None of the NNG Guild’s players had seen Dave’s character yet, but by the time Highwayman and Arianne reached the nondescript single-floor brick jailhouse, they were pretty sure the roaring and crashing noises coming from below ground were previews of what was to come.
One thing Dave had decided on, however, was his character’s name: "4884.” For locomotive enthusiasts, the choice was obvious. It had to be explained to everyone else.
The main problem for Jordan and Amy was one of practicality and survival. Dave would be unable to tell friend from foe until level three. He would also be unable to recover from his initial rage until level two. Between being released and reaching those two milestones, he was as likely to kill everything he saw as he was to breathe oxygen.
Highwayman and Arianne were tasked with turning 4884 loose and then running for their lives. Everyone knew they would both be vulnerable to Dave’s character. It would be catastrophic if they were mistaken for guards or enemies and beaten to a pulp before Dave was able to act rationally. The only bright spot was that Dave would not be able to start gaining weapons skills until level five. His first few heavyweight rounds would be hand to hand only. This could be interpreted as good news or bad news depending on your point of view. The only skill 4884 had with a near-instant capacity for a guaranteed homicide was to grapple. He also had several procs that could provoke his strength to soar well past the theoretical upper limit on humanoid attack power. If they all stacked at once, his relative strength value could go as high as 220. Nobody wanted to be around if that happened.
As long as Arianne and Highwayman stayed away from him, they would have at least a chance to survive. If 4884 got hold of either of them, it was all over. Highwayman had a distinct advantage in all this. Arianne, unfortunately, did not. Even her horse wasn’t going to be much help. 4884 was just as likely to knock it silly as he was to put either of the two humanoids in traction for six months.
Highwayman’s knuckles rose to knock. The entire building shook with a bone-quaking shout, followed by an inhaling growl that nearly caused involuntary loss of faculties for the five real-world humans present.
“Special delivery?” Marc asked.
“Just be ready to run,” Amy said.
“Why doesn’t he just have his character wait until the rage passes?” Robb asked.
“Because then he’ll suck as a berzerker,” Marc replied. “The more stuff he breaks and the more hapless guards he pulps between now and level three, the more powerful he gets. This is like those arcade games with the buttons you press as fast as you can to get bonus points.”
“A lightning round?” Robb replied.
“Yeah, except there’s probably going to be more thunder than lightning,” Jordan replied. “Let’s just hope we don’t get caught in it.”
In the game world, Arianne opened the door. The two characters slipped inside. The building was cramped and gloomy. The passageway that led from door to the down staircase was made of crumbling brick. The floor was constructed out of warped and splintery wood. Creaking and popping noises followed the two adventurers down the hall. They crept down the stairs and found the basement level of the structure. It was filled with firewood stacked six feet high along the walls. At the far end was a black iron cell. Inside was 4884.
Jordan had told himself he was prepared for Dave’s choice of half-giant as his character’s race. But the mountain of muscles and teeth that filled almost all the space between the bars of 4884‘s cell still left him unable to form coherent words. The sound of him breathing filled the room, even though he was apparently completely calm. It was like standing on the tongue of a sea monster.
“What are you doing here?” one of the guards shouted. It was like a starter pistol had been fired. Three relatively large men appeared from side alcoves and hallways. Each was armed with large wooden clubs. For some reason, they were all focusing on Highwayman and Arianne, however, and not paying much attention to the Brobdingnagian threat behind them.
This presented Jordan with an opportunity. He produced a rock about half the size of a ripe apple and gauged the distance to the cell. Jordan had done the necessary calculations to make sure his accuracy with a thrown weapon wouldn’t fail him at the moment of truth. He was somewhat confident it wouldn’t. After all, he was in training to become a master of knife throwing! Just as the first of the three jail guards reached the base of the stairs, he let fly. The rock sailed over the heads of the room’s occupants and struck 4884 right between the eyes. The number 17 appeared and then faded, indicating the amount of damage Highwayman had just done to his future comrade.
4884 made an abrupt noise. It was more a shout of surprise than pain. His enormous hand reached up and felt the relatively small bump. It was immediately clear to both Highwayman and Arianne that the half-giant didn’t particularly approve of the new feature that had been added to his forehead.
So he roared a challenge.
The population of the room variously shit themselves or just narrowly avoided it.
Jordan worked his controls. He and Dave had it all planned. Highwayman made a face and shouted something in a strange language. Whatever it was he had said, 4884 took it poorly. Dave worked his controls in response. By now the non-player guards were obviously becoming aware of the fact the rapidly deteriorating condition of their inmate’s demeanor was a much bigger concern than the two unidentified people on the staircase. They advanced on the cell door, intent on subduing their prisoner. It was a poor choice.
One of the most compelling things about the entire barbarian category in Kings and Conquests was the elaborate rage mechanics. The statistics governing how various kinds of rage affected the potential strength, speed and endurance of a player character were analogous to the Richter scale. Achieving each new level created an exponential increase in the multipliers for the base statistics, and each derivative value changed based on the character’s specialties. Some barbarians applied their power to brute strength instead of endurance, meaning any one use of raw lifting, punching or crushing power could be many times more effective than their overall stamina against external attacks or at-large damage in the overall game world.
Dave had given considerable thought to his character’s potential effectiveness and chose to put nearly all of his skill points into fury, which was one of only four feedback mechanics in the game. Simply put, a character with properly configured fury skill was able, for example, to use one reaction rage point to, a few moments later, generate two points of organic rage, which could then be converted back into reaction rage at a one to one equivalency. The tradeoff was that the fury multiplier could not be de-activated until either the character’s rage reached zero or the character was killed.
Fury also generated continuous health increases, continuous strength increases and continuous attack speed and attack power increases. The only thing that reduced rage was doing damage. It didn’t have to be damage to a monster or person. It could be damage to a rock, or a tree, or a building. The entertaining part was that the player had only occasional control over what got pulverized. Anything that hurt the player, including damage suffered while destroying everything in sight, increased the fury multiplier.
Players able to manage the fury skill were quite rare, but those that did accomplish the impossible were quite literally unstoppable wrecking machines. Characters with most of their points in fury were considered to be the most desirable allies in a large-scale battle, since they were nearly impossible to kill and simultaneously impossible to withstand. Two such characters on opposite sides became the digital equivalent of a battle between superheroes.
By the time the guards reached the door of 4884‘s cell, Dave had worked his character up into a nice thick lather. Despite the fact he had de-emphasized his brute strength score, the half-giant creature’s effective punching power was now nearly four tons per square inch. One of the guards rapped the cage bars with his club. 4884 responded by lifting the building out of its foundation by shovin
g the brick ceiling upwards. A bone-rattling crash filled the room with dust as Highwayman and Arianne slipped out the door.
A muffled scream that sounded like a rabbit being caught by a fishhook in the hind leg filled the jail building moments before the roof collapsed. Highwayman and Arianne ran with their arms over their heads. One of the guards climbed halfway over a collapsed wall before being grabbed. Its head and arms vanished back into the building. Frantic sounds of crying not unlike those of a seven-year-old after a bicycle accident echoed moments before a spray of blood and splintered bone exploded through the shattered windows. 4884 let out a sound that would have caused a fully grown male gorilla to leap six feet in the air. More guards came running.
Teeth, boots, pieces of wood, fecal matter, blood, helmets, shredded paper, pulverized weapons, dirt, piss, armor and bricks rocketed in all directions. Debris rained from the evening sky. By now the jail was a distant memory. All that remained was a pile of blood-soaked building materials in a five-foot-deep crater. The townspeople would later find all that was left of the three original guards was a ripped pair of canvas pants and a shoe.
At the height of the battle, Dave poured 80% of his remaining rage into one of 4884‘s “war shouts,” which instantly killed a level four guard captain and vaporized a blacksmith’s anvil at a range of thirty-five feet. War shout was one of six abilities a barbarian could choose that had no upper limit on rage utilization. With sufficient multipliers, it was essentially an anti-proton beam weapon powered by a small star. Players simply had to avoid aiming it at the ground lest they suddenly find themselves at altitude with no means of a controlled landing.
Highwayman and Arianne sat on the gentle slope of a nearby hill and listened to 4884‘s cacophonous discontent while the village burned in the night.
Minutes later, Dave dinged level three.
Chapter Twenty-Three
“Shit!”
The lunch crowd at Blakely’s Chicken hadn’t been paying much attention to the overweight young man in the corner. After all, he was wearing headphones and had a tray next to him. Obviously he had already ordered. He was intent on whatever his computer was displaying anyway. Such a sight wasn’t uncommon. After all, Blakely’s Chicken had premium wireless Internet access with bandwidth north of 20 megabits when it wasn’t crowded. He was wearing jeans he hadn’t changed in four days and a taco sauce stained T-shirt decorated with a cartoon duck, but none of the restaurant staff had connected the dots. Yet.
When the rifle-shot-like sound of the word “Fuck!” made everyone in the restaurant turn to look, the manager decided to speak up.
“Crowd control!” he screamed. “Stop him! He’s killing us!”
“Sir, I’m going to have to ask–”
“Fuck!” The customer swerved his mouse and knocked the tray out from under his drink. The manager jumped back, trying to avoid the extra-large cup of soda and ice. He wasn’t successful.
“Sir, you’re going to have to leave!”
The customer neither heard nor saw the manager trying to get his attention. In the game, his lovingly shepherded level six character was in a fight for its life against a masterfully executed scheme of pixelated robbery and murder. He had joined the dungeon party based on the fact several relatively high-level characters were in attendance. None were below level four. The deceptively poorly-equipped “thief” character, which was really only a conveniently engineered combination of stealth, surprise attack and poison use skills, was level seven. That should have been a red flag, but the promise of quick wealth overcame prudent observation. The kicker was that everyone had voice chat, so he could hear and speak to everyone in real time.
“Assbag loser! Block him! Block!”
The thief had strategically avoided most of the potentially hazardous combat during the dungeon run. As a result, it was practically unhurt and at full strength, even after the fight with the final boss. The other characters weren’t so fortunate. In fact, they had been drained of health, mana, rage, and most of their advantages. After all, they had defeated every opponent in the dungeon.
Except one.
The thief had waited until everyone was weakened to spring his trap. Both spellcasters were murdered by single thrusts of his knife. By the time the warrior character realized he was under attack, his face had been torn to ribbons by a razor-sharp claw weapon. He swung his sword wildly, but failed to connect with anything. Blood was pouring into his eyes when the poisoned knife plunged into his neck.
The lone survivor was the archer character, which was being controlled by the Blakely’s Chicken customer. It was out of ammunition. It had minimal armor. All it could do was attempt to hold the thief off by using its bow as a makeshift club. Its owner hadn’t been even partially prepared for this kind of treachery.
Another barked “FUCK!” echoed in the restaurant as the archer was disarmed. The other real-world people in the dungeon party were all screaming profanities over voice chat, which was chief among the reasons the archer player’s discretion left a bit to be desired. For everyone else, the chicken restaurant was just a pleasant place to eat. For the archer player, it was a burning building full of dead bodies and bleeding people screeching profanities. His next punctuation-optional tirade drew the attention of a police officer in line to pick up an order of spicy wings.
“Why can’t I move?! What the fuck is this?! MOOOOOVE! YOU FAT FUCK!”
The other players shouted protests, but their characters were far underground in a game world location where nobody could come to their aid. The archer stumbled over bleeding and broken bodies, desperate to escape.
“I spent two hundred dollars on that character!”
“Heal! Heal! HEAL ME! SHIT! SHIT! SHIT!”
“They’re all dead! We’re dead! You suck! You SUCK! NEVER QUEUE AGAIN YOU FFFFFFFF–”
Uproarious laughter filled the voice chat channel. In the dungeon, blood sprayed in all directions, splattering the bodies of the two pale spellcasters. Their shocked dead expressions stared straight up as blood pooled around them. The warrior character slammed into the stone floor, cracking its head on the hard surface. Its armor shattered and tumbled in all directions.
While the stunlock timer ticked, none of the game controls worked at all. The archer character was being brutally stabbed in a manner that would have shocked seasoned homicide detectives. Blood splashed across the screen. It was an effective graphics effect. The chicken restaurant player yanked his laptop computer into the air and smashed it against the table over and over again. Plastic, electronic components, mustard, sugar and picnic utensils shot in every direction. The soda-covered tankard-like drink cup tumbled across the floor. The police officer ran to the manager’s assistance.
“Sir, I need you to step out of the booth! RIGHT NOW!”
The customer looked up just as his archer was stabbed through the face. In the game, his character fell to the ground. A large taunting banner rose from the handle of the knife protruding from its head. It read “EASY PK.”
A trembling combination of tears, flushed face, annoyance at being interrupted and frustration all combined to elicit a double-chin-flapping howl of outrage and despair from the defeated player. “You DISTRACTED MEEEEEE!”
Having lost all sense of self-control, he threw his nearly 300 pounds into a poorly advised grappling contest with the police officer. His headphone cord, laptop, mouse, power cable, mouse pad and charging mobile phone became a whirling, tangled snare. The officer twisted the customer’s arm and nearly dislocated his shoulder. He then grabbed a handful of hair and dragged the screaming player out of the booth in a most undignified manner. Several well-built men in the restaurant went to the cop’s assistance. After a blubbering frenzied tantrum which involved at least two slips and falls in the half-gallon of soda on the floor, a wild haymaker that connected with nothing and a kicked-off shoe deflecting off the drink machine, the former owner of a level six archer was slammed against the table, swiftly handcuffed and frog marched
out of the wreckage and into the parking lot with his headphones clattering along behind him.
In the game dungeon, where there was no police response, the thief rifled through the belongings of his victims and then carefully looted the boss and its henchmen. He rapidly collected the lighter weight treasures consisting of two magic weapons, four medium-sized opal jewels, 121 silver coins, a gold bar, two vials of powdered ivory, a large pearl, sixteen pieces of fine silk and a ceremonial jeweled dagger. His combination of player skills, characteristics and quests produced an experience bonus of nearly two thousand points, which brought him within single digit percentages of progression to level eight. He vanished into the darkness, laughter echoing.
Sixty seconds later, only the Internet knew the Blakely’s Chicken customer had been streaming the session. The entire incident had been caught on live video and broadcast to more than sixty thousand viewers.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Had the executive conference room at N-gate Five Technologies been visible to the pro gamer fandom, even the security camera footage would have pulled competitive prime time ratings. In attendance was two-time Sniper League MVP Jay Zhang, co-captain of Marauders FPS. Next to him was Lori Locke, the record-holding Steel Marble Adventures World Champion. Across the table was “The Wraith,” known in real life as Mike Oaksmith, the top ranked challenger in the Masters of Fantasy player vs. player tournament. A finer or more skilled group of video game experts one would be hard pressed to find.
Only the table was lit. The rest of the room was dark. One wall of the 60th floor conference was a resplendent view of the Los Angeles skyline, complete with a perfect backdrop of Santa Monica Bay and the distant lights of Los Angeles International Airport and the pier.
On the cool surface of the table were three leather folios. Each was secured by a brass book lock. The entire presentation looked and felt more than a little clandestine. The average age of the room’s occupants was only a few weeks north of 22 years. None of the three would have likely been noticed at all outside of their common second career. As professional video game competitors they had a combined net worth of more than five million dollars equally split between endorsements, training camps and prize money. But even that princely sum didn’t match up well with the wealth in the nearby offices.
Overpowered: A LitRPG Thriller (Kings and Conquests Book 1) Page 9
