“Why didn’t you tell me this earlier?” I asked surprised.
“Because you never asked,” the Rogue shrugged. “I’ve been playing much longer than you and know a whole host of things that you’d never even think to ask. If I were to start telling you everything I know, we’ll be here for years. Do you have that much time? Oh, this one’s locked!”
Plinto produced his lockpicks and began to poke around the keyhole. I was standing over him and, given that I had a moment, began to think. Any way you spin it, Plinto’s right—I need to consider what Donnotpunnik needed me for. He could easily pull off this entire operation without me. And yet not only was I let in on the secret, but even introduced to the main conspirators—thereby demonstrating their utter faith in me. It’s as if Donotpunnik knew that I wouldn’t run to the police and would stay with him through the end of his plot. But why trust me so much? Let’s assume the worst: It’s Donotpunnik who ensures my safety and has no reason to worry about me going to the police. The incident with the Omega operator supports this. And yet, they immediately offered to move me wherever I liked, and allowed me out to the street. I could have yelled or asked for help. I could have been recorded by some camera. If Donotpunnik is the one ensuring my safety, then I have trouble understanding him.
“When’s the last time you spoke with Stacey?” Standing there silently waiting for the Rogue to unlock the door was getting tedious, so I decided to dilute the waiting with some conversation.
“When you summoned her to the Dungeon. She’s currently in rehabilitation—she only shows up in Barliona for a few hours a day. You can’t really talk to her much. It’s surprising you even managed to reach her.”
“She’s in rehab?”
“Yes, something went wrong as she was doing a quest and she got locked in the game. I don’t know the details. All I know is that the whole ordeal really took a toll on her. There are all kinds of legal types from the Corporation hovering around her, trying to mediate the conflict…It’s actually starting to look kind of terrifying. I heard that even Johnson himself came by with apologies and offers of compensation. But I won’t lie—I don’t know the truth. Got it! Let’s see what this door has to offer. Okay, behind door number four, we have a…Oh, no way!”
I entered the room behind Plinto and froze with my mouth ajar. Even Plinto, who had seen one or two things in his day, hummed with surprise upon reading the properties of the item we had discovered—what was there to say about a simple player like me? In the center of a square hall, upon a one and a half meter tall plinth lay a bright red pillow bearing a small heap of crystals, radiating a sulfurous-yellow light.
The Tear of Harrashess. Class: Unique Artifact. The owner of the Tear receives the ‘Lament of Harrashess’ buff: Movement speed increased by 1000%, all main stats increased by 10000%, Hit Points, Mana and Energy regeneration increased by 10000%, Experience and Reputation gained increased by 10000%, base Attractiveness increased to 90, ignores level difference when calculating damage and healing (does not apply to PvP). May not be sold, dropped, stolen or destroyed. Effects do not stack. Status: Inactive, unbound to player.
“Thirty Tears,” Plinto uttered slowly, moving toward the plinth like a zombie. “Anyone who owns one of these crystals will be a god in Barliona! So this is why you guys came here? Donotpunnik and Hellfire want godmode?!”
“That’s one way to put it,” I replied in shock. If Geranika doesn’t do anything with the crystals, then Barliona really will witness the coming of a new pantheon—thirty new player-gods who can deal with any opponent with a mere nod. After all, there’d be no difference in levels to reckon with! A player with a Tear could take on Geranika while still at Level 1 and simply throw slippers at him. “But they’re not for you or me.”
“What do you mean?” Plinto asked, but immediately understood: “You know how to give someone a Tear?!”
“Yes,” I replied, and praying to all the devs of Barliona responsible for this glitch, swept all the crystals into my bag. The time had come to see whether the Crastil worked or not.
“How do you feel?” Plinto asked with mock worry. “You don’t feel like devouring the world, do you?”
“You know, nothing’s changed,” I replied with surprise. “The crystals don’t affect me.”
“I assume I shouldn’t count on one?”
“Why? Here,” I got out one Tear and offered it to Plinto. I could complete the Tomb without the Rogue, so I could release him after I got the Salva. Someone had to be my lab rat, after all. Plus, a short stay in reality would do Plinto good. He could go do some shopping and consider who he’s really working for.
You are giving a Tear of Harrashess to another player who does not have a Crastil. Do you wish to bind and activate the crystal?
Yes!
“Whoa!” whispered Plinto when his HP bar suddenly dropped halfway without actually decreasing the HP he currently had. “Mahan, I owe you!”
“We’ll settle accounts later,” I replied. “Let’s get out of here.”
“Clutzer,” Plinto wrote in the raid chat to the Rogue who, surprisingly, still hadn’t been caught! “We’re leaving! Get out of here if you can.”
“All right, I’ll do my best. Though, I can’t last much longer—my Energy’s almost gone. A minute, no more.”
“Good luck then,” I added. “Let me know when you return. I’ll take you to Altameda. We’ll think about what to do next.”
“Listen,” smirked Plinto, looking me up and down. “Tell me again how much you weigh? This little idea occurred to me…”
We covered the distance between the treasure vault and the portal room in under a minute. Plinto heaved me onto his shoulder, engaged his acceleration and paying no attention to Geranika or his assistants sprinted the distance as fast as his legs would carry him.
“Mahan?!” I caught the astonished exclamation of the Lord of Shadow when we tore through the throne room. The Lord of Shadow tried to stop us, but his Stop had no effect on Plinto, while I spent the rest of our escape staring at a strip of Plinto’s chain mail—I didn’t have a tooth of the Patriarch.
“Daaamn. That was close,” muttered Clutzer, meeting us on the other side of the portal. He had made it after all! “I did more work today than I ever did at the mines…Say, is it me or is that tree giving us a dirty look? He’s starting to freak me out. That’d be one for the ages—we escape the palace of Shadow only to get crushed by some Guardian.”
At the edge of another blight of Shadow surrounding the open portal, milled an enormous Oak—the local Guardian was making a show of his displeasure with the damage we were doing to his forest. Not wishing to anger the high-level mob unnecessarily, I deactivated the portal and as I did so, Clutzer offered me a canvas about a meter by a meter in size.
“What is this?” I asked with surprise, brushing the fog from the canvas. The Armard throne room that we had just been in, the alabaster throne, the crowd of terrifying and strange Hadjeis, Geranika beside the throne trying on his crown…It was like David’s Coronation of Napoleon or something…
“This is a canvas painted by a great painter of Shadow, entitled ‘Ascent to the Throne’. Geranika’s the one ascending, if I were to guess. And no need to stare at me like that! When you’re darting from hall to hall in fear of your life, you don’t have time to examine the loot you encounter. I was just tossing whatever came across my path into my bag! You should think about how you can clean the Shadow from the painting. That’s your problem now.”
“Earl,” the Herald’s bell rang, preventing me from coming up with a worthy answer to the bungling thief, “the Emperor wishes to see you urgently. Please follow me.”
“By myself?”
“Yes. As for Plinto and Clutzer, I advise they go speak with the Rogue trainer in Anhurs. As I understand it, Masters who have managed to infiltrate Armard and survive thirty minutes of battle there, are eligible for a worthy reward. Please enter the portal, Earl.”
I had nothing left to
do but submit to the Herald’s demand—and yet when I emerged on the other side of the portal, I couldn’t stifle an astonished exclamation. I had been invited straight to the Malabar throne room. Emperor Naahti sat on the throne, while none other than Geranika stood before him, arms crossed and a very dour expression on his face.
“Greetings!” I began with an immense grin, when it became clear that neither the Emperor nor Geranika would speak with me first. And if Geranika was glummer than a cloud, the Emperor radiated with such a contagious smile of his own, that everyone around him was infected with the same positivity and elation. I, for one, submitted to this feeling entirely.
“Return my scepter, thief!” Geranika roared instead of a greeting. Only now did I realize that this wasn’t the actual Lord of Shadow but his projection. I doubt Geranika is so naïve as to surrender himself to the Emperor’s mercy. Even for the sake of the scepter of power.
“You summoned me, your Highness?” I decided to ignore Geranika. It’s not like our relationship could get any worse, and I didn’t feel like explaining things to the dumb AI.
“Tell me, did you really steal Geranika’s scepter?” the Emperor managed to stifle his grin and asked his question in an utterly ordinary voice.
“I wouldn’t use the word ‘steal,’” I hedged just in case. Who knows what kind of issues the Imitator of Malabar has with stealing. “I expropriated it. I am holding on to it as a trophy. That I received on the field of battle. Choose whichever option you prefer.”
“You stole it!” The ordinarily imperturbable Geranika was having a bad day today. I hadn’t seen the Lord of Shadow so worked up since the Dark Forest.
“How do you wish to use it?” The Emperor followed my example and began ignoring Geranika.
“I don’t even know,” I confessed, producing the scepter from my bag. In a blink of an eye, I was surrounded by twenty Heralds holding Stones of Light in their hands. The Emperor did not want the influence of Shadow to spread in his castle. “What is this for?”
“I have a throne, without which, I lose power,” the Emperor explained. “This scepter does the same thing for the head of the new Empire. Without this item, Geranika shall die in two months. This is why I’m asking you—what do you intend to do with that stick?”
“Judging by the fact that I’m here, I’m going to have to give it back?” I guessed.
“I would put it differently,” Naahti parried. “Exchange it, do a good thing for the Empire, save an innocent life. Choose the option you prefer.”
“I agree to an exchange,” Geranika muttered grimly. “You shall have her back. Return the scepter…”
Only now did I realize the reason for the Emperor’s elation. Without bothering about my opinion of the matter, he’d already dispensed with the scepter as he saw fit, exchanging it for his wife. Whether I wanted this or not didn’t interest the head of Malabar in the least. The devs couldn’t permit the enemy Emperor to die, so I was being confronted with a simple fact—I had to return the scepter. As if! Hamster and Toad puffed up their chests in defense of the lawfully pilfered item, so I had nothing left to do but ask:
“Excuse me, Your Highness, but I have not yet agreed to the exchange. In my view…”
“What do you want?” Geranika looked over at me. “Items? Knowledge? I cannot give those to you, since you do not belong to Shadow. Money? That’s not even funny.”
“I’d like to visit your palace,” I smirked, coming up with what I figured would be the most annoying payment for Geranika. “I want you to give me a tour, at the end of which I’ll be brought back home safe and sound. We’ll take a stroll around your palace, see how things are arranged in it, take in the sights, the sculptures, the paintings. They really are beautiful—I can even prove it.”
Not giving it much further thought, I produced the canvas Clutzer had expropriated.
“Check out the artistry, the brushwork, the composition, the grayscale…”
“YOU STOLE MY ONLY PORTRAIT?” Geranika really lost the plot here.
“You’ll have to return that too, Mahan,” the Emperor said, openly laughing. “I can’t spare ten Stones of Light on guarding a single painting. What do you say, my regal brother,” Naahti turned to Geranika. “Will you arrange a tour for my subject?”
“You have no greater Foe in this world than me, Mahan!” Geranika took ahold of himself and became the imperturbable Ruler once again. “By the power granted me by Barliona, I guarantee Mahan’s safety during the tour of my palace. I guarantee that he will be returned unharmed. But the very instant he returns, I will begin my hunt of Shaman Mahan in earnest! Pitiful fool, I will do everything in my power to make Barliona your personal hell. You have the word of the Lord of Shadow!”
“How am I going to get to your palace?” I asked, ignoring the threats.
“The dagger will open a portal to Armard one more time. After that, you may as well throw it away—I will disable its power.”
“Your Highness,” understanding that I wouldn’t get anything else from Geranika, I decided to turn to the Emperor. What if I manage to get something from him too? “The deal with Geranika is more or less settled. I would like to also discuss…”
“You will receive my complete support,” the Emperor cut me off, understanding what I was getting at, “including complete access to the palace. Will that suffice?”
“Yours or the Empire’s?” I inquired, my heart skipping a beat. Receiving the Emperor’s Exaltation isn’t just an enormous bonus for the clan, it’s…well, Mr. Kristowski would carry me on his shoulders.
“Mine and the Empire’s,” Naahti didn’t bother bartering. “I will never forget the hero who returned my Adelaide to me.”
“In that case, I propose we make the exchange!” I said triumphantly and held the scepter and the painting out to Geranika’s projection. “How shall we do it?”
Achievement earned: Friend of the Emperor. Your Reputation with the Emperor of Malabar has reached Exalted status.
Achievement earned: Peer of Malabar. Your Reputation with the Malabar Empire has reached Exalted status.
Access to the Malabar palace updated. Current access: 100%.
New achievements and notifications sparkled all around me, the clan chat overflowed with the celebration of players, my amulet was bursting from incoming calls, yet I remained standing in the throne room, watching the Emperor bend lovingly over his wife, quietly whimpering to myself.
What am I doing?!
Why do I need these adventures with the Emperor and Geranika? This is like a feast during a time of plague! I have 29 deadly items in my bag, which I need to urgently hand to Phoenix’s players, and here I’m losing time hanging around the castle, eking out new bonuses. What the hell for?! I need to think about my personal safety, about the fact that I’m breaking the law, about the fact that if this affair comes to light, I’ll spend the rest of my days in the mines. But instead of all that, I’m busy scheduling a tour of Geranika’s palace and reveling in my ability to piss off an Imitator. An ordinary program! What is wrong with me? Why aren’t I thinking about the important issues when they’re all I should be thinking about? It’s decided then! It’s time to stop beating around the bush and occupy myself with the deliberate destruction of Phoenix. I would deal with Donotpunnik, Hellfire and the devs they’d bought later. Producing my amulet, I hesitated a bit and, surprised by this very hesitation, made the call. The show must go on!
“Speaking!”
“Ehkiller, this is Mahan. I’d like to see you. I have an offer you can’t refuse…”
“We can’t deal with it over the amulet?”
“No.”
“All right. I’ll see you at the Golden Horseshoe in ten minutes.” To my surprise, Ehkiller agreed to meet me without a hundred preconditions. “Is that good for you?”
“Perfect. Thank you.”
The amulet fell silent, but I fiddled with it for a while longer, and then called Plinto. According to Donotpunnik’s plan, Hellfire wa
s supposed to be the shining example of a player with a Tear, and yet he’d still be resting for the next four-five hours, cursing me with every bad word in his vocabulary. At the same time, using Plinto for the same purpose seemed much better to me—since I’d given the Tear to one of my best fighters, surely Ehkiller would have nothing to fear from the crystals. I’d never risk Plinto after all! Or so they’d think…
“That’s how things stand,” I concluded my brief presentation on the Tears of Harrashess, which included a demonstration of my Rogue’s new stats. Ehkiller had sat through it silently, without asking a single question, which, to be honest, made me very nervous: What if all my efforts were in vain and the entire plan was doomed to fail? Donotpunnik had insisted on using Hellfire for a reason, after all.
“I call upon a Herald. I need your help,” said Ehkiller, making me want to jump to my feet. Instead of jumping at the chance to secure the Tears for his clan, the head of Phoenix was summoning a Herald? What was this nonsense?
“You called me and I came,” the Emperor’s messenger started his typical song and dance.
“I accuse Mahan of using prohibited items!” Without giving the Herald a chance to finish, Ehkiller pushed me further into a state of utter bafflement. Everything was going not at all how I planned it! “The Tears of Harrashess should not exist in Barliona. They break the game balance!”
“Your complaint has been received,” the bells vanished from the Herald’s voice, indicating that the Imitator had been replaced by a real person. “Esteemed Ehkiller, I must inform you that Mahan acquired these items in due compliance with the game mechanics and without breaking any rules. The Tears were introduced to the game for the NPCs—players were not supposed to be able to use them, and yet what happened—happened. We are forced to reject your complaint. May I help you with anything else?”
“If I acquire the Tears, they won’t change their characteristics…”
“I am not authorized to make such decisions. At the moment, we are processing the strategies that arise from the introductions of the Tears of Harrashess into the game. We do not have those results yet.”
The Way of the Shaman [06] Shaman's Revenge Page 37