Spellcraft

by Andrew Beymer

  Trent hit me with a final glare and shook his head.

  "No trouble at all Mr. Armstrong," he said, reaching up and wiping a trickle of blood from the giant egg on his forehead.

  Though as he walked past he hissed at me. "There's going to be plenty of trouble for you later though. Just you wait asshole.”

  I stared up at him with that impassive stare again. Intimidating Trent wasn't exactly what I was going for. That was simply how I looked at the world since my sister had her fatal brush with Horizon Online Entertainment. At least when I wasn’t playing games with Christine. Or making out with Kara in the game. Only if that look was going to intimidate him then I’d use it.

  "Thanks," Christine muttered.

  "No problem," I said, smiling for the first time since the whole thing had started. "We have to stick together when the assholes try to bully the little guy. You know?"

  "What did you do?" Kara asked, also speaking low enough to hopefully avoid arousing Mr. Armstrong’s ire.

  I turned and shrugged, but I did return her grin.

  "My bag got in his way when Trent tried to punch Christine. I really should’ve watched where I put the thing,” I said. "I guess it was just karma coming to bite him where it counts.”

  Kara rolled her eyes. “And I’m supposed to buy that from the big schemer?”

  “How does she know you’re the big schemer?” Christine asked, sounding even more out to sea. “You know you can’t go revealing huge secrets to every girl you have the hots for.”

  “You can buy it or not,” I said, ignoring Christine’s griping. “I happen to know you have some good techniques for getting information out of people.”

  “What techniques?” Christine asked. “Why the hell are you talking like you know each other?”

  “Because we do,” I said. “You know her too.”

  “I do?”

  Kara made a motion that involved her finger pressing against her neck. It didn’t take Christine long to figure out exactly what she meant by that. She actually started to lunge for Kara, then stopped with a nervous glance to the front where Mr. Armstrong was trying to get an ancient 3D Holoprojector to sputter to life.

  “That was you?” Christine hissed.

  “Turns out there are a lot of people we know lurking around Nilbog,” I said. “Which makes sense if you know how the starter areas are assigned and take available player population on our level into account. Which I totally didn’t last night because I was an idiot avoiding spoilers.”

  “So you’re saying Trent and his asshole buddies are in the game?” Christine asked.

  “And they’re the ones running Horizon Dawn,” I said, glaring daggers into the back of Trent’s skull as I thought about jamming other things into the digital equivalent.

  “Holy shit,” Christine breathed.

  “It’s a lot to take in,” Kara said.

  “Not that. I mean not exactly,” Christine said. “I just never figured you would be the gaming type.”

  Kara must’ve thought there was a challenge in what Christine said. There wasn’t, really. Nothing beyond the surprise Christine felt finding out that Kara was a gamer.

  It was a stereotype. I knew it was a stereotype, and I tried not to fall into the trap of stereotypes where I could avoid it. Christine, clearly, was having a little more trouble with the thought of a pretty popular girl gaming, for all that it shouldn’t have been a surprise since it was either video games or drugs to distract you from the existential dread of the real world on our level.

  “Everyone is a gamer these days,” she said simply in an echo of my thoughts. “I don’t see why it’s such a surprise I game too.”

  “Good point,” Christine muttered. “But did you have to work with those assholes at Horizon? You’re not still with them, are you?”

  “She isn’t,” I said, thinking back to our adventures last night.

  “I’m not,” Kara said. “And I'd like to see you turn down early access if it was offered to you. I thought all the rumors about what Horizon did to those poor gamers were Internet rumors, and it was an opportunity to play Lotus a month before anyone else! I didn’t even know Horizon was involved until Trent let slip that the guy he connected me with to get the money was working for them. That’s how secretive they kept things.”

  “Yeah, I’d have trouble turning that down,” Christine said. “I’d have to burn my account when I found out Horizon was involved, but I wouldn’t turn it down at the get go.”

  “Definitely,” I replied, surprised to realize that I’d probably fall victim the same way Kara had, assuming it’d all gone down the way she said.

  It’d be difficult to turn down a crack at the best gaming experience that’d come along in years. The first revolution in gaming hardware since Pong. Or Super Mario Bros. Or Super Mario 64. Or Mario VR, and I’m talking about the later actual Mario VR and not the red and black Wario game that still made gamers’ eyes bleed to this day when they tried it out in emulators.

  Now that I thought about it I realized this was the first revolutionary shift in gaming technology that didn’t involve an overweight Italian plumber leading the charge.

  Armstrong clapped his hands. With the muscle he was pushing around it sounded like a thunderclap.

  "Okay then," he said. "I know I have all of you for at least today, but the longer that damned game is out the more likely it is everyone starts getting mysteriously sick at the same time, so let's get started on our discussion of the Second Sino-American War. I know germ warfare from bugs that got in the wild a little too soon and mushroom clouds are boring compared to your video games, but try to pay attention.”

  So we settled into learning about all the many wonderful ways entire cities, and later arcologies, could be destroyed by threats both microscopic and atomic, but all I could think about was Kara sitting next to me and what was waiting for me when I logged into Lotus.

  42

  Forged in Stupidity

  “Oh my God! You were serious when you said you were taking forever, weren’t you?” Keia asked as soon as I logged in.

  I’m not gonna lie. I got a case of the warm and fuzzies. There was something about knowing she’d been sitting in the game waiting for me to show up that made me feel pretty good.

  A party invitation appeared. I accepted it with a thought, and a couple of faces appeared in the top right corner of my screen. There was Keia smiling out at me, of course, but more interesting was Kris’s face.

  “The two of you are hanging out together?” I asked, a touch surprised at this development.

  “What the hell else was I supposed to do?” Kris asked. “Besides. Your girlfriend here has been really helpful. Turns out having someone along to heal my ass makes killing shit a hell of a lot easier. Even if her heals are shit right now.”

  I felt like there was a story there, but I figured it was a story that could wait until I got out to wherever they were. The minimap helpfully pointed out the direction to the rest of the party.

  “Did you see any signs of Horizon Dawn.

  “Some,” Keia said. “But we managed to avoid them.”

  “Avoid them?” Kris asked. “You shot one of them right between the eyes! Like one moment she was healing my ass while a wolf was trying to chow down on me, and the next she was whirling around and pulling out her bow and arrow and landing one between this asshole’s eyes before they had a chance to reach us. Talk about badass!”

  I smiled as I made my way through the forest. I was careful not to make too much noise. After all, if there were Horizon Dawn patrols out here then the last thing I wanted was to let them know I was out here too.

  “Sounds like you’re having a good time out here,” I said.

  “You know it,” Kris said.

  “Do you want me to come and get you?” Keia asked. “There might be Horizon Dawn patrols around. Wouldn’t want them to cause you any trouble.”

  I thought about that. On the one hand it would be nice to have an esco
rt. It’d be especially nice to see her in her tight leather sooner.

  Only I really didn’t want to look like a wimp in front of Keia, even if that might put me at risk. Maybe it was a little stupid, but at the same time I had some gems on me that I could use to really ruin someone’s day if they decided to fuck with me.

  “I’ll be fine,” I said.

  “Your funeral,” she said in a tone that said she fully expected to be doing a corpse run with me a little later because I was being all macho. I actually relished the idea of getting some skill points in Spellcraft:Combat. Even if the only attack I had so far was blowing up gems by activating the crafting fail state.

  It was a hell of a starter attack, that was for sure.

  Eventually I reached Kris and Keia. For a surprise she wasn’t in her tight leather. That might’ve been a disappointment, except she wore a casting ensemble that wasn’t much more than a glorified miniskirt down below and one hell of a revealing halter top up above.

  I also didn’t mind when she threw her arms around me and pulled me into one hell of a thorough kiss. A kiss that went on until Kris finally got fed up with the face sucking and cleared her throat.

  “You changed your clothes,” I said.

  Keia blushed. “Yeah, well I figured helping out a lowbie like Kris would be the perfect opportunity for me to work on my healing skills.”

  “And I’m more than happy to have someone healing me who can turn into a badass stealth archer terminatrix if a pull gets hairy,” Kris said.

  “Are the two of you at a stopping point?”

  “Hell no!” Kris said. “We’ve got a good groove going here.”

  “I could use a rest. What did you have in mind?” Keia asked.

  “Well I’ve got all this goblinsteel, and I was thinking it might be useful to check out a forge in town. See if maybe I can do something there that I couldn’t at that forge in the goblin mine. They’ll have a vendor who can sell me the basic stuff that goes with recipes, at least.”

  Keia grinned. “Sounds like a plan.”

  Kris groaned. “We’re doing more of this crafting shit?”

  Keia shot her a glare. “Seriously? If he figures out how to make goblinsteel shit then you’re going to have some of the best gear you can get without paying Horizon Dawn to take you on one of their failed attempts to clear the Goblinsteel Mines. Or buying Horizon items on the Auction House.”

  “Oh I know,” Kris said with a grin as she stretched with her hammer clutched in her hands behind her back. “I have to give him shit though. That’s sort of how things work with us.”

  “You’ll get used to it,” I said. “Or you’ll put an arrow up her ass. Though she might like that a little too much for it to be a true punishment.”

  Kris’s grin froze on her face. She looked like she was about to say something, but Keia interrupted.

  “Come on. I can’t wait to see what you can make us at the forge! Not to mention that’s where I turn in the goblinsteel quest you helped me with yesterday.”

  She reached out and offered her hand. I took it. It was a new experience holding hands like that. Like it was new both in the sense that I’d never been able to do something like this in a game before the Lotus hardware came along and in the sense that I’d never had a girl who wanted to hold hands with me like that, but I’d take it.

  My good mood lasted until we reached the forge which was off the main circle. There waiting for us was none other than the three assholes: Torian, Gregor, and Kravos.

  "Well hello there Keia," Torian said. "Fancy finding you here."

  "Torian," she said, holding her chin high. "What are you doing here?"

  “You were out causing trouble by the mines yesterday,” he said. “I figured you’d eventually come here here to turn in the quest for a goblinsteel weapon."

  "What business is it of yours if I am?" she asked.

  "It's totally my business," Torian snapped. "If you think you can do anything in this town without my permission…"

  “Whoa there Ike Turner," I said.

  To be honest I didn't have much of an idea of who Ike Turner was. Just that the guy’s name seemed to be shorthand for assholes who beat up on their women in old movies from the ‘90s and ‘00s, and I was a fan of watching movies from a time before the arcologies and the world going completely to shit.

  Not to mention it was way easier to get old movies through less than legal means than the new stuff where a media multinational might send somebody to kneecap you if you dared download their shit without paying for it.

  “Oh look,” Torian said, his voice dripping with sarcasm and disdain. “The lowbie has decided to grace us with his presence. How wonderful. You didn’t learn your lesson earlier?”

  “What, that you cry like a little bitch when a teacher comes along?” I shot back at him.

  “You watch your mouth when you’re talking to him,” Gregor said, flashing his daggers.

  "So nice to see you too," I said. “How’re you recovering after your difficulties out at the mines?”

  Gregor moved as though he was going to attack me, but Torian held a plate gauntleted hand out and stopped the leather-clad prick before he could take more than a step.

  Torian's mouth turned down. "You might think you're clever killing my people like that and stealing their gear, I’ll be wanting our gear back by the way, but I'm not afraid of whatever it was you did. You can’t pull that AoE magic bullshit here in town. Not if you ever want to be able to set foot in here again.”

  "I'm sorry," I said. "But I’m a little fuzzy on a few things. Are you saying I can't set foot in this place because I'd have to worry about the goblins getting mad at me, or I can't set foot in this place because your guys would keep me out? Because if it's the former with the goblins I’ll have to be careful, and if it's the latter… Well I’m standing here despite your best efforts, right?"

  "You'd better watch yourself," Torian said. "Or else."

  "Would you stop with the macho bullshit and let me complete my quest?” Keia asked.

  “Poor Keia,” Torian said. "Trying to complete the goblinsteel quest line. You must really want that goblinsteel bow and arrow if you're risking making me angry."

  I frowned, but didn't say anything. I didn't know enough about the design of bows and arrows to tell whether or not a bow made out of some sort of steel would be practical or ridiculous. Not to mention this was a game, and sometimes practicality and real-world considerations didn't matter if something was sufficiently cool.

  "Get out of the way and let us get on with our business,” Keia said. “We don’t want any trouble here."

  I figured she could speak for herself. She might not want to start any trouble, but I was feeling the urge to start some. Our treatment here coupled with what Trent pulled in class earlier had me itching for revenge.

  I didn’t say anything like that to Keia though. She was taking point, and I wasn’t going to go against her if she wanted to play nice.

  At least not right at this moment. We were surrounded, after all, if the number of heavily armed players in Horizon Dawn tabards stepping out of the crowd were anything to go by.

  “You already caused plenty of trouble when you decided to kill members of Horizon Dawn out there in Horizon Dawn territory,” Torian said. “When you decided to steal Horizon Dawn property off of Horizon Dawn members!”

  "That's not your territory," Keia said, some heat coming to her voice.

  "Oh but it is," Torian said, though he didn’t seem to notice the angry looks he was getting from the armed goblins that’d also appeared out of the crowd as he casually claimed their territory as his own. "It belongs to us, and I won't suffer asshole noobs coming in and trying to take over my territory. There will be consequences!"

  I snorted. "Consequences? Like all your asshole friends getting blown to little bits? I really enjoyed taking all their weapons, too!"

  "That is stolen property and you will return it," Torian hissed. "How dare you sully
Horizon Syndicate gear with your filthy noob hands!"

  "Sully?" I said. “Anyone with enough money can buy that crap. You don’t get to act like something is super exclusive when it’s being sold to anyone with a few coins rubbing together in their inventory. The way you're sucking corporate cock is pathetic."

  "I'll show you sucking corporate cock!" Torian said.

  My eyebrows shot up. "Really? Like you're going to show me your technique? Because I'm flattered, but that's not really my thing. More power to you if it's yours. I don't judge."

  "You son of a bitch!" Torian shouted.

  He stepped forward, pulling a sword out to bring it down on me. I guess the forbearance he expected from his lackeys didn’t extend to him when he got good and pissed off. Which jived with everything I knew about Trent from the real world. It was almost too easy to manipulate him into doing something stupid.

  Though in this case I was taking a hell of a gamble. I was inches away from being well and truly fucked when a blade appeared between me and certain death.

  I blinked a couple of times as I looked at Torian’s blade mere inches from my face. It’d been stopped by a much smaller blade. A blade that seemed like it shouldn't be large enough to stop Torian’s, but then again it’s not like it would be the first time the rule of cool trumped practicality in a video game.

  I breathed a small sigh of relief. The armed goblins had stepped in. I’d been hoping they’d do that considering the reputation I’d gained with them, but it was a gamble.

  And boy was I glad rule of cool had allowed that small blade to stop Torian’s sword. Otherwise I would’ve been back at my spawn point and all the stuff in my inventory would probably be picked up by Torian who I imagined would be more than happy to get a bit of corpse robbing revenge.

  I was going to have to start being a hell of a lot more careful about what I carried on me when I was in dangerous territory. Unfortunately, considering my rocky relationship with Horizon Dawn, any territory was going to be dangerous territory for the foreseeable future.

  I looked down to see who was attached to that small sword and saw a rank insignia that said this wasn't just any guard. No, this guard looked like he had some authority.