by Vic Connor
Finally, he cleared his senses enough to equip his Second Sight. The sorcerer was a tiny, withered old man with a befuddled grin on his face, belied at all times by his sharp, penetrating gaze. Aremos attacked him with everything he had. As powerful as the sorcerer was as an both enchanter and a trickster, he was no match for Aremos in a straight duel—the old man was incinerated.
But I must learn such mind games, Somera thinks as she logs off her rig and prepares to make the move into Sanguis. They will stand me in good stead in the darker realms.
Just then, her laptop lights up: Skype has activated, and her parents are calling her. She showed them how to use it, of course, and promised she’d call them often. But she hasn’t, nor has she always accepted their calls. Sanguis beckons too often, tempting her away much as the little old sorcerer had tempted Aremos.
Now, Somera feels awful for having ignored them. She considers shutting her laptop to reject the call, to put them out of her mind and begin her evening’s adventure. But the guilt wins out, and she decides she can spare a few minutes.
“Somera, about bloody time!” her mother snaps at her the very second she accepts their call. The picture appears, stilted and fuzzy for a few moments, but it shifts as the connection settles and her parents’ beaming faces fill her screen. “We have been trying you for days and days now. What? You do not love your parents anymore, you do not have the time to talk to us?”
“Mama—” Somera begins, but her father turns to face her mother, cutting them both off.
“Leave her alone, hmm? She’s busy, so much studying to do, a whole new life to settle into, can’t you see?” he scolds. “What, you think that is easy? You think she has free time just to play around with?”
Her parents bicker, sparring playfully, and Somera struggles to get a word in edgewise. Each time one of her parents stops talking, she tries to leap in, but the other one always responds faster. She has forgotten, in such a short amount of time, how fast you have to be in her family to make yourself heard.
Have I really grown so rusty at talking to people, even talking to my own parents? she wonders.
The minutes tick on—she watches the clock in the bottom corner of her laptop as first five, then ten, then fifteen minutes pass. Her mother relays all the gossip from the village—someone is betrothed to someone else, this happened at the market, and “did you know that your father’s boss has been asking after you, telling us what a smart girl you are…”—and her father asks about her course several times without once waiting for an answer, but Somera begins to drift away from the conversation. It becomes white noise, just filling the minutes—and those minutes are ballooning, each one pushing her time in Sanguis farther and farther back until she can bear it no longer.
“Mama, papa!” she exclaims, raising her voice to break through their chatter. “I’m glad you called, truly. I miss you. I miss everyone, very, very much. But I have assignments due—I must do my work.”
“Of course, you must,” her father agrees, beaming at her. “Such a diligent girl, you surely must take after your old man…”
Another couple of minutes pass as her parents begin their goodbyes only to get distracted, meandering off in different directions, but Somera presses the point. “Now I really must go. Goodbye, goodbye … lots of love, goodbye…”
Before her parents can respond again, Somera hits the button to hang up and the video call disappears, leaving her screen mercifully clear.
She wonders if she was rude; she wonders if she should pay more attention to her loved ones… But Sanguis calls, and she can’t resist any longer. She reaches for her rig, sets it up, and logs on, preparing to immerse herself once more into the action.
An hour later, Aremos is chasing through a new area of the map, trading curses with a vampire lord hellbent on killing him.
He’d manifested within Sanguis, as usual, in the wilderness outside the town of death in which the charnel house stands on Crookbeak Lane. On his map, it has been named the Flos Nocte, the flower of night, but he only ever imagines it as the wasteland. The dreadnought had met him, swooping down upon him in his typical fashion. Aremos, as ever, tried to put up a shield, tried to fend him off, knowing what was coming—every time he manifests in Sanguis, the dreadnought has thought it funny to rob him of twenty percent or so of his HP, humiliating him in the process through a series of chastening, visibly simple attacks.
This time was no different, of course. Aremos felt the dreadnought’s presence as soon as he arrived, cloaked in shadows under the veil of night, and Aremos threw up a couple of his most potent wards of protection in a new, as yet untested combination. One day, I just have to land on the right combo, he thought.
This was not that day.
“Aremos, greetings!” The dreadnought laughed, stepping out of the whirling shadows. He noticed Aremos’ shields and his laughter became louder. “Ha! I cannot penetrate such shields… Surely, no?”
Aremos braced himself, ready for the inevitable attack. None came, however. Rather, the dreadnought stood still, calm and peaceful, fixing Aremos with his eyes. After a few brief seconds of silence, those eyes began to glow—a nauseating, hideous yellow. At the same time, Aremos’ own shields began to glow faintly, gently. But they soon became warm and grew warmer still, so that Aremos started to choke in the cloying heat. He tasted the hot air, felt it burning his throat and nostrils. Soon, he began to sweat, and his sweat was steaming. He watched helplessly as his HP trickled away.
“You have made your point, dreadnought,” he gasped, dispelling his shields. However, as he tried to disperse his magical power in the usual way, he felt an icy coldness grip him. The shock of the diametric opposites was almost too much and Aremos swayed, falling to one knee and propping himself up on his staff.
“Foolish child.” The dreadnought chuckled tenderly, affection lacing every line in his face. Then, he struck out—a casual, almost negligent gesture. The force of the blow was terrific, however. It sent Aremos flying and dropping his staff. He went far before hitting the ground, rolling over and landing in a pile. It was the same as all the other times he’d come here, the same as every encounter he’d had with the dreadnought.
In less than a minute, he’d lost a third of his HP, between the burning shield and the ruthlessly offhand, mighty blow.
The dreadnought walked over to him, his black robes gently brushing along the ground. He held out a hand as Aremos stood, dusting himself off and swearing under his breath, and the Staff of Adamant leapt from the ground and into the dreadnought’s hand.
“You’ll be needing this,” the dreadnought said, passing Aremos his staff. “You have a new mission. One of the other dreadnoughts—a rival of mine, in a way—has set up a mighty vampire lord far to the north, deep in the forests there. It is an AI of great power, and it cannot go unchecked. An entire court of minions surrounds the creature, other players enslaved to his bite.
“You must destroy the vampire. I don’t know what will happen to the minions, but that is of no concern to me,” the dreadnought finished.
“I don’t know how to fight vampires,” Aremos replied, caressing the Staff of Adamant absent-mindedly. “They’re few and far between in Arkhart—I’ve never even seen one.”
“So then, it will be a suitable challenge for you.” The dreadnought smiled. He reached forward, touching his palm to Aremos’ forehead. Aremos wavered, disoriented, as his mind seemed to swim. The dreadnought pushed him, lightly, and sent him staggering backward. A new power seemed to wash over Aremos, concentrating over him for a moment before cascading all around him.
“A new ability,” the dreadnought explained. “Your current Second Sight is truly pathetic. There is so much more to see in this world, so many more ways of seeing. Look for your opponent’s weaknesses.” As he spoke, he began to fade away. “Find them and you will know what to do.”
The dreadnought stepped back into the shadows as the mist writhed and danced and made its way back out of the wasteland, t
oward Crookbeak Lane and the charnel house therein. A second later, he was gone.
Now, the vampire stands before Aremos, trapped against a cliff face far above the dark forest. It has been a long fight, and both casters have run low on magical power. The vampire is strong, indeed. He wields black magic as easily as most players wield a sword, skipping from spell to spell with a speed and fluidity that had terrified Aremos when he’d first arrived.
Killing the three minions who were walking through the forest with the vampire had been easy enough. They had such limited willpower and HP, having been so recently drained by the vampire, that a couple of magical projectiles tore through them quite effectively. But nothing seemed to touch the vampire for a long while, so strong were his defenses.
It’s only now that they have battled for nigh on twenty minutes that the vampire’s defenses are seeming to wane. They’ve been blasting each other, cursing each other, evading and then rejoining one another throughout. They’d fought beneath the canopy, but Aremos retreated, knowing the vampire couldn’t resist following. He ran up to some higher ground, away from the darkness in which the vampire thrived, then turned and began to send wave after wave of luminescent fire at the vampire. The creature deflected it with ease, however.
And now, the vampire laughs, mocking. “Come, child,” he invites. “Join me. With your power flowing through me, I would be unstoppable. With my blessings, you could live forever.”
“As your thrall?” Aremos responds with a sneer. “Never.”
The vampire is tall and lean, dressed in a long coat, shirt, and cravat. He had been wearing a wide brimmed, floppy hat when Aremos had found him, but Aremos had incinerated that within the first few minutes. A ruby ring sits on the vampire’s finger, a source of power through which he has been channeling his black magic. He holds a long, slim sword in the other, twirling it with deceptive strength. They have come to blows a couple of times, forgoing magical attacks for blunt melee scrapping. However, the vampire was too strong and too fast for Aremos. Aremos had only managed to land a couple of blows, and even these did little to damage the vampire’s HP, whilst the vampire in turn had almost sliced him open, nicking and slashing with that lightning-fast blade.
“Well, then.” The vampire smiles, bracing himself. His back presses into a high granite façade, while all around him, the hill’s peak drops downward. Aremos thinks he has him cornered, until he sees the vampire tensing.
The creature leaps high—impossibly high—just as the elf had on the pyramid. He shows more grace, however, and each of his moves projects astonishing power. He looks nimble and fully engaged, like a predator toying with its prey. He twists in mid-air and lands behind Aremos, lunging forward with the point of his sword. It stabs Aremos painfully, robbing him of ten percent of his HP in one go, leaving him pitifully low.
Aremos roars and explodes, turning to face the vampire as sheet after sheet of White Fire ripples outward from his body. It scorches the vampire head to toe, but does little real harm. That ruby ring glows bright and absorbs the worst of it. Then, the vampire holds out his hand, ruby ring pointed forward, and a bolt of purest darkness leaps out, weaving through the air like a serpent until it surrounds Aremos. Aremos reinforces his shields, pouring his magic into them, using a full eight percent of his limited magical power to hold off the black magic.
That ring continues to glint and Aremos uses the drama to take a quick break, cycling through his spells and equipping the Unforging. He drops his shield as the black, snaking spell runs out of power, evaporating into smoke, and he thrusts the Staff of Adamant forward, lashing at the vampire with impotent lightning.
It’s enough, however, and the vampire backs off a little, blinded by the light if nothing else. Aremos casts the Unforging, targeting the ruby ring. When he’d cast it on Asba’s ring—his old teammate’s—he had felt it at work. He’d felt the azure light saturate its target, he had felt the warmth as Asba’s power was overcome. As the spell worked, he had felt the ring itself twist and turn, bending out of shape and cracking.
Now, however, he feels resistance. He feels the vampire’s power as an unbending will, unbreachable and secure. He increases his own power, pushing the azure light around the ruby, forcing it to find a way through the defenses.
“But as you can see, child,” the vampire whispers, smiling and baring his teeth. “I have no weaknesses.”
…So many more ways of seeing … look for your opponent’s weaknesses…
He remembers the dreadnought’s words, and he thinks he knows what to do. As the vampire holds out his hands, sword tip lowered and eyes ablaze, the hilltop begins to grow darker than it had already been. A black mist rises, blotting out the stars above and obscuring the red moon’s deathly glow. The mist has to be poisonous: Aremos knows it instinctively. It will kill him soon enough, if he’s not careful.
He throws a magical projectile at the vampire, a ball of pure white magic, but it gets pulled apart even as it moves through the mist. Never mind, Aremos thinks—the vampire is distracted enough.
Aremos searches for his Second Sight and finds nothing is where it used to be. It’s been erased from his list of skills… No, it’s still there, he notices after a moment’s frantic search. It is just … behind a veil. He tries to push through the veil, but fails. Aremos remembers the dreadnought as he bestowed upon him this new gift; how relaxed and casual he’d looked. On a hunch, Aremos gives in to the veil, accepts it—and it flutters within him, empowering a new, fresh, and potent Second Sight, with a subtlety to it that Aremos has never felt. That’s what the dreadnought’s blessing feels like, he knows.
The Sight comes to him, but it’s different. Before, he’d see labels, written words attached to everything, showing him some hidden things, some things in plain sight—all as instructions. This new ability shows him … fault lines, he intuits. Little fissures in reality. He gains knowledge, yes, but he also gains understanding.
Looking at the vampire, Aremos finally sees its weakness. He sees its still heart, unbeating yet somehow sustaining him. The lifeless heart feeds his power, Aremos comprehends. Though it pumps no blood throughout his undead body, it draws the vampire’s black magic and feeds him with it. Those teeth, long and pointed, do much the same, drawing the magic from his victims’ blood.
Cut off the power, slay the beast, Aremos thinks.
He coughs, spluttering. His lungs begin to burn and his eyes swim. As he begins to choke, he watches his HP and his magical power closely. Both are draining, depleting by a couple of percentage points every few seconds. At the same time, the mist crackles and sparks of energy flash around it. A couple arcs of magical power release from Aremos’ own self and light up a halo of energy around the vampire’s body. The vampire’s own HP, barely diminished by their fight, begins to rise—his magical power also swells until it’s nearly full as Aremos’ own drops below the forty percent mark. The vampire is leeching Aremos’ health and strength and using it to bolster himself.
“No, no, no...” Aremos whispers, still choking as his knees give out. He reaches into his robes and finds his health potion. There’s just one sip left and he swigs it fast, gaining back twenty percent of his HP. Next, Aremos grips the Staff of Adamant, feeling its own power crackling beneath his fingertips.
He releases his defenses, allowing the mist to wrap him up fully. But it’s enough; it frees his energy. As the vampire feasts, assuming victory, nearly overloaded by the power he’s consuming, Aremos gathers his wits and lines up a few curses into a combination move. First, he dispenses with the lightning storm and charges his single lightning bolt. Then, he feels out all the metal on the vampire’s person—a chain pendant around his neck, the sword in his hand, the buckles on his shoes, the ring’s clasp… He fills them with his white magic, heating them slowly as he moves on to the next spell. He selects one of his magical projectiles, a simple, focused beam of white magic designed to scythe through dark magic users, and equips it.
His health drops dang
erously low; he falls on his knees, barely able to breathe, but he’s nearly there. Finally, Aremos weaves his magic together in his final spell, the Bright Net, designed to entrap and entangle its victims, burning through their magical powers as it does so.
And I am ready, he thinks.
He releases his carefully constructed combo. The enemy’s ring and sword begin to glow a ruddy red, which does little. It seems to hurt the vampire slightly, but the creature laughs. “You have no power here, foolish wizard,” he croons, watching as his sword flares in his hand. His skin burns lightly on his hands and around his throat, everywhere the metal touches.
But then Aremos releases his lightning bolt, far more powerful than the vampire had thought possible given the dire circumstances. It hits the creature in the chest, shocking his dead, lifeless heart. The heart palpitates, Aremos can see—his improved Second Sight allows him to watch as his enemy is crippled. It shudders arrhythmically and then stops, lashed and lacerated. This affects the vampire’s casting ability and diminishes his strength of will, and the mist surrounding them both starts to thin. Aremos can feel the leaching effects slowing down as the vampire clutches at his chest, gagging.
With his foe distracted, Aremos casts the Bright Net, launching it forward. It catches the vampire, wrapping around him and making him stumble backward, his arms trapped. He’s strong, however, even now: He strains and tenses, and begins to break the net apart. Though he is physically able to tear it open, though, it begins to limit his magical power even more, cutting him off from his dark magic almost entirely. The mist disappears and Aremos finds himself able to stand, swaying slightly on the spot, with only twenty-three percent of his HP left. He raises his hand and the white magic bolt crackles and bursts from his palm, tearing into the vampire’s open mouth as he screams and curses.