Weapons of Mass Destruction

Chapter 465: Challenge

Jean immediately takes a step forward and grabs Luna in his massive hands, lifting the golden retriever to his face so he can look her in the eyes.

Luna calmly returns that gaze. “You will either let me down, or I will bite you, smelly human.”

Leticia rushes in, placing a hand on Jean’s massive forearm. “CarrotCake—ehm, sorry, Jean, please let Luna go before she gets angry.”

It’s easily noticeable that Luna is already growing, and I remember her figure from when she was the size of a horse.

That makes me wonder how big she could grow.

“She really is talking,” Jean says, shaking his head before he lets Luna go, at which point she returns to her normal size and sits closer to the window.

“Modifying my vocal cords to use human language wasn’t that difficult. And please restrain yourself from bothering me; I’m keeping watch.” Having said her piece, she doesn’t give him more attention.

“Sorry! That’s just how she is. I blame the lynthari; they really were fascinated by her, and she learned a lot of weird habits.”

For the first time since I met her, Luna growls, “DO NOT TALK ABOUT THOSE DERANGED BEINGS IN FRONT OF ME, LETICIA! I still have nightmares about that golden-eyed, crazed cat human!”

Leticia just smiles. “She can be such a drama queen sometimes.”

“Say what you want, Leticia, just pull yourself together. You are shaming me.”

“Sorry, Luna! Are there any lurkers closing in?”

“We will need to move in a minute or two. I’ll let you know, so rest for now.” Luna soothes, standing, and taking a few steps over to me before coming to a stop.

Because I’m sitting on the ground, her eyes are on the same level as mine. I lift my hand and put it in front of her, which she sniffs a few times, and I use the opportunity to boop her nose.

She pulls back a little, surprised but doesn’t let it bother her.

"You’ve been marked by someone’s scent, you crazed human."

“What makes you think I’m a crazed human?” I ask, curious.

I swear I have never in my life had anyone look down on me quite the way Luna is now.

She doesn’t even bother answering my question. So I boop her nose, ignoring her quiet growl. So she can sense the mark Lissandra left on me? So far, only Caius managed that. That’s surprising.

"The mark came from someone truly terrifying, and I’m struggling to decipher what it means."

Staying silent, I let her talk, and she sniffs a few times, her tail wagging seemingly without her knowledge.

Her tail’s wagging picks up speed, rapidly crossing into frustration. “What it says, I can’t guess. Companion? Sustenance? I'm not sure what it’s meant to mean.”

Oh my. I think I know where this is going.

“No, I got it!” Luna barks happily but quickly reverts to confusion. “Why does it say ‘Food’?”

Biscuit, you as well?

Noelle nearly dies in one of our next fights.

Specter, the powerful lurker who attacked us before, appears in our midst, his transparent dagger stabbing into her back, the merest tilt of her body causing it to miss the back of her head.

Derick is there instantly, defending Noelle from further attacks.

The lurker runs away again, but before he can get far, Savant somehow forces him out of his strange flickering state and runs the lurker’s body through with a sword he created.

With immense speed, they clash a few times, the lurker’s strikes with his finding themselves deflected by an aura of orange light taking form around Savant’s forearms. Then the lurker flickers away, disappearing before Savant can attack again.

I try to tag him with a Ley Line only to miss, the lurker flickering away before it can latch on.

Derick quickly pulls Noelle to Lucien, who says nothing, simply taking a look at her before healing her completely. Only then does Derick calm down, and Leticia holds back Jean, who moves closer, not liking the implied threat to Lucien.

I think Derick might attack Luna, who hadn’t sensed the lurker coming closer, but he doesn’t say anything and the tension slowly lowers.

That’s when Specter appears again, without any of us sensing him.

This time it’s my neck that gets pierced, the blade nearly separating my head from my body as it pulls across.

Startled, I lose control, and all my mana surges out at once. The full force of stored kinetic energy blasting the lurker off my back and hurling him through several buildings.

POV Noelle Kelley

I can still feel the blade that pierced my back, and even though the wound is already gone, I can still see my hands shaking.

“Thank you,” I whisper to the young boy, and he nods.

Derick, more worried than me, stands concerned by my side, and I feel warmth inside. How can someone as powerful as him panic so much sometimes? We’ve been through so much worse.

“It will be fine,” I whisper in his ear and give him a quick kiss on the cheek.

As he always does, when he finds himself in such a state, he nods solemnly, with a cold expression in his eyes.

I don’t say anymore, knowing he’s better off being left alone when he gets like this.

“What do you...” Words freeze in my mouth as blood shoots into the air.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see a figure appear on Noname’s back. The same lurker that just stabbed a dagger through my back mere moments ago repeating the act with Noname’s neck.

The wound is huge and ragged, blood flowing from his body like a river.

A chill runs through me as my eyes lock with Noname's.

Derick’s been reminding me ever since we first met him, but only now do I understand why he warned me never to anger the man when he’s not around to protect me.

Even inches away from death, Noname’s eyes do not bear fear. There's a moment of pure surprise, which is quickly overtaken by anger that fades just as fast.

The lurker is blasted away, the buildings shaking over our heads with the aftershock. Then an immense wave of mana seeps into the air all at once.

I gasp for air, reeling from the sheer pressure. It’s more than I’ve felt from anyone else in our round. Not even during the tournament. No one was even close to it.

His mana pulses like a living storm, thick and oppressive, filling every inch of space around us. Its presence is raw and fierce as if the air itself were vibrating with barely contained fury.

Noname moves his arm, hooking his fingers in his mouth, before pulling his head back into place, and closing the terrible wound on his neck. The wound closes instantly, in a grand display of raw healing power. Then Noname spits, dislodging a clotted dark red mass of blood onto the floor with a sickening splat. His mana disappears as if it never existed, impossibly contained within that body of his.

I expect him to run out, to hunt down the lurker who attacked him.

Flames spin around me, and the giant lurker ignores them, swinging his hammer at me once again.

I let it connect with my forearms, converting an immense amount of kinetic energy to mana, and staggering a few steps back.

Before I can return the attack, a fireball the size of my body crashes into the ground next to the giant lurker, and the flames envelop an area the size of a football field, turning anything in it into melted goop.

These flames disappear in a blink as I condense them down into a single orb the size of my fist.

The giant lurker with the hammer presses the attack again, his body sporting a number of terrible burns, displaying the bones under the ragged flesh, and I release the orb, the blast of flames burning even the lurker behind him.

[You have defeated Reanimated Corpse - lvl 269]

[You have defeated Reanimated Corpse - lvl 263]

[You have defeated Reanimated Corpse - lvl 266]

Finally, I teleport again, breaking through every attempt to stop me, enveloping the area in my golden flames once more.

An arrow pierces my barrier and lodges itself in my body, the lightning within staggering me for a moment.

Seizing the opportunity, some kind of skill activates increasing the effects of gravity on my body, pulling me to the ground with a loud crash, breaking a few bones in the process, even through my passive.

A fireball explodes right over me, and I absorb the heat again, releasing it in a thin laser-like stream at a vyssari warrior wielding a shield.

The shortie blocks it.

Stuck lying down and unable to move because of gravity, a dozen more attacks head my way just as I manage to teleport again.

And then there he is.

He lands on the grassy field nearby, without creating the slightest disturbance as he does so.

Everyone in the area freezes, unable to even twitch a finger. His heart beats out an angry rhythm that only I can feel.

Whitey disappears from my sight, his white hair streaking through the air.

At that moment, it becomes obvious who the lurkers were trying to protect themselves from.

Even without the ability to think and deprived of their old memories, the lurkers keep some primitive instincts, and grouping up to defend against a powerful predator is one of them. But it’s just not good enough for this one.

With a brilliant sort of beauty, Whitey moves from lurker to lurker, killing each one in a single hit. Heads torn free, chests caved in, bodies torn in half. He acts with extreme efficiency, wasting not a single speck of kinetic energy other than the field around him.

Every time he kills someone, body parts fly through the air and hang in place as if frozen in time. Chunks of bone, blood, and debris—all fly into the air and stay there.

The group that was causing me so much trouble disappears in a flash until I’m the last one left alive.

It feels as if it’s very much on purpose.

My timer is ticking down, but I still have a few seconds remaining.

Yes, I’ve timed it oh so well. Even as angry as I was, I didn’t let it get to me. Just a few seconds, and it will be gone, just like the first time.

I haven’t come here just to die.

With an effort that would have killed me before I gained my newest passive, my body moves even through the field. My kinetic energy goes to war with Whitey’s.

I step forward and declare, “As a Champion candidate, I challenge you, as a fellow Champion candidate. My wager is my life and my status. If I lose, they’re yours—and you can reclaim your position as an attendee, with a chance of regaining your memories.”

Whitey freezes mid-step, and I continue, “If I win, I want all of your knowledge on kinetic energy.”

POV ???

“What’s wrong with attendees nowadays,” a voice resounds throughout the pitch-black darkness, sounding almost dismissive.

“Wait,” another one interjects, joining him, quickly, as if to prevent the first voice from acting.

“What do you want, Greed?”

“I want you to help me accept that wager that Earthling made.”

“That wager is nonsense, and you know it.”

“Diligence, let’s be honest. The system actually considered it for a moment before refusing. I just need you and a few of the others to nudge the system in the right direction. Here, in Beyond, we can make that happen. Then it’ll be up to the system to decide what’s fair once the challenge is over.”

“You would need at least three out of five votes for that amount of interference.”

“I already have Kindness. You know very well she will do what I ask.”

“Yes, I know that all too well, Greed. But I refuse. Sometimes I feel like I’m the only one among the five of us who takes this Beyond cycle seriously. First Envy, then Wrath, and now you, Greed.”

Another voice joins the conversation, “I’d be willing to help with that small bit of interference.”

The reaction catches both voices off guard, and Diligence asks with a measured tone, “Envy, has something changed with you lately?”

Envy ignores Diligence, turning their attention solely to Greed. “So, do you want my help or not? Wrath isn’t going to support you.”

“No strings attached?"

"No strings attached."

"He won’t die, you know that, right?"

"We will see about that."

"Okay, I’m in.”

At that point Diligence interrupts, shooing both of them away. “Now that you are done, go away.”

With that, the silence ensues again, and Diligence returns to their work.

The entire conversation didn’t even last a second.

POV Nathaniel

I feel a sense of acceptance, and in that moment, I know my challenge and wager have been registered.

“Use Beyond 1-day stay token,” I declare, cutting off my only escape.