by John Gold
It had become a behemoth over the two and a half months he’d been there, and its branches sheltered the entire vacant lot. The trunk was just as smooth, with LJ’s special place ten meters up. After that, it shot up another thirty meters. LJ didn’t know anything about trees, though he was happy his had grown so well. The gifts he was given by the animals every night were buried under the roots as usual. As soon as the animals left, LJ went back to repeating the blood knight’s movements until they became automatic. One night, when the lights in the tavern had already gone out, LJ saw the owner walking over with two swords. LJ continued his movements, one eye on the innkeeper. A minute later, the latter had closed to two meters and attacked. Time slowed; everything around disappeared. All that was left were two people and their weapons.
LJ only had a branch to counter the tavern owner’s sword, which meant that he couldn’t block anything. All he could do was parry. He slipped forward, though his opponent struck him with his sword’s guard and backed away. A stabbing cut swept to the side, a backhanded blow to the throat. The assailant assumed a fencing stance; the cat used amplification to try a chop. Wait, what amplification?
They froze. The innkeeper’s sword was at the cat’s side; the cat’s branch was at the innkeeper’s throat. The latter took two steps backward and assumed a swordsman’s stance. Style master!
“My name is Arkham the Dancing Sword, and you already know me as the owner of the tavern. I’ve watched you growing this tree, helping animals, and giving the workers a hand for two and a half months. Throughout that time, you’ve followed three principles: you don’t leave the field, you don’t talk, and you continue to wait for your companion. That impressed me. A couple of days ago, I also found out that you practice your swordplay every night. So, you never sleep?”
LJ nodded, seeing no point in hiding the fact.
“In five months, at the beginning of spring, there will be a trial for acceptance into the ranks of the Hunters. The trial will be held in Gimza, in the Darin Empire. Find a hotel called the Claire Marine and ask the barman for three portions of mari pies. I recommend giving it a try.”
You received access to probation with the Hunters
The probation will begin in five months and six days in the city of Gimza.
Go to the Claire Marine and order three portions of mari pies.
Once again, everything seemed very familiar. The Hunters, the barman, the trial, ordering food.
“Do you want me to teach you how to use swords and daggers?”
You have a new skill offer: Swords and daggers
LJ nodded. You don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.
You learned a new skill: Swords and daggers
Swords and daggers: +1
After LJ accepted the skill, they went back to sparring. His opponent was unpredictable, using a variety of styles—marauder, fencing, swordsman, two-handed swordsman, assassin. Every new attack differed from the one before it. There were lunges from impossible positions, strikes with hilts and guards, tripping, hand-to-hand fighting, and even some dirtier tricks. He really did dance, constantly changing his stance and relentlessly attacking. His movements were all smooth and precise, down to the millimeter. Each strike was calculated. Some were weak, some were devastating. The muscles in his body were like springs.
Fighting the swordsman brought up memories of doing the same with the blood knight, though LJ always lost, both then and in his memories. There was a yawning gap in their abilities that only oceans of time could fill. LJ’s inner voice rejoiced, loving the battles.
Milisandra still hadn’t showed up, but LJ continued to wait. Winter came, work outside came to a close, and snow fell. The houses LJ had built that summer filled up quickly. The crown of his tree completely covered the vacant lot, and both the tree and the grass growing beneath it remained green and healthy despite the cold. The poor cat couldn’t have been more grateful for such a valuable gift during the coldest time of the year. Sweet plants grew, with flowers even along the edges of the field. Nobody had planted them—they grew by themselves. Regardless of how cold it was beyond the edges of the field, the constant temperature under the tree meant that the plants didn’t feel the wind in the least.
Sometimes, animals brought their dead friends. LJ cried over each of them, giving them a burial in the vacant lot. Then, he placed crosses over them and planted flowers. When the weather was coldest, the animals spent all their time there, sleeping at night in the field. Even though the local climate was brutal, LJ didn’t mind it at all. He could even eat or bathe in snow without a problem. With so much free time on his hands, he focused even more on his sword training. In the mornings, when everyone was sleeping, he cleared away the snow. The people living there gave him food in exchange, and he shared it with the animals. Twice a day, he checked to make sure Millie hadn’t gotten back yet. The innkeeper always informed him sadly that she hadn’t.
LJ still couldn’t do anything more than doze. His dreams about the red people grew clearer, always ending in pain as LJ woke up. By that point, all he had to do was tighten up to see all kinds of semitransparent creatures flying around. He could only see the smallest of them, but he knew what some of them were—they were the souls of the animals he’d buried in the field. Some were those he’d fed long ago. So, they died?! Just the thought of that tugged at his heart.
Every night, he trained with the owner of the tavern; every day, he practiced his strikes. He needed more skill, more combinations, more precision, better movements. He needed the experience and unmatched mastery the blood knight and the tavern owner had.
LJ paid for another two months in the rooms and continued to wait. She’s coming back! He just needed to wait for her.
The tree became a city attraction. Sometimes, elves and druids showed up to pray, and they always asked about the druid with a skill advanced enough to grow such a great tree. Shamans came, too. For them, it was a place of power where they could speak with the spirits. LJ had just one rule for all of them: they weren’t permitted to litter or curse. Any violators were thrown out without a second thought. And nobody dared climb into the tree itself—only LJ had his special spot. The cat started to sense the tree and the life flowing from it.
One quiet winter night, a group of troll shamans came over from outside the wall. The city folk didn’t like them, though LJ didn’t see any difference between them and anyone else. The trolls asked the cat for the right to speak with their spirits in the place of power. He didn’t mind; he was only a guest there himself.
Relationship with the Bruma Mountain trolls: +1000
Current relationship: Respect (9000 to esteem)
Relationship with the troll race: +100
Current relationship: Neutral (900 to respect)
In all the world, there was one place where he was always welcome, and LJ showed his appreciation by giving the tree warmth and the earth his gifts.
***
A month before, a rumor went around Radaam about a mysterious tree in Kurg. They said it was as great as the trees in the elf forests, having already become a weaker place of power. Its keeper and gardener was a young man who walked around in a cat outfit with a fluffy, flowering tail and whiskers drawn on his face. The tree’s crown was supposed to stretch two hundred meters, creating a space underneath that was warm even during winter.
Hannah Quick took her wards to visit the sight—all the kids wanted to see the cat.
It was a three-day journey to get from Denev to Kurg on the good road. They ended up using carriages, with riding pets from the zoo to pull them. The kids loved the trip across the snowbound continent.
Eliza was writing an article about mental disorders, and the keeper definitely sounded like a good candidate. She figured a couple conversations with him would give her valuable material for her article.
She’d been enjoying her work with children over the past few years. Of course, just thinking about some of the mistakes she’d made at the beginning of her career was
enough to make her cringe.
As they went, they studied the Kurg guide. Near the tree was a good inn they decided to stay at for a couple of days while the kids enjoyed the sights.
The enormous tree was already visible as they pulled up to the city. Its crown was a hundred and fifty meters high, mushrooming its snowy hat over the city.
When they arrived at the inn and rented their rooms, the kids ran off. They couldn’t wait to see what it was like in an anomalous area. Hannah, in the meantime, decided to ask around and see what she could find out about the cat. A couple of people she talked to recommended that she speak with the innkeeper, and he was only too happy to spill the beans.
“He came here with a girl three months ago. She paid for two rooms for a week and disappeared, telling him to wait here,” the tavern owner said as he gestured her toward a bar stool. “The ‘cat’ sat here for days, only leaving when I promised I’d tell him when the girl gets back. The week passed without a sign of her. The cat gave me enough money for a month, and then did that three more times. In all that time, he hasn’t been in his room once. He just pays for them and lives in his tree.”
“Have there been any other eccentricities in his behavior?”
“He doesn’t talk, he doesn’t leave the vacant lot, and he helps animals. Oh, right! He doesn’t sleep, either. I’ve never seen that before! He stops in twice a day to ask about the girl.”
“He doesn’t get what happened?”
The innkeeper’s face twisted into an expression of sorrow. He felt bad for the cat.
“Loyalty is a quality humans don’t have,” he replied, squinting a little. “The thought doesn’t even cross the guy’s mind that she might have tricked him and run off. He stays there day and night watching the door, waiting for her to come back. That’s all he knows—he was told to wait, so that’s what he’s doing.”
Hannah made a note. What the innkeeper said wasn’t probable, but it could happen in rare cases. Humans are conditioned to doubt other humans; animals aren’t. They just wait and hope their humans will come back for them.
She wondered if he’d turned away from his own identity or lost it due to some kind of trauma.
Next, Hannah decided to go see the cat she’d heard so much about. She stepped out of the tavern onto the snow-covered road, but crossing it was like walking into a completely different world. Warm summer reigned under the cover of the tree. The kids were ripping off their winter clothing to play with each other, while the cat just sat in the branches and watched the door to the tavern. There were quite a few animals there, some rare. A few forest predators even sat peacefully at the edge of the field without attacking anything. The field was bordered with flowers.
When Hannah came over to the cat, he didn’t react in the least. He just kept staring at the tavern door in a dream-like state. Yet the contours of his face were vaguely familiar to her. Hundreds of children had been through her program over the years, but there hadn’t been any adults. Could he have been one of her former patients?
“Anji? Is that you?”
The cat instantly looked over at her, a look of annoyance flitting over his face. There was no sign of recognition or affection. Hannah had the animal lord class, for which perception was one of the most important skills, and that meant she could hear the hum.
“Do you remember me? I’m Eliza Donovan, your psychologist from the orphanage.”
Tears poured from the cat’s eyes, the hum grew louder, and the animals started running away from the field. That confirmed what Eliza was feeling—they could sense the aggression, too. Even the air started growing thick around where the cat was sitting. Anger, rage, and loathing battled across his face.
“The last time we saw each other, you were leaving the orphanage. Me, Vaalsie, Galboa, Finx. We walked out to–”
“Pain…”
It was the first word the cat had said, and it meant nothing good.
Damage received: 468550 (ignored: 3733)
0/12260
The last thing Eliza saw was the clump of air that pounded her body half a meter deep into the group. Her body fell lifelessly into the pit under the tree, where the roots reached out to grab hold.
Next to her, LJ’s senseless body also fell. Some nearby city guards grabbed the troublemaker and dragged him away to the local jail, though Eliza didn’t see it happening.
***
Deep under the surface of Arpa was where the technical premises were located. They belonged to organizations the city did their best not to advertise, including psychiatric hospitals, prisons, research labs, military training facilities, and many more. One of the facilities housed the capsules assigned to the Galileo Psychiatric Clinic. That was where patients who were supposed to spend all their treatment time in the game were kept, where they were disconnected or medicated via a catheter when they had health problems or needed hormonal correction. One of those cases was ongoing.
The patient was forcibly disconnected from Project Chrysalis due to their critical condition. One of the staff decided to use that instance to explain to a newcomer what the procedure was for when things like that occurred.
“The patient’s name is Bak Kvan. His brain has been through a number of strokes brought on by unproven medication, and he spent five years in a coma. As soon as he came to, the capsule established his level of brain activity and sent him to the appropriate medical facility in Project Chrysalis.”
“Why was he disconnected from the game?”
“His brain was seriously damaged from the trauma. When there are spikes in emotional energy or stress, the capsule administers sedatives through the catheter. They didn’t help this time, and the capsule’s ArtIn decided that the patient needed to be pulled out and put to sleep. But that’s the second problem: the patient can’t sleep at all. He feels like his consciousness is drifting into a darkness where time stands still. The overload itself means that his brain hasn’t been fully restored yet, so medical nanobots will get to work repairing the damaged circuits and connections. In the future, that kind of stress on the brain won’t lead to the patient being disconnected.”
“Why is his encephalogram off the charts like that? It’s almost like there’s a group of patients in his brain, and it looks like that only happens when he tries to sleep.”
“What, you thought personalities don’t suffer after strokes? If we were to turn off one of your hemispheres or reduce its capacity by half, do you think you’d be the same person? Of course not! It isn’t just about the physiology—we can fix that. It’s about how badly the individual took it.”
***
Eliza logged out of the game—the second zoo supervisor could take care of the kids, and he was already up to date. What she wanted to find out was what happened to Anji. Why had he reacted so strongly to what she said? Why did he collapse?
Moro responded instantly when she showed up.
“Good afternoon, Miss Donovan.”
“Hi, Moro. Pull up Anji Ganet’s data. He has a psychological problem, so I want you to send everything you have on him to my profile in the infonet.”
A couple of seconds later, Moro replied instead of sending the information.
“My sympathies, Miss Donovan. Anji Ganet died five years ago in D. Shtal’s clinic, over in the city colony Arpa. The cause of death is multiple strokes and hemorrhaging in the brain. I emailed you the autopsy report and the psychological portrait the orphanage supervisor put together.”
Eliza was shocked.
“Really?”
***
LJ woke up in a lone prison cell. The walls were bare, and there was hay on the floor instead of a bed. Sunlight trickled in through a small window.
He pounded on the bars, wanting to find out what he was doing there. All he could remember was talking to a woman standing by the tree. Each of her words pulled an ocean of rage that just made him want to kill her. She’d named places and people, and his head had practically split open with each one. The voices… They’d
been so loud! They wanted to kill everyone. He remembered the names. Blood…
“Ah, you’re back, cat. I remember you—you’re always sitting up in the tree and taking care of animals. Well, you got in a fight? And you made sure everyone could see you?”
LJ shrugged. He didn’t remember a fight.
“You’re in here for a week without bail. The time will let you cool off and think twice next time before you pick a fight around a bunch of kids.”
The jailer walked away, leaving LJ frozen in surprise. What if Milisandra comes back? He didn’t know what would happen if she came and went without waiting for him.
Bad thoughts whirled around in his head, and his mood turned sour. But his internal voice was loving it. LJ had no idea why that was—what was there to be happy about? He was locked up, and Milisandra could come back at any moment.
LJ pulled up the map he hadn’t looked at once and checked to see how far he was from his tree and the tavern. It was about a kilometer as the crow flies, though LJ didn’t have enough unlocked to know that the market and residential area laid in between.
Without realizing it, the cat got into a pose for meditation and closed his eyes. He focused on his senses—touch, hearing, taste, smell. With each passing day, he was starting to sense larger and larger transparent creatures flying around, and they were already the size of ships. He didn’t know their names, though a lot of them were familiar.
LJ heard the jailer’s footsteps as he walked the floor below, the clacking of his boots. He heard all the other prisoners on that floor, not to mention the guards in the basement and even the child playing a hundred meters away on the other side of the wall. Beyond that, however, everything was just a dull murmur no matter how hard he concentrated. He was surprised to learn that he could hear his heartbeat and the blood flowing through his veins. Feeling the magic energy coursing through his body gave him a delicious shiver. LJ tensed up as he listened to the sensations. The magic energy beat to the rhythm of his heart, as did the rest of his body. LJ could sense the energy passing through different objects differently. The denser it was, the slower the magic passed through it, and the stronger the effect was.