A raft appeared behind them. I activated my Observation Skills and focused for a better look.
Well, well, well. If it wasn’t the goblins’ chief shaman!
He looked so old and fragile that he resembled a crooked piece of driftwood overgrown with moss. Elite level-100 warriors surrounded him. I’d never seen anything like them before.
Their tags were green too.
Now why would they deem us worthy of all this theater? What kind of friendly visit was this?
“Don’t aggro anything!” I shouted into the combat chat. Attacking the Hydra could prove to be fatal in this situation. “Arwan, White, Lethmiel, I need you now! Meet me at the level-zero teleport!”
I focused on a spot of the cobblestone square below and ported there.
The peasants’ camps surrounding it were in turmoil. Armed with pitchforks, men hurried to line up to block off the attackers. Women and children sought refuge in the ruins of the outer walls.
My warriors came running from the barracks and hurried to serry their ranks, barring the enemy’s way to the donjon. Bristling with weapons, another line of soldiers stood in front of the breaches in the outer wall.
The cargo portal disgorged the Cargonite Golem. Emitting a mechanical humming noise, the creature stood up to his full height clenching his halberd and casting fiery glances around, searching for the enemy.
The archers on the walls drew their bows and waited for my command. The Elven refugees crowded nearby, presided over by three druids. I could see they didn’t know what to think about it all.
Off-duty dwarves poured out of the tavern while all the others stopped working and trickled toward the square, adding to the crowd.
To add to the commotion, tongues of black flames rose into the sky, announcing the arrival of Christa.
On top of the nearest towers, the catapults’ mechanisms creaked into action. I heard Platinus’ voice,
“That’s not ammo! Those barrels over there, the ones with the green markings, can you see them? Bring them over here! Put the torches away! This stuff doesn’t need igniting! It’ll go off all on its own!”
“Enea, where are you?” I shouted.
I ran toward the jetty followed by the clomping of the golem, with the two Guards of Gloom covering my back.
Finally, I saw White — pale, tense and ready to fight.
“Alex, please don’t hurt them,” Enea’s voice sounded weak and tired as if she hadn’t slept all night. “I’m coming now.”
“Can you explain what’s going on?”
“You’ll see in a minute. I didn’t expect it myself.”
“Expect what?”
The crowd was about to freak out and lose control.
I stopped opposite a breach in the wall which offered a direct view of the jetty and part of the shore. “Step back, everyone!”
The clan’s combat units continued to line up behind my back. The raid’s night shift hadn’t been relieved yet which was why most senior officers were still here in Rion: Iskandar in charge of the wizards and Archie controlling the warriors. Rodrigo, however, was still in the Yonder Isles.
Arwan, White and the two Guards of Gloom made up my personal retinue. But where was Enea? What the hell was going on?
Christa kept a low profile in the crowd, apparently not in a hurry to transform into her Infernal guise. Wise decision. The arrival of a demon could only make the situation worse.
In the meantime, events had taken an irreversible turn.
The Ancient Hydra climbed out onto the shore: a level-230 mob from some top moor location as yet inaccessible to us. Water ran down its lustrous black scaly skin.
The hydra’s twelve jaws exhaled clouds of toxins. Strangely enough, the deadly mist dissipated almost straight away, leaving behind a faint aroma of herbs and flowers.
The crude raft hit the jetty. The elite goblin warriors expertly moored it, then reverently helped the ancient shaman to alight onto the pier.
The sky darkened. The crowd dissolved in fearful murmurs and shrieks of panic. A humongous Black Mantis the size of a dragon dove down onto the shore and landed not very far from me, very nearly knocking me over with the downdraft.
The golem’s level counter span. He raised a menacing halberd. I stopped him just in time via the clan interface.
This wasn’t normal. Between the two of them, the Hydra and the Black Mantis could single-handedly wipe our army out. But it didn’t look as if they were going to. The two location bosses were friendly.
Leaning on his gnarly staff, the shaman walked through the breach in the wall and stopped. Both the Ancient Hydra and the Mantis King did the same.
The Elven druids, too, stepped forward and froze with their hands raised above their heads.
The air seemed to be ringing with tension. None of us had any idea what was going to happen next.
A soft melodious chiming rang through the air.
The morning sunrays reached through the breaches in the wall and dissolved into cascades of warm light.
A flickering blue beam dashed over the overgrown paving stones, drawing three circles which flashed brightly, revealing the symbols of the Founders’ language.
A portal?
It dissolved in a flash of golden light, leaving Enea standing at its center.
Silence fell.
Magic auras expired all around us as our wizards aborted their spells.
The peasants lowered their pitchforks. The warriors sheathed their swords.
No orders sounded. The sunlit stillness embraced us.
Enea looked unbelievably beautiful. Which had nothing to do with the Forest Nymph buff still flashing in her tag.
She was enveloped in light and clad in flowing white garments. Her hair was braided with flowers.
But where was her Staff of a Hydra?
It was gone.
Enea’s gaze sought me out in the crowd. She gave me an encouraging smile, then walked toward the two location bosses.
The Ancient Hydra bent its tentacles in a clumsy bow and lowered its twelve necks bulging with muscles.
The Mantis King dropped to the ground too, greeting the Forest Nymph. To my surprise, I noticed Alpha standing next to him.
Grunting with the effort, the Goblin shaman sank to his knees without taking his eyes from Enea’s face.
The Elven druids began to sing in a rustling ancient tongue, a soft sound reminiscent of the whisper of the wind and the murmur of tree tops.
Enea walked over to the ancient shaman and helped him back to his feet. She ran her hand over the Mantis King’s impregnable scaly armor, encouraging him to raise his proud head, then touched the Hydra.
“Follow me!” her clear voice rang over the square.
The crowd obediently parted.
In the meantime the sun rose higher, reaching over the merlons and pointing clearly at the western towers.
We hadn’t yet started the works there. The walls there were still overgrown with vines, their canopies forming green roofs over the terraced cascades of the inner courts.
Enea stepped onto the path of warm sunlight and followed it, enveloped in the constant glow of new levels being received.
A giant crystal screen materialized in the sky,
The ancient magic has returned to the world!
A new Shrine of Nature has been built overnight with the power of selfless desire, becoming a new center of life and embodying all the skill and knowledge which was lost to obscurity!
The ancient beings, the rulers of the kingdom of nature, have sensed and acknowledged the new power which has transformed the castle’s ruins.
From now on, whenever Rion Castle is in trouble they will come to its rescue!
Each visitor to the Shrine will receive a one-off Regeneration ability granting recovery from the most mortal of wounds.
Enea continued to walk toward the Temple, still enveloped in the constant shimmer of new levels being received. The Mantis King, the Ancient Hydra, the three Elven drui
ds and the age-bent Goblin shaman followed her.
A new system message appeared in my interface,
Quest alert: Spirit of the Woods. Quest completed!
The Elves have received a shrine. From now on, they will remain in Rion Castle as your faithful allies.
* * *
Later, I remembered this morning — which was destined to become the new legend of the VR world — with its incredible abundance of light, intoxicating air and the stunning beauty of what was unfolding around us.
The sunray-woven path directed us to the magically restored part of the castle.
Only yesterday, its crumbling towers had lain in heaps of rubble. Now my eyes rejoiced looking at the delicate archways which rose over its three inner courts.
The magic stone of Rion’s walls had changed its properties and color. Now, an intricate floral pattern covered the snow-white columns. Repeating the complex design, thick vines climbed up the stone, vaulting overhead to form a high, elaborate ceiling.
The vines began to release young green shoots which opened one by one, revealing their first sticky leaves. Clusters of blossoms in every possible shape and color filled the air with their delicate scent. Water warbled in lacy cascades amongst them.
The whole scene was permeated by sunrays seeping through the foliage and casting fancy patterns of light across the shady rooms.
The central hall of this new section was large enough to house all of the castle’s inhabitants as well as the visitors.
I stepped in and froze in disbelief, recognizing the Staff of a Hydra in an incredible translucent plant veined with a web of finest capillaries.
The ruby which had once topped it was now encased within the staff’s crystal body which resembled a tree trunk. Awoken by the drop of Enea’s blood she’s once shared with it, the stone now pulsated like a giant heart, coming back to life and accumulating the power of nature which surrounded it.
Mechanically I focused on it. A prompt popped up straight away,
The Heart of Rion Castle
Permanent effect: Regeneration Aura. Restores 10 hp per sec within the Shrine’s grounds and 1 hp per sec within the confines of Rion Castle.
All pilgrims to the Shrine receive a one-off Regeneration ability which they can then use at their own discretion.
Restrictions: only one pilgrimage per month is allowed to any friendly or neutral character.
Enemies of Rion Castle cannot benefit from the Regeneration Aura. If they attempt to attack the Castle, they will be subjected to the Aura of a Predator which will slow down their reaction times and cause the enemy’s stamina to drop 10%.
Enea had transformed, too. She’d finally found her ideal digital incarnation which perfectly reflected her identity.
The words Combat Wizard had disappeared from her name tag.
Enea. A Forest Nymph. Level 71
The Druids’ song expired on a single quivering note.
Silence fell. Not one voice was heard in the crowd packed into the Shrine of Nature.
The Mantis King touched the Heart of Rion Castle. He froze momentarily, then turned toward Enea and spoke clearly in human tongue,
“O Nymph, You who has brought the ancient magic back into this world, allow me to offer you a gift. Please receive this Summoning ability. From now on, once a month you can appeal to my people for help, and my subjects will answer your call.”
Upon saying this, he disappeared into the flurry of a portal as if he’d never been there.
The Ancient Hydra craned her long necks and touched the Heart of Rion. “O Nymph, from now on you’ll be able to draw strength from the nature around you. Please receive this Mass Regeneration spell. Use it wisely. Remember: for you to heal someone, thousands of little creatures must share a fraction of their own strength with you.”
Another portal popped open, enveloping the Hydra in its whirls and whisking her back to her secret location.
Now, the Goblin shaman.
Leaning heavily on his staff, he hobbled toward the pulsating Heart of Rion. As he walked past me, he mouthed under his breath,
“Don’t even think things are different between us now. Until you find the totem, nothing has changed.”
He then touched the Heart of Rion and said to Enea out loud,
“O Nymph, please receive this Understanding ability. From now on, you’ll be able to speak to any living being, whether a plant or an animal.”
Unlike the others, he didn’t teleport back. Grunting with the effort, he turned back to me and repeated, burning a hole in me with his glare,
“Remember, Alexatis. We’re waiting for our totem back. Now let me through.”
The crowd parted. The chief shaman sashayed awkwardly out of the Shrine and headed toward the jetty where the raft was waiting.
* * *
The activation of the crystal celestial screen which informs players of the game’s breaking news doesn’t happen often. It appears everywhere at once, even in the farthest corners of the Crystal Sphere.
That’s why the news of the new Shrine of Nature and the unique properties of the Heart of Rion spread like wildfire, triggering a tidal wave of pilgrims to the castle.
Pilgrimage applications began flooding in. Thousands of players and NPCs visited Rion on the very first day. Our clan ranking soared. We also heard loads of news, both good and bad.
The impromptu celebration lasted well into the night.
Enea was the center of everyone’s attention. She didn’t have one moment for herself. The curious crowds were a perfect source of information, inconspicuously collected and forwarded to our analyst Stephen who’d been urgently recalled from the Yonder Isles in order to process all this precious data.
The resulting picture was as follows. Many of the game’s regions had suffered from the Reapers’ attacks. Entire towns and villages were deserted in the areas where the new Reaper cult had taken hold.
“This is definitely caused by the defense mechanisms’ activity,” Stephen summed up. “Lots of natural disasters have been registered in the places where defective mobs have declared themselves. Droughts, torrential rains, subzero temperatures... There’s news of inexplicable livestock devastation and several cases of epidemics amongst NPCs. By cross-checking this information on the map, it’s quite easy to see that the arrival of Reapers results in the death of wildlife and the collapse of the local economy. I’d venture a guess that the Crystal Sphere’s AIs have proven to be too inefficient against this new threat. Our defense mechanisms aren’t effective enough against the Reapers.”
“Are you implying that these mechanisms have shifted their focus to target the new cult’s potential followers? By destroying their crops and livestock and flooding their villages?”
Stephen nodded. “Exactly. It’s not the best delay tactic if you ask me but these programs make their own decisions. They’ve no idea that by wiping out whole regions they in fact destroy this world’s integrity. The Crystal Sphere is crumbling. If we fail to stop the Reapers, few will survive. And even those will be forced to languish in a warped world — a miserable excuse for virtual reality. The Corporation’s testing grounds are a prime example. The defense mechanisms won’t stop until they chase all of the defective mobs out of there, stripping them of any means of survival.”
His forecast was sad to say the least. I hated to believe it but all the facts seemed to point at that particular scenario. Now that most of the Corporation workers were dead, it was the game’s emergency protocols making the decisions — and they weren’t exactly known for their mental flexibility. They performed the tasks they’d been programed to initiate without giving any thought to their eventual consequences.
The game’s NPCs with their neurocomp-based minds weren’t much smarter, either. Even the dumbest of peasants amongst them had already put two and two together, believing that the arrival of the Reapers was bound to bring some sort of divine punishment upon them.
So they didn’t have much choice really: all they co
uld do was abandon their homes and join Dietrich’s banners. Because he was the only one who held a glimpse of hope for them.
The party was in full swing but I wasn’t in the mood to celebrate. I spoke to White, then supervised the raid groups’ rotation. Once that was out of the way, I sat down and got thinking.
If we failed to stop the Reapers — which meant the loss of Rion Castle — then we had only one solution left. We’d have to activate the only super long distance portal we had and use it to retreat to the Yonder Isles.
* * *
When the party had finally begun to abate, White and I salvaged Enea from the center of a thick circle of pilgrims.
The three druids took over from her. They were quite used to performing marathon rituals which could last for days on end.
“I’m so tired you can’t even imagine,” Enea laughed happily as we whisked her away from all the bustle. “And happy! I’m too happy for words!”
“But how did you manage to build the Shrine?”
“I can’t even tell you! I was looking through the book until I saw this picture. And I thought I could reconstruct it. And then it all started happening. You should have seen it! Moonlight began to transform the vines and build them into roofs! The magic stones in the walls changed their properties! Alex, I willed new plants to grow! Moss climbed over the stairways before my very eyes! Water springs forced their way from underground. This is what I love, building something new which is so perfect and so beautiful. I could do it all day long.”
She could hardly keep her eyes open as she said it.
I helped her into bed and tucked her in. “You need to get some rest now.”
She gave me a warm happy smile. “Okay.”
Then she fell fast asleep without a care in the world while I sat next to her for a long time, thinking about everything which had just happened.
The Reapers (The Neuro 3) Page 14