O.C. Saar
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Omega Release | Chapter 20: Making a Deal
🕑 Added 2025-06-09 18:00:03 +0000 UTCI stood in the living room, rage building in my chest. The bastard had Aren. Heedless of my anger, the video kept playing.
“Don’t think me a brute. I do not shed blood or cause pain needlessly. It took a bit of elbow grease, but now that he has answered our questions, the child will not be harmed further, provided, of course, you comply,” he said, his business-like countenance setting my teeth on edge. This guy had “Middle Ring” written all over him.
The man, Mr. Toriklas, continued speaking with an infuriatingly smug expression. “I will interpret your disappearance over the past day and a half charitably and assume that you are hiding for a good reason or recuperating from injuries. You have four days to reply to this message so that a meeting can be arranged where I take back what is mine and the kid gets to live. For four days, I will ensure his continued well-being.”
He tapped his chin theatrically, acting as if he were in deep thought. “In fact, I will throw in a reward of twenty million credits for you if you bring me the gem within that time limit. Past that, there will no longer be a carrot, only the stick. A five-million credit bounty will be placed upon your head, and I will start removing parts of the kid until you either capitulate or there are no more parts to remove. Still, even past the four-day grace period, bring me my gem of your own volition, and all will be forgiven.”
How he so callously threw around the threat of torturing and murdering a kid made my blood boil. The credit reward also got my hackles up. For someone to so casually throw around so many credits, they were either a grifter or very, very dangerous, and this guy didn’t strike me as a con artist.
“In fact, as a further show of goodwill and trust, the moment a meeting is set up, you will receive a system-enforced protection order. The protection order will have the condition that once you hand the gem over, it will be extended for an entire month. Should we find further common ground during the meeting, there is also the option of you eschewing the protection and receiving a monetary reward of equal value.” The alarms in my head had never been louder. Shit. Shit, shit, shit.
The average Outer Ringer would never make enough money in their entire life to afford half a day of System-Enforced protection, let alone a month. Whoever was behind this was willing to pay over two hundred and thirty million credits.
With that much money, I could buy a new identity and life extension treatments. I’d have enough left over to do whatever I wanted and live like a king on the Outer Ring for centuries. Some smart investments would set me and my descendants up for success for generations to come. I would become one of the most influential people on the ring.
And yet.
They tortured Aren.
Heedless of my inner turmoil, the monster clad in human skin kept talking. “This is the best and only deal you will receive. Think it over. You have four days before I start skinning the boy alive.”
The video abruptly cut off, and I was left standing there, feeling stunned. This was bad. This was really fucking bad. At least I had four days to prepare, but what was I supposed to do? Then, an idea came to me. A truly terrible idea, but the best that I could come up with on short notice.
I rushed out of the Hab that had been my home for the last eight years, never looking back. I had a kid to save.
“Sir, if I may, I have a couple of questions,” said Hob.
“What’s up?” I brought up my vehicle inventory, paid the exorbitant reconstruction insurance and assembly fee, and chose to have it assembled in front of me. The money was soon gone anyway, and this was far cheaper than buying a new bike. I would have to avoid any street cameras, and a collision would be devastating since driving an unregistered vehicle was a quick way to get landed in jail. Still, as long as I kept my bike intact and had the money, I’d be able to register it to me again.
“Miss Silver’s message mentioned black tokens. What are those?” he asked, curiosity tinging his voice. He was always a glutton for new information.
I mounted my bike and set off down the streets of Sector 16. “Black tokens are the ultimate form of currency in the Otherside. A black token is a favor with almost no restrictions. If the Clan Council has authorized you to accept and give out black tokens, you cannot refuse a black token favor unless it is clearly and directly going to harm you, your organization, or your interests. If you refuse a black token for any other reason, and the Clan Council pronounces you guilty, you get a universal and perpetual kill order on your head.” I turned a corner and finally exited the residential district, lifting off the street and heading north.
“Interesting. And Miss Silver got given two of those?” Hob sounded deep in thought.
I nodded. “Yes. I imagine one was for Silver to hand Aren over, and the other was to stop her from helping me. Whoever this Ignateous Toriklas is, he is extremely well-connected and is not afraid to toss out massive amounts of wealth to ensure I have no option but to obey him. As terrifying as it sounds, I think he might have connections with the Middle Ring.” I shuddered at the thought of that. It was almost unheard of for the monsters of the Middle Ring to get involved in the minutia of the Outer Ring. However, whenever those people deigned to cast their attention beyond their obsidian towers, death and destruction followed.
The industrial landscape beneath me passed by in a blur, factories, assembly lines, and storage facilities all merging into a singular blob of concrete and metal, passing by underneath me. I lost all of my armor, but at least I still had an air-filtering mask, or else this ride would have taken way longer.
I broke the oppressive silence that hung over us. “You said you had questions, plural. What’s the next question?”
Hob perked up again. “Oh, yes! Will you accept his offer, sir?”
“Fuck that noise,” I snorted. “I like money as much as the next guy, but if someone is willing to torture a boy barely into his teen years to get some information and throws around such exorbitant rewards, they are either insane, planning to have you killed off, evil, or a combination of all three. I am hurting for money, and his reward is enough to set up generational wealth, but I am neither desperate nor stupid enough to consider selling my soul to that demon.” I hesitated before muttering, “I’d rather struggle for money and not have the blood of another child on my hands.”
I got the impression that Hob was nodding. “Understandable, sir. So, what do we do?”
I sighed, starting to descend as I approached the 1st quadrant checkpoint. The massive forcefield wall rising to the top of the environmental field forced most people through border control.
My brows knitted together in consternation. “Everything in me screams that if this Mr. Toriklas gets his hands on the gem, the consequences will be as dire as if priests got hold of it, so… Now… Now, I’ll have to make a deal with the devil. But I’m choosing the devil I know rather than a stranger promising riches.”
“I see,” said Hob, with hesitation, obviously having no clue what I was talking about. We settled back into a companionable silence.
I landed the bike a couple of kilometers away from the border control point and opened a set of notifications that had been blinking at me for half an hour.
[MISSION COMPLETED]
[A Hob in need is a Hob indeed!]
You have not earned enough money or performed the necessary repairs. Regardless, you have managed to save Hob’s life.
[REWARD]: +10 XP
[BONUS REWARD]: The [Unconventional Problem Solver] title.
“Somehow, you did it! Yay, you!”
The first notification was a pleasant surprise. I didn’t expect the mission to be counted as completed, but I wasn’t about to complain. I focused on my first-ever title, excited to see its effects.
[Unconventional Problem Solver]: You used creativity, skill, ingenuity, and luck to escape a seemingly impossible predicament. +5 to Wisdom.
The bonus wasn’t exactly ring-shattering, but it was still almost a 10% increase to my lowest stat, so I was over the moon. In my elation, I forgot about the following notification. When I opened it, my mood came crashing down.
[MISSION FAILED]
[Are we HUMAN, or are we Debtor?]
You have failed to pay off your debt to HUMAN. All your registered assets have been seized. Your class will change from [Citizen] to [Vagrant] until you can afford a habitation unit once more.
[ERROR:] [CITIZEN] CLASS NOT FOUND
[ERROR:] [RUST REAVER] CLASS NOT RECOGNIZED
[ERROR:] CANNOT CHANGE CURRENT CLASS TO [Vagrant]
"Before, you only LOOKED homeless."
I gritted my teeth. I knew this was coming, but seeing my entire life go up in flames still hurt. It would have hurt less if it hadn’t been my own fault.
I heard Hob mumble, guilt thick in his voice. “I am sorry, Sir. All this happened because of me. If I had found a way to repair myself, you wouldn’t be in this situ-”
“Stop that,” I cut him off, perhaps a touch too harshly. “We are not going to play the blame game. I chose to stop working and hide at the bottom of a bottle. I chose to lie around doing nothing when I could have learned how to repair you better. I chose to give you that stupid command that stopped you from warning me. This is my doing, and I accept it fully and completely.” I kicked the bike into gear again, slowly driving away from the checkpoint, occasionally opening my map to check my location.
“What matters now is that we are both alive and well. This is an opportunity for a fresh start, a blank slate.” I said, despite the situation feeling a touch optimistic.
“That is true, sir,” Hob said, cheering up. “We just have to rescue Aren from a person of unknown powers and seemingly limitless means!”
My shoulders drooped. “Well, when you put it that way…” I chuckled and shook my head, pulling up next to a pair of giant elevator doors.
I input the access code, and the doors slipped open. I rode my bike in and settled down, hoping the ride wouldn’t take too long. Unfortunately, the elevator took around 30 minutes to reach its destination this time. It was still faster and cheaper than if I had tried going through the Border Control queue and then taken an elevator to the first quadrant’s Otherside, so I couldn't complain.
The elevator led us to one of the main thoroughfares of the first Quadrant’s Otherside. Quickly enough, I located a conversion shop. I parked the bike outside and walked into the tiny shop. It was nothing extraordinary, with barely enough space for six people to squeeze together, the gray walls were bare, and the only decoration was a giant, gaudy “LIVO TIFER’S CONVERSIONS. WE TURN COINS TO CREDITS AND CREDITS TO COINS. BEST CONVERSION RATES IN THE FIRST QUADRANT.”
Behind the counter was a portly old man with a wispy comb-over that did nothing to hide his naked scalp. “How can I help you?” he asked pleasantly.
“Hi,” I said, walking up to the counter and digging through my pockets. I pulled out five gold coins and handed them over. “I would like these to be converted to credits.”
His entire face lit up at the sight of so much gold. “Oh, certainly, sir! The current conversion rate is 928 credits for every gold coin. Is that alright with you?”
I raised a single eyebrow. This guy must have been joking. “That’s the best conversion rate in the first quadrant? I’m from the fourth quadrant, just visiting, so I don’t know about the situation here, but I thought the conversion rate would be closer to 980,” I lied easily. If this guy wanted to rip me off, I’d rip him off right back.
“Ah, from the fourth quadrant? Yes, I have heard that there has been a little bit of an influx of coins to our quadrant, so demand isn’t quite as high here.” He said, his eyebrows twitching.
“I see,” I hummed to myself. “Well, if the discrepancy is that large, I guess it's worth returning to get my money converted there.” I fought back the smirk that wanted to appear on my face.
“Wait, wait!” The man said, raising his hands in a placating manner. “No need for that! You’ve come all the way here, and it just so happens that…” He hesitated for a moment. This guy wasn’t very good at lying. “I am running a special promotion for individuals wanting to exchange over three golden coins at once! The conversion rate is 950 credits for every gold coin! Limited time offer!”
This time, I couldn’t stop the smirk on my face. “Now that sounds much more reasonable. Still, I will probably need to get more of my coins converted later. I'll come to you next time if you give me 960 for each coin. Not a bad deal for a returning customer, right?”
The man’s eye twitched. “960? You are practically asking to steal the food from my mouth!” he said, exaggerated offense thick in his tone.
I shrugged. “I know the kinds of commissions these businesses get for converting coins to credits. It won’t hurt your bottom line too much. Besides, I’m sure others in this quadrant would be more than happy to accept my offer and have me as a returning customer. You just happened to be the closest conversion shop I could find.”
The man seemed to deflate a little. “Alright, alright. Fine. But you'd better come back here next time you need to convert your money. I have a family to feed, you know.”
A window opened in front of me.
[TRADE OFFER]
Livo Tifer wants to trade with you:
[OFFER:] 4800 Credits.
[REQUEST:] 5 Gold Coins.
[Accept] or [Decline]
I chuckled, clicking on Accept. I slid the coins forward, and as soon as the man, Livo, had them in his hands, the credits were added to my account. “A pleasure doing business with you.”
He nodded back, smirking. Like with every good deal, we both came out of it thinking we got one over the other person. “Hope to see you again soon,” the man said as I left his shop.
I searched on my map for the nearest registration office. There was one a five-minute drive away.
A few minutes later, I walked out of the registration office, a couple thousand credits lighter, but with my bike and the possessions on my person and in my suitcase registered back to me. I gave the command, paid the fee for my suitcase and bike to be disassembled and stored, and headed for the nearest elevator.
My palms started sweating as I input the destination and entered the dark room, the doors closing behind me. Only then did I notice a notification in the corner of my vision. Curious, I willed it open.
[NEW PASSIVE SKILL ACQUIRED]
[Barter]
Rank: Common | Level: 1/10
Effect: When you sell an item, you earn an additional 1% of the selling price as bonus credits. When you buy an item, you receive a 1% refund of the item's cost in credits. +1% to both effects with every skill level.
“Cha-Ching!”
I had… Skills? This really was like a video game. How would this even work?
Before I could ask any of the thousands of questions racing through my mind, the doors opened to a sight I had hoped never to see again. Before me stretched a landscape of scorched earth, flowing lava, molten steel, and a few kilometers in the distance, partially obscured by the smoke, a truly massive stone fortress hovering above a volcano.
“Uh, Sir,” I heard Hob whisper in my mind. “Where are we?”
I grimaced. The heat and acrid smoke were already starting to bother me. “This is the main compound of the Molten Fist Clan.”
“Do these people want you dead, too?” Hob asked sardonically.
I seriously thought about his question for a moment.
“Probably not?”
