Neck-Deep In It: A LitRPG and GameLit Series.

by Jason Cheek

  Jodi found herself interested in many of the same questions that were being asked. The unfortunate truth was that her main focus had been on Startum’s interactions with his female companion and slaves, not any of these other points that were being brought up. While that was somewhat asinine now in retrospect, Jodi realized that she’d gotten so caught up with the goings on in Darom and Telrain that it never occurred to her to go back and see how the man had managed to get all of those vassals in the first place.

  All that Jodi could do was make a mental note to research what she could when she logged out again. That side-note quickly grew into a list as she failed to answer more and more of their questions. When it finally became apparent that she’d told them all that she knew, Jodi found herself promising that she would circle back around with them later once she had a chance to watch through more of Lord Ironwolf’s messages.

  Seeing that had gone over better than she’d thought possible, Jodi excused herself from the NPCs who were excitedly talking amongst themselves around her and headed to the open spot she saw next to Tumms Darkbrew. Tumms’ green eyes twinkled over his thick beard as he scooted over enough for her to drop her backpack between them and squeeze onto the stool with the rest of her gear. A harder task than one might expect when wearing thick leather armor with a longbow slung across your back.

  “You handled that better than I would’ve thought possible,” Tumms offered in a low voice, as the NPC Ranger that was acting as a cook offered her a bowl of stew on a large plate and a mug of ale with a friendly nod.

  “Um, thank you,” Jodi stuttered in surprise, as she accepted both from the male Ranger.

  “You’re welcome,” the Ranger said somewhat stiffly, “as long as you don’t disparage Lord Ironwolf again.”

  Before Jodi could offer up another apology, the Half-Elf turned away and went back to the open firepit to pull some flatbread out of the coals. While the man hadn’t exactly been rude to her, there was no question that her Reputation with the NPCs concerning the House of Kayden was still in the gutter. Though, it was a hundred percent better than feeling like she was going to be attacked by the NPCs around her at the drop of a hat.

  “Looks like I still have a ways to go yet,” Jodi whispered back, as she looked over the food she’d been handed. It was a deep wooden bowl of thick vegetable beef-like stew, four thick chunks of a grainy flat-bread made from what looked to be oats, and four odd looking blue fruit that looked something like strawberries. A quick Identify showed them to be Wild Ice Hearts and the bowl to be Wild Vegetable Gore Boar stew. Just as she was taking her first steaming spoonful, a frog-like voice croaked in amusement a few chairs down.

  “You’re going to circle back around with them on their questions,” Grody chortled, slapping the table a little too hard with one of her large ape-like hands. Jodi nearly spit out the mouthful of stew as she looked over to see the Half-Troll’s saggy breasts laying on top of the table like two lost oranges in overlarge gray-skin sacks. As she choked down the lava-hot bite with tears in her eyes, another old fart chimed in.

  “I thought she wasn’t all that interested in forming her own opinion on what went down in Telrain,” Zeppy, the Guild Leader of Zeppy’s Heroes, teasingly said as Jodi gulped down a mouthful of ale to stop the burning in her mouth.

  “Zeppy! Grody!” Sunny chided both men, “Let the poor girl eat in peace.”

  “Ah, come on Sunny,” Grody wheezily croaked out, “Where’s the fun in that?”

  “She’s a big girl that can take her lumps like everyone else,” Zeppy crankily argued back, as Jodi spewed her ale at being called a big girl. Several other members of the guild added in their two cents worth of shit-talking, before she managed to hack her lungs clear.

  “Get off my back, gramps,” Jodi hoarsely said, the frustration clear in her voice as Tumms slapped her on the back to help clear her lungs. Waving off the Devil Dog player’s help, she unhappily glared at the Zeppy’s group. “Look, I already apologized for not doing my own research on what really went down. What else could I really say to them beyond that?”

  “I don’t know,” Zeppy unapologetically shot back, “simply telling them that you didn’t plan on answering any more of their questions instead of just leading them on.”

  “When did I ever say that I wasn’t going to be watching any more videos,” Jodi protested as her burnt mouth and raw throat finally healed up, “I just don’t know when I’ll be back here to answer any of those questions.”

  “Whatever you say Ms. Circles-Back-Around,” Zeppy sarcastically said as he traded knowing looks with the rest of his guild.

  “Look, it’s not so simple as all of that Mr. I-Wear-Depends,” Jodi said in the same derisive tone as she hurriedly glanced around to make sure none of the NPCs nearby could hear her. “I watched the video of what went down in Telrain for myself along with a lot of others,” she pointed her spoon at Zeppy to emphasis her point, “can any of you tell me why Startum egged her on? It was like he wanted the psycho-bitch to destroy the city!”

  “Now, that is a proper question for one seeking the truth,” ChopU Ginsu, one of the Warrior/Monk tanks of the group, said, holding up a finger to the rest of the guild as if marking a point in Jodi’s column.

  “It’s about time,” Zeppy harrumphed, as he gave her an annoyed look, “and you can do better than Mr. I-Wear-Depends. That’s a given for us old-timers.”

  Jodi couldn’t help but smile. She’d reached for the first thing that had come to mind and had to admit that it had been pretty heavy on the weak sauce. Zeppy might be a crotchety grump but the old man could usually give better than he got. ChopU Ginsu was also a pretty hilarious character with his Jedi-like robes and calm demeanor. He was definitely one of those people who were into roll-playing. Though Zeppy’s Heroes were made up of a much older group of players, they honestly weren’t all that different from her own group of gaming friends. The only difference was that she wasn’t used to taking shit from people she didn’t know. As she took another spoonful stew, Jodi was surprised when Tumms joined the conversation.

  “Yeah, we have some information on that,” Tumms said, lowering his voice as he nodded to the rest of the group that he had this covered. “Thomas said that Startum was worried about having the Meteor Scroll used against the defenses of BrokenFang Hold.”

  “I don’t know how much of the previous day’s video that you watched, but Startum had agreed to a plan with the Priests of Light to let them try and capture the scroll from Julie.” Seeing the flash of confusion that crossed Jodi’s face, Tumms hurriedly continued. “Julie is Cristiane Sekhmet’s in-real-life name.” Seeing her nod in understanding, he continued nonplussed. “Though he didn’t warn the Priests of Light, Startum’s backup plan was to get her to use the scroll on Telrain to take it out of play.”

  “Wow, that’s some brutally cold-blooded decision making right there,” Jodi unhappily muttered as she began using the flat oat-bread to scoop out the delicious stew. The combination went surprisingly well with the wild-tang of the meat. Not that Jodi particularly noticed the taste as she realized that everyone here seemed to know a lot more about what had gone down in the Human capital than she did.

  “You have to put it in perspective,” Zeppy said, as he took the lead again, “It’s more like a classic hostage scenario than actual combat.” There were several knowing nods around the table as he continued in an almost instructor-like tone. “There was no talking Cristiane down. She was bent on domination and was using the high-level scroll to threaten the NPC leaders into doing her bidding. The main reason she was able to get as much control over the Kingdom of Kader as she did was because of the threat she represented. In response, Startum managed to get the entire population, along with many of those that she’d put to death for not falling into line, evacuated under her nose, effectively removing the active hostages from play. The only problem was that-”

  “She could do this to any city in The World,” Jodi said, following the logic
as she came to a surprising conclusion, “So evacuating the hostages was only a temporary fix because she could continue threatening them anywhere that they went.”

  “You got it in on the first try,” Zeppy approvingly said, “That threat alone gave her a massive amount of power that could be used to pressure any kingdom into doing her bidding.”

  “Some people might argue that losing the city itself was more important than losing the people who lived there,” Grody added with a sad shake of his head, “but those people forget that people are what makes a city a city.”

  “That’s so true,” Tumms said, giving the Half-Troll a nod of agreement, “From what Thomas said, the city itself wasn’t a major consideration to the overall situation as far as Startum was concerned.” Tumms green eyes turned back to Jodi. “His main concern was that Cristiane would hit BrokenFang Hold or one of their primary defensive fortifications and slaughter his people. If that happened, it would be game over for everything we’re trying to create here.”

  “All of which are important points to the overall situation,” Zeppy said, as he took the lead over the conversation again. “So now, Startum has a hostage crisis scenario where the bad guys don’t know they’ve lost their leverage. It was a perfect opportunity for him to take the terrorists out without any collateral damage, including taking the nuke out of play that they were using to blackmail everyone.”

  Jodi could only shake her head at Zeppy calling the Meteor scroll a nuke. While it might sound stupid to non-gamers, for a bunch of retired military personnel and police officers, it made perfect sense for them to equate the high-level spell to something that their training could relate to. In a lot of ways, the massive destructive power of the scroll had been on par with a small tactical nuke that you might run into in a First-Person Shooter, meaning she understood the basic parameters of what they were laying out.

  “Even with the Priests of Light’s failure to capture the high-level spell,” Tumms added, “Startum’s backup plan came through in the end.”

  “That’s what we call a “clusterfuck surprise” on the force,” Lylar, a Ranger-Priest multi-class player, chimed in with a laugh.

  “Which is still considered a win,” Grody humorously croaked out, as the two of them high-fived. A sight that Jodi could’ve personally gone forever without seeing since Grody’s leather armor straps left little to the imagination.

  “As these goofballs are trying to point out,” Zeppy said as he continued his lesson, “Startum was able to get Cristiane to waste her nuke, kill her forces, and herself in the process. Besides taking her nuke out of play, as a bonus, he was able to get a head start for his people’s escape because the Meteor Strike took her people out of play for a twenty-four-hour period of time.”

  “From what I read this morning on the Devil Dogs forums, he managed to do more than just that,” Tumms mysteriously said, as everyone looked over at him in surprise.

  “What do you mean,” Zeppy asked, obviously confused at what he was getting at, “You know their Twitch Stream updates don’t come out until the day after everything goes down.”

  “That’s why we have our private forums,” Tumms said with a laugh. “You see, there’s a little bit of an argument going on about if Startum knew this was happening ahead of time or not.” He thoughtfully leaned back on his stool and stroked his beard. “When Startum evacuated the NPCs from Telrain, he sent the majority of the surviving Royal Army, Guardian Knights, and the Priests of Light to Palnisdale to reinforce the city, while the majority of the non-combatants were sent to Darom for evacuation to his lands.”

  “Sounds reasonable enough,” Zeppy said with a shrug, not seeing what Tumms’ was getting at, “What’s so special about that?”

  “Well, those reinforcements arrived just before the Kingdom of Kader was invaded by a shit-ton of Orcs from the Plains of Atoll,” Tumms said, meaningfully looking at the stunned faces around the table. “Not only that, it just so happened that Cristiane’s people had driven out most of the non-Human forces from the defense of the city and had laid off a significant portion of the remaining Human Royal Guards and Army forces that were left in the city a few weeks earlier. On the night he arrived, Startum immediately found the spy within their midst and began getting the soldiers back into uniform.”

  “Damn,” Zeppy harrumphed, understanding why that might have started some speculation in the Devil Dog’s private forums, “So is Startum a tactical genius, got an inside information source, or just the beneficiary of some pure dumb luck?”

  “That’s basically the question everyone’s asking,” Tumms agreed, as everyone at the table contemplated the question.

  “What did Thomas have to say about the coincidence?” Zeppy asked, as he listed off the first several points that came to his mind. “Does he think Cristiane somehow planned the invasion ahead of time with the Orcs to tighten her hold on the Kingdom of Kader? How could Startum have even known about any of that? Has he managed other similarly impressive strategic feats?”

  “How would a player manage to do something like that with a group of Orcs even if they wanted to?” Jodi cut in to add her two cents. In her experience, those disgusting creatures only looked at people as food or slaves and nothing else. “I’ve been dealing with the Orcs around Nren Unarith since I’ve started playing. Trust me when I say that there’s no compromising with any of those savage bastards.”

  “We hear you,” Zeppy said, as the rest of the guild nodded in agreement, “We leveled up by mostly fighting Orcs in Myathlune. Those bastards seem to have their claws into everything there.”

  “For the Cristiane question, might she have found a unique quest line to take over the kingdom, or one that gave her the option of selling out her people,” ChopU Ginsu thoughtfully asked out loud.

  “No clue,” Tumms answered, before turning to Zeppy. “A lot of us have been trying to figure that out too, but from what everyone has been saying, Startum does shit like that all the time. When Thomas laid out the reasoning for how the Palnisdale situation went down, it was all just deductive reasoning on Startum’s part for where to send the troopers and the royals.” Seeing everyone’s confused looks, he explained how Thomas had laid it out for him.

  “Look at the map for yourselves,” Tumms said, waiting a moment for everyone to pop their in-game maps open. “The only places Startum could’ve sent everyone was to Lodenburg or Palnisdale. While Lodenburg is an older town that's supposed to be somewhat like Telrain, Palnisdale is the heart of the Royal Army’s power and considered the great bulkhead between the Northern Tribes and the Kingdom of Kader. By sending the survivors there, he was able to kill three birds with one stone.”

  “I see what you mean,” Zeppy said thoughtfully, “With one move he was able to get the royals into the greatest position of power left within the Kingdom of Kader while reinforcing Palnisdale. It just so happened to be what the city needed most when it was invaded by Orcs.” The old player hesitated for a moment in confusion. “What’s the other bird he managed to take down with that one move?”

  “It also allowed Startum to make sure that any of the Chaos Storm Alliance's influence was broken in the city,” Tumms said as he smiled. “Thomas said that I should look up the video for the Naked Raid of Palnisdale.”

  “Woohoo,” Sunny said, “looks like I have something to watch tonight when we log out!”

  “What the hell is up with that?” Zeppy asked in an irked tone, “Is this Thomas’ new way of trying to get his buddies to look at his dick?”

  “Thomas wasn’t there,” Tumms said, shaking his head at Zeppy’s question. Obviously, tricking your friends to look at your junk wasn’t anything new in the military if these old birds new about it.

  “Well damn,” Zeppy said, letting out a guffaw as he looked over at a grinning Sunny. “I might have to join you in watching that too.”

  “I still don’t understand how does the whole Orc invasion come into play with Cristiane?” an oblivious Grody asked as he continued t
o manipulate the map in his HUD to better understand the tactical situation.

  “No one really does, but it seemed like the Chao Storm Alliance was working with the Orcs somehow. During the fighting yesterday, Thomas noticed a large force of players, that they’d been fighting, join up with the invading Orcs as if they were working together, but then something happened and they all started fighting each other. So, it’s hard to really know if that’s the case or not.” Tumms said, turning serious once again. “Startum explains it somewhat differently.”

  “How so?” Jodi asked, finding herself interested in what he had to say on the subject despite the dislike she generally felt towards the man.

  “From the discussion he'd had with Thomas, Startum thinks there’s something in The World that’s continuously trying to take out the Nightmare Start players, and that it reacts negatively whenever there’s a large group of them gathered together in one location for any length of time,” Tumms said as everyone listened to his words intently. “The World might react by sending a monster invasion, a high-level Mini-Boss, or who knows what, but you can rest assured that it’ll be something nasty. Hence, the whole Hobgoblin invasion that’s targeting BrokenFang Hold.”

  “Wait,” Jodi objected, as she cocked her head at him in confusion, “What does any of that have to do with the Chaos Storm Alliance working with the Orcs or not?”

  “Nothing really,” Tumms said with an easy laugh, “All that Startum had to say about them working with the Orcs was that his psycho-ex was a master at getting computer opponents to attack him in games. If anyone could figure out how to do that, he swore it would be her.” As Jodi sat back to contemplate that tidbit of information, a new voice spoke up from across the table.

  “Hold up,” Warduke Notintheface, one of the backup Defensive Warrior tanks, asked somewhat confused. “How many Nightmare players are there even in BrokenFang Hold?”