Neverfall: The Dark Path (Book 2): A Gamelit Lit RPG Series

by C. Wintertide

  She simply started walking towards the gate out of the village and called over her shoulder in her gruff voice, “We have a plan. Now let’s move out.”

  They all hurried after her. Christopher started to plot a course for them which would allow them to hit as many of the quests as efficiently as possible. Mack, though, wasn’t having any of it.

  “You’re asking us all to pretend your navigating has gotten better than a bunch of cats in a bag, huh?” Mack teased.

  Christopher, who was telling Alicia which way she should head when they left the village gate, replied frostily, “I will prove to you that I have improved greatly. I will lead us expertly to every location.”

  “Oh, Hell no. We will be walking in circles all day!” Mack exclaimed. “Just set a marker and be done with it.”

  Christopher narrowed his eyes. “We shall see.”

  “Let’s make a wager, shall we?” Mack suggested.

  “You have nothing I want.” Christopher sniffed.

  “You don’t know that! I could very well obtain some loot that might interest you!”

  “All I want is your apology.” Another sniff.

  “And if you lead us into some terrible danger with your navigating skills, I get to say ‘I told you so’ in song. The whole of the inn will sing it.” Mack spread his hands wide as he clearly imagined the slew of people singing about Christopher’s mistake.

  “Will they also sing your apology for when I lead us unerringly to our goals?” Christopher asked.

  “Of course! You can even make up the lyrics. But I know I’m going to win,” Mack retorted.

  Cassie leaned in towards Luke as Christopher and Mack continued to bicker. “It’s like living with the Odd Couple.”

  “Totally.” Luke smirked.

  “Looks like all of the people have gone back to their homes outside of the walls,” Cassie remarked as she took in lightly populated streets that had been filled to overflowing the night before.

  Mack and Christopher’s bickering suddenly stopped. Luke looked over at them and saw that Mack was staring down at the ground. “Yeah, but they left some things behind.”

  Mack lifted up his boot and Luke realized that he had stepped into some animal dung.

  “Oh, man, that’s… too realistic,” Luke laughed.

  “Your dad really thought of everything.” Mack scrapped his boot on the grass to clean it off.

  They had just reached the gate then and Luke’s gaze went to the guard who was patrolling it. His heart was in his throat as he thought it might be Renard. Perhaps he had respawned and everything would be as it was. But the guard turned and Luke’s heart fell into his feet. It was a different guard. Renard remained dead by his hand.

  Luke finally forced himself to say, “Yeah, Mack, my dad thought of everything.”

  8

  THE GLOWING PATH

  They stood before the glowing blue path that Luke and Christopher had found just the other day. It felt like ages ago. The thick grass glowed an electric blue, and sparks of light drifted upwards from the blades into the air. The path curled its way around thick tree trunks before disappearing into the far distance.

  Cassie was kneeling down by the grass, trying to catch some of the sparks. They always eluded her grasp somehow. Her green eyes reflected the glow, and were wide with wonder and excitement.

  “There’s got to be something good at the end of this,” Cassie enthused.

  “Oh, aye, it’s bound to be brilliant,” Mack agreed. He was munching on a bunch of the dark purple grapes that grew in the field just outside of the forest. Luke and Christopher had waxed so poetic about them that all of the group had to stop and eat a few. Mack was addicted. Purple juice stained his beard as he stared at the path with a look of satisfaction. “It so obviously says, Come this way, adventurers, and seek your fortune… or your death!”

  Cassie was still stuck on the loot as she said, “Definitely something magical down there. Absolutely something we can sell for loads of gold.”

  “If it’s magical, we will likely need it, and we shouldn’t sell it,” Christopher replied. He had one foot on the path and hundreds of the little sparks were whirling around his robes. He reached out a hand and they danced along his fingers.

  Cassie rose up and stared at her brother with narrowed eyes. “Do you remember in Dragon’s Reign when I let you keep that damn gem, and in exchange, we all agreed that the next piece of loot that came our way I got to sell, and swim in the gold like Scrooge McDuck?”

  Christopher’s expression went curiously blank, which meant that he did remember. He had a photographic memory after all. “I believe that was an agreement made just in that game. This one--”

  “No!” Cassie stuck out her right palm into Christopher’s face as if she were a traffic cop. “It applies here and now, Christopher! Whatever is at the end of this glowing path is mine, and I will choose what to do with it. It is only fair, little brother.”

  Christopher closed his dark eyes for a moment as if in pain. Appealing to fairness actually worked with him. While most people would say life isn’t fair, and one had to deal with that fact, Christopher was the exact opposite. He wanted life to be fair. He strove to make his little corner of the universe as fair as possible. And Cassie’s argument obviously appealed to him. But that meant a magical item might be sacrificed for coin, and it clearly pained him no end.

  “I realize that you may have some claim to this next piece of loot, but I do request that you consider that if it is something extraordinary, that you not sell it. We may need it for something far greater than simply to fill our coin purses,” Christopher said as he opened his eyes, and looked at her with desperate pleading.

  Cassie, however, was as immune to her brother’s arguments and pleading as he was swayed by hers. He always wanted to save things in case they were needed in the future. She always figured they’d find something else to use in their next adventure.

  While they discussed what was going to happen with the next treasure they found, Luke opened up his Menu and went to the Items tab. He studied it more carefully this time to see all that he had missed the other times he’d merely glanced at it. He noted that there was indeed a weight limit. It was a rather generous one at 200 pounds. Even with all of his armor and weapons added up, he was only currently carrying 24.5 pounds. Coins, thankfully, did not seem to have any weight. He had no health or mana potions at the moment so he was stripped down literally to his base equipment. That gave him 175.5 pounds to play with.

  He wondered if things like arrows or bolts would have weight. And what about the herbs that they had to gather for Maxina, for example? Would they weigh anything? And was the amount he could carry based on his Strength or on the bag he had or a combination of both? It was a magic bag that allowed even the largest of items to slip inside while the bag never grew larger. He had seen some other bags at Esme’s. Maybe if they upgraded their bags, they could carry more. He’d have to investigate that after they had some money to spend. But, in any case, they would have to be careful with inventory management as they had a long day ahead of them with a lot of looting to do.

  He went over to the Stats tab to check how many experience points he needed to get to the next level. In order to reach Level 6, he needed 1750 experience points. He had already obtained 325 of those through their last fight with the skeletons. He was sure that leveling up was going to get sufficiently harder from here on out. And likely the rewards for doing so would grow less and less. His hope was for them to raise two levels today, if not more.

  Finally, he checked to see if they could Save. But no. The commands for saving and exiting the game were still totally grayed out. He had a momentary thought to record what they were doing in the Chat Box for the people in Neverfall headquarters, but decided against it and logged out of the Menu. His father could be reading everything he sent, and besides, he’d already informed Dr. Armitage and the others on the outside that they were going to quest and build up their experien
ce points. The exact steps they were taking and quests they were going on didn’t really matter.

  But shouldn’t Dr. Armitage be advocating for us to do certain quests and telling us to avoid others to aid us? So what’s with the radio silence? Maybe he really is worried that my father’s watching. Still, some guidance would be nice.

  “Shall we start on the yellow brick road?” Mack asked as he finished off his grapes and tossed the stem into the underbrush.

  “It’s blue, and there aren’t any bricks,” Alicia pointed out pedantically.

  “Are you trying to take over Christopher’s role as pointer-out-of-the-obvious?” Mack needled her.

  “My point was for you to not compare this to something benign. This path is magical. It will lead to something magical that will likely rip our faces off. Be on alert,” Alicia explained, and started stalking forward ahead of the group with her cudgel out.

  “She’s a real bundle of fun, that one,” Mack muttered.

  Luke smiled and clapped him on the back as they followed after her. With every step they took, the intensity of the glow brightened, and more of the little sparks of light lifted into the air and danced around them. It was beautiful, and Alicia was right that it was clearly magical, which meant dangerous.

  Luke ignited one hand with Firestream and drew out Dragon’s Claw with the other. The steel rang as he did so. Mack unsheathed his axe and held it loosely in his right hand. Christopher cast Shield on them and the golden glow of the spell joined the blue glow from the path. Cassie spun her dual daggers with nervous excitement.

  “Be on the lookout for webbing. Remember Christopher’s and my experience with the Death’s Head Spiders,” Luke warned in a low voice.

  They had all unconsciously started to speak lower the moment they had entered the canopy of trees. The air in the forest was still, unlike the pleasant breezes that had rustled the grape vines and stalks of golden wheat in the fields surrounding Lethbridge. The forest was far quieter as well. It felt like the trees were holding their breath. The rustling their feet made in the grass seemed incredibly loud. When Mack stepped on a fallen branch, and it snapped, all of them jumped. Alicia glared at him. Mack had given her a sheepish smile in response.

  But it wasn’t just the lack of air movement and silence that was different in the forest as opposed to the fields, it was the lack of visible life. In the fields, there had been people everywhere they looked tending to the grapes or cutting the wheat or hanging out clothes to dry, not to mention little kids racing around after one another. Unlike the first time that Luke and Christopher had walked past them, the villagers had waved. News of their deeds had spread far and wide, and they were seen favorably instead of greeted with suspicion. Well, except for Alicia. People still fled from her like she had the plague. But in the forest, life seemed to be hiding from them.

  Luke had caught sight of a few drifts of gray webbing well off the path in the trees, but no actual living spiders. He’d also seen something glowing blue-white and flitting between the tree trunks about twenty feet away. When he’d started towards where one of those glowing things bounced, Cassie had grabbed his arm and pulled him back firmly onto the path.

  Her voice had been a fierce whisper as she’d said, “I don’t think it’s safe to leave this path. I’m pretty sure that if we wander off of it we’re not going to find our way back, and we want to see what’s at the end, right?”

  “Right,” he’d agreed and steadfastly ignored the other orbs that appeared in greater numbers as they’d delved deeper into the forest.

  The stillness of the air, the oppressive silence along with the half-seen glowing glittering orbs soon had Luke’s shoulders drawn up practically to his ears as tension filled him. He rolled the fingers of his left hand and the flames of his spell shot higher. He just wanted them to find an enemy and kill it. He couldn’t stand the anticipation. Alicia suddenly halted and let out a soft grunt. Luke stepped up to her side, heart hammering in his chest, and the sick, bitter wash of adrenaline on his tongue as well. Cassie stepped up on Alicia’s other side.

  “What is it?” Luke asked.

  “I smell stone,” she said.

  Luke furrowed his brow. That was not what he’d expected her to say. “You smell… stone?”

  She nodded. “And ozone. Like the scent before a storm. There is something beyond the next curve in the path.”

  “I’ll go scout ahead,” Cassie said, spun her daggers, crouched low to the ground, and sprinted forward absolutely silently.

  Luke watched her go with a sense of trepidation. They had just gotten her back from the dungeon, and he didn’t want to lose her again. But she was fearless. Even if she’d stood still long enough for him to object, it would have been pointless as she wouldn’t have listened. And she shouldn’t listen.

  It made sense for her to scout the way forward. She was a rogue after all. No blundering around, drawing attention to herself like they were doing. She might even be able to make some Stealth kills so that whatever they were going to face would be lessened in number by the time they got there. Though all of that was completely logical, Luke found that he didn’t like having any of his friends out of his sight. He told himself that he should get over this feeling, but he remembered his father’s warnings. Neverfall was unforgiving. It wanted to kill the weak, and they were still very weak.

  I’m not going to lose them. I will protect them. It will be fine. This was a mantra that he decided to repeat any time he felt this fear.

  He got his chance to repeat it quite a few times for the five minutes that Cassie was gone, which felt like hours, but soon she re-appeared, dashing around the curve of the path. Her green eyes were shining, and her cheeks were flushed with excitement. She stopped in front of them, not even breathing hard though she’d been running at full speed. They all huddled around her as she gave her report.

  “Alicia’s right,” she rushed out. “There is a large stone structure ahead of us. It looks incredibly old. There’s something very Japanese about it. It reminds me of an old Shinto shrine. Matter of fact, I think it is some kind of temple. I didn’t go inside, but I could see a statue of some sort at the far back, and the stumps of candles all around it. Some of the roof is caved in, so there’s enough light even without them lit.”

  “Did you see anything guarding the temple or shrine or whatever it is?” Luke asked, certain there had to be some kind of enemy there.

  But Cassie shook her head. “Nothing. But I did feel like I was being watched. I can’t explain it. But the skin between my shoulder blades was twitching up a storm.”

  Mack shifted his axe between his right and left hands. “Then all we can do is keep going forward and see what jumps out.”

  Luke reluctantly nodded. “Christopher, keep us shielded. We have no idea what level the monsters will be here. Mack, once those creatures jump out, tell us everything you can see about them. Cassie, I want you to continue to Stealth. Let’s try to kill whatever it is that’s there before it sees us. Alicia, keep all the attention on you. And, remember, guys, there are no saves.”

  All of them nodded. Cassie seemed to meld into the forest around them. Christopher spelled them again with Shield. Mack tugged his helmet down. Alicia rested her cudgel against her right shoulder, and started to lumber forward again, making as much noise as an orc could make. Luke made sure that Christopher walked between Mack and him so that no one could attack their cleric easily.

  It didn’t take long for them to reach the building that Cassie had mentioned. The path emptied out into a clearing. The temple--his HUD informed him that he had discovered the Temple of the Huntress--rose up thirty feet in the air from the bottom slab of stone to the pointed roof and appeared just as wide. It was a mix of Shinto shrine and ancient Greek temple.

  Luke’s gaze ran over the temple appreciatively. It felt like it had stood there for centuries, maybe longer. There were three wide large steps that led up to a portico. There must have been wooden doors at one time that
would have kept the interior of the shrine hidden from view, but they had long since rotted away, leaving only piles of greenish metal hinges that lay like dead things on the stone floor.

  As they neared the temple’s steps, Luke felt a sense of watchfulness. Just like Cassie had said, something was aware of him. He looked all around, paying special attention to the semi-dark interior of the temple, but he caught no flash of eyeshine. He gazed up into the trees, remembering that the Death’s Head Spiders liked to hang out above and drop down on unwary victims. But there was no sign of webs, and the branches were empty except for leaves.

  Cassie emerged from the woods near the right side of the temple, and rejoined their group. “There are no enemies around the outside of the temple that I can see. Whatever it is has to be inside. If there’s anything.”

  Luke’s gaze roved around the clearing. The sensation of being watched was almost physical now. “Oh, there’s something all right, and I think it’s nearby.”

  Despite his misgivings, and because they needed a fight to gain experience points, Luke climbed the large stones steps to the temple’s threshold. The moment he set foot on that stone, the sensation of being observed was so strong that it was like an itch underneath his skin. The dragon tattoos on his forearms burned. Not only was an enemy nearby, he was guessing it had magic, from the reaction of his tattoos.

  “Huh, look at this,” Mack said. He pointed toward the stone wall on the right side of the threshold.

  There was a scene carved into the stone wall. It showed a female wood elf hunting in the forest. The woman’s features were long erased by the elements, but he could see enough to know that she was an archer. Once scene showed a small village surrounded by woods--maybe Lethbridge--with giant, wolf-like creatures with snouts wreathed in flames and fangs as long as daggers surging out of the trees. The engraving showed people huddled in frightened masses within the village. The Huntress had her bow out and was shooting the giant wolves down.