Clans War (The Way of the Shaman: Book #7) LitRPG Series

by Mahanenko, Vasily

  The mine governor’s office hadn’t changed much. The same elegant statues, paintings on the walls, a large crystal chandelier, carpets, carved wood and a light breeze…The only difference was that instead of two-meter-tall Prontho, the seat behind the desk was occupied by a dwarf. A new anonymous governor of Pryke Copper Mine.

  “Your request was examined and approved,” the dwarf said in a calm, business-like tone, offering me a seat in one of the armchairs. Had my yelling really had an effect? “Prisoner Izu shall be brought here in a minute. Would you like some water?”

  “I won’t say no,” a copper mug with water appeared on the desk. The handiwork of one of the local craftsmen, dressed in a striped shirt. “Permit me a question — earlier, a gnome named Rine worked in the smithy. Where is he now?”

  “How do you know him?” The governor tensed up notably, as if my question had been taboo. I had to respond honestly without hiding anything.

  “I too was a prisoner here just over a year ago. Rine helped me set out on the Way of the Creator. I wanted to speak to him and say thank you but was surprised to see that he wasn’t at his customary place. Has something happened to him?”

  “He has retired,” the dwarf replied, sighing with ease. “He returned to his family.”

  “How could I…”

  “We do not issue the contact information of our former employees to former prisoners,” the governor interrupted. “Please make your inquiries with the Heralds. This issue falls under their jurisdiction. The person you wished to speak to. You have half an hour!”

  The door opened. An old man shuffled slowly into the office. I gulped. I had seen Donotpunnik — or Donald Izu as he was called in real life — in court, but over the last few months he had aged a great deal. A very great deal. Given that a convict’s avatar reflects what he looks like exactly in real life, Don had aged by about forty years if not more. The only thing that remained of the old Donotpunnik were his eyes. Sharp, piercing, intelligent and filled with astonishment. I suppose I was the last person that Donotpunnik expected to see in the governor’s office.

  “Mahan,” he nodded, sitting down across from me. Judging by your lack of a robe, you’re here to ask me questions. Get on with it.”

  “What about ‘I hate you,’ and ‘you damn bastard’ and ‘I hope you die?’” I couldn’t keep from asking. The man before me had ordered that I be drowned in my capsule, so I didn’t feel much sympathy for him.

  “Did you not come for that?” Donotpunnik smiled grimly.

  “No. I need information.”

  “What kind?” Donotpunnik even looked surprised. “They pumped me for everything I knew and even what I didn’t know. A full memory scan — that’s nothing to smirk at.”

  “They only recovered what you remember. I’m looking for your thoughts at the moment,” I barely kept myself from swearing. Alex hadn’t said anything about scanning Donotpunnik through and through. If I recall the law correctly, and I recall it very well, memory scans had to be approved by the President personally. No one else had the power to order the extraction of a person’s memories from their mind. Human rights activists kept a particularly close eye on this kind of thing. All of Barliona was built on the principle that memory could not be extracted. An example could be Kart who refused to give up his corrupt boss. It was easier for the legal system to imprison someone for ten years than pull evidence out of their head.

  “So it’s like that? What kind of thoughts would you like then, buddy?”

  “Marina. Tell me about her.”

  “Marina? What do you need her for?” The old man asked surprised, but went on: “An ordinary operator. She had several objectives. The first was to assemble a database of potential candidates. The second was to draw them into the game. The third was to arrange their exit into the wider game world. The fourth was to communicate with our people in the Corporation. She made no decisions. Are you here because of her?”

  “Yes. Did you meet with her out in reality?”

  “Of course. Every week.”

  “Is this her?” I brought up a photo of Roxanne and showed it to the old man. Alex refused to allow me to do this for a long time, but my ironclad reasoning proved convincing: ‘I feel like this is the right thing to do.’ He didn’t find any counter-arguments to this, so he greed, waving his hand and muttering, ‘Do whatever you feel like.’

  “Yes,” Donotpunnik looked me in the eyes piercingly. “I personally ordered her termination. The results were demonstrated to me. Is there something I don’t know?”

  “That is precisely why I’m here. Marina, the freelancer whom you hired actually looks like this,” I brought up another photo and showed it to Donotpunnik.

  “Go on.”

  “The girl you call Marina actually has a much less typical name. Roxanne Vecchi. The first photograph is her. Here is what I’ve managed to learn so far.” I related the story of my search for the truth and my meeting with Corporation officials.

  “Well oh well,” Donotpunnik muttered, staring into the window pensively. “So you’ve come to ask how I met her to begin with, correct?”

  “Yes. Memories only record the fact of what happened — without thoughts, feelings or emotions. And those are exactly what I need at the moment. Where did Marina come from?”

  Slowly as though unwillingly, Donotpunnik began to tell his tale. I’ll admit that it’s difficult to recollect your own defeat, but I wasn’t too worried about the old man’s suffering. I needed to get at the truth.

  As I had guessed, Marina hadn’t been found by posting an announcement in the classifieds. She had been recommended by one of her partners, to whom the old man had turned for help. An Eastern partner. Bihan. The girl was vetted, but the check didn’t turn up any flags. Marina existed in all the databases, behaved entirely properly without raising any doubts and she really did look like the woman in the first photograph. Through her enthusiasm and emotions, Marina became ‘one of the crew’ within a few months, taking on especially sensitive assignments and completing them with astounding accuracy and cruelty. You need to send ten innocent people to prison? No problem. Marina ingratiated herself with the victims, seduced them and forced them to perform some act of folly. Hack the water management system, steal a painting, fight some juveniles and break one of their arms. The variations were diverse but the outcome was the same — everyone ended up in Barliona. Donotpunnik’s brain trust agreed on eight candidates supplied by Marina and set in motion a grand game that resulted in my terrible defeat.

  “So you weren’t the one who selected us?” I asked surprised.

  “No. I approved the selection, but she was the one making the recommendation. Although…You know, you’ve forced me to reexamine those events from a different point of view. Here’s what else I have to tell you…”

  The conspirators held daily meetings to discuss their plot and make decisions about its progress. At some point in time this group was pared down to three people — Donotpunnik, Hellfire, and Marina. And yet the main ideologue, the one who set the main goals, wasn’t the old man. It was Marina. Donotpunnik even grabbed his head when he reviewed a typical meeting in his mind: Marina would propose the options, these were discussed and the decision that was made was generally the one the girl had preferred to begin with. Not the one Donotpunnik would have chosen. Marina had manipulated the entire process! The only decision that the old man had made on his own was to terminate the operator when the game had reached its conclusion.

  “That’s even among the scanned information,” the Don glared at me with wide-open eyes full of surprise. “The decision to terminate you was hers. We never wanted to kill anyone! It was only later when I understood that you’re in virtual space, I panicked and ordered your termination. Mahan, we were manipulated!”

  The old man jumped up from his chair and started pacing back and forth.

  “I know that our conversation is being monitored, otherwise Mahan wouldn’t have been allowed to visit me. Check Roxanne! If M
ahan is correct, the true mastermind is still free! Bihan recommended Marina, but only after I asked him myself. He gave me several choices to choose from, so I don’t think that he’s the one behind all this! He was trying to destroy Phoenix! The only person who ended up winning after everything was over and done with was…”

  “Time’s up!” The governor’s office dissolved around me and I found myself beside Geranika. He was still playing his role of a statue — even his clothes didn’t move in the breeze that blew through the Mine ceaselessly. Only his eyes — carefully studying me even now — let me know that this statue was a living one.

  “Are you satisfied?” Geranika boomed.

  “Entirely,” I still couldn’t calm myself after Donotpunnik’s outburst. He hadn’t had time to tell me the name, but I didn’t need that either. I knew the name very well — the man who had won everything after the entire plot. The name was on the tip of my tongue and wanted to be uttered, but I refused to do so, despite all the logic to the opposite. This is just emotions and assumptions! This person wouldn’t risk everything over the chance of a profit…

  Or would he…?

  Chapter Fourteen. The Tomb of the Creator

  “I hope you know what you’re doing,” Geranika remarked, examining Altameda’s new environs. On the one side, a dark-blue sea spread itself beside the castle. It was almost purple. The waves came running onto the shore and burst into a wall of spray as they crashed against an unexpected obstacle — the walls of my castle. The moat, which was ordinarily half-empty, filled with seawater and as I looked on, a pair of crocodiles swimming in the moat turned into terrible monsters — some kind of octopus and crab hybrid. I shuddered — despite my sensory filter, I felt a chill as if the bone-chilling sea breeze had found a way from this virtual world into the real world my body was in. On the other side of the castle, an endless plain stretched far into the horizon. There was neither a tree nor a bush nor even a stone to be seen in its expanse. Nothing but withered, yellow grass found the strength to stand up to the harsh climate of our continent’s far North, filling the steppe with itself. But even that wasn’t enough to fill the desolate gray landscape. There were neither seagulls, nor animals, nor people. There was no one.

  “Everything’s dead here,” I whispered with astonishment, suddenly sensing the utter emptiness of the space around me.

  “When at last I get my way, the entire world will be like this,” Geranika replied salaciously, breathing in deeply and with evident pleasure. “All life shall be destroyed!”

  I glanced at the Lord of Shadow from beneath my brow. Lately I’ve started to forget that he is the doom of all life in Barliona. The goal of this NPC, despite his seeming normalcy, is the annihilation of all life and one of my goals, as a player, is to keep him from reaching that goal.

  “Is this why you want to help me reach the Tomb?” I guessed.

  “Mahan, soon enough you will have no choice but to become my trustworthy ally. I can juxtapose facts and make inferences as well as you: You were in Erebus. You have a flying ship. I know what is located not far from this location. I imagine that you know that too. If you do what you’re thinking of, there won’t be a single Empire that will have you. Ever again. You will be enemy number one from now until the end of time. Every sentient creature in this world will hunt you. And that is precisely why I said: ‘I hope you know what you’re doing.’ I will always welcome a warrior like you.”

  “Two warriors, Geranika. Two!” Anastaria joined us. “I go where my husband goes. Until the end of time.”

  “In that case, best of luck to you!” For an instant, an expression of sadness flashed across Geranika’s face — immediately giving way to his customary smirk. Then the Lord of Shadow vanished. Without any sound or portal or other bells and whistles. I’ll need to learn that trick.

  “How’s Don?” Stacey dropped what seemed like a neutral question, but I could tell she could barely contain her agitation. “Did you find out anything?”

  “Bihan.” So long as I lacked ironclad proof, I decided not to lay all my cards on the table before my spouse. “He recommended Marina and I’m sure that Alex is following up as we speak. We need to figure out why the Celestial Empire needs this.”

  “To eliminate an opponent!” Stacey exclaimed unable to contain her emotions. “Phoenix has been at their throat for a long time and using a third party to destroy them is exactly how the East prefers to achieve its goals!”

  “Let’s see what Alex comes up with. I’m sure he’ll share whatever it is. He can’t not. We’ll make our conclusions then,” I hugged Anastaria. “We don’t have a lot of time. We need to go…”

  “I always imagined that there wasn’t anything north of our continent ,” muttered Stacey, frowning from the frigid wind. The GAS struggled against the snowstorm, stubbornly moving forward. The airship had somehow gained a level during its extermination of the players, so our ETA turned out to be five hours instead of the original six. We were standing at the bow of the ship, staring ahead and trying to see anything at all in the blizzard raging around us: the odd patch of ice, gaps of dark blue water with a violet hue, but other than that, a white wall of snow before us. Nothing more. In order to dispel the ‘Frostbite’ debuff, I kept having to cast a Healing Shadow on myself again and again, as well as at Stacey and Gnum who flat-out refused to abandon his creation. Judging by the constantly falling temperature, soon enough all I’ll be doing is healing, since we hadn’t brought any warm clothes with us, while mailboxes didn’t work outside of the continent’s limits. The hastiness with which we had arranged this operation was making itself felt.

  “There shouldn’t be anything here ,” I replied, congratulating myself for the foresight of arranging a Lovers’ Pendant for us. We could communicate telepathically again. As slight as it was, it was some victory over the system that lately seemed stacked against us.

  “I know, but even then it’s still a little too empty here. Why create a giant location without a single sign of life in it. It’s a bit too wasteful even for the Corporation and…”

  “LIVING! WARM! DELICIOUS!” A sinister whisper drowned out both Stacey’s thought and the howling wind. The GAS shook noticeably as three enormous, fog-shrouded Shadows crashed onto the deck. At the same time, the ship’s protective forcefield popped as if it had been made from glass instead of magical energy. The foggy monsters reared up on three legs, spread their flaming wings and turned into three-meter-tall, red-eyed demons, seething with Shadows.

  “FOOD!” they yelled in unison, raised their hands or paws or whatever it is that demons have and thick Shadow snakes began to wind in our direction from their claws. Stacey immediately cast a bubble on herself, while Gnum put on some defense of his own, preparing for battle. I should have thrown up a shield too and prepared to fight this new incarnation of evil, but I shrugged off all logic and surrendered to my premonition. The arena was behind us. The continent was behind us. Everything was behind us. All limitations. All borders. I had had it!

  The Shaman has three hands…

  “HALT!” I took several steps forward and made the summons, pouring all of my anger, all of my hate, all of my hurt into it — all of the negative feelings I had amassed recently. The Corporation, the players, Donotpunnik and his suspicions, Marina/Roxanne, Bihan and his gang, the arena — I had amassed so many emotions that I was going to lose control one way or another. In this sense, the demons’ appearance was actually quite propitious. For about the first time in my career as a Shaman, I summoned the elementals. Three Shadow Elementals, one for each demon. Judging by Gnum’s stunned gasp, the effect was spectacular. The GAS shuddered again when three boulders shrouded in green fog plummeted onto the deck and instantly turned into stone defenders.

  “WE ARE ALLIES!” I barked quite convincingly. I didn’t know that I could yell like a demon. The demons froze in astonishment, as if they’d seen a ghost. Although, I suppose you couldn’t scare these creatures with any old ghost. The roiling snakes ev
aporated, melting away into the snow storm, and one of the demons took a step forward:

  “YOU ARE NOT THE KEYMASTER! WHO ARE YOU?”

  “I am his messenger.” It sounded like these NPCs were expecting someone, so I had better play along. “We…”

  “We were sent to check your preparedness!” Stacey interrupted, stepping up beside me. I looked at the girl and almost lost it — the Paladin’s entire body was shrouded with fog. The typically-glinting golden armor was covered with patches of fog which roiled along the armor against all laws of physics. It was as if the armor wasn’t made from Imperial Steel, but from liquid that had in some miraculous way acquired solidity. And yet, what was especially stunning, were her eyes. The girl’s normally hazel eyes were glowing with a red flame, as if she were an aggroing mob. I hadn’t the strength to look onto these two embers and so I looked away, glanced at my hands and gulped — there wasn’t much difference between me and Stacey. The same seeping fog, the strange armor and — I was certain of it — the red eyes. We had turned into true warriors of Shadow!

  “The Keymaster is worried about the state of the world,” Stacey went on. “He sent us to launch the Annihilator in order to distract the Free Citizens!”

  “THE ANNIHALATOR STILL HAS TWO YEARS TO CHARGE!” boomed the demon.

  “We need it now! Otherwise our plan will be imperiled!” I replied implacably, deciding to bluff. Something was telling me that this would work. “Are you really prepared to anger the Vicegerent?!”

  “THE ANNIHALATOR SHALL BE READY IN AN HOUR!” As soon as I spoke the magic word, the demons did an about-face. Had I really guessed accurately? The redness vanished from their eyes as well as the fog and they even seemed to shrink several times, turning into mere two-meter-tall entities of Level 300. Quite slayable by me as well as Stacey. If it weren’t for the horns and wings, they’d look like ordinary Barliona demons.