(Norad, Colorado Springs, January 8th, 2036)

Adaline smiles at me laughing at something I had just said to her, though for the life of me I can’t remember what it was. I review my memories and realize I can’t remember anything. But I know that I can’t remember anything and with that thought, I take control of my dream and will myself to wake up as, In the dream, Adaline looks at me and says, “Time to wake up Adam!” I come back to consciousness as I feel a stinging pain across my throat. My body is face down on my cot as my head is yanked back while whoever is on me pulls back on my head to draw a knife from right to left across my throat. Suddenly I am released and fall forward to catch myself on the cot as I hear a pop. I realize the weight on my back is gone as someone cries “He Killed Him!” I check my throat to find only a trickle of blood as I also check my prompts.

Surprise attack by Harvey Coolidge strikes for 3 points of damage (Base 5 x2 for critical). Rank Disparity of two levels reduces damage by 1/4th.

I closed the prompt as a woman on my left cried “You Killed Harvey you monster!” and shoots me point-blank in the head with a shotgun. Later I would check the combat log to find out that the reason it didn’t hurt that much was that it was a common item and damage was also reduced to ¼ because of our rank disparity, whatever that was. I ‘d only taken 2 points of damage. The shotgun blast hit me and bounces off as she also disappears. I curl into myself trying to protect myself as much as possible as person after person attacks me and disappears. I think about it for a second and realize the safe zone must be counting people on people attacks as well. Isn’t that convenient? Of course, if I was a little less robust I’d have died already. As I lay, curled in a ball, I hear Admiral Ainsworth rushing into the bunk area

“Stand Down, Stop attacking, or you will be dealt with.” The admiral declares in a military command voice that permits no disagreement.

“Admiral, No Violence, you’ll be teleported out of the Safe Zone,” I yelled quickly.

The room goes dead quiet.

I poke my head out as the people that were about to attack me step back with a look of confusion on their faces as a man next to me says, “But you killed those people, we saw, they just disappeared.”

I stand up slowly, allowing everyone to see that I am absolutely fine and the wound under my neck is fully healed. As I glance around, I notice Mr. Billingsgate, the husband of the former President, standing off to the side with rage in his eyes. I turn my attention to my prompts, chose the Safe Zone tab, pick Permissions, and look for Mr. Billingsgate’s name. Once I find him I hold that in my mind’s eye as I refocus on everyone around.

“Okay, first rule, all of you, and I do mean all of you need to reread the rules about safe zones. Why? Safe Zone, no death, if there’s no death there isn’t any combat, and if you bring combat into the safe zone what happens?”

“I did read the rules and all they say is that monsters get teleported out of the safe zone.” A woman in the crowd says.

“And the definition of one person trying to harm another person during the proverbial end of the world in the only safe places on the planet could be defined as what?”

“A Monster,” she says resignedly

“A Monster” I repeat, agreeing with her.

“So everyone that attacked you, they’ve been teleported outside of the safe zone and they won’t be re-entering any safe zones for the next 48 hours?” she asks.

“Yep!”

“48 Hours? That’s a death sentence,” one of my would-be attackers’ cries!

“It could be. The Admiral could try to round them up and provide protection along the border of the safe area but if someone with the debuff on them tries to step into the safe zone they will be teleported again and guess what, the timer resets. “

“Is there anything you can do for them Adam?” the Admiral asks.

“Unfortunately, not, though I have an idea about what started this, Hold on,” I say as I walk over to a wall and use my ability Spellweaver to create an effect that allows everyone near me to watch my sleeping body 5 minutes before I was attacked until now. I spend 2,500 of my 18,000 mana and a replay shows Mr. Billingsgate walked in with a group of soldiers and pointed at me as I lay on the bed, “That’s the man that killed the President and started this apocalypse. If you kill him we’ll be able to split all of his power and loot.” Then we watch as a Navy Seal places his knee in my back, pulls my head back with his left hand, and tries to slit my throat with a knife in his right hand just before he disappears. We then watch Mr. Billingsgate point at me as I flop forward and says “He killed him!” I stop the recording. As the spell ends I notice Mr. Billingsgate leaving the room. It won’t matter, he can’t get outside the safe zone in the next 5 minutes, let alone an hour.

I look to the crowd and raise my voice so everyone can hear, “I’m done monologuing or explaining. Each and every one of you are safe here. I’m going to head out into the world and try to find more people to save. If you try to harm someone while you’re here whatever is running the Cultivation will put you out in the real world which is where they want you fighting and dying. As for anyone that instigates violence. This is my Safe Zone. With a thought.

“Permission of Duncan Billingsgate to use this safe zone has been revoked.

There’s a scream from the hallway that Mr. Billingsgate was trying to escape down.

“What did you do Adam?” The Admiral asks.

“I stopped protecting someone that tried to kill me in ‘my’ safe zone. Make sure that the President and everyone else that thinks they’re in charge know that. I’ll leave the government to run things but none of you run me. As you’ve seen me die once already you know that I’ll be back if it happens again and the idiots that ordered it will be locked out of this safe zone. Though Mr. Billingsgate should consider himself lucky. He didn’t violate the Safe Zone so he’s probably on the outskirts of this safe area and has the ability to find another and rest there if he can. Funny thing, Every one of those soldiers that attacked me was navy. I just saved thousands of Navy personnel today, no good deed and all that. Now I’m going to head out and see whoever I can save around the country. So, less talk, more action,” I say as I teleport to the entrance of the tunnel that leads to Norad. I draw the sword Ender from my inventory and float up into the sky. The nearest city not in the safe zone is Pueblo so I start flying southeast.

At 30 miles per hour, it’s going to take me a little less than an hour to get to the border of my safe zone. I think about the things I’ve seen over the last seven days. I am currently Division 1, Grade 0, Level 7. I think I know how levels work so access my Personal Interface and look up leveling. I am surprised to find the following prompt

You possess the skill Lore Leveling: 100. Would you like to,

Review lore at your own pace

Download information for instantaneous access, Warning may cause side effects including drowsiness, dizziness, and unconsciousness.

That’s interesting. I think for a moment then teleport to the Safe Zone in Las Vegas where I find the safe zone packed with people and screams and yells for help coming from others outside the safe zone. I teleport again directly above the hospital and look on. A hoard of minotaurs wielding giant battle axes is attacking and killing anyone and everything outside the safe zone. I cast Fly, sheath my sword ‘Ender’ and pull my harness with my M134 Minigun of Unlimited Ammo out of my personal storage. Truthfully I’ve been wanting to try this thing out. While I hover I pull a P90 of unlimited ammo out of storage and start shooting the minotaurs directly below me with controlled bursts. They don’t stand a chance as the two to three bursts tear each of them apart. Once I’ve cleared a place to land, I drop down in front of five survivors, place the p90 back in my inventory and get to work with the Minigun. The minigun puts out 50 rounds per second. Each round is doing only 3 points of damage but they’re coming out like a laser. Additionally, they’re armor-piercing, doing damage to the first minotaur, the one behind it, and the one behind that one. I wonder how many minotaurs one round can go through. All anyone can hear is a loud burr as I turn Minotaurs into hamburger. Once I’ve cleared out a small area I throw down the portal 5 feet outside the safe zone activate it and open a portal to Norad.

“Everyone through, This leads to Norad, It’s a permanent safe zone that will allow all of you to stay in it 24 hours a day. Go, I’ll take care of the minotaurs.

For the next hour, I alternate between the Minigun,2 P90, and Beretta’s of Unlimited Ammo laying waste to any monsters that come close to the portal. I don’t have the Analyze or Identity skills anymore so have no idea what levels I’m fighting but it looks like whatever the Rank Disparity trait is, it’s working in my favor while I protect the portal and the people fleeing through it.

When the last person steps through the portal to the safe zone in Colorado I deactivate the magic item, pick it up and place it in my storage. I step into the safe zone and review my Combat log. I note that I killed 313 minotaurs. I find the message for the death of a 50th-level minotaur and note that I only earned 250 XP for its death. Additionally, I find that after the first bullet each bullet that followed it into the target counted as a critical strike and my modifier was x10 at skill 100. Each bullet after the first was doing 30 points of damage. After I review the combat logs, the lowest level minotaur I’d killed was level 50 while the highest level one was 75.

I walk over and found one of the chairs in a quiet corner of the safe zone. I am now Division 1. Rank 4, level 6 after killing the Minotaurs which means that my equivalent level to the monsters is now level 146. I had a rank disparity of 146. I still didn’t know exactly what that meant. It was a system the Syndicate had adopted to keep things simple for worlds being cultivated. For non-monsters, It looked like they would earn 10 levels then go up 1 grade which cost 55,000 XP total. Then they would start at level 1 again and work their way up to level 10, get grade 2 and head back down to level 0 to work their way back up again. This would go on until they reached Grade 10 then they’d go up a Division and start the process at level 0 again.

This system seemed overly complicated although it looked like each major change, Level, Grade, and Division increased hit points stamina and mana. It also looked like each power level you went up doubled XP and damage against those one classification lower than you but they were worth less XP. If I was the individual one classification lower, I did half as much damage but received double the XP. For me, If I attacked anything under level 100 I was only earning ½ the XP I could if I was fighting something level 100 or higher. If I attacked something that was only levels 1-10 then I’d only receive 1/4th the XP. This system was complicated but interesting. It looked like it was designed to reward those that stayed within their classification while allowing them to possibly affect others that had a higher classification than them, as long as it wasn’t too high.

I thought about leveling for a few more minutes then pulled up my leveling Lores on my Personal Interface and asked for the download. A couple of seconds later I reviewed what I’d just learned. Before I started reviewing that information I decided I needed to know as much as I could. While I had a level 100 effectively in every skill, I didn’t feel like I’d learned anything new. Most likely the information would only become available as I used this or that skill and I wouldn’t actually notice the changes until then because I hadn’t seen them yet. It was completely weird knowing I had the knowledge but not having the knowledge at my fingertips. Until the “Change” that had never happened before. As new experiences went, it sucked. I had 10 hours in this safe zone before the coward debuff was activated. I pulled up Lore skills, categorized them, and started with areas like Space, Time, and Chaos lore then moved to any magical lores I had. It didn’t take long to go through everything that I could think of. I was sure I was missing some subjects but I was also sure if I needed to know something I’d be fine.

Nine and a half hours later I stood, dusted myself off, and looked around. Another couple of survivors had made it to the safe zone. I introduced myself and then sent them to Norad. I didn’t know what the total population in my safe zone was but I was sure I’d saved quite a few. Once everyone here was through I stored my portal device and stepped out of the safe zone. Staying in the safe zone would have caused me problems. That’s why when an energy field surround me and I was teleported, transported, or zapped into space next to the sun, I was a bit surprised.

Of course, the energy field that suddenly placed me next to the sun caused me some problems as well. It was incredibly bright for a little bit then my vision cleared and I was floating in the vacuum of space, not that far above the surface of the Sun. I was lucky I hadn’t had any of my weapons or items out of my Personal Storage, the only item that was destroyed was my Belt of Wardrobes. I was going to have to get another one, maybe a couple if this kept happening

Well, I had expected a response from the Syndicate but this wasn’t exactly what I had in mind. Also, I was pretty sure I didn’t have the mana I’d need to get back to Earth, and the portal I had wouldn’t have the range either. The other thing I noticed was that I was falling towards the Sun. I wasn’t in orbit and the Sun was huge. Gravity, yeah it sucks. I’d be at the surface in seconds. I’d Probably survive that too because gravity wasn’t supposed to have…As I thought that my velocity toward the sun slowed and I started to hover. So Adaptable, as in the ability to survive and move in the environment in question. Well, I’d I wanted to move between this sun and planet Earth, though I had no idea which way it was. I cast a simple direction spell with the location of the Earth as my target. An arrow appeared in front of me and pointed up and away from the Sun. I willed myself to move towards Earth and I started to fall away from the Sun quickly. I wasn’t traveling at the speed of light but within 15 minutes the Earth was growing quickly. Light took about 8 minutes to get from the Sun to the Earth, So about half the speed of light. That was pretty fast. As I thought that, a prompt filled my vision,

Fundamental Ability “Willed Movement” Unlocked. As a being of Chaos, constantly connected to it so long as you are not in a region of ERROR, you have the ability to move through that Chaos as you desire at any rate you desire. As Chaos is present in all aspects of the reality your will allows you to move as you desire. This is a sub-ability of the Fundamental Ability “Adaptable.”

Oh really? No mana cost, nothing? Now all I’d need is a navigation system and I’d be able to travel between the stars at will. I really missed my nanites. I willed myself back into Orbit over North America and was enveloped by the energy field again. I didn’t have the ability to analyze it so I don’t know how to counter it. Although, this energy field feels different yet familiar. As I drop through the atmosphere of Earth I feel myself vibrating into a place where I can look at the Earth and the ground below me but am not there. I’m moving towards the Earth but feel as if I’m getting farther and farther away. One of the RPGs I played described such a place as a parallel dimension that touched all points of the Universe beside it. That was called the Ethereal Plane in that game. Except that I am surrounded by an energy field as I drop through it into another realm of shifting gasses of all colors. I feel like I’m falling forever, which is weird because moments later I notice that the gasses I’m being dragged through lightening to a dull white, a color I’m quite familiar with, chaos.

The energy field deposits me into the center of an Octagonal bipyramid that is slowly spinning on its access all around me while I float in the middle of it.

“So this is the mortal that has caused us so many issues?” a male voice asks.

“Yes, should he survive the year on his planets Cultivation the bet he’s made will require the liquidation of approximately 75% of our assets among the cosmos” a feminine voice answers.

I look around for the speakers and realize they are behind and above me. I am but a microbe compared to the scale of these beings. If I were to guess, they aren’t bigger than The Ancient Enemy which was larger than some Universes when I could gauge its scale. As I look around I note the humanoid shadows near me yet far away and through the colored gases, I can see that I am smaller than the female’s dainty pinky toe, which is covered in a brilliant red polish. As I gaze at her foot I am overwhelmed by some sort of ability that makes it hard to think. My body is locked into rigidity as I will my mind to retreat behind my defenses. My core identity falls back through my memories which span multiple infinities. My body might not be able to move, my attributes are far too low to compete with whatever these beings are, but they will find it a very long time before they could reach me. How long would it take for a being to access and absorb the knowledge that has spanned Universes?

I pull up my personal interface to check my attributes and levels and realize that something is wrong. I have only been in this space for maybe 30 seconds and my Levels are now Division 1, Grade 4, and Level 9. I’ve earned 30,000 XP. Am I back to earning 1,000 XP per second because I’m close to Chaos? As I wonder about the XP I can still feel the pressure from the entities standing above me though I can still hear them as if through a very long tunnel.

“I have scanned this one. I find nothing remarkable about him. He doesn’t even have any abilities” the male voice states

“Not a one?” the female asks

“What is happening to him?” the male asks alarmed

“He’s leveling, he’s leveling at an incredible rate. Discard him now. Whatever is going on, this one cannot be allowed to exist, he will challenge the Gods! Themselves!” the female states as the pressure from their presence fades and I feel a sense of great velocity. I come back to my normal senses to look around and find myself still in the octagonal bipyramid which now spins within the milky white of Chaos. It lasts for but an instant after I look out and Chaos crashes into me flooding my body with 1 million XP per second.

One second Later I’m Division 3, Grade 3, Level 3. The Second after that. Division 5, Grade 1, level 2. Since it only takes 550,000 XP to increase one division 10 seconds after I’m immersed in Chaos I reach Category 1, Division 9, Grade 6, Level 8. I have to admit I’m starting to feel a little more like myself as my attributes are 1,447 each at this point. At this rate, I’ll be through Categories and Tiers in 50 seconds.

I wonder about the sword I have in my Inventory “Ender.” It is magical and can level. Can I pull it out here and allow it to level too. I consider the pros and cons then will the sword into my hand which caused prompts to populate my vision.

The Unique Sword Ender has entered a realm of Chaos. Durability damage to sword far exceeds its current durability. The Soul bound to this weapon has been freed. The Sword has been transformed into a chaos blade.

Congratulations! You have discovered a Chaos Blade.

A Chaos Blade may only be wielded by a creature of Chaos.

This weapon is drawn and sheathed at will from Chaos.

Damage is Variable

This weapon is indestructible.

This weapon is Soul-Bound to the Fundamental being Johnathan Bennard

This Note: may only be seen by creatures with “Fundamental” abilities. The Blade of Chaos ignores all barriers, spells, and armor that do not have the trait “Fundamental” as part of its makeup as if they are not there. Any creature struck by this weapon will react as if touched by raw chaos. As Chaos by its very nature is undefinable, the effects of what will happen cannot be quantified. Though the entities Luck may or may not determine if the exposure to chaos is beneficial, neutral, or ruinous just as your luck did since you are ‘lucky’ enough to be holding this item and reading this note…Johnathan.

Well, that wasn’t supposed to happen. I will the Chaos Blade to be sheathed and it disappears from my hand. I checked my Personal Storage and it isn’t there. I will the chaos sword back into my hand and it is suddenly there. I sheathed it again. Another 30 seconds had gone by while I considered the sword. I am now Category 7, Division 4, Grade 2, Level 4. I have to admit, whoever came up with this way of handling leveling needed to have their head examined. It was complicated to keep track of.

I considered everything I’d heard and witnessed and realized that Fundamental Abilities were not recognizable by even the most powerful gods which those two must have been or they’d have known that throwing me into raw chaos was pointless. Though I hadn’t expected the XP influx. I thought about that for a moment then realized I should have figured that out by the descriptions of my abilities. I was now a “Confluence” which meant that as chaos entered me it was being converted to the Fundamental powers as well as providing me with XP which is what allowed me to use magic anywhere.

In Raw Chaos, there was nowhere for that energy to go and I was still converting it. I wonder if the beings that had granted me that ability knew that was possible? Of course, he or she did and of course, they would have left me an avenue to regain what had been changed, the hints had all been there. Even at a million XP per second, it would be a little while before I was back to what I had been when I took on the Ancient Enemy. I needed to sit back, relax and review what I’d learned about the changes, contemplate anything else I might ‘not’ have lost permanently then figure a way to get out of Chaos and back to Earth.