by Nikita Thorn
“Greed is human nature,” Kentaro concluded.
Seiki could only stare at the new kind of chaos unfolding in front of his eyes. The myriad of Honor Warriors members, plus individual citizens from other clans, in all sorts of mismatching gear, flying no flags and riding in no particular organization, descended indiscriminately on the fish and the Rogami army alike, and perhaps even on one another.
From the tumultuous scene, there was a disorderly mess of multi-colored smoke, gleaming blades, and bodies piling up at a shocking rate. In the distance, more and more people were joining in, and even those who had been staying in the tree lines to watch the siege had now decided to rush into the frenzy.
“It’s a brawl,” said Seiki in disbelief. In this every-man-for-himself situation, the Rogami army was trying to fight back, but the happy brawlers of Shinshioka hardly cared. Even after quickly dying, the majority of them simply chose the nearest temporary shrine and ran back as soon as they could to continue their participation in the lawless frenzy.
“I change my mind. I love brawls,” Seiki said, before starting to laugh. For some reason, he suddenly wished that the rare would drop a Sheathed Blade or some wonderful treasure for any one of these people battling it right now, even if it was the Rogami Clan.
The first light of dawn had touched the eastern horizon once again when the rare finally lay dead on the ground like a transparent beached whale, and the idle citizens of Shinshioka, with no stake in this war other than their own amusement, grew bored and slowly retired back to the city. Like Ippei had said, once you were in the middle of a siege event, it did not matter how you died. And the Rogami army, with less than a quarter of their members still alive, offered to end the siege challenge with a peace-offering in the form of a month-long truce, which Sayahime immediately accepted.
“We could have forced a surrender,” muttered Ippei, who was not entirely pleased with this outcome, as he watched the remaining Rogami retreat back to the road or fade out.
Once the siege was over, the White Crane Order members trapped in the spirit shrine were released from confinement, and the few who had not since then logged off emerged from the building slightly confused about what had happened.
The morning light soon shifted from its ghastly gray hues to warm yellow, and Seiki found himself once again sitting on the third floor of the White Crane Hall, among tired but spirited people, this time with a cup of hot porridge in his hand, which he gulped down.
The reception room was buzzing with casual conversations, as everyone was still pretty much too excited to settle down for the night.
Outside, the in-game morning was fresh and bright, and Seiki felt a kind of satisfied exhaustion washing over him. He doubted the events of the night would bode well for his personal relationship with certain Rogami Clan members, or all of them, for that matter. But somehow, as silly as it sounded, what he just did felt like the most important thing he had ever done in his entire life.
“Thank you, Seiki,” said Kiku, who had plopped down opposite him, after handing out more bowls of porridge. She would normally get NPC attendants to do this, she explained, but resources were low at the moment.
“Thank you,” said Sayahime with a solemn smile. She had stood up in the middle of the crowd. “The White Crane Order is indebted to you, and we are all grateful. Akihisa and I had a discussion, and it seems that both our clans have been fed misleading information all along. Someone has been planting doubt and mistrust in our hearts with the intent to break our alliance.”
“Here comes the great RP speech,” said Ippei in amusement under his breath, and Mairin shushed him.
Sayahime continued, “We never thought the Rogami Clan was capable of such underhanded tactics, but—”
“It wasn’t the Rogami,” Seiki said, before realizing that he had just interrupted the great RP speech and that everyone was staring at him.
Seiki had never imagined he would be defending the Rogami Clan, but the truth was the truth. “They’re not behind this,” said Seiki. He had seen the inside of their army and he had a feeling that the Rogami were opportunists, but surely not plotters. “Rieko didn’t know anything about the key, and they certainly didn’t know about the rare scroll.”
“How can you be sure?”
“He’s right,” said Ippei. “If they had been the one to switch the scrolls, when they saw that we didn’t fall for the trap, they would have known they had delivered a weapon of mass destruction into our hands. You are dealing with a very nasty prank by someone else, who can max out a trade skill on a throwaway character just to make a Level 30 scroll disappear.”
“Who would do such a thing?” said Kiku.
“Indeed,” said Ippei. “Someone wanted your clans to be at war. And without Seiki, you would have lost a lot more resources.” He shrugged. “At least, what they managed to achieve instead is that your clans are on good terms again.”
“Not quite yet.” Sayahime’s voice suddenly turned hard. “There’s this one last bit.” She turned toward the Fuoka Army members. “Akihisa,” she said. “Step outside. I’ve still got to avenge my first captain.”
Everyone went silent for a moment. Akihisa then let out a soft chuckle. “Fair enough.”
Kazuha frowned and reached for her bow, but Akihisa shook his head. Both clan leaders then quietly exited the room.
“They’ll do it outdoors to avoid more damage,” explained Kiku.
“Do we need to worry about this?” Mairin asked.
Kiku shook her head. “That was really terrible what they did to Hiro. So it’s best that they at least pay with a bit of Clan Honor.”
It made sense. All Sayahime had to do was uninvite him and kill him on her territory ground, and with him being the Fuoka Army clan leader, he would be worth a decent amount of points.
“You’re sure your hime-sama is going to win?”
“Of course,” said Kiku. “Once she draws her sword, hime-sama can be quite formidable.”
Whether this was RP or not, Seiki was not quite so sure anymore.
“Kiku!” cried a voice. It was Yuna of the White Crane Order [Level 13], a houshi Seiki was certain he had met before. “There’s someone outside calling for an invite. He said someone in here summoned him.”
“Oh, that will be my guest,” said Kentaro.
A minute later, Yamura of the Honor Warriors [Level 14] burst into the reception room, and he frowned as he spotted Seiki. “Man,” said the ryoushi. “One week away in the Wilderness and that’s all the XP you managed to get? And I thought you’ve all found a way to quickly level or something. You know, people talk about hunting rares and stuff.”
Seiki opened his mouth, but Yamura shook his head in disappointment. “You guys really need to start doing stuff that gets you real XP.” He smiled proudly. “I’m getting my Shogun troops next Tuesday. You know, the grind pays off.”
“Some of us don’t have school breaks,” Ippei replied.
Yamura shrugged. “Whatever, man.” He seemed impatient. “So we’re doing this now or what?”
“Doing what now?” asked Mairin.
“The rat dungeon.”
Mairin looked at him suspiciously. “Why?”
Kentaro grinned. “Because he’s been trying to get a rat fur arm piece for a while now, and I wrote to him and said that if he could go and alert his clan mates about a rare in Nanamura, you would run the dungeon with him until it drops.”
Ippei was about to say something, and Yamura quickly added, “Society says it’s a 4% drop chance.”
Ippei choked, before looking up at Kentaro with an expression of pure horror. “You did not just do that to me.”
Seiki remembered now how his friend claimed to hate quests and dungeons, or anything else not related to war games.
“It’s a cool piece,” Yamura went on. “Gives you health every half a minute. What I’m saying is that 4% is a lot. It’s not like the 0.2% on the gold quiver from tha
t legendary archer. For this thing, if we’re lucky, we do it, like, twelve times, and that gives us a 50-50 chance to get it.”
Ippei stared at him. “You know that’s not how chance works, right?”
Yamura ignored the comment. “Okay, tomorrow, 6 p.m. start?”
Ippei groaned, and Seiki had to laugh. “I’ll tank,” he offered.
Kiku, who was in high spirits, perhaps after such an eventful night that would provide members with things to talk about for some time, was running about handing out more bowls of porridge. “Hello, ryoushi-san,” she greeted Yamura as she passed by. “Care for some?”
Yamura was a bit taken aback, but he accepted it and sat down. “Okay, you’ve got chicks giving you food out here. My clan they kinda don’t care that much about food.” He then guzzled the whole thing and blinked. “No buff?”
“RP,” explained Mairin.
Seiki chuckled and drank some more of his. It was not exactly like the real thing, but he was starting to get used to how food tasted in here, and the warmth was nice.
The ryoushi then proceeded to tell Mairin about the rat-fur piece and how, after the fifth time, he was having trouble getting his clan people to go, and how new groups did not know how to properly pull the old priest and usually fell apart after that—all of which was making Ippei rather unhappy.
Seiki let the chatter wash over him. The sunlight was coming through the window and the room was getting pleasantly warm. Some members had faded out and Seiki found himself utterly exhausted.
It was probably getting very late, but Seiki did not really care. The sense of relief he was feeling was too pleasant, and he thought he would make the moment last a bit longer. Whatever he had inadvertently started, he had done his best to fix, and he felt that he could now wash his hands clean and really start over.
Someone was calling his name, but Seiki was slowly drifting off, feeling the cool morning air on his skin, the warmth of the sun coming through the bamboo slits, and the fading buzz of the crowd at the back of his consciousness. He thought he could hear Ippei asking if he wanted to log out back in the City, and Mairin was shushing him, and then someone else was talking about resources box. For once, Seiki was quite certain he would not have nightmares, but dreams of sunrise and opening gates.
Chapter 28
Sleeping in the game was always strange. And when Seiki logged back in, he felt as if he had really slept for a very long time leaning against the wall of the White Crane reception room, which meant his muscles felt stiff and he had to stretch his legs and back.
He had dragged himself out of bed to do his routine physical therapy and support group as usual, and so far no one had said anything—although, at the end of the day, he did get a rather formal-sounding message saying that the research team had requested a meeting the following week. Yet, somehow, Seiki was not as troubled as he should be. It had seemed like a thousand years since he had felt good about anything, and he was not going to spoil it with worry right now.
The reception room blinds had been rolled up and the sunlight was shining directly onto the tatami floor. Seiki moved a bit toward the patch of sunshine to let it warm his body.
The room was empty, except for Ippei and Mairin sitting cross-legged at the south end. They seemed to be working on a piece of post paper. Since they were no longer grouped, his friends had not been notified as he faded in.
The kitsune girl had a chunk of charcoal in her hand. “That’s just an excuse.” She giggled.
“Hey, put a Level 2 cow in front of me and I won’t be able to hit it. I went to work after all, you know, which means I’m operating on no sleep.”
Mairin pigeoned off her letter. “It’s not a bad dungeon,” she said. “I kinda like it. The color stuff is a bit confusing, but there’s a cheat sheet you can copy from the Society.”
Ippei shook his head. “Four percent. I can’t believe—” That was when he spotted Seiki. “Oh. Trouble?”
His friends knew he was on a rather strict schedule, although he had never told them exactly why.
“Not yet,” said Seiki. “We’ll see.”
Ippei walked across the room and crouched down beside him. With a grim expression, he placed a piece of paper on the floor in front of Seiki. It was larger than a slip of post paper and filled with written text.
FUOKA ARMY OFFER for Ippei
The Fuoka Army is pleased to offer you a spot in our roster of committed members.
War nights: Every other Wednesdays.
Reruns: Every other Sunday afternoons.
Member commitment requirement: 4 clan quests per month minimum.
Clan quest commission: 20% for the first quest of the week, 30% for additional quests.
Special Offer: immediate promotion to the rank of Lieutenant upon reaching Level 14 (basic salary: 70 gold per month)
It appeared that the Fuoka Army did things very formally. “Uh, congrats?” Seiki said.
His friend did not like the response. “You know what I said?” said Ippei very seriously, as he looked at Seiki. “Not interested.”
Seiki realized what his friend was actually trying to say, and somehow he was amused, and glad. All Seiki’s effort had been to save the White Crane Hall. He had even gone as far as to offer to seppuku, and he could see why his friend would be worried.
Seiki shook his head and smiled. “I already said no to them a long time ago,” he finally said. “And I’m not changing my mind.”
“Yet,” added Kiku, who had quietly appeared out of nowhere, with a polished wooden tray in her hands. “The least we can do.” She set the tray down on the floor in front of them. “Just as we have agreed, Ippei-san.”
On the tray were several potions of various kinds and quite a decent amount of gold.
Seiki opened his mouth. “That won’t be—“
“Thank you.” Ippei interrupted Seiki, before giving the obake girl a smile as he picked up the contents of the tray. Kiku laughed as she watched him. The samurai then turned to look at Seiki and said, pointedly, “Mercenaries get paid.”
Altogether, it was over four hundred gold, which would be equally split between them once they got back to Shinshioka. This was the most Seiki had ever gotten at once and, although he had tried to refuse earlier, it was undeniably a great feeling to get something out of all they had gone through. At least, he would not have to worry about paying rent for almost the rest of the year, if people would still allow him to play, that is.
“See ya, Kiku-chan.” Mairin was already a white fox again and dashing out of the room, as soon as she had finished her sentence. Seiki knew it was their cue to leave, and he said goodbye to Kiku as he followed her out.
“Remember, now you’re all on our guest list,” Kiku called after them, as they walked through the adjacent waiting room.
“Not gonna happen,” Ippei shouted back.
After last night, the White Crane members seemed particularly engaged and the clan territory was even more crowded than before, with people running about and recounting details of last night’s events to members who had not been there to witness it. Some nodded toward Seiki and his friends as they got on their horse after crossing the bridge, while some actually smiled and waved.
“I actually kinda like these people,” said Mairin.
“No, Foxy,” said Ippei. “Not gonna happen.”
The kitsune giggled. “Don’t do quests, don’t do clans?”
The territory was in a worrying state. The rock launched from the trebuchet the day before was no longer there, but Seiki could see its former path clearly from a row of broken pine trees to two completely demolished buildings, whose debris was being cleaned up by nameless White Crane Hall Workmen.
Most of the remaining buildings were charred to various degrees, and a few clan members were supervising the rebuildling effort.
The White Crane Hall Guards let them out of the gate, and they found that the reconstruction of Nanamura went at a much
faster rate than the clan territory. The village was a low-level quest hub after all, Ippei explained, and most of the buildings had now been restored. A few NPC villagers were shown still fixing the smaller details, like adding roof tiles and repainting the walls, but everything seemed to be operating as normal. A few Level 7 players, completely ignorant of what had transpired here the night before, were now walking around looking for things to do. It was now that Seiki finally caught a glimpse of the canals and the bridges that Kentaro had mentioned, and if he had time he thought he would pay the village a proper visit later. Now he was just anxious to get back to the City.
The little south road was crowded, and they rode casually along it, with the red wall of Shinshioka on their left. Seiki tried to look for the secret door that Akari had taken him through earlier with her skeleton key, but he had no idea what he was supposed to be searching for.
Seiki let his thoughts wander to the kind of otherworldly trouble he would soon be in. “That was a 9-hour session. I know it’s over the limit we agreed on, but personally I don’t think it was too bad,” he imagined himself saying. “But if I have broken a serious rule and if that disqualifies me from the research program, then I won’t argue with you. And if that’s the case, it would be really helpful if you could please get me in touch with your sales department, and I would find a way to afford the equipment and pay the monthlies myself.”
He still had no idea what to do with his life, but at least he now knew he wanted it, and perhaps it was good enough for the time being. He also wanted to continue to be here and see the sun rise above the city and fields and hear his friends discuss politics and crafting, and to advertise the benefits of bag charms to strangers and drink fake sugar. Apart from that, there was a Sheathed Blade waiting in the Yanagi room to claim when he reached Level 18 and, allegedly, an ocean to swim in. Sometimes, you really had more than you initially thought, and all you had to do was look. Seiki took a deep breath as he felt the thought, still new and raw in his mind, settling itself down.
