Choose Your Apocalypse (A LitRPG Apocalypse, Progression, System Fantasy) [CYA]

<Alex, Real - Endure, High School Sports Field>

As James threw butter knives at Alex, and Alex countered with Life's Active Defense, they both had a bit of spare brainpower.

Since Alex's skill was only usable every five seconds or so, and the point was to test and expand that—and for James to use it to test his own skills and spells—neither were going all out in any sense.

James grinned. "This reminds me of when we met."

"You mean a few days ago? When you threw a zombie-blood-covered knife at me?"

"Yeah, that." His smile didn't falter as he nodded. "Good times."

Alex sighed. "I suppose you could look at it that way."

"I try to look on the bright side of things."

"Oh?"

"Yeah. Like, when we get out of here, I just need to find my girl, and we can claim a little kingdom in the new world."

That caught Alex's attention. "What do you mean?"

"Well, you've been reading all the System notifications. The implication is that we're going to come out of here much stronger than the average person who didn't get an Apology Tutorial."

He grunted at that. "True, I suppose. Assuming we come out at all."

"That's how gambles tend to work." James shrugged, throwing a knife that glowed oddly. Thankfully, Alex was able to block it all the same, though it took about three times as much from his HP and stamina pools. In this case, that meant a whole 3 points from each.

"Don't you ever worry about what will happen if we don't come out, though?"

"Ahh, so you're a pessimist, then?"

Alex grunted. "I like to think of myself as a rational optimist in most cases, actually."

"Then, what's the rational reason to consider not getting out? If we don't, it's not our problem, eh?" The young man grinned.

Alex huffed a laugh, snapping his left hand out to catch the next attack. "Your 'girl' might disagree with that."

"What? Well, that's me. You got someone on the outside who needs you?"

He hesitated at that, then shook his head. "Some friends, some colleagues, but no real family left."

"Why the ring, then?" He pointed toward Alex's left hand.

Alex shrugged. "I was married. She died."

"Oh." That brought the young man up short. "I'm sorry, bruv. How did it happen? Was it just before the System or…?"

Alex shrugged again, fighting between regret in saying anything and feeling foolish for the regret. "It was a long time ago… ten years give or take. As to how?"

There was a long silence during which Alex blocked some seven throws.

Finally, he decided that there wasn't really a reason to hide it. It wasn't like others didn't know already, back home. "We were expecting, and we wanted to get in a last backpacking trip before the little one came. We were two days into the wilderness, out of service range, and without an emergency beacon." He winced at that almost unconsciously, knowing that it had been his mistake that had left them without one. "She miscarried, and the bleeding wouldn't stop… until it did."

James was staring wide-eyed at him, and Alex realized that he had tears in his own eyes. He'd talked through this before with friends and counselors, but it was odd sharing it in these circumstances. It felt different. Not better, not worse, just different.

Feeling a need to finish, he continued. "When I finally got her out, and got to help, they said she'd been dead for hours already." He huffed a humorless laugh. "I think they told me that to try to comfort me. It was like saying that it wasn't because I was too slow or too weak. She died before anyone could have gotten help to her. Rotten chili dogs, they even tried to tell me that even with an emergency beacon, she probably wouldn't have made it."

James stepped forward, somewhat awkwardly placing a hand on Alex's shoulder. "I'm… I'm sorry, Alex. That's a heavy thing."

Alex nodded. "Yeah. The real punch to the gut was how it was logged in the system. My wife died due to complications during a spontaneous abortion." He huffed a humorless laugh, shaking his head. "I had political nuts calling me for years, despite the supposed privacy of the records. One side wanted me to speak up and advocate for better access to abortions to keep women safe, and the other wanted me to speak out on the dangers of abortions to women." He grimaced. "I just wanted my wife back, not to be a poster child for either side. Unfortunately, the fact that a miscarriage is medically classified as a type of abortion was enough for them. Eventually, I had to get our records 'extra' sealed—who knows what that actually means—before they finally left me alone…"

When Alex looked up, he saw vague horror on James' face. "I'm… man, I'm so sorry. That's awful."

Alex shook his head. "I'm sorry, James. That… There was no reason to unload that on you."

James squeezed his shoulder once more, then let his hand fall away. "Even so. My dad always said that sometimes things just need to get out." He gave a sad smile. "Often quite a few times. If you need to get any more out, I'll try to listen. I can't claim to have any wisdom to share, but I'll listen all the same."

"Thank you for that." Alex wiped his eyes clear. "Now come on. Throw some knives at me, will you?"

James tsked a laugh. "As you please."

For the rest of the two hours that they had together, they found out that essentially nothing that James could do would bypass Alex's defense, if he had it available for use. Moreover, Alex was able to use his other hand and then, eventually, a foot as the blocking limb.

He'd just been able to use his left forearm, rather than his left hand, when the 'morning snack' bell rang, and called their time to a close.

A moment after, James let out a grinning 'Nice!'

"Did you improve something?"

"Absolutely! Attacking against your skill was amazing for feeling out the edges of what I can do and then pushing further. We definitely should have the others do the same."

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"I'm glad to hear it, and sure." He shrugged, thumbing his ring as he pulled up his own notification.

Notice:
Skill Upgraded, Life's Active Defense

Life's Active Defense (Uncommon)
Infuse your chosen limb more fully with your health, reinforcing it at the same time.
Damage taken is reduced by 80% then divided evenly between HP and SP rather than taking it all to your HP.
Requires the chosen limb to intercept at least a part of the incoming attack.
Does not work on areas of effect unless they have a directionality and the hand is imposed between you and the direction of origin.
Physical Fortitude has a minor increase to effect when calculating damage, severity of wounds, and conditions received.
Intercepting hand is immune to wounding unless more than 25% of remaining HP is taken as damage.
5 second cooldown.

It didn't improve in rarity, unfortunately, but the change was still wonderful. Now, it explicitly said that he could block with any 'chosen limb' rather than just a chosen hand.

He was quite happy, not only with the small change to his skill, but also to his own experience in its use.

He knew that after the morning snack—I feel like a toddler calling it that, but it is what it is.—he'd be getting back to his skill practice. So instead, he pulled one of the flesh golem bones out of his inventory for inspection as he walked.

This particular one was a finger bone, one of literally hundreds of finger bones within his Inventory as he'd grabbed as much of the bone piles as he could for study if he had a free moment, like he did right at that exact moment.

James glanced at it and grunted. "Flesh golem?"

"Yeah."

"Anything interesting?"

Alex sighed. "No… just confusing."

"Oh? Why don't you tell me about it?"

He gave the younger man a searching look. "You're interested in magical symbols?"

"Not in the least… At least, I don't think so. Who knows what the future will hold, right?"

"I suppose… but if you aren't interested, why do you want me to tell you about it?"

"Well, my dad always said that if you want to understand something, try to explain it to someone who's ignorant." He pointed at himself. "That's me."

Alex chuckled. "Sounds like your dad is a wise man."

"He was, yeah."

"Was?" Alex gave the younger man a searching look.

James gave a sad smile in return. "Yeah, was."

"...want to talk about it?"

"Not particularly." James' smile grew just slightly. "Maybe later."

"Fair enough."

As they walked closer to the school building, passing other people training or otherwise spending their time as they saw fit, James simply waited.

Finally, Alex grunted. "Right, explaining the bone."

"Yup."

"So, these symbols, if I'm understanding them correctly, are ones of negation and resistance—along with others—all arranged to create the anti-magical effect that we saw with the flesh golems of the plague guard."

"Right."

"So, the issue is that they aren't precise at all. They seem like someone hacked them in place with an ax."

James raised an eyebrow. "It's a finger bone. Wouldn't an ax have just shattered the thing?"

"Well… yes. I might have overstated it a bit, but look." Alex handed over the bone. "Do you see the cracks around the symbols? When I try to make symbols, they need to be absolutely perfect, but these aren't." He growled. "I can't figure out a reason for the variation in the symbols. They don't seem to be different-yet-similar symbols, but I could be wrong. I just don't know enough."

"Huh." James handed back the finger bone. "Are the others the same?"

Alex stopped. "What?"

"The other ones of this bone that you have. Are they all the same? This can't be the only example of this bone you have, right?"

Alex… didn't know. He started walking again while pulling out all the bones that were that same finger bone, two at a time, and began comparing. "Unexpected, undiscovered, hidden features!"

James gave him a strange look, then nodded. "Ahh, obscenity?"

"Yes, obscenity! They're all different. They all have the same pattern of symbols, but their imperfections are different."

"Huh… neat…" His tone made it clear that he didn't know why that mattered in the least.

Alex glared at the young man, and James held up his hands defensively, laughing.

"So? Explain it to me. What does it mean?"

Alex growled. "I have no idea. It should make them weaker, but these were anything but weak."

"Well…" James said, hesitantly.

"What?" Alex prompted.

"I'm definitely no expert, but aren't they? I mean, we're just starting out. Thinking about it, this is the tutorial. So… couldn't they be weak? I mean in the scope of things. Their imperfections might be why we were able to use magic near them at all. Right?"

Alex considered that. "Maybe… Maybe? I have no freaking clue…"

James grunted. "So, the imperfections might be because the Plague Guard Flesh Golems were intended as difficult but not impossible opponents, or it could be so the effect was contained. Right?"

Alex growled in irritation again. "I suppose, but I have no idea. It seems silly to take the time to carve all these and to do a gas-station sushi level job of it. Why not do it right and have a better result?"

"Doing it 'correctly' might make it unusable by lower level creatures? I've played some games that have magical equipment only be usable once you fulfill certain requirements. What if this is the same or similar? Can you imagine your bones outclassing you?"

Alex hesitated at that. It did make a sort of sense. Flesh golems were a sort of magical creature in a way. What if an overly powerful anti-magical defense would simply kill them if they were below a certain level?

"Alex?"

He jerked, finding they were standing in the food line. "What? Oh. Sorry about that."

James chuckled. "It's fine. I'm glad that dialoging with me helped you be able to think through it. Any revelations?"

Alex shook his head. "Not really, except that it seems that I still have a lot to learn."

The younger man gave him a funny look. "I mean… yeah? This is the tutorial, bruv. If you could learn all there was to know about something here? It wouldn't be a very useful thing long term now would it? Or at least not a very versatile one."

"I… had not considered it that way."

"Well, now you can." He pointed at himself. "Optimist." He grinned at Alex for a moment before continuing. "So, are you excited to have John shoot you?"

Alex grimaced. "Shoot at me."

"Right, right. That's the plan, but do you really think it will end there?"

"I…" He sighed. "No… I imagine he'll shoot me at least once."

James nodded sagely. "You do need to actually test out that coat after all."

"Oh! You're right. That's a wonderful idea." Alex grinned. The coat should also make any shot hurt less, if it got through the garment at all. Yeah, I really do need to understand what that can take.

"I'm sure John will be happy to have someone to shoot, too."

"Shoot at."

"Sure, sure."

Alex felt like he shouldn't like that idea, but the more he considered it, the more he realized that, yeah, he was excited to be shot. Shot at, Alex. Shot at.