I nodded. I’d always dreamed of an Amazon trek, or of exploring the Australian outback. Those fantasies had died years ago.
“Sometimes you have to take a chance,” said Cal. “Surely this is worth it? Don’t you want to see how this pans out?”
He was right. All this time, I’d always been afraid to take a risk. I’d been scared to go out on my own path, and instead had settled into running the company. Maybe now it was time to get over that. I knew that if I quit now, if I didn’t take a gamble for once, I’d regret it forever.
I looked at my brother. “Get your coat,” I said. “It’s chilly in Artemis this time of year.”
Chapter Fifty
The look of shock on Gabriella’s face was priceless. The four of us reappeared in front of her, right outside the castle gates. The witch sat against the wall with Clive next to her. When the Burr saw Rex, he leapt to his feet and ran over to him. He even stopped still for a second and let me stroke his mane.
“This is it,” I told the party. “It’s time to win this.”
“You could have come up with a better one-liner,” said Jack, shaking his head.
When we entered the castle, the sounds of the island outside seemed to be drowned out. Everything was still, save for dim shouts that seemed to come from beneath us.
At first I wondered which way to go, but then I saw cigarette butts on the floor. I knew that we needed to follow the trail left by Ellis Taunton and Star Horizon. It led us across the forecourt and through a set of metal doors, where we saw steps cut into the stone floor. They seemed to lead down into an underground level.
Following them down, we came to a cavernous room. The roof was thirty feet above us. The floor was made of stone, but red markings were drawn on it. Ellis Taunton and his team were in the centre. Just beyond them, stood on the floor, was a giant stone dragon.
Ashok’s Dungeon Discovered!
15 Exp Gained!
Ellis turned to face us. His character was dirty, and he had scratches on his face. A sneer crept over his features.
“You’re too late,” he said. “We got here first.”
I was going to answer him, when the stone dragon started to move. In a moment of shock, I was reminded of the stone golems. Then, an image flickered into my mind. I remembered being in the ranger’s hut, and seeing the ranger, made of stone and sprawled across a table.
“Vinetwest,” I said.
Jack looked at me. “The illusionist?”
I nodded.
The dragon began to vibrate. With creaking movements, it started to move its arms and legs, lumbering itself up off the floor. It stretched to full height. It snarled at us, and a trail of smoke left its nose.
“Ashok is my name,” it said, its deep voice so loud that the dungeon seemed to shake. “but you met me as Vinetwest.”
I remembered the old wizard hobbling away from us. He’d seemed so pathetic that we hadn’t bothered to chase him. I couldn’t reconcile that image with the gigantic beast before us.
“Vinetwest? What are you idiots babbling about?” said Ellis.
“You have seen my form outside of my castle. But now you see my true power. I warned you, did I not?” said the dragon.
“I thought the warning was hypothetical,” said Jack.
The dragon sneered. “You’re just like him. Like Helder, the pathetic man who came for my daughter. He thought he could creep into my castle and take her, but he didn’t bank on meeting me. The worthless fool didn’t know he’d meet his bane in my walls.”
With that, the dragon stood even taller. He spread his wings out so wide that they almost reached the sides of the dungeon. I wondered if using the company reserves to renew our subscriptions had been a good idea, but I shook my doubt away.
Ashok breathed out a spray of fire, turning his head so that it went out in an arc before him. The blaze hit Ellis and his party, and I heard them shout as their hitpoints drained.
Ellis looked at a woman next to him. “Use Blizzard,” he told her.
The woman, evidently a mage, put her hands out in front of her. She closed her eyes in concentration, and frost began to gather on her fingertips.
The dragon clapped his wings together. At this, I heard footsteps come from the sides of the dungeon. I looked, and I saw stone golems approaching us from the left and right.
“I’ll lay some traps,” I said. “Rex and Francis, aim for the ankles.”
“What about me?” said Jack.
“We need to deal some damage to Ashok. Try and attack him between his fire bursts. Gabriella, do you have any ice spells?”
“Does Elder Esrand like his porridge salty?”
“I don’t have a damn clue,” I said, aware that the golems were advancing on us.
“Of course I have cold spells. But they won’t be enough.”
She was right, I knew. We needed something more powerful to defeat the dragon, but I didn’t know what. Still, anything was better than just letting him damage us.
“Just try and whittle down his HP. We’ll think of something.”
Ellis turned to me. “We might have to work together for a while. We’ll help your little party. But when we see Helder’s Bane, it’s ours.”
“We don’t need your help,” I said.
“Again, you need to work on your one-liners,” said Jack.
I placed my traps in strategic parts of the dungeon. The golems were stupid, and they stumbled into them without even attempting to get out of the way. As Rex cleaved at their ankles and my traps snapped shut, I saw messages informing me of the EXP I’d earned.
At the front of the dungeon, Ashok hissed as he sprayed the room with flames. I heard the snap of Gabriella’s ice spells, though they didn’t seem to worry the beast. Ellis’ mage friend used her blizzard, though it was as much use as a snowflake landing in a volcano.
I just didn’t see a way to win. There must have been something that we’d missed, some vital clue or secret that would have told us how to beat Ashok.
I turned to Elis. I hated to speak to him, but I had no choice. “Did you find anything on your way here?” I said.
Even in the midst of battle, his voice was patronizing. “Like what? A magic dragon-slaying sword?”
“That’d be perfect,” I said. “Or, if you can stop being a pompous ass for a second, maybe you can have a think. There must be some item that you’ve found. Something that seems worthless at first, but turns out to be the key to it all. That’s how games usually work.”
Ellis shrugged. A trail of fire burned toward him, and he leapt out of the way. He brought up his bow and fired an arrow at Ashok. It bounced off the dragon’s scaly hide.
The bowman wasn’t going to be of much help, so I needed to think. What had we missed? There had to be something.
Two more golems stumbled into my traps. When they snapped shut and the stone figures smashed, more EXP flooded my way.
30 EXP gained!
30 EXP gained!
Level up to level 10!
-Hitpoints increased to
-Stamina increased to
-2 Attribute points gained
Bonus: Primary skill slot unlocked
As great as it was to unlock a primary slot, there was no use for it here. I needed something else. Some kind of ice weapon, or a secret about Ashok that told us his weaknesses.
Gabriella stood in front of the dragon and spoke the words of her ice spell. She was so focused on casting it, that she didn’t see the dragon’s mouth start to hiss and glow. He was about to hit her full on with an arc of fire. At so close a range, she’d be incinerated.
I ran over to her, ducking out of the way of a golem that reached for me. I collided head-on with Gabriella, knocking the witch to the floor.
The two of us had managed to just about avoid another arc of fire that burned around us. I looked at Gabriella, and I almost lost my breath.
As the fire lit up the room, the orange glow gave me full view of her burned skin. I saw the
outlines from where her tattoo had once been drawn, before the witch elders had burned it off her.
Chapter Fifty-One
“Gabriella,” I said. “the forbidden spell you learned – what was it?”
She looked at me confused. “It won’t be any good here, Columbus.”
“Just tell me what it was.”
“But it wasn’t a cold spell. Or even anything with attack power.”
“Just tell me!”
The witch looked at me strangely. I realized that I was gripping her collar hard in my hand. I eased off and moved back. My pulse hammered.
“It was Terelbelle’s Destigma. It removes any sort of effect or status.”
I looked up at the dragon. I remembered our first meeting with Vinetwest. Back then he had disguised himself as a bear. Before that, he told us he’d transformed into a hare and had spied on us near the ranger’s shack.
Gabriella’s forbidden spell could help us here, I was sure of it. I was beginning to get the idea that nothing on Artemis was what it seemed. The wave creatures weren’t animals; they were people who had been cursed. Vinetwest wasn’t a bear or a hare, he was an old man. And that meant that there was a chance that the form in front of us wasn’t all it appeared to be.
If only there was a way to restore the witch’s tattoo. There had to be something I could do.
Skill gained – Tattooist (Int) – you can create and restore skill tattoos. At later levels, skills can be designed. Do you accept?
It needn’t be said that I accepted the skill quicker than a drunk accepting a shot of whiskey. A glow spread through me, and I heard a typewriter sound that signified a change in my character screen.
Rex cried out to my right. One golem had struck him in the face, and another was advancing on him. Two of Ellis’ party members screamed out as fire leapt over them. They dropped to the ground and died. A golem advanced on Francis. He struck out with his dagger, but his swing was weak.
“I’m out of stamina,” he said.
The dragon showed no signs of tiring, so I needed to act fast. I put my hands on Gabriella’s shoulder and felt the rough contours of her scars. She shrank back from me.
“What are you doing?” she said.
Like everything in Artemis, using my skill was intuitive. I found that if I traced my fingers along the outlines of the tattoo, the ink began to appear. Gabriella screamed in pain and tried to squirm away from me, but I held fast.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I have to do this.”
Another of Ellis’ party died. Rex took another blow to the head, and he staggered down onto one knee. Clive snapped at the golem attacking his master, and the rocky creature swiped the Burr away. Clive let out a yelp, but then turned his head and leapt on the golem again.
As I traced my finger through the last line of the tattoo, Gabriella’s skin began to glow. The burn marks didn’t disappear, but the ink of a tattoo smothered them. The witch’s eyes widened. She pushed me away, and then stood up.
She stared at the dragon. The beast opened his mouth, ready to send another jet of flame our way, when Gabriella started to scream. It was a sound so loud that it felt like it was piercing my eardrums. The dungeon started to rumble, and dust fell from the roof. A mist of black smoke left Gabriella’s mouth and then gathered in front of her. It was so thick that I couldn’t see her face.
The dragon stumbled back. Whether it was through fear or because it lost its balance, I didn’t know. The witch gave one last scream, and the smoke flew across the dungeon and wrapped around the beast.
Ashok shrieked as the smoke smothered him. It was a dense mist, and there was so much of it that I couldn’t make out his figure. In a few seconds the smoke began to clear. When it did, I saw that the dragon was gone.
In its place stood Vinetwest in his old man form. He staggered down onto the ground, clinging to his last hitpoints.
“Blast him with your ice spell,” I told Gabriella.
As the witch cast her spell on Vinetwest, the old man screamed out. The ice hit him in the face. He staggered back, hit the wall behind him, and then fell to the floor.
For a second, the dungeon was silent. And then I spoke.
“You need to chill out,” I said.
Jack looked at me and grinned. “Now THAT’S a one-liner.”
I sank back to the floor. My body ached with tiredness. We’d done it. I couldn’t believe it, but we’d actually done it. I waited for something. I don’t know what I expected. A congratulatory message? Confetti to fall from the roof and shower us in joy?
Instead, Vinetwest gave a weak cough. Straining with all his will, he pushed himself back to his feet. Blood ran down his face, and his skin had turned blue from the shower of cold that had hurt him.
Before I could react, Ellis brought his up bow. He readied an arrow, aimed at the old man, and fired. Time seemed to slow as the arrow glided through the air, before piercing the old man in the heart. Vinetwest gave one last groan, and then fell to the floor, dead.
I didn’t know what to say or do. What did this mean? Had we won?
My question was soon answered. I heard Francis say something, but I ignored him. All I could concentrate on were the words on my screen.
Quest Failed – Find Helder’s Bane.
I felt sick. Although my pulse still hammered, I felt like I would collapse. Ahead of me, Ellis threw his bow to the ground. He turned and looked at me, and a smile widened across his face.
Chapter Fifty-Two
1 Month Later
We were an hour into a 2-day tour. Sunlight crept through the gaps in the trees and spread a glow across the forest. It was almost time to stop for lunch, but I didn’t want to eat. These days, the only thing that could sate my hunger was exploring. There was so much to do and so much to see, that I never wanted to stop.
Francis walked next to me. Beside him was Jack. Rex was behind us, chatting to one of the players who had booked on our tour. There were thirty of them, which was more people than I’d ever seen in all my time with Ledfield Tours.
Best of all, Dad was with us. He walked in front of me, always trying to push us on, never wanting to take a break. When we’d told him about Pana and what had happened, he’d been angry. Then Jack had shown him our subscriber count. After beating Ashok, I’d been astounded to see that over a hundred thousand people watched our progress. Clips of our adventure went viral, and video hosting sites were filled with our battle against the dragon.
“Wait up, dad,” I said. “They need a break.”
Dad walked over to me. His breathing mask was gone. He walked with confident strides. His character was the epitome of good health, with bulging muscles and veins pumping with blood. It had been difficult to convince him to try playing Pana Reborn, but now that he had, he was an addict.
“No time for stopping, son,” he said. “We’ve got another seven tours booked this month. You need to toughen up a little.”
After leaving Pana, I’d been heartbroken. With one arrow, Ellis had claimed the prize that we’d worked so hard to get. He was credited with finding Helder’s Bane, but the media hadn’t warmed to him. Our game clips were replayed so much that most people knew who the real winners in Pana were.
Terence Pierce had contacted me not long after and offered to invest again. Although I was tempted to take his money and renew our tour license, I refused. Our time in Gossard Forest was done, I knew.
People had started messaging me and begging to join my party. At first Jack, Francis, Rex and I had carried on playing Pana for recreation, but then we realized that we were missing an opportunity.
Ledfield Tours was reinvented. I decided that from now on, we’d run our excursions through Artemis, showing new players the sights of the island. The island was so vast and there was so much to see, that I knew we’d never run out of things to discover.
“Columbus,” said a voice to my right.
I turned and saw Gabriella. She wore new robes. They were purple, to match her hair
, and they glimmered in the sunlight.
“Elder Esrand asked me to rejoin them,” she said. “He wants to promote me to elder witch.”
“And what did you say?”
“I told him to get lost.”
The tour group finished their lunches. Some of them got to their feet, eager to carry on exploring. There was a cave on the north-west edge of the island, and I’d heard that there was rare loot there. It would be risky, since rare loot was often guarded by strong creatures. It didn’t matter. Sometimes you had to take a risk.
The Scout of Artemis (LitRPG Series): Press X to Loot Book 1 Page 19