The Systemic Lands

Chapter 504: Day 4,789 (5) – Layers

Chapter 504: Day 4,789 (5) – Layers

We were quickly accelerating. Airships didn’t care about velocity, but the risk of flying right off into the void was great enough that once we reached the optimal speed, there was no more acceleration. We were going fast enough to leave everything behind.

The trick was getting started, coming to a stop, and then clearing the surrounding area. The last one had been a headache for years. Constant watches and speculations. The trick was coming to a full stop near the ground, and then clearing all the flying monsters.

It was a massive headache. The sheer level of stress we had at the start was immense. Having to wake up constantly to deal with monsters. There was another trick to the entire process as well. Not damaging the airship.

I was only one person, so the trick was to not have too many monsters attacking from too many directions. With our flight forward clear, I let out a sigh of relief. Using my skills was more powerful and a lot cheaper than using the beam cannons on the deck.

Those we would save for when we came to a stop. The wind rushing by me was a nice experience. One thing that Captain Francis made sure of was to never fly directly at the light source, so I wasn’t blinded. That was why picking our straight-line direction was key as well, in addition to being impossible to aim.

All those computer games I had played back on Earth lied. Hitting things while moving was very hard. And the altitude, getting that right was another massive headache. We were dealing with three dimensions not two, which was where the real challenge came in and a lot of the learning curve.

If we went too high, there would be turbulence and monsters would intercept us no matter what. That was why we had to fly at the fourth layer. The first layer was the bedrock that existed at the bottom of the Systemic Lands. The super hard stone we had named after Minecraft rock at the bottom of the world. That was the first layer in the Systemic Lands.

The second layer was the ground itself that we all walked around on. The terrain layer. The mushroom effects, the height of the jungle trees, was where this layer existed at. This was the layer we had to stop at, to avoid the sky monsters.

The third layer, was the space between the top of the second layer, and the airspace around the towers. This was very high up, since the towers were square monoliths. The towers in the higher level zones were taller, but the layers did change based on the zone. The higher the level of the zone, the bigger layers two and three were.

Layer four was the sweet spot. Above the airspace of the towers, flying monsters in the zone itself, but below turbulence level when traveling at speed. Also, the level of the sky monsters was still manageable at this point.

That was the other thing. The higher up one went, the higher the level of the flying monster. And they came in swarms. So it wasn’t an option to pull down one level 6 or level 7 monster and dealing with it there would be a cluster.

That was the dividing line between layers four and five. It was layer five once the monsters started increasing in level. This was where skill in flying the airship came into play. Captain Francis was also the Captain of the Crystal Vortex.

I had wanted to fly it, but I needed to be out here to deal with threats unfortunately. I was too important to the combat ability of the airship was a whole to let things take a turn for the worst. Nothing was damaging my precious Crystal Vortex. Absolutely nothing, which meant that I had to be out here inside of flying it.

It felt stupid and frustrating. It was like being President of the United States, but having to man the guns on Air Force One, not even getting to be the pilot. At least being the pilot was fun. Until you ran into a monster and wasted millions of crystals, and everyone was screaming as we all plummeted for the ground. I could kind of smile at that a bit, but not really.

The level of stress had been immense. Now we had a system in place for flying and almost all the kinks had been worked out. I heard movement behind me and it was Joyo, the man certainly enjoyed coming out on deck while we were flying.

We had been looking for true flight skill, but with no luck. The problem with melee combat in the air, was one of leverage and it becoming problematic to use a weapon. The thing with the Body stat was, the impact of the beat stick didn’t come from the weapon itself with the Body stat.

One used their Body to leverage against a surface to swing the weapon at an immense speed, but the Body stat was not imparted to the weapon itself. This difference was that important on the ground, but in the air, it made all the difference.

This was offset by having an enchanted blade, but the main issue was one of durability. While we had stacked on all the enchantments we could, there was a tradeoff between imparting force and the durability of the weapon itself. It had been an ongoing issue. Joyo had spare blades beneath various beds. We stocked up on them. It was expensive, but when melee was needed it was needed. You couldn’t do things halfway with the kind of fights we experienced.

“Having fun,” I shouted out to be heard and Joyo nodded at me as he passed. I followed him to the front railing, having to carefully adjust my footing so I didn’t get pushed back by the wind.

“Doing well enough. I heard we are going to try and capture some monsters for Michelle. You want to try a level 6 zone again?” he asked me.

“Yes. I want to take them on before upgrading a city. At least this way we should only have to face one level 7 monster. Any more would be reckless. You ready?” I asked him.

“Michelle said we would have a platform?” he asked me.

“We need to get a monster, so I can try and capture the Infinite Block.”

“Not that one, urg, that one was the worst,” he replied.

“It really was. Still, it is needed unless I want to rush in on my own,” I said with a bit of bitterness. During the days off in Purgatory, I had taken up martial arts as a hobby. It had confirmed what I already knew, I hated melee fighting. My instinct was to shy away from attacks.

So, while I had more Body stat than the Divine Empress ever had, it was like putting clothes on a pig, and I was the pig in this case. It didn’t help my melee ability that much. I was a wizard or a mage, not a fighter or barbarian. After years off trying to get better at melee fighting, I had an absolute aversion to getting close in on a monster.

It was depressing. Movement, skills, even esoteric energy uses, I could put my mind to the task and succeed. But melee combat, high level melee combat, where my life was on the line was something I had absolutely zero talent in. At best I would be classified as a battle mage. I didn’t mind getting kind of close in a fight, but some of the monsters were creepy.

Giant eyeballs, slimes, and grotesque monstrosities pulled from nightmares by the Almighty System itself. I did not want to touch these things. I had enough headaches fighting off curse damage. That was my secret talent, curse damage resistance. I was a master at countering it now.

There would be no more tumors ever again. One Astrologer was more than enough. Just like one Ritualist. I was not going to be trampled over by them again. Unfortunately, the Divine Empress still loomed quite large in my mind.

Her melee talent was once a generation, or possibly once a civilization. Trying to learn to fight in close and failing horribly had given me a whole new respect for that woman. Sure, she was unrepentantly evil and insane, making people into furniture and rape houses across her Empire. But damn, could that woman get up close and not hesitate.

Even when were body was being blown apart, she hadn’t stopped. In hindsight, it was far more impressive than anything the Ritualist or the Astrologer had done. Both had their genius level talent in their respective areas, the Ritualist for summoning and control, and the Astrologer for direct energy manipulation. But Michelle matched up or exceeded the Ritualist, while I felt I was just below the Astrologer or at the same level.

Joyo was a pale imitation of the Divine Empress and he was the best. It felt unfair to say that, since he didn’t have whatever meta-points she had. But there was an issue of raw innate talent or fighting genius. The Divine Empress committed her whole being to each and every attack, willing to tank the damage. I guess that was why she was able to, she was insane. It took someone truly insane to run head long into an attack to land one of their own.

I couldn’t do that. Joyo couldn’t do that. No one was willing to do that. To have such absolute faith that you would triumph no matter what and come out alive on the other end. Of all the enemies I had faced, she was truly the most impressive for that singular reason. And I was thankful she was dead and never coming back.

Even if she was somehow brought back, her stats would be out of date. I could just nullify her physical attacks. Skills would be another issue, but I was confident in my close-range abilities. Acid Shot was still one of the best skills I could ask for and I was never going to give it up.

If there ever was a final boss of this place, I would be using that skill along with Force Shot. It had taken a while to find and started off as a level 3 skill. Now like all my skills it was level 6. It would be a pain to redo them all again once I could clear level 6 zones and upgrade them to level 7. Still, it was an acceptable headache in my mind.

That was far in the future. The first goal was to fight in a level 6 zone successfully without burning to a crisp and dying to all the monsters. “Well, you lead, I will follow,” Joyo said. It was a popular line of his. Just nodded at that.

I tried to do right by my team. The fact that none of them had died so far was a testament to my team building and general leadership skills. At least I liked to give myself credit. Michelle was just as invaluable as me with her raw talent.

If only a fighting tournament were possible to find someone like the Divine Empress, but with the Body stat and weird monsters out there, it wasn’t just about punching and getting punched unfortunately.