That Wasn't the Plan

by Jason Cheek

  “Please excuse, Ruirze’s indiscretion,” Sub-Leader Chuzedros said, giving me a slight bow as she frowned at her subordinate. “He didn’t realize the flying rat was yours.”

  “Mistakes happen,” I said, waving the incident away as Neysa returned to my side, but not before giving the Dark Elf a warning growl. Patting my girl’s flank to calm her down, I called out to Angie and her people with a smile as they came to an abrupt stop around us. “Took you guys long enough.”

  “Are you kidding me?” Angie growled, in a voice that was barely understandable. “That descent was a lot harder than it looked.” Her barrel-shaped head swung around to take in the Dark Elves, before returning to look down at me. “I take it there were no problems?”

  “Nope, we’re good,” I jerked my chin at the Shadow Assassins. “Mike had his people keeping the Chaos Storm Alliance members away from the pass. As soon as everyone makes it down, we’ll head to their main camp.”

  “What do you mean as soon as everyone makes it down?” Sub-Leader Chuzedros asked in obvious surprise, as her eyes took in the Druids with a frown. While the Druids Were-forms looked vicious, it was easy to dismiss them once you saw their lower levels, especially if you had an entire force over level 40. Little did the Shadow Assassins know that each of them were Nightmare start players.

  “You’ll see,” I said, giving her a shit-eating grin. Fishing around in my rucksack, I found one of the wineskin’s from our party in Darom and held it up. “Anyone want a pull while we wait?”

  Chapter One.Thirty-One

  (Thursday, May 8th / Day 18 of The World.)

  It was nearly two thirty in the morning when we reached the outskirts of Mike’s encampment. By then, Sub-Leader Chuzedros and the rest of the Shadow Assassins’ attitudes had done a one hundred and eighty degree turn as to the worth of our forces. It had actually been almost comical watching the incredulous looks on their faces as more waves of troops came rushing out of the pass. I thought the stern woman was going to choke on her tongue when we all started raising our zombie pets all at once.

  Yeah, I had everyone wait until the last of my Kayden Troopers were down. It definitely made an impression when a mix of nearly fifteen hundred level 35 and 65 zombie monsters rose to their clawed feet all at once. Needless to say, any superiority complex the Dark Elves might have had about being higher level and more numerous than us when we first met disappeared in the blink of an eye.

  There had been Shadow Assassins guarding the approach to the ridge of the camp. A group of them had appeared out of stealth when we’d nearly reached the crest of the rise. I’d seen them ahead of time when they were still about fifteen yards out as I silently chortled at my new ability. I was still unsure of how powerful it was, but not being able to be so easily sneaked up upon by Rogues and Assassins was huge. Hopefully, I could figure out how to teach this to the rest of my people.

  The encampment itself was somewhat of a surprise. Mike had his people tucked into the northwestern part of the valley on the opposite side of a low rise. The unique spot hid his people from the players in besieging Domenic below and allowed them to have open fires without the worry of discovery. It was even hidden from anyone coming down the pass due to its oblique angle. The only negative I could see was that his options for retreat seemed very limited.

  Lying around the camp, there was a group of forty exhausted Shadow Assassins sitting around the various fire pits preparing meals and repairing their gear. Most were still recovering from the various wounds they’d picked up during the fight, which meant there was probably no healers amongst those present. The Dark Elves’ drawn faces took on a look of relief and wonder as our massive raid entered the camp. We’d barely made it twenty-yards in, when a familiar face came striding up with a wide grin.

  “Mike!” I called out excitedly, as a wide grin came to my face.

  “Jay!” Mike shouted back, before pulling me in for a buddy hug. We pounded each other’s backs, before he pushed me away to look me over.

  Just like in real life, he towered over me at six-foot, four-inches and had a martial artist’s muscular build. Although Mike was from Puerto Rico, he’d grown up in the states and was probably the coolest person I knew. All the ladies went gaga over him and he had a knack with getting along with the various social circles in High School, which I had failed at miserably. While he’d always been handsome, the pitch black skin and pointy ears of a Dark Elf looked extremely good on him, even though he’d chosen to keep his buzz-cut instead of going with one of the more unique Dark Elf hair styles.

  Even more of a shock, Mike was rocking level 45. I could see the twinkle in his eyes as he waited for me to comment on being out leveled, but I refused to give him the satisfaction. Besides, he wasn’t the one taking the road trip and missing out on the opportunities to grind out experience points daily. That was the worst part of this whole trip taking the time out of my leveling to help Domenic out. I was being passed by in levels by the other professional players, which I had no doubt would come back to bite me in the ass later on in the game. For now, all that I could do was hope to remain within range of the top leveled players in The World.

  “Nice armor there, buddy” Mike said, checking out my black coral armor pieces. “Is that … stone.”

  “Black coral grown to fit,” I said, thrusting my chest out proudly, as Mike playfully socked me in the gut. Comparing uber-equipment was always a thing amongst friends in an MMO. Pushing the big oaf away, I gave him an excited grin. “The best part about it is that I can still use my stealth, besides the enchantments are pretty nice too.” I nodded to the leather weave he was wearing. “What kind of leather armor is that? It looks sharp as hell.”

  “Steel wire woven into Black Death leather,” Mike stated proudly, as he stood back to let me get a better look at his gear. Seeing my face screw up at the Black Death comment, he explained. “They’re massive snakes that are thicker than a man that plague the tunnels under Thayjar and are known for their exceptionally tough hide and paralytic poison.”

  “Sweat,” I said automatically, as I checked out the metal threads woven into the leather. “I haven’t seen steel yet in The World.”

  “Yeah, it’s pretty rare,” Mike said proudly, I blackmailed some dwarves into giving it up. Seeing my raised eyebrows, he just gave me a sly grin. “Hey, I’m the head of the House of Midnight.”

  Mike promised to catch me up on everything that had been going on once we got everyone settled. Seeing Ayda’s wretched state, I asked a few of the troopers to help get her squared away for the night, before going back to working with the various Sub-Leaders. It took some time, but the work went relatively smoothly. By the time we’d finished up and settled around a campfire to talk; all of my friends, Assault Leader Dell, the guild leaders, and officers from Uten Syn, Krasnyy Volki, and the Mates guilds had also joined us. While everyone relaxed and ate, Mike explained to me that he’d only been able to grab the Assassin’s faction of The World’s’ underworld. Although that had officially completed his Nightmare quest, he was currently battling another two players for the Rogues and Thieves factions. While it all sounded pretty cool as quests go, it was completely different than the Nightmare quest that I’d been required to complete.

  Our conversation naturally moved to the situation in the valley with Domenic. Mike said that while he still had two groups in play harassing the graveyards, they’d been regulated to just an annoyance. With the new Emergency Hot Fixes that came out this morning, all they could do now was take players out for five to six hours before they were back in the fight. While it was enough to stop the Chaos Storm Alliance from overwhelming Domenic’s defenses, there was no way that his people could keep this up for much longer. Already, his force of Shadow Assassins could only recover half of their total endurance, because of the strain being put on them to fight around the clock. Meeting my eyes, he gave me his honest opinion.

  “Without being able to permanently de-level their forces, I don’t see any way
for us to get Domenic out of this mess.” His gaze took in the new faces that had come with me before continuing. “Even with our NPCs leveling up with the players they kill, they don’t have the same endurance of a player to keep on fighting nonstop. Once we lose our NPC troops, they’ll roll over the rest of us without any problems.”

  “So either Domenic falls now or he falls later,” Mike said apologetically. “I don’t see any other way around it.”

  Looking at the glum faces around the campfire, I made the signal to cut off my video stream and gave everyone a sly grin. Seeing the questioning look on everyone’s faces, I rolled my eyes and waved for them to hurry it up. “Come on and cut off your Twitch Stream if you have one running.” Once everyone with a channel had followed suit, I looked Mike directly in the eye.

  “Is there another way out of this valley that’s not visible on the map?” I asked, as everyone looked at me strangely not understanding where I was going with this.

  “There’s a small goat-like path that went through the mountains along the coast,” Mike said, after making sure I was really okay with sharing this information out with our new allies. “It lets out somewhere above Lodenburg, but could be taken all the way to Dolurn if needed.”

  “Alrighty then,” I said, excitedly rubbing my hands together. “What if I said we could pack up Domenic’s fortress and get the hell out of dodge?”

  Seeing the incredulous looks on the faces of those that hadn’t been with us to rescue the Uten Syn guild, I began laying out my plan. After seeing the makeup of the forces attacking Domenic and their disposition, I realized that the plan I’d been working on for the last several days was still valid. That is, if our new allies were willing to follow my plan. The good thing was that if it didn’t work out the way that I hoped, we wouldn’t lose anything but time and showing our hand that we were in the valley.

  Everyone added their two cents into the idea that I proposed. Most were small tweaks, but while I’d expected them from Thomas and Mike, I hadn’t expected it from Sarka. Most of the tweaks she suggested were small but important enough to change the flow of battle. It truly showed off her knowledge of the various classes she’d acquired from her short time of playing. It was like she was in a groove as she began tweaking the battle plan while everyone listened intently to her suggestions as I proudly watched her go. By the end of the discussion, Dangas and Dmitry said they were willing to give it a try. Mike assured us that his Shadow Assassins would be fine with the changes suggested and if it didn’t work out, they would just join up with the Russians and the Aussies instead.

  It was a pretty audacious plan, especially when you considered that we were facing somewhere in the range of four to five thousand players. Even so, I thought it would work as long as Julie wasn’t here. From our years of playing together, she would’ve immediately understood that I wasn’t going to fight against their strengths no matter how the initial attack started out. Besides, this was the only way I could think for all of us to get away before they understood what was happening and even then it was going to be ugly as hell.

  Unfortunately, even if Julie wasn’t their leader, there was no way the alliance was going to leave us alone after all of this. They’d have to publically humiliate us for having the audacity to attack them and win or no one would take them seriously. While going head-to-head against an organization this big was going to be a major pain in the ass, I honestly didn’t see how they could be any worse than the Hobgoblin invasion that was already headed our way. Well, except for most of them having access to Nightmare-level magic. That was going to suck big balls no matter how you sliced it. I just hoped that Domenic would be able to offer up some good anti-siege advice after everything he’d been through for the last week and a half, because I had a feeling we were going to need it.

  Speaking of Domenic, that was going to be another problem altogether, I thought sourly. He was going to be pissed once he heard our plan. Knowing him, he could very well tell us all to go fuck ourselves once he heard what I had to say. Not that I particularly blamed him. No one liked to be driven out of their home base, but, when it came down to it, there was no way for us to support each other against such a large enemy when we were so far away from one another. Shaking my head at the argument that I knew was coming, I made the signal to re-enable the video and looked around the circle.

  “So who’s coming with me to talk with Domenic tonight?” I asked, everyone around the campfire groaned out loud. Not that I blamed them, we’d had a day from hell and it wasn’t over yet.

  “It’s three thirty in the fucking morning, Star,” Sarka shouted at me in exasperation. Savagely gripping Yun’s hand as if she were afraid he’d argue, she continued apologetically. “Listen, neither of us wants to let you head into that mess alone, but we have to get some sleep. Otherwise, there’s no way we’re going to be able to function tomorrow.”

  “Hopefully, my bowels haven’t burst,” Unalia muttered under her breath to Tinyr, as they both wordlessly agreed with Sarka.

  “We’re logging,” Jill stated in no uncertain terms, as AJ and Krystal stood up with her. “Besides, it’s not like you need any of us to hold your hand.”

  “Just make sure you’re back in by nine,” Mike said, with a noncommittal shrug.

  “Why nine?” Hefe asked, as he stood up holding Bonne Smash’s hand.

  “That’s when the Chaos Storm forces change shifts,” Mike said, explaining his reasoning. “That should give us an hour to get everyone into position and remove any worries about getting jumped by their relief crew.” He grinned at all the exhausted faces looking back at him. “Besides, a little extra sleep wouldn’t hurt either.”

  No shit, I thought, as I gave a tired yawn. Besides, after what happened with the Uten Syn rescue, everyone understood the importance of not getting caught by a double login again as they proceeded to log out without any more chitchat. The Aussies and the Russians were right behind them. Due to the mismatch in time zones, the majority of players in both groups had already logged out. While the Uten Syn players were more spread out across the country, none of them knew Stealth at this time, so they went ahead and logged, promising to be back in the morning.

  “What about you guys?” Thomas asked, looking back and forth between me and Mike.

  “Forget about it,” Mike said, in his best mafia voice. “The first month of any new game is always like this. You have to figure on playing at least twenty hours a day if you’re going to be in the top hundred guilds.” He glanced over at me for support. “I’d even say the first six months.”

  “More or less,” I agreed, with a tired shrug. “It can be longer or shorter depending on how long it takes to get to the end game.” Thinking to how slow the leveling speed was in this game, I grimaced. “Although, I expect it’ll be longer with The World.”

  “Well, it’s not like we have much of anything going on in real life,” Thomas said, glancing meaningfully at Kenzie. I inwardly groaned as soon as the words left his mouth. Even I knew that Kenzie wasn’t interested in him on a romantic level.

  “Speak for yourself,” Kenzie snapped, giving him an annoyed look as the rest of the Devil Dogs shook their heads in pity at their fearless leader being shot down again. “Some of us have a life.”

  “Hey, I didn’t mean it like that,” Thomas defensively said, as I cut them both off before either one of them could really get going.

  “So does that mean you’re too busy to escort me into Domenic’s fortress?” I asked, speaking loud enough to force their focus onto me. “Don’t act like you’re coming until you get some stealth skills, Thomas.”

  “So, do you think we should escort his non-rogue ass or not?” Kenzie asked Zhou and Darkhorse, as she ignored Thomas’ hurt look. I figured it was better to have me put him down than Kenzie.

  “Why not,” Zhou said, giving Darkhorse a look before joining Kenzie. “It wasn’t like we were planning on doing anything but sleeping anyways.”

  “Hey,” Darkhorse
protested, “I didn’t know that was an option on the table.”

  “It wasn’t,” Zhou joked back, “I’m tired and have a headache.”

  All the Devil Dogs oohed and said burn as both rogues laughed it up. Their relationship was still new and everyone was giving them shit about it. At the same time, they didn’t want to make Thomas feel uncomfortable, since he was always getting shot down by Kenzie. Stepping up behind the warrior, Darkhorse clapped him on the shoulder.

  “No sense in everyone staying up for this last run,” Darkhorse said to Thomas and the rest of the Devil Dogs. “We’ll meet all of you back here in the morning at zero nine hundred hours.”

  “Sounds good,” Thompson said, as he logged out.

  “Till the morning,” Sara called out, before logging.

  “About time this day was over,” Theresa said, as both Cobra Kai twins said “g’night” and logged.

  “Thanks for coming with us,” I said to the three Devil Dogs who waved my words away, as they began to get ready to move out.

  “Just give me a second to get a messenger and we can head out,” Mike excused himself, as he waved down one of his Shadow Assassins.

  “You need us to come with you?” Ulia asked, with Keela, Rayne, and Brenna at her back. Neristhana didn’t bother asking as she silently went about checking over her gear. Looking around, I was surprises to see Fylreh standing next to Neysa and Helgath as if she were planning on going along with the rest of the Krasnyy Volki wolves.

  “Naw, it’s good. If we end up having to fight, it means we’ve messed up bad,” I said appreciatively. As they headed off, I called over to Dmitry. “Mind if we borrow your wolves?”

  “Is no problem,” Dmitry said, after shaking his head at seeing his wolves waiting behind Neysa. I silently reminded myself to ask Neysa about that before logging out, when a familiar voice called out to me.