by Pavel Kornev
Victor and Mia started to shoot at the enemy, with the archers on the neighboring hill being just as fast. Even the conjurer occasionally threw spiky balls of lightning down below.
It was slaughter, but it was but a prelude to an even greater massacre.
“Damn it!” I swore and rushed down the hill, forgetting about the orders of the berserker. “Get back! Retreat!”
No one heard me, and then the chaotic crowd of the undead suddenly bristled with the points of long pikes. The dead legionnaires stopped hiding behind the bodies of yesterday’s peasants and stepped forward, immediately impaling almost half of the careless players.
Two dozen lost souls flew over the river with a terrible howl. The flying undead started to pepper the archers in the towers with arrows, but the latter confidently paid them back and the ranged combat players quickly switched to these new aerial targets because the rusty armor of the spirits couldn’t act as proper protection.
The surviving defenders of the crossing fell back from the square and the dead legionnaires immediately got rid of the clumsy zombies, making an even front and forming a wall of rectangular shields. The pikes became a deadly fence and the undead creatures moved to the attack in equal lines.
Grakh couldn’t do anything in this situation. A Berserker Rage and Stoneskin were quite a lot of help in battle, but the barbarian couldn’t get through their monolithic formation. He would simply be skewered with spears.
“Wait!” I growled as I ran into the square and went into stealth mode. I immediately got myself in front of the enemy formation and struck out with a chain of battle moves. I didn’t strike at the legionnaires, who were protected by a wall of closed shields, but at the poles of their black pikes.
The Scythe of Death burned away more than half of my Stamina, but it was worth it — the wild swings of my flamberge left a significant hole in the fence of spears, easily cutting off their points.
I raised my undulating blade again and brought it down in a powerful strike on my nearest opponent. The sword shattered a shield and threw the legionnaire back. A breach appeared in the formation... And I ran away!
My Dodge skill helped me avoid a pike aimed at my side. A fiercely roaring Grakh jumped up to the legionnaires in several rapid bounds and burst into their ranks. His huge double-headed axe slashed in a semicircle, cutting through armor, crippling and knocking down the dead, with the newly encouraged players rushing after the berserker.
The formation of legionnaires scattered and the individual superiority of living warriors immediately made itself felt. The warriors in their solid black armor started to get killed one by one and pushed towards the gates, while the druid turned out to be quite a good healer and cast one healing spell after another. The green gleam of his magic kept flashing here and there.
I didn’t take part in the general carnage and returned to the foot of the hill. A couple of the undead that had spread out around the area targeted my subordinates. I cut down one from behind and slashed open the head of another. I received almost no experience for them.
Everything was going quite well for us in the square — the players that were led by the huge barbarian were pushing the dead legionnaires onto the bridge, while the archers destroyed all of the flying spirits and launched their arrows in a curve, shooting at the reinforcements that were coming to help the dead. The huge numbers of undead kept falling from the bridge into the river.
“Charge them!” Grakh shouted as he swept a legionnaire off its feet and swung his terrible axe. However, he didn’t attack the stunned warrior but the fingers of the mountain troll.
He hit him once, twice, then three times. He struck at him while completely ignoring the blows of the shortswords coming from all directions. The druid kept healing the berserker.
The ravaged hand of the dead troll slipped off the bridge so it had to keep hanging on one arm. The legionnaires that lost their balance flew into the water, while the barbarian used several powerful blows to cut through the monster’s other wrist. Its giant body let go of the bridge and fell downwards.
The undead fighters retreated and were replaced by skeleton crossbowmen, but the archers at the tops of the towers quickly chased the undead away.
The status quo had been restored.
Problem was, we’d already lost half our fighters and the gates even before any of the Death Disciples had joined the battle.
WE RETURNED to the tavern unhurriedly. We were tired and drenched, but we were satisfied. Mostly satisfied. The wounds that some had were so serious that the druid’s magic couldn’t quite deal with them and they needed divine healing or treatment from a surgeon. However, even the wounded forgot about their wounds when they looked at the game statistics. They were primarily interested in the progress of the Defend or Die quest.
It was amazing that my green bar filled over half the scale, even though the undead I’d killed weren’t particularly strong. The best result was shown by one of the bowmen and another couple of fighters that had done well in the fight by the bridge. There was Grakh as well, of course. He’d managed to gather three quarters of the experience needed to complete the task in one battle.
The red-haired boy joined me when I was already by the outskirts of the city, but I immediately sent him to sleep. I too wanted to go upstairs to my room, but Grakh clapped his hands several times to attract the attention of the players.
“Everyone must come back by the evening!” he declared. “They won’t storm the city during the day, so don’t waste you game time! We won’t fight back so easily tomorrow!”
“Too damn easy,” one of the wounded said as the tired players started to go to their rooms.
The only people that remained in the dining hall were me and Victor.
“What’s wrong with you?” the barbarian stared at us, his skin covered with welts from his latest scars.
The half-elf smoothed his tattooed head and explained, “My capsule has been rented, and the time hasn’t yet run out.”
“Same with me,” I lied.
The berserker nodded and shouted to the tavern keeper.
“Hey, boss! Bring us some beer! It’s my round!”
“You shouldn’t,” I tried to refuse but the barbarian didn’t listen. He looked down at me from his great height and slapped me on the shoulder. “You really helped us, John! I heard that warriors with two-handed swords used to break open spear formations by cutting through the poles of their weapons!”
Victor sat down at our table and chuckled. “The only thing is that the legionnaires didn’t have spears,”
“I am talking of another time!” the berserker dismissively waved his hand, grabbed one of the mugs brought by the tavern keeper and saluted us. “To victory!”
The half-elf drank some beer, but I didn’t follow the archer’s example, chuckling instead. “I’ll drink it in my room.”
“You won’t take off your mask?” Grakh narrowed his eyes.
“I won’t,” I confirmed.
The barbarian just shrugged and drunk from the mug again. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and shook his head. “I don’t understand you, John. You walk around with a two-handed sword, but you have no armor...”
I sat on a chair and sighed. “I used to have armor. It’s left somewhere in the fields.”
“Why don’t you buy a new set?” the barbarian asked with surprise.
“Where? It’s like the city has died out!”
Victor finished his beer and made a suggestion. “There’s a weapon shop by the pier. I bought some arrows there.”
“There you go!” Grakh pointed his finger at me. “Get something. Otherwise they’ll do you in with a couple of hits, even though guys like you will still be useful to us. By the way, do you want to join a clan at all? You seem to be rather decent guys!”
Me and the archer looked at each other in confusion. Clans were a good thing. However, choosing a clan would force the selection of the Light or Dark side and I’d never heard of the B
lack Trackers before.
Damn it. What clan?
I was a walking corpse! We were sitting and talking to each other nicely right now, but if they discovered the truth, my drinking buddies would immediately go for their weapons! This wasn’t good in any way! I wasn’t an undercover policeman that was infiltrating a gang or a secret agent in a terrorist lair, I was a corpse! It wasn’t romantic at all!
Victor and Grakh exchanged contact details, while I just promised to think about the barbarian’s proposal.
“Do you think we’ll manage to hold fast?” I asked.
The berserker suddenly gave me an honest answer. “Nope. If we don’t get reinforcements, we’re toast,” he looked at the empty hall. “Just keep this between us, all right?” he warned.
“Silent as the grave!” I chuckled.
The half-elven archer frowned. “Why won’t we manage? We defended well enough today!”
“There were no Death Disciples around today,” the barbarian screwed his face up with disappointment. “Magic would completely crush us. We just have a barely trained conjurer and a druid in our team and they won’t make much of a difference.”
I nodded. “Yes, I already noticed that mages are nowhere to be seen. Quite strange.”
“It is strange,” Grakh agreed. “But we did have some! Then they disappeared somewhere.”
“Mages and priests know how to build portals,” Victor suggested.
“So where will they go next with the deserter’s mark?” the berserker snickered. “However, who knows what mages are thinking? They could bribe everyone and anything is available for money. You just need to count it.”
“Yes. By the way,” I remembered. “Did you see the white sorceress? I couldn’t look at her properly, but her level must be rather high. She had four warriors as her bodyguards. Probably mercenary NPCs.”
“No, I never saw her,” Grakh answered after thinking for a short time and then looked at the archer. “What about you, Victor?”
The half-elf silently shook his head. Silence fell.
I asked a question to fill the uncomfortable pause. “What about the Lord of the local Tower — the Shadow Puppeteer or whatever? Won’t he help us?”
“He’ll help us in the city,” Grakh said. “But there are too few of us to fight in the street. We won’t hold the city.”
“I’m sick of these undead now!” Victor swore. “Damn it, couldn’t the developers think of something better? Some sort of demon? Succubi?”
The barbarian shrugged his powerful shoulders.
“At least there’s some movement. The Light and Dark used to kill each other before, but now there’s a new force.”
The archer didn’t agree with this statement. “A new force?” he snorted with disgust. “What sort of force is that? Cannon fodder! How can players join the side of the dead? Feel like a walking corpse! Level 5 zombie, heh. They’re a piece of piss to crush.”
“Look deeper,” Grakh advised. “All of the Towers of Power are controlled by Light and Dark gods right now, who are AIs and moderators. What about the Tower of Decay? When the kingdom of the dead falls, who will get it?”
Victor frowned, deep in thought, but then immediately waved it away. “They’ll just give it to the next tramp that comes along!”
“Not necessarily,” the barbarian shook his head. “Some clan could take it for itself.”
“What’s the point in that? The Spawn of Darkness and Sons of Light are the projects of the developers. It’s a well known fact!”
“There are other clans,” Grakh said meaningfully.
Me and Victor could only laugh. The Sons of Light and the Spawn of Darkness were fighting for supremacy in the game from day one, while the Blades of Chaos who were third in the rankings, had had no chance to fight them for the leadership.
Victor got up from behind the table. “Time for me to go.”
I also decided to leave the dining hall and went to my rented room. I felt vile about myself.
A game world was a new world. People didn’t just level up their characters and smoked monsters but also interacted with each other, found new friends and even fell in love.
And me? I survived. I did all I could. I hid.
Just like in real life.
What the hell...
6
ONCE I’D GOTTEN to my room, I’d sent the boy to bed — I really had to come up with a name for him, dammit! — and perched on the windowsill and staring into the night. The storm kept raging, dashing water against the window panes.
I didn’t give a damn. Let the living suffer from their joint pains.
I disabled Incognito. My internal energy levels began to creep out of the red. But even that didn’t make me happy. Stone Harbor wasn’t such a big city, after all. I could always go back to the hotel and restore. But what was I going to do in the capital? Was I supposed to lurk in some dark corner waiting for my internal energy to pick up? That was a problem.
I still had to get there, anyway.
I shrugged, driving the gloomy thoughts away. I really had to use the opportunity to level up Incognito once I reached level 35. It just might require less energy.
Would be good, wouldn’t it?
IN THE MORNING, I paid the orc for the following night and left. The sun had already risen above the rooftops but the sky was covered with a thick layer of clouds. Some may call it miserable, but at least the bright light didn’t offend my dead eyes. It was drizzling; the wind was driving the rain from one side of the street to the other. My cape got soaked immediately.
The door slammed behind my back. I turned round and saw Mia who’d left the tavern after me.
“You’re n early riser?” I smiled.
“You’d better get washed up, Scarecrow!” the thief girl walked past me, demonstratively pinching her nose. When she was about to turn a corner, she swung round and shouted to me, “And once you get clean, come to the bridge! It’s gonna be fun!”
I very nearly followed her but reconsidered just in time. I shook my head and made for the pier.
The wretched stench of decay! It deprived the walking dead like myself of any kind of social life.
Last night I hadn’t gotten the chance to see the city which was why I now got lost very quickly and ended up by the Tower of Power, of all places. Or rather, to the houses that surrounded the town square. You could only get inside through one of the four arches. There was no other way of access. There were no windows in the walls, either. It was a veritable fortress.
I continued on my way until I came to a small market. There, I came across the first townspeople. They looked, how can I put it, rather scared.
I’d also stumbled into the inseparable Ripper and Thorn Master. I wanted to ignore them but the warrior noticed me and shouted,
“Hey, Scarecrow! Are you coming to the bridge?”
“Later!” I said before turning off into a side street. I didn’t mind the druid but his friend was driving me up the wall. Or was I afraid of him? I just didn’t know what to expect from him, and that drove me absolutely mad.
Even if the two had followed me, they must have fallen away quickly. I spent some more time meandering around the crooked side lanes until I came to a straight street from where I could see the gray waters of the Twisted Lake.
That was exactly what I needed!
As I approached to the lake, the wind became fiercer. Now it wasn’t playing with you anymore but blew in powerful gusts over the waves which roared, crashing over the pier and covering the cobblestones in white foam.
The water was rising. The bottoms of the house doors were boarded up. I walked out into the open and was very nearly blown over by the wind. The bay was empty, free from both boats and locals. The expired lighthouse towered on a cliff nearby. Now in the light of day it gave me the impression of being shrouded in a bleak gray haze. It wasn’t darkness neither shadows but something completely different.
Although it could have been my imagination.
I looked around and saw the shop sign of an armorer swinging in the wind. I hurried over to it. The door wasn’t locked. A dwarf with a braided gray beard stood behind the counter. A curved dagger was stuck in his belt. A hatchet lay on the counter next to his hand.
He didn’t seem thrilled by my visit.
“I don’t think I can help you today, stranger,” he said, preempting my questions. “The city guards have confiscated all my stock. And I can’t order anything new because of this wretched storm!”
“Yeah, it’s a real humdinger,” I agreed. Still, I wasn’t in a hurry to leave. I studied the empty shelves. There were virtually no weapons or armor left on display but there were plenty of arrows and batches of crossbow bolts in drums near the counter.
“Come some other time,” he suggested.
“You think you might have a set of armor for me?” I asked.
“Hm,” he said pensively. “I have this thing that doesn’t fit anyone.’
He reached under the counter and produced the finest chainmail shirt I’d ever seen. “This is double Elven weave!”
I whistled but immediately lost interest. The item had a “Only for the warrior of Light” restriction on it. I wouldn’t be gaining anything by acquiring it.
“Well, as you wish,” the dwarf shrugged. “I did tell you my stock is limited.”
“I wanted to buy a present for a necro I know,” I said. “You don’t happen to have something from the Deadman’s set, do you?”
Predictably, he shook his head. “I would have sent you to a couple of places where you could have asked about it,” he said, “but they’re all shut now. Wretched storm!”
I heaved a sigh. “And what’s with your lighthouse?”
“The wretched lighthouse! The moment it went out, the storm started.”
I nodded and left. I hadn’t even tried to offer him my trophy amulets. If Isabella managed to ID them, I wouldn’t have to fork out to have it done by a professional sorcerer. Also, the prices in the capital were probably better. They might fetch me more.
