by Paul Bellow
20
The Midgaard Arenas
Josh
A month after enslaving me, the Four Wizards decided they wanted to use me in other ways. I peered at them from inside my metal cage, not saying a word.
“You’ve turned into quite a brute,” Ferris said. “This is natural.”
“Now that we’ve completed the ultimate teleportation spell, we’re going home,” Aaron said.
“You should be thankful we’re bringing you,” Thom said.
Sherlock nodded. “Not everyone makes it past level one-four.”
“The warp zone will continue doing its job, but we’ll be bypassing it to get home.” Ferris stepped forward and unlocked the cage. “Are you ready for some fun?”
I grunted once and nodded my approval. Four weeks in captivity hadn’t taken away my speech, but I’d devolved into a primal barbarian only worried about survival.
The Four Wizards stepped back as the door of the cage swung open. I crawled out on all fours, not bothering to stand. They stared down at me like I was their pet.
“Are we sure he’s ready?” Thom asked.
“If not, he dies.” Sherlock grinned. “I’m okay with that outcome.”
“As long as we win some gold at the arena,” Ferris said. “They’ll be surprised once we make it back, and we’ll need as much gold and platinum as possible to bribe the right people. Not to mention the prestige we’ll get for having a winning fighter in the arena.”
“Midgaard!” Thom shouted then pumped his fist in the air.
I stayed near the front of the cage, waiting for their instructions. They’d kept me from Wiley and all other social contact. I’d cracked on week three. Badly.
“Get up,” Ferris said. “Arms out.”
I did as he told me. Was this my new reality?
Sherlock fastened my hands together with connected steel bracelets. Thom worked on shackling my feet with around two-feet of chain for me to walk.
“Once we cast this spell, there’s no coming back,” Ferris said. “Ever.”
“I don’t ever want to come back to the first four levels,” Sherlock said.
“The way out of the game might appear on those levels,” Aaron said. “What then?”
“Shut up,” Thom said. “You’re taking all the fun out of it as usual.”
Ferris stepped aside then said, “March.”
I put one foot in front of the other, raising my knee. Outside the room, I followed the familiar hallway to a set of stairs leading up. As I climbed, bright light hit my eyes.
They hadn’t let me out for a few days as they finished whatever spell they planned to use. I almost hoped it messed up and killed me. Then I could start a new character.
In the main living area of the luxurious cabin in the mountains, I stopped near the door to the outside. My curiosity got the best of me, and I peeked outside to look for Wiley.
The immense red dragon sat on his haunches, restrained with glowing chains of energy. He looked about as beat up as me. Were they going to teleport him away, too?
“Outside,” Ferris said. “Hurry up. We don’t have much time.”
As I walked out of the cabin, I saw the sun setting behind the mountains in the distance. Wiley lifted his head and swung it around. His eyes twinkled briefly.
“Move it,” Sherlock said then shoved me forward.
I almost turned and attacked him, but I knew it wouldn’t end well.
“That’s far enough,” Ferris said after I had taken a few steps.
Killing off all my emotions made it easier to control my rage.
Wiley attempted to sit up, but the magic chains only tightened.
“Give it another minute,” Ferris said. “The sun needs to be just right.”
“Are you sure this will work?” Aaron asked. “Maybe we should wait.”
“Chicken,” I muttered.
Sherlock spun around. “What did you say?” he asked.
“You’re all cowards,” I said, spitting the words out.
“Take that back!” Sherlock demanded.
“Give him a break,” Aaron said.
“I’ll break his hairy back.” Sherlock strode forward. “Do you hear me?”
When I faked a lunge, he flinched, almost falling to the ground.
Thom laughed while Aaron and Ferris fussed with a giant blue crystal. As they positioned it on the ground, the two other wizards calmed down and joined them.
Is this what they’ve been working on for over a month? Some stupid crystal trick? What a bunch of idiots. My anger flared up then died down just as quickly.
“Now!” Sherlock shouted. “For the love of all that’s magic, do it now.”
All four wizards held their palms out, pointing them toward the crystal. Some of the last rays of light from the sun hit the multi-faceted gem. Their chants increased the glow.
I lifted my arms to shield my eyes from the brightness. Something popped, sounding like a gunshot. The bass hit my eardrums, almost deafening me. I heard ringing.
Aaron, Ferris, Sherlock, and Thom all bent to lift the still glowing gem. I watched in horror as a blinding white beam shot out of it and hit the dragon. Wiley screamed.
His cries echoed up and down the mountain as the crystal grew even brighter. I glanced around, wondering if I should make a run for it even with my feet shackled.
The light overtook everything. My vision returned slowly. We’d been teleported off the mountain and in a field. Tall walls in the distance surrounded a bustling city. I saw the Four Wizards but not the dragon. Had they killed him?
“Where’s Wiley?” I asked.
Maybe I could break the chains if I went into a barbarian rage.
“It worked!” Thom shouted then leaped straight up.
Sherlock kneeled on the ground then bowed his head to the grass. The other three wizards joined him. Were they happy their spell had worked?
“Where are we?” I asked.
Ferris stood while the others stayed on the ground. He walked over and threw his arms around me, squeezing tightly. I hated the smell of his dirty green robes.
“Midgaard, stupid orc,” he said then backed away.
The other wizards stood, all of them congratulating each other.
“Why isn’t Wiley with us?” I asked.
“He sacrificed his life to get us back here,” Thom said.
“What?”
I struggled to get out of the shackles.
“Calm down,” Sherlock said. “It’s not as bad as you make it out to be. You’re about to enter Midgaard, one of the greatest cities in the entire game.”
“At least the parts we know about,” Ferris added.
He turned and walked toward the brilliant white walls of the city.
“Bring the barbarian,” he said over his shoulder.
Sherlock raised his hands as if to cast a spell.
I sighed then turned and followed Ferris.
Once we reached the city gates, the wizards stopped. I stood with them surrounding me on all sides. No sound escaped the walls of the city as we waited.
The image of a bearded man formed on the white wall to the right of the double gates. Ferris stepped toward it, his head held high. Where had they taken me?
“State your business,” the bearded man said in a bored tone.
“We’re here for the arenas,” Ferris said then nodded at me.
I looked over at the other three and saw Thom bouncing around like an excited kid about to go to the virtual circus for the first time. He annoyed me.
“Hold on.” The man on the wall sat up. “What’s wrong with your PIN?”
Sherlock scooted toward the wall and waved three long feathers.
“There’s nothing wrong with the PINs,” he said in a sing-song voice.
How powerful were the Four Wizards? Would I ever escape?
“Clear to enter,” the bearded man said.
I heard a deep clicking sound. The two massive gates slid into the wall, allow
ing us passage. Sherlock came over and shoved me.
“Get going, brute,” he said in a nasty tone.
“Midgaard!” Thom yelled then ran through the gateway.
I followed at a slower pace, amazed at what lay behind the walls. The architecture reminded me of a mix of styles covering thousands of years.
Just inside the walls, tents and mud huts ran the perimeter of the city. I saw men and women of various races walking around in tattered clothes.
“Come on,” Ferris said. “We need to get him registered.”
Sherlock pushed me again. I walked down the main street, following Ferris and Thom. As we headed to the center of the city, the buildings changed.
The architecture reached Roman standards. Shops and taverns lined both sides of the wide, cobblestone street. Thom ran from one to another, peeking through the windows.
“He needs to settle down,” Aaron warned.
I shut the others out of my mind as I took in the sights, smells, and sounds of the thriving metropolis. The Four Wizards had found and taken my Gem of True Sight, but I still soaked in everything around me. Everything looked strange and familiar at the same time.
“Keep an eye on the brute,” Ferris said.
Thom kept dancing around. Aaron walked beside me on my left while Sherlock kept stride on my right. As we progressed deeper into the city, the beings we encountered grew in wealth and status. Up ahead, at the end of the road, I saw the mighty arena.
Ferris stopped near one of several entranceways. He turned as the rest of us stopped. I cursed all of them in my mind as they acted like everything was normal.
“Buff him up,” Sherlock said.
Aaron shook his head then said, “We might get caught.”
“Or we might not,” Ferris countered. “We need the platinum unless you want to sleep in the slums tonight. Nothing from the lower levels is worth anything here, and it might give us away.”
I pondered the so-called Warp Zone they had talked about and how the first four levels of the game had been closed off to trap Magi Inyontoo. Why had the Four Wizards needed to break out? Nothing in the Tower of Gates made any sort of sense.
“The new spell might not work,” Aaron insisted. “They could discover us.”
“Who cares?” Sherlock said. “If they do, they’ll kill the barbarian, and we’ll slip out of the arena. No big deal. Quit being so afraid of life.”
Aaron sighed then waved his hand over my chest.
You feel better.
You feel different.
You have [999/123] health remaining.
“Whoa,” I said, genuinely impressed. “What did you do?”
Aaron grinned like the boy who always craved attention and had finally gotten it. He didn’t answer, but I felt great. Would the health points last? I didn’t care.
“Let’s do this,” I said, still unsure of what they wanted me to do.
I had pieced together the conclusion that they want me to fight in the arena to win them some money, but I wasn’t entirely sure. The roar of the crowd inside thrilled me.
We followed Ferris into the four-story coliseum. The grand spaces within reminded me of the Mines of Oriam in some ways. We blended into the crowds. I looked from one person to another, wondering if anyone would help me.
For all I knew, slavery was indeed legal within the stupid virtual prison. I had read about stranger things in high school, especially my college-prep courses. The Tower of Gates reminded me of Lord of the Flies without the much darker edginess.
As the spell notification mentioned, I felt different, in a good way. Ferris stopped near a betting station and joined the shorted line to wait our turn.
I needed to kill someone. Bloodlust shot through my veins. Synapses fired at fantastic speeds. I would never die. Things couldn’t get any better.
“He’s looking good,” Sherlock said.
The line moved forward. I shifted my weight from my left leg to my right, ready to bound up a wall and fight a spider if necessary. A woman in the crowd caught my attention.
Monky? Not wanting to let the Four Wizards know anything about her true identity, I averted my eyes. Had she noticed me? Was it even her? My thoughts were running a mile a minute.
Ferris stepped forward again. He was next in line. I turned to check on the woman I thought might be Monky, but I didn’t see her anywhere. Ugh. Where had she gone?
“Are you feeling good?” Thom asked, poking me in the stomach with a finger.
“I’m fine,” I said. “Ready to kill or be killed.”
“That’s what we like to hear,” Sherlock said.
“It’s all set,” Ferris said.
He held up a slip of paper.
“Who am I fighting?” I asked.
“Not who but what,” Ferris said.
He grinned as I furrowed my brow.
“You’ll find out soon enough,” Sherlock said.
They led me to a doorway with stairs leading down behind it. A man wearing spiked leather armor grabbed the chains on my hands and pulled me toward him.
“Get this healing collar off him,” the guard said.
“Not a problem,” Ferris said then moved to take it off.
“Hurry it up,” he said. “We don’t have all day.”
After Ferris finished taking off the collar, the guard nudged me down the stairs.
“Good luck,” Thom called out as I descended.
In the dark underbelly of the coliseum, I saw fighters of all shapes and sizes. A minotaur snarled as I passed him. Was that what I was going to fight? Could I win?
“This way,” the guard said, motioning with his hand.
He stopped near an empty cage and opened it.
“Wait here until they come to get you,” he said.
I shuffled inside, magic energy still coursing through my body. Foul smells filled the area under the coliseum. Outside, I heard a crowd cheering.
After a few minutes of pacing the small cage, a different man appeared. He opened the cage and motioned for me to come out. I obliged.
The man in spiked leather armor led me to a nearby wall with a wide array of weapons. I glanced at them all before zeroing in on one.
“Pick your poison,” the guard said.
I nodded at the giant sword. He reached over and took it down from the wall. After examining it a minute, he pointed to an archway.
Light poured through it, barely penetrating the darkness. I walked forward, wondering if they would at least unchain my hands.
When I reached the archway, I saw a ramp leading up to the arena. Three men carried a bloody body past me. I took a deep breath.
“Give me your hands,” the guard said.
I turned and saw he had a key with a skull on the top. He used it to undo my shackles. As he did, I heard an announcer in the arena.
“Next up, we have Yorg the half-orc!” he said.
The crowd, while loud, wasn’t exactly cheering.
“Here,” the guard said after he finished.
I turned and saw him holding out the battered sword. After taking it from him, I thought for a quick moment about running away. But with so many people around, I gave up the idea.
Without having anywhere to go, I walked up the ramp to face my unknown fate in the Midgaard arena. My eyes adjusted to the sunlight by time I reached the top of the ramp.
“Yorg the barbarian!” an announcer said again as I stopped and looked around.
Tens of thousands of people filled the stands. Most of them booed, cat-called, and worse. I took a few steps toward the center of the arena. What am I about to fight?
“Yorg will be facing off against an adult bearbug,” the announcer said.
His voice echoed as the crowd went wild. The little spider-creatures with the body of a miniature bear didn’t scare me. I had fought swarms of the smaller ones.
A gate lifted on the far side of the arena. I held up my forearm to shield my eyes from the sun as a bearbug lumbered out onto the field and gr
owled.
The crowd went into another cheering fit as the bearbug looked around. It stood at least a foot or two taller than myself from what I could tell at a distance.
As the cheers died down, the bear-half of the creature raised its hairy arms and roared again. I gripped the two-handed sword tightly as it shuffled forward on eight large legs.
The buffs the Four Wizards had cast on me still flowed through my body. I stood perfectly still as I tried to invoke my barbarian rage. Something felt different as my anger rose.
Better Barbarian Rage Invoked!
+50% to hit bonus
+50 damage bonus
You get 2 attacks per round.
I lost all conscious thought. My huge half-orc body screamed and ran toward the bearbug with the sword held aloft in one hand. I felt like I was watching myself somehow.
The massive bearbug growled as a ran by, slicing one its legs. It screamed as blood spurted from the wound. The sound of the crowd went away as I concentrated.
My enhanced rage and other buffs made it easy for me to dance around the confused bearbug, slicing and dicing its body. The beast got a few hits of its own in, but I paid the pain no heed with all my extra health points. I kept attacking like a true berserk maniac.
As my rage wore off, I slowed down a bit. By this time, the bearbug was in bad shape. Icky fluids came out of several cuts and holes in its gruesome body. While I hadn’t chopped off any other legs, it was still wobbling like it was about to collapse and finally die.
I aimed my next blow at its chest, scoring a direct hit.
Your slash MUTILATES the bearbug for 73 damage.
Your slash DISEMBOWELS the bearbug for 113 damage.
The bearbug is dead!
Combat is Over!
You get 3,500 xp
You have 15,500 xp
Level Up!
Welcome to Level 6 Barbarian!
You need 7,500 xp for Level 7 Barbarian
Choose your class path wisely!
* * *
>>Urban Barbarian (levels 6-15)
