Chapter 9:

I slowly walked along the forest path, shooting at the ents that crawled out of the bushes. The new skill shot straight through the wooden bodies of the creatures, and the only remaining problem was hitting them. After all, the monster's main body was no more than thirty centimeters wide, and it also swayed when it walked, which provided good protection against long-range projectiles.

It was amazing how I managed to hit the first ent with five crossbow bolts at once. The Ice Blade worked well on the unarmored wood-fiber structure, but with more armored opponents, there might be difficulties. The high density of the ice, which was close to iron, lost its potential due to its low strength. It was a good thing I found this out in advance by shooting at the ground, and not during a tense battle with a protected opponent.

The pleasant walk through the green forest while winter was raging in Moscow caused a slight feeling of cognitive dissonance. My brain still remembered the feeling of snowflakes swirling and falling on my head, and now there was a pleasant summer weather and lush green vegetation all around.

I was literally enjoying the walk, feeling the tension drop with every moment. The successfully solved problem with the long-range skill blocked out the feeling of the girl's betrayal.

I, of course, kept going back to what had happened and tried to come up with justifications for her, but it was frankly bad. Hot kisses didn't look much like a friendly chat or a business meeting, so I once again pushed her out of my head and happily shot the monster that had come out to its doom.

After the tenth ent, I started practicing the skill's effectiveness and my accuracy, trying to first chop off its motor system to immobilize it, and then shredding it piece by piece until I got a system message with experience. The wooden monster would stop moving and would be counted as killed after losing forty percent of its body, before which it would continue to reach for me and reconfigure its limbs for a different function.

So, after being deprived of its root system, it would start moving by plunging branches into the ground and crawling forward like a legless invalid. And after losing its grasping parts, it tried to attack me with its roots when I let it get closer. It looked more ridiculous than dangerous, though.

Getting carried away with shooting the defenseless creatures, I missed a trap, and a thick root that shot up from under the ground caught me by surprise, wrapping around my legs and dragging me into the bushes.

The Ice Blades, formed from both of my hands, slashed at the surrounding bushes until they finally hit an ent that looked several times larger than the previous ones. A sharply sharpened piece of ice plunged into the thick tree bark that covered it like armor and exploded, slightly pushing the monster back.

After getting a second's respite, I moved my aim to the root that was wrapped around my legs and cut it in a few shots.

I jumped to my feet and shouted:

“Eat this, you monster!” The skill cooled not only the ent, but also a huge area of space around it. Unlike its younger brethren, on which the low temperature had practically no effect, this one immediately froze and stopped moving. But since the death notification didn't come, I continued to shoot Ice Blades at the same spot until I cut through the thick tree, which was as wide as my chest. Only after that did the long-awaited informational message appear.

[Wooden Ent Level 6 killed. 10 experience points received]

“Such a strong monster, and so little experience?” I said out loud in a fit of emotion.

Walking up to the defeated monster, I saw a strange picture on the cut with channels filled with a viscous, crystallized liquid. Apparently, this was the equivalent of a human circulatory system, only based on a slightly different principle. And the freezing turned this liquid into ice crystals, suspending its function but not killing the ent.

On the other hand, I wasn't hired to be a biologist or a researcher of magical flora and fauna, and the most important thing was that a method of destruction had been found in the shortest possible time.

I checked the number of experience points and sighed. I still had to finish off at least fifteen more of these creatures or nineteen of their smaller brethren to get to the next level.

Deciding to take a short break, I sat down on the remains of the monster. It felt like a regular log that had, for some reason, gained the ability to move. By the way, with a fairly strong tree bark as armor, which I poked with my dagger and, realizing the futility of the attempts, stopped. It was lucky that it had liquid inside its body that could be frozen, otherwise, it would have been excruciatingly painful if I had been caught in its branches.

I proceeded with caution from then on, trying to spot a trap in advance. And it paid off. A thick brownish root lying suspiciously across the path couldn't withstand an Ice Blade shot and broke into two parts. The remaining root, oozing a greenish sap, crawled back, showing me where its owner was hiding.

“Cold Sphere,” I decided to try a more economical skill and formed it in the body of the wooden monster. Then another sphere a little lower, and it worked. The ice in its veins sealed the vessels, which, while it didn't kill it, did paralyze the monster. The rest was a matter of technique.

“Ice Blade,” a piece of ice crashed into the bark, pierced it, and exploded with ice shrapnel, piercing the surrounding leaves. Another one in the same spot, followed by a second, a third, and through the hole, I could already see the forest behind it. It took four more shots to finally cut it down and lay it to rest.

With a well-developed tactic, it became incomparably easier to move around. The small brethren that I occasionally encountered were broken into pieces, getting ready to become humus, and the big ones did the same thing, but after a preliminary treatment. And even three big guys at once were not a problem. I just had to run around a bit, stretching the mindless monsters into a line. After destroying them, I calculated that I had spent more energy shooting at them than I would have if I had let them get closer and blasted them with one big freeze. But the main thing was the result, not the details of the process.

I looked at the amount of energy on my bracelet and decided to take a long break for lunch so that it would have time to recover. I looked at the experience points and was pleasantly surprised.

[Experience Points: 375/407]

A little more, and the long-awaited level five, and with it, a dilemma. Either upgrade the Thermokinesis skill and add fire to my arsenal, or add solid matter manipulation and expand my arsenal. On the one hand, sooner or later, I would definitely learn all four directions, and the question was whether I would urgently need fire to deal with a problem.

In the end, I decided to move on, finally get to level five, wait for the Aerokinesis to finish learning, choose a skill to improve, and then rest for a few hours and recover.

“And these cuties will help me with that,” my eyes fell on a clearing where about ten ents were aimlessly wandering around.

The very first shot flew into the void, exploding with shrapnel behind the clearing, but this served as a signal, and the whole horde briskly headed toward me, moving their roots quite quickly. But their number no longer mattered much, and as if I were at a shooting range, I shot them down one by one. The last tree fell as if it had been cut down three meters away from me, never reaching its desired flesh.

[Level 5 reached. Experience Points: 48/512]

I walked to the center, looked around, and dragged the future campfire fuel to the center. I opened my inventory, took out a folding chair, a small gas stove with a canister, and a camping kettle. While it was boiling next to the crackling fire, I opened my attributes, once again increased my Intelligence attribute, leveling it up to fifteen, and thought about it.

Level two of the Thermokinesis skill or level one of Pangeokinesis. In seven hours, the Aerokinesis I had set to learn earlier would finish, and I would have to make a choice.

A call from Anya came in on my communicator, and I winced as if I had bitten into a lemon. The last thing I wanted to do was talk to her. I'd rather go through a slime with my bare hands again than talk to her. Not wanting to go against my desires, I hung up the call and added the user to my blacklist.

The kettle boiled and whistled cheerfully with its spout, releasing hot steam. I took it off the stove, poured boiling water into a mug, threw in a tea bag, and froze, enjoying the silence and the living fire of the campfire.

“Hello?” I answered a call from an unknown user on my communicator. Judging by the fact that they were able to reach me in the portal, it was one of our group of ten.

“Maxim?” a vaguely familiar male voice sounded.

“Yes. Who is this?”

“This is Alexey Vinoshnikov. We recently participated in a joint venture,” our system administrator tried to hint subtly. “Well, you know what I'm talking about. That thing, the barking thing.”

“Ohh... Alexey... Yes, I recognize you, your number just wasn't saved. What brings you to call?”

“Well, Anna, our HR manager, asked me to call. She says she can't get in touch with you, so she asked me to call.”

“Okay. I'll call her back a little later.”

“Alright, thanks. Have a good one,” the guy hung up.

The sudden call slightly soured my mood, and I put a block on all incoming calls while I was in the location. A sudden call in the middle of a fight and a break in concentration could cost me dearly, so it was better to avoid such a situation in advance.

I looked at the time and noted that it had already been six hours since I had sat down to rest. I put another attribute point into Intelligence, increasing it to sixteen, checked the status of the capacity charge, and stood up, stretching my limbs. It was time to end the adventure and deal with the accumulated problems in the real world.

It turned out that I hadn't reached the location boss by literally two hundred meters. After destroying three more big ents and earning an additional thirty experience points from it, I came out into a wide clearing, in the center of which a huge tree grew, around which small ents, mixed with large ones, were dancing a round dance.

The strange ritual that the tree-people were performing was fascinating, and I stood for several minutes, watching them circle around the tree and, periodically stopping, drive roots and branches into the ground. The smallest and most sickly-looking ent fell out of line and fell to the ground. A liana that descended from the crown of the large tree entwined it and dragged it underground.

So it wasn't a round dance! This was a vampire tree feeding on weaker creatures. While I was watching what was happening, another ent broke away, becoming food for its kin. Deciding to interrupt the feast that could lead to the main boss of the location getting obscenely stronger, I began to bombard the round dance with Ice Blades from a distance, without getting any closer.

Roots that shot up in all directions, blowing up the ground and dropping all the creatures around, showed that my decision was the right one. If I had gotten caught in such a meat grinder, I could have calmly gone to rebirth, if it existed, of course.

The roots that were searching around the main body, not finding an opponent, dragged all the ents underground, and silence reigned for a while. I was already thinking of getting closer and freezing the huge monster, when the bark in the center of the tree split open, and one huge crimson eye stared at me. The pupil focused on me, the tree tore out its roots with a creak, and headed toward me.

Miraculously dodging a long branch that whipped me from a distance, I shot an Ice Blade, which harmlessly broke on the monster’s thick bark. Another blade, which I sent at the blood-red eye, broke on a protective film, like that of a toad. Another attacking branch, and I awkwardly jumped to the side. If I survive, I'll definitely level up my Dexterity to at least ten so I don't feel like a helpless bum.

The distance between me and the monster was about ten meters and was slowly shrinking, but the problem was that it had a long-range attack that could kill me with one hit, and my Ice Blades were useless. And I was scared to get closer because I remembered how the large wooden carcasses of the ents were dragged underground. I didn't want to become bait for its roots.

A step. Another step back, and I felt a root wrap around my ankle. The damn tree was imitating attacks while slyly approaching me from under the ground. I managed to realize the problem but didn't have time to react, and the tree, jerking its grasping limb, hit me hard against the ground.

For a moment, I lost consciousness from the force of the blow and came to when I was already being dragged toward the roots, and there was no more than five meters left to the huge crimson eye. In a panic, I immediately launched my most expensive ice skill from both hands, which began to work on cooling the area of space. And now I had to try to survive for ten seconds for the skill to have time to form and freeze the creature.

The Ice Blades, also launched from both hands, cut through the root that was dragging me, and I, rolling over, jumped to the side. The new wooden shoots that rushed at me collided where I no longer was, and I ran in a circle, bombarding the tree with Cold Spheres, hoping that it would slow it down.

The skills that were gradually cooling the space slowed the tree down, and it finally froze, spreading its branches out to the sides. The Ice Blades still had no effect, and there was only one thing left.

Human ingenuity triumphed once again.

Hurrying before the boss came back to life and showed new skills, I opened my inventory, and using a Chinese toy in the form of a gun filled with high-octane fuel, I doused the creature with gasoline and set it on fire. I ran to the side and watched as, under the influence of the temperature, the tree first came to life, and then furiously hit its trunk with its branches, trying to put out the fire. Fortunately for me, it didn't manage to deal with the fire, and after five minutes, the long-awaited message about the monster's death pleased my eyes.

[Location Boss, Vampire Ent Level 10 killed. 50 experience points received, 200 experience points for completing the location, 5 bonus attribute points, 1 skill point.]

This time, instead of a material reward, I got an additional bonus skill point, but I wasn't particularly upset. So far, I had only seen two items after completing a location, one of which was insanely useful but opened portals of extreme difficulty, and the second was just protective gloves. But skill points were not only of primary importance to me, but they also closed the question of what to learn, allowing me to get both of the desired skills at once.

After confirming the opening of the portal, I fell out into the real world, stumbling at the very end and hitting the toilet stall with all my might on the way out.

“Hey! What's your problem?! You damn junkie!” a male voice from the next stall shouted.

Without answering, I opened the door and left the restroom, trying to immediately get lost in the large number of people who had come to walk around the mall on a day off. I went to another floor and went into the restroom again, cleaning myself from the dust that I had been slightly covered in at the location. And now looking like a decent guy who didn't stand out from the crowd, I went back into the mall.

If I thought there were a lot of people during the day, now, in the evening, it felt like the entire district had come to the mall. People were wandering through the central corridors, slowly flowing from one boutique to another. Periodically, they would leave with shopping bags and head for the exit, but instead of them, new flushed faces would come in from the cold air, eager to buy new things with January discounts or redeem gift certificates.

I got home by taxi, and the driver with classic features from a neighboring country looked at me with confusion and sniffed. In the end, he couldn't take it anymore and asked:

“Just came back from a barbecue?”

“What?” I didn't understand the question at first.

“Well, you smell like barbecue. It makes me want to eat, and even have a little drink.”

“Ohh... Yeah. You could say that,” I remembered the burned piles of trees. “I was helping a friend of mine, a barbecue cook, nearby.”

“Where exactly? I know everyone around here, and I don't remember any barbecue places nearby. Did something new open up? I'm just crazy about barbecue and have been to all the joints in the city. By the way, I can recommend some good ones where they won't cheat you on the meat and will bring you a tasty one.”

I internally winced at the attention of the overly talkative taxi driver who had paid attention to a guy from the mall who smelled of burnt wood, and I tried to change the subject by encouraging his chattiness. Otherwise, he might remember me as a suspicious person, think I'm an arsonist, and call the police.

“And where is this divine barbecue?”

“The best barbecue is made by Armenians,” he raised his hand with his index finger pointing up and poked it toward the sky. “No one knows meat like we do. So I recommend Gevorg's barbecue place; you can just type that into the search engine. Or here, there's a QR code on the dashboard; you can see for yourself.”

I glanced forward, and indeed, on the dashboard, there was an inscription that said “The Best Barbecue in Moscow at Gevorg's” with a photo of fried meat on a skewer and a printed QR code with a link to the location.

“I'm also a barbecue cook myself, one of the best in Armenia, by the way,” the driver continued. “And here, in Moscow, I just drive a taxi for fun.”

“And where in the city can I try your barbecue?”

“Here, I only make it for family. By the way, my daughter is turning seventeen soon. I can introduce you, and maybe we'll become family, and you can try barbecue from Uncle Levon. You can even eat it every day,” he let go of the steering wheel, took out his wallet, and pulled out a photo. “Look how beautiful she is!”

The photo only showed the face of a pretty girl, whose features were slightly marred by a single black unibrow that ran in a thick line across her forehead.

“Yeah, she's pretty. But I have a girlfriend.” I returned the photo to its owner.

The driver, not even looking sad, apparently used to rejections, put the photo away and drove on, continuing to talk about his family, life, and political views on the state system.

“Thanks! Have a good day,” I got out of the taxi and exhaled. It was because of situations like these that I preferred to take the subway. Less social interaction and in most cases, a much faster way to get to a place.

I had just sat down in my favorite armchair when the phone rang.

“Hey, little brother!” the happy faces of my family appeared on the holographic projection. “I dropped by to see our parents, and we decided to call you.”

“Why aren't you guys sleeping?” I looked at the time and calculated what time it was for them. “It's five in the morning for you!”

“Well, we just stayed up late, reminiscing, watching movies, and we didn't go to sleep. And we decided to call you. By the way, how do you feel about the idea of coming for Christmas?”

“Yes, son! Your mom and I are waiting for you, and you can even bring your girlfriend,” they hit a sore spot.

“The thing is... Well, we broke up. We just weren't a good match, as they say.”

My mom theatrically waved her hands and began to lament:

“Well, good riddance to her; you'll find another, a good girl. By the way, my coworker's daughter just got divorced; she's a sweet and good girl. And her daughter is just as sweet; she sometimes brings her to work, and she just sits there, such a cutie. I could just hug her to death. When you come, we'll introduce you; we can even invite her over, there's enough room for everyone.”

My parents' manic desire to have grandchildren was sometimes a little frightening. My mom, especially, tried to marry me off to every living female of childbearing age. This, by the way, was one of the reasons I moved to the other end of the country.

“Okay, honey... Calm down. He'll find a woman himself; he's not a little boy anymore. And he's still young; let him have some fun. Go look for a wife for Sasha instead; he's already over thirty, so it's definitely time.”

My brother, not expecting such a betrayal from his father, choked and looked at him in indignation.

“Dad, for goodness sake! Why are you throwing me under the bus?”

Seeing that the conversation had taken a wrong turn, I said that I would think about coming to visit and said goodbye.

By the way, maybe I should actually go visit my parents? To rest, to take my mind off things. And I can go into the portal there, in principle, what's the difference? One day to travel by plane, spend a couple of days there, and then calmly return to Moscow. I have the time, so why not?

After making up my mind, I booked plane tickets for tomorrow morning to arrive closer to night, go to bed, and immediately adjust to the Far Eastern time zone.

The phone rang again, and I groaned. How much more could I take! Why did everyone want something from me? I had a wild desire to turn off the communication and go to sleep, but I looked at the caller and decided to answer.

“Yes, Alexey?”

“Max. Anya still can't reach you, so I'm calling. We're all gathered here, just waiting for you. Anya has an important announcement about the communicators, but she refuses to start until you show up.”

“Okay. Give me the address; I'll be there soon.”

Fortunately, the establishment wasn't far away, and twenty minutes later, I walked into another Chinese restaurant.

“Good evening. Do you have a reservation?” a girl in a traditional Chinese robe greeted me.

“My friends are waiting for me, nine people,” I looked around the hall but didn't see any familiar faces.

“Oh! A private room. Come, I'll show you the way.”

I followed the waitress, reflexively watching her swaying hips, and ran into Anya, who had come out to the ladies' room.

“I'll show him the rest of the way,” the girl dismissed the employee of the establishment and looked at me. “Max. What's going on? Why aren't you answering your phone?”

The morning scene flashed in my mind, and I barely managed to keep myself from shouting at her.

“Well, I don't know, darling. Maybe you can explain to me how you were kissing me just yesterday, and today at noon, your lips are kissing someone else?” I had a hard time not adding details about where else they might have ended up a little later, and I felt disgusted to continue the conversation. “It's over, Anya.”

“What? Are you an idiot?” the girl replied indignantly. “It's my business who and when I sleep with. Or did you think that you screwed a girl a couple of times and she's yours now? Max, you're a pauper, you don't even have an apartment in Moscow, and you live in a rented place with a rundown renovation. No car, no prospects,” she hammered in. “You're just a two-night amusement, and I never considered you as a boyfriend. And Oleg is only a couple of years older than you, but he's already the head of our office. So he's clearly a much better catch than a poor test subject,” Anya finished with a sneer.

The girl's words hit me in the heart, and the most disgusting thing was that I had to admit she was right. We weren't in a relationship, and the fact that I had deluded myself was purely my own problem. Everyone has the right to choose, and no matter how painful it was, I also made my own.

After rudely pushing the girl aside, I walked inside, where the whole team was already waiting.

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