World of Karik: A Game of Villains 55 The Geas

"You are a fool," Syomin's voice seemed deprived of emotion. "The one who came before you chose power and is now enjoying it. And what about you? Trying to be smarter than others… Aren't you afraid that you will make a fool out of yourself in the end?"

The one before me? The one who learned how to get power? Must've been Petrovich. It was here where he had learned how to summon and defeat the Earth Dragon, how to steal someone else's attributes and how to protect himself from the law.

"Wouldn't the price for power be too great?" I decided to stop playing games.

"Real power doesn't simply fall into your lap, and it certainly ain't dirt cheap," the old man said rather unconvincingly. "By the way, don't you want to ask me something?"

"I do," I knew I was walking on thin ice. "Do you know the terms of my geas?"

"I do," the old man admitted eagerly.

Truth for Truth has been activated.

Just like that? Now I just have to ask him a question. It should be something simple. If I try to learn something really important, like what this world really is, or if I ask for a complete list of laws, I won't be able to compensate for such information. That is, if I understood the condition number one correctly.

"Why do stats stop developing after level five?" This question had been torturing me for a long time now. He was, probably, the only one able to answer it.

"Everything is both simple and difficult at the same time," the old man didn't waste a second, and immediately started explaining everything in great detail. "Level five is a boundary after which the newcomers become independent. Before that, each of us is under the influence of the person who had brought us into this world. That, of course, has its advantages — working hard, we can improve our attributes and advance our body and skills. However, it has its disadvantages as well — nobody knows if the decisions you make are actually yours. Your God's aura can not only help, but also guide. This is also another reason why those with power aren't in a hurry to conquer other settlements. If you have offended one of the inhabitants of the Heaven, you are practically screwed. Without them, believe me, there is no way to advance deeper into the forest, and no one can guarantee that they won't take control of one of their wards and dispose of you, hitting not only your body, but sometimes the tombstone itself. Maybe they will not destroy it, but no one should take such a risk. For the same reason, a person under level six will under no circumstances be allowed into any city."

Syomin's words got highlighted in my mind as he spoke. Green were true, red were false. My companion lied only when he said "each of us" implying that all of the newcomers might have been under some external influence. So, there are exceptions. Why is he talking so much, though? He is giving me so much information for no particular reason. The first couple of sentences would have answered my question. Damn it, the more he talks, the more I will have to tell him.

"Stop it!" I interrupted the old man who was about to continue his story.

"You figured it out, didn't you?" He grinned at me in response. "It's my turn now. What do you know about me?"

That's it? Why's that important? What should I try to hide?

"I know that your name is Dmitry Valerianovich Syomin." This answer was worth only 10%. I had to keep going. My brilliant idea to get this ability didn't seem so brilliant anymore.

"You faked the battle with the monster." Nothing changed, even though I just confessed my suspicions. Maybe my answer has to include more details? I continued, "I thought you faked your death in order to 'protect me' and gain my trust."

Fifty-five percent. What else do I know about him? I managed to resist the urge to look at his status. My high intelligence would let me see if there was something unusual and it would force to tell him everything. This man was clearly not a fool. However, despite my best efforts, I still had to say something that should have been better kept secret.

"I've known that you've been here for sixty years." One hundred percent. It worked! Moreover, I phrased it well enough that it made it sound like I had known about his age even before I got here. And yet I have not said a word of deceit. I found that out the moment I saw the old man.

"Are you done?" The last part seemed to be an unpleasant surprise for Syomin who was now examining me as if he was seeing me for the first time. "Well, that was quite interesting. Would you like to hear more?"

To hell with all this! My interlocutor, of course, knew a lot, but I didn't know if I could ask a really interesting question or not. I was convinced that he could use my geas's features to learn something that he could use against me. He was obviously trying to check something with this first question. But if he had asked me to tell him about myself, I don't think that I would have been able to keep quiet about my magic.
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"No, thank you!"

"Hhha," He was in a good mood once more. "And why do the strong ones usually prefer to go their own way? Well, now that that's done… I fear that we're out of time..."

Before the sword, summoned from thin air, cut off my head, I managed to check if my most valuable things were in my "inventory". One strike was, unsurprisingly, enough for him to deal with me.

It was so strange… My head flew through the air… My body collapsed onto the ground… But there was no pain. Falling into the water, I noticed the remains of two more bodies in the depths. The first one was nothing but bones, several years old, but the second one still had a couple of scraps of clothing on it. A red scarf… Haven't I seen it on one of our people before? It didn't belong to our lancer that was for sure.

You will be relocated to the nearest tombstone in:

3…

2...

1…

If it weren't for this countdown I wouldn't have seen anything, and would have instantly been teleported to the tombstone. As it turns out, even three extra seconds of life were a lot.

For a moment, there was nothing but darkness around me. Then my lungs started working again and my hands broke through the thin layer of dirt which was separating me from the surface. I was back at the swamp.

Chapter end