Elusive Prey

by Cheek, Jason

  To his relief, the gates were left open with a five yard gap as the higher-level players hurried into the city for safety. Although, it looked like a nearly equal number of lower-level players were trying to rush back out to get in on the fun. What a bunch of noobs, Zeven thought, as he incredulously shook his head. Obviously, the idiots didn’t know that you didn’t get any XP if the guards killed the mobs along with you.

  Zeven was feeling pretty confident in making it through the gate ahead of the train, when a Flurry Spears slammed into his backside. The spell’s slowdown effect instantly dropped his speed by half as a further volley of bolts ripped his health down by half in a literal blink of an eye. The only thing that saved Zeven from being taken out before the gates was a hurried cast of Bark Skin and Spirit Shield, along with a few back-to-back casts of Soothing Wind. By the time he managed to stagger through the line of guards before the gate and enter the city, the train wasn’t twenty yards behind him.

  Lumbering through the gap in the gate, Zeven didn’t stop as he pushed his way through the guard reinforcements. Making his way into the plaza on the other side of the gate, he saw groups of players excitedly talking about the massive train and the triple “A” players that had caused it as he nonchalantly made his way past everyone heading for the avenue that led to the port. While a few people noticed the odd creature in his arms, most everyone was discussing the train or talking about taking out the triple “A” team that was killing everyone. While everyone talked big, Zeven had a sinking feeling in his stomach that those assclowns weren’t going to be stopped so easily. If anything, he expected that they would slip past the guards while they were busy fighting against the mass of mobs trying to enter into the city.

  A quick glance at his HUD let Zeven know that he had five minutes before the next ferry left for the Gnome capital of Tulduroc. From completing his Nightmare quest on the northern continent, Zeven had become familiar with the times the ferry left in the morning and evening. Knowing he had to get onboard if he was going to survive this night, Zeven hurried to the far side of the plaza. He was just sprinting for the docks, when the clash of weapons came to his ears as the Lonsalindel City General Chat erupted in excitement.

  (Lonsalindel City General Chat) Ebolanyc Knifeprty: The triple “A” team just came in through the main gate.

  (Lonsalindel City General Chat) Skarmjr Mochiie: Gah, there’s more of them in Stealthed!

  (Lonsalindel City General Chat) Rosta Boomstick: OMG, they’re killing everyone!

  Not bothering to look back at the carnage, Zeven fled down the hill as the sounds of fighting intensified. A new series of alarm bells began ringing throughout the city as he cut between the buildings in front of him. Using a short cut that he’d seen other players use in the past, he headed down the alley between two stone buildings off to the side of the street he was on. Heading behind the shops, he hopped off the backside of the ridge to land heavily on top of the roof to a pub by the docks. Bright Claw complained loudly as he flopped to a stop, trying his best not to crush the cub in his arms.

  “Sorry Bright Claw,” Zeven apologetically said, ignoring the Grizhawk cub struggling to break free of his arms. Scooching to the edge of the squat stone building, he dropped down into a small alley that ran alongside the pub and led to the main causeway.

  Usually, there were plenty of patrols to make taking a short cut like this was not worth the risk. Getting caught by the city guard would result in a harsh fine and a loss in reputation if you were caught. Luckily enough for Zeven, all of the guard patrols had been called on to deal with the commotion going on at the gate, so no one was around to catch him in the act as he hurried onto the main boulevard and sprinted for the rickety shack that sold tickets for the ferry. Sliding to a stop in front of the bored, old Wolf Kin sitting before the counter, Zeven said. “Ticket for the ferry to Lonsalindel for myself,” as he meaningfully hefted the Grizhawk cub in his arms at the surprised old male.

  “Next ferry departs this evening,” the grumpy Wolf Kin said, critically eyeing the cub in Zeven’s arms. “Five silvers for you and another eight for your combat pet.”

  “Eight freaking silver for my combat pet!” Zeven choked out, before forcing himself to calm down. “Sorry about that,” he said, as the old wolf’s hackles visibly began to relax at his conciliatory tone. “Is there any way I can catch this ferry. I’m running late on my quest and-“

  The old wolf’s black lips threateningly pulled back from his yellowed fangs as he meaningfully began rising off his stool. Knowing that he didn’t have time to deal with this shit, Zeven hurriedly backed away from the shack’s counter as Bright Claw began to growl and struggle to break free of his arms.

  “Hold up for a second, before you get your drawers tied up in a knot,” Zeven said, talking quickly as he tried to hold onto the Grizhawk cub struggling to lunge out of his arms. “Those alarms aren’t for me. They’re for a group of Human Rogues that are looking to skin my little friend here.” Giving the old wolf his best earnest look, he continued his plea.

  “I’m afraid if I don’t leave now, the guards aren’t going to be able to keep those darkness newfar off of me or worse,” he said, letting some of his fear for those guys level show in his voice. “They’ll get tickets for the same ferry and jump us once the boat is underway.”

  Zeven could almost see the virtual game’s dice rolling as the old wolf harrumphed and settled down. Instead of sitting back down, he hurriedly reached for a string to the bell over the shack. Giving it three quick rings, he began talking in a rush as he broke off two tickets.

  “Pay up now if we’re going to do this,” the old wolf groused, as Zeven hurriedly fished out the money and dropped it on the countertop. “They’re not going to wait up just because I rang the bell, so you better move your tail if you’re going to make it aboard in time.”

  Zeven smiled to himself at the old wolf’s reaction. It had been a bit of luck that he’d learned the term newfars and how people of The World felt about them. Acting like he was just another digital personality was a genius plan, he thought, as he reached for the tickets. It also just happened that Beast Kin were less than happy with Humans in general. His tongue caught in his throat as the old wolf gripped his wrist tightly.

  “If I find out that you lied to me about the commotion at the gate,” the old wolf said, letting out a warning growl deep in his throat. “I’ll make sure to take it out of your hide the next time I see you. You understand me, son?”

  “I’m not lying about the Human Rogues,” Zeven stuttered in surprise, as the old wolf gruffly pushed him away with a toothy smile. “Than what are you waiting for, you’ve got a ferry to catch.”

  Zeven didn’t need to be told twice. Turning around, he raced down the pier as the Gnome sailors began untying the ropes. If they saw him coming, they didn’t bother looking up at him at all as they hopped on deck and pulled out long poles to push the ferry further away from the dock. Fucking Gnomes were all the same, Zeven silently swore to himself as he ran his heart out. They didn’t give a shit about Beast Kin.

  Ignoring the commotion that started back towards the way he’d come, Zeven focused on putting one foot in front of the other as he tried to time the jump he was going to need to make. Having Bright Claw in his arms wasn’t going to make this any easier, Zeven thought, as he neared the end of the dock. With a mighty push of his legs, he managed to leap the ten foot gap to the ferry’s rear deck, before the magic engine was engaged.

  Wobbling for a moment, Zeven flung his free arm to the side as he precariously balanced as he began falling backwards off the end of the boat. He knew that if he fell now, none of the Gnomes watching him would bother to help since he hadn’t officially become a passenger yet since no one had taken his ticket. He’d just about given up the ghost as he began pitching backwards, when Bright Claw’s little hand reached out and grabbed the railing in front of him. The shock of the cub knowing just what to do was almost too much of a surprise for him to react qui
ckly enough to recover, but thankfully his free hand snapped out at the last second to grab the railing and stop his slow fall into the bay.

  “Good job, little man,” Zeven said under his breath, as he carefully climbed over the railing onto the deck. Though, he couldn’t help the dark look that came to his face as he heard the Sailors’ annoying high-pitched laughs while the Gnomes began quickly exchanging money with one another. Obviously, the little shits had been making bets on whether or not he’d make the ferry or not. He was just reaching for the tickets the old wolf had given him, when agony shot through his back.

  Xxnos Copexx Backstabs you with Flurry Spears hitting you for 2000 points of damage.

  “Don’t let him escape,” Xxnos bellowed at the top of his lungs, as he raced down the pier towards the ferry as Zeven staggered from the surprise attack and dropped to his knees. That move was the only thing that saved his life from the four follow-up shots that flashed over his head to crash into the ferry’s deckhouse as the Rogue cried out, “A hundred gold to every sailor on the ferry if you bring the Badger Kin back now!”

  Gritting his teeth through the pain, Zeven hurriedly cast Bark Skin and Spirit Shield with a thought, before following up with a Soothing Wind as the Gnomes began excitedly running around the deck. Dropping Bright Claw to the deck, he warily eyed the sailors going about their tasks with the Spirit Lochaber of Chieftain Diongmhalta held at the ready as curses rang out from the direction of the pier. Nervously glancing back towards Lonsalindel, he was surprised to see what had to be fifty city guards tackling the group of triple “A” players to the deck.

  “You are under arrest by the Lonsalindel city guard-” an officious looking city guard started to say as Xxnos cut him off.

  “Get your hands off of me, you stupid BOT!” He fought to break free as the city guards piled on top of him while he bellowed, “I’ll fucking kill you all!” as the Wolf Kin pummeled him with the hilts of their swords. Watching the action on the dock, a smile came to his thick black lips.

  “Damn Humans,” a high-pitched voice spoke up at Zeven’s elbow, as he looked down in surprise at the armored sailor that had sidled up next to him while he was distracted. “Always acting like they can buy their way out of trouble.” Seeing the surprised look on Zeven’s face, the little Gnome held out a small gauntleted hand.

  “Captain Gokmit Clubelvest of the Paddlewhirl ferry.”

  “Zeven Al'Zaric,” Zeven said, shaking the Gnome’s tiny hand. “Chieftain of House of Bruic Diongmhalta.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  (Jodi Tempest (Thomas’ IRL sister) arrives in Delonshire)

  Running Pod Diagnostic – Complete

  Synchronizing controller units - Complete

  Neuro Synchronization - Complete

  Initializing virtual environment …

  Appearing in the game, Jodi’s eyes flashed open as she silently took in the natural sounds of the forest around her. The chirping birds going about their business were almost too loud as she watched the wispy clouds racing across the sky. Due to the late morning, the sun was already peeking through the towering pines of the clearing to warm her face. Somewhere to her right, a group of level 10 Razor Rabbits were silently feeding through the hardened snow. Jodi recognized the irregular sounds of their little paws scratching at the frozen snow. The soft noise nearly covered up the ghost-like steps of a Silver Fox that was creeping up on them.

  In a flash of violence, the hunt was over. As the rest of the Razor Rabbits raced to safety, the Silver Fox proudly stood over its fresh kill. The furred hunter was just bending down to snatch up its meal, when a loud pop of displaced air rang out in the small clearing. There was a streak of snow-white fur as the Silver Fox was instantly killed with one chomp as the strong jaws of a large Lynx bit through the Silver Fox’s thin neck in the blink of an eye. Almost lazily, a voice came to her mind.

  ‘It’s about time you returned,’ Fiona’s annoyed feline voice chastised, as Jodi sat up in her sleeping furs. ‘I can’t believe you left me in this boring newbie zone for a whole three days.’

  ‘Sorry, I couldn’t break away sooner,’ Jodi said to her combat pet, as the Ranger lightly jumped to her feet from a sitting position. The smoothness of the difficult move brought a smile to her comely face. There was another pop of displaced air as the Blink Lynx appeared next to her to rub its furry head against the base of the Light Elf’s jaw. Reaching out with both hands, Jodi gave the large cat a hard scratching between her ears in greeting as they renewed their bond with one another. ‘But, I had family visiting and couldn’t break away.’

  ‘I’ll express my displeasure with you later. For now, you can apologize by scratching my back,’ Fiona imperiously said, as Jodi rolled her eyes at her unhappy girl while letting her scratching fingers move to her combat pet’s back.

  The Blink Lynx was nearly as large as a terrestrial lioness and was quite the hunter. She could blink in and out to anywhere within twenty-five feet of her line of sight. During battles, Fiona used this skill to get in close enough for a quick strike or vicious bite, before blinking away to safety. While her mini teleportation skill was a powerful ability, the Blink Lynx wasn’t a tank. She couldn’t handle going toe-to-toe against heavily armored mobs. She was more akin like having a high DPS Rogue on their team of two.

  Luckily, they worked well together. Enough so, that Jodi had been able to solo through most of her levels up until now. While that gave her a lot of freedom and was great on many different levels, it unfortunately didn’t translate well into completing actual dungeons. Those universally seemed to require a full team of players to complete and were the only areas they couldn’t handle with their team of two.

  A deep frown came to her lips at that thought. While Jodi loved playing in The World, so far, her experience with random pick-up groups had completely sucked. Partly, that was due to most of her gaming friends not signing up for The World in its Kickstart phase. Not that she blamed them, coming up with the money needed for one Egg had taken her two years to pay off. In that way, she’d lucked out that her husband wasn’t a hardcore gamer. Otherwise, that would’ve been a major expense for them to undertake, which was probably why the rest of her gaming crew had waited so long in deciding to purchase their own Eggs. Although, after her issues with finding a team, John had promised he’d look into getting another Egg so that they could play together.

  Unfortunately, that had left her in a bad situation in regards to her progression inside of the game. The simple fix for that should’ve been joining up with her brother and his wounded warrior guildmates. The problem with that was that she’d started in a completely different starting location. While that had been annoying as hell, she wasn’t about to do a death-run with fifty percent realism just to go level up with him and his buddies. That meant, she’d been stuck dealing with either assholes or immature douchebags that couldn’t keep their hands to themselves, until she was a high enough level to make the trek over to where her brother and his friends were. Needless to say, she’d been flagged for PVP so much that she’d given up on doing any of the numerous dungeons outside of Nren Unarith.

  ‘Trust me when I say that there’s no other place I’d rather be than right here with you, girl,’ Jodi said, as Fiona purred into her hands. Giving her a final pat, she stood up and began pulling on her gear and packing up. It was a relatively quick process. Strapping her quiver and daggers onto her back, she stuffed the sleeping rolls into her backpack, before strapping it in place. Standing up and picking up her bow, Jodi paused at the blinking system window at the bottom of her HUD. With a thought, she popped the window open.

  You have been invited to join The Revenants guild and the House of Kayden by the player Startum Ironwolf. Do you wish to accept? Yes or No

  For a long second, Jodi’s mental finger hovered over the “No” button. The problem was that she didn’t understand why Thomas had insisted that she join this disturbing man’s guild. Even though her brother had promised her that everyt
hing wasn’t what it seemed and that she’d understand once they had a chance to talk, the brief search she’d done on the forums on Startum Ironwolf had left her sick to her stomach. If it hadn’t been for her own brother, of all people, telling her that the man was cool, she’d have told him to fuck off in no uncertain terms. Even so, Jodi was at a loss at what her older brother could possibly see in this complete tool.

  It was even more confusing when she’d realized that the entire Devil Dog guild was supporting this unknown player. They were either building up the defenses to his castle or helping him create havoc on the other side of the starting area. It was odd that none of the veterans seemed to be concerned that this guy was PKing players in the newbie zone outside of Delonshire or raping and pillaging the city of Darom. The list of the asshole’s crimes didn’t stop there. The biggest thread currently going around the forums was the video on how he’d destroyed the city of Telrain with his undead hordes. From what everyone was saying, the man had cold-bloodedly slaughtered all of the NPCs and players inside the city without a care in the world. It was almost like he was trying to be a digital Genghis Khan.

  If all off that didn’t make you want to hang the guy on sight, he was a misogynist pig to boot on top of everything else. There were pictures all over the forums of his harem of NPC girls that he’d blackmailed into servicing him. Even sicker were the screenshots of the two monster girls that he’d somehow managed to enslave. While the Centaur woman was straight up bizarre, she had nothing on the naked Half-Orc slave. The terrible scars all over the slip of a girl’s green body made her want to puke. Jodi knew The World was an open sandpit, but my god, you’d have thought V-MMORG would’ve been forced to draw the line somewhere. What could Thomas or any of the Devil Dogs possibly say that would make her accept this vulgar man’s guild invite?