Monday

  “Is this more or less what you wanted?” Morton asked Billy, showing him the massive, semi-spherical basin dug into the ground.

  “I am impressed, Morton. How did you manage to do it so quickly?”

  “I had to shuffle the budget around somewhat. I demoted a couple of guys and promoted another two… You wouldn’t believe the kind of drama that entails. Mel gave up her boss status on the first day I became mayor, as she felt her powers were no longer needed. Some folks could learn from her example.”

  Morton was not only the mayor of Brotonville, but also the dungeon Core. Because of the instance's peculiar rules, he could upgrade any citizen to boss status, granting them a considerable increase in power.

  He could also revoke that status, which came in handy, since he could only have six bosses at a time. Since all citizens developed different powers, being a boss depended more on the city’s specific needs at that moment than on personal merit.

  “This place looks rather familiar,” Billy remarked.

  “I’m not surprised you recognize it; this was the crevice from which Rathemoth erupted. They filled it with toxic gas and threw the poor creature in there.”

  “What I am going to do now isn’t much different,” said a somber Billy. “Who did this? How could they get it so perfect and so fast? It is waterproof, isn’t it?”

  “Of course it is. Everything was done to specification. Joaquin did this. He used to work for a construction company, and his citizen powers are based on concrete. He spent all night creating it. I sent him off to get some sleep; here comes the rest of the team.”

  Billy was overjoyed to see Baliana, Sclarella, Curtis, and a stocky man in his sixties. Two enormous globes filled with water, the size of aerostatic balloons, followed him obediently, hovering thirty feet above the ground like well-trained dogs.

  “The Amazon gang you already know. The man behind them is Jack; he’s spent his whole life in the fishing industry. You can guess what his powers are about.”

  Billy hugged Curtis and the Amazons, then shook hands with Jack. After the introductions, they all got to work.

  One of the globes, made of pure water, went directly into the vault, filling it and creating an artificial pool. Billy could see shapes swimming inside the other globe.

  “Most of them are rainbow trout and bass,” Jack explained. “We have other freshwater fish along with them—basically anything we could find, even some catfish.”

  “Do you have enough fine control to pull them out one by one?” Billy asked.

  Just then, a trout fell at his feet in response. The fish thrashed on the ground. Feeling sorry for it, Billy transferred a corpse-camping charge to it and stomped down, killing it. The trout lay still for a moment, then twitched, coming back to life and growing to the size of an arm, with a mouth full of teeth. Baliana speared it, and the process began again.

  “Remember, it gains a couple of levels each time we kill it. Corpse-camped creatures do not grant achievement points based on their rank, but on the number of times they have been killed. The more times we kill it, the more points it will grant,” Billy explained as the beleaguered trout came back from trout heaven once more.

  “This is not supposed to be heroic. This is an assembly line. We will have to repeat the operation dozens of times. The moment the fights start giving us trouble is when we stop resurrecting them.”

  After a few false starts, they determined that with Morton, the Amazons, and Curtis helping, they could easily and safely dispatch each monster up to its eighth reincarnation. When they reached that point, Baliana, the strongest among them, caught the twitching corpse before it was fully resurrected and threw it into the pool.

  They spent hours at it, stopping only for a light meal. When the sun was setting, the pool was filled with 103 fierce piranha-like monsters, the size of ponies, glaring at Billy with hatred and jumping fiercely, trying to reach the edge of the pool to attack him.

  “Okay, I think this is enough. Stand apart, please; the explosion is going to be quite powerful,” Billy instructed his friends. He waited until they were 300 feet away from the pool and jumped into it after buying 10 explosive charges from the blue room. The piranhas leapt towards him, feeling a brief surge of joy at his presence.

  The remains of the gigantic fish blew apart, scattering debris and dirty water within a half-mile radius.

  A heavy cloak of silence fell over Babylon after the massive explosion.

  The whole process granted Billy 56 achievement points per fish. After adding the few points he had left and deducting 170 points for the cost of the 10 explosive charges, the instant respawn, and some Expand the Room points to reappear at the edge of the pool instead of inside it, Billy was left with nearly 5,700 achievement points. Not bad for a day of work.

  They said goodbye and made plans to meet again tomorrow at the same time.

  Bob had been right all along; he could score many more points by thinking like a factory overseer rather than playing the hero. He was certain that if he had a Nerf module, it would have gone into overdrive.

  That evening, he went to dinner with the Amazons. Billy would have invited Bob, but he had to attend a meeting at another inn that did not allow Amazons inside. Billy was angered when Bob told him about it, but the Amazons found it amusing.

  "Friend Billy, when you parade around with a bunch of heads on your saddle, you won’t get any discounts at the local inn," Baliana chortled, spilling beer all over the table.

  Billy laughed at the joke, but he knew Baliana was mistaken. The ban was not specifically against Amazons; it applied to all Essentials.

  It was only one month into the apocalypse, and all this crap was already back. Amazons and Citizens had fought and died alongside Avatars to protect Babylon, but that seemed to be forgotten. Someone would decide that one of these groups was the cause of the problems, and others would believe it.

  At the end of the day, many people preferred villains to blame for their troubles rather than solutions.

  “Not everything is so bad, Billy,” Curtis said, sensing his friend's gloomy mood.

  “Many Citizens and Avatars fought together in the last battle. People won't forget that. There are even mixed couples now, much like Abby and Thomas were.” He realized that might not be the most encouraging example, considering how it ended.

  “People are worried; everything is so different,” Curtis went on.

  “Essentials don't need to gain experience. Their level depends on dungeon rank. The Brotonville train station is a seventh-rank dungeon. This makes the typical Citizen equivalent to a level 21 Avatar—only the most experienced combat veterans and the most accomplished crafters reach that level. Most people around here don't even reach rank 10.”

  This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

  “Think of it not only in terms of powers, but stats. They are faster, smarter, and more resilient. It’s no wonder many Experientials fear being driven out. There have also been cases of Avatars being beaten by Citizens. There are bullies and bigots on both sides.”

  “Essentials aren’t faring much better,” Curtis continued, giving a cursory glance at the beautiful waitress serving them, only to be interrupted by one of Sclarella’s glares.

  “They may have an easier start, but they can't gain levels. If the system remains unlocked, eventually Experientials will surpass them. I've heard some wild theories suggesting that locking the system might actually be a good thing. Some Citizens are even asking Dignity to do it.”

  “How are things going in Valdar?” Billy asked, curious about the home of Elvenkind and hoping to change the subject.

  “The Queen has declared it open to all mankind, and people are coming in in droves. This is actually good for us, as the Essence they bring will be necessary to create new Elves,” Curtis explained.

  “You and Morton designed the Elven reproduction system, before you gave Elariana that core, didn't you?” Curtis asked.

  “If by designed you mean we chose the traditional method, with lovemaking and pregnancies, then yes, we did,” Billy replied.

  Curtis laughed, drinking from his beer. “You have no idea what you have set in motion, do you?” he asked.

  “What do you mean?” Billy asked, growing concerned.

  “Alarel, who is seldom wrong, believes it will work even if the mating occurs between an elf and a human. She is unsure about the outcome, though. Will the offspring be elves, humans, or something different? And if hybrids are possible, will they be Essentials, Experientials, or something new? You could be the father of a new race, Billy!” Curtis said, clapping him on the shoulder.

  “Thanks, that makes me feel so good,” Billy lied, his face ashen.

  Tuesday

  Tuesday felt like a refined version of Monday. The team repeated the same steps but executed them with greater efficiency gained from experience.

  They managed to increase their tally to 9 resurrections per kill, boosting their previous gains by 20%. By the end of the day, Billy had accumulated nearly 12,000 achievement points, the highest number he had ever achieved.

  As he climbed out of the basin, he found the stern figure of Dignity waiting for him.

  “This has to end, Billy,” she said coldly.

  “But you gave me unlimited resources!” Billy protested. “I haven’t asked for much, only two Citizen bosses. The Amazons are helping of their own free will.”

  “Perhaps it is my fault,” Dignity conceded. “When I granted you unlimited resources, I should have added ‘as long as it does not involve making rotten fish rain all over Babylon.’ That would have worked as fine print, but I can think of additional clauses, like ‘do not piss off absolutely everyone in town’ or that old classic, ‘please do not throw the corpse of a giant piranha inside the school swimming pool while they are having a birthday party’.

  “Oops,” said Billy.

  “I couldn’t have said it better myself,” Dignity replied. “Find another way to gain achievement points. And clean up your bloody mess,” she added as she walked away.

  Billy spent the rest of the afternoon picking dead fish from the ground and tossing them back into the concrete vault. Morton, from the Bacon Brigade, offered to help. “I’ll start at the far edge, and you clean the center,” he told Billy. He indeed went to the far edge, so far that he ended up in the tavern.

  Billy had to respawn in his Headless Machetist form, the cheapest physically strong form he could adopt, thanks to his "Don't Lose Your Head" passive ability.

  As he passed a group of kids heading home, he tried to be especially friendly to make up for the fiasco at the birthday party. However, being greeted by a head held up in a giant’s hand was not well-received. The kids ran away screaming in horror.

  “Guess Dignity will be paying me another visit soon,” Billy thought. This day was not turning out to be great.

  It was late evening when he finished. He lost the Machetist form and went back to his true shape. He could afford it, with so many achievement points stored.

  He went to the inn to meet Bob and have dinner. A bard was playing a lute, seated in the center of the room. People were waiting in line, requesting songs.

  “Do you know anything about Barbara in Minneapolis?” an older man asked.

  The bard plucked a few strings and replied, “Sorry, nothing comes to mind.”

  The man stepped out of the line, clearly distressed. Billy began to pay closer attention, realizing there was more to it than mere entertainment.

  The next petitioner was a woman in her thirties. “Can you play me a song about Ben Farakh from New York?” she asked.

  The bard started strumming his lute and sang in a clear voice about Ben, who was doing well. He had obtained his class and joined a guild in a small community. His whole family was okay, except for Aunt Petunia, who had fallen during a werewolf invasion. He sent her his love and waited for her to answer.

  “Thank you, oh thank you,” said the woman, paying the bard by clicking one of the golden coins everyone used against the one he was holding.

  “They’re using bards as a means of long-distance communication,” a familiar voice interrupted Billy’s thoughts as Bob took a seat beside him.

  “They have special abilities that allow them to concentrate and pick up songs created by other bards, no matter how far away. It’s quite ingenious, really.”

  The bard stood up. “Sorry, folks, but I am not taking more requests for today. It’s closing time. According to Dignity’s instructions, the next song is considered a public service, so there’s no need to pay for it.”

  He then sang a heroic ballad about the city of Madison, which was suffering under the threat of a seventh-rank dungeon that needed heroes to defeat it. The dungeon was also a labyrinth, meaning that significant rewards awaited those who destroyed it.

  Bob interrupted Billy’s thoughts again. “Look at these beauties,” he said as he deposited two multicolored pills on the table and a flask filled with a colorless liquid.

  “The flask is my first alchemical creation. It is a minor work, and as such, anyone can use it. Its effects last eight hours—it makes migraines disappearr”

  “That’s nice, Bob,” Billy replied, somewhat doubtfully.

  “You don’t understand, Billy,” Bob insisted.

  “Migraines were the primary limiting factor when I designed new perks. I have learned to interpret them; they serve as a good gauge for whether a perk is too unbalanced, but they also limit how many perks I can design in a day. After ten or twelve failures, they become so unbearable that I can’t function for the rest of the day.”

  “Using this beauty, I have designed hundreds of alchemical compounds today, Billy. Hundreds. I do not even have to test them. I know each one of them will perform as requested. That is the way my powers work.”

  “That took me all morning. I used the rest to create these two medicinal pills. They’re not pills per se; they have that form, but if you look closely, you’ll see they are just compressed herbs,” Bob explained.

  “What do they do?” asked Billy, as his interest increased.

  “They are concentrated experience, Billy,” Bob almost sang. “Give one to an Avatar, and their quest slots will fill up, even in a locked system. If I take one, the speed at which I learn perks increases by 50% for eight hours. If you take it, it will add 50% to the number of achievement points you gain in the same period. You can even use them to gain achievement points in Belona, but you would only earn half of your usual amount.”

  “This is huge, Bob. If we give these to the Beli people, they will probably get their cards back,” Billy said, holding one of the pills reverently in his hands.

  “Keep it,” Bob replied. “You’re going to need it.”

  “Why?” asked Billy.

  “Because the process is highly inefficient. I needed to spend nearly all our spirit cores to create those pills. Spirit cores were designed for progressors, not alchemists. But if you could create a new tag, one tailored for this purpose, we could get a dungeon that would work for us as effectively as the ones in Belona do for the Imperials,” Bob explained.

  They spent some more time talking, and then Bob went to get some much-needed sleep—or to sleepwalk all night. You never knew with him.

  Billy looked in wonder at the small pill in his hand. He now knew what he had to do. Assembly lines were nice, but sometimes it paid to be a hero.

  Oh, boy. Jenna was going to kill him.