by D. Rus
"Do both! Now!"
"Sir," the monitoring officer reported, "two thirds of the mercs are already gone, the rest are using portals now. Our men are retreating too, pulling back through key positions according to your orders. The enemy has eleven dead, forty still functional, controlling the square. Ah! They're not going for the donjon! Sir, they're trying to get here!"
My heart dropped. The crystal. "Dan! They want the artifact! That's why they're back!"
Dan and the General exchanged glances. "Looks like it," Dan nodded.
Frag lowered his eyelids, searching for the best solution. "Max? You think you can destroy the artifact? Like you did with the dome earlier today?"
I shook my head apologetically. "I can't. The spell has a twenty-four hour cooldown."
The Princess's voice distracted me, melodious and calm against the barking of orders and panicking chats. "There are ways around it," she reached into her bag, producing a purple-glowing vial.
"Reset Potion," Dan commented in a frozen voice. "Rare drop from the Phantom Dragons. Recipe unknown. Ten to twelve grand a vial if you can get it at all."
"If the General foots the bill," she said, handing me the vial.
Frag nodded. I peered at the stats.
Reset Potion. Resets all spell and skill cooldown times. Can be used once every 24 hrs.
Awesome. I accepted the vial, glancing around the cellar. About sixty people had already taken cover inside. The soldiers were promptly barricading the only remaining passage. The HQ staff hovered at the back while reserve supporters faltered in the middle. I did a quick bit of math, moving my lips and counting fingers. Two million hits plus regen. That was two to the power of twenty... or twenty-one, even. A hundred and five seconds of the spell... just over ten thousand mana...
"Dan?" I said. "I'll need seven or eight thousand mana's worth of batteries. Think you can find them?"
He frowned, turning his head as he looked over the crowd calling out the names of whichever Necros and enchanters he could see. "Seven. Do what it takes—drink it, whatever. Just do it. They're about to slaughter us all. Try to make it worth our while."
Then the Princess spoke again. "Dan? How much do you pay your mercs?"
He looked her over. "On average, ten gold a day per level." And, second-guessing what she was about to say, "Less for wholesale. NPCs are paid half."
The Princess shrugged off his attempts to downprice her offer. "General?" she turned to Frag. "I could offer you another fifty cutthroats and a hundred House of Night guards. Only two hundred grand with urgency and delivery charges, provided you give me the access codes," she pointed at a Drow mage who nodded his ability to open a portal directly into the cellar.
Frag cringed. He couldn't refuse the offer. "I accept, Princess."
She gave him a knowing smile. She knew he would. "Here's your contract."
I didn't follow the rest of it. My batteries and myself took a few swigs of our elixirs and began deciding on the mana transfer order. Finally, I opened the Reset Potion. A mere taste made me purr with delight. Orange custard cream... good...
Someone gave me a push on my shoulder. "Quit dreaming! Can't you hear our guys are already fighting?"
I could indeed hear the rattle of steel by the cellar's steps and the Vets' hearty cussing. The attackers in their camo armor fought in silence.
Select target: Crystal. High Spell: Activate.
The floor bulged. I was already getting used to it. The dark funnel disappeared through the ceiling. Its black dome must be looming now over the castle, unfolding its fury, stripping our enemy of their defenses, all the secret observers pissing their pants as they typed away at their reports to whoever had sent them to rat on us.
Thirty seconds. In the pop of a portal, the shuffling of dozens of feet and the clanging of drawn swords added to the sounds of battle as the Drow poured through the opened gate.
Sixty seconds. The nondescript mass of secondary players by the entrance who'd been trying to stay away from the scene of carnage had now begun to dwindle. The pressure of the Camos had dropped noticeably.
Bang! The crystal shuddered and burst in a crimson flash, crumbling all over the cellar floor in an ankle-deep heap of dust.
Spell alert! Your control of the Astral Mana Dispersal spell has soared!
The Astral Mana Dispersal has been transformed into Astral Mana Absorption! The caster receives 1% of all energy he releases into Astral.
I froze. What was that supposed to mean? Around tick 15 or so the spell became self-sustaining? This was something nobody needed to know. Let them think I was just a useless son of a bitch constantly in need of the cavalry to save his sorry backside.
The Vets seemed to have gotten the hang of it. They'd forced the Camos back onto the steps and went on fighting. The spot wasn't good as it didn't allow them to use their numerical advantage. By the same token, the enemy couldn't stealth any more and had to accept open combat.
The Vets were losing one man to their every three, but now they could afford it. The numbers of our attackers continued to drop. A powerful battle cry from outside announced the arrival of the control-room group. This was agony. The Vets were paying back for their moment of weakness and fear as well as for their financial losses.
The Princess cast a sly little glance my way. I frowned, trying to work out the catch. She pursed her lips, apparently annoyed with my dull-wittedness, then glanced down, her eyes pointing to the dust at my feet. I peered at it. Amid the grey fragments, several gems sparkled like drops of blood. Satisfied that I'd gotten her hint, she whispered something to her bodyguards. They lined up, forming a wall that protected me from any prying stares.
I bent down, pretending I was sweeping the dust off my boots, and picked up four precious little stones in the process.
Magic Absorption Crystal.
Item class: epic
The main ingredient for the top-level Magic Negator
Ruata stepped closer and poked my shoulder, inconspicuously showing me two delicate fingers, then opened her hand. Freakin' businesswoman. I parted with half the loot and dropped the remaining stones into my bag. Yes, I'd done it. I just didn't want four more Negators going on the loose in the world. Safer in my bag.
The rattle of blades on the steps had died down, replaced by excited shouting and a struggle. A knot of cussing bodies rolled into the cellar and fell apart, revealing a battered Camo, his hands twisted behind his back. At least we'd got one.
Rubbing his hands, Dan glanced at Frag who nodded. Dan walked over to the prisoner and crouched trying to look him in the face. The man wore a mask that only revealed his thin pressed lips. He raised his head, studying everyone, before giving us all a smile. A very nasty smile.
He jerked his head down, hitting the fragile artifact gem on his neck with his chin, and shouted something I didn't quite get. Then he smiled again. The artifact began glowing, brighter and brighter, droning as it changed color across the entire spectrum.
"Fire in the hole!" Dan yelled, jumping aside and taking cover behind some debris.
Some of the men dropped to the ground, covering their heads and trying to flatten themselves against the floor. The fighters holding the prisoner just cringed, turning their heads away from a blow that couldn't be blocked.
A flash of lightning crackled like a powerful transformer targeting the prisoner's body. A star of five voltaic arcs connected his forehead and limbs, imprinting itself into my retina. With a bang, a granite tombstone collapsed onto the floor.
"Shit!" the General spat, unmoving.
He looked over his fighters getting back to their feet and turned to Dan. "Please. It's time to forget those real-life reaction times. I understand that this motherfucker beeped like an impact grenade, but we're immortal now, right? Anyway. Soldiers! The castle has been taken and purged, the portals are blocked. Whoever wants to squeeze us out of here has got a real job on his hands. Restore order in your units, make a list of prisoners and inventorize our takings
. Preliminary debriefing at ten hundred tomorrow. Dan, get me everything I need to know about this mysterious third party."
The General was still busy barking orders but my inner greedy pig was already deaf to the world, dancing a jig with abandon. His hour of triumph was near—the sharing out of booty!
Chapter Five
An excerpt from the Veterans clan treasurer's memo:
The final loot inventory leaves us with the following picture:
One Bastion-class castle: 3,400,000.00 gold
One Colossus-class Dome Shield artifact: 1,600,000.00 gold
Stationary mana accumulators, 41 (all empty, 24 beyond repair): 1,700,000.00 gold
The Castle treasury: empty. A hidden strongbox discovered in the Commandant's office containing 220,000 gold.
Warehouses and clan depots containing:
Miscellaneous ingredients (pertaining to alchemy, weapon making, forging, etc.): 122,311 pieces, of which Rare: 1,311, Epic: 14, totaling 423,000 gold
Workshop finished articles: 1,488, of which Rare: 36, totaling 172,000 gold.
Elixirs: 14,670, of which Rare: 212, Epic: 2, totaling 155,000 gold
Miscellaneous ordnance (arrows, crossbow bolts, throwing knives, hatchets, shurikens, etc.): 153,300 pcs totaling 19,000 gold
Miscellaneous (crafting tools and fortification equipment, etc.): 611,000 gold
The items dropped by slain enemy soldiers traditionally become property of the combatants. As such, they are not reflected in the inventory, excepting the eight items dropped by the Сamos and turned over to the security department.
Grand total of loot: 8,300,000 gold
Raid expenditures: 155,000 gold, plus:
Payment to mercenaries, 70,000
Payment to Drow, 200,000
Payment to Max, 1,240,000
Mr. Simonov's resolution: I deem it reasonable to undervalue the loot by fifteen percent and raise the price of the unverifiable consumables by twenty percent. That would allow us to diminish our payment to Max to the sum of 1,030,000.00.
Security department resolution: I'm in accordance. One million gold is well enough for a newb. Signed: Dan.
General Frag's resolution: I object. If it ever surfaces, we'll never clear our name. Max's contribution has virtually tripled the loot. Without his exercise in lightning assault, the best we'd have managed to get would have been the castle's bare walls. Pay him in full and consider adding a bonus.
(End of excerpt)
* * *
The attendance of the next morning's meeting was less than usual. We'd had too many things to do so virtually no one had gone to bed the night before. The Vets were busy improving the castle's defense potential and negotiating some of the more sensitive issues with the allies as well as making an inventory of the loot and building the castle into the clan's infrastructure.
About fifteen people had gathered in the small hall which hadn't suffered much during the storming of the castle. The officers rubbed their tired eyes and drank gallons of coffee. The iridescent tobacco smoke hung under the ceiling creating an inappropriately festive atmosphere and making Frag wince. He didn't say anything, though.
I kept nodding off, too. All through the night, the castle had been buzzing—literally, like a high-voltage transformer. The loot crew kept tapping the walls poking their noses into every corner while the others checked every nook and cranny for the last holed-up prisoners. The universal enthusiasm had got the better of me and now I was deeply missing the lost hours of sleep. Only my inner greedy pig diligently listened to every report making mental notes in my memory and marking the most relevant points in red.
An officer from the analytics group was summarizing the reports received, voicing their recommendations.
"...the castle's defense potential has been restored by twenty percent. Three mana accumulators have been fully charged and talks are under way to convince the alliance to temporarily allot us three mages as mana generators. Unfortunately, due to the excessive speed of mana siphoning," he cast me an accusing look, "over half of the unique crystals have been destroyed to a total value of two million four hundred thousand gold. I strongly recommend we find resources to order more accumulators."
Frag waved his recommendations away. "We're not millionaires. The clan's purse has its limits. There're more important expenditures to consider. Even with the remaining crystals the dome is a cut above the one we have in the East Castle. I'd love to know which of the Cats came up with the bright idea of using a shield three classes higher than the castle itself! A Colossus dome in a Bastion castle, who would have thought of that? Not in a Stronghold or even a Citadel but in a Bastion! Actually, we have to thank them for that. Both them and Max. Without him, we'd have still been bashing our heads against their shield barely affecting its regen levels and becoming the whole cluster's laughing stock, much to the Cats' delight. Dan, that's something you should have taken into account."
"My fault, Sir," Dan mumbled habitually, making a show of knitting his eyebrows as if saying, we're not mind readers to have spies everywhere at twenty-four hours' notice.
The officer waited for the General's nod and continued, "We have already started repairing all the non-regen damage to the buildings incurred during the attack. We expect it to be completed by the evening. We can't really improve the castle's defensive potential as the Cats have already maxed out everything they could: the height of the walls, the number of towers and all possible hits. Bastion is its limit. We could install minor dome shields over certain areas, I suppose. The main gates, for instance. But that would be overdoing it, I have to agree with the Cats on this one."
"The emergence of the High Spell," Frag murmured, "makes it more like a new reality. I'd like you to leak information about our supposed mole at the Cats' who had presumably helped us to get access to the Shield Artifact. That will do two things: detract attention from Max and placate our allies as the sheer possibility of penetrating a dome shield within a few minutes overturns the entire clan war strategy. We've been hearing from other clusters about such lightning attacks before, so it's very possible Max isn't the only proud owner of this uber toy. Another thing. We need to assign some people to buy up all available Reset Potions. Price is no object. This is now a seriously strategic product which will decide the outcome of many a sensitive situation."
Upon reflection, I had to agree with him. I contacted my auto buy and ordered it to monitor the market and buy up the precious elixir at a price of up to twenty thousand gold. Yeah, you could call me sleazy, I suppose.
The officer went on, "As you probably know, a class-five castle allows us to hire NPCs up to level 100 for the sum of 2% of the refund value using the following formula: 200-(category*20). In our case it results in sixty-eight thousand a month. Ninety percent of it was spent on the guards, mainly archers and ballista operators. The good news is, if we hire them through the castle interface, the prices are one-tenth of what independent mercs charge. The remaining funds were spent on service and maintenance staff. Mr. Simonov insists we lower alert levels clan-wide as quickly as possible in order to relieve two-thirds of the guards. At the moment, the upkeep of all four castles costs us over two hundred thousand. We could consider some alternative solutions, I suppose, like raising the clan tax from five to ten percent of the loot. I would also like to attract your attention to the fact that the numbers of new clan members grow significantly slower than its territories and the real estate it controls. All this forces us to spread the existing human resources very thinly. The analytics department recommends stopping any further expansion and concentrating on seeking out new perma players. More than that, we strongly recommend reviewing our hiring practices switching our attention from individuals with combat background to those with gaming experience. Actually, this is the chief of the security section's opinion so I suggest we hear him out."
Frag glared at Dan. "Speak up, then, Major."
Dan rose and opened his mouth to speak when a teleport popped open, lett
ing in the White Winnie. He cast a look around as if he owned the place, grabbed at the chair closest to him and dragged it toward the fireplace.
"You piece of shit!" Dan roared like a wounded bear. In one lightning-fast motion, he drew a knife and threw it at the creature's furry back.
Bang! Boom! Equally as fast, Winnie had used a micro portal to teleport himself behind the chair. The knife sank deep between the lacquered scrolls on the chair's back.
That didn't stop Dan. "You furry-eared rat! Just when I hoped I'd never see you again! How I look forward to seeing your stuffed head over my mantelpiece!"
"Belay that!" the General rose, revealing his enormous height. "You, there, Winnie or whatever your name is! Listen up!"
A black-nosed white head peeked from behind the chair, baring its teeth. I selected it as target, just in case: Destructive Touch never missed. Five hundred hits was plenty to instill the fear of God into anyone.
In the meantime, the General continued, "Now. If we're to live under one roof, I'm afraid you'll have to conform to our social order. Rule number one. You disappear at the first request."
Winnie growled warningly, baring needle-sharp white teeth.
"Stop scowling! Rule number two... I'll tell you later. I haven't thought about it yet. You ask, what are the alternatives? Well, we'll make sure we'll be killing you at every opportunity which is basically non-stop. You can respawn all you want, every minute if you wish. Your whole life will consist of You've died in battle! alerts or whatever you NPCs have. I'm not asking your opinion. I'm informing you. I expect you out of here in thirty seconds. If you need a fireplace, the one in the Trophy Hall will always be kept alight for you."
The General smiled at his own words and rang the bell, ordering a servant to start a fire in the Trophy Hall using the best birch wood. Winnie switched his angry glare from one officer to the next, then growled something that in his language had to be akin to an f-word. With a pop, he reappeared on the desk, right in front of Dan. Three things happened at once: Winnie clawed the steaming coffee pot, Dan cursed, a new teleport popped open. Winnie was gone. Our gun-boat diplomacy had once again proven its worth. Dan was wiping his face with a napkin, threatening to nail someone's ears over his bed.