Clan Dominance - the Sleepless Ones 2

by Dem Mikhailov

  “Get ready for what?”

  “Tonight,” Vlas said in a voice promising all the horrors of the Spanish Inquisition. “I’ve notified a few folks from our old gang, and they’ll notify the rest. We’ll be drinking in honor of our reunification, if you survive as long. Skinhead Paul promised to kick your head in the instant he heard the news. He’ll most likely headbutt you. The rest of them will try to break as many bones as they can, too.”

  “Thanks so much, Vlas,” I expressed my heartfelt gratitude the best way I could. “You could have kept it all secret. So, Gosha is all right, is he?”

  “His chest is bruised seven ways to Sunday, a few ribs are crushed, something’s wrong with one of his feet, and he’s also got a concussion and a bunch of cuts,” Claw gave me a full list in a matter of seconds. “He’ll live. Hey, he did mention you, come to think of it. He told me you were taking care of Kyre and that you’d helped him, and mentioned your name. But there was no way I could have known it was you. Yours isn’t exactly an exotic name. He described you in a weird way, too — a quiet fellow, harmless, keeps to himself... Well, he sure was right about the “keeping-to-himself” part, but as for the rest of it...

  “Enough, Vlas,” I begged him. “And as for the evening... Are you really sure?”

  “Sure am.” The big guy jerked his head as he urged Kyre to move closer to the door, telling her, “Now, ever heard of curiosity killing the cat?”

  “I am no cat! And I’m not done yet!”

  “She’s like that,” Vlas sighed as he turned around to follow Kyre. “I’ll come over to pick you up around eight. Don’t think of getting lost — if you do, we’ll find you. You know the drill. Kyre! Why are you standing? I’ve told you to get going, haven’t I?”

  “Vlas, don’t talk too much about me, right?”

  “Sure, no probbo,” Vlas nodded. “But we really need to talk tonight. I don’t get your actions. Like, not one bit. That’s not how we do things, you know.”

  “I’ll explain later,” I sighed. Vlas nodded me goodbye and finally took Kyre away.

  There was definitely a shadow in the spyhole of the flat opposite mine. Ms. Bobrikov was all ears for sure, and must have recorded every single word of our conversation in her memory, unless I was seeing things already.

  I closed the door carefully, and stood still for a few minutes, staring into the great wide nowhere, my brain rolling. You never knew when your past might catch up with you, but what was done, was done.

  As I got back to the kitchen, I made the terrible discovery: Kyre’s plate was absolutely empty, and mine contained but a few scraps, and no yolk. When did she find the time? Those few seconds I’d needed to open the door and get beaten up by Vlas? Oh, Kyre... This would be war.

  I glanced at the clock on the wall, wolfed down the cold egg scraps followed by a few fossilized biscuits, washed them down with cold coffee, and rushed to my room. The jaw objected to me treating it with such indifference, but that was but a minor concern to me. I’d needed to get back to Waldyra, and to get back to business.

  Logging in.

  A flash.

  * * *

  The injured jaw didn’t hurt at all, which was just as well.

  I reached the town of Lagenbrock — the name sounded positively Teutonic — without any trouble. It looked every bit the archetypal mediaeval German city as painted by virtually everyone — houses of stone covered with tiled roofs, weather vanes of all sorts, paved streets, straight and clean, the townsfolk moving about unhurriedly without a worry in the world, and guards in polished cuirasses and helms with narrow tops, all shining.

  I decided to waste no time on sightseeing. The first thing I did upon arriving was approach the bunch of posts with signs of all sorts at the entrance, all pointing in different directions. There were four magic shops altogether, but I instantly crossed three of them out — judging by the mauve frame, they’d been kept by players. In general, such privately-owned shops often give you tangible discounts, and one finds rare items and spell scrolls here, but I’d needed to identify Alishana’s strange present and keep the whole thing a secret. This is why I decided to approach a “local” trader, whose shop was, fortunately, just a few steps away from where I’d stabled Sist.

  The owner was a thin old man with an accurately trimmed grey beard, a mane of hair that was just as grey, and a monocle glistening dully over his left eye. The shop itself also differed from the rest — it was a small space of a square shape, nearly empty, its walls paneled with wood, and a parquet floor with an oily sheen to it, with not a scratch or a speck of dust to mar its pristine surface. There was a single glazed counter across the room, separating it into two unseen parts. Underneath the glazing there were even and well-arranged rows of opened scrolls, rings, amulets, and similar paraphernalia.

  “My greetings to you,” the old man nodded, not a single muscle moving on his face.

  “Good afternoon, kind sir,” I smiled, and then went straight to business. “There are two things that I need. I need a transportation scroll for a human and a horse to the village of Selene, near the Elyrne river, and I have also a ring I want identified. Is that possible? And what would the price be?”

  “It is indeed possible. The identification price is two gold pieces; the cost of a transportation scroll depends on the scatter radius, if you know what I’m talking about.”

  It was expensive. The old man charged an exorbitant price for identification.

  “I do,” I nodded. “I’d be fine with a scatter range of three leagues from the center of the village. It’s not that far away from your glorious city, after all.

  Transportation or teleportation scrolls differed in terms of precision. The most expensive ones would guarantee that you would wind up at the first free space within a given village or part of the city. The cheapest would just land you at a random spot within the radius of ten leagues, meaning I could either find myself in the village proper, or ten leagues away. It was a game of chance. Well-heeled players with no need to spend money bought the most expensive scrolls. The rest settled for cheaper ones, or for learning the teleportation spell and leveling it up, which took a long time and was the literal opposite of fun.

  Having checked with a map on the environs and clicked the abacus laying on the counter a few times, the shopkeeper said,

  “The total is twelve gold coins, and four silvers. Payment up front.”

  “Here you go,” I arranged the coins in two neat piles and placed the ring I’d received from Alishana right next to them.

  The old man grabbed the coins and the ring in what must have been a memorized gesture, then placed a tightly-wound scroll in front of me in a careless gesture, explaining,

  “Here’s a transportation scroll with a radius of three leagues from the center of Selene. I must warn you, though — being thrifty is laudable, but it might do you a disservice in this case.”

  “Why would that be?”

  “Because Selene is located on the banks of the Elyrne,” the old man told me obligingly, making me wince. He was right. Spells worked randomly, and I could very easily find myself in the middle of a fast-flowing river. That would sure be fun.

  “Thanks a lot for the warning,” I sighed. “Is there any chance of correcting the scroll to make sure I end up on dry land rather than water?”

  “Sure is. You’d need to pay six silver pieces and four coppers extra.”

  Damn. Was he just calling the numbers randomly?

  “There goes,” I sighed as I parted with another gold coin, making my reserve even more meager, and instantly receiving my change. The old man’s monocle glinted as he took the scroll, opened it, scratched the parchment with his fingernail, and handed it back to me.

  “Here goes. The ring, too.”

  “It’s ready, you mean?”

  “Why, certainly. Would you like to purchase anything else?” the trader asked, clearly implying something, and I nodded hastily, “Yes, perhaps. Would you please wait a moment?”
/>
  The way the old man talked, one could have thought his shop had been full of people, each of them with a heavy purse of gold eager to spend it.

  I brought the ring closer to my eye to study the information that had been hidden from me previously.

  Type: Jewelry.

  Name: Mark of the Dead Sands Clan.

  Description: A nondescript ring carved from the bone of an unknown creature and covered in mysterious symbols.

  Item class: Rare.

  Durability: Indestructible. Additional qualities: Cannot be stolen, sold, or taken away!

  Duh... Having admired the ring for long enough, I sighed in disappointment, and, after a moment’s thought, put it on my left index finger. A useless item with many big words in its description; just a memento from a grateful local. A bonus for fulfilling a quest. I’d expected something more useful, but I had no reason to complain. The ring would serve me as a reminder to return to Mossy Hills at some point in order to study the local mysteries better.

  “So, is there anything else I can help you with, good sir?” The shopkeeper asked me again.

  “Yes, as a matter of fact. Have you got any elemental spells? Preferably fire-related.”

  The shopkeeper eyed me thoughtfully for a moment, and finally said,

  “Would that be for direct usage or for learning?”

  “For learning.”

  “Hm. Well, in that case, the choice isn’t all that wide. The only fire spells at my disposal are Burning Ember and Fiery Hands. Each cost six gold pieces.”

  “Give me a second, please,” I said. I really needed to think on this one.

  Burning Ember worked in the same manner as Ice Needle — a deadly spell for ranged combat. The best it can evolve to is an exploding fireball dealing substantial damage, with a chance of inflicting a Burn status on the enemy.

  Fiery Hands was a spell for close-quarters combat useful for the kind of fighting I’d always avoided — one needed to level up one’s Endurance to get close to the enemy. I knew nothing about the spell’s development, either, having never bought any magic of this sort. Therefore, it made sense for me to follow a tried path by getting a spell from every element and level them up the best way I could. Some players opted for a narrower specialization operating just one or two elements, but they leveled up in groups, while I was a megalomaniac and a loner.

  “I‘ll take Burning Ember,” I said, having made an uneasy decision. My hands almost shook as I gave the shopkeeper his money.

  Damn and blast it all. It was always this way — the instant I managed to get my hands on some money, it would run out instantly. I praised every deity in Waldyra about having enough feed for Sist. However, I’d need to find me some better equipment soon, and that’s when it would really sting. I could have bought some new clothes there and then, but I hadn’t had enough cash for such extravagant purchases. Gosha did promise to equip me with the best stuff he’d find, but when would that be?

  “There you are,” I saw another parchment in front of me.

  As I brought it to my eye and answered a system request in the positive, the following message materialized in the air before me:

  You have successfully learned the following Tier 1 spell: Burning Ember!

  Spell tier list:

  Spells: Burning Ember, Blazing Ember, Heap of Embers, Fireball, and Unstable Fireball.

  Type: Elemental magic.

  Another spell in my arsenal, and another headache — I’d need to test it properly now before I could get it to Tier 2 and get the Blazing Ember spell. The damage it dealt wasn’t that much higher, but I would have the chance of inflicting a Burn status.

  I said my goodbyes to the old man as I left the magic shop and headed for the stables, my gait being that of a busy man. I took back Sist and rode out of Lagenbrock. I stopped the horse a few dozen feet away, and went on to study the rows of runes upon the scroll that I’d fished out of my pack.

  Would you really like to use the transportation scroll?

  I sure would.

  I saw an iridescent flash. Once the light dispersed, I found myself on unfamiliar terrain many leagues away. The horse’s hooves sank into the shallow sand, and there was a hillock to the side with a tree on its top that had died long ago, with a wide expanse of blue water behind it. We must have landed a few dozen steps away from the river.

  Before I could get my bearings, I patted my horse on the neck, saying,

  “See how I strive to take care of you? Otherwise, you’d be pretty tired by now!”

  The horse grunted derisively, and then grunted again, looking to the right.

  I looked in the same direction, and my eyes bulged as I saw waves touching the shore with a hissing sound. I didn’t get it, so I rose in my stirrups and realized we were surrounded by water.

  “No way... I don’t believe it,” I muttered as I dismounted and my feet hit the sand. “This just can’t be real. Let’s see...”

  My feet kept drowning in sand, but it only took a few steps to get to the hillock and climb to the top of it. I hugged the dry tree, looked around me, and came to the final conclusion that it had been no hallucination. I was on a small island in the middle of a wide river. The only dry land was the tiny islet I stood upon, with no other features but a hillock and a dry tree. There were houses with smoking chimneys on the faraway bank — the village of Selene, doubtlessly; the old man had been telling the truth, and I did in fact teleport to dry land. I checked the map to see my location — it was a quarter of a league away from the village, right on the blue line of Elyrne. Damn and blast...

  I’d need to swim to the village now with my reins in my teeth, braving the current. No one knew where I’d reach the shore, and I really hoped there were no hungry monsters underwater.

  Old man... You bloody bastard.

  I raised my face to the skies that seemed to laugh at me and cried loudly,

  “Old man! I hate you!”

  Chapter Four

  A Rich Collector. PKs on the Road! Death Is Not the End. I Should Have Stayed in Waldyra...

  THE WATER was warm, but still hardly pleasant when it washed over my head. There were, however, reasons to rejoice, too — I wasn’t urging the horse to carry me over; it was doing so on its own. Sist plunged on like a bulldozer, heading right for the shore, his head raised high above the surface of the water. He kept dragging me along, too; the only thing I was thinking of was holding the reins tight in my hand. We got dragged far downstream, but I didn’t mind — the transportation scroll had had a three-mile radius. I wouldn’t have to travel far.

  Five minutes later, Sist broke out onto the riverbank and gave a powerful shake, looking as natural as any real horse.

  “Well done!” I said to my steed, pleased, looking around me.

  According to the map, we were a league away from the village we needed. However, all I could see was a dense wall of reeds, and their yellow stalks, swaying in the wind.

  Having established my location, I checked the bunch of spells I’d placed in my hands. It was my standard set — the Ice Needle and the Thorn Hedge. I had a brand new staff in my hands, bought from the shopkeeper Stevan for a song, and was wearing fashionable deerskin moccasins with a two-point bonus to Defense and Agility. I had a cocked crossbow in my pack, which would have been outlandish in real world, but the game allowed one to carry a battle-ready weapon in one’s pack. That didn’t work with bows, of course, but it did with crossbows. Generally, it was one of the things that distinguished Waldyra veterans from newbies. It wasn’t just about good equipment and levels, but knowledge and experience as well.

  I headed away from the river, emerging from the reeds shortly afterward, and found myself in open woodland.

  The map kept blinking green reassuringly, which was great — I hated to wander through unfamiliar terrain knowing nothing about the mobs populating it. I’d gotten into a few unpleasant situations in the past that way, and was no longer willing to take a risk. My first time involved a dirt boar
— a mighty beast, Level 70, covered in a thick layer of mud caked by the sun and impervious to my arrows. The only vulnerable spots were its tiny eyes and its maw, but hitting them would be quite a challenge — the boar moved as fast as a torpedo, and I’d already run out of battle magic scrolls. I did manage to kill it eventually, but it had cost me a lot of effort.

  Another time I ran into a weird seaside monster with the unassuming name of Brown Gobbler. It looked just the part — an upturned bowl covered in lots of long spikes and moving really fast on multiple small legs. It was impervious to arrows, the knife wouldn’t even leave a scratch on it, and the fireball spell scroll was altogether ignored. My attempts to fight the critter, and then, run away from it, turned out to be quite futile. The gobbler gobbled me up with excited grunts, doing full justice to its name. It was only afterward that I read the game forum and found out, much to my embarrassment, that brown gobblers were favorite mobs for leveling up among players with levels of forty or fifty, since they could be killed with amazing ease. Gobblers could be turned over with a stick or a sword, which rendered them perfectly harmless. They would only wiggle their little legs in the air and squeal, their soft bellies open for a strike. Earth mages had it even easier — they’d just needed the right timing to cast a Stone Spike spell or something of the sort underneath the monster. Its carapace was virtually impossible to pierce with regular weapons, and could be easily sold to any craftsman specializing in armor. Oh, and the same post mentioned that only a total noob could be killed by a gobbler. However, it was strongly discouraged to hunt purple gobblers on one’s own — apart from the fact that their spikes were covered in deadly venom, the things could jump high into the air.