Neverstone: A LitRPG Adventure (The Mad Elf Book 1)

by Ned Caratacus

  Era was bummed out.

  He sat on a small concrete car-blocking pillar at the edge of the parking lot. The ornithomancer's whistle sat in his right hand ready to play but putting it to his mouth required energy that he didn't have.

  The cloudy sky brought a chill to the desert air. Seagulls pecked at the asphalt for traces of food.

  Against his better judgment, Era was starting to miss his days of living on the train.

  [Liv — Jumpscare]

  A small flaming skull popped open behind Era like a firecracker, and he jumped. The seagulls scattered.

  [Era was spooked!]

  Liv snickered. A few bags of gas station groceries sat at her feet.

  “Oh, hey Liv,” said Era. If she did that to Noah, he'd flip out and start crying. Maybe she has me pegged as an outlet for spooking people? Not that I mind...

  “Something buggin' you, Slasher?” she asked. “That's the first word I've gotten out of you all day.”

  Era sighed. “Kinda. Can I vent to you?”

  She sat down on the pillar next to him. “Totally.” He grinned at the sight. It's like we're birds.

  “Okay,” he said. “The Jade Crown has been 'just one of those things' for the past few thousand years. Like, a constant. Sun shines, gravity doesn't let people fly, wind blows, a new Dark Lord shows up twice a decade...and now we're going to get rid of it.”

  She cocked an eyebrow. “Yeah, and that's good, right? No more DLNI act, no more collateral damage, y'know?”

  “Yeah, and I get that. But okay, let's say one night, there's no Moon. Everyone's heading out in the streets, pointing at the sky, all 'where's the Moon?' and whatnot. Turn on the TV—'Breaking news, the Moon has been canceled forever, we are now completely moonless.' What would happen then?

  There'd be widespread panic. Apocalypse cults would start showing up, all 'there's no Moon, ergo, the world is ending, just as the lack-a-Moon manuscripts foretold!' Space travel programs would go bankrupt—no Moon, no lunar colonization. Then the tides! No more Moon means no more tides. Sailors would flip out. Granted, I don't think a lot of seafaring would be negatively affected if the tides went extinct, but that's working under the dangerous assumption that everyone in the seafaring industry has a level head on their shoulders. Sailors would riot with other sailors, the ‘everything's fine’ sailors on one side, and the ‘we're all gonna die’ sailors on the other. Add the lack-a-Moon cultists into the battle and we'd see no end to the bloodshed for...” he stopped himself. “Aw, geez. All that just came out of my mouth, didn't it?”

  “You should be a screenwriter,” said Liv.

  “Do I look like I wanna be homeless again?”

  They shared a laugh.

  “Point being,” he continued, “you can't just change the world and expect the whole population of Luminar to say 'oh, okay,' and carry on with their lives as usual. How many people rely on this Dark Lord Cycle? Even with the best-case scenario, this whole plan goes off without a hitch, victory, no more Dark Lords—we're gonna make the whole world freak the vog out. Win or lose, there's gonna be chaos and death, and there's nothing we can do about it.”

  The seagulls slowly began to return to the parking lot. Paint hissed underneath the Doomwagon.

  “If it needs to happen,” said Liv, “then it needs to happen. Besides, who relies on the exploded hospitals and murdered civilians of the Cycle, other than war profiteers? People like that could use some sudden disappointment for a change.” She pointed to Noah's sign. “Same with people that use the DLNI to avoid accountability—present company excepted. Besides, there's one thing missing from this Moon's been canceled story of yours.”

  “And what's that?”

  She smirked. “Why is the Moon gone? Did it just disappear out of thin air, or did Era the Mad Elf and his terrifying band of thieves steal it, to give its light back to the poor and destitute?”

  Something filled Era's chest—a pleasant burglar of a feeling, which still wasn't welcome in the slightest.

  The bus was flying, and Mischa dangled from the rear axle and screamed bloody murder. A welcome distraction.

  Below the bus, pale blue light glowed in a pattern of hastily-sprayed circles, symbols, and written incantations all over the frame and machinery.

  “Bring it down, Steve!” yelled Mischa. “I know you can hear me!”

  The symbols stopped glowing in a flash, and the bus plummeted toward the asphalt.

  “Wait, wait, notlikethat, slower, SLOWER. BRINGITUP! AAAAHH!”

  [Ofelia — Praetorian Guard]

  Only Ofelia's shield, flung under the bus to form its magical forcefield, stopped Mischa from becoming a thin film of pancakiform viscera.

  He fell from the rear axle, detaching his robot arm from his right shoulder, and landed on the pavement. The bus was guided down gently over him by the floating shield. He crawled out from under it, cheering, just as Era ran up to see what happened.

  “First thing,” said Era, breathless. “WHAT. Second: THE VOG.”

  “We got air power, Little Dork!” said Mischa. “I mean, we gotta go through a few more tests to make sure the thrust glyphs on the back won't atomize us at any speed over 30 miles an hour, and we'll be good to—”

  “Dad, you were almost crushed by a bus.”

  “Keyword being 'almost,' my boy, now pay attention.“ Mischa held up a half-empty metal spray can. “Remember that runic paint I had you grab? Paint a picture, wire the picture to a high-energy power source, BAM! Instant magical effect—in this case, thrust force. Bottom glyphs make it go up, back glyphs make it go—”

  Era grabbed his father by the straps of his tank top. “Dad, look at me,” he said. “You were almost crushed by the bus. Don't do that.”

  Lost for words, Mischa grinned and fell back on his tried and true serious time deterrent: “That's what she said!” He chuckled through clenched teeth.

  Era scoffed. “That doesn't even make sense as a that's-what-she-said! Why would you—”

  Titania peeked out from the door of the Doomwagon—unharmed, but concerned. “By Galgalim's thunder, Sir Mischa, you were almost crushed by the bus!” she said.

  Mischa pointed to her. “There ya go.”

  It was a cloudy, chilly day—a welcome change of scenery from the unforgiving heat of Lottie's Canyon.

  The Chosen Three (and their two “support slot” add-ons, Ofelia and Branwen) were gathered in the couch area of the Doomwagon. Titania stood with an easel and a cheap presentation notepad.

  “Heroes,” said Titania, addressing them, “Your world is alien to me, and so are its problems. I do not understand your enemy's ideals. The phrase 'political correctness' was unknown to me until I saw one of Lord Monty's pamphlets. Insofar as I can tell, the squabbles of the GU and its enemies alike are arrogant and overcomplicated, and I have no other opinion of his cause than that.”

  Her eyes grew darker, as they had when she spoke of House Koschei. “Be that as it may, he's squatting in my castle. For this outrage, I want Lord Monty's helpless cries for mercy to echo throughout the empty halls of Ur-Kobalis, I want his blood to water the wild grass between the cobblestones, and I want bawdy tavern songs to be written of his cruel disembowelment by the wandering spirits of my ancestors.” She caught a quick glimpse of how pale Noah had become. “Or, you know, bring him to a fair trial in your own government, I wouldn't mind that either. For the Light!”

  Era nodded, Liv fist-pumped, Noah clapped, and Ofelia gave a war cry. Branwen bit a seat cushion.

  Titania sat down. “But there remains the question of 'how.' Sir Era told me he has a plan.”

  Era stood up and stretched. Dammit, not the old stage fright again. Keep it together, it's not like this is your freshman recital.

  “Hi,” he said.

  “Hello!” said Noah, waving.

  “Hey, Noah. Okay, um, I haven't really thought of a name for this plan or—”

  “Operation Diet Aether,” said Liv, suddenly.

  Er
a chuckled. “Yeah, okay...what?”

  “Because product placement is a voggin’ gold mine, and we're all broke as hell.”

  “Operation Diet Aether it is.” Era lifted the first page on the notepad, revealing a hastily-drawn map of Pohjola, the glacial continent to the north of Aries.

  “This is Pohjola (pronounced po-YO-lah), a five day journey from here by boat, but a two-hour trip by flying bus. Our enemy is in Kobalheim, which can only be accessed through…” Crap, forgot to draw it, where was it again? He took out a marker and scrawled a swirly magical circle in the center of a mountain range. “This, the Obsidian Gate. From what Titania's been saying, it's some kind of hole in the fabric of space connecting our dimension and Kobalheim.”

  “So, we're just gonna drive there?” asked Liv.

  “Fly, mainly. You got a better idea?”

  “Thoric, remember? That jackass wizard was setting up some kind of teleportation network to get his goons in and out for their Death March. One of us could hack it and show up at their doorstep.”

  “It's hack-proof!” chimed in Mischa from his extradimensional scrap closet.

  “Throw enough money at a programming intern, and nothing’s hack-proof.”

  The door of the closet creaked open, and Mischa's head poked out. “Nah, Liv, I looked into it. Sure, you can access it and get to Kobalheim once, but their teleport gates have gatekeepers. Like, literal, in-person, old-fashioned, magazines 'n' donuts 'n' cigarettes, gun on the hip, sittin' in a booth gatekeepers. If they spot anyone they don't like, they'll block their biometric profile from passing through.”

  He closed the door and went back to his day job: threatening other black marketers on the dark web.

  “He seems to be well-versed in all sorts of your modern human mechanisms,” said Titania.

  “Especially of the 'unhealthy coping' sort,” said Era. “Now, back to the plan...”

  Dust.

  Red dirt under a sea green sky. Black, wispy clouds, and three moons overhead.

  Rows of ivory white towers, long since emptied of their occupants, stood facing a tower of black crystals in the center of the city—the Pyrite Palace. It was shaped like a mushroom and covered in disorganized metallic cubes from the original mountain from which it was carved, and it cast a jagged shadow over the old Gilded Center neighborhood, where Queen Titania's “ring yards” used to produce up to a thousand monsters an hour.

  Seven bridges extended to the “stem” of the castle, over a dark pit of a moat—the bottom of which has never been explored, and best left that way.

  At the third, southernmost bridge, connected to a gas-powered generator, was a hastily-erected archway of steel, circuitry, particle board, frayed copper wire, and blinking LEDs—the first of the GU's planned teleportation gateways. Monty's cousin John—not necessarily in the GU, but John owed Thoric money—sat in the booth next to the gateway, reading a sword catalog. The aimless putt-putting of the gateway’s diesel generator echoed across the empty canyon.

  The archway hummed with gathering power, and a screen of light quickly formed to the basement of Jones Manor. Monty pranced through, and Thoric followed in a significantly less prance-tastic fashion.

  “Gooooood eveniiiing Kobalheeeeeeim!” bellowed Monty.

  Thoric sighed. “Teleportation network test successful, My Lord.”

  Back on Luminar, a sliver of orange to the west was the only indication that the sun still existed.

  A trench of ten meter deep snow sat between two mountain ranges. A roving band of Red Pohjolan Screech Penguins slid through the snow on their yearly migration to the breeding grounds, where they would proceed to scream at a glowing radioactive rock, not procreate, and wonder why their species was slowly going extinct. They were one of Era's favorite birds, if only for their relatability.

  Smoke seeped from the rear end of the Doomwagon. The front half was still submerged diagonally in the snowbank. Steve wasn't as magnificent of a pilot as Mischa had anticipated, and Operation Diet Aether was already having its hiccups. So, Mischa and Steve ran around the bus, frantically making repairs.

  Era, with a heat enchantment ring on all ten fingers of his hands, sat on the rear bumper and held his ornithomancer's whistle. Thank Gods Liv stocked up on these rings at the gas station. We're gonna be here for a while.

  He caught sight of the migrating penguins. Might as well make the best of it. Penguin pettin' time!

  [Era — Bird Call]

  [But nothing happened.]

  What? Lame. I must be losing my touch. One more try...

  [Era — Bird Call]

  [Still nothing.]

  The penguins slid away to the east, ignoring Era completely.

  Dammit. Why, though? I was nice and loud, so it should have worked. Not that I'm entitled to any bird's attention, of course, but this just isn't logical!

  Let's see...

  Hypothesis one: The birds are all deaf. Very unlikely and relies on coincidence.

  Hypothesis two: The whistle doesn't always work, so maybe they're resistant to the tone. Unlikely, but still plausible. There were too many penguins for all of them to ignore it completely, so at least one should have feigned interest.

  Hypothesis three: They're being chased by a predator, and don't have time to hang out with magical luring instruments.

  That last one seems the most likely—and we might be in danger. Pause for a sec, gotta take a listen...

  Turning his ear to the wind and tuning out the noise in his head, only the wind, his dad's magic, and galloping footsteps on the—galloping! Four-legged predator, a wolf or a fox by the sound of it. He listened harder. A big one. Harder. In the near distance. Harder still.

  Coming this way!

  “Dad, we got company!” said Era. “Get behind something!” He scrambled into the crow's nest.

  Mischa looked around, unaware of any “something” in the snow that he could hide behind. He heard gentle footsteps at his feet, and Steve stood out in front of Mischa, volunteering as cover. A noble effort.

  Era returned with Liv and Ofelia—there weren't enough heat rings for the others, who remained at the snowed-in in front of the Doomwagon, bundled up and sipping tea.

  “All right, what’s the sitch?” asked Liv, her staff at the ready.

  The aforementioned “sitch” made itself known with an all too familiar war cry: “Wolf mourns not the rabbit, you bastards!”

  Era drew his sword and turned to the source—there sat a GU centurion, clad in a bulky arrangement of fur coats and scarves. He had no weapons to speak of, save for a small pistol in his off-hand.

  The real issue came from the tank sized black wolf he was currently riding—the GU's man-eating, fangtastic mascot, weighing in at a whopping two thousand pounds, two years overdue for all his shots, the one, THE ONLY…

  [Boss Battle!]

  [Barney ~I hate you, you ate me, I'm a human fricassee~]

  [Bestiary — Barney]

  [Type: Wolf]

  [HP: 300,000]

  [Weaknesses: The fact that his wife, Julia, thinks he's dead]

  [Sing-Along Description: Barney is a giant wolf from Thoric's cruel creation, And when he mauls, he's what we call a true abomination. Barney lives in constant pain. Once, he was a person. When he feasts on human flesh, his anguish only worsens.]

  Oh, and Centurion Ronnie's there too.

  [Boss Battle!]

  [Centurion Ronnie ~Wait, who?~]

  [Bestiary — Centurion Ronnie]

  [Type: Human, Gunner]

  [HP: 2,000]

  [Weaknesses: Lots]

  [Description: Don’t look in his nightstand drawer. Trust me.]

  Era, Liv, and Ofelia hopped down into the snow from the bus. “I'll—“ Era began, stumbling as his peg leg sank into the snow. “Hang on, I disorient 'em, Liv destroys 'em, and Ofelia keeps 'em away from the bus and my dad. Let’s do this!”

  [Barney — Charge]

  Spittle dripped from Barney's blood-crusted teeth a
s he made a beeline for the bus, snarling every step of the way…

  [Era — Trap Strike]

  …only to wonder what that hot, metallic thing in its nose was.

  [13,049 DMG to Barney]

  It wailed, and war pixels scattered throughout the snow.

  “'Sup, guys?” said Era, clinging on to the sword's basket hilt. “How'd you know we were here?”

  “Shut your mouth, Rosie!” said Ronnie.

  “That's cute. Anyway…”

  [Barney — I'll Huff]

  Barney thrashed his head from side to side, throwing Era off his sword and into the snow, face first.

  [Era — Blade Recall]

  With a snap of his fingers, Era’s sword returned to the one hand sticking out from the snowbank.

  [Barney — And I'll Puff]

  Era noticed that his un-snowed-in butt was beginning to feel unseasonably warm, even with the warmth rings on his fingers.

  [Barney — AND I'LL BLOW YOU THE VOG UP]

  Oh. The wolf has fire breath, huh.

  Pretty much, yeah.

  One rush of ‘from wolf throat with love flames’ later, and Era tumbled through the snow, ignoring the searing pain as best he could, and his best was pretty good, as this wasn't exactly a daggerfly attack.

  [5,203 DMG to Era]

  When Era opened his eyes, he had 1,297 hit points left, and lay face up in a deep, freshly-melted valley in the snow, with damp walls three meters high to either side of him.

  This snow goes deeper than I thought. There must have been a blizzard earlier.