by Kevin Murphy
In truth, no one knew if the tribesmen had simply underestimated the force—thus bringing far fewer warriors to the fight than were necessary. When three had been so successful beforehand, surely an extra eight would seem a great plenty. After 11 had failed, it was then possible that they would return in much greater numbers. Still, the expeditionary force consoled themselves with their victory and the hope that, given their direction of travel, maybe the Tribe would realize it wasn’t their home villages which the force was marching toward.
When night fell, circles around campfires reformed, each group huddling much closer to the others than on the first night. The force needed to be ready in the event of a nighttime raid.
Saden shared a drink with the other exorcists as they discussed strategy for the upcoming battle. Zelle tried to facilitate a similar discussion with the remaining shamans, but each appeared to be overconfident in their abilities. Their egos were no doubt bolstered by their effective anti-air attack earlier in the day.
Sift, Cline, and Dakkon sat near a fire where the old man from the previous night was preparing yet another pot of stew and regaling a hungry audience with stories from his glory days. Dakkon knew that the stew’s preparation only took around five minutes from the last night, but apparently an extra 10 and 15 minutes of stirring as the old man held a captive audience wouldn’t overcook the meal. The gap-toothed chef thanked Arstak for his narrow escape from a rather sticky situation in his youth involving an unexpectedly married barmaid and her displeased, doting husband when Cline appeared to tense up.
“What’s up, Cline?” asked Dakkon. “That a situation you can empathize with?”
“No, nothing like that,” said Cline.
“Arstak then?” guessed Dakkon.
Cline stiffened slightly at the name.
“Wait, who’s Arstak?” Dakkon asked. The name sounded somehow familiar.
Sift answered in Cline’s stead. “He is god of chance, good and bad.”
“Oh,” said Dakkon. “He’s the deity of that forgotten temple we found.”
Sift looked surprised. “I do not know of any such place,” he said. “May I ask what it is you saw there?”
Dakkon shrugged. “The temple collapsed but it had been mostly cleared out long before we set foot inside.”
“I see,” said Sift. “That is too bad. It is rumored that lost temples may contain artifacts crafted by the gods themselves.”
Dakkon’s mouth tugged into a thin line and Cline stared deeply into the fire.
“As a monk, you learn about the gods, right?” asked Dakkon. “Are they real entities in this world or just a part of the backstory?”
“I have a little understanding—though most instruction has been on ancestor spirits,” Sift replied. “To answer your query, yes. They may walk among men when they deign to.”
“You don’t suppose finding a god’s relic and smashing it would piss off said god, do you?” Dakkon inquired with poorly feigned disinterest.
While Sift weighed his response, a cleric waiting—bowl in hand—for the old man to produce stew took the presented opportunity to speak on a matter he had some knowledge of.
“That depends upon the god, I’d say,” said the cleric. “The name’s Barnaby, by the by.”
“Dakkon,” Dakkon said. “What if the relic was created by Daenara?”
“The god of growth, healing, and nurturing who’s generally associated with good deeds? I doubt you’d have anything to worry about,” replied Barnaby.
“What if the relic was a centerpiece in Arstak’s temple?” asked Dakkon.
“… err.” The question seemed to throw the cleric off stride. “Arstak is a tricky one. Well, he’s the trickster god of chance and fortune. He’s one of the more frequently thanked and cursed gods. I’d guess that breaking his thing would likely piss him off pretty good and thorough, though.”
“Peachy,” said Dakkon wryly. “If one had a god angry at them through whatever means, what could he—or she—do?” Dakkon’s tone was airy and unconcerned.
“Whatever the god wants to do, it’ll do,” said Barnaby. “They’re gods. They control the machinations of the world here.”
“How do you mean, exactly?” asked Dakkon. He could vaguely remember learning a bit about the roles of gods in the past, but he wanted to know more. “They have an actual role in Chronicle?”
“Well, yes. A big one,” said Barnaby. “Each god is the ultimate authority on the mechanics it governs. The way I understand it—to use Arstak as an example—whenever random decisions are required, the game’s lower-order AI automatically makes the millions of necessary calls instantly. If some decision is too complex, it goes to the next order of chance-determining AI to be instantly and automatically determined. This is how everything runs so smoothly despite the overwhelming complexity of it all. Supposedly, when that higher rung of AI is unable to decide on the appropriate outcome, the decision is made by Arstak himself.” Barnaby scratched his scruffy beard and shot a glance toward the old man who was still preparing the stew. “To have the final authority of decision making, the gods were given personalities which the lower and upper AI both lack.”
“So, gods are basically the tie-breakers for basic decision making?” asked Dakkon.
“Essentially,” replied Barnaby. “But, supposedly, the two levels of AI are so effective that the gods rarely ever have anything to deliberate. I’ve heard that according to their whims, gods can influence, change, or outright decide outcomes related to their respective domain, though. I guess you could say that Arstak would always be able to decide how a pair of dice rolled.”
“Don’t gamble against the God of Luck. I think I can remember that one,” said Dakkon.
“Not if there’s any chance of losing,” corrected Sift.
“Oh,” said Barnaby. “Yes. Well said.”
“All right,” said Dakkon. “The God of Chance controlling random events seems pretty straightforward, but life and death are fairly similar concepts with a murky gray middle ground, so which god does what?”
“The in-game teachings don’t expressly answer mechanical questions like that outright, so it takes a bit of inferring to really get anywhere, but I’d guess that Daenara controls when NPCs are born, monsters spawn, how living things are healed, and the like. Syvil, the God of Death, then controls when mobs die, corpses despawn, and how things are damaged.”
“So, the God of Death can just kill anyone and anything on a whim?” asked Dakkon.
“I reckon so,” said Barnaby with an unconcerned shrug.
“That is my understanding,” agreed Sift.
“But gods are above squabbles and grabs for power—I think—so you shouldn’t have anything to worry about,” said Barnaby.
“Well it’s not like I’m in any position to try and meddle with the affairs of gods I didn’t even know walked the world until now,” said Dakkon. “It just sounds ridiculously overpowered.”
“Well, they are gods,” said Barnaby.
“Fair point,” said Dakkon who noticed his friend’s heavy gaze on the dancing flames and smoldering embers. “Cline, you seem lost in thought. What’s the matter?”
“Ah,” said Cline. After a moment’s hesitation, he looked at Dakkon squarely. “Honestly, I’ve got a sort of important personal matter to talk to you about.”
Dakkon looked around. There was no space to keep information private here by the fires. They’d have to step away to speak. Past experiences told Dakkon that the matter must be important for Cline to put himself closer to danger by wandering to a private location given the circumstances. Dakkon’s curiosity was piqued.
“Gentlemen, if you’ll excuse us,” said Dakkon with mock haughtiness dripping from his tone. “You have been a fountain of knowledge for me to slake my thirst.” Dakkon bowed in jesting reverence. Barnaby shook his head and waved them away.
After the two were comfortably out of earshot from others, Dakkon turned to Cline expectantly. “What’s up?”
>
“I’m really not sure how to broach the subject, so I’m just going to give you the straight and narrow of it,” began Cline.
Dakkon nodded, forcing himself to hold back any ill-timed, low effort humor in consideration of Cline’s troubled expression.
“I’m not exactly…” Cline trailed off.
After a few moments, Dakkon prodded the subject. “You’re not exactly what?”
“Now, I want you to keep in mind that we’re friends here, and this is a huge deal to me, so I want you to take this seriously,” said Cline.
“Enough with the setup. I understand that it’s a big deal,” said Dakkon. “What’s eating at you?”
“I’m not a player,” said Cline. “I’m not a flesh and blood person, to be precise.”
“What do you mean by that?” asked Dakkon, perplexed by the nonsensical admission.
“I guess you could say I’m a product of the game. An NPC—” said Cline.
“Bullshit,” said Dakkon levelly. “NPCs don’t talk about the outside world or use modern colloquialisms. You have a blue player’s nametag in town—which I have seen. I have you on my friends list, and we both started at level one at around the same time.”
“Dakkon, I don’t have any reason to lie to you about this. Otherwise, you’re right on all accounts. I have knowledge of the outside world, but no life there. I can use all the player features—I even have access to the internet—but I am not a player. As far as I can tell, in this world, I’m exactly like any other person except I’m certain that I don’t come back to life.”
“What?” asked Dakkon. He was unsure what to think, but he was leaning heavily toward disbelief. Cline did have one point, however. He had no reason to lie. Moreover, he always seemed to be the most cautious person in the party—but no. Surely not. Cline, an NPC?
Dakkon paused. “So, you’re telling me that you went through that temple dungeon where we were out-leveled by everything there, knowing that you wouldn’t come back to life?”
Cline nodded.
“Does that make you a badass or some sort of idiot?” asked Dakkon.
“Both, hopefully, but I’m definitely an idiot,” said Cline.
Dakkon didn’t know what he was expecting from his friend, but this was far, far from it. This was important.
“Well, how does it feel?” said Dakkon.
“How does what feel?” asked Cline.
“You know—being an NPC?” said Dakkon a bit uncertainly.
“What? I don’t know. How does it feel to be a human?” said Cline, irked.
“I guess it feels… normal?” said Dakkon.
“Ditto,” said Cline. “Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, I hope you can see my plight here.”
Dakkon didn’t know exactly where to begin if he was going to be honest, so he decided to start with levity.
“I’m no scientist, but I don’t think we have the technology to make you a real boy,” said Dakkon.
“Dude, c’mon. Spare me the easy Pinocchio jokes,” said Cline, seriously. “I’m deep inside enemy territory on what’s beginning to feel like a suicide mission and it’s all drawing parallels to our last harebrained mission together where you somehow managed to pull us through it all.” Cline flicked his hands to add emphasis to his words. “I would really like you to help me through it all this time too.”
“Ok, putting aside the idea that you’re claiming to not be one, single, real-world week old yet and are able to pick up a reference to a fairy tale about a puppet—you’ve got to realize that it wasn’t I, alone, who got us out of that. We all did our parts,” said Dakkon.
“Whatever makes you feel better, Dakkon, but I’m not playing a game here. I die and it’s over for me.” Cline breathed in deeply and let out a deep sigh through his nostrils before he continued. “I want to grow strong safely over time so I can watch out for myself. This area was supposed to be lower level. This quest was supposed to be easy, but we’ve already lost a fourth of our people and I have a feeling we just really pissed off the Tribe.” Cline was more worked up than Dakkon had seen before.
It didn’t take a whole lot of consideration for him to make up his mind. If his friend was crazy, a liar, or a computer the answer would still be the same. “Fine. Relax,” said Dakkon. “I get the picture. If things get really bad, I’ll try and carve out an escape route for you. No big deal,” Dakkon stammered a bit. “I mean, it’s a big deal that you stay alive. I don’t mind dying to keep you around.”
Cline nodded, apparently satisfied with Dakkon’s response.
“There’s just one little caveat,” said Dakkon.
Cline’s smile melted into a suspicious scowl. “What’s that?”
“I’m going to rip on you a lot for being a robot,” Dakkon sped up his pace to stifle any interruption. “Wait. Hold your protests. This is a rare opportunity. Do you have any idea how cool it is to have the Terminator as a friend? It’s a childhood dream made real.”
“Dakkon, you’re an asshole,” said Cline with his smile restored.
“Cline, we’re going to talk more about this later, I assure you. I know that robots lack common sense and have no fear of death, but we could be grabbed by animal men any moment here,” said Dakkon in a chiding voice. “We should get back to the safety of numbers.”
“I feel like I may have made a grave mistake,” said Cline
“Oh, I’m only just getting started,” said Dakkon.
\\\
That night was akin to the first on the trail. An unknown number of tribesmen lurked near the edge of the camps, making aggressive noises as a sort of destabilizing, psychological warfare. Shamans’ spiritual scouts returned time and time again, relaying nothing that the force couldn’t already learn by listening or watching. They were surrounded yet again—the fiendish forms darted into and out of sight from heavy brush.
The NPCs—except for, apparently, Cline—needed sleep after a full day’s march, two battles, and little rest the previous night. The force-leading military bunch mostly consisted of NPCs born and raised in Tian. Players such as Damak were the exception, not the rule. Damak and two others kept watch over their sleeping allies, however the military camp had the least activity and would appear to be an easy mark to any beastmen looking for a target.
Not long after the military NPCs had managed to fall asleep despite all the menacing noises, the Tribe struck at the resting men brutally and decisively. Seven transformed and battle ready beastmen were too fast for Damak and his two partners, regardless of their vigilance. Damak and his peers stood in front of the wave of assailants as they howled to alert the others, but the abominations broke around them and slaughtered the soldiers before a proper defense could be mounted.
When the beast that Damak stood to block raised its mangled talons to swipe at the warrior, Dakkon unloaded half of his mana into a fiery ember at the small of the tribesman’s back—halting the beast’s attack and causing it to turn around in confusion. Damak slammed his gleaming shield into the beastman’s backside, toppling it to the ground where Saden pinned it using one of his exorcist’s barriers. As the combatants dealt with the downed tribesman, the other beasts scuttled off as quickly as they had appeared.
[You have gained a level in your secondary class: Thermomancer! Current level 30.]
[You will now be considered a master of thermomancy!]
[New skill acquired: Thermal Sight!]
The Tribe had switched to guerilla tactics—another 12 members of the expeditionary force lay dead, and sleep would no longer be an option for any NPC without a death wish. The whole of the expeditionary force had been shaken by the sudden assault, and the only good thing to come of it was a level gained in Dakkon’s thermomancy.
“Pack your garbage up!” yelled Damak, wasting no time to assume command and salvage what he could of the force’s morale. “We march right now!”
No one argued. Nights and natural darkness were fairly navigable in Chronicle. The real obstructi
on of their vision here was the dense forest which slowed their march to a stressed amble. Between marching to the goal ahead and staying put to be picked off, there was no discourse. The only sensible course was to push onward.
Dakkon checked his character’s skills while on the move. The level he had just gained marked the milestone he had been striving for ever since he gained the edgemaster class. Finally, after all of his training, he had mastered thermomancy.
|Secondary Class: Thermomancer – 80% Power (from multiclassing)
|Class Level: 30
|EXP Until Next Level: [ 10/8,160 ]
|Skills:
|+Thermoregulate – 29— 90% [___________________ ]
|+Heat (Touch) – 26— 12% [__ ]
|+Chill (Touch) – 25— 74% [________________ ]
|+Hotspot (Area) – 22— 80% [_______________ ]
|+Condense – 1— [______________________]
|+Thermal Sight – 1— 0% [ ]
Eager to see what his master-level granted ability did, Dakkon checked his new skill:
|+Thermal Sight: This skill allows its caster to focus on heat and its absence. Sources of heat or cold will appear to radiate their temperature without obscuring the caster’s vision.
As they moved, Dakkon familiarized himself with his new ability. When the skill was invoked, Dakkon had a layer placed over his normal vision that allowed him to see the heat pouring off other members of the expeditionary force. Since the skill did not convert his sight entirely into infrared vision he could still see clearly, only with an added haze signifying the flow of heat. Dakkon couldn’t help but feel that the skill might have been a lot more powerful if it were actually difficult to see in the dark.
The expeditionary force slogged onwards in a comforting clump which had to occasionally sieve through arboreal bottlenecks like sand in an active hourglass. Each chokepoint like this was scouted and re-scouted again by shamans before anyone would set a foot through despite the precious time it cost them to do so. A surprise attack at a chokepoint would be a decisive loss which would rob the force of any chance to leave the forest, let alone complete the quest.
