New Game+

Shuffler was bleeding profusely.

The powerful punch that Richie made shook his entire being.

His entire body shook at the touch of Richie's fist and it was as if a specific vibration were shaking and wrecking his entire body.

It was the first time that such an attack opened Shuffler's sensation. The sense of touch that was only created through the skin and other parts of the human body mysteriously appeared on all parts of his body.

Shuffler felt his organs shaking. He could feel his heart beating. Even the rushing of blood and to its clotting, he could sense it.

Richie paused after punching Shuffler and his expression changed. The former angry expression disappeared as an uncertain look surfaced.

"Jeez. For someone who is a Selective Unlocked, you sure are dumb." Richie finally spoke bluntly.

Shuffler thought that he would die but suddenly, the sensations occurring throughout his body had ended.

"A strategist, an Unlocked specializing in sensory and someone who can link the thoughts. These were the most important soldiers I should look for…" Richie mumbled.

"I guess that makes you both a strategist and a sensory type? You could feel the vibrations, can't you? Interesting. Seeker could only 'see' it when he was an Unbecoming. It took him quite a bit of evolution to be able to feel it."

"What was… that?" Shuffler coughed as he tried to stand. The strength of the punch that Richie made wasn't strong. It was the vibrations and sound around it that made it painful.

"You reached the beginning levels of Realm Somatotopy. This is an extremely powerful technique. But sadly, I can't teach you more about it. I don't need it after all. So I never bothered developing it." Richie sighed.

Shuffler remained shaken.

"What was the answer?" Shuffler immediately asked.

Richie continued to shake his head.

"Meng's power is Desolation. He can summon a strange field around him that is in a constant state of Entropy. Even metals decay with his power. How could you not get that? What the nutterballs were you thinking?!"

"Desolation?! That was his power?! You didn't give me any hints or spoke of any possibilities about that! I thought you knew the rules of deduction and gave me various seemingly unrelated information but would actually be pierced through to make a grand canvas of painting! But what you gave me where his love story and habits! How would I know what damned power he has! Those hints you gave me wouldn't give me any clues to remotely point out his potential road! Much less his damned Path!" Shuffler finally cried angrily in frustration.

"Alright. I do admit that the time I gave you was too short. Even Sherlock Holmes needed hours to figure things out." Richie admitted.

"Hours? I wouldn't be able to guess what his Path was even if you gave me a day for a name!"

"Come on. I did say that you have to be better than Sherlock. Our enemies will be more terrifying and smarter than any of Sherlock's enemies. You need to surpass Sherlock's capacities."

"Surpass him? You do know he's fiction right? And besides, I already said that I can't deduce the impossible! Deduction is an art for finding out the one truth by subtracting the impossibilities! But how can I accurately subtract when the range of impossibilities are so vast?! The data you gave me had nothing to do with Desolation! How can I conclude that?"

"Couldn't you use Sherlock's skill of deducing based on my outfit or something?"

"Do you have any marks from that battle?"

"Of course not… I'm an Unlocked. We can even heal limbs."

"Then how was I supposed to know?!" Shuffler screamed.

"Relax, Sammy! Alright. You made your point."

Shuffler sat down as he continued to shiver. The vibrating sensation remained.

Richie looked at it and started to wonder.

"Why is it that my sound remained in you? Odd. This looks to be different from the trick I did with that horny Aragarian."

"You mentioned that this Seeker messed up? What exactly do you mean?" Shuffler then continued on the topic that intrigued him.

"Right. He messed up. The seed that Seeker planted ended up doing more trouble for us. Seeker was supposed to reveal that he was the cause of Meng's victory as he was the one who gave the means for Meng to win the woman's heart. But careless Causal Carlean was so stunned after realizing Meng had slept with Rosa that he accidentally shouted in surprise at the extent of Meng's relationship. In fact, it sounded as if Seeker was angry that Meng slept with Rosa."

"I guessed something similar. So it was a misunderstanding?"

"Yes. The seed that Seeker planted long before was a red jewel he handed over to Sting. You know him right?"

"Sting of the Dragons Fang. How can I not know? And this red jewel was something that won Rosa's heart?"

"Yes. Seeker didn't expect that. He said that Meng had a hard time winning Rosa's heart in his future timeline. So because of that, Seeker never considered Meng to be capable of using his desolation to some extent. So when Seeker called it out, it made Meng angry to the point of wanting to kill us."

Shuffler was silent but he was hesitating on his choice to follow Richie. Why did it seem that these men of great might sounded like some teens in puberty?

"Ah... You should've been there! Seeker called out angrily at Meng, 'You slept with Rosa?!' That was gold! Meng thought that Seeker was someone who was pursuing Rosa! You see, this little Rosa's in her early 20's so you could say that Casual Carlean had a shot at that ice-cold babe. And so, this made Meng so angry! Seeker's little seed was supposed to help us, but then Meng was so angry that he wanted to kill us at all cost!" Richie laughed and started talking fondly. Devoid of all the seriousness and solemnity found in his previous sentences.

As Richie started to go on a monologue similar to someone telling another person the funniest joke he had heard, Shuffler began to understand the complexities that had occurred on that battle. He was stunned that Richie's own skill had surpassed even what he deduced it to be!

"This Unlocking is interesting." Shuffler quietly thought as Richie continued to talk about the details of the fight.

"But that's not the end of it! Seeker told Meng to stop and that it was 'pointless to fight.' And right before Seeker was about to explain the whole story, the Aragarian's launched a Killing Horn! Meng's radars detected it and the base was in full alarm! So Meng assumed that Seeker was saying that it was pointless fighting because they launched a Killing Horn." Richie continued to laugh hard and even started pounding happily on the table.

"Man, I forgot how funny that was. It wasn't back then because I was about to die!" Richie continued to laugh.

Shuffler had an embarrassed expression as he didn't know how to stop Richie from talking.

"How long exactly has this guy been playing the lone wolf routine?" Shuffler cursed in his thoughts.

"Ahem." Shuffler coughed lightly to remind Richie that he was way off course in their discussion.

"Oh sorry. Right. Anyway, that battle managed to push Seeker to our level. He achieved what he called the Overcomer's Will. Now, imagine this. There was me, Seeker, Richie, and even Lennox Humphrey joined hands because the Tyrant Empress wanted us all."

Shuffler felt a strange type of fear as he heard Richie explain.

"Wanted all of you? What exactly is this woman into?"

"It's something about her Path. Extreme vanity, extreme selfish desires. The only human she knew to be her equal was me. She had been keeping tabs of my whereabouts and after Australia, she was trying to find ways to get to me."

Shuffler's head started hurting.

"You- you were in Australia?"

"Yes. It was like this. I was hired by a Bringer of Change in Australia who turned out to be one of those Aragarians I've been-"

"Wait. Stop. Can we just stick to one story at a time? You really need to work on your storytelling skills. Your flow of thought is just a mess." Shuffler wanted to cry.

"You sound like Cliff. And Arthur… And Alean… and Lowengren." Richie frowned and a trace of irritation resurfaced as he recalled these people complaining about his method of telling a story.

"Alean and Lowengren are alive?!"

"Right. You see about that…"

Shuffler had no choice but to listen to the tale of Richie which was basically all over the place. He was confused as Richie just started naming random persons from famous individuals like the Hero of Helion's Tragedy to a sweet old lady who worked at a local dumpling store which he frequented during his short stay in Nanjing.

"Enough with the dumpling! I'll eat there when I get the chance!" Shuffler finally cried.

"Oh right… What was I talking about?"

Shuffler had already started sketching on several papers the various information that Richie had spoken.

"So the Tyrant Empress. Where is she now? What happened to her." Shuffler finally asked in impatience as the primary question he needed from Richie remained unanswered.

"You already told me how you managed to defeat Meng and you've finished talking about the battle against the Tyrant Empress and how you used her to inflict 'strange voodoo stuff' on this alien called Pridgeon... but what happened next?"

"I'm getting into it! Man, for a Professor, you sure are impatient!"

"I'm freakin' impatient?!" Shuffler cursed in his thoughts angrily.

After explaining all this Richie then recalled how his voice could somehow detect tasty delicacies as his Path improved after the battle.

Shuffler's patience was running out. Even in front of his future boss, he was being worn out and finally, Shuffler decided to lead Richie into the right discussions.

"Ahem. I just have a question. How can you contain the Tyrant Empress? You all have seen her. Is Seeker immune to the lust?"

"No. Seeker's trick doesn't make him immune to it. He knows he can't contain the Tyrant Empress. We all knew. That's why we took precautions to avoid it. Meng met with his girlfriend. Arthur immediately left for New Great Britain together with his father to avoid losing themselves in lust. There were many of us who had seen her and keeping her in one place would only be to our disadvantage. Seeker then kept her to temporarily hide somewhere but after a month, even Seeker concluded that even he wouldn't be able to resist the temptation and contain his own lust against the Empress. So he arranged to have the Empress sent somewhere and arranged for her to be released soon."

"Was there anything placed on her that could be used to control her?"

"Who would that? Even we had to use everything we have just to defeat her. The only way to do that is by surgically operating something in her. But none of us dared touch her. And so after putting that bomb in a way that she can't get it out, she has this strange healing powers that are just disgusting… So after that, she was… Oh, that's right! I have to hurry up!" Richie realized his rants were wasting time.

"What exactly happened?!" Shuffler couldn't contain it anymore and actually screamed at Richie.

"Three months. That was the time limit of that capsule chamber. After three months, she would be released."

"What capsule chamber?"

"The chamber which locks her in. Pay attention." Richie frowned.

Shuffler was cursing intensely. Not only did Richie keep getting off track, but Richie also kept assuming that Shuffler would be able to deduce everything in a very quick manner.

"This is the last time I'm showing off my deductive skills!" Shuffler vowed to himself.

"I meant… what kind of Capsule chamber. I cannot deduce the technologies you used to seal her." Shuffler changed his question like an expert tomb raider navigating through a vast maze.

"Oh right. We built a capsule chamber using several techs. Lennox offered his own, Harker sent his best engineers and Meng also sent out some of his best technicians to ensure that she wouldn't be able to forcibly escape out of that capsule. She's probably among the best engineer on this earth."

"She could build a Rule?"

"With the right tools, yes. We had to make the Capsule chamber in a manner that she cannot alter its course from the inside or through hacking it. We also made it in a way that if she were to dismantle any specific parts of the device it would all fall apart."

"She's underwater…" Shuffler realized.

"Oh now, your smart again," Richie complained.

Shuffler wanted to retort but took a deep breath.

"Never deduce in front of this idiot again!" Shuffler vowedto himself once more.

"The temptation was too great for us." Richie continued.

"Even I who wants her dead can't help but fantasize about her. Luckily, it's keeping us sane thanks to Seeker's trick of sealing memories. But even that's not enough. Her image randomly appears in my dreams. If we knew where she would be, we might have been drawn to meet her. So Seeker gave the control of the capsule chamber to Charles Lindmitt. It was dropped in the Pacific Ocean and Charles navigated it. With three techs combined along with Lennox's own version of enigmatic lightning, an event he WGP shouldn't be capable of detecting it unless they see the pod in plain sight."

"Why are you releasing her?" Shuffler played dumb.

"To set the stage. Something interesting came up and we have to add haste to our plans. The Tyrant Empress and even our little team will all be playing a pretend war. Although, thousands could die in this game we play. But all to take the attention of the Aragarian's away from us." Richie laughed.

"That is crazy!" Shuffler reacted.

"With what you said, a clash between the two of you is terrifying! What if she gets a hold of another Rule? What will you use to defeat her? You are deliberately spending millions and possibly billions of Credits by following this route."

"This is our training. How else can Overcomers grow? If we lose, we simply become controlled by the Tyrant Empress. At the very least, we will still be alive to fight the Aragarians. So this was approved by all sides. Besides, if I have a score to settle with that Overcomer." Richie's voice grew more ominous at the last lines.

"And so, I'm asking you to help me with this game."

"This is a game for you? From what you explained the odds and risks hanging on this game is something that could kill us all." Shuffler sighed.

"Of course... What else would Overcomers play, if not the most dangerous of games? You know the risk, you know the enemy, will you play the game?" Richie asked.

"Of course. Sounds great." Shuffler nodded immediately.

"I ran away from the Underworld because the game got boring and death was imminent.. At least now, with all the hell this new game has, it won't be boring anymore." 

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