The Systemic Lands

Chapter 602: Day 5,099 – Code Black

“This morning’s broadcast is an emergency order. Code black, 789451. I repeat code black, 789451. This is not a drill. At the current time all forces are-“ the transmission from the stone cut out from XLR8s regular broadcast that I listened to in the morning. It took me a moment to process what had just happened.

I left my bedroom and went onto the bridge. “Maximum speed to Purgatory, immediately. Prepare for heavy combat. I will be putting on my armor,” I ordered.

“Cross the Rift, or go around?” Captain Francis asked, and I paused for a moment.

“Stright across. I will handle anything that pops up. And I do mean maximum speed, use the extra engines,” I ordered and went to my room as Captain Francis began issuing orders. Bells were rung as everyone began rushing about. The Crystal Vortex quickly swung around and accelerated directly for Purgatory.

A few minutes later I stepped out onto the bridge as the airship began to ascend. “Michael, what is happening?” Michelle asked.

“There is a critical emergency in Purgatory. A code black was issued with the necessary authentication code, right before the broadcast was cut. Prepare for combat, including the level 7 monsters.” I heard one of the soldiers gasp on the bridge, but no one said anything else. “I will be on the upper deck, dealing with the flying monsters.”

What I didn’t want to say out loud, was that there were very few people who could broadcast a general recall order for me. The fact that the transmission was cut off was even more concerning. The stones communicated through resonance. Cutting off such a connection was only possible by destroying one end as far as I knew. Either something had killed XLR8, or it had been cut off in the middle. Both options were equally bad.

“I will prep high level summons,” Michelle said.

“Our beam cannons are too low level, we will be counting on you for local suppression and defense,” Captain Francis told Michelle.

“How much time?” Michelle asked.

“Pushing it like we are now and cutting across the Rift, two days,” Captain Francis said. We were South of Graystone at the moment, and I frowned at that. Normally it would have taken around 8 days to get back.

“We can cut off that much time?” I asked.

“You can feel the acceleration? It is immense. Also, the number of points we are burning, equally immense. We are also going to go to the apex of speed, before reversing, unless you want to come in hot over Purgatory?” Captain Francis asked me.

“No. I don’t want to overshoot for any reason. I would prefer some maneuverability,” I replied.

“The number of flying monsters will also stack up,” he added.

“Don’t worry about that. We can’t slow down. I will handle the flying monsters, you keep the airship and crew togeather until we get there. Michelle, will prep summons for mass deployment once we arrive,” I replied.

“No contact with any other resonance connections?” Michelle asked.

“All cut, no response,” I replied. “I should get going and clearing them out as they appear.” I left the bridge and made my way to the top of the airship. The crew had all retreated inside their rooms. I didn’t blame them, the wind was incredibly strong. I also saw the engines leaving a slight blue trail behind them. They were literally burning up points and it hurt my soul. Millions upon millions were being used up to race back to my capital.

Force Beam. Void Beam. I took out a flying monster behind the airship and kept repeating that skill combination over and over to create an annihilation effect. It was good target practice. As time went on, the wind got more intense, and aiming was more difficult. The airship was angled slightly forward at around ten degrees forward to help people balance due to the acceleration.

That was as much as could be done while keeping the ship moving at maximum acceleration with the engines at the rear of the airship. At least there was a large place to stand at the top of the airship, and I could use Air Burst to stabilize myself if needed.

I watched the terrain ahead of the airship as it transitioned and kept track of where we were heading with my mental map. I wanted to know when we were heading over the Rift that divided the left and right halves of the Systemic Lands.

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Spotting the void zones ahead, I kept an eye out for any more monsters and got ready to keep myself on the airship when turbulence hit. After a moment of thinking about it, I went down the ladder slightly, rather than being on the deck. We were hitting the mid-point of our travel arc very soon and were outpacing any of the sky monsters.

When we started to slow down I would have to put in work. The Crystal Vortex went over the void zones and turbulence began to hit. The airship began to shake, but the airship was holding togeather. I also noted we had dropped altitude quite a bit. Poking my head up from the ladder area, I saw level 5 and then a level 6 monster descending from the sky to chase after us.

The airship began to spin about as we left the monsters behind. The shaking got worse, but it wasn’t critical levels as far as I could tell. After reorienting, we began to slow down from our current insane speed. It pained my soul to think about how many points this was burning, but if Purgatory was in danger, then it would be worth the expense.

Once we cleared the Rift, I went back up on the deck and began firing beam attacks back off in the distance, sniping the flying monsters after us. With the meta-point increasing my stats, I wasn’t tired as we began to get closer to Purgatory. There was something odd in the air as well. It was hard to see, but there was a minute shift in the energy that was everywhere.

We had just went by New Beijing and it was the morning day 5,101. The flying monsters weren’t catching up, but taking out new ones was important, so there wouldn’t be a huge death ball behind us when we slowed down.

This was important. After killing another flying monster, I quickly went down to the bridge. “Michelle, do you sense it?” I asked.

“What?” she looked at me.

“The shift in the energy?” I asked her. She frowned and waved a hand in front of herself a couple of times.

“My tethers, something is pushing at them,” she replied. That wasn’t good.

“Captain, can you spin us around?” I asked.

“Not easily or quickly. We went for maximum straight-line acceleration. We can begin turning, but the question is which direction?” he asked.

“Can you hold the tethers?” I asked Michelle.

“If the monsters are close yes, but I won’t be able to defend the airship. And if there is foreign energy pressing down, then the biggest concern would be people. We have stats, but the soldiers,” Michelle pointed out the main issue.

“Swing the airship South and then back to the Forbidden City. This started just past New Beijing. The most likely culprit are those shards,” I said.

“Will do, spinning the airship now,” Captain Francis said and began issuing orders.

“Michelle, can you fight off the flying monsters?” I asked her.

“If the external energy pressure doesn’t get worse, then yes. But we will be vulnerable,” she replied.

“We can’t risk everyone, and I am the best person to handle whatever is happening,” I replied.

“With respect sir, if you encounter something, then it would be a massive disaster. Without you, everything will collapse. It could be a calamity, and even the Astrologer wasn’t able to counter that or his entire nation,” Captain Francis said. That was a good point. I could be rushing into my death.

“We make for the Forbidden City. That would be the primary fallback location, with the secondary one being New Dhaka. ETA?” I asked.

“Slowing down, not simple. We can turn. We will come close to Esperanza, as we loop back around. But our speed is incredibly high,” Captain Francis said while I tried to mentally visualize the situation. We had come in on a straight line from the Southwest, with a bit more West towards Purgatory.

“You would overshoot The Forbidden City by a couple of zones and will need to loop,” I said.

“Yes, but it isn’t that bad,” Captain Francis said. It was my mistake for rushing too quickly to get back and not thinking about whatever was doing this would be too dangerous even for me. Purgatory would have to wait for my return. “ETA on the Forbidden City will early tomorrow morning,” Captain Francis said. We would have hit Purgatory this evening if we kept going.

I didn’t like the change in the air. The shards and the change in energy from the landscape around them were not something I remembered very well. My stats were much lower back then. I hadn’t robbed the Divine Empress or gotten a meta-point. But it did feel familiar. There was something hostile out there and it was countering the Almighty System.

While it could be something else, or some other emergency, if the fallout from the shards was even, then hitting the energy just past New Beijing made sense. I would have to look carefully at the density as we continued our turn. Where it leveled off, would let me pinpoint the direction. The spot I spotted the change and when we crossed back over would let me work out the epicenter.

I explained this to one of Captain Francis’ soldiers managing the maps and markers were laid down on top of the map to work things out. As we continued the turn, I took care of the flying monsters, while going below occasionally to report my observations.

As we left the abnormal energy, it was clear that the epicenter were those shards. The big question was why hadn’t the Almighty System moved in to stop whatever was doing this? It had acted once before, but it clearly didn’t finish off the threat. Now several cities were being impacted. It wasn’t just Truth.

I had also been looking at people grinding below and there was no one in the areas impacted by the shard energy. The economy was about to run right into a brick wall and collapse. If this energy was expanding, then we would need to consider evacuating, but how far could we evacuate? The total landmass was incredibly small. Unless we sailed into the unknown on an airship, we would have to deal with this threat.

This was a threat with no clear solution. At least with the Divine Empress, it was to kill her. Same with Ritualist, Astrologer, and the monster. It was simply a matter of killing them off. But how would I even begin to deal with something that not even the Almighty System could deal with?