Saint Slayer Supreme [Title Pending] [0.1]

This is my first attempt at a litRPG story. It's not great, but then again, I'm trying not to split too many hairs with this one. I'm pretty new to the genre, so feel free to let me know if you have any suggestions (or warn me if I'm committing any unforgivable litRPG sins). For those wondering, the next chapter of Virtuous Sons is nearly done. Should have it out soon, god willing.

'Til then, enjoy.

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Saint Slayer Supreme

“Light on your feet, now. It only takes one day to decide the rest of your life. You’re not planning on sleeping through it, are you? No? Then wake up!”

Mason woke up.

Thrashing himself upright, he returned to the waking world with a foul taste in his mouth and a monstrous, pounding headache for his troubles. He felt like he’d been run over by a truck. He tried to throw his bulky old comforter off the bed, only to realize it wasn’t there. After a bit more flailing in the dark, he realized he was still fully dressed - he hadn’t even taken off his shoes.

Actually, this wasn’t even his bed. What the hell had he gotten into last night, and where had it led him? Mason squinted irritably, willing his eyes to adjust to the dark while he rifled through his pockets for a phone that wasn’t there.

[“... Mason?”]

He froze.

[“Mason, are you there?”]

It was a woman’s voice, a startled whisper that could have come from anywhere in that darkness. It wasn’t any voice he knew. But it knew him, evidently.

[“No, this isn’t right. Mason, quickly, go back to sleep! It’s not too late. You can still…”]

The voice kept on whispering, growing more urgent by the second, but he only gave it half an ear. He’d spotted something in the distance. Either his eyes were starting to adjust to the pitch black, or someone had turned on a light. Though at this point, he could have just as easily passed out in a park somewhere, and that speck of light could be a firefly. He blinked, and suddenly there were two of them. Then four, then eight. A dozen. A hundred. Thousands.

Mason stared out - out, not up - at a sea of shining stars. And just like that, he felt it. He felt it like a cattle brand had burned it into his skin, tasted it on his tongue and inhaled the smell of it like cheap body spray in a middle school locker room. It was deafening, and blinding, none of those things and all of those things at the same time.

It was a message.

Please standby for world Creation.

A pair of meteors hurtled into view, one heading east and the other heading west. Against all odds, they were on a perfect collision course with each other. Mason pinched himself, hard.

The meteors collided.

In the chaos that followed, the disembodied voice of a woman spoke up again.

[“... Right, then. Mason, you must have questions. Ask, and I will answer.”]

Mason considered the distant cataclysm. Distant, but not distant enough to have saved him if it was really there, and if he was really here. His throat was dry. Awe made his voice rough. That, and the throbbing hangover. He had a thousand questions, but only one of them was important enough to ask.

“Is this a dream?”

[“No.”]

Mason rolled off the bed, only it wasn’t a bed at all, and there was no floor underneath it. He fell. Floated, really, like a feather in the wind. A third meteor went soaring on by, and oh, would you look at that - it was headed straight for the impact-warped love child of the first two. What were the odds of that, he wondered.

“What is it, then?” he asked. The third meteor struck the first two like the fist of some over-caffeinated god punching through a plaster wall. Idly, he massaged the palm of his right hand with the thumb of his left hand, pressing until the skin turned white.

[“A Game.”]

He could practically hear the capital ‘G’. “What sort of game are we talking, here? RPG, first person shooter, racing sim?” It had better not be a fuckin’ MOBA.

[“It’s… not something I can put into words. Not in any way you’ll understand.”]

Mason’s eyes rolled as he fell through the endless void of space.

“I’m not into that indie dev stuff.”

[“Are you sure you don’t want to go back to sleep?”]

He chuckled.

[“Very well. Repeat after me: Initialize.”]

That last word hit him so hard it might as well have been a fourth meteor - ah, no, the fourth meteor was over that way, and would you look at its trajectory - and overwhelmed all five of his senses, just like the standby warning had. When everything settled back down, he found another message waiting for him.

Character Creation initializing…

Standby…

Standby…

The fourth meteor collided with the cancerous mass of the first three, and at the same time a flashbang of muddled sensation struck Mason blind.

~<< ERROR. SESSION HOST NOT FOUND. >>~

“Son of a-”

[“Just a second, Mason. I’ll fix this.”]

Mason pinched his nose. It didn’t do anything for the foul taste in his mouth, and it didn’t do anything to his lungs no matter how long he held his breath. That made about as much sense as anything else. Honestly, it probably made more sense. If oxygen was an issue, the cold vacuum of space would have taken him out long before he thought to hold his breath.

Two more meteors. One from above, the other from below.

[“There. Now, let’s try that again.”]

“Wait-”

[“Initialize.”]

Character Creation initializing…

Standby…

[“Dreamer sessionHost = ‘Mason Slayton’;”]

Session Host initialized. Welcome, Mason. The Game is about to begin. Are you ready?

Mason stared blankly past the shining text, past the titanic rocking of half a dozen meteors colliding in quick succession, past even the stars. For a moment, his thoughts were one with the black void that was the absence of all things.

“Was that Java?”

The woman’s response was more than a bit exasperated.

[“Ready.”]

Mason hit the floor hard enough to bounce. He twisted and struggled like a fish on dry docks, trying to find his feet in the dark. The floor was slick and cool, like a sheet of black ice floating aimlessly through space. He wouldn’t have been able to tell it was there at all if he hadn’t almost broken his back on it just now. He squinted. Actually… now that he looked close, he could see his reflection in it. And above that, a steadily growing light.

What is the Essence of Mason Slayton?

The lights that appeared after that weren’t words, but symbols, shining dimly under the ice. Three of them in all. A trench lighter, the Joker from a deck of playing cards, and a bullet’s empty casing. They were almost too faint to make out, but when his eyes passed over them, their meaning echoed in his mind.

Flame {Common}

Fortune {Common}

Full Metal Jacket {Rare}

The voice spoke up. Softly, with sympathy. He wondered if the woman behind the disembodied words could see his face.

[“This is your first choice, Mason. In some ways, it is the most important choice you’ll ever make. The Essence of a man is the seed from which all other things sprout. These three… Maybe you should see for yourself. Don’t worry - you won’t be locked into anything by mistake.”]

Mason supposed there was nothing for it. He reached out and tapped a finger on the faint outline of the trench lighter.

Flame {Common}: Strongest in the heat of the moment, you are the spark that sets the world on fire. You thrive in ranged combat. Close combat is possible, but not recommended for the {Common} man. Be wary of ocean waves.

• {+1 Somatic Skill Slot}

Source: Any open Flame.

“Source?” Mason murmured.

[“The Essence you choose will serve as the foundation of your build - if you choose the Flame, every skill you learn will be fuelled by the Essence of fire. That Essence lives within you, but it is not a limitless resource. You can run out. Thankfully, you can also replenish what you’ve spent. The Source is the external provider. If you chose the Flame and used every bit of your Essence up, it might take you a full day to naturally build back up to your full capacity. However, if you had a bonfire in your camp, you could do it in seconds.”]

Mason wondered how much a trench lighter’s flame would be worth as a power source. Somehow, he didn’t think it would amount to much.

He tapped the Joker card.

Fortune {Common}: Strongest when the odds are long, you are the wild card that sweeps the winners’ table. You thrive in non-combatant roles. Fortune is the strongest weapon on any battlefield, but when lives are on the line, it’s best not to bet on the {Common} man’s luck. Be wary of broken mirrors.

• {+1 Somatic Skill Slot}

Source: Any game of chance.

“Any game of chance. I’m guessing not all Sources are created equal?”

[“Correct.”]

It was easy enough to imagine a ‘good’ and a ‘bad’ source for something like Flame. If he had to guess, the larger a flame was, the more it had to offer as a Source of Essence. The relative heat of the fire and the amount of fuel it had left to burn likely mattered, too. He asked the voice in his head if he was on the right track, and she confirmed it.

“For something like Fortune…” Mason hummed thoughtfully. “It says any game of chance, but some games have more to do with luck than others. Poker might feel like it’s all up to chance if it’s your first night at a table, but compared to betting on a horse race…” He blinked. “Come to think of it, are stakes a factor? If I bet a dollar on a coin flip and win, that’s good Fortune. But if I bet a million on the same coin flip and win, that’s very good Fortune.”

Stakes could also just as easily have nothing to do with the quality of a Source of Fortune Essence, but his gut told him he was on the right track. The more he considered it, though, the more questions he had. Did cheating play a part in this? It had to. If you used loaded dice, you were taking Fortune out of the equation. That much seemed obvious enough. Did the same rule apply if your opponent tried to cheat you, though?

[“Not all Sources are created equal, and not all forms of Essence, either. Some are more complicated than others. Fortune is especially so.”]

Mason was still mulling over the finer details of skill and chance as he stood up on the slick platform of black ice and turned away from the glowing symbols.

[“Mason?”]

Six meteors was the limit, apparently. No matter which way he looked, there didn’t seem to be any more coming. They’d served their purpose. In the center of their improbable collisions, a newborn rogue planet spun in the earliest stage of terra-genesis. Fragments of the six meteors spun off from it into the empty reaches of space, and the puffy shroud of a budding atmosphere, rich in hydrogen, obscured the planet’s surface.

[“Focus, Mason. There’s still one option left-”]

“I’m good.”

[“You are not good. This is important, Mason. You must at least consider all of the options available to you. I know it may not be pleasant, but the difference between {Common} and {Rare} is greater than you think. Qualifying for a {Rare} Essence of any kind is an incredible advantage.”]

“Qualifying,” he echoed, watching the newborn planet spin. Was it a trick of the eye, or was it really spinning as fast as he thought it was? “How am I qualified for anything when the Game just started?”

The voice hesitated.

[“Full Metal Jacket {Rare}”]

The spent brass casing glowed beneath the ice.

Full Metal Jacket {Rare}: Strongest when the chamber is loaded, you are the iron arbiter of death. You thrive in lethal combat. Peace is possible in theory, but violence will always find you. It’s a {Rare} man that walks your path long enough to die of natural causes.

• {+1 Somatic Skill Slot}
• {+1 Arcane Skill Slot}
• {+1 Signature Skill Slot}

Source: Bullets. Brass. Bloodshed.

More skills, and a Source as broad as it was simple. There may not be any bullets left in the mag, and there may not be any brass lying around, but there was always more blood to be shed. The advantages of a {Rare} Essence. And more to come as the Game progressed, no doubt.

[“The Game hasn’t yet begun, but your options weren’t chosen at random. These memories may not be pleasant, but they are a part of you. They are the seeds, planted by your choices in life up to this point. It is up to you which of them you let grow. But you must let one of them grow. Our past decides our future.”]

“This Game,” Mason said. “Does it have a name?”

[“It has hundreds of names. You may even add your own to the list, when all is said and done. But the oldest one I know of is Ascension.”]

Ascension. Mason rolled that one around on his tongue. In the distance, the newborn planet was changing. Its atmosphere shifted before his eyes, flashes of lightning and spiral storm currents racing across the surface. He toed the edge of the invisible platform. The planet was close enough to inspire awe, but still hundreds of thousands of miles away.

“And you?”

[“Me?”]

“Do you have a name? If you don’t, can you come up with one? I’d rather not do it myself - naming the voice in my head feels like crossing a line.”

For a long moment, Mason didn’t think he’d get any response at all. He felt around a bit more, with his mind as much as his body. Visualize. Manifest.

[“... It’s Carrara. You can call me Carra.”]

Mason smirked. “You sound flustered, Carra.”

He’d found it.

[“Focus. This phase deserves your full attention. If you’re unable to decide on an Essence, I can advise you. Truly, though, any one of them will do just fine.”]

“No thanks. I don’t want any of that garbage.”

Mason stepped off the platform of black ice. Unlike when he’d rolled off his ‘bed’, though, he didn’t fall. This time, he stepped through the gap between where he was and where he wanted to be. Through the seams he’d found with his questing mind.

In one step, he stood over the newly formed planet.

[“Mason!?”]

This close, he could see the primordial roil seething just under the surface of the new atmosphere. He reached out again, this time with his actual hands, and wedged them into that seam he’d felt. Then, slowly but surely, he pried the edges apart.

Maybe ‘seam’ wasn’t the right word for it. Maybe Menu was a better fit.

[“Don’t-!”]

Whatever else Carra said after that, it was cut short as Mason slipped through the gap between Character Creation and the first stage of Ascension. As he fell through the uppermost layer of the vicious atmosphere, he pinched himself one more time, hard enough to draw blood. Lightning ripped through the air over his head, close enough to make his hair stand on end, and thunder rolled past in its wake. He laughed.

Whatever those stupid bastards had gotten him wrapped up in, he’d face it on his own terms. The past was dead and buried, and the future was his to take. If the powers-that-be wanted to give him nothing but shit choices, then so be it. He’d make his own way forward. That was the essence of Mason Slayton.

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Achievement Unlocked: {Vanguard of Mankind}

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