by Deck Davis
He had been wealthy before the game and was wealthy within it, and the people who joined his Magnificent Elven guild were happy to overlook the fact he was a level one rat with no discernable skills, because he bought them the best armor and swords that Soulboxe’s traders could offer.
It was laughable. He hadn’t leveled up a single time in Soulboxe. He had barely any skills. All he cared about was being able to command people. To boss them, have authority over a guild who he knew was only sticking around because he bought them rare items.
Despite the fact that he’d earned nothing in Soulboxe, and in rising to guild master rank without doing so had gone against every credo of the game, Gilla had some respect for him. She’d fought against the Elven, and although Zayne never bloodied his own hands, his battle organization was tight and his strategies tough to outmaneuver.
Finally, there was Violetta, the leader of the Bellringer guild, who wore black robes and who rarely spoke to people outside her guild, guarding her words like each syllable cost gold. As an old institution of Soulboxe, the Bellringers had developed their own customs of playing the game and even had the rudiments of their own language that was a mix of English, nonsensical abbreviations, and Pig Latin. They were about as insular a guild as you could ever find.
Violetta wore a pale white mask with her features painted on it in purple. She never took it off, leading some to suggest that Violetta wasn’t a single person, but more of a role, and one that different members of the guild took turns in playing it.
The only thing people knew for certain about her was that she carried Abyssal Shard; a sword that looked like it had been carved from metal carried to the ground by a heavenly meteor and still seemed as hot as the day it had been forged. It was one of the few weapons in the game that transcended the rating system, going beyond mythical and legendary, and the offline auction for it had been a bitter war. The winner of the auction had chosen for their account to be anonymous, but it wasn’t long before Violetta was seen using the Abyssal Shard to slice the legs off a rock troll like it was made of jelly.
Penny, Zayne, and Violetta. Three guild leaders who didn’t share much love for Gilla. Then again, few guild leaders did, because Gilla got competitive in tournaments and she said things she shouldn’t when the Striders lost.
None of that mattered now that she needed to get them all to work with her to repel the wave. They could hate her all they liked, but they’d have to listen. Even so, it might have been better to send Lamp to do the talking, if there wasn’t a chance he’d get sidetracked scanning the legacy of the leader's weapons and armor, and completely forget what he needed to do.
The leaders stared at Gila as she walked over to them. All except Penny, who couldn’t take his eyes off his Fleet archers, desperate to go correct their posture while drawing their bows or something.
Their gazes sent flutters of anxiety through her. She already knew what they'd say, but she couldn’t guess at their reactions. She was surprised they even agreed to wait there to talk to her, but she guessed that the prospect of being the first to survive the Reach's Blood Wave was a tonic that eased the hate irritating their throats.
An archer cut in front of Gilla and approached Penny. He had a silver archer badge floating by his head and a bronze knife and arrow next to it, the sign that he was a fletcher. He was carrying a quiver jammed full of arrows.
"Finished," he said. "Took me all day, but we have two dozen arrows each."
Penny, who still wore his tattered beggar robes, all holes and stains, even after becoming guild master, picked up an arrow. He pinched it between his index finger and thumb, turning it around to inspect every inch. Then he snapped it in half.
"Pure shit," he said.
The archer showed no emotion as if he'd expected the rebuke.
Zayne smiled, his rat nose pinching and showing a glimpse of yellow teeth. "Just buy your guildmates their bloody arrows, you stingy bastard."
“You would say that,” said Violetta. “You can make a problem go away with gold, but you won’t learn anything from it.”
"Why buy what you can make?" said Penny, drawing the string of his beggar robes to tighten them around him.
Zayne waved his hand dismissively. "I'm surprised you don’t have your archers sitting outside forts with their quivers out, begging for arrows."
"We tried that last year. The NPCs don’t like beggars hanging around military outposts. The soldiers are programmed to attack."
Violetta, her robe dipping over her forehead so that only the nose of her mask showed, was running a whetstone over Abyssal Shard. The meteor black metal looked like it'd slice a person’s irises in half if they looked at it for too long. The blade didn’t need the whetstone – it actually looked like the blade was damaging the stone - but sharpening it was a way for Violetta to remind the other masters that she had the blade.
"Can we get on with this?" she said.
The archer ran off with the rest of his arrows intact, and Gilla felt the stares of a beggar, rat, and a ghost-white mask upon her.
"So far we've bungled our way through the waves," she said. "Night one was the easiest. People were still respawning, and the weavers came through slower and fewer. Even then, it was a shitshow. People stopping mid-flight to loot, others hiding away and shitting themselves until it was over."
"Your point is that it was everyone for themselves?" said Zayne, his whiskers flaring. He looked like he was smirking, but that might have just been the way his rat face was molded.
"The way it should be," said Penny.
"For once, I agree with the beggar," said Violetta, making a show of sheathing Abyssal Shard. Gilla had to admit that the sching sound it made when it was sheathed was extremely satisfying.
She tried to make herself relax with a deep breath. "Funny you say that, Penny," she said. "Every man for himself is the proper way of things."
"A man has a duty to himself, but no one else."
"Yet you got where you are begging for a piece of everyone else's gold. What if they'd told you that it’s every man for himself.”?
"More fool them that they didn't. Besides, you have no idea why I chose to rise that way. There are a thousand ways to make gold in Soulboxe."
"So why choose the one that relies on charity?"
Violetta stood up. Her black robes flapped behind her with the sudden movement. "There are a couple of NPC fishwives in the Kirby dock who have more interesting things to say than you three. Tell me what you want, Gilla. If the Bellringers hadn't been caught up in the wave while we were crossing through the Reach, we wouldn’t even have stopped here long enough to piss. As it is, a few of us want to see what happens in the end. That’s the only reason I’m here."
"That's something we're agreed on at least," said Gilla. "We want to see what happens if we survive this. The wave is on its way over the plains, only we don't know what is in it."
"You don’t use fog to hide a bunch of orb weavers," said Zayne. "My scouts said the mist must cover a few miles square. This is something else."
"Right. It's the last night of the wave, and we don’t know what's coming. This is why I wanted us to talk. I wanted to do it before now, but none of you replied to my messages, so here we are. It's not too late, anyway."
"Just spit it out," said Violetta. "The Shard begs for blood." she ran her fingers over the blade as she said this, making Penny and Zayne exchange glances.
"I want us to work together," said Gilla. "The four of us can lead a single force. A lone wolf does more damage than four poodles."
"It's harder to control, too," said Zayne.
"Either way, we stay together this wave, or we'll all die. There are forty-six of us left in the Reach now, and we're all defending Mountmend. If we agree to work together and tell our people to do the same, we'll have a better chance of winning. Any non-guildies in the Reach will join up when they see us cooperating."
"And what about when the wave is over and loot frenzy starts?" said Penny.<
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"That's the other thing," said Gilla. "I knew that’d be an issue for you, Penny. I already thought of that. We agree to all bid equally in the post-wave loot auction. We work together in the wave, and we divide its prizes equally."
"Unenforceable," said Violetta. "You might as well get a tiger to agree not to close its jaws over the mouse you put in its mouth. Penny here will make promises to your face and then plan exactly which part of your back he’ll stick his dagger into.”
Penny was going to speak when Zayne put a claw on his shoulder. "You know she's right, Penny.”
Penny shrugged and nodded.
That was the part Gilla had worried about. She'd expected to be able to convince them to work together while the weavers were attacking, but she anticipated that would change when the end was in sight.
As the weaver numbers thinned, the other guilds would start thinking less about survival and more about maximizing their share of the loot. The fewer people to share it with, the more loot you'd get.
In short, the others would start killing fellow players when they thought the wave was going to end, and that'd put them in danger, because Gilla knew Boxe well enough to know he had many tricks up his digital sleeves, and nothing would delight him more to introduce some kind of boss creature just when people thought the wave was ending.
A compromise about loot was the only way to stop that, but Violetta was right. Promises meant nothing in Soulboxe. Not when there were few consequences for breaking them. The only thing that made a promise strong here was the ethos of the person who spoke it, and she knew that for people like Penny, their promises were made of tissue paper.
"If any of you have a solution for sharing the loot, I'm ready to hear it."
"A duel," said Violetta, stroking Abyssal Shard. "When the wave is over, surviving guild leaders fight to the death. The winner and their guild keep the spoils."
"Spoken like a great white shark tempting me into the water for a swim," said Zayne.
"Count me out," said Penny.
"If we can't agree, we're done," said Gilla. "When we're out on the plains and things are crazy, I want to know the Fleet or the Bellringers or the Magnificent Elven are watching out for me and my guys. I don’t want to be fighting orb weavers and worrying about player killing at the same time."
"Visa Versa, Gilla. You don’t have the most sterling reputation for promises, let's not forget," said Penny.
"That was years ago, and I was just sick of the way things were going. Someone had to do something. Don’t hold it against me because I was the only person to take their thumb out of their ass."
"I'm sure that makes it okay in your head. But worming your way into a guild and seizing it for yourself..."
"I heard that too," said Zayne. "She got Raffi to trust her enough to give her admin rights, and then she kicked him out."
Gilla felt her anger forge begin to heat up. When that thing got roaring hot, she would accomplish nothing. "It wasn’t like that. He was going cra...You know what? Screw that. Penny, you begged from strangers to get your guild. Zayne, you bought yours with Daddy’s fortune. Violetta, I don’t know what your deal is, but you’re hiding something behind your mask. None of you are perfect, and if I had to do something underhand to get the Forge Striders, so what? We’re in a better place than we’ve ever been. Now suck it up, go out to your guild and tell them we're all working together."
Penny stood up. "I think not. Use our arrows on the weavers only for Violetta and her ilk to slay us for the loot? No thank you."
"If Penny's out, then I'm out. One thing he's good at its judging things for self-interest."
Without a word, Violetta strode away, Abyssal Shard swinging from the sheath on her waist, the bottom of her crow feather robes trailing on the stone.
"Sorry, Gilla,” said Zayne.
He and Penny left, and then Gilla was alone, having failed to broker the compromise.
Footsteps approached her. Hesitant ones that she recognized as Lamp's without having to turn around.
"It went amazingly well, I take it?"
"As well as we thought it would." She put her hand on Lamp's shoulder. "Well, I offered them the compromise. That’s the important part. I know for a fact that Penny video streams everything he ever does in Soulboxe. As long as people know that I tried walking the high road, I'm happy."
"Then we'll do the other thing?"
She nodded. "Get everyone ready. Tell them to wait for the signal. After that, you know what we said. Quickly, and without mercy."
"Got it."
Lamp moved off and headed toward Kobe, who now had a finished pile of artificed swords in front of him. Soon, he would go from Strider to Strider and hand them out. Gilla felt a queasiness inside her, a coil of nerves getting tighter. Survive this, and with the rewards they’d earn, they would be in good shape for the tournament.
She was about to open her inventory to double check that she'd chosen the right armor and weapon for the night ahead, when she saw movement in the corner of her eye.
Red Dagger Ralph and Siddel were riding through the Mountmend gates on horseback, returning from their scouting mission. Siddel spurred his black stallion on. Its nostrils flared and spit flew from its lips. An NPC fruit vendor moved her cart out of their path just in time as the two scouts reached Gilla.
Ralph looked scared, and that worried her. He had been with the Striders for two-and-a-half years now, and he never got scared. He slapped his horse hard on the rump, spurring it on, and he looked out of breath by the time he reached Gilla. He had spit in his orange beard and his face was flushed red. Breathing quickly and losing his grip on the reins, he ran a hand through his hair, which was long and golden like sunlight plucked from a summer’s day and spun into strands, and hopped off his horse.
“I’m not going to be happy with your report, am I?” said Gilla.
Ralph took another deep gulp of air. “They don’t mean for any of us to survive tonight.”
CHAPTER 71
Tripp’s mind reeled under another slap from Boxe’s digital fist. His sense of reason tried to sprint for the hills, so he just said what came to mind, sputtering words to regain order in the domain of his mind.
“Three minutes until the wave starts. Warren high-tailed it, and Boxe just splattered Bee into a thousand pieces of orb confetti. It’s now or never. Boxe won’t give us much of a break before his next trick.”
Jon seemed to have recovered himself now. He nodded, a look of resolution on his face. “Now or never. Right. But we know we have to turn the keys at the same time. How are we supposed to do that when it’s just me, you, and Clive?”
It was a good point, and one that led to further questions. The key question being, how were the three of them supposed to fight four creatures, one of which was a sleel?
He felt like Sisyphus in Greek mythology, rolling the boulder up the hill, only Tripp had slipped and the boulder was rushing down at him. Or, given Boxe’s love for tricks, it was more like the hill had maliciously pushed him over and then laughed while it threw a dozen boulders at his helpless body.
Taking all of his artificed items from his bag, he laid three swords and shields and axes in a pile. There were two iron swords with water constantly dripping down the blades, three axes with flames dancing over their sharp edges. The shields, some oval and others more of a triangle shape, bore artificery marks on them. One was emblazoned with an image of tumbling rocks, signifying the earth manus wrought into the metal. Earth beat lightning, and this was to help against the sleel attacks.
“This is everything,” said Tripp. “Grab whatever you need whenever you need it.”
“Let those on the brink of death speak their final words,” said Clive. He focused on two of the gold keys on the ground, raising them with telekinesis and directing one over to the sleel statue, the other to the eisschwarm.
Tripp put his in place in the hornfel statue, while Jon slotted the remaining one into a keyhole on the base of the frorarg mod
el.
“This is it,” said Tripp. “When we do this, we’ll have to fight all four at once; a frorarg, a sleel, an eisschwarm, and a hornfel. I say we take the weakest out first, one by one. Jon, you and I will attack. Clive can use telekinesis to keep the relevant manus-shields in front of us to protect us. If we get rid of the others, we can concentrate on the sleel without the others distracting us.”
Jon nodded. “That’d be the frorarg, then the hornfel. The eisschwarm will be tricky. They like to stay long-range and zap people with ice. They’re mostly made of cloud, so unless you hit them in a specific spot, you’ll slash through a mist.”
“You have fire arrows, right?”
Jon nodded and took a red-tipped arrow from the quiver on his back and held it lightly against his bow, ready to nock it. “Half a dozen.”
“Use them on the eisschwarm,” said Tripp.
Tripp felt his throat close, and an emptiness spread in his stomach. Banishing the feeling to the back of his mind, he gripped his flail tight. “Let me take most of the damage where we can,” he said. “My suit will regenerate. Just give me a potion if I take too much of a battering. Warren was supposed to heal me, but…”
“Forget it. Let’s do this,” said Jon.
“On three, then.”
Their shared nervousness seemed to translate to a feeling in the air. It was like tension but softer, darker, covering everything until the air was sticky with it. The calmest of the doomed was Clive, who waited for the signal to turn the keys with an impassive, almost bored expression.
Tripp took one last look around, feeling every bit like a man standing by the guillotine and letting his senses run free for the final time. The room felt vast and empty now, the domed ceiling seemed to have closed in. He looked at the murals on the wall and saw the center panels, where stark colors depicted Godden and his army battling the orb weavers.