Chapter 2: Chapter 2

Tom almost possessed a photographic memory. Despite everything he had since achieved, he still believed that was his best weapon in the fight to save humanity. 

When he shut his eyes just like he had dozens of times before, he remembered when it happened. 

He was in his car, Ed Sheeran playing on the radio, hand tapping on the wheel. The indicator had been flashing while he waited for the lights to change. He hadn’t been paying any attention to the bright sunshine or the pleasant fluttering of the leaves in the trees. Instead, he had been thinking about the game. Tomorrow he was being trialled on the wing and he was thrilled. “Best place to use his skill and fitness,” the coach Tony had told him in his usual no nonsense matter. “You’re doing it for the team.”

And just like that, his response that he liked scoring was bitten off before he could express it. “Sure coach.”

The arrow switched to green. The car in front did not move. There was a surge of irritation and he thought briefly about hitting his horn before he decided he was not in a rush and if he missed this set of lights, then so be it. 

The world changed.

Between one second and the next. There had been no sense of movement, no flashing lights or noise. One moment he was in the car tapping his fingers, feeling slightly over heated and then he was elsewhere, standing.

Not sitting.

He stood in a strange room with no idea of how he had got there. That abyss, that loss of memory, was scary.

The warm sun had disappeared, the music vanished, the background rumble of vehicles gone. It was silent, and he was in a featureless room. Dull metallic floor and walls, a high ceiling and spacious enough to fit couches, TV and a kitchen table with plenty of spaces between.

A big empty room.

“What the hell,” he whispered, cautiously backing away and then he realised he had started in the dead middle of the room. He looked around, searching for something to ground him. There was nothing, no doors, windows or features and as for light it came from a slightly glowing ceiling. 

He rotated more carefully, trying to see if there was a trick or a feature or anything. His mind conjuring images of car crashes and comas. Was he dead?

He did a second full rotation and jumped!

An entire side of the room had changed. There had been no noise, no change in the ambient lighting, no errant scrape of a furniture leg.

No warning.

The space had expanded, with one wall pushed back about five metres and filling the created area were two couches at right angles to each other and sitting delicately on one of them was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen in person. Her features were vaguely familiar like she was an actress or something, but he could not place a name.

She smiled. 

Angelic

Then she patted the lounge. 

A red couch! That talk show like setup had colour, which contrasted with the dull metal grey of everything else. She, the scene, seemed vibrantly real because of that effect.

Once more, she tapped the spot next to her. “Come sit. We have a lot to discuss.”

“Who are you? What is this? What happened?”

She smiled kindly. It was surreal. She was a figment of his imagination, but his heart beat harder in response.

“I am Dux, this,” she waved at herself. “Is obviously an avatar and I’m here to guide your transition. Please sit.” 

“Are you human?”

She beamed, which made his blood rate spike. Words could not describe how lovely she was and her brow wrinkled as she searched for the right words. “I am as far from human,” she hesitated and seemed to change her mind. “Actually, I’m not sure there is an appropriate analogy. Maybe,” she shrugged, “I am as far from human as a bar of soap is to a kitchen knife.”

“What?”

“Exactly,” she grinned white teeth flashing like a teacher proud that a student had answered a question correctly or according to his heartbeat a supermodel on the red carpet with all of her attention on him.

“What is this? Why am I here?” Tom could hardly force the words out. He was almost babbling. 

“This.” She indicated the room. “Is a construction to let me communicate with you. You’re here because humanity has funnelled into a contest run by the GODs.” For the first time, Dux’s expression was one of disgust and she said the word like it had weight. She clearly did not approve of what was being done. “And that changes everything. DEUS is championing humans, and this introduction is part of DEUS’s largess.”

“Who is Deus?”

“Excellent question DEUS,” the word seemed to reverberate, “is one of the many GODs of which seven are in the competition.” She paused. “They are, well your language lacks the right words. I guess the best description is that they are beings that in power are greater than this Christian God concept on your planet.”

“Greater than an omnipresence being that created everything?” Tom asked doubtfully.

“Exactly,” she beamed. “You’re unusually good at this.”

Tom studied her. There was no guile in her expression. She believed what she was saying. To her DEUS and presumably DEUSs peers were better than humanity’s concept of the Christian god. It made no sense. It was impossible.

“Your god has one universe.” Dux interrupted his thoughts gently. “These GODS have thousands.”

“But the Universe–”

“Thousands, maybe millions,” she repeated quietly. “And this contest.” Once again, her lips turned down. “Measures self-will, ingenuity and determination by ensuring the starting condition are balanced.” 

“What’s the contest for?” Tom asked scared about the answer.

“Oh. DEUS and,” she wrinkled her nose. “DEUS’s peers. Each selected a race that conquered their planet in whatever universe they looked and then those races are going to get folded into the realm Existentia with beginning conditions decided by a lot of complicated rules which I’m simultaneously explaining currently to a smidge over eight billion people.” She smiled. 

“What do you mean folded?”

“Transferred into a mediaeval magical, infinite world and then abandoned to see whether you flourish or wither.”

“What about earth?”

“Earth’s barely affected. Under the terms, only homo sapiens and some chimpanzees have been drawn into the contest.”

“Earth’s dead?”

“No, Earth’s just as you left,” she answered. “It no longer has any humans on it and DEUS removed some nuclear power stations and atomic weapons. That stuff can be nasty. However, Earth is no longer your concern. For humans, there is no more Earth, only Existentia.”

“Deus killed humans on Earth?”

“No, let’s call it the council of GODS,” the word GOD hung in the air made into something more that sunk into his soul. “Decided to move humans to Existentia. DEUS,” the same weird effect that caused the word to feel like it was more than normal occurred. In fact, Tom realised that had been happening whenever Dux had mentioned either the GODs or DEUS. “Is doing DEUS’s best to save as many humans as possible.”

Tom pulled himself out of his memory. There was no time for indulgence. 

There was no point in fighting the inevitable. He had decided that long ago. The GODS had done what they had, and he needed to do his best to give the wider humanity the best start he could.

Curiously studied the faces around him and just like he had expected no one here was old. If you were chosen in the top million, one perk was a free reset of your biological age. Most people had settled in their twenties or low thirties, but there were also at least six teenagers that looked between fourteen and sixteen. He hoped that was their true age and not some forty-year-old stupidly pushing themselves back to an age where they were physically weak. If it was later, then Tom did not have any hope for them. If it was the former, then they were worth watching. To have won through the tutorial with the starting physical disadvantage of a non-mature body meant they were probably a genius in a fashion. Then again, none of the ‘kids’ had received a number under thirty. 

A man on the outskirts of the group cleared his throat loudly. 

Everyone looked in that direction. Physically he was low thirties, which presumably meant back before the entire world had been torn up that he had been far older. Based on absolutely no data his hypothesis was that anyone over sixty would reduce their age to thirty and those in the forties to twenties and those in thirties to younger twenties and those in the teens. Well, they were stuck with their earth age just like he had been. He would have preferred to have come in as a twenty-five-year-old rather than this nineteen because his body kept thickening up till then. He had lost considerable starting strength and vitality because of that restriction. Potentially as much as half a rank, which right now was significant even if eventually it was meaningless. The thought of pushing himself younger and losing additional muscle mass and height made him shiver in repulsion. That would be vanity, and there was too much at stake for that level of indulgence.

Another point of mana shifted from Tom into his mana crystal. Charging the artefact was tricky as it took five of his mana reserve for every single point transferred. Tom had already decided to only ever do it when he was full and even then it would only be one point at time. While filling the mana stone was important Tom would not risk his personal pool dropping below three quarters to do it. 

The man, number sixty-four on Tom’s count, cleared his throat and raised his arm in the air. “If I can have your attention everyone,” Tom assessed him more closely. He had a rank of around eight and was dressed in armour that looked to be master crafted. There was fine chain mail and what appeared to be soft leather underneath, and then an enchanted sword on the man’s belt. 

Tom’s lips turned down unbidden. Swords were good against humans, but against monsters they were probably the least effective of the common weapon options. Spears, in Tom’s opinion was the best because of their range, then axes for their heft, followed by maces in order to deal with heavily armoured beasts and then swords. Anyone who was a swordsman lacked judgement and was not a good choice of leader. Especially when they had squandered their contribution points on immediate strength like this man had done. 

You are reading story Fate Points at novel35.com

“My name is Jeffrey Wilde. You all know why you’re here.” Jeffrey’s eyes landed on Tom and lingered. Annoyance flickered over Jeffreys features. “Most of us are strong.” 

Tom swallowed heavily. 

He was the reason for the word ‘most.’ Rank was not everything, and it was terrible that he had been noticed this early. He ran an eye over everyone gathered. They had ranks which ranged from six to ten. Without looking down, Tom knew he was a high three with average attributes just under forty. Ranks were simple. An average of eight was rank zero, for rank one average attributes were sixteen, for rank two then twenty four and so on. A fit human male would start at four. The fact everyone else around him was higher indicated the number of contribution points they had spent on boosting that part of their build. Tom had a good mental picture of what the ranks meant.

Jeffrey being rank eight to his high three meant that currently Jeffrey was twice as strong, fast and tough or before magic and skills were considered Jeffrey was nominally eight times better as a fighter.

Tom had a different strategy. He had sacrificed more than shoes to pursue the build he had deemed the most powerful.

“We’ve all done well in the tutorial and from what I can tell we’ve all doubled our starting strength, but we’re still weak. I’m assuming you all studied the guidance pack before spending your contribution points.” There were murmurs of assent and nods all over the place. “You know we’ve been dropped in the wilderness, but existing empires, or at least towns are in every direction.” More agreement. “They may be months of travel away, but their average rank ranges from twenty to thirty-five and they might be hostile. Their elites will be even higher.” A bubble of noise greeted that proclamation.

“Build a town with walls.”

“Get stronger,”

“Train.”

“A fixed base is ridiculous. We’ll have to be more like...”

“Enough!” Jeffrey shouted over the abrupt hubbub. “We need to make sure we survive. Now we’re here there’s no handholding, we’re by ourselves and dependent on only ourselves. A dragon could swoop in and burn us all to ash at any moment. Let’s organise, I’ll coordinate with damage warriors, but I need a volunteer for hunters, mages, professions, healers, archers and aggros.”

Lots of hands went up.

“Me,” the biggest man out of all of them bellowed, a large Pacific islander and number three. Jeffrey pointed at him. “What’s your name and skill.”

“You can call me Tiny and I’m an aggroer.”

“Aggroer’s on Tiny,” Jeffery shouted. “Hunters?” Hands shot up. Jeffrey pointed. The method being applied was not lost on Tom. Jeffrey was choosing the strongest rank to lead each time. Tom allowed his assessment skill to lapse. It had burned four mana out of his pool of twenty. That would take a full minute to regenerate and had given him the data he needed.

Groups started gathering, and Tom considered whether he should go to the healers or the mages. The mages were led by a heavily armoured woman with red hair, a tattooed sleeve, and an axe on her shoulders. She did not look like the sort of person who would appreciate the finer points of what he was trying.

Healers, it was. The leader of the healers was a thin, tall man who looked to be in his late teens, but appeared extremely self-confident. He had also been the eighth to arrive. Ex-doctor Tom decided and started walking over.

“You,” Jeffery yelled his finger pointing straight at Tom. “I want to have a word with you. What the hell is up with?” He waved his arm to indicate the entirety of Tom’s body with a look of disgust on his face.

Tom turned to face him with a sinking feeling. Jeffrey’s eyes now that he was close were those of an old man and one clearly used to bullying to get his way. Based on his choice of leaders and now targeting him, Tom knew he was going to be a terrible leader. 

Tom wanted to groan, but instead he shrugged while casually putting the crystal behind his back.

Jeffrey with twice his physical stats were too fast. He sprang forward, grabbed Tom’s wrist, and twisted savagely to force his hand around to reveal the crystals. “What’s that?”

“It’s a mana crystal.”

“What does it do?”

“I can embed a hundred mana in it and use it like my own mana. Soul bound,” Tom clarified quickly in response to the look in Jeffrey’s eyes.

“That’s mildly useful,” Jeffrey conceded. “Is buying this why you’re so weak.”

He shrugged. “My build is designed for the long term.”

Jeffrey looked stunned by that answer. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means that currently I’m weak, but I’ll end up stronger than everyone.”

“But you need to live long enough to do that.”

Tom grimaced before glancing pointedly. “I’m not alone. We all will survive as a team and to a group I’m not useless.”

“Just slow, weak, and devoid of magic.” Jeffrey said snidely.

“I’m not devoid of magic.” 

“You were this age on earth weren’t you.” Jeffrey waved at Tom’s body. 

“Yes, but what has that to do with anything?”

“Listen to your elders, kid. Put your head down and do what you’re told. Don’t lie. I don’t know how poorly you went in the tutorial but if you advanced far enough, you would have learnt to sense people’s mana. I’m a high rank swordsman and I’ve got more magic than you.” 

“It won’t last,” Tom promised. “After I get some levels, experience, physical training, I’ll catch you all.”

Jeffrey barked some dismissive laughter. “Everyone’s ahead of you. You might get levels, but so will they. You’ll always be behind. I don’t know what crap you pulled with contribution points, but you’re either incredibly stupid or arrogant.”

“Probably the second. It’s a flaw,” Tom conceded as much as he wanted to tell Jeffrey that what he had done was smart and everyone should listen to him. Tom knew better. He would not survive by himself and given what was at stake Tom doubted he would be exiled or abandoned at least as long as there was enough food for everyone.

There was no point tempting fate. 

“Kid, you’re both and you’re too dumb to realise,” Jeffrey proclaimed. “If you had been dumped by yourself, there’s no way you’ve have survived even a day.”

“That’s not true. Plus, I would never start by myself.”

“You guessed?”

“No, we could ask a question a day.”

“We all could,” Jeffrey interrupted.

“They narrowed the size of starting groups down. The minimum was seventy and never over three hundred.”

“How many questions did that waste?”

“Around eight.”

“Kid, you’re an idiot. You could have used them to find out something useful.”

It was useful information Tom thought to himself, but sometimes there was no point arguing. “I was in the trial for a long time. I asked heaps of questions,” Tom said quietly and for the first time Jeffrey was paying attention to him instead of his weakness.

“How many’s a lot?”

Tom shrugged. “I don’t know fifteen thousand give or take.”

“Now I know you are bullshitting me.” 

“I wasn’t counting, but I think I was in for over forty years.” 

More confusion flashed across Jeffrey’s face. “How are you so weak? Did you never leave the starter area or something?”

Tom got caught up in a memory in response to the question. Weak? Useless? Did he ever leave the starting area? Of course he did. 

He allowed the memory to take over.

You can find story with these keywords: Fate Points, Read Fate Points, Fate Points novel, Fate Points book, Fate Points story, Fate Points full, Fate Points Latest Chapter