The True Enemy Revealed

by Jason Cheek

  I was just about to message the Scout Captain again, when I saw his familiar face come into view at the top of the wall opposite of us with the rest of his Shadow Scouts and Ayda trailing behind. Switching to the local raid chat that covered both of our groups, I called out to him and his men. “Glad to see you gentlemen could make it to the party.”

  “Sorry about that Lord Ironwolf, we were held up by some unexpected guests.” Nivirth shot back without hesitation as he gave me a toothy grin.

  “Yeah, we’ve had our own guests visiting frequently too. For some reason they’re refusing to go away.” I was surprised to see the zombies on the wall along with the Shadow Scouts. “How’s that working out with having them respawn on the wall?” I asked out of curiosity.

  “Works like a charm,” Nivirth said, still smiling. “They usually try to respawn in midair. If they survive the fall, we fill them with arrows.”

  “Midair?” I asked incredulously.

  “Yeah, they usually appear thirty feet out and fall to their deaths.” Nivirth said with a shrug as he came to a stop on the other side of the wall at the top edge of the gatehouse tower. “I’d almost feel sorry for them if it weren’t for all of the townspeople I know they murdered in cold blood.”

  “Yeah, there is that,” I said in complete agreement. Killing was a grisly business, unless it was for people that you knew truly deserved death. Then it wasn’t a chore at all, especially with these guys making it so easy for us to hate them.

  “I have an unconfirmed report that there’s twenty-five newfar in the gatehouses, give or take ten.”

  “Give or take ten?” the Scout Captain asked, confused at my words.

  “Yeah, could be as little as fifteen or as many as thirty-five if the scumbag was lying.” I said, giving him an exaggerated shrug that he could see from where he was squatted down on the wall. He just shook his head once he understood what I meant as he went to the next topic.

  “Just have Team Leader Eevro keep an eye on the entrances to both gatehouses while we stuff zombies down their throats. Two or three casts should be enough to soften them up and get their Flame Shields down with the bard’s magic. The hit on morale after that tends to take the fight completely out of them,” Nivirth said in obvious glee. “Then we’ll go in and finish them off before they know what’s going on.”

  “Sounds like a great plan,” I said, ignoring Fylreh clearing her throat behind me as Gykac smothered a laugh along with several of his men.

  “You weren’t clearing out the towers with zombies, my lord?” Nivirth asked in surprise. “I’m sorry for assuming on the strategy, but if you have a better plan-“

  “Nope, we’ll do the zombie route,” I said, cutting the Scout Captain off as Neysa chuffed next to me in laughter. Even Helgath was starting to smile. Obviously, someone had sold me out to the Scout Captain as I shook my head and sighed. Quickly, I had Zocuth send up everyone but five of his Scouts and five zombies. We’d leave another five up top to keep an eye on the gravestones. I also had Zocuth follow suit. That gave us a combined force of ten in an ambush position at the gatehouse’s front doors and another ten on the wall to keep overwatch.

  Once everyone was in place we started sending the zombies down. Similar to Thomas’ strategy, we got our undead pets in place at the stairwell going down into the gatehouse. At ten seconds before the end of our Raise zombie cast, we sent them down to attack the Dread Pack players inside, while Scout Captain Zocuth did the same on his side. We were basically shoving forty-eight zombies down their throats on our side in twenty seconds. The remaining five were put on guard by the locked iron door to the gatehouse.

  While we were following this up with another cast of raise zombie, all hell broke loose inside the gatehouses. Blood curdling screams of players being ripped apart were quickly drowned out by booming explosions as the Dread Pack players fought for their lives. Ayda’s lute began playing as black smoke billowed out the arrows slit windows while the terrified shrieks rose in volume, reminding me of the haunted house music of my childhood. After the third wave of zombies, the fiery explosions slowly died down to nothing as the screams of the dying rose in volume.

  I was just getting ready to lead my Shadow Scouts down into the fiery mess when the iron door below was flung open. Within seconds the kill zone in front of the gates was filled with bloody newfar fighting for their lives against a handful of feral zombies as a cloud of billowing smoke nearly blinded those of us on top of the gatehouses. Seeing the Scouts down below and on the walls beginning to fire into the mass of players, I took off for the stairs waving for the assault group to follow.

  Inside the gatehouse, pieces of zombies were strewn across the first floor still flopping around with undead energy along with unidentifiable body parts of their victims. Everywhere I looked, bloody streaks covered the stone walls and floors from the ferocious fighting. The handful of gravestones were quickly collected by a few of Gykac’s men as we hurried down the stairs to the middle level. Once again this now bloody floor was void of life except for a number of zombie corpses that had been ripped apart in most cases, except for a small handful that had their heads’ chopped off.

  Obviously, some of the Dread Pack had managed to get their weapons drawn before they were forced to retreat down the stairs. Ignoring the gears and chains that opened and closed the doors, we raced for the stairs. Once again, Gykac’s troopers paused to collect the handful of gravestones as the rest of us hurried to the ground floor.

  We quickly dropped the handful of PKers at range, which were still struggling for their lives against a mini-horde of zombies. Looking around the room, it was obvious that this was where the main battle had occurred. Climbing over the mass of still smoking zombie and newfar bloody corpses that were piled chest high at the foot of the stairwell, we made our way to the handful of feral zombies that were scattered about the room still feeding on the dead and chopped off their heads before they could turn to attack. Signaling to Zocuth to have a handful of troopers collect the gravestones, we rushed out into the battle raging in the Kill Zone in front of the gates.

  There were only maybe five of the gatehouse guards left who were futilely chopping at the packs of five to six zombies tearing them apart. Even as I watched, one player was dragged to the ground shrieking in agony as his Hit Points bottomed out. The rest of the Dread Pack players who were here stumbling around the battlefield in their underwear with their Flame Shields blazing were a handful of respawns that must have resurrected inside the gatehouse. Even as I watched, one of them was cut down by a flight of arrows by the Shadow Scouts left to guard the door.

  Up on the wall, I saw that five troopers who I’d left with Fylreh were fighting for their lives against a group of the Dread Pack players that had managed to get a foothold on the roof of the gatehouse when they respawned. Even as I watched a few Flame Strikes slammed into the stone parapet, the filly had reached the first new newfar and was hammering his shield down. Quickly, I called out for my Shadow Scouts to send their zombies up to the rooftop as I redirected my zombies to split and attack the five remaining players on the ground.

  Even as the orders left my mouth, Helgath had her clawed hand wrapped around my arm as she ripped Mana from me to form her spell. Immediately, the newly respawned players around us began to puke out black gunk from their lungs as the Half-Orc’s shaman magic pierced through their shields without issue. While that was going on, Neysa tackled the nearest player to the ground that had lost his Flame Shield from a flight of arrows. The massive Silver Dire Wolf picked the pissed-off man up by the throat and began shaking her head back and forth. Within seconds, the man’s neck was a shredded ruin as he helplessly screamed and clawed at her muzzle.

  Thankfully, he only had a sliver of health when he spawned in, so he was taken down quickly by her fangs. Otherwise, she could have been in some real trouble. Hearing my thoughts, Neysa gave me a look that said ‘I knew what his health was before I attacked.’ With a flick of her tail, she gave me a m
ental snort before springing atop her next victim that had lost his shield. Shaking my head as the man started screaming in horror while she ripped his face off in a spray of blood that sent him back to the graveyard. In all honesty, I was amazed at the incredible growth of my girl. She was really starting to be a force to be reckoned with when she got herself worked up like that.

  Turning away from my vicious baby, I joined the battle this time around by playing healer as Scout Captain Dherler and Sub-Leader Eevro took over directing the troops on my orders. For a while, the battle was absolute chaos. Zombies were running around in their loping gait taking out players as they were moved around the battlefield to overwhelm the enemy, while flights of arrows hammered the Dread Pack players’ shields down. The few Flame Strikes that the respawning forces managed to get off at us were quickly negated by my healing as I hurriedly cast Regenerations and threw up Holy Shields as needed. By the time the last player was cut down, there was already a new wave of respawns spawning back in on top of us to hit us again.

  Luckily by then, both Scout Captain Dherler and Sub-Leader Eevro had managed to get the zombies divided up between the rooftop and ground level. The redistributed forces easily handed the proceeding waves of vengeful Dread Pack players their asses in a matter of seconds. Some of the players simply appeared in midair to fall to their deaths, while others appeared in the middle of our ranks. Most of them never even got a chance to ‘Flame On’ before being cut down once again.

  I will give these assholes credit though, they didn’t give up easily. It took four times of them being slaughtered like rats in a trap, before they finally decided to give up and take the attribute debuff for an hour by respawning at the nearest graveyard. Unfortunately for them, that’s when they discovered the graveyards were being spawn camped by our people. As soon as the last gravestone turned white, I couldn’t help the grin that came to my lips as I pictured their shocked faces at being cut down as soon as they spawned back in at the nearest graveyard. With that finished, I quickly called out for everyone to form up as we took off at a run for the Warden’s Fortress.

  Fighting those assholes had taken too much of our time. Not that we particularly had a choice one way or another in the matter, but, none the less, it put a severe crimp in my schedule to get to the warden castle in time to see if my plan would work or not. Thankfully enough, the five minute run to the top of the hill went relatively quickly in comparison to the run in-between the castle and the docks. Nivirth kept scouts out ahead and on our flanks as we raced through the empty streets. While it probably wasn’t necessary, I wasn’t about to complain with him playing it safe, since a surprise attack from a group of Flame Shielded newfar could really mess us up. Once again, my stomach was unsettled as my eyes took in the senseless deaths. Everywhere I looked, corpses were strewn throughout the streets where the townsfolk had been cut down simply for the fun of it.

  While we’d been doing well so far, after hearing about the size of the force headed for Thomas’ position, I knew we were running out of time. We either took this force down in this next battle or they’d retake the graveyards and force us out of the city. Of this, I had no doubt. The Dread Pack’s magic was just too powerful to face head-on with the numbers we had available to fight them with. Even with the plan I’d come up with, there was no telling if it would be enough or not. There were too many unknown variables to even try to calculate the odds, not that I was a math whiz by any stretch of the imagination. What I did have was a good feeling for the flow of a battle and the application of force, which is how I knew this was the tipping point.

  By now, all of my Shadow Scouts knew what the mission was, I thought to myself as we passed through the prosperous section of the city like fleeting shadows. Except for the clatter of the filly’s hooves on the cobblestones, our passage was silent as the wind. There were no formations as we ran. Some Dark Elves took to the skyline, while others kept to the side streets. Neysa didn’t even bother to stay with the rest of us as she ranged out ahead to make sure the way before us was clear. As we approached the edge of the city and the fifty yard kill zone before the fortress’ walls, Neysa’s mental warning flared through my thoughts. ‘Ware, there are five guardians at the open gates!’

  “Five guards are up ahead!” I called out in the local raid chat as I unlimbered my bow and nocked an arrow. I honestly preferred hitting ranged targets with my magic, but using brilliant flaring magic on a stealth mission seemed like a good way to blow the mission. “No slowing down, we’ll hit them on the run!” All around me, I heard the slight rustle of armor as the troop of Shadow Scouts nocked their arrows. I saw the end of the town’s buildings twenty yards ahead as the Silver Dire Wolf’s thoughts flittered through my mind. ‘You should see them now!’

  I wasn’t given the option to join the battle as Scout Captain Dherler ordered his Dark Elves to fire. Seventy to eighty yards was well into the scouts sweet zone as a nearly silent flight of arrows took the Dread Pack players out in the blink of an eye. By the time they came into view at street level, the corpses were already down looking like pincushions. Slamming my now useless arrow into my quiver, I gave Nivirth an annoyed look as his eyes twinkled in amusement.

  Not that he’d done anything wrong. We both knew my long distance accuracy with a bow and arrow was questionable to say the least. Honestly, I didn’t dare try for a shot unless it was sixty yards or less. But after all of the preparation, it would have been nice to have at least gotten a damn shot off. Shouldering my bow, I unlimbered my shield and drew the Dark Blade of Lord Kayden as we crossed the Kill Zone between the town and the fortress’ walls.

  The Warden’s fortress had twenty yard high walls with what looked to be a simple fighting platform with a low stone railing as a parapet. Similar to BrokenFang Hold, there was no proper gatehouse, just a large set of wooden double doors that were reinforced with iron. Before we’d cleared half the distance, Neysa appeared at the gates reporting that the walls were clear of enemy, before racing off once again further into the fortress’ depths. With that concern settled, I went back to studying the structure. One of the doors was closed, while the other had been left wide open. I guessed the players had thought with their Flame Shields in place they could easily hold off any attacking force long enough to close the door as needed. Boy were they wrong, I thought as we entered into the courtyard that surrounded the inner keep of stone that rose up six stories.

  ‘There are another five guards at the back gate!’ Neysa’s warning rang through my thoughts. Passing the information to the rest of the raid, I raced around the central keep heading for the new targets. We had to reach them before they realized their companions were down. Nivirth and Zocuth were fast on my heels as they split the force in thirds. One stayed behind to keep an eye on the entrance and the new gravestones there, while the other two passed down different sides of the fortress.

  Fylreh could have sped ahead, but she kept glued to my ass with her bow drawn. As we broke into the clearing before the port-side gate, we came into view of the five guards watching the action going on below in the city. Before they even knew we were behind them, a flight of arrows hammered into their backs killing them instantly. Coming to a stop, I reached out for Neysa. ‘Anymore enemies in the area?’

  ‘None outside within the grounds of the fortress,’ Neysa’s thoughts appeared in my mind almost as soon as I sent the question through our link.

  While the answer sounded simple, it actually carried a lot more information than I could clearly explain. Thoughts weren’t flat like text. Even words aren’t flat like text. Intonation, tone, the volume the way something is said carries a lot more meaning then just the simple words being spoken. It was like that with telepathy in the way a two-dimensional image is different than a three-dimensional one. I understood in her reply that she could smell that the first floor of the central keep was clear of people along with the outer courtyard and walls. This helped immensely when I started giving out orders.

  “Scout Cap
tain Nivirth, do you know where the entrance is to the dungeons?”

  “Yes, milord.” The Dark Elf said giving me a fist salute.

  “Good, then you’re with me. Zocuth, for now I want a group of five scouts on guard at the main entrance. Make sure they seal the gates and take up a hidden position on the walls. I want the rest of our forces gathered up here in case we come under attack. Go ahead and setup the new gravestones in the middle of the kill zone with a group of ten scouts keeping watch on the city side of the zone. That should let us take those assholes out easily if they decide to come back to fuck with us.

  “Also, I want another ten scouts sent inside the keep to take out any enemy that we might have missed. Neysa says the first floor is clear, but be careful and bring your zombies along with you. If you see any weapon, armor or money caches, let me know.” Getting an affirmative from the Sub-Leader, I caught Nivirth’s eye. “Please lead the way, Scout Captain.”

  Quickly, he led me off towards the eastern side of the keep as Fylreh and Helgath silently fell in behind us. This side of the courtyard was larger than the side I’d headed down. Centered to the keep, there was an enclosed, stone structure the size of a large hut which was our destination. Neysa was already waiting at the entrance. Seeing my questioning look, her response sounded in my head. ‘There is much death here.’ I gave her a silent nod as she danced back from the doorway, giving us room to enter. Coming to a stop in the arching doorway, my eyes swept the room. There was a massive trap door in the center of the room that opened with a winch and a chain. To either side of the trap door, there was an area with tables and chairs that was large enough to accommodate up to six guards comfortably, which would make it basically a medieval ready room of sorts.