A Trap for the Potentate (The Dark Herbalist Book #3) LitRPG series

by Michael Atamanov

  “Maybe, the sand demon ate his fill with those three orcs and is resting now as he digests his prey. Or maybe he gathered strength and changed location.” Valerianna Quickfoot suggested, but Taisha, standing not far away and looking at something, shook her head.

  “No, the Ifrit definitely isn't full. He died...”

  “What?!” my big-eared Goblin was instantly next to the NPC thief. Taisha pointed at a small colorful rock half covered with sand:

  Sandstorm Ifrit Heart (alchemy ingredient)

  Insufficient Intelligence to determine characteristics

  Successful Perception check

  Experience received: 160 Exp.

  The stone seemed wet. Strange. Water in the sands of the Great Desert? Perhaps it was just dew, of course. But how could there be dew at the very beginning of the night? And after such an unbearably hot day, at that? I picked up the strange stone. It was fairly heavy, quite wet, and somehow sticky. It didn’t seem to be water. I looked a bit closer. It wasn’t water at all!

  Ifrit Blood (alchemy ingredient)

  A very rare thing, given how extremely difficult it was to come across an ifrit. For my vampiric collection, it was invaluable! Only Taisha and Valerianna were nearby at that moment, so I had nothing to hide. Not wasting time, I stuck the stone in my mouth and sucked all the moisture off it.

  Achievement unlocked: Taste Tester (42/1000)

  The message was, though pleasant, entirely predictable, so I wasn't surprised. But the next events showed me how little I knew about Boundless Realm. The stone suddenly gave a pulse in my mouth, as if the Ifrit heart was still alive, and my goblin swallowed it in surprise... I choked and fell down on a knee, because the stone was fairly large. It took a good bit of effort to pass. Still, I managed to work the stone down my gullet. The next message I saw made my Goblin perk up his ears in surprise:

  Fame increased

  Present value: 5

  You are the first player to use an Ifrit Heart in this way

  You have activated a magical item

  You may choose one effect:

  One-time experience-gain of 500000 Exp.

  Permanent +5% defense against air magic

  One item in your inventory will be stripped of level and skill requirements

  Holy crap! Half a million experience points could instantly level up my Goblin Herbalist to 51! Eleven levels in one go! Although... I imagined my director saying, “your character is at level fifty-one, but Herbalism is still at 15,” and my enthusiasm crashed. So, defense against air magic or... I also had Fenrir's Claw, which I could not use at all due to level requirements! That was right! I opened my inventory. There it was:

  Fenrir's Claw amulet (unique item)

  Gives +250 Constitution, +250 Strength, +50% resistance to physical damage, +50 to reaction of the following creatures: Dogs, Wolves, Wargs, Volkodlaks

  Attention! Your character's level is too low to use this object

  Requisite level: 125

  A great candidate for removing level requirement! I chose to use the Ifrit Heart for that. Nothing happened for five seconds, and the information on Fenrir's Claw didn't change. I even got worried it hadn’t worked. Although... I could now place the amulet in the proper equipment slot, which I immediately did. And, just then, the game system started spewing a whole bedsheet of text:

  You have equipped two items from Fenrir’s Cursed Regalia

  Hidden mission completed: True Alpha of the Gray Pack

  Experience received: 40000 Exp.

  Gray Pack member limit increased to ten

  Set bonus unlocked: all Gray Pack members will receive a bonus of +50 Strength, +50 Agility, +50 Constitution, +25% movement speed, +25% experience gain

  Level forty-one!

  Level forty-two!

  Animal Control skill increased to level 15!

  Mission received: Fenrir's Legacy (1/4)

  Mission class: Unique, personal

  Description: Collect and equip the four remaining items of Fenrir’s Cursed Regalia

  Reward for each item: 100000 Exp., +10 Animal Control, +50 Strength, +50 Agility, +50 Constitution, +2 to Gray Pack member limit

  Optional condition: Equip all items of Fenrir’s Cursed Regalia

  Reward: 1000000 Exp., Fame +3, Gray Pack member limit removed, making number depend only on Charisma and skills

  ATTENTION!!! If Optional Condition is completed, your character will receive the Criminal tag, visible to all players and active until your character unequips all items from Fenrir’s Cursed Regalia

  Your character's death will not remove the Criminal Tag

  It took me some time to carefully read and digest all that information. The game had offered me a unique quest, which was a very rare occurrence all on its own. What was more, I had just been revealed a path that would allow my goblin to achieve truly limitless power. No more Gray Pack member limit! That would mean... My breathing seized from the number of possibilities. Just raise Charisma, level Animal Control and, at the same time probably Foreman, and I could add many hundreds of fearsome predators to my pack!

  And at that, I could give each of them the Pack Hunter specialization, making the strength, survivability and combat abilities of each fanged beast grow proportionally to the total number... Plus, the pets would also be strengthened by my skills... Then the bonuses from Fenrir’s Cursed Regalia...

  Yes, a permanent Criminal tag was extremely unpleasant, giving anyone the right to kill my big-eared Goblin Herbalist, but my vampiric character was already preparing to become a wanted criminal, so that didn’t really change much.

  All that remained was one tiny issue: I had to find the four items. And before I could do that, I needed to find out their names and what kind of items they were... After all, I didn't even have a near appreciation as to what I needed to look for. Boots, or maybe a helmet and cloak? My only clue was that the name of the object would most likely reference the huge mythical wolf Fenrir.

  I took a heavy sigh, returning from the heavens to unhallowed ground. I didn't have enough information. Finding unique items based on what I knew, given there was only one copy of each in the huge Boundless Realm, would be very, very difficult. Although... I had a flash of inspiration... Perhaps they were still in the hands of players who had killed Fenrir a few months earlier! Determining the participants of that notorious event wouldn't be all that hard. After all, there were a ton of video clips, and associated topics on the game forum. There was probably a detailed chronicle of the final battle practically down to the second!

  Although... the players that got those trophies may have sold them long ago, or given them to someone, not seeing any value in the cursed items. I suspected that these items hadn't been made a set until quite recently. After all, the Ring of Fenrir had been made by the game admins just three weeks ago. The players had seen just a heap of odd items in the loot left behind by Fenrir and his army of wolves, and a lot of it was fairly useless, and also cursed, making it nearly impossible to remove.

  Just then, I was visited by another mystery. After all, even if I was able to find the third item from the cursed regalia, I wouldn't even be able to put it on! The amulet said I had to be at least level one hundred twenty-five! Probably, the other items also had very high requirements...

  Overall, I needed to think about this. I called the forest nymph, and told her in detail about my unexpected discovery. My sister immediately dug out the most important bits:

  “Tim, you should cruise the Boundless Realm forum tonight to find the other items from Fenrir’s Cursed Regalia. That whole story with the fall of the Gray Pack didn't end all that long ago, and I'm sure there are some traces left. But it should all be done as delicately as possible, so none of the forum lurkers notice the suspicious interest in cursed items and strange search queries. Lots of players hang out on the forum, and some are very savvy, on the lookout for strange activity in the hopes of making off with items of underestimated value. I should probably do it, Tim.
I'll be better.”

  I was in complete agreement with my sister there. Val was quite a bit better than me at such missions, as well as being faster and more delicate. But, just in case, I told Valeria another potential avenue to look down:

  “All alone, these items have no practical value, but they are unique, so it is totally possible their owners simply put them up for auction. Then you could find the traces. Also, Val, you should check all currently active auctions in all provinces of Boundless Realm. Maybe someone just put an Ifrit Heart up for sale. It's just an alchemy ingredient, and no one else has any idea of its true value. If we get lucky, maybe we can buy one or even a few. If you find any, pay for fast delivery by magical messenger!”

  “Alright, Tim, I'll do it. The doctor said I shouldn't spend more than four hours a day in the game anymore, so after midnight I'll have to log off. Then I can look through the forum and auctions. But for now, seeing as the ifrit died unexpectedly, go look for his lair.”

  * * *

  The entrance to the cave was discovered soon after my sister cast Dispel Magic. Of course, we could have done that earlier, but we weren't exactly burning with desire to fight the high-level magic being in dark and confusing underground corridors. Now though, the threat of meeting the terrible ifrit gone, we equipped some torches and, one after the other, snaked into the narrow, short entrance.

  “Careful! There's a trap here!” Taisha warned everyone, walking first in the file.

  The pretty thief spent three minutes studying a gap in the wall and loose stones on the ground, after which she confidently pressed an unremarkable rough patch in the low ceiling. A mechanical click rang out, and Taisha lit up with colorful flames, having reached level thirty-three.

  “Alright, trap disarmed. We can go,” the green beauty assured us. “But the entrance to the ifrit's lair isn't where it seems. That path...” Taisha pointed into the darkness down the corridor, “leads to a cave-in. Most likely, death awaits careless treasure hunters down there. The real path is that way, right through the wall.”

  The mavka increased the power of her magic torch and carefully looked through the obstacle.

  “Hey, Taisha's right. That wall is an illusion,” my sister agreed and quickly removed the illusory barrier.

  The ifrit's lair was a fairly small cave. Its floor was covered in a thick layer of old dry bones mixed with rotting fabric, tarnished silver and bronze tableware, and ancient weaponry. The amount of coins mixed into the trash heap was so great that my sensitive eyes began to hurt from the many flickers reflecting our torches. But the main thing was that my nostrils picked up on the scent of fresh blood. Orc blood, as I could immediately tell.

  I got my bearings and carefully walked toward the source of the vampire-intoxicating aroma. I threw back a carpet and discovered three thoroughly battered fresh corpses... Although... my gaze unexpectedly met with a the utterly maddened eyes of an orc. With huge effort, I recognized him as being one of the oarsmen from the White Shark. He didn't have any intact parts left, just open wounds.

  “Cap-ptai...” the bloodied sailor rasped out almost inarticulately, his gaze focused on me. “I... I sa... it all with my ow-wn ey... two whirl-rl-winds... Fighting... One... of... sand... and... and... the other... something different...”

  With his last words, blood sputtered out of his mouth, and his eyes glazed over. The shaman standing behind me removed his hat without saying a word. I kept silent and read into an incoming system message:

  Mission received: Something Different...

  Mission class: Unique, group (no more than eight), time-limited

  Description: Find the Sandstorm Ifrit's killer within 23 hours and 59 minutes

  Reward: One Wish

  “What does it mean by 'Wish?'“ Valerianna Quickfoot had also received the quest and could not hide her amazement. “This is the first time I’ve heard of such a strange reward. Wish? But what if my wish cannot be described in stat and skill numbers?”

  I had also never before seen or even heard of a quest like this. This mission was so unique, that it promised something one of a kind. But then everyone was struck by Taisha. The green-skinned NPC thief spent a long time in silence, as if she was looking at something we couldn't see, then asked in surprise:

  “Amra, what does 'Mission received' mean?”

  Taisha's Wish

  NPCs CANNOT RECEIVE and independently complete quests. That's a basic rule of any virtual game, an inviolable truth, a dogma! After all, what use are living players, if the mobs can deal with all their problems on their own?! Sure, NPC's generate missions for players, accept finished quests, and even sometimes get experience and objects after an assignment is completed. But they never get quests, period! That made it all the more surprising when Taisha got a unique mission at the same time as us two living players.

  Valerianna, who also understood this was impossible, was looking at me with her eyes wide in surprise, not capable of giving my NPC bride any kind of explanation. I had to bluff my way out of it:

  “Taisha, remember when you wished to become exactly the same as the undying? It seems the gods of Boundless Realm heard your prayers, and you are now becoming more and more similar to our kind. You are reborn after death, you can make independent decisions and, now, you're also seeing missions, and getting experience and rewards for them. Maybe, in a little bit, you will be able to enter the world of the undying!”

  When I made these bombastic statements to my bride, I was just reassuring and encouraging her. While I spoke, though, I was thinking about something else entirely. Unique missions were so abnormal that most players got them quite rarely. Of course, I didn't have any concrete statistics before me but, somewhere on the forum, I had stumbled upon information that, even among experienced high-level players, over eighty percent had never received a unique mission. So, I simply didn't believe it was possible for my bat-eared Goblin Herbalist to get two of them in less than ten minutes by complete coincidence. It just couldn’t happen!

  What was it then? It looked like the admins were interfering in our gaming, watching carefully to see how the situation would develop. But at that, I had the firm suspicion that they wouldn't do such a thing just for the sake of my Goblin Herbalist. I wasn't such a high flyer that they would rewrite the rules and change the surrounding world for me. And the admins also wouldn't intervene on behalf of Valerianna Quickfoot, even though my sister was a remarkable player. But in my inner circle, there was a curvaceous green-skinned NPC-girl, who had aroused the interest of the Boundless Realm specialists for quite some time with her bizarre behavior and strange algorithms. I suspected that the NPC's call to the real world was the last straw and they had now decided to look into Taisha seriously.

  “Well, what do you say, dumbo? Should we complete the unique quest right away, or invite others to help us?” My sister's question brought me back to reality.

  What did she mean, right away? I stared in incomprehension at the forest nymph and asked her to explain. My sister then chuckled with a gloomy smile, as only she could do, indicating my mental capacity had yet again been cast into great doubt.

  “Amra, are you seriously saying you don't know what killed the Sandstorm Ifrit?!”

  Her question made me embarrassed. I blushed in shame. I confirmed that I didn't even have any near guesses about the killer's identity. Valerianna turned to Taisha and asked her the same exact question. If the NPC had answered positively, I would probably have died in embarrassment, but the green-skinned thief also admitted that she didn't know. The mavka gave a heavy sigh and started unhurriedly giving us one hint after the next:

  “The dying orc pirate said that two whirlwinds were fighting... But, in the bestiary of a great many computer games, there are plenty of transparent creatures that resemble whirlwinds, and hate ifrits... They are mortal, inconsolable enemies who will always fight to the death, if ever they should meet... Amra, you cannot seriously not remember yet, right? They usually grant three wishes, if you free the
m from a bronze lamp!”

  “A djinn???” the answer tore itself from Taisha and I at the exact same time.

  “That's right!” the mavka gave a few claps, applauding our mental epiphanies. “This cave is full of old junk the Ifrit dragged from caravans he robbed. I suspect that, somewhere among all these bones and bronze plates, there must be a lamp. All it would have taken is a light touch to make the djinn trapped inside burst out and see his mortal enemy before him!”

  In fact, my sister's guess looked very, very believable. The ifrit had dragged the three captives down under the earth and, in this small cave, one of the still living orcs might have touched an old magic lamp. It was already too late for that to save the orc but, at that, the djinn he released got revenge, killing the deadly Sandstorm Ifrit. By the way... I was reminded that not every djinn in fairy tales was blazing with gratitude for his liberators. In fact, it was more the opposite. In most cases, these magical creatures tried to kill whatever impudent fellow had dared to disturb their many-century slumber...

  “There's an old oil lamp, but it's empty! And here's another! And another! And here's a bag full of them!” Taisha dug out from under a carpet a whole array of kitchen and domestic implements, including oil lamps.

  But for some reason, I no longer wanted to experiment with releasing a djinn on my own. At one point, Kira had given me some great advice: “If you find a unique quest, but aren't sure you can handle it yourself, sell it!” This seemed like just such a case.

  Boundless Realm had hundreds of millions of players. Some of them were quite wealthy in real life and put a significant amount of money into the game in premium credits. And at that, some inveterate gaming addicts would be willing to sell their last pair of pants just to stand out from the crowd and distinguish themselves in a rare mission or participate in an interesting mass event. And here, we had a unique quest ready to go, and eight players were promised a mysterious “wish,” if they successfully completed the mission. And although three places were already taken by me, Valerianna and Taisha, I could sell the other five!!!