Zones of Alacria- The Dragon Gate

by K R Dimmick

  “I don’t know,” admitted Colt. “For some reason, Andrew thinks it’s Orianna doing it. He just doesn’t seem to know why. I overheard him saying something to Joe about putting a bounty out for her.”

  “This is all just hearsay. I say live and let live,” Baynor declared. “She won’t be alive for much longer anyway, based on my calculations. Perhaps then Andrew will calm down and stop stressing us all out.”

  “Agreed,” said Colt. “If the NPCs are too stupid to see the sigils are helping them, then let them die. If Orianna wants to stop them getting the sigils, then the deaths are on her head, not mine.”

  “Yeah, ‘cause it’s not like we’re the ones pushing the corrupted mobs toward them or anything,” muttered Saris.

  The three players had long since left and I was still sitting in our little hideout. Not only did I now have proof that Andrew was the one creating and releasing the corrupted mobs, he was doing it to get the NPCs in Ratters Town to accept his protection sigils. That proved they were bad news, as far as I was concerned. I also didn’t like the idea of having a bounty on my head, but I had enough things on my plate as it was, without worrying about something that hadn’t even happened yet.

  I needed to improve my Pet Bond, and if the Herbalist hadn’t returned with the ingredients by the time we got back, then I had to go and get them myself.

  I initiated Combine again now that the cooldown was up, and we headed back to El Sanctum.

  47

  I Don’t Like Heights

  “What do you mean you didn’t get the ingredients?” shouted Aliz.

  “There was nothing I could do! We barely escaped with our lives as it is. You can’t expect me to put myself in danger for this. I’m a crafter, not a fighter,” the Herbalist yelled in reply.

  We’d arrived back to El Sanctum to find them in the middle of a huge argument.

  “Calm down, everyone,” bellowed Mikael, rushing in to stop Aliz from hitting the Herbalist. “Start from the beginning and tell us what happened.”

  With a huff, the Herbalist turned toward us.

  “I was told she,” he pointed at Aliz, “Needed five rare ingredients I didn’t have in store to make her Master rank Alchemy potions. Since I have the highest Gathering skill here, I went out to get them. Allion offered to accompany me and keep me safe if we met any of these corrupted beasts that I’m told are wandering around the place. We were out in the Dozen Range Mountains, which is the only place I know where Solomon’s Seal grows. Before we could get near enough to get any of it though, five Dragon Hunters appeared out of nowhere and started setting up camp. We tried Stealthing in and grabbing some, but my Stealth skill isn’t high enough and we got spotted. If it hadn’t been for Allion, I’d most certainly be dead by now. He told me to run while he held them off. I could hear the sounds of fighting as I ran. He caught up with me a while later, saying he’d lost them, but he’d been injured, and we hadn’t brought any Health potions with us. Since we obviously needed more help as well, we just decided to head home.”

  “What ingredients do you need?” I asked.

  “Vetiver Grass roots, Solomon’s Seal, Wild Strawberry leaves, Belladonna berries and Alum,” he replied.

  “So, basically everything I asked you to get,” declared Aliz, looking like she was about to start having another go at him. “All the ingredients, I might add, that are needed to make the potion Orianna needs.”

  That got my attention.

  “I have the Vetiver Grass roots,” I said, pulling them out of my inventory. “They were all around the entrance to Gads End Dungeon, so I grabbed a few just in case.”

  I handed them over to a very relieved looking Herbalist.

  “Thank you. Most of the other ingredients need a Gathering rank of Apprentice to pick successfully. Considering how rare the items are, you don’t want anyone at Novice rank picking them, or worse yet, someone without the Gathering skill,” he shivered, looking horrified at the thought. “You’d never end up with enough of them if that happened. As far as I know, I’m the only one who’s even completed the Novice rank. I keep telling people to get it unlocked, but no one seems to care.”

  The Herbalist started fanning himself, looking thoroughly put upon.

  “Well then, you might like to know that I’ve finished Novice rank. All I need now is for someone to raise me up to Apprentice.” I raised an eyebrow at him.

  He looked at me in surprise. A look of relief crossed his face as he walked over and put his hand on my head.

  Congratulations! You have become an Apprentice of the craft: Gathering.

  Collect plants to increase your skill level.

  You can collect all Apprentice or lower level herbs and plants.

  “I’m hoping this means you’re offering to go and collect all the ingredients for me,” he said, glaring at me with his hands on his hips.

  You have received a quest: Gather Ingredients

  Collect the following for the elven Herbalist:

  Solomon’s Seal Root x 1

  Wild Strawberry Leaves x 10

  Alum Crystals x 20

  Belladonna Berries x 20:

  Accepting this quest will mark possible locations on your map.

  Completion of this quest will give you 3,000 XP and the ingredients you need to make a Phoenix potion.

  Do you accept? Yes / No

  Making sure I didn’t need mining skills to get the Alum Crystals, I quickly thought yes. My one reservation was that I thought Belladonna was poisonous. Hopefully, he needed that for another potion, not the one I was going to be drinking.

  The mini-map at the side of my vision sprouted a bunch of red dots showing me where I needed to go. Some were close, some were in places I’d been to before, but one of them was lurking in the gray mist that was in an undiscovered part of my map. I assumed that must be where Solomon’s Seal was since I’ve never even heard of the Dozen Range Mountains.

  “As I already know where we need to go, I would like to offer you my assistance with gathering the ingredients you need,” Allion performed an elaborate bow.

  “Well, in that case, you don’t really need me to go with you,” said Mikael. “I really need to get back into Ratters Town and see what I can find out. Hopefully, I’ll be able to persuade at least a few of my friends to say no to Andrew.”

  That was a little worrying, given the trouble we’d gotten into last time, but it wasn’t like I was his keeper or anything, so there wasn’t much I could say.

  “Okay, let’s just let King Faelyn know what happened in the forest before we go,” I said, not wanting to share that information with everyone else in the clearing.

  A short while later, Allion, Soter and I were headed out of El Sanctum. We aimed to cross Boon’s Forest, skirting around Ratters Town, then go to Ben Sering to find the wild strawberries I’d picked previously, so long ago. At least this time I was better equipped to deal with the harpies in the area.

  We arrived in Ben Sering and walked up to the dungeon. As we passed by, I considered setting my spawn at the marker stone. On a whim, I decided that it wasn’t worth doing, since I had no idea where this quest might take me. If I died for some reason, then it probably meant that we weren’t strong enough as a party and we’d have to get some help from the elves, anyway. So, we carried on going and started climbing up into the hills. My hour-long cooldown on Combine was up again, so I recast it, feeling slightly less disoriented than the previous time. Whatever happened, I decided I was going to spam this as often as I could to level my Pet Bond.

  With a few slips and slides over the loose rock, we finally found the first bank of shale that I remembered had been near the strawberries.

  The shale was covered with small, white crystals that caught my eye, since there was a faint blue outline around them. Bending down, I gently picked one off a loose stone.

  You have received: Alum Crystal

  Quality: Raw

  Level: Apprentice

  Uses: Leatherworking, Alch
emy and other undefined

  “Why are you picking up rocks?” asked Allion.

  “I’m not,” I responded, starting to pick more crystals and carefully placing them into my inventory. “These are the Alum Crystals I need for the quest.”

  A look of horror briefly flashed across his face before he joined me. Of course, without the Gathering skill at Apprentice rank, he simply crushed all of the ones he touched. Thankfully, there seemed to be an almost unlimited supply of them, so I didn’t say anything. He was trying to help, after all.

  I needed twenty for the potion, but I didn’t know if we’d succeed at making the potion on the first try, so I figured more was better. By the time I had a few hundred in my inventory, I guessed it was time to move on to the next ingredient.

  We scampered across the shale bank and, like last time, I could see a beautiful patch of strawberries in front of me. Unfortunately, also like last time, there was a harpy nest next to it.

  Allion lunged at the first gray-skinned harpy hovering in the air before she could raise her bow. She raked her claws across his chest and a little red tear drop icon appeared next to his name in our party display. I quickly cast Healing Mist, topping up his health, followed by Minimizer to limit the bleeding. Before I could do anything else, Soter pounced on a second harpy. His teeth sunk into one of her clawed bird feet and she let out a high-pitched screech. Three more harpies flew toward us to answer her call.

  I had no way to slow them down as a magic user, but I couldn’t switch to my bow or we’d have no heals. I focused on Fireball and threw the fire at one of the incoming harpies. Guiding it toward her, I watched our party health levels at the same time. It landed and took 80% of her HP. They were easier than I remembered, thank goodness. I threw a second Fireball at her before the others descended on me.

  I Dodged to the side as the harpy I’d attacked fell out of the sky with a thud. Allion finished off the harpy that had attacked him and turned to take out one of the two trying to kill me. Soter was still working on his mob. I cast another Healing Mist to top off everyone’s health and sent a Fireball at the harpy no one was attacking yet.

  Guiding it toward her, she managed to Dodge at the last minute and it only took her down to 90% as it caught the edge of her arm. I threw another one, quickly Dodging as the harpy started firing arrows at me. I glanced around quickly, but there was nothing I could hide behind. I focused on creating another Fireball, but before I could throw it at her, an arrow pierced my left arm. I screamed as my hand started to go numb. Dropping my staff, I watched as it rolled down the bank of shale and came to rest at the bottom. I paid again for my lack of attention when a second arrow lodged itself in my left leg. My HP was now down to 50%. I cast Wound Seal on myself, only to find that, without my staff, the cast took a lot longer than I’d been expecting and the results were less than half of what I needed. Panic started to set in.

  I grabbed my bow from my inventory and infused my mana into it. A lavender arrow appeared as I drew back the bowstring. I fired arrow after arrow as quickly as I could at the harpy. With my left hand still feeling numb, only about half of them hit, but the harpy’s health dropped to 10%. Before I could fire again, Allion stabbed the harpy in the back, killing her.

  We turned as one to help Soter. To my shock, he was still attached to her foot with his bite, his legs pinwheeling as he tried to find something to grab onto and his health at only 10%. The harpy, now below 50% health, had decided to fly upward to try and kill Soter by dropping him. She was flapping her wings rapidly and still ascending, even though they were already five times my height off the ground. She was using her other foot to push against Soter’s head, trying to make him let go.

  “Get my staff,” I yelled at Allion, while trying to kneel down so I could Snipe the harpy.

  I had to be very careful and not actually kill her, just wound her enough that she would lose some height, or Soter would be in all sorts of trouble.

  Focusing past the tip of the arrow, I shot one of her wings. It pierced the leather and carried on into the distance. The harpy was now having trouble staying aloft. She started to fall in a barely controlled spin. Once they’d descended halfway, I fired again, this time into the other wing. With a tearing sound, a large hole appeared, causing her to fall more quickly to the ground.

  “Get ready to let go,” I shouted to Soter.

  As soon as she was close enough to the ground, I sent another shot into the first wing I’d hit.

  “Jump!” Soter opened his jaws and dropped to the ground, letting out a yelp as he landed a little harder than I would have liked. He quickly got out of the way of the plummeting harpy.

  The next arrow missed her completely, but the second one hit her in the chest, taking away the final 10% of her health.

  “My lady,” Allion bowed as he held my recovered staff out toward me.

  “Thank you, there was no way I was going to make it down there,” I said, putting my bow back into my inventory and reequipping my staff.

  I cast Healing Mist over all of us, then, biting my tongue, I pulled out the arrows from my arm and leg. Quickly casting Wound Seal on myself again, this time with the results I expected, thankfully, I felt a blissful, cool wave of healing flow through me and I watched as my skin knitted itself back together. That one had been too close for my liking.

  I don’t like heights.

  I couldn’t help myself. I threw my arms around Soter and started laughing like a crazy person as I recovered from the shock of nearly losing him.

  Time to check for loot, I thought, after we’d had a short rest. Allion had already picked up whatever loot had dropped for him, but mine was still sitting there on the ground.

  I walked over to where the first harpy’s body had disappeared. There, on the ground, in a tangled heap, was a strip of black leather. I bent down to pick it up.

  You have received: Leather Belt of Lasting

  + 2 Intelligence

  + 5 Toughness

  + 5 Endurance

  + 5 Fortitude

  Quality: Average.

  Rarity: Uncommon.

  I guess whoever the game gods were had decided I needed more staying power. I tied it around my waist and watched it shrink down to my size.

  The other harpies had only dropped wings, vials of blood and a few broken claws between them. Still, it wasn’t every day I got a new piece of armor, so the belt had been a nice addition.

  48

  How to Bluff the Enemy

  Now that we’d eliminated the harpies in the area, I picked every single strawberry and leaf I could find. I lost count of the leaves after about fifty, but a quick glance at my inventory told me I’d picked over two hundred of them and a hundred strawberries. I popped the last one into my mouth and smiled as the sweet juice burst out of the tiny little fruit.

  I now had two of the four ingredients I needed, and my mini-map had a lot fewer red dots on it as the quest updated itself. From the look of things, there should be some Belladonna plants nearby, too.

  We carried on up the hill toward the next red dot, which was just on the edge of the gray mist that covered the rest of my mini-map. In the distance, toward the red dot where the Solomon’s Seal lived, I could see some tall, snow-capped mountains. It looked like things were about to get colder.

  I pulled myself up over the latest boulder we’d been forced to scale and there, in front of me, was a wall of pale gray rock. It looked like some giant had come along and hit it with a hammer, the fractures running the length of the wall. It suddenly dawned on me that there might actually be a giant around, so I frantically looked left and right.

  There are no giants here.

  Well that was a relief, at least. I relaxed and noticed several little plants around the base of the wall that coincided with the red dots on my mini-map. They had little purple and green bells for flowers that tinkled gently in the breeze. Further down each stalk were collections of small, shiny black berries. I reached out and picked one of the berr
ies.

  You have received: Belladonna Berry

  Quality: Raw

  Level: Apprentice

  Uses: Poisons, Alchemy and other undefined

  “I wouldn’t touch that if I were you,” I said, as I glanced up at Allion who was about to start ‘helping’ again. “They’re poisonous, and we didn’t bring any antidotes with us.”

  I stood up and cast Minimizer, just in case I ended up making a mistake and poisoning myself.

  The little bushes were everywhere I looked, so I spent a while going around and collecting as many of the berries as I could fit into a single inventory slot. Luckily, I‘d emptied my bag before we’d left, but with only sixteen slots, I needed to be a little careful. I’d have to ask around about getting another bag soon. Even so, with all the potion recipes Aliz and I now had access to, it seemed shortsighted not to collect the leaves and roots as well. I figured I could always throw something out if I needed to, later.

  Allion had been exploring the rest of the area while I’d been Gathering, so I waved to him to let him know I’d finished.

  “Only one more to go. Are you ready to head out?” I shouted

  He jumped and looked around like I’d surprised him.

  “My apologies, I was messaging an old friend of mine,” he smiled and walked back over to me. “So, where to next?”

  “Looks like it’s in that direction,” I said, pointing toward the mountains.

  “Ah yes, the Solomon’s Seal. Well, let us hope the Dragon Hunters are long gone by now. After you, my lady,” he bowed with a flourish.

  We spent the next half an hour climbing higher and higher up the hills toward the base of the huge mountains. Finally, we reached the edge of the gray mist on my mini-map.