Готовый перевод Быть Гладу и Хладу / There will be Hunger and Cold: 9.

9. It’s so convenient to consider everyone around you as bloodthirsty degenerates, if only because you rarely get disappointed!

* * *

If some artist of outstanding skill set out to paint a picture that embodied the phrase "tense silence", then Ilya and old Ryuk could well be used as models. And the resulting drawing would be immediately entered into the registers of the Paris Chamber of Weights and Measures and the lists of cultural heritage under the auspices of the once again reformed UNESCO, no less. Ilya was as sure of this as he was that the earthly Sun rises in the East, that Rick Barley will not take the championship this year, and that builds for the Executioner-healer are a real perversion and cannot be viable under normal conditions. In general, he was very, almost ironcladly sure of this, as much as a mortal and weak little man can be sure of his rightness.

The earthling didn't think about what Ryuk was thinking. The old man wasn't behaving at all like a third-stage Sage or any other Gifted should. There was no point in running. No point in hoping for resurrection either. It wouldn't be hard for the owner of such a class and such an eye to find his respawn point and meet him right there at the beginning of a new cycle. The standard first-stage mechanics of hiding the respawn point wouldn't help at all here. Fight? Even funnier, stop joking like that. Having fully developed all his talents, having managed to snatch a couple of additional ones, having found the necessary places of power and altars in the depths of specific gaps, and having equipped himself with an enhanced set of class relics, sharpened in defense and resistance, he could. He could survive the first blow and run away to a certain distance before the second one killed him.

This is the whole point of ranks and the reason why people rush to advance in them. No matter how much you pumped up at the current level, no matter how much essence you put into yourself, no matter what experience you gained, the next level will have a colossal advantage. Even if you are fighting against mediocrity, who pump up the bare minimum of talents and immediately jump up. Even if the enemy does not have a fraction of your experience. Unique individuals like Echidna or Wellington can go head-to-head with such a “noob of a higher rank”, as far as the concept of “noob” is applicable to such individuals, and then survive and even win. But these are unique individuals. And even they preferred not to repeat such battles again. He, the winner of the Lottery and the Great Patience, has the potential to become another unique individual.

To become in the distant future, sweet and full of success, and not right now. And therefore, the battle with the third stage in the place of his power, and even outside that place, for Ilya is like an attempt by a mouse under the starting engine of a space shuttle to deflect the jet exhaust of the main engine with its breath. You will die in the same way, only you will also make the killer laugh with your attempts to resist. That is why the earthling does not try to fight or even bargain, but silently awaits the decision. The most disgusting feeling of powerlessness, you would not wish this on anyone. Ryuk will offer bargaining, if he wishes, and Ilya will find what to pay with. He knows very well how greedy the Sages are for knowledge. Sages who are able to enlighten the opponent sitting opposite them with a glance literally instantly, without requiring consent or long explanations about who he is.

The only question is, did Ryuk develop his talents towards reading the mysteries of souls? That is, the kind that allows him to see not only properties, mutations, skills, knowledge, vessels, and all that, but also the most secret thing a diver has. His Marks. If he sees them, then it’s both good and bad – good because you have to be completely finished to cut the goose with the golden eggs, bad because after such a coming out, the golden cage and a probable attempt to carve a feature on the altar are practically guaranteed. But whether he sees the features or not also determines the construction of the dialogue, and this is a very important point that Ilya would like to know in advance.

But who knows what he wanted there?

The old man is silent, and so is the diver. The raging Wendigo is struggling in the depths of self-control. The aroma of roasted and cooling duck teases the nose. It seemed like an eternity had passed, but in fact, the old man, cosplaying a motionless mannequin, remained in the pause for no longer than thirty seconds. And only then did he freeze, wearily massaging his temples with his long fingers, blackened by the ingrained burnt honey. He can be proud of himself, because to cause a migraine in a creature of such a level, you know, you have to try very hard. Even a whole holy nine of well-coordinated divers with the support of a commander of the second step will not succeed. Unless, of course, the old man is not pretending to have a migraine. But why would he? The tired and somehow surprisingly non-threatening look of the only unclosed eye looks calmly and a little sadly, but this does not make Ryuk any less of a threat.

"Who do you serve, stranger?" This is one of those questions where an incorrect answer immediately leads to an early end to the game session. "Answer."

No pressure on the mind or will. This is clearly not so much a manifestation of politeness as a test of someone else's intelligence. Will he start lying or will he understand that he is being read? Will he dodge, which is also very obvious, or will he prefer to speak the truth? Earthlings who are in a solitary dive and are not bound by loyalty to the community are taught in such situations not to show off, playing the partisan during interrogation by the Gestapo, but simply to answer the truth. Because a normal interrogation will still expose you, only it will be painful, long, and unpleasant. Especially if there is nothing serious behind you, and therefore the Seekers or Interrogators who exposed you will tyrannize you even more. Why did this moron resist? It means he is now lying.

However, being fair, they often torture and break even those who do not hide anything, purely out of love for art, very respected among the natives. And not only the natives, frankly speaking. Not only among them. In the end, there was no reason to hide the answer. Another thing is that it is difficult to give such an answer so that it is believed. If Ilya now honestly says that he does not serve anyone, except for that asshole who is reflected in the mirror, then his answer will be immediately called into question. The earthling did not want to cause doubts in the person sitting opposite him to the point of mild panic. Fortunately, in numerous instructions, regulations, and codes on Earth, if not everything, then a lot was provided, including the answer to such a question.

"The Assembly of the United Humankind of the Earth is represented by the United Europe." The answer is maximally truthful, because formally he, being a citizen of the said Europe, formally is subordinate and accountable to its rulers, no sense of lies will indicate otherwise. "And to himself, of course."

"And where is your Hunger on this list, I would like to know?" Still in the same dull and indifferent tone, he didn’t even ask, because the intonation was wrong, Old Ryuk simply said, and then raised his open palm, ordering silence. "Stop, hungry one, don’t answer. I’m trying to collect my thoughts. They, you know, always run away from me, hide in the nooks and crannies of my tired head. I will be extremely brief and just as honest. I will ask questions, and you will answer them. You won’t be able to lie, I’ll tell you right away. If I don’t like the answers, you will die. If you twitch, you will die. If you just make me angry, you will die. I am an old, sick man; I can’t get angry, it makes my hair fall out."

Ilya involuntarily glanced sideways at the luxurious bald spot almost covering the entire crown, framed by a thin ring of brittle gray hair that had not known either washing or combing for a long, long time. If you believe what was said, then the old man had experienced even too much anger and rage, but, as it seemed to Ilya, the bald spot significantly underestimated the scale of that anger. Instead of words, he only nods, not even trying to dodge or bargain; here, it is clear to the naked eye that an attempt at bargaining will lead to the activation of an armed eye. Instead of an eye, the old man places a bare palm on the table, and under it, signs flash as if applied in black and blue ink, forming thin concentric circles crossed by ritual lines.

Ilya notes, not without irritation, that he cannot name the exact specification of the ritual, but he can clearly identify the "Chalice of Balance", six steps of the talent, which serves as the basis for a whole galaxy of "pure" rituals, strengthening and "balancing" them, allowing them to work more effectively and without being tied to reagents, season, weather and the position of magical currents. In fact, a full-fledged replacement for another class, so many options for using this talent alone are opened. And in combination with the flashing blackness of the "Last Copybook" and the clearly activated "Retention of Contemplation", even Ilya, with his diploma and list of qualifications, will not undertake to believe that the old man twisted and added to the figure that appeared in one instant. All three talents can only be taken at the third level; only retention is available from the second in some builds.

While the earthling is assessing the small miracle that is being performed before him without any special effects at all, a huge weight falls on his shoulders, as if chained to the spot. The breath in his chest freezes and becomes warm, as if the lines spreading throughout this dilapidated dining room have heated the world around, forbade the Cald to manifest itself even inside Ilya's lungs, let alone outside. The body weakens, becoming as strong and tenacious as a human's, then the extra feelings that are heightened by his class nature fall. Even the mad Hunger, strengthened by a special herb, fades into the background, almost dying under the pressure of the black lines and the shining blue sign of that script that is written in a language close to the Mechanism itself.

If he wanted to impress, he impressed to the utmost; another diver would have pleased the old man with wet pants, and the locals would have fallen ill with a massive heart attack. A complete class blockade! Without a ritual hall, without a couple of weeks of preparation, without additional affectors and relics, without even a retinue of henchmen! And is he really a third level? Or should he be addressed not as "honorable", but as "your excellency" or even "your majesty"? Either he is not just a three, but a three that has reached the limit of its talents, most of them, and is developing into an extremely unusual build, or he is still a four, just young and not yet fledged, as for a four. Ilya did not even know which of the answer options got on his nerves more than the others.

"State your name." The order sounds, echoes in his ears and vibrates in his bones, as if each ritual line that entwined his body, seemingly growing into the flesh that had become normal again, and not frozen, duplicated these words, amplified them, made the answer to them obligatory, which made it unrealistic to even think about lying or silence. "Why are you here?"

Very good question.

Because he's an idiot, that's why.

But this answer is hardly suitable.

"A lilac gladiolus." Ilya’s answer puts him on extremely thin ice, even thinner than now, but it’s better to immediately indicate his ability to lie even under such pressure than to wait for the moment when the old man himself understands, and he will understand, he can’t help but understand. "I came to eat the best duck a la Corona on the whole of Ridge."

The look became even more icy, and the lines of the ritual seemed to dig into the body with a multitude of sharp threads, threatening to cut through the flesh, the aura, and the soul itself. Although, okay, if he also knows the methods of destroying divers, then Ilya is just going home. He doesn’t play like that. There was no blood on the weightless threads, although the pain was hellish, and not even intentionally, as it seems to him, but from the slight shock with which the old man perceived the frankly false and intentionally “funny” answer. It is worth giving him credit; he immediately regained control over the ritual and his composure, too, if he ever lost it. And good, because the troika that lost its composure, holding Ilya in such a compromising position, is of no use in this situation.

"Explain yourself." It's good that he doesn't have to explain about his clothes and his entry into the wrong neighborhood, but somehow, he doesn't find such awesome analogies funny at all.

As I have already said, self-control has always been my strongest side. - Hoarsely, barely breathing from the pressure of the ritual on the whole essence, Ilya speaks. - I cannot lie so as to deceive. But I can not answer. Even under the Chalice and Copybook at once.

"I heard." No, well, there is definitely a spiritual affinity with the cool kids of the kept agglomerations, it would even be funny if it weren't so scary, and the grandfather added in normal words, not with orders that dug into the depths of the aura. "Then answer normally, I'll adjust the circle. Ahem... So, the questions are as follows..."

And so it went. Ilya was turned inside out. A couple of times, blood vessels in his body and brain burst, and his heart stopped twice. And his brains were leaking out of his ears, but this was not a consequence of the ritual. No. Rather, his attempts to understand what was happening. The old asshole did not ask anything about what he knew, how he could be useful, or how he could pay off. But he repeatedly, literally twenty-seven times in various formulations, asked again whether Ilya was working for certain individuals. He even knew a couple of these individuals from the memory of the Twin, because it is hard not to know the name of the ruler of the Crown, whose mug has been cast on the outlines of coins for the second century, or the name of the house that rules Ridge in the name of the Crown.

Just as attentively, that is, twenty-seven questions in different wording, he tried to get to the bottom of whether the stranger-Hungry wanted to devour little Lishka. In response to twenty-six negative answers and the twenty-seventh, according to which Ilya only wanted to give the annoying little thing a spanking, the old man even became embarrassed and said in a somewhat lost tone that yes, he should have. Or rather, he pretended to be embarrassed, and he said it in a lost tone. Very attentively, he listened to Ilya's detailed explanations of how exactly he figured out the talent of the interlocutor and his approximate rank. And if the mistake with the fabric of the bandage was met only with an annoyed movement of the corner of the lips, then he seemed to be a little ashamed of the remark about the blood of the copper-skinned bull and the methods of washing it. The emotion seemed very sincere, real, almost the only one of this kind since the beginning of the conversation. But there was not a single question about the same strange boxes or possible pursuers, although Ilya was ready to tell everything, seeing no reason to keep the secret at the cost of life or injury.

Hundreds of questions were about whether Ilya had eaten people, whether he was going to eat them. The honest answer, that only in case of extreme necessity and a matter of life or death, clearly did not please the old man, but he acknowledged its validity. Whether he was going to hand over Ryuk to the closest guards, secret guards, the rulers of Lazybones, the Crown Chancellery, and all other individuals. He considered his greatest success to be that he managed to explain to the old man that he would not hand him over and did not plan to; neither torture nor mental interrogation would help, just as they had not helped now. Because the old man would definitely like to erase a couple of weeks of memories from his interlocutor, but even with his abilities, the maximum he would get would be temporary amnesia. But Ilya understood perfectly well that ordinary executioners and interrogation experts would kill him once, but Ryuk, disappointed with the situation, could kill him completely.

Still, Ilya's mind also recovers from any suggestions, including amnesia and those inflicted by the higher rituals of either the Supreme Inker or the Essence-Drawer. Of course, it might have seemed to Ilya that it was easy for a person of such caliber to deceive a naive earthling, but somewhere by the middle of the interrogation, a clear feeling formed that he would live. Perhaps poorly and for a short time, but not because he would be finished off right here or sold to someone else. The old man with a sad and tired look in his only eye seemed to be interested in nothing at all, except whether Ilya was going to rat him out or eat his orphan charges. It seemed so qualitatively that the earthling was almost ready to believe that the old man really cared about them, like an ordinary candy merchant, and not a fucking machine of all-knowing death on the third level.

Ilya was even more surprised by the attitude to his answers. In the sense that the old man could not help but ask how exactly Ilya remained sane after eating the special seasoning. And the earthling only said that, if possible, he would not like to answer this question. Of course, he would have answered and knew that he would answer, but here it was necessary to show at least some bone in the spine, without immediately starting to pour out all the secrets ... and he did not interrogate him further. Or rather, they did, but the old man only clarified whether this stabilization of the psyche was some kind of particularly asshole assembly based on the "Face of the Devoured" or another similar talent. And having heard an unambiguous answer, as well as a couple of confirmations, he completely abandoned this topic, continuing the interrogation, or rather, already finishing it.

"We haven't seen strangers under our sky for fifty years." He drawls thoughtfully, fingering the invisible black threads of the copybook, weaving something out of them and then unweaving them. "They quickly ended last time. And the time before that. And before that, they didn't stain our world for long, if you don't count that fool who burned for three years in the sacrificial brazier on the main square of Crown. But you, it seems, are not from that foreign land I heard about... and you have preserved yourself. Somehow. I'd like to cut you open, gut you properly... but what good would that do me? Get out."

The last phrase was combined with a barely noticeable movement of the wrist, after which the crushing power instantly disappeared, the lines and signs disappeared, the weakness that had gripped the body went away, returning the feeling of one's power. Again, the flesh freezes, again the Cald settles in the lungs, again he becomes a Wendigo, and not just a man or even a cockroach under the already lowering fly swatter. Or a slipper. In any case, such an abrupt change of topic, especially considering the last phrase about the autopsy of isekai, knocked him off track a little. The earthling, stretching his hands aching from the returning influx of magic, decided to ask how exactly to understand what was said. Otherwise, he will understand incorrectly, and he will be, damn it, happy for the rest of his short life, and then for three more of them.

"Leave the city, honorable sir? Or the Ridge?" The question is really important, as is the need to carry out this “get out as fast as possible” as fast as possible. "One way or another, I can only thank you for your hospitality and mercy..."

"Get out of my house! I don’t want to see you here! And I don’t want to see you near Lishka. And I don’t want to see you at all!" He seemed to switch gears, returning to the same manner of an eccentric madman with which he had previously covered himself, only now it no longer irritates him, but scares the shit out of him. "I don’t give a damn about you, understand!? I don’t give a damn about the whole world, except for what’s left! I don’t want to see any of you, and you especially! Run from here, or I’ll call the guards... ahem... or I’ll kick you out myself! I’ll kick you out with these legs! What are you still doing here, huh!?"

"I'm running away already." Ilya answered, bringing his body into combat mode and thinking about running through the wall, breaking through it with himself, at the same time suppressing the completely idiotic desire to "joke" by asking for a full list of his orphan charges, so to speak, to know exactly who not to approach. "Good evening to you..."

He finished the last sentence already near the door, still not believing in his luck and fortune, which allowed him to get out of this shit. At the same time, however, he curses this luck and fortune, because it was their efforts that got him into this shit in the first place. Fuck, it’s not a fact that the ruler of Lazy has the third level, and here, motherfucker, is a crazy gingerbread man selling candies! It even sounds so idiotic that Ilya looks at the Mechanism over and over again, checking his single FaFo unit, because no one can screw up like that. This is precisely an accident, which has nothing to do with FaFo and was formed purely empirically. Or he gives up and doesn’t play anymore... oh yeah, such an option is not provided in Broken, abandoning the character for a couple of years will not work, what a trap!

And it's not a fact that he really managed to get out of this, because there is always the possibility that kind grandfather Ryuk will change his mind, that the circumstances will change somehow, and all that. Generally speaking, after this polite conversation, adrenaline replaced Ilya's blood, and its excess almost flowed out through his pants. So for now, he was not going to do anything except go to his inn, which, to Ilya's indescribable happiness, is very far from the home of the venerable Ryuk, and then think a lot. And regret. Regret that he cannot get drunk on regular alcohol, and he does not have money for the kind that will affect not just a Diver, but a real Wendigo.

And there are no connections either.

Unless...

"What are you thinking about, hungry stranger!?" He didn’t think about it; the pause there was less than a split second, but you can’t hide such a pause from the Sage of the third level. "Should I pull answers out of you again or what!? I’ll pull, I’ll pull so hard that you won’t be able to pull yourself back out, you beast!"

"That I want to get drunk." The earthling answered honestly, suppressing the desire to respond with Seryoga's favorite quote, which is "pull your anus, dog." "And that I won't find the kind of drink that will get me anywhere. And it's scary and stupid to ask you."

Well, at least some compensation for the probable death and guaranteed problems in the near future. The old man, apparently without any pretense, choked on his exhalation and tried to clear his throat for a good ten seconds, and then stared at Ilya as if he had said it on purpose so that old Ryuk would choke. Ilya, in response to the now silent question, simply shrugged his shoulders, answering the obvious and completely honest:

"Today I have said goodbye to life several times in a row, all of them at once." He explains the obvious, but perhaps unnoticeable to the old man. "It is difficult to refrain from regretting that I interfered."

"You only survived because you interfered." The corner of his lips twitched, and again it seemed to Ilya that this emotion was real. The old man jerked his hand, as if brushing off annoying midges. "If Lishka had perished under the hoof of the copper creature, I would have dug up the entire city, I would have found you, too. Believe me, I would have asked with all due diligence."

The Earthling felt, for the umpteenth time in a short period, that he had frozen on the brink of death, that the old man had changed his mind at the last moment, stopped the blow. Risky words. It was risky to say them so bluntly, but to lie or to keep silent was even riskier. He could have tried to soften the wording; he knew how not to deceive, but to skirt around such an interrogation, but he did not. He was not sure of success, and he very much wanted to understand certain points, some of which the old bastard's answer had clarified, adding even more questions. The bastard chewed his lips, dry and cracked, as if deciding something important, before opening his lips again, voicing another wonderful thing.

"Don't leave the city yet. Don't go far." He immediately corrected himself, not even letting the first sentence fade. "I remember that you made a deal with the traders to do piecework, so do it. But don't do it too far from the walls. I might want to ask you a question or two in the next nine. If you're already far away by then, I'll be upset. And who knows, maybe I'll shake up the old days and find you."

The Earthling didn't even say anything. He silently put his hand to his heart and bowed, leaving the damn house and, with great difficulty, adopting the gait, manners, and facial expression characteristic of his chosen image. He exhaled only when he reached his inn, locked himself in the room, without even having had dinner, and, exhausted, fell onto the bed. His gaze was directed at the greasy and, most likely, never-washed ceiling since its construction, thinking about the great and the not-so-great. The sudden and terrible meeting ended as well as it could have ended. Someone else, perhaps more naive or not having studied the Broken World in more detail, could have really believed in this "well". But Ilya was not a naive youth with a burning heart, and Ryuk himself still overacted in certain moments. Not enough to reveal his true intentions, but enough to notice their presence.

Whatever they may be.

The old man was overacting on purpose. He was deliberately giving out these phrases full of emotion and feigned anger, like the obligatory appeal to the guard. He was deliberately entering his image. Not the first year, obviously, since until now he had either not been suspected, or, what is more likely, all those who had suspected him did not have time to share their suspicions for one reason or another. Before the earthling, a literal textbook example of a repentant and broken by life sinner was revealed, who is trying to forget himself in the simple life of a sweets merchant. A caring, almost father-or-grandfather for a bunch of orphans, touchingly protecting his charges. It is easy to believe in this image, because it is partly the truth. The best lies are cooked from partial truth, just do not forget to add hints, reservations, meaningful pauses to the cauldron and stir all this happiness over an even fire.

Yes, if something had happened to that Lishka, the Earthman would have been killed. If he hadn't saved her following his reflex, he would have been destroyed. If he had just admitted that he had even considered wringing the little one's neck for the sake of conspiracy, he would have died right there. Ryuk hadn't faked this concern in the least, but what was the reason - the action or the intention? The old man's concern for the orphan girl came from simple concern or from some purpose for which such concern was provided. The Earthman would not be himself if he believed for even a moment, even a second, that it was possible to reach the third level and remain morally pure. He had even less faith in the fact that someone who had once been at the very top of the food chain of this piece of the ecumene suddenly decided to go into philanthropy and confectionery.

It's not impossible.

The probability of such an outcome exists; that's true. But it's too small. It can't be allowed while there's any other reason for such behavior. Not in the Broken. Not with the third level, which seems to have frozen literally one step away from becoming a four. This is what gave the only clue that Ilya's brain was looking for so diligently, just as diligently trying not to think that he even suspected anything. The transition from the third to the fourth level is a fucking circus, God's torment, and all the circles of hell at once. Such rituals are always unique. They are adjusted to each gifted person individually. They all seem to grow on him, gradually forming and allowing themselves to be understood. This transition is very difficult and fails much more often than it reaches a successful end.

Even among the Earthlings with their cheats for cooperation and information, the fourth level was taken by slightly less than a thousand individuals, and less than six hundred are still alive or maintain contact with Earth. For the standard natives of the Broken, the situation is even worse, so much worse that it is not even funny. They often die, break their builds, and maim themselves, and are often in no hurry to break through in rank, even if they were not held back by oaths and the paranoia of the superiors, who are in no hurry to create competitors for themselves.

Loss of talents, serious status effects, distortions of the usual properties of the aura or individual traits - all this happens more often than it can be avoided. Could such shit happen to a Sage who hopes to move to the highest league? It could. Something like this happens all the time, especially when jumping from a three to a four. This is where the highest percentage of not just failed attempts at elevation, but attempts that are extremely traumatic for the individual trying to raise the level is.

So, there is a partially broken, partially damaged by unsuccessful ascension individual of the third level. Let's take this as an axiom, temporarily throwing aside other options, focusing on the most probable and therefore obvious. The old man, known to him by the name of Ryuk, is, to put it mildly, not in shape, but he remains a Third Level, which was one step away from a breakthrough, and has certainly developed well the groups of talents suitable for him. Such Third Levels do not grow on their own if they do not have knowledge at the level of Earth Divers and a blessing for increased extraction of Essence, like one overly arrogant and unlucky Ilya. Such individuals necessarily had patrons, subordinates, and, obviously, enemies, whom they crossed and caused many troubles during their ascension.

And these patrons, subordinates, enemies, and everyone else are still there. They haven't gone anywhere since the failed breakthrough. The patrons don't need the pathetic cripple anymore; the subordinates are eager to sell their patron out tight, hoping to bargain for their life and career growth in a new place, and the enemies are happy to torment those subordinates, taking away everything that the cripple can no longer protect. This is a fucking classic, you need to know this. This is what happens in Broken, and not only in Broken, all the time, just in different corners and on a different scale. The old man runs away, hides, hides at the very bottom, where no one will look for the fugitive, not in the middle of Dead Man's Ridge, not in the lawless lands, and not among the crazy confectionery merchants.

It would seem that this is how he should live, drag out a miserable existence, gradually going crazy, and waiting for the moment when the bloodhounds of his blood enemies will find him and send liquidators after him. Only it seemed so, if you think about it. First of all, why the hell does he need this candy disguise in the middle of Lazy? A large and rich, albeit neutral city, where there are enough agents and the governor of Ridge, the Crown, and, in general, all the interested parties. The smartest thing would be to just hide in some small village or even live as a hermit in the wastelands for a year or two. Or rather, a decade or two. And here you can’t even blame such behavior on the pride and show-off of the former master of life. Someone who found humility in himself to pretend to be a crazy shopkeeper would have found it for the life of a homeless hermit. The latter, from the point of view of the locals, is even less shameful, because at least there are no witnesses.

Let's assume that's what he did initially. The first years or even decades, sitting under some rock and not showing up, so that they would gradually forget about him. So that they would stop searching so furiously, so that they would miss the old madman who came to town... who quite likely even took someone else's name, having previously killed that same "disgraced book reader and all-rounder" who had fled from his problems in the capital. Having killed and, probably, partially changed his appearance, because the bearers of high levels look anything but plain, and they only become ugly when they deliberately or accidentally choose specific talents.

A question for the entire flock of forum warriors of the Wikipedia: why does he need his pretense, why does he need this role, and all the problems this role could cause? The Earthling assessed himself sensibly, knew that he was not a complete fool, and had a very deep erudition, but his set of knowledge was still not considered unique. They were bound to notice the inconsistencies in someone else's image sooner or later, notice them without the influence of Ilya and his fucking erudition. And the old man still took risks, played a role, sold sweets, which he prepared himself, waiting every day and every hour for the liquidators-guests who would come for his soul. Or simply too sharp-eyed individuals who would uncover his game and then it was unclear what they would want.

In such conditions.

With such input.

Ilya shouldn't have, didn't have the slightest right to leave Ryuk's house alive! He wouldn't have gotten into that house anyway. The old man would have come for him himself, unnoticed and quiet, without showing himself or attracting anyone's attention. And the earthling would have lost his first life without even understanding where the strike had come from. And then he would have been able to live not much longer than an hour, taking into account all the other lives, when he would have started to die at the respawn point. He certainly wouldn't have let the bearer of dangerous knowledge go anywhere, and they certainly wouldn't have invited him to a dinner. The most he would have done was interrogate him, first kidnapping him from his room at an inn, dragging him out of town, and conducting a day-and-a-half interrogation with hundreds of cross-questions, so that no attempts at deception could take place.

That's it.

Basta.

There is no other way. Otherwise, the opponent becomes a complete moron, and such individuals, even if they are slightly crazy, are very rarely moron. Because the moron would have been killed a little earlier. But this “otherwise” happened, and there is no way to cancel it, unless you write it off as a malicious hallucination. This is possible only in one case - the old man cannot kill at all and is categorically incapable of attacking first, of striking first. Hence all this confusion with the duck a la crown and special seasonings especially for the Wendigo, with the deliberate play on nerves and an attempt to lead to an attack, to force the hungry beast in the human body to break loose, to rush into battle and die, killing himself with his forehead against the wall of someone else's power. Some form of the cripled aura and spirit, which merges too tightly with the world and does not allow certain actions to be exerted on this world.

This is indirectly confirmed by the talents that the old man used during the interrogation. They belonged to the branches that have a soft and pliable structure, and not a hard, attacking one. Support talents, which are incredibly difficult to use for a direct attack. Yes, Ilya would have had more than enough, but only because these are talents with six steps performed by a third-level gifted person, and not because they are combat talents. I wonder if he can use his eye at all? Although no, that's stupid. Of course, he can. He was going to do it, but he held back at the last moment, yes.

If you think about it, it seems almost obvious that Ryuk had exactly these injuries. If you really think about it. If you know what Ilya knows. The Sages work very closely with the very concept of knowledge, the information fields, and the noospheric currents of the Broken. The probability that one of the injuries during the transition from three to four made the old man incapable of striking first is not zero. No, no, Ryuk can still kill him. He will simply get such a rollback that is not worth the life of even such a dangerously knowledgeable witness as Ilya showed himself to be. Especially considering that the old man was convinced this individual was not going to blab. And that is why the old fart so diligently pretended to be who he wanted to be seen as.

There remains one more question. Why did he even come to the city? Why didn't he continue to recover in the middle of nowhere, under a stone forgotten by the Dead Gods in the middle of the wastelands? Was it to look after the orphans? Here he had to step on the shaky path of mere guesses, which were not confirmed by certain or other facts. Nevertheless, Ilya intuitively felt that his thoughts were on the right path. After all, his Trait and the attributes strengthened by it in such cases act as intuition boosters. And general erudition helps to find among the baggage of knowledge that which will serve as a hint for the aforementioned intuition.

So, orphans.

They don't disappear, they don't die, they don't perish; it's too much the other way around. A conversation with the lazy guard showed that his charges are actually making it in life. Yes, he can ask around and look for answers, but Ilya was almost certain that he wouldn't find any traces of sacrifices, or rituals to drain health, or anything like that. And what good would the third level get from sacrificing orphans? There's such a difference in aura potentials that it would be necessary to cut out a third of the population of Lazy to power the healing effect for the crippled gifted one. The old fart was too sincerely worried about his Lishka, too real, but not the way one worries about a victim, especially such a valuable one. No one would let a valuable victim out into the city to walk among dangerous people, so no, this is not typical blackness, but something else. It’s scary to look for answers, and Ilya won’t risk it, but it still seems to him that he sees the edge of that answer.

Why orphans?

Not just kids, no, literally street kids of the worst kind, who have no one at all, not even tramps, specifically no one's children, not connected to anyone, not needed by anyone. Empty. Sages work with knowledge and the noosphere, often even better than Dreamwalkers, not too inferior to the basic four clairvoyant classes. It's just that their work with information has a slightly different nature and basis, but that's not the point, no.

A failed ascension ritual. Yes, yes, presumably failed, but let's take the assumption as an axiom. A failed ritual by a third-level Sage, failed and resulting in trauma. There is not much information about such things in the public domain, even on Earth. These matters concerning the transition to the fourth level are too ephemeral, individual, and... dangerous. A Treaty is a Treaty, but few would want to get an unregistered Maniac-four, who has eclipsed even the Quebec Tanner. No, if you come yourself and ask for help, then they will give it to you, show you all the honors, and just won't shove their tongue up your ass. Or maybe they will shove it. If you like this kind of intimacy, just sign a contract for the supply of essence with us. They will help and provide, but they will also put you under surveillance; they have no rights.

For example, in the London Anomalous University, certain departments and library sections are classified as highly secret. Any similar educational institution associated with the training of divers had such departments. At his university, access to them was only approved by direct permission of the dean's office or the academic council, while the most delicious things were communicated only to those who entered into a full-fledged contract with the government of the United Europe. In particular, with that part of it that was still full of the interests of old lady Britain. Ilya did not sign such a contract and was not a special favorite of the teaching staff, unless you count Bronislav Valediktovich Yanin, but some things involuntarily leaked out.

There's a forgotten tablet, there's a copybook that was given to someone to read out of friendship, there's a shared lab assignment for which he was given access to the "forbidden section" (for jokes about Hogwarts they could even hit you in the face, especially if you remember the third series of film adaptations of the cult seven-book series), and there some of the forbidden details simply ceased to be such, having become outdated and moved into the general public. Whatever it was, most of what concerned classified topics, which even in London are not for everyone, Ilya learned from the Forum.

The effect that has long been called "Warthander Syndrome", in honor of the cult virtual-simulation game in the shooter genre. If there is an opportunity to brag about classified information on the Forum to prove one's case, someone will definitely do it. They brag and post absolutely secret specifications of the ascension rituals for the fourth level in the public domain. Other fours themselves post their developments on the same Forum, and not only fours. The Lithuanian who became the ninth official five, for example, also significantly diversified Ilya's library of knowledge, sharing, albeit not everything, but a lot concerning his build.

Ilya doesn't have a precise specification. His "theory" has a lot more "ifs" and "let's assume" than any clear facts, but the theory was still coming together. A coherent and understandable, logical and much more natural for the Broken than the fairy tale about a repentant old man who decided to do something good in life, about a full-fledged aboriginal troika who discovered compassion in himself and decided to find redemption. This theory didn't allow him to relax or believe that everything was over; rather, it worried the earthling even more, and didn't let him sleep.

Emptiness.

Nothingness.

The lot of orphans.

They are not empty now; they are no longer useless to anyone. They see Ryuk as their father, grandfather, and older brother. He filled their empty lots, touched their destinies, and, most likely, initially selected those who, without his help, would have either died or fallen to the very bottom and then died. For example, Lishka, or that woman who now works as an assistant to the city accountant. The lot of such social emptiness, which has become complete, replaced, from now on connected with Ryuk. Each of his orphans is truly valuable to the old madman. Neither a sacrificial altar nor a sudden death from a curse thrown down on them awaits them. Their goal is to live, to live a real destiny, interesting and full-fledged, one that will leave its mark on the information layer of Reality.

They will live a better life. All of them, who will become sons, daughters, and grandchildren of a cruel cripple, forced to rise from the very bottom. Not a hysterical fool with pride the size of a Beijing agglomeration, but a very dangerous and completely frostbitten cripple. He found a way to regain his strength, found a way to return all or most of his abilities. And then, look, and again it will be possible to try to break through, only now having experience, remembering his mistakes, and laying down straw under his ass.

Orphans are not victims or meat for Ryuk, but literal anchors that tie him to himself, allowing him to overcome one of the forms of the curse-effect, which is most often displayed in the status list under the name "Dissonant Squandering of the Ultra-Fine Etheric Shells." The form of injury is undoubtedly very unusual, so the name may be different, but the type of injury, Ilya is ready to bet three quarters of his finances, is from this branch. Partially leveled, partially healed, partially stabilized simply from the years he lived, it is this injury that makes him such a caring grandpa; it is this that makes him care about orphans more than about his own children, if he ever had any or still has any.

As soon as he formulated these thoughts, reached them, the image of the greasy ceiling before his eyes blurred, and another one came, so familiar and so dear. The cold and wind that drive the snow over the frozen lake, the stone bowl, and the horned skull at the bottom of it. And the drops that flow down the snow-white bones, the drops that fall to the bottom of the bowl one after another.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

And finally, one more thing that is so dear to my heart...

Tap.

Holy Seven, he would really like to congratulate himself! It was not for nothing that he developed the trait; it was not for nothing that its description said it increases the probability of receiving drops precisely from solving all sorts of mysteries, riddles, and secrets. Even without his blessing, Ilya would have received a drop or two for this conversation and his thoughts after it. For the fact that he managed to turn the dialogue to survive, for the fact that he revealed someone else's disguise, and also for the fact that he understood the real background of someone else's secret. A secret kept with cruel meticulousness, knowledge of which would very much kill Ilya if the old man realized that the earthling understood too much. Despite all his injuries, which forbid him to interrupt other people's stories, other people's destinies, he would kill the hell out of him.

He can't help but kill; he has no right.

Among all these panicky thoughts and anxious paranoia that filled the seething cauldron of his consciousness and the whistling kettle of his mind, a completely inappropriate annoyance was rushing around alone. The annoyance was that if he had the lot of a Sage, as well as the corresponding talents that enhance the receipt of Essence from knowledge, then he, having his blessing, would have received not seven drops, but several dozen. He savored this annoyance very carefully because it helped to push into the background the rest of the situation, which was still developing extremely unsuccessfully for the earthling. And none of his sudden conclusions, which brought a bunch of Essence, improved this situation not by a grain, not by an iota, not by a tiny drop.

"Fucking FaFo!" He nevertheless allowed himself to whisper out loud, and then rolled over onto his side and fell into an anxious sleep, full of dark forebodings.

* * *

Ilya had long ago decided which talent he would raise next, but there were still more than one option. And before making a choice, Ilya still decided to finish one thing that would allow him to finally find out which path would be more profitable and correct now. Everything rested on what he had to do soon, and no meetings with crippled gifted one of high ranks would change anything here. Ryuk can kill the earthling at any time, whenever he wants. It makes no difference what exactly the diver will be doing at that moment and whether he will be doing it at all. As a result, Ilya paradoxically decided to behave as if there was no conversation over the duck a la Crown, hoping that he would get away with it.

The most pathetic form of reaction to the situation that one could possibly imagine, expressing absolute powerlessness in the face of the problems that had arisen. On the other hand, this was precisely the most just reaction. He was truly powerless, and truly pathetic in his powerlessness. These thoughts made his teeth grind, his fists clench until they crunched, and the Wendigo in the depths of his being howled sadly and angrily, demanding to devour. It didn't matter who. It could be everyone at once, individually, or in large groups. Needless to say, the earthling was in a very bad mood, to put it mildly, so bad that some jerk from the mercenaries who tried to get to him, looking for either a job or an opportunity to legitimately take offense and shake the villager about payment for the insult, received a straight punch to the jaw and the same to the liver even before he began to show demonstrative indignation.

Stepping over the passed-out freak, Ilya only noted to himself that it was time to start looking for an opportunity to move out of the inn. Perhaps move to a widow's house or something like that. After all, he had practically found a job, as well as buyers of gifts from the wastelands of the Ridge, he could slowly leave the mercenary exchange, gain a foothold, and settle down in Lazy. And so he went, straight to the market, its farthest part, where they traded all sorts of small items and stolen goods. The latter sometimes so brazenly that they refused to give the robbed a discount on the purchase of their things. Ilya was ready to bet on the fact that the local criminal world was run by one of the gifted. This gifted one is obliged to walk under the city government. Otherwise, either he would have been killed, or the criminal world would have gone completely nuts, but here everything was quiet, peaceful, and amicable.

Ilya's goal was not the inconspicuous entrance to the gambling house, which is the prototype of classic casinos, which is why there are so many small-goods dealers nearby; they act as an improvised pawn shop for those who have lost big, but a small indoor teahouse a little to the side. The sullen man at the entrance did not try to stop him or even ask anything; he simply gave Ilya an extremely gloomy look. It turned out to be almost empty inside; only a couple of tables were occupied by visitors, but Ilya did not stop. He went to the farthest table, literally a small, separate room. A kind of VIP place.

He was met by a slightly less sullen and completely indifferent look from the one who was known in the glorious city of Lazybones by the name of Little Chif. Despite the love of those who give nicknames for all sorts of jokes, Little Chif was not a huge thug or a fat man weighing half a ton, but a really small person. A dwarf, to put it simply, only it was not tempting to laugh at him; rather, it was tempting to feel danger from the dwarf. Not as gifted or blessed by the Dead, but a simple and understandable social danger. Ilya, who was advised by as many as three different sources, including Chif as a trusted intermediary, had heard about this character.

Almost fifty years old, cruel and completely devoid of a sense of humor, but at the same time pedantic and relatively honest when it came to money. Born with such a handicap, he saw no point in wasting the talents he had inherited on the typical gifts of the mechanism of peasants, townspeople, or artisans. No "Strong Back" would improve his carrying capacity, no "Agility" would add stride length, no "Enhanced Health" would get rid of the curvature of the bones of his small body. From what the diver had heard about Chif, one could assume that he had invested all four or five of his "trash" talents in enhancing his memory and thinking.

Well, to extent, is such an investment possible at the expense of standard trash talents of one or two levels. Although Ilya encountered cases with two levels of talent in ungifted natives very rarely, even on the Earth Forum.

And, thanks to his strength of character, cold-blooded cruelty, and certain family connections, the dwarf secured his place, and not a bad one at that. The role of a middleman, responsible for certain types of contracts or agreements between the contractor and the customer, is actually very important. Such a person has no less authority than a major merchant or the leader of a hunting party. In fact, they have significantly more. This is largely because such guys like to “take responsibility” by cutting off the heads of those who try to ruin their reputation. It doesn't matter whether it's a customer who has decided not to pay or a contractor who has decided to take an advance payment and go about his business instead of doing the work.

Ilya silently sat down on an uncomfortable chair that creaked under his butt. Specifically, on a chair, not on a bench typical for such establishments, which is typical. He silently laid three heavy silver coins on the table, moving them towards Vozh. He immediately won some respect for the fact that he did not rake in or even greedily examine these coins, which were not pennies for him, of course, but enough for a drink of synthetic coffee, to use earthly terms. Rather, such a sum served as a protective element, so that all sorts of rabble would not bother the respected man for no reason.

"What do you need?" The question is polite, but the dwarf’s voice is dry and cracked, as if he were scraping glass against glass. "Names? Business? Papers?"

A typical question for the Ridge, and one that Twin remembered. Iliy was a city dweller and sometimes dealt with similar personalities, or at least listened to the stories of those who did. Name - you name someone, and the intermediary, if he knows and deigns, says what he knows about the person who bears this name, or, if you pay extra, can ask someone else. By the way, this also includes such funny details as a reward for the head of the one who bears this name, and it is considered good manners to turn the head over to the customer through the one who asked the name. Business - a certain product, animal, creature, or herb is discussed, which is needed right now by someone ready to pay. Paper - this is about the actual check of some merchant, the owner of the house you want to buy, a guard who offers to "solve" a delicate problem, or a banal desire to buy travel documents without catching the eye of the city government office employees.

T.N. The mask behind which the hero hides speaks with a heavy rural accent. It is difficult to stylize, so I will write as it is. And you use some of your imagination.

"Business." Ilya physically feels that his image of a simple-minded villager-farmer is now enduring a much more difficult test than when communicating with the same venerable Gness, because the dwarf, who looks attentively and without mockery, has much more necessary experience of communicating, including with real villagers. "I hunt. I can collect herbs. I need to know who to hunt. Who needs what herbs? I was sent to you..."

"Old Redhead, I know." The shorty interrupts him, clearly not enjoying listening to such a "rich" monologue. "A boy came running from him. He was talking about you, too. You find good herbs and bring them back, not much worse than when you picked them. My advice - learn to talk like a human being, it's hard to listen to you. If you want to be accepted in the city for something other than shit, learn to talk like a city dweller. There are many things to do now... but to go alone and not die... there are three things for you."

Ilya nods wisely and listens, not trying to irritate his interlocutor. He is pleased that his game seems to have been swallowed. At the same time, he listened to three cases of those that suited his image. Two orders for a large batch of specific herbs, both somewhat narcotic, but one is legal, while the second is only relatively legal, as long as you sell to the city governors or to buyers under the coat of arms of either the Crown or the governor of all Ridge. In the latter case, the reward was larger, paying extra for the risk of being stopped at the gate. Formally, no problem, but after that, you will have to hand over the grass to those same official buyers for a third of the offered price.

The last thing was hunting, and Chif even suggested it with some doubt, but after receiving a confirming hoot from Ilya-Svyatik, he nevertheless spoke out. Hunting a creature, a beast, and not very dangerous, born from a herbivorous deer, which by itself did not hunt people. But the creature had very valuable antlers, as well as a most unpleasant habit of running away at the slightest danger or attacking lone travelers or small groups of them almost at the very city walls. Not hunting, no, just attacking and kicking with hooves, often even simply maiming, and not killing. They would have taken the creature long ago, but it really runs away masterfully, accelerating so that it almost overtakes an arrow. Either they are embellishing, or the creature's abilities resulted in the use of wind magic, which accelerates even turtles to the speed of a cheetah. Deer are not turtles, so the creature accelerated even more.

Judging by the fact that more than one or two witnesses saw the creature's magic flickering like sparks between its huge antlers, it really couldn't have done without air magic. And some form of mutation, because the antlers of ordinary deer are not so healthy and branchy, even in Broken. Although who knows, maybe there are pure species that have not turned into creatures, which have acquired uncharacteristic features. Should he check the almighty Forum at the end of the cycle? Specifically, this task, as Ilya suspected, was given to everyone who goes outside the city, because the deer was really annoying in that it attacks not only lone wanderers, but also, for example, couriers, even armed ones, and on horseback. What are you going to do with that horse if such crap is rushing at you, flying at the speed of an arrow, and ignoring the terrain? That's right, you'll die along with your horse, your hand crossbow, and that very message that you, you fucking courier, are supposed to deliver.

The losses are not exactly huge, but they are enough to really annoy the big guys. A little more, and they would have sent the gifted ones after it. Or maybe they did send them, but if the deer also has sensory abilities, then it can simply run away from the local gifted who has come after it. If it was lucky, it could escape without being noticed, and then they would have to search for it in the rocky wastelands. Humans are undoubtedly excellent hunters when it comes to Earth, but in Broken, typical tactics fail due to the peculiarities of various magical effects.

"Yeah. That's it, I'll personally vouch for all three jobs. Bring me the herbs or the horns with hooves, and I'll do the rest. Either I'll pay you a third less, but you'll get it right away, or you can wait until the person who gave you the job pays up. It's up to you. If you need the money, hand it over, but if you're not in a hurry, well, you know what I mean." At that moment, the dwarf caught Ilya's attentive gaze and smiled unpleasantly, but then again, every expression on his face was unpleasant; that's just how his face turned out. "I see, I see, you understand. You're smart, farm boy, and I'll tell you, that's much more valuable than being able to slit a bull's throat with a knife in two breaths."

"What, everyone already knows," the earthling asks dejectedly, not faking emotions for the sake of variety. "About the copper creature?"

"Yeah. That's exactly how it turns out." The dwarf nodded contentedly, rubbing his hands in some strange gesture, either prayerful or just a kinesthetic tic. "And the fact that you're dissatisfied, instead of boasting, that's right. A good deed requires good silence, but when so many eyes are on you, there's no silence. You, perhaps, will be quieter and you'll live longer. Hmm. This is the third piece of advice I've given, and in one conversation. I'm incredibly kind today, I'm just amazed."

Here is where a typical earthling diver could fail, simply because in the realities of at least the lands of the Crown in general and the Dead Man's Ridge in particular, it is not customary to thank for "good advice" if it is given by someone more authoritative and older. One does not thank for advice, but follows it, if it is truly good. This is not an axiom; nodding and putting a fist to the heart, as Ilya did, is quite acceptable, but one should not really say "thank you very much". They will think that you are insulting, especially if in a village. Actually, if Ilya had thanked, he would have exposed at least the fact that he is not a farmer lad at all, or a very strange farmer, whom his mom and dad did not teach well in manners. This is also a possible option, forgotten backwoods are forgotten and blind for a reason, because there may be their own separate rules of good manners, but suspicions would definitely increase.

"Hmm-m-m... Okay, go ahead, come with good work, and I'll give you a warm welcome." Only now the dwarf allowed himself to drink a little from a painted cup covered with a clay lid, and he drank not alcohol, but some herbs, among which the wendigo's sensitive nose did not smell drugs, but recognized a harmoniously combined dozen of general tonic components. "And one more thing. In the city, closer to the slums, but also in the artisans' settlement, some kind of creature got in. People are disappearing. Not only the homeless, but also just passers-by. That's a common thing. But there are no bodies, no noticeable things, no traces, no screams. This work is not for coins. This is me on my own. Good people pay petals for all sorts of things said on this issue, so if you find out something, don't be shy, come up. I tell this to everyone for free. Don't think that I give such an honor to you alone.

Ilya nodded again, trying to make a simpler face, and thought to himself that there were obviously good people among those who disappeared without a trace, those same representatives of the criminal underworld. And not just representatives, but either important ones or even leaders of such. Otherwise, they would not have started moving so actively. If such a "case" is offered to anyone and everyone who can be useful, then a lot of money has been invested in this search. Intermediaries will not work for free; it is not honorable for them, even if they are taking revenge for "their own", they need to take at least a symbolic fee. Considering some of the peculiarities of relations within competing criminal groups, they can also demand a triple rate, although this is a rarity; they can start raising rates in response.

Having said goodbye to the middleman and being basically satisfied with the contracts he had received, Ilya headed back to his rented room. In fact, this was a very big step forward, because such a "business" was paid for at a price that was not at all the same as the one at which all sorts of swindlers bought up herbs. He would have immediately tried to get in touch with someone like Chif, but he didn't risk it here. After all, a farmer speaking through a continuous stream of parasitic words could be sent to hell without even listening to the first sentence, if he came without recommendations. Ilya first received that very recommendation, and only then came, which is why everything went smoothly.

He gathered his belongings. The friends of the individual who had been beaten in passing gave him a gloomy look, but did not engage with him. He walked through the market, purchased some small items necessary for the trip, and also made a wide detour, walking halfway around the block and passing through a filthy alley. All this was done to stay as far away as possible from the place where Ryuk the Shopkeeper sold his honey cakes. Because of this, he took too long and was forced to return to the inn to spend the night. He did not leave in the night, although he was eager to do so. It was too suspicious. He just downed a traditional shot of wheat vodka, which was very expensive, before going out on “work,” and also talked to a couple of acquaintances about where a farmhand could find lodging that wasn't too expensive, too poor, and didn't have too many bedbugs.

It was not without reason that he asked this question. The vodka in his glass was not only strong, but also laced with some kind of drug, the taste of which no amount of fusel oil could mask. It was certainly not for Wendygo's sensitive taste buds. Or maybe it was worth it, because if the owner of the inn hadn't realized that his client was leaving, he might not have been so openly nasty. So when someone began to scratch cautiously at his door in the middle of the night, he silently got up and opened it, staring at one of the deliverymen with a gloomy look and verbally asking him to explain why he was being woken up in the middle of the night. The man, to his credit, held up a worn and barely breathing belt, asking if he had left it in the hall. Receiving the expected negative answer, he pretended that this was his intention all along and disappeared into the night.

He really wanted to catch up and gently, tenderly, and lovingly squeeze his neck, but there would be too many suspicions. A tinned liver that would allow one to ignore a dose of sleeping potion is quite possible. As trash talent is spent on some form of resistance to poisons. But quietly killing the performer, the owner of the inn, and all those involved, and in such a way as not to fall under suspicion, is too difficult a task at the moment. It will be easier to come back here a little later or meet this asshole on the dark streets of the city. Here, too, there is some crap arranging tricks with an unnoticed disappearance, and there will be another one.

Disappearance.

Unnoticeable.

"I wonder if they are that stupid or that smart." The earthling asks himself under his breath, scratching the back of his head and thinking about whether he should really try to take a nap. "Or both options at once."

If they are stupid and also so brazen as to rob mercenaries in their own inn, then they will be killed very soon without him. In the best case, it will turn out that this crap with the slipped potion is the work of only one of the bouncers and one of the cooks. If they are smart, then they realized that the shady hired herbalist and hunter has no acquaintances, protection, intelligence and caution, and it is necessary to take him now, before he moves out. The potion in vodka was not magical, pure herbalism, nothing more, but such a sleepy drug itself is very expensive, so it is impossible to exclude the option in which someone decided to take the farmer and abduct him, drag him out into the street and kill him outside the walls of the inn, so as not to leave a mark on his reputation.

Even if it was on order that Mutuzy lost two loyal people, whose bulls were brutally tortured and killed by a complete freak without shame or conscience in his, Ilya-Svyatik’s, person!

He didn't find out; it wasn't the right time, but he resolutely wrote this matter down on his list of things to do as soon as the situation with the old "shopkeeper" became clear. Well, if Ilya wasn't killed earlier, and then, given the problems he already had, this story with the unscrupulous buyer didn't bother him at all. It was much more important for him to leave the city walls and take up his own development! Thanks to the adventures with the copper bull, he had accumulated a dozen drops to increase some talent. And thanks to successful or "successful" thoughts after a clearly "successful" acquaintance, there was very little left until the second promotion, just a couple of drops.

He went out into the Wasteland according to all the rules, early in the morning, even exchanging a few words with the bored guards. However, they quickly lost interest in the conversation when they began to decipher Svyatik's answers, which once again confirmed the correctness of the chosen image. However, he involuntarily understood that Chif was also right, because if he wants a normal relationship, he needs to learn to speak normally, otherwise he will not jump above a certain level. He will need to carefully work out the lexical matrix in order to gradually begin to speak normally, in a more urban style.

It may be necessary to use a specific AI, developed specifically for working with the languages ​​and dialects of the Broken. In such cases, it's not that he can't do without it; he'll just waste a lot of time. Well, it's not for nothing that he keeps a whole brood of them, both on his computer and on a rented server, not counting those networks that work on subscriptions? It's better not to touch the latter; there he can quite easily arouse unnecessary interest with a suspicious request. Although he also needs to choose the AI correctly, otherwise crappy language models will advise such things that it would be better to remain silent altogether.

For the development, he chose a very suitable rock crevice, filled with snow, but having a very convenient hole in which one could hide from the storm. Alas, it was blown by a very strong draft coming from a pair of cracks two wrists wide, so without the essence of Wendigo and a special relationship with the cold, even sitting in this place is fraught with pneumonia and quick frostbite. Closing his eyes, sprinkling himself with snow, and placing the hatchet on his knees, Ilya turned his thoughts to the frozen lake and the bowl, choosing where exactly to put the drops.

The choice was not obvious until the very end, but the "orders" received from Chif added to this certainty. If among the orders for herbs there were really interesting ones, and not by payment, but by the opportunity to work with a certain circle of customers, he would have raised the Eye. Simply because in many cases, the opportunity to notice a problem in advance and not encounter it is much more valuable than the ability to survive the problem in a heated battle. There was no order that would satisfy Ilya, and FoFa did not help either, who decisively demonstrated mainly the ass part of Fortuna, and not the front one. As a result, the earthling concentrated on the most important moment of development, not now, but in general, namely, the ability to survive a battle, a sudden attack, or a wave of an infinitely powerful enemy.

The Hungry Hide was chosen by them precisely as a means to win decisive moments. And it doesn't matter that Ryuk's talents will push through that Hide, deceive the defense, partially pass under it, or simply not allow it to activate. After all, if we are not talking about Ryuk, who is absurdly powerful and superior to Ilya in all respects, then yes, the Hide will fulfill its purpose. And now, when the diver reaches into the bloody cup, forcing drops of scarlet gold to flow up the walls, spilling over the edge, the skin will fulfill its purpose somewhat better than before.

In images that exist in him and nowhere else, drops trickle down the bowl, down the patterns on its outside, touching some of those patterns. In primitive cave paintings, scenes of hunting and what happens after are visible, showing how strange figures, similar to and unlike humans, tear apart dead prey. How they pull off bloody skins, putting them on themselves, just like that, with the meat and scraps of skin, how they wrap themselves in this flesh and blood, how they thirst for it, thirst with all their Hunger. Only now the drops stain not only the patterns, which, as in the case of the camouflage talent, have begun to become deeper, but also something else.

The drops hit several ribbons made from cut girls' braids, falling like golden blood onto the animal tails tied around the stone block, soaking into these decorations. And the girls' braids seem to become a little denser, a little stranger, a little livelier, as if the scarlet power in them revives the life that was once in those braids. The braids seem to touch the carved patterns, clinging to them and completing part of the pattern themselves. There you go, Ilya, that's the difference between a three step and a full four, that's the very leap in power depending on the capacity of talent.

Hungry Hide: 2/4 (Essence invested: 0/20)

The concept of Hungor is much deeper and more flexible than it might seem at first glance, if one knows how to use it and call upon it. Few are better at this than the Wendigo, whose will allows Hungor to absorb even steel or magic, devouring the desperate attack of a hunted victim an instant before the blow is struck. Activation requires preparation and reserves a portion of the magical reserve.

The overall effectiveness of the skill has been significantly increased, the expenditure of energy and concentration on the embodiment of protection has been significantly reduced, the one-time expenditure of energy on creating protection has been somewhat reduced, and it has become possible to apply three separate Hungry Hides at once, one on top of the other.

Maw: By embodying the Hunger, directing it to devour not the flesh, but the very essence of another's attack, be it magic or a blade strike, the Wendigo calls upon the deepest layers of its own energy and spirit. By embodying its Hunger as a defense, it is all too easy to forget that the essence of this defense can at any moment turn into an attack, an absorption, a greedy and hungry maw that will swallow the entire attack, and not a separate part of it. And if someone is not quick enough, then it will also bite off the fingers that were clutching the blade or magic staff that directed the blow at the Wendigo, not realizing, not understanding that they only added a little food to the Hunger.

Lucky, no doubt, although not too much. The much-needed development option came up in one case out of three, and with certain features of his build, even one in two. The aspectization of "Maw" was not chosen as often as one might have thought. The essence of the aspect put too much pressure on the consciousness, so it was taken by those who had previously developed one of the balancing talents. But the result was worth spending a talent slot and an additional ten drops of essence on pumping up your own sanity, as it was worth it. The Earthling saw not records, but a series of a dozen quick screenshots with a difference of a couple of milliseconds, which depicted the results of using this type of protection.

Not necessarily for Wendigo. Similar, almost identical talents were found in other classes, like the same Occultists or even Maniacs, but the mechanics changed little. Not at the first stage and not at the first talent increase, for sure. So the earthling understood perfectly well what he was choosing and what he would get. Despite the somewhat vague description, this is not exactly active protection, but rather an increase in armor. Here, some pyromag shoots fire at you, be it a Warlock or even a Martyr with an arson build. And this blow is not a spit, not an arrow, and not even a fireball, but a full-fledged fiery canvas that covers you entirely and the space around you. Or even a stream of flame, continuous and super-powerful, overloading a short second of protection of ordinary Hide to burn an adept of Hungor immediately after that split second.

But the Hide is no longer ordinary, but pumped up, and right on it, on the ghostly canvas of the skinned and bloody hide dressed over the body, numerous toothy mouths open. They open and begin to suck in attacking magic, like a cocktail through a straw! Immediately, the outflow of reserves increases, part of the control over the spells is lost, and from the outside it seems as if the fiery river has become like water in a sink, flowing like a funnel into the very abyss of sewer pipes. Only, instead of a sewer, there is a truly bottomless Maw, the cruel mug of merciless Hunger, limited only by the throughput capacity and the time of existence of the embodied Hide.

An ideal means of countering area attacks, which are good at penetrating instant shields, which provide short but ultimate protection. With such a boost, there will be enough time to run through a sea of ​​flame, a stream of lightning, or a putrefactive cloud, approaching the caster or running away from it. In addition, there is also a bonus to close combat, because hitting the Wendigo's face with such protection is fraught. The Hide is activated, and the mouth on it will appear right under the fist, gnawing off such, if there is enough power to bite off and swallow, of course. And such a mouth will also swallow a blade, edge, or arrowhead, bite off a piece, ruin the weapon, and not just reflect the blow. Well, also not without exceptions, because some Zealots can well pump up so that a blow from their armored fist knocks out all the teeth of such a mouth and shoves them down the throat.

The other three options weren't exactly bad, but they didn't suit Ilya for one reason or another. They were either too weak or they took talent in the wrong direction, depriving him of the opportunity to get particularly strong aspect options on the final steps, or they conflicted with the planned synergies of the future build. That same confrontation between a guaranteed candy in your hands now versus a big cake sometime later, if you can do everything right and deserve that cake.

"Shreds" allowed to enter the branch of blood and meat magic, which goes well with hunger and the Wendigo's build, if he chose the corresponding specification of the initial talents. Thanks to this aspect, after activating the skin, when it falls off, a heap of bloody drops and shreds of flesh remains around Wendigo, the larger the more damage the defense absorbed. And this (not) small cloud is subject to the will of the gifted, thanks to which you can throw a stream of blood and meat saturated with aggressive magic into someone's face in one stream, or a lump, or even a spear-arrow. Or immediately on a wide front, like a shot, hitting more people, leaving unhealed and infected wounds.

Combined with the ability to transfer part of his Hunger to those who touch the blood and flesh of the Possessed by Evil, it is a very harsh and deadly attack. In fact, this is considered the main link of the meat Wendigo build. Develop the talent for transmitting hunger and skin in the aspect of Shreds, and then hit the areas; the effect is very impressive. Especially if there is cover, breaking into pieces the opponents who have lost their minds and all tactics.

But no, Ilya initially rejected this development branch. It is too specific and would weaken his strengths more than strengthen them. Hungor and Cald, if you do not take into account the probability of going crazy, will give more than Blood, Flesh, or both of these Paths at once. Moreover, you would have to choose one of them, and there is a clear tendency of Wendigo to Flesh, so no, he is not a corpse master to go too deep into Meat magic. Not to mention that Hunger is somehow friends with Flesh, but not with Cald in any form, and his main attacking magic talent is tied to Cald. At the first stage, it is still okay, you can work, simply using talents separately from each other, but when breaking through to a new stage, there will be even more problems. In the best case, they are fraught with the fact that some talents would burn out or be modified towards weakening.

It is even easier to abandon the "Glare," the most standard form for most one-time-activated defensive talents. This aspect simply increased the available number of charges, either adding two-three-four of them, or doubling them if you choose the right synergies. Six shield-hides instead of three, and recently, only one was available! Well, isn't that awesome? Yes, awesome. But not that much. Each subsequent skin would eat away at the reserve, and with all six, there would be at least a quarter of the beloved reserve left, the rest would be reserved by the Hides. No exhalation at full power and even a scream must be used carefully so as not to run out of battery, and the duration of the form would also decrease, because it is counted from the reserve of strength, among other things.

The last variation of the enhancement, discarded with some difficulty, was called "Smoothness". The chance is less than half a percent, damn it! This same Smoothness also worked very simply, trivially enhancing the general "slipperiness" of the defense, which is why it begins to work like a lightning rod, letting aggressive energies pass along itself. Alas, more energy. With physical damage, it is much more difficult. But that's not all, because the most important thing is that smoothness increases the duration of the instant shield effect, forcing it to hang for a little longer even after it repels the first attack. If there are ten of those attacks one after another within, say, one and three-tenths of a second, then the entire ten will remove only one charge of the Hide, no more.

The aspect is excellent, but not as cool as it might seem. It covers some of the strongest aspects characteristic only of Wendigo for the following steps, and also somewhat slows down the reaction speed of the automatic activation of protection. If desired, if in a super-close parterre, it is quite possible to have time not to poke with an enchanted stiletto, but to gently apply it to the body and begin to cut and rip, using the delay and smoothness of the modified talent. In this aspect, it is pumped mainly by those who are focused on magical duels, as well as clearing lacunas, while hybrid fighters, mainly close combat, prefer other paths.

Like Ilya has.

Having risen to his feet with a crunch and having shaken the snow off his clothes and face, which had not even melted during the time of immersion in himself, the earthling first of all put on all three Hides in a row. In the end, when he activated the third, the sharp expenditure of the reserve caused a very noticeable weakness. He had to sit in that very crevice for a while. Having thought a little, having restored the reserve and estimated what part of it was reserved for the active charges of the skin, he mentally lamented, but threw off one of the three Hides, unbraiding it and returning to himself part of the blocked reserve. Two are enough. Two will cover him quite well, especially in the pumped-up form. All three would have consumed an excessively significant part of the available forces; therefore, it would not be so convenient to utilize the other talents. In battle, it will be possible to put on the third, but on a normal journey along the Ridge, it is better not to load the energy by constantly maintaining all three charges.

Perhaps he will spend the third step of the talent on one of the forms of reducing the cost of activating the talent; otherwise, it will turn out somehow sad. Fortunately, if his memory serves him right, and it does, then with his build, two aspects from the category of reducing costs will drop out with a very high chance. And if he first pumps up a few more talents to the second step, and the options he wants drop out, then in the Hides of the necessary aspects, there will be as many as three out of four. One pure, initially focused on reducing the cost of activation, and two more hybrid, for which the reduction in magic costs will become a side, albeit powerful effect.

Having activated his renewed talent several times, the earthling watched the numerous ephemeral mouths appearing above the phantom Hide, and at the same time listened to himself. The creature inside was raging, but it was not to say that the rage had increased significantly, not in comparison with the effect of the Shroud for its disguise. For example, an evil pug locked in an underground bunker inside a solid bank safe remained a pug. It just added a couple of centimeters to its withers, becoming even more well-fed and even more evil. Ilya was also angry, but not because the essence of the Wendigo was pressing on him, but because when he jerked his shoulder unsuccessfully, a snow cap from the top of the crevice fell on the top of his head. And a handful of snow somehow managed to get into his pants.

Having climbed up to the Sun peeking through the clouds, which would soon be covered by another snowstorm, the earthling oriented his position in space and moved in the direction he needed. He had a rough idea of ​​where he could and should look for the necessary grass, both the legal one and the not-so-legal one. He would hardly find an unrealistically large amount, but his chances of fulfilling the orders were close to one hundred percent, since both grasses had some kind of magic inside, crumbs of it, so that the Wendigo's eyes could notice the outflow of magic. Not from plants, because crumbs are crumbs for a reason, and plants did not have hearts, but from the earth itself, because both grasses grow in places where magic flows into reality. Any gifted person would notice such crap even without talents, simply due to developed magical attributes, Veil and Mystery.

Of course, there was no great secret, clever trick, or anything like that in the successful search for the ill-fated order that he needed to further integrate into the Lazy society. He had the necessary skills to be considered an extremely decent herbalist by local standards, but nothing more. Just a combination of the basics of magical perception of the world, the same knowledge about where herbs of certain groups grow more often, where less often, and where they do not grow at all, as well as the body of a gifted person. A body capable of walking or even running for days on end, ignoring storms and cold, digging in the snow without freezing or suffering from the cold. He didn’t need more to fulfill and even slightly exceed the order for almost three sleepless days.

He also came across other herbs, valuable ones, suitable for sale, but he didn't take them all, only a little. Bringing an order and not bringing all the little things that statistically should have come into his hands was suspicious. But bringing everything he managed to find was literally signing off on the fact that he was gifted, nothing less. He had to balance, try to maintain that very balance, so that the damn dwarf wouldn't suspect him too much, but also so as not to be known as an ordinary gray mediocrity, who was easier to throw and bury than to work with this individual.

The diver worked without feeling any danger or surveillance, which is not surprising. He has no specific talents, at most an animal instinct coming from the root "Hungor and Cald" and a couple of other talents, which is easy to deceive. And you can't build normal clairvoyance on pure attributes, and that very instinct, otherwise the Broken One would look different, and all the mechanics of pumping in him would be significantly different. But the fact that the earthling did not feel surveillance did not mean that there was no such surveillance. The Sages' arsenal was full of all sorts of data collection methods. Is the "Mark of Contemplation" hanging on him now, or maybe the activated "Observing Face" has long been revealed over the entire city and the surrounding area? It is difficult for him to even simply list the number of ways in which a paranoid old man with a crippled spirit could mark him and keep him under constant control.

In fact, he could only be sure that the observation was definitely there, being presented in one or several forms. Without this observation, Ryuk would have no way of knowing if Ilya suddenly decided to run away, hiding in Ridge, or also ran, but closer to the city center, to the rulers of the City, to rat on the candy master. That's when Ryuk, sensing a threat, would intercept the diver, killing him regardless of the consequences for his health. Moreover, it is not a fact that those consequences will be. In some of the cases, crippled Sage cannot kill first, but the attempt to rat on him could be perceived by the universe itself, with which the Sages are one, as a form of attack and untie the hands of the cripple.

So Ilya did not doubt that he was under observation, sincerely hoping that the movie would be as boring as possible for Ryuk and that he would not watch the earthling take a shit. Oh yeah, right, he was now, like a princess from a virtual Disney composition, able to go without a toilet for as long as he wanted, no matter how much food he had recently eaten. In fact, he did not leave the outskirts of the city, regularly walked around small settlements or hunting outposts, and once lay in the snow for two hours when a very gloomy gang of hunters walked past him, dragging the carcass of some predatory creature in a skinned state, a stretcher with a couple of moderately wounded, as well as a drag with three very fragmented corpses of their comrades.

For some reason, Ilya didn't want to meet these guys and try to explain to them by what right he was collecting herbs on their territory. And it doesn't really matter whether this is really their territory or not, if there is an opportunity and no reason to hold back from splashing out a bad mood, and even with a profit for himself. The guys have had enough. Look how many corpses there are, that's enough for them, otherwise they'll have to lay them all down in the snow at once.

Ilya was quite tempted to hunt the deer, the scourge of couriers. The powerful creature would not only give a drop or two, but its entrails would also double that drop. The horns and hooves would go into his own handicrafts, and perhaps he could even drain the blood and drink it instead of a refreshing cocktail. Well, that was if there were enough Wind in that blood to justify such punitive cooking. He still wouldn’t bring the dwarf proof of his victory over the creature; it was too fraught. They would immediately ask questions about where he had put the entrails, heart, and liver, the price of which was not silver, but gold. Selling the entrails, which could bring him drops of Essence, would be sheer stupidity, even if the dwarf paid honorably and didn’t try to squint at “Svyatik” a little later.

In general, the earthling had a positive attitude towards a possible hunt, but he did not start hunting because where could he look for a cunning and cautious creature? Here, you need to either initially ask where the creature's last victims were found, where it was seen relatively recently, where it generally prefers to wander, and then go there, look for a trail, and hope to meet what you are looking for, and then catch up. Considering Ilya's strong suspicion that the creature does not have a permanent lair or permanent territory. You can search for a long time, especially in solitude, not so much proud as fed up. The local aborigines are anything but morons. They themselves know how to hunt creatures. If they have not yet managed to catch up with a swift deer, then the creature really does not have a permanent location.

Rather, it simply runs into the orbit of the Lazy sometimes, just as often beating down the people it encounters with its hooves. Moreover, it rarely even eats their meat, leaving it for scavengers. In principle, this behavior fits in well with the set of key abilities known to Ilya: someone with such good sensorics and the ability to maintain such high mobility does not need a separate territory. Even if such a territory has an owner, that owner will not be able to get close to an overgrown deer unnoticed and will not catch up with it if it decides to escape. Yes, yes, there are all sorts of exceptions, exotic abilities like teleportation to the victim or a mental decoy that does not allow it to escape, but on average, a deer in the archetypes of a speedster-sensor has nothing to fear.

Certainly not Ilya.

That's why Ilya didn't even start looking for this creature, preferring to quickly finish two tasks on collecting herbs and return to the city. Yes, he will return, despite the fact that he wanted to run as far as possible, spit on everything, and try to hide in the depths of the Ridge, in its most brutal parts, hoping to blur the mark hanging on him with a high-energy background. Yeah, as if he would have time to run to such places, as if he could survive alone where the profile skills of a pumped-up third-level gifted person begin to fail. Most likely, he won't even cover a third of the required distance, even with a couple of days' head start.

The Earthling walked past another notable point, a very high, eighty to one hundred meter cliff, thin and narrow, like a dagger, but still long, almost a kilometer long. Surely it had its own name among the city dwellers and hunting brigades, but Ilya did not bother to ask. He had to walk through particularly deep and loose snow, which was not so actively blown away by the hurricane winds here, which is why much more of it had accumulated under the cliff. If it were not for the very special relationship with the Cold and its derivative part, which can be considered snowdrifts, it would have been even more difficult. There were many cracks and fissures near the cliff, some of which were easy to fall into. Even for him, such a fall would have been unpleasant, especially subsequent attempts to climb back out into the Dead God's Light. He stepped carefully, involuntarily slowing down and, at times, noticing this or that grass, a fragment of a stone imbued with magic, or another saturated piece of ice.

Actually, that’s why he noticed this anomaly, yes.

The eye did not see the heart that beats under the snow; the creature's camouflage turned out to be good, but not ideal. It once again proved the need to increase the Eye's talent next; fortunately, it did not have to wait too long. On the periphery of the strange non-vision, as if something blurry was seen there, below, under the snow. As if it was not the heart itself that was pulsating, beating in time with someone's heart, but a whole volume of space. Like a mirage, a tremor of air in the heat, only discernible exclusively by talent and in the form of not a clearly discernible heart, but some kind of twisted sausage. Ilya was not surprised and did not ask questions about what he saw. He already knew, instantly understood, just as instantly jumping back, backwards, in his own tracks.

Some magical methods of camouflage, characterized by the stabilization of the energy signature to a certain standard, have a similar weakness when faced with sensory methods such as his Eye. The energy is stable, as if it has been forced to freeze and become completely transparent, like a piece of ice, so the heart's signature is not visible. But the heart has not stopped; it beats, it exists, it is full of scarlet, flowing blood. It seems to tap at this frozen camouflage from within, causing the entire camouflage to tremble in time with the heartbeat. The essence of camouflage is a static state of energy, and the beating of the heart is movement. However, more classical methods of sensory perception can easily fool this trick, especially if you take a simpler talent of three steps... as it is true that there are a bunch of techniques that will fool even Ilya's sensory talent.

Realizing that the ambush had failed, the creature jumped out of the snow-covered crevice like the jack-in-the-box in Andersen's works, revealing itself to ordinary vision. The earthling was attacked by a strange mixture of a lizard and a toad, which certainly did not know that both the former and the latter, in fact, do not like the cold and are not very active in the cold, falling into suspended animation at best. This toad ignored the aggressive environment largely because it was, like Ilya, extremely close to the surrounding element. Well, it is easy to foresee that if the camouflage is built on icy immobility, then the attacks can also be icy.

The enemy was not very big, compared to some types of creatures encountered during wanderings along the Ridge. It is even smaller than some large dogs, just longer due to a very thick and powerful tail. But he had enough magic for three of his kind, and he was not shy about using this magic. A spit with a long tongue and at the same time a powerful and very cold stream of air, raising snow, blocking visibility, and depriving one of breath. Something similar to the talent of Ilya, the differences are so small that it really could be the same talent, only developed by the creature, and not by a gifted person. The diver only squints and holds his breath, meeting the stream of cold with his forehead, feeling just a cold wind and slight discomfort, and not tearing off the ice from his face along with the frozen flesh.

He should have closed his eyes; of course, they stung very unpleasantly, but he couldn't. He needed to track the tongue, which was very fast even for Wendigo's perception. Snow was no obstacle to their vision, but the man was ready for this turn of events, and the creature, acting on instincts, could not have been ready. The hand shot up and intercepted the whip of tongue, allowing it to wrap around the forearm, dousing it with concentrated Cald, trying to pull the victim closer, to pull the arm out of the joint, to break the bones in the grip of the insidious tongue. Quite enough for this attack to activate the Hide, quite enough for the jaws that opened over the phantom protection to bite off the entire area of ​​the tongue touching Ilya.

He gave in to the jerk, wanting to get closer himself, immediately hitting the toad's head with his hatchet as it croaked in pain, and then, when it twitched in agony, adding again and again. The hatchet didn't become unusable only because, again and again," Ilya was already hitting with just his fist, not wanting to spoil the weapon and simply finishing off the barely alive creature. Exhaling tiredly, he sat down right in the middle of a cloud of cold and snow, began to wipe the blood from his hands with a piece of cloth, and slowly put on a second hungry Hide, renewing the spent charge.

The fight turned out to be simple, even elementary, but only because his own affinity with Cald was no weaker, and the Hide also helped. In principle, even if he hadn't noticed the ambush, the lizard-toad would have preferred to first blow ice and only then go into close combat. The Hide would have stopped the tongue, and even the unimproved one, and then everything would have come down to close combat, in which Ilya had a huge advantage even without the Form.

The toad is not a physical fighter, in the slightest, but a pure caster with ambush tactics. It is a very rare specialty for creatures, especially animals. Well, it is a caster, not an ambush specialist, because every second animal prefers to attack from ambush, not counting the first one. The toad had very powerful attributes responsible for its reserves, its volume, and the power of its attacking magic, however primitive it may be. Even a full-fledged group of earthlings with standard equipment and amulets would be better off taking down such crap cooperatively and from a distance. If the toad had been fiery instead of icy, Ilya would have had a much harder time, but he wouldn't have fought either. Under the cover of his Hide, he would have broken the distance again and disappeared into the snow.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

The Mechanism's response generally corresponded to the diver's thoughts, and he hadn't even gotten to the creature's guts yet, having a chance to almost double these three drops. Even if he didn't have a super-blessing, he would have had a chance to take a full drop, well, if at once for both eating and fighting. A successful encounter with an opponent very suitable for his build, and even the opportunity to almost immediately increase the Eye! FaFo almost personally expressed to him this hint that his Eye needs to be strengthened. It's not that the Eye is such a bad talent, no, there are no bad talents with five steps. It has a bunch of positive properties, including that very noticing of details, which in many ways is much more valuable than the ability to see the hearts of targets through walls. But on the first step, there are a lot of ways to deceive such a talent, especially considering the fact that the magical X-ray for the Eye is not the main, but a secondary function. On further steps, they also occur, just much less often.

In short, the Eye is not a perfect thing, but still useful enough to learn about many encounters before it's too late and you get a crossbow bolt in the back. For example, this very rock, next to which the battle of the day took place, was made of magic-saturated stone and covered other people's hearts much better than even the walls of the lair of the robbers with Baldy at the head. At least because it was much thicker than those walls, yeah. And yet Ilya noticed the hearts of the people coming out from behind the long rock in advance, as soon as they appeared within the radius of confident perception. He noticed in advance, having heard the sounds of breathing and footsteps muffled by amulets. So it's hunters. Such amulets are more often purchased against animals and creatures, and Ilya's talents are more related to the "wild" ones. The build itself gives off something similar; precautions of this kind also partially work against it. The problem is not even that Ilya did not notice them right away; the problem is that they almost immediately noticed Ilya, and that he was sitting next to the prey.

In fairness, he could have jumped up and tried to run away, if not hiding and not concealing his impossible for an ungifted man dexterity of movements, and in deep snow at that. These guys are struggling to make their way through the snow, despite the fact that they are all well-equipped, including snowshoes. In theory, they might not be able to see his face, he would replace his clothes, but the fact itself would remain that a strange, either gifted or shapeshifting creature was wandering near the city. He didn't really need such rumors and therefore didn't run; fortunately, he had already assessed the approaching seven and didn't find them overly dangerous.

Six are ungifted. Or, if there is someone among the six, then it is an Assassin, Maniac, or Traitor, carefully hiding under the guise of a simpleton. The seventh is a gifted. Female with a strong and beautiful face, albeit somewhat elongated, giving off something of a horse. Dark hair, green eyes, slightly illuminated by the activated talent, higher-quality and lighter clothes with more amulets, a rapidly beating heart filled with magic, as well as two vertical stripes of tattoos running from the temples to the chin. The face, which is important, is open, as if the frost does not bother her too much. A Charmancer, you can tell by the pattern. It characteristically shimmers with a transparent white light, indistinguishable without heightened vision, indicating one of a group of very specific enhancing rituals.

No, she could be a Warlock too, if she developed into shadowmancy. But that's not the impression I get. Her mannerisms and actions are too characteristic. And tattoos of any kind have always been considered the lot of Charmancers, as well as a number of other classes, but not Warlocks. Her entourage is simpler, but also well-equipped. The edges of chain mail are visible from under their warm robes, and someone even wears a cuirass over a warm gambeson. More than anything else, it shows that it's not only the beasts in Ridge that are worth fearing. People don't dress up in armor when going against beasts. Their weapons are not sharpened sticks either. Good blades, an axe, a war hammer, a two-handed sword for the largest one, and as many as five crossbows, one of which is so heavy that it's hard to hold one aloft. Only the youngest and prettiest one is without a crossbow, as if they weren't trusted with a crossbow. And, of course, spears, specifically hunting spears, for creatures, with a leaf-shaped tip and cross braces, like for a bear. Each one weighs about thirty kilograms, but there are no signs of fatigue, which means they threw in some long-lasting alchemy.

They come up and look at the stage. Ilya tenses up and runs his eyes over their figures, trying to create an image of tension and fear at the sudden appearance of the guests, but not panicking. From their side, too, there are glances, some appraising, some, like a woman, bored and slightly irritated. She does not give the impression of an aristocrat; Ilya has seen such, but more of a servant. Most likely, the illegitimate daughter of a noble father or the daughter of family servants, who received the blessing of the Mechanism. There are such servants in local dynasties who serve their masters for generations, sometimes having power and strength no less than some ruling aristocrat, even though in fact they are privileged serfs.

There's clearly something going on here. A nobleman shouldn't be part of a small party. It's even insulting, but such a servant of his House can be sent on such an adventure. If, for example, the House needed certain reagents that are easier to obtain than to buy. Or if the House decided to invest in hunting groups so that they would bring them profit and influence. Or something else like that, pragmatic and logical.

Judging by the fact that they came here in full gear, but did not remove the covers from their spears, they definitely did not know and could not know about the creature sitting in ambush. However, the rock was clearly considered a local landmark; a lot of groups probably go there regularly, so the sudden meeting did not cause any surprise. Why did he come to this rock at all? Although, okay, he got an extra three drops of essence with almost no risk to his life and health, so it was worth it.

"Ice blower." That same big guy with a two-handed blade, most likely enchanted in some way, since the weapon itself is not for hunting, shows considerable erudition, assessing the diver's catch with almost the academic gaze of a professional economist. "Hide and teeth for petals, from five to seven each, and a measure of the cut. The liver, heart, and spinal fluid for inflorescences. Heart no less than nine, liver up to six, fluid from fifteen per measure, and then as much as you can bargain for, there is never enough of it; everyone needs it. You know why."

Ilya also knows approximately, although he can't remember exactly such a creature right away, but all toad beast creatures with magical attacks and a development specification store literally liquid essence in their spines. You'll sip a measuring cup, literally just squeezed from the corpse of the creature, and even without being a Wendigo you'll get a drop or two and, perhaps, some long-lasting effect of a blessing type. However, for the latter, the beast is still not the strongest, so he's unlikely to be so lucky.

Ilya shows amazing patience and understanding of other people's weaknesses, not wanting to engage in combat with someone else's group when a fight can still be avoided. Especially if the old candy dick is still watching him, and Ilya would not be surprised if he somehow provoked the group to come out here right now. This is already paranoia, of course, but if you are paranoid, wiretapping in the apartment will not become any less real. In general, the earthling bowed low, taking off his heavy and warm hat, showing his slightly overgrown crown since his last haircut, and spoke with full respect, trying not to grovel too much.

"I have no claim on your prey." He even reduced his rural accent almost to zero, deciding later, if they caught him at this point, to lie his way out of it, saying that he sometimes started speaking normally when he was nervous. "I won't sell it to anyone anyway. And I survived the Bowstring Binder's mercy; it breathed over me. Let it be so, I don't need more."

For a second, Ilya believed they would just go their separate ways. And then, look, he might even manage to get, if not an invitation to a well-coordinated group, which he didn’t need for free, considering the need to take oaths of service, then at least some kind of recommendation. But then, with greedy satisfaction, he realized that his initial opinion had been justified, and he wouldn’t have to part with his loot anyway. It’s so convenient to consider everyone around him bloodthirsty degenerates, if only because it’s extremely rare to be disappointed! However, one must give the guys and the girl their due; they at least thought about it seriously before making a decision.

"He saw us here." The man with the heavy crossbow yawned with his whole mouth, in which half of the teeth had been replaced with copper and, apparently, enchanted dentures, and he did not lower the crossbow and kept the focus of his attention on Ilya. "He will tell someone, they will send a bloodhound, maybe they will find the cache."

In fact, after these words spoken out loud and in the presence of an extra witness, everything was decided. And Ilya had not seen any cache! It is not surprising there could well be a disguise, but even without it, he could easily miss someone else's hiding place, whatever it was. The gifted lady's eyes sparkled when she activated her sensory skill at full power, as if she had walked over the earthling's aura with a stiff bristle. Naturally, she did not notice anything, given the closed state of his camouflage talent, allowing Evil to hide in the very depths of the human essence. However, she did not try very hard; rather, she had such a reflex to use one talent before activating the second.

"They're going to kill me now, I need to run, hide in that crevice where the creature came out from!" Her lips opened, but the ear does not hear these words; they are not spoken for the ears. "Drop everything! Drop everything and run! Run, jump right there, right now!"

Oh, these Charmancers. Oh, their love for the subtle type of mentalism! Moreover, the talent is one of those that turn out to be key for the build, because it is either "Whisper of Conviction" or "Inspired Thought". Moreover, both options have four steps, and the second one is definitely already taken, given the length of the phrase and the difficulty of its pronunciation. Well, yes, but no problems with washing off blood or the need to pick an arrow out of meat later. Again, the clothes on Ilya are not very valuable, and he, inspired by the idea of ​​quickly hiding in a crevice, jumped into it headfirst, leaving his things lying in the snow for new owners. A very insidious talent in fact, if used properly, but now she used it with the grace of an industrial press, for which the same Mesmericks would have sentenced her to a lifetime of dildoing.

In her defense, such short-term orders, pretending to be their thoughts and decisions, temporarily suppressing any critical thinking, have a truly ultimatum effect on the ungifted. And even so, she still took the trouble not just to order them to jump to the bottom, but also to justify the idea, slightly increasing her costs, but at the same time nullifying the standard instinct of self-preservation and natural resistance to suggestions. Smart or, at least, experienced, able to use her talent. She probably uses it in hunting, slowing down the creatures, not letting them notice the ambush, luring them to strike, or convincing them to eat the poisoned bait.

Actually, that's why she needs the group. She does not cause damage in a normal situation, only exposes the prey to the blows of her subordinates. Or not prey, but just victims, you never know how it will turn out? Ilya, slowly for his attributes running to the crevice, could not ask the small fighting gang about their squad tactics; there was no time for a dialogue, but he did not doubt his conclusions. About three steps before the gorge, he "stumbled", grabbing a piece of unnaturally hard ice that fell from the top of the cliff, and then turned on his toes and accurately launched this creation of the elements right into the skull of the heavy crossbowman. He threw his head back and racked his brains, proving that the helmet should be worn constantly, even if it is uncomfortable.

Well, if you're not gifted.

And if you want to live at the same time.

And it wouldn't hurt many gifted people either.

The others were just beginning to understand the problem, slowly raising their crossbows and trying to point them at Ilya, but he reached the full speed available in a human body, rushing forward. He deactivated the disguise, no longer trying to pretend to be human, so the owner of a two-handed blade and academic knowledge of pricing policy among buyers of magical beast organs managed to see Ilya's inhumanly sinister and absolutely calm face. Exactly until the moment when a boot knife pulled out in passing pierced his eye, stabbing straight into his brain.

Not without some respect, Ilya realized that his skin had flown off, and the already dead thug was left without his own dagger and left hand, because he had managed to swing the blade at the earthling's side and even hit him before he died! Very fast movements, for someone so massive and at the same time ungifted. Probably, some kind of divine blessing was definitely on him, because a simple thug would not have had time to strike, no way. And he was also smart, or at least erudite, if you remember his knowledge of trade matters! What an extraordinary person he was; may all the Dead rest his soul in a particularly tricky way.

The crossbows clanked dryly, three of them, two of which went in the direction where the diver's figure had been just recently, piercing only air and a snow plume raised by the jerk. The third crossbow clanked in Ilya's hands, piercing the head of another bastard, just below the ear. Then the crossbow in his hands clanked again, smashing the skull of an individual who had turned up, but it was not he who struck the next blow to the enemy. The panicked woman struck not with her voice, which, by the way, indicated that her brains were boiling even in a panic, but with another talent, "Air Thorn", most likely. A very unpleasant thing, literally grinding off the skin and flesh from the bodies of victims with hundreds of sharp air currents, as if you were being wiped with rolls of barbed wire instead of terry towels. The spell is unpleasant, even for icy flesh; it is fraught with danger to fall under it for a long time, but what is much more dangerous, it is disorienting and automatically aims at the target.

As soon as Ilya saw the midges flickering around his face and body, vaguely reminiscent of triangular thorns, he closed his eyes and hugged the still warm and not yet dead corpse of the thug. The Thorn, as befits him and a number of other simple and not pumped-up homing strike talents by two or three steps, immediately took the path of least resistance. That is, the targeting mark automatically slid from Ilya's frozen and hardened flesh onto the soft and pliable meat of the thug. What did she want? That's why there are so few steps, because such tricks are more effective against ungifted natives or weak creatures. And in a serious fight, where it is thin, there it breaks, where the Thirst-Anger and Faith-Perdition are less, such striking spells with elements of malefic marks will flow. Like water always flows down, and electricity chooses the path of least resistance.

It was necessary to take the "Scraping Storm" with five steps. It cannot be fooled even on the first division by the simplest tactic "hug the enemy", but then it would be necessary to fight the obsessive desire to scrape the flesh from the bones, so that the wind could play with those bones. And it does not matter, someone else's flesh or your own, yeah. Of course, there are options for balancing talents, which can be very useful if they are pumped up correctly. You just need to know them, as well as the ways of aspectualization. And some of them conflict with the mental branches of sorcery, for which all sorts of lovers of getting into someone's head do not like them very much. Fans of brain fucking generally do not like a lot of things and people, and these many reciprocate them, if you do not count those already fucked right between the ears. And not only between the ears, these perverts rarely restrain their fantasies, especially the natives.

But our native Earthlings, here one involuntarily recalls Operation NTR-City from Ugly Bastard, are not far behind.

Why did the diver get such a thought? It's just that when he, having thrown aside the corpse tormented by the wind thorns, pierced the neck of the penultimate ungifted one with a dagger, dodging the classic "Sickle of the Winds" with two steps, although there are variations for three and an enhanced version for four, he kicked the last bastard. Or rather, he simply hit him in the throat with his fist, breaking his Adam's apple, but he also kicked him. Right in the groin, exactly like the classic fights in the alleys of welfare neighborhoods. The instructors in hand-to-hand combat classes, like all sorts of proper virtual simulations, quickly weaned him off fighting beautifully and forced him to fight effectively. The problem was that the leg met unexpected resistance, as if the pretty young boy was wearing a specially armored codpiece and equally armored underpants.

The kick threw the poor guy into the air. The straps of his pants snapped, which is why he simply fell out of his obviously oversized pants, which were issued just before the hike, which is unprofessionalism, but in the realities of the Broken, where you can’t just buy a good thing at the nearest store in an evening, it’s forgivable. He was left with a bare bottom. Or rather, only his back was bare, because the front was sealed in an iron chastity belt of the male type. With that very memetic hamster cage, only not for a hamster. Since the kick was too powerful, the momentum of the kick knocked out of the said uncovered back a long and rather thick oblong object made of, presumably, enchanted jade. The super-acute senses and consciousness accelerated by the rage of battle even caught the barely audible vibrating hum of this device.

Glory to combat reflexes, those gifted by the skill of the Hunting Beast, and driven in with sticks, sometimes literally, back on Earth! Ilya was so shocked by such a sight, but he did not freeze; he managed to move, jump to the side, raise another snow plume, and rush at the mentalist, who was left alone. Although here he was wrong to call her a complex and dangerous specialist. She is a simple amateur, most of whose talents are locked in the traditional for Charmancers Air and Lightning. It's just that, like a bunch of other amateur Charmancers, including even earthly ones, she took the mental talent purely for fun. It's just that earthly degenerates with a sick imagination usually still assemble a build of higher quality, but the fundamental difference is not visible, because there is none.

Lightning strike. Most likely, the "Linking Shock", in three steps and with a very gluttonous attitude to the reserve, looks like a sparkling thin arc-thread that tied him and her into a tight bundle. The Hide, the second of the available ones, is activated, and the mouth that opened right above the forehead begins to suck in this very lightning, like a long macaroni. Ilya, who caught this association, resolutely promised to pamper himself and eat authentic Italian pasta from expensive and authentic natural synth-mixtures. He can even go there not alone, but in the company of Irina, who chose for herself the simple and honest lot of the Warlock; otherwise, Mashenka could introduce him to the spiritual sister of this bitch, yeah.

The bitch, having sensed the reserve being sharply drawn in through the activated spells, immediately cut off the lightning feed, simultaneously silently screaming the sacramental "STOP!!!". Ilya did not stumble from this scream, into which she put the rest of the reserve, right up to the blood from her throat, but slightly twitched his eyebrow because of a sharp prick of migraine, which did not prevent him from removing the amulet shield with a blow of a dagger. No longer with a dagger, but with a thrust of his fist, he was able to break through some version of air control, most likely even "Good Breeze" with one step, which at the same time greatly enhances a number of other talents of the air branch, which is written directly in the help of choosing talents. The second blow of the dagger passes between the ribs, right through the dense fabric of a light women's vest, and the elbow breaks the jaw, throwing back the head and allowing the temple to be pierced by already bloody steel.

The knife couldn't withstand it, breaking off almost at the handle. Ilya just kicks the dead body, throwing the bitch aside like a broken doll. Who knows, maybe she had taken some version of a death spell or curse? Why risk it if you don't know the full build of the one you've fought to the death? The body fell into the snow, not even twitching in agony, not exploding or casting a cruel curse on the killer. The locals generally don't like to spend Essence on such "surprises"; it's literally a bad omen, increasing the risk that you'll find yourself in a situation where such a talent will be used. Most gifted natives have no chance of being reborn after death, unless you count all the highest aristocracies with altars and Hearts, but even there, either the chances are low, or the costs are astronomical, or at least the third level is needed.

Often all of this at once.

For the same reason, earthlings are also in no hurry to choose this type of talent. It is not pleasant to constantly die, especially if there is no community and support. Although some take it, no doubt. Even though Ilya was thinking about choosing something for five steps, there is almost a quarter chance to get an aspect on the final strengthening, allowing you to resurrect without spending Essence if the posthumous blow takes the life of the killer. Of course, he did not. He thought more theoretically, but he did think! Exhaling tiredly through clenched teeth, the earthling looked at the dead body, and a moment later, he was again covered by a vision of scarlet drops, pouring like hot gold onto the bones of the horned skull.

Tap.

Tap.

Well, he more than agreed with the Mechanism's assessment. This crowd together was less dangerous than a single toad. An amazingly valuable toad, it must be admitted, it was not in vain that the attribute of FaFo worked. This can be considered his deed, as a considerable success. And an equally tangible failure from the fact that he found himself in the path of an incomprehensible hunting group, which decided not to lose a valuable trophy and not to leave a harmless but unnecessary witness. So as not to re-hide the hiding place, yeah. It would be symbolic to hide the corpses of these guys in that very hiding place, but he still does not know where this cache can be located. And, surprise, he is not even going to search.

Hmmm... Two drops for one gifted and six thugs. The gifted one is frankly stupid; the talents are not so badly chosen, but at the same time, she acts in a stereotyped manner and without any flexibility. Charmancers are considered an extremely flexible class, one of the most flexible purely magical ones. From the initial ones, only the Sage among support characters or the Traitor among the lurking physical ones can compete with them. The only reason he started these dances and did not use a Breath, killing everyone at once, was the guaranteed presence of normal protection from the cold, considering the love of a considerable part of the creatures on the Ridge for this type of attack. It turned out to be cheaper and safer to work with his own hands.

Two drops!

Damn, if he told someone about the note of indignation that he was visited by the fact that for the group they gave only two, while for the toad-lizard they gave three, then they would start beating him up with a crowd, with their feet, all at once, forgetting about past conflicts. So that, fucking hell, he wouldn't sit here all satisfied, a shit-stained cheater.

He collects trophies in a hurry and takes only money. He still hasn't really used good equipment and alchemy after the three liquidators, and he simply doesn't need quality weapons, shoes, and armor. They'll add to the risk of being discovered. Maybe he could take a new knife, but the risk of the knife being recognized by those who will start looking for the missing group with their own gifted one is too high. They don't have any relics anyway, and he doesn't need a two-handed sword, poorly enchanted with shock kinetic magic, or a gifted one's staff that enhances air casting. Things that are clearly not the best quality will slow him down more when trying to use them than help him in battle. No comparison with the same Baldy's knife, which alone cost more than all the gang's equipment combined and multiplied by three or even five.

The diver couldn't help but wonder what these guys and the girl were doing here. They were not hiding, but they were gathering as if they were going to war, and it was unclear whether it was against humans or creatures. He knew one thing for sure: he absolutely did not want to get involved in these secrets and would not allow himself to be dragged into them. True, he also did not want to get involved in the previous story with the box, which he had never even seen, but he had to.

He threw the bodies of the murdered into the very same crevice where they wanted to force him to a terribly cruel suicide, including weapons, backpacks, and the still vibrating pleasurer, raised through a handkerchief wrapped around his palm, pulled out of the Charm's pocket. I wanted to believe that it was all by mutual consent, but damn, not with the Charmancer with her "subtle" talent for mental influence and such specific tastes. Although the deceased, undoubtedly, was absolutely sure that everything with her was completely out of love and mutual consent.

"A hentai brothel, not a brutal universe." He quoted one of the classic lore scholars, trying not to laugh as he threw the corpse in an armored loin cage into the depths of the rift. "Or a brutal brothel in a hentai universe?"

In the end, without hurrying too much, already seeing the approaching night and storm, he started on the toad. In such icy conditions, it did not even begin to spoil. First of all, he opened the spine and drank, wincing from the disgusting taste, the spinal fluid. Disgusting for a human, of course, because Wendigo was in ecstasy, complete and absolute. In principle, this can not even be called savagery; the same deceased non-mentalist would have done the same if she had been in his place. This is a rare type of reagent that does not need to be prepared and can be taken just like that, right away, without preliminary processing. Then the autopsy of the main carcass, the extracted heart and liver of the animal turned out to be not too large and were quickly eaten, finely chopped into pieces with a spare knife and sedately chewed, albeit in an accelerated mode, so as not to hang around at the site of the slaughter.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

Another drop seemed to hang on the very edge of being given to him, but it didn't last, didn't reach the final, and it was limited to only three. The essence of ice in the toad's spinal fluid was completely wasted; he was so cold that he didn't receive anything more than what he already had, even temporarily. However, he is not the one to complain; he already feels a little awkward receiving so much essence... okay, away with the lying pretense, he is not awkward at all, give him more.

He didn't throw the carcass of the creature down, but pushed it into that very crevice, deliberately pushing it crookedly so that it wouldn't push through. He knew for sure that scavengers would find this carcass sooner or later and gnaw it, but the stench from the decomposition of that part of the toad's body that was too deep in the crevice to be devoured would cover the same stench from human bodies. He did not doubt that the bodies could be found, but he didn't see a scenario in which they would search thoroughly enough to find them. The hunting parties and reagent collectors regularly disappear in the wastelands of Ridge, even those that belong to someone, even those in which full-fledged gifted ones are members.

Having checked everything around him once more, making sure that he had not left any unnecessary traces, the diver looked at the setting sun, invisible to the ordinary eye because of the snowstorm, and trudged away as far as possible. Despite the desire to immediately put drops into his sensorics, he still preferred to crawl under another boulder, wrap himself in a warm blanket, bury himself in the snow, and then sleep a little. Three days of constant running after herbs, as well as a double battle at the end, did not knock him down, but his reaction began to slow down a little; he felt moral fatigue. In such a state, elevating talents is fraught with some decrease in the chances of obtaining the most delicious and rare aspect. Not a sign, no, confirmed statistics, and there are not fractions of a percent, but almost all twenty. Well, or rather, eighteen point seven tenths of a percent probability of a decrease.

He fell asleep as soon as he closed his eyes.

But instead of waking up in the morning and going about his business, he had a lucid dream, the same type he had seen once before. And no, he didn't doze off next to a hidden lacuna. Someone had just decided to contact his fellow divers again. This time, there was no human sacrifice, but not without sacrifice at all. The ritual was powered by a pair of animal hearts, and it was clearly not just animals that were used, but creatures. An expensive pleasure, but the effect was considerable; even a very advanced ritual could be powered by such a "sauce," and this ritual was advanced.

The diver sees a dark cave, slightly snowy, where snow flies in through a passage from somewhere outside. It is dark in the cave; only a ring of lights illuminates the ritual circle, two homemade stone braziers, in which two hearts burn and do not burn. One has a gray flame, the other an unpleasant purple, gangrenous one. An Occultist is also at work; the entire ritual, his method, this is directly indicated. But the earthling sees that this is a deception, that the color of the flame is caused in one case by the very essence of the creature that colors the fire, and by a special alchemical additive in the other. This means that the ritualist may not be an Occultist at all. There is no figure in the center of the circle, nothing at all, only inscriptions - the star circle of the United Europe and the book of the Assembly tied with a ribbon, and between them, carelessly but efficiently carved with something sharp right into the cold stone, "Da Vinci's man".

Earthling.

Or those who want to convince the one who saw the ritual that these are earthlings, although it is unlikely, everything is too... correct. The way Ilya himself would have done, had he decided to look for his brothers, and not achieve his goals in proud solitude. The author of the ritual himself is not visible; only two blurred figures are outside the circle. A special form of ritual that does not allow the detection of any dangerous information. Ilya himself knows such; if he wanted, he could make calculations and activate the mark with a similar ritual. But here, there is such a suspicion, the ritual was not done by hand, but according to someone else's drawing. Individual small details, there is an incorrect stroke, there is a little less chalk on the stone, and there, on the contrary, too much attention to detail. The overall impression was unambiguous.

Someone paid a specialist of a level not inferior to Ilya's to obtain the calculation drawings of the "pure" ritual, and then remembered that scheme and carried it out here.

One would suspect a trap, a deception, an attempt at a setup from the same Boretsars who knew something about Earth and could draw foreign coats of arms for their purposes. But it is very difficult to suspect, although not impossible, because then one would have to suspect a traitor from the ranks of earthlings actively helping the aliens. The inscription in the center of the circle is extremely laconic and simple, or rather, there are two separate inscriptions.

My nickname on the Forum: KroKroKroKodYYl, anonymous, communication there.

5551163: nine o'clock :)

The first is completely clear. Through the Forum, it is easy to determine the degree of sincerity of each other, and also to agree on an alliance or non-interference, if you are close. The second is more difficult, not a kindergarten, but a school program. In the methods of training European Divers, this digital code means a specific small gift of the Mechanism. A gift, thanks to which the Diver knows exactly when the current cycle will end. Alas, only the current one. And you find out the date only after receiving the gift, at the very beginning of the cycle. Roughly speaking, this unknown earthling performed the ritual literally in the last hours of the cycle, in order to be able to quickly get away from the pursuit group, if one comes to the point of the ritual.

Opening his eyes, Ilya only chuckled approvingly. This is how you should work. Not all these circus acts with bowing to superiors and completely giving away your build to the boss and everyone else. Well, if that Occultist really has that very build. No one is stopping you from lying. Most likely, the Boretsar man did not want to give a link to the Forum because in such worlds, they are even more afraid of their own than the locals. If you give out your nickname, well, or God-loving Nickname, as the Boretsars call their nicknames on the Forum, what if an ill-wisher reads your blog and finds out about everything? What if someone else just reads it? Some peasants will find out about the assembly of the working build and start to shake the government.

It is impossible to completely block access to individual Forum threads for everyone who is not a member of a group, clan, community, or government organization. The Forum is open. All its threads belong to one world. It's just that some topics are popular and have not died down for decades, while others are visited by three and a half anonymous forum members in lurker mode. Of course, you can create a separate dedicated space for private conversation... if you simply pay for this Forum function with essence and activate it.

There are rumors that the Seven directly forbade this purchase in their Treaty. But these are still rumors without clear confirmation. And what is confirmed is the price for such a modification of the Forum, which is not inferior to the ability to record what is happening in the Broken like on video. Of course, there is a certain amount that different individuals have dripped for this or that purpose, but even a tenth of it has not yet been collected, while the "Streamer Mode" has long since exceeded half. Earthlings have not collected this, with their wild rates of essence accumulation. Boretsars will not be able to organize a small digital GULAG on the Forum with the inevitable fencing of any inconvenient information.

However, on the same Earth, there are many servers and closed virtual systems where they store everything that they are in no hurry to post on the Forum. Well, until the next manifestation of the "Wartander Syndrome", but these are just details.

To sum it up, Ilya believed that he had met an earthling, and he also felt the direction. That's where the trouble was. The unknown fellow earthling acted wisely, deciding to conduct that ritual in the depths of the Ridge, most likely immediately running away. Then the completion of the cycle and the flows of forces will partially wash away the traces of the ritual, which the creator himself will try to erase as best he can. Then a run through the wastelands and an exit to the nearest large city, where the traces will be completely lost. Let's add here that the ritual is from the highest or at least simply high segment, which is why it gives much less exposure for everyone who is not a Diver. We can say that the risks are minimized as much as they can be minimized by the efforts of a fresh first-level Diver.

Or two of them.

Ilya is not sure whether the second figure hidden by the ritual is a trick. He could do it himself. Catch a couple of thieves or random tramps, put them next to the ritual, perform the ritual, hiding both himself and the "dead weight" with the veil of the renounced feature, and then clean up the loose ends. There is one earthling there with almost complete guarantee, as for a larger number of exact confirmations, there is no way to get them.

Almost no way.

The main thing is that the marker ritual worked as planned, and the earthling received a clear direction to the place where the ritual was conducted. He simply could not fail to receive it, no matter how you hide those traces. You can disguise the marker from the locals, but not from other divers, no matter how much you complicate the structure of that ritual. The big brains of the Citadel have learned to create false highlights, when one ritual will give a full seven or nine points, among which only one will be true, but this is more of an incident than a real benefit. Why an incident? Because only a carrier of at least the second stage, with hellish patience, a bunch of assistants, and access to resources comparable to those provided by the Citadel, can conduct such an overcomplicated pure ritual. And by the time the above is acquired, there will no longer be a need for a false or real marker, right?

So, the earthling had no doubts about the marker's readings and realized that the ritual had been performed... somewhere thirty kilometers from Lazy, which was already impudence. The local mayor, they say, has a third level, although his class is clearly not from the informational ones. And there was Sweet Ryuk nearby, who could just sense such a ritual, despite all the precautions. To summarize, Ilya really hoped that the earthling had deliberately performed the ritual near Lazy and would move on somewhere else.

They don't need such a neighborhood.

Neither Ilya, nor Ryuk, nor any other earthlings.

As if waiting for this thought, the snowflakes in the air began to freeze as Broken World released his new children back into their home, remaining to await their return.

The Cycle in the Broken World is complete, and the Diver has been returned to his native world!

Deserved drops of Essence: 20

Essence drops brought: 20

The Mechanism has noted the outstanding effectiveness of the Diver among his peers on the Steps!

An additional reward has been received: two small one-time Gift of the Great Mechanism!

The gift will become available to the Diver when they dive into the next Cycle!

Awaken, Diver, for you are home again!

Well, exactly twenty, a real good fellow, a little more and he would have set a new record, having beaten the first cycle...

"To hell such records!" Ilya said in a confident tone and began to get ready for work, although the desire to send everything and everyone was stronger than ever.

Only after he had gathered himself, shaved his face and almost killed himself in the shower, accidentally leaning on the leg injured by Oleg, changed his clothes, left the house, and got to the office, he remembered that he, damn it, had a legal sick leave due to an injury! For a second, he imagined that Her Mashuncheshnitstvo had learned from her friend about the story of Irina and her stalker, and then blabbed this story to everyone and everything. He assumed the likelihood of such an outcome, given his experience of communicating with this fifth-level gossip master. And then he turned around and limped to the taxi stand, ordering a ride to the nearest Italian restaurant on the go and sending an invitation to Irina.

He hasn't tried the paste yet, but he promised!

And the fact that the eye twitches is just an optical illusion, nothing more; it just seemed that way to you all.

* * *
Author's Note:

They robbed a sick person for the first comment, well, screw that sick person. -_-

The dice in the chapter were very dynamic, despite the fact that the chapter itself is relatively calm. Even Ryuk did not kill the main character, although he wanted to, especially at the beginning of the conversation.

As you might guess, the best crit of the chapter was the "attack of deduction", in which Ilya used his outstanding Mark for its intended purpose and added two plus two plus the root of infinity multiplied by an astral fractal, receiving seven drops of Essence for that. Yes, he wasn't joking when he regretted not being a Sage. I calculated that I had nothing to do. Even re-created the Sage build with a super-blessing and other bonuses for winning the Lottery.

So.

If the main character were a Sage with a build that was not universal but focused on "Knowledge of the Mystery", he would have gotten seventy-plus drops, minimum. Because this is the strongest path of a Sage, yes. Multiplied by an incredibly successful deduction - a pure hundred, given that there were considerable pluses there, but they were not needed, and then it was necessary to roll more than 70, and the main character rolled it, breaking through the ceiling and finally understanding what Ryuk is and what his motives are. He did not guess exactly one hundred percent, but he understood a lot correctly.

Although he still omitted a couple of important details that really change a lot, this is a matter for the future.

Of the remaining crits, the unknown earthling/earthlings shot very well, skillfully taking advantage of the end of the cycle and the fact that he/they knew about the end of the cycle to the minute. Seriously, if they don't throw very bad throws in the future, they will be able to leave... the main thing is to really not come to Lazybones, and they can, there are reasons for such a decision, and they don't know about Ryuk.

What else?

The encounter with the toad (I wrote the chapter on Wednesday, how could there be no toads) was quite successful; that toad got two 1's in a row, in separate throws, and not on one (due to minuses, and not pure anti-crits). But what the hell did she want, breathing cold on the main character?

Ah, right, the nameless (her name was Malka, and she really is from a dynasty of servants of one very nasty noble house) non-mentalist. This is an echo of the hentai version of the work, where such a lady could well meet the MC and play with his brain a little, using extremely convincing words. In that case, of course, the MC's backyard would remain intact, but he would not get rid of the hamster cage if he had fallen into the hands of this lady.

Here I brought her kinks to the limit and let Ilya casually express indignation at such an attitude towards others. There was no beautiful conflict. The cottony Charmmancer against the pumped-up Wendigo at close range turned out to be simply doomed. She got off easy; there is an extremely unpleasant person there, and the personal pleaser on two legs taken on the raid was not her first, the previous ones simply completely leaked their brains into their pants.

The group knew about the boss's quirks, of course, it's impossible to hide, but they kept silent, because they were also servants of the same house, only much lower in rank. And they were afraid to take the place of the one who left, yeah.

That's all for now. Good wishes for everyone

P.S. I'm really tempted to release the next chapter not on Thursday, but on the Monday after the following Thursday, or even just the Thursday after that. 130 thousand characters, that's more than four times the original chapter standard. I wanted to start with a shorter chapter while I'm recovering from the scalpel. I wanted to write shorter, damn it. :(

Внимание! Этот перевод, возможно, ещё не готов.
Его статус: идёт перевод

Переведено на Нотабеноиде
http://notabenoid.org/book/88055/590451

Переводчики: Camrad_RIP