by K R Dimmick
I could see Baynor out of the corner of my eye and he was looking extremely worried.
“It is; however, this has nothing to do with Baynor. I forced him to give up the bat wings in his bag. From what Kailu told me, the Dragon Hunters had raided his workshop and taken all his leather. I was simply replenishing his supplies, so he didn’t lose his livelihood and home.” I glared at Andrew, daring him to look away first. “If you hadn’t ordered a team to raid his supplies, I wouldn’t have had to give him mine.”
“Don’t you realize this is just a game? That stupid NPC is purely a piece of code. We’re the only real people here,” spittle started flying out of Andrew’s mouth as he shouted.
“You don’t waste supplies on NPCs. I won’t repeat myself. If you want to stay in this guild, it’s my rules or you leave. Hah, not that you would, since that would mean you’d die,” the corner of his mouth turned up. “I knew I shouldn’t have let a stupid aberth into the guild, they always go soft and can’t cope with the reality of life in this game.”
I clenched my teeth to stop from shouting back.
“For the next two weeks, you’re on prison duty. You’re responsible for looking after the inmates and feeding them.”
Wait, we had a prison? My eyebrows shot up.
“Thought you’d get away scot-free, didn’t you,” he sneered. “Well, that isn’t going to happen. You’ll work off the value of the leather you gave away, instead. And in case you’re wondering, this will be your one and only warning. Next time, I’ll just kick you out of the guild.”
He turned to walk away, then stopped and looked back.
“Oh yes. I almost forgot. That ring you have belongs to the guild. It doesn’t meet the approved builds and since you don’t have the florins to buy your half of it, I’ll take it and you can keep the necklace instead. Hand it over.” He stuck out his hand and glared at me.
Well, today was really taking a nosedive. I pulled off my beautiful ring, knowing I had to pick my battles, jabbing it stone down into his hand. He hid the wince well, but I saw it briefly cross his face, much to my satisfaction.
“Joe will show you to the prison. The library and crafting stations are off limits until you’ve earned back the price of the leather. Plus, I’m confining you to the guildhall during your probation, too.”
A tall, dark-haired, heavily muscled guy gripped my right elbow. I recognized him as one of the people who’d power leveled me. In fact, he was the one that had laughed at me for picking up all the crafting supplies in the arena.
“This way,” he said and pulled me away from the entrance.
Behind the arena was a two-story building. The ground floor had no windows at all, while the top floor seemed to be in a prime position. Someone looking out of the huge window at the top would literally be able to keep an eye on everything that went on in the guildhall.
We walked up to a portal stone and I selected the option to enter the prison. I arrived in a small alcove behind a large partition. Walking around it, I could see a dark stone room with three cells on either side. Each cell had black iron bars from floor to ceiling partitioning it off from the rest of the room. There were thick stone walls between the cells and the whole place smelled of damp, stale air. In the middle of the room was a platform hewn out of rock that came up to my waist.
Three of the six cells were occupied, and all of the occupants were NPCs.
Along the left side, the first cell had a very disheveled looking middle-aged man dressed in threadbare cloth pants and a ripped cloth shirt. It looked like the starter gear we all got from the training instance. He was sitting on the straw that was on the floor, looking like he’d completely lost all hope of ever getting out of the prison.
In the cell next to him was a young woman with stringy, matted hair, staring back at me with terror in her eyes. She was dirty, with patches of smeared mud on her face and arms. Her dark red dress was ripped in various places and she was gripping the bars and shouting about being unfairly imprisoned.
The last occupant was a middle-aged woman. She looked fairly clean, like she’d just arrived. She stood at the back of her cell with her arms crossed and a defiant sneer on her face like she thought I was beneath her.
All of the green text above their heads simply said villager.
“You’re responsible for feeding them,” Joe said. “Sunrise and sunset. The kitchens will have the food ready for you, all you have to do is bring it here and give it to each of them. You’ll need to pick up the key for the cells from Andrew’s office on the way, and remember to put it back when you’re done.”
“I didn’t even know we had a prison.”
“Well now you do. Come on, I’ll show you where the key is.” Joe turned and disappeared, leaving me standing in what had to be the most depressing place in the entire game.
Before I could turn to leave, a flash of white from the last cell on the right caught my eye. I walked closer to get a better look. There were at least thirty bunny rabbits in the cell. What on earth the guild needed with that many bunnies was beyond me.
I hurried back to the portal stone and willed myself back outside. Following Joe straight up a winding staircase, we came to a set of gold-colored, ornate doors. They were so gaudy they wouldn’t have been out of place in a palace as the entrance to the throne room.
“All the guild officers have access to this room. I’ve added your name to give you access for the next two weeks, so you’ll be able to get the key without bothering anyone.” Joe pushed open the doors and walked in.
The room was lavishly decorated, with a plush red carpet, huge tapestries hanging on the stone walls and a magnificent, large oak desk right in the middle. The desk chair was carved with dragons and covered in gold. It looked like an honest-to-god throne.
“This will open all of the cells,” he said, indicating a huge, bronze key that was hanging on the side of the desk. “As you approach the door with the key, you’ll be asked if the prisoner is allowed out or not. Simply select no and they won’t be able to walk out once you’ve opened the door. When you’ve finished, hang it back here on the hook. If Andrew is here, don’t talk to him. He doesn’t like to be disturbed when he’s working on guild business.”
I had no idea what to do with myself. I couldn’t craft, I couldn’t research the riddle in the library, and worst of all, I couldn’t get out of the guildhall. I’d tried, but Andrew had somehow disabled my guild menu. This was going to be a very long two weeks.
Since there was no way Saris was going to talk to me, I had no interest in talking to Colt and Baynor seemed to have left the guildhall, I was on my own.
I walked down to the kitchens. Maybe I could convince Suri to teach me how to cook. Since that wasn’t part of the crafting stations, the restriction might not apply.
“What can I get you?” asked Suri as I stuck my head through the door.
“Nothing, but I was hoping you might be able to teach me to cook?”
“Now why would you need that?” she asked.
I couldn’t very well tell her that I wasn’t allowed to do any other craft, or that I was thinking it would be handy once I’d left the guild.
“Just thought it would be fun,” I crossed my fingers, hoping she wouldn’t ask any further questions.
“Sorry, I have strict instructions not to teach anyone.” She looked rather sad about it, but that didn’t change the outcome.
Okay, so that was out, too. The only other thing I could think of doing was going to the prison to see if those NPCs might know any game lore they’d be willing to share.
Arriving at the prison, I could see that the three NPCs had barely moved since I was last in here. I walked up to the cell of the defiant middle-aged woman, since she didn’t seem shell-shocked, at least.
“Hi. I’m Orianna. I’m the one who’s going to be bringing your food for the next couple of weeks. Any chance you’d tell me why you’re in there?”
The corner of her lip curled upward.
> “You’re one of them. You ought to know already, traveler,” she threw the last word out like it was an insult.
“I’ve only recently arrived in your world. So, there’s a lot I don’t know about it yet. Plus, I didn’t know this prison existed until I was here last time. I really would love to hear your story and why you’re in here.”
“I’m here because I disagreed with your corrupt guild leader,” she snarled. “I am a liaison between the elves and humans. I work with King Faelyn Sophos. We were trying to find the source of the corrupted beasts they were seeing all over their lands. I came to Milgate to see if the humans were having similar problems. The residents there said they were told the elves were corrupting them. When I tried to find out who told them that, I followed the thread back to the Dragon Hunters.”
“I made the mistake of confronting Andrew about it and tried to let him know it wasn’t the elves. Things went from bad to worse, and next thing I know, I’m in here.” She slumped down to the floor. “I still have no idea where they’re coming from, but I can assure you it’s not the elves corrupting them. I think we need to look for an outside source. My name is Cara Legatus, by the way.”
The word villager above her head transformed into her name, with a little 14 next to it. She looked up at me as if an idea had suddenly occurred to her.
“Would you help discover their source?” she asked hopefully, causing a notification to pop up.
You have received a quest: Corruption 1
Discover what is corrupting the wildlife and report your suspicions to the Elf King Faelyn Sophos.
Completion of this quest will give you 20,000 XP, plus increase your standing with the elves to ‘trusted’, unless already higher.
Do you accept? Yes / No
I quickly thought yes. It was something I was wanting to know anyway, and the rewards were huge. Clearly, this was a major quest line for this zone of the game. One I guessed that very few players, especially in the Dragon Hunters, knew existed. For all I knew, it could have something to do with the riddle, although I couldn’t see what yet.
“You’ll have to give the king the information because I have a feeling I won’t be getting out of here anytime soon. However, the king might mount a rescue mission for me if you can find him quickly enough.”
You have received a quest: Rescue Cara
Persuade King Faelyn Sophos to mount a rescue mission to free Cara.
Completion of this quest will give you 5,000 XP and increase your standing with the elves to ‘ally’.
Do you accept? Yes / No
I thought yes again. I had very few allies so far, so this would be a big step in the right direction as far as I was concerned.
“I’ve been confined to the guildhall for the next two weeks, but as soon as I can, I’ll start finding out where the corruption is coming from. You have my word.” As I said that, a series of tiny, golden lights swirled around me.
Your word is your bond. Deliver on your promise or you will lose all unused Reputation Points and have permanent negative Karma.
Delivering on your promise, however, will give you 10 Reputation Points.
Interesting. I’d not heard anyone mention Reputation Points yet, I wished I could go and research them in the library, but that, sadly, wasn’t an option at the moment.
“Do you know what Reputation Points are, by any chance?” I asked.
“Of course. To be able to form a guild or start a settlement, you have to have positive Karma and at least 10 Reputation Points. You can then spend those points on various items that are in the menus of each of them. The only way to get those points is to promise something and then deliver on that promise. Once you have your guild or settlement going, you can get more points by keeping your followers happy.”
Well that was even more interesting. That meant Andrew must have done that at some point to start the Dragon Hunters. It also meant that the raids, like the one where they’d stolen all of Kailu’s leather, were probably designed by Andrew to ensure his guild members had so much negative Karma they wouldn’t ever be able to start a rival guild.
“Out of curiosity, can you start both a guild and a settlement?” I asked.
“Definitely. You just need 10 Reputation Points for each of them.”
20
Talking About the Weather
It sounded like Cara would hopefully be a great source of game lore.
“Is there anything else you can tell me, perhaps about the elves? I have a friend who’s an elf, but he doesn’t seem to want to share his past. All I know is that he’s an outcast. I figure anything I can learn about them would help when I go to ask the King to rescue you.”
“There’s a lot of elf lore I could teach you, but you really need a better standing with them before I can share much information. There is one thing I can tell you though, and that is that their last names aren’t passed down from their parents like humans’ are. Instead, an elf has to earn their last name and there is a meaning behind it. For instance, your elf friend who’s an outcast. I don’t know his first name, but I would imagine his last name is Banni, because that means outcast.”
I nodded. I guess I wasn’t going to get any more lore out of her until I’d done at least one of her quests. It was also nearly sunset, so it was time to get the three prisoners some food. Excusing myself, I explained I’d be back in a little while with some food.
An hour later, after a brief argument with Suri about the quality of the food for the prisoners, I made my way to Andrew’s office to get the key.
Opening the door, I looked inside. Andrew wasn’t there, which was a plus. I grabbed the bronze key and headed downstairs to the prison.
“I have food for everyone,” I shouted, in an effort to drag the two shell-shocked prisoners out of their stupor.
I approached the first cell, took the key out of my pocket and turned it in the lock. Sure enough, I got a pop-up message.
Allow prisoner to leave the cell? Yes / No
I thought no because there was no way I could help them escape when I couldn’t even get myself out of the guildhall. As the door opened, I put the bowl of oatmeal and the side of bacon (that I’d told Suri was for me) on the rickety cot at the side of the cell.
Going to the second cell with the young woman, I did the same, but this time, she tried to make a break for it. As soon as I’d stepped away from the door, she sprinted for it to get behind me. With a loud thud, she ran into an invisible barrier and fell back down, nearly knocking herself out. I left the cell before she could try again.
Last of all, I unlocked Cara’s cell and walked in with the food. She was meditating. Not wanting to disturb her, I left the food and decided to come back later to see if she needed anything else. I figured I could always tell Suri any extra food was for me.
Time to see if I could get more stats through something else besides leveling up. I decided that using up all my stamina and then pushing through was the easiest way to see if I could get an extra point in Endurance. I unequipped as much of my gear as I could without looking like I was walking around without clothes on. With just my top, pants and boots on, I was left with 320 SP. I started running from one end of the guildhall to the other, slowly watching my stamina bar decrease. After a while, it finally hit zero and my legs felt like they’d turned to lead. I kept going, pushing through and forcing myself to take one stumbling step after another. Ten long minutes later, just as I was starting to think this was an exercise in futility, I was finally rewarded for my efforts.
You have gained +1 Endurance for successfully pushing yourself well beyond your limits.
All that pain had been worth it. I was still bent over, with my hands on my knees, breathing heavily, but I’d proved I could increase my stats without having to level up.
My stamina bar was slowly starting to refill since I’d stopped moving. If I wanted more points, now was the easiest time to get going again. At this point in the evening, this was the easiest stat for me to trai
n without anyone else noticing what I was doing. Time to get running.
A couple of hours later, utterly exhausted, but extremely pleased with myself, I’d managed to gain a further nine Endurance points. I collapsed onto the floor and lay there with barely enough energy to breathe.
The main stats I really wanted to level were currently off limits since I couldn’t get into the library for Intelligence and I probably needed someone else’s help to level Wisdom and Fortitude. That meant I could try lifting heavy things to increase my Strength or possibly avoiding imaginary attacks over and over to increase my Dexterity.
Since it was now quite late at night and there was no one around, I picked Dexterity as the one I wanted to increase next. I thought Dodge and threw myself into a roll. The moment I came to my feet, I Dodged again. I rolled the length of the guildhall and back with zero results, other than the feeling that I’d been beaten up by the floor. I guess I needed to actually avoid something for it to work, I thought, as I vaguely remembered the trainer telling me that in the training instance. As soon as I was allowed out, I was going to find an aggressive mob and simply stand in front of it, Dodging its attacks for a few hours.
However, if I wanted to go back and visit Cara, I needed to do so before she went to sleep. Reequipping all my gear, I decided I had time to have a quick look at my stats to see how they were doing now. I concentrated on seeing just my stats as I pulled up the details.
STATS, ATTRIBUTES & SKILLS
NAME: Orianna
RACE: Human
