by G. D. Penman
Martin had to keep him talking, but he had to admit that this latest emotional attack stung more than he would have liked. “I don’t think I’m better than everyone, Dante…”
The Sythvan’s voices were typically smooth and sonorous, but he could hear Dante’s crack when he screamed. “Oh, like hell you don’t. You think I didn’t see you and your little all-star team sneaking off to play here without us? You thought we were just going to take it lying down? We were Iron Riot. Not you. We were the ones on the frontlines in every raid while you stood at the back doing your math.”
Martin paced across the room toward his old guildmate, the Brotherhood parting ahead of him. “You didn’t let me finish. I don’t think I’m better than everyone, Dante. I just think I’m better than you.”
The slit pupils in Dante’s gormless face snapped open. “Kill his ass! Kill him!”
Martin started laughing as the whole of the Brotherhood came at him. His sword lit up with Celestial Strike, and he waded into the swirling melee as it descended on him.
[Zetar has suffered 10 light damage]
[Zetar has suffered 9 slashing damage]
He opened the face of one Wulvan then ducked under the sweeping axe of another
[MISS]
The next two steps were clear. There was empty air between him and Dante. Martin got to see the rage twisting into fear as the distance closed. Then a studded flail of blackened steel whipped around from behind to smash into his face.
[Skaife has suffered 14 bludgeoning damage]
It knocked him off his feet, then the Brotherhood piled on. They were packed in too close to swing a weapon, but not too close to stomp on him.
[Skaife has suffered 7 bludgeoning damage]
[Skaife has suffered 9 bludgeoning damage]
[Skaife has suffered 8 bludgeoning damage]
It was a horrible way to go. The powerlessness was worse than any pain might have been. He’d beaten veritable demigods in this place, and now a posse of thugs got to stamp the light out of him. He didn’t like it, but if it worked, he’d tolerate it.
[Skaife has suffered 9 bludgeoning damage]
The crowd parted and Dante was there. Looming out of the darkness. “Let’s see how smart you talk with no teeth.”
He lifted up his foot and Martin braced himself for impact. But it didn’t come. A rush of gray fur moved by, and suddenly Dante just wasn’t standing there anymore. A breath later the screaming started. Martin was already pushing himself back onto his feet when Lindsay soared over him and rode one of the Knights to the ground, blades springing back and forth.
Jericho was in the midst of the Brotherhood, the broken corpse of Dante lying at his feet. Even for a Wulvan he seemed to be massive in the midst of them. Looming large in the sudden flare of red light as his class switched from Martyr to Heretic. The Brotherhood seemed to be paralyzed by indecision. This was the downside of their strict discipline, if there was nobody to shout out commands, they had no idea what to do next.
Meanwhile, without his guidance, Martin’s friends were doing exactly what they did best. He flung himself back up onto his feet and hacked at the closest enemy. There were still plenty of them, and they were more than strong enough to kill the guild, if they could just get them to act.
The Corvan Knight with the flail who’d nailed Martin earlier was rushing at Jericho. He had two levels on the Heretic, better gear, better everything. It would have been easy to lose to him. If Jericho would just die.
Vengeance flared out in red flashes as Jericho casually flagellated himself with the cat o’ nine tails he used as a weapon. Sweeping over all the Brotherhood and chipping away at their health one crack of the whip at a time. That destructive energy surrounded Jericho like a roiling storm, just waiting for someone brave enough to step up and swing for him.
The Corvan closed the distance, leapt and swung his flail straight down at Jericho’s head. The thunderclap of vengeance unleashed was almost deafening in this close proximity. Powerful enough to launch the unfortunate attacker back across the pit to land at Martin’s feet. His beak was in bloody shards. The face behind it blooming out like some big flower. He wouldn’t be getting up again.
Out of instinct more than any real malice, Martin hamstrung one of the casters as they fled past him, sending the Sythvan skidding face first across the cavern floor.
[Hognose has suffered 29 slashing damage]
Too many of the Brotherhood were panicking. Too many were breaking and running instead of facing them. It was ridiculous. This fight should have easily gone to them, they didn’t even need to be organized. If they could just out-heal Jericho’s vengeance then everything else would be a piece of cake.
Jericho did not seem satisfied. The few loyal Brotherhood soldiers who stood their ground couldn’t touch him without returning damage to themselves. Lindsay was doing an admirable job of slicing her way through their healers and casters. Even Julia was topping off their health as they went, despite the whole point being for the Brotherhood to kill them all.
Martin couldn’t be mad about it. He was moving to the beat of the same drum, following the same instincts that had brought them this far. When the ones facing Jericho turned and ran, he blocked their escape. When a caster got too close with fire coiling between her claws he lopped off her scaled hand with a Smite.
[Theroma has suffered 21 light damage]
[Theroma has suffered 20 slashing damage]
Old instincts died hard, but Martin kept trying to reassure himself that the numbers would win out in the end. They were outmanned and overpowered. The moment the Brotherhood mounted a serious defense, it would all be over.
No longer content to wait for them to come to him, Jericho charged at the stragglers. Martin only realized what was happening a moment before it was too late. “Jericho, no!”
The Heretic roared, “Jericho, yes!”
It was as though he’d forgotten about the whip in his hand entirely, he fell on the Brotherhood with hooked fingers and gnashing teeth. More animal than man.
The first bite crushed a faceplate, leaving the Sythvan inside the armor screaming in terror, but there was to be no salvation for her. Jericho’s fist was all that met her cry for help. Over and over, he pounded his fist into her face, bearing her down to the ground and still punching and punching until the body beneath him faded away entirely.
Lindsay had been doing her usual job of harrying anyone trying to make their escape all too well. The few who had managed to get enough distance logged themselves out the moment they felt safe. Anyone who stood their ground and tried to fight died. Martin had stopped swinging his sword, throwing himself in front of the Brotherhood in the dim hope that one of them might lash out, but all eyes were on Jericho and his rampage.
Martin had spent so much time making them all into a perfectly oiled machine, capable of running at maximum capacity without any intervention on his part, it had never even occurred to him that sometimes he might need to lose.
All of the effort that Martin had taken to decipher both sides of Jericho’s build, Martyr and Heretic, was to make him the most effective version of either. He’d made a monster.
When the last of the Brotherhood died, Martin had given up entirely. He’d waded out of the fight, walked past Julia, who was still frantically healing, and tossed himself down against the wall away from the bigger pools of blood to try and think.
They’d just given the Brotherhood the biggest advantage he could imagine in this moment, and he needed a moment to plan their next move. It wasn’t like the game hadn’t been challenging before, but the obstacles being thrown up in this last deep felt different. This was not a natural difficulty curve, it was the first sign of the living, thinking opposition that the “ecosystem” of Strata had promised, compounded by his own team’s inability to think critically.
He was so lost in his reverie that it took a solid kick from Lindsay to stir him out of it. “Okay, so that didn’t go exactly the way you planned.”<
br />
He let out a half-hearted laugh. “Not exactly.”
She sank down beside him. “So, what do we do now?”
“We? We do nothing.” Martin closed his eye. “You all log out. Live your lives. Have a late dinner. Make conversation. Whatever it is you do. I’m going to work this through.”
“Dude, we’re not going to leave you in some pit just because you couldn’t solve an impossible puzzle the first time you saw it. Everyone needs a break sometimes.” She nudged him with her shoulder. “Come out too. Start fresh bright and early tomorrow.”
Her sympathy made the situation worse, not better. He didn’t need anyone’s pity. “This is my break. This is my downtime. This is my bright start. Just give me a chance to think. Give me some time.”
“Martin, seriously. Come out.” She was leaning against him now. The full length of her body against him. “We can do voice-chat dinner. Eat some nasty takeaway food and make fun of Jericho going totally Donkey Kong on the BiX Boys.”
Martin heard rather than saw their Heretic approaching. Stomping steps on the bare stone. “I do not ‘Donkey Kong.’ I win our battles and kill our enemies, while you lie on ground getting kicked.”
Julia was there too, speaking softly. “Even when we need them to kill us.”
“If your best plan is losing,” Jericho growled. “I don’t need your plan.”
Lindsay cut off the argument before it could start. “We’re going to take a break for the night, give our little brainbox here a chance to work things through.”
Martin opened his eye in time to see Jericho spit, “More time lost. More time wasted. The Brotherhood are getting ahead of us every minute we wait. I say we kill each other, respawn. Start over that way. Everyone knows it is easiest solution, but we are all pretending it isn’t.”
That little pronouncement hung over them for a long moment until Martin sighed. “That was my first thought too. It won’t work.”
“Just because someone else solves problem,” Jericho snorted. “He says it will not work.”
“There are too many variables to abandon our position here for an earlier one. How do we ensure that we all die at the same time? What is the game’s reaction to suicide if we fail to perfectly coordinate? What will the response be back in Deephaven when we show up in our dark classes? From what we’ve seen, I’d assume they’ll become hostile. Are we going to get instantly attacked the moment we spawn back in there and get caught in a recursive loop of death and respawning? If we manage to break out, are the Brotherhood waiting outside of town, ready to ambush us? Are the Felidavans already back in their position, ready to ambush us? If we can’t beat the Felidavan in our dark classes, without a tank, will we end up back here, or will they kill us and leave us to break out of Deephaven in the same recursive loop? If we get past the initial Felidavan defense and successfully reset to our usual classes, will we be able to press on through the rest of the deep with Deephaven turned hostile?”
Jericho held his hands up. “Alright, alright! Such a tiny head, full of so many worries.”
“Just give me tonight to come up with a solution.” Martin rose to his feet. “If we wait until morning we’ll miss the Brotherhood respawn back in Deephaven, and that’ll give your idea better odds anyway.”
“My idea?” Jericho took a step back as Martin rose. “I thought you thought of it already?”
A small smile was all that he could muster in response. “I was being polite.”
After that, there was nothing more to say. Julia came over to give him an awkward hug before she logged out, with a whispered, “I’m sorry,” hissed in his ear for good measure.
Jericho logged out without even the hint of an apology, and once again Martin and Lindsay were alone. “I can hang out. I don’t have anything else to do. We can talk it through. You want to bounce some ideas around?”
“Go eat something. Get a good night’s sleep. You’re going to be working hard tomorrow.”
Lindsay looked torn, but she didn’t argue with him. She just gave him one half-hearted pat on the shoulder before vanishing in a beam of blinding light. Finally, he was alone in the dark.
He let silence settle for a moment. Took a deep breath. Opened his eye. “You can come out now.”
Time ticked on, but Martin didn’t second guess himself. “Whenever you’re ready. I’ve got all night.”
“Worked it out then, did you?”
When the Master appeared, it was without any of the carefully orchestrated subtlety of Lindsay’s stealth or Speckles’ cloak. It was more like somebody flipping a switch. One moment he was invisible, the next he was there.
“It wasn’t hard,” Martin let his self-satisfied smile show. “You did a shoddy job.”
The Master floated close, his robes fluttering in an unseen wind. “Such a shoddy job that you have no means of escape from it.”
“Building a dead end isn’t some genius masterstroke, it is one of the most basic screw ups in game design.” Martin gave him a slow clap. “Well done, you’re as smart as the guy that coded the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy game.”
“It doesn’t take a work of genius to stop you. Just a simple trap.” The Master came closer and closer, until the dark hollow beneath his hood was an inch from Martin’s pointed snout. “The simplest trap, really – a hole in the ground.”
Martin didn’t back down. “The hole is monkey-level thinking, but programming the Felidavans to capture everyone that comes along and throw them in here, just to stop me. I’m touched you care so much.”
“Hah.” The Master drifted on through Martin as if he wasn’t even there. “You still know nothing.”
Martin called out over his shoulder. “So tell me.”
“You’re the genius, work it out for yourself.”
The Master continued to drift, moving right into the wall of the pit. “So what, you’re done stalking me now?”
“Whether you have realized it yet or not, you are neutralized. You no longer require my attention.”
Martin watched the patch of plain stone for a while, waiting to see if the Master was really that sure of himself, but he didn’t return. Martin’s smirk became a grin. He loved being underestimated. The Master had given him everything he needed to escape the pit without even realizing it.
Over the course of the next four hours, Martin moved his way around the entire pit, his little clawed hands pressed firmly against the stone. Hand over hand, he walked along. Tapping and scratching like the rat he resembled, until finally his claw touched something softer. He tapped again. Softer than stone. Not soft, exactly, but softer. He pressed a little more firmly and his finger began to sink in. Moving up and down, he traced out the invisible seams where the texture he could see and the shapes he could feel did not match. The place where, in his hurry to screw Martin over, the Master had made a fatal mistake.
This wasn’t the first time the Masters had screwed him over like this. Last time, they’d left a hole big enough to stick his head through and make a mental map of the next deep from the outside. This time, they’d messed it up even more. Inch by nervous inch, Martin pushed his way out of the Dungeon of Strata and into the empty void beyond.
No light existed outside of the world the Masters had created. No light except for the green glow of the eye in the deep. The Heart of Strata, staring up at him. Always watching him. Here and in the real world he could feel its gaze. The weight of its attention.
Martin dragged his own eye away from it. A staring contest with a creature that the NPCs called the Gods Below was not going to end well for anyone, but Martin in particular needed to avoid it. For some reason, he had already gained its special attention. He did not need any more of it.
With the haphazard way that this pit had been slapped together, the exterior textures were a messy hodgepodge of sharp edges and odd shapes. He reached out and touched them. Felt the roughness under the pads on his fingers. They could climb this.
Taking another deep breath, Martin sh
uffled forward, hooking a leg on either side of the hole in the wall. Leaning further and further out into the darkness. Again, it was as he’d suspected. The pit had been dug down much further than it was meant to be. The rest of the current deep was up on the same level that the Felidavans had been lurking around earlier. The bottom of the pit was practically scraping the roof of deep twenty-two. All they’d need to do was climb down and jump. He took the best measurements he could by sight, then hauled himself back up into the pit and onto blessedly solid ground to do his calculations.
Fall damage was a flat amount based on the distance that characters travelled down. Even without healing, Martin was pretty sure that the drop from this floor to the floor of the next deep wouldn’t kill them. It would hurt, but so did everything in Strata, and it would definitely hurt less than having to fight their way out of Deephaven. It wouldn’t destroy their ability to safely respawn either.
Technically, it was cheating – he knew that in his heart of hearts – but it wasn’t hard to justify it to himself. Yes, they were cheating, but that was only because the Masters had cheated first. If they’d presented a problem that could be solved within the confines of the game that they’d made he would have been happy to bang his head against a figurative wall until he worked it out, but they didn’t trust in their own skills. They didn’t believe that the viable challenges of the game were sufficient to stop him, so they’d broken the rules. Anything he did to right that wrong could be morally justified, and if they tried to call him a cheat publicly afterwards, he’d be able to turn it around on them.
