The Grind

by Dante Doom

  The Grind

  Dante Doom

  Contents

  Copyright

  The Grind

  Blurb

  Dante Doom

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Epilogue

  End of The Grind

  Thank You!

  Sneak Peek

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales, is entirely coincidental.

  RELAY PUBLISHING EDITION, FEBRUARY 2018

  Copyright © 2018 Relay Publishing Ltd.

  All rights reserved. Published in the United Kingdom by Relay Publishing. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  www.relaypub.com

  Blurb

  One young woman hungers for status in a harsh, feudal future—but her greed could become her downfall.

  In the desolate future city-state of Verre, King Leopold and his lords rule with absolute authority. There’s only one way for oppressed serfs to rise in rank: the MMORPG called ‘The Grind’. Once a year, players in this virtual game can fight for the opportunity to raise their standing by gathering as many points as possible. Peasants can become Nobles, Lords and, with enough skill, sometimes Kings…

  Savannah “Savvy” deForge is a Grinder—the lowest of the low, who earns a living racking up points for players by “ghosting” them in the game. When a wealthy client named Timon comes calling, she sees him as her ticket out of the classless limbo of Grinder life.

  But when her father vanishes into the game, Savvy will have to choose between the advancement she craves and reclaiming the one she loves. As virtual deaths start to become terribly real, Savvy realizes there is much more at stake than status, and it may be too late to save anyone, including herself.

  The Grind is a 150,000 word, original LitRPG standalone with lovable characters, unputdownable battle scenes, awesome weapons and a big twist-finale.

  Dante Doom

  Dante Doom didn’t touch a videogame or fantasy book until his 23rd year on Earth. He started working at an old-school arcade—hired primarily, he was told, because of his “badass ridiculous name”—and from then his education began. They started him on the classics, a strict diet of Pac-Man, Galaga, Donkey Kong, Asteroids, Dig Dug, Street Fighter, and Rampage. Freakish proficiency. Beginners luck, they said. He was given well-loved copies of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit, Brandon Sanderson’s Mistborn, Patrick Rothfuss’ The Name of the Wind and Anne McCaffrey’s Dragon Riders of Pern.

  Devoured in days. Finally, he was invited up to the arcade owner’s private gaming room: Battletoads, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (NES), and Ghosts ‘n Goblins followed. Defeated, at last—maybe he wasn’t such a wunderkid, after all. But he didn’t give up. And that earned him a seat at the group’s D&D table. Many a happy day has passed since—he even beat TMNT’s Dam level and its health-draining pink seaweed.

  Then a year ago, that same group introduced him to the new Fantasy-LitRPG genre—what Dante saw as the final stage in his education. Because, for him, it doesn’t get any better than LitRPG. The combination of an immersive fantasy world, gaming objectives and levelled progression makes for a fascinating storytelling experience. Inspired, he took two weeks holiday from the arcade, sat down and wrote the Dragon Kings of the New World series.

  Find out what Dante is up to next at:

  www.DanteDoom.com

  www.facebook.com/DanteDoomBooks

  Chapter One

  The writhing mass of tentacles whipped back and forth menacingly even as Savannah heard the screaming of an inexperienced Noob in her earpiece. She smirked, standing atop the rumbling combine harvester with its menacing blades chopping at the crops and then spitting the grains off to the side. One slip of the foot and she could end up dropping into those blades herself—putting an end to this job—but that wasn’t going to happen.

  Staring at the yellow-green monstrosity, she took a deep breath, her defiant grin making her cheeks hurt before she laughed out loud. Why should she be afraid? She was one of the best Grinders in the game, and this Viral didn’t stand a chance against her.

  “We need to run!” Sal shouted over the voice-chat. “That thing’s too powerful!”

  “I’ll show you powerful!” Savannah shouted as she leapt out of the way of one of the Viral’s lashing tentacles. A gun manifested in her hands. The weight felt good as she placed her finger over the trigger. Savannah landed on the ground then, dodging another attack and waiting for the opportune moment to strike. Hovering above her energy rifle was a small timer, counting down from 10s. Ten seconds was a long time in the Grind, though—long enough to determine life or death.

  Sal, who was hiding behind one of the tractors in the middle of the wheat field, called out again. “Look, we should run!”

  “You’re fine! Stay there and let me do my thing!” Savannah cried out gleefully as she leapt to the right of another tentacle. This time, she climbed atop the yellow tentacle and steadied herself. The arm swung upwards, trying to shake her off, but she was able to hold herself perfectly still. Balancing Skill Increased by 1 noted the heads-up display above Savannah. She smiled at that. Even though she rarely had to use Balancing, it was nice that it had leveled up—every little bit helped with her job.

  Savannah ran along the swinging limb, dodging more attacks from the Viral. It emitted a high-pitched frequency that sounded somewhat like a shriek. No matter how many times she heard it, it always chilled her to the bone.

  Undaunted by the noise, however, she aimed her gun right at the center of the mass. A short, DNA-helix head rested in the middle of the tentacles. This was where the Viral kept its main programming. Savannah aimed her Pulse Blast Rifle and squeezed the trigger, activating the Overdrive ability. The words Overdrive, Extra Damage hovered above her as she began to fire rapid blasts of green energy into the helix head.

  The green shots crashed into the center of the Viral and the phrase 100 damage hovered briefly through the air. The health bar of the Viral dropped down rapidly as she continued to fire away at the creature. The Overdrive function increased not only the damage output, but also the damage per second of her weapon. As the DPS ramped up, the Viral’s health continued to drop down to almost zero.

  The creature shrieked its strange shriek again, flailing wildly, and this time throwing Savannah off the tentacle she’d been riding. Savannah tried to salvage her fall, tucking her legs together the way her dad had taught her; she bent her knees, preparing to roll when she landed, but the momentum threw her backwards and she landed hard, slamming her shoulder into the ground and narrowly avoiding hitting her head. She felt a surge of pain rush through her body as she gasped for breath. The alert 50 damage hovered above her head. She watched her healt
h meter drop rapidly from 75 down to 25.

  “You’ve got to get out of there before you’re killed!” Sal called out as she shifted from her position behind a tractor.

  “I’ve got it, relax!” Savannah grunted as she gritted her teeth. Her gun had been thrown out of her hand and was resting next to the base of the writhing Viral. And her Weapon Summon power was still on cooldown. She opened her inventory for a split second, so she could take a look at what she had, moving even as the creature continued to lash at her.

  Inventory:

  Pulse Shotgun

  Energy Pistol

  Laser Sword

  All of those weapons were weak sauce compared to the almighty assault rifle that Savannah had been wielding a few seconds before, but the creature was as good as dead anyway. She selected the shotgun and took a deep breath, pumping the forend. The gun buzzed a little as blue waves of energy began to collect at the barrel of the weapon.

  The Viral raised all eight of its tentacles at once and brought them down on her, but she was faster. She leapt up and dodged between the tentacles, firing her shotgun and blasting into the center core of the creature. The Viral let out another shriek as Critical Damage x5 hovered above its head. All of its limbs stretched out at once and, in a single moment, the being faded away.

  “Take that!” Savannah triumphantly cried out as she raised her hands towards the heavens. Golden orbs began to flow towards her. They were point orbs, and there were enough points to rank her up several times over. However, the points wouldn’t be going to her. Rather, the points would be transferred to her client, Sal.

  Rank Up! appeared over Sal’s head. The golden letters of Serf hovered over her for a moment, and then the announcement of Rank Up! appeared again over Sal, followed by a series of ranks.

  1.Noob

  2.Serf

  3.Lady

  4.Knight Temporal

  5.Baron

  6.Lady of the High Court

  Lady froze above Sal’s head. “Very nice!” Savannah said as she approached her client. Sal was nothing more than another paycheck to Savannah, but she couldn’t help being excited for her. Her dad always warned her about becoming emotionally attached to her clients, and so it was something she tried to abide by, but watching them level up and knowing she’d gotten them there… she just loved it. Her job was simple. She illegally connected to the Grind and then attached herself to a client’s character—in this case, Sal’s. This practice was known as ghosting. When an illegal Grinder was ghosting, most of the points they would normally earn inside the game would be transferred to their host. Savannah would keep a fraction of the points, but wouldn’t be able to redeem them until she one day entered the game legally. Of course, that was going to be a long, long time from now.

  “Well, let’s get moving!” Savanah said as she grabbed Sal by the hand. “We’ve got plenty more levels to explore. I’m willing to bet I can get you up another rank today.”

  “No!” Sal replied as she pulled her hand away from Savannah. “You’re crazy, do you know that? You could have gotten yourself killed! What possessed you to go after that Viral? What if you’d fallen against the Crop Machina and it had gone Aggro, taking you out? Or worse, you slipped off that combine harvester? You would have killed us both instantly and put yourself into a world of hurt when you woke up in the real world!”

  “Eh, it’s no big deal,” Savannah said. “I’ve been in worse situations.”

  “Worse situations? We agreed to stick to some low-level fighting in order to rank up; you didn’t have to go running after a gigantic Viral the minute you saw him! What was it even doing in the wheat fields? I don’t think it was supposed to be here.”

  “Which was exactly why we had to go after it. Why turn something like that down? He was right there.” Savannah didn’t understand why Sal was so upset. It wasn’t as though she’d gone looking for the Viral. When they’d decided to cut through the Imaren Fields, she’d been expecting to see the Machina working the land and then maybe some low-level Virals, if they were lucky. Seeing this one had been too good of an opportunity to pass up, and it had worked in their favor. If luck stayed on her side, she could easily help Sal move up another level in this same session.

  Sal shook her head before pointing towards a large swirling portal a few hundred feet away. “I’m leaving the game.”

  “Leaving? Are you kidding me?” Savannah laughed, shaking her golden brown hair back and forth. “We’re on a hot streak.”

  “Hot streak? You’re crazy, Savannah,” Sal shot back. “I’ve got enough of a rank to where I’m happy. Don’t forget—if you die, you take all of my points with you and I’m kicked out of the game!”

  “Oh relax, I’m fine,” Savannah replied.

  “Relax? Relax? That’s easy for someone like you to say. You’re a Grinder! You don’t have any purpose in the real world. Out there? I’m trying to build a life for myself. I paid you good money to get me to the rank of Lady safely. I’m not paying you to waste my time. I’ve already been kicked out of the Grind twice. If I’m kicked out one more time, I’ve used up all of my tickets for the year. I’m not going to go another year without being a part of society!”

  “Ugh, what’s so great about being a Lady?” Savannah asked. “Oh boy, you get to live in a dank and wretched world controlled by the Nobles. Hurray. I mean, come on, I can make you an aristocrat! I can get you to the High Court, easy.”

  “The only thing you can get me is killed.” Sal shook her head. “You got me to Lady, so you’ll be paid for your efforts, but I’m getting the hell out of here before you get both of us killed.”

  “Go ahead and enjoy your middle-class life, but you’re missing out on the good stuff,” Savannah shouted after Sal as she walked away. What was wrong with her? Why couldn’t Sal see that becoming an aristocrat was the way to go? A Lady was barely above a Serf! The girl ignored her, however, and strolled off to the swirling exit portal. Sal gave her one last look before placing her hands on the purple energy and fading away. Savannah sighed as she felt the world around her begin to contract and stretch for another moment before she was kicked out of the game, too.

  The world before her slowly came back into view as her glass pod slid open. “Urgh,” Savannah groaned as she staggered out, pulling the cables out from the back of her neck. Disconnecting was always the most unpleasant part of the job. The stench of the real world was unbearable compared to the sterile, clean smell of the world of the Grind. She retched for a moment, trying to keep her composure. How long had she even been in there?

  Savannah glanced back at her pod. It had been illegally obtained by her father and wasn’t as well made as the ones the official courts used. It worked well enough when she was connected inside the game, but the connecting and disconnecting process always sucked. The display next to the pod showed her character, Savvy, who looked similar to her but was far more beautiful. Her brown skin had a luster to it inside of the game, her hair shined more, and even her eyes sparkled with an emerald hue. Savannah wasn’t particularly vain, but she preferred her avatar’s appearance to her own. The avatar had money, and could afford the best clothes on the online market.

  As Savannah checked her character, she noticed that her points hadn’t been adjusted properly. She had forty-five thousand points showing, but her percentage from Sal should have put her up to fifty-two. “Dammit, Sal!” She smacked the side of the pod in anger before shaking her hand out. She really needed to be careful that she didn’t damage herself so soon after exiting the pod. Staring at her points, she counted to three, but the points still didn’t change, making her growl in frustration. How could Sal stiff her after everything she’d done for her? No matter. She’d get her points, one way or another.

  Her eyes darted past her own pod to the large, wooden frame surrounding another green pod. Inside of that tube was her father, Hem. She gently placed her fingers on the glass. It felt warm with the machine pulsing and whirring. Her father was also a Grinder
, illegally accessing the Grind so he could horde points, as well. A few months ago, he had entered for a routine job… and simply hadn’t come out.

  Her mom had repeatedly tried to reach him inside of the game, but either he was ignoring her or his communicator wasn’t working—both possibilities only made her mom worry more. Hem was an experienced Grinder and in high demand with those wanting to level up to aristocrat status, so it wasn’t uncommon for him to disappear for weeks at a time, but he always managed to keep in touch.

  Savannah rested her cheek against the glass. “Where are you, Dad?” she murmured against it, letting the heat warm her.

  The pods themselves were advanced pieces of long-forgotten technology. Relics from the World Before. Savannah was young compared to them—only nineteen years of age, and far too young to have any living relatives who had been in the World Before. She knew the stories, though. They were often told in taverns, on cold nights when the question of survival would come up. In the long ago, there was a place called the World Before.

  Before what? She wasn’t quite sure.

  Some legends told of a great sickness that had claimed many lives, whereas other legends said that mankind had destroyed itself, leaving only a few cities left in the world. Regardless, the legends always had the same conclusion. Three major cities remained in the world, and of all the cities, her home of Verre was the safest.