System-favored…
Well, I really wouldn't call myself that. See, I actually met someone who was System-favored, and that poor bastard was always suffering through either end of some kind of Quest or trying to survive a desperate fight. He also grew faster than anyone I've ever met in my life. His skills shot up to Master within the span of months. And that usually takes other people decades…
But I wouldn't call him lucky. Not even close. Being System-favored means you’re always in deep shit. Guy I talked about got pretty strong pretty fast. And then, approximately a year later, he was dead. Because that's what it means to be System-favored. Keep surviving, you'll turn into an absolute monster. But more likely than not, the System will end up murdering you.
In fact, there is nothing the System enjoys more than throwing one favored at another. It especially loves twisting people who have relationships against each other. So, as favored, you best keep your distance from people too. Otherwise, most of those you like will end up dead, or if they survive, facing you down some day.
Here's the deal with being System-favored. It doesn't mean that you're just talented. It doesn't mean that you have some kind of special insight in a specific area, or a special predilection for some skill. System-favored means that you have probably all those things, some more, and the willingness to throw yourself into the most brutal battles over and over again. And eventually it all sticks to you. The constant struggle. The endless war. The violence.
Make no mistake, the System wants us to struggle, to fight. All Pathbearers have to do a little bit of that in their life, martial or non-martial. But the ultimate thing that makes one person favored and another person just your run-of-the-mill Pathbearer is that sheer concentration of conflict, and the sheer unlikeliness of their survival.
I am a soldier. For most of my campaigns, it was a hell of a lot of boring marching, training, trying to survive command screwing you over. Then, suddenly, more action and violence than you can possibly imagine for a few minutes to a day, and back to the boring shit: After that, more marching. Paperwork. Presentations and plans drawn on a board. There’s a period of peace. To be people. To live.
Pathbearers who are favored don't get that peace. Because there’s always another war coming, and the System will make sure its favorite monsters are a part of it.
-Memoirs of a Master-Tier War Mage
78 (I)
Favored
“P-please, wait… You— don’t have to… I can bless you with my bloodlin—” That was all the high vampire got to say before Shiv pasted the creature’s head with a descending stomp. A satisfying crunch was followed by a bit of twitching. Shiv harvested the high vampire’s lineage core before the body even stilled.
“Got the last high vampire,” he muttered. His Biomancy field couldn’t sense anything other than corpses and allies in Leu’s building, but he kept his guard high just in case. He wasn’t the one with the Heroic-Tier Awareness. When Adam said they were cleared and Uva backed him up on it, then that’s when Shiv would relax. Until then, his Silhouette stayed active, and his Rememberer remained drawn.
They returned with the Guardshead through the waste chutes to retake her building. But by the time they arrived, things were already well and truly out of hand. Most of the tower had been crawling with the invading vampires, and there was no one left to save. But that just made things simple for Shiv in the sense that he didn’t need to worry about collateral damage anymore.
Silhouette > 73
A thought from Adam passed through the group. “Uva, we have a final victim hiding inside a corpse on the eighth topside floor. Master-Tier Stealth and Biomancy Skill Fusion, I think.”
Shiv paused and fully tapped into Adam’s perspective. True to the Young Lord’s words, there was the body of a Vulteg on the ground, but Shiv couldn’t tell that there was a high vampire inside at all. “Are you sure? I can't sense anything with my Biomancy.”
“Absolutely,” Adam said. “I think the high vampire dove into the blood. That might be the ability of her Skill Fusion.”
“And you know it’s a she?” Shiv asked, genuinely impressed. He focused his Biomancy on the body, and he still couldn’t tell anything was out of the ordinary.
“Look at the blood, Shiv. It keeps moving back and forth. Puddles don’t act like waves crashing on a shore. That, and if you listen very carefully, you can hear a voice carried by the vibrations in the blood. Our hidden foe is begging the Great One to preserve her.”
One of Uva’s mana strands speared into the blood without warning. Suddenly, a body exploded out of the corpse as viscera repainted the walls. For a moment, the high vampire struggled and wailed, but a dozen more of Uva’s Psychomancy strands tore into the Bloodspawn. The high vampire let out a wordless scream and splashed down into a gory puddle, her eyes vacant. “There,” Uva muttered. “She can dictate her prayers to the Great One in person now. If she can still remember the words.”
Adam winced at the casual coldness of Uva’s remarks. Shiv just grinned. Hunting vampires was a hell of a lot more fun when you had your friends with you.
“Now, the building’s clear,” Adam declared. “But stay alert. I briefly scouted our surroundings, and they’re spreading from building to building, infecting or slaughtering anyone they can get their hands on.” He sighed. “Damned good timing on their part too. A good number of Adept guards are still down with the super-dysentery they got from Shiv. And a good number of those are lurking in the dark as lesser vampires now.”
Another distant blast shook the building. A second later, Adam provided another update. “And someone just detonated a Pyromancy mana bomb inside one of the mercenary barracks. It’s absolute, bloody pandemonium out there.”
“They’re conducting this invasion strategically,” Uva added. A snapshot of perspectives followed over from her mind, showing a gate in turmoil. Confriga and his available forces were constantly bombarding the bridge leading to the Abyssal Gateway, but across the city, hidden dangers festered like an infected wound. Lesser vampires were spreading, high vampires sank their teeth into unaware victims from the dark, Aviary agents primed mana bombs at critical and lightly defended locations. “I’ve reached out across the city and scanned a few memories. The forces flooding through the Abyssal Gateway are a diversion. Confriga and his elites are driving them back slowly, but the true threat is already inside. I sensed another Master-Tier Psychomancer earlier, but they withdrew and evaded me. The vampires are also focusing on capturing buildings and infecting the local population. Even if Confriga manages to push the enemy back out through the gateway, he will have to contend with the infection festering within.”
A rush of loathing came from the Umbral. “This is the way the First Blood wage their wars. They throw tides of twisted monstrosities they deem worthless or expendable at you, while their true elites slip deep and poison your heart. And with Aviary aiding them, we are facing quite the potent poison at that.”
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“It’s also damned clever and effective in a vile bastard sort of way,” Adam added. “If they focus on capturing most of the structures, they will force Confriga into a series of brutal close-quarters engagements in an enclosed environment. That, or he will just destroy the buildings outright, but that will just see him killing his own people as well, and eventually desynchronizing from the gate’s mana core as he loses his authority from the escalating chaos.”
Shiv took all that in as he stomped back into Leu’s apartment. The ground was covered in butchered monsters. Bobbing up and down in the pool of blood were also two dead crows, three high vampires with holes where their hearts used to be, and the pulped remains of what used to be a raven.
Standing ankle-deep in the blood was Guardshead Leu, now staring out the large, central window of her home. Part of the room was coated in reinforced titanium after she detonated a mana bomb inside when faking her own attempted assassination just days ago. Now, more bombs were going off outside, and bodies rained down from the districts above, splashing down into the molten rivers as a desperate and sudden battle for Gate Theborn raged.
But despite her near-death experience, Leu seemed thrilled at the turn of events. “Look at it,” she whispered, gazing upon the destruction. “Look at what Confriga’s incompetence has delivered upon us. A hostile army in our very home.”
Shiv came to a stop next to her as he noticed an entire building toppling over from above. Due to the room’s wards, the entire display was utterly silent, which made the sight of the structure tearing through multiple bridges before ultimately crashing into a river of lava below strangely surreal. Adam and Uva were right. While Confriga was busy fighting the First Blood’s apparent army, their true Pathbearers were ripping this place apart from the inside. And part of why they were so successful was because of the instability and terror caused by Shiv and his group on both the outside and inside of the gate.
“I wouldn’t give Confriga all the credit,” Shiv muttered. “Hells. I wouldn’t give him any credit. The only reason the vampires and Aviary are ripping through this place is because of the beating we already gave it from all angles.”
“I suspect you are correct, Master Shiv,” Leu replied. Her eye fell on the third gateway, and she scoffed. “Look.” She pointed at the churning portal leading to Vulketh. “He still has not called for aid. He still refuses to surrender his pride. This is why he is damned. He is so desperate to reclaim his honor and retake what he believes to be his rightful place in Lord Scorn’s Fist that he will damn this entire gate to a slow and torturous death. Why, with a little more time, all the local elites of Compact will lose faith in Confriga. And then the core will be lost to him for good as well.”
“Yeah, that’s useful and all, but I’m not a fan of just waiting around for the vampires and Aviary to take this place. I think my preferred outcome is if they all lose.” And then, Shiv paused as he regarded Leu. An idea occurred to him—something that might just be to their benefit down the line. “And maybe have someone more capable replace Confriga.”
“Me?” Leu said. She sounded surprised. “I—I do not hold enough sway with the city.”
“You might if you save it,” Shiv said. “If you manage to stop the vampires when Confriga couldn’t. Or if he mysteriously dies in the process of defending the city.”
Adam cut into the conversation. “Well, before we consider who to anoint as the next Gate Lord, we have many other problems to resolve first. And openings to take advantage of.”
The Young Lord offered Shiv a bird’s eye view of the gate. The bulk of the fighting was concentrated around the Abyssal Gateway. There, Shiv saw waves of misshapen abominations rushing through. Adam Analyzed a particular monster that had mouths and teeth spreading around its body like some kind of nightmarish rash.
Name: Thing of Enamel Born
Age: 3 Months
Race: Blood Horror
Path:
Horror
Feat [0/0]:
None
Ski—
A concentrated beam of frost promptly blasted out from the gate’s mana core and smashed into the Thing of Enamel Born. It, along with a few hundred other Blood Horrors, froze and shattered into fragments of ice. But as soon as they fell, another tide of horrors surged through the gate, prompting the defenders to unleash their skills and spells in response.
Confriga loomed in the air above, launching screaming specters composed of Necromantic corrosion at the enemies. His petal-like wings also caused the weaker among the invading forces to spontaneously combust. As he fought, he roared commands, demanding that his warriors strike harder and drive the First Blood back.
But while Confriga was focused on the problem at his front door, he failed to notice the blood-drenched bat-humanoids darting across his plazas, carrying pieces of the dead in their mouths.
“So, our previous plans are now completely in the shit,” Adam said. “All the groundwork we did basically made infiltrating and capturing the insides of the gate easier for Aviary. Also, their strongest Pathbearers are being teleported. I cast my Awareness through the gateway while the waves of Blood Horrors were rushing through. There’s also an Aviary Owl Dimensionalist that’s actively shuttling high vampires off to System-knows where inside this gate. I’m guessing they have more than a few of their own teleportation anchors active somewhere inside, but considering how many forces they’re dropping across the districts, they either have anchors hidden inside every bloody building or a giant one.”
A gut feeling tugged at Shiv. “I might know where they’re coming from. The Jealousy’s den. It’s functionally a colossal teleportation anchor. It also teleported the Jealousy directly as soon as it made contact with the gate.”
Adam hummed. “Good guess. I think we might just have discovered one of our first major objectives. You still remember the way there?”
“Of course.”
“Good. I think you should go there first. At the same time, Valor and I will prepare to seize the Animancy Core. I took a glance at its defenses, and there is still a contingent of guardians there. Mostly dimensionals, a few Master-Tier Vultegs, and two elemental golems.”
Shiv frowned. “Just the two of you?” He looked behind him and saw Valor hovering within the slug enclosure, dragging the Graven Cage behind him using a corrosive leash.
“It will have to do. I’m not waiting for Confriga’s caution to finally win over his arrogance as he sends the core over to his home dimension and calls for reinforcements. I’m also not looking forward to the felling New Albion birds getting to the core before us somehow. It will be a tight window to intercept the core once we sever the adamantine elevator shaft leading through the third gateway, but we should be able to do it. We must. Uva—”
“I am going to ensure both sides in this fight suffer as much attrition and damage as they possibly can.” Uva’s mind was ice-cold with focused hate. Vampires were her enemies of choice—were practically every Umbral's enemy of choice. “I am going to slip into vulnerable minds on the battlefield to make Confriga and his elites exhaust themselves. I will slay him if I can and leave him diminished if I cannot. I will also steal what memories I can to get a clearer picture of the situation outside.” Uva paused. A slight trickle of worry escaped her mind. “My team and Still Water’s should have seen an attack of this scale coming… Once the battle at the gateway reaches a point of conclusion, I will start locating and culling the vampiric outbreak.”
“Right,” Adam said. “That’s… better than what I was going to suggest. Once me and Valor have the core handled, I’ll come and assist you. I suspect that some of the more hidden Aviary assets will require a keen eye to root them out.”
As Adam and Uva declared their intentions, Shiv relayed the details to Can Hu, and the Penitent gave a high-pitched chime. “Shiv. My drones also have an opening. I will dispatch new orders to have them free the automaton slaves. I will then instruct them to free the organics and begin an uprising.”
Shiv paused. “Right now? The city’s under siege. The guards might slaughter them all if this goes wrong.”
“And once the vampires find them, they will be used as subjects for experimentation or consumed as prey on the spot,” Can Hu retorted. “Or they will be sold again or kept as slaves. Some will always die. But should they struggle now and further inflict instability upon the gate, they might yet live. And more, they might regain their freedom. When this moment passes, should we fail, their fates lie between a slow death under a cruel tyrant or a faster, more brutal end between the jaws of human-skinned monsters.”
“Yeah. I see your point. Adam. Uva. You hear that?”
“We did,” Uva said. “I will target the slavers after I am finished exhausting both armies as well. The more things and essential personnel we can break within the gate, the better. The vampires might have taken us by surprise, but it seems the System has given us more of an opportunity than an impediment.”
“So let’s go make this count, get this damned Quest done, kill Confriga, and secure the gate for ourselves,” Adam finished.