Chapter 3: Trains and Introspection

Isaac hopped on his laptop and bought a ka-bar off amazon, to be delivered in a couple of days. At least that was what the website still promised, though the current situation would likely throw a serious wrench into that.

Of course, if there was one employer whose employees went in regardless of how terrible the overall situation and working conditions were, it was amazon.

Once he’d gotten that out of the way, he downloaded Tor Browser and installed it. Once Isaac had gotten truly involved in the mess surrounding powerful summons directly, a lot of the coordination had no longer needed to be hidden from various interested parties, instead running through the communication channels of the governments desperately trying to put a lid on the ever expanding problem.

But he had spent enough time in that particular part of the internet to at least know his way around a little. Using both the limited anonymity provided by the Tor browser and various other anti-tracking tools he planned to download somewhere other than his home Wi-Fi, he’d eventually release the paper he was writing.

For now, however, all he needed to do was type in the URL for a particular website from memory. He’d only met with the people controlling it a single time and that had been well after everything went to shit, but someone had mentioned the “innovative” idea of having a proper website during a night of heavy drinking.

Quickly, Isaac typed in a short message about having obtained a pair of powerful, [System] related items and wanting to sell them.

It took all of five minutes to get a response back. While it might have been an entire page long, it basically boiled down to “we’re interested, but you’d better not be screwing us”.

A couple of minutes later, he’d already booked his train ticket to Milan and was on the way to the station, with only a backpack for luggage.

Isaac ran down the stairs of his apartment building, quietly reflecting on how easy this would have been if he’d been willing to use his powers to their full extent. In the other timeline, during that short timeframe in between becoming truly powerful and the world going to shit, he’d had a habit of just walking outside his apartment and dropping through the floor using [Spectral Shift], one story at a time. But sadly, that kinds of shenanigans a mere eleven hours after Initialization would raise some serious eyebrows.

Sure, selling to the people he’d just contacted would do the same, but they wouldn’t be quick to spread any information about him.

He’d dressed in an incredibly eye drawing, neon green shirt, but he tried to avoid drawing looks as well as he could. The sheer incongruity of an eye-catching garb and avoiding actually catching gazes would help level his [Sneak] [Skill].

Once he’d reached the central station, he immediately entered the train to Milan and started trying to lose people’s gazes the moment he’d acquired them.

Fundamentally, [Skills] gained strength through one of three methods.

Continuous use did eventually level up a [Skill], but that would take for-ev-er.

One could also use it against significantly stronger enemies.

And lastly, one could train a [Skill] using one’s own knowledge and experience about what the [Skill] manipulated to make it stronger. Isaac did have over almost a decade’s worth of practice using [Sneak] to vanish from sight. Therefore, wearing something that would catch the eyes of his fellow passengers but avoiding their sight should increase his [Skill] levels quite a bit.

Mind you, there weren’t many people who’d used this particular method in the other timeline, at least not in a way that was documented, so there was’t any historical data to back up the theory.

Isaac leaned back in his train seat and sighed. It was only 6 in the evening, he’d only been awake for eleven hours, but he was so bloody tired. Spending that time fighting monsters and considering monstrous invasions might tend to take a lot out of you, but the Level up had taken care of most of his physical exhaustion.

It was his mind that was exhausted. Fighting that final battle, then ending up in bed without even a single second of sleep in between and doing all the things he’d done … he was asleep mere moments after he’d sat down.

He wasn’t sure how long he rested, however, as he jerked awake the instant the train started moving. Constant fighting in the other timeline’s final years had led to him becoming an incredibly light sleeper, ready to defend himself at the slightest disturbance. A lot of other people who’d learned the same skill had also learned how to sleep through those normal and harmless noises, but he wasn’t quite at that level.

Isaac sighed, closed his eyes and tried to fall asleep again. He was just so tired. It felt like a moment’s inattention would cause his eyes to flutter shut and not open for a week.

This cycle of falling asleep, then waking back up as the train a particularly loud rumble repeated itself perhaps seven, eight times until he eventually grew sick of it. A glance at his watch revealed that it was currently a few minutes after midnight.

With a great sigh, Isaac heaved himself out of his seat and began to walk the length of the train to clear his head. He encountered a mere handful of other people, which felt weird. In his experience, at least half the seats were full. But this train was dead. People were scared, hunkering down in place and waiting for the other shoe to drop.

In fact, only a few trains had actually run in the first place, many of them having been cancelled due to a lack of personnel. It was only due to the actions of a handful of people who were either incredibly diligent workers, had ice water flowing through their veins, or were simply in denial about the state of the world.

People barely going into work for a week had nearly been enough to end society. Vital services had been kept going by a handful of people for the first couple of days, at which point a proper workforce sufficient to tide everything over using a combination of incentives and rather creative threats.

Eventually, Isaac found himself in the train’s restaurant/lounge car. Overpriced food and drinks whose quality in no way justified the cost, proper tables to sit down at, and a large TV screen on the wall. Currently, it showed a heart wrenching scene of a Ghost flitting along the street in some random city somewhere on the globe, leaving bodies lying behind it.

Someone had made the mistake of summoning an Ephemeral type creature, been unable to defeat it and now, it was killing indiscriminately. Even the weakest Ephemeral enemy was sadly unbeatable without a proper attack [Skill] or magic, which very few people had right now.

In the other timeline, Isaac hadn’t known this had happened. It had just been one of countless small tragedies that happened after the Initialization, reported on in the moment but ultimately forgotten, drowned in the flood of similar incidents.

Sadly, there was nothing he could have truly done to prevent this from happening. Even if Isaac had stood up in front of a camera the instant he got back and spilled the beans on everything, how many people would have listened? How many people would have even heard the message?

He had no intention of revealing his entire past just yet, perhaps not ever, for obvious reasons. But knowing that even taking that step, that incredibly dangerous step, would barely help with the situation sucked.

The TV was switched over to a different channel by the sole worker in the car. This time, it showed a more lighthearted, feel good story about a group of firefighters who’d managed to pull off a near flawless rescue during a high rise fire thanks to embracing the [System].

[Pyromancers] to redirect the fire, [Hydromancers] to create water from thin air, people with the actual [Firefighter] [Class] that had gained supernatural powers related to their profession.

The report didn’t actually say just how they’d done this or what [Classes] they’d used, but Isaac could think of plenty of possibilities.

And it might even have made him feel a little bit better …. if it hadn’t been for the scorch marks halfway up the building that he could clearly identify as having been caused by a Fire Spirit. For all the good that the [System] had done in this situation, there wouldn’t have been a situation without it.

Seriously though, what kind of numbskull summoned a creature with fire in the name indoors?

Isaac just shook his head and sighed. People, in general, were intelligent beings, he reminded himself. It was just that the most idiotic were also the ones you heard about on the news. Cue joke about Florida man. He snorted internally as he thought about that. He’d never even been to the States before, but even he’d heard some of the more extreme, yet true, tales.

Funnier still would be the reaction of those firefighters who’d taken an Elemental-[Class] when they realized how much physically stronger their other colleagues would be when they levelled up. When humans tried to think of a fit group, firefighters came to mind, yet soon, some of those people would be nowhere near as strong as their toned bodies indicated. After all, their [Classes] would need a very different stat distribution.

Then again, everything would change. People would be able to do more, do different things, even be capable of entirely new actions that had only been possible in their wildest dreams. That alone would cause chaos, even without getting into the issue about how one person becoming able to do the job of ten people would cause nine people to get fired.

While people could gain XP just by taking actions in line with their [Class], such gains were incredibly small. Therefore, the whole issue hadn’t really become a problem until right before the world had truly gone to shit, but people had been able to see the writing on the wall.

Really, it was the whole automation putting people out of a job issue all over again. There would be new jobs, different jobs, entire new industries created, but how many people would be willing or able to make the switch?

And all of that was ignoring the issue of a world filled with people that could bring down skyscrapers with a wave of their hand. Of course, not everyone would be willing to work to reach those heights as it would become increasingly more difficult and dangerous to advance as one’s Level rose, but some would. At what point would law enforcement no longer be able to keep up with the criminals they tried to arrest?

Isaac was here to save humanity from the monsters that the [System] had brought with it and even had the beginnings of a solid plan on how to achieve that, but he had no idea how to save humanity from itself. Or even if he was the one who’d be doing it.

Sure, he wanted to help, but really, those kinds of societal issues would be better handled by someone with a wholly different skillset. One less focused on murder and mayhem and more on getting along with people you didn’t really like.

The sheer amount of change the world was about to go through was mind boggling. Even Isaac, who’d both seen the beginnings of said change happen and over a decade’s worth of time to think about the possible consequences only knew about a fraction of what was going to change.

“Hey, can I get you anything?”

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While he’d been thinking, the attendant behind the bar had come over to him. Isaac had noticed, of course, but he hadn’t expected the other man to strike up a conversation.

“No thanks.” Isaac replied. He wasn’t hungry or thirsty, nor did he currently have the disposable income to spend on overpriced food just yet.

Despite that, a can of coke was placed on the counter before him.

“On the house.” the man winked “Just don’t tell anyone.”

“Don’t worry, I won’t.” Isaac glanced up and down the train car “And I don’t think anyone else will either.”

“It’s crazy, isn’t it? What’s happening in the world right now. I’m Fabio, by the way.” the man behind the counter introduced himself.

“Isaac, nice to meet you.” Isaac replied and held out his right hand, which Fabio shook.

“I was getting off the train and suddenly, this screen popped up in front of me, I nearly fell onto the tracks.” Fabio said.

“Ouch. I was in bed when it initialized. Scared the crap out of me, but that was all.” Isaac grimaced.

“Waking up to a sight like that, you must have thought you were going crazy. Or still asleep. I can’t decide which would be worse.”

“Me neither.” Isaac chuckled, at which point Fabio produced a second coke and they clinked cans.

“So, what brings you on this train?” Fabio asked.

“There’s an acquaintance in Milan I’m going to meet. Someone who might be able to help me in this entire mess. But what about you? Why are you still working? It seems like half of humanity thinks the world is about to end.” Isaac replied.

“Well, I like this.” the other man spread his arms in an all-encompassing gesture. “People think that trains are just a way to get from Point A to Point B and if you spend the entire ride with your nose buried in a book, they certainly are. But when you actually talk to people, it becomes so much more.”

He gestured towards the closest table.

“Just a few days ago, there was a group of old ladies there, and then a couple of criminology students joined them. They talked about a lot of things, but eventually, the students started to explain about their studies. And then, they pointed to each of the old ladies and told them how suited they were to certain types of crimes. Imagine that, some young twenty year old looking a wizened grandmother in the face and saying ‘and you, you would be a born conwoman’.”

“Imagine that.” Isaac chortled.

“I just love … this. All of this. The people. Even if the world were to end tomorrow, I’d still be doing this. Going out doing what you love, what else is there, in the end? … are you alright?”

“It’s … it’s nothing. No, that was a lie.” Isaac sighed “I recently lost a couple of friends, just like that. But nothing you need to concern yourself with.”

“My condolences.” Fabio said. There really wasn’t much more to say.

“Like you said, going out doing what you love, going out on your own terms, what else is there at the end? And that’s what they managed to do. Doesn’t make it suck any less for everyone else, though.” Isaac replied after a short pause.

“Really? I suppose that’s as much as anyone gets.” Fabio said.

‘Too right, Fabio.’ Isaac thought. ‘Too right’

Kade and Mark might still be alive in this timeline, but that didn’t make their loss in the other timeline hurt any less. And even if he did meet them again, they wouldn’t be the same people he’d known in the past. They wouldn’t have had the same experiences, the same memories, the same … everything. Even if he were inclined to carefully recreate their other lives, he’d only be able to create some bizarre mockery of the people he’d known.

What were they doing at the moment, anyway? Mark was almost certainly still chasing storms across the American Midwest, an experience that had left him so in tune with the weather that he’d even gained a powerful [Class] related to it.

Kade was still deployed somewhere in the Middle East unless Isaac was very far of the mark.

The Professor would be getting just about ready to begin experiments to try and make sense of this strange new world.

And as for everyone else? Isaac didn’t actually know where they were right now, they’d never talked about it. They’d all gotten involved in fighting the invasions and become people who fought monsters, different from whom they’d previously been. Their old lives, left behind, rarely talked about.

It was ironic, he thought. Of all the people he’d only met in the other timeline, it wasn’t one of his best friends he’d visited first, no long lost loved one, but a Mob Boss.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to bring up bad memories.” Fabio apologized, clearly having mistaken his silence for him being upset.

“It’s alright. Death is just another part of life, isn’t it? Ignoring it isn’t going to make it go away.” Isaac replied.

“That probably makes you more accepting of that than …” Fabio trailed off, gazing wide eyed at the TV. Isaac turned and his jaw dropped.

On the screen, a little girl, perhaps nine, ten years old stood. It was a scene that would have looked perfectly ordinary … if it hadn’t been for the tentacled thing in her arms. The cute, cat sized thing with tentacles and googly eyes.

“What on Earth?” Fabio asked.

‘An eldritch familiar, adjusted for the kind of [Class] a child would get …’ Isaac thought. Children usually didn’t gain any [System] based powers until they were mature enough to handle them, but there were exceptions. And the [Classes] they got tended to be a little more childish than normal. A pet Eldritch abomination that somehow managed to be cute … sure. Weird as all get out, though.

“That’s something straight out of Lovecraft.” Fabio muttered.

“If Lovecraft had also been the producer for My little Pony, sure.” Isaac commented, drawing a laugh.

“I suppose so. I guess that’s the world we live in, then.”

They continued to talk for a couple more hours until they reached the stop where Isaac had to get off and change trains.

Isaac sighed happily as he stepped out of the train car, taking a deep breath of the cool night air. Hours of such a staggeringly normal conversation had been such a treat after an entire day of nothing but fighting and writing.

He spent a few more hours waiting at the train station, then got onto the next train that would take him all the way to Milan. Most of that time was spent trying to sleep, even if said sleep was fitful.

Looking out of the window, Isaac could see the sun slowly rise, illuminating the city as it slowly came closer. One way or another, the events in this city would change the course of his future, for good or ill.

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