Viridian Gate Online- Doom Forge

by J. A. Hunter

  “I require assistance,” Amara yelled.

  I wheeled around to find that Peng and his forces had somehow managed to create a wedge, splitting Forge and the Dwarven guards. The Darkling general was pushing straight up the middle, toward the fake relics sitting out on the lectern. Abby and Amara were dead ahead, fighting side by side, retreating slowly as they tried to buy time. But Peng was relentless, and it wouldn’t be long before he gained the lectern. Maybe Umbra Bog wouldn’t do much good in this situation, but Night Cyclone would put a little hitch in his giddy up.

  I thrust my warhammer straight out, unleashing the arctic power of shadow from my core. Primal, destructive energy raced down my arm, the head of my hammer glowing violet as the air above Peng rippled then ripped. I caught a familiar glimpse of the packed, hardpan landscape filled with endless black twisters. But then, before the portal unleashed the devastating cyclone, Peng’s Accipiter lackey slammed the butt of a carved staff onto the ground, releasing a shimmering crystal shockwave that...

  Well, it simply cancelled my spell. Nullified it in an instant, before the cyclone could even form.

  “Meet Zhang Young,” Peng said as he advanced hard-fought inch by hard-fought inch, completely undeterred. “My Anti-Mage. Has almost no offensive capabilities, but he can uniquely nullify almost all spellcasters. As I said, I have come prepared for this encounter, Grim Jack.” Turning toward the Accipiter, he said, “Unleash the Arcane Dampener.”

  Zhang Young nodded in solemn acceptance and slammed his staff down once more, this time driving the weapon into the ground like a fence post. The Accipiter tapped a series of runes along the shaft of the weapon, the motions quick and practiced; an enormous dome immediately bubbled up, spreading outward in a ring, enveloping the entire interior of the temple. And everywhere it touched, magic simple failed. As it ran over Devil and the apes, they vanished, followed in short order by Valkyrie, banished back to wherever she came from when not summoned.

  Active buffs likewise vanished—the red glow around Forge disappearing—though it affected both allies and enemies from what I could see. Desperately, I focused on my hand, fighting to form an Umbra Bolt, but it felt like I was pushing my fingers through thick molasses. Out in the open, this kind of anti-magic weapon might not have been so devastating—the dome did have limits, after all—but inside the temple, there was no place to go. No way to maneuver.

  Which meant this battle had instantly become a physical war of attrition, which favored Peng. A lot. Not only did he have superior forces, but since I was crippled by the Diseased debuff—which reduced my Attack damage and took a big bite out of my Health, Stamina, and Spirit regeneration—I wasn’t at all sure I could take him in a straight-up fight. The guy was tougher than old boot leather, built like a tank, and damn good in a fight.

  Still, Peng’s footsteps faltered as the Ari’s illusion spell vanished, revealing my lunch where the Doom-Forged relics should’ve been.

  I could feel the hate rolling off him in waves as he turned to me. “What is this?” he spit, waving a hand toward the lectern. “I thought you were a man of honor. Of your word.”

  “That’s the thing about being hopelessly softhearted and moral,” I said. “No one sees it coming when you finally decide to pull a fast one.”

  “No matter,” Peng said, his voice cold fury. He turned on his heel and stomped over to Abby, who had her back pressed against the wall, her staff out in front of her. Amara fired an arrow at him, but Peng contemptuously batted it out of the air with the back of his golden gauntlet. Abby took a swing at him with her staff, but it was an empty gesture. Peng caught her staff in one hand, then struck with the other, clamping his hand around her throat.

  He pulled her away from the wall, twirled her around, and pinned her back against his chest as he choked her. Slowly, he pulled free a dull black blade that had Malware written all over it. “Let us try this again, yes,” he said, pressing the blade against her throat. “Perhaps you were willing to play fast and loose with the lives of Dwarven NPCs. I very much doubt you will be quite so quick to throw her life away.” He pressed the tip of the blade in until her skin dimpled, and a bright bead of red appeared.

  “The relics and the acolyte,” Peng said. “Now.”

  What in the hell was I supposed to do here? Without my class abilities, there was nothing I could do. And as much as I hated myself, he was right. I could never give up Abby like that—could never let her die if there was something, anything, I could do to stop it.

  “Hey freak, I heard you were looking for me,” Carl said, striding out from the connecting library. “Well, here I am. And I’m giving you one chance to get outta my temple, before I make you pay for what you did to the rest of my friends.”

  Peng grinned, wide and sadistic. “Oh, and what are you going to do against us, failed Cleric? What trick will you employ, when even the hammer of the Crimson Alliance has failed?”

  “I’m gonna get priestly on your asses.” He threw a fist into the air. I didn’t know what he was expecting to accomplish with the Arcane Dampener in play, but I sure wasn’t ready when the colossal statue of Khalkeús looming in the nave lurched forward and launched a fist right into Peng’s head. The statue hit like a semi, knocking Peng sideways and giving Abby enough of an edge to slip free.

  “How?” Peng snarled, grabbing the side of his face as he stole a sidelong glance at the staff planted in the floor.

  “This isn’t magic,” Carl said. “These are the temple’s natural defenses, hardwired into the stones. All the magic in this place? No one outside of the Overminds themselves can tamper with it. Not even your fancy staff there. I bet dollars to donuts you got the drop on Arch Justiciar Tamhas before he could access them. But he’s dead. You killed him. Now I’m the Arch Justiciar, you son of a bitch, and that means I get to control all of them.” He smiled. A cold, deadly thing. “Out there, you might pound me into paste. But in here, pal? I’m the boss.”

  Carl threw his hands out, and light bloomed around us.

  Geysers of red and black light exploded from the temple’s floor, surrounding each member of Peng’s party in a tube of writhing energy. I’d seen spells like this before and knew Carl had just hit Peng and company with a Jailed debuff—locking them in place. But Carl wasn’t done. He chanted, hands waving in a complex series of motions, eyes pressed shut tight. The hulking statue shambled forward and lashed out with a gold-booted foot, catching Peng in the chest.

  The raw force of the blow shattered the Jailed spell surrounding the man, caving in Peng’s chest while sending him flipping ass over teakettle through the air. He slammed down with a thud near the entryway.

  Without missing a beat, the statue tromped over to the strange staff planted in the floor and pulled it free, killing the silver dome of anti-magic filling the temple’s interior in an eyeblink.

  Peng’s crew was still trapped, and without that staff in play we stood a fighting chance, especially with the temple guardian on our side. But the battle wasn’t completely won, not yet. Somehow—miraculously—Peng had survived the guardian’s murderous initial assault. The Darkling general gained his feet with a groan. He snarled, pulled his humongous golden crossbow from his back, and jammed it into the pocket of his shoulder. Time seemed to screech to a crawl as I watched him slide free a strange bolt from his quiver.

  Deathly black, it burned with the same runes that usually graced the edges of Malware blades. But that was impossible. So far, the Darklings hadn’t been able to perfect a Malware arrow, something I was eternally grateful for.

  “A prototype,” Peng said, his words dripping murder. Time lurched into fast-forward as Peng loaded the bolt, turned his weapon on Forge, who stood less than ten feet away, and pulled the trigger.

  The bowstring snapped, twang, and the bolt jerked forward. There was no time to think. To process. Hell, I wasn’t even sure anyone else was aware of just what was about to happen. I simply acted on instinct, whipping my hand out and conjuring a portal di
rectly in front of Forge’s face, praying I was quick enough. The onyx portal popped into existence half a heartbeat before the bolt drove into Forge’s skull, and I found myself letting out a sigh of relief as the arrow passed harmlessly into the void.

  But I couldn’t just leave it there.

  With a thought and an effort of will, I opened a second portal, this one half a foot in front of Peng’s unprotected neck. The bolt burst free like a piston, sinking deep into the Darkling general’s jugular with a wet smack. Peng’s eyes widened, his mouth gasping like a fish out of water as his crossbow clattered to the ground. Something sticky and black bubbled up out of the wound in his throat; more of the black goo trickled from his lips and ran down from the corners of his eyes.

  With one last shuddering breath, he dropped to his knees and keeled over to the side. Killed by his own hand, though with a small assist from me. His body lay there for a beat. Then two. I waited for it to dissolve in a shower of light—the telltale sign of a Traveler sent for respawn—but his corpse remained. Motionless. A pool of dark, malignant blood spread out around him.

  Everyone, including Peng’s crew, looked on, shocked. The rest of them were still jailed in prisons of red-and-black light, while the enormous temple guardian stormed around, looking for anyone who even twitched wrong—ready to turn them into Risi meat patties. But after watching their boss, the right hand of Carrera, eat it for good, no one seemed too interested in pressing their luck.

  There was a loud thud on the temple door a moment later, the wood groaning. More thuds followed, and the doors shortly gave way, swinging in with a crack, stacked pews being pushed aside as Ari and a contingent of Dwarven guards flooded inside in droves. Ten. Twenty. Thirty. Forty. Tanks and rogues, pikemen, axemen, casters, and Clerics. They had come ready for a knock-down-drag-out. Peng’s crew, however, looked like all the fight had gone out of them. Most hung their heads, shuffling in their impromptu prisons, occasionally glancing at each other. No mounted defense was coming.

  They were outnumbered, and without Peng, it was clear these guys weren’t just beaten, they were broken.

  A burly guard, grizzled from long years and more than one hard-fought battle, stepped forward. A badge adorned his tabard and ribbons of achievement littered the uniform. “On behalf of King Henrik Warmane, I charge you all with violating the peace. For sacrilege. For heresy. For murder. I declare you Darklings.” He nodded and dropped his hand.

  A squad of especially grim-faced guards, all sporting gleaming gold chainmail and pitch-black tabards, surged into action. Each carried a golden collar in gauntleted hands, a length of chain running down to a metal cuff clamped tightly around the left wrist. Despite the heat, goosebumps sprinted along my arms, and the hairs on the nape of my neck stood at attention.

  Every city had its own variety of Jailers—a specialty subclass, which could only be unlocked by working in connection with the city guard. Even without examining the odd collars, I knew they would offer a variety of nasty debuffs to the wearer. Some of the more powerful collars even had the ability to inflict massive pain at merely a thought from the Jailer, while simultaneously preventing the wearer from killing themselves—no respawn, no escape, no hope. Most of the collars were used as a way to enforce the law on Travelers who behaved badly, but I knew there was a darker side to them as well.

  There had been more than a few reports to come across the Alliance command desk about a variety of unscrupulous groups using them to capture slaves.

  The guards worked in pairs, snapping the collars on the remainder of Peng’s thugs until they were all properly secured.

  “Now,” the grizzled vet barked once that was taken care of, “will someone please tell me what in the nine infernal hells is going on here?”

  Aftermath

  SINCE CARL WAS THE only Dwarf present—and now an Arch Justiciar, which lent his voice some extra weight among the Stone Reach natives—he explained the situation to the guard commander, though he carefully avoided any mention of the Doom-Forge and our quest to find Khalkeús. The guard captain pushed gently, of course, since it was obvious there were parts Carl was leaving out—the guy really needed to take a few classes on persuasion and confidence from Cutter—but the guard commander seemed extremely reluctant to aggravate an Arch Justiciar in his own temple.

  Especially on matters that directly related to temple business.

  These Dwarves really were an extremely pious bunch, far more than I’d seen anywhere else in Eldgard. It appeared no one wanted to question the workings and dealings of the Divine Aspects, since to do so was to risk incurring their wrath and unpredictable fury. Couldn’t say I agreed wholeheartedly with their piety—someone certainly needed to fight back against the Overminds and their constant scheming—but it suited me just fine since it prevented me from having to reveal my identity further or answer any uncomfortable questions about why we were there or what we were after.

  Once they left with their prisoners in tow, we looted the remaining bodies, taking what we could, before Carl used the temple’s controls to wipe the place clean just as he’d done after reciting his earlier prayer. A quick chant and an eyeblink later the damage was repaired, the pews all back in place, all the bodies and blood, gone. Since Peng and his boys were Darklings, most of their gear was useless to us—all of it augmented by dark enchantments, rendering it usable only by players with an Evil alignment.

  There were a few goodies, though, such as Peng’s beefy golden bow, the Netherstrand War Bow of Titans, which had some seriously wicked stats. It was a fabled Living Weapon with enough kick to sheer off the top of a mountain. Nobody in our party could use it, but I had a few ideas about who might appreciate something like that. The real prize, however, was the odd staff, the Arcane Dampener, which had cut everyone off from their magical powers. It was an Evil artifact, but as I pulled up the description, I got the sense that it hadn’t been designed that way.

  The “Faction Bound” and “Modified” tags in the item description told me the Dampener had probably started out as a neutral item, which only later earned its Evil alignment after being tinkered with by a Darkling crafter.

  <<<>>>

  Arcane Dampener (Faction Bound)

  Weapon Type: Blunt; Staff (Modified)

  Class: Constructed Artifact, Two-handed

  Base Damage: 37 (Modified)

  Primary Effects:

  25 points Arcane damage + (.25 x character level)

  +8% damage to all Blunt Weapon attacks

  Intelligence Bonus = .25 x character level

  Spirit Bonus = .5 x character level

  Increase Spirit regeneration by 5.5 Spirit/sec

  Secondary Effects:

  Absorb 250 points of arcane damage on contact

  (1) Per day, per (4) character levels, activate Nullify on weapon contact

  (1) Per day, per (10) character levels, activate Arcane Dampener Dome; duration (5) minutes

  Note: Players without an Evil alignment suffer 5 points Disease damage/sec while this weapon is equipped.

  To every force, there is an equal and opposite force—light has its dark, the raging inferno has its rampaging blizzard. Magic, it seems, is no exception to this rule...

  <<<>>>

  I couldn’t properly use this weapon as it was, not without incurring enormous penalties that would quickly pull me into an early grave, but it was possible that either Vlad or Betty, our Arcane Scrivener, would be able to figure out just what made the weapon tick. And if they could, it was possible we could replicate it, adding yet another weapon to our arsenal. I could already envision ballista bolts with anti-magic heads, capable of punching through even the most formidable mage shields.

  The possibilities were nearly endless, though that was an avenue to explore once the pressure of the Doom-Forge quest was finally off. For now, I needed to focus on the quest ahead of us.

  “Care to share whatever’s on your mind?” Abby said, interpreting my train of thought. She was lounging next t
o me on a padded pew, her ankles crossed, legs draped over the top of my knees. She looked tired, her hair frizzy, her face smudged with soot, ash, and blood, bags starting to form under her eyes. I knew I didn’t look much better.

  “The Judgment,” I said after a time. This was a world-event quest, so whatever challenge awaited us, it was going to be brutal.

  “Figured,” she replied with a curt nod. “Anything about it in particular?”

  “Yeah, who we should take with us. I don’t know how far I trust Carl’s translation skills, but assuming he didn’t completely butcher it, it sounds like the odds of making it out alive are...” I faltered. “Slim is a generous estimate, I’d say. Three trials, six party members, no turning back once we start, and no regen potions?” I blew my cheeks out as I sighed and rubbed at my temple with one hand. A tension headache was forming there that may or may not have had to do with the damned Diseased debuff rampaging through my system. “Those are bad numbers, Abby.”

  “Can’t argue with you there,” she said as she glanced at Amara and Cutter, who were talking quietly in the other wing of the temple. They were snuggled together beneath one of Amara’s heavy fur blankets and looked, dare I say it... happy. Content, at the very least. “I assume you’re thinking what I’m thinking?” she asked.

  “Yeah. Amara and Ari can’t come,” I replied firmly. “No way. It’s too dangerous, and we can’t risk bringing along anyone who can’t respawn. Odds are stacked against us as it is, and that will just create an extra liability. Cutter, we’ll need to take with us for sure. If my gut is right, then I imagine we’re in for lots of nasty traps. Carl’s a no-brainer, too. Not sure what that ritual on the last metal plate does, but chances are it’s gonna play a big role. Me and you are three and four—Forge is our tank. That’s five. That leaves us with one slot, so who do we take? Who can we trust with something this big?”

  “We could always use another thief,” Abby mused out loud, idly twirling a strand of hair around one finger. “Maybe Jake? Extra set of keen eyes probably wouldn’t go amiss. Or we could recruit a Ranger class to replace Amara’s ranged capabilities. I’m sure Forge has someone in the Malleus Libertas who could pull their weight in a mission like this. Shit, we could even scoop up another Dark Templar, or maybe a Warlock summoner. Someone to provide us with some cannon fodder.”