by Charles Dean
Locke wasn’t sure how to take that, but if messing with him was the objective, he had succeeded. Not like I care what they are. I’m just here to make money and get levels. He shook off the awkwardness. First, a giant suit of armor had a tiny girl’s voice, and now a giant Minotaur was supposedly played by a girl. There is clearly a running theme with this game. Locke laughed to himself at the irony.
“What’s funny?” Bianca asked from behind him. “And where we going?”
“Well, the best recommendation that I could find on the forums is a swamp dead south of us. Apparently, if you can find the boss, it should have a lot of decent items. You guys should be the first group to kill it if we manage to find it.” Locke was careful not to include himself in the group that had to fight it. It might raise their expectations of his role in the party, and he definitely didn’t want to risk dying to a boss and ending right back up in the Holy Alliance camp.
“Sounds great to me,” Tubal said, popping out of what was literally thin air. The whole group almost materialized in unison with Sampson being the only one who hadn’t shown up yet. “What are the creatures we’re going to have to fight around there?” he asked.
“Well . . .” I really don’t want to say we’re going to have to beat a bunch of little P-Ps. That has to be an acronym, right? I know this game isn’t exactly for children, but I thought that was because of the gratuitous violence. “I’m not entirely sure,” he lied. “But, apparently, they’re rather difficult. The first group to attempt the swamp was wiped.”
“So, you think that, even though the first group was roasted like tiny marshmallows over an open flame, we’ll be fine? Or do you just not care if we die because you’re not directly in the fight?” Reginald leveled a glare at Locke.
Why are you messing with me, dude? “The first one? I mean, you guys can do it, right?” he responded, challenging their ego. This always worked with gamers.
“Had David questioned his ability to topple Goliath, would he have ever been King? Had the Emu not stood valiantly against the onslaught of well-armed, bloodthirsty Australians, would we know their legend today? We must be like David! Be like the Emu and fight against the unwinnable odds until we are legends in the history books!” Sparky was practically beating his chest as he spoke with the most over-the-top knightly voice Locke had ever heard anyone use.
“Easy there, Sparky. I think we all agreed already. Reginald was just giving the new guy a hard time. Something I told him not to do.” Tubal gave Reginald the type of look that a schoolteacher might give an annoying child who wouldn’t stop throwing paper airplanes into a fan just to mess with the other students.
“Again?” Sampson asked, appearing at last. “Why must you always tease people in every game we play, Reginald?”
Reginald didn’t respond to Sampson’s question and brushed past it with a quick change of subject. “So we’re going to the swamps, Sampson! I haven’t been to any swamps in this game since it started. Cold, dark, wet and covered with icky things. It’ll be just like home, eh?!”
“Shut up,” Sampson snapped. “Is there anything without a swamp?”
Reginald did call that reaction, Locke noted, giving a little credibility to every other accusation the guy had made.
“Nope. Group made a choice. Let’s go!” Reginald insisted and started the journey south with Tubal, leaving the others to trail after them.
“So there wasn’t even a hint at what monsters killed them?”
“Umm, not that I can recall,” Locke fibbed again. “Hold on. I need to focus on flower picking. It’s very serious work.” Locke excused himself from being asked any more questions about the ‘P-Ps’. Whatever they were, everyone would find out when they got there. No reason to worry until then.
With every step they took further south, the terrain around them seemed to transform, and they seemed to descend deeper and deeper into a shadow of the forest they had come from. At first, it was just like they were walking into a puddle, the water coming up no higher than a few inches. By the time they reached the location the group online had mentioned, the water was already up to their knees, and Locke was finding it more and more difficult to move quickly while picking his various flowers, fronds, and leaves. I need to throw some points into stats, or I’m going to be up this creek without a paddle, Locke groaned.
He opened up his menu and thought for a minute about how to sort out his points. Well, speed is a must since it will determine how quickly I can pick the flowers and how precise my hand movements are . . . and I’ll need some vitality, but I’ll probably also want some strength, too. Maybe, in the future, I can try making a sword even though I’m not a blacksmith, he thought. Okay, since I’m not tanking, this should be a good ratio. He split his points up such that, with each level, he put three points into speed, two points into strength and one point into vitality. If he were a fighter, he would normally grab some concentration to help with magic defense, but he felt like that would never be a concern. Anthony doesn’t use any magic, he thought, glancing over the stat.
“Do you guys see anything?” Tubal asked while Locke finished allocating his points.
“Nothing. Are you sure that this is the right spot, Shy?” Katherine asked, looking around at Locke.
“Yeah, this is the spot. We’re actually right at the coordinates mentioned. There should be something around here.” He peered about, but it was hard to see anything. There was a grimy layer on top of the swamp that blocked most visibility through the surface of the water, and it was too dark with the trees blocking most of the sunlight to see anything above it properly. “No chance one of you has night vision?” he asked.
“Bravery is its own light in the darkness,” Sparky said, opening his mouth and breathing fire in front of him. As he did, it burned away the scum and lily pads that blocked them from seeing under the surface of the water and revealed several piranhas in tiny little priest outfits holding books.
Piranha Priests. P-Ps. Locke put it together almost instantly and couldn’t stop himself from groaning at both the misunderstanding and the ridiculous image of piranhas in priest outfits. Why didn’t they just say piranhas?
“Sparky, blaze the rest of the water. I think we’re surrounded!” Tubal shouted. It was easy to tell from the sound of his voice how worried he was, and Katherine, Bianca and Sparky all took to the air as soon as the words left his mouth, leaving Locke and the other three land-bound members of the group to tough it out where they were.
“The flames of war rage on!” Sparky sounded out as she attempted to burn any remaining scum away. The only clusters left when she was done were those right next to Locke, Reginald and Tubal, whom he had attempted to spare from being barbequed.
“Sampson, I know you hate this water, but I need you to go low, get wet and make me some sushi!” Tubal called out.
All these fish people and none of them can say, “It’s a trap?” Locke laughed to himself, then realized exactly how deadly the situation was. Wait, there is no way those P-Ps are all going to be killed before they get to me! I need to get airborne too! Locke looked at Katherine and Bianca with pleading eyes. Or . . . actually . . . Locke took out the remaining Journeyman Deadly Poison’s he had on him. They were the last of their kind as he had already moved up to Novice’s Deadly Poison, the +6 version of the poison, a while ago. He quickly uncorked three of the bottles and tossed them into the water around him, making sure to note where they landed.
The poison poured out of the bottles as soon as they landed in the water and billowed into a thick cloud. One of the miniature Sushi Priests, a name Locke suddenly thought up for them so as to avoid saying ‘P-Ps’ ever again, swam through the cloud and began to wither and die almost instantly. Tubal and the others didn’t seem to notice, and they continued to swing at anything that came within range of them. Unfortunately, their go-to techniques were mostly worthless due to the terrain. The fire-based attacks that they had based their group around just weren’t going to cut it when their
opponents were underwater. As a result, since they had no other fallback option for clearing out small groups of mobs, they were struggling their best not to be eaten by the Sushi Priests.
Locke stared down at the remainder of his poison. He definitely didn’t want to part with precious cargo, but another solution wasn’t likely to present itself. Finally, he relented and tossed a few bottles into the water near the other three grounded companions. This time, they clearly caught on to what was happening when Tubal noticed that one of the piranhas that was about to take off his leg instead just stopped, turned belly up and slowly floated to the surface like so many victims of dynamite fishing.
“What the heck, Shy? You’ve been holding out on us!” Tubal watched one after another of the little fishies turn from evil, threatening, horror-house aquarium-occupants to unsliced dinner guests.
“I figure that if it works for the oil companies, why not for us?” Locke forced himself to laugh even as tears from lost profits streamed down his cheeks. If we had made a town trip, those would have all been gold. Beautiful, beautiful gold coins. He sniffled in regret.
“So is that all we do for this area?” Tubal asked. “Throw Shy’s poisons into the water?”
“I don’t know, but I’m assuming those things wiped the other group, so they didn’t see the boss. I imagine it won’t be so easily bested,” Locke said, still wanting to cry over watching all of his hard work literally being poured down the drain.
“Shy? Are you okay?” Sampson asked, looking down at the toxic green cloud he was wading in.
“No . . .” Locke didn’t know how to explain it. “That’s not it. It’s just . . . personal stuff.” Like, I just personally lost money. “Could you help me collect the bottles?” Locke asked, bending down to pick the ones up in front of him.
“Oh, sure,” Sampson said, and he was the first one to reach down and help. Tubal was already busy grabbing the little priest bodies.
“It seems like the tiny staves these fishy priests were holding act as charms that can be put together to make a necklace,” Tubal said as he grabbed a corpse. “There’s a limit of five that can be used to make a single necklace, but it looks like it’ll be fun to custom make your own jewelry with the attributes you want.”
Custom made accessories? Holy crud, that could sell! Locke’s eyes burst open like dollar signs as he greedily eyed the dead Sushi Priests in front of him. What luck is this?! He opened up his inventory after snatching up seven of the charms. Some of the items were repeated, but they were all still bound to make money on the market.
Piranha's Blessing of Radioactive Bug Bites: +2 Power. May be combined with up to four Piranha Blessings.
Piranha's Blessing of Caffeine-Covered Candies: +2 Speed. May be combined with up to four Piranha Blessings.
Piranha's Blessing of Beer Commercial Promises: +2 Vitality. May be combined with up to four Piranha Blessings.
Piranha's Blessing of Riddle-Out Distraction-Proof Coffee: +2 Concentration. May be combined with up to four Piranha Blessings.
Hmmm, repeats . . . Is there anything besides straight stat boosts? “Tubal, were there any that gave a boost to spirit?”
“Is that an important stat for Alchemists? I mean, these are your kills. You’re welcome to the loot if you insist,” Tubal answered.
Hmm . . . Why is he being nice about this? Locke squinted at Tubal as he tried to figure out what game the group leader was up to. “No, that’s okay, I just wanted to know what the name is for the spirit blessing.” Locke was too hesitant to take Tubal up on the offer. Everything comes with strings. He was far too suspicious of Tubal’s motives, so he had to reject the gesture.
“Ah, well, it’s called the ‘Piranha’s Blessing of Fluffy Pew Pillows.’ Coulda used those on Sundays.” Tubal tossed one of the mini staves over to Locke. “Here, now your collection is complete.”
“Thanks, I appreciate it,” Locke said. He was tempted to make a combination right away with his charms. No, save them for later. Don’t part with even more money. Your gentle heart can’t handle any more cash loss.
“No problem. So, you gonna be using those poisons for every fight?”
And there’s the catch: He wants me to do all the work while we go through the swamp. Actually, with the poisons, I wouldn’t need a group . . . Unless there is something other than Sushi Priests around here. “Umm, no . . . I don’t have enough to keep it up, but maybe if we’re in a bind?” Locke didn’t want to let his avarice become too evident. “Also, it might be helpful to save them for the boss . . . If it’s a swimmer like the piranhas, that is,” he added hastily.
“Good thinking, Shy. We’ll be counting on you if it is.” Tubal’s smile let Locke know that he had been backed into doing the boss fight for them if it was possible.
“Way to step up there, buddy,” Reginald laughed. “Glad we can count on you.”
This sneaky Tubal, he’s always up to something. Locke knew that he had been defeated by the Blue Phoenix Brigade’s cunning commander. He almost felt like saying, ‘I’ll get you next time, Tubal!’ and slamming his fist on a table to scare a sleeping cat. But, for all he knew, Tubal wasn’t being cunning at all. There was a good chance that he was just seeing which pawns he had on the board for when the real game started. “No problem, but while you guys kill the rest of the fish, I think I’m going to get back to my super-manly flower-picking job.” He chuckled and then went back to harvesting.
Most of the flowers in the swamp were the ones that he needed to make the Fragility Poison, the one that would debuff vitality, so he grabbed as many as he could and started upgrading it right away. It actually took three times as many poisons to upgrade than Deadly Poison, but that made sense. Lowering a person’s vitality was a lot more harmful to a player than simply doing damage since each point of vitality gave the player both hit points and damage reduction.
The group pushed forward through the swamp with Locking trailing behind as he made the Fragility Poisons. Sparky constantly burned away the algae, and Tubal would let loose hundreds of arrows with dozens of them actually landing squarely on their mark. The rest of the group just slogged forward, meleeing any fish that got past Tubal’s arrow rain. The only thing that really slowed them down was the amount of time everyone spent picking up the loot and retrieving the arrows from the ground or dead fish. It was rather peaceful, except for the constant smoky smell and five-foot visibility. So much so, in fact, that no one even noticed the giant boss sneak up on the group. If it wasn’t for Sampson’s perfectly-timed warning, the monster would have managed to jump the entire group without anyone ever having noticed it. As luck would have it, the Minotaur’s olfactory senses were much keener than anyone else's.
“Do you guys smell something funny?” Sampson’s snout started sniffing around. “It kind of smells horrendous.”
“It wasn’t me,” Reginald quickly snapped.
“What wasn’t you?” Bianca started sniffing too.
“Oh, nothing,” Reginald said, turning his head around.
Locke, also confused about what Sampson was sensing, took a deep breath through his nose and tried to sort out the scents. He caught a whiff of what he guessed Sampson was talking about, but it didn’t smell like anything that he could place. He turned to ask Sampson what he--or she if Reginald was right--was picking up. That was when Locke spotted it: The back of a large, black beast was moving towards them just underneath the surface of the water, ripples in the water indicating that it was moving closer to them every second.
Locke screamed as he reacted, uncorking two more of his Deadly Poison bottles and tossing them between the group and the rapidly approaching beast.
“Huh?” Sparky turned around to face the sound of the plopping bottles so quick his tail knocked Sampson an inch or two to the right as he spun. “What is it?”
“I don’t know. It’s just coming at us quickly!” Locke pointed toward the ever-approaching fiend. “Anyone? Someone? Give me a hand, please!” he shouted as t
he group looked at the monster close in.
Tubal was the first one to act, unleashing a quick flurry of arrows into the back of the beast. Sparky reacted almost as quickly and pushed forward, placing himself on the edge of the poison cloud in the water. The monster had run into the poisonous plumes, recoiled, and stood up on its legs. It’s now fully-visible back looked like a pincushion thanks to Tubal’s arrows.
Is that a hippopotamus with a bishop’s hat? Locke stared at the giant, fifteen-foot-tall creature in shock.
“Shy, look around us. We got more piranhas! Throw down some of the poison to keep them off us for the fight,” Tubal instructed, drawing Locke back into reality.
“Can do.” Locke cringed at the sacrifice he was making, and he had to work to hold back tears as he uncorked a few more Deadly Poison bottles and tossed them around the group for the fight. How come the boss couldn’t just be easy enough to die from the poison too? He lamented his financial loss and wished that he could have saved a few so that he would have something to show for his efforts.
The Hippo moved in a rather slow, lumbering gait as it tromped one slow step after another towards Sparky. Tubal kept shooting arrows into it, three to five at a time, but none of them seemed to phase the Bishopotamus. It slowly opened its mouth as it trudged onward and licked its lips.
“We got this, Sparky,” Sampson said, coming up behind the Dragon-Wing. It was the same maneuver that Locke had seen them use during their first fight, and every subsequent fight, against the Knight-Clubbers. “Reginald, get that shield up! We’re going in!”
