“What's the meaning of this? Who are you?” Rake raised his arms in a defensive stance and backed away.
Caelite separated himself from his previous comrades and smiled as the man in black armor spoke up. “Sorry guys, guild business. Those eggs are very valuable,” he said as he watched them. The dragon woman's hands began tapping on the air. “So here's the deal. You have no healer, two of you are missing most your gear. We can either PK you and take the eggs and whatever other loot you guys got doing this dungeon and you can deal with the death penalties. Or you can give up the eggs, and let's say... five gold each. Then we let you go.”
“Five gold! That's highway robbery!” Media yelled, but quickly backed away as one of the spears were shoved close to her face. “It can take days to even get one gold at our level!”
“We're being nice. Besides, once you get stronger, five gold is nothing. Either way we're going to get the eggs. It's up to you how badly you'll be penalized for it. Don't even think of resisting. There's only two of you who can fight, we have you surrounded, have better gear and have you far outnumbered.”
The words 'Class change: Angel. 10 seconds' flashed above Deva's head, drawing their attention.
“Damn it! Hit her, initiate combat!” the man yelled.
The spear holders charged forward, two men and a woman, and tried to stab her with their spears. She didn't even turn around, instead she merely jumped to the right as the spears hit empty air. The two wielding guisarme dashed forward, swinging their weapons low as they tried to latch the hooks on her legs. Before they could get close enough, Rake lunged forward and held both his arms out, catching them under the necks and making them fall backwards to the ground.
“Take care of the beast. I'll get the girl,” the man in black said as he charged forward.
Caelite struck at Rake's chest, but the man deflected it away with his bracer. The beast man tried to move in close to punch into the demon's stomach. As he moved in Caelite shifted the weight of the weapon and pulled the blade towards himself, slamming the back end of the pole into Rake's side.
The beast-man stumbled sideways before Caelite pushed forward and slammed his fist into Rake's chest. The demon followed up by driving the glaive down across the man's chest, the blade glowing black. It left a long, deep gash, cutting off a bit of his robe in the process.
“You should have just given us the eggs. You're outnumbered and out gunned. You don't stand a chance!” Caelite yelled as the two guisarme wielders got up behind him and moved in to attack as well. Rake deflected the glaive with his bracers, but was forced to keep backing up as the guisarme users attempted to latch onto his legs and knock him down. He was soon backed against the wall, cornered.
A white light blinded the fighters, radiating from Deva's position. The words 'Class change: Initiate' formed over her head as the light spread across her body. The man in black armor brought his glaive down at her head, intending to behead her as the transformation took place. Her right hand shot out as a blade of light formed in her grasp and stopped the polearm.
Her form had completely changed to one of an angel. She had a light complexion with short brown hair and blue sapphire eyes. She was slightly taller than average and her wings were long, feathery, and white with golden tips. But the most impressive thing about her was her equipment. Her sword in her right hand was long, the blade pure white with a golden line down the center, and glowed with an internal light. The hand guard was golden with three rubies embedded in the center and on each end of the hand guard. She wore pure white metal armor that covered her entire body beneath the neck. It seemed crafted perfectly to her body, even with small braces for her wings. Gems were embedded across the metal and a crest was emblazoned on the breastplate, an image of angel's wings. A small golden crown shaped like a V was hidden under her hair, only the front showing on her forehead. The gauntlet on her left hand was thicker than the rest of the armor and embedded with jewels on the top, balancing its weight with the sword and allowing it as a semi shield.
Her attacker froze, his eyes bulging. With a flick of her wrist her sword sliced clean through his glaive and sent a chunk of metal to rest on the ground. A moment later the entire weapon disappeared into red sparkles.
The now unarmed man backed away. “I-I know that sword,” he said in disbelief. “That's Excalibur! You're... you're...”
“Yes,” she said calmly as she leveled the blade at his head. The other demons had stopped moving. “I'm a master class. I've been looking for you for a while. A lot of players have put bounties on you. Large bounties. So I'm going to give you a choice.” She brought the sword down to her side. “You can either give in and go to jail peacefully, or I can kill you and send you to jail while you suffer the death penalty.” A cocky grin formed on her lips. “Either way, you're going to jail. It's up to you how badly you'll be penalized for it. Don't even think of resisting.”
He stared at her for a moment before reaching behind his back, a new steel glaive materializing into his hands. “Go f--” Before he could finish the sentence the girl rushed forward and cleaved him and his weapon in half.
“Don't think for a moment that your polearms can stand against Excalibur,” she said before she turned her back to the black rays of darkness. “It would take a master class weapon to fight my holy blade.”
The other demons slowly lowered their weapons and their heads. Within moments they were encased in white spheres and disappeared. “Who are you?” Rake asked as he watched the angel girl slowly revive Hale.
“Ah, right. I'm sorry I lied to you before, but my name is not Deva. Had I used my real one they would have recognized me,” she said with a smile as her hands moved through the air. A moment later the word Deva disappeared from over her. “My true name is Asura. I'm sorry to have involved all of you in this, but I've been after that guild for a while. I couldn't use my angel class since I didn't want to risk them recognizing me.” She gestured towards herself. “It was a pleasure playing with you all, though.” She patted the freshly revived angel on the back, before taking off into the air and blazing across the sky as a white blur.
Her hands wiggled and pushed through a number of menus while she flew. A small timer popped up in the top right corner of her vision, warning her she only had a short time left. She let out an annoyed sigh before she brought up a small menu with a list of names and selected one.
“I caught the people who have been ambushing and stealing people's dragon eggs. I sent them to Sanctuary's Platinum Prison Center. See if you can get any information about them and if they are with any others. I'll be logging out as soon as I arrive in town,” she said before she tapped the name again and closed the menu.
Something eventually appeared off in the distance. Flying high above the clouds, a city of marble floated. The city wasn't very wide, but it was filled to the brim with buildings. The tallest of which were over a hundred stories tall, with the shortest being a few dozen stories tall. Smaller floating islands surrounded the city, some housing towns and others housing just one or two buildings. One in particular held a castle, only about five stories tall, but seeming to be made completely of marble, gold, diamonds and other precious gemstones. Together they made the flying city of Sanctuary.
The castle was her destination. She landed on the roof and slowly walked onto a small circle of diamonds on the ground. She pushed her hands out and tapped on an appearing menu, clicking the option 'Log out'.
The sky and marble slowly faded out to be replaced by an eggshell white roof. White curtains dangled from a metal rack attached to the wall. After a few minutes a small hand appeared directly in front of the glass view screen of the virtual headset. “Asher? You with me?” A young woman appeared behind the screen, she was wearing a pair of blue nurses scrubs.
“I-I'm here,” he said with difficulty. Slowly the headset was unstrapped from his chin and then gently removed, placed on the bedside table beside him.
“So how are we doing today? Did you have a ni
ce day in make believe land?” the nurse asked with a smile that made him want to retch.
Her name was Jessica and he loathed her. She wasn't a bad nurse, per se. But she treated him like a child. Just because the majority of his body was paralyzed she acted as if he was helpless and couldn't take care of himself. Well, technically he couldn't. But he could still think fine and her constant baby talk annoyed him to no end. “I h-had fun,” he said softly.
“Good. It's almost time for your walkies! We'll go and see the ducks, won't that be fun?”
“Thrilling,” he said with all the sarcasm he could muster, but she failed to notice. He gazed longingly back at the direct neural headset as the nurse and a few helpers slowly eased him into a wheelchair. It was a difficult process, due to his weight. The fact he was unable to get any real exercise had led to it increasing over the years.
Soon they were slowly traveling through the hospital, his wheelchair squeaking slightly. He gently wiggled his fingers together in his lap as he listened to the nurse warble on about how sunny and clear a day it was, how he should enjoy the nice weather while he could. All he wished was that it was a dark and rainy day so they could skip the walks and just let him play the game in peace.
Instead he was out in the fresh air, sitting by a small pond filled with ducks. Jessica even gave him some bread crumbs to toss. He sighed and weakly tossed some, his arms a bit numb but still able to partially perform the act.
“Very good dear. A few more feet and you'd have made it to the pond. Now don't you fret, it takes plenty of people a few tries. Why don't you do it again?” she asked in a sickeningly sweet tone.
If he could move his arms high enough to reach the nurse, he would have strangled her. Or at least tried. He doubted a jury in the world would convict him. Instead he feebly tossed bread crumbs a few inches away and waited for the nurse to get tired of bothering him.
“Oh, it's almost time. Ashey, today there is a special surprise for you!”
His blood ran cold as fear grasped him. He prayed she was retiring and not something horrifying like she had been assigned to him permanently.
“Your parents are coming to visit!”
He let out a sigh of relief.
“They'll be here soon. They specifically asked that I bring you outside to see them, so I told them we'd be here. Isn't it exciting?”
Not a jury in the world. He just shrugged and stared at the ducks. The woman started rambling about things he really didn't care about. Instead, he thought about his game. After his parents left, he could probably get back to it. He wanted to get to hatching that egg. He wasn't sure of the exact requirements to hatch it, but he knew a few guys who could help get him the info.
He was brought out of his thoughts by an all too familiar voice. “Asher my boy! Good to see you out and about.” He slowly looked up at the source of the voice, his father. A short, round, balding man, his father was slowly getting on in years. Despite his age however, he was still sharp as ever. He made a living as a stock broker, quite profitably, and it was thanks to his success that Asher was being afforded the best medical care in the country.
Not that it really mattered. They couldn't stop the disease as it spread through his body. All they could do was slow it down and make sure he didn't croak in the middle of the night. Not that they would tell him that. Being told every week for years that it would 'start getting better any day now', while his condition only worsened, had eventually clued him in. He hadn't told his parents yet. He knew they wanted him to at least think he would be able to fully move one day.
“Your mother and I have some good news. We talked it over with the doctors and it seems you'll be able to join us for the family picnic this year. Doesn't that sound wonderful?” Asher glanced over towards his mother, a woman quite a few years younger than his father with long brown hair. She was a little shorter than her husband and rounding out in a similar way. He couldn't look at her for long before he saw the hint of tears in her eyes. His gaze turned downwards as he tried to avoid that look. He knew his parents were suffering from this, albeit in different ways. His mother was just the worst of them at hiding it.
He instead focused on the news they brought. A day out in the sun watching everyone run around have fun, while he sat in his wheelchair and listened to them talk about how 'sad' and 'tragic' it was that the disease attacked someone so young. “Cool,” he said, struggling not to choke on the words. He knew it was important to them that he be there for some of the family get togethers. Besides, last time he told them he didn't want to go they ended up fighting about how he was wasting his remaining time on that silly game of his. He knew it probably cost them a decent sum of money with the game equipment, subscription fees, the constant connection to the net, and on top of that his medical bills. He was sure he could endure one short afternoon to make them feel he was still with them.
The rest of the visit dragged on slowly, mostly with him just smiling and nodding. His mother told him about the newest family gossip while his father told him about his newest big windfall. But after a while they left and he was slowly wheeled back to his room. Jessica fed him his doctor prescribed diet and then she stared at him and looked out the window. “It really is a beautiful day. Are you sure you want to waste it playing a game? Wouldn't it be better to just... fine, fine. No need to pout. Here we go!” Slowly the head set was slid on and strapped in. Blue lights streaked by as the world was slowly replaced around him.
Chapter 2
Age: 15 years, 9 months
The words 'Landasy Reality' filled Asher's vision as a tingly sensation spread through his body. The direct neural interface was intercepting the electronic signals sent through his body and supplementing its own. The tingling stopped as the words disappeared, replaced by a void of white. Excitement rose through him as he anticipated the familiar, and wonderful experiences to follow. A moment later he was no more and Asura came into being.
Asura awoke inside a large marble room. A king sized bed with a pink comforter took up the majority of the space, while the rest of it was covered with trophies she had acquired over the last year of playing the game. An orc's head, a dragon's fang and, most importantly, a medal with the same winged emblem her breastplate held. A trophy from being one of the first master angels, only two of those medals existed.
Across the room a large balcony looked out over the world. Slowly she walked onto it and spread her wings. She closed her eyes and enjoyed the air as it spread through her feathers, letting out a sigh of contentment. She was back, she was herself again. She was Asura. Looking out from her position made the world look entirely devoid of life, not a player in sight, but she knew better. She jumped off the balcony and spread her wings. The world froze for just a second. Then it returned to normal, except there were dozens of players flying through the air as well. She had now entered the real, persistent world.
She flew up to the main city. Her hands navigated the menu and the words 'Class change: Dragon. 10 seconds” appeared over her head. By the time she landed her body and armor had changed to the red scaled dragon form she had used before, with one exception. Poking out from her back were two large, leathery, scaled wings.
Asura barely managed to keep from chuckling as people walking through the streets turned to stop and point at her. Only a master class angel could have wings while in other classes, though the wings looked like a class specific variant, and there were only eight other master class players in the game. Asura was one of the only two angels. She had to resist giggling when people stared at her, and she occasionally stopped to pretend to be interested in something on the city walls, just to allow them the chance to watch.
A small message popped up in front of her and drew an even larger smile to her lips. She tapped it once and it played for her ears only. 'Great job on the capture, get anything interesting? I checked their bail costs, they won't be out of there for a long while unless they choose the pay out option. I got a new job for you. Call me when you get on.'
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She navigated the menus before clicking a name and soon a small ringing fill her ears, a sound made to imitate the phones from ages ago. After a few moments there was a click.
“Hey, you got my message!” a male's voice said.
“Yeah, I got it,” she said before she pressed a small button with the picture of a speaker, muting all other sounds from the game as she walked. The call became private so anything she said in it couldn't be heard by others. “What do you need me for?”
“Well, a new player joined the guild.”
“Really? Another member for our little group?” she asked before she stopped outside a stall and looked the wares over. She spread her wings out, showing off. “How did you get another sucker to join us? Bounty hunter guilds aren't that popular. Not to mention with our silly name.”
“Hey! Escape from Reality is a fine name for a guild! Can you take this seriously? He chose the angel class, so I was hoping you'd show him the ropes.”
“Well. That's a lot of work, and I really need to finish leveling up my dragon class,” she said in a sultry voice. “Buuuuut... if you were able to help reduce my work load I'd be more than willing to help. What do you say, Mutt?” His name was technically B4hamutt, but most called him Mutt to avoid trying to find a way to say that name.
“Uh huh,” he said in a flat, unamused voice. “Whaddaya want?”
“I just did the dragon's egg quest. I want you to find out how to hatch it for me.”
“... Really? That's all? Why don't you just look it up on the internet? You can just open a browser in game.”
“Because it's funner to spend my net time playing rather than researching, and I know you'll find everything I need. So, will you do it? Pleassssse? Oh great and wonderful guild leader, help your lowly soldier.”
Landasy Reality: Angel's Escape Page 3