The Dragon's Wrath: Shadows in the Flame

by Brent Roth

  Strange really, as I can’t seem to see it.

  “Let’s start then, yeah?” stated the dark mage with confidence.

  “Mm. Yeah, let’s.”

  The dark mage led off with his chant as a blackish-purple colour began to swirl around his hands, “With absence, shadows fill the void, disrupt and negate….” The frost mage did the same, raising both hands towards the ceiling as a pale white mist-of-sorts circled about above him. Slightly above the goblins’ heads, a very faint grey and white mist had developed while at the same time a non-distinct blur of undiscernible colour began to pulse outwards from the centre.

  As both mages had been chanting and their hands had started to glow their respective colours, I brought my palms together and slowly expanded them as a small ball of golden-white light began to fill the space between. Muttering out my chant, I too was nearly ready to release. “Beyond reason, the radiance emanates throughout, embrace the light.”

  And then it began.

  “Shadow Pulse!”

  “Freezing Rain!”

  “Holy Blast!”

  In the blink of an eye the [Freezing Rain] had materialised and started to fall as my straight-line skill-shot [Holy Blast] flew towards the centre of the pack. At the same time, the [Shadow Pulse] began to rapidly pulse and expand outwards from the targeted position, causing the ground to turn an odd shade of dark purple for a brief instant.

  The goblins reacted first to the rain that pelted their skins, doing miniscule amounts of damage until they were startled by the small explosion of holy energy that hit a [Goblin Priest] directly in his chest. With my threat level rising, the goblins turned their attention towards me and began to charge but the third of the three quick pulses that were expanding the shadow’s range to its maximum had finally occurred.

  Following the third pulse a sudden collapse of the zone sucked everything in towards the centre as goblins were wretched back and flung towards each other. An audible crash of goblins smashing and colliding was easily heard.

  Momentarily stunned from the impact and with bodies tangled together, the damage done was minimal but it afforded more time under the [Freezing Rain] and allowed for another quick round of spells.

  Before the goblins could properly recover, I let another [Holy Blast] fly forth at a half chant, impacting the [Goblin Priest] as the dark mage followed up with a [Shadow Burn] that swept across the field. The dark fire fanned out and burned everything in its path as the goblins writhed in pain and began to scream.

  As the goblins were distracted by the chaotic flame wave, Emily got within range to land a vicious elbow to the face of a [Goblin Priest], causing its face to cave in and its body to collapse to the floor a bloody mess.

  Rotating towards the [Guards], Emily picked them up with ease as she deflected a spear with her iron splinted vambrace and landed a counter strike with her right fist. The heavy blow from the crude iron gauntlet briefly stunned the [Guard] as she jumped back to dodge the second [Guard’s] spear. [Shadow Flares] filled the corner of my vision as they were repeatedly shot off, first towards the remaining [Goblin Priest] and then towards the [Goblin Chief] that was being handled by the tank.

  The rain had continued its downpour as the three remaining goblins began to slow down due to the accumulating frost. As I watched the fight unfold, I was attempting to time my heals with the incoming damage done to the tank as he took glancing blows. Then right as he failed to dodge a blow, with the large halberd cutting deep into his shoulder, I began my second three-verse chant.

  “Beyond reason, the radiance emanates throughout, embrace the light, Holy Light!”

  The tank’s health had dropped nearly forty-percent but was instantaneously brought back up to full as the golden light engulfed him entirely. Chaining my chants was a necessity due to the low skill level of the tank and thus I began chanting immediately after my last cast had finished. Gathering my hands together as golden energy began to condense, I continued to watch the fight unfold before my eyes.

  Despite off-tanking two [Guards] Emily was having little trouble dodging and deflecting their spears, continually staying on her toes as she bounced around. With her elbows up and her hands kept high, she deflected spears with her arms and countered with devastating leg kicks that left one [Goblin Guard] with a broken leg. Taking advantage, she continually pressed until she was able to disarm the disabled goblin and finished him with a knee strike to the head.

  By the fourth heal on the main tank the [Goblin Chief] succumbed to the combination of dark magic and freezing rain, falling in place and ceasing all of his movements. A slight change in target and the [Guard] fell soon after.

  “Ah it’s over,” I mumbled as the last goblin fell to the floor with a light thud, somewhat disappointed in the quick nature of the fight.

  “That was quick,” said a beaming Emily as she stood proudly over the corpse of the goblin guard. “I think I’ve got the hang of this tanking thing now, hah!”

  “Mm I only had to heal you once too,” I exclaimed with a soft smile. “Though I’m a little reluctant to say this, I think the fight was a tad too easy this time.”

  “Yeah huh, ever since they patched the difficulty last week this fight has become a little silly,” she explained. “Once you get the hang of it… it kind of takes the fun out of it. There’s really no challenge left in the encounter.”

  Walking over to where Emily was standing, I stopped short of the guard she was hovering over and surveyed the remains of the goblins littering the floor. One priest and one guard had their faces shattered by Emily’s elbow and knee respectively, while the other priest, guard, and chief all died to a combination of magic damage. The tank didn’t land any meaningful blows on the goblin chief at all… a pity.

  “Uh, you two girls have been talking about this for a while now,” cut in the frost mage as he walked over to where we had been standing, forming a loose circle around the corpse of the beige goblin. “But, was this fight really that hard before the patch?”

  “Oh definitely,” answered Emily immediately with conviction.

  “Mm, how should I put it… maybe one-quarter as difficult as before?” I replied with a shrug.

  “Serious?” he asked with a strange expression.

  “They aren’t kidding bro,” chimed in the dark mage as he joined our circle. “I started running the dungeon like three or four weeks ago and had been stuck on the last boss until now. Bro, it was stupid difficult. There were like fourteen goblins in all. Ridiculous time sink. I was about to give up on the fifth quest chain until I heard about the patch.”

  “Damn that’s real,” said the frost mage. “Shit, glad I started late.”

  Looking around once more, I noticed that the tank had disappeared and his health bar was no longer visible on my slightly transparent party window. A quick glance at the loot box and the goblin chief told me all I needed to know.

  “Um, our tank has vanished… and the loot box is open and the halberd is missing,” I muttered as I scanned the area once again, unsure if I had made a mistake.

  “Oh for fucks sake,” moaned the frost mage as he threw his hands up in the air. “He seriously just ninja’d our loot?!”

  “Bro who would do that?” asked the other man with a strange face.

  On the other hand, Emily took off with a sprint towards the dungeon entrance as us three casters stood and stared at each other in the confusion. I had never seen or experienced a party member running off with the loot. It was unusual and something I was not familiar with in the least.

  “Ninja’d?” I asked quickly.

  “Yeah, he ninja looted our shit man,” replied the mage almost immediately. “He’s probably long gone by now, what should we do? Your friend just took off too.”

  “Leave it to her, she’ll take care of it,” I answered with an affirmative nod as I glanced around the room. “She surely has a plan.”

  As I walked around and collected the items that had been left behind, there was a fairly
decent pile of gear still remaining to be split amongst ourselves. The fact that someone was so selfish to run off with loot that we probably would have given to him was beyond me. If he simply asked, he would have received what he needed… even if he was an arse.

  I already had every item that I could use in this dungeon and so too did Emily. It wasn’t long after that I received a private message from Em, detailing what had happened.

  “On my way back with the items, he got up to the second floor before I caught up with him. Bastard took more than he could carry,” she said plainly.

  “Ah, she’s on her way back with the items guys,” I relayed to the other two as their faces showed surprise and joy.

  “Wow, your friend is a bad ass.”

  “Hehe yeah she’s a reliable one,” I said with a cheeky grin.

  I could always count on Em when it came to the tricky matters and she seemingly always managed to solve them in some fashion or other. There was also no room to complain when it came to her skillsets and her ability in-game, at least compared to the players we have had the pleasure to play with. By my limited account, she was a very good gamer.

  Not more than five minutes had passed by the time Emily had returned with a bag of goods far larger than any of us had expected. The collection of trash drops from all the previous levels were stowed away in multiple large sacks that had been left at the entrance to the goblin boss’ room. In addition she had a medium sized dump bag suspended on the side of her waist that had previously been flat but was now filled to the brim.

  It all looked awfully heavy.

  “Nice of you to offer a hand,” she said sarcastically to us onlookers as she dropped the five sacks of trash items to the floor.

  “Ahh~ none of my attribute points are in Strength or Endurance… or Stamina I’m afraid,” I let out with a laugh as I tried my best to contain a smile that was quickly spreading across my face.

  “What she said,” followed up the frost mage.

  “We knew you had it bro,” said the dark mage while nodding his head.

  “Riiighhht, thanks for that vote of confidence,” Emily said with a bit of a mocking tone. “Well, I couldn’t get all of the coins back since it was added to his personal inventory already but I did get the five-percent he dropped. Did get all of the items though, it was a pretty average haul, nothing too special but not that bad either.”

  Three pairs of curious eyes looked on as she slowly turned her dump bag upside down and emptied the contents onto the cold, blood-soaked dirt floor. Three rings bounced and rolled along as a dull circlet clanged against a thick chain pendant. The rings were base items with one guaranteed every run and had various stats that weren’t all that terrible.

  A quick inspection showed the details of each ring with the first being a [Silver Ring of the Outcast Goblin Priest]. Awfully similar to the second one, a [Silver Ring of the Outcast Goblin Chief], the priest’s ring conferred a bonus of “plus five-percent or plus ten, which ever was lesser, to the wearer’s Intelligence and Wisdom Attribute Stats.” The latter ring worked with Vitality and Endurance instead but shared the same thematic style.

  Nothing too fancy or complicated, perfect for a beginner dungeon according to Emily. I already had four of the priest rings, so they weren’t of much interest to me. The third ring was an [Iron Ring of the Outcast Goblin Guard] which wasn’t quite as good, only providing a “plus three-percent or plus six” attribute bonus to Strength and Dexterity.

  That was barely better than the plus-three attribute rings that dropped off the trash, with those rings simply being titled [Iron Ring of Strength] or [Iron Ring of Agility] or whatever attribute they happened to be named after. Emily had four of the [Silver Ring of the Outcast Goblin Guard] anyhow… so she wasn’t going to need any of those either.

  “Help yourselves to the rings and other items boys,” stated Emily as she sat down to catch her breath. “I’d like that iron circlet though and the pendant for her.”

  “Pendant? Is it an upgrade?” I asked, slightly confused.

  “Yup! It is way better than what you’ve got,” she explained.

  As they sorted the items amongst themselves, I examined the [Crude Quartz Pendant of the Goblin Priest] that had a plus-2.5% bonus to the strength of Holy Spells along with plus-ten to the Wisdom attribute. Examining the item, it appeared quite strong and curiously I had never seen it drop before in all of our runs. Numerous run at that.

  “Em,” I asked as the other two had left the dungeon. “Is this rare?”

  “Very,” she said with a wink as the other two were long gone and couldn’t hear us. “It’s a new item introduced with the patch. Before there was one guaranteed ring drop plus a ten-percent chance for each other item on the list to drop. Out of a list of almost twenty items, each party should have seen around three drops off a kill.”

  “Mm, and this one’s percentage to drop?” I inquired while walking back towards the entrance with Emily.

  “One-percent,” she said with a big smile. “Your lucky day!”

  “It does strike me as rather powerful,” I mumbled while looking at the interesting jewel in the middle. “Are we done for the night?”

  “Yeah I’ve got work uhhh,” she replied with a sigh. “Oh hey, now that we’re done, want to take a trip somewhere? I think we should head up north.”

  Taking my time to think it over, the idea of a trip didn’t strike me as a bad idea. I was awfully tired of this dungeon and town.

  “Mm, sounds fun,” I answered with a grin.

  * * *

  Chapter 76: More Work, My Lord?

  (Monday, November 15th Game Day / Saturday, April 17th Real Day)

  There was nothing quite like the squawking of seagulls to start your morning off right. Add in an ocean breeze that was stronger than usual along with too many rolling waves and it all made for a seaworthy adventure.

  The only problem being that I wasn’t seaworthy yet. Eugh, my stomach wasn’t used to this. My legs weren’t used to it either. If I knew any better I would have waited another hour off-world for the boat to arrive.

  “You all right there, Sigurd?” asked one of the crew.

  “I’ll be fine… rougher seas than I’m used to is all,” I replied as calmly as I could while trying not to upheave any of the contents of my digital lunch.

  “Ha! So the mighty Sigurd has a weakness,” said a warrior, laughing and mocking me the entire way.

  “As do we all,” sternly replied Sigsteinn. “Every man has his weakness son, what makes him a man is how he handles it. Take that lesson to heart, young one.”

  The young warrior balked at the words of his elder as a few grunts and chuckles followed from the rest of the crew. Conversation soon flooded the boat as nearly everyone onboard got involved. The lone nonparticipant was Katherine, who happened to be sitting quietly beside me while staring out at the ocean.

  That was the reality here.

  Only two in-game days had passed since the raid. To expect Kate to be back to normal after a few days wouldn’t be such a strange thing if her AI wasn’t so advanced. Unfortunately for me she was about as real as a person could be.

  Placing my hand on hers, she turned her gaze towards me as I gave off a faint smile. Reciprocating with a smile of her own, she then turned her head back towards the ocean to continue her gazing. I didn’t know what was so captivating out there but if it calmed her or helped her in some way, I wasn’t going to interrupt any further.

  Leaving my hand where it was, I leaned my head on Kate’s shoulder and began to browse the net. The details of the raid had spread while I was away… despite the no-streaming policy of FWB. They were embarrassed to have been hit at home.

  They were a laughing stock.

  A few travelers and guild members posted on their blogs and on the forums about what happened, ignoring the empty threats to keep quiet on the matter. Details of how a stealth unit came by ship and sailed through the town, lighting it on fire and then disappearing as q
uickly as it came. Stories of a half-man, half-beast rampaging through the town only to disappear into thin air. Even more, tales were told of how every NPC in the village had been killed without a single player in the guild being alerted, throats slit in their beds while sound asleep. Oh, there were stories being told.

  None of them all that accurate but who was I to complain.

  I announced myself to the world and showed them my response. The world, the player base, took that and ran with it. They filled their own fantasies with exaggerated details and were making a legend out of me without any influence on my part.

  The precedent had been set and the rumor mill took care of the rest.

  FWB’s situation wasn’t the only one either. The five players in the middle of the night told their friends that they were ambushed in the forest by a werewolf with red glowing eyes. At first gossip spread that they were telling a tall tale of imagined monsters in the North. Then reports of a half-man, half-beast with red glowing eyes tore through a player village and utilized lightning magic much the same.

  Suddenly a strange coincidence turned to likely fact.

  Yeah, stories were being told now.

  The North was mine and if you didn’t watch your step you were bound to receive punishment. That was the word on the street. Individual players were wary… but FWB was resilient. The more I read the more I realized that they weren’t going to back down. They vowed revenge for the sneak attack, assured their guild members that they would rebuild and regather their forces to destroy me once and for all.

  I had half a mind to turn the ship around and show them the reality of their words. If one goes and issues a challenge, then one must accept the consequences. But to do so required an investment of time and resources and those were things that I didn’t want to part with any more than I had to… they would have to wait.

  Well, I would have to wait for the next strike.