by Jeff Sproul
Players dropped one after another. Their bodies burst into particles and items were left on the ground. Several rooks and cloakers attempted to snatch fallen items for themselves, but in doing so, they often left themselves open for attack, which oftentimes found them becoming particles as well.
The shield of rooks had broken. Everyone was fighting anything they were nearby. Riley, having taken notice of the fine placement of Chase’s spider-bots, decided to climb one of the pillars to get out of harm’s way. A black-energy hand grabbed him from mid-climb and slammed him into the ground.
Riley’s vision went red as he fell to his back, only for another black-energy hand to come crashing down into him. It lifted and fell, punching him as the other hand held him.
The hands were ripped away, as if pulled by some unseen force. Riley pulled himself up to see the ground open up around the lead-cloaker, Shade. The red earth sunk down and then stretched over him, burying him. Those black-energy hands remained above the surface and dug into the ground as Shade sought to free himself.
Riley had to stay in relative proximity to the mutant, so he could keep pulling essence from it. His health had fallen to a little less than half. He reached out and pulled another helping of monster-essence as weapons and powers clashed all around him.
Something red glinted in the corner of his eye. He turned, and watched a glowing red spear dive towards him. His eyes widened. He turned, but there was no way to dodge in time.
Crimson Spear was upon him, plunging that spear right for his heart. It was going to be a critical hit.
A pale white blur flashed across Riley’s vision as the White Weevil slammed into Crimson Spear and smashed him away, just as the spear had reached inches from his body.
The weevil stood tall beside him. Its head turned, those black eyes locked with Riley’s.
Crimson Spear toppled away but quickly righted himself. Instead of re-engaging Riley, he focused on The Weevil that had attacked him. He dove in and swung his spear, using its extended reach to swipe at the Weevil.
The Weevil’s head turned and caught the spear mid-swing.
Crimson Spear froze in-place as his attack was suddenly halted.
Click click click click click click.
Bang!
A bullet slammed into Crimson Spear’s head and knocked him back.
Riley turned his head and saw Laura nearby. Her arm was extended, holding that revolver. She looked between the nearby Weevil, and to Riley. Her brow furrowed, but she’d made her choice in where to fire that special shot.
Shadows surrounded the Weevil. His form was flung into a nearby column. The shadows coalesced outwards, then rushed inwards, impaling him at dozens of angles. The shadows stabbed rapidly at the trapped Weevil.
Shadow Witch stood nearby, her hands in the air as her fingers moved, manipulating the shadows. Red bolts smashed into Shadow Witch and caused the shadows to melt away from the Weevil.
Shadow redirected her attention on Brenda but before she could summon her powers, she was hit with a series of exploding lotuses. Two dark-energy hands swept down to block the attacks as Shade had freed himself and was covering her. The two of them moved to closer proximity as the large energy hands protected them as they backed off, only to switch their attention to new targets of opportunity nearby.
Riley turned and looked back to the Weevil. The white insect was laying on its side at the base of one of the pillars. Riley’s eyes widened as he watched the Weevil’s body shift and contort. White pieces cracked and flaked away. Piece by piece the fragments of chitin broke and then dissolved from the player’s body. Riley walked towards the Weevil, or at least, the player who had been called the Weevil for so long.
Laura stood nearby, keeping an eye on him and the Weevil player. Her clones had closed in around them, only six remained, but they acted as a perimeter in the chaos.
All the pale-white fragments of the insects exoskeleton had fallen away. Its body transformed. What was left, was a player. A male player.
He had long black hair and soft almost androgynous features. He was thin, pale, but not as pale as the bleached-white of the Weevil itself. He wore a black hoodie. His thumbs were poking through the holes at the ends of the sleeves.
The player lifted his head further and sat against the stone pillar behind him.
Even when it was just an in-game depiction. His appearance was unmistakeable.
“Aaron,” Riley whispered. “What the hell is this?” he spoke louder.
Aaron looked up to him and slowly shifted to move to a stand. “I took too much damage,” came Aaron’s soft voice. “I lost my bug form.”
“You’re the Weevil?” Riley spoke, his voice almost cracking. “How...why?”
By now, many of the cloakers had fallen. The paragon PKers they’d fought earlier, along with Shade, were all withdrawing. The Chasm Mutant roared from several hundred feet away, as it was attacked by Red Shotgun and Snow—its health nearing zero.
Explosions and crashing stone could still be heard as the PKers made their retreat. Shadow Witch pulled out another costly orange cube. With a quick shout, her PKer companions moved in to touch her, before they were teleported away.
Many of Shade’s cloakers were left behind to fend for themselves as they ran through the chasm, hoping to find a way out of the area, while Warcry and her rooks chased them down.
Aaron had stood in silence for several long seconds. His eyes darted around the ground, before finally saying, “It’s a long story.”
“You lied to me?” Riley said.
Aaron looked up, his brow furrowed.“I’ve never lied to you!” he said. “Ever!”
“You didn’t even...tell me about this!” Riley accused. “You killed me! You’ve killed tons of players!”
“I didn’t know you were Radiance!” Aaron shouted back. “You never told me anything! You kept me at a distance when you played Sigil. All I ever wanted was to join you, but you insisted you play alone. I wanted to show you my powers! But you never wanted to party. You never even came to visit my shop, or anything!”
Riley could feel his hands shaking as he stared at his best friend. The best friend he’d never played Sigil with, the game that had become his entire life.
“You’re a PKer. You’ve killed so many players, and for what? Just for some money? These are good players, just trying to make a living, like I was! You killed me, whether you knew it was me or not, you killed me and so many others!”
“I had to!” Aaron said. He shook his head. “I had no other way!”
“There’s always another way! You could’ve done anything. Are your bills so damn high that you had to resort to killing other players?”
“It’s not about me, Riley!” Aaron yelled. He paused and chewed on his lower lip. “My mom has cancer,” he said in a low voice. “She’s been in and out of the hospital for the past four months. I...I tried to pay the bills she couldn’t afford. I didn’t have enough! I never had enough! The medical bills kept getting more and more expensive. She couldn’t work and her money ran out. She was evicted from her apartment and has been living with me, when she’s not in the hospital. I needed more money than I could get on just killing monsters. So I did the only thing I could think of. I took from players that didn’t need their gear. I didn’t want to hurt anyone else’s livelihood, but the hospital threatened to end treatment if payments weren’t met! So...yeah, I killed other players and took their gear to sell it. I didn’t mean for some of the players to get killed...like you. All I’d ever heard from other players and on forums, was that Radiance wasn’t too-great a guy, that he had plenty of money, got groups whenever he wanted them, and didn’t care about anyone but himself. So yeah, when I had you under that beam, I let you die. I’m sorry! I wish I had known, but I didn’t! You never told me anything and I had to do something, else my mother was going to lose the only fight that mattered.”
Riley couldn’t find a single word to speak.
Laura stood nearby, havi
ng heard every word.
Riley’s gaze lowered to the ground. He shook his head and looked back to Aaron. “I’m sorry,” he said. “Is...your mom alright, now?” he questioned.
Aaron shook his head. “No, she’s really not. It’s why I made so many appearances lately. I don’t have enough, and it's getting to a critical point in her treatment.”
Riley looked over to Laura.
She looked back and then looked to Aaron. “I’m...Laura,” she offered to him. “I’m sorry about your situation, no one should have to go through that. I...understand, and I have an idea. I don’t think you need to keep killing players to help your mother.”
Aaron looked over to Laura. “Then what am I supposed to do?” he asked quietly.
Laura smiled warmly. “Embrace your infamy.”
Epilogue
Paragon Cafe was busier than usual. More occupants had come in from outside, to catch the special reports on the news.
A mild silence fell over the cafe as the reporter iconic to the White Weevil incidents appeared on-screen. She smiled at the camera, her name ‘Susan Graff’ was listed at the bottom of the screen, just beneath the words ‘Sigil Online Special Report.’
“Hello everyone. As many of you know, the White Weevil has been terrorizing Sigil Online for several months. The White Weevil had been targeting groups of players and using the monsters nearby to appear without warning. However, this ‘White Weevil’ has never actually been a monster. He’s a player. A paragon, actually. He’s like everyone else who plays Sigil Online, except that for him, his powers let him do some extraordinary things, above and beyond what we’re used to seeing. This player has reached out to us for an exclusive interview where we ‘dissect’ his powers and the motives that forced him to take the persona we all know him by. Later tonight, you’ll discover the emotional tale of the paragon, known as Arbiter.”
Another television in the cafe was playing a different channel. Just as many eyes were upon it, as there were on the others. At the bottom of the screen read the name ‘Blake Grigson.’ On the screen, was a middle-aged man with short red hair. He was thin and somewhat pale. He smiled warmly at the camera as he spoke. “Here with me today, is lead-developer Jacob Nunez.”
The camera then shifted, showing another man with tanned skin and a buzzed head. He wore a blue T-shirt and a pair of black slacks.
Blake sat in a red chair, facing the developer. He reached out and shook his hand. “Thanks for joining us today, Jacob. I can’t tell you how thrilling it is for you to be here with us to discuss the next expansion to Sigil Online.”
Jacob took Blake’s hand in a firm handshake, before he leaned back and relaxed in his seat. He nodded and smiled. “Thanks for having me. I imagine a lot of people feel the same way,” he said with a chuckle.
“I’m sure,” said Blake as he remained leaned-forward in his seat. “So let’s get right into it. There’s a new expansion on the horizon. You said there’s not an exact release-date yet, but can you tell us anything about it? The name? What changes we’re going to see?
“I’ve had to discuss this at-length with the directors over at headquarters,” said Jacob. “As far as what they’ll let me reveal. But yes, there’s a bit that I can tell you. First off, the expansion is going to be called ‘Hellions.’”
“Hellions?” asked Blake. “Please tell us more.”
Jacob smirked. “The hellions expansion encompasses a drastic change to Sigil Online. Currently, players are limited. Too limited, we feel. So, let’s say you’re a new player. What do you do in Sigil Online?”
“You mean besides dodging falling buildings and players way more powerful than yourself?” asked Blake.
“Precisely!” said Jacob. “The game has changed significantly since those first six months. As players became more powerful, so did the monsters and threats in the environment. This was all handled by the in-game world AI. You see, the world AI makes sure that there’s powerful threats in the game, that players have to come together and defeat.”
“Like the many world-invasion events?” said Blake.
“Exactly,” said Jacob. “So, we have the world AI making sure that the game remains challenging for the powerful and leveled-up players, but those same challenges are making it more and more difficult for low-level players, and new players, to enjoy the game.”
“Which is an interesting problem, due to how open the game is. There’s no real ‘low level’ area as far as cities are concerned,” said Blake.
“Right,” said Jacob. “There’s been a lot of trial and error with Sigil Online. We want players to build the communities and help shape the world. There’s been a lot of conflict in the game, not just between the constructed threats, but also from players themselves. We imagined that this would happen, but when you combine the substantial threat that players cause to other players, and then add in the fact that there’s all these powerful monsters, we have some bad situations arise, situations that the player base as a whole, aren’t dealing with.”
“Like the Uber City incident?”
“Yes, just like Uber City,” said Jacob. “With Uber City, we saw a large player versus player component, that really kept everyone fighting each other, instead of risking their characters on the monsters. Which then led to the downfall of that city. When the city essentially became abandoned, the world AI turned it into a monster-infested zone, that still also has NPC activity.”
“So what’s being done to combat this?” asked Blake. “I know that you don’t want to push the players too much, as you’ve said in the past.”
“Right, we don’t want to tell players what to do. We want to give them options, rewards, challenges, and a reason to play the game different ways. So, what we’re doing, is adding in new features for new players. These features are kind of like a whole update themselves. New players are going to be able to fulfill a mercenary and minion role for already established guilds. Think of it as an extension of the billboard system.”
“Can’t guilds already hire NPC workers?” asked Blake, despite already seeming to know the answer.
“Yes they can, and they’re going to be able to continue to do so,” said Jacob. “Currently, crafting and many of the in-game jobs, center around sending NPCs off to collect items. What we aim to do with these changes, is allow guilds to place jobs directly to those billboards. So you’ll have the jobs that are there now, which are getting a bit of a rework, but you’ll also have a whole other section for guild-based jobs. We’re also adding a new type of item to the game. It’ll be relatively easy for established guilds to create, and it’ll let them give non-powered players, temporary powers. Think of it as a weapon rental, but with powers. There’s no good way to ‘lend’ weapons, without the weapon being stolen. We don’t want weapons to magically teleport out of a user’s hand when the time expires. We could have the weapon break-down, which is something we’re still considering, but we think ‘temporary powers’ is a good solution. This will let guilds offer time-limited powers to new players, and those new players can fulfill new roles they otherwise couldn’t, such as helping with monster hunting, or defending an area, or protecting a resource caravan, or even collecting non-monster materials for crafting.”
“That sounds like it’d let new players jump into something more exciting than carrying water around, or repairing a damaged building,” said Blake.
Jacob nodded. “Which, in hindsight, we wish we would’ve improved upon sooner. We want these new-player features to really bolster the community. There’s some other implementations that are going along with this, but I can’t say any more on that.”
“So we have a revamped new-player system,” said Blake. “But that doesn’t sound very ‘hellions’ to me.”
Jacob smiled. “It doesn’t, does it?” he said with a small laugh. “Well, the big change coming to the expansion is something that’s going to change Sigil Online in such a big way, that people are going to see the game differently. Right now, you can fight
monsters and you can fight other players. You can gain powers and reach tier one, and you can gain your sigil, and become tier two, which is also known as becoming a paragon. With ‘hellions,’ we’re adding something else to that mix. When the expansion releases, we’re giving players another option. There’s been a lot of hype around this whole White Weevil incident, which is really quite interesting. Because we just learned that the White Weevil was never actually a monster, but a player.”
“Which I’m sure you guys could take a look at the game-code and figure that out for yourselves, right?” Blake joked.
Jacob smirked. “More or less, I’m not going to say we did or didn’t...but regardless, it was very cool to see what the community did in this situation. The timing of this is also very interesting, because with the hellions expansion, we want to do something a little similar. When the new expansion releases, players are going to have the option of becoming a monster.”
“What?” Blake gasped, his eyebrows lifted. “What does that mean? How’s that going to work?”
Jacob held up his hands a moment, as if to calm Blake. “So...ok, there’s a lot to explain. First, I want to compare this new system, called the hellion system, to the paragon system. Essentially, a player starts out and can go out to obtain tier one powers, to work towards becoming a paragon. The expansion is going to let players go out and in much the same manner, become a hellion. We’re adding new NPCs to the world, as well as new monsters and rare spawns, and a whole bunch of other things to make this work. When players interact with these things, they can become a monster, just like they were able to previously obtain their tier-one powers. It’ll be somewhat random, but it’s something players will be able to seek out.”
“So you’re saying that all the different monsters we see in the game now, a player could look like and be as big as any of them?” asked Blake.
Jacob’s lips parted, his head tilted from side to side. “Technically, yes. It’ll be up to the world AI to determine what all happens in that regard, but yes, that’s correct. Players can now choose to try and become solo or even clan monsters.”