Continue Online The Complete Series

by Stephan Morse

  Below me, the giant screamed in a delayed manner. Beth’s sword slashed, creating glowing streaks. Her form stood out brightly as I slammed into the creature’s body. Pain rippled up my legs and certainly felt real.

  [Morrigu’s Gift] dug into its chest, and I slipped down. The beast cried out, then reeled back. [Awareness Heightening] once again showed its broken properties, because I had enough time to calmly stand up on its nearly vertical body. My feet gained purchase. Side effects of prolonged usage would include nausea, vomiting, and possible loss of consciousness. This monster would die first. I intended to give everything I had to ensure that.

  “Keep hitting it!” I shouted.

  The beast didn’t bleed, but it burned away in chunks. [Morrigu’s Gift] pulled out of its flesh with a searing flash of light. Dark flakes of shadow skin flew around like confetti in a parade, flaring up as they vanished like flaming paper.

  The beast righted itself. [Blink] was off of cooldown, so I grabbed my other weapon in a slow motion hustle, then leapt backward with its sway. My body hung in the air before [Blink] put me behind the shadow man’s head. My giant enemy had no real brains and only a basic aggressive pattern. Given a Rank, this beast would be fifteen at most. Even that was only because of its size and insane health, supposing such a monster could even be killed.

  Inertia carried me into its neck, where I jabbed my weapons. In real time, none of this would have been possible. I couldn’t fight giant monsters based on pure reactions. Not over a pit of endless abyss that represented a hole in the virtual world of Continue Online. But Hermes, the man I lay in the ARC dreaming about being, certainly had the abilities.

  Both blades dug in. I alternated stabbing them swiftly as rhythmic pulsing filled my ears. My chest hurt a little as [Awareness Heightening] took its toll. I had to pray that we could drive it back before the creature got bigger.

  Wait, it was smaller now, wasn’t it? Beth’s balls of multicolored energy were zipping around. Three swam together and formed a spinning bolt that cut through the air. A rainbow of colors splashed off the beast’s side as embers of burning shadow-flesh fluttered away.

  The creature was chipping away in size. The pit beneath me appeared bottomless, and I couldn’t tell where the legs were. I stabbed again while screaming in frustration.

  “Hit it with the biggest spell you’ve got!” Awesome Jr. shouted.

  “Casting! Fifteen seconds left!” my niece responded with an equal level of excitement.

  The two of them sounded like this was a roller coaster of epic proportions while I was fighting against something that might destroy the world.

  Did they not know? Of course they wouldn’t. They couldn’t be aware yet that Miz Riley had somehow killed Mother and the world would crash because of it. My gut clenched again as I reared back to stab the large man’s neck.

  “You can use that sword to cast? That’s so…”

  His words were drowned out as my ears were boxed. A huge hand slammed into me as if I was a bug biting its neck. My teeth banged into the giant man’s surprisingly solid neck. [Awareness Heightening] faded with a jarring sensation.

  System Error Diminishing!

  We’ve determined Hermes is a potential pancake!

  Total health loss: 40%

  The world abruptly went sideways as a giant hand tried to slide me off. My body flew through the air as if I had been unwelcome bird shit to be slung away in disgust. The pit’s edge came up quickly and I had only enough sanity to put the weapons into my player inventory storage so they wouldn’t be dropped.

  My side crashed into the wall. One arm went numb. The other’s fingers scrambled for a handhold. Rock around me crumbled into the pit below. My feet kicked at the edge in panic. How far down did I have to fall before being subject to possible deletion?

  I lost the hold and fell. The world was moving too fast now. [Blink] activated and put me midair, where I fell into the ground beside the hole again. Fresh pain reported in from my face and feet. My toes ached, and my ankle refused to support standing. I needed more skills, heals, or a regeneration ability.

  Light went off on one side of the pit. Beth stood in front of a set of six circles. Her face dripped with sweat. The large creature was rearing back an arm to hit the young woman. I scrambled to stand, but the recently damaged leg gave out. My mind’s desire to override ARC signals and stand anyway met with failure.

  [Blink]’s cooldown had four seconds left. The creature’s arm moved fast. Awesome Jr. threw one of his weird concoctions, and a pile of green goo expanded into the air like a slimy airbag. Its swinging limb slowed to a brief stop. It jerked once, then twice. The mess of materials Awesome had released was going to fail.

  I took a breath, pulled out [Morrigu’s Gift], then [Blink]ed again. My body tumbled into its new position. Everything ached, but I had no choice other than to grit my teeth and bear it.

  Beth’s face looked haggard. Casting those spells must have taken a lot of energy out of her. Otherwise her health was fine. I refused to let the arm hit her though. The idea of this former little girl being hurt on my watch washed away some of my pain.

  Dusk’s gift came in two forms. One required me to catch a ball of flame that came out of my mouth. The other made me feel like a comical virtual dragon shooting fireballs. Maybe in Advance Online, I could have stuck to the Gatling laser. I looked at the shaking hand and wondered how the beast was so stupid it couldn’t figure out how to use its other arm.

  Maybe destruction programs weren’t required to have intelligence. It didn’t look like the sort of being that might suddenly drop everything and wonder why there was a need to delete. Plus, we didn’t have the luxury of waiting for an existential crisis.

  The man stared at Beth. I had no doubt that it would go right through me and slam into her. What tools did I have to stop that blow? I could have taken [Wings of The Messenger] and flown around to distract it, but no, I had a few other hopes.

  A shuddering breath passed while I tried to ignore the ARC’s feedback of pain. My throat swallowed, then bulged weirdly as [Breath of Flame] activated. Without my hand to catch it, the ball of fire shot out much like Dusk’s did. Fire pelted the shadow creature’s face while Beth made three slashes behind me.

  “Awesome!”

  Its face stayed locked on Beth. I took a deliberate breath, and another ball of fire seared a path outward. I swallowed afterward and felt as if I hadn’t had any water in days.

  “Awesome! I love this game!” the young male declared again. A potion crashed into the arm, and weird yellow lightning made the monster’s arm jerk uncontrollably. “I don’t know how long these stuns will hold!”

  One last ball of fire went out before I had nothing left. Messages came up citing [Hoarse] and [Winded]. Dusk cranked these out ceaselessly, and a few left me gasping.

  “Got it!” Beth shouted as lights brightened up the night.

  Six circles had been cut into the sky. Each one mixed together her green, light blue, and scarlet spell schools.

  The monster’s arm shook loose from a fresh goo grenade then continued to slam down toward my niece. I pressed a foot down and activated [Power Armor]. My toga flowed and joined together with my hat. The clinks of metal swam over my arms and legs. I pulled out [Morrigu’s Gift] in its two-handed form. I flipped it sideways and braced for impact as the impossibly huge arm hurled into my body.

  “I’m out!” Awesome Jr. shouted.

  This damned monster was trying to clothesline me like I was some toddler in its way. My boots dug into the ground. Jarring rippled every portion of my damaged body. My ankle threatened to buckle, and my stupid health bar dropped quickly for every second I strained against the arm’s force.

  “Beth!” I almost screamed between gritted teeth.

  “It’s going!” she shouted.

  I heard a sharpening hum. Light flared, and the creature roared. The pressure on my arms fell away, and I stumbled. My body turned just enough to see the creature’s che
st with large holes poking through.

  [Barricade] sustained for ten seconds against a creature over 8000% bigger

  [Barricade] Rank 5 or higher

  Skill added: [Immovable Object]

  I fell forward into the messages. They shattered through my visor and vanished into a splash of light. The armor slid away, and someone ran over, their footsteps drowned out by my beating heart.

  The beast was sinking into its pit while groaning loudly. A hand sat on the edge, curled in a claw of protest, as its sinking continued. Finally, no part of the beast of shadows remained. A bottle was being shoved into my face to drink. My eyes were locked on the pit that refused to close up. It sat there like an ugly scar on the land of [Arcadia] as a notice that even if we fought, our actions would do nothing more than stave off eventual destruction.

  “Drink this, Hermes. It’ll help,” the young man said.

  Cool liquid soothed my throat as it went down. Awesome Jr. was cradling my head and trying to lift me. My head throbbed, and everything hurt. His potion filled part of my health bar, and one or two pains went away. I still felt dizzy, and nothing was in focus.

  The thought occurred to me again. Those small abyssal holes wouldn’t close.

  “I think that’s the biggest thing I’ve ever fought.”

  “I’ve fought bigger.” I remembered the eyeball on that [Leviathan]. It had been absolutely insane in size. Putting our recent combat into perspective helped me move more easily. Some of the fog lifted from my head. It might have been due to Awesome Jr.’s potion. “How did you get here so fast?”

  My breath was running short. One foot shuffled in front of the other as I looked over the edge of the hole. Part of me was terrified a grasping hand would come up in an overtime boss mode fight, but nothing happened. Only black emptiness existed down there.

  I took a breath as another scary thought occurred to me. Was that pit, which had tried to swallow us all, a part of the fear that King Nero had had before? He’d spoken of a black abyss. Did he mean deletion? Or did the Voices bring him back with a healthy fear of what may come? Deletion would be death to a digital creature.

  “There’s a trail of destruction through the woods, plus nothing tried to stop me. I picked off a few of the wolves for easy skills,” Beth said.

  My head slowly turned around to see my niece. She wore a proud look.

  I smiled. “That was some spell. And those potions helped.” I gave an exhausted thumbs-up to the young man. I tried to give credit where it was due.

  “Yeah! Wow, I wish I could learn real magic. That would be awesome. Or that sword, or those movement things. I’m jealous. You’re even better with them than last time.”

  “I’ve had some practice since then. But how did you even get here?” I stared at the other man.

  “I found her. The others and I split up. You remember them, right? SweetPea, HotPants?”

  “And Shadow.” I nodded. James had mentioned there were a ton of players named Shadow around this world.

  “Yeah. It’s awesome,” he muttered. A second later he flinched and looked behind him, but no one was there.

  The movement made me laugh. He probably expected HotPants to bonk him on the head. Part of me expected it too after seeing that very scene multiple times.

  “Convict, are you alive?” a rougher sounding male shouted from farther away.

  “It’s Hermes!” I waved. Wyl and I needed to have a serious talk. We all did, about this event with the pit and what roles we had all been assigned. “We’re all clear!”

  Wyl walked slowly in our direction, and the three of us met him halfway. He stared at the ground in wonder while shaking his head. Around us, the formerly lush forest was missing huge swaths of trees. Roots were in clumps, and dirt had been sheared off at a completely flat angle.

  “Someone needs to tell me what happened,” he said.

  “A giant monster.” Awesome Jr. leapt into the conversation. “Hermes here was fighting it. I haven’t seen anyone take that kind of damage in a long time.”

  “Yeah. That last blow, I thought for sure we were fucked,” Beth said.

  I raised an eyebrow at her, and my niece blushed.

  “I know some of it, but anything I share will sound insane, and we need to get somewhere safe.” My head tilted and I looked around. There was no knocking or other signs of wildlife.

  “Does this have to do with auntie?” Beth asked from behind me. Her face pinched a bit around the eyes.

  I tried to smile for her. It felt fake, but the system provided a notice about my [Acting] skills kicking in. Maybe that was how I’d gotten them in the first place—by being good at pretending everything was all right.

  “You’re hiding something,” Beth said. “I can tell.”

  “Now’s not really the time, and we’ve got a long road ahead of us.”

  Both the teens tried to get information out of me after that. I couldn’t bring myself to answer. That fight had been hell, and everything ached. I ignored their constant stream of questions, and eventually they talked amongst themselves about their characters.

  Wyl walked parallel to me. His eyes kept turning toward the other two, and his face would scrunch up. Each time, the sickening feeling in my gut grew. I tried to distract myself with thoughts of Xin and ways to grow as a player.

  What would I do if we fought one of those monsters together? Would she have the strength to combat them? Could we escape anywhere safely if those things were following me? That knocking sound had been centered nearby the entire time.

  Hours later, Wyl stopped walking as fast. Awesome Jr. said we should make a camp, and I couldn’t bring myself to argue. It was late in the night back in reality. Beth should have been asleep, but she had pushed through. Wyl couldn’t last much longer.

  Dusk was the only one who appeared to have boundless energy. He winged around a few additional laps once we stopped to make camp. I set about the fire while Beth pulled out food. At some point, I ended up sitting while staring at a small but warm fire. Crumbs from a sandwich sat in my hand.

  Wyl sat off to one side and sharpened a sword. I thought it was the same one he had stolen from a player back at the [Abyss of Light]. He was exceptionally skilled at disarming people and stealing their weapons.

  “Here, let me do that,” Awesome Jr. said to Wyl. “I take care of the weapons and armor for my group, so I’ve got a lot of practice.”

  “What’s your skill at?” Thorny asked over the soft grinding noise.

  Wyl chose not to respond and handed the sword over. The young teen, and his ugly green cloak, sat there calmly inspecting the blade for nicks. He lifted it to eye level, one hand on the hilt as the blade rested across the back of his arm.

  “Five, as of last week. I ended up polishing an entire stockpile of items for Shadow’s small army,” he said while squinting.

  “An army? Your guild member has an army?”

  “Oh yeah. The League of Shadows. I kid you not, an army of players named Shadow, or something close.” Awesome Jr. smiled as he set down the blade. Cloth and a tiny whetstone came out of his player inventory. “All of them are, like, vigilante justice player killers hell-bent on making sure no guilds try to monopolize dungeons and stuff.”

  I watched them talk while I felt absolutely numb. Dusk stalked around the fire a few times, staring into its depths before wandering over to me. His face looked a bit haggard and scratches showed up in multiple places.

  “Seriously? That guy is in charge of all of them?”

  “Yeah. But some are, like, ShadeX or Nightfall or other stupid names. They’ve got close to two hundred players in the guild, nearly all with sneaking skills or rogues. A month ago, before we joined up, they dismantled the entire High Rollers leadership in four days.” Awesome paused his weapon caretaking and lifted one hand. It crossed his neck with a cutting motion as his tongue stuck out to the side. “They sneaked into their base and offed players and autopilots alike, then kept griefing them for four Eart
h days.”

  “Jeez.” Beth whistled.

  She knew exactly what questions to ask. My method of dealing with other players had devolved to smile, nod, and hand them a letter.

  My fingers clasped over the tube for a moment. There were no messages inside or in my inventory. Based on what that Voice of Faith and Sanctuary had said, most of them were probably busy trying to keep the world from falling apart. Except for Mezo anyway. It made sense that she might not care at all. It was the end of the world, and she was probably trying to convince all the other Voices to join her in a lust-filled last hurrah.

  “But still, getting an army of players? Was that a unique quest? How did they even agree to that?” My niece scooted closer with an excited look.

  My eyes closed, and I wondered what SweetPea might think. Girls got jealous often, didn’t they? I didn’t remember that ever being a problem with Xin. How would she feel after finding out I had tried to date someone once after her passing? Such thoughts kept me silent and introspective while the other two chatted away.

  “I guess. I think it started from his old trainer in Haven Valley, plus that guy is, like, always grinding out skills while SweetPea and I have to go to school.” He shrugged then put away the stone and inspected Wyl’s sword again. “HotPants might know more, but I think she was doing some monk training style stuff. Like, Zen waterfall face the sunrise stuff. God knows she could use meditation.”

  “Really?” Beth pulled out another chunk of food and offered it around.

  Wyl shook his head slightly, but Dusk felt comfortable enough to take a bit from her hand.

  “Yeah. She’s angry, like, all the time.” Awesome Jr. kept talking and flipped the sword over. “The game even changed her hair color because of the prolonged rage usage. Apparently if you hold on to rage abilities for more than an hour, it starts shifting to red? I dunno. I can’t get upset enough to trigger it.”

  I wondered if Wyl remembered Awesome Jr. The young babbling teen hadn’t been one of his charges. Shadow and HotPants had been. Either way, none of it triggered a reaction from the guard captain. Likewise, Awesome Jr. didn’t pry about Wyl’s current situation so far from home.