Chương 79: Chapter 76

Wade looked at her. Illy looked back.

"I'll take a wild guess Nox had no idea what Apex Legends means."

"I do not either." Selena said from that back, probably coming to her goddess's defense.

"I can sense it isn't a literal peak legend however?" Her ears twitched as Market's Blessing was feeding her some kind of context about it.

"A… game? Is it similar to what you explained about your world and powers? Is an Apex Legends Player more powerful than you are?" Illy shook her head, "No, what we got is only loosely inspired by these video games. Those games are just that, games. And don't worry about missing the context, it ain't just an Azdrial native problem. I fecking didn't know what it was either until I looked it up." Selena's ears waggled.

"It's some first person shooter game, barely been out a year and there's already enough playing it to get a worldwide tournament. Heard somewhere there's more money in video games these days than the whole bloody film industry, starting to think that's not a made up fact. Bet those developers are laughin' all the way to the bank."

"First person shooter?" Selena asked.

"That's going to take a while to answer." Wade said.

"Maybe after this call's up you should show her some of these games. We're all technically in one now. What's Nox's reason for picking you over the 'sports legend'?"

"She figured military connections would be more useful than some bloke who's good at sports. But she's convinced some of the other gods are gonna make right mental choices, so we'll have to deal with some odd folks. Some of these gods aren't all there in the heid, like they're so bloody controlled by their domain they make about as much sense as priest stripper." She stopped.

"Wait, no that one does make for a good bachelorette party. Feck, you know what I mean. Nox says Gods that deal with emotions or thoughts tend to be like that, totally warped. Being a moon goddess, she's not as mental as the rest. And especially one that's got no moon anymore. Anything that's influencing her is secondhand at best, so she's very lucid." Wade thought about that for a moment. The image of Play in his mind, and how'd she almost instantly turned into a NEET. It seemed destined given her domains.

"Speaking of, this brings us to the main reason I'm moving the timelines up. Got a quest when I was chatting with her about the other gods in this game. And there's one we should be worried about. War. Apparently, he's the type of bawbag that thinks Earth shouldn't exist. Like, if Azdrial's destined to kick the bucket, then everyone should go down with it. Anyone trying to flee is the enemy. That god's completely off his rockers. And he's picked some rocket to help him cut the ties. That's the problem."

New Personal Quest - Killing the Serial Killer: Eliminate War's sponsored champion. Rewards: One Gold Lootbox. Three storefront coins. Oh. That's not good.

"… Serial killer?" And it awarded a gold lootbox and three storefront coins. Which meant the System probably considered it difficult.

"I see you got the same quest. It's exactly what it reads, War picked a serial killer, and we're pretty sure it's with the direct intention of hunting and offing other Players. And I don't mean killing them in Azdrial, I mean here on this rock." Wade was starting to see why Illy had such an aggressive timeline with bringing in the world powers.

"Err…" Wade did have Eri right behind him. The skeleton would be able to beat just about anything with his level… but Players were different. The boons they got would mess with everything. If the Serial Killer had a strong enough boon or used one creatively enough, they could kill Wade before Eri could act. Or kill Eri himself directly. Wade had beaten things higher level. It was a bad assumption to imagine nobody else could pull that feat off.

But he could understand now why Illy had gone from being cautious to trying to move the timetables faster.

"How fast is your plan getting into action?"

"Fast, but not fast enough. Father's flyin' to the estate in seven days, we'll make the case to him then. But it'll be more than seven days before we get logistics support."

"Wait, wasn't your little half-brother having a birthday in a few days?" Wade was a little fuzzy on the details.

"Aye, he is."

"Your dad isn't there right now?" Illy looked at him for a moment, then laughed.

"I can count on one hand how many birthdays Da's been with me at. And it's always just coincidence that he was by the estate when it happened. Others in the family have nothing better to do so they all came. Not the same for him."

"I'd think 'hey there's an entire other world with magic, and we have an elf here' would get his attention. Or 'I need some protection because we have a serial killer problem.'"" Harrison rang him direct, but it's a wee bit hard to swallow without hard evidence. Plus the birthday party is a problem. He thinks this is a ploy by the estate staff to get him to come to Thomas's birthday, and that they somehow convinced Harrison to join in.

Only reason he's coming at all is that Harrison agreed to be fired if Father shows up and it ends up a prank. But even after he comes, it won't be all done in one day. Expect some time for it all to shake out." Wade calculated his chances. Play wasn't answering texts right now, it was the afternoon so that NEET was probably sleeping. Assuming the goddess slept. So getting advice from her was off the table for now. To be a threat to Wade, they'd need to be nearby Los Angeles. Which was already small on the chances.

Seemed the System was a worldwide thing, so there's equal chances they'd showed up in another country. After that, the serial killer would need to locate them in specific somehow, out of all the other ninty something players out there.

"I think we should be fine so long as we don't paint a target over us and make it clear to the world we're Players, I can setup my company underground first."

"Don't get all high and mighty, that's how we get shanked."

"All right, fine, what's your suggestion then? What should we be doing?"

"We keep our eyes open on how many sods are still alive about in this game." Illy waved her hands, trying to ram home the plan.

"If that number starts dropping like flies outside of Azdrial, we know shite is happening and the Serial Killer is legit dangerous. According to Nox, War's older than dirt, and a right powerful weapon. He's one of the few gods left that's strong enough to grant a blessing. And if Market's blessing was good enough to do all of that to you, imagine what War's blessings could do?" Wade gulped, suddenly realizing this might actually be a problem.

Sure he had a video game system, but he was still quite squishy right now.

"Keep Eri close to ya for the moment. I'm moving things along as fast as we can without mucking it up. Too fast, and we lose our leverage. You yanks have that saying, speak softly and carry a big stick. Well, we need that stick." They shared a few more possible plans, but until they knew more about the serial killer, there wasn't much deviation to what they could do. Keep sharp, and watch for the signs.

If other players start getting wacked, then it's likely the killer really does have some kind of tracking ability.

"So what happens after your dad knows about Selena? And believes in all… uh, this." Illy took out a piece of paper with multiple notes and bullets. It looked like she'd plotted just about all possible items neatly down.

"Right, so here's how I predict it'll go down: The military will be ages sorting out Father's pish, probably think he's gone mental at the start. Soon as the right people actually get some proof, things will snowball fast, but only internally. The brass'll guard this intel like it's the crown jewels." Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

"You think they'll keep quiet about this from everyone else?"

"Not forever. Until they decide everyone else is about to find out anyhow, or they've extracted everything they could get out of knowing before the others do. First mover advantage is a real thing." Illy said.

"By the time the rest of the world catches wind from other Players making waves, it'll either be a right free-for-all or the big powers'll play nice through the UN. Good news, doesn't matter a toss to us at that point."

"You think we'll have the stick by then?"

"Without a doubt. We'll have spent a month or more in Azdrial, collecting gear and boons all the while by then." Illy said, tapping a few bullet points on her sheet.

"First mover advantage, like I said. At our rate, they'd come crawling with sweeties and fancy gifts instead of scientists with their pokey instruments and attitudes worse my own. I'm anticipating we're not the only ones that'll make waves, but at least the UK will see me as an ally from the start. What we have to do is make sure you're in a good position when the USA starts getting involved. No telling how your government will react."

New Personal Quest: Foundation - Gain sufficient capital power to become a mover among world governments. Rewards: Seven Storefront Coins.

"Hah. Got a quest for exactly that. Reward amount is making me nervous though." Wade said, re-reading it all to her. Illy, on the other hand, had gotten something different.

"Just got a quest too, but lot different to yours. Feck, says I need to get back into the graces of my family here and get them aligned under me. Rewards are a copper lootbox."

"Why the giant difference?" Wade asked.

"I think this is more to do with your Market blessing. Moving gear and bodies about's would inevitably stack up a different kind of power than pure might by default. We're talking a small village real soon. Or a refugee camp at absolute minimum. You got a quest to outright bring back Market's followers? Have you thought about where they go?" A village sounded difficult to manage. But a corporation? That appealed to Wade a whole lot more.

He sensed some ethical, legal, and probably a toilet paper roll's amount of other issues to iron out - but companies already offered relocation packages to prospective employees to get them to move from city to city. He'd be doing the same here, just the relocation package included going to a completely new world. Same thing, right? Maybe a tiny bit of law issues with illegal aliens from a fantasy deathworld who probably couldn't be deported back.

That seemed like a problem Zin could take care of temporarily until the governments got involved. Right now, a small handful that could all fit in a large mansion would probably be fine. There was a bigger issue: "I have zero idea how to even find them. Market said there were something like seven left alive in the world. We might only be smuggling gear and items into Earth for a little bit before we bring people."

That'd be a lot easier to handle, Wade's main problems still involved paying rent on time, learning how to not die in the other world, and doing research on tax avoidance - which was a completely legal thing to do and absolutely not related to tax evasion, which was highly illegal and frowned on.

"Have you found him yet?" Illy said, interrupting Wade's completely legal musings, "Market I mean. Maybe he's got something he can tell you now that we got more info."

"It's on the to-do list, but it's a little hard finding a homeless guy out in the city here." He looked over to Eri. At least if he got jumped, he had a bodyguard now. Might be safe to venture out where Market might be bumming it out. He was the god of fortune after all, could just be lucky to find Wade a second time when he needed it?

"Don't think Leon's bringing people anytime soon," Illy said, "But if a boon can drag a mana crystal over, then there's a fair chance more boons exist that'll let us do some kind of ferry service. Maybe not as good or conclusive as your blessing, but good enough to work with."

"Talking about him, can you send me his info? You're probably going to sleep soon, but it's still early afternoon here." Wade said.

"Rather knock that out earlier than later."

"Oh, I ain't going to sleep anytime soon bampot, remember the jump leaves me feeling like I already got eight hours of sleep. Yer stuck with Selena and I for the night, I'm planning on staying awake and finding out the exact time we get yanked off to Narnia." That wasn't a bad idea at all, now that Wade thought about it.

"Now what's the app we're moving on?" Illy asked.

"I'll ping Leon that I found yer sorry arse, he'd been asking me to do that first thing when I get clear of the chaos here. All I had time for so far was swapping a few texts." As it turned out Zin's little choice of app was indeed fully encrypted and came with quite a lot of good features. Including video chats, which Zin swore up and down were more reliable. Wade's wifi was pretty terrible, given it was the cheapest possible internet plan he could get so he wasn't quite certain he'd get all those benefits.

So long as it was good enough for 1080p youtube videos, it was good enough for the low resolution video calls this app used. Leon's face appeared on the screen, pixelated at first before resolving into a clearer image. A broad smile spread across his features when he spotted Wade.

"Wade! Is good to see you again." His accent rolled pleasantly through each word.

"And Illy, you're finally online. What took so long? Thought we were friends." Wade greeted the big man back, while Illy went onto a small rant about certain moonwing elves and their insistence on family armor. Leon was up to speed soon enough.

"How's Las Vegas on your side?" Wade asked, curious what he'd been up to. The answer to that was not much, just a regular day like any other. He'd come back and stared at his homework and current schedule as a tutor looking, thinking the world had just changed completely, doing any of it was almost a waste of time now. He'd also gone shopping today, but when asked what he'd gotten, he'd just smiled.

"Is surprise, until right time to talk about. But enough about that, Illy say you quit already. Moving fast and adapting, da?" Out of the three of them, Illy had been the fastest to adjust and move on with the new reality, but she'd also started that day with Selena, so that made things easier for her.

"Had Play's butler to give me a slap into gear, but otherwise I'm handling the change as well as I can I think." Wade said.

"I figured it's hard to run a business empire from behind a Hobby Froggy counter." Also Bob would be the kind of dick that would demand some kind of kickback or another for doing personal work while under his roof.

"Talking about business, I hear you managed to smuggle a mana crystal before I could?" Leon chuckled, "Ah yes, business. I see you have sights set high already," He reached off-screen. When his hand returned to view, he held something that glowed with a soft bluish light.

"Look what I have, my friend." Leon's voice carried the pride of someone who'd pulled off something impossible.

"Last meal I ate in Azdrial, now on earth." Wade tried to identify it. Smartphone - System Quality Right. Because Leon wasn't actually here, this was just a video call. He didn't know what he expected. Well, that sucked. But good to know he couldn't identify through screens. Still disappointing. Illy gave a slight grin, getting the wrong idea from his reaction.

"Not enjoying the idea of competition, eh?"

"What? Me? No way." Wade started, almost on autopilot.

"My competition's services are limited to whatever he can fit in his mouth. I hardly feel threatened, considering what I can do. Could do. Theoretically." He'd never gotten out of Azdrial alive yet, but seems it was just an hours-spent issue. He'd just fix that problem. Not dying was on the to-do list. He'd be getting things smuggled back here as soon as he resolved that problem.

"Anyhow, what's Identify returning it as?""'Medium Mana Crystal.'" Leon said with a shrug.

"Not very expensive according to the demons on the boat.

"Well, better than nothing. If you can, try to replicate one each time you can." Wade said.

"There's probably going to be better uses in the future. Play's butler is after these things and would trade good stuff for them."

"Might meet him in person faster than you expect." Illy said.

"Leon, Las Vegas is only three hours away to Los Angeles. And Wade's got no car. You need to drive down to him, tonight. Probably in a few hours."

"Oh? Why the rushing?"

"Remember that chat earlier about a serial killer on the loose? Better keep close to each other just for minimum safety at the least. Wade's got Eri there, you ain't got jack shite except that hammer. Wade, can you hold him wherever you live at?"

"Uh, sure." Wade said.

"You might need to pack a sleeping bag or something. My bed's a twin." Leon thought about it for a moment. Then shrugged.

"Eh, is end of the world. Why not? Will cancel plans here and road trip it is. Send address when you have it, will be there in a few hours."

"Oh, think ye can just nab a few shooters from a gun shop in Nevada? Or however you yanks get 'em. You lot probably get free firearms with your happy meals." Wade realized a few things all at once: He could just jump the border and buy a gun with a lot less difficulty than California. Duh. Zin likely knew this and didn't mention it to Wade because then that'd be one less item Zin could sell Wade, he was angling to do it himself and then hold those guns in exchange for favors.

And finally, none of the above changed a thing for Wade since he didn't have a car in the first place. But Leon did.

"Nyet." Leon said, ruining Wade's daydreams.

"Have student visa only. Can give a try, but thinking gun shops will prefer to not get in trouble over one extra customer. But, I do have weapon."

"You already have a gun?" Wade asked, more surprised.

"KGB agent, remember? I have three guns hidden in cereal box, best hiding place."

"Yer full of shite." Illy called out.

"I can smell it all the way here." Leon laughed, then moved his phone to show something inside his small dorm room. It was not a gun. It was a full on longsword. High quality too.

"Is what I was buying earlier today. I have very interesting boon for this round. Called Swordmaster. And it is not common rarity." Both Wade and Illy whistled when he heard the full details.

"I remember you telling us you were more a cheerleader last round against Lapushka." Wade said, calculating what the group could pull off.

"I think you can retire the pom poms this time." Wade's own boons so far had all been common. The best he had to work with, had been his Skyviper archer, which had been upgraded to uncommon. What Leon got was one step further. Swordsmaster (Exceptional)