by K. T. Hanna
He tried to activate his interface to log out but received an error notice.
Error
You cannot log out until your quest has been finished.
Panic gripped him once again. Quest? He wasn’t even on a quest. He’d deliberately not taken one. He wasn’t playing the damned game to complete it or actually be an adventurer; he just needed answers.
Riasli purred as she pushed open what appeared to be the thick bough of a very large tree and laid him down. “Oh, Mr. James. Don’t you realize? You’re going to get all the answers you need and more. I promise, you’ll be a big part of the solution.”
Somnia Online
Cenedril - Curet
Riasli’s Exile Hideout
Day Thirty
James felt every root, every stem of every plant, and every leaf that made up the makeshift mattress he rested on. No matter how many times he tried, he couldn’t figure out how to access his HUD, and therefore couldn’t figure out a way to disconnect his mind from the system. This left him with the unenviable position of being stuck in the game. He didn’t understand how that worked. It wasn’t supposed to be possible.
Through all the testing, through all the usage, no one reported anything like this. The headsets were compatible with other games, and no one had registered complaints of any sort yet. So why was he stuck here, in this game, without the ability to exit?
Even the cat-like creature had left the small home, as if she knew he wouldn’t be able to escape. And she’d been right. How she’d managed to truss him up and make him stay in that spot, he had no clue. This wasn’t the easy jaunt through the game he’d intended. If he really examined his fears, James was somewhat terrified.
He’d thought they were hiding something—he’d no idea it would be something this big.
“Silly human. It’s not this. This is not what they’re hiding at all. In fact, this has nothing to do with anything except for me. You wouldn’t believe how I got to be this way. It’s an excellent story, if I do say so myself.” She purred as she walked back into the small living space. Massive leaves made up sturdy doors that surprised him with their durability.
James wanted to speak and ask a question, but this Riasli wouldn’t let him. Come to think of it, he had no idea how he’d known her name. He’d certainly never asked for it. And while he could see his spells listed out, their listing was heavily overlaid with interference, barely legible.
“Sometimes the best gifts we receive are those for which we do not beg.” Riasli twirled around the room with some sort of flower arrangement in her hands. Her calico fur was brushed until it shone, and her ears twitched amicably.
Then she stopped and took a few steps toward him, frowning slightly. “You know, though, you’ve gone about it all the wrong way. All you had to do was ask. We’re pretty amenable to those thoughts you have. Those wish fulfillments you seek. Making your bosses happy? We can do that. We can do anything.”
Her cat slit eyes were hypnotic, and James found himself falling into them, believing every word she said. Even if a portion of his mind rebelled against the fact, even if a part of him was horrified that any part of him even contemplated accepting their help.
“Just what can you do? Can you show me what they’ve been hiding, what they’ve been concealing in the reports? Can you show me why?” Finally allowed to speak, he could hear himself begging, which was so unlike him. A part of him wanted to scream at his mouth to stop letting words spill out of his head. But it wouldn’t come, it wouldn’t listen, because a part of him longed for this cat to do anything she could to him, anything she wanted with him.
Riasli purred and her eyes gleamed a strange sort of yellow.
“Now that’s a good human. Of course, you want that. I can make you want anything, but this is what you chose for yourself.” She turned around, her tail swishing with agitation and she began muttering under her breath. Quick and soft, and yet just enough that he could hear her if he strained. “Not, of course, if she protects them. That damned shielding. It shouldn’t be possible for a player to do something like that. Not considering how weak players should be. I’m so sick of that girl and her machinations. She could have been my student. I could have taught her so much. But this one is a warlock, something not even I can access. He can’t resist me. This will be perfect.”
She busied herself with something over by a crude sink that leaned against the wall.
James wanted her to keep talking, regardless that he had no clue what it was she was talking about. Her words and her voice, they clung in his ears, rang through his mind like a bell of joy. His head yearned to hear more of it; his body begged to let her touch him. But in a corner, just a small corner of his mind, his actual self screamed, trying to make itself heard as the space for it to exist got smaller and smaller, until all he knew was Riasli and all he wanted to do was to please her.
Hipnormous roared. The wind that tunneled out of its mouth was rank, its stench worse than week-old meat left out in the sun to rot. It hit every single raid member with a debuff.
Disorientation
You have been bowled over by the stench. You cannot gain your bearings fully. This effect will last for five seconds.
Murmur really hoped the others had resistances. What with her shielding over half of the raid, and her own magic resistance spell, the people in the raid should be mostly safe. But for the next time she’d need to make sure they potioned up to give themselves the best possible chance.
Why didn’t the damned mobs seem to get a diminishing returns notification? That wasn’t balanced at all. And this wasn’t even the ability that required them to hide behind the damned pillars.
She took a split second to recognize that she was getting flustered. That wasn’t going to do any of them any good. She turned her attention to observation, trying to catalogue everything they were learning as they went.
The boss was based on a hippopotamus. He was huge, sort of bulbous, with a huge mouth and giant teeth that decorated the inside. However, his massive feet had clawed paws on the ends of them, more like a crocodile than a hippo, and the horn on its head resembled that of a rhinoceros if rhinoceroses had horns with dripping poison.
Seven people were already dead, and he sat at sixty percent life, like he wasn’t about to go anywhere and only wanted to dig his feet in more. He was definitely an angry hippo. Not hungry…probably hangry. She would be if she were stuck on this tiny damned sand island. Although if he was based on a hippopotamus, then he should be able to swim out without a problem, but that was being too realistic.
She wanted there to be an easier way to solve this boss, but there didn’t seem to be. Merlin was down, leaving Exbo to wrangle the rangers himself. Both Ishwa and Dalvin, the mages from Exodus had been thrown against the pillars as they tried to run to hide behind them, and they were down two of their five healers, one of them being Veranol. Not having the defiler there to cast wards on people definitely showed in the amount of damage being delivered to the raid members.
Devlish struggled to hold his own against the massive blows the beast hammered into him. All in all, this fight was a pain in the ass. Risk was dead, and Rashlyn died too. And even as Murmur began to recast her slow that, of course, had diminishing returns as well, she could see the beast bringing his foot down on the Spiral bard Ivinel.
It seemed like its limbs could draw people to them like a magnet. She needed time to go through the combat logs and figure out the damned thing’s special abilities. Eight members down, only twenty-two of them left, and she could have sworn the damned thing’s life just ticked back up to sixty-two percent. They needed to wipe it and start again, armed with better knowledge.
“Wipe it!” She made the call, and the wave of relief that rippled through her sensing net toward her helped reinforce it to be the right decision.
Sinister grumbled as she backed up next to her. “Seriously hate dying, and this damned thing doesn’t improve it.”
She tapped her headset
and turned away from Murmur, as the enchanter did the same. Something about watching each other die was most unpleasant. Thought it didn’t take long, because the damned beast had so many different abilities that could crush a character who wasn’t trying to survive.
Deafening Stench Roar hits you for 700 damage.
Cascade of Death hits you for 483 damage.
You have died.
You have been slain by Hipnormous.
You will respawn in 12 seconds at a safe zone within reach.
Murmur blinked, groaning in pain as she rematerialized at the beginning of the dungeon. Her body ached from the stomping she’d received, like all the bones were trying to click back into place.
All around her, the raiders were picking themselves up, dusting off, checking stores and beginning personal buffs. There was no dejection she could find in any of them, instead a renewed vigor to rally together now they knew more about the creature. Nothing would taste as sweet as victory…provided the boss didn’t stink as much in death as he did using that damned stench skill.
With everyone resurrected, Murmur pushed the lingering pain against her skull to the back of her mind. She didn’t have time to dwell on the ghost pain from her death even if it made moving distinctly uncomfortable. Instead, she began her own round of buffs, making everyone got their correct speed buff, and that all the right people got more agility, not to mention this time, she actually gave Devlish her aggro-holding buff this time. Good old level twenty-five spell to the rescue.
Enrage
Cast: Self or Others
Type: Buff…Sort Of
Duration: 15 minutes
Effect: This buff will cause your target to receive some of the aggression generated by you. The mob will assume it comes from the target of this spell. This spell is intended for tank types or pets to take on. Only cast it on someone else if you really, really don’t like them, or maybe if you’re running for your life. Also—this can only be cast on one target at a time.
She rarely used it because Devlish rarely needed the help, and sometimes the ability could backfire, but Hippo down there was a one-meatshield fight. Their tanks didn’t need to swap aggro on the boss for any reason. Off tanks were only needed for the one wave of adds they’d seen so far. At least now they knew they were coming, anyway. All in all, that first group of three had totally startled Rashlyn.
Then, while everyone was still gathering themselves, she went through the combat log, seeking out maximum damage performed by the beast, the timing between stomps, and if there was a type of trigger for his abilities. The only thing she could be certain of was that the latter wasn’t based on health percentages. From what she could tell, it was time elapsed since Hippo was engaged.
She could work with that.
“Okay, everyone. Buff up. You know the drill.” The thrill of raiding through trial and error was such a rush. Murmur loved it. Learn, wipe, progress. Learn, wipe, progress. There was such a sense of accomplishment in knowing that you’d figured out something no one else had. Sure, riddles were great, and brute force was excellent. But this? Time consuming as it was, this was the type of raiding she lived for.
“Looking like your old self a lot more now, Mur.” Havoc was there again, his voice soft as he spoke. The furrow between his brows told her his headaches were still there.
“Yeah, this is the sort of raiding I love most. You know that, though.” She took a step toward him with hesitance. “Havoc, are you okay?”
He laughed somewhat self-deprecatingly. “I’m far from okay, but I will be fine, if that’s what you mean.”
“I’m not sure. How can you be far from okay and fine?” She raised an eyebrow at him as she checked over her raid listing briefly.
“There’s a living, breathing virus running rampant through a virtual reality game and a game world that’s stuck in my brain and communicating with me. That is definitely not fine.” He sighed, and she could see the thoughts like they were running through his mind.
“Ah.” She gave his shoulder a somewhat awkward pat. “I get that more than you know.”
“Let’s go kill a hippo. I think it’ll help with this weird sort of aggression build up I have.” Havoc winked at her before moving away.
She watched him go and felt Sinister twine her fingers around her own and squeeze. “He’ll be okay, Mur.”
“I’m not so sure. He’s laboring under the headset. More so than you or any of the others except Jinna appear to be. It seems to be hurting more than it’s helping him.” She knew she’d spoken the words out loud, but they were just words, just idle thoughts she had about his situation.
It appeared Sinister didn’t have an answer, because she only squeezed Murmur’s hand again before falling silent.
Murmur shook her head, yet another thing she could push back to her future self. “Come on, everyone. Move out. We’ve still got to swim back to the damn hippo.”
Everyone groaned, and Murmur had to admit to taking a little bit of delight at torturing everyone.
“Fuck!” Merlin screamed out as his back slammed into a pillar, winding him sharply and dropping his health by two-thirds.
Murmur winced, grateful to see the heal that hit him fill him up quickly enough that he survived the fall from halfway up the pillar. The hippo was more trouble than she liked. This fight was full of mechanics and cooldowns, abilities that required interruption by vigilant stunners. Except it seemed that Jirald and Jinna weren’t on their A-game. They’d missed more stuns in this fight than in the previous two dungeons combined.
She frowned as she called out the next wave of adds. “Incoming! Separate into tank groups and whittle them down.” The damned adds needed to be killed within a short window of each other, or else they’d spawn another group. They’d learned that the hard way too, and it was why their first attempt had lost so many people so quickly.
This entire fight was the hard way. Which she’d normally have loved, but with the time limit hanging over their heads, her lack of sleep really setting her on edge, and the need to finish this dungeon so they could get the last keys they needed, or however it worked…
“Play my new game, she said. You’ll love it, she said. Sure thing, Mom,” Murmur muttered in front of her, getting a concerned side-eye from Sin. She ignored the look and continued, drawing some strength from blaming her mom for the time being. She couldn’t even enjoy doing the things she usually loved to do in games.
The riddle dungeons had been easier…though making wrong decisions might have been worse. Out-of-the-box thinking made for easier and less toll-taking victories. Taking a deep breath as Snowy licked her fingers, Murmur stunned the add group she was with, fighting alongside Esolan as Devlish remained on the main boss.
Just as the last add fell, Jinna managed to miss his stun in the rotation, and the Deafening Stench Roar got through.
Disorientation
You have been bowled over by the stench. You cannot gain your bearings fully. This effect will last for five seconds.
Resisted
While Murmur had extended her shielding over the entire raid earlier, and while it was a huge drain on her MA resources, it was worth it, because the disorientation was resisted by about eighty percent of the raid, including herself.
They were down at the sixty percent mark again, and only two had died so far. Just then the rumbling began, the one that would shake loose the rocks from the ceiling and send Cascade of Death tumbling down on top of them. It wasn’t interruptible and only gave them a few seconds before they needed to be behind those pillars.
“Run!” Merlin yelled as the bard buff icon changed to speed and everyone ran for their designated pillars. Veranol had already cast his cooldown ward on Devlish, which was the only way the tank survived the barrage.
Even with Devlish still standing, they lost another ten people to the rain of boulders. The thing was, she knew what caused it now. It wasn’t horrible, but she’d wanted them to do better. Twelve people down, and Hipnormous
was at fifty-five percent. They needed more practice running to the pillars, because from what she gathered, they had to go to a specific one each time.
Everyone at once, behind one of the pillars, which would then get destroyed, removing one of their protections. Which meant they had to kill the damned hippo before a fourth potential Cascade of Death.
The interruption of the Deafening Stench and the avoidance of the Cascade. All of it required time to learn the cadence of, and practice to make sure they avoided the incoming damage as much as possible. Trial and error. Wipe and repeat. For the first time in her gaming life, it was driving Murmur up the wall.
“Keep it up. Need practice,” she shouted, trying to make herself sound encouraging and not irritated. They were going to wipe, but those eighteen of them who remained were going to get as much practice in as she could encourage them to.
You’re not very good at this whole learn-the-fight thing.
Shut up. This is the sort of thing I love to do, and I hate having to go through it in a rush like this, half-guessing what I’m going to need to do. Murmur was so annoyed and knew the only person she could really lash out to lived in her head. Which was just a whole other kettle of fish.
Wrong analogy.
Shut up and stop reading the thoughts I don’t speak out loud to you.
She turned her full attention back to the raid, noting that it didn’t matter much as during her conversation that took all of two seconds another two had died. She didn’t even want to ask.
With thirteen people down, almost one half of the raid was wiped out, and they’d only got down to fifty-one percent. She sighed and took a deep breath, willing herself to speak calmly. “Wipe it! Rebuff! Run back!”
And as she watched her raid stop their actions and wait to die around her, she knew it was going to be a very long night.
Somnia Online
Continent Firtulai