Chapter 104

Mount Merder, Merder Stadium, Atlanta - 4:10 PM

I dove into the trees and started jumping from branch to branch on the way down, not wanting to show off my Slow Fall ability so early in an event where it would be important later. Especially not with so many eyes watching me. Managers weren’t supposed to be able to communicate with the contenders while the events were going on, but that didn’t stop Branson and his teams from doing so. It was overlooked so long as it meant the games were more exciting.

Since killing Dave had stopped every plan his team had other than “book it to the mountain as fast as we can,” I knew they would be seeking revenge. That being said, I had no time to spare for them just yet. I made it out of the trees and scanned the skies.

I spotted Team Titan’s Claire flying towards the summit almost immediately. She had taken on the form of an oversized scarlet macaw and seemed almost panicked as she flew, dodging and weaving through the sky. Other teams were taking shots at the bird, but any time she would actually take damage a blue sphere lit up around her. That was Preston shielding her from damage while he hid in the forest.

On the side of the arena opposite Claire, a series of hemispheres of darkness formed a path to the base of the mountain. That would be Tito casting spells that would allow Joanna to make her way up the mountain in an almost effortless manner thanks to the shadow-based abilities of the Syndicate Shade. It was fast now, but there was a limit to the distance he could place them. He would have to leave the safety of the trees eventually to get his teammate to the top.

More contenders began to rush out of the forest, and a pattern started to emerge. Anyone with ranged capabilities stayed in the treeline, setting up and checking for anyone trying to stop their team from climbing, while the melee members began making a mad dash for the mountain. It made sense; the frontline fighters would have a better chance to not only make it to the top, but survive the trip. I understood their reasoning, but didn’t agree with it.

Activating Shield, I leaned back onto my heels and let Divine Messenger carry me towards the mountain. The open ground before I reached the slope was nice and even, perfect for zooming around. Even though the trip was short, I had only made it a few feet before I was getting fired upon for being so bold.

Both Grey from BYOB and Samantha from the Thunderstealers were taking shots at me, though the former wasn’t aiming very well with his pistol. The Thunder Striker was draining my Shield far more consistently as she used her electrical powers to apply a continuous stream of damage. It got weaker with distance, but what I wanted was to remove it completely.

Ignoring Grey’s frankly terrible aim, I switched to running as I reached the slope and used the boulders as cover. The moment I broke line of sight, the electricity stopped arcing towards me and my Shield had a chance to breathe. Mages and magic were incredibly dangerous so long as they still had resources to cast their spells, and I could tell from the sheen of my defensive ability that I had lost almost three quarters of the 180 odd hit points of damage it could absorb.

All around me, the sounds of gunfire, cannons, and battle reached a roaring crescendo as everyone tried to stop the other teams from accomplishing their goal. I stopped on the slope and, using a boulder for cover, started surveying the battlefield. Despite all the ammunition and magic flying around, very few people were popping away due to damage. I watched as Team Titan’s Kenji fell down before getting blasted by a cannonball, disappearing before he even had a chance to scream.

Some of the more bold players had already made it higher than me, and I could see that Tito’s darkness was getting closer and closer to the spire. Making one last sweep to ensure that Jamie wasn’t anywhere in my line of sight, I pulled out the Vague Stick from my inventory just as I heard the gravel shift on the other side of the boulder.

Grey jumped out and pointed both his gun and his sword at me. “This is for Dave, you son of a bitch,” he said. As he spoke, I Lifted the safety on his pistol and smirked, not that he could see it behind my mask.

“Who?” I asked cheekily.

Grey scowled and pulled the trigger, only for nothing to happen. He looked at it in confusion, and I pulled my Writhing Belt Whip out of my pocket. I lashed out at him as his eyes shifted back towards me.

Grey lifted his sword, attempting to parry my attack, but I used Orbit to keep it out of the way. The whip struck him against the chest, breaking the Mobile Opportunist’s armor before slamming into the ground. He fell backwards, sliding a bit on the gravel. I dropped the Vague Stick and reached into my inventory again.

Pulling out Vernon’s Smash Stick, I lunged forward. My restrictions were still in the forefront of my mind, so I didn’t bother caving in Grey’s skull with it. Instead, I wanted to make use of the Smasher trait. Raising the club high above me, I brought it down on the man’s sword, smashing through it with one clean hit.

“My sword!” he yelled angrily before trying to slash at my ankle with what remained attached to the hilt.

I moved my leg, making sure that the motion I took couldn’t be construed as a kick, and avoided it. At the end of the movement I placed my foot against his arm and pushed it down towards the ground, pinning it there while I swung the Smash Stick again. This time I aimed for the pistol. He moved it out of the way, but when he was distracted with that I stepped over him, stepping on his other arm so I could get a better angle. It didn’t stand a chance against my next swing.

Stepping off of him and dropping the Smash Stick back into my inventory, I grabbed Grey by his chainmail shirt. He had been in the process of clambering to his feet, and I lifted him off of the ground. “You need to put more points into Constitution, man.”

“Scre- '' Grey's last words were interrupted as I lifted him up and brought him down head first onto the boulder I used as cover. Just like that, BYOB was down to one member.

[[Notice]]

You have defeated another player.

Points will be tallied at the end of the event.

Turning towards the crowd, I raised my hands again. “Meow!”

Laughing at the absurdity of it, I returned the Writhing Belt Whip to my hoodie pocket. Next, I picked up my Vague Stick from the ground and willed it to change into a broom with several branching pieces on one side and a hole through the middle. The process took seconds. Placing the broomstick between my legs, I stuck my index finger through the hole I made and wrapped my arms around it. Aiming upwards, I began Pushing.

One of the nuances of my Warmind abilities was that the point of origin had to come from within my body, but it didn’t matter where that point of origin was otherwise. I often used my hands for this, waving them or raising them dramatically. It was good for control, and I could shift it around easier to suit my needs. In this case, the point of origin was inside the broom from the middle of my finger.

This allowed me to fly using the Vague Broomstick with an amazing degree of control. I could Lift by shifting it or Push in any direction I wanted. The only thing I was missing was Spin for changing what direction I was facing to really sell the illusion that I had a flying broomstick. Regardless, I started sailing into the sky. Slowly at first, but picking up speed.

A thought occurred to me as I flew towards the spire. Mentally controlling the Vambrace of Wires, I snaked the metal rope around the center and used Lift on it. I immediately began going much faster than I had previously. Since I could spread out the pressure, the Vague Broomstick only had a small risk of breaking at a single point, and I nodded to myself at the application. I really liked this new item.

It was a good thing I had thought about it, too. There was a sharp whistle coming from behind before the slope underneath me exploded. Dirt and rocks slammed into me and the Vague Broomstick, and I reflexively activated my Shield again. I was saved from the brunt of the damage, though my ability was close to disappearing completely.

The Vague Broomstick had to be molded back into its original shape, and I did that immediately. It had actually broken in half, but the Cable Conglomerate managed to keep it in one piece. Throwing my arm back, I aimed for Team Trouser Snake’s disc and flipped Bill, the Glass Cannon, the bird.

Bullets whizzed past me as I made it to the spire and started flying straight up. At this distance, very few people were accurate enough to be able to hit me from their position at the treeline. Bill didn’t count since he just had to hit close enough, but he fired far too soon; I would be up to the top by the time he could fire again.

My only concern was Jamie, and I weaved back and forth as I flew just in case. Thanks to all of her Mastery abilities increasing her accuracy, she could use her pistol and hit just about anywhere in this arena with alarming regularity. She was near the top of my hit list because of this fact, though it was sufficient to say that I was looking forward to scrapping with her again.

Just thinking about it was starting to make my blood boil, that familiar feeling of wanting to fight someone strong suddenly making my heart beat faster. “That must have been why I didn’t start feeling it when fighting Branson’s men,” I muttered to myself. “I knew there was someone else there that would do better.”

[[Patron Message]]

You can fight Jamie later. Just get to the top now. Claire’s already there and Joanna’s catching up to you!

Sincerely,

Sara

“You right, you right,” I said aloud. It was the first message my girlfriend had sent me in hours and she essentially had read my mind to keep me on task.

To my left, spheres of darkness started rising over the spire and I could see a dark shape moving between each of them with a speed much greater than mine. I knew something that they didn’t, however, and I didn’t deviate from my path.

An errant bullet slammed into my back, hitting my Shield and causing it to shatter, but I didn’t look down. The trail around the spire just finished and I only had a little bit more to go. I passed through Merder Stadium’s open roof and into the sky.

Even destroyed, Atlanta looked amazing from all the way up here. Between the skyscrapers of the downtown area and the neighborhoods that surrounded it, the sight was breathtaking. That was why I wasn’t surprised to see that Claire, after having already reached the top, had decided to take her time returning to the fight. The moment she noticed me, she squawked in panic and started diving back down into the arena. I landed on the flat top of Mount Merder.

[[Notice]]

You are the second player to reach the top of Mount Merder.

Points will be tallied at the end of the event.

I took a breath and shoved the Vague Broomstick back into my inventory. “Howard was right, flying is basically downright cheating,” I chuckled to myself, hands on my hips, as I stared out at the city. Waiting up here wasn’t a bad plan, at least until the thirty second cooldown on Shield was up, but also for what came next.

“Tito!” I heard Joanna yell from the side of the spire. “Tito, I need more darkness!”

Snorting, I started heading in the direction of her voice. It was about this point when Tito was getting overwhelmed by other teams with only Manny to protect him. He was no longer able to focus on getting Joanna up because he was in the middle of a fight, and his instinct was to protect himself. Instead, I gave her a hand.

I pushed the Cable Conglomerate to its maximum and tossed the rope over the edge while still keeping it connected to the Vambrace of Wires. “Hello, down there,” I yelled, causing her to look up at me. It dangled against her shoulder. “Mind if I speed up the process a bit?”

“Why should I trust you, dude?” she called back.

“You probably shouldn’t,” I countered. “But I promise not to kill you until you’ve reached the top!”

Joanna thought about this for a moment before yelling again. “That’s very comforting, but I’m afraid you’ll just have to wait!”

“I hate waiting!” I shouted, snickering. “It’s cause you were nice to me, alright? And my manager has a bet riding on the fact that one of your team will make it to the top. So if you don’t trust me, that’s fine, but you can at least trust my greed, right?”

While she was staring up at me, a few bullets ricocheted off of the rock around her. Joanna panicked and flailed but managed to grab the rope. I started pulling her up. It wasn’t difficult, and I was soon going to give her the same lecture I had given Grey just a few minutes before. When Joanna reached the top, I offered her my hand and she took it. I hauled her up only to have her collapse to her knees as I returned my rope to its home.

“This event is damn scary,” she muttered.

“It’s just a little player on player violence with some verticality issues,” I said cheekily. “Nothing to be completely worried about.”

“Oh, sure, easy for you to say.” She paused, then shook her head and looked up at me. “I suppose I should thank you for not just dropping me, though, so thanks.”

“Don’t mention it. A promise is a promise, after all.”

Joanna stiffened. “Didn’t you-“

“Promise not to kill you until you’ve reached the top?” I asked jovially. Reaching out, I grabbed her by the collar of her black leather armor and lifted her into the air with one hand. “Yes, that is correct.”

The Syndicate Shade’s knives were in her hands before I knew it and she was slicing at my hand with one and attempting to stab me with the other. My Shield wasn’t up yet, so I used a small Force Field to block her from reaching me. I began spinning in place, keeping her out of stabbing range as I kept moving faster and faster.

“You suck!” she screeched.

“And you need to boost that Constitution, girl!” I yelled in return before letting her go. “So long, Joanna!” She sailed off the edge of the mountain far from where Tito would have been able to reach her. It only took seconds before I got the notification.

[[Notice]]

You have defeated another player.

Points will be tallied at the end of the event.

I clapped my hands together before looking down at the arena. There wasn’t any crowd to play to up here and I wasn’t sure what direction the invisible cameras were looking at me from, so I picked one at random. “Meow!”

Laughing to myself, I started to stalk around the edges of Mount Merder, looking for my next victim.