Lord of the Flame: A LitRPG novel (Call of Carrethen Book 2)

by Stephen Roark

  “No,” I replied. “I am sorry. I’m new to the Dark World.”

  “You are not Sunken,” Anwi said, the softest of smiles appearing at the edges of her lips as she gazed across our party. “Hectar has sunken. I fear what has become of him. I’ve spent many days searching for him…you would tell me if you had seen him, wouldn’t you?”

  “Of course,” I replied quickly, loosening my grip on my daggers. “But, I’m sorry—the only people I’ve seen in this world are you and my two companions here.”

  “Oh, hello,” Anwi replied, as though she’d forgotten her manners. “My name is Anwi of Alexandria. How are you?”

  “Hi, Anwi. I’m Kodiak.”

  “And I’m Gehman.”

  “Do you know of The Fallen God?” she asked. There was an innocence to her—the way she spoke—like a child.

  “I do,” Gehman replied. “I’ve seen her.”

  “Might you know where I can find her?”

  “I’m sorry,” Gehman said. “But the last time I saw her was outside Sheol.”

  “Oh,” Anwi replied, hanging her head once more. “That is unfortunate. Sheol is a long journey from here.”

  “Anwi,” I said. “Why are you looking for Rayne?”

  “Hectar has sunken,” she replied, her voice quivering as she stared into the flames of the bonfire at her feet. “There is nothing I can do to save him now from that, but the Fallen God possesses the power to end his suffering. A blessing from her will allow me to save him from his terrible fate. It’s the least I can do for him.”

  “You mean…end his life,” Kodiak said softly.

  Anwi nodded, slowly getting to her feet. “I must be going now. If the Fallen God is indeed found in Sheol, I must get started. I have a long way to travel.”

  “Wait!” I cried out as Anwi stepped past me towards the mouth of the crypt. “I—I can save Hectar! You don’t have to kill him!”

  Anwi shook her head sadly as she slid her helm over her head. It hid her face completely, with only a series of small holes for her to look out of. I could no longer see her expression, but as she shook her head, I understood how she was feeling.

  “Such a thing is not possible,” she whispered, shouldering her shield and monstrous sword. “Although I wish it were.”

  “It is!” I cried out. “This is my friend, Gehman. He was Sunken! But I restored him! Gehman, tell her!”

  “It’s true,” Gehman replied. “I died countless times and had sunken completely. But Jane brought me back.”

  Anwi turned her head to me and shifted in a way that caused me to step back. There was something threatening in her pose. Where moments ago there had been a sad, broken girl, I now saw a wounded warrior.

  “It is unkind to say what you are saying,” she said slowly. “Do you think ill of me? Perhaps you are not as friendly as you appear.”

  I held up my hands in a display of peace. “I don’t think ill of you, Anwi,” I told her. “I am just trying to help Hectar.”

  “There is no help for Hectar now,” she said. Her voice was steel, no longer wavering or sad, but full of purpose and determination. “Only a blessing from The Fallen God will allow me to lay my companion to rest.”

  “Anwi,” I said, but stopped as she placed a hand on the hilt of her sword.

  “Do not attempt to delay me any longer,” she said, her voice low and threatening. “I do not wish to harm you.”

  “Let her go,” Kodiak whispered from behind me, gently tugging on my arm. Slowly, I stepped aside and allowed her to pass. She stepped out of the crypt into the graveyard—into the pouring rain. She stopped and turned back to us.

  “Perhaps we will meet again,” she said, the strength in her voice fading. “I wish you luck in your journeys.”

  Resting her sword against a gravestone, Anwi raised her fist towards us. A golden light appeared. It swirled and grew, coils of energy twisting around her wrist. When she opened her hand, pillars of golden light formed at our feet, swept over our bodies, and then vanished.

  “A blessing,” she said, picking up her sword. “The Dark World has claimed many souls. I pray you do not befall the same fate.”

  And with that, she turned her back on us and walked away into the darkness.

  14

  Chilgrave Castle

  “What was that?” Gehman asked. I quickly glanced down to the corner of my vision and saw a small icon of a flexing arm holding a sword.

  Blessing of the Valkyrie—Places a blessing on a player that increases all their stats by 10% for 1 hour.

  “She buffed us,” I said with a smile, peering through the darkness in the direction Anwi had gone. “She must be playing some kind of Paladin build or something.”

  “Did you see that sword?” Gehman asked. “I’ve never seen anything like it! Wish I could get it back to the shop.”

  “I don’t think she’d be too keen on you messing with it,” Kodiak said grimly. “She doesn’t seem to be the kind to let other people help her.”

  “If only she’d have listened to me,” I said sadly.

  “It wouldn’t matter if she did,” Kodiak remarked. “She’s on her way to Sheol, with absolutely no idea where this Hectar guy is. What were we supposed to do, just roam around the world with her until she found him?”

  I sighed and leaned back against the cold stone of the crypt. I knew the headstones in front of me were not those of real people and were merely a piece of the world created by the developers, but I couldn’t help but be reminded of all the friends I’d lost in Carrethen.

  “This is…this is all really bad,” I muttered miserably to myself. “You know—it’s more than likely that Jack is dead.”

  “I don’t think…” Gehman started to reply, but his voice trailed off. I turned to face him. “If the Fallen God—Rayne, has found a way to kill the Sunken, then…there’s a chance, right?”

  “Jack can take care of himself,” Gehman replied. “I mean, he was a complete badass, remember?”

  I smiled. “Of course I do. But you haven’t seen him, right? I mean—what if he’s stuck in Sheol with all of those players going Sunken!?”

  “Then he’s not dead,” Kodiak replied. “Rayne can’t get in there. Not while the Lord of the Flame guards the entrance.”

  “Okay, so what if he was Unchained?” I asked, growing more and more panicked as I went on. “What if he died out there like Gehman, and Rayne and her guild found him and—”

  “Stop it,” Kodiak said firmly, taking my hand. “You’re only going to drive yourself crazy. There’s no way of knowing what happened to your friend. The best we can do is find you some gear, get Gehman some levels and keep searching.”

  I took a breath. He was right. I knew he was right, and it was a completely uncharacteristic display of emotion for me—at least in a video game.

  “We need to find some loot,” I said. “You know—I haven’t even checked out these daggers you made for me.”

  I inspected them.

  Pristine Double Daggers—Damage 415-480. Piercing.

  “Hmmm,” I mumbled, a little disappointed. They were better than nothing, but barely better than Jack’s Executioner’s Blade after Gehman had upgraded it. For a level 126, it was severely underpowered.

  “They were the best I could at this level,” Gehman said sadly, kicking a stone at his feet.

  “I’m sorry, Gehman,” I said quickly, turning to him with a smile. “They’re fine. They’re great! If it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t have anything at all.”

  His face lit up slightly at that, but I still couldn’t help feeling a little sorry for the guy. He’d died so early on in Carrethen that he’d never even got started. Then, he’d been stuck in the Dark World, dying over and over, losing himself more and more each time. I’d saved him, and he wanted to help, but at level 24, how much was there really he could do?

  “Okay,” I said with determination. “I need gear. Gehman needs levels. This place is empty. We need a plan.”

&nbs
p; “There’s a canyon about a half an hour walk from here,” Kodiak suggested. “Rock Golems and Stone Lizards.”

  “Do they drop anything I could use?”

  Kodiak shook his head. “Not really.”

  “Ugh,” I groaned, looking up at the sky. The rain had slowed slightly, turning into more of a mist. My eyes searched the trees for a Skeleton spawn or some kind of monster we could fight, but the forest was dead. Apparently spawns were broken in the Dark World too.

  Some backup, Wintermute.

  But as I gazed out through the mist, the blackness and the trees, something caught my eye.

  A light, soft and almost imperceptible, but a light nonetheless. I raised my hand and pointed.

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  Kodiak stepped up quickly to my side and peered out through the mist. “I don’t know,” he said cautiously. “Another bonfire?”

  “I don’t think so,” I said slowly. “It looks like it’s in something. A window maybe. Is there a castle up that way?”

  “Not that I know of,” Kodiak replied. “But I’ve never really been past the woods in that direction.”

  “Well, it’s better than staying here,” I shrugged. “Come on. Let’s check it out. Gehman, stay between us. I don’t want you getting one-shotted.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” Gehman grumbled.

  I led the way through the woods, my Pristine Double Daggers at the ready. But the forest was dead. There weren’t even any in-game sounds as we progressed. Everything felt unnatural. The silence hung over us like a constant threat of danger, and I couldn’t help but feel as though we were walking into a trap.

  We left the gravestones behind us, and eventually, the trees began to thin out and the terrain turned rocky. Twisted roots clung to rocks and boulders, and skeletal trunks protruded from the stony ground at our feet. It was like a once great forest, now hollow and petrified. The lack of anything living simply added to its chill. I ducked under a fallen tree in front of me, and when I came out on the other side, I saw the source of the light.

  “There,” I said, stepping up onto a fallen tree trunk. I raised my hand and pointed to a ruined stone castle that lay ahead of us atop a rocky peak. On one side was an enormous cliff that dropped off into a chasm below, and the entire castle seemed to be leaning towards it. It looked like the slightest breeze would be enough to topple it. And in the top window of the single high tower was the flickering light.

  Gehman stepped up beside me. “Chilgrave Castle.”

  15

  Deadly Shadows

  “Chilgrave?” I repeated. “How do you know that? Are you sure?”

  Gehman nodded. “Pretty sure. Cavey told me about it. Said he wanted to hunt there when he got high enough. I don’t know if he ever made it.”

  “He’s right,” Kodiak agreed, hopping onto a large rock to get a better look. “I’ve heard about it too, but I thought it was way down south on an island off the coast.”

  “Yeah!” Gehman replied excitedly. “That’s what I heard too!”

  “The Dark World is just full of surprises,” I frowned, sizing up the castle. We were still kind of far away, but I could see dark shapes moving beneath the large front gate. “Any idea what those are?”

  “Werewolves probably,” Kodiak replied. “I’ve fought lower level ones and they’re a real pain in the ass. They have this obnoxious stun attack and this super fast claw attack. They also like to gang up.”

  “What level are we talking here?”

  Kodiak shrugged. “Could be 50, could be 250.”

  “Cavey said they were in their 60s,” Gehman said, trying to be helpful.

  “Kodiak’s right,” I said, keeping my eyes on the shapes. I counted three of them. “There’s no telling what level these guys could be. Gehman, I want you to stay way behind us and we’ll go up there and scout it out.”

  “All right,” Gehman replied. I could hear the disappointment in his voice. He was useless right now and he knew it. But we needed to start getting some experience, and for the moment, Chilgrave Castle seemed like our only option.

  “Okay, here we go,” I said, crouching low. “Stay with me, Kodiak. We’ll get close and inspect them. If they’re a level we can handle, I’ll motion to you, Gehman, and you get in range to gain experience from our kills. Got it?”

  “Got it!”

  “If you get attacked by anything, you call out to us, okay?” I told him. “I don’t want you dying and going Sunken again on me.”

  “That makes two of us.”

  I flashed him a smile then started off towards the castle, keeping my head down while running as fast as I could. The slope was difficult, filled with gaps in the rock big enough to catch your foot in, and caused our progress to slow significantly as we approached the base of the keep.

  A large pile of stones that had come off the tower wall lay in front of us, and I quickly took cover behind them and looked out. Kodiak slid up beside me.

  “See them?” he asked. My eyes searched the courtyard. The massive metal gate appeared to have been bent and broken from the inside, as though something enormous had escaped from within, but there was no sign of the shadowy shapes we’d seen from the woods.

  “No!” I hissed. “Do you?”

  “No! What the Hell—?”

  But before I could finish, a shadow moved in the corner of my eye. I didn’t have time to react before a set of silver claws tore into the side of my face, slashing away at my health.

  “Look out!” Kodiak cried out, leaping over me to block the next attack from a werewolf at least twice our size.

  The beast clawed at him but Kodiak ducked and weaved with incredible speed, dodging a series of attacks and replying with his own. His dagger dug into the beast’s chest, chipping away some of its health but nothing very significant.

  “Are you guys okay!?” Gehman shouted from behind us.

  “Gehman, stay back!” I didn’t have time to inspect the monster, but judging by its health pool, it was definitely a tough one.

  Kodiak pivoted leapt over the werewolf, evading another one of its attacks. The wolf spun around to face him, leaving its back exposed to me. I seized the opportunity and activated Ambush.

  The blow struck home, dealing 400% damage and also scoring a critical hit. More than a quarter of the beast’s remaining health was gone in an instant. Wasting no time, I followed up with Mutilate, spinning quickly and driving both dagger’s into the werewolf’s side, scoring a second critical hit.

  The wolf howled in pain as I raised my daggers for another attack, but before I could use Blade Flurry, something grabbed me from behind.

  An enormous claw seized me by the throat and yanked me backwards, hurling me into the air like a ragdoll. I cried out as I slammed down against the rocky ground and watched as a good chunk of my health disappeared. I looked up as a second werewolf leapt at me, its enormous mouth wide open, exposing two rows of putrid brown teeth.

  I tried to scramble out of the way, but my body didn’t respond. It was then that I noticed the stun debuff ticking down in the corner of my vision. There was nothing I could do but watch as the wolf sank its teeth into my chest.

  “Aaaaaah!” I screamed in pain as half of my health vanished instantly. I felt every one of the countless teeth penetrate my flesh. Like a rabid dog, the beast swung its head back and forth, peeling away even more of my remaining health.

  It released me, sending me spinning into the stone rubble at the base of the castle. I slammed down hard as the debuff wore off, and tried to scramble for my Health Kit, but there was no time. The third werewolf had positioned itself in the shadows beside me. With a snarl, it leapt towards me.

  I threw myself out of the way, doing my best to scramble across the stone, but it was almost impossible to get my footing. I heard one of my attackers let out a roar that seemed to shake the very ground beneath me, and I knew I had less than a second before its jaws found me again.

  Kodiak was in front of me, still fig
hting his wolf, which was below 25 percent health, but if these two took care of me, there was no way he’d be able to handle all three of them. I tried to dodge left, hoping that the beast behind me would somehow miss with its next attack, but my foot caught in a crack beneath me and sent me toppling forward like a falling tree.

  I hit the ground hard, but the fall was a blessing in disguise. The werewolf soared over me, its jaws open, and slammed headfirst into a boulder. It slumped down, apparently stunned, and I used the moment I had to use a charge from my Peerless Health Kit. It wasn’t enough to refill my health, but at least I wasn’t one hit away from death anymore.

  I hope.

  “Jane!” Kodiak shouted. “Help!”

  “Oh, sure,” I grumbled, leaping to my feet. The third werewolf was hot on my heels as I raced towards Kodiak, who was being backed towards a thick chasm that had cut its way through the rock. His health was dangerously low, but so was the wolf’s, and again, it had its back to me.

  I used Ambush and scored a massive critical hit that shaved away almost all of the beast’s remaining health. I followed up with Blade Flurry and lashed out as a burst of speed and power flowed through my arms. My daggers slashed into the wolf’s back like a whirlwind, and I watched as his health bar dropped to nothing. With an ear piercing howl, the werewolf collapsed to the ground and exploded out of existence.

  “Woo, thanks!” Kodiak grinned.

  “Hey, you did all the hard work,” I replied.

  “Duck!” he shouted.

  I dropped to my knees as another one of the wolves leapt after me. It landed on the ground between us and snarled, baring its teeth at me. I heard more movement behind me, and spun around just in time to block a double claw attack from the other wolf.

  I held my daggers together in front of me, using my high Strength to push back against the beast as it snarled and snapped at me. I knew the moment I pulled back, it would be on me, and the chances of me surviving a direct attack were not good.