A reply in three seconds.
Gabby LeMort: Hidden options in the settings screen. Smart noise cancellation.
In a mad flurry, Rowan barged into the settings screen and swept his eyes left and right for those hidden options, hitching on a tiny spanner and lock icon at the bottom left he had missed before. He forced the lock to open, channeling titanic willpower. It clicked open after a pained half second.
Over thirty settings appeared below the main list, Smart Noise Cancellation near the top. He ticked the box and relief flooded his ears in an instant.
The setting smothered all non-important sound effects and appeared to prioritize character speech. Dorian yelled, “What’s wrong, Rowan? Can’t handle a tiny battle? Pathetic! Pick up your wand and stop hiding!” His laser disintegrated more Imps, cutting towards Rowan, but a continuous stream of demons filled the space, hundreds of fiery claws grinding against their shields.
Rowan chuckled and first gave Gabrielle his appreciation.
Rowan Black: Thank you.
Gabby LeMort: No problemo. I am the most helpful Occult-Engineer in all of Aeon Chronicles!
Ambiguous Pain: Yeah, the sound effects really need to be toned down in large battles. Don't know what the AI was thinking with that…
Zaine Everlight: What are you talking about?
Gabby LeMort: Just our mind curse! Don’t worry! ^_^
Zaine Everlight: Right, whatever.
“Did you run out of blizzards?!” Dorian again. “Is this all from the great Ice-Dark class?! If that’s it, prepare to be brought to justice in the heat of my flames, Black!”
Bloody hell. This guy had to be reciting lines from his favorite action movie. The cringe was on a next level. At this rate, Rowan wouldn’t even need to humiliate the guy here for standing in his way. He was already doing it himself with his shoddy attempt at role-playing.
And was this all just a game to him? Did he even care about his dead brother?
Well, he had been reduced to tears in the courtroom over two years ago. Maybe he’d gotten over it.
“ROWAN BLACK!” That piggy fucker yet again. No one else was throwing cheesy taunts. A Priest chuckled at him from behind, his robed shoulders shaking. “You loser baby! Is this all you’ve got?!”
Two shields dispersed into glittering dust but Rowan was far more interested in Dorian’s peculiar behavior. And that particular taunt greatly irked Rowan. Baby was one of Max’s most overused insults. Looks like the guy did still hold a large grudge despite the not-guilty ruling. He’d been tried as an adult too. Full jury and everything. Was that not enough for him?
Truly, Rowan did a favor for Dorian by offing Max. Rowan certainly wouldn’t want a brother like Max.
“You will pay for your crimes!” Still Dorian—him alone. The other defenders spoke too quietly to hear from this distance.
Rowan sighed and looked away from the piggy-brother, his nerves starting to bristle. He nudged Gabrielle’s shimmer. “Has he been like this the whole time?”
“Ah… Yup! Justice this, flames that, baby you. You’ll pay for your crimes against the light, Rowan Black.” She laughed. “Some players are like that. The realism of the game gets to their head.”
“Yeah, I see.”
Rowan focused on his wand and it puffed into his hand. Thank the AI gods for this unique soulbond mechanic. If it wasn’t for what his dead brother put him through, Rowan would’ve found Dorian quite the amusing person. Thank the real-life gods for creating entertaining characters like Dorian, he tempted to think.
Shrugging, he saw no reason not to indulge and partake in whatever Dorian was playing at. If he wanted to sling tripe insults, then Rowan will just have to one-up him. He was the better man here. “Your corpse will make a fine butler in my mansion!” Not too bad. Could be better.
“Spoken like a true murderer!” The double-meaning was clear. Dorian began chanting a spell under the dome of the last remaining shield. His face contorted into something of a slimmer replica of Max’s characteristic sneer. The resemblance was eerie, a decent looking guy morphing into the image of a chubby, snotty jackass on a whim.
Rowan shivered, a few memories threatening to bubble up. He ground his teeth and let Zaine absorb the bird-shaped blasts with the palm of his outstretched hand. Sparks showered the rooftop and one sizzled against Rowan’s Mana Shield without doing more than 10 fire damage. Weak.
What a true idiot the piggy-brother was. It was a basic mechanic of this game: elemental projectiles can be absorbed as long as the power of the projectiles doesn’t overwhelm a defender with the matching mana-type. Fire mana could be converted to Fire-Dark though not the opposite. Yet another reason why dark classes were just so superior.
“Your bones and flesh will make fine crafting materials! It’s all you’re good for anyway!” Rowan bumped Gabrielle, a cue.
She cut her song of invocations. “Yup! Second tier classes make excellent ingredients for high tier draughts!”
“It’s true,” Zaine added, though not loud enough.
Ambiguous pelted the shield in front of Dorian’s face with flashy purple bolts. “What’s wrong?! Too poor to afford more spells other than that narrow fire beam?! I’ve fought level 90s with more girth!”
Gabrielle giggled at that.
“The Imps are smarter than you, piggy-bro!” Rowan said and charged another blizzard. And it was true. Most of the Fire Imp Mages dodged that disintegration ray with ease now.
The taunts worked, especially the last one. Dorian bellowed a stream of typical cusses like a hooligan teenager from impoverished areas waiting for tech upgrades. What a joke, if this is what the so-called elite of society had to offer. Intuition springing, Rowan attempted dialing down his volume with a simple thought. It worked.
He checked Zaine’s debuff timer and found less than five minutes left on it. Five minutes too long.
The defenders realized Zaine’s debuff was running out at the same time Rowan checked its timer. Quite unlucky.
Zaine motioned his katana in a circle, forming a cage of Fire-Dark mana which blocked most projectiles except for the smaller ones. He face-tanked over thirty skill every second while Undead Priests and Gabrielle spammed heals. Still the tankiest by far. All the support minions more than made up for his lack of gear and crippled resistances. Focusing Zaine was foolhardy.
Focusing the tank—always a bad strategy when it wasn’t necessary. They should’ve gone for the support minions first. It’s what Rowan would’ve called for. You always take out the supports first if you could reach them, which they clearly could. Though the smarter players focused on owls and Dark Priests; however, futile it was when they were worked out of sync.
Their leader had to be an idiot: Dorian. It was a wonder why the Paladins would listen to him.
Another line of Imps in front of Rowan disintegrated in the piggy-brother’s fire laser, his favorite spam-able skill. He will get what’s coming to him along with the rest of these goddamn good players. All Rowan asked for right now was one little mana-rich dark city for himself and his beautiful Gabrielle. Who was being unfair? Certainly not him.
The blizzard activated when Rowan shoveled streams of ambient mana into his bone wand. No wonder Gabrielle desired this area so badly. The rush of unlimited mana was unlike any other, the warm water mana mixing with his Ice-Dark into a cool, calmer slurry. A lovely feeling which he could get used to.
A wave of mortars detonated against the remaining shields. Two heaved and dissipated. One remaining. Every Paladin activated Light Screen—over fifty of those buggers and each could take over a hundred thousand damage. This had to be why Paladin was so popular. They were fucking mobile Shield Generators.
Rowan pinged Gabrielle. “Curses through the screens. Healers first, not Paladins.” He relayed orders and a mental image to the trebuchet operators. Focus fire at the south shields closest to the party!
“They have life links,” she said without a hint of stress, “Gotta take down the Pa
ladins first.”
Rowan recalled the Paladin section of the forums. Life Link—a skill that allows Paladins to take all damage inflicted on another player. Yes, these skills were exactly why Paladin was so popular. Their skill repertoire made them perfect tanks in a game without a taunt or aggro system.
Another wave of mortars smashed into the Light Screens, taking out ten or eleven. Something brighter shielded the central fountain, difficult to discern under the glow of forty screens.
Rowan pumped more of his mana reserves into his blizzard, sacrificing shield points to up its power. The ambient water mana had a maximum throughput; the conversion from Water to Ice-Dark was low as well. This was a risky move but with all these Stalkers, owls, and two Colossus Enforcers near him, they’d never reach him. That wasn’t even counting Zaine.
Four more screens shattered and whatever protected the fountain became clear enough to Examine.
Light Screen: Tier 9
Shield Points: 500,000
Dark Resistance: Very High
Other Resistances (Average): High
Armor: High
Buffs: Divine Veil (A heavy buffer against all dark projectiles and inflicts recoil to melee attackers, active only when the screen is under 30 meters in length), Protection Aura (Increases armor), Elemental Resistance Aura (Increases all elemental resistances)
God dammit! And there were five or six of them overlapping the fountain!
Rowan’s skin prickled in annoyance, the Paladin class now really treading on his nerves with these insane defensive skills. What was it again? They had an invulnerability skill, a handful of personal defensive cooldowns, two or three auras, a life-link skill, and a fucking divine shield. He snarled into the wind.
Gabrielle huffed. “If it was easy I’d have just bombed this place myself.”
“Yes,” Ambiguous said, her shimmer nodding, “Don’t underestimate them. Most players are fodder but top hundred are gaming veterans, many Internet celebrities.”
"Keep sieging," Zaine said darkly, "We need to take out the spawn point before the Imperial Guard arrives."
“How powerful are they,” Rowan asked.
“The king should be tier seven.”
“Eight,” Gabrielle corrected.
“What?!” Zaine spun to face her, his boyish glare less creepy behind that low-level Demon-Knight mask—a simple black mask without much decorations apart from a dark ruby at the forehead.
“Why didn’t you mention this before?” Rowan snapped. This was more than crucial information. This siege had progressed at a lazy pace and there was a T8 World Boss who could port in any second. This was pure insanity.
“Didn’t want to panic ya,” she said, “Like ya are now!”
“Mmm,” Ambiguous agreed.
Zaine grunted and began slashing Dark Chaos Arcs at an increased rate, still slow thanks to his debuff.
Rowan snarled and sifted through a string of strategies popping up in his head. None would work except for one: rushing down the spawn point at the cost minion lives. Thousands would perish—though it was no loss. Imps could be summoned with ease. He dished out the order to the Imps and they responded in a heartbeat without a care for their lives. A deluge of black and flaming claws poured into the square and friendly fire reached critical mass. "Don't bother healing the Imps. Save your totems for the better minions," Rowan said to Gabrielle.
“Kay.” She tossed a Dark Essence Totem into the mass of Imps anyway.
What a naughty girl. He spanked her with his free hand before sacrificing his entire Mana Shield to bolster his Blizzard shards raining onto the last ten Light Screens.
More personal portals opened, ovals of various colors, many sprouting in unprotected areas, the Paladins dashing to cover.
Too late.
Rowan had ordered Imps and a nearby Colossus to bombard them in an instant. No mercy. No forgiveness for the piggy-boy’s family. And definitely no letting down Gabrielle and jeopardizing the birthing of their empire. Taking over this city either meant total failure or the start of a tremendous success.
Gabrielle’s player-seeking Laceration Curses downed five Mages quick enough to react with blinks.
The defenders retreated into the fountain as another volley of mortars and Colossus eye-beams finally arrived and demolished the outer Light Screens. Though several were caught in the blast along with a hundred Imps, the weak and dumb quickly being weeded out.
Rowan switched to Tainted Ice Blasts—and found he dealt less than a hundred damage per blast. He stopped firing and ordered every Fire Imp Mage to stop as well.
The tide of clawed Imps reached the inner Light Screens in under a second. And true to the Examine dialog, Imps disintegrated in recoil damage by the hundreds, bypassing buffs and super-effective against their squishy bodies.
But not nearly enough to stop the thousands of Imps. Each Imp swipe took out a tiny sliver of health. The defenders had mowed down less than two hundred in total. Most of the damage dealers had been incompetent and died. Dorian killed over twenty Imps a second with his spam-able skill. Not impressive. He should’ve started channeling that large blast skill long ago. Terrible judgment.
“Hurry!” Zaine said. He sent in the Stalkers.
Rowan debated on sacrificing the stalkers but resigned. They needed to stop the king at all costs.
Gabrielle’s shimmering wand was a curse machine-gun and downed a Paladin every second. Layers of lower-tier, recast Light Screens sparkled out.
Ambiguous was being ambiguous, sticking to those puny bolts.
Melee Mage, Rowan reminded himself.
Another round of mortars crashed into the fountain. Only one T9 screen shattered. Three remained.
Two, Gabrielle’s curses doing work.
The heavy support of Undead Priests, Owlish Overseers, and Gabrielle’s auras and heals topped up critically injured Stalkers in fractions of a second. The zerg-rush was proving effective. Too effective thanks to Gabrielle’s curses. She was really the most valuable player here. The water in the fountain was blood-red, corpses piling. Less than ten players remained.
A Paladin collapsed. One screen left.
A flood of ecstasy pumped through Rowan’s flesh as victory inched closer by the second.
Another screen shattered under the heat of Colossus Enforcer eye-beams, leaving a single Light Screen that didn't cover the whole fountain. Twenty players perished in a mortar and a hail of Chaos Orbs, too slow, too stupid to notice their positioning was horrid and overextended. Their hagged screams and cries released a wave of endorphins into Rowan’s blood.
“More,” Zaine grunted in front of him, channeling all sorts of defensive skills. A minute left on his debuff.
The Colossus Enforcers converged their eye-beams and the final shield disintegrated.
“GOOOOO!” Gabrielle shouted.
Ambiguous’ shimmer disappeared and Zaine vanished in a puff of flame.
The Stalkers and Imps flooded in.
The last player standing was a Paladin. Dorian had died sometime before in silence. Stalkers rushed the old man. He didn’t scream a single breath, fighting to his death like a true hero. If only he was on Rowan’s side. He Examined to find his name.
[Divinely Blessed] Edgar Silversworn: Level 218
Health: 525
Mana: 0
Stamina: 120
Buffs: Holy Light Aura, Protection Aura
Wait. Not a player? Divinely Blessed?
Before Rowan could ruminate on that, large Group Portals opened throughout the courtyard as the fountain’s central pillar splintered and crumbled under a guillotine of crackling dark fire.
Blasts of dense, golden light erupted from each portal and flooded the square with blinding light. Countless Stalkers, Imps, and Undead perished while the Colossus Enforcers took large chunks of damage.
Zaine’s health bar dropped to half before he retreated in a crazed blink, his debuff timer in the single digits. Undead Priests and Owlish Overseers t
opped him back to full in a microsecond.
Rowan’s stomach sank as a figure stepped through a portal of pure liquid gold, garbed in the most ornate Paladin gear in the game.
The king had arrived. Rowan dared to Examine.
[T8 World Boss, Divinely Blessed] Xapham Xuriel (Paladin): Level 264
Health: 8,350,500
Mana: 4.671,000
Stamina: 6,250,450
Buffs: Holy Light Aura, Protection Aura, Searing Light Aura
Eight million health and fully geared. No fair. Their T8 World boss was better than Rowan’s T8 World Boss.
While hundreds upon hundreds players and beasts rushed through and pushed back the tide of demons, Xapham pointed his blade above the ruined fountain and bellowed a single word in the primordial Language: Revive.
Aeon Chronicles Online_Book 1_Devil's Deal Page 44
