’What is it, Taylor? Did you decipher the Runes?’ Dad asked as he looked from the photos to me and back down at the pictures, taking care not to allow anyone to notice we were having a silent conversation.
’Yeah…kinda wish I didn’t, too,’ I grumbled while lifting up one of over 40 pictures off the table. This one, in particular, was from near the center of the formation.
’Huh? Why not? I mean, if we know what’s about to happen, then we should be totally able to handle it…right?’ Brenden chimed in from a few feet away as he made small talk with an over-excited Sonas.
’Yeah, well, that was before our happy little undead hunting ground was about to be exposed and opened as a Returner amusement park.’
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’Amusement park…wow, that’s morbid, millions of people are about to be sucked into an instance, and you are making jok…wait, did you just say our happy undead hunting ground…no way…is this summoning Circle bringing the Caverns of the Undead to Earth???’ Tripping on air, Brenden stumbled before catching himself and resisting the urge to run over to Dad and me.
’Undead Caverns, and yes, the inscriptions designated those two specific words in particular, and unless there is another Undead Caverns out there that I don’t know about, odds are, the instance we were in last week is about to be turned into a PermaInstance, one spanning a large portion of Colorado.’ Running my hands through my hair, I took a red Sharpie and circled multiple runes on the picture before walking around the table and continuously marking runes.
"Um…Nexus, what are you doing," Fredrick, who had been tailing me like a lost puppy around the table, questioned.
"Sorry, I didn’t mean to ignore your previous question; go ahead and tell your father that I will meet him in 10 minutes once I finish marking out all the runes that detail the contents of the new PermaInstance."
"You figured it out already? Alright, I’ll go let him know right away."
’Are you sure it’s a good idea to bring the Colts into this? They aren’t exactly the most accommodating bunch.’
’Better now than later on down the line, Dad. The way I see it, they will rush in and try to claim the Instance as their own, but little do they know that this thing is undergoing massive changes.’
’From what I am reading, this inscription serves three key points; the first is targeting a suitable instance that can generate all particle types, the second is bringing said Instance to earth, and the third is transforming it into a Permanent Instance.’
’Then there are thousands of micro-adjustments, turning a linear plane such as the caverns into a multifaceted and floored Instance Tower…or well mountain, I suppose.’
’Mountain?’
’Yeah, from what I’m reading, Draven plans on creating a pseudo-form of Arkadia, in the form of a tower using the Undead Caverns as a basis for normies to gain access to the system.’
’Come again?’
’I expect you wouldn’t get it, so there’s a very common trope in novels and Japanese media, post-apocalyptic series where a tower mysteriously appears and gives the people of earth a chance at obtaining what they most desire.’
’Generally, this involves a series of trials or challenges the characters need to complete while climbing the tower. From what I see, that is exactly what Draven wants, but more so, he chose the Undead Caverns as a means for people to increase their racial classification rapidly.’
’So hes trying to create an army of High-Ranker Evolved people?’ Brenden asked while glancing off in the distance at the wall of light.
’I don’t know. There are rudimentary control commands in the inscription, so in theory, he would become a moderator of the tower to an extent; however, I don’t see Arkadia allowing that, considering it’s already giving people who enter a watered-down version of our System.’
’So all the people of Colorado…’ Brenden’s words trailed off, but I knew what he was getting at.
’Will become the first generation of System Holders, even if it isn’t the full system, they will all gain powers; I just don’t know to what extent.’
’And that’s why you don’t mind bringing Stillwater into the equation.’ Although he was having a difficult time understanding the things I was saying, my father still had his input.
’Precisely, with Their government connections, they should be able to regulate somewhat the coming and going of things, and although we are able to enter as Returners who have full access to Arkadia, we wouldn’t be gaining anything substantial until the later floors.’
’If I’m being totally honest, I don’t see many of the people who will be forced to enter surviving very long, even with the restructuring, Undead in the Non-Rank will carry contagious diseases akin to what you’d expect to see in Zombie movies.’ Heaving a tired sigh, I circled the last rune and stepped back from the table to examine my work.
’This isn’t your fault, Taylor; Draven would have done this with or without you changing the Caverns.’ Walking to my side and patting my shoulder, my dad gave out meaningless consolation, making me give him a weird look.
’O… okay? You do know this isn’t bothering me, right?’
’Really, because the way I see it, you seem to be a bit stressed out, maybe not for the reasons normal people would, but you definitely aren’t pleased that Draven has hijacked the Undead Caverns.’
’Oh…that, I mean, yeah, it ticks me off a bit because that was a place I formed for our use and had factored it into a few more plans later on, but it is what it is; if anything, it’s better this way since it means that if need be, we will have access to the Instance without encountering the random chance of Instance Tokens.’
’Plus, it’s not like he succeeded in gaining full control of the place; if anything, he will have limited access to the lower floors, but that’s it; even so, it will cause a war between High-Rankers and Parteavian as they try and gain sole control over individual floors so regardless, things are still in our favor once we reach Gamma or Higher.’