Raven- The Beginning

by David Wadsworth

  Looking at my current funds, I now had just under 11 gold total, which wasn’t bad, but I needed more in order to pick up both my alchemy skills and train my unique skill. Perhaps if I joined that NPC assassin guild, I could get a discount. Thinking about this, I decided to make my way. Giving Bartley a slight nod and thanking him for his time and coin, I made my way further into the city.

  “So, if I was an assassin looking for a guild of assassins, where would I go and look… um, actually, nix that, since I am an assassin looking for the assassin guild. I wonder if the guild is a legal guild and if I could just ask a guard without dying? I suppose I’ll need to do that, but before, let’s get to the inn so that I can bind there. It would suck if a guard killed me on sight and I re-spawned back in Timberdenn.”

  Looking around, I spotted a guard that while it was getting late, he was standing at a corner that made a Y-split in the main road that entered the city. It looked like he was falling asleep even though I couldn’t see his eyes due to his plate helmet.

  I walked over to him and asked loudly before I got within arm’s reach, “Excuse me, guard. I need directions to the local inn please.”

  The guard stumbled for a minute and almost dropped his halberd before straightening his back, looking around. So far, this was the most hilarious thing I’ve seen in the game since I, well, yea.

  “Who are you!” he shouted. “I wasn’t sleeping, and if you try to say that I was, I’ll throw you into the brig. Now, what can this hard working, no slacking off, guard do for you?”

  I raised an eyebrow and attempted to stifle a laugh, only barely holding it in, and said again, “I’m looking for the local inn.”

  “Go towards the left. You should see it down a bit. Here, I’ll light the path for you,” he said, gesturing a low arc with his left arm. Immediately after, a blue glowing butterfly appeared, and started flying down the path. A handy trick for new players when they were lost, which I was grateful for, now that I was in a new city which I never went to.

  Arriving at the inn, which was named Tangi D’innsreg, I swung open the heavy wooden doors and entered, a huge ornate lobby greeting me. I went over to the innkeeper who looked like a middle aged dark elf with droopy brown eyes who looked at me with discerning eyes. I walked up to him and asked if he had a room to spare.

  “No, I do not have any rooms to spare, as if someone like you could afford it. Why don’t you come back when you can afford more than a silver a night,” he replied back in a condescending voice which made my nerves twitch in anger. If I wasn’t in town, and would immediately get executed and barred, I would have pulled out my dagger right then and gouged out his tongue for speaking to me like that.

  Containing my anger, I replied, with my hand shaking next to my dagger, “Fine. If you don’t have a room for someone like me, then maybe you can point me to a different inn that would be more suitable?”

  I heard a cough behind me which startled me, and saw the innkeeper’s eyes widen a bit. “Merzen, is that any way to talk to a lady? Perhaps you would like to re-think our arrangement,” a voice asked, which sent chills up my spine.

  The innkeeper went deathly pale with this statement by this newcomer. When I turned my head to look over at him, I saw that he was well-aged, piercing gray eyes that looked as if they could see inside of your soul, and then shredding it without a care in the world. Both the look he was giving the innkeeper and the not so hidden threat in his voice raised the hairs in the back of my neck. Now I felt that I should run out of the city and never look back.

  “Ye… yes, of course Mr. Tarrokh. Of, of course, I should not have taken my anger out on this young lady.”

  Merzen looked at me, visibly shaking and gave me a bow from behind his counter. “Miss, you have my deepest apologies. For the inconvenience, I would be more than happy to give you a room for free for a week, and then it will only be 50 silver per week if that is acceptable?”

  His eyes looked as if they were pleading with me to stay, to which I replied, still angry at how he treated me. “I will take that week, however, for the length of my stay, I want a room for 25 silver, rather than the 50 silver.”

  The man behind me laughed, “You heard the young lady, 25 silver for the length of her stay.”

  “Very well my lady, Mr. Tarrokh. 25 silver for your stay here at Tangi D’innsreg,” he replied, somewhat irritated but still fearful. He handed the key to my room, and in turn, I gave him the 25 silver before turning around to meet the guild master of the Velg’larn.

  The guild master looked at me and before I could say anything, he said in a low voice, “Not here. When you’re ready to speak with us, an agent will meet with you at Velg’larn Tavern.”

  A new quest window appeared before me which I read before accepting. The quest was the Assassin’s Initiation quest, which had a difficulty rating of hard, and the reward was initiation into the Order of the Velg’larn, which was the Dark Elves version of a default guild that recruited player assassins.

  I looked more closely at the guild master, who was wearing a dark gray, almost black leather outfit, with two straps that were crossed on his chest, most likely for dagger sheathes. A number of other straps went along his legs, also an indicator of where a massive number of sheathes could be attached. He was wearing a dark cloak that gave off a shimmering look, as if the cloak didn’t want you to look at it, rather, it seemed as if the cloak wanted you to look through it.

  I could only nod meekly, and went to the stairs that where to the left of the counter to leave the innkeeper and the assassin to discuss whatever business they had with each other.

  I entered my room at the inn and the message window appeared stating that I was now bound at this inn and room. Closing the window, I let out a shiver that I had been holding since meeting the guild master of the Assassin’s guild. “Holy shit, I really need a drink after meeting that.” I said, almost under my breath.

  Shaking my head to calm my nerves, I looked around the room that the innkeeper provided. The room looked to have multiple rooms, as I saw two doors inside the room. In the center of the room was a large table that was made of thick, frosted obsidian that had four chairs, obviously a sort of meeting area. Embedded in the stone wall was a fireplace, it’s mantle made of a red crystal like material. Two large windows completed this part of the interior which allowed the room to be illuminated from the sun outside.

  I made my way to one of the doors, and when I opened it, there was a large and immaculate bathroom with marble flooring which matched the room itself. Closing that door, I went to the other room, which I assumed correctly would be the bedroom. A large bed which could comfortably hold at least four sat in the center, with black satin sheets, met my eyes. I looked longingly at the bed, wishing I could rest for a few days and just relax, but I was a busy woman, and I had places to be and people to meet.

  After binding my respawn point to the inn, I left and started exploring the bustling city, keeping away from the crowds as best as I could. The dirt roads were aligned by cobblestone which allowed people to walk without fear of getting trampled by the carriages and wagons that would often go to and from various places. I noticed a weapons and armor store which immediately held my interest, so I walked across the road and went inside of the shop.

  I was immediately stopped by an NPC who introduced himself as Godyn, a master blacksmith and armorer. I informed him that I was just browsing his wares and he eyed me with suspicion, probably due to my current equipment. It wasn’t my fault that I had to rely on drops, and the fact that I was still using rawhide armor and iron daggers, which was rated to be roughly between levels 5 through 10!

  On the upside, the store was extremely well organized with multiple rows of weapons that were organized by type, and armor stands lined the walls. The one thing I could say is that this place was definitely not cheap, and would cost a small fortune to any new player. Looking at the armor, I could only eye longingly at the set of ephemeral leather that was encased in a crystall
ized shell to prevent theft. The price was only 100 platinum coins, which I rolled my eyes at. Any decent player would have their armor specially crafted with various enchantments, rather than purchasing base armor. Either that, or have special or unique equipment from the various raids that were in the game.

  I did make my way to a counter that held an assortment of daggers. At this low level, it actually did make sense to purchase equipment from the NPC merchants, even if it could not be enchanted. A set of bronze daggers would cost me 1 gold for the pair. With a disappointing sigh, I left the store empty handed. I had to first purchase the skills to learn both alchemy and herbalism, which is where I headed to next.

  A little way further down the road, I spotted a building that had an potion emblem and vial imbued on the frosted glass in front of the store. The sign itself was engraved with the words, “Buraste’s Alchemy”. Satisfied that this was the store that I was looking for, I stepped through the doors, my elven senses immediately being assaulted by the various scents that permeated through the store.

  The store itself was a mix of what looked to be a cross between an atrium and a store. Various types of plants where growing where ever they could, vines wrapping around the store’s pillars and rafters.

  “Good evening, assassin. To what do I owe the pleasure? I hope that I haven’t gotten on anyone’s bad side, although, looking at you, I wouldn’t care if I had,” a woman’s voice said to the side of me.

  Was it just me, or did it seem that everyone so far in this damned city was a condescending asshole to me? Sighing, I looked over at the woman who wasn’t what I was expecting. Instead of a dark elf, she was an elderly gnome, sitting in a high chair behind her counter, with her elbow on it, holding her chin as she looked bored to death. Her dark green eyes actually matched her long hair, which must have been dyed, since most gnomes that I’ve seen always had brown or dull white hair depending on how old they were. Interesting, although, annoying.

  “Perhaps true, perhaps not. Well, to be fair, you’re right in the fact that I am a young assassin and not properly equipped,” I started as I walked towards her counter, careful not to rub against any of the offending flora that was in my way. “I was wondering if you might be able to train me in both the Alchemy and Herbalism skills,” I finished as I reached her area.

  “Oh, I like that,” she grinned. “A dark elf with a green thumb. What would you know about the life of the world around us, except to destroy the life force of others, answer this honestly assassin, and maybe I might train you, for a cost.”

  I gave the elderly gnome a smile which stated that I understood her riddle, which I had to research long before. I answered, “The life around us is intertwined, one life affecting the other, life affects death, and death affects life. The string of fate connects us all.”

  The gnome looked at me and grinned, “What bullshit. I would take that from anyone else but you. Give me the real answer child, there is no one around to hear you, and this place is shielded against those that would spy on us.”

  I looked at her, stunned, my eyes going wide. This couldn’t be right. The store NPCs were supposed to at least initially allow a player to train a profession. Her words though made me shiver. She knows.

  In the World of the Veil, all of the deities and the NPCs that resided in the world were ran by advanced AI using quantum learning algorithms, which allowed smooth conversations with players. Enemy NPCs though were typically ran by typical “dumb” AI, even though they could learn various things from players using machine learning, such as combat patterns and player resistances. This gave the players a real challenge to overcome, which was one of the draws of the game which made it so successful.

  If Noctis and Conall knew of my situation and what happened, then it would make sense that all of the NPCs in the game would know. Calming down again, I looked at the gnome again.

  “Ok then, let’s throw the bullshit lore away then. I’m a player in this game, unable to log out, and I have to live here for who knows how long. I’m under-equipped, lacking any sort of decent money, and to be honest, quite terrified of what I have to become in order to survive here. Honestly, now that I can truly get hurt, I don’t want to do anything but crawl into a bed and lay down for who knows how long. However, I can’t do that since it would draw attention to myself. If that happened, then this game might be shut down, and if it was, I would die.”

  “That doesn’t answer my question,” she responded, rolling her eyes at me.

  I was starting to get angry now. This damn NPC was going to actually make this hard. “Fine. The people that you refer to as Veil-Walkers are the players inside of this game and they live outside of it. The deities and NPCs, like yourself, are nothing but figments of computer code. Complicated code, sure, but nothing but computer code nevertheless.”

  “Oh, really? Is that why you suffered, and are still suffering from, killing those bandits? Is that truly how you think of this world that you now live in, as nothing but computer code? I will train you, of course, however I can only hope that through your training you find the right answer to my question, young Raven.”

  Two message prompts appeared in front of my eyes, the first one asking me if I wanted to learn both the Alchemy and Herbalism skills, and that it would cost me 5 gold for each skill. I accepted, knowing that I was again penniless.

  The second message prompt though was a bit more unexpected. It was a character based quest, which meant that I was the only one that the quest would ever be given out to. The only objective for it was to find the answer to the riddle, and the reward for completion was unknown. Interesting.

  “Now leave, you’ve worn out your welcome for the day, my old bones cannot put up with the idiocies of the young,” she informed me, clearly telling me to leave.

  Leaving the old gnome’s store, I pondered where to go next. I could find a skill trainer, but in order to learn my Shadow Step skill I would need to pay 5g, which I only had 1 gold left after learning my professions. Perhaps I should go to the tavern and speak with the representative from the assassin’s guild. It was also getting dark out, and I wanted to get a good night’s sleep in an actual bed tonight after being on the trail a few days. It was much more difficult than I expected, and I was not accustomed to sleeping outside, even in the real world.

  I asked a guard that was passing by if he could point me in the direction of the tavern, and like the previous guard, he summoned a guiding butterfly to lead me to the tavern. I wasn’t in the mood anymore to do much exploring, just wanting to get this day over with.

  I followed the glowing butterfly to the Tavern, which was aptly named “The Drunken Elf.” I was surprised that it was in English and not Drowish, however, it could be that I was getting more accustomed to reading it and the system was performing auto-translation for me. I could hear the sounds of a very lively bar, and it sounded like there was a fight going on inside, which was unusual for any of three elf races. My weariness that I was feeling while walking here lessened, and I went inside the tavern.

  The tavern itself was dark, lit only by the braziers that aligned the walls. There were overturned tables and chairs in the middle was two dwarves that were fighting a single human. Believe it or not, the human was actually holding his own against the dwarves.

  Taking an interest in the human, I looked at him a bit more closely. He was fairly tall at roughly 6 feet, if I estimated correctly. He also had a lean but very tone build, his skin was a darker shade like he had a full body tan. It also seemed that he had a bit of scruff on his face, as if he didn’t shave for a few days. His brown eyes and smile showed how much he was enjoying this brawl.

  The dwarves he was fighting against were your typical looking dwarves, fairly short, the tallest looked like he was just over five feet tall, however they were built like brick stack-houses, extremely muscular, and each had a long, braided beard of various shades.

  “Look here Darrius, I don’t care what you think you’re doing, but you will leave my si
ster alone. She doesn’t deserve your kind meddling in her affairs, so just get your scrawny ass out of here before we show you some true pain,” one of the dwarves said, almost yelling.

  “Nordred, I honestly don’t know what you’re going on about, and I know how you think all humans look alike, so maybe you got the wrong guy,” the human said mockingly.

  The dwarf looked at him and then over to his partner who also looked ready to brawl, when a smoke cloud appeared in the middle of them with a dark figure inside of it. The smoke was a dark gray, mixed with a dull yellow. It not only looked creepy, but even worse, it smelled like corrosive death. Both of the dwarves and the human stepped back a couple of steps to find out who this new intruder was, and as the smoke dissipated, a dark elf in a red silk shirt and black pants stood there.

  “You all need to stop before you ruin my bar. You’re also bothering my other customers,” this stranger said, looking back and forth between the human and the dwarves.

  The second dwarf that was next to Nordred decided to speak up against this stranger. “Look here Ga’arvn, I know you’re the barkeep here, but you need to step back while Nordred and me take care of the trash.”