by John L. Monk
“Quiet, Larry,” Lord Beast said. “You’re just in time, Mister Ethan. Almost got enough griefs to kill the dragon right from under the turncoats. I’m offering quarter points for griefs only, but I’ll make an exception for you, being Hard Mode and all. Everyone knows my word’s good.”
Nodding all around confirmed that yes, indeed, his word was good.
“But I get the girl,” he said. “Supposed to be prettier than even the dryad. Helluva lot safer, too.”
When he chuckled, the men laughed with him, on cue. The diviner affected a polite, tight-lipped smile.
“Mister Lord Beast,” I said, tamping down a flash of white-hot rage to keep from killing him. “I honestly don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Behind the brute’s eyes, outrage and disbelief fought a fierce skirmish as he tried to determine whether I’d insulted him or not.
“Are you kidding me? Is he lying?”
“Duel! Duel!” the sneerer shouted.
“He’s telling the truth,” the woman said quickly. “He didn’t understand you.”
“I said shut up, Larry,” Lord Beast said, glaring him into silence. Then he looked at me. “You do know why we’re here, right?”
I nodded. “There’s a woman somewhere ahead. You have to kill a champion so you can kiss her. You win lots of points, and … whatever. What I don’t understand is … I mean, I know about griefing, but what’s quarter points for griefs mean, and why does that matter?”
“The XP split,” he said. “We divvy it out. Haven’t you ever raided before?”
“No,” I said.
Lord Beast looked at Dory, who nodded.
When it was clear I was serious, he laughed. “Well, I guess it’s your lucky day. Truth is, we’re pretty close to not needing you, but I’m impatient. Sounds like you’ve never fought turncoats before. They’re usually strong or they wouldn’t dare. Twinks. Only way to deal with them is to get a group like this”—gesturing around him—“and trick the traitor into killing them three times. After that, they can’t touch ’em. Still need a lot of people with lives to spare. This is Ward 2, after all.”
The guards, who I now saw as his core group, chuckled darkly. Like Lord Beast, none of them were Hard Mode players, which meant they had at most a thousand lives to spare. Probably less if they were letting themselves be griefed as a tactic.
I nodded like everything made perfect sense. “And these traitors—how many are there?”
“Two,” Lord Beast said. “A man and a woman. The man’s got some sort of trick going on. Not even Dory can stat him. He’s helping the dragon. Waits for us to attack it, then jumps in the way and gets hit, lifting the penalty. Then he kills us real fast.”
“What about the woman?” I said, hoping she hadn’t lost too many lives to scum like this.
“A flying monk, five hundred, last we statted her. Fresh out of the Trial.” He shook his head bitterly. “Those plus five hundred-monks are stupid fast and hard to corner in the air. That high-level protects her worse than the dragon.”
Something didn’t sound right. “But how come the dragon doesn’t kill Jad … uh, the turncoats?”
The sneerer said, “You ain’t even in the group yet.”
“Shut up, Larry,” I said, getting a laugh from everyone, and a smile from Lord Beast.
The diviner spoke next. “We think the man is a plus-thousand level ranger with Ward 4 gear. Rangers can charm beasts, though I’ve never heard of one charming a dragon. I can’t discern him, either. Some sort of blocking spell.”
“To kill him,” Lord Beast said, eyeing me skeptically, “you’re gonna need better gear than that noob shit ya got on. How the hell’d a killer like you wipe so bad?” He waved me off. “Save it. We’ll gear you up with castoffs. Play smart and you’ll get enough treasure to replace what you lost. If you do good enough, you can stick with us afterward.”
I nodded slowly as if that interested me. “But only you get the girl.”
Lord Beast smiled. “You catch on quick.”
Chapter Forty-Eight
The diviner took me to the strangest binding stone I’d seen yet. It wasn’t even made of stone, but rather some smoky crystal that had been broken in a hundred pieces and then reformed. The woman told me to bind myself and I did. After that, we went to a tent filled with various castoff weapons, armor, and other equipment.
“Staffs in that corner,” she said. “Robes over there. Rings, amulets, and bracelets in that box. And don’t get greedy.”
“Hi, I’m Ethan,” I said, hand out.
“I heard,” she said, staring dubiously at my hand before shaking it. “Dory. And I don’t date other diviners.”
“I’m married,” I said.
Dory glanced over my head. “I also don’t date married men.”
“Me either.”
“You don’t quit, do you?” she said. “Listen: I’m here for the points. Trying to make it to Ward 3 for a chance at my own mini-world. Beast’s a perverted freak, but he gets results. And yeah, I could see you back there hating on him. You don’t have to like him to get what you want.”
“I wasn’t hating on him,” I said.
“More like ready to explode, calling him Mister Lord Beast like that.” She shook her head. “I’ve been a diviner long enough to know just by looking at faces. That’s why I don’t date our kind. My mind is my own business.”
“Sure,” I said, keeping my face as blank as possible. She had me feeling self-conscious.
“Don’t take all day.”
Not waiting for a reply, Dory exited the tent.
“What to choose,” I said, looking around. Some of this junk would have been impressive two hundred levels ago, but when I tried on the various items, my stats barely changed. Still, I hated my noob tunic, so I chose a midnight black robe that let me fly at a cost equal to my mana regeneration.
I didn’t bother with the rings or amulets, the bulk of which were for classes that used weapons. Besides, I already had the mother of all amulets, and the manual said I could only wear one at a time.
The only other thing I took on the way out was a bottomless bag off a pile of such bags in the corner. Not to put anything into. There was an idea I had—a backup plan if one were needed.
“You coming?” Dory shouted from outside.
I exited the tent and found her waiting. “I thought you left.”
“Nope. Beast wants you good on the strat before we hit them again. We’re meeting soon. Come on.”
“Lord Beast,” I corrected.
Dory snorted.
We arrived at the command tent and were ushered inside. A massive oak table ran down the middle of it with about fifteen people sitting in chairs. Roughly twice that number crowded shoulder-to-shoulder behind them.
“There he is!” Lord Beast said from his place at the head of the table. “High-level diviners are hard to come by, and this one’s a sorcerer-diabolist. Mary! Yeah, you—get up and stand in the back. Ethan, take Mary’s seat.”
Whoever Mary was glared at me, then got up and did as she was told.
I sat down.
For the next hour, Lord Beast and his generals went over the battle plan in meticulous detail. I listened carefully and replied whenever someone asked me a question. Pretty soon they realized I wasn’t helpful and stopped asking.
My part in the plan, they said, was no more complex than flying in and “laying down holy hell on that turncoat slut and her twink friend,” as Lord Beast put it. Meanwhile, priests and other healers would load me up with shields and heal-over-time spells while the un-griefed kept the turncoats busy. At the same time, Lord Beast and anyone with three deaths would coordinate on the dragon in a game of “aggro ping-pong”—meaning they’d wear it down in a series of attacks that kept it pursuing the last person who’d hit it.
“That’s why we need you,” Lord Beast said. “If the turncoats are there when we attack the dragon, they’ll try to get hit, and we’ll be open season if
they do. We need you to distract them—throw ’em off their game. They’re fast, so be damned impressive with your sorcerer jazz. Got it?”
I nodded.
Lord Beast leaned back in his chair and shouted deeper into the tent for someone named Nocula.
The change in the room when he did this was electric. The men—about half the gathering—turned as one, as if tugged by invisible wires. The reaction among the women was markedly different. Their faces revealed disgust, if not open hostility.
When I looked at Dory, she just shook her head.
The air around the table cooled a few degrees, and a naked woman entered draped in golden chains. Flowing black hair framed a darkly beautiful face that seized my attention in a way no other woman had, regardless of comeliness scores. Her teeth were barred in a sensual snarl that revealed white fangs, like a vampire’s. And her body … it called to me in a way similar to my experience with Myrialla, but on a physical level.
The woman scanned the men in the room, weighing and dismissing them with imperious scorn. When our gazes met, she blinked. Then she smiled.
Hard to get?
Her telepathic words sounded in my mind the way Myrialla’s had, and I felt a surge of horror at being so close to her. Not because I feared losing control. I wouldn’t—of that I felt sure. But if the thing could invade my thoughts, what else had it gleaned? Did it know why I was here?
As if in answer, the naked, fanged woman stalked boldly around the table to stand breast-level to my eyes, her golden chains tinkling like a favorite song.
Distracted by the sweet perfume wafting off her shining skin, I swallowed and focused on the table.
“Hold out your hand,” she said in a voice both sensual and hard.
When I didn’t, Lord Beast said, “She’s not here to screw you, Ethan. Not unless you pay me. But she does need to bite you.”
“What?” I said.
Bitterly, Dory said, “Beast … Lord Beast made her our raid leader. After she bites you, we’ll share unequal percentages of a points pool. It lasts twenty-four hours or until you drop from the raid.” She held up her wrist to show two little red marks. “Normally, it’s just a ceremonial cut, but he chose a frigging vampire, so it’ll take forever to heal.”
One of the women there swore quietly.
I looked at Nocula, who stood gazing at me like a starved wolf. Her thoughts invaded mine:
You can take me from him, you know. He wears a key around his neck similar to the acorn, though without its protection against theft. Take it from him and you can have me forever. We could share Myrialla’s charm. Forever…
“What the hell are you waiting for?” Lord Beast said loudly. “Hurry up so we can get going.”
Forcefully, I thought at the thing, No. Then, against my better judgment, I thrust my hand toward her.
Nocula’s knowing smirk was her only reply. She took my arm in her soft cold hands and leaned down for the bite. I felt her teeth pierce my skin—but no pain, thanks to my amulet’s anti-pain properties. I also felt a frosty tingle spread from the wound and throughout my body.
NOTICE: You have joined “Lord Beast’s Legion. Don’t Screw Up!”
Chapter Forty-Nine
I’d flown before using foul-tasting potions, or with Rita, dragging me through the air in her vice-like grip. But my new robes were easily the most enjoyable method yet. All I had to do was think of a location and I’d fly there as easily as if I were walking.
“You okay?” Dory shouted from twenty feet up.
“Huh?” I shouted back.
“I said are you okay?”
“Yes!”
“Because you look sick!”
“What? Thank you! How long till we’re there?”
“Just ahead! Over those cliffs!”
The cliffs in question were two enormous protrusions of stone over the road that passed beneath them. According to my inner map, just beyond them was a bowl-shaped expanse several miles in diameter. The Vale of Solace.
About fifty other heroes waited atop the right-most cliff for us. Stepping from the air, I congratulated myself on not stumbling. Granted, with my acorn-assisted agility, I was basically an acrobat now.
“Everyone know the plan?” Lord Beast said.
“Yes!” someone shouted in the back.
“Griefs with me,” Lord Beast said. “You others have two jobs: die and fly back, and protect him.”
He pointed at me.
“We said we knew!” someone else yelled, bringing a nervous chuckle from a few of them.
Lord Beast glared at the heckler, who was now staring at his feet.
“All right, let’s go—everyone up. Keep him alive! Carlos, Mitch, keep up this time or your ass is grass.”
Half the raid launched into the air and followed him along the eastern edge of the valley in a flanking maneuver. A few seconds later, a blue shield shimmered around me and the others, and we flew in straight.
EXPLORATION AWARD: Vale of Solace, 55,000 EXPERIENCE POINTS
Our group was both healer and shield-heavy. My own shield stacked with the ones they’d put on me, as well as several “trigger-heals.” I also felt tingly, as a so-called “heal-over-time” spell fed me a constant stream of healing magic.
From a few feet away, Dory said, “One of ’em will hit us by the time we reach that river down there.”
“Huh? What?”
“There!” she said, pointing.
I followed her finger. It took a moment, but I found the river.
“Get ready!” she yelled.
I wasn’t ready.
The valley cracked like a thunderbolt and the sky split as a wave of force blasted out of the air, slamming into me and the mass of nearby healers.
Whatever it was started slamming and kicking me in a blur. I couldn’t react fast enough, and two layers of shields vanished as if they were soap bubbles. When I didn’t die fast enough, my attacker zipped away after the healers, who were already fleeing.
I barely recognized Rita as she flew from healer to healer, smashing them to bloody pulps. Dory hovered behind me firing spells with a terrified expression. If any of them hit, I couldn’t tell. Certainly they didn’t slow Rita.
“Do something!” Dory yelled.
“You mean like this?” I said and blasted Dory with a Mighty Solar Strike. The spell burned through her small shield to engulf her in a miniature nova.
ENEMY DEFEATED: “Dory,” 365,300 EXPERIENCE POINTS
NOTICE: You have left “Lord Beast’s Killer Legion. Don’t Screw Up!”
Sure, Dory had been nice enough. But she was in cahoots with Lord Beast and thus a part of his plan to turn my wife into some sort of sex slave. There simply wasn’t enough nice in the universe to make that okay.
Rita had downed most of the healers, and the others were already soaring toward the cliffs and the safety of the camp. That didn’t stop her. She flitted from person to person hammering them like a human pile driver.
Hoping she’d notice, I followed, attacking anyone in range.
When the healers were all dead, Rita soared overhead in a wide arc both beautiful and terrifying to behold. She then destroyed my shield with a massive gravity-assisted kick that punted me earthbound like a meteor.
Between the kick and the fall, I took enough damage to kill me three times over, if not for a trigger-heal kicking in. In a kind of chicken-or-egg race against negative health points, the trigger-heal won and I lived.
Likely the pain would have been unbearable, but I had the amulet. Feeling great, I rolled out of the way an instant before Rita’s leg buried knee-deep into the spot my head had been.
“It’s me, Ethan! Wait!”
“Ethan?” Rita said, fists raised, ready to flatten me. “Is that really you?”
“That’s what I’m trying to—”
“What’s the name of your wife and kids?” she said suddenly.
“Huh? I don’t have kids. My wife’s name is Melody. That’s why I’m—�
��
“Oh, Ethan!” Rita said.
She flew into my arms in a sobbing hug. Then, in a move almost as scary as anything I’d seen yet, she lifted me off the ground and spun me around in circles.
“I thought you were gone forever!” she said, laughing and crying with joy.
I opened my mouth to say that no, I wasn’t gone forever, but found I couldn’t. Rita was kissing me.
And I was kissing her back.
Chapter Fifty
Rita pulled away first. Rather than look at me, she scanned the area as if looking for enemies.
“What level are you now?” she said in a husky voice, trying and failing to pretend nothing inappropriate had just happened.
For my part, I wasn’t sure if anything had happened. Yes, we’d kissed, but I was relieved to see her, and it had just happened. Excitement of the moment. Nothing more. Even if there had been more—just a little—that door was firmly closed again.
“Uh … four thirty-six. Mostly as a sorcerer. I split the rest evenly. Not sure if I made the right choice.”
She still wasn’t looking at me.
“Yeah,” she said. “You can rearrange it all later. There’s a way in Ward 3. Jaddow said.”
That surprised me. I’d assumed our choices were now permanent.
“Where’s Jaddow?” I said.
Far in the distance came a deep roaring that faintly vibrated through my noob sandals.
“Tagging and smashing,” she said. “But he can’t heal worth a damn. If they kill the dragon, they can enter the ruins. That’s the key to this quest: kill the dragon and the shield dies. Oh, I just noticed—you can fly now? How?”
“New robes.”
“Good. Let’s go!”
She leaped into the air.
I followed as close as I could, but her flying skill vastly outstripped my robes. She had to stop and wait repeatedly, and though she never complained, I sensed her impatience.
Off in the distance was a faintly glowing red sphere. Above it, small shapes dodged and weaved through the air as another form—massive in size—dipped and soared while spouting terrific gouts of flame in every direction.