World At War

by Dave Willmarth

  “Rocky! Stop that! Get away. There are too many!” Alexander yelled at him. He couldn’t see the moat monster anymore through the frothing pink water. The giants’ blood was flowing freely from their feet and whatever wounds Rocky inflicted. He hoped the water dragon had listened to him.

  As they reached the wall, the giants were unable to scale it. Their arms weren’t quite long enough to grab hold of the top. After a moment of useless scrabbling, they stopped trying to climb and began to pound at the walls with their stone clubs. The impacts thrummed through the stone walls and sparked off the magical enhancements Fitz and Kai had put in place.

  The walls held up under the abuse, and Alexander returned his attention to the drow. He couldn’t see Brick anywhere but a quick glance at his raid UI showed him that his friend was still alive and healthy. The two trolls who’d made themselves meat shields for the drow were dead, their bodies cut to pieces by the relentless light cannon beams. But their corpses still shielded the drow, who had stepped down from her chair and was crouching behind the trolls’ thick bodies.

  She shouted another command and the remaining giants stopped pounding on the walls. They gathered together in twos and threes and began to boost each other up so that they could reach the top of the wall!

  “That’s it! Everybody off the wall. Get inside the inner keep!” Sasha sounded the general retreat for the players. The citizens who could be evacuated had been and only players were left in the battle zone. They began to jump from the walls as giants pulled themselves up and over. There were only about fifteen players still alive, counting Alexander. The rest had sacrificed themselves to buy time for the citizens.

  Alexander hit each of the giants in the face with Wizard’s Fire as a parting gift. He took one last survey of the wall before leaving. The were-beasts and hobgoblins all lay still, either burned to death or killed by his people. Three giants had pulled themselves up onto the wall and were reaching down to help others up. Massive pools of blood were forming under them as it poured from the wounds on their feet.

  The orcs were still pounding at the outer gate, trying to break through. A wicked smile grew on Alexander’s face. He teleported himself to the gate room, where the mechanisms for raising and lowering the bridge were located. When the dwarves had built the drawbridge, he’d been given a cursory explanation of how it all worked.

  He quickly moved to the lever that locked the gears in place, preventing the chains from moving up or down. Unlocking the gear, he pulled another lever that started to lower the gate slowly using a counterbalance weight system. He pictured the orcs massed together outside, pounding at the drawbridge. He gave it just a few seconds to gain some momentum, then pulled the pin that freed the counterweight.

  The momentum and weight of the massive drawbridge was suddenly freed to succumb to gravity. The orcs tried to scramble away as it fell but only a few of them managed to escape. A couple moved to either side or fell into the moat before the bridge slammed down, crushing the rest. Alexander peered out a small window in time to see Rocky pick off the orcs that fell into the water. He also saw half a dozen of the survivors rush into the tunnel toward the inner gate. They would get nowhere, so he promptly disregarded them.

  He was about to teleport back to the inner keep when he caught a flash of sunlight on plate armor near the tree line. Putting his head closer to the window, he focused on the spot. A moment later, he saw Brick disappear behind one of the troll corpses that the drow apprentice had taken refuge behind. Almost immediately, there was a flash of holy light.

  Alexander thumped the wall, grinning. In raid chat, he said, “Brick’s taking on the drow! I’m going to go help.”

  He teleported himself atop one of the troll corpses. Looking down, he saw Brick hunkered behind his shield as the drow bombarded him with magic attacks. She was mid-cast when Alexander drew his sword and leapt down at her, plunging the tip downward toward her neck. But the blade bounced off of a magic shield, half a second before Alexander himself bounced off of it.

  “Shit!” was all he had time to say as he fell onto his back, off balance from the unexpected impact. He had managed to interrupt the spell she’d been casting at Brick, but now he had her full attention. He quickly cast his own magic shield as he scrambled backward and tried to regain his feet. The drow waved one hand and uttered a single harsh word, and one of the shit-weasel spells sped toward him.

  His shield was nowhere near strong enough to stop the evil worm-thing that flew at him. He just hadn’t used it enough since learning the spell. It was still at level one. But it was strong enough to deflect the thing just enough that it glanced off his Legendary dark mithril chest piece as he tried to dodge the thing by rolling to one side.

  She growled in frustration and shouted, “My master has wasted enough resources on you, boy king! You will die here and now!”

  She began to move her hands in an intricate pattern as she mumbled the phrasing of a major spell. Alexander managed to gain his feet and was about to try to dash behind the nearby troll when Brick slammed into the drow from behind.

  She’d made the mistake of turning her back on the paladin and he took full advantage. Activating his Shield Rush ability, he shot forward and slammed full speed into the drow’s back. Her shield burst and she screamed in rage as the force of the impact slammed her into the troll corpse. Brick pinned her there, shouldering his shield as he used his hammer to cast Holy Smite.

  The drow’s scream turned from rage to pain as the holy spell struck her face. Brick wasted no time, slamming his hammer into her right arm, using the stone skin of the dead troll as an anvil. The arm snapped, and the drow snarled, “Get off me, you stumpy worm!”

  Drow Wizard’s Apprentice

  Level 110

  Health: 54,100/65,000

  Brick was a dwarf, with all the strength that came with his dwarven build. And the drow was slender and willowy, even for a drow female. But she was roughly forty levels higher than Brick and Alexander. As she struggled to push off and free herself, Brick’s feet slid back as the soil gave way under him.

  Alexander lunged forward, his sword piercing the drow’s side as she struggled with Brick. The blade went deep, and he could feel it scraping against her ribs and deflecting off her spine before it stopped. He quickly tore the blade free as roughly as he could, twisting it as he pulled, trying to do as much damage as possible. At the same time, he cast Wizard’s Fire on her face to distract her.

  Her struggling increased as the pain sent her into a frenzy. She growled a three-word phrase and a burst of magical force sent dwarf and elf flying backward several feet. Alexander was stunned, the debuff timer appearing on his UI and counting down from ten seconds. Brick, being behind his shield, was able to avoid the stun and charge right back into the fray. This time when he got close to the drow, he used his Shield Bash ability to slam her back into the troll corpse and interrupt her casting. As a bonus, his shield struck her broken arm, inflicting more pain.

  Bleeding, broken, half-blinded by fire and outnumbered, the drow wasn’t giving up. She gritted her teeth and produced a wicked-looking dagger in her unbroken left hand. It was clear she wasn’t used to wielding a weapon with that hand, but all drow were born knowing how to stab things. She slammed the dagger toward Brick’s face even as he raised his shield to block it. The black blade scraped across the black scales of the shield and left a trail of poison behind.

  Alexander warned his friend, “The blade is poisoned!” even as the dark elf struck again, and again, growling with each motion as her savaged torso objected to the movement. Brick managed to block each blow but the force behind them was pushing him backward, giving her space to move more freely.

  Alexander swung his sword again, connecting with the drow’s wrist. The blade bit deeply, lodging itself in the bone. She screamed and jerked her hand away. Even as she dropped her dagger, his sword was yanked from his hand. They stood staring at each other for a moment, both disarmed unexpectedly. She recovered first
, uttering the shit-weasel spell again even as she shook her arm and the sword dislodged to fall to the ground.

  Being just a couple feet away, Alexander had no hope of dodging the spell. It slammed into his chest with the force of a kick, knocking him back off his feet. The worm-thing didn’t penetrate his chest piece, but as he hit the ground it began to crawl up toward his exposed neck and face.

  A flash of light struck the thing as Brick cast Holy Smite on it. The spell didn’t kill the thing, but did stop it long enough for Alexander to swat it off his chest. Jumping to his feet, he stomped on the thing, then cast Wizard’s Fire on it. The nasty shit-weasel worm shrugged off both attacks and began to scurry after Brick, who had pissed it off with the holy attack.

  The dwarf just laughed, watching it come at him, then stomped on the thing, pinning it beneath one of his iron-shod boots. “Ye don’t scare me, ye-”

  He never got to finish the sentence as the she-drow blasted his exposed face with a spray of dark magic bolts that looked much like barbed crossbow bolts. Brick took the full force of the attack directly in his face and was thrown backward. His face disappeared in a pink mist and he was dead before he hit the ground.

  Alexander began to build up a Ray of Light spell. He poured mana into it as quickly as he could while the now-gloating drow turned toward him. She smiled cruelly at him.

  “My master will reward me greatly when I bring him your head.” Her voice was ragged, as she was clearly in great pain. “When I am done with you, I will slaughter each and every one of your people. When you return, you will find nothing but the corpses of those you swore to protect!”

  She raised her badly bleeding left arm and began a spell. Alexander held his ground, building more mana in his own spell. At her level, he doubted even his best shot would kill her. But he had to try.

  She finished the spell and a black cloud formed around him. His whole body erupted in pain as it ate at him. The spell was some kind of acid cloud. His UI showed a bleeding debuff and, for half a second, a poison debuff that instantly disappeared as his poison immunity negated it. He clenched his jaw against the pain and added even more mana to his spell.

  When the spell reached two thousand mana, he felt himself begin to lose control of it. Still, he held it a moment, unable to see his target through the cloud. An idea struck him. He succumbed to the pain and let loose a scream.

  “Yesss! Suffer! My poison rushes through your veins, boy king. The acid melts your skin. You will not die quickly. I’ll make sure of it!”

  That was all he needed. Focusing on the sound of her voice, he raised his hand and loosed the burst of light magic. There was no scream, no sound that his elven ears could detect. But the black cloud around him dissipated immediately.

  Alexander heard a series of roars from the direction of the wall as he got his bearings and gazed upon the drow.

  Most of her face was just gone. The blast of light magic he’d sent at her had struck her mouth and neck, incinerating everything below her eyes.

  Level up! You are now level 71! …

  Level up! You are now level 72!

  Your Wisdom has increased by +1.

  Your Intelligence has increased by +1

  You have 8 free attribute points available

  Alexander cast a heal on himself, then another. The pain from the acid subsided as his skin knitted itself back together. He was glad he couldn’t see what was going on there.

  He bent and looted the drow and the two trolls, and was about to gather Brick’s gear for him when another roar from the wall grabbed his attention.

  “The giants! Shit! How could I forget?” He quickly grabbed Brick’s gear and teleported himself back to the keep. As soon as he arrived, he turned and found a clear spot atop the wall and teleported himself there.

  Looking out, he was immediately confused by what he saw. There were only four giants still standing in the area between his walls. All of them were badly wounded, sporting horrible gashes and broken bones. One was missing an arm, another had a half-crushed skull.

  And they were fighting each other.

  Alexander looked at his own people, a question on his face. Sasha was there and gave him a happy smile and a shrug. “Whatever you and Brick did to that drow, we think it must have cancelled her mind control over them.”

  “Okayyy….” he led her to finish her explanation. Fitz finished it for her.

  “The giants are very territorial. In their mountain homes, they tend to range far apart. When they encounter another giant, there is almost always a fight to the death. Except when they mate.” The wizard grinned and waggled his eyebrows at Sasha, who just rolled her eyes.

  “So, as soon as they were free of the drow’s influence, they went after each other instead of us?” Alexander’s jaw dropped.

  “Aye, lad.” Silverbeard approached from further down the wall. He had a light cannon on his shoulder. “They be destroying our crops in their tussle but I advised Sasha to stop our own folk from firin’ at ‘em. No point in makin’ ‘em angry at us if we can just leave ‘em alone ‘n let ‘em do our work for us!”

  Alexander watched as the giant with the damaged skull tottered and fell, only to have his head stomped by another of his kind. Now there were only three.

  “Fitz, are the giants servants of the dark? Like the drow?”

  The old dragon wizard shook his head. “They worship no gods. Very simple creatures. They generally mind their own business, preferring to stick to their lands and avoid others. They’ll fight like mad if you invade their territory. But otherwise they’re mostly harmless.” Fitz looked at him. “What’re you thinking, boy?”

  Alexander turned to face Fitz. “I was thinking it might be good to have a giant or three as allies.”

  “HA!” The wizard’s grin stretched from ear to ear. “And how do you propose to stop them from killing each other first? And for that matter, how are you going to convince them you’re friendly?”

  Now it was Alexander’s turn to grin. “I was thinking a certain crusty old dragon I know might have a way to stop them.”

  Fitz glared at him for a moment, then chuckled. “You know, boy. You’ve got me just curious enough to want to see what you do. I’ll stop their fight. The rest is up to you.”

  A second later, Fitz ran forward and leapt off the wall. In a flash he morphed into his true form, growing in size as he gained altitude. All along the wall, the Elysians gasped.

  When Kai had taken his true dragon form and flown over the keep, his shadow had blotted out the sun over a large portion of the keep’s grounds.

  Compared to Fitz, Kai was puny.

  The ancient dragon was as white as fresh snow. As he beat his wings and gained some altitude, the true immensity of his size became apparent. The dragon’s head alone was larger than any one of the giants still battling below. His shadow stretched out over the keep, the lake, and the entire battlefield. His wingspan was so wide that Alexander feared one wing would scrape against the cliff behind them.

  Fitz let out a roar that shook the ground. The giants immediately stopped fighting and cowered on the ground. As did nearly all the Elysians. More than a few pissed themselves.

  Lowering himself back toward the earth, Fitz began to shrink. When he was roughly twice the size of any of the giants, he settled in the fields nearby. His massive dragon voice growled out, “ENOUGH!”

  When the giants made no move to resist or resume their battle, Fitz settled himself to the ground, tucking his front legs under himself like a housecat, and looked expectantly toward Alexander.

  Alexander mumbled to himself, “Damn. How am I supposed to follow that?” making Sasha snort. Still, he had to try. He saw a lot of value in having the giants as allies. And even if he couldn’t pull that off, he saw no reason to let them kill each other. They had been enslaved by the drow and had suffered enough.

  Turning to Sasha, he said, “Spread the word. On my signal, I want every possible heal on those three.”

  No
t waiting for her answer, he cast Levitate on himself. Shouting out, “HEY BIG FELLAS!” at the giants, he began to move himself in their direction. All three were still sitting on the ground, but he kept himself about sixty feet in the air. Just in case one of them decided to make a grab for him.

  All three of the giants turned to look up at his voice. Their eyes grew wide to see an elf floating through the sky. Alexander spoke loudly enough for all to hear.

  “I am Alexander. This is my kingdom! You have come here and killed my people!” He motioned toward the outer wall, blood-spattered and littered with corpses. Then he motioned to the ground the giants were sitting on. “You’ve ruined our crops! For this, I should kill you all!”

  The giants cowered slightly, despite Alexander’s small size. He tried to take credit for it in his own mind, but knew it was mainly because Fitz leaned his head forward to emphasize the threat.

  “But I know you did not come here of your own will. The evil drow captured you and made you slaves!”

  One of the giants nodded his head in vigorous agreement, blood from a head wound spraying in every direction. Alexander continued. “I think you have suffered enough. So rather than kill you all, I offer you healing, and friendship!”

  All three giants lit up with several different shades of light as the healers poured on their magic. Green from the druids, gold and blue from the priests, white from the paladins. Alexander missed hearing Fibble’s “Pew! Pew!” in the mix, and momentarily worried about his little green buddy.

  The giants gasped in surprise and ran hands over their bodies as the heals mended bones, closed wounds, and stopped bleeds. Likely none of them had ever experienced healing magic before. Alexander took advantage of the moment.

  “You see! The drow enslave you. Force you from your homes against your will. Make you fight and die for them. I offer you healing! Protection from the evil drow. And food!” He waved at the wall and several of the hunters began tossing down bear and wolf carcasses. The giants looked to Fitz, who nodded his head. Each of them rushed toward the wall and began scooping up meat and shoving it into their mouths.