Kingdom of the Dead

by Pavel Kornev

  Only a game, you say? Yeah right.

  Without the flamberge, I felt naked. The black sword was somewhat longer and tangibly heavier. To add insult to injury, it was absolutely useless in a fight. Had things come a head, I had only my bone hook to count on. And admittedly, the Soulkiller was a very capricious weapon. I still hadn’t got the hang of it.

  Still, we’d reached one crossroads, then another, and nothing had happened. Nobody seemed to be paying any attention to us. There were enough players passing us by in the narrow streets but not one of them tried to attack us with shouts of “There he is!” Their glances seemed to just slide off me. My investing into Incognito had completely paid off. Excellent skill, I couldn’t praise it enough.

  Isabella who walked first seemed to know all the local alleys like a stray cat. Soon she took me out to a bridge. There I had to pull my hood further down, trying to protect my dead eyes from the blinding sunrays.

  “Is it far still?” I asked.

  “We’re almost there,” she replied, heading across a square toward a small crowd of about twenty players which heaved on its far side.

  I tensed up a little. Still, the players had more important things to worry about. They were engaged in a heated discussion about an upcoming raid, casting impatient glances at a tower with a golden clock face. Its long hands pointed at five to one.

  We turned off into a side lane. Immediately my Watchful Stare skill gave me the feeling of a knife between my shoulder blades.

  I swung round with the Soulkiller extended but missed. The unstealthed thief froze in mid-step, so the sharpened bone sliced the air in front of his face. The next moment he miraculously dodged my second blow and disappeared down a dark alley. Just like that.

  I mentally reached out to my phoenix who was circling the sky above the roofs. He hurried to give chase above the streets but the thief was long gone.

  “Clever bastard,” I muttered. Personally, I couldn’t pull off tricks like that.

  Isabella frowned. “What the hell was that? Did someone recognize you?”

  “I don’t think so,” I shook my head as I lodged the hook in my belt. “He had nothing in his hands.”

  “Must have been a pickpocket,” she decided. “Shit happens. Let’s go.”

  I gave the street a wary once-over, turned round and hurried after her.

  “By the way,” I snapped my fingers as I caught up with her, “my skills are stuck at level 15. What can be done about it?”

  “At fifteen?” she gave me a look of superiority. “You need to get some training. Then you’ll have access to the next ten levels.”

  “What kind of training?”

  “Are you into Stealth?” she said, second-guessing me. “There’re several schools. The Stealthers, for instance.”

  “Is there no other way?”

  She shook her head. “You can only get trained by Masters and Apprentices. I guess it’s a problem for you?”

  I nodded. Problem wasn’t the word. No one was going to train a deadman. No amount of Incognito was going to help me in this case. A student with a closed profile was a contradiction in terms.

  Shit! I had so many points that still required distribution! I wasn’t going to invest them into any unnecessary skills.

  We left the dark passage and turned into a busy street. There, Isabella headed through an open gate into a shady garden. A shop sign said,

  We Buy and Sell Weapons, Armor & Amulets

  When she swung the front door open, the vendor behind the counter startled and shook his head. “Ms. Ash-Rizt! Unfortunately, none of your bids on the Crown of Chaos has worked out yet.”

  The priestess screwed her face up in disappointment. “Is the old man here?”

  The vendor hesitated. “Yes, Mr. Lloyd is here,” he said after a tangible pause. “You can go through.”

  “Excellent,” Isabella cheered up and pushed an inside door without knocking.

  Mr. Lloyd turned out to be an alchemist. He wasn’t old at all, just gray. Also, he wasn’t human. Neither did he belong to any other game race known to me.

  His receding hairline exposed a pair of short horns on his forehead. His eyes glowed with an amber flame.

  A demon? Whatever. I wasn’t there to sell my soul to him, anyway.

  Upon our arrival, the alchemist looked up from his engraving table and winced in annoyance. “What now, Isabella?" he sighed, readjusting his plain overalls. “I told you you couldn’t just buy the Crown of Chaos! And you didn’t even bother to offer me a realistic price.”

  “Well, sometimes miracles do happen,” she muttered.

  The alchemist rose up, insulted.

  She motioned him to sit down again. “Please don’t start. That’s not why I’m here, anyway. I just want to give you some stuff.”

  “What’s up with Ulrich, then?” he sniffed, apparently referring to the vendor, and looked at me through the colored lens of an alchemist. “Is your gear so hot that you need a bodyguard?”

  “This is a friend,” Isabella corrected him. “And no, my gear’s not hot. It’s just that I can’t identify a few things.”

  “Very well, dearie, lay it out!” he demanded, scooping all of the trinkets crowding the table into its top drawer. “Time is money!”

  With a crunching sound, the skull topping the priestess' staff swung around, its teeth chattering.

  The shop owner pointed his gnarly finger at him, “Shut your trap, Roger!”

  The old man turned out to be a player too. After my conversation with Mark, that didn’t surprise me anymore. If the truth were known, playing the part of a fence was admittedly cooler than that of an innkeeper. It must have paid better, too.

  Isabella leaned her staff against the wall and laid the three items on the table: the emerald pendant, the sapphire ring and the gray sculpted bracelet.

  In disgust, Lloyd brushed the pendant onto the floor. “Take that revolting thing away!”

  “What’s with you now?” Isabella demanded indignantly.

  Wincing, he set his lens aside and rubbed his temples. “Have you ever heard about the curse of the Night Druid?” he asked, visibly annoyed. “It kills you slowly but surely. And even once you’re resurrected, you’ll have to pay a whack of gold to have the curse lifted.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “I’ve seen its description in a couple of catalogs. Consider yourself lucky you didn’t try it on.”

  Isabella sniffed. “Do I look that stupid?”

  “It’s just that you all seem to have a penchant for flashy baubles,” he sighed, then turned his attention to the ring. “That’s a nice item,” he gave a nod of approval, turning it in his fingers. “The Ring of Intuition. Unfortunately, only Elemental mages can use it.”

  “How much would you give for it?”

  “Ask Ulrich,” the old man said dismissively. “He’s the one with a calculator in his head. He'll work it out.”

  The alchemist laid the bracelet down and fell silent, studying the metalwork through his magnifying glass.

  Isabella slumped into a rickety chair. I leaned a shoulder against the door frame and gave the room a good looking-over. It was lined with bookcases stuffed with dusty old volumes. A magic crystal hanging from the ceiling lit the place up. I didn’t see any chests or goods up for sale. No windows, either.

  “Very interesting,” the old man drawled, puzzled. He poured some kind of magic chemical onto the bracelet. The metal hissed and began to emit a faint white smoke.

  “Do you mind?” Isabella voiced her concern.

  The old man sniffed as he wiped the artifact clean with a piece of cloth. The acid seemed to have had no effect on the intricate metalwork whatsoever.

  “Dwarven silver,” Lloyd told us. “The item’s ready for rune casting. As it bears no magic, it’s unfinished. It might fetch a grand to a grand and a half at auction. Take it to Ulrich.”

  Isabella scooped both the ring and the bracelet up from the table. I handed her the meager loot
I’d farmed while playing solo — the gold ingots and a few precious stones — but decided not to show them either the mithril pauldron nor the fragment of Nest Hunter’s bone. I very much doubted they were worth anything. And I certainly didn’t want them to laugh at me.

  “Tally this up apart for me,” I told the priestess.

  “And take that dreadful thing away,” the alchemist added.

  Isabella looked down on the floor and kicked the wretched pendant out of the room. “Good job I didn’t try it on. I very nearly did,” she muttered as she left the room.

  Mr. Lloyd looked up at me. “How can I help you, my mysterious stranger? I don’t have all day.”

  I perched myself onto the chair vacated by Isabella. “I’m interested in the Deadman’s Set.”

  He eyed me with undisguised interest. “Your sword isn’t part of the set,” he said nonchalantly.

  “I’m selling it,” I said. “But that can wait. How about the Deadman’s Set?”

  He gave me a pensive nod, rose from the table and reached into the nearest bookcase, producing a fat leather-bound tome framed in steel. “This is what we have or what can be delivered within twenty-four hours,” he told me, chucking the book onto the table in front of me. “All the items here haven’t yet been listed for auction. Everything is from private vendors.”

  I opened the book.

  “The section you need is somewhere near the middle,” he said as he began replacing the items from the drawer onto the table.

  The book turned out to be a bona fide catalog. As soon as I concentrated on a picture, it would come into focus, gaining depth and dimension. Prices were listed next to the items. Once I got rid of the loot, that would allow me to maybe buy one or two things. Unfortunately, the prices in the section I needed turned out to be three or even four times more than I’d seen elsewhere.

  The Steel Crown of the Deadman went for twelve grand. The Bone Ring cost thirteen and a half and the Ice Gauntlets, all of seventeen grand! This was daylight robbery! I didn’t have anywhere near that kind of money. Some of the items in the catalog were even more expensive; and as for unique ones, their prices were sky high.

  After a while, my gaze chanced upon an unassuming gray smock complete with a hood and a short cloak. I just couldn’t take my eyes off it. The price was fourteen grand.

  Shadow of Death

  You’re surrounded by shadows even when you’re standing in plain sunlight, making you inconspicuous for all the others and helping you to avoid enemy blows.

  +3% to Stealth

  +1% to Dodge

  Wow. An ordinary necro wouldn’t gain much from wearing it. But a Lich... a Lich would happily sell his soul again to lay his dead hands on it. And a Rogue Lich? That goes without saying. Those bonuses!

  But fourteen grand?

  “Ahem,” I cleared my throat. “Your prices aren’t very friendly, are they? Other sets are considerably cheaper.”

  “Other sets!” he took a peek into the catalog and chuckled. “That’s for the sets that can be broken up. But the Deadman’s Set can’t.”

  “Does it make such a difference?”

  He heaved a long-suffering sigh and ruffled his gray hair. “Other sets can be altered at any moment. Non-separables can’t. But the chances of a player losing it when he dies are also quite slim.”

  “This I know.”

  “That’s why the parts of a separable set cost what they cost. But if an item is part of a non-separable set, the buyer pays extra for its not being burdened with something else. Do I make it clear? Are you following me?”

  “Not really,” I admitted.

  “Well,” he smiled, “if you don’t mind me saying, your boots will let down the price of your complete set by about 20%.”

  “Why, what’s wrong with them?”

  “These are Boots of Silence, aren’t they? But the Deadman’s Set only interests necromancers. Who are either death mages or death knights, and therefore have less need for them than for a chocolate teapot,” he allowed himself a light smirk. “You understand now, don’t you? If you mix and match items in such an eclectic way, no one will buy the resulting set for neither love nor money. Now a well-balanced set can cost any amount of money you care to ask for.”

  I winced. “Interesting. So do you want to say that it would be a waste of time looking for affordable auction options?”

  “What sort of money are you thinking about?”

  I pointed a meaningful finger at the door through which Isabella had just left.

  “I see,” he sighed. “In that case, let’s wait for her. In the meantime, if you don’t mind, let’s go back to your sword,” he extended a hand. “May I?”

  I drew the black longsword from behind my back and laid it gently on the table. “Be my guest.”

  The old man swept his hand just above the length of the blade, then took his time studying the hallmark through his magnifying glass. Only then did he closed his hand round the hilt. Predictably, his fingers slipped.

  He laughed, looking pleased. “To you, the Longsword of the Autumnal Equinox is absolutely useless but the item itself is extremely, extraordinarily rare. I’ve only heard about one of those and it wasn’t for sale.”

  “How much do you think it might cost?”

  Mr. Lloyd gave it some thought. “At auction, you mean? I should ask thirty or even forty thousand. But you need to understand that finding a buyer won’t be quick. Realistically, you’re unlikely to unload an item like this in less than six months.”

  “Are you sure?” I frowned, suspecting foul play.

  A smirk curved his lips. “I know for sure. Rare items are my specialty.”

  Dammit!

  Forty grand! That would be enough to buy the Shadow of Death and there would be some left for the Hell’s Pauldrons or even the Helmet of Dark Glory. But...

  I sighed and asked him point blank, “How much would you give for it? Here and now?”

  He pushed the sword away and shook his head. “Nothing at all. I only know of one player who’d be interested and he’s broke at the moment.”

  “Only one?” I sniffed. “Why is that?”

  Mr. Lloyd heaved another sigh. “Orcs are even worse racists than Elves and Dwarves. It applies to not only other races but anyone who’s different. There’s no such a thing as Light Orcs but their affiliation with the Dark is also quite peculiar, with a distinct leaning toward Chaos. An orc who worships the Equilibrium? I know one. How many do you know?”

  I didn’t know any such individuals at all. Still, I knew better than to admit to the validity of his arguments, so I changed the subject. “The Swords of Chaos, is it an orcish clan?”

  “Not at all. Orcs make up a considerable part of the clan members but far from all of them. The Chaosites believe their religious identification to be above their racial one,” he tapped a finger on the table. “So coming back to the sword...”

  The door swung open, letting in Isabella who hurled a heavy moneybag into my lap. Gold pieces clinked inside.

  “How much did it go for?” I asked quickly.

  She shrugged. “Look yourself,” she turned to the dusty mirror and began rearranging her hair. “Haven’t you finished yet?”

  I poured the gold into my inventory. Even though my cut turned out to be quite impressive, I was still almost five grand short of buying the smock.

  “Is this together with the option?” I asked.

  She gave me a meaningful look and smiled smugly. “Yes, Kitten. That’s all of it.”

  The alchemist, however, seemed to come alive on hearing it. “Did you say option? Isabella dearie, I hope you haven’t got involved in anything serious.”

  “Ah,” she gave him a theatrical sigh. “Don’t even go there. It’s broken me.”

  I hurried to rectify my faux pas. “Will you take it off my hands for five grand?” I slapped the sword in front of me.

  The old man shook his head. “It’s not about the money,” he stroked his beard and explain
ed further, “No good you trying to haggle. This has more of an ethical nature.”

  Isabella drew her attention away from the mirror. “A conflict of interests?” she said with an understanding smile.

  The alchemist nodded. “I could give your coordinates to my client and you can negotiate directly. But let me warn you straight away: he has no money.”

  Isabella snorted. “You have a client who can’t pay? Pull the other one!”

  “He had to take out a loan to buy the suit of armor of the Autumnal Equinox and he hasn’t even started to pay it off yet.”

  “Shit!” I swore. “Isabella, do me a favor. Lend me five grand.”

  “I don’t think so, Kitten! I’ve already invested my share into raising my bid.”

  “Ah, the Crown of Chaos,” the old man remembered. “It’s a rare and expensive thing. But you can’t become the High Priestess without collecting the full set.”

  Isabella winced. “Don’t beat about the bush.”

  I frowned. “Why do we need that guy if he can’t even pay?”

  The alchemist shrugged. “He’s collected the entire Autumnal Equinox set. The only thing that’s missing is a suitable weapon. You might come to some agreement. Does the word ‘barter’ ring any bells?”

  Isabella gave it some thought. “Tell him to come to the Old Archer Inn,” she decided for me. “It’s on-”

  “On Granite Island. I know it,” Mr. Lloyd said.

  Isabella nodded and turned to me. “Come on, Kitten!”

  “Wait, all of you!” I exploded. “I have almost nine grand in my pocket and you want me to leave without buying anything?”

  The alchemist pushed the book across the table toward me. “Choose something affordable.”

  “Even better, stop splashing your money around and buy something decent but cheap until you've saved enough to buy the item you need,” she advised.

  Pensively I stroked the catalog’s leather cover.