“Sorry, babe,” I said with a sigh. “Twelve hour cooldown.”
“Ah, shit, I forgot about that,” she said. “Oh well, I still unlocked Achilles Heel.”
“I unlocked a new spell too,” I said as I scrolled through my interface. “Something called Magic Bolt. Holy shit, it takes 50% of my mana to cast and has a ten second cooldown.”
“Yeah, I’ve seen it in use,” said Ember. “It’s a pretty badass spell.”
When we had dressed and emerged from behind the silken veil, we found Trinity and Anna playing cards at the table. On the looking glass behind them was a video feed of a group of fairies, all level 35 and up, and all real-world characters, battling a demon.
“It’s about time,” said Trinity as she slapped her cards down on the table. “We were turning into a bunch of old maids out here waiting for you two. Congrats on leveling, now can we go do some questing?”
“Sure,” I said, and glanced back at the silver-haired drow assassin. “But first I need to tell you all something.”
“Awe,” said Trinity mockingly as she grabbed Anna’s arm. “He’s going to confess his love.”
“Close,” I said with a small laugh. “Actually, I wanted to let you all in on little secret. I haven’t known any of you very long, but I feel like I can trust you.”
“What is it?” Ember asked. “Are you like actually a five hundred pound, forty-year-old dude who lives with his mom? I mean, if you are I don’t give a shit. You seem like a really great guy.”
“Uh, no. As boring as it sounds, this is what I look like in real life.”
“Oh,” said Ember. “Then what is it?”
“I came into the game with 100,000 gold, and it was stolen by Mad Morgan.”
Ember’s jaw basically hit the floor, Trinity’s eyes widened, and Anna’s long elven ears perked to attention.
“One-hundred thousand gold?” said Anna.
“You got it stolen?” said Trinity.
“And you want to get it back?” Ember deduced. “What’s in it for us? What’s the split on loot for the guild?”
The girls all eyed me with a mix of hope and apprehension.
“Even shares,” I said. They all shared pleased nods. “You ladies help me get it back and I’ll give you each 25,000.”
“Why would you give away most of your gold?” Ember asked with apparent suspicion.
“I want to have a strong guild, and the more money we all have the faster we can level.”
“He knows he’s too valuable for us to screw him over,” said Trinity.
“There’s that too,” I said with a wink.
“Well then,” said Anna. “What are we waiting for? Let’s go grind out some quests and get our asses fighting like a well-oiled machine. We’re going to need to be good to take out Morgan and his cronies.
“We should go see a trainer first,” I said. “I’d like to learn these new spells before we start questing.”
“There’s a dwarf city about five miles north of here,” said Ember. “It’s called Aeorock, and its neutral ground for all levels, but we’re kind of wanted right now, and the authorities in the city are sure to have heard about us.”
“Great, so we can’t learn our new spells?” I asked.
“There are other ways,” said Ember. “Trainers can be found in other places besides cities and villages.”
“How do we find them?”
“On your map, sometimes they pop up.”
I clicked on my map and noticed that it had expanded to include the Beartooth Mountains. There were a lot of different icons glowing on it, and as I zoomed in on the area I found a big M icon. Another click confirmed that this was indeed a Mage trainer.
“The Caverns of Crystal,” I read aloud and glanced at Ember. “It’s deeper in the mountain, ever heard of it?”
“Yeah, I’ve been in there,” she said. “But I don’t know a way to get there through the mountain. We should go around the western ridge. There’s a yeti clan up there that we can loot on the way. They’re all like level 17s and up though. You peeps think you’re up for it?”
I glanced around at the girls, and they seemed confident in their abilities.
“Screw it,” I said. “Let’s give it a shot.”
We left the way that we had entered and walked out into a world of white. The late afternoon sky looked mean and gray, and a wicked wind howled in from the west. We headed that way, pulling our collars high and trudging through the whipping snow. Trinity took the lead and plowed through the ankle-deep snow with her big boots. I fell in line behind Trinity, then came Anna, while Ember took the rear. As we marched through the snow, Anna laid blessings on us all, and Ember buffed us with something called Untraceable Step, which had a half hour cooldown on it.
Trinity suddenly stopped beside a boulder that sat near the edge of the natural shelf that we were traversing. She ushered us all behind the rock and hooked a thumb back over the edge.
“There’s a couple knights from Riverton snooping around down there in the valley near where we came off the road,” she said, and glanced at Ember.
“What?” said the assassin. “I put wards on those wagons wheels, and the horseshoes. They must have a pretty high-level tracker with them.”
“What should we do?” Anna asked. “What if they find the hideout?”
“They won’t find it if we kill them,” said Ember, and Trinity seemed to agree with her.
“We can’t kill them,” I said.
“Why not?” Ember asked skeptically. “They’re not real people, you know.”
“Yeah, but they think they are,” I countered.
“They’ll respawn back in town and have no idea what happened,” she argued.
“Look, we’re already wanted. You want to add murder to the list? I didn’t intend on being a bad guy in this world.”
“Bad guy?” said Ember. She rolled her eyes. “How old did you say you were?”
“Just because this is virtual reality doesn’t mean we should just act like assholes,” I said. “I’m the leader of this guild, and I say we leave it alone.”
Ember glanced at the other women, but they had already accepted me as the leader of the group, and they let her know it.
“Fine,” said Ember. “But when playing nicey-nice backfires on us, you’ll know I was right.”
We continued around the west ridge, and eventually the path meandered up a steep incline, then turned northeast toward a small valley between the mountains. Ember told us to stay on the path, and Trinity led us down a slow decline peppered with crooked pines. There were creatures on the white slopes, bears, wolves, wild cats, and even snow dwarves, but we didn’t bother with any of them, and they stuck to their programmed routes.
“Down there, see it?” Ember said, pointing down at the valley floor.
“Where?” I asked as I strained to make out the creatures against the glaring white world.
“By that dark ridge.”
I finally spotted the yetis, five of them to be exact, all gathered near the mouth of a cave. I couldn’t tell exactly what they were doing from this distance, but I could tell that they were big...really big.
“So, what’s the plan?” Anna asked.
“We should lure a few of them out if we can, take them out one by one,” I suggested.
“They’re too close together,” said Ember. “I don’t think we’ll have any luck pulling just one of them.”
“Well I can’t tank all five at once,” Trinity said as she squinted at the faraway group.”
“How about this,” I said, and motioned for the girls to all gather around. “Ember, you sneak around behind them and use whatever you’ve got in your arsenal to slow down as many as you can. Anna can hit the group with her stunning spell, and I’ll blast the hell out of the one with the lowest health and get it out of the picture early. Meanwhile, Trinity, you keep the stronger ones at bay until we can focus our efforts on them.”
The girls all agreed, and we mov
ed off the trail and slunk toward a copse of birch trees. We were now less than one-hundred feet away from the group, and the yetis’ size became apparent. The beasts were at least eight feet tall, with thick white fur, and ugly little faces set on big, shaggy heads. Their long claws were like daggers, and I didn’t want to imagine what they could do to our flesh.
“Those are some ugly bastards,” Anna noted with disgust.
“Give me about 30 seconds to get in place,” said Ember, and she faded until she was as translucent as a ghost.
“Now that is pretty cool,” I said as I watched her sneak right into the group of yetis.
The beasts were gathered around a pile of bloody bones, gnawing away at the recent kill. Their scent found me like a punch in the nose, and I almost gagged when I smelled a mix of old soggy carpet, piss, and B.O.
“Damn, shower much?” Trinity said as she squeezed her nose.
“I’m glad I’m not the one who has to get close to them,” Anna told her.
“Alright, Ember’s about to make her move,” I said.
We watched as Ember moved to the other side of the group, slowly pulled a mean looking dagger from its sheath, and quickly sliced two of the beast’s ankles. Beside me, Trinity tapped on her interface, began to slow, and then she shot across the open ground and slammed into one of the yeti’s. I conjured a fireball and sent it shooting across the white expanse. Anna’s stunning spell washed over the yeti’s as my fireball struck one of the beasts right in the chest, instantly lighting its thick fur on fire. I saw quickly that its health had dropped to 30%, but then it plummeted to zero as Ember suddenly appeared on top of it and stabbed a dagger right through its eye.
One down, four to go.
Trinity faced two of the monsters, hacking and slashing at them with her giant sword as they growled and lunged at her with big, swiping paws. One connected, and I released a fireball right into the face of her assailant as she went flying overhead. She landed in a heap behind me, and even as Ember rode the beast I had just hit to the ground and killed it, the other three charged right at us.
“Trin?” I said urgently and hit the yetis with arcane lightning that slowed them down a little. I followed it with scorched earth, and the ground around the beasts flared to life. They screamed as they were engulfed in flames, but they kept on coming.
I glanced back and was surprised to see that Trinity was frozen solid. A menacing growl forced me to whip my head around, and I came face to face with a big, hairy, flaming yeti paw. The force of the blow took me off my feet, spun me through the air, and slammed me into a thick pine tree. I hit the ground like a brick of ice, and that’s when I felt the cold quickly creeping through my bones. Horrified, I stared at my bluish hands as frost and then ice covered them.
FROSTBITTEN!
Movement slowed by 90%
5 second duration
Shit!
Through the sheen of ice covering my eyes I watched helplessly as the three yetis bore down on Anna. Ember rushed up behind them and hamstrung all three, and one of them turned and swiped her to the side like a ragdoll. She slammed into a big boulder and froze as well.
Anna fought valiantly with her staff. She summoned holy light that forced the yetis back and scorched their snow-white fur. She hit them with a glowing spell that siphoned their health. But they kept coming, their big paws reaching for her.
Then I saw Trinity thaw out and spring to her feet. I had only two seconds left on my debuff, and in that time Trinity had closed the distance to the yetis and stabbed one of them through the back. When I thawed out I had a fireball waiting and hit her opponent in his hideous little face.
To my surprise, my fireball took the monster’s head clean off.
Three down, two to go.
Anna blessed us all with healing energy as Trinity engaged the last two yetis, turning them away from me and Anna. I stood side by side with my healer and we unleashed a barrage of spells that dropped the yetis to below 10% health.
Ember thawed out during the last moments of the fight and managed to kill one of them with a well-placed dagger throw that took the last creature in the forehead and dropped it at Trinity’s feet.
“That was awesome!” Anna cheered when the last yeti fell.
“Easy for you to say, you didn’t get frozen,” said Ember shivering.
Coins flew from the ash that had once been the yeti’s bodies. The share was 2 gold each, which wasn’t bad, and a pair of shin guards that were better than the ones that Trinity was currently wearing.
“This way to the caverns of crystal,” Ember said and started up the ridge above the cave entrance.
About ten minutes later we came to a frozen lake, and Ember led us beneath the low hanging icicles at the mouth of a cavern. Multi-colored crystals grew out of the stones at odd angles, lighting the cavern with an ambient glow.
Trinity and Anna waited near the mouth while Ember and I sought out our respective trainers. Toward the back of the cavern we found them contained within frozen blocks of ice.
“Just touch the ice and they’ll thaw,” said Ember.
I placed my hand on the block of ice containing the mage trainer, and he quickly thawed out and fell to the floor.
“Oh, thank the seven gods,” said the old, Asian-looking elf. “You’ve freed me from the clutches of the winter witch. What can I do to repay you?”
“I need to learn magic bolt,” I said.
“Ah, congratulations, it seems that you are becoming a powerful mage indeed. And this will make you even more powerful. Now, let me find the correct text,” he said as he scrolled through his interface.
“That’s alright, I don’t have much time, and I’m sure that you want to get out of here. How about you just show me the hand gestures?”
“Hmmm,” he said, and glanced around warily. “That is probably a good idea. That witch might come back any minute.”
The trainer straightened, took a deep breath, and laced his fingers together in front of his chest. He then quickly pressed his palms together, creating a popping sound, and pulled back his right hand, which was now crackling and glowing blue with untold power. He extended his hand toward a distant icicle, and a shimmering bolt of magic shot from his fingertips and exploded against the ice.
“That’s it?” I said, thinking that the spell would have been much more intricate. “I’ll be able to cast that quickly.”
“Easy peasy,” he said with a nod and a smile. “A great spell for a mage in a bind.”
“Alright, let me try it out.” I laced my fingers, clapped my palms together, and pulled back my right hand. Power coursed through my fingers and I aimed the spell at the far wall. To my delight, a glowing dart, about six inches long, shot across the cave and tore a big chunk out of the ice.
“You’re a natural.” The trainer leaned in conspiratorially. “If you help me get out of this cavern, I shall reward you further.”
“Hey, Ember, should I take this quest?”
“Might as well,” she yelled over to me. “I’m going to as well. It’s easy enough. Just have to get them out of the cavern. Some crystal creatures spawn and try to stop them, but they’re easy enough to kill.”
“I’ll help you get out,” I told the trainer. “But first I need to spend these attribute points. Can you put them toward Vitality please?”
“Sure thing,” he said with a wave of his gnarled hand.
“Alright,” I said with a quick glance around the cavern. “Come on, follow my friend.”
Ember and I led the two trainers back through the cavern, and sure enough, at the entrance the crystal critters came alive. The hanging crystals dropped from their mooring, sprouted legs, and scurried toward us. The NPC trainers attacked the creatures, who quickly surrounded us and soon numbered in the dozens.
“Uh...Ember?”
“They’re just level 4. Use your arcane lightning, it should kill most of them.”
I hurriedly performed the spell, and lightning erupted from my palms
followed by barking thunder. My Arcane Lightning webbed from one crystal creature to another and continued on through the group in the blink of an eye. The creatures all shattered into a thousand pieces, and we easily made our way back to Trinity and Anna.
“Thank you, my young apprentice,” said the mage trainer. “And for your reward…”
He withdrew three mana potions from his pocket and handed them to me, before turning and rushing toward the sunlight. The assassin trainer did the same, and we followed their tracks out of the cavern.
“What next?” Anna asked.
“First things first,” I said as I practiced the hand gestures for my new spell. “I want to try out this magic bolt. Let’s find something to fight.”
Suddenly, a massive explosion rocked the mountainside right beside me and the girls. A gigantic fireball engulfed me, and I cried out in pain and surprise as I was lifted off my feet and sailed into the nearby rock face. I hit the slope and tumbled down it like a ragdoll, before coming to a groaning halt on the rough rocks near the trail.
Somewhere beyond the rising smoke a creature screamed, and the noise reminded me of a T-Rex from a dinosaur movie. I squinted through the fog and covered my ears as the thing cried out again, but this time it was followed by at least four others. Then I saw them gliding down through the swirling smoke.
Dragons.
There were five of the creatures, each with a rider, and one of the riders I recognized as the mage from Riverton.
Kincaid.
I pulled myself to my feet defiantly, ignoring the warning that flashed on my interface, telling me that I had only 12% health. Kincaid and his lackeys landed their dragons on the edge of the ridge and I uncorked and tossed back a healing potion.
Anna was already up, and her buff soon washed over me. Trinity was favoring her right leg, but Ember was nowhere to be seen, and I worried that she had been blown over the side of the ridge. We were at least five hundred feet up, and the drop on this side of the mountain went straight to the bottom.
“Ah, there’s my fiancé,” said Kincaid as he came swaggering across the scorched earth with his guildies in tow. There was a dwarf healer among them, as well as a female orc witch doctor wearing rags and about a hundred little bones. A giant troll with green skin and flaming red hair took up the rear with an elven death knight whose matte black armor covered his entire body.
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