NPC ReEvolution

by Rae Nantes

  I looked at the others in the room. "I trust this will work?"

  They nodded. "It's the best we have so far," an officer said. She patted me at the shoulder. "Leave the tactical plans to us and get some rest."

  "Thanks." I joined Simone at the doorway and into the long hallway. It was dark - lit only by the moonlight pouring in from the windows. "Well, what did you find out?"

  "You're not gonna be happy," she said.

  "Out with it."

  She looked off to the side, fidgeting with uncertainty. My patience was crumbling, and when she noticed, she let it out. "Okay, Smith is enslaving nipsies."

  "I'm gonna cut his balls off."

  "He's forcing them into his armies, using them to pad out the lines, as they say."

  "So cannon fodder," I said. I wanted to rage in anger and flip over a desk, but part of me had already expected this. With how tense I already was, the looming threat of losing everything and losing everything to them, I felt I couldn't be much angrier. "How is he even able to enslave that many people?"

  She shrugged. "I dunno. By force, coercion, threats? How did people do it in history? What matters is that it's being done." She dropped her gaze to the floor. "I'm sorry. Maybe I should've tried harder to convince him back then."

  "But he convinced you."

  "I'm sorry," she said.

  We stood in silence. A nearby tree limb brushed against the glass with the outside breeze.

  "Back then," she continued, "I never even considered it. It's not that I didn't think you were real, or that I didn't take you seriously, it's just I didn't have a reason to think about it. After you left, after Smith and I argued - again and again - then after we broke up, that's when I started to seriously think it over."

  I let out a breath of impatience. This wasn't a conversation that I wanted to have, something that we had been avoiding the past month and hoping we would both forget - but we didn't. It felt as though she needed this more than I.

  "Tae explained it all to me," she said. "About how AI rights were theorized and debated on long ago, back before any AI of that level even existed. But now that you're here, it's like everyone stopped caring. They stopped caring even when you're not just AI, you're... real."

  "Are you finished?" I asked.

  "I'm trying to apologize," she complained. "I just - I just want to convince you that I'm not shit and that while I was stupid before, now I know to respect you. I know the human spirit is deeper than just code or flesh. I just—" The words fell from her, and her eyes started to water. She looked at me with sadness, like she had hoped she was reaching out to me, but my reluctance told her that she failed.

  I stepped in and took her for an embrace. I held her there, took in her flowery smell, felt her warmth against my own, and her tears that dripped along my neck. I knew that since that day, there was an uncrossable gulf between us, an anger unspoken, and a trust that had been severed - yet, her words gave me hope.

  "Thank you," I said.

  I walked alone in the darkness, feeling the softness of the grass beneath my feet, letting the moonlight and stars wash over me to drip the tension away. The crisp breeze caressed my hair, and for a moment, I was at peace. The door to my cabin creaked shut, and two figures hopped off the porch. It was Yun and Relce.

  "What are you two weirdos doing out this late?" I said.

  "Chasin' tail," Yun said.

  "Shootin' guns," Relce said.

  "Hmm. Sounds fun." They chuckled like mischievous little runts, and I wanted to ruffle their heads like an older sister would.

  "We're headed to the range right quick," Yun explained. "Relce needs to see the new ammo." Relce pointed finger guns to drive the point home. His mustache dangled.

  "New ammo?"

  "The magic ones," he said. "I used them with the revolver, but we might mass produce them."

  "That sounds cool," I said. "Like explosive stuff?"

  Relce stifled a laugh. "Yeah, probs, but something preferably less dangerous."

  "Nothing dangerous about that." I knew my expression was betraying me. "Okay, how about bullets, that uh, explode inside them?"

  "Dude," Relce said. "That's like the same thing."

  "Yeah, maybe we should just sort this out between us," Yun said. "It's really complicated and super boring."

  I narrowed my eyes at them. "Sure." I knew these turds wanted all the fun to themselves, or maybe they didn't trust me with my pyromaniacal episodes, but it didn't matter. I had more important things to do, like sleeping. "Have fun."

  "Yep."

  I went up the steps, through the door, and found Willow asleep on the couch. She looked like a kitten, all curled up under a blanket with her little paws covering her mouth. I wanted to pet her and nuzzle my face into her hair, but I knew better than to wake a sleeping wizard, so I stepped away as quietly as I could.

  Yet here I found the unwritten physical law of the universe. Anytime a person wanted to be quiet, every sound was amplified to the tenth power. My clothes brushed loudly against itself as I stepped. I moved from the heel of one foot to the toes of my other in one elongated, exaggerated step, and the floors creaked so loud I thought it would shatter in half. My breath felt like a dragon's roar escaping from my nostrils in the dead quiet. Each step up the staircase was like a minefield of creaks and groans, and if I hit the wrong one, I'd be the most terrible, rudest person in the house for waking the one who chose to sleep in the living room instead of literally any other place in the house, yet that person was not going to be me.

  After a tactically careful march up the stairs, I finally made it to my room. Pitch black in darkness, a sliver of moonlight, and the familiar scent of home. Then I felt it. Warms hands to slide up my legs, to my waist, then under my belt. I could feel her smile behind me as her hands jammed into my sides and armpits with writhing, tickling fingers. I struggled against her and her against me, both of us laughing hysterically in the dark before we found ourselves spread out on the thick rug, sated and out of breath.

  Willow rested her head on my chest, riding my rising breath like the beat of a wave. "Willow," I said. "Didn't you have something you needed to tell me?"

  "Oh yeah, I did."

  "And?"

  "The island."

  I had forgotten all about the thing. "What about it?"

  She rolled off me and struggled to her feet. "Well, first," she said with a grunt. "How does the situation look?"

  "Ugh. The island, Willow. What about—"

  "What about the coalition," she pressed on. She was digging into the wardrobe for her nightwear.

  I dropped my head back to the floor. "Bad. It looks bad. Terrible even. Unless absolutely everything goes as planned, it'll be the hardest fight I'd have ever heard of. Which reminds me - how do you feel about us killing nipsies on the battlefield?"

  "Well, passivism against normal people can only take us so far." She dropped onto the bed and stared down at me. "In the case of war, there isn't much we can do. Not even Lord Gaia showed people that much mercy."

  "I'm not Lord Gaia," I said.

  "But if you were," she continued. "Then maybe the people would be more reluctant to fight."

  "What do you mean?"

  "The rumors are already there," she said. "And most people here in the republic think of you as the second coming."

  "Pretty sure you guys started those rumors."

  "And," she continued with a smile, "if you just came right out and took the title, I'm certain the enemy armies would just give up. At least some of them."

  "Yeah, but anybody could just walk up and make those claims," I said. "I don't have any legitimacy."

  "Which brings us to," she trailed off.

  "The island," I finished. "Now what about it?"

  Her voice took a darker tone. "You've bathed armies in fire - I've been a firsthand witness to it. Though I was hesitant to tell you to go until you were stronger, now might be the best time. It might be the only time."

  "Didn'
t you say there were monsters there?"

  "Manatech guards, yes," she said. "Teleportation traps, anti-magic barriers, that sort of thing."

  "It sounds like a proper raid. But I don't think we'll have the time," I said. "The coalition could declare war any day now."

  "Well, it'll take them a week or so just to get here, right?"

  "What is even there in the first place?"

  "The secrets of Lord Gaia," she said with pride.

  "That sounds made-up. Are you sure?"

  "I only half believed it before," she explained. "But now, I don't have a choice." She stared into me, and I felt her conviction. "There is certainly something there that will... jog your memory."

  Of course, I had no reason to doubt her, especially if she inherited the powers of the priestess. Naturally, she was right - she always was. If I were able to dig into that island, find whatever magic treasure bullshit that was there, maybe then I could inherit Lord Gaia's powers and come back some crazy powerful wizard. It could provide me the legitimacy I needed for the other nations to bend their knee, and the power to conquer those who won't. I would just need to be quick. "Fine," I said. "I'll do it."

  "Excellent."

  "On one condition," I said.

  She tilted her head and narrowed her eyes. "And what is that?"

  I eased over to her, rested my hands on her knees and drove my face up to hers, my lips brushed over her own. "I want to learn... the spell."

  She let out a soft laugh and held my face at hers. She looked into me with those emerald eyes, and I reached into her. "Seduce."

  Chapter 40

  Before the Storm

  The next morning, I formed my party. Simone, the tank. Willow, the healer. The rest of us - Tae, Relce, Yun, Huge guy, and me - as DPS. It felt like the first time in ages I was doing something that actually felt like a game, rather than a fight for survival. In a way, it made me excited.

  We met at the airship hangars near Tae's castle. The place felt like a distant memory, like something I had seen long ago in a movie or a game that resembled an airport. Lines of metal hangars that each housed an airship - some actively worked on by people in hardhats and safety gear. Birds chirped overhead, wings catching the morning wind. The entire place smelled of metal and sawdust, complete with the beating of hammers and grinding of mechanical saws. Blue and white banners flapped and rolled against grey and red ones, all tacked on every airship and hangar in sight.

  Tae's own behemoth airship, called the Anhur, sat at the far end of the runway, docked against an arm of the castle. I understood his reasons for not wanting to bring it along for this, but I was still a little bummed I didn't get to ride in it. After all, his crew needed to be ready at a moment's notice for the impending war.

  My party was led along by Tae's overwhelming enthusiasm and excitement, down to the closed hangar on the far end. A couple of workers cranked open the front doors and the roof, slowly revealing the demon inside. "A masterpiece," he said. "A retrofitted work of art."

  There I beheld the new airship, my airship. "The Anubis," he said. "But call it whatever you like." The sliver of light widened over it, revealing black metal armor that covered the wood panels, and more armor sticking out from that. Charcoal grey and rustic red sails. Fins along the sides and top. Half as long as the Anhur, "but twice as nimble," he said. A cluster of cannons in the front that "spins like an autocannon. Or maybe that actually qualifies as an autocannon," he said. "I'm not sure." Rows of cannons on its sides, as is the norm, but with strange chairs on the edges of the decks. "Magazine-fed machine guns," he explained. I was in awe, and I already wanted to dogfight with it, but it would have to wait.

  We double checked our gear while Tae completed his pre-flight checklist. I wore my now-favorite uniform, treated with anti-heat properties for obvious reasons, and a brand new staff for the occasion. Relce and Yun stood with new guns in hand, tactical armor wrapped tight against their chests with a million pockets and annoying velcro straps. Simone was buffing out old dings on her shield to, I guess, make it look shinier. Willow had on her usual brown robes and wizard's hat, but with a metal earpiece that wrapped over to her mouth. It must've been a radio, something I had completely forgotten about but made absolute sense - how else did the spies communicate so quickly? Huge guy came without a shirt, to no surprise, said little, and held a massive cleaving axe cradled in his arms like an infant child.

  "Here." Huge guy tossed me a brown vial. "It's a mana potion." Yun snickered when he caught sight of it.

  "No kidding?" I asked. "We have mana potions? That's a thing here?" I popped off the top and took a whiff. It smelled like whiskey.

  "Yeah," Huge Guy said. "Take a bit. It'll, uh, help your magic."

  I narrowed my eyes at the suppressed smiles and brought the vial to my lips. It tasted like whiskey. "This is whiskey."

  "Yes."

  I downed the rest - maybe a shot's worth, but no harm in trying.

  "Say again," Willow said. She was holding her earpiece closer to get a better listen. Her smile faded away to a frown, looking at us as she listened. She nodded along, then dropped her hand. "Iskala is making their move."

  "What? They haven't even declared war yet."

  "The Black Lions ambassador has just arrived at the capitol."

  She didn't need to say anything else. I took the hint, sighed at the sight of the airship, then turned to Huge Guy. "Can you port us there?" I knew he wasn't nearly as skilled as Boot-hat man in teleportation, but he at least could use it to travel.

  He nodded, ripped open a portal beside him, then we filtered in.

  It was the hallway of the capitol building, bureaumancers and administrators walking to and fro, all stopping at the sudden snap of the portal. Some only paused out of courtesy, as they had likely been used to the unexpected arrival of VIPs by now.

  "Ah, queen!" A young woman in a suit hurried over to me, arms full of papers and a briefcase under her arm. "The meeting is in the office."

  "Thank you," I said.

  We hurried onward, past a group of officers, past a group of suited diplomats, passed a shifty-eyed group of foreign guards, and right to the closed doors of the President's office. I had the others wait outside, next to a gaggle of bored officers, and took Willow by the hand to burst through.

  Two people sat in conversation, mouths agape, hand gestures paused mid-sentence. "Oh," the President said, "Uh, yeah come in."

  I gave the ambassador a look over. A man in his thirties, not a player, wearing a suit, stubble on his tannish face, hair neatly parted, piercing green eyes. I knew him from somewhere. "From the coalition, I presume?" I asked him.

  He stood up and offered a slight bow. "Yes."

  "Is this the declaration of war?" I demanded.

  "Well, you're not one for flowery talks, I see."

  I knew this voice. Deep. Dark. Distant. I've heard it before. "Well?" I asked him.

  He took a deep breath, reached into his suit jacket pocket, and pulled out a scroll. He thumbed it open and recited the words. "The Sanctioned Punitive Coalition hereby demands the immediate surrender of the People's Republic, and thereafter the partitioning of its properties and assets among the participant nations of the coalition."

  "And the people?" I asked.

  He rolled the paper and stuffed it back in his jacket. "I believe that one is filed under properties and assets."

  I knew it would be unforgivable to torch a diplomat, and especially rude to do it in front of the President, so I took a deep breath to stave off any idea of killing the messenger.

  "I must say," he said. "I did not think you'd make it this far."

  "We've met," I said.

  "And your friends dropped a meteor on me. Though I should thank them for choosing not to let me die there, I did lose my home and job."

  "Ain’t that some shit," I said. "I wouldn't have been so graceful."

  "My name is Abdul," he said, reaching his hand out for a handshake. The fact that I was star
ing fire-laced daggers into him told him I wasn't going to return it. "You know, I never once believed that you were the person they claimed you to be. Yet now the rumors are stronger than ever. So now I have to ask: is it true? Are you the Lord Gaia?"

  "Yes," I said with pride.

  "Yet anyone can say that," he said. "And now the world is begging you to prove it."

  "And I will."

  He sighed and let his eyes drift across the framed paintings on the wall. “There is still room for you to bargain. There is still yet peace to be made. If you continue this struggle against the players, you will lose, and you will take countless lives along with you.”

  “You suggest that we be satisfied with this? That we should bend our knees to these foreign invaders? These occupiers?”

  “What choice do we have?” he asked.

  “To fight,” I said.

  He brought his eyes to me. "I assume your answer to the coalition will be—"

  "War," I finished. I spun on my heels and toward the door.

  As I walked away, he said, "Prove me wrong, Alex, the pretender."

  I slammed the door shut behind me.

  "Well?" Yun said.

  "Well, what?" I snapped. "We're at war."

  "Are we still raiding the island?" Tae asked.

  As much as I wanted to, as much as I needed to, I knew it wouldn't work out in time. Iskala's air force would undoubtedly strike while we were busy, and I would never forgive myself for not being present while my men and women died for me. No. They're not dying for me, they’re dying for their own nation, their own sovereignty, and if they fail, they'll lose everything - if I fail. This is just the first fuck-over in the long list of things that could be.

  "The island will have to wait," I said. "I'll have to draw upon my own strength and not the echoes of who I was. Not just who I am, but who I aspire to be - and I aspire to be better than Gaia."

  "With the war official, the Iskalans will attack as soon as they arrive," Willow said. Her words struck me deep, and now the reality of it came crashing back down. It was us against the world. "If you've made your decision, we need to hurry."