Electra: Red? I asked you a question.
Red: I’m public. Gotta be careful…
Electra: Sure. Were you traced? Any worms or bugs or trackers on your avatar?
Red: No. I don’t think so, anyway.
Electra: You need to be sure, man!
Red: Okay then, yeah. I’m sure. You know how good I am at this.
Electra: How good you were, Red. You’re getting sloppy. Aldaron is a mess.
Red: I know, right. I just need to know how to open the Green Ouroborax. How!? Please!
Electra: *sigh* Okay, but you know – this didn’t come from me, right? You need to go to Oak Shrine. The Green Ouroborax is sacred to the elves of the Judgment, right? And the Oak Shrine is their most sacred place. You immerse it in the holy pool there, and that should open it…
Red: Thank you Electra! I swear, if I get out of this alive, I’ll do anything you want.
Electra: Just don’t get me arrested, Red, that would be a great start.
Electra has disconnected Chat.
Ramesh logged out of the mail account and leaned back, visibly relieved. Now all he had to do was find a new hotel room with a Wi-Fi connection, and then zap his character to the Oak Shrine.
And then find four other Ouroborax Crystals, too he thought, navigating to his online money transfer service, which indexed to his personal bank account. The people after him weren’t powerful enough to seize his bank details, so he was still receiving the Odge health compensation payments every month.
“Thank God,” Ramesh whispered, transferring a large sum of it to his online account. He knew it would be easier to draw it down through one of the Smart-ATM machines from there, and then he wouldn’t leave a digital trace of where he was.
Ramesh the Red Hand, most notorious hero of the realm of Aldaron, slurped his coffee, spilled some on his sweater as he logged out, and almost ran from the cyber café.
Part 4: The Green Ouroborax
Chapter 19: The Shrine of Oak
“Freakin’ elves,” Crusher muttered, looking down the slopes.
The company of the sorcerer Winters, Crusher the dwarfish spy, the enchanter Sari, and the explorer Lady Jay stood on the saddle of a wide pass in the ranges that separated the Near Realms of the High King from the Outer Realms. The Wyvern Peaks soared on either side of them into the skies, topped with lightning and clouds, whilst down here where they stood it was a chill but bright summer’s day.
At either side of their path stood a tall, wind-carved stone, with strange holes carved or etched through it, making it look like it had been bored through by some stone-eating worm. Below them, and what Crusher was frowning at, was the great green expanse of the Wildwoods, with gigantic Malorn trees rising from the canopy like stilled giants. The tallest of these was easily the height of the cliffs and the citadel of King’s City atop, and it looked to Dean as though the path led directly to it.
“What’s so bad about the elves?” Dean shrugged.
“The Judgment? You’re joking, right?” Lady Jay frowned, one gloved hand hovering over her pistol. “They’re crazy.”
Coming from her, Dean thought, the woman who probably couldn’t be friendly to a basket of kittens, was a statement!
“They hate humans,” Sari said, flicking her long golden hair over her shoulders. “They think we’re destroying Aldaron.”
“Oh,” Dean said. Nice to know that even here in the game, different ethnicities can’t be nice to each other! “Great. But we’ve got to do this… Otherwise how else are we going to find anything out about the Lady of Efen…?” He took a step down the path towards the deep forest, and as soon as his booted feet had passed the bored-through columns, a strange, eerie ringing sound set up around them.
“What’s that?” Dean hunched, expecting an attack.
“You’ve just set off the perimeter alarm, numbskull.” Lady Jay frowned.
“How was I supposed to know?” the sorcerer was saying, even as there came the sound of thundering hooves as a group broke from the forest leaves and started charging towards them.
“Riders,” Crusher said, unslinging his hammer and readying himself into a defensive crouch.
“They won’t take us so easily…” Lady Jay drew her pistol, sighting down the barrel at the lead.
“Hey! Wait!” Dean stepped in front of his two more warlike comrades. “We want to talk to them, remember? That’s why we’re here, for God’s sake!”
“I can’t do much talking with an arrow sticking out of my beard, Winters…” Crusher grumbled, but the sorcerer wouldn’t move, instead turning around to raise his hands in the air in a greeting to the thundering riders.
Elvish riders on stags, it appears, Dean saw as the figures drew closer.
They were indeed elves, wearing the linen and leather winding straps he had become accustomed to seeing on their form, with their mostly long hair shining sumptuously in the light; white, blue, turquoise, black, or gold. And they were indeed riding large antlered stags that could canter as fast as any horse as they kicked up dirt and dust behind them in their charge towards the trespassers to their territory. The riders in the lead held long spears in one hand, whilst others appeared to be holding finely-curved bows of elvish design.
Maybe I should get a shield up… Dean thought, reaching for his magic spell just as the first of the riders reigned in their mounts a few meters away.
“Halt!” the elf in the lead shouted – a tall man with hair as gold as the sun, and white-pale features. Instead of the linen wraps, wore a close-fitting armor that appeared to be made out of stiffened leaves.
He narrowed his eyes as he looked at the human sorcerer standing in front of him, still with his arms raised.
“What do you want, human?” the elvish warrior said. “What brings you to the Oak Shrine?”
Dean was about to answer, when he was surprised by another voice coming from behind him. “We’ve been here before, sire, remember?” It was Sari, coming to stand next to Dean.
The elf leader turned to look at the woman for a second, and then really looked at all those assembled in front of him. “I remember you, Enchanter. And your disagreeable companion.” He flickered a glance at the Lady Jay, who only clenched her teeth.
Dean saw that there were more of them – easily double the number of his companions, and he didn’t like their chances of all of them escaping this alive if the elves decided to attack.
“Wait, Captain Vaniel!” said one of the elves at the back of the group, urging her own stag through to the front of their encircling herd. “I know these people. Sort of.”
It was Mirelle, Dean saw, still with her faintly glowing skin, and the linen bindings around her chest and shoulders. Her hair was a deep scarlet red, and seemed to almost float around her as if she were caught in her own sphere of power at all times.
“Marcy!” Dean grinned, forgetting himself.
“What did he call you?” the elvish Captain said.
“Mirelle, I mean,” Dean quickly corrected himself, and he wondered if his avatar was blushing at the same time as he was.
“You really know this human, Mirelle?” the Captain said.
“I do. We are companions. You know that I travel far and wide.” Mirelle nodded. “And the dwarf, too. He is a brave and good friend.”
“Ah. The dwarf.” The Captain’s scowl grew only deeper. “I don’t like it. The human enchanter and her companion I could handle. They are but two humans, after all. But this here is a sorcerer – doubtless come to steal our secrets – and now you want us to entertain a dwarfish warrior… A spy for the Duma, no doubt!” Captain Vaniel said.
Dean shared a look with Crusher, who remained carefully composed. Well, he’s not wrong there, is he? Dean could have laughed, were the situation not so serious.
“Captain… I vouch for them. They are good people. They will mean no harm to the ways of the Judgment,” Mirelle said, although her eyes flickered with
uncertainty.
A pause passed between them, before the Captain growled and wheeled his massive stag around, back towards the Wildwood, and the Shrine of Oak beyond.
“Then you take care of them, Mirelle. I will inform the Queen of your decision. Come, riders of the Judgment – ride!” With a yell, all the rest of the company of elvish stag-riders leapt into a gallop and were soon dust and noise racing back to their home.
Goal Reached! +125 XP!
“Morning, Mirelle,” Dean said in a more casual manner, even managing a little wave. “I hope we haven’t made things awkward for you.”
“When is life not awkward in Aldaron, you noob?” Marcy laughed through her fine lips, turning her steed and nodding down the road. “Come on then you lot. You can fill me in on what brings you to my home all of a sudden.”
“Well…” Crusher cleared his throat. “You’re not going to like hearing this, I can tell you.”
The company of five, made up of three humans, one dwarf, and one elf, clipped their way down the path to the forest.
New Chapter! The Shrine of Oak.
Story: The Ouroborax Crystals.
Continue? Y/N.
Y.
*
“Okay, so you’re saying that this Lady of Efen is super bad news, right?” Mirelle said as they picked their way along the trail that snaked past massive tree roots. Crusher had been right. She didn’t want to hear this, but had listened all the same to the party’s tale of the crazed elvish demi-god who had destroyed the Steward Fabrio’s fort, searching for an Ouroborax Crystal.
“The worst sort of news, my lady.” The dwarf nodded grimly.
“We were hoping the Judgment would know some way to stop her,” Dean said. “After all, she is, like, the spiritual mother of your entire way of life.”
“She started the Judgment path,” Sari added helpfully. “Before Efen, the elves didn’t trust the dwarves and the humans, but it was Efen who turned it into a whole religion…”
“I love it when characters speak about me in the third person,” Mirelle snipped at the human Enchantress.
“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean any offence!” Sari swept a hand to her mouth.
“Don’t mind her Sari…” Lady Jay muttered angrily, earning another scowl from the nurse. “Elves are always rude…”
“Are we now, human?” Mirelle suddenly reigned in her stag and stared hard at both the Lady Jay and Sari until their gazes dropped to their feet. “Uh-huh, I thought so…” Mirelle continued her clopping pace.
What was that about? Dean thought in alarm. I didn’t think Marcy was a racist – even if this is a virtual game! If anything, Marcy was the nicest human being he had ever met… When Dean shared his bewildered look with Crusher, he found the dwarf shaking with mirth, barely containing his laughter.
“What!?” Dean hissed at the dwarf beside him, but Crusher only tapped his nose and shook his head.
“Anyway…” Dean said loudly, clearing his throat in an attempt to clear the air between the women of the party. “So that’s why we’re here. We’re hoping to find a way to stop Efen before the whole world goes to war.”
“Wow, Dean – what level did you say you were again?” Mirelle shook her head. “That’s not even the sort of story I would go on.”
Dean shrugged. “That’s another thing as well…” he sighed, but, before he could start explaining the weird glitchy aspects of this story to her, his thoughts were interrupted by the distant sounds of chiming, coming closer.
Their path was wide and made of packed earth, but ferns and vines fell and snaked over it at every interval – and beyond the path were the roots of the massive trees themselves. Their trunks were the size of houses, with smaller trees growing out of their roots and in their shadows on either side of them. They could see no hint of sky above them as the canopy was so thick, but Dean could hear the many rustlings and see the bright flashes of the birds.
And the glowing lights that drew near to them.
“What is that?” Dean whispered.
“Guardians,” Mirelle whispered, halting her stag and lowering her head respectfully. “Don’t look at them. They keep the forest.”
They keep the forest doing what? Dean was about to say as the chiming sound and the glowing lights grew brighter, and suddenly—
A procession crossed their path. Dean was transfixed.
They were otherworldly, and they appeared to glow diffusely as if seen through a pane of glass. The beings were hunched over and dressed in long white robes with gold trim, their hoods so low Dean couldn’t see their faces. But they moved with an eerie grace Dean thought made them look unreal, and about their procession floated orbs of glowing light.
They Guardians passed by in groups of twos, each holding staffs a little taller than they were, and made of a bleached-bone type wood. Dean didn’t know where the chiming sound was coming from, until he noticed that on the ends of their robes were tiny golden bells, just above their feet.
Not feet. Paws, dean suddenly gasped, when he saw that each one had the large hairy paws of a dog, with jet-black talons.
“Hssss!” The procession had mostly passed by when Dean recoiled in sudden fright. Only the last one had raised its hood, and stared at Dean with an eyeless, noseless mask of a face, but a mouth that was filled with rows of teeth. It snarled at him.
“Winters! What did you do?” Mirelle said, at his side, still averting her eyes from the creature. “Don’t look at them! You’ll make it mad!”
“I think it’s already mad,” Dean said, as the last of the Guardians stepped away from the procession and towards them, stamping forward as it challenged the staring human.
“Oh, hell,” Crusher growled, raising his hammer and opening his eyes at the same time. “Back off!” he yelled at it.
“Oh, great…” Mirelle muttered, raising her gaze at the thing too.
The other Guardians continued on their way, apparently either not noticing, or content to let only one of their number answer the sacrilege.
The singular Guardian, staff in one hand and a curving sickle in the other, took another step forward and hissed a challenge — and Dean was suddenly thrown backwards by a wave of force.
“Ooof!” The sorcerer hit the trunk of one of the trees and slid down.
-4 Health!
“Dean!” Mirelle shouted, raising her short bow and firing off a fast shot at the creature.
Dean groaned, raising his head to see the elf dart speed towards it then suddenly explode into splinters about a meter away from the thing as it kept on stamping, straight towards him.
“You’ve gone and annoyed it now,” Crusher muttered, rolling his shoulders and charging forward, hammer held high—
“Urgh!” The dwarf met a similar fate, suddenly being flung beard over boot to smack against the nearest tree.
“Dean — you’d better get up and start casting magic…” Mirelle was shouting. There was a loud BANG as Jay shot at the thing, followed by an almost instantaneous PING as the bullet ricocheted off from some invisible forcefield.
“Fire Dart!” Dean started small, a bolt of red energy zapping towards the thing, to explode harmlessly around it.
“It has some kind of protection shield…” Mirelle said. “It can probably take so much damage before it breaks. We have to overcome it…”
“Blind!” Sari called, raising her hands to weave a sudden fog of graying light in front of the thing.
“It hasn’t got any eyes, stupid!” Mirelle snapped at her, but strangely, the thing halted in the woven light for a moment, swiping at it with its sickle.
“Fireball!” Dean threw one of his most offensive spells, and this time he saw it spread around the Guardian’s protective shield, but then, with a loud flash and a crack, the shield broke inwards.
10 damage!
“Yes!” Dean punched the air, readying another spell … before he was suddenly lifted from his feet and t
hrown back against the tree trunk once more. “Argh!” THUD.
-6 Health!
“Earthfist!” he heard Mirelle shout, and there was a sudden crunching, crushing noise as the path ahead of them broke, and a large rock speared out to bat at the thing.
6 damage!
“Way to go Mirelle!” Dean called. He had one spell that might just punch the thing into tomorrow. “Lightning storm!” he shouted, pointing a finger at the thing that was even now managing to cut through Sari’s obstruction.
There was a crackle of thunder and a shake from the trees above as the temperature suddenly dropped. Dean could feel the hairs on his arms and neck raise a second before bolts of electricity shot out from the unseen skies above and hammered into the thing.
-10 Health!
-7 Health!
-5 Health!
“That’s the way to do it, Winters,” Crusher roared, picking himself up from where he had been thrown, before suddenly lurching backward as another forcefield hit him. “Urgh!”
Dean looked back to the cloud of smoke rising from the path where his lightning storm had struck. It was still there. Smoking, and its white robes now burned black in places, but it was alive, and standing.
“I guess you weren’t joking when you said don’t annoy it…” Dean had a chance to mutter before the creature swept across the empty air with a staff, and everyone still standing was hit by the thing’s field of energy. Even Mirelle was thrown from her steed, and the stag bolted into the forest. Sari and the Lady Jay tumbled back across the ground, and the thing kept advancing, now only a little way off from Winters, its target.
“No, you don’t… Cripple!” Dean called, pushing himself up onto his elbows.
-8 Health!
The thing rocked backward and slowed, taking a haltering step forward, before ramming its staff against the ground.
“Oof!” Dean felt the force wave wash over him like a tsunami, pinning him to the floor.
What can I do? I’ve almost spent all of my Mana! Dean panicked, feeling his heart starting to beat faster and faster inside his chest. I’m going to die. I really am going to die the vicious cycle of thoughts riding around and around inside of him. It wasn’t the ghost pain making him panic, it was the invisible force that was holding him down and not allowing him to move. It made him feel worthless and powerless – just the way he had felt when those thugs had shattered his hand and broken his knee.
Tales of the Gemsmith Page 18
