Matheus woke up startled, his memories from last night coming to him in waves.
“Captain. Rick,” he said while searching for them.
They were both sleeping beside him, still unconscious.
“They are both fine. It'll still take a few hours until they wake up, though,” said Sophie, standing nearby.
They were all by the entrance of the cave. Had she dragged them while they slept?
“Are you sure they will be alright?” Matheus asked, looking with worry at his fallen allies.
“I'm sure,” she answered with a smile.
“You saved us. Thank you, Sophie. Really, thank you.”
She seemed to be a little uncomfortable with his comment. Was she embarrassed?
“It was nothing. You are lucky I was around.”
“Damn giant widows. I have no idea what they were doing so far from their usual area.”
“They are monsters. We can’t really predict how they'll act,” she said with a shrug.
“You are right,” he said. ”It's just… today was too close. I really thought it was all over for a second. There has to be a way to prevent it from happening again. If there's something I missed, I'll find it.”
“You are very determined, aren't you? That's good. It's important that you are one.”
She looked at him with uncertainty, as if deciding on her next words.
“We need to talk. There is something we really need to discuss.”
Oh shit. He’d completely forgotten to unequip his title. He hoped she wouldn’t start acting weird towards him.
“Look, the king stuff…” He began, but Sophie cut him short.
“I’m not talking about your title. I already knew about it.”
“Really? You don’t seem to care very much. Rick changed completely when he found out.”
“It’s something way more important. Truth be told, I’ve been wanting to talk with you about this for some time, but there hasn’t been a good opportunity.”
“What is it?” Matheus asked, starting to get nervous.
“I know you are a champion,” she said bluntly.
Matheus froze. What had been happening lately that everyone seemed to be learning his secret?
He thought about denying, but no words left his mouth when he tried to speak.
“It’s alright,” Sophie continued,” I am a champion too.”
“What? Seriously?”
“Yes.”
“Why are you only telling this to me now?”
She shrugged. “I didn’t really know you before. And we never had the chance to speak in private.”
“That was true,” Matheus answered. “This is great. I’ve been dying for the opportunity to talk with someone about what the hell this whole contest is about. I have so many questions.”
“I imagined,” she replied with a tired smile.
“Are you also from Earth? I mean, normal Earth. I have no idea if this planet we are on is also called Earth.”
“It is, and yes. I believe that just like you, I started my second life here when my first ended.”
“Oh.” Matheus hesitated, then asked what was in his mind, “how did you die?”
“I drowned,” she said with a somber expression.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to intrude.”
“It’s ok. What about you?”
“I…choked,” Matheus said, not wanting to explain the whole situation.
“I’m sorry,” she said in sympathy. It seems like neither of us had it easy the first time.”
“You could say that.” If he was being honest, he didn’t like thinking about his first life that much. There was too much pain in there.
Nonetheless, Matheus started laughing. He couldn’t help it.
“What?” Sophie asked.
“You have no idea how good it is to find someone else experiencing all this,” he said, gesturing to the space around them. “Everything is crazy, and everyone acts like it’s normal. It’s maddening.”
“I know,” she answered with a nod. “It feels like we are in a play, don’t you think? And everyone else is an actor, just following the script. I swear, some folk in the city only repeat the same badly written lines. I wish there was a better effort to make it believable.”
“Exactly, I….what?” Matheus asked, not sure he fully agreed.
“Nevermind. You should rest. It’ll still take a while until we can go back.” She looked at him. “And I believe you have a lot of decisions to make. Have you checked the system yet?”
“Not yet,” he said. He had indeed received a lot of notifications after the last fight.
With delight, he noticed he’d gotten 3 more levels. Plus a lot of improvements on his skills. That was the fastest he had leveled up since coming to this world.
Matheus guessed there were some advantages to being cornered by monsters. If you manage to get out alive, you are fated to become stronger.
He started going through his notifications.
Bubble Ball has reached level 5!
A spell modification has been conceded!
You have three options.
Distance and speed control
Allow long range shots, also greatly increasing the reach impact of your balls. Costs 1 more mana for every 5 new meters.
Power and density control
You can shoot bigger and stronger soap balls, 1 mana for twice the size to a limit of 10 times.
Movement control
Change the trajectory of your projectile, costing 1 mana for every second of manipulation.
That was interesting. Instead of changing to something else, it seemed like spells could be modified when they reached a higher enough level. Or at least spells earned by the system could. Honestly, who knew?
“Did you get anything good?”
“Yeah, I can make a modification to my bubble ball spell. And all the options are great.”
“Want help deciding?”
“Sure,” Matheus said, glad to have someone who could help him with those decisions. He explained the options in detail.
“If it was me, I’d go with the first one. Having a bigger reach has made my life much easier here,” Sophie said, caressing her bow. “But having your fighting style in mind, I think it’s either power or movement manipulation.”
“My fighting style?” Matheus asked, curious.
“You know, relying on your cleverness and tricks. You usually try to take your enemies by surprise, do you not? Creating distractions and confusion, attacking in ways they are not expecting.”
“I guess,” Matheus said, blushing. Being honest, he relied on those tactics because he wasn’t able to face an enemy straight on. He didn’t feel there was much admirable about that. “I imagine yours is mostly killing things from afar, right? Don’t you ever get out of arrows?”
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She took her quiver and showed it to him.
“Here, analyze it,” she said, handing it to him.
Quiver of the insistent archer.
+3 Agility +1 Will
Creates a new arrow every hour, to a maximum of 12. If there are no arrows left, you can create another one for 5 mana.
“That’s amazing. I wish I had an enchanted item like this one. The best thing I have is this cape and my sect ring, but they only give me slight bonuses.”
“Don’t you have anything else?
“I had a flame ring. I had to use it a few days ago to get out of a tough situation. Now I have nothing else,” he said with a sigh.
“We can work on it. I’m pretty sure there is an enchanted dagger for sale that would suit you. I can help you get it.”
“This is great. I’ve been dying to discuss those plans with someone. We can weigh the pros and cons together and cover each other's backs.”
“I hope so,” Sophie answered with a grin.
“By the way do you know how those soul abilities work? I haven’t really figured it out yet.”
“Honestly, don’t worry about it. They are pretty much useless until we get to very high levels. How is your connection?”
“It’s level 6. I want to increase it, but there always seem to be other priorities.”
“I know. 6 is not bad. What about the rest?”
He hesitated for a second, unsure. He didn’t like sharing that much about himself. But he had asked for her advice, hadn’t he?
He told her everything.
“Why is your core so high? You know it’s mostly related to inventory stuff, right?”
“I need it because of my head collection. I get a boost against an enemy I have a head of in my inventory. It was one of my first skills.”
“Oh, interesting. Makes sense. I think you should increase your synergy and energy. As you said, take everything to 5 first.”
He nodded, happy for the reassurance.
“And speaking of stats, do you know what they all are? There’s one I have 42 of, but it’s still unavailable for me. It has been driving me crazy.”
“42?” She asked with one arched eyebrow. “No, unfortunately I haven’t figured it out either. I am not as far advanced as you may think.”
He analyzed her.
Sophie - Human
No Title
Level: 16
“Wow, you are already level 16! If you wanted, you could leave for the next city. What’s holding you back?”
Sophie’s face changed, her smile gone.
“Matheus. I need to know how serious you are about the contest.”
He was caught off guard by the intensity of her question.
“I’ll do what’s necessary to win. I know I’m still very far behind, but I haven’t lost hope.”
“Great. That’s what I wanted to hear,” she said, her smile returning. “Because of your curse, I thought there was no way we could work together. But I was wrong. I think I’ve found a way for us both to boost our progress by a lot, even without being in a party. If I am right, we’ll leave Tartaros at least twice stronger than we are now.”
“That’s great!” Matheus exclaimed, excitedly, “you really have no idea how much of a relief this is. It has been difficult staying motivated by myself.”
“I understand. I…also wasn’t dealing well with being alone.”
“Well, we are a team now. Even if we can’t partner-up directly, we can still help each other.” He stretched his hand in her direction. “Let’s win this contest together.”
She took his hand, and firmly held it. And just like that, the unbearable weight of this world was now shared.
Matheus was surprised how light he felt.
“You’ve been checking the quests available daily, I’m assuming?” Sophie asked him.
“Yeah. I think I know most of them by heart now.”
“So you know about the one called ‘stop the proliferation’, right?”
“Of course. It offers the biggest reward by a long mile. Do you know how to complete it?”
“No, I don’t think we can really stop it. It’s way out of our league. But we can do something better.”
“What?” Matheus asked in anticipation.
“We can accelerate it.”
“I’m not sure if I follow.”
“For what I gathered, the proliferation is a hoarde of tainted demibeasts.”
“I’m sorry, what??”
Sophie raised one hand.
“They are powerful monsters that have been corrupted and banished to the empty dimension. I know, I know, I’ll explain it all eventually. The point is, some are trying to return using the people from the city as its conductor. When they do, they will feast on the energy of everyone inside it.”
“That’s terrible! We have to do something before that happens. Thank Gods you found out about this. There have to be ways to counter those demibeasts if we know they are coming. Have you alerted the people? We need to tell everyone.”
Sophie said nothing, just waited in silence.
“Wait. Did you say we are going to accelerate it? But…why?”
“We can’t stop the demibeasts. The proliferation can’t be stopped. What we can do is connect our souls to them. There’s a ritual we can use, but one person wouldn’t be able to do it alone. Two champions, though, it’ll work.”
“You are crazy,” he exclaimed in disbelief, “you want to tame those beasts?”
“I prefer unusual,” she answered with a grin, “and yes. That’s exactly what my plan is.”
“That’s amazing,” he said, laughing, “we would be able to control them, then?”
“Not exactly,” she admitted with a sigh. “Such creatures can’t be controlled. I doubt we would ever be able to directly order one around, however, it wouldn’t be necessary. Just the initial feast would get each of us a dozen levels.”
“Oh, that’s…what? Initial feast? Do you mean the town people?”
“It can’t be stopped, Matheus. Believe me. The best we can do is to share the experience.”
“Wait, what are you talking about? Are you saying your plan is to let everyone die?”
“Yes,” she said bluntly, “and become stronger in the process. Trust me, it’ll work.”
“Don’t say something like that. We don’t have a way to do it now, but there’s gotta be something we can do. We can’t just let everyone die.”
“Matheus. C’mon,“ Sophie said, suddenly extremely serious again. “That’s something else I wanted to talk to you about. I know you are not dumb. You must have figured it out by now,” she said while gesturing to Rick and Captain.
“They are not real. No one here is, except you and me.”
