“If you succeed, you will have defeated the greatest digital challenge ever engineered and become the undisputed World Champion video game player of all time. Good luck.”
The video ended and a single input field appeared with the redemption code still inside. Underneath was a button labeled “Continue?”
Nobody spoke for several moments. Robb jumped from his seat and ran to the window before whirling about with a delighted expression. “What do we do! What do we doooooo!” He leaped around like a garden hose that had escaped from its sprinkler. “This is the coolest thing ever! Ever! EVER!”
“How could they have finished the game? Why didn’t they just launch it? Like every other game?” Dave sputtered. “Why didn’t they tell anyone?”
“Because this isn’t like every other game,” Jordan muttered.
“What is going to happen when the rest of the world finds out Kings and Conquests is live?” Amy asked. “According to this status page, the servers have only been up for two hours! There’s nothing on social media. Nothing on the news. We are literally the first and possibly the only people on the planet to know about this!”
“It’s one AM. Everyone within five thousand miles of here is drunk or asleep. We’re already two hours behind,” Marc said with a yawn. “Let’s quit and play pinochle instead. Let’s sell it all and buy a pizza parlor.”
“Do any of you have even the slightest idea what all this is worth?” Jordan asked, running his hands through his hair. “If we get to that Safekeep place, we own the company! It’s billions of dollars. Money forever! We would own the greatest game ever made!”
“Okay, we need to keep our mouths shut!” Amy whispered urgently. “I propose we learn how to play this game before the rest of the universe comes barging through the door and fills the place with newbs, trolls and noise!”
“We could form the first guild. Jordan will be the guild leader. With a high level account like that we probably get tons of perks!” Dave offered.
Jordan sighed, trying to mentally prepare himself for the ultimate quest. “Alright, we will spend tomorrow preparing, and then we’ll all enter the game at once, get set up and start leveling our asses off. Levels are everything in an MMO. If we max out first, we’ll have the best chance. Okay?”
There was general nodding and agreement.
“You do realize once you press that button, you’re betting a hundred and fifty thousand dollars you can win this game, right?” Marc asked.
“If he wins, he gets billions,” Amy replied.
“If he loses, he will be the biggest chump to ever draw breath.”
“Robb, meet me tomorrow morning as early as possible. We’ll set up the LAN in my garage like we did for that charity tournament. Call in to your jobs, do whatever. We are submerging the boat for the next 96 hours. If we get a four-day head start, we’ll have the best chance.”
“What happens if we win? Do we split the money evenly?” Marc asked.
“Jordan gets the car,” Amy said. “We split everything else five ways. Deal?”
More agreement.
Jordan pocketed the map. “Let’s go.”
Chapter Fourteen
Amy shrieked. She stood frozen with her hands over her mouth. The rest of Team NNG stood in the doorway to Jordan’s small rented house, staring into the cramped living room. Jordan himself was sitting on the couch with a look on his face like he was either the father of newborn triplets or he had just been drafted by a professional hockey team. Surrounding him were stacked packages of every size, from letter envelope to refrigerator box. All were emblazoned with full color Kings and Conquests logos. On the coffee table in front of Jordan was a gigantic leather-bound book with a magnificent carved KNC logo worked in bronze and jade to match the boxes. The book appeared to contain at least a thousand pages and was half-again the size of a large cookbook.
“Where did all this come from?” Marc asked.
“It was delivered by special courier this morning,” Jordan said in an exhausted monotone. “I only opened this.” He indicated the book. “It’s got everything. There are more than sixty player classes. Two thousand NPC types. Fifteen hundred quests for players under level 20. As a Founder I can set my character and up to four companion characters for continuous progression.”
Robb quietly closed the front door as the rest of the group carefully took seats in whatever furniture wasn’t piled over with packages.
“What’s continuous progression?” Dave asked.
“My character and group keep playing even when I’m logged out. I give it general instructions and it does what I tell it until I log back in.”
“That’s insane,” Amy said.
“No kidding,” Robb added. “You could win the game without ever logging in.”
“Until I die and have to start over,” Jordan replied. “The instructions in here recommend progression players never leave safe areas, as they are likely to end up attacked by other players or monsters, then killed and looted.”
“Other players?” Amy asked.
“Anyone can attack anyone at any time,” Jordan said. A coldness settled on the room.
“No wonder getting to level 75 is impossible. It’s going to be a free-for-all!” Dave exclaimed. “No factions?”
“There are factions, but the game doesn’t prevent you from attacking your own. There are penalties, but if you are high enough level they don’t matter much.”
Robb tried to pick up the book. “Ugh! This thing weighs a hundred pounds!” He set it on the floor and started looking through it. Every page was printed on thick glossy paper and designed in hand-painted full color. The first chapter outlined all the maps and land areas in the introductory game, which accommodated players up to level ten. There were fourteen different zones, each with a top-level creature, unique quest lines, several claimable plots, at least a half-dozen villages of various types and one large-scale adventure consisting either of a battleground, dungeon, ruins or a roaming boss. Each village had a merchant profile and economy, and more than a few had semi-permanent trade routes which players could either protect in exchange for a share of the wealth, or raid in an attempt to steal it.
“What’s a claimable plot?” Robb asked.
“Where players build their own structures,” Jordan replied, rubbing his hands over his face as if he hadn’t gotten much sleep.
“We can build our own structures!?” Dave half-yelled. “Player housing right out of the gate?”
“There aren’t any patches or expansions in this game,” Jordan replied. “The players build out all the adventures. Once you obtain enough wealth, you have to build some place to store it all. Then you have to hire someone or something to guard it. Then other players can try to steal it, but only if they can invade your keep and defeat all your defenses.”
“Meaning you are the boss of your own dungeon!?” Robb exclaimed. “That’s it! We’ve discovered Shangri-La! We really will never leave home again!”
“What is the rest of this stuff?” Amy asked, peeking inside one of the boxes.
“The hardware. Apparently Founders get new machines to go with the printers, augmented reality gear, handhelds, networking stuff and sound gear.”
“Augmented reality? This thing is a virtual 3D game or something?” Dave asked.
Jordan shook his head. “No. You play on a PC. No goggles. The augmented reality gear allows you to do several exclusive quest types outside in the real world when you get to level eight. According to the instructions, you can use your phone as a lens.”
“How many of these things did you get?” Amy asked.
“Five. I told the delivery guy we were going to have a LAN party, so he dropped off the first set and then came back about an hour later with the other four.”
“Do you have any idea what our next videocast is going to be like? We got seven thousand subscribers out of that crossbow!” Robb said.
“We’re not doing any streaming until we’ve got our head star
t,” Jordan said. “Let’s get to work. We need to be ready to log in and start leveling tomorrow morning bright and early.”
Chapter Fifteen
“Drink this! DRINK IT!” The muscular green creature grabbed Jordan’s character by the neck and shoved a vial of even greener bubbling liquid towards his face. The authenticity of the graphics and animation caused Jordan to involuntarily lean away from the cinematic flat-screen display. The giant’s toothy grin filled most of the screen. Jordan moused over the bottle and saw the eat and drink cursor appear. He clicked it.
His character took the vial and drank it.
“Ha! You’re dead, knave!” The giant smashed the bottle across Jordan’s character’s face. It landed hard in the dirt. Jordan watched with a confused expression as his character’s skin blackened and rotted in the muddy road. A game event bulletin appeared in the center of the screen as the giant looted the character’s corpse:
I’M AFRAID YOU HAVE DIED
Beneath was a button labeled “Start New Character?”
The entire NNG guild membership sat with roughly the same looks on their faces.
“What the hell was that?” Robb barked.
“Okay, instead of trying to be wiseasses, why don’t we all start in the same area?” Dave offered.
“Then we all have to be the same race,” Amy replied. “I’m not playing a human. That’s really boring. You know how I feel about boring games.”
“Okay, but if we play the cat-race, we start in a higher-level area. Then we have to run for the village so we can get some protection from what’s lurking in the Blighted Forest!” Marc said. “I don’t know about you, but I didn’t find what happened to Amy’s last character all that enchanted.”
“We’re learning as we go,” Jordan said. “There’s no guarantee any of us will survive, but what is guaranteed is that if we’re isolated we’re easier to pick off. Let’s at least try the human option first, learn what to do, then we’ll add other races as alts. Fair enough?”
“Whatever,” Amy sighed. “I just don’t want to be Sir Vanilla for 75 levels.”
Another fifteen minutes of character creation elapsed. Everyone had carefully chosen new starting skills, appearances and character histories. Marc’s character spent all his starting money on a battle-axe. Dave bought a healing potion. Not that it would have helped his last character much. It’s hard to drink a healing potion when you don’t have a head.
“Alright, the first thing we do is form up and run for the open field. Hopefully this time we can outrun whatever is in the starting zone and the rest won’t pay attention,” Jordan says.
“Easier said than done, Mr. Guild Leader,” Robb quipped.
“All zone in at once. Ready?”
Five gamers clicked their “Begin” buttons all at the same time. The scene that greeted them was enough to cause a brave man to retreat a few steps. Shrieks that could have easily come from creatures not-entirely human rang in the night. Fire was everywhere. Panicked and fleeing “adventurers” were running in all directions as if trying to escape carnivorous bees. One was hoisted into the air and carved into chuck, ribs, sirloin and round by an armored ogre the size of a city bus. A courageous soul was trying to shout instructions, only to have his open-mouthed head pinned to a wooden pole by a concrete spear.
Jordan, Amy and Marc’s characters managed to run about fifteen yards before Robb and Dave’s characters were immolated in a gigantic wave of fire. The bottle containing Dave’s healing potion exploded. The glass shards instantly killed a vicious dog-like humanoid just before its body was vaporized by a spray of boiling acid. Several other player characters screamed like mashed cats just before Amy’s meticulously crafted human avatar was thrown off a 2000-foot cliff by a passing horseman. A twelve-foot-wide hair-covered claw absorbed a nearby plate-armored knight and crushed it like a soda can. It banged the corpse on the ground until the helmet flew in one direction and the head in another.
Jordan’s sword-wielder actually got an attack off. It missed. An instant later it was brained by goblin-like creature armed with Marc’s battle-axe and eaten in a most undignified manner.
That left Marc’s character alive, but unarmed. It ran past Jordan’s swordsman’s lifeless corpse, fleeing for its digital life. Its tunic and leggings were covered in blood and pieces of the swordsman’s shattered skull. It actually made it to the edge of the forest just before a well-aimed spear lodged in its neck. Marc’s avatar landed face down in the river. Blood mixed with the bubbling water.
I’M AFRAID YOU HAVE DIED
Jordan tried the berzerker skill. His character zoned in to the human mayhem only to have its sword ripped from its hands and rammed straight up its ass. His new character’s face crashed into the dirt. Its equipment was looted in seconds.
I’M AFRAID YOU HAVE DIED
Amy tried another cat character. This one had stealth. She tried to sneak out of the starting area. A green tentacle emerged from a previously undetected hole in the ground. It wrapped tightly around her character’s face an instant before both the tentacle and the level one character vanished directly into the road. A dark pool of blood oozed from the hole.
I’M AFRAID YOU HAVE DIED
Marc tried the aquatic race. He lasted less than 60 seconds before a shadow darkened the water around the little pod plant. There was a bloody explosion of bubbles and thrashing. Pieces of shredded meat floated in the ocean near a sword lodged in the sandy undersea floor.
I’M AFRAID YOU HAVE DIED
Jordan’s new spear-throwing character was hit by a three-ton boulder during the wind-up for its first attack.
I’M AFRAID YOU HAVE DIED
Dave tried a magical wizard-like character. It was grabbed by a passing bird the size of a B-25 and never seen again.
I’M AFRAID YOU HAVE DIED
Robb’s character ran and ran. A creature with six legs and a big fanged smile ran alongside laughing. It produced a gold club and clocked Robb’s avatar right in the mouth. Another face slammed into the grass. Looted in seconds.
I’M AFRAID YOU HAVE DIED
Amy went back to human. Her thief-like character was set upon by a swarm of feral locusts. The white skeleton gleamed in the moonlight.
I’M AFRAID YOU HAVE DIED
Suddenly real-world Dave howled with palpable rage. “What the hell is this! My subscription cost went up to $29.50 a month instead of $22.00! I thought I got a discount!? What’s going on Jordan!?”
“Why are you asking me? I didn’t set up the rules!”
“It’s because you died fifteen times,” Amy said quietly as she worked on her tenth character. “The monthly subscription goes up if you die.”
“Okay, so this game is just for rich people or something!?” Dave protested.
“It goes back down for every level you earn past 35,” Amy replied calmly.
“Sure, level 35. So far the best I’ve done is run about forty yards before I get bit in half!”
Robb tossed his mouse across the table. “I need a break. We’re obviously missing something here.”
All Jordan could do is stare at the screen. They were already beaten and it had only been two hours. “It can’t be this difficult.”
“Please allow me to correct you, son,” Robb replied. “Not only is it this difficult, it’s bloody impossible! All we’ve accomplished so far is to soak the starting area in blood. I don’t even want to think about how other players are reacting to this!”
“Maybe we could get some pointers online?” Marc offered. “Someone out there is probably already level ten.”
“Nobody has leveled up yet,” Amy replied.
“How do you know that?” Dave asked.
“There’s a realm status page for every server. Our server has all level ones. No level twos or higher.”
“Not a single person has leveled up yet?” Jordan asked. He sounded exhausted.
Amy shook her head. “Not one. Imagine what it’s going to be like if you’re
level ten. You’ve got sixty-five levels to go, and you could be instantly killed any second.”
“Forget that. What if you’re level 74?” Robb added. “This game is beating the Internet’s ass!”
“I need a break,” Jordan said. He wandered out the door, leaving his massacred guild behind.
Chapter Sixteen
“What makes Kings and Conquests different?”
The Fantasy News interviewer spoke authoritatively, as if Garrett Wyland and his team hadn’t been asked the same question a thousand times before. Jordan sleepily watched the now two-year-old video, only occasionally recognizing he was listening to the words of a man who had been killed fleeing law enforcement.
“I believe there is more to gaming than performing a series of rote tasks in order to achieve minimal accomplishments like leveling and obtaining more skill points. Video games should train the mind in much the same way building a trestle teaches a group of boys on a camping trip patience and performing a task the right way the first time. The real world enforces certain rules that require mindful work. Until now, the only thing video games have enforced is a minimum time investment in exchange for a wad of money.”
“I’m not sure I follow you, Mr. Wyland.”
Garrett gestured to emphasize his points. “I used to believe writing down the instructions for a game was redundant. But I was wrong. Reading instructions and putting learned knowledge into action is one of the most fundamental and unique powers human beings wield. It is how we communicate civilization from one generation to the next. So I launched an initiative to document my game, and in the process I learned more about what a real community is than I ever had before. Think about some of our greatest cultural achievements. The Constitution. The Magna Carta. Mozart’s Operas. The stories of Edgar Rice Burroughs. Homer’s Odyssey. These are among man’s greatest attempts to communicate timeless truths to other men, and look what they were able to accomplish with only words and symbols! What I have at my disposal would have astonished the authors of those works, yet all I’m allowed to say is ‘Congratulations, you are now level 19?' I refuse to believe that is the limit of our potential.”
Overpowered: A LitRPG Thriller (Kings and Conquests Book 1) Page 6
