"What does that mean? There's a new boss called Punisher, but it isn't a boss, just an elite? And someone already killed him? I mean... you said he's not alive..."
"He's not alive because he became a zombie, Sheppard!" Hung boomed out in his deep bass. "A huge zombie wolf for Christ’s sake!"
"Pf-f..." I replied, trying to affect disbelief.
Before the lethal blow I dealt to Crusher, a hidden effect of the Mark of the Destroying Plague kicked in. The system gave me the option to infect my victim. The mad alpha of the pack died, but was infected. Did that mean he was back? I didn't get any notifications, and nothing new appeared in my interface. But I figured it was worth popping back into Gloomwood to see how the new mob would treat me.
"Boys, Tissa, I'm out of here! How should I know about these phases and other problems? I've only been really playing for three days now! I have no idea how any of this stuff works!"
"Alright, we'll go with that," Crawler accepted my explanation. "Snowstorm must be up to something again. Last year's escape from the nether wasn't enough for them!"
"What about the League of Goblins? How did those little green vermin have the brains to take over the entire criminal world?" Malik exclaimed. "My brother plays a gnome in big Dis. He works in a bank. Some goblin crime ring has scared off all their clients! Those little pipsqueaks aren't afraid of anything! And now they’re shaking hands with the mayor of the capital!"
"So people don’t control everything there?" Hung asked in surprise. "Why..."
"Alright, enough rattling!" Crawler barked. "So then Scyth. We aren't going to hurt you, but we will be very disappointed if you don't tell us the truth. Something happened after we got wiped. Something that killed the boss. And we would really like you to show us the real loot, not this trash. Hung!"
The tank nodded and shook the two green items out of the air.
"Hm? Go get them, they're yours. And give us what belongs to us."
"What the heck makes it yours exactly?" I freaked out. My nerves were shot to hell with all the stresses of the last few days and nights. "You said it yourself: you got wiped. That's all! And I could have taken down Crusher myself without your help!"
"What?" Crawler choked with indignation.
"What is this heresy, Scyth?!" Bomber asked, picking his jaw up off the floor. "Did Crag hit your head too hard or something?"
Tissa gasped for air in silence, but her eyes were laughing. I realized that the best approach to hide the most important facts was to reveal things of secondary concern. To the nether with that, blind luck would take me.
"Well Dementors, let's do this!" I called them closer. "I'll show you that I can take down a rare on my own, explain how it happened, and you leave me alone. And you don't claim the loot from the boss. Shake on it?"
Crawler looked at my outstretched hand mockingly. Hung jabbed him in the shoulder:
"Yes!"
"Alright, Scyth," Crawler squeezed my hand and the other Dementors put their hands in on top. "And you'll also explain how you got three levels in less than three days."
"Ok. Then stay here, I'll be right back."
They didn't have time to answer, just Infect grumbled in dismay when I grabbed the green and ran into town. I quickly reached the tavern, threw everything of value in my trunk, filling it completely and putting what didn't fit in my inventory. And meanwhile I put on my novice’s canvas clothes. A quarter hour later, bombarded by messages from my classmates, I was back.
"Well?" Ed asked impatiently.
"So..." I looked at all of them one after the next. Still trying to find the path of least resistance, I pointed at Tissa: "Melissa, kill me."
"I don't understand..." she drew out her words. "Kill as in to death?"
"Exactly. But make it quick, I want to get at least three hours of sleep before school."
"Come on, Palm this freak already!" Infect pleaded. "Tissa!"
A clump of condensed light lit up her hand. Tissa waved and I was held down tight. I just about went up to my knee in the dirt, but I was still alive. An indifferent white beam drifted in my direction, a bolt stuck in my chest and I died. Nether! I guess light magic wasn't that kind after all!
The phantom pain of death slowly faded away while I lay there lifeless, staring at the Dementors.
"Crawler, I think he tricked us," Hung exclaimed.
"I don't understand," Crawler shook his head. "Where's the trick? He could have just left Dis. Why make us kill him?"
"To make us look like bigger idiots than Crag!" Malik shouted, enraged.
Tissa kneeled next to me and, looking into my dead eyes, asked:
"Alex, what’s going on? Are you making fun of us?"
Alright, it was time. I got up to the shouts of amazement and splayed my shoulders, stretching my stiff muscles after respawn. Tissa frowned as usual when she didn't understand something. I answered:
"I wouldn’t make fun of you. You're serious people, you don't like jokes. But if you want, kill me again. The same thing will happen."
"What the crap? How?" Crawler asked. "And how the hell aren’t you dead? Why do you respawn without full health?"
"I'll reveal my debuff info for a minute. Look carefully..." Burbling their lips, the boys slowly read the description of Patrick's curse. "Basically, I got back up and hit him again. Hundreds of deaths, guys, hun-dreds..."
Tissa, who was the fastest reader, looked dreamily into the starry sky. And when the others had figured it out, Ed “Crawler” Rodriguez gave me a slap on the back. And with all his dumb might, he hugged me and lifted me up, tearing my feet off the ground and shouting right into my ear:
"Sheppard, you son of a bitch! We can use your buff to clear raids in hard mode!"
"What?" Just in case, I walked away, a bit closer to the city. "What the crap makes you say we? I didn't agree on any 'we!'"
Crawler exchanged glances with his clanmates and announced ceremoniously:
"We officially invite you to join our clan..."
Chapter Twenty. Friendly Strangers
DREAMS REFLECT reality. Or so said one ancient psychologist. The three hours I managed to sleep before school, though, didn't reflect any reality. In my dream I accepted Crawler's invitation and joined the Dementors.
Ed’s idea was basically like this: raid dungeons would not reload as long as at least one group member was still inside. And the only survivor after a wipe would always be me. But I could use the Stone of Resurrection to bring Tissa back. They told me it was an extremely expensive crafted item that could raise any dead group member as long as they were still in their body. And a player could lie as a corpse as long as at least one member of their group remained in the raid.
The Dementors had emptied out a large part of their clan stores to get the money for this artifact. They were planning to take advantage of Infect's invisibility. He could leave combat mode, raise Tissa, then the priestess of the Radiant God could use her ability to bring back all the rest. A great idea. This way the whole clan wouldn’t have to run back after a wipe to redo a whole ins from the beginning, just hoping no one else got in there in the meantime. But as it happened, the high-level mobs would drag Infect out of stealth and tear him to bits. The artifact was no use, but they hadn't sold it at auction. They kept it.
In our whole sandbox, there was only one raid dungeon that hadn’t been passed yet. It appeared long ago in the Olton Quarries and was called Evil from the Depths. The minimum recommended level for it was eighteen. And no one in the sandbox was that strong. It took Crawler nearly two years to hit sixteen. And after two years in the sandbox were up, players got forcibly transferred to big Disgardium, even if they wanted to stay.
Basically, all that time Evil from the Depths was sitting there ripening, expanding, conquering new territory. Now, the reward for passing it was the stuff of fairy tales. The city council increased the prize for passing Evil just about once a month. The bosses and mobs inside were growing in level, and along with that the drops improv
ed qualitatively. And most importantly, it was a guaranteed achievement: first pass and First Kill of a final boss, who few had even seen yet.
So basically, I dreamed I joined the clan and we passed the Olton Quarries. And I didn't die there, instead getting taken by the Curse of the Undead. And the very same day a hunt was declared for me not only by my own clan, but the whole sandbox, including Patrick the drunkard. In my dream they were chasing me around Tristad with torches and pitchforks then caught me. And before once and for all expelling me from Dis, Chief Councilman Whiteacre ceremoniously announced:
"Undead must lie in a grave!"
And Patrick nodded, saying: "Cursed undead! Could have found a little copper for old uncle Patrick!"
My dream was so overwhelming I almost chickened out, and played sick to skip school. I would have had to fake an illness for that and send it to the system. I didn’t actually know how to do that, but I had heard it was possible and I was about to look into it. I heard, for example, of classmates who had raised their body temperature by drinking a ton of coffee or by taking a few drops of iodine.
While I thought about it, not getting out of bed, my mom walked in and unceremoniously forced me awake so she could get my bedsheets off to be cleaned. I meanwhile decided it was easier to sit through my lessons than figure out how to get to a pharmacy for some iodine to raise my temperature.
I got to school as usual with Eve. She was talking the whole time, but the color of her room in her new house seemed like such a trivial problem that I just about slapped her. Good thing I held back. I mean, was she even remotely at fault for having an easier life?
The city was blanketed by a featureless sheet of clouds. The skies were only cleared over neighborhoods for citizens of category D or above and our neighborhood was not one of those.
Eve, sensing that I was getting farther from her and not listening, jabbed me in the shoulder!
"Alex!"
"Sorry, I wasn't listening. What were you talking about?"
"A gift for my birthday! I asked my parents to get me the ‘Total Babe...’ It's a package including plastic surgery, face correction and..." Eve went a deep shade of red.
"What?"
"Alex! Don't make me say it!"
"A sex machine?"
"No dummy!"
Eve got mad and didn't say another word to me until we arrived.
I knew that her gift included a robot lover though. And it would teach her... everything. My parents had an old-fashioned mindset when it came to that stuff. They thought all that was overkill. Most kids tended to agree. It wasn’t a cool thing to own. Admitting that you used a doll, even one identical to a person was basically social suicide. And that was why no one talked about them in school, but I knew for sure that Aaron Quan got one from his parents that looked like Denise Le Bon. Sure, he denied it, but he slept with her at least once. Haha, of course we believe you, Aaron "Robolover" Quan!
Just as an aside, Denise Le Bon got paid one hundred million phoenixes for the right to use her image in erotic VR worlds and as a model for pleasure robots. As my father loved to joke, humanity opted not to mend their flaws, just make them less harmful.
In school after first period, Ed and the guys dragged me out into the schoolyard and started giving me another go around. At night I refused them and left the game as Bomber cursed ornately. In the morning they were standing watch at the front door of the school, but I arrived with the bell and Tissa just stared at me all class. From behind, Hung kicked me in the back and Malik whispered my name forebodingly: "A-aa-le-ee-ex!" When I turned around, he had his hands folded at his chest, pretending to pray. I shook my head and didn't look back again.
"You little bitch, Sheppard, don't make me push hard!" Hung pressed me to the wall with his hand, holding me in place.
"Alex, hun, why do you break so easy? You’re like a little girl!" Tissa joined in on the fun. "Oh well, if you don't want to be in the clan, that's your right. But join a group and come with us. We'll get the achi and you can go. How about that?"
"Aw nether, Alex!" Ed shook a fist at the wall next to my head. "What the heck?"
"God! Boys, Tissa, do you realize you're making this much harder than it has to be? Who taught you to negotiate like this? I could get through that dungeon on my own once I level up. That's one. And two, you can't intimidate me with violence! Okay, let’s say I join the group, we go to the ins and you die. I could just not use the Stone of Resurrection! Weren't you told that people only work together if everyone benefits? Sure, you get what you want. But what about me? Why should I share experience and loot with you?"
"Like I said, he won't do it!" Malik cried. "Tissa, I always told you he was a freak! So he’s playing Dis now, who cares? Inside, he's still the same Alex Sheppard we've known since first grade!"
Ed cleared his throat, then said gloomily:
"Hung, let him go. Let him waste his time."
"We shouldn't have helped him yesterday!" Malik kept up his malice. "He wasn't worth it!"
"Not at all," Ed disagreed. "We never let outsiders take one of our own... no matter how big of assholes they are."
Tissa wanted to say something, but kept silent. Ed understood that I was not going to answer, and waved a hand:
"Beat it, Sheppard! Use your cheaters' ability, level up... If you change your mind, you know where to find us. Let's go, guys!"
Hung took his hand away. They left. But I just stayed there for a while, sensing a strange frustration burbling up in my chest.
When I got back to class, my cheeks were burning. I was trying not to meet eyes with the Dementors. Ed made me feel really bad, and I was thinking about it the whole next class before I made up my mind.
It wasn't easy but I seemingly had begun to understand what Rodriguez meant when he burned Eve and said I didn't have any friends. Yesterday when they went to bat for me it was... Not just nice but somehow... special or something. It gave me a rich mixture of emotions. Joy, pride, satisfaction at a just conclusion. And all that from a positive ending to the Crag situation. So I decided to take a risk.
After class, when I wanted to talk with them, Greg held me back. The history teacher dug around in his tablet and brought up my success profile.
"Look, Alex. This is your report for the week. Your activity level in class has fallen by eighty-four percent. Is everything alright? Is something wrong?"
Actually, a lot was wrong: my parents' divorce, the fear of not passing my citizenship test, keeping my threat status and my relationship with the Dementors. But admitting to any of that would mean coming under observation of the academic council. Of course, their purpose would be to help me, but I couldn't see a single way that might be to my advantage. Most likely, they would just pile on with questions, do my parents’ heads in and assign me a mentor. And a supervisor was the last thing I needed. So I smiled and shrugged:
"I'm doing just fine, Mr. Kovacs. Just wonderful!"
"Oh yeah?" he angled his head in mistrust so he would seem the same height as me – another of the psychological tricks Greg was famous for. "Alex, you can be honest with me. I remember you on your first day of school when you were just six. I’ve watched you grow up!"
"Everyone grows up, Mr. Kovacs..." I shrugged again, looking around nervously. I wanted to talk with Ed, Tissa and the others but not in Dis.
"You can call me Greg, Alex."
"Greg, everything is A-okay! Can I go now? My friends are waiting."
"Alright, go. But if you want to talk, you know where to find me..."
Hey, what was that? This was the third time I had heard the words "you know where to find" today! This morning, after breakfast when dad forgot he was going to divorce mom, and asked her where his socks were, she answered:
"You know where to find them, Mark! And if you don't, better learn to leave your things where they belong!"
To be honest, she was not right. My father and I always remembered where we put our things. The robot cleaner didn't touch them, but mo
m had a habit of "putting things away." That was when she moved our stuff to where, in her opinion, it belonged. And those places were always changing, so finding a t-shirt you threw on the couch in the morning could be a truly legendary quest by evening.
There was a bothersome fine mist coming down outside. The launchpad was already empty. Not even one flying car, and almost no school kids. Only two people stood out under the roof: Eve wrapped in a beige overcoat and under her airstream umbrella, and just next to her was Tissa, shivering. Schafer’s face was under a hood, and her hands were in the pockets of her baggy hoodie. When she saw me, she waved. Eve took an indecisive step toward me and glanced at Tissa.
I walked toward them.
Class-A Threat (Disgardium Book #1) LitRPG Series Page 17