Chapter Thirty-Seven - Meanwhile

Meanwhile, Part 1

Sam aimed at the troll’s neck, imagining it being her father’s dick. It shouldn’t have been necessary. While nobody had told her directly, she could imagine what Jane had done the evening before. That stain on humanity’s reputation should be dead by now. But still, the hate and anger inside her broiled as hot as ever.

“Three”, she heard and then brought her sword down with all her might, activating both blade augmentation skills, ignoring the backlash from using them at the same time. That did it, and the blade crossed the troll’s neck as if it were made from butter.

She stumbled for a moment, tasting blood in her mouth as the backlash opened thousands of tiny cuts all over and inside her body. She blinked away blood from her eyes, but her left one still was cloudy. The cut must have appeared inside, she thought. Then a mighty bang in front of her shook her from her self-reflection. She looked up and saw Jane writhing in the fire, one leg held on to by a troll.

“Again?” she mumbled as she assessed the situation. Geri and Megan seemed to be ok, but Jane was in trouble. She set off, running in a curve around the troll to not get caught by him before she could attack. She had to duck as Jane passed over her head. She had no time to think about her, but still noticed the leg still in the troll’s hand. Then, she was in position and put the momentum of her run into her swing.

She aimed for the neck, taking full advantage of her decapitation skill and putting her blade momentum skill on the sword. It was the better choice for trolls and such a swing than sharpness. It hit true, but half of the momentum went into knocking the troll over, so it wasn’t the decapitation in one swing she had hoped for. Still, the front of the troll’s neck looked like Chloe had looked days earlier. Had it really only been two days? It felt like it had been months.

The troll grabbed his neck, air bubbling through his blood as he tried to roar again, but he did not go down like a human would have. Still, he was in no shape to get to her at the distance she could keep, and hacking at it like hacking at firewood, eventually, the remaining piece of neck gave way.

Sam stood there, breathing heavily as a mighty roar from the other side of the clearing shook her to her core. The troll boss had awakened.

Meanwhile, Part 2

Geri knew her blades couldn’t do more than tickle a troll, but she knew she wasn’t exactly useless here. Being level eight gave her an immense power boost not just to her weapon attacks but also to some less obvious skills. The one she concentrated on now was life absorption. It wasn’t her strongest eating skill, but she could hardly rape the troll to death, could she?

Unlike her skills for eating souls and blood, which allowed her to digest them when ingested, an absorption skill was more direct—it allowed her to pull the life right out of her victim; she just needed an opening. And her daggers would provide that with ease. The hard part would be staying attached to her victim once it had awoken and was trying to kill her.

“Three.”

Geri plunged her daggers through the troll’s eyelids, through its eyes, deep into its brain. That would hardly be lethal to a troll—she knew that in her bones—but it provided her two perfect channels to pull on the troll’s life force. She could feel it entering her blades—those were part of her body, after all. Slowly at first, but speeding up fast. The troll roared, then gurgled as Megan pierced its lungs with short, hard stabs.

It rolled, trying to shake her off or to avoid the stabs to his body, and Geri had to cling to him with all her strength. She felt one of her ribs break as her body got between the troll’s head and the ground, but she clung on, sucking in the delicious life force as fast as she could.

That wouldn’t be able to kill the troll on its own—that was outside the skill’s power—but losing years and years of its lifespan, rapidly ageing through it, would hamper him so Megan could kill it with her attacks, she hoped.

The troll rolled again, slower already, and she got a face full of ash and embers from something landing in the fire. “Ten coins it’s Jane,” she thought, then spread her legs to hinder the troll’s movement. It felt like it had lost enough of its power by now that that would do more than simply breaking her legs.

The troll struggled and jerked every time Megan sank her hand blades into it, but it got weaker and weaker as more and more of its life flowed out his many wounds and into Geri. She felt sated, then bloated, then wanted to barf up like a child at Halloween. But she couldn’t; the troll was more important. The life force started to taste bitter, then sour like vomit. And just when she thought she couldn’t take it…

🖹

Achievement earned: “Limit? Not with me!”

You have managed to push a skill over its limit, forcing it by sheer willpower to do something it explicitly cannot do. Sadly, skills don’t bend. They break. You lost the skill “life absorption”.

This achievement comes with a reward: You are rewarded skills that can do what you pushed your old one to do. You have gained the skills “death touch (reality altering)” and “life digestion (physical)”.

🖹

Death touch (reality altering), Level 1, 0/100 XP: You can siphon life force from any creature you touch. Creatures are weakened severely while you do this and can die if you suck them dry. Higher skill levels speed up the process and help you break through magical protections easier. Siphoned life force will temporarily strengthen you and then dissipate unless you have a skill or ability to use it otherwise.

🖹

Life digestion (physical), Level 1, 0/50 XP: You can convert other creatures’ life force into your own, sating your hunger or extending your life span. To access a creature’s life force, you need to form a connection with its core, either by overcoming its defences by force or by being let in voluntarily.

🖹

Achievement earned: “Not your tool anymore”

You were created as a tool with a specific purpose but broke free from the limitations your creator bound you to.

This achievement comes with a reward: You are now free. So free that your creator doesn’t even remember you once were bound to their will. (ERROR: Impossible reward, creator is immune to memory alterations, compensating)

🖹

Achievement earned: “ERROR”

You managed to cause a system error.

This achievement comes with a reward: Hey Geri, please don’t tell Jane about this. She’d be livid if she knew I even tried to mess with Livia’s memories by accident. Let me bribe you with a good reward, ok? How about I drop all the vampiric debuffs you have? I know you’ve been hiding the pain from everyone, but your acting skill hasn’t been skyrocketing for nothing, has it?

🖹

Achievement earned: “ERROR2”

You managed to cause a system error.

This achievement comes with a reward: Ok, I see. I can’t change your mom to respect you. That would be akin to killing her and replacing her with a bad imitation. The same goes for making you forget what you had to go through. I’m really sorry. I’d offer to block your nightmares, but vampires don’t dream anyway. How about some good advice? Remind Jane to select her class already before the sacrifice expires, she keeps forgetting. Tonight would be perfect. And how about the skill “mirror of love (reality altering)”? Hint: That limit is per person and day.

🖹

Mirror of Love (reality altering), Level 1, 0/100 XP: This skill allows you to use a loved one’s skill or ability once a day. If the person loves you back, you gain it at its full power; otherwise, it is limited by this skill’s level. Higher skill levels allow you to use this skill more often. Warning: Effects from abilities that alter your body without having to be kept active will stay with you after your use of the ability expires until you mirror that ability again to undo the change.

A roar interrupted Geri’s thoughts before she could take all of it in. She felt how it wanted to induce fear into her, but she still was an undead, immune to such effects.

Meanwhile, Part 3

Rune crouched next to the other female. Her blood was boiling, the rage and anger at having to tolerate that shameless intruder in her territory, not being allowed to slap her into oblivion for that insult, nearly overtaking her.

But she had to wait. There were the intruder’s mates, and they had to be taken care of first. She barred her teeth to show her aggression and gave the signal to her own mates to take down the offenders. She contemplated dominating them and taking them for own own, but those stupid oafs weren’t worth it. She already had better mates, even a clan queen she adored.

She was eyeing the intruding female while her mates took their positions. She was old and strong, yet she slept like a little baby, her mind overtaking easily by one of Rune’s mates. She hadn’t yet mated with that one, not fully, but it was only a matter of time until her clan queen would allow that.

Rune felt giddy to take on the intruder, to show her queen she was worth being kept around. If she failed, it would be a sign she wasn’t. Simple as that. She wouldn’t flee her queen’s wrath, would not go back to hating herself. She would rather die for her queen than that.

There was the strike! The din was washing over her like a wave, spurring her own to join. But she held herself back, watching the intruder female closely instead. She also heard the noises, Rune saw, as she began to stir slowly. Let her take her time, then strike just before she’s fully awake, she thought, happy about her own cleverness.

There, the eyelids fluttered, and now! Rune bit down hard on the intruder’s throat, the rough skin scraping on her teeth and the hot blood filling her mouth. She ripped, and the whole throat came out in one bloody mess. Rune spat out the flesh and chomped down again, this time on the thick bones connecting the tiny head to the body.

The intruder scratched at Rune, her claws ripping deep gauges into Rune’s flesh but not doing any real damage. Rune, meanwhile, built up the pressure with her mouth. She felt her teeth chipping, one giving way completely, as they weren’t made to crunch on troll bones, but that couldn’t stop her. Teeth were replaceable, heads weren’t. Then the bones started to give way, crumbling into sand and gravel, and the sweet taste of marrow filled her mouth. One last effort and her teeth closed on themselves, the intruder’s neck gone.

She sat up, sucking the sweet marrow out of the bone left in her mouth. Then she saw it. Her queen flying through the air, crashing into a tree head first and dropping down in a lifeless heap. She roared. She roared as loudly as she could. Her queen!