Reaper's Resurgence: A System Reset

Alexia

The woman just grasps at my hand on her throat while choaking and furiously trying to get out of my grip, rudely ignoring my greeting.

I narrow my eyes a little bit.

She could at least reply or nod her head back. Ignoring my greeting is just plain rude.

"Could you answer some of my questions?" I eventually ask her, deciding to ignore her rudeness for now. Even as I'm being shot at by people down in the castle below.

Not that any of their bullets are actually hitting me, what with them passing straight through my body.

The target continues flailing for a little while before eventually falling still and glaring at me. Nodding her head once as she does so.

"Great," I state with a nod before asking, "What's this about you tearing away at the boundaries of the universe into the void?"

Her eyes go wide with shock at that.

Then silence follows.

And more silence.

And still silence.

Except the people shooting and shouting at me from below. But even they eventually give up and start running the hell away instead after realizing they can't hurt me.

"If you don't answer I'm just gonna assume you're guilty of something bad and crush your throat," I bluntly state while beginning to tighten my grip a bit.

That immediately gets the selkie talking.

She goes on to talk about how she was trying to dig her way out of the Dimensional Block back into our universe but ended up almost breaking the dimensional walls into some pitch black abyss instead. With her assuming that she was digging in the wrong direction. And the sight of it ended up making her curious so she tried to dig further.

"The void should never be exposed to the mortal universe or the Dimensional Blocks," Zal says, sounding rather serious. "It could lead to the end of half of whichever Dimensional Block they're in before I'm able to seal the hole up."

Ah.

So it's a bad thing after all.

I crush her throat before dropping the corpse into the icy water below as I get a notification from the System.

Huh. Convenient.

The skill I need to level up right now is obvious though.

And before I can even finish the line of thought, I find Energy Manipulation rising a level.

Huh. Maybe hunting targets has more benefits than simply being a requirement to ascend.

That's nice.

"Were you asking…" Zal begins before pausing for a second as I glance at the rapidly evacuating castle.

Yeah, I wanted to make sure I wasn't just becoming the universe's slave or something. Someone to kill those the universe labels as a target just because it labels them that way.

I wanted to make sure they were actually doing something that deserved being reaped.

Not that I actually care about those that I reaped.

I just don't want to be turned into some hunting dog that obeys orders without hesitation.

All that said…

I smile a little as I continue my teleporting trip through the Block to the next Dimensional Block.

Completely ignoring the still-fleeing people in the Block.

Honestly didn't think about the rewards though.

It might be nice to be rewarded for every target.

Maybe I should just go on a hunting trip for targets? It could speed up my leveling at the very least.

So with that thought in mind, I continue searching around for more targets. A process that doesn't take too long as I find another one two Dimensional Blocks over. And I do the exact same thing that I did with the previous target to this next one.

I grab them by the throat, ask them to make sure about what they did, then crush their throat without hesitation.

And just like with the first target, this one gives me a reward. Except it's a different reward.

I blink in surprise as a strange ring appears above the corpse of the target I just killed. With the target being some species of undead. One with a bit of corruption mixed into him that he was trying to spread to others through his undead infection.

As for the ring itself? It looks like a bone claw. Finger and all. Albeit tiny and only large enough to wrap around a finger.

Not exactly the most visually appealing of rings, but the item's effects…

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Ring of the Fallen

Description: This ring is tainted by the death energy and corruption of the fallen crypt riser whose finger it is made out of. It grants the wearer the power to control all those of the fallen crypt riser's line.

Stats Bonus: +50 MAG, +50 MEN

Requirements: Can only be worn by those with the class 'Quantum Reaper'.

Item Tier: 4

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Huh. That's pretty good.

Better than I was expecting.

But I'd still prefer another free level up, if I'm being completely honest.

And the ring looks creepy. So I don't think I'm going to wear it unless I need to.

Especially since I already have too many rings on right now anyways.

So I go ahead and put the ring in my storage before moving on to the next Dimensional Block while training my energy manipulation.

Because I might as well go ahead and search for more targets while I train. Since hunting targets gives me a reward for each one.

And rewards are nice.