by Arthur Stone
“In that case, what was the reason this unpredictable top-tier network was created in the first place? Wouldn’t it be easier with human operators? They could control these updates, at the very least.”
“We have already discussed the role of the unexpected and how it becomes impossible if we involve human developers. Also, the complexity of the world we have created is such that we would need a million geniuses to be able to exercise so much as partial control over its processes. We could opt for stability. However, a perfectly stable world is tedious and vulnerable. Imagine if the Chinese were to send an army of their players to fight us. Given their sheer numbers, I’m not sure we’d be able to repeal their invasion. However, the top-tier network would not let something like that happen. It would start to take actions to cool their military zeal. Moreover, a large-scale confrontation can be prevented if the systems acts proactively, reacting to the very first symptoms of a major perturbance.”
“But how would it stop such an invasion?”
“No idea. Nobody knows. The top-tier network chooses its own methods. But consider this: had we decided to stop the invasion manually, it would really hit the fan. Yet who would argue with a computer? Anyway, this is neither here nor there—the world possesses an integrity, and we have no place within its structure. We can only play by the rules of the world. We cannot break them. We obviously were tempted to leave a few decent backdoors for personal usage, but all we managed were trifles. It wouldn’t work any other way. After all, we didn’t need a toy—we were aiming higher than mere entertainment.”
“What if we disconnect Rostovtsev? Will everything go back to normal?”
“Doesn’t work—we’ve already tried it, at the very beginning. He was offline. We’d even suspected it to be effective, for he seemed to have disappeared, but Cody has managed to prove this false. Rostovtsev is either stuck, or there’s something weird going on with him…”
“So, we have no idea who’s trying to oppose us and what the consequences may be?”
“Quite so. We are stumped. Any chance you might find out more? It’s within your area of specialization.”
“Do you think there’s a nation state behind this?”
“The Russians, the Chinese, or the Europeans. Someone with a lot of pull. It’s an organization rather than an individual. We have to identify them. Use all your resources—time is against us. The Old Man hasn’t got much time, and he’s extremely unhappy about the delays.”
Chapter 3
The recommended level for the group to have a chance at clearing the dungeon was sixty—fifteen levels higher than before. However, this time Ros had a pet whose level was fifty levels higher than that of the leprus, and he wasn’t a level zero player, either. His level was 43, he was well-equipped, with a ton of buffs and some truly obscene primary and secondary skills. Even without bonuses from equipment, all that added up to a nice total. And with the bonuses…
The legendary belt alone added 126 primary stat points.
But Ros would look formidable without any equipment—there were few level 150 players with such stats. As for secondary stats, many level 200 players would envy him.
And auxiliary ones didn’t even bear mentioning.
Some character—a veritable monster behind a noob facade. With some decent equipment, he could even hunt mobs above level 100.
All of this made him confident that the dungeon would present no unpleasant surprises. It may have gotten harder, but he’d also leveled several times over since then.
There was no thylbit camp at the exit from the first tunnel, so they didn’t need to bother with the barricade. Upon descending to the lower level, he became so bold that he commanded the centipede to run through the tunnel, past the mobs, before bidding it to return some three minutes later.
By the time the giant arthropod reached the exit, it had lost about a quarter of its HP. He must have gotten carried away a bit. The train following the pet had so many thylbits that it reminded Ros of a political protest with a free buffet and mini bar. The centipede’s area-of-effect skills didn’t fail, drawing the attention of the speediest ones, and was now gnawing at them one by one, while also remembering to hammer at the slower ones as they pulled up.
Ros healed his pet, poured fire and chaos over the heads of the enemies, and healed the pet again. He damage output was higher than the pet’s, so sometimes a mob would switch their attention to him, and he would hasten to finish those off before they could reach his much-cherished body. It made no sense to receive any damage. His Stamina stat was very high, and would not increase much from the loss of HP in battle. Much better, then, to fight without feeling any pain or damaging equipment. A single thylbit required just five or six spells to finish off. Chaos Arrow worked best—particularly lucky hits would take off about a third of an enemy’s HP bar.
The first and second levels of the dungeon had weaker mobs than the ones they would find further down, but it felt good all the same.
Ros exhaled with relief a few minutes later.
“That was the biggest train I’ve ever seen in my life as a gamer!”
“Oh yeah? And here I go thinking you always grind like that, and feeling like a total loser. Wanna take a break?”
“You mean, stop and chat?”
“Yup. I have spent all my mana points, so it’s back to a miner’s honest toil for me.”
“Shoot,” said Ros as he sat down upon a flat rock.
“Well, come on, tell me what you plan to do next. What would you do right now if you were on your own?”
“First of all, I’d keep going till I cleared this dungeon completely. Then I’d sell some of the trophies and get down to some serious Enchanting.”
“Why Enchanting?”
“A friendly NPC recommended it. He also told me that if I mine a gem myself, then cut it and place it in an item that’s also crafted by me, I’ll get a higher chance of creating something of value. I studied some of the books the Mages’ Guild had at their library and came across a hint that seemed to corroborate this. It should work even if someone else mines the gem, so long as the miner is in the same party as you. After all, I also know Jewelry and Gem-Cutting, and my Mining is relatively decent, so I have the full set of skills. And Enchanting seems to be in high demand these days, so it might be a lucrative profession.”
“Sure. What you need to bear in mind is that leveling Enchanting to 15 or 20, which is where it begins to be remotely lucrative, will cost you four or five hundred grand in gold. Way more in dollars, of course. Do you have that much cash?”
“I don’t. But I’m prepared to invest everything I earn into it. Half a million won’t solve my problem, so I’ll consider it a reasonable investment. I have done my calculations, and it’s as if I was made to be an enchanter, so I’ve got to try.”
“Can you tell me more about your calculations?”
“Ponder this yourself. The main auxiliary stat that an enchanter needs is the Essence of Things. Mine’s at 10, which is not too shabby by any account. According to what they say on the forum, top-level enchanters raise it to 15 or even 20, but there’s but a handful of such high-level craftsmen, and given the sheer volume of the market, you barely notice them. Arcane Knowledge, Creation, and Reason are also very important for Enchanting, and my corresponding stats are 14, 9, and 12. Top-level enchanters rarely have anything above 10. Another factor is Luck. Everyone needs it, but enchanters are universally believed to need it more than most. Mine’s at 90.”
“How much?!”
“Are you hard of hearing?”
“You should have each mob drop a full set of armor and a few legendary items to boot!”
“Well, then? Do I have what it takes to be an enchanter?”
“Ros, there’s something you’ve overlooked: top-level enchanters and other folks who do it for a living have a bunch of equipment with bonuses to Enchanting, Essence of Things, and so on. Otherwise you’ll just keep flushing money away whatever you do, even with a
clan’s help.”
“I’ll have enough someday. I need a lot of money, and I don’t think I can earn enough by just clearing the dungeon once a month. And a low-level dungeon to boot. I need something lucrative and consistent. Enchanted items have always been in demand—and will always be. There’s an enormous shortage of high-level professionals. I rather like that niche.”
“Have you already unlocked Enchanting?”
“Not yet. I didn’t just come here for loot. I also use Essence Study on every enchanted item that isn’t particularly expensive. It’s an enchanter’s skill, and I bought it.”
“You must have paid through the nose!”
“Oh, it’s not that expensive. But it’s absolutely essential. The thing is, that’s virtually the only way of studying Enchanting. You need to study enchanted items. Enchantments disappear as a result, and the item itself breaks apart. Once the enchantment has been studied successfully, you get some experience. So I’ll unlock it sooner or later.”
“Right. But there’s another thing you don’t know about top-level enchanters. They’re all clan players. And all of their clan’s necromancers work for them harvesting soul crystals. Without such crystals, you can only do the cheapest enchantments that won’t even earn you enough for a loaf of stale bread. You need them to make expensive stuff. And the higher the level of the mob that drops the crystal, the better the available enchantments, and the wider their range. So you’ll have to buy them, and the prices are pretty steep.”
“Why would I?”
“Anything you don’t get? Without crystals, enchantments will bring you no money, whatever your level, and that’s a fact, Jack. You’ll get a hundred or more noob stats to choose from, and one of them will be randomly assigned to the item—most likely, something useless. There’s no play here.”
“That’s not what I meant. The crystals—why would I need to buy them?”
“You mean you can procure them by yourself?”
“I sure can. And better than any necromancer, too. Their chance of getting a crystal tops out at 35 percent, according to the forum, whereas my skill has a 25 percent chance just by itself. But it’s linked to Intellect, which is obscenely high in my case, and Summoning, which has also been beefed up to the max. So I have an 88 point something chance of getting a crystal from a mob. That’s what the extended description of the skill says.”
“Hm… Have I already told you that your Enchanting scheme would be a completely useless gold sink?”
“Not yet.”
“That’s good, because I’ve changed my mind. I’m a doofus—should have figured it out myself. You don’t get pets out of thin air, do you? You resurrect them. From those very crystals, I take it?”
“Indeed.”
“In that case, the only thing I don’t get is why you would need me in the first place. You’re a one-man band of the highest order!”
“Well… You can give good advice, praise my talents, and fetch my slippers every morning. Really though, it would be great if you could handle the trade end of things—I have no time for running around auction houses and keeping track of prices.”
“Well, aren’t we busy…”
“Moreover, Digits, you’re supposed to be in charge of strategy and tactics. Or did you forget?”
“I have already thought of a few things. I’m leveling my debuff, which will always come in handy. And I’m going to pick up a few other debuffing skills. I can be your personal debuffer—that’s real convenient, since the mobs won’t switch their attention to yours truly while I help you to waste them much quicker. Particularly handy when facing a nasty boss. As for the rest of it, I’ll probably have to level my Mining, and no fooling around. You’ll need a crapload of ore and gems, and there’s no point digging for it all by yourself. You might even have to buy raw materials from third parties, wholesale.”
“I’ll need lots of gems indeed. Not so sure about the ore.”
“Shouldn’t I start working on Blacksmithing? That and Alchemy? We could be perfectly self-sufficient, then.”
“I have Blacksmithing, and I can use Transmogrification to craft all related items. You won’t catch up with me there.”
“Tailoring?”
“That works—I’m unlikely to go there simply for lack of time. Leatherworking would be useful, too—I have no experience with leather whatsoever. I have no experience with lots of things. You realize there’s never enough time for everything.”
“All right, I’ll give the matter more thought. Though I have already given myself a headache…”
“Why don’t you rest while I clear out the next part of the tunnel?”
“I’m not tired. It’s just that I’m still in a state of shock—only a day has gone by, after all. I still can’t believe I’m out of that city. I’m even beginning to get nostalgic about it, even though I’ve had it up to here with that place…”
“No worries, you’ll have a chance to return. More than once, in fact.”
* * *
Ros had seriously underestimated his abilities when assuming it would take him a week to clear the dungeon. Despite there being eight levels instead of seven this time, they had arrived to the stalactite hall already on the fourth day.
Ros gestured for Digits not to move, and crept forward as carefully as he could to reconnoiter. Everything looked just the same as the last time—an enormous drum with an exquisitely dressed thylbit perched upon it, and a colonnade of enormous stalactites and stalagmites along the walls of the hall.
There were some changes, however: the boss had a different name this time.
“Trathkazir the Second, Viceroy of Chaos. Level: 134. Abilities: hidden. Stats: hidden.”
Ros sneaked back to where Digits stood and whispered to him happily:
“There’s a boss there, and I managed to see his level—it’s 134.”
“Not too shabby, eh?”
“His name is Trathkazir the Second now. He used to be the First.”
“You killed the First, so this is his next reincarnation.”
“So, Chaos fiends become reborn just like players?”
“The process is different, but if we disregard the details, the gist is somewhat similar. So, what are we going to do now? You’ve already been here, so you’re in charge.”
“You shouldn’t even enter the hall. Once we get started, wait a little, then cast your debuff from a good distance and leg it. Should the boss start shrieking, or should any weird stuff happen, run like hell. I remember some really nasty area-of-effect skills from last time. I nearly got myself killed, and it hurt like hell.”
“Try to raise your pain threshold in the options.”
“I didn’t know about it back then, and I don’t want to do it now—it gives penalties to Resilience and various resistances.”
“Those penalties are pitiful.”
“Every little bit can save your life.”
“Well, suffer if you want, just don’t complain about it. But what are you going to do?”
“I don’t have to do much—the pet will be doing most of the work. I’ll heal and dispel him from a distance if he gets stunned or suffers some other debuff.”
“That makes sense. But it’s going to take a while—your pet doesn’t deal that much damage.”
“That’s OK, I’m in no hurry.”
“As for me, I need to go offline.”
“Damn! Well, leave your character behind the corner—he should be safe there, and you’re gonna get some free XP.”
“The hell I will! I’ll never be able to fall asleep trying to imagine the kind of loot you’ll get from this uniformed cricket. It’ll be easier for me to stay.”
“All right, here I go.”
Ros renewed all the buffs on the centipede, Digits, and himself, checked the slots in his belts for vials of potions and elixirs, and chewed on a piece of Bunjoyan Apre’s Gammon with Southern Spices. He had no idea what an apre was, but its meat, when cooked right, gave a player some useful
protective buffs.
It also nearly cost its weight in gold.
Trathkazir turned out to be a vindictive bastard. As soon as he saw his guests, he gave a mirthful screech, and hurled something resembling a black droplet of mercury from the palm of his hand, ignoring the centipede no less. Ros tried his best to dodge, he still got hit in the small of the back.
