“In that case, I would like a peek at her,” Grimguy said.
Mastermind grimaced.
“You haven’t seen her, yet you have already fallen for her. Wow,” there was much sarcasm in his voice, “in such a case, consider us having already defeated the monster.”
“Well, I take back my words then,” Grimguy said, turning a shade of pink.
“You are men,” Lovebird suddenly said. “That’s why you fall for her, at least in her woman form.”
“That’s the problem, isn’t it?” Mastermind said. Then he suddenly seemed to understand what Lovebird really meant, and his eyes went wide.
“Which means I shouldn’t fall for her,” Lovebird said with a smile like she had conquered a mountain.
“Well, that depends, you know,” Grimguy said. “It’s not guaranteed that simply because you are a girl you won’t fall for her.”
Lovebird narrowed her eyes.
“Look, I am not into girls, okay?”
“Then that’s that,” Grimguy said. “You will go to the ruins and slay the monster.”
“I don’t think it will be a great idea to send her alone,” I said. “What if the monster attacks her in the form of the old woman or the old man? Or what if the monster takes the form of a seductive man? You never know.”
“Rohan is right,” Mastermind said. “I think it’s best that we all go together.”
“And this time, we are not leaving you,” Danavma told me.
“So, all of us will go together,” I said. “But first, Mastermind, can you go to the ruins on Pero’s back? Take a look at the ruins from the sky to see where our bags are?”
“Not a bad idea,” Mastermind said. Then a shade of fear crossed his face. “But I am afraid that the monster might attack me from the ground.”
“Don’t say that,” Grimguy said. “You are our leader. If you show fear, we are done for.”
Mastermind looked a bit taken aback at this.
“All right, fine,” he said. “I’ll go and have a look from the skies. Pero, come along.”
Mastermind climbed onto Pero’s back. And in a matter of moments Pero and his master were climbing height.
“I shouldn’t have said that,” Grimguy said, uneasily scratching his head.
“Mastermind is a good guy,” I told him, “but he has his own fears. He doesn’t like using spells although he does know a good number of them. He fears that using spells might allow the gang members to trace his real location on earth and get to know about his true identity.”
“I don’t have any such fears thankfully,” Grimguy said. “I am perma.”
We all watched as Mastermind and Pero circled above the Ruins of Drabund. Even as we watched, Mastermind had his hands over his ears for there was the faint sound of a sweet song in the air.
“Man,” Grimguy said, looking like he had drunk wine, “I could barely hear her voice. But it’s a damn beautiful one.”
“And also a dangerous one,” I said.
Mastermind and Pero flew back to where we were and landed.
He climbed down. There was sweat on his brow. Like he had barely escaped death.
“She’s there in her beautiful form,” he panted, “and she was sitting on a stone slab just near which were our bags. When she saw me, she began to sing.”
I scratched my head. Defeating this monster sure seemed like a big task. I felt weak without my sword in my hands. Then I remembered that there was always a solution. Mastermind and I had successfully saved ourselves even though the monster had stripped us ofalmost all our health.
“We just have to attack her when her back is turned to us,” I said, as a plan formed in my mind. I looked at Mastermind and Pero. “Pero will carry all of us to the ruins. But he will drop us at different spots. We will all move towards the monster in the middle of the ruins with our ears covered. When she tries to bewitch one of us, the others will attack her.”
Lovebird placed a hand on my shoulder.
“That plan should work without a doubt.”
The plan finalised, we set to making it reality. Mastermind seemed a bit queasy as he didn’t want Pero to carry so much weight in one go. But Pero looked rather enthusiastic, and he let us all climb onto his back.
Pero flapped his massive wings and took to the air. For a moment it seemed like he wouldn’t be able to carry all of us as his height dropped and we began to panic. But Pero beat his wings even harder, and he took us towards the ruins.
Once we were near enoughto the ruins, I spoke,
“Wait, I am going to jump down here. Best of luck, everyone.”
The ground was only a few metres below and I leapt from Pero’s back. I landed on the ground roughly, but quickly stood up. My health fell just by 5. I would have used a health vial but I didn’t want to waste any more health vials by using them for such a minor loss.
Pero took the others away and I saw him dropping them at different locations around the ruins.
I created a quick group and then messaged everyone.
“Everyone, go into the ruins cautiously.”
Once he had dropped off everyone, including Danav and Danavma, Pero took to circling the sky overthe ruins. Ifelt a sense of safety to see him every now and then, flying overhead.
I entered the ruins. At any point there could be the monster. I put my hands over my ears as a precaution. If I saw the monster, I would use my paralysis spell.
I stepped past a broken wall, and my heart skipped a beat. The monster was right there and she was looking directly at me. Almost immediately I began to lose myself to her beauty. I let my hands fall from my ears and she began to sing. She stepped closer to me and ran a finger across my face. I purred.
I took her hand in my hands, staring at her sparkling eyes. Just then, some kind of a powerful force hit her and she was thrown away from me.
I cried out, but since I was no longer looking at her face, the charm ended, and I came back to my senses. I looked around. Mastermind had attacked the monster with his fire blast. The monster was getting back to her feet when I cast my paralysis spell on her. She froze for a few moments. I picked up a fist-sized broken stone slab from the ground and ran to her. I hit herhard on the head. I felt extremely happy as I saw her health drop by 50. Next, I began to repeatedly hit her head multiple times. Luckily, she was facing away from me and I felt no remorse as her skull cracked and blood leaked out.
But just then, my paralysis spell ended and before I could cast another one, she began to sing. Too bad, I hadn’t put my hands over my ears. I became enthralled by her voice again.
Thankfully,she caught fireat that precise moment, and she ran away from me in her agony. I came back to myself and saw that Grimguy had cast the spell. The monster began to run this way and that. I recalled that Grimguy’s spell was also meant to paralyse, but apparently only one part of the spell was working on the monster. But the fire alone was good too. I could barely see the monster’s face because she was totally covered in the flames.
Taking advantage of the situation, I cast a paralysis spell on the monster and she froze. I grabbed another fist-sized stone and used both my hands to hammer onto her head repeated times as the fire began to die out. Just as I felt that she was about to spring back to life, I took a dozen steps away from her.
It was Mastermind’s turn now, and he hit her with a blast of fire just as the paralysis spell ended. She sailed through the airand hit a wall.
“Here are your bags,” Lovebird said, appearing from behind a wall with two bags in her hands. One she threw to me and the other to Mastermind.
“Thanks!” I shouted to her.
Just as the monster was stirring again, Danav and Danavma entered the scene. They sprinted to the monster and began to beat her up. I watched extremely pleased as her health fell steeply. My pets weren’t even allowing the monster a chance to show her face to us or to sing, hitting her again and again.
In a final attempt, with only 400 health remaining, the monster took
the form of the old man with the many legs that we had first met. Now it was very much possible for me to look the man in the eye and I wasn’t afraid at all. He had a scowl pasted on his face, even as he bled from many wounds we had given him.
Danav and Danavma backed away. Grimguy cast his spell on the monster and he caught flames again. I pulled out my sword from my bag and approached the monster as it tried to beat out the flames in panic.
Just five hits were required and then the monster crumbled to the ground, its health zero. I let out a sigh. This had been tough. The others came and gathered near me. The monster disappeared, and in place of it a helmet materialised.
Quest one completed!
You have killed the shape shifter of the Ruins of Drabund!
You receive the helmet of Ravana!
You receive 20,000 gold each!
You have levelled up!
I had a fuzzy feeling following this message as I levelled up. After all the hard work, I knewthis was a good end to the day. I picked up the fallen helmet and raised my sword to the air.
“We did it guys! We fucking did it!”
All the others began to cheer as even Pero landed on the ground near us to join the celebration. I handed the helmet to Mastermind and then wrapped my arms around Lovebird in a tight embrace, lifting her from the ground for a few moments.
“Your plan worked!” she told me, looking into my eyes.
I just kept smiling at her for a moment, before Grimguy let out a cough, and I thought I had beenromanticenough. I placed her back onto the ground.
“This was the hardest quest,” Mastermind said.
“I reckon, the other quests will be even harder,” I said. It was obvious.
“So, what next?” Grimguy said.
Mastermind took out the book of immortality from his bag. The sun was setting in the distance. He flipped through the pages and with the orange light available he pointed at a particular word in the book that formed the heading of a chapter. The Tournament of Death.
“Now what is that?” I asked.
“Thischapterhasonly just appeared becausewe killed the shape-shifter.Let's see what it contains... Hmm, looks likethe tournament is a weekly one held in a place called Dhagotistil. This week’s tournament will be held the day after tomorrow,” Mastermind replied. “I guess whoever wins the tournament will win the next piece of the artefact. But first we need to get to Dhagotistil and unlock quest number two, as per the book.”
“The tournament of Death, eh?” I mused. Why should there be “Death” everywhere?
“I am sorry guys, but I think I will have to go now,” Lovebird said apologetically.
“Wait a minute,” I said. She had stayed for quite long, and I was thankful to her for that. But if she just logged out now, it would create quite a few problems. I turned to Mastermind.
“When are we going to Dhagotistil?” I asked him.
Mastermind glanced at Pero and at the others present.
“I would have liked to start the journey now, but for tonight let’s just rest here,” he said. “Let’s begin tomorrow morning. Pero is quite tired, and I think we have accomplished enough for the day.”
“Some rest will be good,” Grimguy said.
“If you log out now then you will have the option to either re-enter the game in this location, or the place where your birthstone is,” I said to Lovebird. “You will be able to log back here tomorrow morning, right?”
“I should be able,” Lovebird said, “I hope you don’t mind me leaving for the night.”
“No, it’s okay,” I said, “if by any chance you are not able to log in tomorrow morning, then don’t come to this place at all later on in the day, because we would have left. And then it would be impossible for you to return to Kapilpura. The orb of the portal would have also expired in twenty four hours. Just select Kapilpura, all right? You’ll be safer doing that.”
Lovebird kissed me on the cheek. It was her first kiss to me.
“Thanks for thinking about me,” she said. And then she logged out, waving at us, and disappeared. After sometime, I asked Danavma and Danav to go back too. They had helped us tremendously for the day, and Mastermind also told his pet to go and rest. In a few minutes, Grimguy, Mastermind and I were the only ones present.
“We never really looked at the artefact properly, did we?” I said. Mastermind had put it inside his bag and now he took it out and let us have a good look.
The helmet seemed to be made of pure gold. At least as pure as gold could be in the game world. Intricate designs adornedthe helmet.
“What kind of an artefact would the larger artefact be?” Grimguy said. “A person’s head?”
The remark made me think. A helmet was meant to fit on a person’s head. Where else would a helmet fit?
“It can be a statue’s head, we don’t know yet. Perhaps it’s a whole statue of a person” Mastermind said.
“Possible,” I said. “Perhaps the artefact is some kind of a statue that needs to be awakened, and then it would destroy Death13 for us.”
After we had observed the helmet to the content of our hearts, and speculated all the things it could be a part of – which included the statue of some powerful animal, a sleeping warrior, or perhaps the helmet was not really a helmet at all. But then, the quest messages had said it was a helmet, so it had to be one, right? Perhaps it was a helmet that was not worn and used in some other way. The possibilities were infinite.
We created a fire as darkness fell. We had conquered the Ruins of Drabund. We were able to find some rabbits. We ate the meat and went to sleep in the midst of the ancient ruins, the stars shining down on us. I looked at the face of the moon, as Mastermind and Grimguy began to snore, and a cold chill came over me as the fire died. I imagined the face of my brother on the moon’s face. I had taken my stance against evil. Prithvi Online had become much more than a game for me. Yes, I had lost my brother because of my obsession with games. But I will save the lives of thousands of perma players and make my brother proud, wherever he was.
Rohan.
Class: Multi-tasker
Race: Human
Sex: Male
Level: 6
Strength: 400
Health: 689/650
Mana: 315
Intelligence:110
Karma: 0
Chapter 6
It was Lovebird who shook me awake.
She smiled down at me.
“It’s morning!” she said.
I couldn’t believe that she had been so punctual. Or was I dreaming? I rubbed my eyes. No, Lovebird really had come.
“Everything all right back home?” I asked her as I slowly sat up. It seemed like the sun had risen only a short while ago.
“There has been a ceasefire for a few days,” she said with a bright smile.
“That’s excellent news!” I said. Mastermind and Grimguy were still sleeping. A fly came and sat on Grimguy’s face and he tried to swat it, but it flew away. I woke up the two of them, and said that we should get going immediately. After a quick breakfast, Mastermind summoned Pero. The four of us then climbed atop the beast and off we went. As the Ruins of Drabund became smaller and smaller, I couldn’t help but be thankful for the challenges it had offered. I thought about the monster in the form of the beautiful young woman. She had been just about the most attractive woman I had seen in life… Or had she? Nah, I was better off with Lovebird.
It was an hour later when we first saw them. At first we thought they were birds. Then we realised that they were actually pterodactyls, three of them. And the pterodactyls had Raks atop them.
“Don’t fail me this time,” Mastermind said to Pero as the tension began to rise. Pero flapped his wings harder, fuelled by the desperation of his master. But the other pterodactyls were at least twice Pero’s size and had larger wings. They began nearing us despite Pero’s best efforts.
“What’s going to happen now?” Grimguy said, fear dripping from his voice.
�
��Why are they pursuing us?” Lovebird said.
“I think they are players, who else can they be?” Mastermind said, “They are probably members of the Kartoshi gang. Perhaps they saw us from some village that was near the Ruins of Drabund. You never know. We are in Rakshasha territory after all.”
I turned and focused on one of the Raks. Doing so was hard because the flight was unsteady; Pero flapping his wings made his body bob up and down. Yes, the Rak was no NPC. It was a level 40 player. It was safe to assume that they rest of the Raks were players too.
As the Raks approached fast on their flying reptiles, Mastermind became more and more worried and so did the rest of us.
“Do something,” he said to us. But there was nothing really that could be done, right? The last time I had used a spell on a pterodactyl it hadn’t worked at all. Using the spells on the Raks would be pointless, because the pterodactyls would catch us anyway.
“There is nothing that we can do,” I said.
“There is always something,” Mastermind said, “we defeated that shape shifter yesterday for god’s sake.”
I had come to like this trait of Mastermind. He occasionally became fearful, but he never lost hope.
“Damn it, I am doing it myself,” Mastermind said. He turned. It was difficult for him to move properly, as he was the one sitting just behind Pero’s neck. He made motions with his hands and set a jet of fire at the pterodactyls. He missed them completely.
“Let me try,” Grimguy said. He muttered words under his breath. One of the Raks seemed to become paralysed for a moment and his body caught flames. His health fell by about fifty. But since he was of a higher level, the effects of the spell ended quickly.
“Wait,” I said, as an idea came to me, “I have a plan. Don’t attack now, wait till they are closer. It’ll be easier to attack them without missing them.”
Meanwhile, I pulled out the sword from my bag. Pero tried his best to keep his distance from the other pterodactyls, but they were just too fast for him. In a desperate bid, Pero suddenly slowed and dived down.
“Hold on tight!” Mastermind yelled, though with the wind roaring at my ears I could only barely hear him. I just made sure to keep a hold on Lovebird. I would be devastated if she fell.
Perma-Death Online: A LitRPG adventure: Book 2 Page 9