Realm of the Nine Circles: A LitRPG Novel

by P. Joseph Cherubino

  The warrior jerked her head in a curt nod. “The old temple was looted an hour ago. It's mostly burned but there's enough stone left that it's defensible. It’s on a low rise.”

  “Go. I'll try to send a portal mage your way. Evacuate all you can, even NPCs if they want to go.”

  The girl didn't even tweak an eyebrow at that. No, Keerna thought. She doesn't have a harness so I can't see what she's thinking. The Sorceress Keerna watched the group leave in a huddled pack, the strong protecting the weak so that the weak might help the strong.

  Chapter 19

  Kalmond yanked the portal mage back just in time to save his scrawny neck from a ball of sickly green mist.

  “Gas grenade!” The dwarf screamed. The pressure inside the globe overcame its emerald bounds just shy of its target. It shattered, sending clouds of burning gas billowing out in a circular pattern. Someone screamed. Kalmond turned to see a character clawing its way through the gas as armor, flesh and weapons all melted away.

  “Retreat!” Kalmond hollered. “One-Eye, take the mage. Find Keerna! I'll hold them off. Get as many out as you can!”

  The orc saluted and wrapped a big hand around the thin elven arms of the mage, who responded with a grateful smiley face emoji. A tag appeared above the orc’s head:

  Buddy Carry: +10 charisma, +20 exp, -10 Agility

  “I’m not even in your clan,” the magic user said.

  “We Nameless are not a clan,” One-Eye said. “Besides, only two clans now: one for Mylos and one for the Noble four.”

  A warrior advanced, pointing his sword at the glowering dwarf. It was a mistake, as Kalmond was no longer willing to show mercy. The dwarf lunged without aim, chopping sideways with his axe, then throwing his flat skull forwards when the axe caught nothing but air. The enemy dodged the blade only to be raked across the chest by Kalmond’s horned helmet. The horn attack did its job, stunning the player.

  The warrior stumbled, and a quick reverse stroke to the neck removed the player’s head with a lucky critical that made the dwarf wonder if Virgil gave him some kind of cheat. Kalmond spat on the dead avatar, then looted the player thoroughly. He came up with legendary enchanted armor (that did its wearer little good) and an interesting longsword, also enchanted. The armor gave +5 against fire and +2 agility, while the sword gave +2 speed and +1 chance to make criticals. Something in the back of Kalmond’s head told him he was lucky. Had the player been quicker, the fight may have turned out differently. The thought faded with the corpse as Kalmond stood and stashed the equipment in his inventory. He briefly considered trading his axe for the sword, but his slower weapon still had the overall damage advantage. Besides, he liked it.

  When he scanned the town-turned-battlefield, his heart plummeted. Burning piles of debris from looted shops formed barricades in the streets. Bodies of NPCs and gamers alike lay in broken heaps among the rubble, compounding the obstruction and making it difficult for players to flee and easy for those loyal to Mylos to do their work.

  Kalmond squinted, trying to detect the telltale wavy lines that might reveal a cloaked figure. But the high-level mage wore legendary cloaked robes and a powerful invisibility spell. The Nameless also made sure their allies had an ample supply of mana potions from Corey’s shop. One such ally was around, but… “Arnott, what’s our status?” Kalmond asked, hoping she was actually there.

  A slim figure gelled into sight next to Kalmond, shaking off her invisibility spell with glazed eyes.

  “They have the commercial district surrounded. Traps and ambushes are scattered through the parts of town that are already lost while the main force is converging on the town gates right now. Anyone outside… “ She shrugged, then lifted a leather-bound gauntlet and stared at the sky. A tiny speck circled overhead, growing bigger as she watched.

  “What about the forest?” Kalmond asked.

  “My birds-eye spell won’t reach that far, but I saw some troops pouring in from that direction. Kalmond, we need to get these people out.”

  Kalmond nodded, then stepped back as a black eagle swooped past him, back-flapping its wings. Its claws found purchase on Arnott’s outstretched wrist.

  “I can’t cast again for fifteen minutes. Do you need me?” Arnott made a gesture and the bird vanished.

  Kalmond shook his head. “No. Not much we can do here.” Arnott turned to go but Kalmond caught her arm, releasing it before saying, “Thank you. You may have just saved us all.” He produced the looted sword and handed it to her. “You might get some use out of this,” he said.

  “Thanks! You’re just…giving it to me?”

  “Yes. Use it to take this bastards down,” Kalmond the dwarf growled.

  Arnott turned away and the dwarf caught a whisker between his teeth and nibbled at it, thinking furiously. From scattered reports trickling in, Kalmond guessed the town had about a hundred survivors left, counting up the players who were still online and the NPCs that remained. Though he wasn’t sure just how sentient the second group were, the idea of leaving them behind to be slaughtered twisted his stomach. As the battle wore on, they grew more and more human.

  An arrow zinged through the air, piercing his shoulder through his armor. He’d lingered here too long. His health bar registered a full 17% loss with a surprise attack, nearly a critical. He grunted with the impact, clutching his shoulder as he looked around from behind his quickly-deployed shield. He blocked the second shot. An arrow protruded from his boar oak shield and he yanked it out, diving behind an overturned wagon. A third arrow whizzed past, landing in the dirt where he’d stood moments earlier.

  “Kalmond!” An urgent whisper crossed the street.

  The dwarf looked up, eyeing the empty buildings. A door squeaked, cracking slowly open to reveal a single, elven eye peeking through. It was Thuglar. An arm snaked through the crack, then made a sharp upward motion, releasing an object that landed just in front of Kalmond’s shelter.

  Kalmond strained and stretched his arm out to grasp at the hard, square item. Several arrows sprouted from the ground disturbingly close to his arm as he retrieved the box. By the little cat head icon carved into the wooden surface of the little box, the dwarf recognized it as a cat carrier.

  “Bond to me,” Kalmond muttered. The box glimmered for a moment.

  You have gained a pet! Your cat’s name is Fluffy. To change your pet’s name, access your inventory and right-click your pet, then select ‘rename’. To summon your pet, use the command /summon . Don’t forget to feed it!

  Kalmond took a breath, then hurled the box as far away as he could, whispering “Summon Fluffy!” as he dashed across the dusty street to the open doorway.

  Arrows flew, one with the cold hiss of an ice trap, the other silently gliding through the air before landing with an explosive bang. Kalmond braced as he ran, but the flare of heat never came. Instead, a bright flash produced the momentary shadow of a cat being vaporized. The door opened just before Kalmond could slam into it, and he slid across a hovel floor on his chestplate.

  Your pet has been attacked.

  Your pet has died. RIP Fluffy.

  “You are a terrible pet owner.” Thuglar grinned at Kalmond, then clapped him on the arrow wound on his shoulder. Kalmond winced. “Sorry,” Thuglar said.

  “Is good?” A hulking brute shuffled forwards to examine Kalmond, his nose crinkling as he leaned in uncomfortably close. Kalmond stepped back, but the giant followed.

  “Is good, Bertram. Kalmond is good, ok?”

  “Is good. Not bad.” The giant stretched a toothy grin, then flopped back in the corner, and his head scraped the ceiling.

  “Uhh. Who’s that?” Kalmond muttered over a private voice channel to Thuglar.

  “Bertram.” Thuglar mimicked the cheesy, vacant grin and Kalmond rolled his eyes. “I think he’s an NPC. A few screws loose, but he’s letting me hide out here, so I’m not complaining.”

  “We’re not hiding man, we’re trapped.” Kalmond looked around the room quickly
. “There’s no way out except the way I came in, and that way will get us killed.” Kalmond timidly probed the hole in his shoulder and pulled up his stats. “You got any heals left? I never built up my mana capacity, and I don’t want to spend it healing if I don’t have to.”

  Thuglar slapped his head. “Bertram, can I have another Band-Aid?”

  “Band-Aid! Is make bad good!” Bertram declared, then dug in the pocket of his dirty apron and pulled out a small strip of paper. “Is good?”

  “Is good, my friend.” Thuglar plucked the item from Bertram’s meaty fingers.

  “Thuglar… we don’t have Band-Aids here.” Kalmond eyed the rectangular piece of parchment warily. “And anyway, that’s just paper.”

  “Trust me.” Thuglar stretched out the paper and patted it gently on Kalmond’s wound. Nothing happened. “Hey Bertram, what’d I do wrong?”

  “Is bad?” Bertram came over to peer at Kalmond’s shoulder, bringing his face within an inch of the dwarf’s throbbing wound. “Ah. Is bad-bad. Need two!” He whipped another piece of parchment from his pocket and put it over the first, gently smoothing it down to form a crooked ‘X’.

  Heat soaked Kalmond’s shoulder, spreading down to his fingertips and across his chest. It flared, burning, then faded. As the warmth dissipated, so did his pain.

  “Did he just…”

  Thuglar nodded, eyes wide. “He found me keeled over in his doorway at twelve percent. I couldn’t even move!” The elf paused, then chuckled. “That took three Band-Aids.”

  “Virgil,” Kalmond thought. “Explain.”

  The robed and bearded interface materialised. Thuglar jumped, but Bertram wandered over to his workbench, oblivious to the old wizard.

  “It seems this entity’s previous player class was healer.”

  “Previous class?” Kalmond asked. “You mean he was added as a healer but changed?”

  “No.” Virgil’s face smoothed to a blank, empty expression for a moment. “The terms of the lesser realm often elude me. You have previously referred to his kind as brains and also fish.”

  Kalmond sat down with a thump.

  “Woah.” Thuglar looked at his new friend, busy cutting cutting parchment into long strips. “You mean he was a doctor or something? And now he’s… one of those things? It’s like they can remember parts of their own lives. That just ain’t right.”

  “Bertram is one of the captive souls from the lesser realm,” Virgil explained. “Most came with minds wiped clean. Every now and then, one of the lost souls finds a fragment of its former life and fixates on that fragment. None of my incantations in either realm can help such unfortunates. Bertram is who he is, but I can no longer allow such pain in this realm. Only defeating Mylos will allow me to help them.”

  “Virgil, you’re dismissed.” Kalmond pulled his knees up to his chest. His emotions roiled—there was an army at the door and the man who’d just healed him was a disembodied brain, one with a garbled memory of his previous life and no idea he was nothing but a body part connected to a few wires. The ghoulishness of using thinking human brains as game processors sickened him.

  “Bertram?” The big man turned to look at the trembling dwarf. “Thank you. For healing me, I mean.”

  “Is good. Not bad. Good.” Snip. Snip. He pocketed the small pile of Band-Aids he’d crafted, then started on a new batch.

  The only warning they had was the soft snick of the lock being picked, but it was enough. The intruder, an elven thief, fell to an axe blow to the throat. The human warrior behind him keeled over with an arrow jutting from his left eye. Kalmond heaved the bodies from the doorway, then ducked a sword that clipped one of his helmet horns, only to lodge in the door frame. He killed the centaur and left her in a heap near her two dead companions. Kalmond quickly grabbed what he could from the bodies, yanking out a pair of shin guards for himself and a peytral from the centaur.

  “Come on, Bertram. Bring your Band-Aids,” Thuglar called over his shoulder as he pushed past Kalmond to throw himself at two more players with the bull head icon above them. “Kalmond, we need to get to the shop,” Thuglar said, as his dirks slashed his opponents.

  “No time for you!” Kalmond said, smashing one of the enemy with his shield. The warrior responded with a power lunge that the boar oak shield absorbed, but just barely.

  Kalmond returned countered with an overhead one-handed strike that didn’t do much. The warrior was high-level and knew how to dance. The dwarf kicked hard to make some distance, then put away his shield to get both hands on his axe.

  His opponent used the opportunity to execute another power move that was not-so-easily blocked by the axe handle. Kalmond threw his head into the fight, scoring a solid hit with the stunning horns. He spun around, using a leg sweep to knock the warrior over, then came down with the axe as if he was chopping wood.

  “Done!” Kalmond bellowed.

  “Damn,” Thuglar said, kneeling over his kill and looting heavily. “That was harsh.”

  “He deserved it,” Kalmond growled. “Let’s go.”

  Another Mylos soldier rounded the corner and a thick fist clunked the dwarven paladin over the head. Thuglar finished him with a double critical. Kalmond nodded thanks. He hollered a gleeful shout when he checked the body, tossing his recent aquisition aside for some real, dwarven shin pads.

  Shins of the relentless dwarf: +5 Stamina, +5 Strength, +3 Fear Resistance.

  Kalmond slipped them on and flexed his knees, relishing the perfect fit.

  “Is good? Is good!” Bertram laughed gleefully as he turned and smacked another fighter who came up from behind. “Is bad,” he said by way of explanation. Kalmond winced.

  “Bertram! Not him! He’s on our side!”

  “Thuglar, ye wee fool. Get yer Noble ass out of here. We’re bloody overrun!” One-Eye said over voice chat. The orc whirled a sling around his head and with an expert flick of his wrist, launched a rock into a mob forming at the end of the street.

  “The shop!” Thuglar yelled back. “Help us get to the shop! We need what’s in there!”

  One-Eye jerked his head in acknowledgement, spinning to deploy his oversized mace and clunk an archer over the head. Mylos troops began to appear at random, just running around looking for kills. It was the growing mob down the street that bothered Kalmond.

  “We think alike,” One-Eye said, grunting as a dwarf charged into him with a shield slam. The orc kicked his attacker to Thuglar and continued talking as if nothing had happened. Thuglar scored a quick throat-slash move, and the dwarf collapsed like a ragdoll. “I told lots ‘o folks ta meet us there. Seems like a good rally point. We’ll get yer spells, then scamper. There’s a portal waiting for you back with your pretty spellcaster.”

  Kalmond winced. If Keerna heard that descriptor, One-Eye might have the chance to change his name to One-Ear instead.

  “Let’s go then!” Kalmond stopped to throw his axe at an ogre who happened to come around the corner. One-Eye hit the ogre with a fire rock from his sling, just as Kalmond’s axe materialized. The ogre stopped, dropped and rolled right into Kalmond’s axe, rendering the ogre like just another log to chop.

  Dwarf, elf and orc raced through ruined streets, past vacant buildings with shattered windows bright with fire. Daylight faded, and Kalmond lost track of how many soldiers of Mylos fell to them as they flew through the streets. Trying to put a number to his kills also made him wonder how much time had passed since he put on the immersion harness.

  A game-day was about five hours of real time, but devoid of light in the caverns below the Giant’s Toe mountains, Kalmond had no way of knowing how much time had passed since he’d raced past real life attackers through the warren of passages in the Plexcorp building. His mind tumbled over that, noting that his dwarven body felt little fatigue. He rounded a corner and all thought of the real world vanished.

  Thuglar’s shop, the little shack he’d scrimped and saved for and stocked with some of the finest weapons and rarest spells in
the land, was burning to the ground. He snagged Thuglar’s quiver as the elf tried to dart past with a murderous growl.

  “Look!” Kalmond hissed and pointed.

  A trio of wraiths, led by a dark-armored Paladin, loitered around the building while their master rummaged through the debris. One of the wraiths, hovering a foot off the ground and gliding up and down the street in front of the shop, paused. It turned its hooded face towards Kalmond, a yawning void enshrouded by tattered black silk. It held for a moment, and Kalmond lost himself in the mesmerising shimmer of absolute darkness bending the light around it.

  “Is bad,” Bertram said.

  The muttered words jerked Kalmond out of his mesmerized stare as the wraith drifted over to its human companion. A hissing static issued from them and long, skinny arms, wreathed in black, stretched out towards the living.

  Thuglar snarled. “They want a fight? I’ll give them one.”

  Before Kalmond could react, Thuglar loosed two arrows. Burning tips shot through the wraith, doing no visible damage. Another volley, this time with a breath of frigid air, struck the dark creature and it howled.

  Thuglar lunged forward, and Kalmond lost sight of him as the human Paladin charged. The human ducked a swipe from Kalmond’s axe and delivered an attack of his own. The insidious strike with a cursed sword took the dwarf down by 15%. Kalmond had to roll away to keep from getting hit hard again with the counter swing. This character was high level and fast.

  Kalmond ran a few paces in order to chug a healing potion. Nothing happened. Kalmond gasped in shock. No enchantment should be able to prevent potion effects, but the notice popped up on his HUD just the same and told him it was so. This was a new ability, and it was a disturbing one.

  The Evil Paladin uttered arcane words, and a shiver of fear crawled down Kalmond’s back. He had to force his eyes to remain on his opponent as the fear spell took hold, unimpeded by armor buffs or natural resistance. He didn’t see the sword strike once, then again. He was only aware of his rapidly-dropping hitpoints and the deep pit of fear that seemed to expand beneath his feet. Kalmond’s vision was tinged with red.