The Feedback Loop (3-Book Box Set): (Scifi LitRPG Series)

by Harmon Cooper

“So now we got some experience?”

  Rocket: Yep, that’s how it works.

  Zedic turns towards the town on the horizon. “Let’s fight our way towards the town. Once we get there, we can rest up and do some trading or undertake a quest to gain some EXP.”

  ~*~

  Giving the beat down to Tronkyins proves to be an EXP awarding experience. By the time we reach the town, Krikaya, I’ve leveled up and I’ve got better at fighting through a turn-based system. Every hit counts, so the moves I’ve figured out that have the most range are golden. Nothing tops what I’ve come to call the Sword Sweep – a giant leap into the air with Buster behind me gathering gale force, which takes out most of the enemies and only uses a small percentage of my AA bar. Not too shabby.

  Krikaya is a medium-sized village, which sits on a plateau overlooking the plains we just battled our way through. An onion-domed cathedral rests in the center of the town, visible above all the other homes and businesses. The buildings are crafted from wood, dressed stone, and daub-and-wattle, giving the whole place a sort of Holy Grail-ish feel.

  Zedic and I walk under a moss-covered archway. We pass Juggernaut’s other brother, decked out in shiny armor and Asgardian boots with fur uppers. He has a beard tied into two knots that drape over a leather necklace that’s set with a sparkling sapphire. A lady with a hooded cloak and face tattoos steps in front of us, gives us the once over, moves on. The ends of her robe dance behind her body, magically keeping the hem off the filthy cobblestone road.

  “We need to select a class,” says Zedic, pointing at the cathedral.

  “What happens if we remain classless?”

  “Not bueno, that’s for sure.”

  “Rocket, give us the lowdown on classes.”

  Rocket: Easy. There are seven main classes and seven subclasses. Each avatar gets two classes. The seven main classes are warrior, mage, healer, assassin, thief, archer and shield. The seven subclasses are berserker, dark magic, white magic, mind magic, ninja, shield and brawler.

  “Well, rather than forcing us to read a manual, can you just tell us what classes we should select?”

  We approach the basilica. It ain’t quite the Cologne Cathedral, but methinks that churches get a tax break in Tritania because the structure is larger than anything around.

  Rocket: Easy. Q, you should select ‘warrior’ and ‘shield’. Shield Warrior. The warrior class has the highest attack power and the shield subclass will increase your life bar. The shield function also allows you to target yourself for all attacks and protect people in your party. Zedic should select Archer, obviously, and white magic. White Archer. The subclass comes before the class when spoken verbally.

  Zedic looks up at the sky. “White Archer? That’s not exactly how I pictured myself.”

  Rocket: White magic is healing magic. Each shot you take will add to the damage you’ve dished out and gives you and your party additional health.

  “That could come in handy,” I say.

  “Fine, White Archer it is. But I’d like to note that this title gets my skin crawling.”

  Rocket: Noted.

  We enter the church and walk along an aisle of pews. An NPC in priestly robes stands at the chancel, his hands behind his back as he takes in a stained glass image. A few more steps towards the man and a flattened circle appears. Select a class.

  I turn the circle with my finger and classes appear. Mage, Healer, Assassin, Thief, Archer… Warrior. I stop on Warrior and select it. The class appears under my username, which still reads Steamboy_889, something I keep meaning to tell Rocket to change. Another circle appears and rotates around the main class circle like a proton until I select it. I choose the Shield subclass and the word Shield appears next to the word Warrior on my display screen.

  “Congratulations, my child,” the priest says, “you are now a Shield Warrior.”

  “Thanks, dad.”

  My life bar increases by about a fourth and a number appears next to it.

  Zedic does his thing and the priest confirms that he is indeed a White Archer.

  “You really did him dirty on that one, Rocket,” I say under my breath.

  Rocket: Cast your racial assumptions aside – this is for the guild!

  “Guild?”

  Zedic says, “Now that we’ve selected a class, we can create a guild.”

  “Why do we need to do that?”

  Rocket: A guild allows you to use a shared bank. You can also use combos and go on larger quests.

  “Guild it is, then. But before we do that, I have a few friends I’d like to invite.” My inventory list comes up and I select the NVA Seed, item 556. The seed appears in the air and I place my hand on it.

  ~*~

  “Assassin class,” Aiden says as soon as he spawns.

  “How did you know?”

  “Your handle reads Steamboy_889, Shield Warrior.”

  “Dammit, Rocket, change my handle.”

  Rocket: I keep forgetting!

  “What about a subclass?” Zedic steps forward and shakes Aiden’s hand. The two lock eyes for a moment, sizing each other up.

  “You’re Quantum’s teammate?” Aiden asks. Zedic nods.

  An arm slides into mine and I glance right to find Dolly.

  “Hiya, Doll,” I say, kissing her forehead. She wraps her arms around my neck and gives me a kiss on the lips that nearly shocks me out of my NV Visor. “Careful,” I tell her, “there are kids watching.”

  Rocket: I’m eighteen.

  “And I know you still have pictures of both Frances and Dolly in their steampunk gear.”

  Rocket: Those are just for the Dream Team archives!

  Aiden laughs. He’s only catching half the conversation, but he gets the gist.

  “You two need to select a class,” I tell the Loopers.

  The NPC priest’s eyebrows dip in the middle as Dolly approaches. She passes through the circle I previously engaged with, presses her hand on an open book resting on the dais in front of the priest. “Aiden,” she says, her hand still on the book, “you will take Assassin as your main class and Berserker as your subclass. Berserker Assassin.”

  “With pleasure,” he says, baring his fangs.

  “And I’ll be a Mind Warrior.”

  Rocket: Mind Magic is her subclass. Not many people can wield mind magic correctly according to Steampunk’s notes. In fact, only 9% of the entire fantasy world use mind magic as a subclass.

  “You’re making me want to say Peanut Gallery but I’m trying to restrain myself.”

  Rocket: Self-control is important, especially if you have the runs.

  “Thanks for the heads up.”

  Dolly and Aiden are given their classes; the priest utters an incantation and calls them his children.

  “That reminds me,” I say as soon as they return to the front of the cathedral. “Did Dirty Dave come through with some armor?”

  Aiden gives Dolly the ‘you tell him’ look.

  Dolly says, “Dirty Dave got into some trouble in Chinatown.”

  “With Chinatown,” Aiden says.

  “Tony Clifton again?”

  “Scarface Charlie this time.”

  “He’s out of the slammer?” I shake my head. Damn fiends. “Well, I hope you two at least have some weapons.”

  “I have my inventory list,” Aiden says. “No guns, I get the rules, but there are other standoff weapons that are just as effective as firearms and directed energy weapons.”

  “Dolly?”

  She shows me her fingers, which are covered by a pair of elbow-length gloves. “These should do the trick.”

  “Somehow, I believe you.”

  We exit the cathedral, greeted once again by the hustle and bustle of the town. “So, a guild name … ” Zedic says.

  “Aiden’s Assassins?”

  “You’re getting funny in your old age,” I tell the NPC who killed me for two subjective years. “We need something Latin, something guild-y, Round Table-ish, Prince and the
Pauper-y.”

  Dolly says, “Knights of Non Compos Mentis – The Knights of Insanity.”

  “Zedic?”

  “Works for me.”

  “Aiden?”

  “I liked my suggestion better, but that’ll work.”

  “Knights of Non Compos Mentis it is!” I say, brandishing my Buster Sword.

  Several popups appear in front of me from various players gathered around the cathedral.

  “Engage in a duel?” I ask aloud.

  Rocket: Lower your weapon!

  “Raising your weapon and declaring your guild name is one of the more common ways to challenge other players, FNG.” a woman with elf ears calls over to me. Dolly pushes me aside and declines all the duels.

  “We should probably get some armor before we start issuing challenges,” she says as she slides her hand up my arm.

  ~*~

  The armor shop is next to a bustling pub – these are the types of tough decisions I’m faced with in VE Dreamworlds.

  “I’d love to see what’s on tap,” I say.

  Zedic hesitates. “We should really get some gear and start leveling up. We’ll need EXP to beat the orcs, and we’ll need both the dragon that the orcs have taken and EXP to get to the next continent, Polynya.”

  “Can’t you use some of your NVA powers to just transport us there, Doll?”

  “Tritania limits the ability of NPCs, and I’m only the NVA in The Loop.” Dolly’s leather armor is similar to ours, aside from the fact that it appears to have been molded on her.

  “Didn’t Rocket say something about going to the pub to accept quests? We can get a quest or two and get EXP that way.”

  Rocket: I did say that.

  “See?” I ask. “I am good for something!”

  “This place?” Zedic steps around a man with cat ears and long white whiskers on his cheeks.

  The pub door swings open and two players roll out, throwing fists into each other’s faces. A beaky dwarf who’s just different enough from DisNike’s Grumpy to avoid copyright infringement issues gets the upper hand. My sphincter puckers in sympathy as the schnozzle king lets loose a series of particularly well-executed examples of the Liverpool Kiss. Dust swirls in the air around the two and the dwarf Zidanes the man once again.

  “This looks like one of those fight your way in, fight your way out places,” I say as I sidestep into The Green Dragon. The inside of the pub is exactly what you’d expect in a fantasy world – frosty mugs, gnarled faces, ladies in corseted armor, beefy buffoons with clubs and axes at their sides, DisNike knock-off Tinkerbells zipping around carrying trays ten times their size to a few anthropomorphized Twilight rejects.

  “Standing room only?” I ask.

  A hand grabs my wrist; I glance down at a hooded woman sitting alone at a table. “You can sit here,” she says without making eye contact.

  ~*~

  “Don’t I recognize you?” I ask as I take a seat. Zedic sits on the left, Dolly on the right. Aiden remains standing and watches the other patrons – one can never be too safe.

  “Earlier.” The hood covering the woman’s face reveals just the bottom of her jawline. Pinning her cloak together is an enormous red brooch. Her handle appears: Veenure. Dark Mage.

  “Veenure.”

  “Steamboy_889?”

  Zedic snorts.

  Rocket: I’ll get it changed, I promise! I can’t do it while you’re logged in.

  “So, what are two NPCs doing with two players?” she asks.

  “We’re part of a guild, the Knights of Non Compos Mentis,” I say proudly.

  “I’ve never seen a guild parading around without any armor,” she says. “You’re lucky people just started drinking about an hour ago.”

  “We can handle our own.” I’m uncertain of the way she’s looking at me. Her green eyes shine out from the shadow cast by the hood over her head.

  A not-Tinkerbell waitress stops in front of our table, hovers like a hummingbird. “What’ll it be?” she asks in a high-pitched, squeaky voice.

  “Four of the strongest brews you have,” I say without looking up at her.

  “Four Horse Piss coming right up.”

  “Horse Piss?”

  But she’s gone already zipping towards the bar.

  “It’s the name of the brewery,” Veenure says, “On the northern coastline in a city called Shiya.”

  “You know your way around,” says Zedic.

  “I’ve been coming to Tritania for a year or so now.”

  “Are you part of a guild?” I ask.

  “I was part of a guild, but that was before they became PKers. I quit.”

  “PKers?”

  “Player killers.” Veenure lowers her hood and locks eyes with me. Her nose is long and thin; her eyes stretch across her face as if they’ve been ironed. Vertical Arabic-looking script is tattooed down her cheeks, three lines on each side. Her ears are Spock-pointy, her lips thin and purple, her hair midnight blue. “They hunt other players for sport.”

  “Why?”

  “Rewards. People drop valuable items and rupees if they are killed in the game.”

  Tinkerbell returns and magically sets four beers on the table. “That’ll be 100 rupees.”

  Zedic raises his hand to transfer the money. “There goes our armor savings,” he says under his breath.

  One sip of Horse Piss and my life bar flashes. “Wow, this is some strong stuff!”

  Aiden slams his mug down, burps. Dolly cracks a smile and my hand instantly squeezes hers under the table.

  “You need armor?” Veenure asks.

  “We need a lot of things,” I tell her. “Armor, to rescue a dragon named Mirror from some orcs down south, and enough EXP to get to Polynya.”

  “So that is your guild’s mission?” she asks. With another sip of Horse Piss, I find myself staring at the writing tattooed on Veenure’s face. What could it mean?

  Her eyes catch mine and I know I’ve been caught.

  “My tattoos?” she asks.

  “Yeah, just wondering what they say. I’ve never seen that type of writing before.”

  “It’s Thulean, called a Duchigno Banj.”

  “You speak Thulean? That’s the uppermost continent, right?”

  “I’m learning it,” says Veenure.

  “What does Duh-chig-no bansh mean?” Zedic asks. He’s a quarter through his Horse Piss, quickly catching up to yours truly.

  “Duchigno Banj means Prayer of the Dead. “Duchig” is an adjective for dead, “banj” means prayer. Having the ink increases the power of my summoning spells.”

  “Have you been to Ultima Thule?” I ask.

  “No, but I’ve been to Polynya.”

  “Do you have a dragon?”

  “No, I took an airship there.”

  “Not another air ship,” I mumble, remembering what I’ve seen in Steam.

  “We call it an airship. It’s actually a floating ship with magical oars,” she explains. “Still, you need to have enough EXP to travel on it.”

  A pig-faced man bursts into the bar squealing at the top of his lungs. “She’s been kidnapped!” he snorts. His nasal septum is pierced with a licensed, collector’s edition, XXXL reproduction One Ring, and bristly tufts of black hair are scattered across his dome. “Empress Thun has been kidnapped!” Homo Porcum shouts.

  “Kidnapped?” An ogre with acne on his acne exclaims. He slams his fist against his table, splintering the wood.

  “She’s been kidnapped! She was last seen being taken west, in the direction of Mount Mentlana. The Authorities in Aramis are offering ten thousand EXP, five thousand rupees as well as legendary weapons for her rescue.”

  “Is that enough to get us to Polynya?” I ask Veenure.

  “More than enough. It would take you days of battling to get that much EXP. Most battles award less than a hundred EXP aside from bosses.”

  A woman in a yellow cuirass and horned helmet knocks her table over as she leaps to her feet and brandishe
s her sword. “I will save Empress Thun!” she screams. “And no one can stop me!” She makes for the door and barges into the ogre, who snarls and backhands her into a Billbarian wannabe who spills his plate of pulled unicorn with fries into the lap of a mage in a black cloak with silver stars and golden moons, and a pointy wizard’s hat with Wilst Thou Kisseth Me In The Dark, Baby? spelled out upon it in glow-in-the-dark script.

  He shouts, “Mother Pus Bucket!” leaps up and bangs his chair into the table behind him.

  It’s a downhill geometric cascade from there. In no time at all, tables and chairs go airborne, weapons clash, balls of fire and great whopping electric blue ZOTs of magic burn through the air, and with a commendable impartiality, the not-Tinkerbells hover above the action and slam tremendously disproportionate Acme mallets onto the heads of anyone they can reach.

  Watching turn-based fighting is a completely different experience from actively taking part. It seems as if everyone is moving quickly, but in reality – even in a bar brawl – each avatar is waiting for their turn to strike. The brawling dwarves from earlier were also turn-based fighting; Einstein roll over – quantum physics takes on a whole new meaning in a VE dreamworld.

  “Outside,” Veenure says, her hand falling on mine. A quick look from Veenure to the Queen Bee Herself, and I pull my hand away.

  “Let’s go,” I tell Dolly loud enough that Aiden and Zedic hear me.

  ~*~

  As soon as we’re outside, I turn back to the entrance to The Green Dragon. “You know, we could gain some EXP in a fight like this.” The building shakes and rumbles as thrown bodies transfer kinetic energy to its structure and magic backwash bounces around inside.

  “They would eat our lunch and bitch-slap us into next week.” Zedic says, touching his cheap leather armor.

  “He’s right,” says Veenure. “You two have amazing offensive weapons, but those will only carry you so far in a turn-based fighting system.”

  “So we need armor. Then we can rescue this Princess Thun. Once we get some EXP, we can get the dragon and head north to Polynya.”

  Rocket: Ask Veenure to join you.

  “Good idea,” I say to the sky. “Veenure, would you like to join our guild?”