It took a second for my mind to catch up with my body. “What was that?”

  The old man rose from his chair, his smile widening, but his face looked odd. His mouth was smiling, but his eyes were black and lifeless, his skin sallow and pale as death. He looked as wasted as my grandfather had when I’d last seen him lying in the ICU just before dying of cancer.

  He extended his arms in a welcoming gesture and said, “I apologize for the suddenness of my invitation. I sensed that Alpha had made contact and I feared he was about to kill you. That would have been unfortunate.”

  “I’m sorry, but who are you?” I glanced around, ready for a fight, but the room was empty except for us. The old man seemed physically harmless after somehow suppressing his aura, but I’d felt it. I would not underestimate him.

  Thankfully, he hadn’t attacked. My body still trembled with pain as my ribcage pulled itself back together. I was beat and bloody and in no condition for another fight.

  “I am Noctarus Razen.”

  “Hi.” I shoved my hand into my pocket and summoned my goggles to make it look like they’d been in my pocket all along. I settled them over my head and activated the invisible full-head shield.

  “There is no need for concern, I assure you,” Noctarus said, advancing slowly toward me, his smile still plastered on his strangely dead face. “Can we not sit like civilized people and discuss our situation? It’s a rare opportunity to converse with newcomers before misconceptions can take root.”

  His language was rather formal and archaic, his voice gravelly, and he spoke with a distinct Russian accent. The whole situation was too weird. I’d heard a voice like his before, but where? I was more than a little tempted to summon a weapon, but I didn’t want a fight right now and from the feel of his aura, I doubted I could kill the old guy.

  He wasn’t acting like a monster, and I needed more information. So I slowly took the proffered chair. The rug under foot looked threadbare, but felt incredibly soft under my bare feet. Some kind of enchantment. I suppressed a groan of relief as I leaned back in the chair. I stayed on high alert, but every second he gave me before attacking gave me another second to recover from the fight with Alpha.

  “I’m Lucas. Where are we and what’s going on, if you don’t mind me asking?”

  “Not at all,” Noctarus said as he settled into the opposite chair and waved his hand.

  A fancy wooden door in the wall opposite the fire opened, and I bolted out of my chair at the sight of a zombie. The woman was clearly undead, with the bone of her jaw peeking through bits of missing skin and muscle. Except she was wearing an apron and carrying a silver tray of mini sandwiches. Behind her came another, carrying a full tea setting.

  “I apologize, my friend,” Noctarus said, gesturing me back down. “I thought a little refreshment might be welcome.”

  “Uh, sure.” My racing mind could only come up with one conclusion about where I’d ended up, but it wasn’t a good one. Identify finally kicked in to confirm my fears.

  “Noctarus Razen. Level 59 stage-2 boss Necromancer. Noctarus is dedicated to building up his fleet of zombie sailors to embark upon the great mission of his life. He only needs a lot more bodies to succeed.”

  “Congratulations, Lucas! For getting within touching distance of both stage-2 bosses within hours of escaping stage 1, you’ve proven you’re a relentless fighting machine, or so addicted to near-death experiences that nothing will satisfy you until one of these bosses finishes the job. You receive a platinum Death Wish loot box.”

  Not funny. I silently worked through all the Earth curse words I knew. Cyrus couldn’t change them if I kept them in my mind. This was really bad. I wasn’t ready to take on a level 59 necromancer boss. I glanced again at the door. If he attacked, I might have to bolt. At least Noctarus hadn’t ripped out my soul, or anything. Yet.

  Okay. Focus. Figure this out.

  “This is the zombie castle on the north side of the stage, isn’t it?”

  Noctarus smiled as he poured himself some tea. “Indeed. That you know of my home confirms you are the human who stirred up Alpha and his pack so much a few days ago.” He frowned, making me instantly tense. “I lost 3 entire teams that night during their blood frenzy. You have no idea how scarce resources are right now.”

  “Yeah, that was a crazy night. I barely survived,” I said carefully.

  “You are either incredibly lucky, or supremely resourceful. I’m glad we have this chance to chat and establish lines of communication before Alpha feeds on your heart. He is quite relentless, you know.”

  “I’m getting that picture. How did you teleport me here, anyway? You said something about sensing contact?”

  “Indeed. Knowing the whereabouts of Alpha at all times is vitally important. I managed to tag him with a tracking spell that had an ingenious added component to notify me when he made close contact with a human. I assumed it would be you, which gave me the perfect chance to trigger the spell and pull you out of his claws, at least for now.”

  He nodded to my bloody, torn clothing. “I see my supposition was correct.”

  That was scary. If he could summon any of us at any time, we were screwed. I wanted to ask more about that, but hesitated. Noctarus leaned forward slightly, sipping from a delicate tea cup with dainty flower designs. He studied me curiously. All he needed was a pair of spectacles to push up his long nose to complete the mad scientist vibe.

  One of the zombie ladies held out the food plate to me, but I refused. It was a testament to how rattled I was that I barely reacted to a zombie lady waving a platter of tiny sandwiches barely a foot from my face.

  “I must admit, I wasn’t sure what to expect of the human leader. I sense . . .” His voice trailed off as his dead, black eyes studied me with an unnerving intensity. After a couple seconds where I prepared to fight for my life, he blinked and his smile returned. “You only arrived on this world a week ago, yes?”

  Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

  “Yeah, it’s been a crazy time.”

  “You seem to have acquired a significant amount of power in such a short time. Am I correct in assuming that a human possessing golden eyes is not common among your people?”

  Oh, right. I had forgotten about my golden eyes. Did he know about titles? I schooled my expression to remain calm. “That is correct. They were changed when I arrived here.”

  “Interesting,” was all Noctarus said. “I am beginning to understand how you survived Alpha and the pack the first time you visited this stage.”

  He could sense my power? Not good. I would prefer him seeing my levels and underestimating me like everyone else. If it came to a fight, I’d need every advantage. “Why assume I’m the leader?”

  “Alpha swore to eat the heart of the human pack leader first, and you are the first he made contact with. I salute your bravery for meeting him in combat, but do hope that does not mean your intelligence is lacking.”

  It might not be wise to insist I wasn’t a leader. If Noctarus thought me useless, he might unleash his powers on me, and I held no illusions that I might be ready to deal with a level 59 necromancer boss without understanding something about his powers.

  “So you can see my levels?”

  Noctarus chuckled and shook his head. “Nothing so concrete. Like you, I am not from this world, but do not qualify as a player, so cannot access all the resources you do. However, I have a similar, if less comprehensive ability from my own world.”

  That was a lot to digest. Before I could organize all the questions I had, Noctarus placed his tea cup down and sighed. “I’m afraid you and your people have arrived at a critical junction for both myself and my people, as well as Alpha and his pack. We are under tight deadlines and a lot of stress.”

  “I can understand that.”

  “Indeed, I suppose you can. Unfortunately, where I have left most of the passions of the living behind, they rage through Alpha stronger than ever. He can be quite unreasonable. Please, won’t you take some tea? I swear upon my honor that it is not poisoned or tampered with in any way.”

  “No offense, but I’m not a tea person.” I needed to keep the conversation going, though. It offered an unprecedented chance to gather information I could not pass up.

  So I pulled a tankard of Sam’s ale from my inventory and raised it in a toast to Noctarus. “If you don’t mind, I brought my own drink, and I’m happy to talk.”

  “Ah, a personal inventory space. Very good. I should have foreseen that.”

  I hadn’t wanted to give that secret away, but I doubted he’d believe I kept a full tankard of ale in a pocket. Revealing a bit about myself was preferable to eating or drinking zombie-prepared snacks. Hopefully he saw me sharing a secret as a gesture of goodwill. Didn’t mean I wouldn’t conceal the full extent of what it could do.

  “Yeah, it’s useful. I can keep a few things close to hand. Now, will you tell me about the situation on this stage?”

  “Of course. That is the primary reason why I summoned you here.”

  “Can you teleport anyone you want?” I couldn’t help finally asking. If he could, I’d have to take the risk and try killing him after all.

  “If only life were so simple,” Noctarus chuckled, sipping his tea again. “I can track Alpha sometimes, and bringing you here was the product of a very complex spell array that took several days to prepare.”

  “I’ll admit, I was not expecting anyone to want to talk.” Most monsters just attacked and fought to the death. I suspected Noctarus could prove far more dangerous than even Alpha, in his own way. Good thing he chose talking first.

  “Why would we not wish to? We are stuck in a difficult situation too after being pulled here from another world.”

  “So were we.”

  “Indeed, as are all contestants. In our case, our world has already been integrated into the multiverse, and it has not been a pleasant experience. Our world is suffering greatly, and our community was wiped out. Alpha and I both survived, but by pursuing very different paths to power.”

  So he knew Alpha from before? Had someone on their planet participated in a game like ours and failed? It was a great reminder not to get distracted. If Noctarus’s story was true, his planet’s fate sucked, but my job was to make sure the same or worse didn’t happen to mine.

  He continued, his gaze drifting to the fire as he spoke. “Alpha chose the path of the wolf, which has granted him tremendous physical might. Treading the path of necromancy allows me mastery over death.”

  How much mastery? Could he be killed? In all the stories I’d read, necromancers could die, but sometimes they had weird safeguards to keep themselves alive. If I couldn’t figure out his, killing him might not be enough to beat him.

  Noctarus glanced at me and smiled again, sipping his tea. “And now we have both been chosen and given a quest. We must strengthen our forces to escape this stage, return to our world, and save the remnants of our people from total annihilation.”

  That quest sounded way too similar to mine, but then why were they fighting each other so much? If they were from the same world, wouldn’t they want to work together? He wasn’t telling me everything.

  “What can you tell me about your world?”

  “I was not part of the initial integration challenge, so I do not know specifics. All I know is that we were integrated as a low-tier world that is being overrun by powerful monsters while many of our natural resources are being mined.”

  Was that the first step in the world destruction Cyrus had threatened for Earth? I’d assumed it would be a faster process, but it made sense that it took time to mine an entire world. So if we failed, would people back on Earth get the chance to escape or fight to salvage something from the disaster?

  “What does a low-tier world mean?”

  “Apologies. I know too little of the multiverse to explain much, but I have garnered a few scraps of information. Different worlds have different tiers of power, with different privileges, depending on that tier. Higher-tiered worlds prosper, while lower-tiered worlds like mine are exploited.”

  Did that correlate with the tier-1 body upgrade I’d received? Everyone else was still tier-0. Did that mean people on a tier-2 world were 10 times stronger than me? That was a scary thought.

  “It sounds like you’re in a rough spot.”

  “To put it mildly. You are fighting for the survival of your planet, but so too are we. We must escape this stage, but the system has arranged for us to fight. Our quests are set at cross purposes, but the most likely outcome is that we weaken each other to the point no one gets what they want.”

  Was he talking about them versus us, or zombies versus werewolves? Or all of the above?

  “We still have to try.” Maybe chatting with the nice old necromancer hadn’t been such a great idea. The more I learned of his rotten situation, the less I wanted to fight him. It was easier to kill monsters with little intellect and no past.

  Noctarus leaned forward, gesturing with his tea cup. “But if we work together? Then, and only then, do we stand a chance!”

  His calm facade broke finally, showing a bit of passion. He might be lying, but he was working hard to make the lie convincing.

  “How could we possibly help each other?”

  “We are finally getting to useful questions.” Noctarus hurried to his writing desk. I tensed, ready to pull a weapon or Tether Slide for the door. Instead of attacking, he pulled out some papers. Returning, he shoved them in front of me. “I have done extensive research into the matter.

  The papers were covered with advanced mathematical formulas. I’d done enough higher-level math recently for my computer degree to recognize some of them, but it was way over my pay grade. The formulas and patterns seemed to float off the page and dance in front of my eyes, a confusing blur of numerical gibberish that gave me a headache.

  “You have been affected by advanced mathology. You are now Befuddled. For the next 2 minutes, your Intelligence will drop by 10% every time you look at math equations.”

  I dropped the pages, massaging my temples. Befuddled? First time I’d seen that one. “Are you trying to charm me, or something?”

  Noctarus recovered the papers from the floor, smoothed them, and returned to his seat. “My apologies, Lucas. I did not consider the effect my formulas might have on a recently integrated mind. You saw them, if but for a moment. Even if you don’t understand them, believe me, they are clear. Numbers do not lie.”

  He folded the page to show me the line at the very bottom. It held a single number. 500.

  “Five hundred. That’s the key. I need 500 humans at level 20 or above.”