Apocalypse Conquest: A Dungeon Crawler LitRPG Adventure (Gravity And Divinity System 4), page 1
Apocalypse Conquest
A Dungeon Crawler LitRPG Adventure (Gravity And Divinity System 4)
Hunter Mythos
Copyright © 2023 Hunter Mythos
All rights reserved
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
Cover
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Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Cover
Dedication
1. A Whole New World
2. Reconfirm and Motivate
3. Ultimately Gonna Die
4. Fighting A Rank 5
5. Growth And Worries
6. Post-Apoc Slavic Tour
7. Russians and Crafts
8. Duelists (I)
9. Duelists (II)
10. The USA War (I)
11. Floridian Homecoming
12. The USA War (II)
13. Home At Long Last
14. Married
15. Brunch
16. Wander
17. Reunion
18. Team Redemption
19. Red Death Redemption
20. The USA War (III)
21. The USA War (IV)
22. Peacetime Transition (I)
23. Peacetime Transition (II)
24. A New Empire’s Potential
25. Caribbean Conquest (I)
26. Caribbean Conquest (II)
27. Caribbean Conquest (III)
28. Caribbean Aftermath
29. Prepare to Celebrate (I)
30. Prepare to Celebrate (II)
31. Morning of the Ball
32. Summer Solstice Ball (I)
33. Summer Solstice Ball (II)
34. Summer Solstice Ball (III)
35. Step Up And Conquer (I)
36. Step Up And Conquer (II)
37. Step Up And Conquer (III)
38. Summer Months Montage
39. A Conqueror’s Morning
40. The Mightiest Duel
41. The Level 100 Grind
42. USA War: Battleships
43. USA War: Patriots
44. USA War: [Freaks]
45. The Greatest Challenge
46. The Greatest Change
47. The Greatest Weapon
48. The Greatest Standard
49. Broken but Determined
50. No Longer An Empire
51. The Evolution of Spite
End of Book Four
Extra Goodies
About The Author
LitRPG Group
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1. A Whole New World
It was a wintery but sunny day in early April when Jay was walking on top of the walls surrounding a small diamond mining town. Snow crunched quietly under his crocs as he mundanely explored a place that was far from home and plopped in the middle of the vast and wild lands of Siberia. So when Jay showed up earlier today, most, if not all, of the townsfolk knew nothing about him. This was a rare treat he tried to enjoy like sipping good rum.
The walls were thirty feet tall, ten feet thick, and made from the gathered trees of local coniferous forests. The towns’ [Crafter-types] did their best with the mundane wood from evergreen pines and spruces– the magic they infused into the wood elevated the walls’ protection up to high Basic Quality. With just that, they had fashioned themselves a defense that could withstand mundane rocket barrages all around the edges of the town.
The Rank 4 monsters on a southbound march through frozen pine forests, glacier-made valleys, and across white-capped mountainous stretches of the Siberian landscape would find no resistance with these walls in the next coming hours. The monsters would march through the walls like a toddler running through a stack of cards. They would turn this town into a hellish playpen. Then the monsters would messily toy with and eat their food– the human and non-human inhabitants. After they finished demolishing everything, the monsters would turn toward another town that was ‘nearby’ unless someone or something stopped them.
Nothing was truly nearby when in Siberia. The locals here liked their space if they weren’t in a commune already. Everyone and everything was so vastly separated Jay imagined people who wanted peace and quiet would find plenty of it here. Granted, they would have to contend with the monsters and learn to survive on their own. In this one town, Jay was one hundred miles away from the next. And the next ones were two hundred miles away or more. That sort of distance would doom most people even if they had a System and magic powers.
Jay liked the open spaces, however. Fewer people. Less noise. The Rank 4 monsters that were en route made it all the better.
His tour on the wall ended near the main road where the northern gate stood– a large diamond door and frame that glinted brightly under the noon, blue-sky day. The gate would open upward or lower down with the pull of heavy metal chains, which was a good design for getting crawlers back behind the walls when escaping larger monsters.
The diamond gate was Good Quality stuff, too. It was made from materials extracted out of a nuclear monster lair that the town’s occupants crawled and killed off a week ago. Just a couple of things of note the Agents of Change had researched and compiled in their reports for Jay to read. Apparently, the Soviet Union had thought it was a good idea to make a mine by blasting it open with an atomic bomb decades ago.
Nonetheless, Jay found it favorable that the townsfolk had been practical with the materials while also slaying the lair and its monsters. Some people would skip over all the lair-loot they could’ve dug up and focus on killing monsters for levels. Once a monster lair died, that stuff died with it.
Missed opportunities like those could ruin the growth of a crawler in this new world. Or it could cost someone their life for not having the needed items that a [Crafter-type] could’ve made from the materials found in a lair.
Jay had seen plenty of those mistakes.
On the ground level inside the wall, a handful of [Fighter-types] gathered. They whispered in accented Russian that was heavily bent toward the local dialect. Jay could understand most of the phrases. This was thanks to his Russian lessons Hailey insisted on him taking while out here in the broken lands of Russia. Jay looked northward in the direction of the monster stampede and pretended he couldn’t hear the [Fighter-types] talk rudely or suspiciously about him.
“Eh, maybe I won’t have to assert my dominance this time around,” Jay said with a small smile, his tail swaying lightly behind him.
The [Fighter-types] were all men in their high Rank 2s. Big. Brawny. Heavily bearded. Like they were more beast than man. These tough-looking guys would go out into the taigas and find themselves a monster bear to wrestle for the fun of it.
Jay had traveled enough to know this hadn’t been their norm half a year ago. These men were probably your average run-of-the-mill workers once upon a time. Now they lived up to their Siberian roots since the world was both simpler and more complex.
Fight to survive.
Rebuild to survive.
Level up to survive.
Or die.
For now, the [Fighter-types] stayed on the ground instead of taking the stairs up to approach Jay. They were sending a different representative.
“May I approach you, Beheader?” asked a local spirit.
“You can approach, but please tell me you kept my identity to yourselves for this once,” Jay said lightly, with no force or magic in his voice. His presence was so heavily subdued, an NPC or MOB might confuse him for a Level 1 weakling by feeling alone.
But some spirits of the new world had solid connections with the fourth dimension and were wise to Jay’s tricks. They could learn the truth of things or people if the narrative weight of them were great enough.
Despite his cloaking abilities, Jay was a tad too great to truly hide himself while in plain sight of people and nosy spirits. And he had taken the heads of a few Slavic immortals half a year ago. That wouldn’t go unnoticed while he toured openly in these lands.
The Level 10 Elder Yard Spirit looked like an old man with a crooked back. He wore a long-sleeved traditional Russian shirt that reached down to his thighs where his legs faded from sight. His face was so wrinkled and squashed together, his eyes were barely visible to low Perception. The Elder Yard Spirit bobbed in the air with his hands behind his back, examining Jay from twenty feet away while on the wall with the [Exceptional Freak].
Behind the elder were a dozen other spirits of human and non-human appearances. Some weren’t all that good and were pretty mischievous– the little bearded gnome spirit among them had stolen his third sock of the day. Good or not, they were all wary of Jay, and they should be. They fell under his mercy the moment he’d appeared. Spirits took root in places and couldn’t go too far away easily. They were here to plead for their safety, most likely.
“I convinced the others to not say a word,” the elder said.
“Even th
The sock-gnome trembled hard out of pure fright. A dozen socks fell out of his spirit body. A female spirit with the horns of an elk sprouting from her head gathered all the socks. She rushed up to the elder spirit and passed them to him, as if he should hand them to Jay.
The elder spirit gave Jay a questioning look.
“What?” Jay asked. “I’ll take those as a tribute. Hand ‘em over.”
Thus, Jay became a dozen socks richer. They were thick, wooly, and colorful. All Basic Quality, too. This day was starting off on the right foot.
Jay eagerly stuffed the souvenirs into the spatial-pockets of his joggers. He wiped the smile off his face once he noticed the strange looks from the spirits on the wall and the [Fighter-types] on the ground.
“The socks will help me defeat the monsters,” Jay lied, as if the Siberian socks weren’t just funny knick knacks for his collection of random stuff taken from around the world.
“Ah, of course, the magic of the hardworking man seeping into his footwear will turn away the monsters and have them seek the monarchs instead,” an old lady spirit murmured. “If only such wisdom wasn’t spoken by an even worse monster who would butcher us.”
“What makes you think I’m here to butcher you?” Jay asked. “Except for the gnome.”
The gnome spirit fled with a tiny shriek as the other spirits stirred with great fear and confusion. Some, if not most, of them wanted to find a place in the town to hide away. That was all they could do, really. There was no running from Jay.
“We spoke of this fateful meeting a week ago,” the elder said to get the conversation back on track. He spoke quietly, too, only loud enough for Jay and the spirits to hear. “I had a vision of a short child of dark skin and long twisted hair like liquorice.”
Jay frowned. He hated liquorice. Definitely his least favorite way to describe his dreadlocks.
Sensing Jay’s displeasure, the elder spirit hurried. “In my vision, the child dances in a sky raining the heads of gods. A sword made of laughing green light is held in one hand. In the other is purple magic that cannot be escaped from. Three eyes of many colors look across the world with a strange and otherworldly hunger. And a wide and wicked smile like that of a curved blade hangs above the necks of all challengers. From this vision I knew the many things that make you a devil, a darkened leader of insane killers and mass murderers, a mad fool of the court of the dead, a corrupter of holy light, an executioner sent by the tyrant god-princess… you are… the Beheader of the 72 Immortals.”
“That checks out,” Jay said, using the tip of his monkey tail to scratch his chin. “Other spirits from outside America had similar visions when I set my eyes on a place.”
“What happened to those other spirits whose visions became true?” the elder asked carefully, barely able to contain his own fear.
Jay stroked his thumb along the black leather wrapped around the handle of his sword. It was fastened to his belt, always close. Even with the weapon’s power contained inside a scabbard his divine wife had made for him, The Sword of Comedy’s energy pulsated a bit from his attention. A green ripple traveled through the air and touched all the spirits on the wall and hiding around town. The elder spirit relaxed, and so did the others behind him, even if only a little.
“You aren’t a monster?” asked the elder spirit.
“Not in the way you think I am,” Jay said.
“But the visions. The fear I felt. The things you’ve done. They are the making of a monster.”
“I can be monstrous,” Jay said. “And I’m not the goodest of good people. But believe me when I say that I’m here to help, and a hero of comedy doesn’t kill or terrorize for no good reason.”
“You terrorized me and stole my socks!” the gnome complained after having returned to his spot with the other spirits.
Jay’s third eye cracked open slightly. A thin slice of vertical black purple light appeared in the middle of his forehead. The eldritch eye examined the gnome akin to an unfathomably huge monster examining an ant.
“Nevermind. Forget I said anything.” The gnome spirit ran to hide again.
Jay’s third eye sealed.
All the spirits were back to shaking as if they were going to die-die, and then become instant ectoplasmic goo that faded away. They were sensitive to Jay’s slight fourth dimensional shenanigans, unlike the local men who grew tired of the meeting between Jay and the local spirits. A Level 25 Rock-Smasher led the other [Fighter-types] up the wooden stairway and on top of the wall to gut-check Jay.
“Who are you?” asked the Rock-Smasher as he pointed a Diamond Pickaxe (Good) at Jay. “What do you want?”
“Your Rank 4 monsters,” Jay said. “Let my Champions have them. It’s been half a year since we’ve fought a decent gathering of Rank 4s.”
Jay’s voice was soft, like a passing breeze. Some of the [Fighter-types] mistook that as him being afraid of the Rock-Smasher. They sneered and laughed at Jay. The Rock-Smasher regarded Jay with a mean mug.
“There are no Rank 4s.” He drew closer until his shiny pickaxe was in Jay’s face. “And you’re in my town unannounced. I do not care if you are demon, spirit, or trickster, I will smash you if you don’t tell me what you truly want, little one.”
Jay tilted to the side slightly and saw the spirits huddled away from the conflict. The elder spirit watched with apprehension, as if Jay’s words from earlier were nothing but phrases of falsehood.
“I’ll be nice,” Jay said, snatching the pickaxe out of the guy’s hand with his tail. “We can play-fight a little until you are satisfied. I’m not as good as Hailey with deescalating stuff, anyway.”
Then again, Jay wasn’t as cruel as Hailey when she escalated a situation. That was the thing with the Champions– they all had their positive and negative quirks. And Jay couldn’t help but show off a little when given the opportunity.
So he smacked the Rock-Smasher off the wall with the flat side of his Diamond Pickaxe. No hands needed. Jay slipped them into the pouch of his hoodie, his tail flexing for a warmup while armed with the shiny pickaxe. Having a long and prehensile tail was nifty.
“Let’s do this now before I pay the shaman a visit,” Jay said, deflecting a fiery punch with the flat side of the pickaxe. “And I think it’s okay for you to come out of hiding, Hailey. You can have some fun, too.”
“All I see are brutes being brutes,” Hailey said from seemingly nowhere. All the men and spirits stumbled in surprise since they both fell for Hailey’s powerful illusions. “You could’ve talked them down so we don’t waste time.”
“Nah, this is the best way to do it.” Jay bashed aside a man with ram horns. With every swing of his tail, Jay attacked and defended as he dawdled down the stairs. Sometimes he had to tilt his head a little to the right or left when the attackers threw in a few magic projectiles at him. “They’re men. I’m a man. We speak a simple language that words can’t hope to express. Manliness.”
“Does manliness include tussling around in the mud and holding each other tightly until one asserts his dominance over the other?” Hailey asked somewhere in the air above.
She hovered over Jay, the center of the conflict. Some of the [Fighter-types] paused again as they looked up in wonder. Jay slowed down to let the guys recover or regather their wits before they barreled back at him again.
“Why do you have to make it sound weird?” Jay asked, frowning.
“You’re the one that mentioned asserting dominance,” Hailey said. “Or were you saying inserting your dominance?”
“It was a bad idea to make you the fourth highest chair of the leadership,” Jay said. “All that power has gone to your head. Now you speak of nothing but nonsense and lunacy, and I might have to admit you to a special place to deal with that. A shame, really.”
Hailey squawked stridently with slightly tipsy laughter. It was a real laugh, not a political one. And because of her changes as a Rank 4, her real laughter could come out like the crackle of a witch dancing in a vortex of cawing crows. It was chilling for the Rank 2s to hear, and some of them might go through a Conviction Check and suffer an outright fear-based debuff just from hearing Hailey laugh.
