“Relax,” AliceX said to him, her face muddy and slightly burned just like his. “We’re entering from their farthest reaches, you see. These are high-level Orkish lands. We’ll have to cross them. It will get nicer after that.”
“It’s all my fault,” Zack said.
“What is?” AliceX said. “The difficult layout? The fact that the Orkish altar is at the heart of all this? Well, at least it’s in their kindergarten area, or whatever works for kindergarten with Orks. We are still dead, don’t get me wrong. Don’t even think of attacking anything here, neither PC nor NPC. Anything engages with you, you RUN. That way.”
She pointed at the yellowish and brownish rolling hills up front, the heart of the Orkish domain.
“Except you run carefully,” AliceX said. “Don’t run into more trouble you’re running away from. Remember you’re being watched by all kinds of random event triggers based on your actions. Don’t play a hero ready to die. Seriously.”
“Do I look like a hero?” Zack asked.
“Stop extorting compliments out of me,” she replied.
“Compliments?” He was genuinely shocked she would consider complimenting him.
“Be CAREFUL!” AliceX shouted and pushed him aside, then again and again, until both of them fell down a small ravine.
CRASH-BOOM! A pod made of volcanic lava that looked unpleasantly like a chrysalis made of fiery flesh, its veins burning red, the size of an aerial bomb, crashed right on top of them, raising a huge fountain of mud.
WHOOSH! Before the cloud of dirt had time to settle, the lava pod broke open. It became twice bigger and discharged a strong whiff of mustard and gasoline and almonds and rotten eggs, the smell hitting Zack hard like a hammer, the congregation of everything poisonous or repulsive he had ever smelled in his life. He felt the close presence of pure evil.
“It’s huge,” the golden-braided Elf Ranger whispered, crouched next to him, peeking out of their improvised trench. “The thing that fell down… that was spawned when… I can’t see what it is but it’s huge.”
Zack looked back, slightly panicked, and saw the shadow of the creature stretching across the badlands behind them. The ground was cracked in places but otherwise flat as a cinema screen, and Zack suddenly realized he could discern who the demonic paratrooper was.
“It’s a Basilisk!”
“How do you know?” AliceX asked.
Zack made a painful grimace. “It’s this shape, a chicken carcass on stilts, I kinda remember it.”
And I so hoped I’d never have to face this thing again, he thought. Especially not in this weird Permadeath mode, or in a coma, or whatever brings me into here and now.
He remembered Elon Musk again. What if someone would feed a self-learning AI The Godfather trilogy? A good question. What would happen if you gave such an AI a world to rule, and taught it all the fun stuff about demons, and abominations, and Inferno, and human fears of spiders and skeletons and death? What would this AI grow to become if you made it into a god of this insane fantasy world, gave it superpowers? What if such a god was opposing him now, testing him, making his worst fears come true?
“I’m sure it’s a Basilisk,” Zack said.
You encountered a Greater Basilisk!
Greater Basilisk Lvl 31
“It’s okay,” he told AliceX. “This thing, it has to get really close to you before it attacks. And it doesn’t move too fast. Let’s go, we’ll outrun it.”
Zack tried to move forward but the little golden-braided Elf Ranger blocked his path.
“No,” AliceX said. “No, stop. It’s no Lesser Basilisk. This one is more like…”
HISS-BOOM! Something roared and hit the dirt right next to them, bringing up a spray of mud taller than the Basilisk’s shadow was.
“…like artillery,” AliceX finished.
You encountered a Lesser Leprechaun!
Lesser Leprechaun Lvl 31
A ball of tentacles dug itself out from under the ground in the place stricken by the Greater Basilisk’s missile. At first, it looked just like that, a tentacle flower of sorts. But the next moment, the flower bloomed and opened, and Zack saw the creature was mostly a huge blind open red maw inside of a ball of flesh, with the tentacles protruding and retracting all around it like a little hungry corona, probing the air, pulling the creature forward, probing the air some more.
“Ewww,” Zack said. “Isn’t this too far?”
“Too far in what?” AliceX said, nocking three arrows at once and sending them in quick succession straight into the mouth of the creature.
Lesser Leprechaun Lvl 31 was hit by AliceX and lost 5 hit points
Lesser Leprechaun Lvl 31 was hit by AliceX and lost 4 hit points
Lesser Leprechaun Lvl 31 was CRITICALLY hit by AliceX, lost 17 hit points, and was killed!
“Well, how abominable an abomination must really look?” he asked, quickly scanning the land around him, harvesting everything he could. Zack realized now the game always wanted him to be active as an Alchemist in response for his love to Alchemy. Somewhat, this Director AI was a fair thing.
HISS-BOOM! WHOOSH! The next moment, another maw wrapped in a ball of tentacles fell from above and burrowed into the ground.
You encountered a Lesser Leprechaun!
Lesser Leprechaun Lvl 31
HISS-BOOM! WHOOSH!
You encountered a Lesser Leprechaun!
Lesser Leprechaun Lvl 31
“Do you see its attack pattern?” Zack whispered to Alice as they lay low. “Do you see what it wants, this Basilisk? It tries to bring us back, turn us towards this walking thing launching them. This is why we must push forward. Check this out though, this pod, when it exploded, it rained a lot of useful things for me to craft from. Rained them all around. Funny, is it not? FIREBOMB!”
Items Lost:
Sulfur X3
Saltpeter X3
He hoped it looked half as impressive as he intended it to. Truth be told, Zack was broken completely, and brought down to the state of a chased and hunted wild animal, ready to fight tooth and nail until the end, no matter what was to come.
Items Gained:
Firebomb (1/1)
He tossed the fiery metal grenade straight into the hole burrowed by the second maw thing. BOOM! Flash! A tail of fire lashed back out, and a fountain of tentacles and, for some reason, eyeballs burst out, though Zack was unable to see any eyes on neither of these Leprechaun creatures. The gore fell down on them like rain, and he once again felt like a soldier at war, someone caught in an open battlefield, someone who shouldn’t have intended to live forever.
Lesser Leprechaun Lvl 31 was hit by Zack, lost 27 hit points, and was killed!
For defeating your opponents, you receive 50 XP!
You earned 5 XP for using your Alchemy skill
LEVEL UP!
Congratulations!
Your Alchemist is now Level 10!
+1 to Agility
+1 to one of the skills:
Sneak - Speech >Alchemy<
Achievement Unlocked: Journeyman Alchemist
Reward: Crafting Recipe: Potion of Mana Burn
Craft Potion of Mana Burn
Alchemy Lvl 10 Recipe
Items Required:
Antidote
Nightshade X3
Think “Craft Now” to Confirm
AliceX brought down the next thing with an arrow, and it exploded into a rainbow of viscera, scattering golden coins.
Lesser Leprechaun Lvl 31 was CRITICALLY hit by AliceX, lost 28 hit points, and was killed!
“Leprechauns…” Zack muttered as they made it out of the Greater Basilisk’s attack range and stayed on the move. “What sick creature designed these Leprechauns? It’s like this island of some crazy scientist making ugly things that shouldn’t have existed in the first place.”
“Why, you’re taking it a bit too close and personal,” AliceX said. “See, your position is unique, and w
e other millions of people perceive this world as a videogame. A demonic, hellish thing in a videogame must remain scary past what, a century of horror movies? Half a century of other videogames, each one trying REAL hard to creep you out? I say it’s good artwork. Creepy. In a proper way. The steampunk way.”
“It’s no steampunk,” Zack said. “Tentacles have nothing to do with steampunk, same as stupid goggles. It’s more of a body horror in fact. It were Japanese sickos who invented all this.”
“Jules Verne,” AliceX said. “A Billion of Leagues under the Sea or something. We read it at school, it’s French and very old. It has steampunk and it has tentacles.”
“It’s not how it’s called,” Zack said. He looked back, at the Greater Basilisk still towering behind them in the mist, moving after them because they didn’t made it past the creature AI’s target tracking radius yet. If their path was to run into any kind of an obstacle now, they would be trapped in a deadly crossfire with Lovecraftian themes, Zack realized.
“Okay, you know what?” He looked at AliceX as tragically as it was possible while walking hurriedly by her side. She seemed to catch the despair Zack tried to broadcast, so he went on, “I’m not a hero. You’re right; I’m the biggest loser, ever. It’s all my fault, the volcano, the demons. I was the one to flip this global trigger that started it. I’m sure it was placed there, inside this Shrine of Marduk, just on that purpose. They wanted the greediest, lowliest, stupidest crab to switch it on one day. It was a big trap meant to punish me for being this way. It succeeded. Now I just would like to go home.”
“Look, I could have left you any moment,” she said. “But I didn’t. But if you’re going to whine all the way again, I don’t know.”
“All right, I will shut up,” he replied. “Okay.”
“And stop AGREEING with me all the time!” AliceX turned around, looking like a little enraged pixie. Then she saw he was trapped and struggling to please her and toned down her wrath until it was gone. She said in a more relaxed voice, a game streamer’s voice, “Look, I’m sure you have this delusion about you being the reason for this demonic thing. I’m sure it’s simply some event, you know. The school is over, the time of vacations is soon, and you want people playing your game still, so you run this event, Demonic Summer Invasion or whatever, you sell some tie-in merchandise, maybe someone writes a fluff book about it, and then it’s over. You think it’s the first time we have something like this? It always arrives like a Christmas surprise of sorts, and then turns into the Ten Plagues of Egypt. This new year, we had Yetis and Ice Giants and their Mammoths, you know, a season thing. This spring, we had this big dragon event. Next, who knows? Could be locusts. Or rivers of blood. I actually think it’s kinda cool.”
“It’s not like that,” Zack said feebly, trying to disagree all he could. “I was chosen for this, Alice. I am a pariah now; I am really cursed by destiny.”
“Look, maybe you’re right,” AliceX said. “Maybe this invisible ever-present AI puppet-master thing is listening and watching you all the way, treating you like his favorite. A Chosen One or whatever. Maybe all of this happened on purpose. Then what? What’s the point?”
“No idea,” he said.
“Well, I have an idea,” AliceX replied. “Don’t you think you are maybe a bit of a negative person? Too concerned about small stuff? Someone to be taught a lesson on how to be happier in life?”
“Well, thanks, I don’t need it,” he said. “All I wanted is to play a videogame.”
AliceX fell silent for a while.
“You know, this is exactly what my little brother said when he stole that cash from our parents, all I wanted is to play, I wanted to buy some premium stuff, so what.”
“And why did you cover up for him then?” Zack asked.
“Because I know this thing is real.”
“Which thing?”
“VR addiction. Social anxiety. Escapism,” she said. “And you are an F2P player as well, the free starter pack as a gift along with the VR rig, right?”
“Pretty much,” Zack said. “But I happened to want to be a Human Alchemist anyway, not an Ork and not an Elf, so I consider it a bargain.”
“Then, economically, you have to thank people like me, a multitude of us who spent fifty or so bucks on their merchandise. Elves especially. The premium core at its worst, stylish but underpowered. You guys make good fillers for players, a lot of people running around making the world live and breathe. And still, it’s our money which pays for the prizes here. And pays for things like new game servers being brought up or cutting-edge ragdoll and AI technologies introduced. We are the taxpayers who keep this reality show going.”
“So how…”
“And ESPECIALLY,” AliceX interrupted him in her ruthless manner, “you need to thank the people like my brother. Who sell their birthday presents on eBay. Who sell their bedroom furniture on eBay to pay for all kinds of premium stuff. The Two-and-a-Half Percent, the true spenders, the whales, or, to put it straight: the truly addicted players. They are the people who barely have a life because they give it all to their favorite game.”
“Now I see why you’re with me,” Zack said. “He’s no different from me. He plays this game for his life. I play it for mine.”
At first she didn’t reply. A new volcanic spore crashed somewhere ahead. A big cartoonish boar was watching them from the reeds closely but not attacking, its attention most likely drawn to the bigger enemy shuffling stubbornly after the two of them.
“Thanks for reminding me I’m going to lose you too,” AliceX finally said, her voice quiet and serious. “Everyone by my side always seems to stay by me only on some extreme conditions requiring my complete sacrifice.”
“I am not a loser,” Zack said. “I’m maybe not that good in videogames, yes. I never win at sports. That’s why I chose to be an Alchemist. I mean that’s why I chose chemistry as my field. My life is devoted to science, which makes me a nerd and kind of a loser from the standpoint of you pretty extrovert girls in love with competition and cruel public humiliation of those they find unworthy.”
“My life is devoted to proving to you all I don’t need you!” AliceX shook her golden braids furiously. “Don’t get me wrong, okay? I become weak sometimes. I want to be cool. I read books. I go to disco clubs and say awkward things to boys. I always hope someone in some club will ask me about the books I read. Yes, I’m that stupid. I get offended when you all see nothing but a pretty stupid thing in me, someone to be patted on the head or lectured or fooled and taken advantage of and left alone because of her kindness.”
She broke off and went completely silent.
“Look,” Zack said. “I will always be around, I promise.”
“You won’t,” AliceX said, her voice as cold and furious as before.
“I WILL.”
“YOU WON’T,” a voice roared right in front of him. The next moment, the light and shadows and mist coalesced and wreathed into the bulky green figure of an Orkish Commando. In a brief magical flash, the Ork appeared behind AliceX and grabbed the little Elf Ranger, his crude crescent-shaped blade wrapped around her throat.
MadDoc reveals Commando Grab!
The Commando said, “Don’t you listen to what your girlfriend says? You talk too much! You pity yourself too much! You got you both killed for sure.”
“It’s you again,” AliceX said. “Also, he’s not my boyfriend.”
Two more Orks stepped out of the mist, a big towering Brute and a small Shaman. The trio was recognizable except for the Shaman. He was spitting darts the last time we met, Zack remembered. The little goblin must have changed his specialty. He carried a crooked staff now, with an end shaped somewhat like a bloodied pointed ear.
“I also remembered you,” MadDoc the Commando said, holding AliceX in his Commando Grab.
“She is the one who’s dangerous,” Zorg the Brute said. “He’s nobody. Kill her outright and let’s make him run, then use his b
ack for target practice.”
“No!” Zack said, taking a step forward, his shoulders proudly wide. “It’s her who is nobody. I am the Chosen One. I’m the guy trapped inside the game, remember?”
“I remember him telling this,” MadDoc confirmed.
“Like Neo,” the Shaman said.
“Exactly,” Zack said. “I’ll tell you more. You know what I learned?”
“Thirty seconds until I kill her,” the Commando informed him.
“Oh, you won’t,” Zack said. “For you see, I’ve been chosen by Aetheria’s Director AI.”
“Really? Yeah?” The trio of Orks exchanged puzzled looks.
“You think our second meeting is random?” Zack asked. “Oh no. Not twice in a row. I bet this Big Brother AI has chosen me for real.”
“Zack,” AliceX said in a worried voice.
“I bet,” Zack said, “that this AI will try and keep me alive no matter what. And if you will count with me, you will see what happens. One. Two. Three.”
The Elven Ranger seemed to realize what his plan was. She fell silent. The three Orks also quieted down.
“I admit your boyfriend does sound crazy,” MadDoc the Commando said, his Commando Grab timing out and yet his attention fully devoted to Zack.
“He’s trying to fool us,” Zorg the Brute said. “I just have no idea how, not yet. But he does.”
“Maybe he is like Neo, who knows? Let him prove it,” the Shaman said.
“Four. Five. Six,” Zack counted. “Seven.”
What takes you so long? he thought. Where are you? The counting thing would serve him well only until ten. And then…
HISS-BOOM! A Lesser Leprechaun launched by a Greater Basilisk went down in a wide yet very precise parabola, directly through the Orkish Commando’s chest.
“What the…” MadDoc had the time to say.
WHOOSH! SPLAT! A ball of tentacles exploded from his chest the next moment, and his two Orkish companions watched in amazement as a huge red maw devoured their friend from the inside.
MadDoc was CRITICALLY hit by Greater Basilisk Lvl 31, lost 117 hit points, and was killed!
“He didn’t listen,” Zack proclaimed. “And he was punished.”
The Alchemist of Aetheria: A LitRPG Adventure Page 19
