The Power of Ten

Chapter 9-261 - THE HUMAN RACE!

It took few questions to learn they had all grown up in Shanghai under the domination of the Daoists, and so the suppression of the Human Akasha and magic... and the Primos had either found a new path, or rediscovered an old one.

The Human Racial Class!

The Cultivators had forced the rise of the Human Racial Class to defy them!

I wanted to find a Cultivator and give them a big sloppy kiss, just before I blew their head off. This was a species-changing moment.

A Racial Class had no Stat pre-reqs! All you needed was Karma and persistence, and you could Level! You still had to beat the Six and Ten Ceilings, but you could have a Stat range no higher than 12, or even below 10, and still Level!

There were literally hundreds of Human/3’s running around here. In normal circumstances, this would mean hundreds of Seven+’s, but these people had no more than one Class Level at all... and from the looks of things, they’d just picked up the Archer or Melee Level within the last day, and only the ones Four and higher had a second one.

If what I was seeing was right, that was because the Melee or Archer Level filled in a point of Attack Bonus they didn’t have, and they couldn’t take any more.

I thought I was changing the world by releasing the news of vivus, Naming Karma, and the Helix Method.

The Human Racial Class had interplanetary ramifications! I had to get news of it off this world!

I rather breathlessly pointed this out to Sama and Briggs, who might not have noticed it at all, as it wasn’t obvious without an Assay pointing out the difference. They would just think these people were Human/1’s, and Ones through Fours, maybe.

They rapidly figured out the importance of the information to the baseline common person.

There were known to be ‘monster’ Racial Class Levels... it was how both Rantha Hagbloods’ Racial Classes existed. It had been assumed that Humanity’s limit, and that of most humanoid species, was Three.

Now it was plain that wasn’t true at all. It was an alternative path of advancement...

And if it existed for humans, it doubtless existed among every race here tied to them. Everyone had assumed that the Class System was the only way to Level up, but there was an alternative!

Had no one ever asked about this? Did they know to ask? I had to slap my forehead in disbelief.

“Damn it all,” I muttered, standing there on my Disk as the three Void Brothers walked up warily, staring at me and wondering what to do.

I was quick and succinct with them. “If you would commence with your Helix Scan and get it out of the way before I ask some quick questions of you, Brothers,” I said respectfully, lifting my hands out to my sides.

The trio looked at one another, then a triple set of Helices rose up in their shades and colors and reached out to caress my Aura, sampling but not breaking anything. I watched the expressions flitting across their faces at the realization that it would take some time for them to worry away and tear apart my magic... which was definitely not enough time for them to take me down.

“Are you satisfied that I am not a wielder of Dark magic, although I definitely have incredible potential to be?” I asked calmly, and they looked at one another, saw the confirmation, and nodded to me.

“Our American brothers spoke of you and some of the things you have done,” the grim little hyn said, stepping forwards slightly. I noticed he was speaking Human. “I see you have indeed grown in power since that time.”

“I have to save the world. It’s not a task done by the weak,” I replied evenly. “Now, I’m going to ask all of you to receive my Blessing. It is a temporary thing, and will be replaced by the Marks from Sama or Briggs when there is time to do so, but it will get you into the communication and coordination loop, and allow us to talk while I get about doing other things.” I turned and tapped the symbol on my tricep. “If you are conversant with the nomenclature, you may choose a +4 Sacred bonus to Intellect or Dexterity. You may remove it at any time, of course, as I am sure you can sense.”

“Will you be able to use magic on us through that?” the human, a Chinese fellow in his early-thirties, spoke up quickly.

“Yes,” I confirmed, and as their faces soured, “thus you will want to swap it for Marks sooner rather than later. As such, this is a temporary thing, and you should be well aware that enslaving you via magic is literally impossible... and you can remove the Blessing with great speed, as I will be happy to demonstrate.” I waved the brawny orc forwards. “Brother Ancientaxe, if you will.”

A bit unwillingly, but like most strong men also unwilling to admit to it, he stepped forward. I took his thick arm, lifted it up, and kissed his forearm. Silver lipmarks swirled and resolved into a demonic Rune pulsing with holy magic, and he grunted despite himself as he blinked in surprise at the feeling of his nerves suddenly pulsing in precision.

“Remove it.” He turned his crimson eyes on the silver Rune, and the greys and blacks of his Helix rose up, descending upon the Blessing and tearing it apart in mere seconds. It didn’t have nearly the Spell Power that my Cast spells did.

“Again. Brother Shadowknife, you will remove it this time.” I repeated the kiss, and Ancientaxe slowly held out his arm to the hyn. Black, white, and grey Helix Coils swirled up, converged on the Blessing, and tore it apart within seconds. “Brother Firesword,” I continued, kissed Ancientaxe’s arm again, and the same feat was repeated.

A little more reassured now, they exchanged glances, and decided to trust me, holding out all their arms for a Blessing, which I applied calmly to each of them.

-This is the Door through which I speak with you.- All of them flinched and stared at me, internal eyes looking through the point in their minds my /voice was coming from. -Now, we’re going to get you into the chain and the people working for you to put down the undead that are going to be rising.-

The next second, the bright yet shadowy auras of the three men hit the Markspace, and they gaped at the lights in the immediate vicinity... and the tens and hundreds of thousands further off, busy doing their own things, but which they knew they could just reach out and touch if they had need to.

Then they looked at me, Sama, and Briggs, and almost choked.

-Awright, we got Voids in here!- Briggs /exclaimed cheerfully. -Okay, everyone, directions incoming! Brothers, where do we need to go?-

In some disbelief, the Void Brothers nevertheless looked around, and suddenly The Map of Shanghai was all around them in almost terrifying detail, current and broad and they could go everywhere in it with a thought.

-Here, here, here,- they began to point out, and without hesitation Sama and Briggs were dispersing people, using Powered for the more distant locations where Death was gathering and the undead were going to rise... and vivus could stop them either before or after that happened.

Closer locations were given to the normal people with Weapons dripping unwhite flames, who could do much the same. If the dead were buried in buildings or ash, then they could only wait for midnight and for the undead to emerge from the rubble with the power of their birth, and shoot them down then.

At least, they were assured, the undead would not be coming back.

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Had some Daoists gotten away? Yes, I was 100% certain of it. That meant the other Sects and their masters would be warned soon enough.

Would they whelm to come bug Shanghai? Mithar and Sylune, I sure hoped so. I’d Teleport back to the city and proceed to blow the shit out of as many as I could as fast as I could, and see what they could do about it.

In the meantime we were heading south... overland. Because that way we’d meet more Cultivators on the way.

-Brothers, a moment of your time.- Three eyes turned cautiously towards me. They knew I was off to kill even more Daoists, but that didn’t mean they weren’t wary of me. I was just humming with too much danger and a tie to the Shroud. -You are undoubtedly the most informed sources in China. What can you tell me of what is going on in Hong Kong?-

The spikes in their Auras assured me that whatever was happening there that I wasn’t going to like at all.

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There was plenty of mileage between Shanghai and Hong Kong, 1200 kliks of it. Once a high-speed train might have covered it, but whole sections of train and roadways had been torn apart to make it harder for normal people to get about, making it much easier to corral and control them.

Widened Commune with Nature radiated out for over a hundred kliks from me. Much of it was a puke-worthy awareness of the pervasive Qi growing over the landscape like poison gas.

It took time, but I couldn’t turn away from the Qi-making Formations scattered all over the place and put up at regular intervals. I didn’t destroy them; I reversed them and lit off vivic torches on them. The Daoists didn’t have Shape Stone at VII, so they couldn’t do shit about it. They’d have to destroy the Formations and make completely new ones, sure to annoy them.

Not that any Daoists lived if they came within a klik of me. I couldn’t aim through the Commune at that range, but I could tell they were there, and I could aim once I got within range of Detect Qi at VII.

They helped recharge my Pool as we moved overland.

I painted a huge area into The Map, more accurate than a satellite scan, the terrain above and below precisely conveyed to me by the sleeping Land. Various Place Spirits called out for help against the suppressing power of the Qi, making Master Fred’s face change as we passed location after area.

There were certainly people out and working, largely ignorant of just how compromised around them the world was. The Haze above, Qi around, magic slumbering below... they couldn’t tell it was there, and it didn’t make much difference. The rice still had to come in, the chickens to be herded and fed, this stuff here moved over there. Sure, we turned a lot of heads going by on a motorcycle, and if I happened to mention in Chinese that a lot of the local Cultivators were about to get suddenly dead and not be surprised about it, most of them just went back to work, not wanting to get involved.

I didn’t expect much more from them... but was still impressed to see all those Human/3’s and /4’s sliding by.

Uneducated and untrained non-combatants, basically peasantry! Threes and Fours!

Very nice, indeed!

I focused on the information streaming into me, parsing off the important data for Sleipner and Master Fred, altering our course this way and that. Unseen Shards rose and flicked out towards anyone with a Qi signature over Two that came in range, and marked those with any Qi for later attention. Daoists blew apart messily, burned vivic, and recharged my Pool.

We actually overtook one group of Daoists flying overland from Shanghai, urgently heading south instead of going inland, following the railroad tracks as the logically fastest course overland there.

They were not very happy when Sleipner pulled up beneath them and I shot them all out of the sky, and they couldn’t even see what killed them. Invisible on the approach, the half-panicked bastards didn’t even get to see us coming and try to split up to make it harder to kill them all, poor milk-skinned bastards.josei