Blood and Cupcakes

by Taj McCoy El

  It was a warm day and it was well lit on the floor of the forest. She peered through the wood and saw a trail of people in elegant clothes from what looked like every era. Pharaohs and Queen Mums walked side by side in a processional of empires and ages. She followed them along their meandering path, making sure to keep an eye open for anything she was “supposed” to be seeing. The line ended in a clearing where hundreds of people danced to music she couldn’t hear. She sat there for a while watching them eat their hor d'oeuvres and tried to figure out what to do. When she stood up to stretch her legs, a member of the party turned to look at her.

  He made the universal “stay right there” gesture with his hands and dashed off. He returned carrying a silver chalice. He stood by the tiny stream and gestured for her to come closer. She opened her mouth to say thank you, but he hushed her by waving his hand and covering his overly pursed mouth with a finger. It was the universal motion for “quiet.” Mayah returned the gesture with a confused look. The man looked much relieved. He took the silver chalice and handed it to her very, very carefully, making sure not to touch Mayah at all. Mayah looked in the chalice and saw a mostly clear green liquid. She looked at the man and nodded in thanks. He smiled.

  But when Mayah lifted the chalice to take a drink from the chalice, the man flipped out, his arms waving wildly, motioning for her to stop. Mayah stepped back with a jerk at his commotion and a drop of the liquid splashed over the side of the cup landing on the forest floor. It left a sizzling, smoking, blackened spot on the verdant carpet. She stared at it with wide eyes. The man saw realization spread across her face. He mimed relief by wiping his hand across his forehead and smiling.

  Mayah hoped she was gesturing, “What am I supposed to do with this?”

  He pointed off into the woods, waved goodbye and went back to the party.

  Well, I guess I better go that way, she shrugged

  She began her trek through the wooded vale and found the magical barrier between two trees that formed an arch with their branches. This time she stepped through holding the goblet out to the side as far away from herself as possible.

  Don’t want to spill any of this on myself.

  She found herself back in the original hallway rushing at the opposite wall. She stopped her forward momentum with a slap of her hand against the wall.

  She yelled out, “You do know that some of the things we come back with are dangerous, right?”

  "Everything here is dangerous if used improperly.”

  “I came back with a full cup of some acid. It could have killed me.”

  “Look into your chalice.” She looked and saw that the liquid had turned into a crystal bearing a rune.

  “That is the rune for Acid (D). It was turned into a form safe for transport when you touched the barrier.”

  “So, the path of life gave me Acid (D)? That’s weird.”

  “That was the path of death.”

  “But there were people there, dancing.”

  “There were spirits there. You obviously didn’t speak whilst in the realm of death. If you had, you would’ve been terrified to death or at the very least driven insane.”

  Mayah felt that the voice was speaking literally and not figuratively.

  “Speaking to the spirits disrupts the spell placed over the veil and alters your perception of them as well. It took 14 novice runists going insane for us to ward that tunnel.”

  “That would have been nice to know beforehand.”

  “Are you ready for your third trial?”

  “Yeah sure, it’s not like I'm doing anything else," she huffed.

  Silence.

  “This kinda sucks…” She put the chalice and crystal into her bag, returned to the central chamber and repeated her selection process. “Okay, here we go again.”

  The tunnel opened into a chamber filled with flowing magma cascading over rocky walls. Ash and brimstone were heavy in the air, burning her nose and the back of her throat. The heat stifled her breath, drying her mouth in an instant and baking her eyes.

  I guess this is fire.

  There was a pedestal in the center of the chamber with a golden circle drawn around it. She walked through the heat waves that rose from the floor while they half-scorched her legs and feet. She hopped from foot to foot like a desert lizard or a tourist on a hot stretch of sand. A small flame floated on top of an empty brazier ahead of her, slowly changing color: orange to red to a deep purple then blue, then green and finally yellow and back to orange. Her feet cooled once she passed the golden circle and she breathed a sigh of relief.

  Even though you could feel some pain in Majesta she warily reached out to touch the fire. It flowed up her arm and engulfed her whole body, expanding into a bubble spreading 10 feet all around her. The room shook as fist-sized rubble fell towards her from the ceiling. They hit the fire that was emanating from her and burned into cinders instantly. She could feel the hits draining her mana. She located the archway on the other side of the cavern, made a beeline through it and the portal that lay beyond and found herself in the main hallway again. Her shield constricted down to a small, bright rune of flame.

  “I guess that's the rune for Shield (F),” she said to no one.

  The voice responded, “After you choose your last rune you will return to Majesta. Only a few moments will have passed. I gift you now your runebook.” A thick leather-bound tome with brass binding straps. materialized out of a golden light that floated down and rested just in front of her. She reached out and the light disappeared as soon as she had a grip on the book.

  “It will hold all of the runes you manage to learn. If you learn a rune, copy it into the book and you will not be given that rune again. It will also count as experience towards new levels.”

  “Cool—I won’t have to return here to get all the runes I want.

  “Thank you,” She said to the disembodied voice.

  “For what?”

  “Oh, I don’t know… giving me this awesome gift?”

  “You’re…. you’re, welcome runist,” the voice stuttered. It seemed as if its manners were long out of practice. Mayah didn’t miss that fact. “Fare thee well on the path of knowledge." The voice sounded a little flustered.

  If I ever come back I need to ask some questions.

  She undid the book’s simple locking mechanism and opened the book. The three runes she knew were already inscribed. They had detailed descriptions, including mana cost for activation and durations.

  “Okay, last one.”

  She chose an archway and walked forward. The air grew moist and she heard the sound of water dripping in the distance. The walls were slick and water pooled on the floor. Her slippers were definitely not waterproof. More suckage… The water was getting deeper, reaching past her knees. She slogged through it to find a massive cavern filled with an underground lake. Rivulets poured down the walls making the air damp and misty. A small island rested in the center of the body of water. A pedestal on a plinth similar to the one in fire’s cavern sat there beckoning her. Instead of a flame, water poured out of the bowl that lay atop it. She waded to the island and climbed up out of the water. When she looked behind her, she saw the golden ring shining in the water below. She turned back to the bowl. There was a spout allowing the water to flow out in the lip of the bowl without leaving a ripple on its surface. She placed both hands into the bowl, waiting for something to happen. Nothing did. She pondered on the mystery while wiping her hands on her dress. A singular thought occurred to her. Moving from hypothesis to experiment, she returned her hands to the ever-pouring bowl of water.

  I am a little thirsty.

  Her cupped hands rose to her mouth and she drank the water. It was icily cool and very refreshing. A chill ran through her body and as she exhaled, she saw the cold on her breath as the moisture began precipitating as snowflakes. She turned around to take a look into her runebook and stepped on a tiny lance of ice that tried to impale her foot. Frost began to cover her foot and then di
ssipated. That ice wasn’t there before.

  Although it pierced her foot, the ice shard had no effect on her HP. Returning to her book in search of a clue she found the rune on the first page with the others.

  “Spike (W)… looks interesting.” She waded to where she thought the exit would be and found the magical barrier. With a deep breath, she stepped through.

  In that moment, the world glitched. It felt like all of her senses were fracturing. Everything pixelated and went to black. She could see the serpent before her in its ghostly blue outlines. The bolus was there, its eye unseen. The terror of her dream returned. The bolus turned and the eye flashed into view.

  She tried to run, remembering how the serpent had tried to strike her before.

  You….

  Noooo… she screamed in her head.

  You were here…

  Before…

  It didn’t have a voice but she could hear it, in her head. Can you hear my thoughts?

  Yesss…. Yesssssss…. Yesssssssssss. The voice grew thundering and oppressive. If she could do anything but think about fleeing for her life, she would have thought that she didn’t like the sound of its voice.

  …..

  “Delilah??? We’ve got problems!!!” Carelton yelled out from his station in the terminal hub.

  “What is it, Carelton?” Delilah jogged over to his terminal and stood behind him.

  “The virus has found Mayah and its copying massive amounts of data. It’s not corrupting it anymore. I think it’s learning.”

  “This is bad. Get Josh back down here.”

  “Chief, it’s trying to isolate Mayah’s signal from Majesta.”

  “Send me the window.” She ran back to her terminal and started typing furiously.

  …..

  Mayah just lay in the blackness. This thing, it just kept repeating the word yes. She had tried to contact Attactus and her mother but her status screen was gone. She even tried to find the logout button with mental commands, but that was still not an option. None of her screens even opened. When she tried to communicate with it, it had just projected “Yes” into her mind louder and louder and louder. She had passed out a few times from the mental pressure. Her tears of fear had dried up a while ago. She tried to figure out how long had she been here in this nowhere. She could feel the snake thing in her mind, looking in all of the hidden corners of her memories. She had no power, but she was getting plenty of attention.

  Suddenly, a bright flash of light made the snake thing recoil. The darkness crystallized and broke into shards as pixels quickly came back to life. She found herself sitting with her back to a tree, the very same tree where she started her runic journey. Her hands held her new runebook laid out on her lap.

  That wasn’t a dream. She quickly messaged Attactus tech support to see what had happened.

  Princess.Cuddle.Fluff@MajestaWeb - What are you guys doing out there?

  Techsupport@Attactus - The virus that is keeping you in your pod tried to isolate your signal from the Majesta servers. We have corrected the problem and are putting other defenses in place. Can you tell us what happened on your side?

  Princess.Cuddle.Fluff@MajestaWeb - It started off earlier, as a dream about a giant Ouroboros snake this morning. It was hundreds of miles long. Its head and tail, are tied in a freaking Gordian knot. Only one eye showed itself through all of the coils. It tried attack me and I woke up.

  This time though, I was returning from the Hall of Runes and it held me there in that nothingness nowhere space. It felt like it was rummaging through my mind and all of my memories. All of a sudden, light was pouring into the darkness and I was back in the game proper. I messaged you ASAP. I'm getting the sense that this virus is getting stronger and growing.

  Techsupport@Attactus - That was very wise of you. We will continue to work on extracting you from Majesta. Please message us if anything like this happens to you again.

  Princess.Cuddle.Fluff@MajestaWeb - Roger that, but when it had me, I couldn’t communicate with anyone. None of my screens worked. So, if you could do something about that it would be a great help.

  Techsupport@Attactus - Thank you for the information. We will look into it for you.

  Well, that was interesting. Her head rolled back against the rough bark as she thought about what would and could happen to her. I've been safe so far and it’s been less than 24 hours in real time since I’ve been stuck in here. I guess that’s not too bad as far as things go. One day to fix a mutating and now sentient virus may be a lot to ask.

  “Wait, how do I know it’s mutating?” She said aloud. Her mind rolled over her imprisonment. It was looking for a way out. I could feel its frustration. But it was different from before as well. I'm sure of it. I don’t know if it could talk before, but now it certainly likes to say ‘yes’ a lot.

  She ruminated on this until she ran out of information. With any reasonable conclusions well out of her reach, she pushed those thoughts to the back of her mind. Giving it a last look, she decided to alert Attactus.

  Princess.Cuddle.Fluff@MajestaWeb - Looking back at my ordeal I remembered that the Ouroboros is looking for a way out.

  Techsupport@Attactus - Thanks. That will help us with our predictive models. Stay safe in there.

  Now what am I going to do with these runes? I know I need so many more of them, but any start, whether good or bad, is a start. She stood and made her way back towards the smithy. On the way, she saw a cobbler’s shop and walked in. After inquiring about different footwear choices, she found a pair of black, thick soled, waterproof, hobnailed boots with a durability of 200 and a +2 to stamina. After the incident with the ice going through her slippers, she wanted to make sure her feet were protected. She also purchased a basic cobbler’s tool kit and some red leather shoelaces. The boots fit perfectly and added a little bounce to her step as she walked through the market. She really liked the bright red laces.

  As she approached the smithy, she realized that this was the first time she had actually seen it from the market side. It looked like a large, gabled barn with walls that could be opened or closed depending on the weather. Right now, they were open and the pealing “ting, ting, ting” of hammers on metal rang out across the marketplace. Big burly men, some twice her size, some triple her width, walked about bringing glowing metal to anvils, stoking forges or fitting pieces of armor together. She stood in one of the doors looking for John when a barbarian-looking brute stepped up in front of her.

  “Whadd’ya want?” The disinterest and condescension rolled off his sloped forehead in a palpable avalanche. His face and body language said he had much better things to do than stand here and wait for her answer.

  Before she had a chance to say anything, he snapped his fingers twice in rapid succession right in front of her eyes. “Hey, you, whadd’ya want???”

  Fire blossomed in her chest. Did he just snap at me??? Awh –awhhhhn, he did not just snap at me. The fire in her chest hatched a plan in her brain like a dragon egg. This little dragon was going to make him pay, in blood.

  She stared at him with innocent, unknowing eyes. She took a big swallow to enhance the false timidity and said “I... I’d like to learn bla… blacksmithing.”

  “Why don’t you come back when you learn how to speak and put some muscles on those arms? I could barely hear you over the racket in here. I don’t even think you could lift one of the little hammers—Maybe this isn't for you.” he said, turning to walk away. Mayah really, really wanted to show him what kind of hammer she could lift. She was proud of her restraint.

  “B... but I’ve got the blacksmithing skill?” she phonily implored.

  “You’ve got the skill,” the brute leaned down to her height and put his hands on his knees, “but you ain’t got no skill,” he said looking directly into her eyes.

  “This is where I'm supposed to train it right?”

  “Look, what’s yer name?” he asked, returning to his full height. Mayah was glad he had done so because she wanted
to put her new boots through his face.

  “Fluff,” she said meekly wringing her hands. I can’t believe he’s actually buying this.

  “Okay Fluff, here's the deal. This is man's work and a little girl like you shouldn’t be in here where you could get hurt. So why don’t you move along now or make a purchase over at the counter. Either way...” He shrugged his shoulders and looked past her head as if she wasn’t even there.

  ‘Well I was told to speak to John? He’s the head blacksmith here, right? If I could just talk to him for a mome….”

  “Look,” he said, angrily cutting her off, “why don’t you just shove off, there's nothing here for ya.” He made the shooing gesture with both hands.

  Got’cha, ya smarmy chauvinist shaz-sucker. Mayah assumed her real voice and attitude. “So, let me tell you something, you giant simpleton.”

  His face went from confusion to understanding and then indignation, shocked as her personality instantly transformed.

  “I'm here at the PERSONAL INVITATION of John Maam and will not be talked to like a filthy rag. What right have you to bar any player from entering into a trade training facility in a TRAINING village?”

  Her voice had risen and hammers had stopped. “If you don’t get John for me right this instant I might teach you a lesson or two about what ‘a girl’ like me can do. DO… YOU… UNDERSTAND?”

  “Travisty,” John growled the name as he appeared from behind a forge. “What are you doing?”

  “He wouldn’t let me in.” Mayah tilted her head then crossed her arms, her cockeyed stare burning directly into Travisty.