Over the course of the next minute, you will have to make a decision about whether to read this document or not.
If time runs out without you making a decision, you will fail Truth Under a Lid.
If you decline to read the scroll of five seals, you will fail The Gods Return to Fayroll.
If you agree to read the scroll and then decline the quest, you will be assessed serious penalties. The game administration will inform you of what they are and how long they will last.
A timer started ticking away. At least, there’s nothing that says to burn it after reading. No, I was onward and upward to those gods and heroes. I’m a hero, too, if a small and sickly one. And I didn’t have a choice.
“I’m prepared to accept the quest.”
Five Seal Scroll
When they kicked the gods out of Fayroll, the Demiurges sealed the entrance to this reality five times over, protecting it and pouring no small portion of their power and strength into the seals.
If they are broken, the one who breaks them will receive enough power to summon the Departed Gods back to this world.
The five seals are located in places of concentrated energy in this world, each of them mortally dangerous both to the intelligent races in Fayroll and creatures with more power than mere mortals.
If you are stubborn, brave, and wise, however, you can walk this path.
Are you prepared to take your first step toward bringing divine light back to your world?
If you say yes, you will receive the location of the first seal.
If you say no, you will fail this quest and the entire series. You will also be assessed penalties, as you already agreed to complete this quest.
It was harsh but fair. Needless to say, I agreed. I kind of like not having to think about anything. Even the thought of what would happen to me if I declined made me chuckle.
You completed a quest: Truth Under a Lid.
Reward:
2000 experience
1000 gold
But that wasn’t all.
You unlocked Remains of Five Seals, a series of quests.
This is the fourth in The Gods Return to Fayroll series of quests.
Task: Find and break the five seals keeping the gods from entering Fayroll.
Reward for entire series:
70,000 experience
50,000 gold
A set item matching your class
Two random elite items
A random spell scroll
An elite crafting item
The next quest in the series
Note! This is one of five standalone series, but failing any of them will mean failing the entire quest.
Accept?
The reward, at least, was worth it, what with the pile of experience and the items.
You unlocked Sanctuary.
This is the first in the Path to the First Seal series of quests.
Task: Find the road to the land of the White Light, a strange and terrible place hidden from people in the old days.
Reward:
3000 experience
1000 gold
Valuable crafting item
The next quest in the series
Note! The approximate location is listed on your map.
Accept?
I was just happy I knew where to go. All the running around to who-knows-where had been wearing on me. I accepted the quest and pulled up my map.
It was in the North. The quest had been right about that “approximate” part, too. The red spot covered nearly a third of the entire North. Whatever, I’ll figure it out. I had plenty of friends up there, and I assumed someone must have seen something. I’ll check the forums, too.
Ort’s muttering had morphed into a recitative growing in volume. The red stone in his hands shone with a crimson light, throwing a scary-looking gleam onto the hermit’s face. The whole thing looked like the beginning of the Sabbath.
Suddenly, he fell silent. A second later, the amulet bathed his entire figure in a red light that looked like it was soaking into his body. His eyes rolled back, and he stood there like a statue of himself—not a movement, not a blink, not even, it seemed, a breath.
Maybe, I should get going, crossed my mind, but the whole thing stopped right then. The amulet died away; Ort livened up.
“Hey, are you okay?” I asked him nervously.
“Okay?” he laughed. “You have no idea how okay I am. Do you even know what that was?”
He shook the amulet in the air, and I noticed the gem was gone. The spot where it had been was empty.
“No idea. Care to enlighten me?”
“Now, sure.” Ort wasn’t just happy; it was like he was glowing. Although, given what had just happened, that could have been exactly what was going on.
“When the Demiurges kicked all those idiots out of reality, they lost some of their power. The Demiurges didn’t need it, they had to put it somewhere, and so it ended up compressed into that gem. And now…”
“You’re loaded up on free divine power. That’s pretty serious. Are you a god now?”
“Yes and no.” Ort rubbed his hands together. “Here, in Rattermark, I was never anybody, and I never will be anybody. The seals, the legacy of the past, and a lot more I’m not going to explain to you—there’s no time, and you wouldn’t understand, not because you’re an idiot; it’s just too complicated.”
“Then, why did you need it?” I shrugged. “Just because there was free energy lying around?”
“Like I told you, I’m nobody here. But in Rivenholm, where there’s nobody to hold me back, where there never have been and never will be any gods, I’ll be everything. I’ll be the one and only.”
The old man pulled the wand and the other scroll out of the casket.
“This parchment is my ticket over there. It’s only one-way, of course, and I can only use it once, but that’s fine. If you only knew how sick and tired I am of sitting in this cave.”
“And the wand?” I jabbed a finger at it.
“This?” Ort stuck it in his belt. “It’s a symbol of my power. Well, it’s a weapon, too, I guess, and I could use it to crack nuts if I wanted to.”
“Cool. Well, good luck. Who knows when we’ll see each other next? If I find my way over there, I’ll send up a prayer and see if you drop by to visit an old friend. It’s always nice to have a god as a friend.”
Ashen squinted at me. “What if you weren’t just an acquaintance? What if you were a personal friend of the god? I’m serious. Why don’t you come with me? No jokes, no conditions; I’m going to be everything there, and you’ll be the first power under me. Sure, you’ll have to do what I tell you to do, but you’ll be under a god!”
My eye twitched. I wasn’t expecting that.
“It’s true, you won’t have a place in my palace,” Ort said harshly, if honestly. “On the other hand, you’ll be able to do anything on earth! You’ll be free, really free!”
Hagen,
You have been offered the unique opportunity to get to Rivenholm without sailing through the Tigali Archipelago.
If you accept this offer, the following will happen:
All the quests you have open on Rattermark will be annulled.
You will be assessed a number of penalties for failing quests, including the social quest with the MacLynn clan. Note, however, that you will not be assessed penalties that only affect Rattermark.
A number of actions tied to Rattermark will be annulled.
Your reputation with a number of game factions, including a number of NPCs, will be annulled.
All items in your room will be lost forever.
If you accept this offer, you will receive:
A number of status benefits in Rivenholm (including clan benefits)
A number of hidden and epic quests related to the new divine order
Privileged access to new abilities and skills
The opportunity to take part in the Arrival of Ort Blazing, a continent-wide game event
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Note! If you accept this offer, you will never again be able to visit Rattermark, as this action cannot be undone.
Chapter Three
In which we find that night time isn’t the same for everyone.
I couldn’t help but sense a trick. Somebody outside the game was watching my face with interest through fogged glasses. The message was so odd, so involved, and I couldn’t believe Fayroll would draw up two pages of text listing everything that I’d just read. The only thing I couldn’t figure out was if Kostya himself had shown a little initiative or if it had come from over his head. On the other hand, maybe, they just modified the quest on the fly, and I’m making a lot out of nothing.
It would have been fun to agree, stick my tongue out at the world around me, and find myself a hundred and fifty thousand miles away. At my level, which wasn’t so low anymore, and with Ort’s help, we could have shown everyone in Rivenholm what was what.
Whatever, forget it. I put Rivenholm out of my mind, but not the trick. It was the kind of thing I could use to my advantage when I saw the right opportunity.
“Sorry, old man, but I can’t,” I said, throwing my arms up. “I really appreciate the offer, but I have a rendezvous with the gods here, not to mention all kinds of other things.”
“Idiot,” Ort replied rudely. “But hey, you made your own choice, so don’t come crying to me later.”
“Don’t worry. I won’t.”
The hermit grabbed a shoulder bag from the corner—one he’d clearly had waiting—looked around, and sighed. “Well, I’m off, then, to fame and a resplendent throne. Good luck, boy.”
“See you, Ort Ashen.” I held my hand out to the hermit. God, I mean.
“Blazing,” Ort replied as he took my hand. “It’s Ort Blazing, now.”
The new god took a few steps away, winked at me slyly, unrolled his scroll, and muttered something unintelligible. The parchment exploded into a blue flame that engulfed the figure of the old man. When it disappeared, he was gone.
“Off he goes,” I muttered.
The curtain by the entrance rustled, and I turned to see Nazir standing there.
“I don’t like wizards,” he said suddenly. “I’m glad he’s gone.”
“I hear you. Okay, wait there and make sure nobody comes in. I’m going to look around and see if he left me anything.”
I spent the next ten minutes digging around the cave, or, at least, the spots I could get to. There were probably hidden stashes, but I didn’t find them. You needed a special skill, developed and powerful, for that. I should bring a good thief or maybe Tren-Bren here.
Still, I did get something: fifty gold, including a coin with an odd description.
Gold sovereign from the time of King Edward IV, the Insidious.
The attributes are hidden. To find out what they are, identify this item.
There was also a crummy knife; a noose; a fishing rod; eight tomes on the Skeleton War Chronicles that were missing some pages; a cheap brass ring with terrible attributes and an inscription that read, To your health, Greta; a hat that reminded me of a turban; and a bunch of other junk I just left there. I was no junkman; I was a hero. Probably.
I dumped everything out on the table, dug through it, and picked up the noose.
“Hey, you need this?” I asked Nazir. “It’s nice. You can wrap it around someone’s neck or use it to hang your clothes up to dry.”
Nazir turned the instrument of death over in his hands, nodded, and stuck it in his pocket. I didn’t get a reputation boost, so my reputation with him either wasn’t the kind I could increase or needed a different approach.
Besides the sovereign, the only decent item in the pile was the fishing rod, which added +30% to your catch in all freshwater bodies. It was also great for a few kinds of high-end fish. If I’d been working on that skill, I probably would have danced for joy. As it was, I assumed I could give it to someone or sell it. The fact that I wasn’t exercising my fishing skill, which I’d gotten quite a while before, didn’t mean that no one else was exercising his. There had been lots of times when I’d seen players fishing in rivers and lakes, though I wasn’t sure why they couldn’t just do that in real life. They were odd ducks, I assumed, and so I had a feeling the rod would come in very handy at some point.
After thinking for a little while, I decided to pull open my bag and see what I’d gotten for all the quests I’d finished.
One of the items was just mediocre: a pair of greaves with average attributes. They were, I thought, the reward for finishing the quest for the third part of the key since the reward had been variable, depending on how fast I finished it. I wonder how fast I would have had to do it to get something nice.
I clucked my tongue in satisfaction when I checked out the next thing. Not bad.
Sir Bus’s Cuirass
This armor belonged to a renowned knight who once scored victories everywhere he went: in war, in the stadium, and in the hearts of the ladies. Of course, it’s important to remember that heroes like him often do not live long enough to see an honest death in battle…
Protection: 680-740
+37 to strength
+33 to stamina
+25% chance of successfully parrying your opponent
+17% equipment durability
+11% chance of pulling off a successful counterattack
+9% movement speed
Class limitation: warriors
Minimum level for use: 70
It was really, really good armor. How do I make sure I don’t end up like that Sir Bus, though? I didn’t want his fate to befall me.
Getting right to it, I slipped the cuirass on and tapped it happily with my fingers.
Okay, what else?
The letter of credence was fine, but next came the crafting recipe.
If you unroll this scroll, you will learn the recipe for crafting Spring Wind Valley Bracers.
Warning! To use the recipe, you need to be a Level 7 blacksmith.
Warning! Once you unroll this scroll, you can neither sell nor gift it.
It was definitely something for the clan storehouse…or the auction. I needed to check with Kro to see what she thought I should do with it.
Then, there was a ring. It had to have been a bonus reward since none of my quests had mentioned anything about a ring in with the main rewards.
Graybeard Ring
This ring was worn long ago by one of Fayroll’s greatest magicians. From a young age, he was unbeatable in duels and talented when it came to creating magic items. He knew no equal and spent the rest of his life within the walls of the Academy of Wisdom, where he taught young mages his secrets.
+55 to wisdom
+48 to intellect
+35% fire damage done to opponents with spells
+28% air damage done to opponents with spells
+20% mana restoration speed (does not work during battles)
+15% chance of identifying hidden attributes
+5% ability recharge speed
Class limitation: mages
Minimum level for use: 95
I was no mage, and I couldn’t say for sure how good the ring was, but it sure looked nice. It earned itself a ticket to my chest until such time as we had a mage in the clan. Maybe, I’ll give it to him then.
Finally, I looked at the ability, though the name didn’t give me much hope that it would be very unique.
You learned a new active ability: Dusty Eyes, Level 1.
Lets you disorient your opponent for fifteen seconds.
With sufficient skill, you can use that time to make your attack.
Chance of success: 65%
Activation cost: 240 mana
Recharge time: 2 minutes
Just as I thought, it was practically worthless. It would have been nice to have at the lower levels, but I’d picked up plenty of more powerful abilities by that time.
I looked around the cave and sat down on the stool. For some reason, I felt sad. Ort Ashen had been a
n unpleasant, rude, old guy, but it still left a small emptiness inside me when he left. Really, the pain of separation wields quite the influence over us, even when it’s somebody we don’t like all that much who leaves forever.
For example, let’s say there’s someone from the office, someone you can’t stand, who’s always writing formal complaints about everyone else, who smells bad, and who would never lend anyone so much as a cigarette or a sugar cube. Them quitting would be a good thing, right? Even then, it’s a sad occasion, and all you can think of is the change they lent you that one time and the good piece of advice they gave you when you were remodeling. That’s why ancient eastern wisdom holds that only a quarter of the sadness is felt by the one leaving; those watching him go experience the rest.
It’s the same with last dates—the ones where you know you have to have that tough conversation. Right at the last minute, you start to doubt yourself. Maybe, this isn’t the right time. She isn’t really so bad, her nose isn’t that big, and she isn’t such a pain; she just likes it when things are tidy. Couples have their own story, even if it isn’t that long, and cutting the thread is hard.
Although, of course, we men are usually the ones being broken up with, since women are the ones who run the relationship from start to finish, but that’s another story.
I sighed, stood up, and left the cave.
“Tired of waiting?” I asked Nazir.
The assassin didn’t even move an eyelid, not really one for replying to rhetorical questions. He’s a good, silent guy to have around.
I opened a portal to Lossarnakh’s castle and motioned Nazir to follow me through. It was a shame to waste the scroll when I had Homeward Bound, but I wouldn’t have been able to take him with me.
The Right to Choose Page 4
