Awakening a 10,000x Skill Proficiency Multiplier in the Apocalypse

By the time the red smog began to thin to signal the arrival of morning on Day Zero, the situation outside the walls of Sanctuary had devolved from a tactical standoff into a desperate massacre.

Colonel Vance stood behind the crushed husk of a ruined hover car. His officer’s uniform was now heavily splattered with the black oily blood of the Infected. His hands shook as he ejected an empty magazine from his sidearm.

Click.

He reached for a fresh mag. His pouches were completely empty.

”Status on ammo?!” Vance screamed over the relentless wet tearing sounds echoing through the ruins.

”Dry sir! We’re completely dry!” a terrified corporal yelled back as he frantically swung a combat knife at a lunging Demon Rat.

The military camp was being overrun. The noise and the bright lights of the Sanctuary had drawn every wandering Void monster within a ten mile radius. Thousands of mutated civilians and scuttling Phase Spiders were relentlessly throwing themselves at the defensive line.

The tanks had run out of explosive shells an hour ago. Now they were just serving as heavily armored coffins for the crews trapped inside. The metal groaned as giant invisible mandibles tried to pry the hatches open.

And to make matters worse Operation Ghost Protocol had been a total failure. Vance hadn’t heard a single peep from his elite Meta Human squad since they breached the Citadel walls. They were dead. He knew it.

He looked over his shoulder. The towering black walls of the Sanctuary stood untouched and bathed in the warm mocking glow of the golden barrier. Inside those walls was safety. Inside was survival.

Vance looked back at his men. Dozens were already dead and their bodies twitched as the Void corruption rapidly rewrote their biology to prepare to turn them into the very monsters they were fighting.

His pride finally shattered.

”Cease fire! Fall back to the gates!” Vance roared as he dropped his empty pistol. He frantically ripped a white undershirt from a fallen medic’s pack and tied it to the end of a broken rifle barrel.

He stepped out from behind the cover and waved the makeshift white flag wildly in the air.

”WE SURRENDER! OPEN THE GATES! PLEASE!”

He ran toward the golden barrier and ignored the screeching Demon Rats snapping at his heels. He didn’t care about his dignity anymore. He just wanted his men to live.

High above standing on the obsidian ramparts Sebastian watched the pathetic display with cold eyes.

”Open the outer barrier,” Sebastian commanded without turning his head.

Down in the courtyard Valerie tapped the console.

The golden dome flickered and parted. It created a narrow ten foot wide tunnel of safe passage leading directly to the heavy titanium doors of the inner fortress.

Vance and his remaining fifty soldiers violently shoved their way through the gap. They practically trampled each other in their desperation to get inside. The moment the last man crossed the threshold the golden barrier snapped shut behind them.

SPLAT! FZZZT!

A massive horde of pursuing Infected slammed blindly into the restored shield and instantly cooked into a foul smelling pile of ash and grease.

The soldiers collapsed onto the polished stone of the courtyard. They gasped for air and wept openly while clutching their bleeding infected bite wounds.

Vance leaned heavily against his knees and tried to catch his breath.

HISSSSSS.

The massive titanium doors of the Citadel slowly ground open.

Sebastian walked out. He didn’t wear armor. He wore his simple black leather coat with his hands resting casually in his pockets. Behind him walked Grog the towering Level 20 Ogre mercenary who dragged his massive iron shield and looked incredibly bored.

Sebastian stopped a few feet away from the trembling Colonel. He looked down at the defeated military commander with absolute apathy.

”You look like shit Vance,” Sebastian said flatly.

Vance swallowed hard and forced himself to stand up straight. He tried to muster whatever shred of authority he had left. ”My men need medical attention. We have wounded. We demand immediate access to your facilities and”

”You don’t demand a damn thing,” Sebastian interrupted as his voice dropped to a dangerous tone. ”You brought tanks to my front door. You tried to shoot me. You sent four roided out freaks into my hallways to assassinate me.”

Vance flinched. ”You killed them?”

”I didn’t even bother,” Sebastian scoffed. ”My janitor killed them. They bled all over my floor.”

Sebastian took a step forward and closed the distance. ”You have no ammo. Half your men are infected and ticking down to a gruesome mutation. You have absolutely no leverage here Colonel. This is not a rescue. This is a negotiation.”

Vance looked at his men. He looked at the festering black veined bite marks on their arms and legs. He knew what happened when those veins reached the heart.

”What do you want?” Vance whispered as his shoulders slumped in total defeat.

Sebastian didn’t smile. He just reached into his inventory and pulled out a small roughly crafted wooden crate. He dropped it onto the floor between them.

CLACK.

The lid popped off to reveal dozens of small corked glass vials filled with a murky violently bubbling green liquid.

”Mana Potions,” Sebastian said simply. ”Or at least my heavily corrupted version of them.”

Vance stared at the vials. They didn’t look like medicine. They looked like toxic waste.

”They taste like battery acid and regret,” Sebastian explained clinically. ”But they are overflowing with raw Ethereal magic. The Void corruption hijacking your men’s biology is weak to dense mana. These will cure the infection.”

A wounded soldier clutching a heavily bleeding and blackened bite mark on his shoulder didn’t wait for permission. Desperation overrode discipline. He scrambled forward and snatched a vial from the crate before downing the green liquid in one massive gulp.

”Wait!” Vance yelled.

It was too late.

The soldier’s eyes went wide. He dropped the glass vial and grabbed his throat as his face turned a violent shade of pale green.

”HURK!”

The soldier violently doubled over and fell to his hands and knees.

He opened his mouth and projectile vomited!

SPLAT!

It wasn’t normal bile. He forcefully expelled a massive horrifying slurry of thick black sludge and rotting grey tissue directly onto the marble floor. He coughed and hacked as his body convulsed while the potion aggressively and painfully purged the Void corruption from his system.

He vomited three more times and cried in agony before finally collapsing onto his side and panting heavily.

The horrific black veined bite mark on his shoulder had completely cleared. The flesh was raw and red but the rot was gone. He was cured.

The rest of the soldiers stared in absolute horror at the puddle of biological waste. They then looked at the crate of potions with desperate hungry eyes.

”It’s not a pleasant experience,” Sebastian noted dryly. ”But it beats turning into a brainless zombie. I have thousands of these.”

Vance wiped the sweat from his brow. He looked at the man in the leather coat. He finally understood. Sebastian wasn’t a survivor. He was a warlord.

”What is the price?” Vance asked.

”Raw materials,” Sebastian stated with his corporate logistical mindset taking over. ”I need thousands of tons of steel. I need gunpowder. I need heavy construction machinery and I need access to whatever military grade server nodes you have left in the city.”

Sebastian pointed a finger at Vance’s chest. ”I trade you the cure and you become my supply line. You scavenge the city. You bring the metal here. And in return your men get to live and they get to sleep inside the outer barrier.”

”You want me to turn my battalion into your personal delivery boys?” Vance gritted his teeth.

”I’m offering you jobs Colonel,” Sebastian corrected smoothly. ”Which is a lot better than what the spiders outside are offering.”

Sebastian turned his back on the military commander and was entirely unbothered by the heavily armed men behind him.

”One more thing,” Sebastian called out over his shoulder. ”Sanctuary is no longer part of the United States. We are an Independent Zone. My walls my rules. Do we have a deal?”

Vance looked at his dying men. He looked at the puddle of purged black sludge. He looked at the impenetrable black walls of the Citadel.

There really was no choice.

”Deal,” Vance rasped with his head bowed.

Sebastian smiled. He didn’t look back. ”Grog. Show the delivery boys where to park the tanks. Try not to step on them.”

”Yes little boss!” the Ogre boomed happily.

The trade was struck. Sanctuary had its materials and Sebastian had his army. The real work of surviving the apocalypse had finally begun.