Viridian Gate Online: Books 1 - 3 (Cataclysm, Crimson Alliance, The Jade Lord)

by James Hunter

  Everyone was quiet for a time. Thinking about the people we’d left behind, those we’d lost to the transition or the asteroid.

  “I miss my parents,” Abby said with a sniffle. “My dad didn’t even make it to the end, which is a blessing I guess. Large cell lung cancer got him about six months before …” She trailed off, refusing to speak the words. “I was so busy working I didn’t see it until it was too late. He didn’t tell me he was dying. Not Dad. He tried to get me to go out fishing with him, though. I remember he called a couple of times—said he wanted to get down to the lake. I blew him off. Too busy. If I could change anything, it would be that. I’d go back and spend more time with him.”

  “I have a question,” Amara said after a time, interrupting our nostalgia-fest. “I want to know what happened. We natives”—she hooked a thumb toward Cutter, sitting nearby—“we’ve heard there was a cataclysm that drove you all to our realm. That your kind found a way to open a rift to Eldgard from some fantastical place. Yet, it is a thing we do not talk about. It makes travelers uneasy, but I want to know. Where do you come from, truly? What brought your kind here?”

  Vlad, Abby, Forge, and I shared uneasy looks, not sure what to say or how to say it. We knew the NPCs were not simple computer scripts—they were definitely something more, but they weren’t human and their world wasn’t what they thought.

  “Well, you’re right,” Abby said carefully. “We did travel here through a type of magic gateway, one that allowed us to move between the realms. The realm we come from is called Earth, which is a giant place with billions of people. Or at least there were billions of people. Something bad happened. A giant burning rock fell from the sky. It marked the end of our world. The way our world was, anyway. Some people survived, but most people died. Unless they came here, and even some of those people died. Their bodies, their minds, couldn’t handle the change.”

  “This Earth,” Cutter said, his mouth tasting the strange word, “what was it like? Is Eldgard really so different?”

  Forge whistled. “Oh, it’s a different kinda place, that’s for sure. It’s big—giant, even—and we had all kinds of things. Cities a hundred times larger than Ankara, with buildings made outta metal and glass that damn near scraped the sky. There was one city, New York, nine million people lived in that one city alone. We had cars and planes, cellphones and TVs.” He sounded wistful by the end.

  “No magic, though,” I added. “There was a lot of technology this world doesn’t have, but no magic there. No spells. No monsters—except the human kind. It made less sense, too. I mean here, everything is part of a story. Quests give meaning, everything has a place and a purpose. Even monsters and dungeons fit. Things didn’t always make sense back on Earth. Bad things happened and there was no monster to slay, no quest to set things right. You just suffered and tried to pick the pieces up.”

  “Sounds like a sad place, your world,” Amara said eventually.

  “It was,” I replied, bowing my head and staring into my palms. “It was still ours, though. But enough of that,” I said, clearing my throat and gaining my feet. “This is supposed to be a party, a celebration of second chances. So, let’s celebrate. Who needs another round?”

  We drank and talked for a bit longer after that, then around 2:30 in the morning, I finally drifted off as the fire dwindled and burned low, leaving only cherry-red embers and a blanket of gray coals behind.

  TWENTY-ONE: The Knobby Knee

  I groaned and cracked open bleary eyes as someone nudged me in the ribs with the toe of a boot. “Time to get this show on the road, friend,” Cutter said. My head throbbed with dull pain and the light jabbed at my eyeballs like an army of needles. Though not a violent person by nature, I really wanted to punch him in the nose. I mean it couldn’t be time to go already—it felt like I’d closed my eyes two minutes ago. I pulled up my interface and checked the time. 7:05 AM. God that was early. Too early. I pressed my eyes shut, rolled onto my side, and draped an arm over my face to block out the warm morning light already flooding into the open-air atrium.

  “Oh no you don’t,” Cutter said, this time giving me a much firmer nudge with his boot. “If I don’t get to sleep, you don’t either. Abby and Amara are already scurrying about, getting ready to leave, and if you don’t wake up, it’ll be my bloody neck. So up you get, or I’ll start nudging you with the tip of my blade, Jack.”

  I sighed, resigned, and flipped onto my back, glaring up at him from the floor, my head still pulsing.

  “Don’t look at me like that,” he replied with a cocked eyebrow and an indifferent shrug. “If it were up to me, we wouldn’t leave before noon. Abby, though, seems to be under the impression that you’ve only got about four hours before your first Death-Head debuff kicks you in the teeth like an unruly packhorse, so she thought we should be moving early.”

  I groaned and pulled up my Active Effects screen. Sure enough, just under four hours until the Diseased debuff took hold. Even more shocking, however, was the other active debuff currently working against me:

  <<<>>>

  Current Debuffs

  Death-Head Mode: You’ve temporarily activated Death-Head Mode! Time until the Diseased debuff takes effect: 3 hours 39 minutes 19 seconds.

  Hangover: You drank too much and slept too little; as a result, you have a hangover. Mild confusion and disorientation; duration, 1 hour. Mild head pain and light sensitivity; duration, 3 hours.

  <<<>>>

  That was great. Just perfect.

  In less than four hours—and with a major boss battle looming right around the corner—the game was going to hit me with a bushel of crippling effects. The Diseased debuff came with a 15% drop in Attack Damage and Spell Strength, plus an additional 25% reduction in Health, Stamina, and Spirit Regeneration. And until then? Well, until then I had a hangover. For the thousandth time, I wondered what kind of twisted, demented jerk would purposely add a feature like that. I mean, the Devs of VGO literally had the option to create the world to their liking, and some Troll still thought it was funny to include hangovers.

  Cutter offered me a hand, which I begrudgingly accepted, and pulled me to my feet. The rush of blood to my head was painful and left me wobbling unsteadily for a second, again cursing the Dev responsible for my plight. Once the ground stopped reeling, I headed over to the banquet table from the night before. It was still loaded down with food. If there was one thing I knew, it was that food was always good for a hangover—particularly in VGO, where eating could cure just about anything. A plate full of flatbread Kabis, piled with meat and veggies, took care of my gnawing hunger. And someone had been thoughtful enough to bring out a pot of Western Brew, so a giant mug of steaming rich coffee took care of my attitude.

  By the time I was done munching and drinking, the rest of the party was ready to step out, even if not everyone was quite as bright-eyed and bushy-tailed as Abby and Amara. Cutter was sullen and pale. Forge sported huge bags under his eyes and was diligently nursing a mug of coffee as big as a beer stein. And Vlad? Poor Vlad looked like a disgruntled hobo rudely kicked away by a passing cop: his clothes rumpled, his hair matted, his skin waxy. Yeah, everyone had overdone things the night before and we were all paying the price. Still, hungover or not, the quest was the quest, and we needed to go.

  After only a little prodding by Abby and Amara, we left the Rooster behind, heading for an Affka den called the Knobby Knee in the Bath District.

  Ankara was, without a doubt, the most beautiful city I’d seen in Eldgard, but conversely, the Bath District of Ankara was the grossest place I’d seen. Apparently, Ankara was a metropolis of extremes. The streets in the Bath District were cramped, narrow things made of cracked hardpan instead of sandstone, and littered with rubble, mud, and fluttering pieces of cloth. The people, all Accipiter, were more often than not dirt-caked, their hair greasy, their eyes hollow, their feathers molting and dull. There were a handful of vendors, selling questionable looking bread and even more questionable meat, but no
real merchants.

  Nothing like in the other sections of the city.

  Eventually, we took to the foul back alleys in an attempt to avoid the claustrophobic thoroughfares and the press of unwashed bodies. We made better time, but instead of dirty Accipiter, we had to contend with rank puddles of fetid water, mangy dogs, and scampering rats almost as big as the pooches. After half an hour, we finally ducked onto a nearly empty street, cloaked in constant shade by the neighboring buildings. It wasn’t hard to tell why the street was empty: the whole place reeked like the inside of a dumpster behind a sushi bar.

  This was the heart of the Bath District, so named because you needed a serious bath to scrub away the stink. According to Cutter, the runoff from the tannery, the stockyards, and the sewer ways all converged in a central pipeline running beneath this street. The place we’d come to find was a crude three-story building of mud and straw, its walls leaning drunkenly, the white plaster cracked or crumbling, the yawning windows covered with fluttering, sun-faded curtains instead of glass. A pair of grimy, rough-edged Accipiter in dark leathers loitered out front—a threat to warn away anyone who didn’t have business here.

  Unfortunately, we did have business.

  We beelined across the street, and for a second I thought the surly guards would give us a hard time, but one nasty glare from Forge, combined with a cold and feral grin from Amara, saw us through without a hitch. The inside of the Knobby Knee was even worse than the outside suggested and left me feeling supremely uncomfortable. It was dim and poorly lit, the walls were cracked and pockmarked, and a thick cloud of cloying blue-gray smoke hung in the air. Even a faint whiff of the acrid smoke left my head foggy and my stomach queasy. There wasn’t much by way of furniture. Just giant dirty Persian-style rugs strewn all over the crude mud floors.

  Men and women—filthy, rail thin, and sickly pale—lounged on the rugs, leaning against fraying pillows as they inhaled the stale smoke from bulky glass hookahs with a host of tubes snaking off each one like rubbery spider legs. The whole scene was deeply disturbing. And more so because even at a glance it was obvious these people weren’t smoking tobacco. Not with those glazed and glassy eyes. Not with their skin paper thin. Not with those gaunt cheeks. This place was some sort of opium den, and these people were addicts.

  I’d worked as an EMT for long enough to know all the signs.

  As with the hangover debuff, the existence of a place like this shook my faith in the whole system. Why make this? Sure, it added an extra layer of submersion and reality to the gaming experience, but was that worth it? Then I reminded myself that Robert Osmark had known about the asteroid long before the general public. He’d always planned to turn VGO into a new feudal system with him at the helm, and I couldn’t help but wonder if this was part of the scheme, too. Had he allowed a place like this to exist as a means to placate and control the serfs in his new kingdom?

  It felt horribly cynical to think that way, but after talking with Osmark, I wouldn’t put it past him. Not after hearing his disdain for the average person and the length he was willing to go to achieve his goals. I glanced at Abby and saw the same disgust and uncertainty on her face.

  We headed deeper into the building, leaving behind the glassy-eyed addicts as we passed through a curtain made of polished bits of colorful glass. On the other side was a plush office, hugely at odds with the rest of the building: sandstone floors, crystal walls, lush carpets, and elaborate tapestries. Even an immaculate chandelier hung suspended overhead. A prim Accipiter woman with chestnut eyes and a mass of auburn hair sat behind a sprawling crystal desk with a bulky Risi bodyguard flanking her on either side. And those guards looked like they meant serious business.

  With their steel plate mail and beefy axes, both looked like a match for Forge, and I hoped this wouldn’t devolve into a fight.

  The woman smiled, a frosty thing showing too many teeth, and stared at us over steepled fingers. “Now what is this we have here?” she purred, her voice equal parts smoky and sultry. “You lot aren’t our typical clientele, and you’re outsiders to boot.” She leaned forward, lips drawing down into a frown. “Should I be worried?”

  “You should be worried for your soul,” Amara replied with a dismissive sniff before I could speak. “Peddling Affka in the Storme Marshes is a good way to find yourself exiled.” Her glare was as cutting as a razor blade. “Or dead.”

  “Well,” the woman said, shrugging one shoulder, “it’s a good thing we’re not in the Storme Marshes, then, isn’t it? And here in Ankara the Affka trade is entirely legal and embraced by the Merchant Council and King Ibrahim himself.”

  “I hear King Ibrahim’s love for Affka is the reason some people call him the Mad King,” Cutter replied offhandedly, casually surveying the room—no doubt casing it for valuables to steal.

  The woman thumbed her nose and shrugged again. “I couldn’t say. And, word to the wise: if I were you, I wouldn’t say such things where anyone more reputable might overhear. In Ankara, peddling Affka is legal, but speaking ill of the Merchant King certainly isn’t. Now, let me ask again. Should I be worried by your presence in my humble shop?”

  “No,” I said, before shooting Cutter and Amara hard, please shut up now stares. “We were referred here by Hakim, from the Lucky Rooster. He told me you could help us find the entrance to a set of old tunnels that might lead to the Citadel of Arzokh.”

  “Ah,” she replied, leaning back and visibly relaxing. “So you’re the daring band of adventurers responsible for robbing Yusuf. Quite the extraordinary tale. And made all the better since no one likes old Yusuf—an insufferable moron.” She paused, uncrossed long sleek legs, then carefully recrossed them. “Well, needless to say, you won’t find any opposition from me. My name is Ekrin, and I am but a lowly businesswoman, offering a necessary, even if distasteful, service to the fine people of Ankara.

  “And yes, I can point you in the right direction—especially since you’re friends of Hakim’s.” Ekrin hesitated, on the verge of saying something. “Since you are guests here, seeking my aid,” she finally said, “I will be so bold as to ask what your purpose with the Winged Disciples is. Few know about the Cult of Arzokh, and none have ever sought them out—not in all the years I’ve owned the Knobby Knee. Frankly, I’m surprised that a party such as yours would have any interest in a monastic order.”

  “They have some information we need,” Abby replied coolly, without giving away much.

  “Well …” Ekrin paused again, chewing on her lip. “I’ll show you the way, of course. Just one thing before we go. The Winged Disciples … They are a godsend to the people of this city. Especially to the poor—to the overlooked and downtrodden. And the high priestess, Elanor, she is a good woman. I understand a recommendation from me may mean little, but you should know that.”

  Her comment didn’t make much sense to me. I mean, the Winged Disciples were Dragon-worshiping crazies, hiding out in an underground bunker no less. Still, Ekrin seemed mollified by our silence, so I didn’t push her to elaborate.

  “Well, why don’t you follow me,” she said, standing, then adjusting a pristine toga, fidgeting until her robe lay just so. After a few seconds, she nodded, satisfied, and ushered us from the room to a small set of stairs that dipped into a dank basement, lit by a few wall-mounted torches. “Originally, this building was owned by the Ankara Sewer Union,” she said offhandedly, stealing a quick glance over one shoulder as we made our way deeper and deeper. “A headquarters of sorts for their operations.”

  “Great, more disgusting sewers,” I muttered, thinking back to my time trudging around in the knee-deep, fetid muck flowing below Rowanheath.

  “Not really,” she replied. “That was ages ago, long before the Merchant Council put in the junction for the tannery. True, these stairs do connect to an ancient section of sewer—almost as old as the city itself—but after the junction went in, everything got rerouted. This portion of the tunnel is no longer in use, and as a result, this building”—
she swept a hand around the dim hallway—“became essentially useless. Which is when I swooped in and snatched it up for a handful of silver.

  “And that is good news for you lot because it means no unpleasant mess to wade through,” she continued. “Now, you’re going to take the main tunnel straight for about two hundred yards, and then you’ll see a ragged hole gouged into the wall. It connects to a sandstone passageway, and that’s what you’re looking for. That passage leads to a series of natural tunnels, which used to be the den of a great Sand Wyrm, back a thousand years ago before the first King of Ankara slew the creature. I’ve never been to the Citadel myself—it wouldn’t be proper, being what I am—but it’s down there somewhere. Be warned, though, it’s a regular labyrinth.” She turned, regarding us coolly. “And it’s not empty.”

  “Can you tell us how long we should expect the trip to take?” Abby asked, professional to her core.

  “My apologies, but no,” Ekrin replied. “You couldn’t pay me enough to go wandering down there—not even with my bodyguards, Marcus and Mert, in tow. Ah.” She paused as we came to a creaky wooden door, bent and warped from age and studded with rusty iron rivets. Nothing grand or fancy, just a practical door, built for a practical job. “This is where I’ll leave you fine folk. I wish you the best”—she paused, lips pursed, forehead furrowed in worry—“and I also wish you failure. As I said, Elanor, the Priestess, is something of a friend and I would hate to see harm come to her. And you? You all seem like a group ready unleash great harm.”

  Her remarks left our group in an uncertain and somber mood as we headed into the thankfully dry sewer, built from time-worn sandstone blocks like most things in Ankara. It only took us a few uneventful minutes to locate the yawning hole Ekrin had mentioned. “Alright,” I said, drawing my warhammer in a white-knuckled grip. “Let’s go grind some monsters and find that belt.”