by Jason Cheek
“We are all going to die,” Krystal swore a little too loudly under her breath as she covered her face with a gloved hand.
I rolled my eyes as everyone began giving me a rash of shit all at once. It was a weak-ass spell. I was crazy if I thought that was going to get us out of this mess. Thompson wanted to know what I was smoking so he could have some too. Did I still think we had working Moonshine Elementals or something? Taking a deep breath, I simply weathered the storm. This wasn’t the first time that I’d come up with what I thought was a winning strategy that no one could see how it would work and took a heaping helping of shit. You’d think my friends would’ve stopped doing that shit by now, but it just seemed to get worse the more we played together.
Except for Helgath, the only other person that seemed to understand the strategic implications of the spell and what I might have in mind was Terry Cobra. She tried to tell the Devil Dog’s around her what she’d figured out about the spell and strategy that she thought I might use, but everyone kept talking over her whenever she tried to interject in the complaining circle-jerk that was going on.
Even with having access to my vision of the battle to come, Helgath had silently admitted to not having any idea if what I was planning had a chance in hell or not. As far as she knew, no defenders had ever managed to stop a horde’s initial invasion force before in known Orc history. A horde was considered an unstoppable force that had only been somewhat countered by large defensive fortifications. Nonetheless, she silently promised that she would fight with me to the bitter end. As the muttering finally started dying down, I continued nonplussed.
“As for the rest of the plan, I have Domenic working with my companions on setting up the defenses at the top of the path leading out of the valley. We will stop the vanguard’s advance here and break for the night.” Twisting around on Neysa’s back, I took a moment to scan the faces of my friends and allies alike. “The people of the world that are sworn to me have to rest and sleep or they’ll be run down like dogs. If my plan works out the way I hope, we’ll have a few hours of peace for everyone to rest and log out as needed.” A frown creased my lips. “If not, we’ll have to fight through the night like Kenzie said while rotating people out as needed to take care of their physical needs in the real world.”
I paused as a low angry muttering came to my ears as our allies started complaining amongst themselves all at once. Luckily, it wasn’t from everyone. My friends knew the deal which was why we played together. Even if they complained at times, we were here for the long-haul even if it sucked at times. This was just another expected part of being a serious gamer.
In many ways, this was no different than taking on an End World dungeon in any MMO that required forty players working together to complete. We’d spent many fourteen to sixteen-hour days playing straight through until we either permanently wiped or made it through the dungeon. When you were learning a new dungeon, that always meant numerous wipes for months on end, before we’d finally manage to complete a successful run.
After that, we would focus on streamlining our strategies to get the run down to six or even four hours a shot. That was because dungeons like that required constant camping to get everyone geared up with the specialized drops and loot that the dungeon dropped. When talking about a forty-person raid, that was a lot of repeated runs since most bosses only dropped six to eight pieces of gear at any one time. On top of that, those drops were completely random. That made it especially difficult to gear up the whole forty-person raid when each individual player usually needed up to ten pieces of specialized epic gear for their character to complete a whole set. Depending on the game and the number of available classes, that could mean a total of nine or even up to eighteen various class combinations of specialized gear that could drop amongst those random six to eight pieces. Clearing my throat, I addressed the newbies of the group.
“Look, the rest of us are pro-gamers,” I said, noticing that Jill and Krystal both unconsciously grimaced at my choice of words, “or serious-gamers and are mostly used to this type of playing schedule.” Not all of us had gone full-time as of yet, which reminded me that the girls’ vacation time that they’d taken at the start of The World was nearly used up. Giving a mental shrug, I continued. “We’ll take the brunt of the watch if necessary. Having to play hours or even days on end at times is standard operating procedure to access the unique areas of a game for the rest of us.”
“Just know, this isn’t typical,” I said, sweeping my hand at the horde of Orcs chasing after us. “Things should ease up for those of you who are finding this hardcore schedule tough to keep up with when we reach Darom. Though, things won’t really get back to normal until we reach BrokenFang Hold and deal with the Hobgoblin invasion. After that you can get back to a more normal gaming schedule if you want,” Noticing a number of our allies shake their heads at my words, I smiled, seeking out Angie, Krishna, Kenzie, and Thomas’ eyes, “or not. Just know that we couldn’t have done all of this without you.”
My words seemed to settle everyone down. Not that there wasn’t a lot of discussions going on around us about how we were supposedly going to stop the Orc’s vanguard. I didn’t get a chance to eavesdrop further since my friends were already pushing their mounts to catch up to Neysa.
“Give up the spell Jay,” Jill said as soon as she rode up beside me with Kenzie and Krystal riding to either side of her. AJ, who was a little behind the group riding next to Thomas, hid the smile that came to his lips as he waited to see what I was going to say.
“Not until we’re ready to use it,” I said without hesitation, “I told you, it needs to be part of the ambush. If they figure out a counter to it for before we can use it to full effect, we’re screwed.”
“I’m not going to use your stupid spell early. I just want to-” Jill began to protest as I cut her off midsentence.
“Bullshit,” I said, shaking my head without even looking back at her, “you try this every fucking time-”
“Fuck you, Jay!” Jill said as Krystal laughed at her girlfriend.
“He does have a point,” AJ said as Hefe, who was listening in on the conversation, began laughing his ass off, “you do this in every game.”
“Not without a good reason,” Jill said with a dismissive sniff.
“What about that one time-” Krystal began to say as Jill sarcastically cut her off.
“In band camp,” Jill said with a twinkle in her eyes.
“You were playing that Nanomage and were not supposed to attack the whole camp with your new AOE spell until we gave you the go ahead,” Krystal continued, ignoring the byplay.
“Oh my gawd,” Jill said, rolling her eyes, “I can’t believe you’re bringing up that old shit.”
As Krystal and Jill started arguing while a laughing Kenzie, AJ, Hefe, and Bonnie Smash watched on, Thomas rode up beside me with a nervous looking Krishna, Phoenix, and Angie following behind him. Well, Krishna and Phoenix looked anxious. It was hard to figure out what Angie was thinking or feeling with that furry Umbra Hunter face of hers.
“You really think we can do this?” Thomas asked as he unconsciously glanced over his shoulder at the seemingly endless horde of Orcs chasing after us.
“It looks like we haven’t managed to thin them down at all,” Krishna said in obvious frustration.
“That shit ain’t no joke,” Phoenix agreed, “I don’t see how they’re not going to roll over us like an old speedbump.”
“We’re fucked if we don’t,” I said with a shrug, “My troopers are barely staying ahead of the Orcs as it is and that’s with us slowing them down with regular cavalry charges. We either fight or we lose everything,” I nodded towards the Dragoons riding ahead of us, “because we need every one of these troopers back at BrokenFang Hold for the Hobgoblin invasion.”
“That’s not making me feel all warm and fuzzy about the coming fight,” Phoenix unhappily muttered, “I thought you said you had a plan.”
“He does,” Thomas
said, sharing a knowing grimace with me, “the question is will it be enough.”
“Basically,” I agreed with an indifferent shrug. It wasn’t like there was any other choice available to us. As Krishna and Angie shared a nervous look, I tried to gage how much time we had before reaching the trail out of the valley, “I expect we’ll get one more charge in before we find out if this is going to work or not.”
“Have you told Domenic to expect company soon,” Phoenix asked as everyone’s eyes meaningfully turned to me.
“If you guys can get everyone ready to move out,” I said, grimacing at the thought, “I’ll do that now while I’m heading forward to talk with General Dell.”
“You got it,” Thomas said with an amused look on his face. All of them knew how pissed off Domenic was at me upon finding out Rani was a V-MMORG Admin after the fact. Whatever, it wasn’t like there’d been any other choice for us at the time. It was either use the fucking Moonshine Elementals in front of her or be wiped out.
“Yeah, have fun with that,” Phoenix mockingly agreed as a shit-eating grin split her lips.
“We’ll get everyone ready to move out on this side,” Krishna said with a nod, as Angela growled in agreement.
“Let’s go,” I said out loud to Neri and Fylreh who were still following behind us as I mentally echoed the thought to Neysa. Giving my friends a two-finger salute as we sped off, I turned my focus to Tengsly who was just climbing up onto my shoulder. Chittering happily, the Flying Squirrel snuggled up to my cheek as I gave him a quick finger rub on his forehead before continuing. ‘I need you to take a message to Vengeance Burnslinger.’
Standing up straight, Tengsly bobbed his head excitedly as I gave him the message. Thinking over the situation for a moment, I added a quick note for my companions to let them know what was up. You know, since Domenic wasn’t known to be the best communicator even when he wasn’t pissed the fuck off.
With a chirp of farewell, Tengsly took off into the air just as Neysa caught up to the rear of the Dragoon’s formation. While we were passing by the men and women sworn to me, the cavalry troopers gave respectful fist salutes amid cheers of “Lord Ironwolf,” while I gave a confident nod or a quick word of encouragement as we sped past, doing my best to look the part of their fearless leader. Though, I can’t lie, their enthusiastic reactions to such simple signs of respect brought an appreciative smile to my lips.
The whole “fearless leader” concept came from something that Thomas had told me about during a break that we’d shared the day before. The Devil Dog Guild Leader had explained to me that was basically how the military trained their noncoms and officers to be during combat. A leader was supposed to always look the part. Soldiers wanted to see capable confidence from their sergeants and officers that were in charge. It didn’t mean you had to have all the answers. It simply meant that you were prepared and ready to act as needed, while privately confiding in me that was because no one wanted to see their leader losing their shit during a tight situation.
The act seemed to be working. As we rode past, I could see the fear and nervousness reflected in my people’s eyes for the fight they knew was yet to come easing somewhat. Not that I blamed them in the least for being afraid. The Orc horde was truly terrifying and this was just one of many small vanguards pushing their way into the Kingdom of Kader. A vanguard, might I say, that we hadn’t been able to do more than temporarily slowdown for more than forty-five seconds at any one time. Nonetheless, seeing the easy set of my shoulders, confident smile, and Helgath perfectly balanced behind my back on the loping Silver Dire Wolf with Neristhana and Fylreh following close behind as we passed by seemed to give them courage.
“Lord Ironwolf,” General Dell called out respectfully as we caught up to the command group. Riding next to him, Rani gave me an amused smirk at Dell’s fist salute. Almost like she was saying you think you’re so special because an NPC is saluting you, “I just wanted to let you know that the last of our new Dragoons have reached level 40.”
“Excellent,” I said, ignoring the annoying woman’s amused glint in her eyes as I immediately opened up my Character Sheet. Finding the tab for my troopers, I selected the entire raid and shared out the spell Zombie Hands. It was a new trick that I’d picked up earlier that day from Ulia to speed up the training of the people sworn to me in Dark magic. It might actually work for swearing fealty too, but that was something that I felt should be done face-to-face whenever possible. “I’ve offered Zombie Hands out to the raid. Once everyone’s mana has recovered, we’ll switch up to our regular charge.”
“Yes milord,” General Dell agreed, before lowering his voice as his face turned serious, “Though, I don’t expect we’ll get more than one more cavalry charge in before we reach the end of the valley.” The veteran swordsman politely said meaningfully looking towards the slope trail heading out of the valley in the distance.
“Yeah, that’s what I figured too,” I said nodding in agreement, “everyone’s already getting prepared for the final charge before we make a run for it.”
“Milord, if you could be the one that informs Lord Burnslinger, I would greatly appreciate-” General Dell began to say as I cut him off with a raised hand.
Even Rani was self-conscious enough to cringe at the mention of Domenic’s name. Not that I blamed her … or him for that matter. He was pissed the hell off at me for not telling him about Rani being a V-MMORG Admin, and at Rani for gimping his Moonshine Elementals. Rani was pissed off at him for going off on her. Even though, he knew as well as I did that there was no way they could let him keep something that overpowered in the game.
“Don’t worry, I’ve already informed Lord Burnslinger about the situation,” I assured Dell, trying not to roll my eyes at the shitstorm of attitude I was about to get. Seeing the older man’s raised eyebrow, I gave him a wink, “I’m still waiting for his reply.”
“Thank you, milord,” General Dell said, giving me a look that said “better you than me.”
“And the Dark Lance spell?” I asked.
“Shared out to every trooper that has reached skill level 45 in Dark magic as you requested,” Dell confirmed.
“Excellent, then we’re as ready as we can be,” I said, nodding more to myself than anyone else that I’d covered all of my bases. My eyes focused on Dell. “I doubt any of these trainees will hit level 45 after this next run, but still plan on keeping them in reserve with the rest of the Dragoons. We can always use them to lock the enemy down if things start going south.”
“Going south, milord,” Dell asked as Rani tittered at my use of slang.
“Sorry, I mean, if the situation starts going badly for us,” I clarified as the old veteran nodded in understanding.
“If anyone could pull this plan off, it is you milord,” Dell said in all seriousness as he clapped me confidently on the shoulder.
No pressure there, I silently thought as Rani derisively snorted, while adding “Not that anyone has managed that before in the history of The World.” I felt Helgath go still behind me as my gaze swept back to the dismissive Admin who was looking at me like I was a complete idiot. “But I’m sure you can pull off what no one else has ever managed Lord Ironwolf.”
“I’m sure I will,” I said, mentally picturing ramming the point of the Dark Blade of Lord Kayden through Rani’s smirking face. While that might seem terribly violent to anyone reading my thoughts, the mental imagery helped me to keep from losing my cool and doing it for real. Not that the V-MMORG Admin didn’t deserve my ire. Still, taking her out here and now wouldn’t help our cause any. Taking a deep breath as Helgath’s claws unconsciously dug into my shoulders, I continued in an even tone, “despite your best efforts to fuck us over with every chance you get.”
“That’s not fair Star-,” Rani angrily began to say.
“I’m not here to argue the point with you. No matter your intentions, the results are ultimately the same,” I said, holding my hand up to forestall her protests, “How many players h
ave an Admin assigned to them to make sure they’re not cheating?”
“How many other players are as controversial as you?” Rani unapologetically shot back.
“A lot, but just like with everything else, the squeaky wheel gets the grease,” I meaningfully said, looking her in the eyes until she self-consciously looked away in embarrassment.
“At least, you weren’t simply kicked out of The World without having anyone looking into the validity of the accusations against you,” Rani muttered in defense of her actions.
“Great, a handful of asshole players lie and cheat, but I’m the one put on trial and assigned a watcher even after it’s proven that I didn’t do what I was accused of doing,” I said, turning away from her in disgust, “I guess that’s modern-day justice for you.”
Why was it that so many companies and people only listened to the handful of people that liked to loudly complain and bitch about everything? You’d think that by now it would be simple enough to point out the truth of what really happened and move the fuck on, especially when the bitching was completely out of touch with reality. Now they wanted me to be thankful that they didn’t simply kick me out of The World for some random asshole’s fake complaint. It was such complete bullshit. I didn’t bother saying anything else to Rani.
“Form up once everyone’s ready and we’ll charge the enemy like usual,” I order, getting an affirmative nod back from Dell, “Then, we’ll fallback to the defenses being set up and reform our lines there.” Returning his fist salute, I signaled to Neysa and my companions as we headed back to my friends, when I saw Tengsly flying up to me.
‘God you’re such a fucking asshole!’ Domenic’s voice instantly sounded in my head as Tengsly landed on my shoulder to give me the message, ‘A half an hour to forty-five fucking minutes, are you out of your ever-loving mind? I can’t even do half of what I was planning to do because you ordered your NPCs to ignore my commands if they went against the basic layout that you gave them for the defenses being set up!’