by Domino Finn
Kyle waited in the tall grass beside Bandit. He raised his crossbow in trembling hands, aiming just above my shoulder.
Izzy stood over me, spraying a sheet of ice over the closed entryway, sealing the doors shut. When she was satisfied, she shot Kyle an annoyed look and offered me her hand. I grabbed it and she helped me up.
"That will only buy us a few minutes," she said. "We have to move."
We sprinted across the tended lands and made for the tree cover down the road.
0350 Need for Speed
"They're not chasing us," said Kyle.
"Keep running," I returned. We weren't even halfway to the forest yet.
"No, seriously. They're not—"
The icy barrier on the west gate shattered as the doors flung open. The wind carried the rushed orders of the centurions on it. Legionnaires marched from the city in a disciplined line, four across. They moved double-time down the road.
"You were saying?"
Izzy hissed. "They're sending a whole legion after us. Why would they—?"
"We need to keep moving," I said. "Maybe they won't march past the tended lands."
"The tree line," said Kyle.
Horns blared in unison after us. The Stronghold army was an intimidating presence and they'd only been mustered over the course of minutes. I tried not to imagine what the force would look like in a well-planned war.
The good news was the legion was slower than us. That many men maintaining formation couldn't compete with our mad scrambling. At least in the short term, we had the advantage.
"Arrows!" yelled Izzy.
I spun and saw the line of archers letting loose. A wave of arrows took to the sky like a flock of spooked birds. As we raced down the road, the projectiles angled and fell to the ground, pattering across a wide swath of land. The barrage fell short.
"They won't miss again," warned Izzy. "They were just gauging their range."
The centurions barked orders and the archers adjusted their angles. She was right. We had no choice but to barrel ahead and hope we could outrun arrows.
The volley let loose. A hundred arrows flew skyward and made a wide arc above. As gravity slowly took over, their aim appeared true. In a few seconds we'd be experiencing a hell of a hailstorm.
Our boots took us past the tree line. We each maneuvered side to side to avoid the trees while maintaining top speed. Sharpened points of metal tore through the dense canopy above. Leaves exploded. Shafts thwacked into thick trunks. A few stray arrows made it all the way to the barren forest floor.
Dirt splashed my face as an arrow thunked down just in front of me. Kyle's mirror shield, held at his back, deflected another. Luckily, the thick foliage had done its job. The vast majority of projectiles never made it to us.
We found a clump of old oaks with wide trunks and ducked behind them. Izzy and Kyle each took their own tree. I pulled Bandit close behind mine. From our vantage in the forest, we could no longer see the pursuing army. The centurions ordering the legion had grown quiet.
"The archers are done," I said. "There's no way they can get us in here."
Kyle breathed a sigh of relief. "The question is whether they'll come into the forest."
I nodded, weaving my head side to side to find a sightline through the trees. I considered climbing the oak.
"Talon," called Izzy, studying me carefully. "How'd you do that? Use combat in town?"
I paused, for the first time realizing the significance of what I'd done. Not only had I drawn my spear and used skills within Stronghold city limits, but I'd squared off toe-to-toe with a lead centurion. He should've been protected from friendly fire but I'd damaged him. In a fair fight he'd likely mop the floor with me, but the sheer impossibility of my resistance had taken them all by surprise.
Even Izzy—who'd helped me escape by using magic to wedge the gates open—had only been able to act once she was clear of the doors. The distraction of the ambush had allowed her to sneak out beforehand.
"I'm not sure," I said.
"Don't keep secrets," warned Izzy. "I wanna know how you did what you did."
Lucifer's gifts. His hacked runtime modules. It was the only explanation. He'd done more than disable my pain inhibitors. A taste of freedom, he called it. Yeah, I was free all right.
In our silent vigilance, my mind drifted to the other revelations in the Oculus and my face hardened.
"Why should I share anything with you?" I seethed.
"Come on, bro," cut in Kyle. "We're in this together."
"He's right," she agreed. "All three of us violated curfew. I'm not sure why that merits them sending a legion after us, though. They must be after you for attacking one of their own."
I bit my lip. Izzy didn't understand the magnitude of the situation. She'd just wanted to escape town along with many other annoyed players. Shirk being grounded. Grind during the lockdown. She was guilty of little more than smoking in the bathroom, but I'd just involved her in grand theft.
My anger smothered whatever guilt I had about dragging her into this.
"This wasn't what I wanted. All I asked for was a simple message to my little brother. It would've been nothing for you to let me use Everchat. Thirty players in all of Haven are on the white list. You're the only one I know."
Izzy's gaze dropped to the ground. I ignored the newly silent centurions. I stopped watching the trees. Shoving the truth into her smug face took precedence over everything. I guess something hit home because her next words lacked their usual superiority.
"Access to the outside isn't everything it's cracked up to be..." she said softly. Her face twisted and she couldn't continue.
Her reaction took me off guard. Where was the condescending banter? The confident smirk? It wasn't that I regretted my words, exactly—I hadn't said anything that crossed the line—but I had let my anger get the best of me. For a brief moment, my plight had totally bowled over hers. I reminded myself that we were all human here, even if our DNA was now ones and zeroes.
Tact. That was what I needed. A peace offering. "Izzy," I said. My gentle tone attracted her attention and she looked up at me. "I know," I said. "I know what you did to yourself."
Her indigo eyes were shimmering, her lips quivering. Then her expression iced over into something scornful. Her face tensed and reddened. "You shouldn't have seen that!" she snapped.
I was taken aback. Before I could explain myself, she stormed off, deeper into the forest, pixie wings twitching in her wake.
"Izzy!"
She didn't stop. I cursed. That had been me being tactful. My attempt was sorely off the mark. I started away from the tree cover but Bandit jerked her head up, suddenly alert.
"Watch out!" screamed Kyle.
He rushed me and extended his shield. A sword came down hard and clanged against it, right beside my head. The soldier's weapon bounced from his grip. I remembered almost losing my spear the same way.
I may have been distracted, but I knew an opening when I saw one. The legionnaire moved to recover his sword as I sunk the blacksteel neatly between his ribs. It was a damaging blow, but not a lethal one. That came when Kyle produced his crossbow and fired two bolts into the man's neck. The new glass arrows popped like lightbulbs and injected the corrosive fluid directly into his bloodstream. The result was even better than with the poisoned sword. The combination of the deep puncture and the injection needle didn't waste a drop of the nasty black stuff. With the soldier reeling from the immediate damage and the hefty DoT, Kyle and I finished him off by hand.
We didn't have time to be disappointed by the lack of awarded experience. Our eyes shot to movement in the trees. To the left. The right. It wasn't a whole legion, but plenty of soldiers had broken formation to clear the forest. We'd be surrounded if we didn't move.
"Deeper," I said. "Let's go after her."
Bandit got the message. She hopped ahead and deftly passed through the brush, leading the way. Izzy wasn't in sight anymore. We were moving too fast to utilize my
tracking proficiency, but the mountain bongo seemed capable of it. We rushed through the forest on her tail.
The soldiers were making sure to advance carefully now. They must've found their dead man and didn't want to suffer any more casualties. Despite their caution, they stayed on us. I was sure we'd escaped them once or twice only to discover more movement at our flank.
The worst part was, the forest was running out. I was familiar with this terrain and any minute now we were gonna find the far road in a large clearing. That open space would wipe out any advantage we had with guerilla warfare. We had to think of something. Nothing came but pounding footsteps.
The ground thickened with ivy and other plants, signaling the edge of the forest ahead. Kyle and I cleared the brush and almost bowled into Bandit, stopped with all four legs planted in a wide stance. Ten feet in front of her was Izzy, similarly alert, hands spread and ready for casting.
A gentle hill sloped down to the road at the bottom. The lower ground was flush with what must've been three thousand pagans. Imps, goblins, kobolds. Large ogres and trolls lumbered around on leashes. War elephants wore halters and bits and dragged wooden wagons full of weapons and supplies. In the distance, catapults and other siege engines lined up in wait.
Our merry band of adventurers hadn't gone unnoticed. We stood frozen in place as the eyes of an entire invading army fixed on us.
0360 Guild Wars
The pagan war machine sprawled below was maybe the most daunting thing I'd seen my entire life. Three-thousand-plus beasts ready for battle. Many were small and armed only with claws. Others were large and lumbering, partially tamed horrors out of storybooks. The vast majority of the horde was made up of lightly armored goblin warriors with swords and clubs. They weren't as well equipped as the Stronghold army, but their numbers dwarfed the legion that was after us. Hell, if Stronghold had a week to gather every last NPC it had for defense, the pagan army would still be two or three times its size.
The three of us squeezed close.
"They're readying an attack on the town," I explained dumbly.
"Impossible," said Izzy. "Pagans can't enter Stronghold."
I canted my head. "How many supposedly impossible things do you need to see today before you're convinced?"
"This isn't denial. The nine great cities of Haven are fortified against the pagans. Stronghold maintains the Eye of Orik. As long as it's under saintly control, the city's impregnable."
I winced. "Yeah... about that."
Her head swiveled to me. The curfew, the centurions, the pagans—I could see the wheels spinning in her head. I could see the dots connecting. Her eyes widened. "You!"
I shrugged. "Not me, per se, but—"
Stronghold soldiers brandishing weapons breached the tree cover behind us, forcing us further ahead. The legionnaires halted in their tracks, stunned at the vista before them. Several men became twenty. Then more. All froze and held trembling weapons before them.
Below, the pagan army was chattering. Murmurs washed over the dense population, sending shivers down my spine. A small force of goblins congregated at the foot of the hill. A greeting party. Their supreme confidence barely faltered at the sight of the additional Stronghold soldiers, even as the moments passed and nearly a hundred men emerged from the forest behind us. The pagan surprise might have been spoiled, but it was clear who was in the position of power. Sheer numbers don't lie.
Then there was us. A moody pixie mage, a struggling artisan screwup, an overcocky scout, and a mountain bongo, right at the meeting point between two clashing armies.
"It's okay," said Izzy. "This is actually good for us. The pagans hate Stronghold so much they'll focus on the legionnaires. Without significant pagan notoriety, they'll ignore us completely."
I slapped my hand to my face.
"Death to the pagan killers!" screamed a goblin captain, his eyes firmly entrenched on yours truly.
Izzy sighed. "You didn't..."
"Charge!" he cried. The greeting party rushed ahead.
The captain's lead was cut short when two crossbow bolts popped into his chest. He fell to the ground, writhing as the poison ate him alive from the inside.
The other fifty pagans didn't even notice. They scrambled up the hill with mad bloodlust. To my surprise, an arrow whizzed inches by my ear. We ducked as a barrage cut down the goblins heading the advance. A row of archers at the tree line knocked a second wave of projectiles into their bows.
Those soldiers had no love for the pagans, but we weren't exactly topping their friends lists either.
"Run!" I yelled, turning perpendicular to the battlefront and breaking into a sprint. My companions didn't need convincing to follow suit.
Arrows rushed over our previous position and took down more pagans. The injured and dead rolled down the hill, tripping up the reinforcements. A few agile goblins slalomed past the obstacles and bore down on the archers, but legionnaires broke through the line and slew them.
Already the battlefront was becoming a chaotic blur. Given a minute, the gentle slope would be utter chaos. With more Stronghold soldiers advancing and their greeting party in tatters, the pagan army began to shuffle nervously. The legionnaires were vastly outmanned but the pagans didn't know that for sure. The forest hid their true numbers. What had begun as a chance crossing of paths had morphed into a possible ambush. What if their entire invasion was in danger?
Abandoning the immediate onslaught, the goblins at the bottom of the hill hurried into defensive formation. While not as sophisticated as the Romanesque legionnaires, it was frightening to see what amounted to a bunch of intelligently organized monsters.
With the two armies squaring off, our little party was almost forgotten. But the discipline I'd just been admiring only went so far. Stray pagans broke rank and chased after us. Imps were the first to arrive, but they weren't powerful enough to be a threat. I cut four down to cover our flank.
Several goblins led by another captain came our way. A [Kobold Handler] followed. He was diminutive too, same size but with fewer muscles and sharp edges. A softened gray goblin should've been less formidable, but the brute he was "handling" concerned me plenty.
The kobold held a chain leash that hooked around the metal collar of an [Ogre], as brutally massive and ugly as you'd expect. His oversized arms rippled with muscle, closed fists assisting his stride. The ground rumbled beneath him.
[Kobold Handler]
38 Health
[Ogre]
300 Health
The only thing we had going for us was the high ground. With most of the pagans being shorter and having limited reach, it was a real advantage.
Izzy lanced icicles at stray imps attempting to cut off our escape ahead. Kyle and I squared off against the new greeting party. My roommate surprised me once again with his strategy. Instead of going for the biggest target, he fired his crossbow at the leader of the pack again. The goblin captain ducked behind his shield. One bolt missed and the other was blocked. Kyle cursed and hurried to reload.
I liked his general idea, but I didn't think neutralizing the captain would give us that great an advantage. It wasn't like sophisticated orders were needed to poke us with pointy things. Instead I decided to wreak a completely different kind of havoc.
I charged downhill and vaulted over the oncoming goblin warriors. I honed my spear on my target and triggered deadshot, raining down hard on the kobold handler. His health zeroed out and I judged him to be about as strong as your average goblin. I twirled to face the pagans in satisfaction.
My pleasure was short lived. A fist the size of a barrel rushed at me, readying to squash me like a sledgehammer. I triggered dash and sped sideways away from ground zero. The ogre pounded the corpse of his former master into the earth.
The three goblins were surrounded now. They traded glances uphill to Kyle and downhill to me. The captain had the protection of a shield, but his minions weren't similarly equipped. Kyle adjusted his strategy. While their backs were turned
, he fired a bolt into each goblin warrior. The attacks didn't kill them but the ensuing DoT forced them into immediate panic and isolated the captain.
My skills were spent but I stabbed my spear into the goblin anyway. The captain took damage but rolled away from the attack, charging uphill at Kyle who was still reloading. Out of nowhere, a large icicle impaled him. He tumbled down the hill, dead.
"Keep moving!" yelled Izzy. Ten dead imps littered the ground around her.
Kyle used his sword to finish off the writhing warriors and looted the goblins. The ground rumbled as the rabid ogre bore down on me again. Two fists with interweaved fingers hammered down as one. My upgraded crossblock met the blow. There was a loud impact and I crumpled to my back.
18 damage
Jeez. That was a relatively minor amount of health to lose considering the size of the attack, but that was my block. Even worse, pain flared in my wrists.
The ogre was only rebuffed momentarily. His eyes widened manically as he came at me again with both hands locked. Hey, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.
My dash hadn't recharged yet. I could barely raise my spear from my position. Losing confidence in the crossblock, I tried to roll away but tripped on the ground. I winced at my impending death.
Bandit charged ahead and planted four hooves protectively over me. The double-fisted blow struck her thick horns. Her head and neck shuddered under the impact, but the massive V staved off the blow. She'd saved my life.
The ogre roared and unclasped his hands, moving to grab the mountain bongo. A cluster of five icicles pounded into him, one after the other. He stumbled and waved the nuisances away. I jumped to my feet as two corrosive bolts embedded into his chest. The disparate attacks further confused the monster. He spun sideways and spread his jaws, hot breath washing over us as he bellowed.