He horked up a single scroll. I picked up the sopping-wet paper and unfurled it, reading.
Duke,
Today is 45 days left. I don’t know where you are. I think maybe they got to you, turned off your rig, and the system thinks you’re still online. Maybe you’re free. Maybe you’re stuck in a hole somewhere. Or maybe you’re just dead. I don’t know.
I have completed the fae quest. I have the controller for Avvinik. As I write this, I am level 50. After level 50, it becomes very difficult to level up further. During my quest, I also received the controller for the Opera. He’s a giant salamander.
Jenk is alive and still in the game. I had a short encounter with him, but I escaped. He mentioned you. I understand why you didn’t want to tell me about him, but you can still go fuck yourself. Not cool.
God, I hope you’re okay. I knew I would like you.
There’s something I need to tell you. It’s about your daughter. And your son.
Come to Avvinik. Bring a guardian so I know it’s you.
Clara.
“Banksy,” I said. I slowly folded the paper, thinking hard. “What did you tell Clara about my daughter?”
“I didn’t tell her anything. She has never asked.”
Jenk must have told her something, then. But what could it be? Chris was dead. I’d been gone for almost six months. Mary was probably just now picking up the pieces, figuring out how to move on. And Ruth… I hoped she had found help. But if Jenk knew something and passed it on to Clara, it couldn’t be anything good. Did I even want to know?
I had two choices right now. I could head straight to Clara to find out what she was talking about. Or I could go to Medina.
I gazed west. There’s something I need to tell you. I sighed.
“Banksy, can you go over to Clara and try to talk to her? Tell her I’m back?”
“She doesn’t come out of the panther very often. Not so much nowadays. Not after the wolfman went in there and she fought him. The panther and the two-headed wolf fought after that. Both guardians died.”
“Did you fight them, too?”
Banksy seemed to hang his head in shame. “I did not. Not that time. I stayed underground. Avvinik doesn’t like me. He killed me when we first met. I stay back now. Sometimes he growls at me.”
I patted him on the side of the head. “Have you tried any of your new attacks yet?”
That perked him up. “Yes, yes. I have three attacks now. But one of them kills me, so I haven’t tried that one yet. I don’t want to. Clara said all guardians, even minor guardians like me have three attacks, and one of them is very powerful. I have an attack named Descending Angel that makes everything fall down out of the sky. You have the same spell I remember, so we’re like twins. I can do that every five minutes. It hurts my head, though. The second one I can only do every five hours. It’s called Green Hell. It’s kinda gross.”
“Green Hell? Is it a poison attack?”
“I wish it was, father. It’s a vomit attack. I just start spraying puke everywhere. And it melts everything it touches. It’s a lot of vomit. I mean a lot. I don’t know where it comes from.”
“Ahh,” I said. “An acid attack.”
“The third one I can only do once a day, and it kills me. I haven’t tried it yet. It’s called Ghoul Night Out.”
“What does it do?” I asked. The new attacks were listed in my familiar menu, but they didn’t have descriptions.
“I don’t know,” Banksy said. “I’m scared to try it. When I die, I come back to a place that’s very far from here. There are small monsters there that bite me. I don’t like it.”
“Yeah, sorry about that,” I said. “I wanted your regeneration spot closer to the rift. I think we’ll need you there. I can change your spot until you reach level 50, but it’s the only open-area spot I’ll be able to pick.”
“Okay,” Banksy said.
“Hey, can I go inside of you now? Like how I go inside of the Shrill?”
“No,” Banksy said. “Deep dive isn’t available until I hit level 50. If you go inside of me, you will die.”
“Hmm,” I said. “What about your saddle? I suppose that’s long gone, but can I ride on you?”
“If you give yourself the Freeriding skill, you may while I am above ground. Otherwise you will need to purchase a proper saddle or howdah. Then you must return to Crust Sock in the nerve agent town of Yelm so he can install burrowing protection.” My pet did not look like he approved of the idea. He never liked being a mount. “I mostly travel underground now,” he added.
“Shit. I’m going to need a way to move around quickly.”
“What about this?” Banksy asked. He lifted his head in the air and made the throat-clearing noise I knew meant he was about to hurl. I jumped back.
He vomited a tracked vehicle onto the ground. It crunched to a stop in front of me, groaning as if it was going to fall apart.
This was the same derelict vehicle that had been sitting by the town’s gate. Banksy must have swallowed it when he killed the zippers and demon.
I walked around the truck. It was like a rusted-out short school bus but with tank tracks instead of wheels. This wasn’t a flying car. Not at all. Multiple guns covered the bus, pointing out in all directions. A wedge-shaped plow covered the front grill. The thing was so old it looked like I could stick my finger right through the rusty skin.
“I thought you said you only had that note in your stomach.”
“The note was in my storage. That’s different than my stomach. I ate this. I was about to digest it, but I thought you might want it instead.”
I touched the door, and a window appeared. Flash Chaser?
“Chaser?” I said. That must be the name of the vehicle type. I clicked Yes.
A status bar pulled across the screen. The truck flashed.
A moment passed. Then a status popped up.
Vehicle Drivetrain has been repaired.
The rusted, broken down hulk didn’t look any different. I looked at the chaser dubiously. I pushed at the school-bus-like door, and it squeaked open on rusted hinges. I had to pull myself up to step in, and once inside I was assaulted with the earthy stench of must. It appeared someone had used the driver’s seat to host a campfire. The backing was intact, but four rusty springs were all that remained of the seat part.
I sat in the seat, which groaned and poked uncomfortably against my ass. The engine roared to life, and the whole vehicle vibrated. The door fell off. Multiple status bars appeared in my interface. The first two were Vehicle Power and Vehicle Integrity. The rest were weapons status indicators. The power was 100%. The integrity was at 17%. The weapons all said Offline.
Unlike the last vehicle, whose controls were more like that of a small airplane, this was a more traditional truck. I wanted to test it, so I eased the gas.
The chaser chugged forward, moving more smoothly than I would expect. I tapped the brakes, and the truck squealed to a stop, taking much longer than I anticipated to stop rolling. I cringed as the front wedge crunched up against the last still-standing chunk of Charnel’s back wall.
The barrier fell over in a heap.
Warning: the town of Charnel no longer exists. As a result, you may no longer use your currently selected regeneration spot. Your previous location: Bast – Player Base has been selected.
“Oh hell,” I said.
I had a bag full of branding irons, but I couldn’t use them until I got back into Medina. That clinched it.
“Banksy,” I said. I slipped out of the seat and jumped back outside. The engine stopped humming the moment I left the vehicle. “I have to go to Medina right now. I can’t take you with me. Can you… Can you swallow this thing back up and keep it for me? I might need it again.”
“I have plenty of room,” Banksy said.
“Great! Keep it for me. Also, try to talk to Clara. Tell her I will be there tomorrow.”
“Okay, Duke,” he said. He paused. “I missed you, father.”
�
�I missed you, too.”
Next, I pulled up my Guardian menu, thought for a moment, then clicked on Moritasgus. I summoned him to an area just south of Avvinik. It would take him a good day to walk there.
I waved goodbye, and I stepped into the overturned transport gazebo.
Chapter 51
Entering Medina – Main Square
I slammed onto the ground. The gazebo of Charnel was knocked over, and it translated me into Medina in a position relative with the bottom of the gazebo, making it so I teleported in on my side.
I stood, brushing myself off. A light drizzle fell. It was a downpour the last time I was here. I eyed a familiar stall. I approached the proprietor. A shade gremlin named Well Done.
“Hey there, remember me?” I asked. “You gave me my first brand.”
“Yes, yes,” the angry-looking gremlin said. He gave me an appraising glance. “You’ve grown a bit. You’re under-armored, but you are much more powerful than the last time I saw you. What can I do for you today?” He produced a gleaming knife with a serrated edge. “Do you want me to remove that defunct brand on the center of your back?” He waved the knife hopefully.
I pulled two brands out of my pack. “I got something even better for you.” I pushed the Shrill brand forward. “I want this one on my neck. And this one,” I tapped the Moritasgus oblation chamber brand. “I want this one on my chest. I also have two old brands from cities that don’t exist anymore. Do you buy them?”
“If it’s a defunct brand, it’s junk. But I’ll give you five teeth each. I can always melt ‘em.” The shade gremlin rubbed his hands together. “So for the two brands. The first will be your third brand, and that will be 500 teeth. The next will be 1,000 teeth.”
I nodded. “How much if you throw a third brand in? One for Medina.”
The gremlin could barely contain his excitement. He leaned forward. His breath smelled like turned mayonnaise. His entire body trembled. “That’ll be 2,000 more. Plus 100 extra teeth for renting out the brand. So with everything it’ll be 3,600 teeth. 3,590 if you want to sell me those two old brands.”
I had just over 5,300 teeth on me.
“Let’s do it,” I said.
Well Done squealed with delight.
***
I set my respawn to the Medina main square. I poked gingerly at the sore spot on my neck. I’d gotten the other two brands on my chest. They burned, but the neck brand had hurt the most. I could still smell the burning flesh. The sadistic little gremlin had held the branding iron down for several seconds longer than necessary. I could feel the little bastard’s erection pressing against my side as he burned me.
The original plan was to come here, find some quests, and then work on leveling up. We were well past that stage now. My food was going to run out in two weeks. I needed to get some shopping done, and then I needed to go out to Clara. I needed to get the key, and then we had to make our move on the rift, ready or not.
Medina was much as I remembered it. I spent some time exploring, getting the lay of the city. It was arranged in haphazard neighborhoods segregated by race. The worm surgeons lived in the poorest part of town. It seemed the practitioners of resurrection magic were the lowest class of citizens, followed by the steampunk folks. The bird-headed plague doctorers were the very bottom of the social ladder, followed closely by the worm surgeons and the menders, a race of clockwork humanoids who looked like poor imitations of their elite cousins. The technology and celestial-based citizens dominated the more affluent areas of the city, though I didn’t see any of the sundered walking about, thank goodness. The lizard-headed caduceus dominated the richer shops and neighborhoods.
Regular humans were everywhere, by far the largest population of the city. They didn’t fall into any specific socioeconomic category. Most were merchants or just random, wandering NPCs who seemed to be going about their days.
A sprawling temple stood on a hill in the very back of the city. The gold and white towers glittered with a magical aura. This was the Temple of the Chained Gods. It was where people like Clara had to go to get her supply of blood nuggets for her spell ability. I wasn’t sure how the whole process worked, but it seemed like more of a pain in the ass than my method of just getting soul power by killing stuff. A constant cloud of demons hovered above the main temple, unable to descend further thanks to the protection spell that surrounded Medina. The hawk-like radiants dominated this area, and I steered clear.
I was almost shanked by a group of groundlings after I inadvertently wandered into one of their neighborhoods. A group of teenager groundlings saw me and started throwing rocks. A few brandished knives and approached menacingly. I turned away and after that I decided I’d had enough exploring.
My first stop was a potion shop. I walked in, eyeing the physicker merchant. The ghost-like proprietor waited patiently behind the counter. I tried to see any emotion in the twin eye slits on the smooth, white face. There was none. These guys freaked me out.
I pulled one of my two Colo Colo Menses potions. “How much will you give me for this?”
The physicker’s name was Hito. He picked it up with long, alien fingers, examining it. He moved slowly, sloth-like.
“Hmm,” he said. He sounded tired and bored. “This is an interesting potion. I think I can give you 40,000 teeth for it.”
That was a lot, but I wondered if I could get more.
“Hey, do you have any of those charm potions? The pink ones?”
“Yes. They are 1,000 teeth each.” He waved his hand, and the shop’s stock appeared in a floating window. “Be warned, they do not work on me. They perhaps might work on other merchants who are not physicker or others of the wind.”
This was the slowest-moving creature I’d seen since I’d come into this damn game. I didn’t know how the hell he could possibly be wind-based.
“Okay,” I said, studying the list. The variety here wasn’t nearly as good as what Stolas had in his shop out in the woods, but Hito had loads of the basics. This was a potion shop for lower-level players. Stolas the owl demon had something called “full-healing” potions for 1,000 teeth. Hito only had “Healing” potions, but they were much cheaper, only 100 teeth each. These were the same ones I already had. I didn’t know what the difference was for sure, but I suspected the full healing ones cured things like poison and paralysis in addition to your basic health. Either way, Hito didn’t have any. “I want twenty of the health potions, five of the resurrection point potions, two of the charm potions, and two of the deftness potions. And I want to sell this Colo Colo potion.”
“Very well,” Hito said.
I walked out of there with just under 35,000 teeth. It seemed like all the money in the world, but in most games, I was usually a multi-millionaire by now.
I picked up a few hundred extra teeth by completing quick delivery quests. During one of these, I discovered a small shop called “Sigils.” It was listed on my map under miscellaneous.
The shop sold gear for evoking demons. The shopkeeper was a female viceroy, the resurrection and celestial-based race of goat people.
In order to evoke a demon, you needed a special container filled with salt. You used the container to draw an unbroken circle on the ground and then cast the evocation spell which burned the demon’s seal within the ring. Doing so allowed you to temporarily summon the demon whose seal you cast. The seal would quickly degrade, so if you didn’t use that time wisely, you were in serious danger of getting ripped to shreds by the demon you evoked.
You also had to make sure you made the circle the correct size. Most demons took multiple forms, and you could force them into certain incarnations based on the size of the circle. But if the circle was too small for any of their forms, the summoning would either fizzle out or worse, the demon would come to you untethered. If you made the circle too big, they could easily escape. So you had to know what you were doing when you called them.
Once evoked in this manner, you could create a contract with the demon. The
demon would complete one task of your choosing, depending on their abilities. Once the task was completed, the sigil would erase from your library, and you wouldn’t be able to evoke them ever again.
These supplies were fairly inexpensive.
If you wanted to keep the demon around longer, the prices went up exponentially. Permanently bound demons were very valuable. A lamp similar to the one I had that contained Count Fronz cost 150,000 teeth, not including the wax-coated evoking plate that needed to be placed at the base of the container. One placed the plate into the magic container and cast the summoning, which trapped the demon indefinitely.
The problem was they sold larger evoking plates, but not larger containers. According to the proprietor, using a plate without a container was much the same as just using the salt. Certain race path quests involved building these larger containers, but it wasn’t something that worm surgeons regularly did. Evocation was more of a celestial thing than a resurrection thing.
The store sold a short array of seal scrolls. They were all of lesser demons. Fronz was one of them. It cost 5,000 teeth to learn his seal.
The demon Andras was also listed. It cost 7,500 to learn his seal. This was my target in the Stolas quest. After a moment of debate, I decided to purchase it along with three skins containing enough salt to attempt several evocations.
Andras required Evocation level 3 to bind. I spent 10 skill points to bring myself to level 2. With my necklace, it automatically brought my skill up to 3. The top level for the skill was 4, but both level 3 (without the necklace) and 4 required something called a “Blessing” to get. It seemed like it was the celestial version of a cybernetic upgrade. One had to visit the Temple of the Chained Gods to get those upgrades. Level 3 costs an additional 20 skill points, and level 4 was 40, the most expensive thing on the whole list. That made me wonder how valuable my necklace was.
I was hoping the donkey queen Lamashtu would be available, but I guessed she was too high up on the hierarchy to be sold in a store like this. I would have to venture back out there to give her the egg.
“Tell me what you know of Andras,” I said as I packed up my purchases.
Kaiju- Battlefield Surgeon Page 39
