by Domino Finn
"It's madness out here," said Izzy.
"Much worse than what's going on in town," I pointed out.
"Except, in case you didn't notice, everyone else is headed there as well."
Kyle nodded. "No matter which way you slice it, it's a bad idea to go back."
"I can't believe I agree with the frat boy," she muttered. Kyle scowled her way.
"I thought you said you liked that town," I said. "Was Lucifer right about you? That you finally found a life you wanted to live?"
She worked her jaw and watched the distant city. I could tell she didn't like seeing it threatened. "What happened to you back there?" she asked.
I paused uncertainly.
"You were gonna let that giant squash you," she explained.
"My leg was broken. I couldn't move."
"It's more than that. It wasn't just your movement being negated. You were rolling on the floor. What happened?"
I sighed. "Lucifer turned off my pain filter. Every time I take damage, I feel it like it's real."
Their breaths momentarily caught in their throats.
"And you're still willing to fight Orik?" she asked. "His army?"
I shrugged weakly. What could I say?
"I don't know," said Kyle. "Realistically, what could we hope to do?"
"We need to warn the city. Tell the people what we know. Help them defend Stronghold."
Izzy's face darkened.
"Or we could cut our losses," offered Kyle. "That town never did me any favors. We could cut our losses and head east. There's a fishing city called Shorehome that way. I've never been high enough level to visit until now. I just made 4. We could make that our new home."
Kyle's suggestion was cold and heartless, but it was also practical. I thought it unlike him. Then I realized he'd been taking my cautionary advice to heart.
The detached surgery of Kyle's idea seemed to warn Izzy off that line of thinking. She wasn't used to backing away from a fight, perhaps, but I thought it was something else. Maybe she considered Stronghold worth saving.
"That's an even worse option," she said reluctantly. "I'll fight. But only if we're smart about it. We need guarantees the white robes won't turn on us."
I snorted. "What are we supposed to do? Just ask the saints for a powwow—" I paused as I realized the sheer simplicity of it all. I opened my menu and hit the green help button. Seconds later, a man popped in.
"Hello, sir. It is good to see the seven suns of Ejiya are still shining upon you."
I massaged my temples and took a measured breath. Varnu Johnson stood at full attention in his scarlet military getup.
"Varnu, we need to talk to Saint Peter right away. It's an emergency."
"Of course it is, sir. I am equipped to handle any emergencies you encounter."
"No, seriously. The Eye has been reunited with Orik. He's tearing himself out of the mountain as we speak. Stronghold will be facing more than a pagan horde."
"By the eight arms of Stranja, that sounds serious."
"It is." I waited but the minimum-wage tech-support employee just blinked at me. "What are you doing?" I asked impatiently.
"Besides enjoying Texas french fry vindaloo? I am assisting with your emergency, sir."
"How?"
Varnu was taken aback. "Well, you see, I am filing a report." He mimed emphatic typing with his hands.
"That's not good enough, Varnu. We need to talk to Saint Peter."
"Impossible. Please to be describing your emergency once more."
I rolled my eyes. "You're just stalling."
"Describing sources of stress will help residents feel like their opinions are relevant. Oh dear, I don't think I was supposed to read that out loud."
"Never mind," I snapped, and waved the tech support away. Varnu disappeared and left me in a foul mood. "This is useless. I'm blocked. One of you needs to do it."
Kyle arched his eyebrow at me. "You serious, bro? The saints don't answer personal calls for help past the first few days. They settle new residents in but have more important duties. They pass everyone off to tech support." Kyle thought hard about the problem. "What about you?" he asked Izzy. "You're the Haven VIP. You have access to the white robes."
She looked away, annoyed by the implication. "It's my living father that has the privilege. Not me in here. Everchat's for his sake, not mine. I hate talking to him." She frowned. "That's why I killed myself in the first place. Talking to him is the only part of Haven I hate. I skip it when I can, but I'm forced to be social once in a while."
Kyle was awkwardly silent. When Izzy realized he hadn't known about her death and she had just revealed the details, her face flushed.
"Wait, wait," I said, trying to keep everyone from each other's throats. "I have another idea."
I opened my menu again. The green help button was still active. Why not? With outsourced tech support playing interference, there was no reason to impede access. This time, however, I clicked the other button. The little red spider icon.
Izzy and Kyle looked over my shoulder at the floating screen.
"You're gonna file a bug report?" she asked skeptically.
"It's worth a shot." I began filling in the form.
WHAT IS YOUR ISSUE?
Ancient god has risen from the dead to destroy all life.
ON A SCALE OF 1-5, HOW WOULD YOU RATE THE SEVERITY OF THIS ISSUE?
99999
PLEASE SPECIFY IN EXPLICIT STEPS HOW TO REPRODUCE THIS ISSUE.
Uh...
1) Get tricked by devil into stealing Eye of Orik.
2) Give gemstone to eyeless boggart witches.
3) Run like hell.
I sighed. I'd thought the idea was viable, but reading the generic form questions deflated me. I submitted the bug report and swiped my menu away.
THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUBMISSION! YOUR VIGILANCE HELPS MAKE HAVEN A BETTER EXPERIENCE FOR ALL RESIDENTS!
"Who knows when they'll read that," muttered Kyle.
"Or if," added Izzy.
The brewmaster put his hands on his hips. "So we have to run, then."
She scoffed. "Yes, let's all listen to the fuckup."
"Hey, maybe we both killed ourselves, but at least with me it was an accident."
Izzy's indigo lips twisted. She lifted her frost wand, glowing icy blue. "I can show you what it's like when it's not an accident."
"Stop it!" I thrust my hands out to separate them. "You guys are acting like slaves to your previous lives." I stared at each of them hard. "We're in Haven now, aren't we? This isn't about the past. It isn't about giving up or goofing off. It's about that city and that army and that one-eyed abomination. It's about the three of us and Bandit."
Their expressions didn't share my camaraderie. I had to get more personal.
"Izzy, stop denying it. Lucifer was right when he said you found something you liked. You're the best player in town. You spend your free time showing off in the Arena and putting on juggling shows. You like being good. You like the attention it brings. But he was also right about you being an escapist. You avoid Everchat. You do everything solo. You act like you wouldn't care if the whole world was on fire. It's time to stop living in denial and embrace who you are. Who you want to be."
Her eyes were fixed on Kyle, but her chest heaved as she took manic breaths. He smirked at my admonition of her.
"And Kyle, your problem's not too different. You accept this world, sure, but only as long as the brew is pouring and the entertainment's ongoing. You haven't had success until you started taking this seriously, right? Open your eyes, man. This means something. Our party, our city, our world. This is reality, not fantasy."
His face soured. I knew he'd started to see the light already. He just wasn't used to it yet.
"The past is the past, guys. Can we please deal with the future?"
Their faces remained firm, neither wanting to back down before the other. I hissed.
"Fine, I'm going back. There're a lot of people who need
our help. If you wanna stay here and kill each other, be my guest."
I stomped away toward town, Bandit in tow. It was fifty-fifty whether crashing icicles or crossbow bolts would fill the void behind me, but only silence followed. After a minute of marching, Izzy and Kyle fell in step beside me, glowering. I tried to hide my smile.
0410 Bastion
Instead of plowing north to the field where the pagans gathered, we headed east until we were directly south of Stronghold. Our approach was likely to go unnoticed in the night. Even if we were spotted, the entire army wouldn't drop their preparations to go after us. Goblins and imps aren't the model of discipline but they're not a pack of rabid dogs either. As their final siege engines funneled in from the forest road and took up the rear, the army waited with one eye on town and another on their awakened god.
Orik bellowed at the summit as the mountain birthed him. Boulders larger than me tumbled down the cliff side. Anyone within a hundred miles would know something was horribly wrong.
If we couldn't get behind Stronghold's walls, we wouldn't survive the hour.
"So what's the bright idea?" asked Izzy.
Kyle kicked a stone into the river. It was the same one that led into Stronghold, and as far east as we could go without crossing. "Please tell me you don't expect us to knock."
I chewed my lip. Knocking beat the alternatives. We wanted in and we wanted the attention of the saints. Walking right up to the gate would accomplish both tasks. Assuming they opened the doors for us.
Then again, Stronghold's legions were readying for battle. The west gate was likely barricaded—the heaviest fortified position in the town. If the centurions did grant admittance, there was no guarantee they'd give us an audience with the white robes. After our little show earlier, they might think it more prudent to simply tear us apart.
"Keep moving," I told them. "I'm gonna scout ahead."
I whistled and Bandit cantered up. I hopped on her back and charged upriver. She was happy to open up to top speed. Her hooves beat against the grass and we made good time. I first looked for a place to cross the water—Stronghold's east gate should be an easier problem—except the river outside the city wasn't nicely tamed by stone walls. It was wild and jagged white water rushing from the mountains. Much more treacherous than the smooth flow inside. Bandit galloped all the way up to where the river fed underneath Stronghold's towering stone walls.
An underground tunnel. Thick steel bars gated the passage closed. A rusted lock mechanism stood above the current. That was our way in.
My smile was short lived.
A gargantuan cry rang out from the top of the summit. Orik was free. Every single pagan on the battlefield hollered in response. The war cries turned the air and wilted the grass. When the voices finally died down, the drum beats and horns began a steady rhythm.
The army marched and the earth shook. The pagans were on the move.
I jumped on Bandit's back and made for my party. Kyle and Izzy had picked up their pace. As they raced past me, Bandit turned in a tight loop and followed.
"The river gate," I called above the din. "We need to break in with your corrosive."
Kyle nodded as he ran, watching the hordes of goblins bearing down on us, far across the tended land but covering ground quickly. I had no doubt we'd beat them to the wall. The pertinent worry was whether or not we'd be able to breach it in time.
We reached the wall as Stronghold's horns sounded. These weren't curved pagan horns fashioned from gourds. This was a brass choir of trumpets performing an upbeat tempo. The goblin army was halfway across the plains now. The city opened fire.
Arrows arced high into the sky. What we'd seen before of Stronghold's archers was a pale comparison. This wasn't a hasty pursuit; it was carefully prepared city defense. The mass of arrows blackened out the moon for a still moment before raining down on the horde with gut-wrenching effect. Imps and goblins collapsed under the onslaught. Heavy arrows harried larger creatures.
I'd expected the converging front to panic. To slow and stumble. Instead, the fallen were trampled beneath their fellow soldiers. The horde was an unstoppable mass now, feeding on bloodlust that had been pent up for hundreds of years.
The pagans were finally storming Stronghold. Even death itself couldn't stem the tide.
"I think this will work," hurried Kyle. He dropped into the water, pressed against the river gate by the incoming current. He scaled sideways to the lock and squeezed a crossbow bolt inside its mechanism, snapping off the tip and pouring acid into its guts. "That should do it." He produced his hammer and went to work. The banging sounds were lost in the clamor of battle. Unfortunately, the hammering didn't get anywhere.
"Move aside," said Izzy.
Kyle edged sideways along the gate to clear the way. Izzy kneeled by the river and splashed water onto the lock. Her wand came up and froze the water. It frosted from within and grew outward like a crust. Then she formed an icicle in her palm and flung it at the lock.
The entire gate rang with the impact. Still, it held closed.
"That's one strong lock," I noted.
Kyle placed a hand in the air, asking for a moment. "Dudes, just leave it up to Brewmaster Kyle." He reached into his pouch and pulled out something like his old grenades, except this time the fluid inside was a ruddy yellow. He took another step along the gate, lined up his aim, and tossed it at the lock.
A fiery explosion engulfed the opening. Izzy and I shielded our eyes. Kyle, too close, lost a third of his health. The blast swung the gate open against the current, with him still clinging to the heavy bars.
"It worked," said Izzy, betraying her shock.
Kyle smiled in a daze, soot on his face. "All hail the brewmaster."
We helped him into the tunnel. "You too, Bandit," I said. "It's too dangerous out here." The wild girl didn't want anything to do with the town but the trembling fields and mountain slopes weren't exactly comforting either. She plopped into the river. I pulled her by a horn to guide her safely inside. As I slammed the heavy steel gate shut, I took one last look at Blind Man's Peak.
Orik was descending the mountain.
0420 Team Fortress
We needed some hacks to get the gate closed again. The explosion had flung a crossbar open. We reaffixed it after only minor repair. The lock was the bigger problem. It was completely wrecked. Even though it was now worthless, we set it up so it looked like it held fast. Izzy froze the fractured pieces together with magic. It wouldn't keep the horde out but, with any luck, they wouldn't think to check the river gate.
"What was that?" I asked Kyle, referring to the explosion.
"I told you. I'm a brewmaster now. Flame gel is my new skill branch. I'm gonna be a badass battle alchemist, whipping up potions and concoctions to help out the party. I think I'm gonna like being an artisan."
I clapped his back and chuckled. "Brewmaster Kyle."
He nodded proudly. "The brewery part will take some work."
A short swim through the tunnel led us to the other side of the sturdy city wall. The lock on the inner gate cracked with only the corrosive. We crawled to dry land and found ourselves back in Oldtown. The empty ruins sprawled before us. It wasn't a huge neighborhood. Quaint almost, to imagine the town had once been so small. Of course, there was nothing quaint about the neighborhood's central monument.
Dragonperch loomed a short distance downriver. The half-crumbled statue on the roof foreshadowed the fate of the entire city. If only we had great heroes like that still alive. Instead their monuments flaked away to dust while old gods emerged from the land.
"That's our destination," I said. We navigated over the rubble of toppled buildings.
"I don't think we need to hide," said Izzy.
Oldtown was abandoned, as always, but across the river was Hillside and the Foot farther north. Everything was a mad scramble in those residential areas. Every single player knew a pagan army was descending on them. Even the watchmen marching by in the distance were
n't paying attention to us.
"Maybe not." I scurried down the brickwork along the river's edge and followed the ledge to the underground grotto. Bandit traversed the thin platform easier than any of us. Inside, we could finally take a minute to relax. I immediately recovered the bit key and slipped it into my inventory.
"How'd you find this?" asked Izzy reverently. She studied the paintings and statues adorning the secret place.
I hit up the antique weapon rack and compared the available spears. They were all noob weapons, for display only. I grabbed the best one and led the others to the inner tower door.
"What do you say? Can the dual terrors of fire and ice break into Dragonperch?"
Izzy approached the barred door leading inside the tower proper. "No way. This is warded tight. Same as the outer doors." She turned to us. "I've tried them before. Many times. Absolutely no way into Dragonperch. I promise you."
I cursed and thought about the many threats headed our way. It was past midnight. That marked the end of my first day in Haven. It had been an incredible experience so far, but hindsight revealed just how much I'd failed at. How much I still didn't know. Without a safe zone I couldn't contact Derek, but we had more pressing concerns. Knowledge about the pagans or the Eye of Orik was paramount.
I thought of the texts I'd seen in the Pantheon portico.
"I really wish we could get into the tower. There's supposed to be a great library in here, right? Maybe we can find something to help against the Nine. I'd rather approach Saint Peter with an idea instead of my hands in my pockets."
"You don't need an ancient tower for lore," said Izzy. "You just need ancient texts."
"Yeah, well, I'm new and Kyle doesn't take Haven history too seriously. What's your excuse?"
"Excuse?" Izzy scoffed. "You're in luck. I specialize."
A very large tome blinked into her arms. It was a dusty hardbound book a foot and a half tall that must've had thousands of pages and weighed as much as one of the bricks that built this tower. Kyle and I peeked over Izzy's shoulder as she flipped it open. She typed into a search bar and the animated pages flapped. A scroll bar along the bottom of the display sped to the middle of the book. When Izzy noticed us reading along, she increased the size of the text.