Hope Engine

by Andrew Lynch

  “You must kill it for us to join. Then your sacrifice will be over.”

  If I hadn’t been inside a giant creature’s digestive tract, I would have argued with the voice inside my head that I was starting to think might just be a manifestation of mental illness.

  With the walls of muscle moving and grinding, I had one knee pushed into my chest, one arm above me, and one behind and below me. I tried to squirm enough to get my lower arm above me, but as I twisted my body to make room, the muscles moved with me.

  A sudden, violent spasm from the walls around me, and I could feel slime wash over me in the pitch black. Was it going to vomit me back out? The muscles moved again, and this time they slid with ease. Nope to vomit. It had just lubed me up so it could get me into its stomach!

  Another contraction, and another moment of my lungs wanting to burst, and my Life beginning to drain, and suddenly, I was bathed in light. It wasn’t the dull grey of the Dead Wood. This was a brilliant golden gleam. As my eyes adjusted, I could see bubbles in the gold, and then I could see the darkened walls of flesh surrounding this pool of liquid gold. A bubble popped and a tiny fleck of the liquid jumped up onto the shoulder pad of my breastplate and I heard a sizzle. Oh shit!

  You got me in here, now get me out!

  “I cannot do anything yet. You need to seal our bond before I can act. For now, give into your instincts. Kill!”

  Okay. Well, clearly we needed to have a talk because my instincts had never been to just start killing things. Ignoring the battle frenzy I’d fallen into once or twice… those were thoughts for a time when I wasn’t about to be eaten!

  One hand was still trapped by my side, and it wasn’t like I could aim, but I didn’t have any choice. And I didn’t think aiming really mattered when you were inside your target.

  I began casting Soulburn.

  The wall of muscle flinched, trying to get away from my hand where the dark mist began to form, but now its own properties worked against it. As one bit of the muscle moved, another collapsed to take its place. The slickness it had covered me in meant it couldn’t stop itself from touching me. The mist formed in my trapped hand, and purple smoke rose up from the dark-singed insides. It smelled bad enough that I began to gag. Again the walls spasmed and roiled, and I could feel the Child of Light was moving as my neck strained to keep my head in place.

  The mist began to coalesce into bubbling, toxic darkness, and this time the Child of Light moved enough that I finally got my hand free, and I dropped further into the hydra’s stomach, only my legs below the knees still being held by the muscular walls.

  As the muscles jerked my fall to a halt, some of the purple goo fell into the roiling sea of golden light – and it was like a hydrophobically coated brick dropping into the ocean. The golden liquid parted before the darkness even touched it, and then flowed back together. I could hear the Child of Light roar from its throat above me. It really didn’t like that.

  As my Soulburn finished casting, I pointed my right hand where the drop of goop had gone. I was about to part this bitch like Moses!

  The dark liquid shot forward, and the gold sea spread so fast that waves shot up all around me. I was lucky enough to not take a full wave to the face, but the sea spray effect was devastating, and my robes bore the brunt, dissolving into tatters.

  “Again.”

  I didn’t need the figment of my imagination to tell me twice. Still dangling by my ankles, I cast another Soulburn, and again the gold parted, and I was slammed into the side of the hydra’s stomach as it must have reeled in pain. The wave of light liquid acid splashed all around and took the remains of my robes with it along with one of the shoulder pads from my jailor’s plate mail.

  “More!”

  Thorn boomed in my head, his intensity passing to me with such force that, if I hadn’t already been in the middle of an elite monster, it would have spurred me into a frenzied attack.

  My Soulburn congealed and slung itself through to whatever lay beyond the golden sea. And another one. And again. As I readied my fifth Soulburn, determined to keep firing until something happened… something happened.

  The muscle around my ankles let go and for the briefest of moments, I realised my idiocy. I was about to fall into the vat of light death that the was Child of Light’s stomach. Whether my last Soulburn had landed a killing blow, or I had just finished being swallowed, it didn’t matter.

  I closed my eyes and tried to protect my face from the acid that was about to wash over me, when suddenly something bit deep into my left leg at the ankle and wrapped its way up to my knee. I looked down to see what had caught me. Had an ally jumped in after me? Was Thorn doing some weird things? Was this a new form of my Shadow Clone ability?

  If I’d had time to think or act, I might have done something useful. As it was, I saw a small pair of jaws with sharp teeth digging into my lower leg. It turned out those inner mandibles that I’d seen shoot out and grip onto Arthur were an appendage at the end of its tongue, and it had swallowed its tongue to fetch me, the thorn in its throat, out. And up.

  It took less than a second for the tongue to yank me through the darkness and the moist, slippery walls. The hood that was left from my robe whipped back and wind rushed past me as the tongue released me. I opened my eyes to see a grey sky. I was above even the tallest trees far in the distance of the Dead Wood. I was lethally high. I’d done all I could. I’d sacrificed myself for my village. Oh Eyes! Was this whole “sacrifice to gain power” thing going to be so cheesy to claim that the friendships I’d made along the way were my power?

  My motion came to a halt as I reached the apex and wind rushed past me again. I contorted my body, twisting and pulling limbs until I managed to face the ground.

  The Child of Light was still retching, its mouth open and its jawed tongue flailing wildly. The hole I had just been ejected from was a giant black target. One I couldn’t miss.

  I’d begun casting a Soulburn while I was in the elite’s stomach, and in all the confusion and near death experiences, I’d forgotten. But Thorn hadn’t.

  “Finish Him.”

  My Soulburn cast, and as I plummeted through the air, the purple toxicity shot forward, and I fell through the trail of smoke left in its wake. As the Soulburn hit its target, the Child of Light threw its head back. There was no roar of anger or cry of pain. In the end the Child of Light had died silently. Just as I would when I landed. It had thrown me too high for any human to survive the landing.

  “It is done. We are bonded. The cogs turn, my friend.”

  I had a lot of questions about whatever Thorn was going on about, but just as I wanted to start asking them, I smacked into the Child of Light’s leathery skin with bone crushing force. The world went black as I bounced off it and… stepped forwards from the shadows of a nearby tree. The bouncing form that had been my body vanished in a flash of purple mist.

  I’d been in so much danger from light magic for that entire fight that I forgot about Shadow Clone! The fall hadn’t killed me because it was just normal, boring physical damage!

  I let out a laugh of triumph, and punched the air with my jailor’s chain.

  I’d dived inside the most powerful elite the Eastern Shadow had in their army, and then when I’d been spat out I managed to 180 no scope it! I was only level twelve, how was this possible?! I was Eyes damned invincible!

  I felt a burning pain shoot through my back, and I flinched away from it. I screamed from the pain. The real life pain! I fell to the floor and clawed at whatever had hit me as if that would take the pain away. The agony shot through me, pain dampening from the game nowhere to be seen.

  I rolled onto my back, all thoughts fled from my mind apart from fear. What had happened? Why? How?!

  Koif was standing in front of me, his honour guard by his side. He held a thin curved dagger by his side. It was dripping with blood. My blood. I coughed violently and blood welled in my mouth, spattering my face, making me cough again. Drowning in my own blood wa
s a vicious cycle. I was helpless. And the pain was REAL!

  “That is how bonding works. Fear not. The Awakener has done his part. Shall I end him?”

  I tried to speak to Thorn, telling him that I was terrified and ask him what the fuck was happening, but I couldn’t breath as blood bubbled inside my lungs.

  Koif was talking. An evil villain monologue, about how righteous he was and how if only the rest of the world could see it from his point of view then they’d all understand. I didn’t listen. I couldn’t listen. I could only hear my rapidly fading heart beat. The push and pull of blood. The whisper of the hole that was stealing it from me.

  I could hardly see Koif now. Just a blur of white with a crimson dagger. Dark Thorn, so much a part of me that I hadn’t dropped it through the insides of the Child of Light, now lay at my side, my hands too weak to grip.

  “Use me.”

  How.

  “You know.”

  As I lay there dying, a memory came back to me. It was like remembering a dream from a year ago. A memory that wasn’t mine. Or was truly mine, I couldn’t tell. It snapped into focus, and then everything else followed it, the house of cards falling down. I remembered myself in a bright, sterile corridor, my home zone visible through giant viewing windows. Men in armour with guns came for me. Yes, tranquiliser guns. I’d been shot. I’d fallen and I…

  Through the blur of my now useless vision, I raised my hand toward Koif. My body spasmed from an involuntary gasp that it couldn’t take, trying to breathe down the blood that had just left my lungs. I thought a word. There was no malice to it, only fear. I didn’t want them dead, I just wanted them to not hurt me. I wanted to live.

  “We’re losing him! Stop!” A voice from outside the game, panicked and faint, echoing all through Thanis like a screaming God.

  Thorn felt my base instinct and finally reacted. Tentacles of darkness lunged forward, exploding and multiplying from my outstretched hand, soft and winding until they hit their target where they become violent spikes. The Pristine Guard’s armour was nothing to Thorn. I couldn’t see the details, but they all fell as if a child had dropped its toys on the ground. Life had been taken from them now that it was done playing.

  The last thing I saw, crisp even through my dying, was the golden knife covered in my death.

  I fell into oblivion.

  The dead wind didn’t come.

  Chapter 55: Winning

  Bright lights pierced my eyelids. I lifted a hand to cover my eyes.

  I heard feet shuffling, and a door opening then closing.

  I ached all over. I ached in muscles I never knew I had, and in bones that I was pretty sure I shouldn’t be able to actually feel.

  I let my hand fall back to my side, the effort of holding it in place too much. The light flickered in my eyes. The light flickered…

  I opened my eyes to find myself on a bed. I was in one of the rooms of my tavern. I was still in Thanis. I hadn’t logged out when I died. But that had been a real death. I felt it. I felt myself die. I tried to sit up, but the wound in my back wouldn’t let me, threatening to rip open if I strained any harder.

  I fell back to the bed and gasped from the pain. I felt like I’d been trampled by a stampede of Moonbeasts.

  ‘Did you really just try to sit up?’ Bri’s familiar voice came from the door.

  I grinned. Whoever had left the room when I woke up had brought her. Whether she had left instructions that she be notified as soon as I awakened, or if she was simply the closest person, I knew it was because she cared.

  ‘Pretty stupid, I know.’

  Bri entered the room and took a seat next to my bed. ‘Pretty and stupid describe you perfectly. Also alive. Good.’

  I smiled at her. ‘About the alive thing… what happened? I didn’t get the death wind or log out or anything.’

  She nodded slowly. ‘We were hoping you would know.’

  ‘It’s all a bit fuzzy, to be honest. Who knows, maybe I was sleeping in the real world. Playing too long, maybe.’

  Then I remembered all the bright lights and the corridors. And Koif had said I couldn’t log out, but I’d thought he was playing mind games. But now I hadn’t logged out after “dying”. Wait, Thorn had said something about the dead wind being lost to me, hadn’t he?

  “I did.”

  You need to tell me what’s happening right now. What am I seeing in those visions. Are they real? Is that me?

  “I can explain soon. For now, you need to pay attention.”

  ‘Severo, I’m talking to you!’

  I snapped my head up and saw Bri. And another woman. ‘Sorry. What did you say?’

  ‘This is a priestess. She’s been attending you since she arrived.’

  ‘Oh, a healer? Could have used you during the siege! Sorry, that sounded rude. Thank you for your help.’

  Bri turned to the healer. ‘Don’t mind him, he’s oblivious to most things. Especially women.’

  The priestess laughed and said I didn’t need to worry about it. She cast a few spells on me, and I instantly felt better. Dizzy, but better. She made sure to let me know that she’d never seen anything like my condition. Her spells were having no effect, whether healing or resurrection, until now. Suddenly, boom, I was at full Life. But whatever I did, I had to leave the bandages in place. My torso was the only part wrapped, I assumed it was to keep pressure on the wound at my back – I never had levelled up First Aid though.

  I tried to sit up again, and while I wasn’t good as new, I could move freely. There was a phantom pain where Koif’s golden dagger had pierced my lungs and heart through my back. My breath caught at the remembered agony.

  Bri caught me by the arm as I stumbled.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said.

  ‘Nothing to be sorry about. If you’re feeling up to it, would you like a tour of Thanis? A lot’s happened since you passed.’

  ‘I dunno,’ I mumbled. ‘I was kind of hoping you and I could spend a bit more time alone in this bedroom.’

  She looked at me menacingly.

  ‘Sorry. I just woke up. I’m not myself.’

  ‘Again, there’s nothing to be sorry about.’ She ushered me forward, leading me by the arm. She was confident, yet not rushing me. ‘And perhaps we could try your idea once you’ve seen all the changes.’

  ‘Cool,’ I said, my brain on autopilot. Wait, she’d said she wanted to be alone in a bedroom with me?!

  ‘Severo!’ Ixly boomed from across the tavern. ‘Good to see you on your feet! Is everything…?’ He looked questioningly at Bri who shook her head. ‘Anyway, I hope I’m not too late?’

  ‘Too late for what?’ I asked. And what were they keeping a secret?

  ‘Right on time, Ixly,’ Bri said, ignoring my question. ‘Why don’t you join us?’

  ‘I’ve cleared my schedule. The orcs won’t like it, but I’ll deal with the negotiating blunder tomorrow.’

  ‘Orcs? What are you negotiating?’

  ‘Story for another time.’ He gently patted my shoulder. ‘Everyone’s been busy since the siege. Let’s go.’ He moved forward to hold the door as Bri and I left the tavern. Standing outside were Ixly’s honour guard who eyed me with extreme suspicion – something that I didn’t expect to ever stop after the whole “getting him killed” thing – and the little wizard Geeko.

  The wizard Geeko gibbered some clicks and slurps while looking at me, so I assumed he was talking to me. I looked questioningly at Ixly.

  Ixly smirked. ‘You don’t want to know.’

  The little Geeko patted the back of my knee, tapped his staff against my shin, and hobbled off.

  ‘Weird guy,’ I said.

  Ixly and Bri agreed. I was pretty sure even the honour guard nodded slightly.

  Thanis was no longer looking like a refugee camp or a war camp – which, now that I thought about it, were basically the same thing. The masses of people weren’t sprawled everywhere waiting for an unwinnable battle. A lot of them had died. In fact, I’d had comp
lete tunnel vision on Koif’s rear attack. Half of his army had still attacked from the front!

  ‘What happened to the front gate?’ I asked Bri.

  ‘Ahh.’ She paused for a moment in thought. ‘It didn’t go brilliantly. As the army leaders were all focused on the Child of Light…’ Because I had called everyone with me instead of being a good general. ‘One of the orcs from the militia led the defence. They are a base and brutal race, but he did manage to hold the wall until Koif was killed. Heavy losses though.’

  Damn it. I shouldn’t have been focusing on myself so much. ‘How many pulled through?’

  ‘There were only… ahh.’ She couldn’t find the words, which worried me, but Ixly spoke up.

  ‘Four.’

  ‘Four?!’ I stumbled and they both tightened their grips to keep me upright. ‘They suffered 98% casualties?’

  ‘A story for another time. The orc, Jakog, would be happy to tell you, I’m sure.’

  ‘He’s a talker,’ Bri confirmed. ‘For one of their kind, at least. Impossible to shut him up from telling you how he lost his arm’

  ‘Eyes above.’

  ‘It’s not all bad, Severo,’ Ixly said. ‘Just look around you.’

  The militia was gone, yes, but Thanis was busy. Foundations were being furiously laid, and through the never-put-up gate I could see more buildings being erected across the travellers’ road. Most of the workers weren’t my cultists or Ixly’s Geeko. And we’d attracted that priestess who healed me.

  ‘How’s the population looking?’

  Ixly laughed. ‘Oh, we are far beyond capacity. That’s what Little Thanis is doing over there.’

  ‘Little Thanis?’

  Bri sighed. ‘It’s ironic.’

  ‘Ironic? How?’

  ‘Let’s just say, high level players love throwing their weight around.’

  Horace joined us, appearing alongside Bri from seemingly nowhere. ‘Not to worry though, master. I transferred the remaining excess militia units to the secondary population. Thanis remains in good health. I took the liberty of ordering a few more buildings to be built. Only the bare minimum, of course, without your guidance.’