by Brian Simons
“Thank you,” Sal said. He seemed genuinely grateful.
“I’m sorry,” Coral said. “Did you say Grum?”
“My husband,” Aga said, “wherever he is.”
“I know exactly where he is,” Coral said.
Aga took a step back, away from Coral and the others. “This is mean,” she said. “I don’t understand.”
“No, Aga, I’m not trying to trick you. Grum is a hostage in the basement of Havenstock’s castle. He didn’t abandon you, he was falsely imprisoned.”
Tears welled in the corners of Aga’s eyes. “We have to find him,” she whispered.
New Quest: Jail Break
Aga’s long lost husband is not so lost after all. Liberate Grum from Havenstock’s underground prison to reunite the pair.
Reward: Aga’s Bag of Goodies.
“After the ceremony,” Varta said. “Father is about to speak.”
Once the pigpens vanished from the event field, King Ploth walked out with a handful of ogre guards dragging a wooden cart behind them. Inside the cart was something six feet tall and covered in blue butterflies.
When Ploth got to the middle of the field, the guards put the cart down. “Father is a high level Entomologist,” Varta whispered to Coral. “He loves his butterflies.”
“I didn’t realize that was a class,” Coral said.
“Oh yes,” Varta said. “He approved of the armor you made me. He was pleased you found something good for cockroaches to do.” She banged on her roach husk armor again, filling the air with a drumming sound. King Ploth looked at her and narrowed his eyes, causing her to stop.
“I assumed the king would be some kind of combat class,” Coral said.
“No,” Varta replied, “he made me go that path.”
“Today,” King Ploth yelled across the silent crowd, “we honor Thanaker, god of death and patron deity of our kingdom. Through him, all things are possible. When we fight, it is to win. When we love, it is with passion. When we eat, it is until we burst at our own seams!”
The crowd clapped and hollered.
The king continued. “Thanaker reminds us that death will come for us all. His holy gift encourages us to live to our fullest while we can. That is why I honor my wife each year. Cherish those you hold dear with all of your might, because the only thing we can predict is loss.”
King Ploth lifted his hands and a thousand blue butterflies launched into the air, revealing the statue they had perched on so calmly a moment before. It was a wide, tall woman with a belly larger than the king’s. Her features were hewn into dark gray stone with exquisite detail.
“That’s my mom,” Varta said. Coral nodded. She didn’t know what it was like to lose a parent, but she was sure whatever words she had would be insufficient.
Then a black beetle descended from the sky, no taller than Coral’s palm was wide. “Another insect?” she asked.
Sal leaned forward. “That’s Thanaker.”
Coral peered at the beetle’s glistening black body. His wings fluttered quickly, and his face was hidden in a black helmet resembling a skull.
“Your king is right!” the death god yelled. His voice was much larger than his body. “Death comes for everyone. But today, uh, it’s not my fault. Not really. Do not blame me for what’s about to happen.”
13
“What is Thanaker talking about?” Coral asked.
“Dunno,” Varta said. “This is new.”
“The balance is upset,” the small god said. “I told them this would happen, but no one listens to me, do they? Who am I? Oh, just the god of death. Don’t mind me.”
Aga and Varta exchanged puzzled glances.
“And just like I said it would be, the balance is totally whacked. So this is happening now. This is a thing.” He shook his head.
The ground began to shake and collapse into sinkholes like the one Coral had encountered that morning. King Ploth ran from the field, pulling the statue wagon behind him and dodging the gaping holes taking over the event field. Other ogres simply clapped and hollered. They must have thought this was part of the festival.
It wasn’t until swarms of black shadows exploded from the collapsing dirt that players and NPCs started to unsheathe their weapons.
“Ruined souls!” Coral said. “We need to get out of here.”
“We need to fight!” Varta said. She slashed at a shade that flew past her, but her hands passed right through it.
“There are too many,” Coral said, shooting an injured one with a flaming arrow.
>> Ruined Soul takes 448 Damage.
>> Ruined Soul dies. You receive 900 XP.
She scooped up the death’s veil it dropped. “If you don’t have magic attacks, you can’t hurt them.”
“Let me!” Aga said. She used Chocolate Rain again, drenching a few ruined souls with mud. The mud seemed to burn through their shadowy forms like acid. Three of the mobs died.
“Great job, Aga,” Coral said. “Keep it up.”
Varta began tapping on her breastplate angrily and speaking under her breath. “Physical attacks are no good. Music would be magic, if I had any.”
Coral drew another arrow and tried to aim it at one of the many ruined souls weaving through the air. She halted at the sight of a particular ogre, still harassing vendors despite the evil mobs whizzing past.
“Hey look!” Sal yelled as he swung his iron hammer. “It’s Bergg!”
“That rat!” Coral said. Bergg stood in front of another table, this time clutching a vendor by his cloth vest. The vendor looked frantic as ruined souls swooped past them, but Bergg never took his eyes off the poor man. Bergg held a small jar in his other hand. “He’s hocking our juvensprig!”
“Never trust a Bergg,” Varta said.
Coral took a step toward the harried vendor, but Sal put a hand on her shoulder. “I was up against these ruined souls earlier. These mobs can be dangerous. Let Bergg be Bergg. We need to run, fast.”
“That’s what we did last time we were here and the elves forced us out,” Coral said. “This time, I want what’s ours first.” She turned to Varta. “Varta, you’re a General, right? Can you rally the mages and have them extinguish these ruined souls?”
Varta nodded and Coral ran. She had to catch Bergg before he disappeared among the crowded maze of tents.
“Bergg!” she yelled.
He looked over his shoulder at her, a snarl on his face. He let go of the vendor’s vest and ran.
Coral jumped over poles from tents that had been knocked down in the fray. “Come back here, you weasel!” Her stamina bar slowly depleted as she ran at full speed, but there was no way pot-bellied Bergg had more stamina than her.
Coral took an arrow from her quiver and nocked it.
“Don’t shoot him!” Sal yelled from behind. “If the ogre guards see you attack an NPC—”
Coral released her arrow. Bergg flinched as it sailed past his ear and onto its target. The arrow slammed into the support pole of a nearby tent, knocking it down and sending a ripple of heavy canvas down on top of him. Coral kept running until she set foot on the fallen canvas, standing on the flaps that trapped Bergg.
“Hand it over,” she said.
“Now is hardly the time!” Bergg yelled. A ruined soul swept past them and Coral prepared an arrow with lightning speed, heating it up and releasing it. The ruined soul lit up in a quick burst of flame, netting her another 900 XP. It dropped several patches of death’s veil that wafted slowly toward the ground.
“Now’s the only time,” she said. “Don’t drag this out. Give me our share of the juvensprig salve. You still have your half.”
“The farmlands are infertile,” Bergg said. “The soil is more useless each day. I need this salve. It will quickly respawn the few crops we still have. Without it, the ogres will starve.”
“With all that food they piled on for the pig eating competition? I don’t believe you. You’re just greedy.”
Coral trained another ar
row on Bergg while players swarmed in all directions.
Sal had caught up with them. “What do we even need it for?” he asked, ducking as a ruined soul flew high overhead.
“I don’t know,” Coral said. “Maybe it’ll help against these ruined souls.”
“If we don’t get out of here,” Sal said, “the ruined souls will get us and then nothing will help.”
“Out of here sounds good,” Bergg said. “Watch out!”
Another ruined soul swooped toward Coral. Her Hot Shot didn’t hit for enough damage to kill it and stop its trajectory toward her. She ducked in time to watch it pass through a nearby canvas tent as though it were air. When she turned back, Bergg was twenty feet away. She ran after him, but watched as he dived into the hole Aga had dug. He was escaping the Ogrelands, and taking the salve with him.
She kicked at the ground and turned back toward Sal.
“Forget him,” Sal said. Coral followed after her ogre friend toward the crowded field in the middle of the tented kingdom, but something strange happened as she ran.
Her movements became jerky. Mobs seemed to freeze in place and then reappear a few feet away.
There were too many players, NPCs, and monsters trying to battle at the same time. The servers couldn’t handle it.
“Lag!” someone yelled from the fray. Players seemed to panic. Coral panicked too. If she couldn’t trust what she saw, the ruined souls would have the upper hand.
She kept running, though her arms and legs looked like a spastic frenzy of frozen poses.
Coral turned and ran back toward her friends, dodging past the deluge of magic attacks falling from the sky. Some ogres commanded fireballs and ice spikes, while others summoned a rain of frogs or, in Aga’s case, mud. The remnants of ruined souls littered the ground, but so did fallen ogres.
Coral tried to compensate for the lag by aiming where she thought the mobs would be, but after several minutes of careful aim, she still hadn’t landed a single hit. The NPC ogre mages were having better luck though. They must not suffer from lag the same way players did.
Then, as if the Ogrelands weren’t under enough chaos, someone yelled from behind and knocked into Coral’s shoulder on his way past her.
“Help me!” Bergg yelled, spinning around and grabbing Coral’s upper arm. “I swear I’m not a weasel, I’m a man. I’ll give you the juvensprig. Just help me!”
“What are you talking about?” Coral asked. She turned around and saw a massive cheetah bounding toward her. Either another cheetah came by and fell into the tunnel they dug, or Bergg’s frantic escape had caught the predator’s attention and incited a chase. However it happened, Coral didn’t appreciate him pulling the mob into the middle of an already dangerous, laggy fight.
The cheetah leapt over Coral and landed on Bergg as he tried to flee, pinning him to the ground and sending out a loud crunch as its weight crushed one of Bergg’s legs. It reared back its head and prepared to rip a mouthful of ogre flesh from his neck.
The little red dot in Coral’s peripheral vision continued to blink. She was getting all of this on camera.
Coral kicked the cat in the side, knocking it off Bergg. The ogre pushed himself backward along the ground, wincing and leaving behind a trail of blood.
The cheetah had no interest in Coral. It doubled back, stalking toward Bergg’s injured body while Coral nocked an arrow.
Coral stood motionless as the cheetah stretched its jaw and lowered its teeth over Bergg’s throat. Her fingers froze into place, refusing to release the arrow that would save Bergg’s life until the servers could process her intended action.
The last three ruined souls converged on the feline. Its body began to shimmer into translucence. The cat monster sank into Bergg and fused with him, a pulsating pool of fur and flesh that solidified into a new creature.
The animal maintained the cheetah’s long, powerful frame, but it sported a large rippling gut that dragged along the ground with it. Its fur was green and the hollow eyes in its ogre face radiated blackness. The ruined souls were gone, having used their dark energy to ruin something else.
Coral’s arrow finally left her bow, arcing too high. She stared at the new monster.
>> Level 27 Subsumed Predator (blighted).
“Not a sexy cheetah,” Varta said.
“No,” Coral said. “Do you think Bergg is still in there?”
“I hope not,” Sal said. “We can’t exactly put that thing in a cage until we find out.”
The predator charged at Coral’s group and they scattered. Coral shot arrows as quickly as she could, not pausing to heat them up.
>> Subsumed Predator takes 209 Damage.
>> Subsumed Predator takes 187 Damage.
“Now can I use my claws?” Varta asked.
“By all means,” Coral said. Varta charged at the green cat and sliced her claws through its flesh in a wild frenzy, sending small clumps of lime-colored fur in every direction. The two tussled while Coral used the last of her MP to heat an arrow. She held it steady waiting for a clear shot.
Varta rolled onto her back with the cheetah on top of her. The fat, green feline launched from Varta’s prone body into an impossibly high jump. Coral unpinched her fingers, releasing an arrow that seared its way into the monster’s chest and right through its heart.
>> Subsumed Predator takes 1002 Damage. [CRITICAL]
>> Subsumed Predator dies. You receive 3120 XP.
The creature landed on the ground in a heap, sending a small white jar of paste rolling toward Coral. She knelt and picked it up.
With the ruined souls gone and the cheetah dead, the Ogrelands fell into an eerie silence. Many of the tents near the center of the Kingdom had folded amid the chaos, covering the ground with swatches of white, yellow, and tan fabric like a patchwork pall.
Varta stood over the subsumed predator’s body as it faded away. With her fists clenched tight, the tips of her bear claws dug into her green skin. “It’s not right,” she said.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t protect him,” Coral said, putting a hand on Varta’s shoulder.
“Bergg was a sneak,” Varta said, “but he was our sneak. I just wish I knew who sent those ghosts after him.”
Coral brought up her settings menu and stopped recording. This wouldn’t be the video that kept her parents clear of Domin Ansel’s wrath. She’d have to find some other quest or epic loot to catch on video.
“Where’s Ernest?” she asked. No one seemed to know.
“Ernest?” she called out.
The fisher emerged from behind the corner of a tent. “Is it over?” His voice quavered from behind his mask.
“For now, sure,” Coral said.
“It was awful,” Ernest said. “One of those shadow monsters was chasing me and I kept trying to log off but the game wouldn’t let me.”
“You can’t log off during battle,” Sal said.
“Oh,” Ernest said.
“We’re heading out on a quest,” Coral said, “to rescue someone who has been gone a long time. You’re welcome to join us.”
“No,” Ernest said, “I think this was enough excitement for me. I’m more suited to fishing.” He seemed pretty shaken up.
“Okay,” Coral said. She was sorry to leave her new friend behind, but she didn’t want to push him too hard. “Before we go, here’s your half of the gold we earned from those mud masks. You deserve it.”
She handed him 240 coins.
“This can’t be right,” he said. “This is twenty-four dollars’ worth of coins.”
“Yeah,” Coral said, “that’s exactly half. Sorry there’s not more.”
“Sorry there’s not more?” he laughed while his eyes started to glisten. “Coral, I’m going to eat today. Thank you.”
He vanished in a wisp of logout smoke.
“It’s getting late,” Coral said, “I have to log out so I can get home.”
“Really?” Sal asked. “Where are you?”
“Arbyten’
s headquarters,” she said, “and I don’t want to be.”
14
Daniel’s eyes took a moment to adjust to the total darkness of The Ersatz. Natural light couldn’t reach the tunnels that ran beneath the drow’s homeland, but Daniel was at Nightvision 3. It gave him 4% added visibility in the darkness — just enough to reveal the basic outlines of walls and people.
Sybil stood inches from him, her spear held out, ready for anything.
“Sybil,” Daniel said. The darkness seemed to amplify his voice. Something about the stillness of that room forced him into a whisper. “Use that song you learned last time.”
“Shadowshatter?” she whispered back. “It would break the darkness for us, but then anyone else would be able to see perfectly too. We’re in the entry room to the minotaurs’ tunnels. Those stairs up there,” she pointed to a steep set of stairs hewn from mountain rock, “lead right to the drow. Eventually, one will come through here to complete the initiation quest and look for a minotaur to slaughter. When they do, the darkness will be our friend.”
“But drow have Nightvision,” he said.
“Yes, but they have to train it up like any other ability,” Sybil said. “The initiates that come down here are usually lowbies. They can barely see their own feet in the dark. I’d like to keep it that way.”
Sybil led the way into the tunnels, treading lightly but swiftly. Her Nightvision was far more advanced than Daniel’s. She avoided boulders and uneven patches of ground that Daniel only saw when he was inches from them. The only thing Daniel could make out easily were the bones of dead minotaurs, which appeared whiter than the other debris in the tunnels.
“There are a lot more minotaur skeletons than we saw last time,” he said. “The new players may be lowbies, but there must be a lot of them, and some are strong enough to finish the initiation ceremony. On the bright side, if any players do come down here they can’t attack us. It’s not a PvP zone.”