“Second bowman,” the Princess said. He fired the arrow as she spoke, and the iron tip hit its mark. The arrow sunk into flesh, the shaft disappeared, leaving only the feathered end of the arrow protruding from his scales. Purplish-red blood poured from the wound. The iron had pierced the heart of the animal.
+500XP
Killed: Dragonling Level 5
Dropped: 100 bars of gold.
Dropped: Human bones, unknown origin.
Dropped: Map, unknown origin.
“Ruthann, heal the bitch,” the Princess said. “The rest of you prepare to move. Dogs are to stay close. Bowmen, string iron. Be on alert, the dragonling certainly has siblings.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
He who controls the spice controls the universe.
~ Frank Herbert
Three rewarding career paths are available to skilled sociopaths: thespian, prostitute, and politician. One of these is honest work.
~ Tory Wells
...........................
Dale Brown packed his belongings and ordered a pickup. He ate dinner with his little brother. He told his parents good-bye.
“I’m going to miss you, son,” his mother said.
“I’ll sort of miss all of you,” he said.
His little brother looked at him and stuck out his tongue. “I won’t miss you. Are you leaving your—”
“No, I told you. I need my Rhith World Console and all my games at school.”
“That’s not fair.”
“You’re too young to play.”
“I am not. Mooooom, Dale is teasing me.” He pouted.
“You’ll be old enough in a couple of years,” Dale said.
“Enough bickering.” Earl Brown picked up a bowl of mashed potatoes. “You’re ruining dinner. The food’s delicious, honey. I think I’ll have seconds. Boys?”
“I’m full,” the littlest Brown said. “Can I have dessert now?”
“I need to catch my car and make it to the train. I hate long goodbyes. See you all later. I’ll be back in three months at our first break.” Dale kissed his mother and shook hands with his father. He left home.
...........................
Dale was on the train. Finally. His new life.
...........................
Robrsltater: So you’re going?
DaBrFreak8: Y
Robrsltater: You promised. We shook on it. I thought you’d change your mind.
DaBrFreak8: I told you I couldn’t pass this up.
Robrsltater: You made a deal. If you were my friend you wouldn’t go.
...........................
Dale made it to school with only about twenty percent of his guilt remaining. He was taken to his room and found his belongings stacked next to his bed and dresser.
“That’s efficient.”
“Yes, we’re like that around here,” Cole said.
“Great. Anything else I should know about before I unpack?” Dale looked at the room; it was bigger than his old bedroom at home, and it had a small window that had a view to the outside. He was excited to be on his own. And he felt a little weird and uneasy, too.
“Nope,” Cole said. “Be at orientation tomorrow at ten. I know that’s early, but someone thinks it’s efficient.” He pointed upwards.
Cole left. Dale organized his belongings. He discovered a gift his mother had secretly packed, a family photograph mounted in a simple metal frame. The photo had been taken last summer. It had a classic, old-fashioned look to it, a father and mother with two boys in a small fishing boat. They had been to a man-made lake at a family summer camp. It was a fun trip, he thought, as corny and dumb as it was. He’d complained at the time about being off-line for three days as if that disconnection was going to cause him serious trauma. Well, it might have.
...........................
Dale joined fifty or sixty other students at the appointed time in a large conference room. Dale double checked the room number and the schedule several times. The campus was big and confusing and every time he went down a different hallway he was surprised at how big the school was. It looked like the other students were also nervous and anxious about the start of training. At least he wasn’t alone, even though he felt that way. Dale attempted to act like he wasn’t bothered at all by the new surroundings and uncertainty, but he felt that his act was transparent, and so he kept his head down and avoided eye contact with other students.
“Ladies and Gentlemen, please welcome Vice-Dean Bold.”
The students clapped.
“Good morning, students,” the Vice-Dean said. “I would like to make this short and to the point. Your lives will never be the same after today. Graduates of our programs have changed the world. Our alumni have won awards ranging from the Nobel Peace Prize to the X-Olympics, to every major gaming prize on the planet. We influence both the entertainment industry and the military-industrial complex. Space programs across the globe use our systems for the training and development of their teams. Medical, biological sciences, disease prevention, and numerous other fields depend upon our models, our programming, and our hardware to better the world.
“Among you seated here today, I have little doubt… Let me rephrase that. I have zero doubt that among you seated here this morning we will see great things, new things, and an entirely new generation of awards. In a moment I will start a short presentation on the main screen that will briefly give you an overview of how the next week is going to proceed. There is much to do. More testing. Yes, I know, I feel your pain. More testing and more aptitude research. Some of you students think you know what your best skills are, but you’re mistaken. Some of you may decide to move into a different field, some of you will come to realize that your destiny is different than what you’ve planned or thought it was.
“Ladies and gentlemen, I bid you good morning and good luck.”
The students stood and cheered. While they clapped, the Vice-Dean walked off the rear of the dais, and a moment later a presentation began.
A knight on a horse, both in full armor, appeared. The knight carried a metal lance. The war horse pawed his front hoof on what was now grass and dirt in an outdoor setting. Steam billowed from its nostrils. The horse snorted and took a step backward as a dragon appeared on the other side of the stage.
“From the dawn of storytelling,” a voice of authority filled the room, “we have told stories of hero’s journeys.”
Dale thought he recognized the voice. It sounded like a famous actor, but he couldn’t recall who it was.
“The story of a knight and a dragon pitted in battle is ageless. We’ve created a way for our users to experience the feelings of this battle for themselves. The fear, the anxiety, even the pain, are real. The victory is sweet when it can be earned. Watch.”
The horse charged, and the dragon leaped. The scene played out in front of the students as if they were really in an outdoor meadow watching an ancient duel. The sounds were real. Every detail of the set looked authentic. Even the smells of the fight, the horse, the dragon, the faint scent of eucalyptus trees were present. Dale had watched realistic CGI since he was a child, and he had played games that were amazing in their life-likeness, but this action was on another level. Completely. In spite of knowing that he wasn’t in danger he felt a cold sweat and his heart raced; his primal brain overrode his intellect.
The knight made a charge. As the lance plunged into the dragon and blood gushed and poured from its wound, the scene froze. A man walked across the stage. It was Tory Wells, the actor, after all. He walked in-between the knight and the dragon and put his hands on the lance. He looked up and smiled.
“Students—”
He was interrupted by applause from the crowd.
“Students, please, sit. Thank you for that gracious welcome.”
The students sat. The applause died.
“I’m not here on this stage. In fact, I’m a hologram. Let me prove it.” He waved his hand.
The scene
behind him came to life. The dragon swatted away the lance, opened his mouth, and roared fire. The knight and the horse were consumed by fire. Their remains turned into piles of ash, and then the dragon rose above Tory Wells and ate him.
“You see, students,” Tory’s voice echoed in the room, “I was not physically in the room. You were applauding a hologram inside of a presentation. What is real and what is not real is no longer something you can assume you know.”
The dragon walked to the front of the stage and ate a student in the front row.
Then the beast disappeared, and the Vice-Dean appeared back on the stage.
“Hello students. Fantastic dragon, yes?” He took a step towards the students and spoke again. “No, don’t answer me. I’m a hologram, too. What’s really going to get you thinking is this: was I really here a few moments ago? Was that me giving you a welcome speech this morning? Or was it a vision of me? Perhaps I was still in bed? Perhaps I was in Zurich? You’ll never know.
“I’d like to remind you that everything is questionable. Everything. Life, death, the future. What is real? What is an illusion? Nobody knows. The least of all me.”
And then he disappeared again.
The stage went black.
A knight appeared on a horse.
The horse breathed and stomped its feet.
This time, a T-Rex appeared. It took a few steps towards the knight, leaned forward, and bellowed. The unearthly scream filled the room. Dale felt his skin grow goose-bumps, the scream of the beast causing his evolutionary programming to kick in. The primal portion of his brain was again fooled into thinking that an actual danger existed.
The scene froze, and Tory Wells appeared.
“I look pretty good for someone that was just eaten by a dragon, do I not?” He walked a few steps towards the students and spread out his arms.
“This is not merely entertainment, students. I want you to remember something, one thing above all else, as you begin your studies. The future is not determined by fate and chance. The future is determined by the actions of people. The knight and the dragon is an old story. It’s a morality play, as ageless as men themselves. God and Satan. Good and evil. The T-Rex represents a way of mixing up the familiar, making it entertaining, and exciting. But it’s not only for fun, students. Imagine this scene moved to a planet of your own creation. Can you imagine a flying, dragon-like T-rex styled monster on a distant planet? Good. Now imagine the training programs we create for, say, an advanced team of colonists. What will they find on Planet X? Who knows…
“Nobody. But what do we know? We understand how natural selection works, don’t we? We can speculate how, on this imaginary Planet X, that bats might have evolved, can we not? Perhaps on Planet X a bat is the dominate species, say like an orca is the alpha predator in the sea. Or how lions once ruled the plains of Africa. Maybe these pack hunter bats we are imagining are a full meter tall and have fangs that deliver deadly venom. What if they can fly silently, like an owl? Perhaps flying mammals on distant planets have feathers. What if future colonists from Earth land on Planet X and are attacked and eaten by giant bats?
“Billions of dollars could be wasted. The colonization of that system could be set back hundreds of years. Tragedy. Sadness. Waste. So, students, one of your goals here is to think ahead. Create every ugly scenario you can imagine. And, while dragons and hungry Tyrannosaurs are fun to create, we need deeper thinking. We need to remember that the games we created as early humans were always about war; attacking, defending, storming, capturing, and colonizing. Imperialism has received a bad reputation in more enlightened times, but let us not forget it also brought progress.
“Evolution has produced its most deadly things in small forms. The virus. The bacteria. Can these be mimicked in a game? Can they be designed in the lab? Of course. If we send men out into space, if we colonize Mars, if we create underground cities on earth, what will unhealthy bacteria do to humans? What about a deadly virus? Ladies and gentlemen, I submit to you that viruses and bacteria will continue to evolve. And what better food source is there than man? We multiply and grow like rats in a landfill. Our bodies represent a tasty meal to not only dragons but to the tiniest things that have evolved the ability to replicate.
“I bid you all good luck. The fate of future generations is in your hands.”
The scene disappeared, and the students began chattering away like a bunch of monkeys in a zoo.
Dale realized that a massive catalog of animals, real and imagined, could be built in a VR world. He could help re-create any extinct animal that ever existed, as well as help imagine what kinds of animals had evolved in other systems in the universe. And it all started with reconstructing the bones, his specialty.
CHAPTER NINE
I am a woman of very few layers, and most of them are selfish and mean. My parents tried to make me a good girl, but I just wasn’t having it.
~ Christian Harlin
Serving the Princess is my life, and will be, until it isn’t.
~ Ruthann
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The Princess and her entourage approached a small fortified village that stood along a wide river at the base of a series of mountain ranges. She ordered one of her swordsmen to accompany Ruthann into the village to ascertain its rules, customs, and to see if any threat existed. Most villages in the Arodian Mountains were peaceful and filled with craftsmen, artisans, and traders, but she couldn’t afford to take risks. Not with the importance of the Jewel she carried and the unknown nature of the coming war.
When Ruthann returned, she seemed to be in a cheerful mood.
“My lady, they are peaceful. Traders. Capitalists. Gamblers. The village is called Evelake. The mayor welcomed me, gave me a tour, and implied I’d be a fool if I denied his company for the last meal of the day. He said as long as coins remained in our purses, we were most welcome.”
...........................
The group entered the village and boarded the horses and dogs. Rohini put Ruthann in charge of a rotating guard over them; they were too valuable to leave alone, even if the villagers seemed friendly enough.
“Men,” she said. “Enjoy yourselves tonight. Gamble, drink, and whore if you want to. But do not, under the penalty of the sword, divulge our mission. Ruthann, you have a job to do. Find us a witch; I’d like to hire one for the remainder of our journey. We depart tomorrow one hour after the rooster crows.”
The men departed after Ruthann assigned duties and the two women spoke in a court language that was, as far as they knew, known only to a handful of her father’s most trusted advisors and diplomats.
“Find me a witch who can pass your testing and is willing to swear a blood oath of loyalty. The pay and reward are at your discretion, do not hesitate to make it high. I fear without a magic maker and seer; our mission will fail. And Ruthann?”
“Yes, my lady.”
“All work and no play makes you cranky. Find a hero to warm your bed tonight.”
“Yes, my lady.”
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Rohini instructed her companions to not refer to her as a princess when they traveled among strangers, there was no reason to risk a kidnapping for ransom, in spite of how unlikely. As much as the House of Talargo hated war or using force to obtain wealth and favors, the King was always prepared for defensive war and he acted swiftly and without mercy against criminals. The last kidnapping of a court official ended when the King sent troops to the city of the kidnappers and began razing the city until the kidnappers were given up by their families. After a few beheadings, the reputation of the King spread, he was fair, but also ruthless. He acted without mercy against lawbreakers. Rohini always felt safe growing up, but she knew better than to let her past blind her to the future which now held dangers they’d never faced. Her situation was similar to the Royal Goose. Treated with delicate care from spring to the winter solstice, every day the goose, if it could have been capable of speech, would have said
to the other animals, “Peace, safety, plentiful food, and clean bedding. I have the most splendid life of all the Royal Animals, and surely I am most favored.”
On the morning of every winter solstice, since the founding of the House of Talargo, the Royal Goose met its Black Swan event in the form of the Royal Butcher.
She entered a gambling hall and sat for a game of Dragonesallanti. It was one of many ancient card games she’d learned as a child. Because Dragonesallanti involved lying, deception, bartering, trading and risking large amounts of money, it was similar to diplomacy, and thus she was quite skilled at winning. Her motive was not winning gold, but gaining information.
“What are the stakes?”
“Minimum bet is a centrie and the maximum is one bar.” The dealer shuffled while talking. “Would you like chips?”
“Yes, ten bars.”
...........................
Exchange
Location: The Stuck Pig Inn & Casino
Exchange: 10 gold bars for 1000 centrie chips.
Automatically exchange chips for gold upon exiting casino: Y/N?
...........................
Rohini sat and placed a bet. She played for an hour listening to conversations before a hunter mentioned, in a story about a hunting trip for red deer and bear, a mine shaft. It was the ancient tunnels Rohini was interested in, but she’d wanted to avoid asking directly as that would be something a person would recall if interrogated in the future. She didn’t know what or who would be hunting her eventually, only that someone or something would be.
“I thought those old mine shafts were legends,” she said. She pretended to be casual when she spoke as if she were merely making conversation.
“Oh, no. I saw it myself,” the hunter said.
“Maybe it was just a cave…”
“No, I know a cave when I see a cave, miss.” He was aggravated, which was the reaction Rohini was attempting to illicit. Angry people were more likely to talk.
Nagant Wars: A LitRPG Novel (Nagant Wars Series Book 1) Page 4
