Chapter 34: Dante Rewards
[Administrator Dante, Your Avatar Beatrice Artabell has died, converting her suffering throughout the second playthrough into +62 Strands of Negativity]
[Administrator Dante, Your Avatar Beatrice Artabell has died, converting her suffering throughout the second playthrough into +137 Strands of Negativity]
[Administrator Dante, Your Avatar Beatrice Artabell has died, converting her suffering throughout the third playthrough into +201 Strands of Negativity]
[Administrator Dante, Your Avatar Beatrice Artabell has died, converting her suffering throughout the fourth playthrough into +170 Strands of Negativity]
[Administrator Dante, Your Avatar Beatrice Artabell has died, converting her suffering throughout the fifth playthrough into +96 Strands of Negativity]
[Administrator Dante, Your Avatar Beatrice Artabell has died, converting her suffering throughout the sixth playthrough into +88 Strands of Negativity]
[Administrator Dante, Your Avatar Beatrice Artabell has died, converting her suffering throughout the seventh playthrough into +100 Strands of Negativity]
[Administrator Dante, Your Avatar Beatrice Artabell has died, converting her suffering throughout the eight playthrough into +275 Strands of Negativity]
Dante reclined in his chair, lazily spinning himself around with one hand on the armrest, the faint hum of his computer screen flickering across his face. Right now, he wasn’t anywhere near a planet, in a constructed building like he made for Beatrice.
His desk sat perched on a fragment of an asteroid, massive shard of rock drifting through the silent infinite ocean of interstellar space. Around him stretched the endless void of his dream domain, a field of moons, stars, galaxies, basically everything you would expect of a universe, scattered like glass dust across a black canvas.
At this moment, Dante was simply chilling. A cup of steaming coffee floated beside him, held in place by the subtle pull of his will alone.
Normally, this would be the point where he would scold Beatrice with a smug, "Git gud," or something equally dismissive. But lately, her suffering had been making him rich, so Beatrice deserve her rest, after each playthrough. But then and again, who was he to get in the way of success?
"Hehehehehe... Who am I to casually take away quality experience from such a beautiful and determined girl?" He murmured, his eyes glinting red as lines of words scrolled across his monitor informing him of how much Negativity he has harvested over the past week from Beatrice journey in Sunderland. "Besides, dying like crazy is part of the soul game protagonist experience, you can’t be a soul game veteran without dying thousands of times at the bare minium."
The corners of his mouth curled into an amused smirk. "Still, all that pain is giving me so much Negativity... this is absolutely delicious." He stretched his legs out, leaning back into his chair with a satisfied sigh. Beatrice’s constant cycle of death, rebirth, and rage was a jackpot of emotion, each scream, each desperate fight feeding him a steady stream of negativity, and more of this he has the stronger he becomes generally speaking.
"This is honestly a massive win for both of us." He said, scrolling through the data streams that represented her progress. "Beatrice gets stronger, I get wealthier. Everybody wins." He grinned wider, spinning slowly in his chair again.
"I doubt she would care either way though. She is literally pulling power from another world and using it in her reality. That is a level of exploitation I can respect, beside that bitch is seriously power hungry, you love to see it." He paused, chuckling softly.
The thought made him sit upright, eyes gleaming, then a spark of wicked realization hit him. "Wait a second. If I had more players... that would mean more emotional output, I should really, start hunting for more gullible humans, then and again Beatrice as my avatar was basically an investment, hell the amount of Negativity I got from her these past eight days already makes up for what I lost when I created the Dream World of Sunderland."
He started laughing, an amused, low, greedy laugh that echoed across the emptiness of his domain. "Ohhh, that would be just brilliant. It is basically cheating. Actual, divine-tier cheating, like pay to win but like in real life."
Negativity to Dante was currency, pure, refined energy that could be shaped into almost anything. To him, it was better than gold, better than faith, better than anything else. It was the perfect fuel for his existence.
He tapped his monitor with one finger, watching Beatrice’s feed as she tested her new abilities, white fur coat her body, black fog curling around her like a cloak of some sorts.
"Good for her, though." He said with an odd fondness. "She looks happy. I am glad she is satisfied with our arrangement. Still... His gaze drifted to another window blinking at the edge of his screen, with another set notification, looking at it he smiled happily and said, as he expand it to make it take up his entire screen. "Dearest Virgil... you are basically spoiling me with all these rewards, not that I am complaining."
It wasn’t the usual flood of red notifications reporting his growing Negativity balance. This one shimmered in gold, a rare color, one he hadn’t seen since his awakening as an Outer Spirit, when Virgil first explain what the abilities of the Administrator can do.
Dante leaned forward, eyes narrowing as he clicked it open. The golden panel unfolded like a digital scripture, scrolling lines of text before him.
[You have unlocked two new Sub-Abilities under one of your three branch abilities of Reality Quest, which together form your Unique Ability — The Administrator]
[Sub-Ability Unlocked: <Spiritual Manifestation> Allows the Administrator to manifest within the real world by forming a temporary Spiritual Body. However, doing so continuously drains your Negativity Reserve at a rate of -50 strands per hour]
[Sub-Ability Unlocked: <Synchronization> Grants the ability to synchronize with your Avatar on a conceptual level. This enables the Administrator to wield the Avatar’s abilities regardless of the vessel currently possessed — even while inhabiting another Avatar or existing in spiritual form. However, this process consumes -5 Negativity per second per head while active]
"Well then!" Dante said getting up from his chair, information flooded his mind the moment he open the tab, as he made up his mind on his next move. "As much as like my alone time, after dying some time back, I think I should explore the outside world a bit." He said, as he prepare to use Spiritual Manifestation for the first time. "Let see, just how screwed this world really is."