Chương 58: Let’s call it the “Code Venom.”

George blew out a breath, laid down on the edge of the platform, and repeated the same procedure to slide his body over the edge until he was once again hanging from the lightrope just beneath the bottom of the platform. George looked down and said, "Ho, boy." >>Now, just extend the lightrope a bit. We need to get lower. The token will be in range in about five seconds. George willed the light grapple to pay out more of the strange lightrope and his body slowly sank several feet. >>There you go. Easy.

See the token below you? George looked down and the prestige token was passing just a few feet below his toes. He let go of the lightrope with one hand and cast draw downward. Collected: 1 prestige token (21 total). >>The next step is a bit of a challenge, but I have COMPLETE faith in you and think it is VERY UNLIKELY that we are about to die.

"What?" George shouted.

"You aren't going to drop us again, are you?" >>Nope. >>Just do as I tell you. >>Extend the lightrope another fifteen feet or so… oookay… there! Stop. >>Now, kick your legs so that you start to swing. >>Yep. That's it. More of that. George pitched his legs forward in jerky movements that slowly smoothed out as his body swung back and forth. >>Nice one. Now, we need to time this right, but the lightrope is the perfect length so that the arc of your swing will intersect that platform ahead of us if you keep swinging.

>>I'll lengthen the rope at just the right time and set us down for a nice, soft landing. If we slide when we land, just use Bind to connect one of your gauntlets to the platform. Good? >>That's it! Keep pumping. >>This is going to work. >>KEEP PUMPING! George was breathing hard, timing his leg swings and arm pulls as the arc widened with each pass. One swing rose nearly level with the platform ahead of him as it drifted by. >>This is it! Next swing! George swung back, then surged forward on the return.

At the bottom of the arc, he knew he wasn't going to make it—the platform had already drifted too far ahead. He shot upward, slicing through the space it had just left behind. At the peak, time seemed to stall. He turned his head and watched the platform slide away to his right, just out of reach. >>Whoops! >>Nod taking over! Nod cut the lightrope and George felt himself start to fall. Nod controlled George's arm and pointed the light grapple at the far end of the receding platform.

He shot the grapple at the leading edge and paid out enough lightrope to turn his fall into a swift swing. At the bottom of the swing, Nod quickly contracted the lightrope, causing George's body to accelerate on the upswing. >>This is going to hurt… George swung around the front of the platform and suddenly he was above it. The circle of his swing kept going and the now-short tether of the rope slammed George's body onto the top of the platform so hard that he bounced. But he didn't fall.

George coughed and curled into a ball.

"Ow," he groaned. >>I know, right! Just imagine what would have happened without the armor. >>You'd have been splattered. George rolled onto his back. His left side had taken most of the impact and he could feel a long, deep throbbing on that side of his body. It wasn't the pain of broken bones, but he couldn't imagine doing any more swinging any time soon.

"I quit," George said.

"Let's wait here for the portal." >>You're right. This isn't working. >>Telling you what to do won't be fast enough. >>And you're just going to keep missing things. >>And then we won't get tons of tokens. >>And then we won't be the star of the next voting round. >>We need a new plan. >>I want my 100 tokens, George.

"Ok, what if we just climb straight down?" George suggested.

"I can lower us down as far as the lightrope can go and then we wait until a platform comes by and then repeat it again. We'll get lower but we won't have to swing around." >>Hmm. I'm not going to say that is a bad idea because I know you are trying your best. >>However, I have something a little less passive in mind. You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version. >>Let's call it the "Code Venom."

>>With your thick head, and my bloodthirsty, amoral savvy, the Eddie Brock-Symbiote relationship is probably more our brand than "Peter Parker," anyway.

"I'm not going to like this idea, am I?" George said. >>The good thing is that you won't have to do much. >>Actually, that is the whole idea. >>Let Noddy take the wheel. >>Falling is just physics… >>…and I'm great at physics. >>Ready?

"Wait, ready for what?" George said. >>Just draw those tokens when I tell you to, Georgie. >>And remember… you picked this. >>We could have been gently floating down right now like a little autumn leaf… George felt his arm reach up toward a nearby platform and he watched his hand form a fist.

"Nod, stop. No!" George shouted as the dot of light flashed and the lightrope appeared again. Nod made it contract and George's body lifted upwards and swung out over the edge of the platform.

"Shiiiit!" George screamed as he reflexively clung to the rope with both hands. >>Wahoooooo! Nod lengthened the rope, and they accelerated downward in a wide arc. >>Get the token, George! Their trajectory took them past a prestige token floating in mid-air and George cast draw on it as they swung past. Collected: 1 prestige token (22 total). >>Now, hold on! As soon as Nod said that, George reached the top of the arc of his swing and the lightrope suddenly disappeared before he could start swinging backward.

He flailed his limbs as he started to fall. The arm Nod controlled, however, didn't flail. It cast draw toward a platform above them to reorient his body and then sent out the lightrope again. This time, it caught on a platform directly above them and Nod used it to slow their descent until they came to a stop.

"Oh, thank you," George said.

"Let's just take a little break. I think I pulled something." >>Oh, we'll take a little break, alright. >>Just getting the timing right… >>4. >>3. >>2.

"Nod, no!" George began but his plea turned into a scream when he saw the lightrope disappear again and felt himself start to fall. >>1. Nod let them fall for a few seconds and then sent out a long length of the rope again, turning their fall into a broad, sweeping curve. >>George, draw! >>We're coming through a cluster. The rope pulled him laterally and increased his velocity to the point that it was all George could do to see the prestige tokens, let alone draw them, but he did manage to get a few.

One of them was directly in the path of his swing and actually hit his chest, but that seemed to count. Collected: 1 prestige token (23 total). Collected: 1 prestige token (24 total). Collected: 1 prestige token (25 total). Collected: 1 prestige token (26 total). And it went on like that for the next several minutes. It was all George could do to hold on and draw the tokens when Nod told him to. If the rope had not been physically attached to his wrist, he doubted he would have been able to even do that much.

Nod was unrelenting. He only paused briefly to wait for the paths of platforms to align, and then dropped them into another free fall followed by another shot with the grapple. It was the most violent thing George had yet experienced since waking up without his memory. His body was jerked up, down, sideways, and into tight, hairpin curves as Nod cast and released the grapple again and again.

Sometimes, Nod performed "landings" on one of the platforms that were difficult to distinguish from crashes but Nod just said he was "putting the armor through its paces." But Nod never missed. For all the violence of the experience, the node spider was in complete control. All George had to do was reach out one hand and use his draw power anytime Nod told him to. And it was working. They had descended hundreds of feet—perhaps a thousand—in only a dozen minutes and the prestige token count had more than doubled.

Collected: 1 prestige token (53 total). The last time they'd seen the leaderboard, Neco was at the top of the gold tier with a 99 rating and only 13 tokens. They were on pace to end this Hunting round with more than four times that amount. And they still had jagged time remaining after the challenge room ended. At the five-minute mark, they had descended well into the zone where the platforms were behaving erratically. The platform they were hanging from was racing sideways like it had an AI chauffeur of its own.

Other platforms zipped by, some headed a different direction, some moving up or down within the challenge room. A few platforms flickered in and out of existence like strobes. Some platforms spun in an interlocking pattern like the gears of a giant clock. George could even see platforms at the deeper levels that seemed to be fighting and eating one another. >>Here we go again!

Nod released the lightrope and pointed George's arm down, attaching the grapple to a group of three platforms swimming through the space like a tiny school of fish. He pulled hard on the lightrope as soon as it was anchored and they rocketed down. >>Draw! George cast draw and got another token. Collected: 1 prestige token (54 total). As the challenge room timer ticked down to its last minutes, Nod told him there were fifteen tokens packed close to each other in a vertical stack at the bottom of the room.

It was the densest concentration of tokens left in range, but it was still 400 feet below them and about 300 feet away to one side. >>Long story short… gird your loins, Georgie. I'm going to slingshot us around that platform down there. >>Don't worry about drawing… I am going to drop us down right on top of them. >>If we can get there fast enough. Nod flashed the light grapple onto a platform careening toward them from behind and cinched in the rope as it passed them, sending them curving behind it at high speed.

George couldn't hold on with his free hand and his vision went black at the edges in the midst of the turn. They turned a long loop behind the platform and then Nod drew the lightrope in again and sent them shooting downward and sideways. >>Going to vomit. >>You better not! >>Puke spatter won't improve conditions inside that helmet! Nod quickly shot the lightrope at three platforms as they flew downward but let the rope catch for a brief second before it flickered off again.

Each cast slowed them and slightly altered their course. >>9 seconds! Assume the brace position! >>What? What are we going to hit?! >>The portal! They were falling straight down on top of the stack of prestige tokens. George felt each one hit the armor as they fell. Collected: 1 prestige token (56 total). … Collected: 1 prestige token (71 total).

"What portal?" George screamed as he saw nothing below them but the white void and, apparently, the very bottom of the challenge room. >>That portal! As he said it, a green circle appeared in front of them and they immediately fell into it. George threw his free hand in front of his face, the sudden image of flying into a wall in the vehicle garage filling his mind. They surged through the portal and outpaced the green sparks as George slid across the smooth floor of the garage on his belly.

They'd come in at ground level and somehow his vertical momentum had been transformed into horizontal momentum. His armor sent out a rooster tail of sparks behind them as George slid and rolled to a stop. He lay on his back and panted, trying to figure out if any of his bones were broken. The cartoonish figure of Pal, the assistant robot hovered into view and said, "Wow! Are you OK?" He tapped on George's helmet with one plastic hand. George couldn't respond. >>Hey, George. >>You were right.

>>The light grapple was much better than the slowfall belt. >>That was FUN!