Collide Gamer

John was en route back to the table when an arm was suddenly slung around the back of his neck. The intensity of the sudden movement made him stumble and spill the drinks all over the floor – and himself. The latter would have been a catastrophe if he had been wearing a mundane suit, considering one of those glasses contained a glass of red wine for himself.

A number of things went through John’s head. Who dared? That was the first question, but there were enough drunk youngsters around that would do something stupid at this hour. Besides, there was a primary candidate that would do something this annoying even sober. The second question was why he was being swayed like this? Particle Skin prevented involuntary movement, unless the target had no hostile intent whatsoever.

Which made Suel’s sinister grin next to his face all the more confusing. The breath of the man smelled of… ink, oddly enough. “Say, are you interested in some exceedingly fresh and exciting news?” he asked.

“…Is this a threat?” John asked, while letting Suel drag him off to the side. The problem was that the Gamer knew Suel was one of his fellow information-gathering types. That meant that whatever news he had for him could actually be worth it and John wanted it. He wanted it a lot.

“I have some… let’s call them bats for the sake of your vampire paranoia.”

“I’m no longer paranoid about vampires, I have one at home now,” John answered.

“Oh? Free intel, how delectable.”

“Do you not know about Claire?” John asked, actually confused. That was incredibly widely spread knowledge, as far as private information of the upper echelon of Abyss society went. Considering what everyone had gone through to get her out of the Iron Domain and the open letter John had published beforehand, it was practically public information. “Are you lying?”

“Hm, no, not in this case.”

“Is that a lie?” The Gamer kept on with that line of question, until Suel had guided them to a corner of the garden where no one else was currently standing. They must have looked incredibly conspiratorial from a distance. That was not something John minded. “Alright, enough of these games, what do you want to show me?” he switched modes instantly.

“Have you ever heard the term ‘Generation of Monsters’?” Suel asked.

“I have…” John responded slowly, wondering once again if he was dealing with the Horned Rat. It would have been just like Richard to ask a question about a thing that he himself had told John about. It would also have been just like Suel, the person that could have been their own entity, to tease John with some knowledge few people had. _{𝘯𝘰𝘷𝘱𝘶𝑏.𝑐𝘰𝑚}

“Oh, how disappointing,” the Lord of Pontis sighed, outwardly sad he didn’t get to explain.

‘God, I hate it, is he Richard, just that much of a cunt, or someone else entirely? But how could he be Richard… Luna seriously must have noticed… my paranoia is killing me.’ “If you’re so eager, why don’t you repeat to me what it is,” John graciously allowed, trying to glean more about the honesty of this person by reading their reaction.

“So, you do not know…?” Suel asked, a bit of hope sneaking into his tone.

‘Fuck, I have no idea if that’s genuine hope about getting to be an asshole or someone just that good at lying,’ John groaned in his head. The test had been useless. “Let’s just assume that I don’t,” the Gamer said, for now discarding the theory that Richard was behind that face. There were lengths of paranoia that were just unreasonable.

The problem was that it could still be right.

While John was wrestling with internal conflict, the Lord of Pontis explained in a high-and-mighty tone, “Ah, there’s no helping you, is there? The Generation of Monsters is a term many gods use to refer to your generation. For some reason, people in your generation are much more likely to be born with powerful Innate Abilities.”

‘For some reason… Ah, for the average Abyssal the whole ‘babies get doused in magic by Gaia in the womb’ thing is not confirmed, right…’ the Gamer had to remind himself that this was something he knew outright thanks to Romulus and Gaia, but was just a popular theory for everyone else. ‘Well, I’m spreading that it’s true. That’s not a knowledge I regard as harmful.’

“Next question, do you know about the raids of the Dangun Clan?”

“Do I know about one of the greatest ongoing atrocities in the Abyss? Yes, yes, I think I do,” John responded drily. “Where is all of this going, Suel?”

“Patience, patience – last question, do you know what a Worldturtle is?”

“Yes,” John kept that short. He had fought one before. A Granite Titanturtle, to be exact. It had been a Raid Boss in the Valley of Stone and Thunder. At the time, there had been a chance to drop a hatchling of one of these, which sadly had not triggered. Sadly, mostly, because Lydia had offered to be his full-blown sex slave for a week in exchange for it. Public impregnation had been on the table. ‘Oh, the opportunity,’ John cried in his mind. He wasn’t even an exhibitionist, but that was a level of perversion that he was drawn to just because of how intense it was.

Who else, in history, could claim to breed the queen of a country in public? While she screamed ‘Master’ repeatedly, no less?

Before John’s base instincts could make him seek out that very same queen right that moment, he returned to the here and now. “Can we get to what this is about now?”

“I suppose,” Suel cackled and pulled out his smartphone. He tapped around for a little while, accessing his files. “My bat brought me this video, about thirty minutes ago. Doubt you will ever find anything about this in the newspaper.”

John watched with interest. The video was filmed from the back of a Worldturtle, as John realized pretty quickly by the massive fin that was paddling in view. People were exchanging words in Korean. Since the Gamer had spent many an afternoon learning every even remotely important language in the world, he understood them perfectly.

“Think it’s even worth burning down anything this year?”

“In Daisen? Probably not, but we need to check if they build anything up anyway. The Enlightened Lady demands.”

“It would make our job way easier if they just surrendered the coasts already.”

“Nice and confined inland, they’re locked away and Korea is safe.”

“Korea is safe? You just want the landing teams to take care of everything!”

Laughter, in response.

John hated listening to that conversation, as it reflected everything he knew about the conflict. A bunch of callous soldiers doing their job, with a reason that had been good and was brought to extremes. Anyone could understand that, after the horrors of the second World War, the ravaged countries wanted to take measures to prevent it from happening again. Annual raids targeting any and all coastal infrastructure were not the way to go about this.

The conversation continued for a while. Whoever was carrying the camera did not do so covertly. It had the feeling of a bunch of people on vacation just filming a video for their folks back home. For good reason, when talking about the scenery alone. The mountains of Japan rose behind the urbanized coast, while the Worldturtle drifted by, the Natural Barrier it emitted serving as a massive Mobile Barrier that could catch in it anything that wasn’t protected by a Fateweaver.

It was as effective as it was a terrible use of such resources.

John was about to ask when there would be a point to this when the camera suddenly started shaking. The conversation was stopped short, as the soldiers on screen snapped into their trained instincts. Shouts for everyone to assume their posts rung out. The camera must have been left running by sheer accident. The soldier was running with it; for a long time, there was only his feet and the road they had built on the back of the Worldturtle. In the background, one could hear the wailing, deep cries of the massive creature, louder and more intense than a foghorn.

Then there was a loud cuss. The camera was raised, reflexively, and showed a massive gap in the side of the turtle. Suel tapped the screen, pausing the video just before it ended. Although blurred, John could see the layers of building, sediment, and hard rock shell that had all been sliced through. Golden, magma-like blood was gushing out of the depth of the wound.

“The video was making the rounds for a bit, before the Dangun Clan scrubbed it,” Suel explained. “Obviously they don’t want it to leak out that their precious, fully grown Worldturtle was injured. Not that I can do anything with that knowledge.”

“Neither can I.” John had plans to liberate Japan at some point, for reasons of family and principle, but Fusion did not have the power to go up against the Dangun Clan at the moment. Even if they had the economic power and the army, both of which they were approaching, they first needed to reach the US west coast to even have the bases for any operations and the navy to carry them out.

“That makes the really interesting question: who is capable of doing that to a Worldturtle?”

“Very interesting question indeed,” John hummed. “Well, I have no clues,” he said and began to walk away.

“Awww, don’t be like that, Gamer, we can help each other out with this!” Suel shouted in the obnoxiously gleeful tone of someone that had accomplished something.

John had no idea what that was and refused to play along any further. He would investigate this on his own. While walking to get him and Nightingale some new, full glasses, he directed Jake, his Creator Puppet double, to write Scarlett a message via the Harem Comms. Given a direction and a description of what she was searching for, she could doubtlessly locate the file. Nothing that entered the internet was ever truly gone.

Although, with technomancers in the mix, maybe there was a chance to scrub something totally. That was a scary thought.

He would also contact Nariko in a bit. If anyone knew anything about this, it would be her. ‘He’ being the part of his mind operating Jake. Being able to split one’s current thoughts into several pockets was something he had long gotten used to. It was all him and, simultaneously, not. Any memory either of them made were just his, they were not separate entities and would never diverge in terms of character. Separating who was busy with what just allowed him to have a relaxed gala date, while his secondary body was now in work-mode.

The servants of the estate were growing more tired, even if they hid it well. They must have known what they signed up for. If not that, the minimum they had to know was what was in store for them. More of the decent people had left and by now it was almost only the hardened core of drunkards, gradually increasing the ratio of alcohol in their blood.

John returned to the table, to see Lydia and Nightingale chat. Their words didn’t reach his ears, not even when he stood right next to them. The goddess of the night said something while looking at him, Lydia chuckled. In the middle of her response, their sound was allowed to reach him, “…and then he insisted on acquiring a farmstead for me.”

“…Are you talking about the Veilstanz incident?” John wondered. “I thought we agreed that never happened.”

“It never occurred, except when I am talking to a prospective member of our group of hopelessly swooning female fools.” Lydia looked at the glass of wine that was placed in front of her. “I do not recall having ordered something.”

“You haven’t but the wine is the same colour as your lips. Only natural that they should meet,” John said and placed the water in front of Nightingale. “No, I do not think you should drink ink,” he pre-empted the joke on her lips.

“You are reading me expertly, my suitor.” Nightingale bowed down to her glass and sucked on the straw. She seemed relieved, above all else, when she let go. “More alcohol definitely would have been a mistake.”

Across the table, Lydia downed the entire glass of luxurious wine in one go. “I am considering murder to acquire a cold beer,” the queen stated.

“You know, your elaborate talking style is a bit ridiculous at times,” John joked and reached into his inventory. “You can just say ‘I would kill for a beer’, you know?”

“It is habits that make one who they are and my habits dictate that I am expansive but precise in my formulations.” Lydia held her hand ready before John had actually retrieved a bottle of beer from his inventory. Once it had been handed over, she made the lid fly off with her mind. “I am a politician, if by blood rather than by trait, and my bearings must reflect this.”

“Just saying, you could reign it in a bit,” John said, still standing next to the table. He wasn’t sure where to sit. His dates were too far apart to hold both of them at the same time. “You are putting me in a predicament, ladies,” he confessed.

“By seniority and current status, your decision must be clear,” Lydia stated. “You do not know if she is yours yet, after all.”

“She will be tomorrow night,” John declared.

“Oh?” The queen took a sip of her beer. To see such a regal person in full dress drink beer (of a common German store brand) straight from the bottle was an interesting contrast that fit Lydia quite well. “Is that what you decided, my love?”

“Yep,” John declared.

“You have my approval.” The queen nodded over to the songstress, who gratefully lowered her head. “I am fond of you, Nightingale. You will do well in helping our John stay on a productive path.”

“Thank you, Lady Lydia.”

“Lydia will be enough, for now until you have no more interest in John – which he will prevent with all he has to give.”

Nightingale nodded. “Which is immense effort and charm.”

“You have my total agreement.” Lydia returned her eyes to John; they were a calm and gentle blue. “Sit down, my love,” she enticed him.

“Just ignore that I’m here,” he encouraged, eager to hear them compliment him more. Once he sat down, he entirely dismissed his own words. The queen stood up and grabbed one of his legs, making him spread them out before taking a seat on the left one. Her butt had plenty to sit cushioned on his thigh.

“Join us,” Lydia demanded, gesturing at John’s other leg like a monarch inviting a cherished guest to the seat of honour. That was, taken literally, actually what was happening.

Nightingale took the invitation without hesitation and soon John had a queen and a goddess in his lap, an arm and a wing wrapped around him, with one woman kissing his lips and the other his neck. “I will not be able to speak clearly for long,” the lady of the night cooed.

“That will not be an issue,” Lydia whispered, mostly into John’s ear. Her eyes glanced off to the side for a moment. “I think it is time we wrap things up here.”

“Well, let’s give him three minutes to stew,” John decided and claimed Lydia’s lips again.

He knew Bertrand was watching.