“Alright.” Rowan massaged his neck, stretched his back and arms. “Now, Liluth. Is there anything—”
“I’ll take care of her,” Gabrielle interrupted. “Go check on the others. Shoo. Shoo. Ya too, Zaine—go mine some stone for your shrine.”
No more words, Zaine hurried off. He mumbled a sentence to Liluth along the way, who then abruptly stood. She said hoarsely, “Lord LeMort, my mate’s body will spoil soon. I cannot bear to watch.” Her tears returned full force. She ran out the door, into the forest.
How dramatic.
Rowan was about to yank her slave thread when Gabrielle’s head shook. “Leave her be. She’s got nowhere to run.”
“I guess,” he yawned. He didn’t mind either way, and he was not the best at condoling someone’s grief. Though he did understand her pain. He could imagine how he would feel if he lost Gabrielle—not an enjoyable thought.
“Row,” Gabrielle said glumly.
“Yeah?”
“We gotta hurry.”
“Yeah, I know. That spider nest is growing. More trolls will be coming.”
“Not just that. A guy on the forums slipped that there’s gonna be a raid on us in a few days.”
“Holy shit. Are you serious?”
“Nope, I’m joking,” she said sarcastically.
“Then let’s get our classes and get back to work. We’ll wall off the mountain pass next.”
“Kay,” she chirped.
Outside the workshop, Ayla was leaning against the wall, waiting. The afternoon sun made her fiery hair glow. “I love your eyes. They are dazzling.” Her voice was slicker than a snake’s.
Rowan met her gaze. “Alright, what do you want for those Swordsmen and Demonology Tomes?”
His directness did not phase her. “How about a kiss, Rowan?”
A cough tore up his throat. “Huh?”
Gabrielle had flinched violently. She hissed, “Come again?”
A haughty smirk dimpled those freckled cheeks. “I’m just kidding. You should’ve seen your face, Gab.”
“Dun make me slap ya.” Gabrielle’s hand twitched.
That thin fiery eyebrow arched. “You do realize this is being recorded.”
Rowan said, “Violence is part of the game.”
“Oh, I must’ve forgotten. This VR tech is something else, you know? I love it. I wish I could afford to book extended immersion.”
Ah, there it was. She didn’t want a kiss. She wanted money. Rowan straightened his linen garb, unrolling the sleeves. “I thought you were an attorney.”
Gabrielle pointed with her pinky finger. “Did ya lie to Tasha?”
“Assistant attorney,” Ayla said. “Junior assistant attorney. I’m little more than a secretary. And the job security is pretty poor. You know with all these AI advancement, I might be made redundant any day.”
A sound story. Rowan could not detect any fibs, but he knew to never fully trust a lawyer. They were masters of facades and emotion. “We can’t afford it. We’re saving for a house. Have you talked to Tasha?”
“I don’t have anything she wants.”
Of course, Tasha wasn’t going to spend hundreds to thousands of credits on another booking; Gabrielle already owed her quite a bit. “Do ya want anything else?” she asked.
“How about a split of your MyTube revenue? How much do you make?”
“Nope. Not sharing that.”
“What’s your channel.”
“Haven’t posted anything on Sortis yet.”
Surprise flashed. “Seriously? It’s been like a week.”
Rowan gave her a dumb look. “Did you forget we’re wanted?”
“Only with the Humans.” She touched her hip.
“And the Trolls.”
Gabrielle added, “The Orcs don’t like us either.”
“What happened with the Orcs?”
“Tried to eat us. We escaped.”
Confusion etched wrinkles into Ayla’s beauty. “How did you get up here?” Her tone was accusing.
Rowan saw no reason to lie. “Nargol, one of their chiefs, tasted my blood. He freaked out and ported us up here.”
“Ported you? I didn’t know there was a portal skill. What class was he?”
When Rowan could not recall, Gabrielle answered, “Something advanced. The popup window didn’t say.”
Leaf-green eyes shifted from Demon one to Demon two back and forth. “Okay, I’ll believe that for now, but I want to see a recording.”
“Kay,” Gabrielle chirped. “PM’d ya our channel.”
“Remember to subscribe,” Rowan added.
Ayla gazed into the distance for a dozen seconds. The bags under her eyes made the expression zombie-like. “Wow. Fifteen thousand subs, though your recent videos haven’t done well.”
Gabrielle shrugged. “We’ve been busy with uni. What’s your channel?”
“House Ayla. Two words.”
Rowan didn’t bother checking it out. He cleared his throat. “Ayla. If you don’t hand over those tomes, this settlement won’t survive. You know you’re stuck here until we get a portal building up, so why not cooperate?”
She frowned. “What’s the rush?”
“Big things are coming.”
“What’s coming? More Trolls?”
“Probably.”
“More than probably,” Gabrielle added.
Behind Ayla, Tasha was approaching. She said groggily, “It’s okay, you two. I didn’t want to be included anyway.”
Gabrielle’s eyes refocused and skipped leftward. “Hehe. It’s not like that. We just didn’t wanna wake ya.”
“Oh, I know.”
“Awww. It’s not like that. We’re sorry.”
Having to communicate and negotiate everything was painful. Why did Tasha have to pick up a random stray? Rowan pulled apart his scowl, but it would rip off his brow. “Hand over those tomes, Ayla. What do you want from us apart from credits? In-game.”
Ayla had matched his scowl. “The usual. A share of the loot, a section of land, access to crafting resources. Content for my channel.”
Suspicion took root. Rowan said calmly, “Why us? You have a pretty face. I’m sure there are big guilds full of top streamers willing to take you in.”
Gabrielle quipped, “Yup. We’ve fallen behind heaps too.”
Ayla’s chin lifted to the challenge. “But you have slaves. I don’t think anyone else has managed that yet. I wanted to have some NPCs as my personal work force, like slaves, but Light’s Justice wasn’t having any of that. Neither was the Royal Guard. I can look after yours while you’re offline or in dungeons or whatever.”
Good reasons, but were they good enough? The risks were not insignificant. Rowan said, “I can allow you sub-control if you also submit to us.”
“Submit?”
Did he have to spell everything out? “You’ll be a slave like the cousins.”
Her rebuttal was long-prepared: “Why not a guild? Or a faction?” A faction was basically an upgraded guild. An advanced guild.
Gabrielle said, “Factions aren’t as controlly. I want full security!”
Rowan nodded. “The slave brands guarantees there won’t be trouble. And we barely know you. That’s not even mentioning your Fate.”
Tasha said, “She’s been alright to me… but I get your point.”
Ayla’s eyes rolled. “Thank you so much for the vouch.”
“Just being truthful.”
Rowan’s jaw shifted. His forked tongue wiped his lips. “Final offer. If you want to stay, you’re getting a brand eventually.” He presented his rune-etched palm, beckoning for those tomes.
“Seriously? After everything I’ve done for you lot?” Ayla’s composure was tested.
Gabrielle’s tongue clicked. “Ya’ve done a lot for Tasha, not us.”
Tasha whistled a short note. “That’s true.”
Rowan grunted in agreement, beckoning again. “Tomes, please.”
Ayla held a stare for a doze
n heartbeats. “We’ll talk about this later.” Her lips pinched tight as her hand dipped into that magical pouch at her hip, her secure inventory. She pulled out a stack of three surprisingly thin volumes. They were notebooks.
Class Tome: Swordsman (2)
Requires character level 10
She placed them on Rowan’s hand, maintaining eye contact, and did not reach into her pouch again. “I’ll hold onto the Demonology tome for now—as insurance. And anyway, you need to be level twenty, and level fifteen Enchanter.”
The leather covers were warm and torn at the edges. “Weren’t there four?” Rowan handed one to Gabrielle.
“We traded one for a Builder Tome, gave the other to Zaine.”
“Ah, that’s probably why he was in such a good mood.”
“Ye, he was quite a little punk.”
Gabrielle hugged Ayla. “Yippie! Thank you! Welcome to the family.”
Rowan muttered, “Hopefully Zaine behaves now.”
“Hopefully.” Ayla yawned. “Seeya later.” She suddenly disappeared in a wink of gold light, taking the Demonology tome with her into the nether.
Rowan was not concerned. He pried open his tome, its spine stiff. A skimming flip-through revealed pages upon pages of lore detailing the life of the first Swordsman. Fairly interesting, and by that, he did not find paragraphs upon paragraphs of drivel interesting by any exaggeration of the word. When he flipped to the last page, not even reading at this point, invisible runes lit up with white mana.
A prompt appeared with a gong.
Would you like to become a Swordsman?
Yes.
The old stained pages glowed white, the ink unreadable in the light. Magic drained from the pages, flowed into his fingers, up his arms and neck, into his head.
Knowledge appeared in his mind, the sensation indescribable. Techniques on how to handle a sword, different types of swords, and how to care for a sword, and typical tactics for playing as a Swordsman, were written into his head. On top of everything, words in the mystical language and their meanings made themselves clear—skill names.
Incredible. Simply incredible.
Multiple windows expanded as something in the distance flashed white, rumbling.
Congratulations, you are now a Swordsman!
Easy to learn, but difficult to master, your future is riddled with hardship as a melee to short-range damage dealer. Active skills for this class are gained in a linear fashion every five levels starting at ten until thirty. Passive skills are gained at levels twenty and thirty.
New skill: Crescent Slash
Your next slash will unleash a crescent of typeless destructive mana.
Restriction: long-bladed melee weapon
Range: 6 yards
Damage: 120% weapon damage + 20% Agility
Cooldown: 15 seconds
Mana Drain: low
New Skill: Twinpoint Thrust
Restriction: pointed melee weapon
Your next stab will unleash a needle of typeless destructive mana.
Combo: Within two seconds of Crescent Slash, Twinpoint Thrust unleashes two needles instead of one.
Range: 9 yards
Damage: 90% weapon damage + 5% Agility per needle
Cooldown: 20 seconds
Mana Drain: low
At last, some skills. On day eleven!
This Fate had been a gargantuan setback. Eons. But these slaves and Demon powers were more than worth it. He was satisfied with the game experience—five out of five stars!
Rowan slipped his new notebook into his pocket.
Oh, and he missed a forth smaller window hanging toward the right.
Synergy Detected: Hellfire
Instead of typeless mana, you may choose to unleash fire-type mana.
And a fifth.
Synergy Detected: Demon Race
There was no description other than that. A bug? He dismissed every window. “Did you get a syner—”
“Demon Race? Empty Description?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you think it’s a—”
Something thin tapped his elbow. Another leather tome.
She said, “Forgot to give it to ya from Tasha. And there’s a pouch in your room waiting for ya.”
He glanced at a pouch magically attached to her waist. It was the size of a swollen grapefruit, its opening just wide enough for one of her hands.
“Hmm? Take the tome. Ya don’t want it?”
“I do,” he said, focusing on the polished leather.
Profession Tome: Enchanter
Requires character level 5
“Takey takey…”
He was reluctant to say, “You sure? I thought you wanted to be one, and I’ll have to take Demonology.”
She smiled coyly. “Come on. Just take it! I know ya wanna.”
“Well, if you insist.” He accepted and embraced her with a tight hug for two warm heartbeats. “What are you taking instead? What else did Tasha buy?”
“Cooking, obviously. I’m gonna do something special with with it!” she sang. “And she just got the profession tomes and food supplies. Expensive stuff.”
“What will you do with it?”
“A surprise.”
“Then it better be good.”
“It will. Hehehe.” She zipped her lips shut, then skipped off toward the Workshop.
Chuckling, he let her be and started flipping through the tome. His eyes stumbled on an intriguing cautionary tale of how ancient Lunar Elves discovered the means of harnessing malleable magic latent in runestone. They had lost many to explosions and unpredicted reactions. This was not a profession for the careless. This was an unintuitive, frustrating puzzle minigame.
It was not surprising that Gabrielle left it to him.
41
Viola scarfed down the rest of her home-made strawberry bun, then wiped her lips and hands with alcohol tissues pulled from a dispenser on the wall in this tiny air-conditioned room lacking windows. Claustrophobia creeped up her back and quickened her pulse.
The VR pod’s gel linings welcomed her clumsy shuffle. She glanced at Skylar’s at-peace face across the room, and pressed a tactile clicky button on to glass lid as it closed on her. Tingles brushed up and down her body.
This was it, again.
Darkness seeped in from the corners of the ceiling. Her head swam, and in a trice she was at ease. Confidence she didn’t know she could muster flowered from within.
Bold letters faded in.
You have died. Respawning at your entry location in 29 seconds…
28
27
26
Eagerness squeezed her invisible toes. A ninety minute death timer at level fifteen! What sort of game was this? She would say the balance of things was utterly laughable if it weren’t so novel. So breath-taking. Playing as a slave destined for greatness—it brought her a certain rush of intoxication.
Rowan. The Demon guy. Her roleplaying master. He was much nicer than the Trolls, though not at first. Viola suspected Gab had something to do with it, convinced him to not whip his slaves. Or do anything else questionable. Good on her. This was not that type of game! He was not that type of scummy husband.
The timer blinked to zero.
Solid ground pressed up against the bottoms of her feet. Her sandaled feet, sandals that Liluth had crafted.
Then that nasty smell of Troll poop violated her sinuses. Horrible. She was back in the slave pens.
And it was crowded in here. At least a dozen Sun Elf slaves stood like statues among the soiled beds, and there were not enough beds. And a few Lunar Elves too. One was a child.
Two children. A Sun Elf girl was sitting on the muddy floor, her face blank, but her eyes were alert and focused on Viola. That slave brand was glowing.
Then it smacked the back of Viola’s head. She had no master, but the slave brand remained.
She was free.
Wait, no. The magical link connecting her to Rowan was there… but sev
ered. It pointed somewhere to the right. She could not pull at it and resist… because at this distance he could exert no control. She was, technically, free.
And that particularly hideous Troll Knight, picking its nose, acting as a spear-holding guard, had not noticed her respawn. So, so stupid.
But as for all these Elves…
Nothing could be done. She was but a single level fifteen Archer, and her Crude Longbow wasn’t here, which was actually good thing. Very fortunate.
Trying to not look at their dead eyes, Viola began walking mechanically, her face cleaned of emotion. Her acting wasn’t award-winning, no, but that Troll bought it nevertheless when he glanced at her. Vertigo squeezed her belly, her heart racing.
So many Elves. What for? Another settlement? These pens had been empty on day one.
She made it through the doors. The Troll even held it open, a gentleman for once, rare for them. A tiny smile took control of her cheeks for a second and two.
The stench out here was incredibly worse. Lumps of brown dotted near the opposite building. She swallowed a gag reflex and turned… leftward. Her memory couldn’t be failing at nineteen, twenty soon. She wasn’t a kid anymore. Her master, her lord, wasn’t here to protect her—after failing to protect her.
Slight vexation rolled her tongue. She kept walking past whatever this block of rooms was. The Trolls had a vulgar sense of architecture, like slums. There was no rhyme or reason to these shack-like buildings. At least they got the right-angles correct, more or less.
She passed Trolls, some on the road, others through open windows. They shot her disgust and menace, and she made damned well sure to not sneer back. A Troll kid threw a fish bone at her hair, testing her control beyond anything else. She didn’t dare pick the bone hanging from her bangs until no Trolls were in sight.
Unfortunately, Trolls were everywhere. Literally everywhere like a bug infestation.
She couldn’t take seven steps without bumping arms or overhearing a mundane conversations about what’s for dinner or the might of the Troll King’s Elite Guard crushing the latest Sun Elf camp. And they sure loved fish and mushrooms. Admittedly, their food at that now-destroyed settlement wasn’t bad.
When Viola was two hundred yards from the northern gate, a conversation at the Town Square grabbed hold of her ears. Multiple slaves, constructing the base of something out of stone, stood among Trolls in nicer equipment. Sunlight glared on the leader’s mithril plate armor.
Demonborn's Fjord Page 34
