THE BOOK OF JAKE
Chapter 4
4:1 And in the fourth week the Paladin was sent against the System, which had built the swamp, and which had said unto him, Watch your step.
4:2 And the Paladin did not watch his step. He walked straight through the deepest part of the swamp in full armor, waist-deep, and did not slow.
4:3 And he counted his congregation, and they were four. Four Avalanche players, faithful, present, accounted for. As it was in the first week, and the second, and the third.
4:4 And the System scored one hundred sixty-nine.
4:5 And the Paladin scored two hundred twenty point eight, which was the top score of the week, and the highest score ever recorded against the System in Season 3, and the System has asked that this verse be kept short.
4:7 And the margin was fifty-one point eight.
System Notice ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED: SMITE THE SYSTEM. WEEK 4 HIGH SCORE: 220.8. OPPONENT: THE SYSTEM. THE SYSTEM HAS REVIEWED THE FOOTAGE. THE SYSTEM IS STILL REVIEWING THE FOOTAGE.
4:8 And on the way out of the swamp, the Paladin stepped on something small and hard in the mud, and bent down, and it was a bead.
4:9 Burgundy. Round. Very nearly the right size.
4:10 And he held it up beside the friendship bracelet, beside the empty place where one bead has been missing since the Lobby, and it did not quite fit, and he did not force it.
System Notice LOOT DROP: A SINGLE BURGUNDY BEAD THAT ALMOST FITS. TIER: COMMON. EFFECT: +2 PTS IN ONE WEEK OF HIS CHOOSING, DECLARED BY WEDNESDAY NOON.
4:11 And he placed the bead in his pack beside the Holy Water, Swamp Vintage, which he has not yet drunk, for he is saving it, and the System does not know for what.
4:12 And he is 3-1, and he has scored 780.9 points, more than any crawler in the Dungeon by over eighty. And he is second. Because Matt has never lost. And the Paladin does not complain about this, because the Paladin does not complain.
4:13 Next: Kyle, who has seven cats, possibly eight, and who won last week by three-tenths of a point.
Here endeth the reading.
The System did not approve this format. It appeared in his log on Monday morning, already numbered. The System has decided to allow it.