by K R Dimmick
“I have developed a protection sigil,” Andrew declared, holding up something that looked like a cross between a syringe and some kind of stamp. “It is available to any and all who want it, and there will never be a charge for it.”
The crowd started muttering nervously.
“Your protection is vital to me and my guild. All you have to do is accept this gift, get the sigil, and you will be immune to attacks from all corrupted beasts. I would never ask you to simply believe me without proof, so I have a demonstration for you.” Andrew waved his hand at the door behind him, and once again, it opened.
This time, Colt and Saris walked out, pushing a huge cage between them. Inside the cage was a corrupted vampire rabbit, just like the ones I’d been power leveled on.
“Some of my most trusted guild members,” Andrew indicated Colt and Saris, “Will now demonstrated the power of this protection sigil.”
He held out his hand toward Colt, who reluctantly walked over to him. Andrew injected something into Colt’s right arm, then pressed the stamping device down on the back of his hand.
After a quick flash of green light, I could see a small mark on the back of Colt’s hand. I assumed this was the protection sigil Andrew had been talking about.
“Please put your hand into the cage,” Andrew said to Colt, pointing at the cage beside him.
Colt gingerly pushed his arm through the bars toward the vampire bunny.
Well, at least part of this was going to be entertaining, I thought.
The rabbit lunged at Colt’s arm and bit down hard on it.
A huge gasp escaped the crowd’s lips as they pushed forward as one to get a better view.
“Hold your arm up for all to witness,” Andrew instructed, grabbing the arm Colt had placed in the rabbit’s cage. “As you can plainly see, he is completely unharmed.”
An excited mumbling broke out among the crowd.
“To show you that this isn’t some kind of trick, my other guild member will now demonstrate the power of the protection sigil.” Andrew looked pointedly at Saris. “Place your arm inside the cage.”
A look of terror briefly crossed her face, but, credit where it was due, she bravely pushed her arm between the bars. The rabbit once again leapt forward and bit down hard on Saris’ arm. She screamed and tried, without success, to pull her arm away from the rabbit.
Suddenly, an arrow flew across the square and hit the rabbit between the eyes. Colt, shaken out of his stupor, drew his sword and stabbed the rabbit a few times until it was dead. I looked up to see Joe, Andrew’s second in command, disappearing from atop the roof of the building that was situated against the town’s wall.
A very pale Saris, with about 10% health left, shakily withdrew her arm from the cage and quickly downed a health potion.
“So, as you can see, my friends, this protection sigil will keep you all safe until we have eradicated every last corrupted beast from this world.” Andrew shouted, throwing his arms back up into the air and looking around at the now very excited crowd.
A feeling of dread settled in my stomach. There was no way Andrew had suddenly developed a desire to protect NPCs, so he was up to something. The question was, what?
Looking back at the crowd, I glanced around to see if I could find Mikael, but I couldn’t spot him anywhere. Hopefully, that meant he’d left without anyone noticing him.
An NPC dressed in rough spun, brown clothes stepped forward from the crowd and started walking up to Andrew. Given that the soldiers had let him through and neither Andrew nor the mayor looked overly concerned, I guessed this had been set up in advance.
The man stopped at the top of the stairs and turned to address the crowd.
“I’ll do anything to protect my freedom,” he declared, turning back to Andrew. “Give me a protection sigil! I want to thwart those elves and their evil plans.”
Okay, that sounded a little fake and over-the-top. Unfortunately, judging by the cheers coming from the crowd, I was clearly the only one who thought so.
Andrew reached out to the man. Taking his arm, he gave the man the injection, then pressed the stamp onto the back of his hand, causing that same green flash of light I’d seen when Colt had been branded. There, on the man’s hand, was a vibrant, green mark. I wasn’t close enough to see the details, but it looked like some kind of cross from where I stood.
“I’m protected!” shouted the man. “Come and join me, and thank our new champion.”
The crowd rushed forward as the soldiers tried to funnel them into some semblance of a line.
This had to be bad news. I just didn’t know how yet.
“Well that was entertaining. One of the best pieces of acting I’ve seen in a long while.”
I spun round to see a grinning Mikael standing next to Aliz.
“I think we all need to make ourselves scarce, don’t you?” he asked.
“Definitely,” I said, letting go of a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding. “Lead the way, since you seem to somehow be invisible to them.”
“Ah, I’m guessing you’ve not been in party with someone in stealth before?”
“What?” I asked, bewildered. What did being in a party have to do with that?
“When you’re in stealth, like I was after I realized what was going on, anyone in your party will still be able to see you. They can all see you just fine. It’s designed for when you have a big hunting party going,” he winked, “After all, it wouldn’t be much use if you couldn’t see the people you were hunting with. You’d end up running into each other and alerting the animals.”
He turned away, chuckling, and offered his arm to Aliz.
“Shall we?”
They both hunched down, presumably going into stealth, and walked slowly back toward the town gate, leaving me alone with my thoughts.
We walked in single file past the guards and out of the gate, heading back toward Boon’s Forest. As soon as we reached the tree line, Mikael stood up.
“Unfortunately, it looks like we won’t be visiting the Beastmaster in Ratters Town today,” Mikael looked apologetically at me. “Once the Dragon Hunters have gone, we can go back.”
“We can always sneak back in, I guess,” I said. “The guards didn’t seem to spot us leaving in stealth.”
“Ah, no, that only works one way. You can leave anywhere you want in stealth, because you can only be in the town if you’ve already been allowed in by the guards. Therefore, leaving in stealth is a benefit to the town if they’re under attack,” Mikael explained. “Entering the town is a whole different matter, though. The guards all have a special ability to see through the stealth of anyone, at any level, trying to make their way into a town. It’s for the safety of the people living there. That way, only those the guards let in can enter.”
Well, that made sense, I suppose. At least we’d been able to get out in stealth. We’d have been in a lot of trouble otherwise. I, however, was now stuck. I had five days left to solve this riddle and zero idea how to get any further other than leveling up. I slumped down onto the ground and put my head in my hands.
“I need some help,” I said, letting out a big sigh. “I don’t know how much you know about travelers, but I have this riddle I have to solve if I’m not going to die in six days’ time. And I’m already on day two.”
They both inhaled sharply.
“I’m stuck, and I don’t know where to go from here. I was hoping the Ratters Town library would have given me some clues, but I can’t afford to waste a day or two waiting until we can get back in there. On top of that, we need to get Aliz away from Milgate.”
The others sat down next to me and Mikael pulled some food out of his inventory.
“Cookie?” he asked, holding a chocolate chip cookie out toward me with a smile on his face. “I find everything is better with a cookie.”
I reached out and accepted it. Taking a bite, it did somehow clear my head. I looked at the explanation of the buff and laughed.
Chocola
te Chip Cookies: 2 hours of contentment
+5 Wisdom
+100 Karma
Sounded like exactly the thing I needed to solve this problem.
I filled them both in on the riddle I had to solve, sending them both a copy like I had to Kailu. I also shared what I’d seen in the Dragon Hunters’ prison and how Mikael would have been sacrificed at some point to fuel whatever artifact Andrew seemed to be building. That got them both looking very worried. Finally, I summoned Soter, since whatever we decided here would affect him and where he needed to go. Plus, he might end up having even more interesting insights.
“Cara, the woman that was in the prison with you,” I nodded to Mikael, “Told me the elves weren’t creating the corruption. My guess is that, since Andrew imprisoned her for no apparent reason, simply knowing the elves aren’t responsible goes against his plans.”
The others nodded along.
“In my experience, Andrew always seems to be a step, or more, ahead of what’s going on around him. I’m still not quite sure why it was so easy to help you all escape from their prison. Hopefully, it won’t come back to bite us somehow, but that’s a problem for the future. The only conclusion I have is that, despite what he’s saying, or possibly because of it, I think Andrew is somehow the one causing the corruption.”
They looked rather shocked, but before they could object, I held up my hand and continued.
“The prison in the guildhall is just above the gate to the arena. When they power leveled me, they used corrupted mobs because of the high XP they each give. Every one of them came from behind that gate. Also, before I saw that sacrifice, there were about twenty rabbits in one of the cells, and when I came back the following day, they were gone. I know it’s far from proof, but I really think he’s got something to do with it.”
Person. Follow.
I looked up in surprise as Soter appeared next to our group and urgently tried to get us to follow him.
31
Sanctuary
Mikael was the fastest to respond and grabbed Aliz’s hand, pulling her up. We all quickly dropped into stealth and headed to a thicker line of trees as fast as our reduced speed would let us.
We skirted the fields on the west side of Ratters Town until Boon’s Forest gave way to yet another new location for me.
Congratulations! You have discovered: Elvenwood / El Silvam.
Well that was good, I hoped. Both Cara and Kailu had implied that humans and elves didn’t get on particularly well, though. However, we had news about Andrew’s upcoming attack, and that would hopefully make them like us, or at least not kill us on sight. Plus, I had that outstanding quest from Cara so I could be introduced to the King. I let out a sigh and smiled. Things were finally going my way.
“Show yourselves.”
I looked around and could see no one. However, Mikael raised both of his hands and dropped out of stealth.
“I come in friendship,” said Mikael. “I have hunted with you in years past, I count several of you as friends and I come bearing gifts.
“Mikael?”
A tall, slim female elf materialized from behind one of the trees in the clearing. She had the same faint golden glow to her skin that Allion had, with long, honey-brown hair and leaf-green eyes. Her green and brown leather jerkin, pants and soft boots made her look like she was part of the forest. The gray text above her head simply said: Elf Hunter. She took a step forward as gracefully as a cat and a captivating smile broke across her face as she lowered her bow.
“I thought that looked like you,” she exclaimed. “Bows down, everyone.”
Three other elves I hadn’t spotted melted out from between the trees.
“I’ll walk in with them, you can carry on with your patrol,” the beautiful elf said to the others.
The three male elves turned and almost vanished from sight within a single step.
“Kira? Is that you?” Mikael looked the female elf up and down admiringly as I felt my face get hot. “You’ve grown up since I last saw you.”
She laughed, sounding almost like a cross between a breeze blowing through the leaves and a bubbling stream. My gaze was glued to her.
“You can turn off your Infatuate skill, Kira, these other two are friends of mine and we’ve got news King Faelyn will want to hear.”
Suddenly, she became normal, for want of a better word. She was still pretty, but I didn’t feel I needed to gaze at her adoringly any longer. In fact, now that the spell had worn off, I was feeling rather embarrassed about the whole thing. I looked back up at her to see the text above her head turn green and change to Kira Modig - 21.
“Don’t worry, all elves have the ability to enchant people as part of their racial skills,” Mikael said, looking at me. “It’s part of how they persuade humans to stay away. You’ll need to build up a resistance to it like I have so you don’t get affected by it. Elves under five years old can’t turn it off, so you’ll need to stay away from them when we get to their town or you’ll be running around like their slave.”
“Arik and I used to run you ragged when our parents first found you out in the forest,” laughed Kira. “My parents were the ones who found Mikael when his parents abandoned him. They took him in and raised him as part elf. It’s why he’s so good at hunting compared to most humans I’ve ever seen. Unfortunately for him, though, my twin brother Arik and I were both four years old at the time and hadn’t quite managed to learn how to control our abilities. He used to follow us around like a little wolf pup, fulfilling our every request until our parents found out.”
“Yes, you both paid dearly for that, once they discovered you’d had me doing all your chores,” Mikael said, smiling. “Anyway, as I said, we have some urgent news for King Faelyn, so if you could take us to El Sanctum as fast as possible, that’d be great. We also have a white wolf with us that has bonded to this traveler, Orianna.”
Mikael indicated I should call Soter back. I thought Summon Pet.
A minute later, Soter bounded into the little clearing we were in, sniffed Kira and promptly sat down in front of me.
Elf. Good. I heard.
Well, even if I’d had any doubts about the elves, that pronouncement would’ve made them completely evaporate.
“Soter, this is Kira,” I said, waving in Kira’s direction.
“He’s already greeted me,” Kira said, surprising me. “All elves talk to the animals in our area of the forest and we can all hear the ones who are smart enough to talk back, if they choose to let us. Soter here is exceptional, and he’s bestowed a great honor on you by bonding with you.”
Her comments were enough to let me recover from the shock that she could talk to Soter.
“I’m also here to find Cara Legatus. She gave me a quest when I helped her escape from the Dragon Hunters. She said to come and find her among the elves.”
Kira looked at me again, this time with a lot more respect.
“In that case, you are doubly welcome to El Silvam,” she bowed slightly.
“Since no one seems to want to introduce me,” Aliz said pointedly, glaring at Mikael, “I’ll do it. I’m Aliz Rynemann, Journeyman Alchemist, daughter to Savrine Rynemann, Grandmaster Alchemist.”
A look of shock crossed Kira’s face so quickly I wasn’t certain I’d seen it.
“In that case, you are most welcome among us. There are few elves who haven’t heard of Savrine and how she helped so many Alchemists escape from the Dragon Hunters’ killing spree. I only wish her knowledge hadn’t died with her,” she shook her head sadly. “We lost a lot that day.”
Aliz looked like she was about to say something, but changed her mind.
“Today, however, seems to be making up for it a little bit. An old friend returns, accompanied by a bonded traveler who saved one of our own, and now the daughter of Savrine is with us, as well. Plus, of course, a new four-legged friend,” she said, nodding to Soter, who somehow seemed to acknowledge her back. “The King will most certainly want to see you a
ll as quickly as possible.”
The deeper we traveled into Elvenwood, the denser the trees became, until we were walking in single file, pushing bushes aside to get through. Suddenly, we passed an unseen barrier and everyone seemed to relax. The trees became spaced further apart and the undergrowth all but disappeared. Kira kept nodding her head or waving a hand as she signaled elven guards I couldn’t see. Finally, we crossed a second unseen barrier, which must have been a magical illusion, and all at once, we were in the elven city.
Congratulations! You have discovered: El Sanctum.
Elves were casually standing around chatting on walkways between the trees. Children were chasing each other among the bases of the trees, and all the trees were easily ten times the size of any other I’d ever seen. They disappeared up into the sky as far as I could see, their canopies all shading the city below.
Tall, white plants that emitted a bright glow were spaced between the trees, acting as the elven equivalent of street lights. One stood at the base of each of the largest trees, lighting what looked like staircases grown from branches and moss. It was the most magical thing I’d ever laid eyes on.
I bumped into the person ahead of me and came to an abrupt halt. Quickly dragging my eyes back down from the bustling walkways above, I spotted what could only be a delegation standing before us.
Cara, the NPC I’d rescued from Andrew’s prison, was at the front and smiling at us. Her greying hair was tied up in an intricate knot on top of her head, and her new, blue robes hugged her curves. Behind her stood a tall, regal looking male elf with long, white hair, holding the hand of a stunningly beautiful female elf, also with long, white hair. He was dressed in golden-colored robes and wore a circle of branches on his head, while she was dressed in a green robe that looked like it was made of leaves. Behind and off to one side was another male elf who looked a lot like Kira. I could only assume this was her twin brother.