by Arthur Stone
At the same time, Cheater was also tempted to pour all of his available experience into bonus stats, Luck specifically. His Luck value was obviously already formidable, but if it improved the monsters’ dropped loot, every single point was worth it. The longer Cheater played the game, the more he admitted to himself how useful the bonus stats were; however, the benefits of increasing his main level also greatly appealed. In short, he wouldn’t rush to decide. He would take time to think it over, to be measured and strategic.
Absorbed in deep thought, Cheater’s hands once again gained a mind of their own. Releasing the mug, they withdrew the weightless ball he’d gained from the grays. He then propelled it at the window. As usual, the grays’ gift melted away, disappearing within six feet of its flight.
“Did you throw something?” Drowner stammered, staring dumbly at the spot where the sphere had vanished. Touching his pocket lightly, Cheater felt the sphere resting there.
“Oh, it’s nothing,” Cheater dismissed. It was his turn to be mysterious.
“Strange. Well, come on then—let’s get out of here.”
Chapter 22
Life Nine. Quest Unknown
“We checked everywhere. We asked everyone. We heard nothing. No one has seen this ‘March’ person.”
Watershed’s words hung in the air. He shared at Cheater expectantly. After a few stunned seconds, the player shook his head vigorously.
“No. He’s here somewhere—somewhere in the region,” Cheater stuttered in denial. “Either your people failed to look thoroughly, or he’s well hidden… though he has no reason to hide.”
“Are you sure he has no reason?” the NPC pressed.
Cheater weakly nodded, betraying his uncertainty. “No reason that I can see?”
“We checked the chats, put in his ID…came up flat. That’s not odd if he’s hiding around some black clusters. Perhaps he’s somewhere in the desert?”
“I doubt it. Two weeks have passed now! He can’t last that long without beer.”
“Is that so?” Watershed grinned tightly, his eyes mirthless.
“I did mention his love of beer, right?”
“Yes, I remember that. Well then, there are three likely options: he’s camped out among the black lands of the border, he has crossed into another region, or he is located in a place my people cannot access. Which do you prefer?”
“I already expressed my doubts about the border. There’s no reason for him to be there among the dead clusters. March wouldn’t change regions either; he needs me, and I’m here. We’re supposed to meet up, we made a plan! You told me you could access any region. Is that true, or is there a place even your people cannot reach?”
Watershed hesitated, then confessed. “There is, yes.”
“Do chat messages not work there?”
“They do; not everywhere, and not in all directions, but they work. However, messages cannot get in from outside. I’ll show you the place.”
The NPC spread an ordinary paper map across the table between them. The map was hyper-detailed, up-to-date, as if it were freshly printed. Watershed pointed at a corner of the map and cleared his throat. “We’re in this corner here. Overly dramatic types call it the ‘Dragon’s Eye.’ Normal people just call it ‘the Hole.’ They also call it by the name of the biggest settlement. You’ve been there. Racist place, you said.”
“I know you mean the stable,” Cheater nodded.
“When viewed from above, the Hole looks like a cut-up head of lettuce. The core is Fifth Mine, and all the normal clusters adjacent to it. As you proceed outward, you encounter larger and larger layers of mixed clusters. Some places are mostly black, others less so. Some clusters are impassable, others dry. To get to the stable by vehicle, you have to zigzag; otherwise, you’d have to try on foot. Towards the border, everything is black or gray. There are few normal clusters in that direction. If you go east, the situation improves, but you’ll still see these sections shaped like bull’s horns here and there. Neither place is suitable for travel. They’re very dangerous places. Merchants don’t even have plans to create trade routes through these places—it’s far safer to go around. Do you understand?”
Cheater nodded, reiterating Watershed’s information carefully. “The Hole is like an island. Because of the border, no one wants to pass through. It’s a dangerous area in general; plus, it’s basically cut off from the rest of the region by these two horns. I see on the map that they nearly touch.”
Returning his nod curtly, Watershed poked at the map’s horns. “This place? Where they nearly touch? That’s the only road into the Hole. We call it the Drain. It’s the only route vehicles may take. If you’ll look further east, you’ll see another pair of similar horns, stretching out from the black of the border.”
“So there’s a second Hole to the east of here? What—”
“—Not quite,” Watershed interrupted, stopping Cheater short. “This land area is much larger, and the borders are not nearly as close. No place there is as dangerous as the lands out here. You do have the gist of it, though: it’s like a copy of our own terrain’s layout. That second Hole, by the way? It’s called ‘the Cauldron.’ It cuts us off from entirely the rest of the region. The road through the Drain leads directly to the Cauldron. We can’t go that far, not even to the Drain—even on foot through the horns. My people cannot go into those lands. They belong to others. They could, perhaps, but only by going around this second island by the Cauldron. That would be an arduous journey. They can certainly never enter the Cauldron directly.”
As Cheater opened his mouth to ask about March, Watershed interjected. “If your friend is there, consider him lost. The horns will block us from using the chat. Even without them, these black clusters here would still maintain the interference. Even inside the Cauldron, all the surrounding black causes problems with the chat system.” Watershed drummed his fingers on the map thoughtfully. “That’s the problem in a nutshell, Cheater.”
“I don’t get it,” the player remarked. “What’s stopping you from entering the Cauldron? Some sort of feud?”
Watershed narrowed his eyes. “How did you know that? Did one of mine say something?”
“No, I just assumed.”
“You assumed right. We can’t touch it, nor can others. No one from the Hole is permitted. Even Sevens and the other local players fear to enter that area.”
“Players…?”
Rolling his eyes, Watermark pointed at himself. ““I’m a character. An NPC. A ‘dumbass digi,’ if you will. Right? And you—you’re a player. So is Sevens.” He continued slowly, as if tutoring a small and inattentive child. “Do you know why the Drain is called the Drain? If I grab a vehicle and drive to the Cauldron, that’ll drain one life from me, guaranteed. But you, and Sevens, and players like you? You have options. Sevens might have fewer options, it’s true. She lives with the digis. She even took a digi man as her partner to keep her company. Those in power in the Cauldron have known this for a long time… and they do not approve.”
“More racists, holding the pass?” Cheater frowned.
“It’s worse than that—much worse. The whole Cauldron belongs to the Devils, a powerful gang in this area. You came from the west, right? Did you run into the Spiders?”
“Maybe?”
“The Devils are just as brutal, and they’ve struck some sort of deal with the Spiders, too. It’s double trouble. I don’t think they plan to formally join up, but the two do have common interests. Now, the Spiders treat the digis reasonably fairly. They get along fie. But the Devils plan to root us all out, relocating us to reservations where we’ll never be heard from again.”
“Why?” Cheater exclaimed, disgusted. “What’s the point?”
“Who said anything about a point? Hey, people are sheep. Digis and players alike are dumb followers. That’s one thing we all share in common: give us a clear idea and a good kick, and off we go. The Devils have a leader to give them their vile ideas and their kicks. Bugle is
his name. Fitting—he sure does know how to make a lot of noise. He’s a fantastic orator. He makes a fiery speech and the Devils hang on his every word. He’s silver-tongued, though the tongue is forked. Smoothest talker this side of the Continent. Smart people are hard to deceive, but how many smart people have you seen in your time here? It was easy for Bugle to gather hordes of simpletons around him to control with his botched rhetoric.
As Cheater fumed, Watershed massaged his temples. “The digis and players didn’t get along too well before he showed up, but he’s escalated the conflict to unprecedented levels. ‘The only good digi is a dead digi,’ That’s their slogan. No parlay, no peace talks, no compromises—just executions. You were in Fifth Mine. You saw how they treated you there. Do you understand why, now? You’re no Devil, but that doesn’t matter. The locals are too scarred to shake the sentiment.”
Profoundly disturbed, Cheater shifted the subject to March. “You think March could be somewhere in the Cauldron?”
“I have good reason to believe he is.”
“Is that your prophet ability at work, or just a guess?”
“Ah, so my glory as the great prophet has reached your lowly ears!” Watershed winked.
“I might have heard something,” Cheater deadpanned.
“Listen, Cheater: People love to lie, especially when faced with something they do not understand. In this region, nothing’s as simple as it seems. This region was supposed to birth amazing things. I won’t go into details, but the Cauldron and the Hole possess massive amounts of raw materials assembled for a large-scale, highly profitable project. You can find every cluster necessary for a streamlined chain of mass production. My predecessor of sorts began mobilizing in this direction. Everything was going well—and then it all went to hell. Bugle cut off my predecessor’s lifelines, demanding that oversight of the project be transferred to him. The sneaky little demon waited until all of the most difficult steps were completed. He was angling to earn all of the money without breaking a sweat.”
Watershed glowered at the memory. “Of course, my predecessor responded by telling him to go… uh, acquaint himself with his own genitalia in a, well… more D.I.Y. fashion. You catch my drift. As you’d expect, things escalated from there. Back and forth, to and fro—unexpected consequences. For example, the local digis revolted at Fifth Mine. I and the other representatives of the organization can’t go there, but the Fifth Miners can’t approach the Cauldron either, thanks to Bugle’s hostile policy. Their enemies include all of the Devils and their allies. Bugle made this mess, and the locals are his dumb, oblivious puppets. Divide and conquer, right? A classic strategy. Bugle succeeded in dividing us. Now, the local digis hide away in the Hole as Bugle sits in the Cauldron, growing stronger. My people had to watch, powerless, as a promising business fell apart before their eyes.”
A beat of silence passed; Watershed stared hard at the floor. “So… I was sent to fix things,” he revealed quietly. “My abilities may turn the tide, but I’m no prophet—I’m a crisis manager.”
“Okay, crisis manager,” Cheater suddenly snapped, surprising himself. “This is all well and good, but not really of concern to me.” Cheater didn’t mean to grow brusque with his benefactor, but he’d grown tired of story-time. After all, March was still out there. “I need to find my friend, and I need to find him now. You promised to make this happen, Watershed.”
“I’m sorry, Cheater, but I’m not omnipotent,” Watershed responded, rummaging for an object by the table. “Here’s your bow—it was just delivered today. Sadly, this is not the organization’s property, so I can’t give it to you. You’ll need to buy it. I was offered a good discount, though: just 48,000 spores.”
“‘Just’? It’s a bow, not a tank convoy! That’s insane!”
“Just take a look at it.”
Cheater shook his head. “No one would pay that for a bow. You’d have to clean out a whole city to get that much.”
Watershed regarded him for a moment. “So you’ll pay it, then? It’s not such a high price. Usually items this rare go for much more. To be frank, this bow is too heavy and the tension’s too high. That’s why they discounted it. If you don’t like the terms, we’ll have to keep looking, which will take time. Who knows if we’ll even be able to find better? Such bows are rare. We could always find a player with a bow like this and convince them to unbind it. That’s a more realistic option, but it would still come with a surcharge of its own.”
“I can’t waste any more time,” Cheater insisted.
“What’s your decision, then?”
After a mere two seconds, Cheater gave into his impatience and committed. “I’ll take it. How do we settle up?”
“No need,” Watershed said, waving Cheater’s question out of the air.
“What?”
“My people found your cache. We haven’t yet evaluated all of its contents, but our estimated total is between 1,100,000 and 1,280,000. We agreed on an investment of one million spores, correct? That will still leave you with ample spores, even after buying the pearls and other such things you mentioned. How much you’ll have left, I can’t say—I’ll know in a week. It will also take quite some time to liquidate all of it. If we flood the market, prices will collapse in this region; neighboring regions will take a hit, too—”
“—I can’t wait a week!” Cheater interjected, growing jittery. “You can pay it back later, assuming there is a later.”
“Your trust in me is well placed,” Watershed assured, locking eyes with anxious Cheater. “I will not pay it back—the organization will. I need that money to solve our problem with Bugle and the other vermin in the Cauldron. Our organization is not the poorest in the world, but we don’t approve of waste. Every operation is designed to be self-sufficient. If this is war, we have to remember that the main essential in war is not ammunition or troops, but money. With your million added to my savings, I can handle this situation without troubling those above me. That will count in my favor. In this region and others, you will make good friends with excellent prospects. Good friends are essential, more valuable than an ocean of spores. You will thank me many times over for such profitable returns on your investment.”
“So far, I’ve not noticed your organization to be effective enough to be worth that million.”
“I won’t argue with that,” Watershed agreed self-effacingly. “You did not pay us a million spores, though. You lent it to us. Does it bother you that we failed to find your friend? I’m sorry, but I’ve thoroughly explained that we have no way into the Cauldron. Any digi there can only survive until the players notice him, which gives them very little time. There are some exceptions and complications, sure, but I didn’t want to weigh down the big picture. Not everything is under my control yet—not even here. You have seen for yourself that I live in a black swamp. I haven’t been here long, and we’ve only just begun our operation. If you’d arrived later, we might have been able to locate this March of yours in a day or two. This is the worst of times. This leaves you two options: you can wait, or you can travel to the Cauldron yourself. The latter option is certainly faster.”
“I’ll go, dammit!” Cheater exclaimed, strangely giddy. “I’m sure you recall there’s a reward on my head. I have no better chances in the Cauldron than a digi does.”
“You’re wrong,” Watershed protested. “They’d string us up on sight. You, they need alive. There’s a bounty out on you, posted by a very serious player.”
“I can guess who it is,” Cheater responded queasily, “but you think they’re taking me to a place that’s better than the gallows and the head-spikes, you’re mistaken.”
“I know, I know,” Watershed concurred. “We do have some resources we can call upon to help you, though—reliable player friends of our own, ones associated with our organization. They can be trusted. This will still take time, however, as they’d have to be brought here from other regions. It’s clear you’re not willing to wait—and I don’t necessarily advise y
ou to, either. Just believe me when I say that you need to go to the Cauldron by yourself. The sooner you go, the better.”
As Cheater mulled this over, Watershed’s eyes suddenly lit up. “Wait! I should tell you about this merchant beyond the Cauldron. He has a certain rare item in stock: it’s like this bow, but a rifle. Not the best in the world, but better than what you’re carrying. Well, that’s in terms of its base stats—not its stats after you’ve spend God knows how many fussy hours modifying it. I have personal reasons for sending you to this merchant too. A visit would be beneficial to us both.”
Before Cheater could pry further, Watershed turned away. “I can’t say more at the moment. We prophets have to be picky with the information we share. Too much knowledge can negatively influence your decision-making. It’s better to act while somewhat in the dark, trust me. My people will lead you along a safe path as far as they can; then, you’re on your own.”
“What’s your interest?” Cheater persisted. “You brought it up!”
“One minute...” Watershed trailed off—then froze. As his eyes began to roll nearly to the back of his head, he went limp, as if he’d withdrawn from the world entirely. As Cheater watched Watershed transcend, a message appeared.
The character Watershed is offering you a quest (title unknown). Quest description: unknown. Reward: unknown.
Note: Watershed is offering you a completely hidden quest. Accept it at your own risk. The consequences for completing this quest, or failing to complete it, are unknown.