Chapter 66
The Assessment
I emerged in a huge chamber.
I lifted a hand and studied it, turning it over. It looked exactly like my hand. Glancing down at my clothing, I was relieved to see that I was still wearing incredibly stylish peasant garb, identical to the real thing worn by the empty vessel that was my body.
It was a strange feeling to know that my body – the real me – was tucked away in a storage space somewhere.
I reached up to pinch the fabric. It felt completely real…
Damn, Zalandar was good.
I made a few exploratory movements – some little jumps and experimental sidesteps. The arcane projection responded exactly as my body would.
Shaking my head in impressed disbelief, I took in my surroundings. It was an enormous space, the wall opposite me more than a mile away. Although the walls and ceiling were made of stone, the ground was split into sections like a mash-up of different environments: rolling fields and hills, sand and dunes, a wooded area, and a lake.
Auroria said I’d have a few minutes to familiarise myself with the chamber, so I leapt from my current position to the top of a grassy hill around fifty metres to my left. From my new vantage point, it became clear that the portal had dropped me in the centre of the chamber. I spotted several other sections and wondered if the ‘constructs’ she’d mentioned would reflect the different environments.
I shrugged.
There was only one way to find out. Content to wait and see, I lay back with my hands behind my head and enjoyed the feel of the soft grass beneath me.
It was a minute or so later that the first wave of constructs approached. Their arrival was heralded by excited chittering and squeaking, as if they were all voicing their delight at having been served up a tasty treat.
I grinned and opened my eyes, rising to my feet with a dramatic stretch and yawn. I looked down to see that the hill I’d been relaxing on was surrounded.
By enormous rats.
The fuckers looked like they’d been shot up with some sort of potent super-soldier serum. They were waist-high, with bodies as long as a horse. Their thick brown fur did little to conceal the dense, rippling muscle beneath.
They fixed me with intelligent, beady eyes. As they drew closer, their movements slow and deliberate, as if attempting not to startle me, the chittering and squeaking grew louder, and their long, pink, leathery tails began to lash excitedly from side to side.
Honestly? If it weren’t for the fact that their excitement was based on the idea that I was going to be their next meal, they might almost have been cute. Not conventionally cute, of course. Cute like one of those dogs with busted faces and tongues constantly hanging out because they’re too long to fit in their mouths.
They drew closer, maintaining their slow, predatory approach until they were clearly satisfied I had no way to escape. Then they darted forward in an explosion of movement. The squeaking and chittering reached a triumphant crescendo as the first rat locked onto my thigh with its needle-sharp teeth.
Several more lunged forward and joined the fun, until it looked like I was wearing a writhing coat of brown fur. They swung their heads wildly, attempting to tear free great chunks of flesh. However, after a few moments of frenzied effort, they seemed to realise that no flesh had, in fact, been torn free.
My hand shot out and latched onto one of their tails. It squirmed furiously, trying to break free of my grip, but there was no chance of that. Even over the chorus of squeaking and chittering, I could hear its panicked squeals.
And then I started swinging the rat through the air like the galaxy’s most fucked up flail. Blood and bone rained down as rat collided against rat.
After three swings, it stopped struggling, and I glanced down to see that the front half of its body had been reduced to little more than bloody pulp.
I tossed it aside.
Several rats watched it thud to the ground, considered their options, then scurried the fuck away as quickly as they could.
The remaining few, who were apparently oblivious to the utter carnage that had just unfolded, were still trying desperately to take a chunk out of me. I reached down and tore them loose one by one before tossing them across the chamber. They soared through the air and crashed into the wall.
It appeared that the stone of the chamber was sturdy stuff. The rats splatted against it, but other than the thick coating of gore they left behind, the wall was entirely undamaged.
I was just about to pursue the fleeing constructs when a system message appeared.
First wave defeated.
You are now eligible to access Tier One quests.
Second wave spawns in one minute.
It was a pleasant surprise. I guessed the system considered intimidating them to the point that they ran away like little bitches as being ‘defeated’.
*
The next constructs emerged from the wooded area.
A faint fluttering noise caught my attention – the sound of wings flapping somewhere among the trees.
I raised my fists, ready to unleash a can of whoop ass, but lowered them slowly when I caught sight of the approaching creatures.
They were fairies, like some shit straight out of Peter Pan.
They were around knee-height, but floated through the air towards me. Their features were humanoid, but in a soft, delicate sort of way that made them look almost harmless.
Large, innocent eyes. Tiny hands. Button noses.
If that weren’t enough, their shimmering wings left a trail of gold and silver sparkles in their wake.
There must have been some sort of mistake. I may have become a bit of a ruthless bastard since arriving in the Trial Zone, but even I drew the line at smacking the shit out of a bunch of fairies.
Probably.
They reached me, all eight of them, and surrounded me.
And then they began to change…
It started with their eyes. A black dot appeared at the centre, then slowly spread, the twinkling blue fading away until all that remained was a swirling abyss.
It didn’t stop there either, with veins of black spreading across their bodies until they looked like someone had taken a storybook fairy and turned it into some sort of fucked-up nightmare fuel.
Then they smiled, and it was quite possibly the most disturbing thing I’d ever seen. Their teeth were jagged points the colour of blood.
They were some sort of demon fairies, who, based on how they were looking at me, wanted to feast on good old Peter Brookes.
Their wings began to beat faster, directing a powerful gale in my direction. I activated the magical sight on my glasses and saw the magic flowing towards me on the wind, congealing around my body like some sort of arcane tar.
It seemed as if it was meant to be some sort of paralysis spell. Apparently, demonic fairies preferred food that couldn’t fight back. Well, the vicious little fuckers were about to be very disappointed. It looked like beating the shit out of a bunch of fairies was back on the menu.
The flow of magic stopped, the fairies clearly satisfied that I was held firmly in place. They let loose a high-pitched trilling noise, which I took to be fairy for ‘dig in!’
They shot forward, teeth bared, and tore a chunk out of…
The air.
And, in a few unfortunate cases, each other.
It took them a few confused seconds to realise I was no longer there.
I was standing ten metres away, staring at them through narrowed eyes.
“Going for the bait and switch, eh?” I said. “You come out of the trees looking all innocent, make me lower my defences, then turn into something from a bedtime story written by someone who hates children. Then, to top it all off, you try to imprison me in some sort of magical cocoon. You vicious little shits were planning to eat me alive!”
I drew my swords.
Frostfire flames erupted along the length of the blades, and I saw the flickering arctic blue reflected in the black of their eyes.
Eyes that were now wide with panic.
I darted forward, moving so quickly that I was entirely imperceptible to them, my swords slicing through the little fuckers with surgical precision.
In the space of a second, the bodies of eight fairies thudded to the ground.
Well, I supposed it was sixteen, really, seeing as I’d chopped them all in half.
Second wave defeated.
You are now eligible to access Tier Two quests.
Third wave spawns in one minute.
*
“And I thought Lokta’Inif was impressive,” said Auroria, shaking her head slowly. “But your friend is something else altogether. His fighting style may not be the most… elegant, but he more than makes up for it with overwhelming power.”
Rel chuckled. “There are many words you could use to describe Peter Brookes. Brutish? Certainly. Unrefined? Most definitely. But elegant? Absolutely not.”
“I’ve worked in the Trial Department of GEC for seven years now,” continued Auroria, “and I’ve seen very few Trialists reach such heights by this point in the process.”
“That’s because you haven’t seen me in action yet,” replied Rel. “During my assessment, you will bear witness to a mastery of the arcane arts that–”
“The next construct has spawned!” interrupted Allaria excitedly. “This is the one I failed to defeat during my initial assessment. My arrows bounced harmlessly off its body. I can’t wait to see what brilliant strategy Pete comes up with to get past its incredibly durable outer shell.”
Auroria and Rel turned to face the screen, their conversation forgotten.
A magma golem emerged from the volcanic environment, the ground trembling beneath the weight of its fiery bulk. As it moved across the grass, it left deep, charred footprints in its wake.
It was a little taller than Pete, but easily twice as wide and ten times as heavy. Its body was formed of dense, dark rock. Lava flowed along the deep fissures that ran across its surface.
Its arms were thicker than tree trunks, but rather than ending in hands, they widened suddenly, making it look as if it were carrying two enormous, fiery boulders.
“The Molten Golem is a powerful construct,” said Auroria, waving a hand to change the display in the bottom corner of the screen. Her eyes scanned the information before she turned to face the others. “Of the two hundred and seventeen Trialists who have encountered it so far, only eleven have been able to defeat it. Although I believe you already met three of those Trialists outside the city…”
Pete and the golem walked towards each other, slowly at first, as if sizing each other up. It was the golem that made the first move, suddenly charging forward with a speed that should have been impossible given its bulk.
It lashed out with a powerful swipe, the fiery boulder that served as its hand taking on an infernal glow as the lava flowing across the construct’s body gathered around it. It seemed the golem could use the lava to empower its attacks.
Pete twisted and leaned back, avoiding the blow, then gave the now off-balance golem a light push. The creature stumbled for several steps before crashing to the ground in a heap of fire and stone. The lava flared, and judging by the huge ring of charred earth surrounding it, the heat radiating from its body had soared.
It roared as it rose to its feet, the sound like two mountains colliding.
Then it surged forward again, unleashing a relentless barrage. Its arms moved so quickly they became little more than blinding red streaks.
Pete dodged every single attack – twisting, ducking, sidestepping, and weaving – his lips curled in a shit-eating grin.
“Master Pete is incredible,” said Kaelis softly. “I’ve never seen anybody move like that before. I think even Thalos, my world’s Champion, would be hard-pressed to match him.”
And then Pete struck.
He slipped past another blazing swing, stepped inside the golem’s reach, and hooked an arm around its neck. With a sharp twist, he dragged the massive construct down into a headlock, its molten bulk crashing to one knee as it struggled against his grip.
Rel snorted. “This must be the ‘brilliant strategy’ you were referring to, Allaria.”
Then Pete drove his knuckles into the top of its rocky skull and started grinding them back and forth.
“I don’t understand…” said Voklum. “I’ve never seen such an attack.”
The golem let out a furious, rumbling roar – a mixture of pain and rage. The pain came from the sparks and molten fragments being chipped away by the rapid friction of Pete’s knuckles. The rage, on the other hand, was born of the sheer indignity of being handled in such a way.
Pete gave it an enthusiastic little shake.
“Who’s a big, angry rock, eh?” he said, his voice so clear it was as if he were standing in the office with them, rather than in some distant magical dimension.
Then he drove a fist through the creature’s skull.