by Michael Ryan
What’s PTSD? Paranoid To Stupid Degrees?
You’ll be okay, honey. You went through a – look out!
A group of spiders moved along the corner of the wall and ceiling. Using his sword, he sliced and sliced and sliced until eventually their numbers decreased.
“I think they’ve stopped coming,” he said. “Double-check everywhere.”
They squashed the remaining spiders, but everyone was still panicky. Then, a dense cloud of bats flew into the room, and chaos reigned again.
Torches and swords flew, uncontrolled and wild.
Screams of pain were intermixed with cursing in foreign languages.
“Calm down!” Dale shouted. “Quit worrying about the bats; they’re harmless. Instead, get ready for the boss.”
The flying creatures proved that even harmless animals were capable of starting a riot. The platoon suffered more friendly-fire casualties from the chaos caused by the bats than they’d suffered from the spiders.
“Shit,” Dale said. The last of the bats flew away. “At least that’s over.”
“Ahhhhh! Help me!” A soldier was on her back, screaming in pain and shouting incoherently. She died with a gurgle, and Dale frowned.
“What should we do now?” Sanjay asked.
“We move on. Once we find the castle entrance, I’ll have the other teams join the attack.”
Dale returned to the door and tapped the handle again. Nothing jumped at him, so he turned the knob with his gloved hand.
The passageway was locked.
“I don’t suppose anyone has picks?” Dale asked.
Nobody answered.
“New strategy. Inspect your loot for clues,” Dale said. “I have a silver coin from the orc-spider; maybe it does something. And I also have several metal pieces that appear to be part of a puzzle.”
“I found a silver coin as well,” someone said.
“Me too,” a second person said.
The drachmas totaled thirty.
“There must be a clue in this lore book,” a soldier said. He held up a scroll.
“It’s an ancient anime,” said a female voice. “Like from the eighties.”
“So?”
“You just want to read it. Be honest.”
“It might contain an Easter egg. You know, eighties trivia.”
“That’s been done already.”
“Dale?” Sanjay interrupted. “What’s your–”
“It’s a puzzle,” Dale declared.
“How do you know?”
“These things are similar to an old Rhith World called Scorpion Island. It’s a pirate game.” Dale held up one of the metal pieces. “These form a key. The challenge was figuring out how to piece them together. Put whatever you’ve found on the floor.”
Once all the parts of the three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle were placed on the floor, they matched them together. When they finished, they almost had a complete key.
Dale noticed that one end had a notch.
“Try fitting a coin in the slot,” he said.
It fit.
Dale unlocked the door and swung it open.
Two enemy guards sat at a table playing chess.
They were dressed in medieval chainmail cloaks and carried longswords and daggers.
They looked at the intruders with surprised shock.
“Sanjay,” Dale commanded, “take the one playing black alive if you can!”
The guard who’d been playing white pulled out his sword and swung it at Dale’s head.
He deflected the blow and returned one of his own.
The second soldier reached for his weapon, but Sanjay kicked him to the floor. Two of his squad swarmed the fallen guard, and they pinned him to the ground.
“We’ve got him,” Sanjay said.
Dale faked an attack at his opponent’s right side, changed direction, and then stabbed him in the neck.
The wounded soldier shrieked, dropped his weapon, and grabbed his neck with both hands. Blood spewed from the gash, and he looked Dale in his eyes as he fell to the ground.
“Rook to queen four,” he mumbled as he bled out.
Dale was unable to remove his gaze from the gushing red flow that puddled around the guard’s corpse, and reminded himself that the blood wasn’t real. The pain was real unless the guard was an NPC, but he’d acted like a real person as he’d died. In either case, Dale felt sick watching it.
Ërin: There’s no time for that kind of introspection right now.
Dale: It’s just so real. You wouldn’t understand. Do we still have a commlink up to Smith?
Yes, but messages will be routed through the soldiers you’ve posted. So you won’t have privacy.
That’s okay.
“Smith?” Dale asked after activating his commlink.
“Still here. Guarding a tree. It’s my complete bitch, so don’t worry. It won’t be leafing anytime soon.”
“We’ve made contact. One guard dead, one alive. We’re going to interrogate him. I’ll let you know soon if you should send the other teams through the tunnel.”
“Roger, but hurry up. I’m growing roots.”
Dale wasn’t in a joking mood. He stared at the blood splattered all over his boots and wondered why the game was programmed with such realism.
“I’m not sure how to interrogate this guard,” he said to Sanjay. “Or if we can gain anything worth knowing.”
Dale knelt and got close to the captive’s face. “Talk,” he said.
“Urgggg,” the guard answered. “Rook takes rook.” He spat out a mouthful of blood.
Dale looked up. “Sanjay, send two soldiers down the hall to make sure we don’t get ambushed.”
Dale: Ërin, are there any rules about this?
Ërin: No. This is war, and the only rules are ones you can’t break even if you tried.
Is he sentient or NPC?
I cannot answer that.
Cannot or don’t know?
Null question, Dale. Sorry.
“Kill him quickly,” Dale said.
“What?”
“There’s nothing he’ll give up. Even if he told us anything, we couldn’t trust it. We’re not going to torture him. Bottom line, we don’t have the time. Kill him swiftly and let’s go.”
One of Sanjay’s squad hacked off the guard’s head.
Someone else vomited all over Dale’s boots.
“I have a new directive,” Dale said. “Kill enemies and take no prisoners. Let’s find the princess and get the fuck out of here.”
After following a stone and brick corridor and climbing another stairwell, they found the entrance to a garden courtyard inside the castle. Dale peeked over a stone wall. A dozen soldiers were wandering around, and another six were positioned at exterior arrow slits.
“Smith?” he asked, whispering into his commlink.
“I’m still here,” Smith answered. “With the tree. We’re friends now.”
“Have the two teams attack. Be cautious, but I need them to create a diversion.”
“You got it,” Smith replied.
Dale explained his plan to Sanjay.
“I have nine soldiers left, not counting the ones who are still posted along the passageway,” Sanjay said.
“Order them to join us. I can reach Smith from here, and we need all the help we can get.”
When teams Kim and Tom attacked the castle, the defending soldiers shouted an alarm and scurried around like panicked insects after something disturbed their hive.
Dale gave the ordered to invade. They attacked the archers first, hoping to give the other teams a reprieve from the defenders’ projectiles. Dale and Sanjay’s attack caught the bowmen by surprise and killed most of them, with only small losses on Dale’s side. Continuing to use coordinated formations, they destroyed the rest of the courtyard troops within a few minutes.
“Smith?” Dale asked.
“I’m here.”
“Proceed to the front of the castle. We’ll drop the dr
awbridge for you.”
“Roger that.”
Dale enlisted a couple of soldiers to help him lower the drawbridge, and the other teams crossed the moat. Once all three groups reassembled, they assessed the situation. Kim’s team had lost two soldiers, both shot by arrows. Tom’s crew had lost a few as well, also by arrows.
They were left with a force of just under forty soldiers, and Dale thought it seemed like too many people for the difficulty of the quest.
Then the portcullis dropped.
A trap.
The doors opened on the upper floor, and a swarm of swordsmen flooded into the courtyard. A chaotic battle began. There was no time to communicate or strategize.
Swords flew.
People screamed.
Blood and gore splattered everywhere.
Dale engaged a tall, muscular enemy with mad sword skills. He blocked everything Dale tried against him. When Dale feinted right, the swordsman moved left. He attempted to advance straight using brute force, but the swordsman was too powerful.
Dale reached for a throwing knife, but lost his balance and almost dropped his sword. He was beginning to accept that he’d be facing a torturous, painful death again, but Smith spun behind the swordsman and lopped off his head.
“Quit goofing around,” Smith said. “We need to find the princess. Follow me.”
As Dale’s platoon dispatched the remaining enemies, carrion birds landed and picked at the bloody body parts strewn about the courtyard.
“We could use ranged support,” Smith shouted to the group. “Follow us up.”
Dale was right behind Smith when they heard a loud crashing sound. Behind them, a giant troll with a club broke through a wall. The beast separated them from the rest of the group.
“Hell,” Smith said.
“How do you know where you’re going?” Dale asked.
“I’ve been in this castle before,” Smith answered.
“Really?”
“Maybe not this exact one, but the same designer. It wasn’t originally a Rhith Systems construct. They must have contracted with the government and used the same blueprints. Cheap bastards.”
“But good for us,” Dale said.
“Exactly. Follow me.”
Dale followed him up another flight of stairs and down a long hallway.
Chapter Twenty-One
Maybe Krishna didn’t create the universe just like a computer, but as a computer.
~ Sanjay Patel
Dale approached a large wooden door that featured an intricately designed gargoyle face carved in the center. Set into the hardwood above the relief was an opaque window covered with iron bars. “What’s behind it?” he asked.
“Oh, nothing much if it’s like Grey Arrow, the game I mentioned,” Smith said. “Just a powerful two-headed ogre boss with a club.”
“Any weaknesses?” Dale asked.
“Not really. He’s slow but defensively skilled. To kill him you’ve got to remove both heads.”
“Okay,” Dale said. “Sounds easy. Ready?”
“Sure.”
The ogre boss was there just as Smith had described.
Dale entered the room first and moved to the right.
Smith followed and moved to the left.
The ogre followed their movements, with one head for each of them.
Locked in a cage behind the ogre was the princess in a pretty pink ruffled dress.
The beast rushed Smith first.
Dale tried to flank him, but after the giant swung at Smith, he spun his whole body around and nearly took Dale’s head off with his club.
“He’s not exactly slow!” Dale shouted. He ducked, rolled, and came up behind the ogre in another attempt to flank it.
Dale lashed out with his sword.
The beast swung its club and blocked the slice, but Smith’s blade struck home. The ogre screamed with a ferocity that hurt Dale’s ears. It went after Smith in full berserker mode.
Smash! Smash! Smash!
The club flew so fast Dale could barely see it.
Smith was only partially successful in blocking the attack, and Dale could see he was weakening.
Using the ogre’s attack as a chance to get behind him, Dale lunged at the boss and aimed a vicious blow at one of its heads.
Success!
The ogre jumped, screamed, and turned towards Dale. Blood spewed out of its severed neck while it launched another assault. Its club flew, and Dale barely dodged the strike. Wood splinters flew off the floor and hit him in the legs, dropping his HP more than he thought possible from an indirect hit. The beast swung its club at Dale and then turned and picked up its severed head.
The monster threw the bloody mess at Smith.
Smith was caught off guard by the orbiting gore, and it hit his leg. He screamed because the disembodied head was still capable of biting, and it clamped down on Smith’s thigh. He attempted to pry it off without success.
Smith fell to the ground, writhing and moaning in pain.
Dale lunged.
He struck the ogre in the chest with his sword and drove the blade to the hilt. The beast batted Dale away as if he were a pesky insect.
Dale flew across the room and struck the princess’s cage.
“Thank you so much for trying.” She spoke sweetly and seductively in a sugary-sweet serenade.
“I’m not done,” Dale said emphatically.
“You have no sword. Your companion is dying, and you’ve missed the ogre’s heart,” she said. “It’s lower, near its stomach. Look out!”
Dale jumped to his feet as the ogre rushed him.
The half-decapitated boss swung its club to the ceiling and brought it down with all its strength.
Dale jumped.
The club smashed into the cage, splintering the wood and crushing steel.
Dale moved to his left.
Smith yelled, “Catch!”
Dale saw Smith’s sword flying through the air toward him, and caught it with one hand. Without losing any momentum, he sliced off the ogre’s second head with a stroke that would have hit the green on a six-hundred-yard par five championship course.
He sighed with relief at his victory.
“I’m glad that’s over.”
“Look out!” the princess shouted.
The ogre picked up its second disembodied head and cocked its arm back like it was about to throw a seventy-five-yard touchdown pass.
Smith cried out in pain, the princess screamed with fear, and a disembodied head with chomping jaws flew through the air.
Dale dropped to a knee and lifted his borrowed sword up as a front guard.
The flying head struck the sword.
The ogre’s face cleaved solidly on the sword, and both eyes glared at Dale with undiluted hatred. The stench of the monster’s saliva hung in the air like the putrid aroma from a dead rat. Dale swung the sword to the floor with all his might.
The head split in half, exposing a brain the size of a walnut, which explained a lot.
Globs of gooey fat filled the remainder of the skull cavity, but mixed with the ooze was a sizable diamond. Dale was examining the baseball-sized rock when the princess shouted. “He’s not dead yet!”
The headless beast chased Dale, swinging its club blindly. He moved out of its way, but the bloody headless monster continued randomly smashing the floor with powerful swings.
Some of them came very close to hitting Dale.
Massive amounts of blood spewed from the boss’s double neck wounds, and soon the room, as well as Dale, Smith, and the princess, were painted with sticky red goo.
“You need to stick the sword into its heart,” the princess said. “Aim for the belly.”
Dale leapt in front of the ogre between swings and plunged Smith’s sword into the monster’s abdomen. With a loud thud, it landed on the floor, dead.
Congratulations!
+1000XP
You’ve killed the Ogre Boss!
Victory Bonus Awarded t
o all team players!
Training mode: 100 gold bars to all players!
Hint: Two heads are better than one unless they’re attached to the same body. This is why females rule the world.
Attention: This training quest is complete. All members must return to barracks.
The celebratory dinner was excellent.
The kitchen had received Dale’s request, and he didn’t have to suffer the embarrassment of being served Peanut Butter Captain Crunch, although after the day’s performance, nobody would have teased him about it.
“Are you feeling okay, Smith?” Dale asked. They were seated together at the head of the table next to the base commander.
“Yeah, mostly. I still have a bit of a headache,” Smith answered. “But I’m well enough to eat.”
“Good. I feel bad about those who couldn’t be here.” Dale picked at his food. He wasn’t sure what to make of the death, respawn, and continuity problems that still plagued him.
“I know,” Smith said. He patted Dale on the shoulder and said, “You’re a good guy, but you need to quit overthinking everything.”
“I still say he just needs to get laid,” Tom said.
“Your answer to everything,” Galina said. “Pig.”
“Box muncher.”
“What’s that?” Sanjay asked.
“Bahen-chod,” Sanjay whispered under his breath before returning to his curry.
Dale looked at Kim, who never seemed happy. “You did good today. Thanks.”
“Back off, Corporal-boy,” Tom said. “She’s out of your league.”
Kim appeared to smile for the briefest moment, but it could have only been the way she was chewing her food.
Dale looked away, embarrassed that he might have been staring a moment too long.
“Sir,” Smith said. “Permission to speak, sir, about the injuries?”
“Granted,” the commander said. He’d sat silently through most of the meal as if he were only a figurehead, or perhaps an NPC. Nobody at the table was stupid enough to ask him what he was, so he’d been mostly ignored until Smith’s request.
“Are the dead players coming back soon, sir?” he asked.
“Respawn is working fine, son,” the officer answered. “Well, a few glitches, but this is war. You understand? Snafu, tanstaafl, and teotwawki apply, if you know what I mean.”
“Um, no. Sir?” Smith said.
