Wolf Mountain: A litRPG Novel (Adventure Online Book 1)

by Isaac Stone

  It was a bundle of confusion if I focused on it. Right now, I didn’t want to think about it.

  “I see you found Chamita,” Bonnie called down to me. “I’ll tell Howard and Lester.” I could see the look in her face and it wasn’t good.

  “She has a fungus down here that heals wounds,” I told her. “Chamita put some on my hand and the scratch from today healed up. We need to keep it in mind if we have any injuries. How’s Lester’s head?” I continued to look up at her.

  “He’s okay; I don’t think he’ll have any more trouble.”

  “Tell Howard I’ll be up with Chamita in a few minutes. He needs to be ready.” Bonnie vanished over the edge.

  We both knew what I meant by the “ready” part. Chamita might not take us in the middle of her gem collection very well. There was the matter of which it belonged to since, if she was the daughter of Wellington, she would also be the legal heir to it.

  Chamita didn’t say a thing when Bonnie appeared. I had no way to understand if she could interpret human emotions or interactions. I needed to find out, if for my own curiosity only. I took the hand she had on mine in both of my hands and rubbed it. She seemed to respond.

  “Do you remember much?” I asked her.

  “Much what?” she returned. Her hands were soft, a little bit of a surprise considering she’d lived in the forest since a toddler.

  “How you came to be here?” I explained. “Have you lived in the forest all your life?

  “Yes,” she said. Then a look came over her face that told me she was unsure. Perhaps there was more to our little wolf girl than the programmers would care to admit.

  “There was a man when I was little,” she said. “Taught me things. Not remember much.” Her dark eyes gazed into the direction of the river, as if she tried to remember something. I saw her face tighten up. Whatever she went through wasn’t nice. Chamita was in the middle of a bad memory and she tried to suppress it. Damn their ability to code emotions was high end!

  I opened my mouth to ask her some more questions when we heard shouting down the tunnel. Dammit, those bootleggers had followed us to this location. My hopes that we were free of them were dashed by the sounds. Chamita turned and jumped up on a rock. She swung her head in their direction and tried to feel the air for something. Lobo was on his feet in seconds. A low growl emerged from his throat.

  She grabbed my hand and pulled me in the direction of the rise where the others were camped. “Need to get away,” I was told. “Go up there.” Chamita pointed up to the rise and turned to Lobo. “Follow!” was the only command she gave the wolf. Lobo turned back to me and waited.

  I was at the top of the rise by the time the first bootlegger emerged from the bend in the cavern. By now, Chamita had time to dump the larger rodent body in the river. She flowed past me and was at the top of the rise as Lobo and I were still climbing it.

  By the time I reached the top, the others had time to return the jewel cache to its original location. The box with the pictures was still out as they felt the treasure should be hidden first. Chamita didn’t seem to notice anything out of place. Even Lobo was focused on the noise coming down the river.

  “Our friends are back,” I informed the others. “They don’t sound too happy either.”

  “I can travel,” Lester, informed me.

  “Need to go,” Chamita informed us.

  “What about all that is up here?” Howard said to me as she nodded his head at the books and materials Chamita stashed over the years. We all knew he meant the fortune in gemstones she kept on the riser.

  “We’ll deal with it later,” I told them, we need to move.” Bonnie grabbed a few things off the ground and placed them into her vest.

  Chamita shuffled into the miniature library and found the rock pile where we’d located her gemstone treasure. She moved the rocks away and pulled it out. With the aid of a burlap sack, she brought it back out, stopping only long enough to grab the small box, which contained her photographs. Both the treasure box and the one with the photographs went into her bag.

  “Need these,” she held up the bag. Then she rearranged the piles of books and magazines.

  We all slid down the small hill to the bank of the underground river. We banked the fire on the torches, as there was no need to make it easy for the bootleggers to find us. We kept two in hopes they could be relit once we were far enough from the gangsters. Chamita and Lobo reached the bottom first. The rest of us landed as gracefully as we could.

  The trail next to the bank ran around several bends and I felt we could outdistance them. Chamita jumped on the rocks near the banks of the underground river as we made our way from the bootleggers. So far, they hadn’t found us, but this was about to change. We couldn’t stay invisible to them forever. Eventually, they’d locate us and then the real fun would begin.

  I watched Chamita leap from rock to rock. She turned back every time she landed to see where the bootleggers where. The light was faint in that cavern, but her profile was eerie. I could see her outline as she poised barefoot on each rock to steady herself. With her spear, Chamita resembled something out of a Greek legend. Perhaps this was the intent in the programmer who came up with her character.

  “Just be quiet,” I told Bonnie. “We can get out of here. Chamita knows this place.” I placed one hand on her shoulder and it seemed to comfort her.

  Howard took the rear, with Lester just in front of him. We could see the lights of the bootleggers and they were closer each time I saw them. My hopes of staying ahead of the bootleggers were dashed by the progress they made down the banks of the river. It wasn’t a riverbank as you might see on the Mississippi, but was solid rock. The river had carved out its passageway over the thousands of years it flowed through the cavern, or at least this was the effect of the game system.

  I knew they were about to charge when I saw the lights stop for a minute. The bootleggers weren’t too far away and I could hear them converse in some Eastern European language. They prepared to make a run at us and I knew we had to do something if the game was going to continue.

  “Everyone behind this rock,” I announced as we reached a larger boulder that marked the bank and trail. It sat between them after rolling off the cavern wall eons ago.

  “How is it supposed to stop them?” Lester grumbled. “They’re coming right at us.” He moved with the others behind it, although he fumed all the time.

  “It will give us interference,” I tried to explain. Most of my strategy came from war games, time to see how it worked in the real world.

  Chamita saw what we did and leaped from the rock where she stood to the larger one when we vanished behind it. Lobo followed as well. The entire group was behind it now as Chamita realized her position on the boulder made her an easy target for the bootleggers.

  I heard the sound of feet running down the bank and waited. We still had the element of surprise. Lester held his Tommy gun and Howard his shotgun. I had the 1911 automatic, which felt like a ton. I noticed Bonnie still had the low caliber pistol on her. It might be all we had at the moment, but it would have to do. We’d left some of the ammunition on the rise and took what we could run with. Lester wasn’t about to give his Tommy gun away, so I positioned him at the far left end of our group.

  “Now!” I yelled. Lester jumped out with his Tommy gun and fired off a burst.

  The first one of the bootleggers went down as the bullets ripped through him, but the one behind him opened up with the pistols they carried. Lester took a hit in the arm and fell. By now, Howard and I were in position and started to throw lead in the direction of our assailants. I managed to take down one of the gat men while Lester’s buckshot was unable to do much more than pester them at the current range.

  Chamita swung around the boulder and pulled Lester back as the bootleggers fired at us from their side of the divide. Somehow, she managed to get him out of the way without injury while the battle raged. Lobo was on the ground, fighting the command to stay put that
she’d given him a minute ago.

  Sections of rock were blasted away and the sound of gunfire in the cavern echoed all over it. I didn’t know what was down there, but I’m sure any creatures took flight the moment the battle began. The air was filled with smoke and the smell of burnt gunpowder. I swore and wished I had the logbook with the character sheets.

  I never saw him come up behind me.

  I was told a long time ago to watch your rear in any tight situation. I forget the most fundamental rule. I heard a movement next to me, turned and expected to see Howard or Bonnie. I moved my head and found my eyes staring into one that belonged to one of the gat men. He swung the stock of his rifle and smashed it right into my head.

  I went to the ground. Pwned.

  Chamita stood over me. What woke me was Lobo licking my face. I had dim memories of what happened while I was out. She reached down and helped me up. I felt a little sick, but the pain faded quickly. No one wanted the bloody concussion in a “fun” game, no matter how realistic it was supposed to be.

  I saw Howard with his shotgun sitting next to Lester who cradled his Tommy gun. Lester’s gun had one of the big 100 round magazines on it. I’d picked it up and that gun was heavy.

  “What happened?” I asked Chamita. “Where is Bonnie?”

  “He grabbed her,” she explained. “Man who hit you. I was with Lester. Couldn’t stop him, he drug her away. They back there.” She pointed to the distance.

  I worked myself over to the other side of the rock as Lester and Howard applied some of the brown fungus to wounds. Chamita found it near the rock, they informed me. Already I could see the healing powers of it go to work on the wounds they’d received.

  “What about Bonnie?” I said, as the lights of the bootleggers were visible in the distance. “What are we going to do about her?”

  “I get her,” Chamita told me and leaped from the trail to another rock, headed in their direction. Lobo followed her in silence.

  11

  Chamita wanted to attack the other side with her spear and wolf. Most people would consider this a suicide charge, but the wolf girl was more than human. I watched Chamita make her way toward the group of gat men and bootleggers who were trying to figure out what to do. One of them had Bonnie up against a rock. He yelled at her.

  That was too much. Game or no game, I couldn’t let Chamita go out there alone. It was time to bring this thing to an end and leave with my money. I could survive without the bonus and maybe Sandstone Gems would find a way to use me later. After all, hadn’t I lasted much longer in this VR world than they expected? I reached into my pocket for the watch.

  It wasn’t there.

  As I searched the ground in frustration, I saw Chamita’s form move closer to the bootleggers. This was serious. Not only had I lost the logbook, which gave me the information on the game, I’d mislaid the watch. Or did someone grab it when I was out cold? I needed that watch and continued to search the ground for it. I was down on my knees feeling the stone floor when I saw Chamita jump from a rock and land in front of the bootleggers.

  I decided the watch could wait. I wasn’t about to let this massacre happen. Lobo stood next to her and let loose one of his signature growls. Chamita raised her spear and sighted on the man who slapped Bonnie.

  “Cover me, Howard!” I yelled as I ran past him. My head still hurt from the blow.

  Howard was up and with his gun by the time I ran past. Even Lester looked better when I zoomed by his boyish form. I ran past the boulder we used as cover and sprinted down the path to where Chamita stood with Lobo. I had to get there before those gangsters realized all they faced was a small woman with a spear. She might be the angel of death with a knife, but no way would she survive a fusillade of bullets from those bootleggers.

  In my mind, I tried to remember the stat sheets about the gun types the bootleggers carried and their level of skill. Most of these guys were basic gat men or red shirts that were expendable to the mob bosses. However, there were a few trained killers in that bunch. All it would take to end this game right now was the right virtual D10 dice toss inside the computer and we’d be gone. Then I’d be back in the laboratories of the Sandstone crew with the knowledge I’d failed again.

  Before he even noticed her, Chamita struck the bootlegger with the full force of her spear. The man screamed when the point gouged into his arm. He dropped the gun he carried. The gat man staggered away and tried to reach down for it, but Lobo was on him. It was a good thing the bootleggers didn’t see Chamita until his screams attracted their attention. The entire group swerved in our direction with enough guns to pulverize a house. I only had a few seconds to react.

  I grabbed Bonnie and pulled her back with me. Thankfully, I’d brought the automatic with me and stopped long enough to fire a round into the mob of bootleggers. The almighty dice decided it was a good move and one of them fell to the ground, maybe I got a backstab modifier on my roll. However, there was more who stood in our direction with trigger fingers.

  Chamita went in low with her spear and attacked another bootlegger who screamed when he felt himself disemboweled. I held my fire as she was between us and the other mobsters. She leaped on a rock, found another target and jumped into the mob. There was another yell and Chamita jumped back out in time to avoid a gunshot.

  The bootleggers were out of control and shot wild at the shadows. Chamita could take advantage of the confusion. She managed to get a few more strikes in, and then disappeared. The caverns lit with the muzzle flash from the mobster’s guns as they fired in all directions. But they couldn’t sight on her in the low light of the glow fungus. They’d brought torches and electric lights with them into the cavern, but those were scattered everywhere in the fight.

  I found a niche and pulled Bonnie into it with me. “Are you alright?” I asked her. “I saw that thug slap you and wasn’t about to sit still for it.”

  “I was scared,” she trembled with her arms around me. “That man, I couldn’t understand a word he said. He kept screaming at me. He wanted to know something. All I could recognize was ‘diamonds’. He kept asking me about the diamonds.”

  I groaned. “That’s great,” I told her, “They know about the treasure. Thermon survived after Lobo went at him. Now he’s passed on that information to the others and they want the gems. It’s why they came down into the cavern. The treasure makes it worthwhile to risk coming after us.”

  “She stabbed him with that spear,” Bonnie gasped. “Chamita came out of nowhere and got him in the arm. I couldn’t believe it.”

  “I think she was aiming for his heart,” I observed. “She’s made a number of kills with that spear of hers. And she hasn’t used the knife yet. That gat man is lucky to be alive. He might not be much longer.”

  I could hear the bursts of Tommy guns. The bootleggers had them too. We were trapped between the two parties as Lester fired at the bootleggers. They returned with their own spray of bullets. I didn’t know if Lester had any more drums of ammunition. I hoped he’d had enough sense to bring a few with him after we discovered that haul.

  The problem with the Tommy gun was that it was a short-range weapon. I didn’t need the stat sheets to know it wasn’t accurate over a certain distance. Because the weight of the gun, it was not that accurate unless the person who fired it did so at close range. Against a room full of targets, the gun was deadly. Against an opponent who crouched behind a rock and returned fire, not so deadly.

  Eventually they would cease-fire and wait to see what we planned to do. It didn’t matter how many men each side could command, the Tommy guns could sweep any approach and exterminate the attacker.

  I held Bonnie close. We were both frightened at the moment and I wasn’t certain who was more scared.

  I cursed myself in silence for losing the watch. The Sandstone crew would figure out they couldn’t get in touch and bring me back if I remained incommunicado. They could still monitor my life statistics inside the VR world, but they wouldn’t allow
me to wonder around without proper supervision. Yeah, this was definitely a beta test.

  From where I stood, I could barely see Howard, who’d take a position on the rock next to Lester. I waved my hand up and down since it was so hard to see anything in this land of eternal night. I saw him nod and continue to sight on the bootleggers with his carbine. At least he knew we were there.

  What had Chamita meant by learning from an old man? This must be a piece of the puzzle I didn’t understand. If she was the daughter of Wellington and survived the crash, someone had taken care of her. What happened to her benefactor? If she was raised by some hermit, why was her command of language so sporadic? It was an odd story line to build into a pulp adventure game, but it could reveal a lot about the game designer.

  This place was so remote that it didn’t surprise me no one noticed the airship crash until now. The airship wasn’t even supposed to be this far north when it went down. I had little knowledge of the incident, but I had someone with me who knew all about it.

  “Bonnie,” I began, “was there a storm the night the Wellington airship disappeared?” I looked down at her.

  It was quite as there was a lull in the fighting.

  “A bad one,” she told me. “The airship hit some really bad weather after it took off. It was an experimental one with gas engines and was supposed to go south to Florida, where it would refuel and resupply. But the wind took it off course and it was never seen again. Radio transmissions were hard to broadcast back then and it didn’t have any way to communicate with the ground.”

  “So how did you know to find it here?” I asked her.

  “Lester and I spent the better part of a year going through libraries and looking up the weather patterns recorded that day. Lester did the calculations on where it must have gone down. We went to Howard, who’d done this kind of treasure hunting before. Guess we didn’t bring enough guns this time.”