Hope Engine

by Andrew Lynch

  Finally, I had time to look around. I could see the heads of two more Children of Light in the middle of NPC groups. Hursh and his bodyguard were going to have their hands full, but that execute would make short work of them all once they were below 50%. At least, I assumed that was the trigger to use it.

  When the group of awesome dudes moved back in to loot the corpse, they all stood around it. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but it wasn’t the calm and confident body language of grizzled veterans. Something wasn’t right.

  No sooner than I’d considered the possibility of a front row seat to the elite fight being a bad idea, the Child of Light’s health returned to 100%. Odd, as it still didn’t have a head. The next thing that happened? A new head shot out in such an explosive manner that it hit one of the shield maidens on the way past, taking her health down to 10%. What else happened? Another head, which then killed that damaged shield maiden. It now had two heads that had both begun vomiting puddles of light all over the battlefield, which was now taking up twice as much room as before. It wasn’t a snake, it was a hydra!

  As if that wasn’t enough, there were now things – with nameplates – wriggling in the light puddles. It was spawning MOBs.

  They weren’t baby hydras though… hydrae. Hydri? Whatever.

  They were more like slugs. Brightly glowing slugs the size of my arm. Heck, make the eyes large, give them smiles, and they’d almost be cute. As it was, they had beady little dots at the end of stalks for eyes, and a fang ringed maw for a mouth.

  One of the shield maidens slammed her shield on the ground, killing most of the Light Parasites with a single hit, and making both heads attack her. The bodyguards began the same routine as before, a mixture of tanking, healing, and damage. Hopefully this time they wouldn’t cut the Child of Light’s head off.

  Hursh shouted to the NPC leader of the player group. ‘Get the frozen council over here, now!’

  Sounded like ice mages. Maybe they could muster up some sort of giant freeze spell.

  My vision darkened, which was very odd seeing as how everything in front of me cast no shadows and radiated light.

  The air in front of me crystalised and cracked, and I remembered what the darkened screen meant. With my Shadow Skin gone, I threw myself backwards. It wasn’t graceful, and I had just put myself on the floor, so I wasn’t going to be winning any awards for tactical decisions, but it did let me see what had hit me. One of the Light Parasites had slugged its way over to me while I’d been captivated by the high-level gameplay.

  Shadow Skin had saved me, but I didn't know what to do next. I was sure my Shadowbolt would be resisted, but I was out of options.

  “Shadowbolt hits Light Parasite”

  “1 (-35)” pinged off its nameplate. Okay, not great, but it was something. Something meant it could be hurt. I wasn’t powerless.

  As the slug slowly slimed towards me, I weighed my options. At this speed, I could probably just run away. It had taken me by surprise, but that was the only reason it had hit me. Now I was focused, it was an easy opponent.

  I tried my second spell.

  “Corrupted Tendrils hits 1 MOB”

  Oh wow. There wasn’t a follow-up resisted message. Sure enough, the Light Parasite was now being held to the ground by shadowy tentacles, and “1” was ticking off its nameplate every three seconds. Okay, now things were happening.

  I got back to my feet and recast Shadow Skin, just in case. Corrupting Tendrils was only a snare, not a root, so the Light Parasite was still moving, but it was barely noticeable at this point. I cast Shadowbolt again.

  “1 (-34)”.

  Luckily for me, this Light Parasite must be a significantly lower level than the Child of Light, because its health had ticked down to 95%. This was going to take a while, but it was going to work.

  Hold on. I had a fourth spell! I hadn’t used it yet, so this was a perfect time to try out my first DOT.

  I reread the tooltip: “Corruption. Hits an enemy for 2% of their total Life every 3 seconds. Lasts for 60 seconds.”

  I cast it on the Light Parasite. The animation was the same as Shadowbolt, but a different stream of words came from my mouth.

  The nameplate above the MoB gained a second little icon that was the same as the icon for Corruption. The next time a tick came along, the “1” for Corrupted Tendrils pinged off, followed by “5” from Corruption. A quick bit of maths, and I knew that its total Life was “250”. That still sounded like a hell of a lot considering I was one-shotting pillagers in the tutorial when hitting in the twenties.

  All I had to do was keep my DOT up, keep it snared, throw the occasional Shadowbolt for good measure, and this thing was as good as dead.

  It was at that thought that it reared up onto its haunches and opened its mouth, which I now noticed was dripping liquid light.

  I cast a Shadowbolt and hit it square on the mouth. I mean, like a torpedo into the Death Star exhaust port. Nothing but net. The inside of its mouth briefly flashed a shadowy purple, and it coughed out a puddle of light instead of the ranged spit I knew it was meant to be.

  “3 (-56)”. Oh yeah. I’d peaked. I wasn’t going to top that crit.

  Its health was ticking away, and my Corrupting Tendrils came off cooldown. I instantly recast it, followed by another Corruption and another Shadowbolt. I was slowly backing away, walking in a giant circle. Once or twice, Hursh’s Javelin bodyguard ran between me and my target, but I didn't have time to see why, or how cool their battle was. I had my own epic struggle going on here.

  At 40% the little guy went for another spit attack. It reared up, and light pooled into its mouth. I threw another Shadowbolt, and hit its soft, squishy underbelly. Which wasn’t a crit, and didn’t interrupt its casting.

  The light-spit was laser accurate and hit me in the eyes. Or would have, but my Shadow Skin blocked it. I didn’t take any damage. Sucker! Warlocks are so overpowered. It’s awesome.

  At least, that’s what I was thinking until I noticed a small, interesting, probably inconsequential fact. It hadn’t been a single glob of light that had been spit at me. There was a trail between the globule on the floor and the Light Parasite.

  I checked the combat log.

  “Light Harpoon hits Akuma Severo. 0 (-22)”.

  Harpoon, hey? Harpoons, famous for reeling in a catch after it lands a hit. Or, depending on the mass of the object, pulling yourself to the target…

  The Light Parasite lunged forward using its harpoon goo, and my entire plan of “be faster than it” went right out the window.

  I had never been in a fight before. I mean, nothing that was life or death. In school, there were no such things as Life, or stats that I could lose, or physical stimulators waiting to shock me to let me know a fraction of the pain of character death. The only fights I’d had in here had been turn based in the tutorial, or long distance, or I’d managed to solve with words. I hadn’t felt it when the goblin had charged at me because, frankly, it looked silly and I’d have just been embarrassed to die from its gangrenous loincloth. The wolf? Surprised me, I’d hardly seen it coming.

  This little Light Parasite was my first real enemy. No tutorial easy-mode. It was the spawn of a raid boss that was part of an army which was wiping the strongest players in the game off the map. It was something I could respect. And I knew it was coming. Another minute or two and I’d have killed it by running it in circles. Now it was time for a stand-up fight. A real duel between worthy opponents.

  As this was my first true fight, I wasn’t exactly sure what I was feeling? I didn’t know if this was a feature built into the game, or if this was how anyone that got into a fight felt. It was fear mixed with a dash of terror. It was the knowledge that life was on the line. It was absolutely intoxicating. It was motherfucking bullet time.

  The Light Parasite moved slowly through the air. Destination: my face. I had all the time in the world to formulate a plan, but I didn’t need it. The adrenaline running through me made every th
ought sharp, and every idea a masterstroke of tactical genius. The cruel twist? My movements were still in real-time. My limbs were sluggish, like I was swimming through treacle. Something I’d done once in my home zone, because that’s the kind of thing 14 year old kids get curious about.

  My mind had already begun casting Corrupting Tendrils, but my arms were getting into position too slowly – there wasn’t time. Plan B. I cancelled my cast, and let my legs drop from beneath me. I began casting Shadowbolt – my arms weren’t going to get up in time, but I’d already accepted that.

  Gravity. When you jump off a building, it’s a very strong force, pulling you dozens of metres in the blink of an eye. I only needed to move a handbreadth. Get my head out of the path of the, now very open and very scary looking, mouth. As I fell, I had a good chance to really inspect this thing’s horrible looking face. It looked like an angry spiral, the muscles twisting around themselves from the base of its neck until reaching its horrific… teeth? No. Interconnecting fangs that when opened, pulled out like the shutter on a camera lens. Even worse, now that the teeth were open, I saw that it also had mandibles inside its mouth, there even now were shooting out to meet me before its main hellish mouth could.

  What kind of designer put mandibles inside a mouth? Mandibles go on the outside of a mouth. This was just silly. I continued to fall at a snail’s pace, so much slower than I needed to be going, but there was no plan C, so it was this or death.

  My arms had drawn into line with the MOB, but if I shot now, the Shadowbolt would hit its tail, doing 1 damage. I had to wait. It was all or nothing.

  I sacrificed a few strands of my hair to the dark gods of inertia as the mandibles closed on the part of me that couldn’t get out the way fast enough. The main mouth followed close behind, one of the razor sharp fangs throwing up a small shower of stubble in front of my eyes as it grazed my chin. And that was it. I was home free. The body of the Light Parasite hit my nose as I barely got out of the way. I took 6 damage. Acceptable losses, given the situation.

  I’d guessed right. It began to twist in midair so that it would land still facing me. It hadn’t severed the harpoon slime from its mouth, so it wasn’t a one-use ability. It was now able to attack me almost instantly, and I wouldn’t be able to outrun it. I got lucky dodging this first attack, but the second would kill me. That was why my Shadowbolt, although missing the first pass, were ready to hit it the second it landed. Thanks to this adrenaline, I’d have all the time in the world to take aim. Just like last time, the critical hit inside the mouth would disrupt it.

  I kept falling backwards, keeping the Light Parasite in my vision, even upside as it now was. My right hand glowed with purple light, the charged Shadowbolt flowing into it. The slug had just touched the ground with half its body as my Shadowbolt fired. Not good.

  “Shadowbolt hits Light Parasite. 58”.

  A crit with no resist. On the one hand, hell yes! On the other, my screen flashed red. It had landed with only half of its body. It didn’t have a tail anymore. I tried to get to my feet to inspect it when its nameplate went grey and cracked. It had died! But I couldn’t get up. I looked down and saw what had happened.

  “Light Parasite casts Self Destruct”.

  It had blown itself up as it passed me. My screen turned a darker red. I couldn’t move. I opened the character screen to see what had happened and boy was I a damn mess. I swapped from the equipment tab to the health tab. Both of my legs were blacked out and had several status effects next to them. Safe to assume that meant they weren’t usable any more. The status bar next to everything else had also taken hits, but it was my torso that was concerning me. Its bar was dropping fast, and my overall Life had dropped from 120 down to 30. I wish I’d looked at this tab earlier, because I didn’t know what was going on. I hovered over the status effect on my stomach, hoping that would enlighten me.

  “Unknown: raise your First Aid skill to identify”.

  Great. Something else I should have done before I started this suicide run.

  Three seconds later my Life was 29. Another three, and it was 28. I had a minute and a half to fix an unknown status effect, in a skill I’d never heard of before.

  Perhaps my own ignorance of the game’s mechanics could be used against it. I didn’t know exactly what was possible, so I also didn’t know exactly what wasn’t possible.

  That is easily the stupidest thought I’d ever had. That wasn’t how games worked. Anyone that actually thought they could outwit a basic element of a game that had been played by billions for decades, deserved to die!

  Oh shit, I was going to die.

  Aww, my Dirty Robes. They’d served me faithfully.

  Still, no time to mope. I had a battlefield to claw my way across. I may have had my legs crushed into uselessness and was rapidly bleeding out from the jagged cuts where bone tore through flesh, but… you know, loot.

  Loot brings gear. Gear brings power. Power brings safety. At some point there’s also fear leading to the dark side, but for now, we loot.

  Also, the little slug might just have some magical leg-demangler.

  I’ll admit that my mind was wandering as I was scratching my way along the ground, but in truth, not much else was really going on, and narrating a crawl seemed a bit silly. I mean, who would ever do that? Better to ruminate.

  Now that my hands had done what my legs couldn’t and placed me in looting range of the Light Parasite, I entered the loot screen, and found it had two containers, “body” and “heart”. Another Minor Shadow Gem to add to the collection of things with an unknown purpose.

  Checking the “body” container, it was pretty small at only four slots. As I rummaged through the corpse, the loot timer ticked away, slowly revealing its treasures. First up, occupying only a single slot, was a “Worn Mandible”. That was fair, I had shot it right in the mouth after all. The next two slots were filled with a single “Used Flesh”. Blowing yourself up would count as used, sure. The final slot remained empty.

  Fifteen seconds left.

  I rolled over onto my back as the red of my vision grew thicker, and darker, like congealing blood. On my left, the Child of Light now had a third head, only a single shield maiden remained standing, and Hursh had clearly taken a beating. Would have been pretty cool to have watched that fight, I supposed. Maybe one day.

  Twelve seconds.

  To my left, I saw melee and tanks being overrun, and healers doing some ridiculous things that I didn’t understand the mechanics of to try and stem the tide.

  Nine seconds.

  In front of my face, even through my poor vision, I noticed something odd. There was something spreading up my arms. A shadow, possibly, but it was hard to tell. I raised my head to look at my ruined stumps. I realised I hadn’t felt the pain of losing them. I had tuned the pain meter right down, but I still should have felt something. I mean, I’d felt those stupid spiky trees in the death forest, so losing a leg or two should have registered. I felt a bit cold, perhaps, but not in pain.

  Six seconds.

  I was sure of it now. There was a darkness engulfing me from my hands down and my waist up.

  Three seconds.

  “System message: Neuropathy Plague has been detected within your server shard. Immediate evacuation from HOPE commencing”.

  Chapter 16: No Escape

  My vision warped and distended. I was pulled sharply backwards, the ground slamming into my back. I distantly realised I’d taken out several healers as I’d flown through the air, gaining speed, no longer hitting the ground. I was rising into the air now and I could see the whole battlefield beneath me. I could see the other two Children of Light devastating Hursh’s forces. I rose above the crest of the hills and I could see the Eastern Shadow in its entirety. It didn’t end. A sea of poorly rendered MOBs of every size and race possible.

  I stopped rising. I would like to say I started falling, but that wasn’t fast enough. I hung at the apex for half a second as my stomach caught up with me. Th
en something hit me, and I tumbled towards the ground. I spun and twisted, sky, earth, sky, earth, sky, just missed a mountain, sky, a tent, fog.

  I crashed through a wooden door and skidded along the dead earth of my village. Now the doors to both huts didn’t work. Typical.

  I rolled to an unceremonious halt and my shadowed hand flopped out to land on… a white, scaled, taloned foot that was the size of my entire torso. That couldn’t be good.

  Something felt wet against my face. Blood, probably. Except, I hadn’t hurt my head in the fight, and all this throwing around from the game engine didn’t seem to be doing damage. No, this wasn’t blood. It was morning dew from a patch of remarkably healthy looking grass. I looked away from the giant scaled foot to see a column of water that was gently swirling. It was a font of brilliant, sparkling blue water that was wearing clothes and had a face. A kind of cute face, actually.

  Angie’s voice. ‘Wake up.’

  My screen went blank.

  “System purge start. HOPE engine will be unavailable for a brief period.”

  The headset retracted, and I felt the tingle of electricity disconnect from the metal plates at my temples. The feedback pads loosened and fell away from my legs, arms, and body.

  I blinked, stunned at what had just happened. A full terminal evacuation. Like they used to have fire tests in school, I’d had terminal evac tests. I knew what to expect, I knew it was possible, but to actually have it happen?

  I ran my hand through my hair, not yet standing up. It was coming. I hated this part. I clamped my eyes shut. The after image was burned into my mind. The last thing I’d seen before I’d been booted out – a player character. They’d picked the water elemental race. They were covered in green cloth and brown leather plates.

  I rolled onto my side and vomited on the floor. I was pretty sure I tasted Bubonic Buttercup, but there was no sign of their yellow leaves in my government supps. Mildly concerning – the gruel looked the same now as it had when I ingested it. Better, maybe.