by Edward Brody
She was in Eden’s Gate somewhere—at least according to the Old One whom I’d met in the Eternal Ravine. I needed to find her. I needed to get back out in the wild and start questioning people, and better yet, I needed to get back to fighting in the Arena. It was still the only real lead on how I’d ever find her in the world. Otherwise, I would be mostly wandering around hoping for a miracle.
But how would I ever get back to fighting in the Arena with enemies knocking at our doorstep every day?
I needed to protect Edgewood. I needed to protect Unity. The Scourge... the goblins… they just kept coming. Our homes were burning. Everything was falling apart in front of my eyes.
And what was the state of Highcastle? I hadn’t been out of Edgewood since the attacks, so for all I knew, it was overrun. Maybe the Scourge had taken it. Was Highcastle even one of their targets?
And Dryden… fucking Dryden Bloodletter. How could I forget about him? Dragons were coming… the Ancients! I needed to protect everyone. I needed to—!
“Gunnar!”
I felt a firm slap on the side of my face, jerked hard, and sunlight stung my pupils as my eyelids slowly crept open. I licked my lips and groaned as my vision began to clear.
“You okay, man?” Ozzy asked. “You looked like you were having a bad dream.”
I groaned a little and groggily sat up in my bed. “Yeah, I’m alright.”
I looked up to the ceiling and could tell that it was late morning, maybe afternoon, by the light shining through a hole in the roof that had formed from one of the Scourge’s flaming arrows. The smell of scorched wood still hung heavy in the air.
“How long have I been sleeping?” I asked.
“Quite a while…”
“You were supposed to wake me at sunrise.”
“Things have calmed a bit. No more waves of Scourge except for a few stragglers, and the guards are handling them all pretty well. Figured it was best to let you have a few extra hours of sleep.”
I yawned and pulled myself out of the bed. “Well, that’s good news. I should get up and do a survey.”
Ozzy raised an eyebrow and sucked air between his teeth.
“What is it?” I asked.
Ozzy tilted his head to the side and shrugged before moving towards my door and pushing it open. “Nothing. Just there isn’t much to survey, is all.”
I had slept with my dirtied robe and all of my equipment in case I needed to get up and fight right away, so I didn’t require any preparation to step outside. I walked through the door, leaving all of my other belongings, which thankfully had managed to survive during the last few days of attacks.
The dead bodies had been cleared from in and around the village and moved somewhere deeper into the forest and out of the way. Weapons, armor and other loot were stacked in a huge pile beside our guild shop.
Jax, Rina, and Sung were outside picking up broken arrows and other litter, and a quick scan of the area showed our elven guards strategically placed around the village, on the lookout for any sign of attack.
Even with most of the large debris from our destroyed buildings cleaned up, things didn’t look much better. One side of our guild shop was blackened from a fire, and the only good thing about the damage to my and Aaron’s houses was the possibility of repair. Everything around us was blackened and destroyed. Even portions of the forest that weren’t ruined had been strewn with ash that had drifted from the fires.
“When was the last wave?” I asked Ozzy.
“Several hours ago. Like I said, just stragglers.”
“Well then maybe this is a good chance for me to get out of here and gather intel,” I said.
“Jax is already scouting the area, looking for any sign of Scourge,” Ozzy said.
“I don’t mean scouting around here. I can recall to the Mage’s Hall in Highcastle to get a better look at what’s going on there and in the Freelands. I’m sure Darion or someone else in the Mages Guild can give me some information also.” I groaned. “If Highcastle is still intact, that is...”
Ozzy nodded. “I’m sure it is. I should probably check in with the Fighters Guild myself. I just wish I could recall there like you.”
“I’d prefer if you stay here,” I said, “at least until I get back. We can’t afford to have too many of us missing when we have no idea what the situation is out there. There’s still a chance another horde could show up at any time.”
“Fair enough,” Ozzy said. “Unity is my main priority.”
I threw Ozzy a fist bump and smirked as I scanned over the wreckage again. “This reminds me a bit of a game I played back on Earth.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah…” I said as gaming memories flooded back to me. “It was a survival game. You started out with virtually nothing and worked your way up, crafting and getting stronger, but also building a house and then a base or a compound. It was pretty satisfying, except the moment you logged out, your base would be undefended, except for whatever NPCs you left behind. A satisfying game quickly becomes unsatisfying when you’re raided while logged out and lose months and months of progress.”
“Or super satisfying if you’re the one doing the raiding,” Ozzy countered.
“Can’t disagree with that,” I said with a nod. “Too bad we’re the ones getting raided.”
Ozzy smiled. “Yeah, and we can’t logout here, so maybe it’s not as much of a gut punch.”
“But we can’t really leave the village unattended either.” I leaned down and picked up a flake of charred wood. “Every structure is vulnerable.”
Ozzy turned towards our castle wall. “Well, when we get that thing up, it’ll be a whole lot harder to burn things down.”
I pressed my lips together hard and looked towards the Freelands. “I’m not even sure if it’s safe here anymore. We’re basically exposed with so much forest burned down.”
“You might be right. Are you suggesting we leave?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know. But while we have the chance, let’s get the guild together. We haven’t had a meeting since the encounter with the Dark Hand, and there’s a lot to discuss.” I scanned the surroundings again and didn’t see some of the guild mates. “Where’s Jeremy, Aaron and Keysia?”
“Jeremy and Aaron are still sleeping, and Keysia left to check on the other dark elves quite a while ago.”
I sighed. “Alright, well, let’s not disturb them. Everyone needs to catch up on rest, and I’ll just stick around today. We can plan the meeting for tonight when Keysia returns. If things don’t get crazy by day’s end, I’ll head out tomorrow.”
“Sounds good, brotha’,” Ozzy said. “I’m going to head back to my tent and relax a while myself.”
I sighed. “You guys are alright in tents, right? I know it sucks, but—”
“It’s fine,” Ozzy said. “Not nearly as comfortable as before, but we’ll get things back to normal when this is all over.”
“Yeah…” I groaned.
Ozzy threw me one last fist bump, turned, and walked away.
The sound of a crackling tree caught my attention, and it grew louder as I turned towards its direction. The tree in question was severely burned and began to sway as the damaged trunk struggled to handle the load. The tree tilted sideways, and finally snapped, causing one of our High Elf guards to run for cover to avoid getting squashed.
Boom! the tree thundered as it slammed into the ground, throwing up a thick cloud of ash and debris.
I took a deep breath and exhaled. Would things ever be back to normal? I wondered. The possibility that we were going to have to leave Edgewood suddenly seemed very, very real.
Chapter Four
2/17/0001
The guild, minus Keysia, sat in a half circle around our newly-built campfire, burning very low, as to not attract any unwanted attention from the Scourge. I stood near the center of them with my arms crossed.
Aaron stretched his arms out as if he were ready to go back to sleep, and Jeremy let o
ut a tired yawn. Everyone else sat at full attention for the commencement of our meeting.
“There’s a lot to talk about, but first off,” I began and slowly nodded my head, “you guys did great. Unbelievable job. I haven’t had the chance to thank you all.”
Aaron chuckled. “I wouldn’t say we did great. Half our shit is destroyed.”
“Not regarding the Scourge,” I said. “But because of everyone’s help, Adeelee is alive and back where she belongs. I seriously couldn’t ask for a better team.”
“Oh yeah, that… of course,” Aaron said, rolling his eyes. “The one thing I wasn’t involved in was unbelievably great.”
“The Princess is alive, and thank the gods for that,” Jax said, “but the Dark Hand has Tymrial’s blade now. One wrong made right but another wrong born in the process.”
“Yeah…” I muttered and lowered my chin to the ground a bit. Everything had been moving so fast that I hadn’t even had time to sit down and think of the repercussions of the Dark Hand having an ancient weapon. I knew it wasn’t a good thing in the long term, but another part of me wondered if it was really so bad. After all, the Dark Hand was the enemy of Dryden, and the Dryden I knew was nothing but pure evil.
Gerard shook his head. “I’m still confused as to what’s going on, to be honest. We marched to that shore to help you with the Magi. How the hell did the Sparrows get involved? And how is the Scourge connected to all of this, if at all?”
“Yeah, Gunnar,” Jeremy said as he yawned again and lifted his arms high and wide. “What the hell is going on? We’ve been fighting for days without really knowing what’s what. First it was supposed to be returning the sword to the Magi, and then it turned into that Dark Hand guy, and now all of a sudden, it’s goblins on goblins on goblins… I’m tired of fuckin’ goblins!” He shifted his head from side to side, looking at everyone. “I mean, I’m not fuckin’ goblins, but you know. I’m tired of the fuckin’ goblins.”
Aaron pointed his index finger straight up. “That’s one thing I wouldn’t fuck. They smell like shit and the females have flabby-ass tits.”
“Sorry I haven’t had time to explain everything to everyone,” I said. “Bear with me. We’ve been pretty busy since we got back.”
“Well, we’re all free now,” Jeremy said.
I took a deep breath and started pacing. “For those of you who haven’t figured it out already, the whole thing was a setup… sort of.”
“Sort of?” Sung asked.
“It turns out that the men who had attacked us were never Magi to begin with. They were Sparrows posing as Magi. The Dark Hand was pretending to be some sort of Magi leader as a ruse. Their plan was to lure me into getting another ancient weapon.” I gritted my teeth and sighed. “And it worked... They saw an opportunity and used Adeelee as bait.” I shook my head. “I mean, I had no choice… There’s no way I would’ve left her captive.”
“Wait,” Jax said, shaking his head. “I don’t understand. Why would they target you specifically to bring them an ancient weapon? What’s so special about you? Do they know you’re a Reborn?”
“No, but the Dark Hand knows we stole the Fellblade, or rather he thinks I stole it alone. He assumed that if I could take his weapon from his hideout without getting caught, it would be easy enough for me to get him another one from somewhere else.”
Jax’s eyes widened, and he scooted forward as if he were about to stand up. “He knows we stole the Fellblade?! How?! What else does he know?”
“I don’t think he knows as much as he makes it seem, but…” I lowered my eyes, pushed a knuckle up to my chin and sighed. After a moment of pause, I turned to Rina and kneeled in front of her. “Rina…” I swallowed hard. “Your friend… Maleena… she’s… she’s gone.”
“Gone?” Rina’s eyes went wide. “What do you mean ‘gone’? Gone where?”
I sighed. “She was killed.”
Rina slumped. “Maleena was killed? What? How? She got away from Dryden with her husband, far from here, far from the Endless Sands.”
I nodded somberly as I considered the best possible explanation.
Rina shook her head in disbelief. “How? Why do you think she’s dead? I don’t understand.”
I turned back towards the others and continued the tale. “For those of you who don’t know the whole story, a man by the name of Satorin tricked me into teleporting to the Sands. He was an agent of Dryden’s but later betrayed him to work for the Dark Hand. Satorin assumed, incorrectly, that I stole the Fellblade alone when he saw me fleeing Knuckle Bay.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Aaron said rudely, not taking the conversation as seriously as he should’ve. “And then you saw a baby dragon and escaped the Sands with two chic-a-doos, blah blah blah. We’ve heard it all before...”
I frowned at him. “Okay, well after I helped him and his wife, they went to rebuild their lives somewhere away from the madness. Stonefort, if I remember correctly…. But according to the Dark Hand, a couple of his agents happened to be passing through and recognized him. A case of bad luck, I guess.”
“Damnit to hell,” Jax cursed. “So that’s how…”
I nodded. “They captured Satorin and his wife, brought them to the Dark Hand, and extracted information from them—specifically the idea that I alone stole the Fellblade. I don’t think Satorin knew that Adeelee or you were involved, but he knew enough to lead the Sparrows to me… Who knows how long they’ve been tracking me, waiting for the right opportunity?” I turned back towards Rina. “When I was on the ship, the fake Magi leader brought Satorin and Maleena in front of me and revealed his true identity. He killed them both in front of my eyes.”
Rina lowered her head and started to sob. “She was such a good girl. She didn’t deserve that. Not after all she went through with Dryden.”
“I’m so sorry,” I muttered. “I wish I could’ve done something more.”
Rina wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and looked up at me with confusion in her eyes. “I was right outside of the boat. Why didn’t you fetch me? I could have resurrected her.”
“You saw what happened to the boat, right? Some kind of blasting powder exploded in the same room where they were killed. Their bodies must have been blown to…” I shook my head and groaned. I had to say what probably happened to them. “And then everything went up in flames… I don’t think there was any chance we could’ve gotten back on the boat or saved them.”
Rina squeezed her eyelids tight and nodded in understanding, but she couldn’t control the tears pouring from the corners of her eyes. It hurt to see her in pain, and it made me question if I’d made the right choice. Should I have listened to Satorin and lit the barrels filled with blasting powder like he told me to? Had there been another way?
“So, the Dark Hand was in the same room as the explosion?” Jeremy asked. “How’d he survive?”
I shook my head. “I’m not sure. He’s strong, but I’m sure you already know that after watching him battle King Ryvvik.”
Jax snorted. “Oh, he’s strong alright. The Sparrows wouldn’t follow him if he wasn’t, and he sure has a lot of resources behind him. Whether it was his gear or some trait or ability he has, I’m not surprised he survived.”
Sung pursed his lips and leaned back a little. He shifted his eyes as if calculating something in his head. “So, help me understand this,” he urged. “You had Tymrial’s Blade—an ancient weapon—in your possession and just handed it over to him. Why didn’t you just abandon the quest, use the blade to kill the Dark Hand, and save everyone? You do realize the obvious path isn’t always the best course of action in Eden’s Gate, right?”
“Of course, I know that. And it’s a nice thought, but I didn’t meet the stat requirements of Tymrial’s Blade. There’s no way I could’ve wielded it effectively. I’d likely have disemboweled myself or gotten us all killed if I had tried.”
“Damn…” Sung muttered, slumping his shoulders. He looked down and darted his eyes around as if he was
n’t used to being wrong and had no idea how to respond.
“But that’s a good thing, right?” Aaron asked. He paused and pursed his lips, realizing his words didn’t match the mood of the conversation. “I mean… not that your friends died, but that the Dark Hand has Tymrial’s Blade.”
“How the hell would that be good?” Jax hissed.
“Well, you guys stole the Fellblade because you thought the Dark Hand wanted to kill the King. But, the Dark Hand actually wanted the Fellblade to protect himself against Dryden, who has his eyes on the throne of Highcastle. So, since the Dark Hand stands a better chance against Dryden with an ancient weapon, doesn’t that help in the long run? Let the two of them duke it out until one kills the other… It’ll be one less asshole to deal with.”
“Yeah, that’s logical,” Ozzy agreed. “We’ll have less to worry about if they kill each other.”
“I’ve had similar thoughts,” I said. “We need to wrap our heads around the logistics of that, though…”
Jax stood to his feet and shook his head. “I won’t let the Dark Hand take the throne of Highcastle regardless of Dryden!” He turned to me. “You promised me that we would kill the Dark Hand when the time comes. If that promise no longer stands, then I’ll leave the guild now, so that I can figure out a way to take matters into my own hands.”
I held up my palm towards Jax. “Calm down, man. The promise still stands. Don’t worry.”
Jax gritted his teeth as he slowly sat back down. Rina grabbed his arm to comfort him.
“But Aaron does have a point,” I added. “In our current state, we have no chance against Dryden and his dragon. If either Dryden or the Dark Hand kills the other, things get easier.” I shook my head, not wanting to come across as fully agreeing with Aaron’s calculation and dismissing Jax’s demands. “Whatever the case, we still have time so long as the King of Highcastle is still alive. And nothing matters if we don’t survive up until that time comes. What matters most now is the Scourge.”
“So, what do we do about them?” Sung asked. “What’s the plan?”
