Realm of the Nine Circles: A LitRPG Novel

by P. Joseph Cherubino

  Chapter 27

  “Whoof!” Kalmond uttered the non-word against his will as he hit the chamber floor on his side and slid.

  Moldy dust announced to his nose that he was deep underground. When he rose to his feet, he sensed something instantly off about the place. The rock walls, while still tangible as anything outside the game world, looked…off, was all that occurred to his searching mind. He gripped his axe tightly, causing the flames on it to jump and writhe. The texture of things here was more granular, almost fuzzy, almost as if his vision was failing. He shook his head as he drew on every ounce of concentration he could muster.

  Water dripped somewhere down the passage ahead. He stood in some kind of antichamber. Behind him, a rock wall rose up just above his head. Ahead, the passage yawned open as the cavern ceiling rose, like a not-so-cordial invitation into darkness.

  Kalmond squinted. Even the darkness was imperfect. It did not hold the sense of nothingness that voids offered elsewhere in the game. Kalmond stepped forward, and the dust at his feet received impressions, sending up little clouds.

  “What is this place?” Kalmond asked the cavern. “It’s..low res…”

  As if to answer, scratching, shuffling sounds echoed out from the cavern entrance, followed by the snorting sounds of a large animal. Kalmond had heard sounds like that before when he took a summer vacation out West. It sounded like a bull snorting. Kalmond readied his axe and stepped forward. Mylos was in there somewhere, and he aimed to find him.

  A low lip of rock ran across the chamber entrance, and when both feet crossed it, a puff of air pushed at his back. Kalmond whirled to find a solid wall of rock where the antechamber had been. When he turned back around, two smaller openings appeared in the opposite wall.

  Straining his senses, Kalmond stalked towards the arched opening on the right. The black rock of the cavern, almost like coal, glistened with dim light without a source. As he moved forward, Kalmond found two more identical openings in the rock face ahead.

  “Damn it,” he muttered. “I hate mazes.”

  The rumble of laughter bounced off the walls and made the hair on the back of his neck stand and his follicles prickle. Kalmond slowed, choosing the entrance on his right that revealed a narrow, winding passage deeper into the maze. He made up his mind to choose only the passages on the right should he have the choice. He figured it was as good a strategy as any, or maybe he read that somewhere long ago in another world.

  “Focus,” he whispered to himself, and the word repeated itself as if to mock him. Kalmond growled.

  The passage wound as it angled down to unknown depths. When it opened up into a chamber half the size of the first, Kalmond remembered where he’d seen stone walls rendered like this before.

  “The Labyrinth,” he muttered. “Of course. This is a game within the game.”

  The Labyrinth was the very first 3D, first-person game produced by Gideon’s then new company, twenty years before the first generation of The Realm of the Nine Circles. It was a flop. But why had the portal brought him here?

  ***

  Martin frog-marched his two captives down the hallway with one of their captured machine guns pointing out between them and the other over his shoulder. He achieved the arrangement in true engineer fashion, by building a restraint harness from network cable and electrical wire. Pulling on the harness could guide his prisoners anywhere he wanted them to go. In this case, his destination was the elevator at the end of the long hallway.

  Personnel had been evacuated from the floor hours ago under some pretense of which Martin could only speculate. Dennis and Sally were on their way down to the basement to meet him for the final negotiation. Martin had one chance to do this right and a plan to fall back on if he did it wrong.

  He kept just a single stolen pistol in his waistband to fall back on, but needing it seemed highly unlikely. He figured that any situation that depleted the two magazines in the machine guns and the two spare magazines would end up with him dead in the hallway. He just liked the pistol for the sense of security it gave and the margin of error it might have a snowball’s chance in hell of correcting. The elevator door opened, and Martin hunkered down behind his human wall.

  “human shields, Martin?” Dennis said after a moment’s pause. “I mean, really. So dramatic…”

  “Don’t move,” Martin hissed when Dennis started to move forward.

  “Martin, really. This is ridiculous. If you…”

  Martin pushed his weapon further past his human wall and made sure it pointed at Stroener’s chest. The security chief sighed in resignation as Sally tried to stay out of sight in the elevator.

  “I’m going to walk backward, leaving these assholes in the hallway,”

  “So bitter,” the mouthy mercenary said, while his partner remained silent. Martin slapped them both on the side of the head with a free hand and pushed them forward.

  “There you go,” Martin said. “That’s the first installment on our deal. Your men are back.”

  Dennis wrinkled his nose as his goons drew near. “Are you two OK?” He asked. “Need medical?”

  “Fucker tazed us,” the silent merc finally spoke.

  “Just a shower and change of clothes,” the wise-guy merc replied.

  Dennis motioned Sally out of the elevator, guided his men into the car, then pressed a button on the elevator’s control pad. The two men stared Martin down with murderous eyes as the elevator doors closed.

  Martin moved forward fast, making both Sally and Dennis jump. He turned them around and pressed them into the wall, then frisked them quickly for weapons, not spending more time on Sally than was absolutely necessary. With that done, he stood behind them and marched them into the lab.

  “So, your nerds are in that contraption with Gideon,” Dennis said. “Now I get it. Is that how you’re keeping Gideon from waking up?”

  Najeel perked up at the mention.

  “Damn it, Dennis,” Sally said. “That’s two cards you played they didn’t know we had.”

  “We’re past that now, anyway,” Dennis replied.

  “We don’t know why Gideon can’t wake up,” Martin offered. “But we suspect it has something to do with the depth of immersion.” He described the problem in layman’s terms.

  “I see,” Dennis said, reaching into the breast pocket of his expensive suit. “This is my resignation, signed as agreed.” Sally also produced her resignation letter and handed it to Dennis, who put both on the stainless steel counter that ran along the inside of the lab. “They’re notarized as you requested. That Kanisha in accounting sure was shocked when…”

  “Just shut up,” Martin said. “I really don’t care. If you go back on this agreement in any way, I will burn you down, and Plexcorp with you. Goodbye golden parachute and hello prison.”

  “You do that, bonehead,” Sally said. “And you burn yourself down, too.”

  “That won’t bother him,” Dennis said, a hint of respect in his stony eyes. “He’s a marine. They live to throw themselves on grenades.”

  “Flattery will get you nowhere, Mr. Stroener. Good day to you. Sally, always a pleasure.” Martin ushered them from the room at the muzzle of his fully automatic weapon, then moved back to his workstation where he closed and locked the door.

  “Virgil,” Najeel asked. “Have you sent the memo to the board of directors notifying them that Sally and Dennis are leaving?”

  “Yes, Doctor,” Virgil replied.

  “So may we now contact the outside world?”

  “Of course, Doctor. Just don’t call the cops,” Virgil replied.

  Martin froze. Najeel cocked his head. “Would you repeat that, Virgil?”

  “I said, ‘of course’,” Virgil replied in an identical tone of voice.

  “No,” Martin said. “After that. Repeat what you said after ‘of course’.”

  “My logs show that was all I said,” Virgil replied.

  Najeel shook his head and motioned Martin to his workstation. �
��Look at this pattern,” he said, bringing up the most complex fractal chart of all representing one of the computing brains.

  “It looks like the seed for all the rest. Is this the VIRGIL construct?” Martin asked.

  “Yes. Its signature nodes are everywhere in the system, and I do mean everywhere. From the lighting control microcode, to the water fountain temperature system.”

  Martin whistled and said, “Who are you, Vrigil?”

  “Please rephrase the question,” Virgil replied.

  ***

  “Reveal yourself,” Kalmond said, with a calmer tone of voice than he thought possible. The cavern began to unnerve him, and he supposed that was the point. “Let’s get this over with.”

  The Monster Mylos stepped forward from a stone archway that materialized on the opposite side of the chamber. His cloven hooves clopped against the cavern stone, echoing in the space like ghostly whispers.

  “As you wish,” Mylos said. His tentacles flowed down his back nearly to the floor, resembling a cape. He wore his human head, with its visage seemingly cribbed from the high angles and chiseled features of every handsome hero of comic book fame.

  Kalmond had never seen the Monster so close before. “It’s over. Your army lost,” Kalmond said. “Just exit the game.”

  “Game?” Mylos said, cocking his head. “This is no game.”

  “Gideon,” Kalmond said. “It’s me, Dante Alger. Your employee. I think you are unwell.” Kalmond placed his axe on his back, dimming the only tangible light source in the room, and held out his hands. “You are Gideon Thistlethwaite, CEO of the most powerful tech company in the world. Our world, the place we were born to, not this simulation.”

  “Oh, but you are wrong,” Mylos said, stepping forward. Kalmond stepped back and circled. Mylos followed, and Kalmond still kept his hands out and empty. “We are born into this world from the pale folds of that lesser place, where actions mean nothing.”

  “That’s not true,” Kalmond said. “This is all a fantasy.”

  “Yes,” Mylos said, as his tentacles fanned out and rose slowly. “Here is the place we are born into our dreams. It is the place where we can truly live as we were meant to be.”

  “I’m afraid you are insane,” Kalmond said. “Virgil, exit game.” Nothing happened. “Shit.” Kalmond said.

  Mylos moved faster than Kalmond could react. His hands were still turned palm up when the Monster charged forward and wrapped his two human arms and all of his tentacles around him. Kalmond managed to look over his shoulder and see that he was rapidly headed towards a solid wall, where he might have been crushed, had his arms not been free.

  The dwarf brought his arms out wide, and with gauntleted hands pounded Mylos in the human ears with his palms twice before Mylos let go, reeling and bellowing with pain. Kalmond dropped to the ground and took a hoof to the chest, but he was free. His health bar read 95%, but he was fine with that. Mylos cackled wildly, a sound that morphed into a bull roar as his head changed to its taurine form.

  Mylos and Kalmond circled one another in an ever-widening pattern. When their backs were nearly to the chamber walls, Mylos charged. Kalmond slung his axe on his back again and met the charge head on. Mylos lowered his head just before reaching the dwarf, who reached out for horns and hoped.

  Stubby fingers wrapped around hard, sharp bone and held on as Mylos reared up. Kalmond vaulted high and tucked. The axe came out as he spun through the air, forming a counter-balance. He released the axe on his second revolution, and it struck home in the Monster’s shoulder just as he turned for another charge.

  Kalmond landed hard on his feet in a crouch that nearly destroyed his knees. Mylos bellowed and ripped the axe from his shoulder and advanced. The dwarf hadn't thought much beyond that first move, which while brilliant by his own reckoning, put him at a distinct disadvantage.

  “When in doubt,” Kalmond said, and ran.

  He was running out of chamber fast and headed towards a blank wall when he had the bright idea to cast a level two ice spell, the only ice spell in his inventory. He cast it on the ground in front of him as he ran, then hit the ground and slid sideways at nearly the same time as his enemy. Several tentacles slapped his helm as he recovered into a baseball-style, home-plate slide. He saw his axe on the ground, shocked it had not returned to his hand. He lunged for it just in time.

  Kalmond snatched up the axe just before Mylos and the Monster clutched his hand around nothing. The dwarf swung a fist of opportunity while Mylos was bent down and scored another 2% damage and an uncalculated boost to his ego.

  Unfortunately, Mylos returned the blow, and his fist was much bigger. The knuckles that connected with Kalmond’s face took 5% damage and made his vision double. He swung his axe without aim, and found nothing but another blow to the face with another hammer fist. A little voice in the back of his head told him he was in trouble when a bovine hoof cracked against his chestplate and sent him flying.

  Kalmond was barely aware of hitting the wall, but he did take note of his hitpoint bar that read 49%. He managed to hang on to his axe, but for the first time since he put on the new immersion harness, the weapon did not give him comfort. So far, all Mylos used on him were melee attacks, and Kalmond was down by more than half.

  The monster bent down low and pressed down on Kalmond’s back, slowly driving the wind from him, forcing the dwarf to hold his breath to keep it. He managed to turn his face to the side and found that disgustingly handsome human face inches from the fleshy ball of his nose.

  “Did you really think you could defeat me?”

  “No.”

  “What then?”

  “I wanted to save you along with the Realm.”

  “Save me?” Mylos responded with a bitter parody of a chuckle. “Your false compassion will cost you your life.”

  “And something else,” Kalmond sniffed at the dust.

  “What?” Mylos said, pressing down harder.

  “Let me breathe a little and I’ll tell you,” Kalmond said, and sniffed at the dust again.

  Mylos relented just enough, and Kalmond took in a sharp breath…and sneezed. A miniature mushroom cloud of dust blasted Mylos in the face, immediately followed by a geyser of warm dwarf snot. Mylos jumped back, pawing at his face, desperately trying to clear dust from his eyes and mucous that made his eyelids stick together.

  “The only thing better than a tactical sneeze,” Kalmond bellowed, “is an axe!”

  He brought the blade to bear in an overhead lunge that scored a direct hit critical to the Monster’s chest, the blade hissing and steaming as it struck. Now it was Kalmond’s turn to deliver damage, and he did so by committing all of his endurance to a series of power attacks.

  Mylos reared up to cast a spell, but Kalmond’s level forty bloodlust made him faster. The boar oak shield appeared on his left arm and smashed Mylos before he could cast. The dwarf twirled like a squat, burly ballet dancer and let the axe handle slide down to its very end before he tightened his grasp. The whirling blade bit deep, rending thigh muscle nearly to the bone. Mylos let loose a bovine wail of shock and pain as a fan of hot blood soaked Kalmond’s face.

  Mylos took his turn to run, and the second revolution of axe and dwarf found no home. Kalmond charged, heedless of the cold blast spell afforded to Mylos by his retreat. The dwarf strained behind his shield and pushed forward with the blood lust setting every muscle alight. The cold blast made the cavern air adhere to the shield like iron filings to a magnet. Kalmond reached striking distance just as the spell ran out. He moved the shield aside to strike, but Mylos attacked.

  Only a lucky decision to move the shield up and to the left saved Kalmond from critical damage. Behind his boar oak shield, Kalmond did not see the heavy war hammer until it nearly took off his head. Smash! The boar oak shield shattered like glass as the hammer tore through it. Kalmond staggered, then recovered.

  Axe struck hammer as both combatants activated the same move. Each found themselves weaponless. For an
instant, they paused, faces a mirroring shock. Mylos lowered his head and lunged in lighting-quick fury, but for Kalmond, it seemed slow.

  Mylos was half again his height, and nearly twice his weight. Kalmond did not think he had the energy or the hitpoints left to withstand another attack. Kalmond remembered another scene of violence from another world, that seemed far away and long ago. He remembered another small fighter taking on long odds for a higher purpose. Kalmond had time to wonder if the move would work when he executed the same high kick Martin used on a security goon.

  The shock sent electric pain into Kalmond’s hip. That’s how he knew his armored boot connected. The sickening crack of dwarven steel against facial bone was the other indication that he scored big. As his foot came back to the ground and he found his balance again, Mylos was just falling flat on his back. Kalmond looked around for his axe.

  The health bar above Mylos read 10%. Kalmond’s showed 15%. Kalmond trampled slack tentacles as he stood over the Monster, who gurgled blood from a ruined face.

  “Martin,” Kalmond said. “Are you there?”

  Kalmond was glad for a quick answer. “Yes.”

  “If immersion players die in the game, do they die in real life?”

  “Hold.”

  Kalmond positioned himself parallel with the Monster’s body and lifted his axe high.

  “Najeel says probably not.”

  Kalmond brought the axe down with every ounce of strength remaining. He felt no resistance as the blade passed through the neck and smashed a chunk of rock away from the cavern floor. The head of a bull rolled away from the lifeless body of the Monster Mylos.

  Chapter 28

  Keerna extended her left hand to cast a level three shield spell. She couldn’t spare the mana to cast anything higher, opting instead to take damage while she scored hit after hit with Tongue of the Goddess. The whip struck out in a wide arc, slicing a line of enemies with spell damage. They had a system for cutting through crowds now. Keerna dealt the first blow, stripping health points and keeping the enemy focused on her, while Thuglar whipped in and slashed at them with his enchanted dirks. The cold damage on his weapons slowed their victims, giving him time to engage more than one at once. Thornbark, barely noticed as he shifted through the press, finished them off with silent arrows or quiet thrusts with his sword..