Fantasy Online Polynya

by Harmon Cooper

  “No,” she says.

  “That’s cause you and Twixy were too busy killing zombies while Tammy – fick her by the way – and Marbles and I were busy looting. That’s how you got your necklace. The gnomes gave it to us. I forgot their names. Anus and Chippie. That might have been it. You’re wearing your necklace, right?”

  “Arun and Chantrea. They were married,” Ryuk interjects.

  “Close enough, and that’s their damn fault.”

  Zaena pulls it out from the front of her armor. “I’ve been wearing the necklace since it was given to me.”

  “We should see what Oric says about it,” Ryuk suggests. “He may be able to read it or tell us if it has some type of power. There’s no telling.”

  “Good idea.” Zaena lifts another lily pad from the water and flings it over her head. As she does so, a great beast, easily the size of a city bus, pulls out of the center of the lake, flapping its enormous wings.

  “Holy fick!” Hiccup shrieks, and lets loose a squealer.

  The great beast cries out, shakes more water from its gigantic wings, and lifts into the air.

  “What the hell is that thing!?” FeeTwix shouts, his eyes black orbs. “A what?” he asks his fans.

  “Charochakcha!”

  “WE’RE FICKED!” Hiccup dives for cover just as the great bird-like creature swoops down and grabs the goblin with its talons.

  It screeches and the crimson wattle beneath its neck expands in size as it lifts back into the air.

  (0)__(x)

  “It has Hiccup!” Ryuk charges after the giant bird and as he does so, its stats appear before him.

  Charochakcha Level ??

  HP: 2000/2000

  ATK: 348

  MATK: 0

  DEF: 407

  MDF: 386

  LUCK: 25

  Her ghost limbs propelling her forward, Zaena hurls herself into the air and latches on to the feathered creature.

  She hits the dirt as she’s dragged forward, and she collides with a thick bramble that definitely gives her some nicks and scrapes. From there, she’s airborne, propelling herself closer to the flying monstrosity in her mad dash to save Hiccup.

  Save Hiccup? Even Ryuk takes a split second to consider this and its implications. They may be a motley group, half NPC and half commoner, but the Mitherfickers are the best damn guild he’s ever been part of, well, sort of. Well, at least for entertainment value, Ryuk thinks, and while they bicker and disagree, everyone has each other’s back.

  Case in point: FeeTwix, who has equipped the bazooka he forced Ryuk to use against the Cherry Blossom Ninjas. With a squeeze of the trigger, the rocket whips into the air and collides with the great flying beast’s tail.

  -110 HP!

  “Fiiiiiiiicccckkk yoooooouuuu, Twixxxxxxyyyyyyy!” Ryuk hears Hiccup shout, as the bird drops towards the ground. Soon, it’s trying to again pick up speed, forcing the goblin to run like a madman through a patch of prickly bushes. “Fick, fick, fick!” he cries, running and simultaneously trying to wiggle out of the bird’s grip.

  Ryuk leaps over a bush, nearly trips, gets his footing, and keeps his marble gun trained on the bird’s ass. He’ll take any shot, but his Cherry Poppin’ Daddy Skill would definitely leave the bird begging for mercy.

  He keeps his Marble Gun trained on the bird, and he’s just about to fire off a round of molten marbles when the creature turns, pulls back, and screeches, sending a tunnel of wind in Ryuk’s direction.

  Whack!

  -69 HP!

  He hits the ground hard after colliding with a tree branch. Another rocket sails over his head. Ryuk looks up just in time to see it pass right next to the bird, who has veered off to the left, Hiccup in its grip and Zaena trying desperately to climb up to its neck.

  “I’m going with a hack!” FeeTwix announces.

  Ryuk stands, rubs his temples for a moment, and takes off the other way once the bird has swooped back around.

  “Shit!” He pops his molten mag out and replaces it with sword marbles. He keeps running, aimed directly at the shore of the lake. He glances over his shoulder, back to his path, and over his shoulder again.

  The bird is gaining on him.

  If I can just …

  Ryuk takes a deep breath and increases his speed. The bird chases and just as it is about to snap at him with its ginormous beak, Ryuk drops onto his back, slides forward, and with his marble gun aimed over his head, fires all eight sword marbles at the approaching bird.

  -85 HP! -106 HP! -32 HP! -66 HP!

  The bird lifts and drops Hiccup, who lands on Ryuk and for once doesn’t let loose a cloud of putrid fecal fumes.

  “Get off me, Hiccup!”

  “Shit, Marbles! Fick this! Fick this! I’m going back to Jatla!” The goblin pushes himself off Ryuk and accidently stumbles over him again as he tries to flee. This time he does remind Ryuk what DD’s BBQ must have tasted like, and it takes all of Ryuk’s willpower not to pistol-whip the living shit out of the gaseous goblin.

  Zaena flips off the flailing bird and superhero lands next to Hiccup.

  The charochakcha hits the ground, scrambles to its feet and …

  Schoooom!

  A bolt of green energy at least two meters tall rips through the soil. It connects with the large bird, rips its head and shoulders off in a spray of blood, and continues past the now dead creature, where it eventually takes out a large oak tree.

  Instakill!

  Level up! LUCK +1

  Ryuk Matsuzaki Level 16 Ballistics Mage

  HP: 426/495

  ATK: 103

  MATK: 134

  DEF: 81

  MDF: 56

  LUCK: 14

  Ryuk feels a pouch form on his belt and a prompt appears.

  New marble acquired! Gravity marbles change the gravitational pull of the object it connects with. It will pull a flying object to the ground, and move a semi-stationary object to the nearest surface. It can also be used to hurl an enemy into an object.

  A new marble?

  “Hey, I got a new marble,” Ryuk informs his guildmates.

  “What kind?” Zaena stands near him now, brushing off her armor. There are a few scrapes and nicks on her, but the huge smile on her face tells Ryuk that she lives for this kind of action.

  “A gravity marble.”

  “We’ll have to test that out.”

  “Fick!” Hiccup says as he watches the bird’s body continue to burn with a green fire. The goblin looks down the line at FeeTwix, whose mutant hack crossbow has already returned to its original shape. From there, he looks back at the bird, nodding as he takes in the Swede’s handiwork.

  “Not fickin’ bad, Twixy,” he says as a large knife appears in his hand. “Liz, set up camp by the water. Marbles, get out my sleeping bag. We can fick with your new marble later. Let’s carve this bitch up while the meat is still smoking.”

  “I don’t have your sleeping bag,” Ryuk says, still unsure if it is a good idea to breathe after the foul stench that the goblin just bequeathed onto the digital world.

  “FeeTwix does. That reminds me.” Hiccup takes a cherry-flavored, generic healing potion out of thin air and downs it. “Fick me, that’s the good stuff.” He reviews the label. “Cherry Apollos, huh? Fick, this is a good potion. I’ll have to write this one down.”

  He burps, and tosses the bottle over his shoulder. Another potion appears and he savors this one, doing his best to clean inside the bottle with his boily tongue. “Yeah, it’ll give me heartburn later, and if this doesn’t, this oversized pigeon over here definitely will. But them’s the ropes. Come on, Mitherfickers, let’s camp.”

  “I’m not eating that.”

  “You know what, Liz? Normally, I’d argue with you, but Uncle Goblin is tired right now and all I really want to do is eat something, drink something, relax under the stars, think about some of my past loves and see what arises if you get my hint, and sleep in tomorrow. So, just to show you how big of a gentleman I am, I won�
�t respond to your clear and bigoted hatred towards good eating.”

  The two lock eyes.

  “And one other thing,” says the goblin, “um, thanks for saving me back there.”

  “It was my pleasure, Hiccup.”

  “Although it was actually Marbles and Twixy who saved me, but you were the first to go for it.”

  “You’re pushing your luck. And seriously, I’m not eating charochakcha.”

  Hiccup snorts, “Fine, fine, Your Highness, the kid and I will catch some fickin’ fish for you. Ain’t that right, Marbles?”

  “Um … sure.”

  “Fickin’ fish – that has a ring to it!”

  Chapter 16: Poisoned by a Seagull

  After waking at the crack of dawn, Ryuk looks up at the ceiling of their yurt, something FeeTwix apparently had stuffed in his inventory list, and from there, he glances around the circular tent to find the Swede and Zaena cuddled up under a blanket. A glance to the door and he sees the goblin with his back pressed against the wall, snoring loudly.

  Hiccup wears a soiled bathrobe and a pair of, oddly enough, Japanese clogs, called geta. Where the goblin gets his odd clothing is beyond Ryuk. Further adding to Hiccup’s general air of bodily excretions is an actual snot bubble expanding and contracting as he snores.

  Ryuk chuckles. He’s only seen that before in manga and anime, never in real life.

  Real life? Ha!

  He gets out of the small bed and makes his way to the front door of FeeTwix’s yurt. The cool morning air greets his face as he steps past a pile of discarded fish bones. He remembers catching the “fickin’ fish” by firing an explosive marble into the water. It was, of course, Hiccup’s idea, and it worked brilliantly.

  After stretching his arms overhead, Ryuk walks down to the water and sits on a flat rock with some Thulean writing etched into it. There’s a sweet scent to the air, and while the chill is there, it shows clear signs of disappearing in the next hour or so.

  As he stares out over the misty water at the herders on the other side of the lake, he runs his finger along the etching. A deep breath in and he notices the smell of the lake, and with it, a sweet smell that reminds him of watermelons.

  Ryuk takes his slingshot off his belt and pouches one of his new gravity marbles. He was so distracted last night that he forgot to give the marble a test. With everyone sleeping, he now has the time and quiet to see what it is the marble actually does.

  The gravity marble is clear with a cream swirl running through it. It is slightly warm to the touch, and even as he holds it in the pouch of his Magic Slingshot, he notices that it adds an odd weight to his wrist. He aims at the water, pulls back and …

  “Hi.”

  He hops off his rock at Zaena’s voice and nearly lets the marble fly. The Thulean takes a few steps in front of him, her orange hair disheveled.

  “You scared me,” he says, a bit too late.

  She shrugs. “I figured squeezing your shoulder with my konoshlo would have scared you even more. Let’s see it.”

  “My new marble?”

  “Please, you said it was a gravity marble, did you not?”

  “Yep.”

  “Fire it.”

  Ryuk aims at the water and zings the marble away. As soon as it touches the surface, a large scoop of water lifts several feet into the air and hovers there.

  “Whoa,” Zaena says. “How long will it last?”

  Ryuk palms another marble. “No idea; that’s the first one I’ve shot.” He glances around for a moving object. “I need to test something in motion.”

  “Test me,” Zaena volunteers.

  He hesitates. “You sure?”

  “I’m sure. Let’s see what it does.”

  They both watch as the floating scoop of water loses its shape. Droplets form on its underbelly and plink onto the surface of Lake Klattenhoff.

  “I don’t want it to hurt you.”

  “Come on.” Zaena leads Ryuk to a clearing. The Thulean runs a few paces away from him and drops to a battle stance. “Do it.”

  “Um … ” Ryuk aims his magic slingshot at her. He doesn’t like the idea of firing on Zaena and is in the process of lowering his weapon when she shouts out to him.

  “Do it, Ryuk! Don’t be a little bitch!”

  Fwwhip!

  The gravity marble strikes her in the sternum and sends her flying backwards, not by explosion, but by something that reminds Ryuk of a clear bubble.

  “Shit, Zaena!”

  The Thulean zips backwards until she smacks into a tree.

  “Damn!” she shouts out, baring her teeth as she laughs. “That was crazy!” Zaena tries to squirm out of her pinned position. The tree branches above shake as she attempts to use her ghost limbs to pull herself up. “It’s like glue!” she says, once she realizes she’s unable to move.

  Ryuk looks down at the gravity marble in his hand. He turns to see that the scoop of water hovering over the lake has dissipated.

  It doesn’t last very long …

  He approaches Zaena, and as he does, she starts to shake her shoulders loose. “It’s freeing up!”

  So like thirty seconds?

  She drops and quickly moves over to him. “Wow! Your new marble is very, very interesting. Just think of what you will be able to do!”

  “Do you think … ?” Ryuk places the marble in his mouth and feels gravity tug at his stomach.

  “Amazing!”

  New skill learned!

  Skill: Levitate

  Level One: By placing a marble in your mouth, you can levitate for thirty seconds. Higher levels allow for longer levitation.

  Requirements: Level 15 Mage, LUCK > 12.

  Ryuk now floats about a meter off the ground. He looks down at Zaena with a huge grin on his face.

  “Do something!” she calls up to him.

  “What do you mean?” he asks, the marble still in his mouth. He notices that it has started to dissolve. It fizzles on the back of his tongue and is completely flavorless.

  “Um, fly or something!”

  “I’m not flying, I’m floating!”

  “Then float.” She moves her hand in a swimming gesture. “Like this.”

  “It’s not like that, it’s like … ” He thinks of the best way to describe it. “It’s like I’m on solid ground.” He takes a step forward to demonstrate. “An invisible plane.”

  “Can you go higher?”

  Ryuk falls back to the ground. “No idea,” he says as he pops another marble in his mouth. He resumes his floating position and places his hands before him. As he does, he feels what seems to be an invisible ledge. He scrambles up onto it, and now he’s about two meters up. “Apparently, I can!”

  “Let me try!”

  Once he’s back on the ground, he hands Zaena a gravity marble. She places it in her mouth, holds it there and ... nothing happens.

  “Well, it was worth a try.” She spits the marble into her hand, and rather than give it back to Ryuk, she uses her ghost limb to pop open the pouch on his belt.

  “That’s the wrong one.” He says as a tingling sensation comes over him.

  “Well, which is the right one?”

  “This one,” he says, pointing at the new pouch on the left. He awkwardly waits for Zaena to finish putting the marble in. Once she’s done, they turn back to the water.

  “It really is a pretty lake,” he says. Secretly, he’d like to test out a few more gravity marbles, but now that Zaena’s around, he feels a bit self-conscious about it.

  Why? he asks himself in his head. Humans have the weirdest emotions. He’s pretty sure she wouldn’t mind watching him lift things into the air and play with gravity for the next hour, but to be polite, he lets her take control of the conversation.

  As if on cue, Zaena sighs, her eyes transfixed by the water. “This reminds me of a small pond near my home in Athos, back in Ultima Thule,” she finally says, her mood suddenly the polar opposite of what it was just moments ago.

  “
Oh?”

  “My tutor, Clemon, would instruct me along the shoreline during the warm months. We’d start with Thulean texts, then mathematics, then combat, then lunch, and we’d usually dedicate the afternoons to studying your world.”

  “He taught you all that?” Ryuk tries to remember if he’s ever had a professor who taught such a wide variety of subjects. He comes up flat.

  “He was an RPC who held several doctorate degrees and studied at all the great universities across the three floating continents. He’d won awards, given lectures, had been asked to run for various offices but always declined, and in retirement, he taught me. My siblings too.”

  “In combat?” Ryuk imagines an old man teaching Zaena how to swing her blades.

  “Can the elderly kill just as easily as the young?” she asks.

  “It sounds like it.”

  Zaena’s face hardens. “But that was then, and this is now.”

  “Okay?” Ryuk looks up at her, not sure of what she means by her statement.

  “But he did teach me a lot about your world. Still, there are many things I don’t understand. It is odd to think we were created by your kind, yet your kind comes here to escape there. I’d love to see it, though, your world.” The smile returns to her face. “I can only imagine what it’d be like driving in an aeros, shopping, visiting other countries, using crazy technology that most of you seem to barely understand … ”

  “It is definitely something else.”

  Silence grows between them for the next few minutes, and Ryuk, rather than try to awkwardly force a conversation, allows the moment to happen.

  “Shall we wake the others? I would keep your levitation act from the goblin for the time being. It may be useful in scaring him later on.” She grins wickedly. “I can think of a pretty funny prank we could play with a white bed sheet.”

  “Yeah, that’d be good.” Ryuk laughs as one of the herders across the way mounts his griffin. The griffin flaps its wings and soon the herder is airborne.

  “Let’s wake them; I’d like to be in Porthos by this afternoon if we can manage it.”