by Charles Dean
Darwin didn’t actually know this. Eve had just told him where to go and what to get, but didn’t fill him in on all the details. He normally wouldn’t have trusted her, but she had laid out perfectly what would happen to Valcrest and what he needed to save the people remaining. That said, he did know that the level cap was 255, probably the game creator’s homage to old number limits from the 8 bit games. He also knew that no one was supposed to reach that level until a few years after the release of the game. “Yeah, I don’t know. I guess the only question left is if Stephanie was actually a raid Boss.”
“No, the real question is, why the heck was one of those Stones on this island? This is a beginners’ island. Who would put a super Boss and a secret Stone on a starter island where no one could ever get it? That just seems really confusing and kind of mean, like they were expecting players to spend forever doing something repetitive just so they could get a reward they weren’t even sure existed.”
“Yeah, kind of like the gem on Diablo 2,” Darwin thought, thinking back on the hours he had clicked it without knowing what it did.
“Don’t remind me,” Kass muttered under her breath.
“Okay, but yeah, the gem being here does raise a lot of questions. Questions that we probably can’t answer here, so we should get a move on.”
“Ummm, about that. You see, the thing is . . . I’m not okay with just going back to town right now.”
“Why not?” Darwin asked.
“Because, I want a proper Boss fight, Darwin! I want an awesome Staff like your Sword! But between your family reunion and little miss drools-over-old-men, I’ve spent two days in dungeons and don’t have a single item drop from a Boss fight to show for it,” she whined.
“So you want to try to take on the raid Boss?”
“Oh, Hell, no. Let’s get out of here. I’m just saying let’s go to the closest dungeon around our level and fight a Boss, get me some gear, and then we can go back to the mine where you can play Sim City with your group. But I want a cool Staff.”
“Your Staff isn’t cool enough with all that ice coming out of it?” Darwin tried to make a pun, but the cold look on Kass’ face showed him it wasn’t appreciated. “Alright, alright, fine. You’ve helped me get this far. I’ll help you with a dungeon. Do you know any close by?”
“Yeah, actually I thought when you said Grennich dungeon on Menive Mountain you were referring to the dungeon people were talking about on the forums. By the time we had gotten to the dungeon, it must have slipped my mind that it wasn’t the same place. They say the Boss is supposed to be a giant beast with monstrous power, but I’ve got some cool enchantment spells that should help you handle that.”
“Alright, let’s do it.”
“And I get to keep all the items.”
“. . .”
“Fine! We’ll go by class breakdown as usual. But just so you know, you’re being totally unfair. Even Fuzzy Wuzzy thinks you should let me keep the items.”
“That’s because Fuzzy Wuzzy hasn’t learned who his master is, has he?” Darwin said, wagging a finger at his Zombie Bear as if it were just a regular bad dog. “No taking her side over mine. Bad! Bad!” The big beast lowered its head like a dog does when it puts its tail between its legs and made a whimpering sound.
“Hey, ease off the big guy. He just knows who is smarter and better looking,” Kass said, wrapping her arms around the big Bear.
“Smart enough to talk yourself out of a dungeon?” Darwin threatened.
“Nope! Let’s go. I think I know the way,” Kass ended the conversation before things could go any further.
-------
Kass did not know the way though. It took them half an hour of searching around the area where it ‘should have been’ before they finally found it. They might not have found it at all if one of Fuzzy Wuzzy’s attack attempts against a low flying waspy-like monster hadn’t knocked over several trees blocking the view and revealed the cave. When Darwin noticed that there weren’t any fancy statues, beautiful cut roofs or even a hint of decoration, he somehow felt a weight lift off him that he didn’t know was there. All he needed now was a trusty Spear and he’d be back in one of his old games. Maybe he could even get a ridiculously big Sword, add fifteen buckles needlessly to his Bathrobe and pretend he was in a Square Enix game. While he was eager to go back to the silver ore mine and set up his new toy, he couldn’t complain with the dungeon idea after seeing it. A good simple dungeon with easy grinding: it was like being home again for Darwin.
“So what do you think the monster is going to be this time?” Kass asked as they started into the cave.
“I don’t know. Maybe a giant bunny. I’ve heard they're very deadly,” Darwin said, just as clueless as she was about what they’d run into.
“Not if you know how to count to three.”
“Well, that might be a problem considering I went to a public school in the States.”
“Ouch.”
“Yeah, they let us bring calculators to class so no one would fail algebra, but the teacher was so old he didn’t even know that the calculator would solve equations with variables if you just plug them in.”
“Wow, you got lucky. My teacher wouldn’t even let us bring a cheat sheet much less a calculator.”
“Well, to be honest though, I spent most of my time playing Snake, Drugwars and Tetris on my calculator. Didn’t really use it much for math.”
“Yeah, that definitely explains a lot.”
“Hey, don’t be like that. I learned plenty of math, just from a higher form of education: video games. I don’t think I would have even passed the SATs verbal section either if it weren’t for grammar nazis on reddit and video games using outdated words like they were all magical. God bless the modern education system.”
“Aren’t you supposed to be the old man here? Shouldn’t you be lecturing me about staying in school, not telling me to spend my time playing video games and browsing reddit?”
“Nah. You’re old enough to know that all that stuff about your parents being model students is probably a lie.”
“As if! Mine were--woah! That thing is ugly!” Kass was about to argue about how great her parents were when she stopped to point out the monster ahead of them.
Darwin could only shake his head. It was a horrendous looking hairless Boar. It had the normal ugly snout but with a disfigured lopsided underbite and two sets of tusks instead of one. On top of that, it had horns with patchy hair on them growing out of its ear. “What in the world is that ugly thing? It’s like a pig man with radiation poisoning.”
“Awww, so it will be another dungeon hosting of a Darwin family reunion,” Kass said, not able to stop herself from laughing.
“Har dee har har, and here I thought he was your type,” Darwin smirked.
“Okay, well, jokes aside, do you wanna go do your little double Sword dance and kill that thing? I’m kind of getting sick just looking at it,” Kass said while enchanting Darwin’s blade with ice.
Darwin couldn’t agree more about wanting to get rid of the creature, but he was more worried about the prospect of an entire dungeon of them. The first dungeon had been nothing but Turtle-Wolves, and now this dungeon was likely going to be nothing but Mutant Boars: ugly, gross, disgusting, Mutant Boars.
As he pulled out his two weapons and charged the Boar, Darwin found himself very happy he had a strong stomach. If he hadn’t been desensitized from years of horror games and movies, he might have lost his lunch when he cut open the Mutant Boar with his Burriza’s Blade. It was only after the creature was dead that he stopped thinking about how gross it was and started thinking about something wicked. What if I revive it and have it follow Kass around? How long would it take before she got mad and tried to kill it--or me? The ends of his lips curled up in such a fashion that even Fuzzy Wuzzy started to look uncomfortable. I’ll just get her to agree to it first without realizing what she’s agreeing to, he schemed.
“Kass, I have an idea,” he said, loo
king over to her.
“Nope,” Kass said.
“Nope? How can you say that so quickly when I haven’t even told you what the idea is.” Darwin was doing his best to stifle a laugh; he couldn’t keep his mind off the idea of a Mutant Zombie Boar following her around.
“I don’t know what you’re planning to do, but I definitely know it’s a nope with that face you’re making.”
Darwin silently cursed his inability to keep a straight face. He would make an awful poker player--maybe he could get a few lessons from the poker Bear boss of the dungeon he now owned. “Alright, fine, but it was a good idea.”
“Nope. It wasn’t,” Kass reaffirmed, cutting him off before he could say anymore.
“You don’t even know what it is!” Darwin protested.
“I know enough,” she said with her head held high.
She was right, but Darwin still felt unhappy about the fact he didn’t get a chance to even tell her. When they rounded the corner and saw not one but several Mutant Boars, Darwin sighed and looked over at Fuzzy Wuzzy and the two Turtle-Wolves. He knew it was going to be a long dungeon and that those three would be his only backup through most of it. Stupid ugly Boars, couldn’t let me enjoy some quality level grinding, could you?
Qasin:
Qasin felt an itch as he walked to the White-Horn capital. It was irritation that gnawed at his mind, letting him know in vivid detail that his Sword was doing nothing. The walk had been about as uneventful as a walk could be. He knew what was in store for him: that he would walk all the way to the White-Horn capital and challenge their leader by their own ridiculous rite of combat. If he won, he would be made their new leader, and from there he would have accomplished something that had never been done before, uniting all the races, in less than a week. Talk and politics--they were all useless to Qasin. All he needed was a good blade, a fact that made him painfully aware that he was missing an excuse to use his.
After hours of walking since he had left the Black-Wing village, he came upon an interesting sight. In the distance, there was a tall, dark-haired girl with ivory white skin and a black Dress heading in the same direction as him, just at a much slower pace. She was also clearly about to be ambushed by three red-eyed, giant-antlered Moose charging at her from her side, and the oddest part was that she didn’t seem to notice.
Before he could even think, Qasin’s instincts took over and he found himself charging at her attackers. He leaped in the air and landed on the closest Devil-Moose, and he stabbed his sword right through the back of its neck. He jumped off the dead monster as it fell to the ground and landed with a roll in front of the next charging Devil-Moose, slitting its throat as he went.
Qasin sighed. The fight was over, but so was his excuse to swing his blade. He had saved the girl, dispatched of the evil, marauding Devil-Moose and now was back to being just a regular guy standing around with nothing to do. He was about to complain about the whole ordeal when the damsel in distress broke the post battle silence.
“My hero,” the woman said, giving him a golfer’s clap. “Should I always expect the person who rescues me to be so dashing and thorough about it.”
“You shouldn’t always expect to be rescued,” Qasin said, his instincts telling him that something was off about this red-eyed woman.
“But then how would poor little old me ever get where I need to go?” she asked, clearly affecting a sultry tone as she sauntered closer to Qasin.
“Look, just be careful not to travel through dangerous zones alone.” He knew she was going to try to use him. Qasin had seen women move this way at the courts when they wanted something. But that itch that let him know everything his blade wasn’t doing was coming back already, and a distraction from it was more than welcome.
“Oh, but I’m not alone. I have you to escort me. You will escort me, right?”
Extra luggage. Qasin frowned. “I suppose I can escort you for now, but I don’t think we are headed to the same place.”
“Really? I’m going to meet with the leader of the White-Horns,” she said, circling around Qasin and adding, “I have a terribly urgent request of him, and I need to notify him of some awful events that have happened.”
“But, aren’t you a Human? Why would you go to the White-Horn’s leader and not the Human Faction’s leader?”
“Oh him? He’s a terribly dull man who does nothing but listen to the idle chatter of fat, piggish Councilmen. Why, asking him to do anything would be a waste of my time and breath. I’m sure you understand,” she said, waving off the idea as if everyone should have known it was preposterous.
“I do . . .” he admitted. She may have been making fun of him, but he couldn’t have agreed with her more if this had been a week ago. Even the words she used to describe the Council felt like his own.
“So then, you know why I must go seek help from the White-Horns instead of the humans,” she said, the daggers of her words digging into his chest.
“I suppose I do,” he answered, deciding it was probably not in his best interest to tell her the person she was talking to was the King she had just mocked.
“Good. Then you know where I’m going, but I don’t know where my young hero is off to?”
“Oh, we’re headed to the same place.”
“Are you also seeking an audience with their ruler?”
“You could say that.”
“Well, good, then you can be both my dashing hero and my charming escort,” she said, wrapping herself around his left arm. “Now, let’s get going, dear.”
Qasin didn’t argue with her at all. He didn’t know her name, where she came from, or what dire information she needed to tell the White-Horn King, but he did know that he had already saved her life and agreed to escort her somehow. “Yes, milady.”
“Now, if you’re going to escort me, I think it’s only proper we get to know each other,” she said. “My name is Eve. What’s yours?”
“I’m Qasin,” the King said. Only after saying it did he remember he was still trying to hide his identity.
“Like the King?” she asked.
“Yeah, just like the King,” he mused. It’s not technically a lie.
“Then that must explain your royal demeanor. You’re positively brimming with stuffy, entitled, sophisticated royalness. Why, one might even think you were a King yourself.”
“Are you sure you’re not talking about yourself?” Qasin deflected, wondering if he was really that stuffy.
“Oh, me too! For sure. But I’m a Queen, you know?”
“A Queen? Of what?”
“Oh, well, women must have their secrets. If I didn’t, then I wouldn’t be able to call myself a proper lady, now would I? So I’m afraid that little tidbit will remain a secret.”
“I see. So this meeting with the White-Horn leader will be diplomatic by nature then?”
“Not quite . . . do you know any restaurants along the way?”
“Can’t say I’ve ever been down this road, so I’m going to have to say no.”
“That’s too bad, you’ll have to find a nice place to treat me to a meal. I can’t be famished on my way, and you shan’t get away without fulfilling your role as my escort.”
“Yes, milady,” Qasin said for the second time in the conversation. He still felt like something was off about her, but he also felt like having her around would alleviate both his boredom and his growing thirst. “I’ll make sure it’s up to your standards.”
Kass:
Kass always felt a mixture of admiration and horror as she watched her red-eyed friend tear into the flesh of his enemies. She had seen warriors fight before, and she knew their gorey, hack-and-slash melee visage well, but they were nothing like Darwin. When others fought, it was clear they were playing a game. They would either play out their attacks like turns, thinking before each strike, or just recklessly swing with abandon at the monster’s hit box hoping to do damage.
When Darwin fought, it was different: almost every hit landed with gore
-creating precision on a vital spot, and his motions didn't even flow so much as creep like lingering death across a battle. It was a fine line of savage he walked: somewhere between an animal fighting for its very survival and a sadistic artist that considered his weapon as an instrument and a body as a masterpiece waiting to be painted with pain and cruelty.
Naturally, then, it often sent shivers down her spine when Darwin carved up forest monsters, but not this time. This time, it made Kass feel relief as he obliterated the horrendous and putrid Boars one after another. Just looking at them caused her stomach to do somersaults and her insides attempt an emergency evacuation through her mouth. I need to have Dad find out what team designed these vile creatures and fire them. Then fire them from every future job require the designing or illustrating of anything on any medium, she thought angrily. The only saving grace was that between her spells, Frost Edge and the new Frost Step, she could close her eyes and still contribute to the fight. With Frost Step [Level 1], she could increase Darwin’s movement speed by 5% while slowing the speed of all those within a 3-meter radius of him by 5%. Coupled with her Frost Edge [Level 3]’s 25% boost to damage for Darwin, she felt she’d contributed enough to justify gaining the experience in those fights where the visual was too much to take.
