Rise of the Crimson Order: A Crematoria Online LitRPG Novel

by Matthew J. Barbeler

  "I'm going to see what I can find. You check things out too. I have an ability called Find Clues, and it highlights any clues that might be relevant to my current case, but it can be leveled up. I'm still a novice, so you might be able to find some things that I miss."

  Ellie nodded. "You got it."

  I activated my Find Clues ability, and the inside of the place didn't light up like a Christmas tree like I expected it would.

  The clue closest to me was a scrap of paper sitting on the table. I picked it up and inspected it.

  Queen's Orders

  Andestra wants only able-bodied men and women for her army. Find the strongest among them and bring them back to us.

  Remember, only the strong can accept our power. Seek only those of sound body and mind. Dispose of any that might see you. Our presence must remain secret.

  "Who is Andestra?" I mused.

  "What did you find?" Ellie asked.

  I handed her the note. Her eyes grew wide as she read it.

  "It answers one thing," I said. "The disappearances are definitely happening, and they're taking people under orders. Andestra is a name I haven't heard before, and this is an order from the Queen. But which Queen? Is Andestra the Queen they're talking about?"

  "I don't know. Let's keep looking."

  The Queen's Orders disappeared into my Investigations Journal. Ellie looked through a bureau on the other side of the room while I looked over the shelves closest to me. Several different books were highlighted in purple haze, but none of them gave me an answer right away. They were all reference books about the world of Crematoria.

  One of them was about the rise of the Lightsworn Dominion, led by the Dawn Elves from their rainforest city of Kamja. There was another reference book about the history of the Four Kingdoms, once locked in a constant state of war, and now united under the iron fist of Emperor Erodwulf. Stacks upon stacks of books were highlighted, and there was no common thing amongst them that I could see. Once I finished collecting all the clues, I could use my Deduce ability to identify any connections that I might have missed.

  "Oh no," Ellie said from the other side of the room.

  "Oh no? What's oh no?" I asked.

  She held up a golden badge with a closed fist in the center. "This is the badge of a Judiciary Carnifex. They're the equivalent of a Black Ops team. They get in quietly and do the nasty jobs without anyone ever knowing the Judiciary was there."

  "What's it doing here?"

  "Two options. Either the Sanguinari are powerful enough to kill a Carnifex, or worse, they've managed to turn one."

  "That doesn't sound good."

  "It's not. The Carnifexes work autonomously, answerable only to the Chief Justicar. If they've managed to turn one, then the Chief Justicar could be at risk. The Judiciary needs to know."

  "What's the risk if we let this information slide for a couple of days?" I asked. "We can't let this trail go cold."

  "They have direct access to the Chief Justicar. If he dies, then the Judiciary all over Crematoria will be thrown into chaos! We can't rely on Emperor Erodwulf to protect the people of Eldin and Dregswyk. He's too busy fighting his was against the Lightsworn Dominion. His eyes are fixed on the west."

  "All right," I said as I tried to sift through all of this. "We might need to cut this investigation in Dregswyk short, then. I don't want to let the kid stay in their possession any longer than he has to, but the threat against the Judiciary could result in even more deaths. We can head back topside and let the Chief Justicar know. We'll give them all the information we've found so far, and they might be able to send some more Enforcers down here to keep the people of Dregswyk safe."

  "Yeah, that sounds like a plan. Plus, something of this magnitude might be enough for me to get a Celestial Offering of my own. This is my chance to get back to the real world."

  "Let's finish this, and then we'll go back to King Malidar."

  Ellie nodded.

  There was one more item wreathed in purple haze, and it was sitting in a stack of papers on top of the bureau Ellie was going through. A leather-bound book. It wasn't there when I first looked over at it.

  "Where did you find this?" I asked, holding up the book.

  "It was in one of the drawers," she said, handing me the book.

  The image on the first page made my skin crawl. It was a smaller version of the Sanguinari symbol on the wall, but it was bright red against the white background of the page. I turned the page and shuddered when I saw that the blood had flowed so freely that it had stained through onto the second.

  From there on, the book was mostly empty, save for a couple of sketches of things that I couldn't quite comprehend.

  On one page there was a drawing of something that looked like a snake. A few pages later there was a crude sketch of a set of light armor. A piece of white cloth was tied around the arm of the armor on the page, and the Sanguinari symbol was drawn on it too.

  A few pages later another message was scrawled in blood.

  THE CRIMSON QUEEN IS BEAUTY

  THE CRIMSON QUEEN IS TRUTH

  THE CRIMSON QUEEN IS POWER

  THE CRIMSON ORDER WILL RISE

  I showed this page to Ellie and she screwed up her face in a look of disgust.

  "Ugh," she said.

  "At least we know their name. They're calling themselves the Crimson Order, and they answer to the Crimson Queen. I'm guessing that's who Andestra is."

  "That sounds logical."

  These connections and ideas were coming to me more easily now. It must have been because I'd put some more points into my Intelligence and Perception stats.

  "Do you see anything else?" Ellie asked.

  "Just one more thing," I said as I strode over to the symbol of the Crimson Order on the wall. "Do you see this? The floor between this wall with the symbol and the front door is completely cleared. It's so that whichever Sanguinari Martha Stewart lives here can get their prey back to wherever-it-is they come from easily. It's most definitely a door."

  "You're right. Is that all? Should we get out of here now?"

  "One more second," I said as I deactivated my Find Clues ability. "I just need to try and make some new connections before we go. While all of this information is fresh."

  "Then get to it, Rain Man."

  I grinned, but it got awkward as I let my Concentration Points fill up to 100% again. Then I activated my Deduce ability. My Concentration Points fell to zero as a wealth of information flooded out of my mind and into the world around me.

  On the chaise lounge, I saw the ghostly figure of someone reclining there with one of the reference books I'd gathered from the shelves. Then their form shifted, and they were holding another book. A smaller book, and they were drawing something. The leather-bound book with all the sketches in it!

  Whoever had made this their base of operations had spent a lot of their time studying and writing down their findings. Their findings would likely have been sent back through the portal to the other realm to their commanding officers, or maybe even to the Crimson Queen directly.

  The mechanics of who was here and what they were doing were not as relevant as what it was they were studying. All those reference books spread out in front of me. I was vaguely aware of Ellie's dark form in front of me, but it looked as though she was covered in shadow and moving at the speed of molasses as I tried to make connections between the clues.

  A map of Eldin appeared in front of me, translucent and divided into kingdoms. The Lightsworn Dominion's lands to the west were separated by the vast desert of Akani, where the Al Akani called home. The Four Kingdoms on the eastern edge of Crematoria sat below the vast Erwysh Wildlands. The book covers arrayed themselves around the map, and red lines came out of each book and settled on a specific location on the map.

  Two lines ended in Eldin. One was about the history of the Erodwulf Empire and the unification of the Four Kingdoms, and another called The Secret History of Dregswyk. Another line led from one book
to the Dawn Elf city of Kamja, another line led from another book to a small island in the Kigari Isles, and another to a place within the heart of the desert in Akani.

  Staging grounds. These reference books were identifying areas of potential egress into Crematoria from wherever it was these Sanguinari were coming from. That's what the Crimson Order was researching here!

  The maps and books disappeared, and suddenly I was back in the real world. I immediately noticed a new message at the bottom of my view.

  New Case File created in your Investigations Journal: Uncovering the Crimson Queen's Plans

  Good. I'd need to look over everything again later.

  "They're looking for places where Crematoria is vulnerable," I said. "That's what they were using all of these books for! They're looking for staging grounds that they can launch their invasion from."

  Ellie let her breath whistle out from between her lips. "That's why they're taking people from Dregswyk. Nobody here will be missed. They're amassing an army."

  "If they can get into our world from here, then what's to stop them from catching a wagon out of Eldin and going to Akani?"

  "I don't even know where that is," Ellie said.

  "It's to the west, halfway across the continent. It's the desert where the Al Akani come from, and there's a location that they're very interested in there. Same with some little island in the Kigari Isles, and in Kamja."

  "That's a lot of ground to cover," Ellie said.

  "Yeah, it is. But luckily for us, they can't actually teleport across the world. To open a portal, they need someone at either end to draw those symbols. They have to get there manually, just like we would have to. Those journeys would take days. Weeks. I think we have some time."

  A notification appeared at the bottom of my view.

  Crime scene investigation completed. You have gained 650 experience points!

  You have reached Level 8!

  You have received 1 Primary Attribute Point to distribute.

  That was a lot of experience! This crime scene might have been at a higher level than the ones I had completed in the past, because the reward it gave me was incredible.

  "I just leveled up," I said.

  "What level are you now?" Ellie asked.

  "Level 8. What are you at?"

  "I'm almost at Level 10," she said.

  "Damn! Nice work." I glanced at my experience bar. "I'm about a fourth of the way to Level 9 already. Give me a sec. I'm just going to allocate my point."

  With the mounting threat looming over us of a Sanguinari invasion, I decided to sink another point into Fortitude to boost my HP. I had a feeling that this was all going to come to a head very soon.

  Lucas Hutchins

  Investigator

  Level 8

  HP: 196

  Strength: 5

  Dexterity: 6

  Intelligence: 8

  Charisma: 7

  Perception: 9

  Endurance: 6

  Resilience: 6

  Fortitude: 8

  I was very happy to see that my HP was almost at 200. One more level and I would be there.

  "Uh, Lucas, do you feel that?" Ellie asked, and I had to admit that I did feel something strange.

  There was a changing in the air, like the crackling of static electricity. The symbol on the wall shimmered, and then the wall around it began to shimmer too. I caught a glimpse of someone standing on the other side of that wall - in the other realm - wearing the light armor that I had seen in the sketch-book. She had the symbol of the Sanguinari drawn on the white cloth tied around her left arm.

  She strode into the room and stopped dead as she saw us. Her red-rimmed eyes narrowed, and her lips drew back from her teeth in a snarl. She was younger than I expected her to be.

  "You're not supposed to be here," she said.

  "No? Well, neither are you!" I said as I drew my flintlock pistol and loaded it.

  I never had a chance to fire a shot. The invader scrambled backwards with a curse, back into the realm beyond our own, and the wall snapped back into reality, cutting off any avenue of pursuit.

  "Damn it!" I said. I lifted my flintlock pistol anyway and fired.

  In the closed space, the shot sounded like thunder following a crack of lightning from across the street. Ellie's hands went to her ears, and my own ears started ringing.

  The slug slammed into the symbol on the wall, shattering it. Bits of brick peppered us as we stood.

  A notification appeared.

  Sanguinari Blood Portal destroyed! You have gained 150 experience points!

  147 Sanguinari Blood Portals in Dregswyk remain.

  "Whoa, did you get that?" Ellie asked.

  "The experience for destroying the blood portal? Yeah. I got it."

  "Did you see how many are left?"

  "We've got our work cut out for us. That's just Dregswyk. It doesn't count Eldin or anywhere else the Crimson Order has access to."

  "I don't think we can do this alone," Ellie said.

  She was right. But at least the Sanguinari wouldn't be coming back through this portal again.

  "Luckily for us, I think we make a pretty good team," Ellie said.

  "Damn right we do." I held out my fist for a fist-bump, and I was glad Ellie didn't leave me hanging.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Ghosts of the Real World

  We delivered the bad news to King Malidar in his were-rat form sitting atop the Trash Throne, but he didn't seem all that surprised.

  "You've confirmed my own suspicions," he said. "My were-rat guards are already doing double duty, and they're stretched thin as it is. How are we supposed to be able to stop these Sanguinari if we can't tell who is one and who isn't?"

  "I don't know. I've only met one so far," I said. "They had red-rimmed eyes, as though they'd just been crying. That might have just been how she was, but it's a better indication than nothing, right?"

  King Malidar grunted in agreement. "Yes. Better than nothing, I suppose."

  Ellie stepped forward. "We need to head back to the surface. We've found out some information that the Judiciary needs to know."

  "And what might that be?" King Malidar asked.

  I watched Ellie as she thought about this. I couldn't imagine that she wanted to expose the Judiciary's potential infiltration to King Malidar, so I decided to do it for her.

  "We found a Carnifex badge," I said. "We have reason to believe that the Chief Justicar may be at risk."

  A shudder passed over King Malidar. "If the Judiciary falls, then Crematoria is doomed. You must go and warn them, but not until morning."

  "What? Why not?" Ellie said.

  "Emperor Erodwulf's curfew," King Malidar said. "Anyone out of doors after sunset is at risk of being arrested, and you shall not make it back to the surface before then. So stay here and set off in the morning."

  Ellie sighed. "Fine."

  "Hey, look at the bright side," I said. "We have one more night of King Malidar's wonderful hospitality."

  The smile that crept on Ellie's face was forced. "Well, let's get some food and settle in for the night, then. I want to get going early."

  "They are serving food in the great hall," King Malidar said. "Please go, eat, and rest. Thank you for your service to the people of Dregswyk."

  "You're very welcome," I said.

  Ellie and I bowed our heads, then left the throne room. We followed our noses through the odd corridors of the Trash Palace towards the great hall. The smell of fresh bread and hearty stews wafted through the air. After seeing what The Bleed could do to someone who ate it, I had been nervous about eating the food here. Those fears were diminished when I saw King Malidar's troops eating it.

  We settled down towards the back of the great hall, and a comely serving girl came over to us soon after. She bore a tray filled with thick sliced bread, freshly whipped butter and bowls of chunky soup. Ellie and I took them greedily and made short work of them. The soup was rich, with some kind of gr
ain and dark meat that tasted like a gamier version of beef.

  A message appeared, telling me that I was now well fed.

  I wanted to talk to Ellie, but I couldn't find the right words. Anything that I could have said would have just made things worse. I was glad when she broke the silence.

  "I just want to get back to the Judiciary as soon as I can," she started. "My quest is completed now. I've identified how the victim with the bite mark was killed. All I need to do is go back to my Arbiter and tell her. Maybe once I give them this new information then I'll be able to log out of this stupid game. If not, if the quest just ends and I get some experience and a crappy piece of equipment, then I don't know what I'm going to do. I can't stay here in this world."

  "I'm sorry." It was all I could say.

  "Why are you sorry? You're not the one who got me into this mess. I am. My choices led me here, and now I have to live with the consequences."

  "I'm not saying it's my fault," I said. "I'm just sorry you're in this situation. I'm sorry I'm in this situation, too. I'm sorry for everyone stuck in this damned game."

  Ellie lifted a spoon to her lips, then nodded. We finished the rest of the meal in silence, then headed back to our chamber in the tower.

  It was a single room, with a set of bunk beds set to one side. There was a water closet in a recess in the wall, but not much else. It was still a step up from the house I grew up in. We made small talk, but I got the feeling that Ellie just wanted to be left alone. Ellie straightened up her pillow and blanket before pulling it back, and I started to get ready for bed.

  I stripped off everything but my boxers and equipped the tattered shirt I had started the game with. I didn't want to sleep in my good suit. As I was pulling the tattered undershirt over my head I glanced backward and saw Ellie looking at me. Her cheeks flushed red as she saw me catch her.

  "I'm sorry," she said. "I wasn't-"

  "It's fine," I said. "I'm not this buff in the real world, so I check myself out all the time in this game." I laughed at my stupid joke, and I was glad Ellie laughed too.