The Ultimation (Play to Live: Book #7) Read online

  Hmm... my body, my friends... or rather, my Friday beer buddies. Their experts didn’t have to try so hard. I didn’t any ties left with Earth. My entire life was in AlterWorld. But Dan, on the other hand, seemed to have taken the bait.

  Dan was pale but smiling, like a rogue soldier receiving news from home. I understood his emotions, but the countdown to trouble quickly picked up its pace.

  "Dan, so what did you find over there?" I brought the officer back down to earth.

  The stealther slowly drew in a breath, exhaled, and returned to the business at hand. "It's OK, commander. The watch group is keeping guard. We met as per protocol. I sent the package along with a report. They mobilized all forces and rushed to the portal zone. The mages received a code red and hurried to the arch."

  "There's no time to spare! Take the order to retreat to the clan. Meanwhile, I'll run to the ziggurat. Whether or not it can take a nuclear blast is unclear, but I really don't want to leave such a thing behind. If we want to fight our own war, we’d better do it right."

  I quickly typed an order into the virtual keyboard and signed it electronically. According to my order, Harlequin's mages and looters had exactly six minutes to strip the place down. Anyone who failed to either get to the Tower’s contents or get back the portal in time—well, tough. A blast wave followed by a radioactive cloud forcing its way into AlterWorld through the pinhole of the portal arch were the last things I needed.

  I also gave the order to Lady Cornelia to get the hell into the portal along with her troops. There was no point destroying the Heroine in the plasma of an atomic blast—but I’d be very interested to see if a Heroes NPC could go perma in AlterWorld.

  I ran up the steep staircase of the north wall of the castle. I didn’t have to seek out the altar: the top of the ziggurat was a good hundred feet up. Skull after skull, large male ones and toothless old men’s. Numerous female craniums were ranged with those of tiny children filling in the spaces between them.

  The worst was the aura of infinite despair and the light of half-life in their empty eye sockets. I gulped. The skulls acted as material vessels for the hundreds of thousands of captive souls, giving up their energy for the interplanetary portal gates.

  Without taking my eyes off these black hellish deeds, I blindly pulled out my tome of parchment. I flipped through the pages to a red bookmark of uncategorized spells and tore out the parchment for Astral Mana Dispersion.

  The enormous skulls of the ziggurat’s sentries, creatures unknown to me, slowly spun in place and searched me with their eye sockets. An artifact of this level inevitably takes on a semblance of intelligence and feels like a threat. The pyramid creaked, camouflaging itself from this stranger with a thickening haze of darkness.

  I gave an evil grin and focused, selecting a target, then broke the fancy seal.

  Space trembled. A vortex formed above my head and began to spin. The earth groaned. Using the High Spell scarred even the long-suffering astral of AlterWorld which had seen it all—let alone this ancient, magicless planet that had long fallen into a senile slumber.

  The first seconds of the spell began. The mana bar drained in bursts. The spell’s cooldown laid its iron hands on my shoulders. The sharp snapping of lashes added to the roar of the vortex: the ziggurat was defending itself! Magical whips swept around, breaking through the air. Stone fragments whistled; one of the wall merlons crashed down.

  I frowned, praying they didn’t disrupt the spell.

  However, faithful Snowie appeared alongside me after a moment, covering me with a tower shield and then shuddering from a powerful blow from the pyramid.

  A manmade storm seethed in the sky. The magic tornado twisted air currents into an artificial cyclone. The castle walls heaved. The angry planet shuddered in its skin, trying to shake off these brazen insects.

  One and a half minutes. Seventeen ticks of the spell. APM went into self-help mode. The mana bar began to fill in. Now it was an Absorption and not Dispersion.

  The ziggurat shifted, deforming the pyramid’s intricate shape. Its magical binds began to give some slack. The cooldown from the High Spell was palpable, pressing me to the ground. The basalt slab cracked under my feet as the first stones of the wall rained down.

  Twenty ticks. How much mana had this thing used?! My collar bone snapped; now it was me shifting and deforming.

  The bells of healing magic rang out behind me. Zena was here.

  "The portal closed!” Dan anxiously followed the timer's readout. “Our people already left! The others' spells only got ninety-six people. They airlifted seven tons of cargo from the treasure. Four minutes until the airstrike!"

  I couldn't answer. My teeth were clenched; my tongue was heavy and clumsy like a fighter pilot's in nine Gs. Magic gushed into the astral as every tick released millions of units of free mana. The planet happily choked on it as did all the half-dead mummified astral beings who’d gotten the chance to last another couple centuries.

  Five seconds.

  Tick 23. Dispersed: 4,000,000 units. Absorbed: 40,000

  Five seconds.

  Tick 24. Dispersed: 8,000,000 units. Absorbed: 80,000.

  Five seconds.

  Tick 25. Dispersed: 16,000,000 units. Absorbed: 160,000.

  Five seconds.

  CRACK!

  The ziggurat jolted, lost its shape and crumbled into a white bone dust. In the middle of the man-made sand dune sat a great jewel: the heart of the pyramid, the essence of the artifact's power. The thousands of its facets sparkled in the cold light of the stars, reflecting the crimson lava flow. The power that had been locked inside it was now bursting from within. The intelligent artifact didn’t let us destroy itself entirely, creating a safe chamber and concealing its most precious elements inside.

  "Holy fuck," was all I could whisper.

  I glanced at the timer, gritted my teeth from the crushing pressure of the time constraint and cast a levitation spell on myself. The shortest distance between any two points is a straight line. Especially in three-dimensional space.

  I turned around. My group stood behind me, all present and correct, slowly coming back to life. Fully-fledged New Year's fireworks were but a single firecracker compared to the effects of a High Spell. You felt it with your animal instincts, like a wild beast can sense an earthquake. Your aura stood up on end, tainted by the marks of its presence. Not fully-fledged marks, you understand, but enough for those in the know.

  "Everyone, follow me! Let's move it!"

  I squeezed between the battered merlons and stepped off the sixty-five foot drop. There was an alarming cry from above, and then cursing. Snowie quickly dropped past me. You fool!

  BOOM! The albino rammed the basalt, losing his passive shields and knocking out three quarters of his hits. If he had had a brain, he would have gotten a concussion. This way he got off with some damage to his gear, medium injuries, and a dose of expletives from Zena.

  We floated down like autumn leaves. Time rushed swiftly; we had just over three minutes left until the alleged strike. Giving up the castle was a damn shame, but we were in no condition to keep it. But we’d gotten a clump of wool from this black sheep: some jewels, firearms, and artifacts of uncertain value. The most important bonus was the set of unique spells.

  Most of them had analogues in AlterWorld—like Deceleration and armor buffs. But the devil is in the detail. What was the cost and speed of the cast? Were there any resists? Stacking effects? Their ability to be used by other classes? This was the heart of the matter!

  My feet hit the surface. I bounced off it back into the air. Laith the hovercraft, yeah right.

  I shoved a Levitation scroll into a groaning Snowie's hands and rushed to the sand dunes left in place of the ziggurat. My mithril boots with glittering enchantment stones were sinking into the bone dust. My mind was cold: I wasn’t really concentrating on the fact that I was stepping on human ashes. The cartoon-like existence and immortality of AlterWorld had necessarily changed our consciou
sness. We didn't know fear or true suicide. We were going to live forever. We calmly looked down at our own guts streaming out of our torn bellies, and we opened up our enemies’ stomachs with an equal ease.

  Above our heads, the drone circled anxiously like a wounded, voiceless seagull. The copter made inviting jerks, motioning us to the side and staring at us with its camera, then promptly returned, again inviting us to follow it.

  Behind me, Dan was already behaving like a madman. Of all of us, he couldn't die. The bureau had done its homework, pinpointing his most vulnerable spot: his family.

  "Max, what are you doing?! We need to get out of here! This thing will blow any moment! Who the fuck is going to resurrect us then?!"

  I nodded, picked up the precious crystal and almost blindly rushed after the spy-copter. The sound of the motors was clear, but my field of vision was blocked by the statistics of the artifact I had just picked up.

  Scalable Soul Stone. Artifact, indestructible.

  Contains the souls of:

  Humans 666,661

  Titans: 4

  Archangels: 1

  Choose your path! If you’re our Dark brother, use the accumulated beings to summon pets and strengthen infernal rituals. If you’re a creature of Light, take the risk of freeing the captured souls, provided you're not afraid of releasing the Holy force. Are you ready to become a freak angel?! Muahaha!!!

  Hooves clopped on the ice as my group switched to their mounts in order to move faster. Our short, twenty-second sprint wasn't bad, but a long distance like this was easier to overcome on four legs.

  "Saddle up!" Dan grunted.

  I wiped the stats of this two-edged artifact from the screen and blew my whistle, summoning Hummungus. Teddy appeared with a resounding roar, exposing all of us and summoning all potential enemies to battle. Typical. Pointless fighting with him. He was an alpha-male to the third power.

  I grabbed the pommel of the saddle with a gauntleted hand and heaved myself up. Hummungus grunted almost inaudibly from the strain—the weight of the items in my inventory had been zeroed, but the inertia and kinetic energy had been retained, just like in zero gravity.

  I wanted to offer my hand to Zena who had lost her snotty albeit charismatic lizard in combat. But the goblin had already hopped onto her spare Pegasus. The winged horse was not as rare or prestigious as her swamp creature. It couldn't fight and had a lower carrying capacity, but it was fast—and its rather decent soaring properties allowed the rider to cross ravines and small rivers.

  We skipped along quite briskly: nineteen miles per hour. We could have gone faster, but we adjusted to account for Dan's massive truck. We followed the law of the sea: “The speed of the squadron is the speed of the slowest vessel”. But the rest of the brutal naval adage — "but only until we come across the enemy's submarines!" — we didn't use. We don't leave our own.

  The curvimeter that followed the dotted line of our path on the map, showed that we had gone more than than two miles from the castle. And there was still no blast. Could it have been disinformation that we’d stupidly bought into like blind kittens?

  Fuckyall showed his optimism and ability to use a clock. "The time is plus four minutes! Is it over?"

  Dan shook his head incredulously and once again dug his heels into the bloodied sides of his frothing horse, exchanging hits on the unfortunate animal for speed.

  The drone that was looming ahead suddenly soared upward, anxiously listening in on something, and then rushed back down. Its propellers rang, accelerating, as if it was trying to warn us about something. Then it jerked to the side and collapsed behind the massive body of a rocky hummock, dropping to the ice.

  Dan was the first to understand. "Everyone, down! Take cover! There's a blast behind us!"

  I shoved the resentful bear back into his artifact—he didn't like being pulled back and forth—and dropped onto the ice near the drone. It faintly hummed its mechanisms, hastily going into hibernation: sheathing its delicate optics and turning off its EMP-vulnerable electronics.

  Zena used her magic behind us, quickly renewing the group's shields.

  "Zena, get down!"

  "Just a couple more buffs!"

  A barely visible shadow crossed the horizon. At the last second, the gliding aerial bomb corrected the trajectory of its fall, working its engines and driving the nuclear weapon precisely into the geometric center of the infernal castle.

  Dan buried his head down, simultaneously shoving my curious face into the prickly snow.

  Flash!

  Night turned to day. Anyone who hadn’t turned away in time got a long-lasting souvenir in the form of a whitish glare in the retina of their eye. About five seconds later came the shock wave, knocking down everyone within its reach. Zena's marker went out on my interface: she hadn't managed to take cover in the acoustic shadow of the hummock.

  Then the sound wave finally reached us and beat our ears, pushing our eardrums into our skulls and forcing blood out of our noses.

  BOOM!!!

  The earth tried to kick us off its surface, causing our noses and lips to bleed.

  Dan stopped pushing my head down and jumped to his feet. The most destructive aspects of the atomic blast were over. He pulled a scroll from its binder and began an indistinct recitation of Resurrection. OK. We would have to change casters for a pure experiment.

  Snowie squinted shortsightedly, rubbing his eyes with his huge fists in spiked gloves. He must have looked at the thermonuclear flash.

  A crimson mushroom cloud was forming where the castle had been, spinning with dusty spirals and reaching for the stratosphere.

  The cork of a vial of mana popped open. Dan was refueling: resurrection on Earth was a costly thing. The store rooms of the Great Nothing were dusty and immense. Finding and retrieving a lost soul in them was not easy.

  The drone buzzed and rose up onto its supports, emerging from sleep mode. It released its near-view camera, then hummed its servo motors, focusing its lens to count those present. The result seemed to have alarmed it. Its camera searched for Zena's tombstone. Having located it, the copter’s ailerons drooped.

  It was as if it was a living thing, I swear.

  The heavenly trumpets announced her successful resurrection. Zena accepted the customary and slightly embarrassed congratulations from the group that had failed to protect its healer. The drone enthusiastically circled around. This looked more like an unhurried farm raid than a reconnaissance mission in a new reality. Another day at work.

  I smiled. Let them relax. It's not every day that a nuclear bomb explodes overhead. And the successful experiment on our immortality was clearly a win.

  Judging by Dan's steely eyes, I wasn't the only one following what was happening with a cold stare. This was a psychologist’s nightmare! Around me, in the guise of their teenage bodies, were wise old women and hardened counterintelligence officers. Good luck to anyone trying to second-guess their reactions and behavioral patterns.

  Dan stopped patting the face of the already-conscious Zena and pulled a silk bandana over his face like a cowboy.

  "That's all, guys,” he pointed to the drone that circled overhead. “It's time to get out of here—the copter is giving us a hint. Cover your faces. It looks like the wind is blowing in our direction, but better safe than sorry. Max, if I understood correctly, we’re allowed to make contact with the authorities?"

  That asshole had already made up his mind. He was only asking for the sake of being polite. For him, family was the highest priority. Discipline and subordination were lower down on the list. I had to remember his Achilles heel and protect it with all due diligence.

  I nodded. "Yes. In principle, that's what we planned from the start. We were considering making contact with the officials through my connection with Lazarus Moiseyevich, but the Bureau has found us herself, bless her. They work hard for their bread and caviar. So everything’s going according to plan."

  We calculated the right direction, then set off at a crui
sing speed of sixteen miles per hour. We would be at the rendezvous in a little over three hours. The copter acted confused, circling over our heads, betraying our advance and diverting our attention. Snowie tried to wave it off like a pesky fly, then offered to swat the annoying mechanoid. After Gimmick's betrayal, he overtly distrusted golems. Though if you asked me, the troll was just jealous, competing for his clanmates' attention.

  Dan suggested that the copter must have lost connection with the base due to the nuclear explosion’s electromagnetic impulse and now, in the wake of its damage, it followed the commands generated by its rather primitive on-board AI emulator.

  We cast an Invisibility. Still, the machine hadn’t lost us but confidently continued to hover at an altitude of six hundred and fifty feet where its horizontal flight propellers were barely audible.

  I frowned. Our famed stealth only worked to the naked eye. A simple thermal attachment to the enemy optics, and—voila!—you could just as well begin writing your last will and testament in large, legible handwriting.

  This theory was rather quickly confirmed. An hour later, we heard the dull whirring of an approaching helicopter. It turned out to be much closer than it had first appeared. We barely managed to take a guarded stance when the predatory hull of the Apache copter jumped from behind the nearest rocky ridge, showered us with unguided missiles and ducked behind the closest hill.

  The rockets sullied the frozen ground barely twenty steps away from us. This was precision fire—which, although spectacular, wasn’t all that effective.

  Thermal and high-explosive effects were zero. Too far!

  Shockwave: meager damage. Too far, plus we were too heavy.

  The massive hit of the fragmentation warhead flechettes had completely reset our passive shields, scratched our tank's armor, and took a third of the hits from our cleric and rogue. Our mounts took on more, but their fate was secondary.

  Stamped from simple steel, the two and a half gram arrows dumbly lacked the sufficient kinetic energy to cause much damage. It could rip through exposed flesh, but we were different. Like it or not, we couldn't be categorized as “manpower”. In terms of armor and survivability, we fell into "light tanks", at least. And in terms of firepower, we were akin to an attack helicopter.