Finding a Body (The Dark Herbalist Book #4) LitRPG series

by Michael Atamanov

  “I have no idea where Kira is now. We went somewhere, her security mentioned a defended palace and a guy with a missile launcher discovered near it. It was all basically going fine but then Kira went nuts over something and abandoned me in an unfamiliar neighborhood, taking off in a flying taxi.”

  “That sounds just like her!” the former spy laughed. “Well, best of luck to you, Timothy. I suspect that you were actually being brought to a desolate location so she could secretly get you out of the picture. But either the conditions weren’t right, or the spoiled brat hadn’t steeled her nerves enough to commit cold-blooded murder and reconsidered at the last moment. In any case, in your place, I would not keep taking risks and stay as far away from Kirena as possible! Alright, I’ve gotta go. Leadership wants to chat. See you soon at the board of directors!”

  Andrei Soloviev took his leg out, and the elevator doors finally closed, cutting me off from the fearsome man. I breathed a sigh of relief, only then having noticed how nervous I was. With Soloviev nearby, I felt helpless like a rabbit before a constrictor and didn’t know what to do with myself. He just emanated death despite all the false friendship and promise of sweeping changes for the better. Also he was saying Kira wanted to kill me, and I didn’t believe him one bit. Maybe the ex-agent wasn’t even totally lying and, according to her grandmother’s will, if I died Kira actually would get my two percent. But despite all my girlfriend’s impulsivity and all her current financial problems, I didn’t even slightly believe the beautiful redhead might stab me in the back.

  In any case, I would have to think very carefully over all of this squabbling around Inessa Tyle’s inheritance. The conspirators’ obstinate desire to isolate Kira from the battle or even physically eliminate her had to have some kind of rational explanation. As did the baffling attempt to keep me locked in a virtual reality capsule until the board of directors’ meeting. Why limit my freedom if I would never get my two percent of the stocks anyway? Getting me into that virtual office must have been risky and complicated. There was a huge risk that my imprisonment would leak or spill out yet, on first glance, there was no benefit whatsoever. Those kinds of things didn’t happen. There had to be some kind of logical explanation, but I just couldn’t find it.

  * * *

  I WAS ALREADY at the clinic and heading to see my sister when my cell phone rang. It was a new phone that I bought today and wasn’t used to. It had a different ringtone, so at first I didn’t even realize I was getting a call. But I had the number in my contacts and it was saved as “Boss.” That meant it was coming from the office of the Director of the Special Projects Division. But despite my expectations, the person calling was not Max Tohner, but his assistant Tina:

  “Timothy, I’m calling to say that your gaming cabin 4-16A is ready. The equipment has been installed and set-up, and it’s ready to go. Mr. Tohner asked when you’d be coming into Boundless Realm , too. It’s just that lots of stuff is happening, and lots of people are waiting for the Dark Sovereign to return.”

  I glanced at the clock and answered I couldn’t be there any earlier than one thirty, because I had an important meeting.

  “Alright, I’ll send that on. And before you load up the game, Max Tohner wanted you to drop by his office. There are a couple papers here for you to sign, plus he wanted to brighten your day with two pieces of good news.”

  Good news? And what about the fact that I had at most three or four more days left to work here? Strange. I wondered what could even happen over such a short time. The issue was that I had gone to see Max just an hour ago and we had a long and substantive conversation. We discussed my termination, the end of the Dark Sovereign event and various aspects of the game. Most of all, we decided to reset and redo my character’s skills. We also thought over how to turn the upcoming final battle into a big show so the viewers on the gaming channels would be humming in delight when seeing the enthralling pictures of the big “meat grinder.”

  I also discussed the future of my NPC friends: Taisha, Irek, my adopted daughter Chai-nee Shu and other companions. Yes, they were just mobs, essentially a chunk of programming, but I insisted that, after the Dark Sovereign’s death, they would all be saved and brought to some far-away location in the huge Boundless Realm . One where players hadn’t been before. It would be easy enough to come up with an explanation for my companions disappearing. For example, they could say it was the last wish of the Dark Sovereign, which took the last of the game superboss’s Direct Intervention Points. The moment Amra’s companions disappeared could even be played up elegantly and made into a beautiful video. The corporation’s specialists had that down pat. But I was worried and my speech was occasionally disjointed or lacked decent argumentation. I was afraid the director wouldn’t agree to take a hand in the fate of some mere NPC’s. But much to my surprise, Max Tohner didn’t object and even promised to help solve this issue and speak with programmers and marketers.

  So, was this good news? In these worrying times, good news was like water in the desert. I wondered what Max Tohner wanted to tell me. I had to admit, Tina had me intrigued. Had the issue of rescuing Amra’s companions really been approved? Or was I being allowed to gain experience even faster? Not especially counting on success, I asked Tina to tell me the secret. What did he want to say? And the director’s assistant agreed with surprising pliability:

  “Only if you never say I told you!” Tina warned me. “And it means you owe me at least one chocolate! So then, the first piece of news: the boss just agreed with other directors on how experience would be divided for killing the whole army of the Dark Sovereign’s enemies. We should have given the players some kind of explanation about who put it all together. The forums still won’t shut up about the deadly trap in the middle of the sea. The experience will be split equally between Titanium Joker, Valerianna Quickfoot and Amra. And it will be enough to bring all of you over level four hundred! Congratulations, Timothy. The three of you are now the highest-level players in Boundless Realm !”

  Woah! Apparently, the corporation had found a simple and elegant way to both respond to the players and make the Dark Sovereign more powerful. Now as the president said today, by the time of the final battle, the Dark Sovereign would be in good shape. I thanked Tina for the information and asked about the second piece of news.

  “Alright, second: our boss managed to push one of your suggestions through leadership. Now, players who fight on the Dark Sovereign’s side will also get a souvenir marker so everything is fair. Now they’re just discussing whether the enemies and allies of the Dark Sovereign should be able to fight throughout Boundless Realm until the end of the event, including in defended locations. If so, they don’t want the city guards interfering. I don’t know what the directors will decide, but in any case it will help you get plenty of allies. I’m sure there are players who will want the unique souvenir marker of an ally of the Dark Sovereign!”

  I considered it. Yes, I had indeed suggested adding souvenir rewards for all taking part in the event regardless of which side they chose. After all, we needed to encourage participation for the Amazons , Max Sochnier, Shrekson and Valerianna. I hadn’t considered the possibility of spontaneous fights between my supporters and detractors, although... that would be just great! If players were allowed to fight right in the cities, that would be quite the happy hunting ground for all kinds of PK’ers. Just get the Dark Sovereign’s ally badge and you can attack players unpunished so long as they participated in the corporation’s global event! I already had a few hundred thousand enemies and, in the last few days of the event, their numbers would grow sharply into the millions, if the president was right. All these hordes of undying were strong together, attacking my holdings in organized squadrons. But all alone in cities, not expecting attack, these players were easy targets for PK’ers. I imagined the chaos that might ensue if the directors eventually did allow players to fight in protected locations!

  * * *

  “TIM, YOU’RE back!!!” Valeria sto
pped talking with a tall curly-haired boy and hurried down the hallway to meet me, flailing her crutches and making every step a silly little hop.

  I had brought her some fruits as a gift, but threw the bag right on the floor and ran out to meet her. I hugged my little sister tight, lifted her in my arms and spun her around. Val laughed sonorously in glee and squealed just like a little girl playing a game with her older brother. I couldn’t even hold back my tears of compassion and joy. How nice it was to see my dear little sister!

  “Tim, this is Andre!” Valeria said, now a bit calmer and pointing at the curly-haired boy as he walked up closer.

  Carefully setting my sister on the floor, I picked up her fallen crutches and gave them to her to lean on. After that, I gave a big smile and extended a hand to greet the athletically-built six-foot-six boy. But he just stood there with his arms hanging limp and a strange grimace of embarrassment and confusion frozen on his face. Only then did I realize my mistake and quickly become ghastly embarrassed. What an ass I was! Valeria told me about him. And I read about Andre online as well. How could I forget?! He just had an operation to implant bionic arms! He was probably barely able to control his limbs yet, even if the operation was a success!

  “Glad to meet you,” he said with clear strain on his face, his lips squeezed tight and his teeth clenched to the point of crunching. He looked like a man trying to lift an overloaded barbell in the gym. But after all that he did eventually manage to slightly raise his right arm.

  I took over from there, grabbing his hand and giving it a slight squeeze. Andre breathed a heavy sigh and lowered his hand as soon as I released my grip. I must have guessed right and the new bionic arm was still a challenge to control. Seemingly, Andre wouldn’t have any use for that guitar for quite some time. Nevertheless, the elated gazes Val and Andre were exchanging didn’t escape me. Seemingly, even that slight lift was a huge breakthrough in Andre’s recovery and Valeria, having been in a similar situation, appreciated just how hard it was to achieve.

  “My parents should be coming soon. A few minutes ago, they called to say they’d already left home, so I’ll go meet them,” Andre said and tactfully walked away from our private conversation.

  “So, what do you think?” my sister asked, making sure Andre had walked out of earshot.

  I shrugged my shoulders indefinitely. Just another boy. Tall, athletic. Probably from a woman’s perspective he was pretty cute. Polite, sensitive, proud and goal-oriented. That’s basically what I told my sister.

  “Yeah, he’s great!” Of all my words, Val seemingly had taken only the positive. “Andre came out of his coma just yesterday, and he’s been going to the doctor since this morning demanding to be released. The doctor refused, of course. He said he needed at least another two weeks of observation and treatments, and that’s in the best case. But Andre didn’t give up and is already making plans to run away. He has so many ideas after these months of forced inactivity that he doesn’t want to wait even one more day! But alright, that’s enough about Andre, that isn’t why you came. Let’s talk about us and our stuff.”

  Yes, Val and I really did have a lot to talk about. So much had happened, both good and bad since the last time we’d seen one another in real life! It was as if a whole lifetime had passed! I didn’t hide anything from my sister. I told her about my wounds, even lifted my shirt and showed her the scars. I told her about my fabulous office, which was actually a virtual reality capsule in the middle of a room filled with toxic gas. I told her I would soon be out of a job, but that they promised me a big payday. I told her the Dark Sovereign event would be over soon, and my Amra would be dying permanently. Valeria reacted with surprising calm to the last piece of news:

  “Maybe that’s for the best... I don’t want to play Boundless Realm alone. And I’ve actually been looking at my life and realizing that, other than computer games, it has been totally empty for the last few years. Talking to Andre actually makes me feel awkward. He is full of energy, has been to every continent on Earth and is just a fountain of ideas about new travels and adventures. Just imagine, Andre even applied to join the space fleet. He wants to go on the third expedition to the rings of Neptune and help build a base for humanity on Triton. Or he’s considering applying to crew the first starships going to Alpha Centauri and Barnard’s Star. By the way, Tim, will you let me go with him? I also want to get out of my wheelchair and start living, not just existing!”

  I was not used to hearing such bold plans from my normally clammed-up and unconfident sister. Sure, the plans about space voyages, to my eye, looked childishly naïve. Even a healthy person had an extremely hard time being approved for space travel. For someone with bionic appendages, passing all the tests and high G-loads would be twice as hard. But I could only be glad that Valeria finally had some interests outside of virtual worlds. So I answered that I would support her in any endeavor. Most likely, after finishing work as a videogame plotline tester, I would also start doing something different. What was more, soon enough our money problems would be gone for good.

  I told my sister about talking with Kira and what I knew about Inessa Tyle’s will. I told her about the attempt on Kira’s life, her difficult financial position and the conspiratorial scheme that bordered on a maniacal obsession to cut Inessa Tyle’s granddaughter out of the upcoming board of directors vote. At a certain point I let slip the phrase: “It’s too bad we don’t know how much stock Kira has. That might clear up a lot.” My sister answered that by simply taking out her cellphone, calling up a search engine and saying:

  “Boundless Realm Corporation. Main shareholders.”

  After that she showed me the results. It was that easy?! How hadn’t I thought to try that? My sister always had a unique talent for making her brother feel like an ass, but this really was the apotheosis of my idiocy, even compared to all my past confusions. I thanked Val for the simple solution and picked up her phone.

  Among the many useless links, I found results from last year’s board of directors vote to once again elect Thomas Heywood president. And that had the exact information I was after: Inessa Tyle — 33.33% of voting shares, Kirena Tyle — 10.40%, Thomas Heywood — 6.28%... This article led me to believe that a year ago Kira was in possession of more than ten percent. Well, I’d take that into consideration and think it over...

  I had only heard tell that Kirena was a spendthrift and lived too high on the horse. And that was from Andrei Soloviev, so it was hard to believe. I mean, he was an insanely biased source. Also, no matter how luxurious my girlfriend’s life was, no matter the Black Crystals and tropical islands she bought, she would never have been able to spend thirty billion credits and change.

  That meant Kira still had a very respectable amount of stocks, even if they were frozen at the moment. If she still had, let’s say, ten percent, then... I quickly imagined it... ten percent was out of the picture, just the remaining ninety percent were voting. Given Andrei Soloviev was so confident he could win the vote, he must have already had forty-five percent or more, or he could see a way of getting that soon. But he definitely did not have fifty percent of the shares, otherwise there would have been no sense in tracking Kirena Tyle or attempting to knock her off.

  That meant that, no matter how confident he was in winning the vote, Andrei Soloviev’s accomplices were actually in a fairly tight spot. With the new powers so obviously wanting to replace the president with their own loyal candidate, they would never get an alliance with Thomas Heywood, so the conspirators wouldn’t have more than fifty percent. Also, with that outcome, one option of upending their whole game became obvious: I just had to get Kirena Tyle’s shares unfrozen before the board of directors’ meeting. Then Andrei Soloviev and his mucky-muck backers would simply not have enough shares to take the vote and their candidate wouldn’t go through. I had no idea what would happen after that, though. Perhaps the current president of the corporation would retain his post, but maybe the new president would be someone else.

 
According to Thomas Heywood, she would need to pay a bond of two and a half billion credits to get the shares unfrozen. At first glance such a huge sum was impossible. But with control over the richest corporation on the planet at stake, with a value of one hundred billion credits, finding a two-and-a-half-billion-credit loan didn’t seem totally impossible.

  Then I had to stop thinking because a big group of people came up. One was Andre, two others must have been his parents and there was also a short balding geezer wearing a white hospital gown over an expensive suit. The old man was accompanied by a large contingent of security, although they didn’t have any obvious weapons. Still they shot cautious gazes at all the people in the hallway and even scanned the walls and ceiling with a device that looked like glowing frame. I had never seen Titanium Joker in real life, but I immediately realized this must have been him, the Russian Billionaire Vladimir Toropov, who Iron Jeanette had described as a great friend and admirer. But what was he doing here? Ah ha! I remembered that this Russian oligarch had paid for Andre’s treatment. He was probably coming to check up on him.

  “What an auspicious occasion! We’ve got the three highest-level players of all Boundless Realm in one room!” came the geezer, extending a hand in greeting. He was surprisingly well informed, too. He must have heard this news from Tina no more than fifteen minutes ago. “You really brightened my day, Amra! I love big publicized projects and operations, but recently I haven’t had the chance to take part in any for a long time. I hope you have plenty other enemies to keep delighting this old man for weeks to come, Dark Sovereign!”