The True Enemy Revealed

by Jason Cheek

  What was it about the human psyche that could be responsible for such wonderful things and yet be capable of such terrible atrocities? It reminded me of the Milgram experiment they did in 1961, or hell, even The Stanford Prison Experiment they did ten years later. All in the hopes of understanding how people could carry out the atrocities that had occurred in World War Two prison camps. The results of the experiments had been terrifying for the researchers in that day and age. Both proved the point that most people simply followed the orders of those in authority without questioning those directives. It wasn’t just a “German” thing but a “humanity” thing.

  Nowadays, professionals try to say these types of attitudes reflected simply a Narcissistic Personality Disorder or possibly a lack of dopamine in people’s systems that stopped some them from putting themselves in another person’s shoes. Honestly though, with how people acted in today’s society, it seemed like most people were simply following the herd without taking responsibility for their own decisions or verifying what was being told to them. Either way, it was a scary thought.

  Yeah, I know. It’s a weird set of thoughts to have while torturing some hapless asshat. It wasn’t that I didn’t take personal responsibility for my actions. I knew exactly what I was doing. I’d have probably just killed the player and moved on if this were a random encounter where I’d caught someone ganking. However, after the atrocities he’d admitted that he and his friends had done to the townsfolk, they weren’t getting out of this unscathed. All that I wanted right now were answers. Once I had that, he could take his trip to the graveyard. Looking at Amron in disgust, my voice took on a harsh tone.

  “Tell us what you and your people have been up to and where the townsfolk of the city are. Do that and I’ll send you to the graveyard.” I somehow held the smile that threatened to split my lips at the gleam in Amron’s eyes as he weighed my words carefully.

  “Give your word that you’ll send me to the graveyard after I answer your questions,” the rogue said with suppressed excitement as he gritted his teeth from the pain.

  “You have my word that I’ll send you as soon as I can without any further torture.”

  Sneering at me like I was a dumbass, Amron began his tale by saying that his entire guild had gone the Nightmare start route, explaining that the Dread Pack owned this city and could do with it as they pleased. Their guild was huge, approximately nine hundred plus players strong. A smile came to his lips as he talked about rounding up the citizens and putting them in sweat shops to craft potions and items for their alliance.

  He openly laughed at how they enforced their brutal, gang-like rules and worked the starving digital people in the arena like slaves chained up in cages. He went into the story of how Warden Laxjar Rohan had dared to challenge them with nearly two thousand NPCs. Now the old bastard was feeding worms under the Keep with the rest of the surviving Royal Army that had been locked away in the dungeons.

  I’m sure he thought he was terrifying us with all that they’d accomplished in the short time they’d been inside the game. He had no doubts that we’d choose to run away instead of facing him and his buddies, since all that we had as backup were a few hundred NPCs. Instead, his words just gave the Devil Dogs and the rest of my friends that much more of a willingness to do whatever was necessary to cut these assholes out of Darom like the cancer they were. As the smug rogue came to a finish with his story, he looked at me expectantly.

  “Are you going to be the man of honor that you portray yourself to be, or are you going to punk out and go back on your word? I have a whole Podcast channel of fans that will be watching the choice you make,” he said giving me a smarmy smile. “As it is, my ratings are going to skyrocket when I show you torturing players.”

  I knew he thought he had me between a rock and a hard place. I’d given my word to kill him and let him respawn at the graveyard. If I went back on my promise now, he’d blast this video around to everyone. The jackass would probably do it anyway just to say I was afraid of him and his buds. That’s when the last part of what he said hit me. This was probably that podcast guy who had been accusing me of cheating. Instead of being afraid, a grim smile came to my lips as I stood up straight and put the gag back in his mouth.

  “Oh, it’s you, the guy who accused me of cheating.” I said, dragging out the ‘u’ sound. “I wonder how many of your fans know you’re a player for the opposition, let alone all the nasty crap you’ve been up to.” Seeing the sudden look of concern in the man’s eyes, my grin widened further.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll make sure to link this to your Podcast.” I said, making the appropriate notes for Lora Lyn. By now, the Twitch Video Technician was familiar with my idiosyncrasies to know what I wanted. If not, she’d contact me before posting the videos on my Twitch channel. As I spoke, the man’s struggles seemed to become that much more urgent. Stepping up to Amron, I caught his chin forcing him to look me in the eyes.

  “Don’t worry, little podcaster. I’ll release you as promised in just a moment,” I said, letting Amron’s chin go as I caught Helgath and Neysa’s eyes. ‘Could you guys keep an eye on this asshole for me, while I’m getting everything ready to go?’

  “I’ll make him shit out his mouth if he tries anything,” Helgath promised in her spooky child-like voice. It always had that odd inhuman tone whenever she was excited about hurting someone that had upset me. I couldn’t help but smirk. I honestly wasn’t sure if I was more impressed or terrified by those simple words. Either way, she was going to have to show me how to do “that trick” for sure.

  ‘We’ll make certain he doesn’t do anything he shouldn’t,’ Neysa’s thoughts echoed in my head. As if to one up Helgath, the Silver Dire Wolf throatily growled as she crouched down low in front of the rogue and snapped her jaws menacingly at the man’s junk. There was no confusing the threat as the player whimpered into his gag and writhed in the Royal Knights’ arms trying to cover his groin with a knee. He wasn’t the only man who shifted uncomfortably at the obvious threat to his manhood as I even felt my own balls shrink just a little.

  With a shake of my head, I gave Neysa a quick pat on her flank and the Half-Orc a one-armed hug, before walking away to huddle with the rest of my people. Catching Thomas and Phoenix’s eyes, I nodded back towards the rogue. “Did anyone else find that odd?” Seeing both of their questioning looks, I rolled my eyes as I laid out what was bothering me.

  “While the seventy-five percent realism hurts, after leveling up to level 34 you’d think by now he’d be somewhat more …” I paused searching for the right words when Phoenix cut in.

  “Not such a pussy about taking a hit?” She asked, catching my drift.

  “Yeah, basically.”

  “Why would that be a concern,” Thomas asked, knowing me well enough to realize I’d picked up on something during my questioning session that the rest of them had missed.

  “How could he have reached such a high level without getting accustomed to taking a hit?” I asked, looking back and forth between them.

  “By killing a bunch of defenseless higher-level soldiers that were helpless and couldn’t defend themselves?” Thomas said, getting it in the first try. I could see the outrage in the Devil Dog Guild Leader’s eyes as he glared at the rogue in disgust.

  “Nooo, they wouldn’t,” Phoenix’s eyes widened in horror as she got the gist of what we were saying.

  “No, they would,” Thomas confirmed unhappily. “Makes a certain kind of sick sense in its own right. If you had no personal honor and were a bunch of cold hearted assholes, you could level up a bunch of players easily without ever having to actually get your hands dirty with actual fighting.”

  “And I thought the worst horrors I was going to run into were going to be from the monsters inside the game,” I said, grimly wishing I was wrong but somehow knowing that I wasn’t. “You want to join in on the discussion I’m giving to the soldiers being sent to the graveyards and the reserve units?”

  “Yeah, I�
�ll join you,” Thomas agreed readily enough. “I just got an update from Kenzie about what’s happening in the lower parts of the city.” Seeing my questioning look, he quickly explained.

  “There’s no putting lipstick on this pig,” Thomas growled unhappily as he listened to Kenzie’s message. Running a shaky hand through his hair, he tried to cool off his emotions. “It’s plain ugly. On the three main streets, there are multiple groups of the Dread Packs members doing door-to-door searches as they ransack entire city blocks.” His face noticeably darkened in anger, while his voice took on an even harsher tone.

  “They’re yanking out any women and children they find and chaining them up in a line like chattel slaves.” There was a dark murmur from my friends and companions as I felt my face harden into a mask.

  “Tell Kenzie I need to have everyone’s videos of what’s going on.” I made a symbol with my hands meaning the message was for my video technician, Lora Lyn, with Twitch Online. Quickly, I explained to her that I wanted the last three minutes of the three rogues videos included on my stream and to have it inserted here showing the crimes being committed by the other guild to the townsfolk of the city. I also had Kenzie, Zhou and Darkhorse give their verbal agreements for their video transfer to my stream.

  Once I was finished with that, I turned back to my friends and companions. “We’ll be moving out in just a moment. I just need to get a group of soldiers stationed at each of the city’s graveyards first.” I said getting nods from everyone. Catching Sarka, Phoenix, and Thomas’ attention, I nodded my head towards the soldiers that were forming up on the dock as Ulia, Ayda, and Fylreh silently joined us along with the remaining Devil Dogs. “Okay, let’s get this ball rolling,” I said heading towards the gathering soldiers.

  “Assault Leader Dell,” I called out to the debarking soldiers coming down the gangplank from the Command Ship. Unlike the Royal Knights that had sworn their oaths to both Princess Isolde and me, the soldiers of the Royal Army had given me their allegiance and were solely my men. There was a small commotion at the head of the formation, before a stern faced swordsman broke free. Coming to a stop in front of me, he saluted smartly with a fist to his chest.

  “Lord Ironwolf.” I’d run across the man along with several others when I’d been making my rounds the day before to share out my Dark Magic training. At the time, I’d assigned him as the overall commander of my Royal Army Forces, since I’d heard good things about him from Phoenix during the battle and from Kenzie during the cleanup operations. The men knew him and respected him, which was always a plus. Besides, he was used to being in charge and knew how to deal with the Royal Knights who could be pushy pains in the asses at the best of times.

  “I need three Sub-Leaders assigned to guard the graveyards. They’ll be leading a force of fifty soldiers with the mission to de-level any newfar that respawn at their locations,” I said nodding to the gagged rogue whose eyes were getting wider and wider at my every word. “I expect the action to be fierce but doable. Once they have the newfar de-leveled to zero, they’ll need to be bagged, gagged, and stacked until the end of the battle.” A frown formed on my lips as I lowered my voice for the group around us alone to hear.

  “The Sub-Leaders will need to be smart enough to make the determination if the newfar are part of this crew or not. We could have some innocents who were caught up in this crap like everyone else was.”

  “I know the perfect men for the mission milord,” Assault Leader Dell said confidently. With a piercing whistle he waved over three men. Jogging over, the three men lined up in front of the Assault Leader within moments as everyone’s eyes watched our group. With a nod from Dell, the three men stepped forward one at a time to introduce themselves.

  “Ollie Burns,” the first Sub-Leader announced with a fist to his chest. He was a whip thin, olive skinned man that topped out at six foot two with short cropped black hair. The game popped up his information, a Level 39 Swordsman as I stepped forward to shake the surprised man’s hand. The trimmed full beard somewhat messed up the Star Trek video game Terran Empire look but otherwise he looked more than capable. As soon as he stepped back, I turned to the next man in line.

  “Liam Miller,” the Sub-Leader stated with a salute. He was an average sized man with toned muscles and a hard look in his clear blue eyes as the game flashed his information above his head, Level 38 Swordsman. His military-cut, blonde hair and goatee went well with the Black Cuttle leather armor that everyone was wearing. With a nod, he took my proffered hand in a strong grip before I faced the last man.

  “Logan West, milord.” The man respectfully said in a deep voice as he thumped his meaty fist against his chest in salute. Looking up at the trooper, I swore the man was a proverbial blonde giant in size. Although, his clean-shaven look was somewhat at odds with the mane of blond hair that cascaded down his back. Honestly, his bearing was more befitting of a Viking warrior from Earth than that of a Royal Army trooper. As he gave me a firm wrist clasp, the system displayed his information above his head, Level 39 Swordsman. The look of surprise on the man’s face as I greeted him as an equal said much for how regular people were treated in this world.

  “Your mission will be to camp the graveyards for enemy newfar.” Seeing the men’s confused looks, I explained. “You’ll each be taking a group of fifty men with you for support. As soon as we kill people like this rogue,” I nodded back to the wide-eyed newfar. “Your jobs will be to repeatedly kill them as they respawn in the graveyard until they’re down to level zero. Then you’ll gag, bag, and tag’em.”

  This brought an animated round of questions from the three men as I gave my explanation about fighting newfar and our special ‘respawn’ ability. I did my best to ensure that they understood the importance of de-leveling them down to zero and stopping anyone from reporting our activities. By the time we finished, the entire crowd of soldiers were listening intently to my explanations and passing the information to their buddies further back who couldn’t hear my words.

  I assured them that we’d have quick reaction groups available to give them a hand if the situation turned ugly, so they had some back-up. Everyone quickly understood the number of forces and their levels we were likely up against. I could tell in the eyes looking back at me that they understood this was going to be an epic fight. Luckily, the soldiers knew of my ability and my willingness to resurrect them if they were cut down during the fight, which gave them a confidence few of them had never had before.

  Unbeknownst to me, it was once again my perspective that every life had worth that had bought me their allegiance more than plain words ever could have. I wasn’t aware of the social revolution I was starting by just being myself, but my decent treatment of these men, caring about their families, and worrying about the townsfolk, had made all of my troopers want to fight. Not just fight. It made them want to win.

  These men came from a society that looked at the common man and woman as worth little more than the beasts kept in the fields by the nobles. As soldiers, they had a little more value in their society than a shop keeper or farmer would have, but not much more. It definitely wasn’t high enough for a priest with a Resurrect spell to be willing to expend the mana or time necessary to bring them back to life if they fell on the battlefield.

  In the short time I’d been their lord, I’d done more for them than any other ruler had. Besides treating them with common courtesy, I’d given them a level of personal respect that was usually only reserved for the high-borne of the land. During this time, Thomas took a moment to give the troopers a few words of advice, reminding them that it was essential for them to keep away from the Dread Pack teams scouring the city for loot.

  None of them liked that, which I more than understood. Unfortunately, it was where we were at. I gave my word that the rest of us would take care of ending the atrocities occurring in the city. Their job was to make sure the PKers couldn’t come back and overwhelm us. With a final fist salute, the three men took off at a run down the dock
s with the fifty soldiers under their command following after them as I turned back to Assault Leader Dell. Before I could speak, Princess Isolde abruptly stepped in front of me.

  “Don’t you ever publicly disagree with my orders again,” she hissed, giving me a look that could kill. “These are my lands and my people. I’m not about to have some uncouth-“

  “Shut up and step the fuck back!” I growled, cutting her off as the Royal Knights shifted uncomfortably around us at my harsh tone. Before she could get over her apoplectic reaction, I continued in a more evenly. “I’d hoped we wouldn’t have to go down this road to get this straightened out, but obviously, you’re leaving me little choice in the matter.”

  “First off, you are my vassal. I’m not yours.” I said in no uncertain terms, as her mouth snapped shut in silent outrage. Unconcerned about her feelings, I continued outlining the relationship between us. “I am willing to work along with you, but you need to be aware of my strategy and be willing to work with me. We need to be working together or this is going to turn bad in a heartbeat. Until my people are in place, simply killing these newfar won’t help anything but to warn the rest of these assholes that we’re here. So, the next time you want to make some command decisions, how about talking to me first to make sure we are on the same page before moving forward. Otherwise, I’ll intervene if necessary.”

  None of the Royal Knights looked happy at my words and the princess looked like she’d just eaten something distasteful. I tipped two fingers to the rim of my helm as she spun away and stomped down the dock towards the human squadron of biremes. As the Royal Knights created a solid screen around the princess, Sir Hemmet gave me an unhappy look before falling in line with the rest of his men. Unconsciously, an ugly frown turned down my lips as I watched the group head towards the most decorated ship docked next to the pier.