by Domino Finn
[Keeper] is defeated
75 XP awarded
Crusader Reputation -100
Lash looked up at the young necromancer and said, "All right, then." She turned and planted her cleaver into the pink floor.
[Lash] cast Shield Wall
Yellow light burst and spanned the thin hallway, cutting off access behind us. The three keepers slammed into the magical barrier. They droned to each other and banged at the energy.
The keeper I had struck twisted back at me with a blow of his own. I crossblocked the baton. The deflection was successful but red energy crackled through the dragonspear to my fingers.
Electrical Damage!
32 damage
Stun!
You are stunned. You may not use skills, move, or attack for 20 seconds.
Friggin' hell. Why did I always run into the OP mobs?
Crux backed away from the conflict, staring in terror. I could do nothing to avoid the keeper's follow-up strike.
47 electrical damage
Stun!
You are stunned. You may not use skills, move, or attack for 20 seconds.
I screamed through the agony. "A little help here."
Lash swung her heavy sword, this time directly impacting the sentinel's midsection. The blow did normal damage and shoved the danger away.
"Can you deanimate it?" she asked.
"Too soon!" said Hex. "It's a powerful spell but has a long cooldown."
Lash swung again but the enemy dodged the blow. Behind us, the keepers pounded at the energy wall.
Hex set her jaw and stuck a pin into her palm.
[Hex] cast Living Spirit Infusion
Cost: 37 health
Deanimate is recharged and ready
Whoa, despite the seemingly modest cost in health, Hex's life bar sank to half. Glass cannon was right.
The necromancer leapt forward and repeated her deanimate trick. The second keeper collapsed like a bundle of dropped billiard balls. Our retreat was clear.
"What the hell?" I asked Crux, who was leading the way.
He shrugged. "I'm a pacifist."
"Of course you are. You don't wanna get beat up when you're caught stealing."
"Sorry, boss. That's what legs are for."
"The rogue is right," said Grimwart. "We should be moving." I noted he still hadn't drawn his sword.
"Score!" exclaimed Hex, tossing me an item from the looted guards.
[Knife Handling Scroll]
Awards the weapon skill managing use of small blades.
"Nice! You don't need it?"
She flashed the pin in her fingers. "Already have it. And my bro the pacifist would only sell it."
"To the fast travel!" urged Grimwart, hurrying down the hall after Crux.
"They're not so tough," said the necromancer.
"Hex..." warned her brother.
The keepers all struck the energy barrier at the same time, splintering Lash's magic. They burst through the wall in showery sparks. We spun to them but the keeper boss was too fast. His baton struck Hex.
Beside being near death, Hex was stunned. Thankfully, my status effect had worn off. I aimed my spear at the brute as he grabbed the necromancer in a bear hug.
"Let go of me!" she yelled.
I didn't have a clear shot. Lash and I kept the other two at bay while we decided what to do. Hex smartly chugged a health potion. She was still helpless but had a buffer of health.
The keeper boss changed colors from red to white. A low hum vibrated through his glassy body. The smoke-colored stones lit up with vibrant energy. Hex screamed.
The brute threw her to the floor and returned to his aggressive red hue. Hex twisted in pain as her torso crystallized into black stone. The affliction extended through her legs and outstretched arm, finalizing as her open eyes petrified.
"No!" yelled Crux.
[Hex] is petrified!
"Damn you!" boomed Lash. Her cleaver thrummed yellow and she slammed it into the nearest keeper. A gaping crack split across its chest. The boss closed on her next.
"Get out of here!" I ordered. "Follow Grimwart."
"Screw that," she barked, full helm cocked menacingly. "These blockheads want a fight, they're getting one."
"That's an order, Lash!"
She swung at the boss and missed. The wounded keeper attempted to grab her, but she moved faster than her size and armor let on. Her blade smacked him again. The sentry canted to the side, catching the wall with a stone hand for support.
Lash was a powerful fighter but left herself exposed to the most dangerous of them. The brute moved in and punched her.
I hated the thought of running, but I was trying to avoid a diplomatic incident. These were the keepers of Oakengard. Even if five fell, how many more would fill their ranks? And it wasn't just us to think about. Half the brigade was elsewhere and hurrying to the fast travel. If we didn't get there with Grimwart, they'd be stranded.
Luckily, the white knight's magic resistance had avoided a stun.
"Lash, I am ordering you to lead the rest of Bravo Team outta here!"
"I can't do that, boss." She swung wildly at the third keeper, who had moved from me to engage her. "Leave no man behind." She nearly got caught with a baton and battered the stone guardian's arm away. The keeper boss lunged at her.
I pounced between them and triggered Spinshield. My spear deflected stone away but also battered Lash's white armor, creating much-needed space between the combatants. Two more keepers rounded into the hall behind them. One was another giant. Lash's eyes widened.
"This isn't the Marines," I asserted. "We can't save Hex anymore. You're a Black Hat, and as your leader I'm ordering you to retreat and save the rest of your team."
She was dazed, eyes still on the enemy reinforcements. Lash raised the cleaver over her head. I cursed as she swung, but instead of striking a keeper, she planted it into the floor.
My eyes went wide. I tried to hurry to Lash's side, but the keeper brute lunged into my path.
[Lash] cast Shield Wall
I was exactly a second away from being stuck on the wrong side of Lash's magic. I dove toward the giant blocking my path, right under his blocky body where his legs should've been. I slid under and past the hovering brute to safety.
The energy wall nipped my toes as it spawned, cutting off our pursuers.
"Come on," Lash relented.
We sprinted down the hall after Crux and Grimwart. The magical wall trembled at the keepers' might. With so many involved, the obstacle would only buy us a few seconds.
We scrambled down the maze of tunnels. Past the amethyst staircase, now empty. The two guards we'd killed had been the ones posted here. My boots skidded to a stop as I considered darting down a level and appealing to the Trinity. I turned to my brigade, sprinting ahead toward the fast travel.
Grimwart had a good head on his shoulders. He was right to distrust Loras. If he was sure something was wrong with the Trinity, I believed him. Maybe they had just put on a good show for me. Blinded me with quests and XP. I couldn't risk going down there and leaving my people to fend for themselves.
Izzy: We're being chased by keepers. Just made it inside. It's gonna be close.
Talon: Don't wait up.
I set my jaw and bounded down the main hallway toward Bravo Team. A keeper boss sailed through the air and smashed into the tile directly ahead of me. Its glowing red helmet swiveled, head canting and transitioning to the white energy of its petrify attack.
Normally I'd go for a baseball slide—it worked last time—but the rose quartz was now smashed to rubble from the landing. Furthermore, the brute was too tall and the ceiling too low to consider vaulting.
Still running full speed, I swapped out the dragonspear for climbing claws. Leather straps outfitted on gloves, iron hooks spiking from the palms. Without slowing to think, I pounced sideways, boots and claws finding purchase on the rough brown stonework, and I triggered dash.
Skill Evolution!
You learned Wall Run
A rush of adrenaline amped my muscles as I whooshed right by the hulking mass of rocks. Boot steps pattered on the wall; hands steadied my balance. Stone arms slammed behind me a step too slow. The guardian roared in anger as I skittered off the wall and back to the tile in a smooth motion.
Intense didn't begin to describe it.
The pack was all behind us now. Specializing in agility, my speed was too much for them. Unfortunately, once I caught up to the rest of the brigade I had to slow down to cover their six. That was when the keepers started to overtake us. We rushed past the sages and priests and the overlook. We were just two rooms away when I felt them at my back.
I batted a stone arm away with the dragonspear, narrowly missing the electrified baton that would mean my death. Five other keepers quickly converged.
Double doors beside us buckled open. "Heads up!" alerted Kyle.
I was absolutely stunned as a person-sized treant lumbered into the hall holding a mirror shield. "Kyle?"
The living tree jumped into the path of the giant sentinel's baton, shield braced against his shoulder. As the electrified weapon hit the reflective surface, the charge reversed into the keeper. The giant stumbled backward, incapacitated for a moment. Glinda and Conan hurried in. Izzy slammed the doors behind them and glazed them with ice magic. Pursuers immediately pounded at them.
"I told you those were the right doors!" She looked around and sighed. "You too, huh?"
We squared off against the wall of pursuing keepers. "Hit the fast travel," I ordered. As the first boss shook its head and recovered its senses, the second speed-lunged past us and landed behind, splitting us from Lash and Grimwart. Our escape was officially cut off.
"How do they do that?" I groaned.
The mob attempted to move in. A hasty sentinel struck Kyle's shield. It was unable to handle the stun as gracefully as the boss. Conan heaved a double greataxe and partially split a rock head. I utilized deadshot to bat away a dangerous baton.
"We can't keep this up for long," I hissed. The others waited by the fast travel. Lash and Crux. "Send them home," I shouted to Grimwart. "We're right behind them."
Izzy forced crystallized water into our enemies' magical joints. It held them off for precious seconds until they cracked free. At this point, it was really only Kyle's mirror shield they were wary of.
I studied the brewmaster. "What's with the getup?"
"Oh, this?" He waved a tree limb at his trunk body. "I chugged a decanter potion. This is what I got, so we ran."
Dorfin's Decanter of Luminous Fluids was one of the sillier artifacts we'd thus far encountered in Haven. The magical flask generated a once-a-day potion with a 60-minute effect. It often granted Kyle a specialized skill or transformation of some sort, though usually its effects were rather random and humorous. As hilarious as it was to see Kyle's face etched into the bark of a living tree, this wasn't the ideal situation to appreciate it.
"Okay," I said, "watch the batons at our backs. There's one keeper between us and the fast-travel portal. We hit him together and get out of here."
Everyone nodded. Unfortunately, the keepers had the same idea.
The wall of guards advanced in unison. Izzy slowed one down and Kyle faced the shield toward the brute, but two others squeezed in. I dodged an overhead strike and rapped the guardian on the head. Conan bashed one away with the flat of his axe, but his opponent's baton twirled around and struck his back. He was stunned.
The keeper brute flushed with white as he readied his petrifying hug. I dashed to the barbarian and yanked him away, getting struck with a baton myself. I tensed my muscles against the stun effect.
[Glinda] cast Minor Healing Aura
You are healed and instantly relieved of minor status effects.
Our afflictions melted away as suddenly as they had come on. I recoiled from the giant's bear hug. The priest had effortlessly cured us.
"Age over strength," chuckled the elderly woman.
The keeper cutting off our escape knocked her upside the head with his weapon. Glinda stiffened and screamed as the stun overtook her.
Dammit. Just as with Hex, the keepers had immediately gone after the biggest threat to their power. Without Glinda's magic, there was little we could do to neutralize their stun. The brute flared white hot as it prepared to do her in.
"Arrrggghh!" Lash screamed as she charged. Her entire body glowed gold as she bashed her shoulder into the giant's back.
The surprised guardian stumbled forward. Kyle pulled Glinda to safety, but the other keepers reached for her. He spun away from the threat and brandished the mirror shield. One keeper stunned itself; the other two struck true. Batons hit Glinda and Kyle.
Electrical Immunity!
[Keeper] dealt 0 damage to [Kyle]
The frat-boy-slash-tree arched an eyebrow. "That all you got?"
The keepers cocked their heads and battered him again. He shielded Glinda in a hug as batons struck his wooden back. Kyle shoved the priest into my arms and spun around laughing. "Treant!" he said. "You guys don't have a lot of wood in Oakengard, do you? One thing you should know about wood," he said as he drew his sword. "It doesn't conduct electricity."
He slammed his blade toward the boss, who parried. Even though his weapon was steel, the electricity arcing through it fizzled out once hitting his tree fingers. Another keeper moved in with a kidney punch.
Bashing Resistance!
[Keeper] dealt 22 damage to [Kyle]
A wide grin consumed my face. Unfortunately for the keepers, trees didn't have kidneys and, on top of being immune to electricity, treants were resistant to bashing damage. Laughter boomed through Kyle's chest as he read the notification.
Remind me never to make fun of Dorfin's Decanter ever again.
"Retreat!" called out the brewmaster, swinging again.
Kyle wasn't a great swordsman. He missed quite a bit and wasn't doing much damage against the rocky bodies, but in his new form he could tank their attacks all day.
"Wood!" exclaimed Izzy. "Use wood weapons!"
She swapped out her winter staff for a small wooden rod. The keepers advanced on us. Conan countered their strikes with the wooden staff of his axe. The brigade backed away, but we still had trouble.
The brute flushed red again and bashed Lash across the face. Her helmet twisted. A baton strike flung her backward. Glinda, relieved of her status effect, slipped past the enemy to heal her team leader. The giant clutched at her.
I swapped the dragonspear out for the noob spear I'd taken from Chadwick's man. I hadn't bothered to sell or drop it yet, and that laziness had just paid off. I batted the stony hands away. The sentinel twirled the baton on me but I met it with wood. The cheap spear nearly buckled under the high-level strength.
Now able to counter keeper attacks, the rest of the group hurried past the obstruction. Kyle took up the rear. "Go, go, go!" I had never seem him more brave. To be fair, was it brave if he was invincible?
We hurried past Grimwart. Crux had already teleported to safety. I helped Lash into the fast-travel circle. "You really don't like to follow orders, do you?"
She laughed it off.
"Come on," pushed Grimwart. "Ready yourselves."
Kyle disengaged from the two bosses and retreated into the portal.
"Come with us," I told Grimwart.
The black knight shook a solemn head. "I cannot, Talon. This is my home. I will not abandon it."
The colonel didn't flip a visible switch or cycle through menu screens or anything, but he somehow initiated the fast-travel process. As I readied a grateful nod, my expression twisted into alarm.
"Watch out!"
A white-hot stone giant wrapped him up.
"Be gone!" snapped the colonel.
Mild annoyance shifted to sudden panic. Grimwart's mouth stretched into a scream as the status effect hit him. The keeper brute let go and he stumbled to the floor.
As the room faded to pu
re white, our friend petrified to dead black rock.
-- Cutscene --
Christian Everett had fought for this.
Day and night, year in and year out.
He'd cut himself off from the outside world so that he could create another.
The tech titan blinked tiredly at the flashing server lights. He listened to the thrum of the cooling fans. He was deep in Kablammy headquarters, witnessing the birth of a new world. Seven years, it had taken. Now he had created light.
The developer perused the logs, pleased as every line of text reported further success. Haven was operating smoothly. Each of the redundant servers was online. Events were queued and processed, seamlessly connecting the various discrete systems into a unified and organic whole. The individual modules had been exhaustively tested over the years, many of them components of various social games and apps, but this was the first time the greater body existed. A newborn making its first gasps.
The bulk of Christian's family was long beyond reach. That was a fate no longer necessary for others. As of 1:57 a.m. Tuesday morning, Haven version 0.1 officially powered on.
The simulation was designed to be upgradeable, extendable, and—above all—robust. If operation continued smoothly, the collective servers would never be turned off again.
The CEO breathed solemnly and glanced at the external solid-state drive on the shelf over his desk. It was plugged into an independent backup and had its own screen log. Constant ASCII activity reported spikes and lulls, but the machine code was unreadable to the human eye. It was unreadable even by Haven, which was currently too primitive to parse the raw data.
