Zones of Alacria- The Dragon Gate

by K R Dimmick

  You are bleeding.

  Duration: 5 seconds.

  Shoving my finger into my mouth to avoid getting blood on anything, I discovered four little metal spikes, all the size of a toothpick. Got it. I picked one up. When I was under the desk again, I slowly pulled the empty drawer back until I saw the blue flash. I focused hard, and the tiny hole became visible. There must have been some kind of camouflage spell on it so you couldn’t see it unless you really looked carefully.

  I took the small piece of metal and inserted it gingerly into the hole. Nothing. I pushed. A loud click came from the drawer, making me jump. Standing up, I peered down to find the drawer had a false bottom, which had now moved away from the edges of the drawer.

  Carefully, I pushed the extra panel of wood back. Underneath the false bottom, there was a plain metal box. I pulled it out and put it on the desk. It looked like it had seen better days and didn’t fit the rest of the overly ornate look of the room. The plain metal was tarnished and covered with dents and deep scratches. It did look big enough to hold a journal, though. I turned it over in my hands, but couldn’t find any kind of lock or possible way to open it. It was simply a metal box with a handle. Somehow, though, I knew this must be what I was looking for, it was just too out of place not to be.

  I ran my fingers over the top, seeing if I could find a catch that I couldn’t see. Nothing. I did the same for each of the sides and even the bottom of the box. Still nothing. Trying to work out what to do next, I realized that I was staring off into space, and with my eyes unfocused, I could see a faint pattern in the dents and scratches.

  If you applied some imagination, it almost looked like runes scratched across the surface.

  There must be some kind of clue in the room, surely. I was this close, there had to be a way to open it. Think. My eyes drifted to the tapestries. Andrew didn’t strike me as someone who appreciated great art and tapestries were this world’s form of art. I walked over to get a better look.

  The first scene to one side of the entrance was of a man dressed in silver armor, doing what looked like Alchemy. The second tapestry showed the same man fighting a beautiful, golden dragon. The man had a huge shield, which he was crouched behind attempting to avoid the fire the dragon was breathing over him. He seemed to be holding some kind of large, white, oblong rock in his other hand. The third tapestry showed the results of the fight, with the dragon lying dead on the floor, however, there were a few details in the picture that caught my attention. Instead of a golden dragon, the artist had, for some reason, made it green and much smaller. Also strange was that the man wasn’t standing triumphantly over its body like you’d expect, and was instead on his knees, with his head in his hands, almost like he was weeping.

  All of the first three tapestries were done in greens, browns and golds, except for the man, who was in silver. The last tapestry was very different, however. The background was much darker, almost black. The man was standing on a small mound of earth. What really grabbed my attention was the fact that he was wearing the same dark blue robes Andrew had been wearing when I’d first seen him outside the inn in Milgate. He was holding the glowing white and blue orb he’d had in the prison above his head.

  This must be Andrew’s history in the game. I went back to the first tapestry to look for anything that could possibly be called a rune.

  Sure enough, around the edges were a series of runes that I’d assumed were squiggly decorations. Each tapestry had a single rune repeated over and over around the edge.

  I grabbed the box and brought it over to the first tapestry. Comparing the rune on the borders with the almost rune on the box, they were very similar. The full rune looked like a capital letter R, written with purely straight lines. One of the lines was missing in the pattern on the box. I traced over the area with my finger, as if I could simply paint the line in. A blue flash flared from the box and the area I’d traced seemed to dip slightly. A few seconds later, the dip simply faded away and the metal pushed its way back into its original position. The metal pick lying on the desk caught my attention. I wonder…

  I traced the line on the box again and when the dip appeared, I laid the metal spike lengthwise into it, filling in the missing line and completing the image of the rune. An intense flash of golden light left me with a little red icon of an eye in the bottom left of my vision.

  You have been blinded.

  Duration: 5 seconds.

  When I could see again, I looked at the box, and there, on the surface, was a gold-colored rune that looked exactly like the one around the border of the first tapestry.

  Focusing on the rune and wishing for information, I got a notification.

  The rune RAD, known as the letter R, is about the act of riding, a journey, movement or adventure to further oneself in a specific direction.

  I grabbed the other three metal spikes and hurried over to the second tapestry. All around the edges were little crosses, like an X. Sure enough, the box pattern looked like a Y, with the bottom right line of the X missing. I traced the area with my finger, and once again, the metal dipped. This time, I closed my eyes as I dropped a metal pick into the dip. Opening my eyes after the flash, I could again see a golden rune that looked like an X.

  The rune GYFU, known as the letter G, is about partners, honor, connection, gifts, love and divine union.

  Well I’d read fantasy novels where dragons were worshipped as gods, and others where knights killed them off and were then thought of as honorable. I briefly wondered which scenario would be true for this game.

  The third rune looked like a sideways infinity symbol, drawn again with only straight lines. I traced the missing line, dropped the third metal pick into the dip and was rewarded with another gold-colored rune. This time, it was shaped like a bow tie or pointed infinity symbol.

  The rune DAGAZ, known as the letter D, is about breakthrough, stability between opposites, stopping harmful energy while letting good energy through, cosmic consciousness, intuition and the light within.

  From the look of the knight on his knees, he’d messed this one up. I had no idea what the good energy he should have let through was, but clearly, he’d gotten it wrong. Either way, I needed the last rune.

  Around the edge of the final tapestry were little arrows pointing upward. I repeated the process and put in the final metal pick, causing a golden arrow to appear on the lid of the box.

  The rune TYR, known as the letter T, is about justice, courage, being a warrior, success and victory.

  If I remembered my studies correctly, Tyr was the Norse god of war.

  A click brought me out of my memories. The top and bottom half of the metal box now had a clear line between them. Pulling on the top, I found I could now open the box.

  There, sitting snugly inside, was a brown leather journal with a dragon branded onto the cover. It had what looked like a little claw as the catch, with a length of leather string tied around it to keep it closed.

  I picked up the journal.

  You have received Brown Leather Dragon Journal.

  Something about this journal makes you feel it holds secrets within its depths.

  Yes! I quickly put the journal in my inventory. Looking down, I saw something shiny in the corner of the box. I looked closer. It was my ring. The one Andrew had confiscated. On a whim, I picked that up too, and put it in my inventory. Hopefully, it would be a while before he noticed it was gone.

  Now I had to get this room back to looking like it had before I’d searched it. I closed the box and the opening disappeared with a click. With another golden flash, the four metal picks were ejected from the lid of the box and it returned to looking like a beaten-up old metal box.

  I put the box into the drawer and covered it with the fake wooden bottom. Next, I crawled under the desk again and pushed one of the metal picks into the tiny hole and heard the piece of wood click back into place. I closed the drawer and put all four metal picks back where I’d found them.

  There hadn�
�t seemed to be a specific order to the junk in the rest of the drawers, so hopefully it wasn’t in some clever layout I couldn’t see.

  To cover my tracks, I grabbed the prison key and headed out of the room and toward the kitchens.

  I started thinking about the riddle. There had been a line in there with a bunch of letters in it and I was wondering if it had anything to do with the runes I’d just found. I pulled up the relevant lines.

  Decipher runes, or you’ll remain,

  R G D T defines the frame.

  They were the same runes. Well, at least I now knew which runes I was looking for. Where they were was an entirely different matter, but I was clearly going in the right direction. Seeing them in Andrew’s office, however, also meant he knew about them. If those tapestries were correct, and were about his past, then he not only knew about it, he’d fought a dragon, killed it and somehow regretted it.

  Either way, it meant that the dragons weren’t myths and Andrew knew that. They had at least been around at that point. I guess that didn’t mean they were still alive now, Andrew could have killed the last one for all I knew.

  I had a sudden flash of inspiration. Growing up, I’d loved ancient languages, and in Chinese, the word for dragon sounded like ‘long’. I quickly pulled up the riddle again, and sure enough, there it was.

  Lore describes the Elven death

  intentions glow in one Long breath.

  The word that had seemingly been capitalized for no reason finally made sense. It was about the dragons. Something to do with their breath, which had to mean fire. Maybe that bit about glowing referred to the fire. I did know from Kailu that the line about Elven death was about a place called Goran Thedgate that was marked in the gray mist on my map. Maybe that’s where the dragons were located?

  23

  Gift Horses

  Things were starting to fall into place. Alchemy must also have something to do with the riddle, otherwise, the first tapestry wouldn’t have been about Andrew leveling his Alchemy. It must also have something to do with why the Dragon Hunters killed off all the Master and Grandmaster Alchemists. My guess is that there was some potion that you needed to be at Master rank to create, and that I needed to solve the riddle.

  As soon as I could get out of the guildhall, I was going straight to Aliz, and I was going to level up my Alchemy as fast as I possibly could. Then, hopefully, I could help her decipher the journal I’d just recovered, and we’d find what I needed.

  Lost in thought, I realized I’d essentially been solving puzzles all morning, so I took a quick peek at my stats sheet again in the hopes that I’d managed to get a few extra Wisdom points. To my surprise, I’d managed to gain an extra seven points.

  “What can I get you?” Suri said automatically as I entered the kitchens. “Oh, it’s you. Did you find anything yet?”

  “Yes, I did.” I pulled the journal out of my inventory and handed it over to the chef.

  Her face broke into a huge smile.

  “Finally, I can give this to my niece. I’ll tell her who found it for her, and she’ll teach you as much Alchemy as you could possibly want to know. I also have these for you,” she handed over some little metal picks.

  Congratulations! You have completed the quest: Missing Journal

  You have received: High Quality Lock Picks x 3

  Each pick has an 80% success rate and is consumed on use.

  I put them into my inventory, sure they’d come in handy at some point. It was time to get the prisoners their food and find out who the new ones were. I was not looking forward to that part after what happened to two of the last set of prisoners.

  Laden down with food and the cell key in my pocket, I headed for the prison. I was rather dreading going in there and seeing what state Cara must be in, let alone the new prisoners. I arrived via the portal stone and stepped around the partition into the prison room.

  There, sitting at the back of her cell, was Cara. Her dark green dress was crumpled, she had streaks down her grimy face and her eyes looked hollow, like she’d never be able to get the vision of that sacrifice out of her mind.

  “Orianna?” croaked one of the new prisoners, dragging me away from looking at Cara’s huddled form.

  I turned around and dropped the food I was carrying all over the floor. There, in the cell next to Cara’s, was Mikael. The guy who’d warned me to stay away from this guild. I hastily grabbed the packages I’d dropped.

  “Mikael. How…?” Words failed me. He looked like he’d been beaten nearly to death.

  “I was trying to convince the residents of the next town over to stop listening to Andrew and they locked me up. They said I was disturbing the peace and maligning the reputation of the guy who’s protecting everyone from the corrupted beasts. Then, at some point in the night, they knocked me out and I woke up here.” He waved his left arm, indicating the small, dirty cell he was now confined to. He was holding his right arm at a rather alarming angle next to his body.

  “I need to get you out of here. I need to get all of you out of here.” I started fumbling with the lock. “You were right. Andrew is up to something horrible. I don’t know what, but a few nights ago, he sacrificed two locals to fuel some glowing orb. I’m sure that’s what happened to the friends you said went missing.”

  Finally, I managed to get the cell door open and quickly went in.

  Allow prisoner to leave the cell. Yes / No?

  Selecting yes, I tried to pull a health potion out of my inventory, only to find I couldn’t. In fact, my entire interface seemed to have been greyed out. It must be something to do with the cells. I hurried back out. Sure enough, I could access things again. I grabbed two health potions, just in case, and went back in. Popping the cork, I poured the first one into Mikael’s mouth. Thankfully, his arm popped back into position and all the nasty gashes and bruises cleared up. Since he was still only at 50% health, I gave him the other potion to drink, too.

  I opened Cara and the other prisoner’s cells and set them both free so they could leave. However, they each stood in their cells without walking out.

  “It’s okay, I’ve set it so you can leave the cell,” I said, looking at Cara and the other prisoner. I did a double take and realized he was an elf. I wondered if he’d come to rescue Cara. He looked quite young, at least by my reckoning, but then I didn’t know a great deal about elves. Like Kailu, his ears came to subtle, but defined points. His hair was almost white and fell to his waist, while his skin had a faint golden glow, almost like you’d be able to see him if you turned the lights off.

  They both left their cells and Mikael swallowed the second health potion and then got up to join them.

  “I think the only people who can be in the guildhall are guild members, or those in a party with a guild member. So, are you all in a party with someone or were you forced to join the guild so they could keep you in here?” I asked, trying to come up with a plan to release them.

  “Unfortunately, the latter,” the elf said in a highly refined voice. “I was blindfolded, so I don’t know for certain who it was, but someone in your guild possesses Mind Magic. They compelled me to accept the guild invitation, then forced some disgusting potion down my throat. I’m assuming that potion is preventing me from being able to leave the guild or the guildhall.”

  “Probably, since I have the same problem,” I said.

  “I don’t think I drank a potion, and if it tasted that bad, I think I would have remembered it,” muttered Mikael.

  The elf flashed a brief look of annoyance at Mikael before turning back to me.

  “Since we haven’t been properly introduced, let me start. My name is Allion. I’ve yet to earn my last name,” he bowed with a flourish. “Would you be so kind as to tell me the name of my beautiful rescuer?”

  I could feel the heat rising in my face as I muttered my name and watched the text above his head change to Allion - 25.

  “Let’s not get too excited, we’ve yet to get out of the prison, let alon
e the guildhall,” said Mikael, rolling his eyes.

  I hadn’t thought my face could get any redder. Clearly, I was wrong.

  “Can you access the guild menu?” I asked the three of them, quite aware that we needed to speed things up if we wanted to avoid getting caught. “There should be a little picture of a dragon claw somewhere that will give you access to the menu system.”

  I had no idea if NPCs had the same interface as players. For that matter, I didn’t know if they had an interface at all. Hopefully, they would understand what I was talking about and wouldn’t think I was crazy.

  “I don’t see anything that looks like a dragon claw,” said Mikael. “I do, however, seem to be in a party with Allion and someone named Cara.”

  “That would be me,” added Cara. “Thankfully, I’m not in the guild, either.”

  “Well, if you’re not in the guild, you should be able to simply leave the party and that will kick you out of the guildhall,” I said. “At least that’s what I’m hoping will happen.”

  “In that case, I will do that,” Cara replied. “Before I go, though, the quest I offered you to persuade the King to rescue me will fail the moment I leave this place. So, I will give you another.”

  You have received a quest: Seek Out Cara

  Seek out Cara Legatus and she will introduce you to King Faelyn Sophos as her rescuer.

  Completion of this quest will give you 5,000 XP and increase your standing with the elves to ‘ally’.

  Do you accept? Yes / No

  I quickly thought yes, accepting the new quest.