiling in joy. Baptiste had wanted more than anything a future for his people and he was getting that. The weight of expectations had been overwhelming for the young plant, and now they were gone.

With deep, centreing breaths, he forced himself to calm down.  

It was done. Emotions, no matter how powerful could not change reality. Humans had been fork checked by a knight. They had lost a queen, and it was time to accept that and concentrate on the larger battle and stabilise their now weaker position.

He glanced at the polished metal walls and nodded as the tears and reddened eyes vanished. Then, with another thought, he appeared back in the central area.

Baptiste was holding court. Everyone wanted to hear about his miracle. They desired to consume every detail so they could dream such an outcome for themselves as well.

Briana leaned in to whisper in his ear. “What was that? You looked like a ghost had danced on your soul.”

Tom swallowed. “Because I know who saved him.”

She looked at him quizzically, but her eyes showed that she was already realising what was happening.

“Yes, that,” he told her despondently. “The wador. The same species that killed me in my first life, they’re the saviours.”

“Oh.”

“They’re number one on the ladder now.”

She stared at him in shock. “What? No. That’s impossible. You’re exaggerating.”

“Nope. It’s a fact.” He said simply. “I checked the ladder. I don’t know if they’ll keep their spot for ever but right now they’re number one. It’s clearly not just Baptiste’s people. I think they’ve made the same oath to thousands of civilisations.”

“So many?”

“Maybe more. There should be about a hundred thousand of them left. So yes that many and that five hundred year oath was about maximising their ranking points.”

“It might have been to help others,” she whispered.

“Indeed, it might have been,” Tom agreed. “They are species WADOR champions, so yes serving the greater good will be part of it. He is a balanced god and none of his people are evil and some are even altruistic.”

He was genuinely amazed at the ingenuity of their plan and what appeared to be a near perfect execution. They had pretended to be a battle thirsty average species and had been treated that way, which had given them this opportunity. If the dragons or insects had suspected, they would never have been allowed to gain the personal power or have spread as widely as they had.

It was an act of beauty especially the synergy the idea had with their competition bonus, which allowed them to reset class, traits, skills and spells every few years. In one stroke of genius, they had probably saved thousands of species. The deception before, the execution, and the foresight to exploit their advantages could only be admired. Tom wondered how far they had truly spread. Had they reached two, three, four, five or six local clusters distance. If their travels had extended that far, they could very well be saving the full twenty thousand species that five trainers per civilisation limited them too.

A large part of him hoped they would win if only to spit in MAKROS face but he doubted they were going to be that successful. MAKROS did not seem like a GOD that would allow himself to be defeated so easily. There was a difference between tricking a human analyst and a GOD, even if, Tom thought in the privacy of his own mind that the GOD was flawed.    

If the wador were to achieve as much good as he suspected they were on track to deliver, then the purist in him felt that he should be celebrating. If only it hadn’t come at the expense of humans.

Tom frowned. He could feel the melancholy building, and doing something was the only way he was going to escape it.

“I’ll be back in half an hour.” He promised Baptiste. “Don’t leave before then.”

“I’ll be here all day.” Unspoken was the truth that he was leaving. After today, he would never be back and they would only meet if Tom went to his sunny plains.

Tom was thoroughly sick of the champions trial and being by himself. He needed answers and if Dimitri didn’t have them, then Tom was happy to watch as he learned the truth.

A moment later, Tom was back in his bed. There was movement as one of the few early risers in the dorm got ready. It was too soon for Tom, so he continued to pretend to be asleep while he waited to see if Kang would realise his need.

Nothing came through, so after almost a minute of impatient waiting, he triggered the title directly.

An instant afterward he materialised in Kang’s system room because that’s the location they both preferred, no matter the instigator.

A very sleepy Kang waved at him from the bed. “Wh, wh?”

“I need to talk to Dimitri.” Tom answered immediately. 

A half-asleep Kang nodded and then a moment later Dimitri appeared in the room. He did not look happy.

“I know Tom,” he snapped. “We’ll find out what they’re doing and we’ve got a couple of teams of assassins we can send. But don’t stress we’re onto it.”

“You really don’t know how?”

“It’s been two days, Tom. The spy rings take time to find the answer.”

“Well, there’s no need to wonder I know what they’re doing. They’ve become trainers for diminished species.”

Dimitri stilled and then bitter realisation flooded across his face. His hand raised and massaged the bridge of his nose. “Damn, that’s clever. Absolutely brilliant. I’ll tell the council to abandon the countermeasures.”

“That’s it? That’s the extent of your reaction. Don’t you care about humans at all?”

The big man’s head snapped up. “Tom, you’re going too far. If you don’t want to be treated like a child, don’t act like it.”

“I didn’t.”

“Tom. You did. There’s no need to do personal attacks. Use your big words. Why aren’t I over reacting? Why? Well, the answer is simple. I’ve been working on this for over forty hours now and ultimately this doesn’t change anything.”

“They’re in first place.”

“But we don’t know for how long and even if they keep the spot it just means instead of catching inventors and giants, we’ll also need to pass the insects.”

Tom stared at him his own frustration causing his face to go red, but he suppressed the anger. “Are you going to add a theoretically to that? To make it sound more correct.” He asked.

Dimitri looked confused. “No, why would I. I was only stating facts.”

“I can’t see how we will catch the giants, let alone the insects as well.”

“Calm down Tom. The situation is not as precarious as you errantly believe. We’ve spoken to priests plural,” he continued, emphasising the word plural. “Their official line is that ‘they’re cautiously optimistic that humanity is in a good place.’ But unofficially, they’re saying we’ve got nothing to worry about.”

“Nothing?” He interrupted and laughed hollowly. “Are you listening to the shit you’re parroting? How can they say that? Are they on drugs? Are they even real priests?”

“They’re real Tom. I don’t know how or why they’re claiming what they are? But the fact is they believe it. And before you question my judgement, these statements were made under a GOD’s oath. There is no doubting it.”

Tom sighed. “They can claim what they want, but the maths doesn’t make sense. We’ll have to earn tens of millions of ranking points a month to catch them. Where’s it going to come from? We’re not going to get magically ten times better without taking drastic measures. And with them saying shit like that no one will gamble like we need them too.”

“Yes, I don’t know their game. But the wador can still be caught. The priests suggested their points are a one off. After this week, there won’t be many more.”

“I can see that,” Tom admitted grudgingly. “Their points are going to slow down. They got as many as they did because they’ve taken five hundred year oaths. That’s them banking all their points up front. Maybe if the giants go after them they’ll be reduced back to their normal low number of points, but I can’t imagine that happening.”

“Nor me.” Dimitri said nodding agreement. “Neither the giants nor GOBUS would go that low and stop this.”

“If we assume they keep their points then I have them getting second. I assume the dragons will overtake them. Humans, we’re going to be miles back.”

“Yes. Our forecasters agree with you.” Dimitri said, supporting him. “But the priests believe differently.”

“They think we’re going to get above third?”

Dimitri shook his head. “Who knows. They’re being cagey. All we’ve got out of them is not to worry, and humans will be a thriving, non-diminishing species in twenty generations’ time. They are not explicitly claiming that we’ll be ranked third, but their statements are as good as confirming it.”

“That’s their actual wording?”

“Yep. Out of the blue, too. Over sixty years and not a peep and then wham. Two days ago, in all three towns they communicated that line to each of the council. We all wondered about the timing and then the wador points shot up. I figure they were just getting ahead of the news so that no one would panic.”

Tom rather than reacting further considered what the headmaster was saying. Were they being accurate or was this a case of Baghdad Bob who was made to stand in front of the world and say everything is fine as Iraq crumbled around him. He wanted to trust the priests, but it made no sense. “I can’t fathom how the priests could be wrong, but I also don’t understand where we could get that many points?”

Dimitri shrugged. “It’s possible. There’s some special projects that have the potential to have a massive pay off.”

Tom raised an eyebrow at the older man. “Ones that can generate billions of points?”

“Maybe… for example there’s a team trying to create a divinity virus. They’re not stupid. It won’t target the big eight, so it’s not crossing in blasphemy territory, but it will kill the worshipers of minor deities. A group of scientists from earth created it while leaning heavily on fate. They’re still refining it and while it’s crap now, there’s an outside chance that it could be improved enough to become an epidemic and if that happens we’re talking tens of billions of points. That could change not just the local area but the entirety of Existentia.”

“And paint a massive target on our backs for the rest of our existence. We shouldn’t be doing something that evil.”

“Being hated is better than extinction.” Dimitri shot back. “We didn’t choose to come here and we can’t be held responsible for what we are being forced by circumstances to do.”

“But killing off everyone who worships minor deities is too much. That might make eternal empires come for us.”

“Let them,” the big man answered simply. “If we’re all gathered in the same spot, our community’s fate will protect us from retaliation. Not even an eternal empire will be able to stand against that. And while I personally don’t think it’ll work the scientists claim the virus project is close. That’s not the only potential big earner. There’s another four teams which are focusing on creating invasive pests… based on our earth history that’s got the promise of being devastating if done right. If the approach works, we can scale quickly via long range teleports. I’m not saying any of them are sure bets, but they could have a big enough payoff to make a difference and considering the priests are saying ‘nothing to see here,’ I’m thinking one of those undertakings is going to come good.”

“No,” Tom said definitely. “I can’t see how any of those could work. How many millions of species are there in Existentia. All of what you said sounds like stuff that must have been attempted thousands of times before. It won’t work.”

“Tom. I can’t argue with you. When I look at the numbers and the projects that I know are ongoing I have to agree with you. But if the priests claim, we’re going to get above third. I have to assume one of those will be successful.”

“But.”

“I get it Tom. The numbers don’t work, but this is what the priests are saying, and they’ve got no reason to deceive us. I don’t know why, but that’s what they say.”

Tom disagreed with Dimitri’s assumptions. Those plans weren’t going to get enough points and why someone might be on track to achieve the outcome they needed. He suspected it was to be a case of dozens of the elite having to step up and he would have to be one of those heroes. That new life started when he turned fifteen. In the meantime, he would go celebrate with Baptiste, as humanity’s crisis was not the plant’s issue.

Three days had passed, and he was still disturbed by Wador’s outrageously successful gambit. The human analysts were scrambling, and it was unclear how much each oath was worth and what percentage of Wador’s had made them already. It was possible that so far they had only seen a few percent of their population sign up in which case they would win the competition by a landslide or the massive influx of points was the result of the wador’s entire population swearing the oath on the same day and they as species would therefore effectively have no future upside. Not that it mattered to the wador they probably had enough points to clinch a top two spot already. 

Tom figured specifics were irrelevant.

Nothing much had changed. If the wador were now the run away favourites, they would just have to get the points to pass the insects along with the giants and the inventors.

To that end he was working on the upgraded version of the ritual disks. He had moved on from his initial schema as per the plan and been taught this new higher tier one. While the previous ones had never stopped being effective, it was clear from the millions of years of history available for research that continuing to use them would create failures and lots of unnecessary deaths from over confidence. That, more than anything, was why they had been phased out.

Tom was not too disappointed. His hard work had given over two hundred individuals the chance to earn hundreds of extra coins. That would have fortified their foundations and increased the probability of them turning their people around. Not to mention that for twelve months there had been no deaths, which meant he had indirectly saved over a hundred lives.

It had been a success.

Nothing like the wador had achieved, but he was sure based on his point total that ten to twenty of those civilisations had been saved by his actions.

This latest project, the upgraded disks, would help a couple of handfuls more. Less than the first attempt both because he would be restricted to no longer training with brackets one and two and the useful shelf life of the powerful gifts was lower. Even if the first phase had finished successfully, both FAMES and MAKROS would have introduced a counter. Expanding that to also beat the newer versions would not be anywhere near as difficult as the initial engineering.

His handlers were hopeful of a six-month run.

There was a cough beside him, which he ignored while he finished the section he was on so he could put it down without spoiling any progress.

Finally, he looked up.

Briana stood next to him.

“You need to return to your body. Like now.”

“Really?” he winked at her. “Are you ruining a surprise?”

She flushed red. “You just have to return to your body.”

“Bri. I know I’m turning thirteen today.”

She vanished.

With a sigh, he followed and discovered his body dutifully attending and taking notes in a Natives Studies class. Unsurprisingly, Briana was not at the desk but rather hovered completely unsuspiciously in the doorway.

Her timing had been good.

The volunteer teacher was finishing up by extolling the virtues of purchasing a psychic mood sensing skill as opposed to a translation ability. Her view is the generalised skill would always work while translation skills were notorious for failing and doing so badly.

“For example, a body language skill that specialises in body language would be unable to interpret a species that communicates mood through explicit precise moments of silence. This will be an invisible failure and the native might be trembling in fury and you’ll never pick up on it. Mood Sensing at least would make the issue clear.”

The lesson ended, and the volunteer beamed at him. “Tom, if you could come up to the front of the class.”

Reluctantly, he did as instructed and stood next to her.

“Happy Birthday.” The entire class yelled. Weapons were drawn and smacked down on their tables to make an almost physical wave of noise.

That was the cue for Briana and another volunteer carrying a cake to come in. The cake was placed on the desk and his friend hovered nervously nearby, clutching a present. She had obviously been chosen to give the traditional gift, which was a surprise as he had been expecting Eloise.

“Tom,” she said tentatively, clearly trying to project the sound to everyone but failing as the more distant people had to strain to hear. “Is my best friend.”

“Second best.” Eloise interrupted.

Briana flushed red. “One of my best friends,” she said her voice almost dropping to a whisper.

“Speak louder,” Adolf yelled. Tom managed to suppress a glower. That kid had always been a prick. 

“And as per tradition, I have a gift for him.” She looked up with some measure of defiance with her voice clear and echoing across the room. 

Tom said nothing. He was very proud of her. Standing in front of the entire class like this and talking was really hard for her.   

She handed him a small package.

“What is it?” A boy at the back called out.

“It’s a sensing skill.” Briana answered. “It was given to me and I don’t have a strong earth affinity, and I know Tom does. So…” she trailed off and then mutely held out the present for him.

As was tradition, everyone cheered as he accepted the offering.

Later, in the isolation room, he opened the small package. Staring out at him was the tier three Earth Sense spell that he had chosen not to consume and instead release it in the wild in the hope it would come back to him having passed through three sets of hands so Known Heretics’ new functionality could be applied.

He hoped it worked, and for a moment, he hesitated. Wondering if Briana had grabbed it months ago thinking it would be the perfect gift. It would be the type of thing that she would do, but it would totally have ruined his plan.

Grinning wryly and knowing there was only one way to find out he concentrated. With a thought, he transferred it into his soul storage and almost sighed in relief when he felt the upgrade.

Spell: Earth Communion - Tier 4

An expensive mana spell that will allow you to sense any movement on or in the ground for thirty metres in all directions. Range increases and mana cost decreases with skill level. When using this earth itself will actively help you be identifying threats and points of interest over a distance three times larger than the range of the spell.

Without hesitation, he consumed it. It was exactly like the ability he had gotten in his first life, which had been useful but with an added wider area of effect where while he wouldn’t be able to directly sense anything the earth itself would communicate with him what was there.

A grin split his face. This success took some of the sting out of what the wador had done.

The gamble had worked.

He would gloat about the trick to Kang and if that had the impact he suspected, then it was possible items would be cycled multiple times through him. If that happened, he might even get a chance to push something to tier five or six.

Tom grinned. If Known Heretic could let him create items worth close to a million experience while still a child he wondered what he would get once he was strong enough to be brushing shoulders with emperors and all the thousands of native powerhouses and the treasures they possessed.

If he could set an expectation of them gifting him and getting items on average a little stronger back in return it would be like printing money. It was going to be awesome.