The Dragon's Wrath: Shadows in the Flame

by Brent Roth

  Staring across the white and brown field filled with melting snow and mud that was hundreds of yards wide and easily twice as long as white forests flanked either side, I continued to survey the scene. The northern and southern forests were deep and went on as far as the eye could see but it was known to us that a large river ran throughout each, effectively containing us here within this prearranged field of battle.

  The only true path of escape was directly behind.

  Barely over a hundred yards away were the two powers of Cleftside, easily identifiable by their yellow or purple armbands that designated their allegiance. With their force on the eastern side of the field and with their backs facing the rising sun, our forces were at a distinct disadvantage as the intense light forced us all to squint. The glare off the melting snow proved nearly blinding as well as the majority of the players shielded their eyes.

  Turning back to look at the men and women of varying races that surrounded me, elves of all shades, dwarves of random heights, animal-types with curious tails and ears, and even orcs of large and medium statures had filled my view. The mixture of the races was one I had yet to see in-game as the melting pot of the middle kingdoms continued to successfully bring everyone together, completely unlike the North.

  Motivated by coin, quest, action, or fame everyone sought a life of adventure here in these parts. Overcrowded and filled with immense competition, most found little success but for those that did, life was good. That drive and desire to make it rich in any of the aforementioned aspects was what led to such numbers.

  Four-thousand, five-hundred and thirty-seven players numbered on our side as they all fell into place, roughly twice as long on the front as we were deep with everyone wanting a first row seat for the start. A quick check of the Leaderboards told me our numbers but as for the other side, the number was capped at one-thousand and was entirely misleading.

  The reality was that the other side doubled ours. Slightly wider and over twice as deep their numbers could have easily been in the five digits. Even if my perception had been warped by the sheer numbers and my mind was simply imagining the differences, the enemy looked to have considerably more. That was impossible to deny.

  Staring at the rest of the men and women that made up the force, fear had invaded every single one of their minds. All except for Valerie, who strangely seemed immune to fear… she stood there and stared at the rest of them, the same way I did. No one in this game had ever witnessed a sight so intimidating, not in a game setting, not in real life.

  Thousands of bodies standing shoulder to shoulder, armored and armed with weapons drawn and at the ready. The field between us was large but impossibly small with so many people amassed in front of us. The thought of running to our deaths was there as the first to reach the enemy would surely die. The first waves usually were the ones that did.

  Yet we weren’t alone as players.

  My original observation of the harmless NPCs in view turned out to be incorrect as weapons were spotted, reflecting in the distance and giving them away. The inhabitants wore colors on their arms as well and were hard to spot but they were there. They were different in their own way.

  A small laugh escaped me as I stood at the front of the line and did my best to examine the NPCs a hundred yards out. Inhabitants weren’t supposed to be involved in the first wave, as they would only join when the battle had either been won or lost. A strange condition but one that left us adventurers in charge of their fate. This was a player war through and through.

  We were only supported by the NPCs.

  Though the answer to their involvement didn’t take long to figure out, as all one had to do was examine the NPCs within the ranks a few feet away. These inhabitants were either criminals or ones that were seeking a form of redemption or promotion through the ranks for some reason or another. Their lives hung in the balance as they manned the frontlines, requiring a victory and success while attempting to survive till the end.

  I pitied them and their chances of survival.

  They were well aware as well as they stood equally afraid with the realization that if they killed the first man or woman in front of them, they would have to then fend off the next on the left and right until the replacement filled the front again. Repeating on and on until hundreds or thousands were killed.

  Survival wasn’t only about killing the one in front of you but keeping those around you alive. The more allies that surrounded you, the less likely you would die. The odds of being singled out and killed were smaller when you were surrounded by other targets.

  As long as it wasn’t me, that’s what they all thought, that’s how they all coped. It was what you had to do in a situation like this. There wasn’t much else to think otherwise, except that you would surely die.

  After thirty minutes of the current stalemate had passed us by with no one willing to make the first move, my patience had started to run thin. As the sun had finally moved across the plane where it was no longer directly in my eyes, my mind turned to one of action as one disadvantage had come and passed without consequence. Someone needed to take the first step forward, yet even then it was no guarantee that others would follow.

  “I’m not going to live forever!” I shouted so others could hear me.

  Taking the first step towards the thousands of enemies in front of me, I increased my walking pace as I left everyone else behind. By the sound of her footsteps, Valerie followed closely behind. After that, I didn’t know if one or ten or a hundred followed. I wouldn’t turn back, I wouldn’t show my back to the enemy now. I looked straight ahead and continued to stare into the horde as the sounds of footsteps filled my ears.

  More had joined, how many didn’t matter.

  “How should we start it?” said Ethan as he caught up and walked to my right with a bit of a skip as he seemed eager to start.

  “With a bang,” I replied as I put an arm up and pointed at the sky with a single index finger. “A fire blast there, to send the message.”

  “No lightning?” he asked quickly as the distance between our armies shortened, as we both knew that his fire blast wasn’t the loudest of spells.

  “I’m a warrior priest today,” I replied with a deep laugh and wicked grin.

  Returning my hand to my side, I drew my axe and raised it once more as I swung it around and leaned it against my shoulder. Extending my left arm out with index finger pointing ahead, I began to laugh as I let my anger consume me.

  The lightning-wielding Sigurd was still in the North… but the red-eyed berserker was here. The beard and medium-length hair long gone, the wolf pelts left behind. All that remained were my plain leather armor and axe. My hair, a buzz cut, left me a different man, one unrecognizable to anyone who had seen the footage. I wasn’t Sigurd today.

  Today I was a player-killing mercenary.

  Though maybe those two were one in the same.

  One-hundred yards out, the sounds of the footsteps behind me began to pound in my ears as drums filled the air between. Battle drums provided by the Houses as both sides began to play their tune.

  A truly glorious sound.

  As the ground began to shake under the weight of a thousand steps, I continued to point directly above the enemies’ heads. Adding a little pep to my step while bobbing my head slightly with the rhythm of the noise, my pace had started to increase.

  Accelerating quickly, I lowered my arm and pointed directly at the man in front of me, shouting my last words, “To hell with them!”

  Focusing my gaze while entering into a sprint, my axe was held high and behind as my rage had started to spread. Eyes beginning to burn their steady and familiar burn, my other senses began to dull as the noise filtered out.

  Then followed the fire, a flash instantaneous and silent sailing across the sunlit sky as muffled noises began to ring out. White noise increasing as bodies moved in reaction. Mobs of people turning, shifting in place as weapons were lowered with others leaking out. Movement in my direction as th
irty yards separated the first victim and my axe.

  Rushing with shouts of rage and red light streaming and trailing behind, axe lifted and dropped with momentum and an increasing pace that couldn’t be stopped. Blood splashing and splattering across my face as a head rolled and bounced along my path, only to be kicked forward and down into the next man waiting.

  Legs clicking and clacking as knees hit together, shield raised and spear leveled. Heels digging into the light snow as thick mud displaced. His eyes closed, frozen in the moment. My pace still increasing, accelerating, I rushed past and towards the swordsman in my path as the faint sound of a scream reached my ears.

  Axe raised and dropped once more.

  Clanging against a sword that sent it flying, the man reeled as he tried to recover. Legs weak and out of position, he twisted and turned while reaching out. Ducking forward as a spear crossed my path, I raised and swung to the left only to miss. Carrying the momentum and circling around with a spin of the axe, I released a second swing across the midsection without breaking a step. As I stepped through and onto the next, the torso of the man peeled back and flopped to the floor with legs still walking.

  Entering into the wall of bodies that showed no gaps, the deafening noise of hundreds of sharp metallic objects hit my ears. The shrill clinks, clatters, and clangs immediately set off a ringing in my ears as I began to go numb to the noise. Ignoring my lost senses as an arrow brushed past my face and cut through my ear, I dropped a heavy swing on a shield-bearer that was standing in my path.

  The weight of the blow shattering through the wooden shield caught the man unaware as a shower of splinters rained down on those around him. The squinting eyes of the man opened wide as panic reached him a second late, for he was already gone.

  His mouth open as I yanked the axe from his chest, three spears from behind him were thrust towards my chest and face. Back-pedaling into the charge of an unseen man behind me, I twisted and spun myself around as the sudden impact nearly jarred me. In an instant the ally who had hit me fell forward, careening to the deck as two spears went straight through him.

  Arms going limp, his weapon fell to the floor.

  Lifting my axe again as another man bumped me from behind and shoved me to the side, I retracted and stepped back as hundreds of players clashed and crashed into each other all around me. Nothing could be heard as the ringing in my ears became nothing more than pure noise, white noise, of the battle that enveloped me.

  Pulling back into the crowd with the intention to look for my crew, Barik was nowhere to be seen as Ethan was observed casting fire blast after fire blast haphazardly into the crowd. Then I spotted Emily as she jumped and delivered a flying knee to the face of an unsuspecting man, crushing his jaw in an instant as he blacked out and fell to the ground.

  Hitting the ground hard herself as a sword nearly slit her throat, she tucked and rolled only to spring up and enter into a clinch with the swordsman before he could react. Pulling his head forward and controlling his movements, she denied him the ability to swing his sword with deadly force as he attempted to switch his grip on the sword to counter.

  Shattering his ribs with a single powerful knee, the man hunched over in pain as she controlled his head and delivered an alternate knee strike to his nose. Dropping the man as he fell limp to the floor, she charged back into the fray in an attempt to find another challenger. Standing back as I scanned the crowd, the world began to blur around me as I tried in vain to find our healer.

  At that moment a spear tip was thrust in my direction as I countered with a weak parry and then grabbed at the shaft. Pulling the man into me I kicked at his shin as he fell forward, causing him to tumble to the ground as he lost his footing in the muddy snow. Sliding past me as others continued to run by, I switched my grip on the axe and executed the man as his hands were raised in a pleading manner. Cutting through the palms and then through the face, I pulled my axe back and resumed my search for Valerie.

  Then the sight of a dwarf surrounded by multiple enemies caught my eye as all of his allies were already engaged in one on one combat of their own. Defending every other blow with his large shield and only deflecting and parrying with his sword, he was losing ground as I decided to help him.

  Picking up my pace as I timed my movements with that of the crowd, I side stepped and jumped while leaping and lunging through the bodies that swayed back and forth at every turn. Wayward swords and arrows nearly clipping me as I closed the distance, by the time I had circled around Barik my own situation had worsened.

  Surrounded by three men as I deflected a spear and caught an axe by its shaft, a sword cut through my bear hide jerkin and pierced soft flesh beneath. Hand bruised and numbed from the impact with his axe’s shaft, I grabbed tightly as I pulled him with me.

  Diving forward and rolling to the ground, the axe-wielder slipped and fell as we began to wrestle in the snow-covered mud. Kicking up clumps of soggy soil and dead grass as the melting snow and mud caused us to slide without much control, I let go of my axe and punched the man directly in the center of his throat. Instantly gagging and coughing from the impact as his eyes began to water, the spear of his friend nearly pierced my side as I turned and shielded myself with the body of the warrior.

  Unable to scream in pain the man’s eyes grew wide as the allied spear was pulled out and the gaping hole began to bleed profusely. Stuck in the mud with little leverage left, I yanked a knife out of a sheath on my leg and quickly stabbed the man in the gut as I twisted and pulled the blade. Retracting my knife as I rolled around, my eyes then grew wide at the sight of a sword being slashed down towards my face.

  Unable to dodge I threw my arms up as my thick leather vambraces partially absorbed the blow. Blood pouring out of my forearms as it dripped onto my face, the sword was pulled back as the spear was thrust again only to miss wildly as he was hit from behind by a random axe.

  As he stumbled forward from the blow, I reached out and grabbed him and used his body to help pull myself up. Jumping up above him with knife in hand, I stabbed him once in the throat and turned back to the swordsman who had resumed his attacks.

  Pulling a second knife from a sheath on my opposite thigh, I parried weakly with both knives crossed as I held his blade steady. Overpowering him, I shoved him back as he tripped over a headless body and fell to a knee. One arm in the muddy snow as another held the sword up, I lunged to his weak side and slipped a knife under his armpit with ease, slicing and stabbing up until my knuckles contacted flesh and blood.

  With my left knife still lodged in his axillary artery, I dropped to a knee and thrusted the second knife in my right hand up into his stomach. Switching the grip and pulling all the way across, he immediately fell to the floor woozy and dazed.

  Leaving the man to die, I grabbed my axe and headed over to Barik who had been successfully holding off five men by himself. Coming from behind his attackers, I readied a swing and released with practiced precision as two spines were severed at the neck, with two bodies collapsing in unison. Immediate surprise flashing on the other three attacker’s faces, Barik lunged and stabbed one in the groin as he pulled and sliced at his femoral artery along the inner thigh and across his hamstring.

  As that man collapsed to the floor a cripple, the other two turned to attack me as I deflected and parried with relative ease. Distracted by my presence, Barik stabbed another from behind as his sword tip flashed through a throat and then the last man found the edge of my axe a cold way to go.

  Nodding at Barik to retreat, I then turned and saw Emily delivering an elbow to another man’s skull as the man’s forehead caved in from the blow, censored brain matter splashing up and onto her face. Another corpse fell to the floor as she moved with precision and agility that was hard to match.

  Slipping in and out of the crowds only to find another unsuspecting man. Elbows and knees followed as that man fell to the ground with shattered femur and knee, then a broken neck before he could react to the pain.

 
Rushing up to her as she was about to engage another, I grabbed her around the waist and pulled her back as her bloodlust was taking over. Cutting through the crowd I dropped her off next to Barik as I made my way back in for Ethan, only to find him laughing maniacally as he let a flame wave out as if it were a flamethrower.

  Watching as people burned in front of him, he was enjoying it all a little too much as I tapped his shoulder and nodded for him to follow. The last one was Valerie but I had yet to spot her amongst the massive crowd. Then as the four of us grouped up, out of the corner of my peripheral vision there was a strange sight that caught my eye. As I turned and focused on a girl sitting in the middle of the battle, calmly watching everyone fight without lifting a finger herself, I could only shake my head in confusion.

  As if the players knew she was harmless, they fought around her and ran past without batting an eye. She remained silent and still. Unafraid of the battle surrounding her, she simply watched it all unfold. Shaking my head, I signaled at the crew to fall back to the northern forest as I ran over and grabbed Valerie. Picking her up and tossing her over my shoulder, I began to push my way through the crowd as she kicked and hit me.

  Setting her down only after she managed to pull one of my knives and stabbed me in the thigh with it, I turned my hands and arms out with palms to the sky and bowed slightly for her to continue on her own. Furious with me for carrying her over two-hundred yards, she blew off steam as she slashed my arm and tossed my knife on the floor.

  Picking up the knife and following after her, we were a couple hundred yards from the edge of the forest where the fighting had been sparse. The intent was to catch a breather and relax while the rest of the players continued to fight. Stragglers would be caught here while we watched the battle unfold. To fight until one hit exhaustion would only lead to death and here in this battle we couldn’t afford to die.