《Death Metal Alchemist (LitRPG)》 [1] >Compelling Chapter Title< Handsome Alex was all business even though his skull and spinal column were the last remnants of the man he used to be. I had his bones laid out on the floor of my train car as the starry sky whooshed past outside my window. With no ribs or arms or anything, he looked like a demonic sperm. ¡°You look like a Halloween decoration.¡± I lied and leaned closer. ¡°Why do you smell like coffee? Anyway, I don¡¯t think there¡¯s anything to worry about. Have you seen some of the rich weirdos on this train? No one will say shit once we get you some arms and legs. I bet half the drummers here were never even human to begin with. You¡¯re practically boring.¡± Handsome Alex ignored me. ¡°The guitarist approaches,¡± he warned, and with a puff of dust his jawbone cracked clean off. Without muscles and tendons to work it, his jaw had always just hung open, anyway, and he could still talk just fine without it. His eyes lit up with an eerie amber light marking each syllable. ¡°Hide me now, before she arrives. Hurry, you fool.¡± I didn¡¯t say anything but it was weird that his jaw had just fallen off like that. Wasn¡¯t he supposed to be indestructible? I shoved the stray bone into my pocket. Then I slid Handsome Alex and his rickety tail of yellowed vertebrae under the bench seat opposite where I was sitting. My hard-sided suitcase fit snug against the gap between the floor and seat and I put my feet up, wedging it even more firmly in place. I pinned my chin to my chest and pulled my derby down over my eyes like I was asleep. A moment later, the door slid open and a slender, dark-haired woman with a guitar case strapped to her back swept inside. I didn¡¯t flinch at the sudden blast of music and voices from all the partygoers out in the corridor. I performed a gentle, wavering moan of a snore, instead. I could see her reflection in the metal frame of the bench across the way. She was wearing a black, fitted leather jacket with lots of superfluous zippers and short sleeves that ended mid-bicep in lacy ruffles. I suddenly felt very underdressed in my Old Loser costume. Her jeans were also black but sort of faded with a hole in one knee. And she had on a purple shirt of some kind underneath the jacket. She saw me sleeping there and quietly slid the door closed, more polite than the obscene tattoo on her forearm implied. It was an anthropomorphized penis cutting itself to pieces with machetes. For some reason it had eight arms. Reminded me of Alex in his final form. In addition to the guitar case on her back, the woman was also carrying a green and purple duffel. The thing was bulging and she was straining to hold it up and started searching for someplace to set it down, but I had strategically occupied both benches in this car. I was asleep on one and had my feet and jacket on the other. ¡°You awake, dickhead?¡± she whispered, very, very low. I held in a chuckle. She reached behind her back using her free hand and slid the door open again, but only for a moment before slamming it shut with a schwack! ¡°Annie are you okay!¡± I cried as I pretended to be wrenched out of a dream. My hat fell on the floor. I looked around wildly for a moment, selling the idea that I didn¡¯t know where I was. I felt all over my bald head like the hat might be hiding somewhere up there. ¡°Oh, hey,¡± the woman said, a guilty note in her voice. I couldn¡¯t tell if it was real or not. ¡°My bad. Were you sleeping?¡± I bent down to pick up my hat and stuck it back on my head. ¡°No worries, man I was out.¡± After wiping my eyes and yawning behind my hand, I reached across the car and dragged my coat off the far bench. I placed it on the opposite bench beside myself and gestured for her to sit where the jacket had been. ¡°There, sorry about that. I¡¯ve been traveling a lot. This is Hawijimi still, right?¡± She grunted. ¡°Yeah. It¡¯s still Hawijimi out there.¡± She sat down, eyeing me with distrust. This was going perfect. ¡°You mind if I smoke?¡± ¡°Nope, make yourself at home.¡± She took off the guitar case and laid it on the bench next to her. That was a stroke of luck. She might have noticed Handsome Alex if she¡¯d stowed her instrument under the seat. She dug around in her duffel for a moment before pulling out a silver cigarette case and a lighter. The case opened to reveal a number of hand-rolled cigarettes. They might have been magic cigarettes. I was hoping. She flicked her lighter and watched me while she drew on the cigarette, which with her first exhale I confirmed was, in fact, magically-enhanced as I suspected. The way she puffed, it didn¡¯t last long, and she didn¡¯t offer me any. That was fine. ¡°So, you play?¡± I jutted my chin at her guitar case. ¡°You must be signed up for that whole battle of the bands thing, right?¡± I snorted, sort of amused and dismissive at the same time. ¡°The Cacophony, you mean.¡± There was no warmth or humor in her voice as she corrected me. Only irritation. ¡°And yes, I play. Swell observation there, Sherlock.¡± She knocked on her guitar case. I smiled. ¡°That¡¯s right, the Cacophony. What a name. So where¡¯s the rest of your band? Isn¡¯t the first stop tomorrow night? Shouldn¡¯t you be busy rehearsing or something?¡± ¡°They¡¯ll be boarding in the morning.¡± She looked at me warily. ¡°What are you doing on this train? You don¡¯t look like a¡ª¡± ¡°Like a contestant? Or a rich weirdo? Yeah, you¡¯re right. I¡¯m neither.¡± I held out my card and she just looked at me without taking it. Shrugging, I stuffed it back in my pocket. ¡°I manage a band. Sorry, a Sonic Combat Unit. We used to just call them rock bands when I first got into this business. Anyway, name¡¯s Kirby. Kirby Dufresne.¡± ¡°Mina Diamond,¡± she replied, narrowing her eyes. ¡°But you already knew that, didn¡¯t you?¡± ¡°Pardon? Not sure I follow your meaning. Are you a well-known act around these parts? I¡¯ll be honest with you, I¡¯m from Tulsa. That¡¯s in Oklahoma. This is actually my first action outside North America and Europe. First time on a train, too.¡± I winked like a dork. ¡°Don¡¯t tell the conductor.¡± She was staring so hard then, I thought she might drill a hole between my eyes. It was too good, we¡¯d really gotten off on the wrong foot and she was full of distrust. While she focused on me, Handsome Alex took advantage of the distraction to do his thing. I tracked his progress using our party interface: >Handsome Alex is preparing a [Compelling Narrative] >Stage 1 of 7 is 12% complete¡­. This was some seriously haunted shit. Handsome Alex came back from the first plane crash with a whole suite of mind-bending superpowers. Among them were a slew of like, video-game-styled windows, for lack of a better concept to compare it to. These windows could show me all kinds of freaky stuff about the world. Tooltips I had no business reading; stuff I would have told you was batshit just a few years ago. We used one of these windows to communicate with one another telepathically, I¡¯m dead serious: Handsome Alex: You are performing well today, Kirby. Keep her attention and I will have the story finished shortly. Handsome Kirby: No problem, Bud. Just let me know when she¡¯s ready. Handsome Alex: We will talk about the inappropriate modification to your chat tag later. Handsome Kirby: You don¡¯t like? Handsome Alex: You are not handsome. The tag is a lie. Hurt Kirby: /sadface Handsome Alex: You are also without a single shred of professionalism. Do let me work in peace now. Mina Diamond must have noticed I was sort of spacing off, because she reached right into my face and snapped her fingers. ¡°You still there, uh, dude? Furby. Derfy. Whatever you said your name was.¡± She snapped her fingers rapidly. Narrow, exceptionally long, and nimble fingers. She certainly had the physical attributes to shred. Or I assumed she did. Soon I¡¯d know for sure.Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there. I blinked and pretended to bite at her hand. My teeth clicked in the air. ¡°Rawr,¡± I growled. I didn¡¯t say another word and sat back, arms crossed and grinning. My eyebrows waggled lasciviously. This was too far, and I knew it right then. I¡¯d gone from foil to clown when I bit at her finger. She surprised me by cocking her head to the side and smiling. Smiling with her whole face and a warmth I didn¡¯t expect. I caught myself mirroring her ¨C or was it the other way around? ¡°I don¡¯t know what your grift is,¡± she said, her smile still forcing mine. ¡°But I can¡¯t wait for you to try it.¡± ¡°Oh yeah?¡± ¡°I¡¯m gonna enjoy myself. Take my time.¡± She sat back, arms crossed. The smile and its warmth were gone but now her eyebrows danced, clearly mocking my own. ¡°I¡¯m gonna make you beg to die. You fucking amateurs.¡± >Handsome Alex has completed 3 of 7 stages. > Stage 4 is 61% complete¡­. It was taking too long but I didn¡¯t dare interrupt Alex, not now that the Compelling Narrative prep was over halfway finished. He¡¯d go apeshit if he had to start over at this point. My role in this part operation was just to distract our mark for two or three minutes so he could work. My best asset was being unlikable. Our targets would be so sick of me, they¡¯d never notice Handsome Alex digging inside their brains with his freaky psychic powers. Not until it was too late. But I had serious concerns that Mina Diamond here was going to kill me before we ever got there. I couldn¡¯t allow that to happen. There simply weren¡¯t enough hours left before showtime for me to find another body and complete the necessary rituals to puppet it around. ¡°Can we back up?¡± I said, uncrossing my arms and showing her my hands out at my sides. ¡°We got off on the wrong foot, right? There¡¯s no reason we should be at each other¡¯s throats.¡± ¡°You represent the enemy. We might be destined to meet in the arena.¡± ¡°Holy shit, lady. Holy shit. That¡¯s a little dramatic, don¡¯t you think? You act like this is a literal battle of the bands.¡± ¡°Isn¡¯t it?¡± I realized she still had the cigarette case open on her lap. She¡¯d smoked her joint and squashed the roach on the floor but never for a second had she shut the damn case. Hurt Kirby: Hold on, buddy. I think we¡¯re walking into a trap. Handsome Alex: Do not bother me with this. Her story is nearly complete. Whatever is happening, you must deal with it yourself. Hurt Kirby: Brother I wouldn¡¯t bug you if I didn¡¯t think I had to. You gotta pause the narrative or something. Handsome Alex: I will not and you know this. It burns if I try to stop it before it finishes. I am muting this chat. Do not open another or I will be forced to block you again, despite the complications this will present in coming days. Mina smiled at me like she had hacked our entire conversation. I¡¯d have to ask Handsome Alex later if that was even possible. I tried to study the cigarette case more closely without her noticing, despite the fact our eyes were locked on one another. It was no use. She was watching me too close and if my eyes strayed down she¡¯d definitely notice. My only play was to wait for her to make the first move. I hated that, but at least I could be ready the moment the Compelling Narrative hit Stage 7. >Handsome Alex has completed 5 of 7 stages. > Stage 6 is 91% complete¡­. I flinched. Only nine percent to go? The finish line had snuck up on me. Mina noticed something was suddenly extra off and her eyes narrowed. The cigarette case was still splayed on her lap, but her right hand flicked to her pocket so fast it barely registered that she¡¯d pulled a little ivory-handled purse-pistol, probably a .22 with only two bullets, if my past experience with the ladies was any guide. >Handsome Alex has completed 6 of 7 stages. >Stage 7 will now commence¡­. The lights in the rectangular train car cut out and the voices of two-hundred and thirty-seven ghosts began to wail like they were going down in a fiery plane crash. I don¡¯t know why I always started laughing here. My usual nervous tic was cracking my knuckles until they wouldn¡¯t pop any more, not giggling like a dipshit. Handsome Alex floated straight up through the bench beside Mina. He had taken his sepia-toned, ghost-flame haloed, non-corporeal form, which meant this thing was basically a done deal. Compelling Narrative was just one of the superpowers he¡¯d gained in the afterlife, but we used it all the time. We¡¯re basically talking mind control here. I forgot the exact stages but it was along the lines of: Stage 1: Break into their brains Stage 2: Steal a bunch of their memories and hopes and dreams Stage 3: Replace that junk with false versions that support the Narrative we¡¯re after Stage 4: ????? Stage 5: Profit baby One thing for sure, if it got as far as Stage 7 then they were cooked. Handsome Alex hovered beside Mina like a biker tattoo come-to-life. She turned and took one look at Handsome Alex and gasped, squeezing the trigger on her little pistol out of reflex. Shot me right in the goddamn stomach. >Your vessel has suffered an [Injury]. >Your vessel has been afflicted with [Gut-Shot]. >[Gut-Shot] initially inflicts damage equal to 15% of the target¡¯s Base Health. >[Gut-Shot] causes your vessel to [Bleed-Out]. This is a damage-over-time effect which will accelerate the longer it persists. This status will not heal without intervention. >Current Health: 184% ¡°Granddaughter!¡± Handsome Alex scolded. It took me a second to place his accent because I¡¯d never heard him do Japanese before. The lights all came back on brutal as closing time at the bar. The two-hundred and thirty-seven ghosts shut right the fuck up. Mina dropped the gun and it went pop! Her last bullet left a pea-sized hole in the window set into the upper-half of the door. The corridor out there was a champagne-drenched sausage-casing crammed with rich weirdos who were stoned on everything money could buy and then some. Every now and then they¡¯d manage to organize a conga line. If she¡¯d just killed someone, it might be a problem. Or it might solve one. Time would tell. ¡°Granddaughter,¡± Handsome Alex repeated, calmer than you¡¯d ever believe. Like he was sitting cross-legged in his bonsai garden right at that moment not snatching this woman¡¯s body so I could turn her into magic rocks. ¡°Please be still and listen, little one. I have so much to tell you.¡± ¡°Hell yeah, story time.¡± I grunted and untucked my shirt in order to probe the bullet wound with my finger. I gave Mina the play-by-play as I did. ¡°Unreal. You got me right above my belt-buckle, lady. Look at that. I bet it would have stopped the bullet. Yeah, I¡¯m sure it would have. Goddamnit. And they call football a game of inches. Got nothing on death metal, am I right?¡± ¡°Kirby.¡± For just a moment there Handsome Alex sounded like Handsome Alex again. But that old bag of bones minus the bag was a real pro¡¯s pro. There was no hint of irritation in his voice when he continued. ¡°It would be most pleasing if you made yourself absent so that Mina and I might speak in private. It has been so, so long since I''ve seen my granddaughter. I¡¯m sure you understand.¡± ¡°Sure. Yeah, you¡¯re right. I¡¯ll scram.¡± As far as Handsome Alex was concerned, I was already gone. ¡°I hope you have been well, little one.¡± ¡°Is it really you?¡± Mina reached out to touch Handsome Alex¡¯s nasty skeleton face with its jaw missing and her hand became covered in sparkling pinpricks of light as it passed through. This always felt dirty, even to me, watching people hallucinate their dead relatives. I liked it better when they had a celebrity crush we could exploit or the like. But she was mesmerized by the whole thing with her grandpa, couldn¡¯t pry her eyes away, don¡¯t think she even noticed when I reached across and snatched her still-open cigarette case as I rose to my feet. I found a complicated rune etched into the silver interior, underneath half-a-dozen tightly-rolled magic cigarettes which I had to dump into my breast pocket for science and safekeeping. The rune depicted a series of geometric pentagrams, twisted together and stacked impossibly like something MC Escher would¡¯ve come up with on acid. ¡°Told you it was a trap.¡± I flipped the case open and held it aloft, like I was a fed flashing his badge. The bite of the bullet in my gut doubled me over, but only for a second. ¡°I better see if there¡¯s a doctor in the bar.¡± ¡°Kirby,¡± Handsome Alex interjected as I shoved the case into my pocket and slid the door open. I paused at the threshold with my hand against my belly. Nobody was lying there dead in the aisle, which always had a calming influence on me. ¡°Yeah, bud? You want me to get you something? Hankering for some of that peach wine again? You know I can dig it. I¡¯ve got you.¡± ¡°Kirby, stay out of the blasted bar. For the love of¡ª¡± ¡°Alright, alright.¡± I chuckled and then winced. I coughed up a shot-glass worth of blood onto the floor and that momentarily got Mina¡¯s attention back on me. Her eyes looked heavy, like a hypnotist¡¯s victim. But this was going to be so much worse than tricking her into acting like a chicken. I tried to sound like a human being: ¡°You gotta let him talk for as long as it takes, Mina. Believe me on this, babe. He¡¯s older than shit so at least half of what he says isn¡¯t going to make any sense, but Grandpa Spoopy Bones there tells the best stories. Gonna change the way you see the world.¡± Handsome Alex unmuted his chat to tell me to go away but as soon as the window popped up I muted his ass right back. I stepped out into a conga line and someone slipped a champagne flute into my hand. [2] Reap ¡°Hey, lemme see that bottle a sec.¡± I waved the cocktail waitress over. ¡°I¡¯m not supposed to let the patrons pour. I¡¯ll get in trouble.¡± ¡°Sweetie, you¡¯re serving free champagne. In a bar. On a train in some ass-backward dreamland called Hawijimi. A train full of billionaires who all happen to be lunatics.¡± I panned my gaze around the table at the rich weirdos. None of whom had turned out to be a doctor. We¡¯d all conga¡¯d here together. ¡°And you¡¯re dressed like that.¡± I gestured up and down sassily to indicate her outfit, which was basically a less-modest take on the Princess Leia bikini. ¡°Girl, trouble already got you!¡± Cherilynne Gates¡ªyeah, that Cherilynne Gates¡ªlaughed like that was the funniest thing she¡¯d ever heard. The woman was worth at least five billion and she was drunk. Everyone else at our table laughed along with her, each of them smaller fish playing their own angles. I didn¡¯t give a shit about any of that. I wasn¡¯t interested in hustling her. I just thought she might have a personal physician onboard. Shit, she had to be like ninety. ¡°Oh just give Mr Dufresne the damn bottle,¡± Cherilynne croaked, taking a sip from her own, empty flute. She was wearing this big ass American flag bow on top of a blonde bouffant that was definitely a wig. She shot me a wrinkly wink. ¡°I¡¯ll pay for it.¡± ¡°It¡¯s free. And you know it¡¯s free. Christ, Cherry-lynne.¡± I turned from shaking my head at Lady Gates and said to the waitress, ¡°I¡¯m not looking to get you in any trouble, sweetie, I swear. I won¡¯t do anything weird or dangerous.¡± I tried to arrange my face in the most innocent way possible. I have no idea what it conveyed, she mostly looked confused and worried. ¡°Fine, but don¡¯t tell Randall. I really need this job.¡± ¡°No worries, I don¡¯t even know who that is.¡± I took the bottle from the ice bucket she was pushing around on this little cart and thumbed out the cork. It bounced off the ceiling and landed at my feet. Then I handed the bottle off to the guy next to me even as it was starting to foam over. His name might have been Kato. I bent down to retrieve the cork, and then I lifted up my shirt and held it against the bullet wound to determine if it would fit. Too big; the cork, that is. Blood seeped out as I disturbed the dark little pock of the bullet hole, and Kato or whatever wouldn¡¯t stop gawking. The bubbly had bubblethed all over. ¡°You gonna pour that?¡± I asked him in a way that wasn¡¯t really asking. ¡°Or you gonna keep Lady Cherry-lynne waiting all night?¡± He started filling everyone¡¯s flutes like his life depended on it. When he got to mine I held it up full and tipped my cap to Cherilynne. Then I downed it in one gulp and went back to performing first aid on myself. I had to stretch the wound out a little bit if I was going to close it with this cork, so I went in with my pinkie finger first, followed by the ring. Just kinda tugging it out around the edges, trying not to tickle the vessel¡¯s tummy too much. After all that fingering, the cork finally fit snugly. I checked the most recent entries in my status log, confident I¡¯d fixed the problem: >Your Vessel has been affected by [Alcohol Poisoning]. >[Alcohol Poisoning] has been purged by [Kirby, Please. I Need You To Stay Sober]. >Your Vessel has been affected by [Rohypnol]. >[Rohypnol] has been purged by [Kirby, Please. I Need You To Stay Sober]. >[Gut-Shot] has been treated with [Improvised First Aid]. >[Bleed-Out] has been replaced by [Bleeding]. This is a damage-over-time effect which will decelerate the longer it persists. Absent aggravating conditions, [Bleeding] will end in 3 hours 14 minutes and 58 seconds. >Current Health: 67% ¡°Oh that¡¯s bad.¡± I¡¯d done the thing I always did. I¡¯d stayed at the bar way too long. Longer than I meant to. I couldn¡¯t even get wasted anymore with the purge effect Handsome Alex had woven into this vessel. It wasn¡¯t about that; I just loved the scene. I started crunching the numbers to figure out how much time I¡¯d wasted. Last I¡¯d checked, I was sitting pretty at 184% of my maximum health. I¡¯d bled out 117% since then ¨C it was a damned good thing I¡¯d cannibalized my last vessel before we got on the train. That Bleed-Out status had caused me to lose 1.5% of my health every minute. That meant nearly ninety ninety minutes had passed¡ªseventy-eight, to be precise¡ªsince I left Handsome Alex to finish implanting Mina Diamond with the Compelling Narrative. He was going to be pissed. ¡°Unless¡­.¡± ¡°Sir, are you okay?¡± Princess Leia the cocktail waitress looked worried about my bloody tummy. This shirt was toast. I stripped it off and the champagne cork protruded from my FUPA like a chonky wooden nipple. ¡°Can I get you a doctor?¡± ¡°I can¡¯t believe you¡¯re only now asking me that, but no. It¡¯s handled now.¡± I tapped my temple. ¡°I put a cork in it.¡± ¡°Yeah, uh, are you sure that¡¯s sanitary?¡± ¡°No I¡¯m not. Not at all.¡± I got up from the table, dropping my blood-drenched shirt on the floor. The air-conditioning in the bar was set extra cold and it felt sensational against the bare chest of this fat vessel. ¡°Hey, maybe you can help me with something else. I¡¯m supposed to bring a drink to the mortician; you wouldn''t happen to know which car contains the morgue, would you?¡± I could see that before I said anything, this poor girl had never even considered the possibility there¡¯d be a car full of corpses. It was written all over her face. ¡°Nevermind, I¡¯ll find it.¡± I knew that was doubtful. The train was damned near 600 cars long and they weren¡¯t all arranged in a straight line. Some were stacked into doubledeckers and others were attached side-by-side to create double and even triple-wide suites suitable for passengers like Lady Gates over there. Speaking of, she wondered where I was going. ¡°It¡¯s early, Sir Kirby. Surely you can stay for one more round?¡± ¡°Sorry, Lady, Sir Kirb¡¯s got places to be.¡± I nodded toward the barman. ¡°But my man over there says they¡¯re serving biscuits and gravy first thing in the a.m.. You in? Say, sevenish?¡± She chuckled, wet and lilting like a songbird drowning in a gold-plated toilet. ¡°Wouldn¡¯t miss it for the world.¡± She shot me that damn wink of hers again. I left the bar heading in the opposite direction from where I¡¯d entered. The first few cars on this side of the bar were the same as the one Alex and I had been assigned to: plain and small. An aisle ran down the middle and there were cabins on either side, six per car. The sliding doors to each were narrow and all had the same window set into the upper half as ours, but most were covered with bed sheets or newspaper or the like. We hadn¡¯t bothered. Handsome Alex had ways of maintaining our privacy right out in the open, when he wanted to. After ten or twenty of these slummier cars, I finally hit the money. All of a sudden everything was detailed in what I assumed was rich mahogany and brass. The aisle down the middle widened, was lined with soft rugs underfoot, and to either side there was only ever one cabin at most per car. This was clearly a stretch where they were attached two-and-three wide. Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere. It felt like it took forever to traverse the luxury cars, but shortly after they ended I came to a locked door. Picking it opened up a new phase of my hunt. ¡°Eureka,¡± I whispered as I felt along the wall inside a train car that had such heavy, industrial vibes I felt like I was back in my goth era. It was the type of thing they¡¯d transport oil or acid in or something. But on the other side of this wall I was feeling up, there were dead things. Humans. I could smell them. A sudden realization struck me. Handsome Alex smelled like coffee because he¡¯d recently been buried in coffee grounds. We¡¯d hidden him in a barrel of grounds once¡ªmany, many years back¡ªwhen we were taking him someplace where we needed to avoid cadaver dogs. I don¡¯t remember where, exactly. A crime scene, I¡¯d guess. The way these bodies smelled on the other side of that wall ¨C I knew right then he¡¯d woven some canine tissues into this vessel¡¯s sinuses, giving my sense of smell the same range and depth as one of those cadaver dogs we¡¯d dodged together decades ago. And then he¡¯d spent who knows how long buried in coffee so that his natural bouquet of decay wouldn¡¯t overpower me. ¡°Fucking thoughtful sonofabitch.¡± I could have cried. I found a loose panel, pressed it, and the outline of a door appeared. Steam hissed out from the edges and I laughed. This shit was just so fun. Secret doors to secret morgues. You¡¯d have to be even deader inside than I was not to love it. The door was locked so I got out my kit. This vessel wasn¡¯t as dextrous as the last one and I admit it took me a good twenty minutes to pick the damn thing, but finally the lock tumbled and I slipped inside the morgue. A pair of operating tables sat in the center of the room. Both held a body, covered by a sheet. The walls were lined with drawers and I could smell that many of them were occupied. My breath puffed out, which was amusing. You forget about stuff like that. And I must have tripped a silent alarm. The door locked again as soon as it closed behind me and the already too-dim lights cut out. I cursed myself but only for a moment because I couldn¡¯t have risked leaving it propped open, anyway. ¡°You¡¯ve stepped right in it this time, Kirbster.¡± I hung my head. ¡°He¡¯ll kill you for sure. And then he¡¯ll bring you back and kill you a second time on principle.¡± I un-muted the chat: Contrite Kirby: Hey bud, you there? Handsome Alex: What trouble has found you this time? Contrite Kirby: I knew you¡¯d say that. Well get ready to eat that chat because I¡¯ve gone and found the motherlode, is what I¡¯ve done. I¡¯m just shooting a note to let you know that in ten, maybe fifteen minutes we¡¯ll be sitting on a stack of essences that should last us all tour. How¡¯d it go with Mina? Handsome Alex: The narrative is complete. We only await your return. Forgive me for assuming you had become entangled in unwanted complications. You have done well in locating the assets. Contrite Kirby: You¡¯re forgiven. Handsome Alex: Have you found a doctor to treat your injury? I had actually forgotten all about it, but now that Alex forced my attention back to the gunshot wound I realized there was an unsettling cold spreading across the vessel¡¯s belly and legs. The fingers tingled with pinpricks, too. I glanced at the last few entries in my log: >The [Bleeding] effect has come to an end. >Your vessel has been affected by [Sleeping Gas]. >[Sleeping Gas] has been purged by [Kirby, Please. I Need You To Stay Sober]. >Current Health: 23% ¡°Oh shit.¡± Way too close for comfort. Also, the sleeping gas must have been completely undetectable. I was lucky that Handsome Alex had evidently anticipated me trying to get high on sleeping gas. Still wasn¡¯t going to thank him for making me immune to whiskey, though. I returned to the chat, but at this point if some security nerd found me in here and so much as breathed on this vessel I¡¯d end up on one of these slabs, so I had to come clean: Contrite Kirby: Alright look I fucked up. I need a portal. Handsome Alex: Impossible. I refer to the portal, of course. That you would find some way to sabotage our efforts was nigh inevitable. Contrite Kirby: Brother, I gotta have it, I¡¯m sorry. Handsome Alex: We possess supplies to open but a single bone portal during this venture, Kirby, and we will require it for the final maneuver. What trouble are you in? Contrite Alex: I¡¯m locked inside the morgue. I tripped an alarm, so they¡¯re gonna be here any minute. And I might have let my health fall down to 23%. Alex didn¡¯t answer again in the chat, but I could feel his rage from here. I could only see anything in the morgue by the eerie green light cast by some random medical monitor, but I hurried to the operating tables in the center of the room and dragged the sheets off both. I put my hands on their cold throats and squeezed gently. The corpse under my right hand was a nobody. A cook. He liked to paint, but he wasn¡¯t any good at it. Thirty-one years old with entirely average attributes across the board. I harvested him anyway. We were going to need as many bone essences as we could get our hands on now, and humans were practically overflowing with bones. The other body belonged to Rajah Superbus. He was perfect: Rajah Superbus. Human. Male. Age 27 at time of death by overdose. Notable Attributes: 1) Presence(15-30 essences) 2) Stamina(5-10 essences) 3) Agility(5-10 essences) Notable Talents: 1) [Singalong] 2) [Swagger] 3) [Stage Dive] I closed my eyes, and his soul was still warm in there. I drew it up though the palm of my hand and received a stream of notifications: >Harvest Results. Rajah Superbus. >>>27 Presence, 10 Stamina, and 10 Agility essences. >>>206 Bone, 192 Blood, and 127 Tissue essences. >>>[Singalong], [Swagger], and [Stage Dive] frameworks have been collected. >Your [Reap] skill has gained a Rank. >Your [Reap] skill has gained new utility. ¡°Sweet.¡± I called up the updated skill description: [Reap] Necromancy. Soul Magic. No Mana Cost Rank: 3 Description: [Rank 1]Harvests essences and talents from the soul of a recently-deceased asset. [Rank 2]Provides pre-harvest analysis of potential assets. [Rank 3]Allows harvest from multiple simultaneous assets. Physical contact restriction removed. The timing of this rank-up couldn¡¯t have been better. I needed to harvest every soul in this morgue and I needed to do it ten minutes ago. Suddenly the door opened up behind me with a hiss. ¡°Get your hands where I can see them!¡± screamed the security nerd who entered. ¡°Alright, be cool.¡± I spread my hands out wide at my sides. I could feel Reap yearning to activate, like the spell had a will of its own now. ¡°Maybe we can work something out.¡± ¡°What are you doing in here?¡± A flashlight lit me up from behind and imposed my shadow on the far wall. Security Dude must have noticed the withered condition of the corpses laying atop the slabs on either side of me, because then he asked, ¡°What in the fuck?¡± Over on the wall, the edge of my shadow began to burn with purple flames. It hit me that if this security nerd hadn¡¯t shown up and lit me up, I wouldn¡¯t have had much of a shadow for Handsome Alex to drag me through. The purple flames coalesced into purple bones, thousands of them, forming a frame around the darkness which was no longer my mere shadow. It now had obvious, impossible depth and it didn¡¯t matter if Dude turned the flashlight off now; the portal would remain until I passed through it or died trying. I activated Reap ¨C or maybe it¡¯d be more accurate to say I unleashed it. It felt like a dozen ravenous eels leapt out of me at every angle. The corpse-filled drawers all slammed open at the same time. Green and purple auroras danced in the air, flowing from their bodies to mine. Nice touch, I thought. Hopefully every rank up came with similarly upgraded aesthetics. The security dork saw all this haunted house shit going down and must have pissed his pants. He started screaming and blasting away. I hit the deck and army-crawled toward the portal as sparks flew off the wall all around it. Motherfucker had a machine gun, I swear. I couldn¡¯t begin to count all the essences and talents flowing into me as I fled. I prayed I wouldn¡¯t get hit by a ricochet. Even that would probably eject me and losing this vessel now would ruin everything. And no, I won¡¯t confess to whom or what I prayed. But goddamn if it didn''t work. [3] Dare Not To Utter His Name ¡°Whaddya mean it didn¡¯t work? I¡¯m here, ain¡¯t I?¡± I was sitting on a bench seat in our cabin wearing a too-small concert T for a band I didn¡¯t recognize. I Am Shartacus was stretched taut across my ample man-bosom. Handsome Alex was propped up on the bench across from me, his bones situated between a trio of red velvet pillows as he often requested. My butt was asleep from tailbone-to-taint. ¡°If I made it through the portal and ended up back here, then what¡¯s the problem?¡± I gestured to indicate my whole body. ¡°And I mean check me out. I made it through. I¡¯m right here.¡± ¡°In fact you did not.¡± Handsome Alex¡¯s eyes lit up with amber light emphasizing each syllable. ¡°The bone portal was altered in several ways the exact moment you entered. First, it was made to exclude blood and tissue from transport. Some hours ago, your vessel emerged as bones, only. I have spent the past four hours weaving it back together.¡± I realized suddenly that the sun had come up. The time-skip was disorienting. Handsome Alex continued. ¡°Another effect of the portal¡¯s unexpected reconfiguration was the rapid, unpreventable application of several valuable essences to your soul. Unfortunately we will be unable to remove them. The plan will likely need to adapt now to include you in a performance role.¡± ¡°Wait. Wait. What do you mean the portal was altered? An unexpected reconfiguration? How could you let that happen?¡± None of this made any sense. I squinted hard at Handsome Alex. ¡°That¡¯s it, isn¡¯t it? Of course it is. You didn¡¯t let it happen. You wouldn¡¯t. You¡¯re too much of a pro for one of your portals to go haywire. So something else is going on here. Something fucked with the portal; something so powerful you couldn¡¯t counter it.¡± I stopped. I thought. It was a lot easier with this freshly-woven meat-brain. ¡°Oh shit, don¡¯t tell me it was¡ª¡± ¡°Stop there. Your instinct is correct, but dare not to utter his name. Not so soon after his influence has been imprinted upon this realm.¡± The door to our cabin slid open just then and Mina entered. Her eyes sparkled as she saw me. ¡°Hey! Uncle Kirby! You finally made it!¡± She rushed up and caught me in a hug. She loved me, I could really feel it. In her mind, she¡¯d known her Uncle Kirby since she was a child; longer than he¡¯d even existed. She had a lifetime of memories with her two wacky uncles, all courtesy of Alex¡¯s Compelling Narrative. ¡°Hey, kid.¡± I peeled my way out of her hug and she went over to her guitar case and got it out. It was an old Gibson Flying V. The whole thing was painted to match her penis-torture tattoo. She started tuning it and I returned my talk with Handsome Alex. ¡°I feel weird, Bud. Real weird.¡± ¡°A revelation which comes as no surprise. Before we proceed any further, I must insist you take complete stock of the major changes your vessel has undergone.¡± ¡°Alright, one sec.¡± I first tried checking my logs out of habit but there were thousands of entries I¡¯d missed and parsing whatever Handsome Alex was referring to would have been impossible. The quickest skim showed me dozens of notifications from the corpses I¡¯d mass-reaped, literally thousands of essences being harvested, followed by entering the portal where things got all jacked up, then having all my blood and tissues stripped away, dying, being put back together by Alex, and finally waking up hours later to find my butt asleep. With the logs a mess, I¡¯d need to scope out my DNA to dig into these supposedly major changes to my vessel, instead: Dead Nerd Appraisal: Ossick Meldrath. Dead Man Walking. Soul Alchemist. 1,621 years old. Current Vessel: Kirby Dufresne. Human. Male. 43 years old. Attributes: 8 Strength 20 Stamina 17 Agility 23 Intellect 4 Spirit 35 Presence Spell and Powers: Rank 5 [Alchemical Soul Conjunction] Rank 5 [Alchemical Soul Dissection] Rank 5 [Alchemical Soul Purification] Rank 1 [Child of Rivulon] Rank 2 [Down Here, We All Float] Rank 5 [Mend Soul] Rank 2 [Putrefaction] Rank 3 [Reap] Rank 1 [Rivulon¡¯s Pact] Rank 2 [Shadow Boxers] Rank 2 [Weird] Talents and Traits: MUNDANE[Insurance Salesmanship] EPIC[Kirby, Please. I Need You To Stay Sober] LEGENDARY[Singalong] LEGENDARY[Stage Dive] LEGENDARY[Swagger] GOD TIER[Voice of Rivulon] ¡°Alex,¡± I said, ¡°what the shit. Why would he do this?¡± ¡°One could sooner shoot one¡¯s piss into space and extinguish the sun, than comprehend the motivations of beings as ancient and inscrutable as the Old Gods.¡± What did he just say? A hairline fracture suddenly zig-zagged from the top of Handsome Alex¡¯s skull to the bony ridge of his brow. I couldn¡¯t handle that right now. I had to focus on what Rivulon¡ª ¡ªon what the R-word had done to me. ¡°He¡¯s gone and made me into the baddest motherfucker since Freddie, is what he¡¯s done.¡± ¡°On the contrary, Her Royal Majesty¡¯s presence attribute never exceeded eighteen. Yours is now nearly twice that. The comparisons to historical earth figures would be more accurately limited exclusively to a handful of messianic figures.¡± ¡°He¡¯s gone and made me into a rock and roll god.¡± I felt mad with power. Looking at my DNA, there were a pair of new spells. Both had R-word¡¯s name in them so I was hesitant to even check the descriptions. They¡¯d wait. The legendary talents leapt out at me, of course. And I¡¯d never even heard of a god-tier anything before. Again, I ain¡¯t ashamed to admit I was scared to even read the tooltips for these. But more than anything it was the attribute scores that had me instantly feeling like the belle of the Boner Ball. These I understood at a glance, because the average human scored eights across the board, and without supernatural intervention they could never grow past fifteen in anything. My stamina, agility, and intellect had all shot up to superhero levels.Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon. With a little effort, seventeen agility would let me dodge bullets. But twenty stamina meant I didn¡¯t really need to. And shit, twenty-three intellect might finally make me smart enough to not get shot at in the first place. But it was the presence score that really made my eyes cross and my toes curl. A thirty-five in anything was unheard of, full-fucking-stop. I couldn¡¯t wrap my head around it. I was going to attract followers like some kind of religious figure now. And a marketable religion, at that, not like the Temple of Neverending Agony I was brought up in. Handsome Alex and Mina were just watching me struggling to reckon with it all. ¡°My presence is thirty-five now, dude. Do we even need to win this stupid contest? I think I might just be able to con Emperor Hawijimi into giving us a couple wishes for free now, right?¡± ¡°The Emperor is a powerful reality mage. He is immune to your confidence games.¡± ¡°Fair enough.¡± ¡°Now, I understand your hesitation, Kirby. I empathize, believe it or not. The Old God of the Unraveling is known for his love of intricate traps. But before we go further you will need to study your new talents and traits. It simply cannot be avoided any longer.¡± His insistence was making me nervous. While he was weaving me back together he¡¯d obviously already seen what the R-word did to me, and there was something in there that was going to fuck our plans good, I was sure of it. Stalling for time, I said, ¡°You know he slipped two new spells into my repertoire, too.¡± ¡°I am aware. I believe he forced these incantations into your arsenal as a trap. To use them would almost certainly result in outcomes both unintended and disastrous.¡± ¡°Alright then. Gimme a sec and I¡¯ll read up on these new talents.¡± I still wasn¡¯t eager to read the description for the god-tier Voice of R-Word trait I¡¯d picked up. He was a mean old bastard and I wouldn¡¯t put it past him to replace the tooltip with, like, a spell that turns the reader into an anthropomorphized herpes sore or something. Hard pass on that. Never again. But the three legendary talents I¡¯d acquired were recognizable, at least, the frameworks for which I¡¯d reaped from a corpse named Rajah Superbus right before I¡¯d fled the morgue. ¡°Superbus,¡± I muttered. ¡°Why does that sound familiar?¡± For a moment Handsome Alex¡¯s eyes flared bright yellow but he said nothing. I went ahead with reading the descriptions for all three of my new legendary talents: [Singalong] LEGENDARY TALENT Activating Singalong forces entities within earshot to repeat any phrase you sing. Can be toggled between Concurrent, Harmonic, and Call-Back. This Legendary version allows the talent to function over radio and television signals. Will not affect Gods. Limited effect on Angels and Demons. [Stage Dive] LEGENDARY TALENT Stage Dive is a crowd control ability. You may designate an area of any shape and size. Observers you select will be drawn to the designated area, where they will prepare to catch objects falling from above. This Legendary version allows the talent to function over radio and television signals. Will not affect Gods. Limited effect on Angels and Demons. [Swagger] LEGENDARY TALENT Activating this talent instantly doubles your agility and presence attributes. This Legendary version triples that shit. I paused. My blood, which was brand new, started to boil. ¡°Alex, did you plant a fucking story in my head, man?¡± I got up from the bench. ¡°We had a deal¡ª¡± ¡°He means to drive a wedge between us. You have my word as your partner, Kirby, I have not and will never employ my narratives upon you. More importantly, you have my word as your brother. He has given you unfathomable power. You are now indisputably stronger than I and he expects you to resent the hierarchy of our operation, where we have agreed I am empowered as the ultimate decision maker. The suspicious entries inserted into the tooltips are entirely of his devising, I assure you.¡± I looked at the tiny crack which had appeared on his forehead earlier. ¡°It¡¯s all about destroying you, isn¡¯t it?¡± ¡°As it has always been. My utmost regret in undeath is that I have drawn you into our conflict. This is my curse. I, alone, should bear it. You must read the final trait now, Kirby. It is unlike the talents taken from Superbus.¡± ¡°Alright, alright. Hey, why is that name familiar? Superbus. Do you know?¡± ¡°Superbus is the stage name of the Drix Consortium¡¯s acquisition arm.¡± ¡°Oh shit, those are the guys from that pocket dimension full of murderbots, right? They had a band entered in the contest?¡± ¡°Correct. And I have learned while you were indisposed that a cloned replacement frontman will arrive shortly, having already departed a titan-class warship currently in orbit of Saturn, which will allow their skew to perform tonight as required.¡± Skew was a phonetic pronunciation of the acronym for Sonic Combat Unit. The word felt extra-cringe coming from an ancient evil like Handsome Alex. ¡°They represent perhaps our toughest competition.¡± ¡°I can¡¯t believe they want to colonize Earth right when we¡¯re about to conquer it. I mean, I can believe it. Their dimension is full of killer robots and whatnot. But still!¡± ¡°Kirby, our reason for entering this contest is not to conquer Earth. Now, please, view the tooltip for your newly-acquired trait.¡± ¡°I know the goal is to break your curse, Bud, but if we can take over the world at the same time I¡¯ve always felt like we really gotta go for it.¡± ¡°The tooltip, Kirby. I beg you.¡± ¡°Alright, alright.¡± I laughed, but I felt legit anxiety when I looked at the entry on the very bottom of my Dead Nerd Analysis: [Voice of Rivulon] GOD-TIER TRAIT Sing, my child, and the worms will enter their brains. That was it. ¡°¡®The worms will enter their brains¡¯?¡± My face screwed up in confusion. ¡°I think that¡¯s Floyd, right? But that¡¯s it? What¡¯s it even mean?¡± ¡°I do not precisely know, but I have suspicions. He is the personification of the Unraveling. His goal is and has always been to break, but not outright destroy.¡± ¡°That¡¯s why he doesn¡¯t just snuff you out of existence, right? He wants to drive you insane; change who you are.¡± ¡°Correct.¡± A centipede as thick as my wrist wriggled out of Handsome Alex¡¯s eye-socket. He ignored it as it crawled onto the floor and began to shriek in a tinny voice. ¡°He will not break me.¡± ¡°Man, this could really put a twist in our plans, eh? How do you think we should move forward from here?¡± ¡°Nothing has changed in that regard. Same as before, we must build the skew in time for tonight¡¯s performance or we will be disqualified and required to exit the competition.¡± His eyes flared with what I can only describe as renewed fervor. ¡°We will begin with Miss Mina.¡± Mina stopped tuning her Flying V and turned to look into those glowing eyes set in his ancient skull. She smiled with excitement. ¡°Oh, oh! Is it finally time for Uncle Kirby to play with my soul?¡± ¡°Uh, yep.¡± Her eagerness to have me fuck around with her immortal soul was a little unnerving. That was the thing about a well-built Compelling Narrative; what made it perfect for this job. Without that enthusiastic consent, I couldn¡¯t do shit to enhance her beyond human limitations. Neither could Handsome Alex. Not without killing her. Mina Diamond grinned at the skin-suit she thought of as her dear Uncle Kirby. ¡°This is so bitchin¡¯.¡±