Gestation by John Gold (love books to read .txt) 📗

me go indifferently, as if I’m already dead. Then, they go back to stomping on the faces frozen into the ice.

Suddenly, I’m right next to him.

I don’t see a name, which is unusual for a bot. He’s no longer radiating power; he’s just standing there looking at me. Snow starts falling on the both of us.

“Congratulations, Sagie, your trials are complete, and you can return to your world. You can’t take anything you’ve found or made here, however. Your physical attributes will revert back to what they were before you were sent to Hell.”

“…”

I feel like I’m going to die. Everything I’ve done here is lost. But what can I do? All he would have to do to kill me is to wish it, and I would be powerless. Just one thought! If he released the power he had pent up, I would be a goner.

“Goodbye.” My body starts melting into a stream of light.

∞ ∞ ∞

The person standing in the middle of the lake smiled and turned to the block of ice to his right. His expression was forceful, his body muscular, his clothes rich, his movements smooth.

“Stop hiding. Come here and sit down.” With one motion, he created two benches and a table laden with food.

The illusion of ice faded, and the three people hiding behind it merged into one. By the time they’d moved over to the bench, they were indeed one person.

“Why didn’t you let me talk with him? I had every right to! And why drag him here through all the belts?”

“What if he’d killed the titans?”

“How? He hasn’t even finished the first level, and their power is on a par with the gods’! They’re only Level 900 here. If they found their way to the world of men, they’d jump straight up to Level 9000.”

“Set, how did you even get here? You weren’t keeping track of his trials.”

The odd fellow with the hair jutting up just shrugged.

“I did exactly what I was supposed to do: I tortured the sinners in the ice, the worst of them, obviously. Why? What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, just a few eensie-weensie issues.” The man did nothing to hide his emotion, and started counting on his fingers. There was an expression of rage on his face. “During the first trial, he hid from the guards, and then Death itself noticed him. He found Death’s throwing spike without even knowing it. That should tell you a little something about how capable he is of killing the titans. That isn’t the only thing he could have used, either, regardless of what level he’s at. He doesn’t feel auras of power anymore. He boosted his resistance gradually. Then, he found the guards and tortured both them and their helpers.”

“How? They’re even stronger.”

“He paralyzed them and pinned them to the ground.” The man ticked off one finger.

“Kids these days…”

“Have you forgotten how to think? That’s just the beginning. He killed the succubus, and then he flew right over the fields of strength.”

Set pulled actual, real cigarettes out of his pocket, the kind that didn’t exist in the game world.

“He’s from one of the flying races? I haven’t gotten any of those so far. They haven’t been unlocked yet, I thought.”

“He made a pair of wings for himself.” After waiting for a reaction, the man continued. “And off he flew! There wasn’t a single flying creature in the entire zone. Nobody uses the air to move around in the fields of strength, and the boy used that to his advantage.”

“It would have been simpler if he’d just used shields.”

“Kids aren’t allowed to use things like that in their world. They just changed that six months ago, though there are still a few conditions.”

“Well, I’ll be… And what happened then?”

“The second thing,” the man replied, ticking off another finger. “He came across Cerberus, though he jumped onto the dog’s neck and started choking him out. Cerberus realized what was going on and tossed Sagie, though the boy just killed the dog with one blow. He created eleven charges and crushed the dog’s ribcage.”

“How did someone in their first level learn tricks like that?”

“You idiot! That trial was created to develop the participants’ mental capacities. Have you done nothing? Did you read the officer instructions you were sent for that level? I guess not, otherwise, you would’ve known.”

“Calm down, calm down,” Set said. “We’ll resurrect the dog. He isn’t an officer, so what does he have to be mad about?”

“Oh, absolutely! Why would anyone get angry about a little thing like that? Then, he spent a month swimming around the trial zone, having fun where people usually rot alive. He dropped down and killed the next guard, too. He even killed the guard in the same way the guard usually kills his victims - beat him to death after pinning his whole body to the ground with stakes. After that, he used the souls of sinners to create semi-intelligent items. The grand finale was a weapon so strong that he could have activated it and destroyed the entire trial zone. The keeper noticed and sent a hint to the boy via the astral that he should go easy with that, though he just disappeared for two months before showing up again to grow a forest you haven’t noticed yet. He stole a power crystal, too, and you didn’t see. Then, he just walked on to the next trial. That’s when they called me, telling me we might have our first candidate. So, who was supposed to make sure the trials were beaten correctly?”

“Me?”

“Yes, you! If it weren’t for you, I’d still be off relaxing, but no, I’ve had to spend four months getting here. I still have nine years of relaxation left. Oh, by the way, he drowned the boatman in the Styx, and he created another one of those weapons in the swamps. That…that person…he didn’t even realize how powerful it was. The keeper got involved, though the boy figured out that something was wrong while the keeper was creating