by John L. Monk
Thanks to that salamander, I only needed 400 points more to reach level 4. The leap between levels 4 and 5 took a massive 5250 points. At 400 points a salamander, I’d reach 5 in fifteen more kills. After that, I’d be able to use that Lightning Bolt spell I’d purchased from William.
A long way off. In the meantime, I needed a way to kill repeatedly without having my face fried off in the process.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Taking a break to rest my tired arm, I gazed down the switchback at the sulfur stalagmite forest, searching for any sign of the little bastards. When I again saw nothing, I returned to my task.
For two hours now, I’d been doing something not usually associated with monster killing: I was making apples. Thousands of them, as fast as I could—which turned out to be roughly two a second.
“Apple, apple, apple, apple,” I said, willing them into my hand and chucking them with a machine-like rhythm.
They rolled down the slope and gathered in little depressions. Some of them spilled over to the next switchback, which was steadily filling as the upper pathway overflowed.
Anything trying to come up, in theory, would have to traverse this jumbled, rolling, mushy mess. With luck, it’d slow them enough to cast a second Ice Bullet. If it didn’t work, these apples would make a great garnish for my roasted hide.
After chucking my last apple, I sucked in a deep breath and shouted, “Come on, you bastards! Come and get me! Come on!”
Two of them quickly popped into view … and I began to doubt myself. What if they could jump straight up? What if they could fly? Wasn’t leaping lizards a thing? Very nearly, I almost ran. Then I clenched my jaw and gazed at one as it approached the first mound of apples.
“Ice Bullet!”
Magical morphine and arctic coldness heralded a crack like a gunshot, and a hole appeared in the creature’s upper chest. It staggered, got up, then tried running through the apples. The fruit sloshed and rolled underfoot, causing it to slip. As it scrambled for purchase, I was able to fire twice more before killing it.
ENEMY DEFEATED: Under Town Salamander, 400 EXPERIENCE POINTS
Apples or no apples, the second creature was halfway to me before the spell came off cooldown. It took the first shot hard, disorienting it, but not for long. It got to within ten feet of me before I brought it down with my second shot—and not the three needed for the previous beast.
I’d rose to level 4 off the first one. I now dumped all 5 stat points into intelligence, giving me more mana and more mana regeneration.
To track the damage I was doing, I checked my combat log. Ice Bullet caused a variable rate of damage, ranging from 9 to 20. It caused more damage to fire creatures, and like all spells, had a chance at a “critical hit.” My last spell had critically hit it—a stroke of luck I couldn’t depend on next time.
I toggled off the Enemy Defeated messages, but localized the choice to Under Town. With luck, I’d be killing a lot of these things, and the constant alerts saying the same thing served no purpose.
I had 70 mana left. Possibly enough to kill another with two shots. Rather than risk it, I played safe and returned to the four-way juncture. To pass the time faster, I forced myself to sleep for an hour and a half. With a mana regeneration of 105 an hour, this was enough time to bring me back to 220.
When I got to the cavern, all my apples were still there. The second salamander had strewn them about a little, opening an easier path up, so I called up five hundred more to fill in the trough.
“Here we go again,” I said, and cupped my hands to my mouth. “I’m back, you ugly bastards! Woo, woo, woo! Yah, yah, yah! Come and get me!”
Well, that did it. One showed up at the bottom a few seconds later. This one took four Ice Bullets—low damage per spell, and no critical hits. The salamander made it nearly to the top and even sent a burst of flame my way before it finally died. I was literally playing with fire here. If I called again and two came …
“Come on, you jerks!” I shouted anyway. If I saw two, I’d run back. I had a feeling these creatures couldn’t leave the cavern. Otherwise, that second one would have killed me.
Down below, a salamander poked its head around a small stalagmite and I took it down in three shots. Now I only needed seven more salamanders to level, after which I’d dump my points into intelligence for 50 more mana and 25 mana regeneration. Then Lightning Bolt. Then rinse and repeat for as long as I could before the points spread grew too wide and I had to find bigger game.
This was the “grind” the manual had talked about. And despite all this monster killing, magic, and danger, I couldn’t stop grinning.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
I was getting into a groove of sorts. Kill, kill, kill, then regenerate. I’d summon more apples and then sleep off the remaining time. Then I’d get up and do it again.
After another near disaster, I finally reached level 5. My free points went into intelligence, giving me another 50 mana with which to shoot my deadliest spell yet: Lightning Bolt. It cost 40 mana but hit for a whopping 30-40 points of damage.
I still had a free skill point but held onto it. In-between the useful spells, the game was now offering up “spell features” for 1 skill point each. Why anyone would waste a point to make Ice Bullet purple for no extra damage, I didn’t know. In another level, I could make my Lightning Bolt seem as if five tiny bolts were streaking from my fingers—again, for no additional damage.
A look ahead at spells to come showed multiple levels at a time with no useful combat spells, or spells I didn’t need right now like “Magic Gills” and “Siphon Mana.” The latter would allow me to steal mana from another caster, and the former would let me breathe underwater like a fish. Still other spells were situational, like the various shields: Ice, Lightning, Poison, Kinetic, Fire…
I used my frequent downtime to continue studying the manual. The more I learned, the more I was tempted to slip back to The Slaughtered Noob and purchase the warrior class from Bernard. Doing so would let me use swords effectively—an advantage if I ever ran out of mana. But then I’d have to stand toe-to-toe with monsters…
No thank you.
The manual said multi-classes had great early survivability, but were harder to achieve very high rankings in because of the XP spread needed for each level. It took 1050 points to reach player level 1, 2100 more for level 2, 3150 to reach level 3, and another 4200 to hit level 4. The amounts needed increased dramatically at higher levels. For example, it took 70,682 points to go from level 29 to 30. Skipping the spell modifiers would give me enough skill points to share around. But I’d need a lot of class points if I wanted to raise each class equally, relegating me to low-level skills and yet more useless modifiers.
The more I learned, the more I became aware of just how much planning it took to maximize my advancement.
Players gained 1 class point and 1 skill point for every player level achieved. New abilities were paid for with skill points, but only after advancing in a class—using class points. My player level was currently 5. I’d gotten my first class point at level 1, and I’d applied all my points to sorcerer since then. In theory, by level 100, I could be a rank 100 sorcerer and learn a hundred spells.
After level 100, the dynamic changed. I’d still only get 1 class point and 1 skill point per level, but spells would now cost 2 skill points. The game called these spells “2nd Order” spells. After level 300, I’d get my 3rd Order spells, which took 3 skill points. And so on after that, for as long as I cared to keep leveling.
“Back to the grind,” I said.
When I called for the salamanders this time, they took longer to show up. The first one poked its brilliant orange head from behind a stalagmite—which I’d mentally dubbed the Stalagmite of Death—and I blasted it out of existence with a single Lightning Bolt.
Compared to Ice Bullet, the effect was spectacular—a jagged spark of blue light so bright it left an afterimage. The concussive blast that followed rattled my teeth, and I
’d never felt more powerful in my life. I could only imagine what it was like at very high levels when I found myself battling dragons and hill giants and things of that sort.
No longer worried about salamanders, I proceeded carefully down the apple-strewn switchback, ears perked, staring at every crag and ridge in anticipation. The way was especially treacherous in places because the crush of salamander feet had trampled the apples into slimy mush. What a shame to survive all those monsters, only to slip and crack my head open. One happy side effect: the apple scent mingled with the sulfurous air, freshening it a little.
Feeling happy with myself, I picked up the pace. I’d cleverly figured out how to beat the system—game the game, as it were. Everlife had given me apples and I’d puckishly made applesauce.
I even whistled.
Which, it turned out, gargantuan salamanders absolutely hated, judging by a horrific growl that shook the earth. I staggered but didn’t fall. Then I watched as a lizard the size of an elephant crawled from a crack in the cavern floor. Unlike those other salamanders, this one sported an enormous webbed sail on its back, like a dimetrodon. When the thing saw me, its roar tickled the bones in my chest.
It sucked in heavily, and I dove flat and covered my head. Searing heat licked down my back, and the all-to-familiar smell of smoldering robes and hair filled the air. Screaming in pain, I rolled around to put myself out. My health points had dropped by 20, and my Weak Shield was gone.
The ground shook in successive waves as it stomped toward me. In haste, I cast Ice Bullet, then Lightning Bolt. When all that did was piss it off, I ran.
With bad scores in so many stats, I wasn’t even close to fast, but there were a lot of obstacles in-between me and the monster. I could dodge in and out fairly easily, whereas it was too big to do more than barrel through.
My foot caught the lip of a hole and I cartwheeled into a particularly large stalagmite, smashing it so hard I dropped another 10 health points. In a daze, I scrambled to my feet to resume my flight, but it was too late. The creature had caught up to within chomping distance.
The giant salamander’s up-close roar was so loud I fell over in shock. As I watched in horror, it unrolled a huge, scarlet tongue and slurped my entire body in a scalding blanket, burning me down to 100 health points.
Through the blinding pain, I reeled at the mix of smoke, stinking slobber, and my own sizzling flesh.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Howling in agony, I watched as the monster opened wide to eat me. My only hope was to fire an Ice Bullet through its mouth and into its brainpan for a critical hit.
Just as its head descended to gobble me up and send me back to Martyr’s Square, a pear sailed out of nowhere, smacking it in the head.
Rita!
The beast whirled at frightening speed for something so big. Then it blew a massive blast of fire—away from me, thank goodness. Even so, the air around it ignited, and I lost 2 health points breathing the superheated air.
By now, all my spells except Weak Shield were off cooldown. I considered shooting it with a Lightning Bolt but paused for two reasons. One, it took twenty seconds to fire another bolt afterward. Two, I might not have to do anything at all. The creature seemed to hate pears even more than whistling. It forgot me completely as a deluge of pears began hitting it, this time from a different direction.
I wondered why the monster didn’t shoot fire constantly. Did it have its own cooldowns to deal with? With no time to hunt for an answer in the manual, I simply ran. At the same time, I shrugged off feelings of cowardice for not helping Rita. She was smart, resourceful. She wouldn’t have antagonized the thing unless she knew what she was doing.
I managed to reach the safety of a really big stalagmite before looking back. The monster hadn’t given chase. It was picking its way carefully around the towers of yellow stone in search of Rita.
I ran some more, ducking around every stalagmite I encountered. Occasional roars and blasts of heat punctuated my escape, causing me to smile. If it was still upset, then Rita was still alive.
“Ow!” I shouted as something slapped me in the back of the head, knocking me down. Suddenly the horrible thing was on me, jerking my arm behind my back like a schoolyard bully.
“Going to Ward 2, huh?” Rita said, shoving it up high.
I twisted to face her and she gasped in surprise, or possibly disgust.
“Ow, dammit!” I said. “Let me go!”
Rita jerked my arm again and shoved off.
As I squinted against the pain, my breath caught. The word “Monk” floated over her head, barely visible, next to a “4.” I stopped squinting and they both disappeared. I squinted again and they came back.
“What happened to your face?” she said.
“Huh? Oh … It’s this ring I’m wearing. If I take it off, I’ll die.”
“Good! You’re a lying jerk!”
It had been ages since anyone seriously suggested I’d lied to them. Maybe when I was a kid …
“Are you really level 4?” I said to change the subject.
“Are we competing?”
I pointed over her head and squinted. “Can’t you see it? There’s a number right there next to the word Monk.”
“Oh, that,” she said. “If you squint at people you can see their level and class, but not if they’re higher.” Her face grew stormy. “Never mind that. There’s no wife named Melody, is there?” She shoved me hard, almost knocking me back down. “You know what? Don’t flatter yourself. Pig.”
Rita walked in the direction of the tunnel and I hurried to catch up with her.
“Rita, wait,” I said, searching for the right words. “You don’t understand.”
“That’s fine,” she said. “If I wanted mysteries, I’d be in a spy world. You’re welcome, by the way.”
Welcome? Ah…
“For the thing back there,” I said, nodding agreeably. “Thank you. A lot. I got fried by one of the little ones, and—”
“Don’t care,” she said and fell into a fast jog.
Even with my +5 vitality boots, I struggled to keep up with her. When we reached the tunnel, I was gasping for breath.
One last try.
“Melody’s real … my wife … tried leaving town, but … got killed a bunch of times … friend of the guy who … tell you everything just … stop and listen, dammit!”
Unable to continue, I fell over panting. Way off in the distance, Grandpa Salamander roared a final time as if saying, And stay out!
Stars filled my vision as I caught my breath. How many points did it take to run like her? Had she thrown everything into vitality? Or was it strength?
I yelped when something jabbed me hard in the ribs. Rita’s foot—she’d come back. She still looked angry, though.
Holding one finger up—not that finger—she said, “You get one chance to explain yourself. Why did you lie to me? Why didn’t you just tell me you wanted to do your own thing? I would have understood. I thought you actually had class.”
“I’m so glad you’re giving me a chance,” I said, “and not just piling on everything you can think of without waiting to hear me out. Because that’d be unfair, right?”
To her credit, she didn’t stomp me into jelly. She waited.
I told her about Melody’s death and my last five years alone, then moved to Cipher’s first message—how, being a patron of her gaming, he’d found a way to bring her in as an unregistered player.
Rita stopped me. “Sorry, but … I mean, you seem sincere, okay? But this sounds like total BS. You don’t actually believe someone could reach out and do all that from … what? Inside the game? It’s not possible.”
“There’s more,” I said. “Hear me out.”
She smiled politely, her former storminess replaced by embarrassed patience. Which was fine, so long as she listened.
I described the transference—how Cipher had somehow hacked it to pass me a message. Already I could see the gears working behind her eyes
, coming up with reasons why I might hallucinate such a thing.
“When Bernard said he’d never heard of anyone named Cipher,” I said, “I started to worry it was all an elaborate prank. But then something wonderful happened: I tried to leave town. When I did that, his friend Jaddow killed me twice before I could make it to the hills.”
That got her attention.
“You actually met this guy? There’s really someone named Jaddow? You saw him?”
“Sort of,” I said. “He wrote messages on the arrows he killed me with. Then he gave me 10,000 gold coins. That’s how I bought these rings.” I held up both hands and waggled my fingers at her. “Magical.”
Rita bit her lip as if struggling to decide whether I was crazy or an even bigger liar than she’d originally thought I was.
Hesitantly, she said, “It’s not that I think you’re lying…”
“But?”
“It’s just so bizarre,” she said. “Nobody can contact the outside world once they’re here. It’s actually illegal. The politicians decided way back when the first worlds came online.”
“The way I see it, this guy found a glitch in the system. It seems farfetched, I know. But if he’s not lying … If Melody’s really here…”
Rita didn’t reply right away. She watched me, head cocked a little to the side, weighing my words against her seventy-plus years of life experience.
Eventually she said, “I remember you asking Bernard about him. He said he’d never heard of anyone named Cipher. But he has that perk that lets him know everyone’s name.”
I shook my head. “He just calls himself that. Who names a baby Cipher?”
“Your name is whatever you want it to be here. You can change it by altering your character sheet. As soon as you do, Bernard will know.”
That was a novel thought. I’d always hated the name Ethan. Now I could be Nick or Steve or Buddy. One of the cool names…
“But what if he didn’t change his sheet?” I said. “Bernard would never know.”