Capítulo 23: A Man Named Nikolai
[PAIN RESISTANCE] was a strange skill.
Sometimes you didn't feel any pain whatsoever, sometimes you felt slight discomfort that was bearable, sometimes it didn't negate any pain and you felt all of it if the pain was above the threshold of your MIND stat.
Today was one of those days when he felt slight discomfort, and that's what he woke up to.
Ignoring pain is easier when you're distracted by problems.
When Adam finally made it to the villa in the Capital City of Ortu Solis he collapsed onto the bed as soon as Henrietta and every other trouble had been taken care of.
He had such little care for self-preservation he fell asleep in his ruined and bloodied clothes.
You would think he would at least have the decency to clean the dried blood and dirt on his face but for some reason he didn't seem to care about it.
Maybe because he was just tired.
Running such a long distance while carrying someone in your arms is hard enough but doing so while [PSUEDO-IMMORTAL] drains your vitality trying to heal you is what makes it even worse.
By the time Adam reached the Villa he was completely out of energy and had been covering the last leg on pure willpower.
The guards at the capital gates stopped him to question him about his appearance and bloody attire but shut up and let him pass as soon as they saw his annoyed expression and identification.
The last thing the guards wanted was to offend a noble.
When Adam fell asleep, instead of dreaming he once again ended up in his old apartment from his past life.
The same familiar man with red eyes looked down on him with the same disdainful look as if he were looking at a piece of trash beneath his feet.
The man with red eyes spoke first.
"Do you have any idea what you have done?"
Feeling dazed as he got up from the floor Adam asked back.
"What have I done?"
"Seeing how clueless you are about the whole situation... I guess you don't know. But that's alright, even someone like you will know how royally f*cked he is when he wakes up and sees what happened."
Adam, furrowing his brows unable to understand the man's riddles asked, "What are you even talking about?"
With a malicious and naughty smirk, the man replied, "Heh, you will know soon enough."
As he said this, he grabbed Adam by his shoulder and threw him off the balcony once again.
It wasn't the shock of falling down that woke Adam up; it was the shock of hitting the concrete pavement below.
Adam jumped off his bed but fell back down after his head hit something.
Opening his eyes he saw Anita with her signature outfit rubbing her head with her hand as if something had hit her there.
Moving aside his thoughts about the vision Adam said, " So do you enjoy watching me sleep that up close?"
"Who doesn't like looking at pretty things?"
Realising that Anita's stamina for flirting was near infinite unless Adam did something about it, Adam cut to the chase.
"Why are you here Anita?"
"I wanted to make sure you got here safe after what happened."
"What do you mean what happened? How do you know about the ambush?"
"Ambush? What ambush?"
"Wait what? You don't know about the ambush? Then why are you here?"
Both of them seemed to be confused by the other. It was as if they were talking about two completely different things.
Trying to fix the confusion, Anita took the charge.
"I'm talking about the Phenomenon that occurred all around the world last night."
"What phenomenon?"
"What do you mean what phenomenon? It's all over the news... wait did you somehow manage to sleep through it?"
Instead of replying to Anita, Adam grabbed the remote and turned the TV on.
As soon as he saw what was being reported on the news, he started to have an early morning migraine.
"Greetings people of the Stellar Empire, this is Empire Times reporting to you after an extreme phenomenon that has terrorized and killed more than a million people around the continent in their sleep. The total death count is still being calculated. We will inform you of the real number of deaths around the continent once the other kingdoms provide them to us.
Today we bring you word from the king of our Stellar Empire, William Argento Stellar the 11th himself. "
"Citizens of the empire, there is no reason to worry. Archmage Cain Iglesias has already been dispatched to understand the source of this phenomenon.
Preliminary investigation has told us that the entire continent has experienced an earthquake of the 9th tier which caused many buildings all around the world to collapse.
We as the servants of the empire, must serve our ancestors and the citizens of our Empire. We will get to the bottom of this issue and root it out from its very core as quickly as we can. Glory to the empire! "
Adam shoved his hands into his face so hard you would think someone slapped him. The only reason he did so was because of his utter disappointment in himself at what had just transpired.
"That was a word from none other than the great ruler of our glorious empire. It feels so good to be at the mercy of such a dependable ruler who does anything he can to help his people.
Next up we have the famous actor Richie Rich known for his bald head and weird beard and his unique dating courses which help lonely Young men attract women through the usage of pheromone soap which can be yours for the measly price of 1 go.. "
Before the news host finished his ad read, the fountain pen on the bedside table floated upwards and shot towards the TV, breaking it.
Adam could barely contain his hatred for himself.
Somehow he blade himself for the 1st cataclysm taking place before the game even began.
There were a total of 3 cataclysmic events that terraformed the entire world of Klienova.
They worked as world events that made the entire world progress into the next stage and made all combat encounters harder by increasing the stats and spawning higher-tier enemies.
With each cataclysm, the world became more desolate and bleak but the rewards and chances for profit increased as well.
More risk more reward.
But what's the point of more risk or reward when you can't deal with any of the higher risks because nobody in the main cast is strong enough since the story hasn't even started yet?
And which cataclysm was it?
The awakening of the Dragon Queen Sahmira after she senses the presence of The Demon King and his 13 Demon Generals that served a subordinate role to him?
Or was it the cataclysm that takes place when the demons invade Klienova for the first time since the Great War 500 years ago?
Or was it the 3rd and final cataclysm when the gods make a mistake and give birth to an undead lord that starts creating greater undead from the bodies of all the dead demons during the war?
And most importantly... what even caused a cataclysm to occur?
What did Adam do? Was dealing with all the undead in that graveyard such a drastic event that it completely shifted the timeline of the story?
Adam stopped his thoughts from racing any further.
Thinking about how it happened was meaningless, dealing with the issue as it came was more important.
Adam's entire progression planning had completely collapsed.
The entrance exam is tomorrow, and a lot of changes might occur.
Stopping Adam's mind from running wild, Anita said in an annoyed tone.
"Hey I was watching that, I wanted to know if there were some pheromone soaps for women so that they can attract the men they like."
Another divergence from the plot. Anita Hopkins never had a love interest because she always considered everyone else to be childish and ended up being killed by the head of Darkus Maximus while defending the academy.
" You like someone all of a sudden?"
As always, our womanizer was clueless about the matters of a maiden's heart.
"I might..."
"Anita you're really stupid."
"How am I stupid?"
"Because you don't realise that guys would be dying to court you anyway, you don't need some made-up bullsh*t like pheromone soap."
"Heh, you think that highly of me?"
"Of course I do, you wouldn't know because you constantly hide yourself so nobody has seen your real face."
"So if I were to stop hiding, guys would be all over me?"
"Duh?"
Then with a smile and a little redness forming on her cheeks, Anita said,
"Alright, Adam I will keep that in mind, freshen up and come down for breakfast."
Anita left the room immediately after saying this, Adam didn't understand what all the hurry was for.
He had to set some things up by tonight so he can be ready for whatever surprises are going to come in the future.
After getting ready and eating breakfast and letting Henrietta and Anita know about what happened on the way here, Adam left for the Market to meet a really special man.
As the cataclysm happened many opportunities came with it as well.
Human ingenuity reached an all-time high giving birth to many new devices and technologies of a higher caliber than their previous iterations.
The leading Frontline of these bleeding-edge technological advancements was none other than Montgomery and Sons Ltd. Guild which was the 3rd best guild in the world.
The entire theme of this guild was corporatization and corporate culture.
Vanita Montgomery was the man who created this guild and his sons worked in it as executive members.
This guild functioned purely on the beliefs of capitalism.
Even his songs could have their positions taken away if someone else in the company fulfilled more quotas than them after a financial quarter.
A purely merit-based system.
The issue is that, like every good idea, all good ideas turn into bad through human corruption.
So what if you made a charity with noble beliefs? If the workers or others who are a part of it want to keep some of that charity money for themselves nothing is stopping them.
The ideas themselves aren't the ones at fault.
The fault lies within human greed that taunts everything on the path to quench its endless thirst for more.
Speaking of someone with endless greed and zero ethics, there is a man named Thomas Ewill Edison who was the head executive of the technological branch of Montgomery and Sons.
Under him worked a true genius of this Era named Nikolai Tezra.
While Thomas only managed to create artifacts and gadgets that maximized profits and were incredibly derivative of other products, Nikolai didn't care about profits and focused more and more on innovation that was years ahead of its time and rapidly progressed humanity.
Thomas couldn't accept the fact that Nikolai was more liked by the engineers under him and revered as a superior genius than him.
One day, Thomas ransacked Nikolai's lab, stole all of the prototypes he could get his hands on, and made the ones he could while burning the blueprints that he couldn't wrap his tiny insecure head around.
After defeating Nikolai in the engineers' and company's eyes by making his artifacts before him, Thomas managed to gain leverage and exposed Nikolai as a fraud and isolated Nikolai both financially and socially to ensure that even if he had ideas, he couldn't make anything since nobody would fund him.
This was the story of the man named Nikolai Tezra whom Adam was now looking at from afar as he sat on the floor in the market with a tattered suit on him as he sold artifacts that he made from scrap he could get his hands on.
While these artifacts looked horrible since they were made from scrap, their performance was undeniable.
But the fickle and Superficial thought process of human beings would never buy something that didn't look good.
Looks are what rule the world.
The issue with true believers like Nikolai was that they were so intertwined with technological advancements that they never figured out what made the human mind tick, and that became the reason for their downfall.
Adam had an entire script ready.
He made his way toward Nikolai with a sleazy, fake, and cheesy smile.
"Good sir how much for this Magic Cassette Recorder Gauntlet?"
Nikolai looked at Adam with an annoyed look and said, "100 gold"
The smile on Adam's face doubled in size, the answer Nikolai gave was exactly what he was hoping for.
"Good sir, you have to be joking, that pricing is absurd."
"What do you know about this artifact to even think that my pricing is absurd? Do you know what it does?"
The smile on Adam's face vanished it was all according to his plan. [CALCULATOR] was ready to make its move.
"The magic cassette recorder gauntlet is an artifact that uses specially prepared magic scroll cassettes to create and control any magic the user wants while not having any aptitude for magic. Am I correct?"
Adam's voice changed from a childish, shrill, and naive voice to a deep voice filled with contempt as if he was looking down on the person he was speaking to.
Even Nikolai who had zero care of other human beings or social norms or socialization itself was taken aback by the sudden change in tone.
"Well... well yes.. that's exactly what it does. Since you already know what it is why are you saying the price is absurd?"
"Listen up dumb ass I get that you only have numbers and equations in your head but did you ever think about the cost of utilizing an artifact like this practically? You need a magic scroll that is already expensive, then we need to turn them into cassettes that only you can do, then we also need S grade Mana stones that we need to constantly replace just to make it work on a regular basis and at the end you need to make sure this artifact made with these cheap junk materials doesn't fall apart from the aftershock of the spells. Tell me now, does this sound like an acceptable price for something so tedious to use?"
Nikolai was speechless, he was too hung up on making artifacts that he completely forgot about the end user and practicality of using such an artifact.
But his ego couldn't accept being outsmarted by some random noble. The geniuses never appreciate someone questioning their intelligence. Nikolai got a good look at Adam.
There was something peculiar about his eyes but for some reason Nikolai's anger had extinguished and he thought with a calm mind.
"What do you think I should do?"
"Well a self sufficient Mana coil would do wonders for equipment like this wouldn't it?"
Mana coil. An idea Nikolai had only thought of once, it was an idea in his head that he never told anyone about because of the leaps in technology that would need to take place just to make one.
"How do you know about the mana coil?"
Nikolai was now completely serious now. He realised that the man in front of him was no simpleton and might even be a genius of his own calibre.
"Let's just say I can read minds, I read yours and I want to help you make your dream reality, and we might even ruin Thomas's life on the way there."
On an average day Nikolai would think this guy was probably one of Thomas's lackey that had come up with an elaborate plan to rub his pathetic state in his face.
But there was something about this man in front of him, something rather assuring.
His demeanor looked like he knew everything that had to be known about Nikolai or Thomas or even the specifics of their work as an artificer.
He felt assured that if he were to work with this man, his dreams of creating the mana coil would be realised.
Nikolai grabbed Adam's hand for support and got up.
After packing up Nikolai's stuff, both men went to the villa.
A new partnership was born.
One that would drastically change the future.
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