Chapter 28 (UPDATED)

After recovering his bag of gemstones and leaving the Mistveil Peaks Dungeon, Caleb set off to find a new challenge. He sent a quick soft pulse of light into the sapphire which was repeated fifteen seconds later. It was a message to Chloe to let her know that he’d found them.

Damn. It’d be nice if I knew some morse code or something. Not sure how I’d learn it now, but maybe we can just make up our own morse code once I’m back.

Caleb spun around, picked a direction at random, and started leisurely jogging. Though, his ‘jog’ would have kept up with cars on a highway.

The landscapes passed him by, looking eerily familiar. The hills, trees, and rocks were right, but every shred of civilization was gone. He recognized a hill with a peculiarly shaped bit of earth jutting out the top of it. There had been a cell tower up there before. Not anymore. It felt like he was looking at his childhood home after it got a fresh coat of paint, a new roof, had an addition tacked on to it, and the old tree out front cut down. The bones were still there, but he didn’t recognize it.

He passed by a river and saw where a bridge had once been. How many thousands of cars had driven over it every single day? Now it was like it had never been.

But then, there were also pieces of the land that were entirely foreign. A few mountains reached into the sky, far in the distance. Those had certainly not been there a few weeks ago.

So the System shuffled the earth around? Took pieces and placed them elsewhere, then picked up all of the buildings and threw them around, too. Does that mean people got shuffled around as well?

If those mountains are from another continent, are the people that were on them when the System arrived still on them?

He shook his head and continued on his run. Before long, he realized he was somewhere that he didn’t recognize at all. There had been a sharp change in environment. Like someone had drawn a dividing line between one land and the next.

Massively tall trees stretched up around him, their trunks wider than his wingspan. He craned his neck to the sky, peering up into their branches and couldn’t even see the tops. Either the System had given regular southern pines some super charged fertilizer, or this place had previously been located along the western coast. Caleb had never been to California, but he’d seen pictures of their Redwoods and these fit the bill.

He stopped his jog and slowed to a walk, taking in the environment. Birds flitted from the trees, chirping and filling the forest with a melodic song. He ran his hand along the bark of a tree, feeling its roughness as his feet squished into the soft dirt.

His eyes narrowed. Not much stone here. He doubted there was much that would give him a true fight, but he had to be mindful of his limits. This wasn’t a domain suited to his skillset.

The skin on the back of Caleb’s neck prickled.

His instincts flared and he threw himself to the side just as something blurred past him, slamming into the ground right where he’d been standing. Caleb rolled across the ground and came up with his back pressed against a thick tree, eyes wide and alert.

The attack had come from above, in the branches. He looked up, scanning, but again, saw nothing but birds and leaves.

You want to hide from me? Okay. I’ll come and seek.

Spectral arms grew from his back. The energy coated him in the same sort of armor that it had when he’d fought Thrymm with one change. His greaves now covered his feet and had a two inch spike sticking out from the toe. He kicked the spike into the tree. It held perfectly.

A devilish grin spread over Caleb’s face as the thrill of the hunt burned in his chest once more. With a powerful kick, he tore himself up the length of the tree. His fingers punched holes into the bark, spikes on his feet stabbed and created footholds, muscles screamed as he flung himself up into the air, catching himself on a branch and swinging further up. Practically flying.

In seconds, he’d reached the canopy.

Everything was still and silent. The only motion he caught was the occasional flicker of red or blue feathers against the sea of green and brown.

“Where are you,” he whispered beneath his breath.

There.

A spot of black and red was getting further and further away, just barely visible through the brush. It was running. Not on his watch.

Caleb darted after the spot. He swung from one branch, leapt on top of another, sprinting along its length before catapulting himself into the air and catching onto another tree. Breath surged in his chest, blood pumped fire in his veins. He felt like he was on one of those ninja warrior obstacle course shows and let out a whoop of exhilaration.

The spot got larger and larger. He was getting closer, gaining on it in hot pursuit. It jerked to the side, suddenly changing direction. Caleb wrapped a spectral hand around a branch and flung himself sideways, hoping to cut off its line of escape.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Is that, he thought as the spot became clearer. A monkey?

Dark fur, long prehensile tail, about half his size, and a bright red ass. The monkey glanced back over its shoulder and hissed, baring its fangs in threat. Caleb bared his teeth right back.

Tosser Ape
Aether Level 7
The standard words blossomed over the creature’s head as Caleb focused on it. But then another screen appeared in the corner of his vision. Like a small little notification.

Some creatures on Solar-AE109, otherwise known as “Earth” have been upgraded and augmented with Aether, turning them into stronger versions of their previous counterparts.

So it used to be a normal monkey, did it? As far as he was aware, there weren’t any monkeys in the California redwood forests, but what did he know? There was one here. Maybe the fauna got shuffled up as well.

Another blur shot by his face and Caleb jerked his head to the side, letting it fly past him and shatter into pieces on a nearby branch. A pinecone? The monkey was throwing pinecones with the speed and accuracy of a major league pitcher. One of the pinecones’ needles zipped toward his face after exploding on the branch and he deflected it with the palm of a spectral hand.

Caleb grunted as another pinecone whizzed past his ear, splintering against a trunk ahead of him. The Tosser Ape darted through the canopy with desperate speed, but he was faster. Much faster.