by J D Astra
Not far into the trees we encountered another two Corrupt Valdgeist. Otto slashed them down easily, and I tried not to proc Burning Affliction on them, though I failed. The rancid smell of fiery crap followed us as we moved deeper and encountered more Valdgeist. Each gave us 1,500XP and five gold like clockwork, and each took about four solid hits to take out.
Whether it was the flaming stench that followed us from corpse to corpse, or there was just nothing else to be found in the forest, it seemed the Corrupt Valdgeist were the only things around. Though, if I knew anything about games, and I did, there was going to be some source of the corruption around here.
After our eighth Valdgeist, I leveled to 17. It was a bit of a grind, but really not too bad. I decided to save my ability point, but of course, had to drop all my stat points into Int and Spirit. I panned over to my character sheet and inspected Wildfire, disappointed to see the 2% chance of adding a new stat or bonus hadn’t been in my favor this time.
Despite all the distractions and the joy of now being up twenty gold, the nagging worry of Sandra slashing my gut open and playing with my digital intestines remained. What would they do when they found out we raided their dungeon? More importantly, what would Aleixo Carrera do? It was “his” dungeon after all, which made me think there must be some kind of unique, specific item at the end of it.
“Let’s get back to that dungeon entrance. We know what’s around here, we need to know what’s in there.”
Otto grunted in agreement and scraped the last five gold out of the dilapidated corpse. We were surprised to find that the Valdgeist were already respawning behind us and didn’t hesitate to earn ourselves another cool five coins each, though we could’ve easily avoided or outrun them.
Back at the clearing, Otto took a moment to manage something in his inventory, and I popped open my own character screen, checking for a PM from Jack. I sighed with impatience. Nothing yet.
We looked down the sloping stairs to the intricate door with apprehension. I didn’t want to open it, honestly. If it closed behind us or if we triggered some sort of quest start, it might set off alarms for Sandra. I had no idea what kind of setup she had for monitoring the secret dungeons, but if I knew anything about Osmark, there certainly would be one. Sandra hadn’t pinged me again since our arrival, so I had to assume it was related to the opening of the door. Otto stepped forward and put his hand on the large metal ring that served as a doorknob.
I grabbed his elbow. “Otto, they might be watching the door somehow. I don’t think we should go in until we’re ready. And even if Jack does show up tomorrow, which he hasn’t messaged me back, we’re not ready.”
He nodded thoughtfully. “I’m not sure how they would monitor the door without actually being here, runes perhaps, yes that might be it.” Otto stroked his chin. “You’re right. If they’re keeping an eye on this door, we’ll want to be prepared for what’s on the other side of it and what might follow us in after. What do you suggest?”
It was interesting having Otto, who had been our battle planner since the beginning, now looking to me for council. I imagined it must be that Otto was starting to really trust me. Dread tugged at my heartstrings. He trusted me, and I might get him killed with this quest.
If he was already bonding with me, it would be a hell of a time getting him to stay behind for this quest. Even if I could convince him, I couldn’t afford for him to stay behind. If Jack and I were going to take this thing down, we would need everything we had. But if everything we had wasn’t enough, I’d lose Otto.
If I could hit 25, unlock the tier-four abilities like Phoenix Rising and Rain of Fire, maybe, maybe, I could duo it with Jack, depending on his class. Twenty-five was a long way off, and it was already 3 PM. Just twenty-four hours to get the dungeon started. I hoped an hour was all we’d need to talk when Jack arrived, if he arrived.
I’d have to figure out how to get Otto to hang back, however I could manage that.
I sucked in a deep breath. “We need to grind.”
With a resigned sigh, Otto turned and headed back into the forest of Corrupt Valdgeist. The dread in my gut spread to an aching in my chest. I would have to hurt him, badly, to get him to stay behind. The kind of hurt that friendships don’t come back from. The kind of hurt that burrows inside your soul and changes you forever.
I was an only child, but being with Otto gave me a taste of what it was like to have a big brother. A big, ugly, somewhat smelly, green brother, one that I didn’t want to watch die, or worse, be the cause of his death.
It seemed this quest was going to force me to lose Otto, one way or another.
A Violent Farewell
OTTO GRUNTED AS HIS sword chopped down the last Valdgeist. He leaned against a nearby tree, wiping sweat from his brow.
“Abby,” he panted, “it’s nearly midnight. Let’s head back and get a good rest for tomorrow.”
I shook my head, grabbing the expected gold from the corpses. A few of them had some random midlevel gear, mostly for Otto or the vendor, but otherwise, gold. I was level 22, and though the gold drop stayed the same on the Valdgeist, the XP started to drop with every level. The cruel curve I forgot about, but perhaps it was good. The monsters wouldn’t get any higher level for when—if—Jack showed up, and he’d be able to take some on himself.
He still hadn’t messaged me. Still. Eleven hours since my message and no reply. If Jack didn’t show, there was no way Otto and I could duo it. If Jack or I died, we would respawn. It would suck, but it would be fine. But if I tried to do this with just Otto, I would lose my only friend. Even if Otto stayed behind, if I failed, we could all be stuck under Osmark’s boot. But maybe his slavery would be better than my NPC’s death.
I checked the social tab on my character sheet again in the sent messages. Yes! Its status was “Delivered, Read”! But, still no reply. What the hell, Jack!
“Abby,” Otto said, a little louder than he needed to, “let’s head back.”
“No, Otto.” I rounded on him, my finger pointing up at his face as I closed in. “I’m only level 22. There’s no way that’s high enough for whatever is in that dungeon. I need to hit 25. I need to hit as high as I can before 2 PM tomorrow.”
Otto closed his eyes, and I could tell it was more than just the exhaustion that was getting to him. “I’m tired. You’re tired. Look at your debuffs.”
I ground my teeth from side to side in frustration, but opened my character sheet.
<<<>>>
Current Debuffs
Tired (Level 4): Skills improve 20% slower; Carry Capacity -40lbs; Attack Damage -15%; Spell Strength reduced by 40%
Thirsty (Level 4): Health, Stamina, and Spirit regeneration reduced by 50%
Hungry (Level 5): Carry Capacity -100lbs; Health and Stamina regeneration reduced by 50%; Stealth 45% more difficult
Unwashed (Level 3): Goods and services cost 15% more; Merchant-craft skills reduced by (3) levels
<<<>>>
Shit. Not that I needed to buy anything right now, nor was it very important to improve my Two-handed Staves skill. In about 20 points it seemed I would unlock a spellcaster buff, but I did need my spell strength, and I definitely needed my regen rates to be higher than... negative. I didn’t realize I’d been popping all my Spirit potions. I was down to three, and two combo potions, which tasted even worse than the Health and Spirit separately.
“So what?” I closed the menu. “We’re not ready for this, and there’s precious little time left.”
He raised both fists and bared his teeth, then took a deep breath. I nearly flinched, but I knew my own NPC wouldn’t hit me. At least, not yet.
“I’m tired, and we’re getting nowhere. These mobs aren’t giving us enough XP anymore, and while the gold is nice, we’re loaded down. This stuff is heavy. I need to sell, eat and drink, take a bath, and sleep. And so do you.”
This was it. I could push him over the edge.
“Yeah?” I threw my hands up in the air. “You’re just
going to give up? Loser! Why would I even want to party with you if you surrender this easily?” I stormed around the corpses, stomping my feet to hold back the tears. If I cried, he wouldn’t believe me.
His eyes widened, forehead creased. “Why are you being like this? We have time to sleep, Abby, and we need it. Come back to Harrowick. I’ll even pay for you,” he offered, and the gesture was sweet—a sweetness I could exploit.
“I’m not some child who can’t make it on her own. I don’t need your money, Otto, and I don’t need your weak DPS for that matter, either. You should sit this one out, since you’re not in it for the win.”
I turned away and crossed my arms, biting down hard on my lip to prevent the sobs that threatened to break through my facade of anger. The muscles around my throat tightened, and my shoulders trembled. I didn’t want to say goodbye to him like this, but I didn’t want to say goodbye with him on the ground, in a pool of his own blood, dead.
“What has gotten to you? Sandra?” Otto grabbed my shoulder and turned me around. It was all I could do not to break down, but he gave me another easy win.
“She was right,” I spat, “you’ve let me down. You’ve failed. All that’s left is for you to die, so why don’t you run along home to Harrowick before you do that.”
I hated myself. I hated the way my words stabbed into his digital heart, one I could clearly see he had. He pulled himself upright, a glisten of tears in his eyes, and sniffed.
“If that’s how you feel, I’ll see myself back to Harrowick.”
I bit down on my tongue, unable to say any more without collapsing into hysteria. I hadn’t felt the closeness of family in so long, and Otto had given me that. At the end of the world, with all of my blood relatives dead or about to die, my greatest family was a few lines of code. I didn’t want him to go, I didn’t want to lose him forever, but I didn’t want him to die, either.
“All right. See you around, Abby, the greatest Sorceress in Eldgard.” Otto pulled a red-ribboned return scroll from his inventory and popped the seal. He gave me one last glance and reached into the glowing portal. White light glowed about his body, and with a crackle, he and the magical doorway were gone.
I dropped to my knees, screaming until my throat burned. A curious Valdgeist stumbled into my vicinity, so with tear-blurred vision I staggered to my feet. I launched a fireball at the form in front of me, then another, then blasted it with the inferno of my desperate fury. Why! Why did it have to be like this?
I smacked down into the flaming, moonlit figure with my staff until it stopped moving and slumped to the ground. I wanted to go home. Not Harrowick. Home to my mother. Home to her couch. Home to die with her when 213 Astraea hit.
I opened my character sheet and stared at the disabled “Log Out” button.
“Damn you! Goddamn you, Robert Osmark! Shit!”
I closed the menu and rolled onto my back, staring at the twinkling stars in the computer-generated sky. It was beauty unfathomable. Blue and pink nebulae shimmered in strange, distant constellations known to the world of Eldgard. An aurora of greens and yellows snaked across the north, over the frost-tipped mountain peaks and into the abyss of uncharted territory.
Find your strength, Naitee’s voice echoed in my mind. I felt weaker now than before. But Otto was my weakness. Otto’s death would be my downfall. Why now, when he was safe, did I feel worse than ever?
I staggered to my feet, desperate to find something else to kill, to take my anger out on. I stumbled through the trees until I found another Valdgeist, but I didn’t cast. My spells were stronger than my staff, true, but beating the thing to death felt better. Taking the scrapes, the hits, felt better. Hurt me. Kill me!
“Damn it!” I stabbed the bottom of my staff through the creature’s face, and it went limp. I dropped to my knees, pressing my forehead to the base of my staff.
I wanted to go home.
But this was home now, there was no escape. I swallowed back my emotion and found my feet again. Though my legs trembled with exhaustion, and my grip was loose on my staff, I fought on. Valdgeist after Valdgeist, until I collapsed.
I checked the time; after twelve Otto would’ve gone to sleep by now, or at least not be in the tavern of the Boar’s Head. I would sleep somewhere else, somewhere away from him. It would be easier.
I grabbed the gold off the mangled Valdgeist and popped a return scroll. The glow of the portal enveloped me, and with a pop, I was back in the warm wooden inn of Harrowick. I knelt on the polished floor, holding my staff tightly as I fought back more tears.
“You’re back.” Meredith’s voice snapped me from my stupor.
She looked tired. She’d been working from early that morning, so it seemed appropriate. But why was she still working?
“He was here,” she remarked after looking me up and down, guessing what it was that left me on my knees and broken.
I tottered as I rose to my feet. “Where is he now?”
“Left, about ten minutes ago.” She wrapped the cloth in her hand around and around.
“Did he buy a room for tonight?”
She shook her head, and I bit down on my lip. “Good,” I lied. “I’ll have a room, whatever’s hot, and a bath.”
“Take your seat.” She gestured to the open tavern.
I looked to Otto’s spot and moved as far away from it as I could. I waited as Meredith brought me a plate of what I’d had for lunch, and a glass of something strong.
“Need anything else?” She stuck her hands in her apron pockets, unlike normal when she asked for payment.
I stared down into my plate of food I didn’t want to eat and shook my head. She turned to leave, then sat across from me instead.
“It can’t be that bad,” she cooed. “Tell me what’s wrong.”
I picked up my fork and stuffed a slice of gamey meat in my mouth, chewed, then swallowed hard to keep the tears from coming back. I picked up the cup and took two gulps, realized it was hard liquor, and took one more.
“I didn’t ask for this.” I set the cup down and pushed it toward her.
She stood, flattened her apron, and pushed in the chair. “It looked like you needed it.”
The barmaid turned without another word and left me alone in the tavern. I bit down my self-hatred, finished the meal and the drink, and dropped ten silver on the table.
There was a hot bath already prepared for me when I got to the back of the inn. I stripped down, placing everything in the repair wardrobe, and stepped in. My frizzy, gore-matted hair straightened, and my skin reveled in the bubbly heat.
But I couldn’t drown out the pain in my heart, the sting of my venomous words. Otto trusted me, believed in me and us, but I let him down. I failed him. And now, all that was left was for me to die.
Solo
ERRH ERRH ERRH! I shot upright and beat my fist at the nightstand that wasn’t there. I fell from the bed and landed hard on the wood floor. My body ached. My head pounded. My gut turned with the fury of an all-night rager.
Errh errh errh!
“Alarm off!” I screamed, holding my ears to no avail until the painful noise ceased.
I opened my character sheet. Nearly 8 AM. I wanted to crawl back into bed and die. It felt as though thousands of tiny needles were poking through my skin, and millions of mosquitos were crawling down them, under my skin, biting, gnawing, and eating me alive. I curled into a ball, forcing my face into my knees as I moaned in agony.
“Ever’thin all right, love?” asked the same old woman from my first morning in V.G.O.
“Yes,” I groaned. “Just feel like shit.”
“I’ll put an elixir out at your table,” the granny said. I heard her take a step, and then she spoke again. “Sigorsped, child. Don’t let Otto get into any more trouble.”
Otto. My heart ached at the mention of his name. He wouldn’t be getting into any more trouble on my account, that was for sure. I idly wondered what all this trouble was he’d been in, but realized, with deep contemp
t of myself, I didn’t need to care anymore.
I rolled onto my back, my insides feeling like they were being stabbed by hot pokers through the whole motion. I rubbed at my face. The only cure for this was food and drink. I had an appointment I needed to keep and a quest that wouldn’t wait for me. The countdown timer at the corner of my vision blinked as it ticked over; seven hours left to get into that dungeon.
The silent countdown I was keeping wasn’t much longer. Twelve hours until I hit my full seventy-two and either died or transitioned. The way this morning was going, it felt like the former was more likely than the latter. All the more reason for me to get this done and figure out what was going on before there was no one left who knew anything was going on.
I crawled to the wardrobe, pulled Wildfire down, and put it on. I instantly felt better, but not nearly enough. The rest of the gear equipped easily, but without much of a benefit, and I used my Obsidian War Staff to prop myself up to my feet.
Though there were no blinking notifications, I checked my social tab one more time. Nothing from Jack. I had to assume he wasn’t coming, and I was on my own. That was fine. I’d been on my own most of my life, and I made it okay. V.G.O. was no different.
I hobbled down the stairs and saw a cup sitting on Otto’s table, but no Otto. Ah, the elixir the old woman spoke of. I shuffled to the booth and sat in my regular spot, looking up at the wall where Otto would normally tower over me. What had I done?
The right thing. I did the right thing. Otto was safe now.
I pulled the cup to my lips and sniffed. It smelled like liquid death, but I trusted the woman enough to take a sip and find out what it was.
<<<>>>
Buff Added
Elixir of Health:You’ve consumed the Elixir of Health! Increase Stamina and Spirit regen by 35% for 2 hours. Regenerate 25 HP/sec for the next 5 hours.
Never doubt the powers of an old wise woman.
<<<>>>
I slammed the whole shot-sized beverage and sighed as the pounding in my head dimmed to a dull ache. The flavor wasn’t as bad as the magic-unlocking potion Naitee had given me, but it still gave me a gross burp I let fly freely without Otto around to blush.