Chapter 49: Bunyan's Lightning

A bolt of lightning was flying directly for him, but Rick decided to step into this one. It tore through his body, severely damaging his defensive core, and much of it coursed through his limbs. He convulsed involuntarily, struggling to resist the effect but still failing. When it ended, he collapsed down onto one knee and still had to prop himself up with an arm.

"Okay..." He barely gasped the word out before he had to take several breaths. "We can take... a quick break..."

"Seriously?" From across the combat chamber, Tom eyed him with a mix of surprise and concern. "Are you sure you don't want to be finished for the day?"

"No. You know what I'm facing, thanks to you."

The reminder brought a flash of guilt to Tom's face and he nodded before turning away. That left Rick to just lie down on the ground and try to pull himself together.

If they had really fought, it might have been an interesting match, but that wasn't the point. Instead he was just subjecting his defensive core to repeated attacks in order to improve it as quickly as possible. Though Tom's lightning wasn't as monstrously powerful as as Jack's Aura Ink skills, it was the best opportunity he had aside from Emily. Between the two of them, his defensive core would be improved by their next fight.

But as he'd concluded in the strategy meeting, he couldn't win this fight by relying on his defense. Rick sat down, wiped himself off, and popped open a bottle of 250k philosopher's elixir. By using up the money he'd been saving for the fighter's deposit, he was able to get all he needed. Unfortunately, he was also seeing the limits of trying to increase his strength with raw money.

When he'd first met Birthrighters with generation rates of six digits or more, he'd assumed that their parents just handed them 100,000 lucrim. Now that he'd actually held almost that much in his bank account, he realized that it wasn't actually that much money on their scale. Oh, it was a small fortune by his family's standards, and a lot more than he and Melissa needed to live for a long time, but not compared to Birthrighters.

Just how much money would it take to actually create a Birthright Core that had a generation rate of six digits? A hell of a lot, that was for sure. Emily had implied that the orders of magnitude actually had some significance - apparently the lucrim analysis system had been calibrated that way. Hence why he was struggling to get any of his smaller Lucores above 10,000, and why 100,000 total generation rate was a difficult barrier for many.

Not that he was anywhere near those heights. For now, all he could do was continue with incremental improvements and hope that they would be enough.

Once he had some serum and elixir in his system, Rick set about what had become a familiar routine. He took several supplements that Lisa had left for him, then began his usual exercises of Lucore reformation and meditation. Since he was already stretching his body beyond normal training, he extended his rest periods by working on Graham's Stake as well. Maybe he couldn't be completely respectable, but it wouldn't hurt to improve it if possible.

All of that would help, but it was really just laying the groundwork. His more significant progress came from two things: hardcore biking and training with Melissa. When he still made attempts at finding anomalies, he tried to push himself, biking in 38^th gear or higher. It was exhausting, but it was helping his Dark Blood Kettle foundation grow.

Working with his sister provided even greater benefits, though they were hard to pin down. In the beginning, her manifested void flames had been great for improving his defenses and making his foundation more efficient. Yet over time, it had stopped hurting him. Melissa said that she thought she was gaining control of it so that she wouldn't harm anyone she liked.

In any case, contact with something that dangerous made the pool of the Dark Blood Kettle grow. Likewise, when Emily really attacked him with her aura blades, or now with the lightning attacks. The pool of black blood within his lucrima soul didn't seem to grant any amazing abilities, but it was growing, and that theoretically aided all the rest of his development.

When he finished another cycle of everything, Rick took several deep breaths. He needed to make sure that his lucrima soul was in order, plus it was just difficult to throw himself into that much pain repeatedly. This was the only chance he had to make Tom help him, so he needed to get everything he could out of it.

Currently the other man was on the opposite side of the room, shadow-boxing against a wall. It looked like he was serious about improving his melee combat skills, though Rick suspected there was something more to it. Maybe he could combine those blows with bolts - Rick presumed he was holding back a trick, but it didn't matter, since the important thing was being exposed to all the lightning.

Since this would be the last session, Rick grabbed his backpack and carefully pulled out the "Great Wheel Heaven and Earth Realmshattering Pill". He still hated the name, but it had cost a hell of a lot and Damian had vouched for its efficacy. Most importantly, it was supposed to help a person absorb some of the qualities of elemental attacks. As soon as Rick felt it begin to filter through his system, he stood up to begin the last match.

"Alright, Tom, one more." Rick began stretching his legs to make sure his exhausted muscles wouldn't cramp. "If you do this, then I'll be willing to overlook how you sold me out to Granny Whitney."

"I really didn't have a choice, man." Tom still looked guilty, which was the point. He moved away from his corner and shook his head. "Maybe I wouldn't have let you go this far, but I really do want to help. You're in a rough situation and you deserve better."

"If she gets her hooks into you, you're actually the one in more trouble." Feeling a bit bad for exploiting Tom's guilt, Rick faced him with a serious expression. "Please, remember what I said about her. She's going to do anything it takes to win, so you need to make sure that her winning somehow leaves you far away from her."

"I'll try, but Alger is getting worse these days..."

"I can only wish you luck with that." Fully stretched, Rick stepped out into the center of the combat ring. "This time we're going to do something different. I'm going to use my speed technique and I want you to hit me at exactly the moment I use it."

"What good is that going to do?"

"Maybe nothing, but that's my problem. But first... you have more than one speed of those bolts, right?"

"That's right." Tom raised both hands, a thin bolt crackling between them. "If I simulate actual lightning, it activates slower and it's weaker, but it moves at the speed of light. My normal bolts aren't that fast, but they pack a lot more of a punch."

"Use the fast ones this time, then."

"That'll take some work to get the timing right, but if you count down to your jump, I should be able to do it."

"Alright then. Three... two... one..." Rick leapt and immediately fell down to the ground, spasming wildly.

As he pushed himself back to his feet, he actually laughed a bit. Normally he might have had a chance to dodge, since the buildup to the bolt was relatively slow, but the bolt itself was still... well, the speed of light. More importantly, it seemed to connect with his movement in some way, perhaps because of the ridiculously-named pill.

Tom was standing nearby, giving him an odd look. Rick got up and wiped a bit of blood from his lip. "Again."

By the time Rick couldn't take any more, he'd lost track of how many times he'd been shocked. Just having all his muscles regularly spasm like that was exercise in itself, though he doubted that would really be meaningful. What mattered was that he'd successfully absorbed just a bit of that quality into his Bunyan's Step core. When he lay down to rest, he prodded at it within his portfolio.

The Lucore was seriously burned out, but by this point he was good at not going so far that he damaged them. Once he managed to reform it, he knew that it would be significantly advanced. He hoped that would include an upgrade in the evaluation, but it would be a few days before the app properly calculated that number. For now, it was enough that he could feel the progress.

"Is that finally it?" Tom regarded him with another strange look. "I hope so, because this is starting to feel masochistic."

"Yeah, I think that's the most I can accomplish today. Thanks, man." Rick leaned over far enough to get his phone, though just that effort made his muscles ache.

Most of it was just the usual messages while he'd been sparring. Emily had sent him a detailed list of tasks she wanted him to complete before they next met. Melissa had sent him a link entitled "grievous training accident" that just had a video of a dog falling over. And... three missed calls from Damian. Sighing, Rick tapped to answer him.

"What the hell were you doing?" Damian answered immediately, practically spitting out the words, but then spoke over himself before Rick could say anything. "Never mind, doesn't matter. Just get to the CSLA website and see the new announcement."

"What's it s-"

"Never mind that too! Read it later, but they announced a new assignment. Apparently there will be multiple lucrim anomalies that will be rupturing simultaneously, and all contract workers need to be present in order to take care of it."

Rick blinked, feeling like he was still missing something. "If they know they're going to rupture, can't their top fighters just take care of it first?"

"Exactly. Everyone who isn't an idiot will eventually figure out that the terms are artificial: they're setting this up. That means this is effectively a test, and a test means that they're probably done. Maybe we cleaned up all the anomalies, maybe not, but they're probably going to close the program. This competition is everyone's last chance to earn merits and impress the top brass."

"Including Jack. Fuck." Rick rubbed his eyes with his other hand. He'd hoped he'd have more time, but now... "Do you think he knew about this ahead of time?"

"I'll bet that he did. That Pan Zhou fucker was mouthing off as if he knew more." Damian sounded bitter, then let out a growl and refocused. "So the reason he hasn't ever taken his shot at you is that he knew he'll have a perfect chance at the last competition. Given that it's likely to be chaos, he can injure or even try to kill you without it drawing too much suspicion."

So much for having three months to train. Rick saw the date on the announcement and winced. "Yeah, I get it. I could sit out, but even then... he'd just have an entire month of free time to come after me."

"I think that'd be a terrible idea anyway. Whatever the CSLA intends with all this, they're very serious about everyone coming. Look at the terms in the announcement, they could sue you for breach of contract. Maybe not fairly, but against a corporation with pockets that deep, does it really matter?"

"No. Thanks for warning me, Damian."

"It's not just that." There was a pause, then Damian spoke again, quieter. "By all accounts, the top competitors are going to group up into teams - the idea is that they're looking for our ability to work, not necessarily our individual capacity. You agreed that we could work together, and now's the time. Join my team."

"Uh..." Rick hadn't expected the conversation to go that way and tried to think through the consequences. "I assume you'd help me fight Jack, and in return I help you win the competition?"

"Essentially, yes. I won't lie, I intend to come out ahead on the merit scoreboard, but I'd compensate you for that. Money doesn't matter to me, I need to get a permanent position in the Global Lucrim Authority."

"I... I need time to think, man. Jack is going to be coming for me sooner than I thought."

"And I'm offering you a way to get through that fight."

Rick rubbed his forehead as if he could squeeze an answer out, then slowly shook his head. He realized that was completely useless over the phone and forced himself to speak. "We'll talk about everything later, okay? Right now I need to get some things set up."

"Fine." Damian didn't sound happy, but he hung up. Rick just stared at the phone for a while, trying to absorb the new information.

Though he had a new foundation and had made real progress, this was just too soon. His portfolio was still a weird mess that didn't quite add up by any method he used. Even if he was stronger than before, he hadn't reached his potential. Joining up with Damian was the logical easy choice, but that would basically mean forfeiting the competition and possibly losing his job.

Assuming there was any chance that he'd keep it. After all, he was up against people with bigger lucrima portfolios and far more qualifications. Rick shook himself and put all of that aside, focusing on what he could do now.

"Hey, Tom." His call stopped the other man before he could finish getting his things together. "Listen, I need to contact Granny Whitney..."