Awaken Online: Catharsis

by Travis Bagwell

  Robert observed Claire discreetly. She was busy looking at the strings of information that scrolled across the terminal’s screen. He turned to the tech, quietly adding, “Keep an eye on that player and let me know if you notice anything else that seems unusual.” He was certain that no one had hacked the game, but Robert’s curiosity was piqued.

  * * *

  The next estate was better guarded than the previous manor.

  Jason had collected his zombies in an alley adjacent to the next estate. His eyes shone darkly as he reviewed his troops. He had carefully searched the previous manor before he left and had raised any additional guards that had been slain by his off-group of thieves. His motley group now stood at attention in the alley.

  He pulled up his Summoning Information to assess his numbers:

  The average level of his thieves was level 25. His guards were each level 66 (reduced from approximately level 90). After Jason had summoned the guards in the previous manor, he had still been three zombies shy of his Control Limit. Not being a wasteful sort of person, he had decided to raise three of the servants. He had also equipped them with some of the damaged armor he had found.

  Maybe they will at least be a distraction, he thought skeptically as he surveyed their haggard appearance.

  The servants' entrance at the next estate opened into the alley. He assigned two guards and three thieves at the door. Jason instructed the thieves to wait ten minutes and then infiltrate the manor and clear the nearby rooms. They were to remain within fifty feet of the exit. This group's job was to take out the kitchen staff and then mop up anyone who tried to run out the back.

  I can't have anyone alerting the guards.

  Jason circled back to the front of the manor with his remaining troops. This manor was a two story building with a large open courtyard. It didn't have a gate or any guards patrolling the grounds. Dim lights could be seen from the windows on the second story, and bright lamps could be seen through the ground-floor windows. It was about 10:00pm in-game, and the occupants of the estate were apparently still up and moving about.

  He had four thieves, six guards, and the three servants in his main strike force. He put the servants in front. They would be replaced soon anyway. He gave his zombies careful instructions on what they should do when they entered the estate. His thieves would scout the manor and kill silently using the same tactics as in the last house. Jason and his guards would cover the entrance and act as backup if the thieves were revealed.

  He had learned his lesson from the battle in the last manor. The trick to being a Necromancer was not letting anyone notice you. Jason was now clothed as a guard. The mail was heavy and he hated it, but it was a necessary disguise. He stood off to the side and gave one of his guards instructions on how to act if they were attacked. The fake leader would shout orders and say a bunch of evil sounding nonsense. The other zombies were instructed to ignore his orders and carry out Jason’s original commands.

  Turning to his side, Jason saw that Onyx stood beside him and gazed steadily at the estate before them. He had been acting strange since the last manor, lagging behind the group and taking occasional detours to other streets. It almost seemed like he was reticent to attack the next estate.

  Silly cat.

  Jason turned his attention back to the estate in front of him. The residents were in for a surprise. His lips curled into a grin, and darkness crystallized behind his eyes. Now wasn't the time for hesitation.

  With his strategy in place, Jason commenced the attack.

  A thief entered the front door quietly and then reported back to Jason. Now that he knew they could speak, his thieves had become quite useful as scouts. Two guards stood at the entrance. They were both level 102. Nervous about the level difference, Jason had his thieves slit the guards’ throats from behind and his guard zombies finish them off.

  Jason had just hit level 31. The guards here were a bit higher leveled than those in the last house. The experience he was gaining was incredible. Jason kept putting points into Willpower, raising his Control Limit to nineteen zombies.

  He moved forward and claimed the foyer with his guard zombies. The entrance hall was extravagant. In the center stood a gigantic polished wood staircase. Lamps brightly illuminated the many paintings and tapestries that decorated the walls. Four hallways branched off from the foyer on the ground floor in different directions. He ordered two thieves to search upstairs, while two searched downstairs.

  In the meantime, Jason had his guards destroy one of the servant zombies and he raised the two dead guards at the front door. He was now standing in the midst of a group of eight guards and two servants. He positioned a pair of guards at the entrance of each of the four hallways leading into the foyer. He stood at one of these hallways, while his decoy stood in the middle of the room and acted regal.

  Now I just need to wait for a few minutes until I hear back from my thieves.

  If anyone had been watching Jason's group carefully, they would have noticed that something was off. It appeared that while many of the guards stood eerily still and peered into the hallways, one of the guards was acting strangely. He was cursing softly and focused on something in his hands.

  Jason was actually working on creating something that looked like an evil crown from the scraps of metal and leather he had salvaged. The process wasn’t going well and the damned thing looked terrible.

  By the time his thieves reported back, Jason had created something that vaguely resembled a crown and set it on his fake leader's head. The effect was comical. His “leader” zombie looked like he was attending an anime convention in his homemade “king of darkness” costume.

  Good enough, he thought wryly.

  Onyx lay on the banister to the stairwell and eyed the evil leader zombie with skepticism. He then looked at Jason with an expression that said, “Really? Are you proud of yourself?”

  “I’d like to see you make something better,” Jason muttered at the cat. “Oh wait, you don’t have thumbs!”

  Onyx let out a soft huff and then began licking his paws.

  The pair of thieves that had scouted the upstairs portion of the manor reported back. There was no one left alive on the second floor. The thieves that had scouted the bottom floor indicated that there was a large room located near the back of this manor. The lord of this particular estate was entertaining guests at some kind of banquet. The thieves were concerned that they couldn't take out the servants and guests without being spotted.

  Jason frowned in concentration.

  I'm not certain I can avoid a fight this time. I have two guard zombies wearing this house's livery, but the thieves cut their throats and the guard's attacks ruined their clothing.

  He couldn't think of a clever plan for taking out the group in the banquet hall. It would inevitably turn into a melee. He hoped his curses, numbers, and the occasional Corpse Explosion would be enough to turn the battle in his favor. He moved his force forward quietly until they were near the door to the banquet hall. As far as Jason was aware, the only exits to the estate were the servants' entrance in back and the front door that stood behind his forces. The key was to not let anyone out of the building.

  He ordered his troops into position and provided careful instructions regarding how they were to respond to different combinations of attacks. Once he felt confident that he had planned as well as he could, he appraised his troops one last time. Eight guards and four rogues (he didn't count the cannon fodder zombies) were going to take on an indeterminate number of people. He could only hope that most of the NPCs in the room were servants or unarmed nobles.

  Jason felt his pulse quicken in anticipation of the coming battle. The familiar chill that permeated his body softened his anxiety, and all he felt was subdued excitement at the impending battle. The creeping cold that permeated his mind seemed almost a permanent fixture now.

  Onyx eyed Jason carefully as he crouched near the doorway to the banquet hall. Since the last manor, Jason’s body had radia
ted dark mana continuously. This was now the longest period of time that he had channeled his dark mana. Onyx’s tail twitched erratically, and his expression seemed conflicted.

  Meanwhile, images flashed through Jason's mind. He saw the slumped and sickened bodies of the people in the south-side - the filth and the dilapidated buildings. He felt calm. The nobles had this coming. They deserved this. He wanted to make them pay.

  Without doubt or hesitation, he ordered his troops to attack.

  The guard zombies threw open the doors of the banquet hall, revealing a large room with an enormous vaulted ceiling. Jason noted nearly thirty people in the hall, a medley of guards, nobles, and servants. Long tables were positioned at regular intervals along the length of the hall, and most of the guests were seated. The guards ringed the room and servants stood in between the tables, carrying plates of food.

  As he surveyed the room, Jason shivered with a mixture of excitement and adrenaline. A grim smile grew on his face, and his eyes were filled with an unholy light.

  At the sound of the doors banging open, the occupants of the estate turned with shocked expressions. Capitalizing on the moment of surprise, Jason immediately started casting Curse of Weakness on the guards throughout the room.

  His zombies didn’t hesitate and rushed into the room, quickly slaying two of the manor's guardsmen before they had a chance to react. Blood flowed freely where the zombies’ blades struck and the guards let out muffled gurgles as they toppled.

  His thieves had activated Sneak at the start of the fight and circled around to the back of the banquet hall. When they heard the commotion, they entered through the backdoor to the hall used by the servers. The thieves took advantage of the confusion and ambushed the guardsmen standing near the back of the hall, driving their daggers into exposed necks and backs.

  The fight was underway. Chaos reigned as people screamed and moved frantically about the room. Nobles darted under tables. Steel clashed as the guards fought back against the zombies. Blood splashed and tables were overturned in the whirlwind of the battle. Jason continued to cast Curse of Weakness at random intervals since he had trouble targeting more than one guard at a time. As he watched the melee, he saw two of his guard zombies fall.

  Regardless, the tide of battle seemed to be turning in Jason's favor.

  In the confusion, he discreetly raised the two enemy guards that had been slain near the front of the hall. This burned a lot of his remaining mana, but bought him two new soldiers to replace the ones that had fallen. The raised guards had the advantage of surprise. The guardsmen defending the hall didn't expect to be attacked by their own.

  He looked at the two guards he had told to stand back near the entrance. They were there to provide Jason with cover if someone noticed him in the shadows near the entrance or tried to run towards the main doors. He wondered if he should order them to enter the fray so that he could finish this.

  I wonder where this estate’s lord is? I would have expected him to be as strong as the knight.

  His fake leader zombie was standing near the center of the hall cackling and spouting evil-sounding catchphrases as he swung his longsword two-handed. Suddenly, a large ball of fire hurtled across the room and struck the leader zombie in mid-cackle. The leader zombie promptly erupted in flames and then moved frantically about the room trying to put himself out.

  The scam works! Jason thought gleefully.

  He was quite happy to be the one that was not currently on fire. Jason tried to suppress a chuckled as he watched his stand-in running in circles in the middle of the room. Onyx observed the flaming zombie from beside Jason and made a noise that almost sounded like a snort of amusement.

  Jason glanced at the source of the fireball and saw the manor's lord standing in a corner with two guards. He was a middle aged man with a long, greying beard. He wore a flamboyant orange robe embroidered with red flames. In one hand, he held a staff, while streamers of flame curled around his free hand. The man glared at the guard zombies attacking his guests.

  Shit! He's a mage.

  A quick inspection revealed that he was level 102.

  “How dare you attack my guests!” the mage roared in anger. His face turned a bright red, and a vein pulsed in his forehead.

  “I will make you pay, spawn of the dark! BURN!”

  Flames swirled around the mage and then rushed out into the room, forming hundreds of small balls of flame along the room’s towering ceiling. The flaming orbs slowly began to grow in size as the mage continued to channel his spell. A manic grin was plastered onto the man’s face, and he appeared to be wreathed in flame.

  This doesn’t look good. This looks like a variation on a meteor shower spell.

  As the orbs of flame reached a certain size, they dropped from the ceiling and streaked towards Jason's zombies. The undead dove for cover to avoid the torrential flames. Where the orbs struck, they splashed against rotten flesh and disintegrated bone at an alarming rate. Two of his guards were too slow to dodge the orbs and were engulfed instantly.

  Crap!

  The mage laughed cruelly, “BURN!”

  Flames continued to cascade off the enemy mage's body and rush towards newly forming orbs along the ceiling. Jason really couldn't afford to let him get off another cast. Judging from the way the flames flowed from the mage to the orbs along the ceiling, Jason assumed he had to continually channel his mana into the spell. At least this caused the spell to have a lengthy casting time. He ordered the two guards he had kept by his side to rush the mage. He had saved up enough mana during the last few minutes of the melee to cast Corpse Explosion on both guards.

  “Kamikaze!” he roared, breaking Sneak and pointing at the fire mage.

  The remaining guards in the room immediately moved to act as a rough defensive line, helping to clear a path for the two suicide bombers rushing at the mage. He saw the mage's lips curl into a smirk, as he slowed the channeling on the meteor shower spell and conjured a wall of flame in front of his two guards.

  The heat from the fire wall melted the nearby tableware and charred the floor and walls. The two guards closest to the mage backed away from the wall quickly and huddled near the mage. The enemy mage was clearly expecting the firewall to stop the two zombie guards that rushed toward him, and he turned his attention back to channeling his AOE spell.

  Idiot.

  Right before the two guard zombies reached the wall of flame, Jason completed casting Corpse Explosion and they both exploded violently. Jason's other undead had pulled back as the two suicide bombers reached the fire wall. All but one guard had made it out of the blast radius. This had been part of his “Kamikaze” instruction.

  Jason couldn't see through the wall of flame and the debris caused by his Corpse Explosion, so he glanced at the damage window.

  -2056 Damage. 706 Overkill.

  Guard Dies. 7000 Experience (-70% EXP due to level difference)

  -2081 Damage. 731 Overkill.

  Guard Dies. 7000 Experience (-70% EXP due to level difference)

  -1100 Damage (STUNNED). 900 Damage Absorbed.

  Shit. The mage is still alive.

  The stun must have interrupted the mage's spells, because both the globes of fire hovering along the ceiling and the fire wall began to dwindle and fade. As the flames of the firewall parted, Jason could make out the bodies of the two guards. They had nearly been ripped in half by the force of the blast. Jason's guards were now level 69 and had almost 1,000 health each. The combined explosion had done a ludicrous amount of damage.

  The mage was partially protected from the explosion by the bodies of the two guards protecting him. He must have also cast some form of damage shield when the battle started. This had kept him alive, but he was no longer on the offense.

  Jason didn't wait for the mage to recover.

  “Assassinate,” Jason yelled while pointing at the mage.

  Every thief in the room turned their milky eyes toward the mage and then sprinted in his direction. The first
two thieves to arrive leapt over the waning flames of the fire wall. One thief hit the floor and used his momentum to slide forward, slicing deeply into mage's legs as he passed. The mage toppled to the ground. The other thief rushed forward and jumped onto the man, thrusting both of his daggers deeply into his throat. The combined attack was too much for the shaken mage, and he died on the floor in a pool of his own blood.

  The fight was over. Jason stood in the center of the room, and his dark gaze took in the carnage around him. Fires smoldered throughout the room and smoke filled the air. Several tables had been overturned, and the room was littered with crushed food and tableware. Bodies lay strewn over tables and chairs, while puddles of blood pooled on the floor.

  Onyx sat on a chair beside Jason and glanced at the wreckage that was once a regal banquet hall. He turned to Jason with an expression that said, “Again? Look at this mess!”

  Rolling his eyes at the cat, Jason did a headcount of his remaining zombies. He had lost a total of seven guard zombies, including the two he had detonated. One of his thieves had also fallen, but the rest had taken only minor wounds

  I wish I had a healing spell for the undead.

  No one in the manor had made it out alive, and he counted over thirty corpses littered around the banquet hall. The bodies hadn't been that badly damaged since he didn't detonate his guard zombies in the middle of the room. He eyed the corpses greedily. He now had plenty of materials available to raise additional minions to replace the ones he had lost.

  Jason ordered his zombies to move the bodies of the house guards along one wall and to place the corpses of the servants in a far corner. He sent one thief to inform the group of undead he had left guarding the servants' entrance to move inside the manor. Jason was afraid that the zombie might be spotted by a passing troop of city guards. He ordered a separate group of minions to close the front door and then stand guard in the foyer.