Tournament Lord

by Felix Craft

  My companion looked unfazed. “I do. And you’ll be disappointed. Or haven’t you taken a look?”

  One of the Brit’s eyebrows shot up, then his eyes unfocused. He blinked, then his jovial expression turned into a scowl. “Level 10, and you don’t have a faction? What have you been doing, avoiding all contact and hiding in the woods?”

  “More or less,” Leesha answered dryly.

  “Hey! I shouted from my crouched position on the ground. “Anybody want to tell me what the hell is going on?”

  Leesha answered, though she didn’t look over at me. “Our friend here wanted to hold us ransom. It’s something some asshole players do to members of other factions to get a little coin and not go to the bother of selling the player’s stuff instead. However, Henry here neglected to check us beforehand, so he didn’t see that neither of us has a faction.”

  I opened my mouth, then closed it. I knew Leesha had a faction — those supposedly untrustworthy Sisters of Evenfall — but why couldn’t Henry know that? Then I remember that I hadn’t seen her faction either when I’d first examined her. It was only once I was in her party that I saw.

  “So since you can't collect ransom,” Leesha continued, staring at the rogue Henry, “how about you let us go?”

  The Brit barked a bitter laugh. “And let all my time go to waste? No, I don't think so.” He took a step closer, and Leesha's jaw tightened visibly. “I'll get my ransom. It'll just have to be from you, small fry.”

  My companion’s eyes narrowed. “What, we pay you or you’ll kill us?”

  The rogue held up his hands with an apologetic smile. “Hey, it’s not what I want, either. But you must admit that paying up will be cheaper than losing your stuff and half your Rc. So what do you say? Five thousand coins from each of you, and we’ll call ourselves square?”

  I stared. Five thousand? I was nowhere close to that. “Sorry, Henry,” I said from my patch of ground. “We ain’t got that dough. Looks like we won’t be worth your time, after all.”

  Leesha looked over sharply, while the rogue’s smile twisted. “No? I guess I’ll have to see what you have, Zane.” He gestured to the orc and dwarf standing over me. “Go ahead.”

  My axe was in hand as soon as he said the words, but the orc only looked amused. “What will do with that, little man?” he snorted. “Pick my teeth?”

  The rogue rolled his eyes lazily over to Leesha. “Any objections?”

  She met my gaze for a brief moment before I turned back to watch my assailants.

  “You’ve made yourself clear, as have we,” she said.

  I grit my teeth. It was as good as a death sentence.

  “You leave us no choice then,” Henry sighed. “Boys!”

  “And lass,” the elven archer grumbled.

  They charged me in a flash. My leg had been slowly healing around the arrow and my HP creeping back up, just enough for me to be able to stand on it, though it hurt like a bitch. I swung at the orc, stepping away from the dwarf as I did. It didn’t much matter. The orc caught the head of my axe in his hand and held it fast, grinning at me. I blinked. I hadn’t noticed he wore a steel gauntlet, allowing him to touch my weapon with impunity.

  I tried wrenching my axe away, but even with one arm, the orc had me. So I let go of it and gave him a kick backwards, then whirled to face the oncoming dwarf. The armored man, about half my height in size, roared and swung his two-handed hammer at my kneecap. Not keen to fall to his height again, I hopped back out of his short range, but my arrow-shot leg didn’t hold this time, and I staggered to my knees. When I looked up, I was level with the bearded man’s face.

  He roared again and raised the hammer aloft for a final blow. With few choices left, I threw myself forward and grabbed hold of the hammer at its furthest point back, coming close to the dwarfs helmeted head. A poor decision, as it turned out, for the nasty little guy butted his head forward and caught me in the nose with an explosion of pain.

  I stumbled back again, but the orc, who had been waiting his turn, came forward and grabbed me by the front of my jerkin. “Say goodbye.” Then he stabbed a wicked curved sword into my gut.

  For a moment, I blacked out, the pain too much to handle. When I came to, I wished I hadn’t. The waves of red pain were growing all too familiar, but no more welcome. I barely noticed how I leaned all my weight against the orc, unable to support myself.

  Then the same jolt as before wracked my body, and I went rigid. In my peripherals, I saw my HP and SP bump up a bit from the bottom. Die another day, as that one Bond movie went.

  Everyone was talking, so the orc didn’t notice as I reached down to the ground where my battle-axe had settled. I had to strain to reach, and it took all my self-control not to gasp in pain as I leaned just a bit more on the orc’s sword to get down to my battle-axe. This apparently was more than the orc wished to bear, for he grunted and turned me over so I slid painfully off of his sword.

  Barely able to keep conscious, I managed to grab ahold of my battle-axe as I fell onto it. It was pinned under me for the moment, but if I just rose at the right time, I’d be able to use it.

  The orc’s booted feet passed me as he walked a bit beyond my range of vision. Though I couldn’t see the dwarf, I knew this was my opportunity. With my SP and HP both about 20, I forced myself, trying not to look at the shocking amount of blood spilling from my gut (not to mention the other stuff I tried to see) while I hefted the axe and turned around toward the orc.

  The orc whirled and seeing me, his mouth dropped open, tusks projecting from his mouth at odd angles. “What the bloody boar—?”

  I swung my axe at his head.

  Still shocked, the orc didn’t move out of the way of the crescent blade, and though his tusk softened the blow, the axe still cleaved into his skull. He roared in a cocktail of pain, fury, and horror as he fell to the ground. Clutching at his bleeding wound, he stared and scrabbled backward, eyes round. I had barely to take one swaying step toward him for the orc to set off at a dead sprint into the woods. I stared after him, confusion and relief battling in me, then waving a weary truce.

  “Superstitious pig!” the dwarf scoffed from behind me. “I’ll kill the revenant myself anon!”

  Reeling more than turning to face him, his rush left no doubt he was talking about me. Weak as hell, I barely turned aside his blows, catching them on the haft of my axe and turning them away. The dwarf, beard flying either side with each swing, puffed with fury. My SP was draining with my efforts, but my HP just kept creeping up.

  “What … are … you?” the dwarf huffed as he swung.

  I finally had enough, and turning out of the way of one of his beleaguered swings, I caught the rim of his helmet with my axe and pulled. The dwarf went sprawling. Pinning his hammer under a boot, I stabbed the top point of my axe through the open visor. “If only I fucking knew,” I muttered, then pulled the axe free with a sickening squelch.

  My own battles concluded, I turned to see how Leesha was doing. I grinned at what I saw. The elven archer was sprawled behind a tree. Based on her stillness, I guessed she wouldn’t be getting up. The British rogue was down on the ground, clutching a smashed knee. Though I’d almost suffered the same fate myself, I couldn’t feel sorry for the bastard, especially when it barely hurt him. The only person from Henry’s party standing was the confused looking man, who still looked … well, confused.

  “Do something!” the Brit raged. “You bloody useless fool!”

  Leesha winked at him. “I think he likes us.”

  “I think he doesn’t know who the fuck we are,” I retorted. “Or where.”

  The idiot just shrugged, turned, and stumbled away.

  “You were supposed to be a magician!” Henry yelled after him. “Do magic and stuff!”

  “At Level 10?” Leesha snorted. “I’d say you got screwed”

  Henry’s furious gaze left the fool’s back and traveled to me. “You! How did you not die? Yolruk stabbed you in the gut! That had to have been a
crit!”

  “A what?”

  Leesha sighed. “A critical hit.”

  “Then, yeah, I’d say it felt like a crit.”

  The Brit ground his teeth. “Why. Are. You. Alive?”

  My companion approached so she stood over him. “Wouldn’t you like to know?” Without warning, she swung her mace down and smashed his head in.

  I winced, but the gore didn’t stay long. A second after Leesha dealt the blow, the Brit’s body began dissipating in a green mist. Before long, it was completely gone.

  “He’ll respawn soon, naked as a babe, unless he had a Bag of Holding,” Leesha said with obvious relish. “Now let’s get to looting so you don’t look like a pauper run through a blender.”

  I grimaced, but for once, I agreed with her. “Next time,” I said as I painfully bent over, my stomach still healing, “how about you not let me get run through?”

  Leesha shrugged, then put on the dwarf’s helm, which was too short and wide for her. It hung off her head. She giggled and pulled it off. “We’ll see. Now more looting, less talking.”

  I sighed again, and we went about my favorite MythRune chore.

  13

  Lady Vash and the Swallows

  Once we’d stripped the bodies, we put the items in a pile (minus the Rc I pilfered and the amount I suspected she also squirreled away) and began to divvy them up. I acquired a full new get-up, a mishmash from Harry’s and the dwarf’s old stuff. Holding up the compressed breastplate of the dwarf’s, I eyed it with skepticism. But Leesha assured me it would fit, and sure enough, as soon as I put it on, the plate mail started groaning as the metal shaped itself to my body. “Weird,” I muttered. But I supposed it was no weirder than anything else here in this game.

  In addition to the steel breastplate, I picked up a leather hood from the elf that didn't smell too bad, as well as a pair of heavy gloves from the dwarf. Henry's contributions to my safety included a soft shirt under the breastplate to help with chafing, a pair of nice boots, and some padded pants over which I strapped some leather armor.

  New armor on, I spread my arms and turned. “How do I look?”

  “Like a medieval hobo,” Leesha observed. “But better than most Level 4s.”

  “Level 4? Don’t you mean 3?”

  She rolled her eyes. “Check again.”

  Checking my waiting notifications, I found I’d advanced to Level 4. “Again?” I asked, a bit incredulous. I’d only just gotten to Level 3. “This game makes it too easy.”

  “Easy?” She slid down a tree to rest at the base of it. “Haven’t you come near to dying every fight we’ve had?”

  “Not every fight,” I muttered.

  “Oh, right. You ran around for one like a chicken with its head cut off.”

  Sometimes, you just have to grin and bear it. This wasn’t one of those times. “It’s not as though it hurts you like hell when people bust up your shoulder! Or did you forget how we met?”

  She winced. “Fair enough. I guess you’re no coward.”

  “That’s right.” A bit taken aback by her concession, I left it at that.

  “But honestly,” she said, picking up the initial thread, “it’s not that surprising because you’re doing this with me. When you’re in a party, you share XP.”

  “Okay. Shouldn’t that mean I’d be going slower?”

  “Not when you’re fighting things way beyond your level. Henry was Level 8. That bandit leader was a 5. How many Level 2 or 3 players could take either of them on?”

  I puffed up my chest. “How many could take out an orc and dwarf when they’d already been stabbed through?”

  “When they were Level 6s, no less,” Leesha agreed.

  I frowned. For once, she wasn’t making fun of me. It made me suspicious somehow, like she had ulterior motives.

  “Anyway,” she said, her eyes unfocusing as checked her own notifications, “we need you as high a level as — yes!” She pumped her fist in the air. “Level 11!”

  I rolled my eyes. Some people cared way too much about this game. I sighed and opened up my stats to start assigning points.

  Name: Zane_SD21

  Level: 4

  Profession: —

  Faction: —

  Runecoins: 252

  - HP: 110/110

  - SP: 100/100

  - MP: —/100

  Affinities:

  - Battle-axe: Level 3 - 63%

  - Sneak: Level 2 - 29%

  Ability Trees:

  - Combat:

  - Tier 1

  Battle-axe: Damage - 5% (1)

  - Calisthenics:

  - Tier 1

  Dodge - 5% (1)

  - Survival:

  - Industry:

  - Civil: (available at level 20)

  - Magic: (available at level 20)

  I boosted my HP by 10 again, but also added 10 SP, since I always seemed to be running out, bringing me up to 120 HP and 110 SP. As for my traits, I knew I could be there for hours looking through the spider-webbing skill trees, and I didn’t have the patience or time for it. So for my first AP, I added one to battle-axe swing speed to boost it by 5%, then another to my battle-axe damage. I added 1 AP to my block as well, considering I seemed to use it quite a bit. Then I looked at the armor branch of the combat tree. I could have gone for more dodge, but considering my heavier armor, I figured I’d just compromised my ability to dodge, anyway. So instead, I went for increasing the effectiveness of heavy armor, adding a 5% bonus to my armor rating.

  That settled, I looked over at Leesha, and saw she’d taken care of her level up as well. I nodded at her. “Time to get going, then.”

  She cocked her head to the side. “But you don’t even know where we’re going yet.”

  I stared. “Did you get hit on the head? To Mythgard. Where Lord MythRune is holding his tournament?”

  She shook her head, her expression a mask of contempt. “We can’t go there yet. That Henry_808 had a had a bounty on him. And we’re going to go collect it.”

  I stayed silent. We’d been through the outrage before. Time to ride this one out.

  As expected, Leesha continued right along. “Apparently, we’re not the first people that damn Brit has done this to. Some small-time faction called the Swallows had a bounty out on him.”

  “Do I want to know how they got their name?” I couldn’t resist saying.

  “The birds, idiot. Anyway, we go to their leader, some Lady Vash, and show her we took care of her mark, and we’ll pad ourselves with a good bit of cash.”

  I wasn’t opposed to money, but I couldn’t help remember we were still two days out from Mythgard, and this sounded awfully like a detour. “We need to get to the tournament.”

  “It doesn’t matter if we get to the tournament if we can’t win it. You don’t get to see Lord MythRune without winning, remember?”

  “And visiting this Lady Vash will help us win? Is that what you’re telling me?” Like I’d believe it to be anything other than what I knew it was — a distraction.

  Leesha rolled her eyes. “Yes, actually. We can buy weapons, armor, and consumables with it, maybe even magic ones. Without good gear, we won’t get far.”

  I conceded the point with a shrug. After all, I knew I was going wherever she was going, at least to a point. “So, where are we talking about?”

  “It’s not even off course. The Swallows have their settlement just off the High Way a day or so ahead.”

  I shrugged my shoulders, my new gear wearing more than my stuff before. Still, I didn’t mind if it meant not getting stabbed in the gut next time. “Fine. Let’s go. But I get a turn on Charlotte.”

  Leesha snorted. “No way.”

  I sighed. It had been worth a shot.

  We reached the Swallows settlement the next morning after traveling the night through. Even with Leesha being oh-so-kind and not forcing me to run until I jump-started alive, we made good time. MythGard was only a day and a half away, if Leesha was telling the truth. I s
hook my head at the absurdity of the thought. I'd already been in this damn game for over twenty-four hours, and now I was thinking a day and a half more was no problem. I was becoming used to my prison. Somehow, that didn’t feel as wrong as it should have.

  It was easy to tell where Lady Vash lived, for a decent-sized castle rose from the middle of the settlement. I shook my head at the absurd amount of digital currency that had taken. “You think what she spent on that is enough for a house in real life?”

  Leesha shrugged. “Sure. A three-bedroom in a small city suburb, maybe.”

  I shook my head again, but there was nothing more to say, so we headed to the gates. They were wooden and didn’t seem like they’d take much of a beating, but they were well-maintained, and the guards on either end of them were well-equipped and proper. “Halt!” one said. “State your business!”

  A quick Analyze showed the guards to be level 10 NPCs. Hiring them couldn’t have been cheap.

  Leesha spoke for both of us, friendly but firm. “My sidekick and I—”

  I bristled, but bit my tongue.

  “—have recently fulfilled the Swallows faction’s directive for retribution against a rogue and his crew and are here to collect the bounty. I believe we must report to Lady Vash to confirm it?”

  “That is correct,” one of the guards said. “You may enter. Please proceed to Lady Vash’s castle and state your business to the chamberlain there.” She motioned to her fellow, and he began to crank open the gate. Once there was a large enough gap for Charlotte, the guard waved us through and said, “Welcome to Nest.”

  We nodded in acknowledgment, then entered the settlement.

  Nest was, as Leesha had said earlier, a modest settlement. If I had to guess, I’d say there couldn’t have been more than a thousand there. Still, considering it was a player-ruled and built town, I was fairly impressed. This Lady Vash had invested a lot of time — and money — into making this a virtual home. And even if it was more than a little pathetic, you had to admire her dedication.

  We proceeded down the brick road that led between houses and shops with obvious signs declaring their trades, like back in the nameless village I’d spawned in. Maybe customization was more expensive, or maybe she just preferred it that way — who knew? Leesha eyed the stores, but she continued to lead us down the main road, which led straight toward the castle.