by Kyle Vauss
When Loria approached the altar, Crawford stared at her. “What are you doing? Get back on watch,” he said.
This was it. It was time. My heart pounded.
Loria drew her warrior sword. A look of shock took over Crawford’s face. Without giving him chance to react, Loria took a deep breath. She held her sword high, closed her eyes.
And then she plunged it into Gabber’s throat.
When I heard the blade pierce his flesh, I had to look away. I felt sick. I took a breath and got hold of myself. Gabber thrashed around, and then, a few seconds later, he was still.
He was dead.
My pulse raced. This was it.
“What the hell have you done?” said Crawford. His face twisted into a rage so tremendous that Loria stepped back. She dropped her sword, and I heard it clatter to the floor.
I needed to act quickly. My Spare the Dying skill would only work within 5 minutes of a creature’s death. This meant we didn’t have long to bring Gabber back. I felt the presence of a ticking clock so strongly that I thought I could hear it.
Crawford drew his crossbow and pointed it at Loria. I deactivated Shadow Form, since, I wouldn’t have enough mana to cast use a cantrip and an ability at the same time.
As Crawford readied his bow and prepared to fire at Loria, I cast Dark Magic. A thick cloud of smog gathered in my palms. I felt wisps of it curl around my fingers. I pointed at Crawford and threw it his way.
Just as he was about the fire his crossbow, the smog hit him in the face, blinding him. I didn’t know how long my Dark Magic would blind him for, but we didn’t have long. On top of that, I had only 4 minutes to use Spare the Dying on Gabber.
I ran over to the alter. I drew my sword and started hacking at the ropes on his wrists and ankles.
Seeing me, Crawford’s neeves leapt up. The two mercs held their swords and got ready to run at us.
I cut Gabber free and picked up his limp body and slung him over my shoulder. We needed to get as far away from the altar as possible.
The neeves prowled forward now. Loria turned to face them. She held her hands and tried to cast a spell, but nothing happened.
“Your mana,” I said.
She tipped back a mana potion. The neeves were closer now, ready to leap. Just before they did, Loria cast Major Illusion. It was an improvement on my own Minor Illusion, and rather than making just one copy of herself, it made a dozen. Twelve hologram copies of her own form.
Seeing so many Loria’s appear in front of them, the neeves didn’t know what to do.
“Come on,” I said.
Loria didn’t move for a second. I wondered if it was the shock of carrying out our plan of killing Gabber. I stepped forward, grabbed her shoulder, and tugged her away.
Three minutes left to use Spare the Dying.
As the neeves and the mercs attacked Loria’s copies, we turned and ran down the hill. The two neeves were on the ground, chewing on the troll meat. When they saw us, they growled and leapt to their feet.
With Gabber on my shoulder, I drew my sword with my free hand. The goblin’s added weight made my movements slow, but as one neeve leapt at me, I slashed, cutting it along its waist. The neeve squealed.
The other one focused on Loria. With the last dregs of her mana, she cast another dire rat illusion. The rat ran toward the neeve, then ducked under it. Distracted, the neeve turned away to chase the vermin.
Two minutes to use Spare the Dying now. My pulse hammered. As we reached the bottom of the hill, my lungs ached with the effort.
Just one merc lay between us and freedom. He saw me, drew his sword, and stepped forward. As he approached me, I wondered if I’d be able to match him, since Gabber was hampering my fighting ability.
Just as the merc reached me and was ready to attack, Loria moved to the side. She skirted around and hit him on the back of her head with her staff.
1 minute to use Spare the Dying.
The merc stumbled forward under Loria’s blow. Seeing the opportunity, I held my sword tense in my hand, then ran it through his stomach, forcing it into his flesh. I hadn’t wanted to kill him, but there was no choice. It was him or Gabber.
The merc gurgled, then fell forward onto the ground.
With the seconds ticking away, we reached the bottom of the hill. I set Gabber on the ground. I took out my last mana potion, unscrewed it, and topped up my bar.
Then, looking at Gabber, I cast Spare the Dying. A yellow light gathered in my hands. It drifted away from me and then seeped over Gabber’s lifeless body, smothering every inch of his skin.
For as few seconds, nothing happened. Loria joined me at my side. She was panting, and her face was white.
“It’s not working,” she said, with panic in her voice.
“Just wait” I said, forcing more confidence into my tone than I felt.
She was right, though. Nothing was happening. Had we been too late? I couldn’t help but think that my plan had failed. Rather than freeing Gabber, all we’d done was to do Crawford’s job for him. Sure, we’d deprived the hunter of his achievement, but that meant nothing if Gabber was dead.
And then the yellow light concentrated on his chest. It shot out into the air, a single beam reaching toward the sky. I saw a flash like a zap of lightning. I held my breath.
Gabber coughed. Slowly, he opened his eyes. I breathed a sigh of relief. I couldn’t stop myself moving forward, and before I knew it, I was crouched next to Gabber. I grabbed hold of him and gave him a hug.
Gabber looked around, unsure what was happening.
“If you wanted a hug, you could have just asked,” he said, his voice weak.
Chapter Thirty-Three
After healing Gabber using the last of the goblin potion, we didn’t waste any time. I checked my map and put a custom marker on the nearest goblin respawn point, to the north. After that, we’d have to get to the most northern point on the map.
Up there was the old goblin clan village where Gabber would get me my reward. Beyond that, was the point where the map ended, and where Gabber would leave us forever. I didn’t want to think about it.
We said little for the first day of our journey. We were all too tired, and none of us seemed to want to confront what had happened. Loria seemed different after killing Gabber. The goblin, understandably, was so shaken from his capture and from dying, that he said little. He didn’t even hum or sing as we travelled.
At night, Loria and I took turns to both keep watch and log out to get some real-life sleep. Gabber didn’t seem to snooze much. Instead, he’d lie on his back and stare at the stars, deep in thought.
On our second day heading north, Loria broke the silence that had settled on us.
“I levelled up back there, you know,” she said. “And the weirdest thing happened.”
I wondered if she’d found herself in the white-walled room with Bolzar. I hadn’t mentioned it to her, since I didn’t really want to talk about what had happened.
“What was it?” I said.
“Well, after I levelled up, I got the summon Major Beast illusion.”
“What’s so weird about that?” I said.
“I just didn’t expect something so good so early. I was starting to think illusionist was a boring class, but its turning out pretty great.”
I nodded. “It sure helped us back there.”
“Half of your new power belongs in my pocket, by all rights,” said Gabber.
We both looked at him. It was the first thing he’d said in hours. “What do you mean?” said Loria.
Gabber didn’t turn to look at her. “Well, you gained a new power by sticking a knife in my throat. If killing me somehow gave you a power, I should have it.”
“It doesn’t work that way,” I said.
Gabber huffed.
“Come on,” I said. “I know you’re upset. I mean, who wouldn’t be? It’s not every day you get murdered by a friend.”
“She’s not my friend,” said Gabber. “And if I’d
known she was going to do something like that, I’d never have suggested you contact her.”
“The plan was my idea,” I answered. “It was the only way, Gabs. We could have freed you some other way, with a lot of luck. But Crawford would have come after you for his achievement. By doing it this way, he thinks you’re dead and his chance of the achievement is gone.”
Gabber looked at the ground. “And I was dead, for a while. When I died… I saw my father.”
This was getting surreal. I had come to terms with how advanced Gabber’s AI was. His thought patterns, his speech, they all seemed real. But I couldn’t believe that an NPC would get dreams, or that he’d see something in a near-death experience.
“I need to do this more than ever, Tamos,” said Gabber. “Father wants me to. He hates what the clan has become. I just don’t know if I can do it.”
I wished I could help him. If only Gabber’s clan wasn’t beyond the main map. When I looked at my friend and knew that he’d soon leave us, I felt a stab of sadness.
“You can do it,” I said.
“I hope so. I just don’t feel strong enough.”
It took us the rest of the day to reach the goblin respawn point. When we got there, Gabber looked around. He seemed confused. I think he expected the respawn point to be some kind of monument.
I knew better. The respawn point was a forest full of trees with thin trunks and spindly branches. They were all bare. The mud on the ground was cracked and dry. Holes were dug into it in various places, as if something had burrowed underground.
Since the respawn point was miles away from the nearest dungeon or quest, there were only a couple of players here. We stayed back, just beyond the edge of the forest.
We watched as goblins appeared from thin air, as if entering through some unseen portal. This was how NPC respawning worked. They had to enter the game somewhere. For Loria and I, it wasn’t a shock. Gabber watched in amazement as his goblin kin, small, feral, and naked, sprouted out.
His amazement soon turned to anger. The two players in the forest were a level 14 mage and a level 34 thief. I guessed that they were friends. The higher-level player had probably brought the mage here to level up in peace.
When Gabber saw the mage blast a goblin with a fire scroll, incinerating it in one go, he trembled with anger. Suddenly, he moved forward, hand axe drawn, ready to attack. I managed to grab him by the scruff of the collar and pull him back.
“They’ll kill you,” I said.
“Not with you here to help me.”
“I can’t fight them,” I said.
Gabber was so angry that spit formed at the corner of his lips. “Why not?”
I couldn’t explain to him about player killer zones and non-player killer zones. NPCs weren’t programmed to be able to talk about game mechanics. Gabber seemed to have a basic grasp of how certain things worked. He knew, for instance, that the more creatures you killed, the stronger you got. I doubted he knew what levelling meant, though.
I had to make up an explanation. “This area has a magic ward,” I said.
I wondered if this sounded even remotely believable. I’d never been good at improvisation.
“It’s made as a place where humans can kill things, but not each other. I wouldn’t be able to attack them.”
More little goblins appeared in the middle of the forest. They were a foot shorter than Gabber. When they opened their mouths, I saw tiny rows of sharp teeth. They had wild looks on their faces, as if ready to attack everything in sight. I wondered how on earth Gabber planned to use them to take back his clan.
“We need to get rid of the players somehow,” I said. “But we can’t let them see Gabber. They’ll just attack him.”
“So, politely ask them to leave the area,” said Gabber.
I shook my head. “Humans aren’t the most reasonable of creatures, as I’m sure you’ve noticed,” I said.
“What, then?” said Gabber.
The mage blasted another goblin with a fireball. The little creature fell to the floor and tried to roll on the ground to put out the flames. I saw Gabber’s hands clench into fists.
Loria put her hand on his shoulder. “Leave this to me,” she said. Then she looked at me. “They’re here to level up, right? And no grinder can resist a creature with a juicy amount of EXP.”
“So, what do you suggest?”
“Watch this.”
Loria closed her eyes. She held her hands out in front of her, and they began to glow. Slowly, light drifted from her hands. Thin streaks, like yarn spooling from a thread. It gathered in front of her, then started to take on a shape.
Gradually the light concentrated together until it was in the shape of a monster. A few more seconds later, and the illusion was complete.
There, stood in front of us, was a ten-foot dragon. So not a fully grown one, but a dragon nonetheless.
“It’s not exactly a giant, is it?” said Gabber.
Loria shrugged. “It’s my new ability. I can make illusions of higher level creatures. But it’ll be a while before I can make something like a real dragon.”
“Still,” I said. “It should be enough to tempt the players away from the forest for a while.”
Loria made her dragon stomp across the forest and toward the mage and the thief. When they saw the creature stalking toward them, they ignored the goblins. The thief held a dagger in his hand, while the mage gathered a fireball.
Without warning, the dragon picked up speed. It ran at the players, then darted passed them, and sprinted out of the forest. The players, seeing a monster with the promise of decent EXP, chased after it.
Once we were alone in the forest, we walked into the center. The goblins had gathered together. They chattered to each other in a high-pitched language. More of them had sprouted out now, so that over twenty of the little creatures scurried around.
One of them saw us approach. He looked first at Gabber, then at Loria and me. He opened his mouth and made a sound so high-pitched that it hurt my ear drums. The other goblins snapped to attention, straining up on their heels like a group of meercats.
The one nearest to us snarled. They might not have feared Gabber, but they were wary of Loria and me.
Gabber walked forward. He held his hands up, and then began to talk to them in high-pitched squeals.
Loria looked on, confused.
“He does this a lot,” I said.
It was obvious that Gabber was trying to earn their trust. The goblins didn’t seem convinced. One of them looked at me and bared its teeth. Three others dropped to all fours and stalked forward like cats hunting prey.
This wasn’t going to work. While Gabber was intelligent, the goblins in the forest were wild animals. They had little intelligence, and a distrust of people had been bred into them.
Gabber turned around. At first I thought he was going to say something to me. Then he lifted his armor and his shirt and showed the bare skin of his back to the goblins.
“What’s he doing?” said Loria.
Realization hit me. He was showing them the red mark on his back, the one that indicated which clan he belonged to.
After this, the goblins seemed to relax a little. Loria and I hung back while Gabber spoke to them. The high-pitched squeals seemed to fill the forest for the next ten minutes.
Finally, Gabber stopped talking to them. He turned around to face me, and a smile beamed across his face. He strode toward me like a conquering army general.
“I’ve got my army,” he said.
Chapter Thirty-Four
We journeyed north with Gabber and his goblin army. It was like trying to control a litter of hyperactive puppies. Every time we passed a tree, the little goblins absolutely had to climb it. If they saw a fence, they cocked their legs up to mark it with the scent. Whenever we went by an area with long grass, they ran into it to play hide and seek.
The first time it happened, I charged in there to grab them. As I got nearer they started to growl, and when I re
ached out for one, it bit me and knocked off 5HP. After that, I decided to leave the goblin babysitting duty to Gabber.
Although the creatures were vicious when cornered, I couldn’t see how Gabber could make an army out of them. They were wild, unruly, and they just didn’t listen.
“Don’t worry about it,” said Gabber. “Leave it to me.”
Every so often, we’d stop to rest. Gabber spent his time with his goblins. At first, he tried to talk to them, but the conversation was difficult with the little creatures. Eventually, he started using his animal whisper skill on them. That did the trick. A day later, and they were falling in line behind him like a disciplined army. Gabber walked at the front, smiling with pride. The effect lasted around an hour, after which they were their usual feral selves.
