“Don’t frown meat; it will all be over soon,” smiled Voresh.
Gerald was down to only 30% HP. He had already used his emergency heal skills, and now he was just left with taunt and stun abilities to aid him. He had hoped taunting the enemies would give his two cloth wearers a breather to recoup and attack the enemy's rear while they assaulted him. But there were no heals being placed on him, and Kandice was no longer aiding him with attacks of her own. Alex disappeared the moment that monster killed R.J. Frustrated, he cast Titan stun on the two monsters raining down blows on him for a momentary breather for himself.
Both Kel’Van and Belar shook for five seconds in place after the shield-bearer used his stun ability on them. This was the second time he had to use it since his self-heals were spent. The player used that precious time to dive into a roll away from the tree, and then he looked around. Gerald’s team was too spaced out for him to be of help to anyone and vice versa. He was wracking his brain to come up with an answer, but the creeping feeling of a lost cause kept becoming more of a certainty by the moment. He shield-bashed against the hooded swordsman, but the other one, who was weaponless, punched him square in the head, knocking him back into the tree. While he put up his shield in her direction by reflex, the swordsman with a run, quickly ran him through the side with his blade, punching through to the other side of his armor. He lifted Gerald with both hands with him impaled on the sword and then proceeded to thrust the sharp end of it through the tree.
“Grahhhh” sounded Gerald.
He dropped both his shield and short sword as he used both hands to try to pull himself free from the sword pinning him to the tree.
“Well, that’s new” Belar said conversationally.
“Yeah, but it’s effective,” answered Kel’Van.
Belar stepped up to Gerald. She grabbed him by the chin, removed his helmet then eyed his face for a bit. “So, this is what a Terran looks like?”
“Yeah, this one is called a human.”
“Frail things these humans,” she mused aloud. “It’s a wonder they forced out the orcs.” She then put her face only inches away from the Gerald.
“This is not your land human, there are dangerous things here, and you are not welcome.”
With that, she grabbed Gerald by the face, then slowly pushed her thumb and fingers into his eyes till he was screaming, then she slowly twisted his head until she heard the neck snap.
Kandice had heard Gerald’s scream and knew that his avatar was done. She had tried to come to his aid, anyone’s actually. But the large orc literally stood in her way. She blasted him time after time with arcane blasts, and even tried to skirt around him to help the others, but that shield and his constant positioning while closing off her means of escape had laid that idea to waste. Though she wasn’t injured too much, her mana supplies were going dry, and the mana potions she had were gone. The monster before her had its Hp over 90%. Then all of a sudden, the beast just sprinted towards her. She tried to dart to the right, and a sword came at her full force. She spent the last of her mana forging a shield. Just as the blade hit her blue bubble, the beast shield bashed her, destroying her mana shield and staggering the mage backward. He then front kicked the Kandice, which for her stature to the orc, amounted to an extremely hard kick to the face. She flew across the grass, and her body skidding across the ground. Momentarily stunned, she just laid there immobile.
Kel’Van and Belar had sprinted to where Fer’shad was standing over the crumpled body.
“Guess you didn’t need any help with the arcane mage here, big guy.”
“No captain, though it did take longer than I wanted. I will rectify this however, very shortly,” answered Fer’shad.
“She’s still alive?” questioned Kel’Van.
He stepped closer and got a better look at her. When they first encountered their party, he thought the player looked somewhat familiar, but he couldn’t quite place the face. As he stood to the side of the fallen arcane mage, he saw that he could glimpse the call sign above the character.
“Hmm, nice to know that still works,” he thought to himself.
As he looked above the character, he saw the name ‘” Blue princess1.”
The name struck a strong chord in his mind. He closed his eyes to think about it as Fer’shad raised his foot above the character's head. Then as the unbidden memory came back to him in a flash, Fer’shad began stomping the body into the ground.
“You’re the worst Arcane mage ever,” he laughed.
“That’s Blue princess to you Kevin, and you better not forget it!”
That’s what he called her in secret when they worked together online. Blue princess.
SHIT!!
Kel’Van grabbed Fer’shad as he stomped the body a fourth time. She was clutching her body, gasping for breath as the rest of her HP was steadily dropping due to the bleeding effect of Fer’shad’s attack.
“Blue princess, Kandice, is that you?”
Kandice could barely speak as the blood curdled in her mouth. Hacking up blood as she turned to her side, she closed her eyes and became still. Fer’shad looked at Kel’Van as he grabbed his hand. “Is something the matter?” he asked.
“No, for minute there I thought…. never mind, it’s nothing,” said Kel’Van as he walked away from the body. “We should get to Voresh and finish this.”
Alex was on his last legs.
He was barely past 10% HP. While his opponents haven’t left 70% since his last skill combo. With the monster’s reach and longer sword, he was able to beat him around with just his basic attacks and swordsmanship. Alex was beaten black and blue with visible cuts all over his face, arms, and body that weren’t covered in body armor. His opponent however, still had that godforsaken smile plastered on his lips. Like the orc was in on a joke that Alex wasn’t. It was about this time the rest of the monster’s party had walked in on their contest. They didn’t look as if they were in a rush to help him. Alex had to chuckle darkly to himself about it. Why would they at this point?
“I’m pretty sure it’s Voresh who is always telling us not to play with our food, am I right Fer’shad?”
“Yes, I do recall him saying those words,” Fer’shad answered back.
“Some meals should be savored in order to appreciate them,” replied Voresh
“Well the cook better hurry up and eat. We got a home to get to,” said Kel’Van as he left to investigate the bodies.
“Hm, he is right you know, we should end this,” Voresh said to his opponent with a smile.
Alex had had enough of this orc’s talk. But mostly, he wanted to wipe that sick, arrogant, self-righteous smile off his face before he died. Alex activated his sword skill Eagles Launch and quickly took to the air with a rageful cry.
Voresh’s smile grew wider.
Alex’s snarl grew feral.
As he came down to land his blow, Voresh did a pirouette to the side, creating a gap, distancing himself from Alex. As he came out of his spin, Voresh swung his sword, clipping Alex in the back. The blow knocked him forward as his HP was now down to 6%. Anger still hot within Alex, he turned around and faced the smiling monster. He ran towards the orc with a roar, and when he got within striking distance, he activated his Double Puncture skill. The player closed in on Voresh, but the orc did not attempt to block all of the quick multiple jabs of the attack. He simply counted the blows. 1…2…3…4…5…6...and on the seventh and final blow of the attack, Voresh slapped the sword away with a side strike from his own weapon in his right hand, then gripped both of the human’s tiny wrists in his left hand. He then pulled him close, enough that Voresh was almost kissing his right ear.
“That is an incredible skill you have there meat,”he whispered in his ear. “But it doesn’t penetrate the heart like a decent sword thrust should. Here, let me show you.”
And with that said, Voresh thrust his sword into Alex in an uppercut motion through his stomach. Then he slowly began raising up the sword into the
air with both hands. Alex dropped his weapon and grasped the sides of the bone sword, lifting his body off the ground. Then, with a groan and blood pouring from his mouth, the impaled player began to slide down the blade. Alex’s world began to go black, and the last thing he glimpsed was the smiling orc’s grin growing wider.
“Goodbye, meat.”
CHAPTER 27
Alex reappeared in the Nether region of North gate. It was the “graveyard” setting for players who died in the area close to the sprawling city. It was all greyed out, in the form of a cemetery, something straight out the old school Halloween scare flicks. Though he didn’t die near North Gate, it was the closes respawn point from Gladys Mountains, since for whatever reason, there was no save point in that region. He looked for a second before he spotted the group over near the king’s mausoleum. He made his way over, then Gerald’s ghost made a cutting action under his own neck. You couldn’t talk in a death state, so when Gerald made that motion, it could only mean cut the feed and leave Avarice Online. Alex opened his D.S. menu and hit the log out button. Then the world greyed out.
Alex's eyes opened with a flash as his virtual pod opened. Covered in soft liquid, he swung his feet outside of his pod as if he was getting out of a tub. A thrown towel landed on his head before he even stood up. He raised the towel over his eyes to see Gerald almost already dry and putting on his shoes.
“Dry off and meet us in the office,” said Gerald in a business type tone. “We need to compare notes and turn in reports. But mostly we need to discuss what happened out there just now.”
They quickly cleared away the general reports and filed them for the upper management to look through and figure out. The bulk of the conversation was about the group of orcs that recently handed them their asses on a platter. Each of the five recounted what happened in their own view with the fight. Gerald listened patiently to each story with him shaking his head as the stories went on. He finally pounded his hands on the table in anger.
“We got played,” said Gerald as he massaged his hand.” His forehead creased as he pulled the facts together in his head. The table they were sitting at had its shares of pens and paper. Though they had datapads, sometimes it’s better to illustrate a point by drawing a physical representation.
Today was one of those times.
“What do you mean we got played?” Alex asked, rather loudly. It was apparent he was still pissed about that fight.
“Just what I said. They played us the minute they saw the makeup of the group,” Gerald grumbled.
“I don’t understand,” Ara stated.
Gerald blew his breath in exasperation, so he took a pen and made a line in the middle of a page. “This group above the line is us. The four below the line are them. I didn’t put you in here R.J because you died before the fight got going” He looked at R.J. before he went further. “No offense, my man.”
“None taken.”
Gerald stood and went to the board and started writing while he was talking. “Okay, what do we know and understand about mobs or enemies in an open world setting?”
“They are computer-generated A.I.’s that attack players in a player vs. environment or story mode of a game,” offered Ara.
“Or just the bad guys in a game,” said Alex.
“You’re both correct, and we will get back to that point in a minute. Now, what do we know about the mobs that attacked us?”
“They were level 11 Elites class!” yelled R.J.. “What the hell are elites doing walking around?!”
“I’ll admit, that little tidbit is bothering me as well,” said Alex. “Was that the entrance to a dungeon where you spotted them at?”
“No, at least it didn’t look like one. But if it was, why would they follow me all the way to our camp? They would have at least walked back after about 20 meters if they were guarding a dungeon or its entrance. They tracked me all the way back and then attacked!”
“I agree with R.J. on this one,” said Kandice. “That makes no sense at all.”
“I have a theory about that too, but I don’t want to get ahead of myself in case I missed something. But let’s get back to the board. Here’s the last question. How do mobs attack?”
“Well normally, whether in a player vs environment or dungeon, they usually follow a set pattern of attacks. Even the bosses have a set of actions they follow. If you pay attention, you could see the pattern and then form a plan,” explained Kandice.
“Yeah, that’s pretty much any MMO, virtual or not for the past 40 years,” laughed R.J.
“Yeah, well our green-skinned friends didn’t exactly follow the script, did they?” remarked Alex.
“No, they didn’t Alex,” said Gerald. “Which brings us back to this board. When these mobs found us, the first thing they did was get into a formation and then charged us. Then, and by the way, this is when it gets even more confusing, is when they intentionally split us off from one another.”
“Gerald, all due respect man, I think you are giving them too much credit, No?” said Alex. “When they showed up, it was all carnage and a free for all.”
“No, we were in disarray. They were not.”
” Let’s review the facts by everyone’s account here, shall we?” When the mobs attacked, I myself specifically heard the hooded one with the short sword cry out “Formation.” Gerald formed a diamond, then a circle around it. “Then they all formed as one behind the big one with his shield. They crashed into us, and then two of them engaged me and Alex, while the other two engaged Kandice and Ara. Are we all on the same accord here?”
Everyone nodded their heads in agreement.
“This is where is it comes together. The one with the biggest sword kicked Alex over towards me first, BEFORE he attacked Kandice,” Gerald insinuated. “Ara, what did the orc say to you right before he attacked?”
“He didn’t say anything to me,” said Ara quietly to herself. “He was pointing his sword at me and screamed “her” right before he threw fire at me.”
“He was a mage?!” shouted R.J.
“I guess so, but he killed me with his sword,” Ara explained. “Since when do mage mobs carry swords?” she asked as she rubbed her neck.
“That further proves the point I’m going to make later, but I don’t want to get too bogged down at this point,” said Gerald trying to steer back control of the conversation. “What I’m trying to say is this.” He drew a big line between where he and Alex were, putting Ara and Kandice on the other.
“They separated the fighters from the cloth wearers, and as soon as Kandice put up her shield, the other two orcs attacked Ara with a vengeance. That whole initial attack was to isolate the healer and kill her.”
Gerald then put the marker on the table and watched his team’s reaction.
Total silence in the room.
“Holy fuck…” murmured R, J. as he sat back in his chair with his mouth open. Alex said nothing as he put his hand on his chin, his eyes distant. Ara was just as dumbfounded as R.J. as she processed the information in her head. Kandice, who had some assumptions of her own earlier but discounted them, had to return to them after hearing Gerald out.
“The rest of it is academic at this point. With no healer vs. 4 level 11 Elites, it was just a matter of attrition before they beat us, “Gerald pointed out. “Now we come back to R.J.’s definition of a mob. Do mobs form a formation before they attack? Do mobs leave a given area and follow them as they did with R.J.? And finally…do mob scripts have dialogue like the ones they did with me and Alex?”
No one could answer the question. They didn’t even attempt to. They couldn’t, because in their minds and experiences, enemy mobs just did not act this way.
“I’m going to assume you guys are going to say no,” answered Gerald. “The thing is, I believe you’re all correct. There is no A.I. that I can think of that can make scripts for mobs and have be able to behave the way they did against us.”
“But they had to be mobs Gerald,” said Ara. “N
amed mobs at that. The fact that they were elites attests to the fact that an A.I. made them.”
“Again, then you would have to believe an A.I. is capable of creating enemies who seemingly have independent thought.” He passed his hand through his mop of black curly hair. “Avarice Online has the best A.I. in the world, and I know that it does not have the capacity to instill in its characters the ability to attack like that. I mean, look at them!” he yelled. “They acted exactly like a party would in a dungeon than the monsters that inhabit it!”
“Or PVP players...” whispered R.J.
“What?” asked Gerald.
“PVP players,” answered R.J. “That’s what they do in a party against another group of players. The first thing they look for is the healer. Not just because they are the most vulnerable, but because they can keep a team going for an indefinite amount of time. It’s like PVP 101.”
Kandice closed her eyes. That is exactly what happened. Now she was able to put the whole puzzle together, no matter how crazy it sounded. That was the man’s thing. As much as he liked going through dungeons for the story, he liked fighting against a thinking person better than raiding a dungeon.
Gerald held his hand to his chin, mulling R.J.’s words in his head. He would have more experience in that regard than himself. He rather enjoyed raids and commanding armies to meet out a goal rather than the wholesale madness of PVP. He just didn’t really see the point of it, except to brag how good your build was. Hell, most of them just tried to pawn players who were lower level than they were, which is why he never took to it. Bullying wasn’t something he was big on.
“There might be something to that R.J.” admitted Gerald. “Either way, I think we were fighting real players in those mountains. Our primary mission is gonna be to ferret these guys out before the massive launch.”
AVARICE ONLINE: KEL'VAN RED HAND Page 25
