Crystalfire Keep

by J. A. Cipriano

  “We’re going to kick butt if how you guys tore through the keystone quests is any indication.” She turned her head a little, tilting up her neck enough to kiss me on the nose. “Thanks for opening up to me. I’ll give you back that point in spades when we get our weekly allotment of Trust points tomorrow.”

  I laughed and returned the kiss, wondering how it would feel to do this in person with her. Not that it would be the same, but still I wanted it. “Well, now that I’ve come clean, is there anything on your mind? I know you said this whole thing with the Sisters hasn’t been on your mind but … well, Amethyst is one of the things I saw in the Vale. It’s hard for me to think that you’ve brushed it off so easily.”

  “Really?” Kayla’s brow knit in thought as we each slipped back a pace or two, still close on the small observation platform. “I don’t know. I’ve been trying to stay focused on everything we’re about to go into that I’ve put her out of my head.”

  She blew out a sigh. “Still, I can’t deny that there’s a part of me that really wants to beat her. You know, we used to duel a lot. She was the one who saw potential in me back when I started doing the Arena events and those duels were all about teaching me how to handle myself in PvP. I never beat her, you know, and now, this is a chance to do so.”

  I nodded slowly as the airship from Granholm started to slide into view below us. The majestic vessel, a sailing vessel of the skies suspended by a huge gas bag that hung like a cushy mattress under the platform, moved to dock and judging by the chatter on board, it was packed to the limits. There were a lot of people making a last-minute push to get ready for Crystalfire, so it seemed.

  “I’d say it’s more than a chance,” I grinned, “but is that all there is to it?”

  “What do you mean? I mean, I guess? I’ve come to terms with my choice of sides and that’s about that.” She shrugged helplessly as she frowned up at me. “Now I’m curious what all you say in the trials.”

  I rubbed the back of my head. “I could ask the same thing.”

  “Well, now that we have this one moment of quiet, we should really talk about everything.”

  “That would be the smart thing to do, of course.” Chuckling, I hooked my thumbs on my belt. “So, other than Amethyst, I saw – “

  A shout interrupted me, echoing up from the narrow stairwell that wound up from the airship dock proper, a familiar Ember’s cry. “Dudes! Where the Brazil nuts are you guys hiding?”

  Kayla giggled, her hand over her mouth, as I rolled my eyes. I tried to mask my annoyance as I shouted down the stairs, “Up on the observation deck, Burnie.”

  Crysta’s laughter joined the echoes of boots on the stone steps. “I told you they’d totally be here.” A few moments later, the two of them with Wazif in tow crowded onto the observation platform, turning our intimate moment into an uncomfortably full party.

  “You could have sent us a tell or something,” Kayla muttered as she tried to pull her knees in and still balance on the railing. “We could have found someplace a lot, well, roomier to talk.”

  “Hey, I figured we’d be less of a bother this way, right?” Burndall replied, leaning to one side of the archway leading down. “Besides, we don’t have too long left on our timers and there are two things we need to do before tomorrow that we can’t do remotely.”

  “You mean the guild charter?” I asked, stuffed between Kayla and Crysta in one of the corners of the square deck. “Yeah, I suppose we should have our flag flying when we show up at the war camp in the morning.” I arched an eyebrow. “What’s the other thing?”

  As the Sorcerer conjured up a foot-long scroll of gilded parchment from his inventory, Wazif stuck his thumbs in his belt and smiled. “Well, I finally found time in the midst of all this adventuring business to do that crafting I promised everyone, and while I could have mailed everyone this – ”

  “I thought it would be more fun for him to deliver them in person,” Crysta finished for him as she poked me playfully in the side. “See the smiles and all that … plus we haven’t actually settled on a name for the guild.”

  Kayla sighed and nodded. “Fair enough, I suppose. So, do we do the gifts first or start arguing about what exactly we’re going to call ourselves?”

  “There won’t be an argument if you agree with whatever I say.” The Ranger grinned back.

  I chuckled and crossed my arms. “Let’s postpone the great debate for the moment and enjoy some good loot first. It’ll make the infighting go down smoother.”

  “We, uh, we won’t actually be fighting, will we?” Wazif let out a nervous little laugh as he got that distant look of someone sorting through their inventory. “It’s been some very stressful three days, you see, and I certainly don’t want to go through that kind of ‘friendly discussion’ right now.”

  “Nah, it’s all good.” Burndall grinned, twirling the scroll in his hands. “Go on, buddy, and give Shale and Kayla their goodies.” He tapped the blue leather-wrapped hilt sticking over his shoulder. “Crysta and I already have ours.”

  The jovial miner brightened from Burnie’s assurances as he nodded. “Oh, excellent then! For you, Shale, I noticed that your boots are, well, I don’t think you’ve seen an upgrade for quite a few levels, eh?”

  Blinking, I took a look down at my old Grade A Slate Sabatons. I hadn’t thought about it for the past month, but I had gotten six levels since this all started. Add to that, the Sabatons were level 36 boots. Almost ten levels out of date, they had been great when I first looted them, but I was due for an upgrade.

  “You can say that again,” I nodded.

  Wazif’s smile widened. “Well, here you go!”

  Wazif would like to trade with you!

  Do you accept?

  Obviously, I did so. Gleaming silver plate boots materialized in my open hands. They were surprisingly light for the thick metal and the jointed plates were etched with geometric golden patterns, an open Gem socket visible at the top of the cuff of each boot. Plush Scorch Wolf fur lined the insides and the actual soles and shoes were thick, sturdy leather with hard, reinforced soles. I focused a little more and the tooltip popped up in front of me.

  Elemantium Knight’s Boots

  Grade S Heavy Foot Armor (crafted)

  Level 44 and Strength 100 required

  Physical Resistance +10%

  All Elemental Resistance +4%

  +16 Strength

  +28 Vitality

  +20 Infusion

  Passive: Movement Speed +15%

  “I know it doesn’t have any extra sockets over your current pair,” Wazif explained, “but it is overall a superior boot, certainly the best I can craft for your level. I think the movement speed bonus is a particularly nice touch. You know, the best to save our lives with, eh?”

  Grinning, I dissolved the Elemantium boots to my pack and started to process of transferring Gems from the slate boots on my feet to the new pair. “These new boots are great, man, and you’re absolutely correct. Flexible movement options can be critical to tanking, especially options that don’t require EP or burn cooldowns.” I smiled as I sketched a bow. “Thank you!”

  The craftsman beamed. “Excellent! I’m glad I judged your tastes so well!” He turned to Kayla, well, more like shimmied in the stuffed space. “Hopefully, I did as well for you as I did for Shale.”

  He held his hands out to her and she reciprocated, going through the usual canned motions of the trade interface. “I’m sure whatever you made will be perfect.”

  “Now, keep in mind that I don’t know much about how the Arena game is played, but I figured that you had PvP vendors for that sort of thing,” Wazif said. “Instead, I tried to find the right bit of something that might be an improvement in terms of the PvE game, considering what we are about to do.”

  Kayla opened her palm and a long, silver rod, maybe three feet in length, materialized in her hand. Arcane sigils were etched in glowing gold along its length and crystal orbs the size of a double-fist topped bo
th ends, one filled with swirling water and the other filled with a constant flame. Two Gem sockets were mounted just under each orb, each pair linked, to make four sockets in total.

  Though I usually didn’t minutely inspect the gear of everyone I worked with, the rod was flashy enough that I focused on it just hard enough to bring up its tooltip.

  Elemantium Rod of Balance

  Grade S Mystic Rod (crafted)

  Level 44 and Power 100 required

  Weapon Damage 90-150 Fire and 90-150 Water

  Attack Speed 2.2

  Skill Speed 1.3

  +32 Power

  +16 Vitality

  +32 Infusion

  Active: Elemental Polarity Switch: You change the polarity of the rod from its current setting to any of these three options: Fire (boosting all Offensive Spell effects by 14%), Water (boosting all Support Spell effects by 14%), and Balance (boosting all Spell effects by 7%). 30 second cooldown.

  She let out a low whistle, but it was Crysta that said what I believe we were all thinking. “Wow, that’s beautiful!”

  “I know, right?” Kayla gave the rod a spin as if she was some kind of sorcerous majorette. “And I think it’ll do a perfect job out in Crystalfire. It has just the right number of sockets and that active effect is intriguing, to say the least.” She looked from the weapon up to Wazif. “Why haven’t I ever seen anything like this before?”

  Wazif managed to shrug despite the close quarters. “To be bluntly honest, my friend, it is because most of the player base has no patience for what has to be done to create truly fine crafted goods. Between the preponderance of farmed dungeon gear and the ease with which guilds can clear current content, it doesn’t much matter that I could make such a thing.” He laughed. “While I appreciate the interesting content ideas that K-Pat has pushed out with this patch, I sincerely hope a crafting revamp is in the works next!”

  Burndall twisted enough to where he could pat the bulky miner on the shoulder. “Don’t worry, bro. I’m sure it’s coming and until then, you’ve got a crew that’ll help you get those sweet mats.”

  Crysta nodded. “For sure! I’m totally curious to find out more about those Gem transmutation recipes you told me about earlier.” She raised a finger. “After all, Gems are the lifeblood of the game!”

  “You know, I really wonder how many undiscovered or underutilized Gems are out there,” I nodded. “Heck, half the Gems Merina uses barely have a sentence or two in the wiki and my Watchdog Stance Gem didn’t have one until I made it.”

  “Well, I, like, can’t say for sure but with multiple AIs monitoring everything,” the Ranger explained, “they totally could have a loot AI making up new skills and gear and stuff on the fly based on the rules, allowances, and algorithms. In fact, I bet it’s likely.” Her eyes widened, as if a lightbulb had gone off in her head. “Which means there’s probably a way to make almost any combination of role and class work if you do enough work and find the special gear and Gems the AI makes for your preferences.”

  “While that’s really cool and I see how that’s a big deal when it comes to validating our little band of misfits, all I ultimately want is some of that special loot myself.” Burndall held up the guild charter again. “Now, can we get to the really important business now?”

  “Right,” Kayla said, looking over to me. “Max, will you do the honors?”

  Nodding, I quickly added us all into a group. To ensure that players wouldn’t tie up names in the guild registry on a whim, creating a guild required one full group of players and the charter, which I knew cost a clean 2,000 Gold. While the conversion between EO Gold to U.S. dollars fluctuated, it usually waffled between 500 to 600 Gold, so you either farmed a ton of gold or spent four or five bucks for a charter. It wasn’t much to most, but it still made you want to be sure before you ponied up.

  With a quick trade, Burndall traded the charter over to me, causing it to disappear in his hand and reappear in mine.

  “Okay,” I began, “we’ve already agreed on a lot of the basics here. I’ll be guildmaster, Burnie will be my second, and everyone else will be brought on at the officer level. If people want to change things up some if we grow, we’ll handle that then.”

  I concentrated on the scroll and the Guild Creation UI appeared, a semi-solid holographic pane before my eyes. Most of it was filled out but one critical part was blank, and the File Charter button was greyed out as a result.

  “So, we need a name.” Glancing around the packed platform, I smiled. “Any ideas?”

  “Why not the Firsters?” Wazif suggested. “I mean, it is what you all are known as already, if I may be bold to point out.”

  Crysta (to no surprise) and Burnie (to a little surprise) both, near simultaneously shook their heads. “No deal,” she declared. “That is so non-lore, it’s not even funny.”

  “Exactly,” Burndall said. “Right on, sister! We can have a cool name and make it sound in-lore too. There are all sorts of cool polecats in the lore!”

  Wazif backed down from the twin onslaught while Kayla tapped her lip. “Well, maybe we can still incorporate something about being the Firsters somewhere in it?” As the lore police turned on her, she stared them down. “Look, Wazif is right. It’s what the general public knows us as. We shouldn’t confuse them, right?”

  My brow knit as I thought it over myself. While I did read some of the lore stuff, I wasn’t quite as fanatical about it as Burndall and certainly not to the degree Crysta was, but I also always thought the Firsters name was kind of … well … lame. Still, Kayla had a good point, too. From the microspeck I knew about marketing, branding was supposed to be important.

  “Maybe there is a middle ground,” I said, inserting myself into the fray. As all eyes turned to me, I blanched a bit at the sudden attention. “Well, I’m not some super creative sort but we could try something like ‘the First Legion’ or ‘the First Knights’ or some kind of reference mixed with lore-appropriate stuff. I mean, it’s a thought, right?”

  Burndall mulled it over. “Huh, maybe we can make something like that work.” He glanced over at his co-conspirator. “Whaddya think, Crysta?”

  “Let me look at some things,” she said as her eyes took on that out-of-focus-I’m-looking-at-the-UI look. “There are several references to numbered military groups in the Elementalis lore, so we would be fine there. ‘Knights’ and ‘champions’ are the most commonly used universal names for elite fighters in the world. Things like ‘legions’ and ‘lancers’ are more region-specific, and I think would totally go against our inclusive make-up and stuff.”

  Wazif nodded. “So, what about the simple one? The First Knights? It has a certain heroic ring to it!”

  I raised a hand. “Let me check the registry, make sure that name is open before we get too worked up for it.” Mentally flipping open the Herald tabs of my interface, I settled on the Guild tab before focusing on the Guild Registry. A few quick word searches and a few moments scanning through the comprehensive list brought about a painful enlightenment.

  Kayla’s smile faltered as my own did. “Max, what’s wrong?”

  “Someone already founded a First Knights … and a Firsters and, heck, just about anything with First in the name.” I mentally did a few more targeted searches, then sorted all those searches by date of founding. “To top it off, most of these were founded in the last couple of days.”

  Wazif’s eyes widened. “That cannot be a coincidence, my friends, but who has so much time, gold, manpower, and vitriol to do all that?”

  Burnie let out a bitter laugh. “Dude, the real question is which of the two people with all those things did it first or did they decide to do it together?”

  “Thadivus and Amethyst.” Kayla actually punched the railing under her shapely hip. “Those blistering rocket jockeys!”

  Crysta closed her eyes and let out a sad sigh. “I don’t know if Amethyst had anything to do with this but Thadivus surely did.”

  “Well, to heck with it,” I pr
oclaimed. “We won’t let them, whoever they are, get us down. We’ll just have to come up with another name.” A bit of inspiration struck me at that very moment and while I was sure it would get shot down, I had to say it. “I think I might have something but it’s probably not a winner.”

  “Man, don’t be that way.” Burndall shot me a grin. “Lay it on us.”

  “He’s right, Max, don’t cut down your idea before you even start,” Kayla tutted. “I swear, you’re your own worst enemy.”

  I laughed. “Okay, okay.” Taking a deep breath, I got it out. “What about the Knights of Four? I do really like the knight thing and the Four part, well, that has a lot of meanings. There are four kingdoms of Elementalis, four core elements, and as sort of an Easter egg, there are four original Firsters, so there’s still a tie back to our original identity, so to speak.”

  Relative silence descended on our little perch, the only noise being the crackle of the Flames of Wrath and the creak of the weather vane on the tippy-top of the Sky Tower. After a few moments of this, Crysta was again the first to weigh in on the moment.

  “Well, while I think we could dig for an even more lore-intensive name,” she prefaced before continuing, “I really do like it.” She smiled. “I’d be totally proud to wear that guild tag.”

  “Well, if it passes Crysta’s test, I’m on board,” Burndall said.

  “I’m certainly not one to contradict your ideas, Shale, but even if I was, I like the ring of it.” Wazif smiled as he hooked his thumbs on his belt. “There’s a certain air of mystery about it. The ‘Four’, as you said, can mean many things.”

  Kayla smiled. “While it was nice to be part of a sisterhood, I think it will be even nicer to be part of a knighthood where everyone stands as equals.” She nodded. “Do it.”

  I let out a breath I didn’t know I had held. “Great, thank you, everybody!” It only took the smallest of thoughts to fill out the name and give my assent.