Drogar looked up in fury. “VHERE THE HELL DID YOU GO?!”
“It wasn’t my fault! Mira and I are at Varidian, and they yanked us out.”
“Okay,” Vlisil snapped, “but why were you gone so long?”
Daniel thought about what he was and wasn’t supposed to say, but decided Screw it. They already knew about the AI – who cared if they knew about corporate politics?
“The CEO of the company didn’t trust me, so he kept me and Mira out of the game until the board of directors voted on it.”
“Yeah, sure, the CEO wouldn’t let you come back,” Vlisil mocked him. “Had nothing to do with having to come back to Hell.”
“It’s true,” Daniel said angrily. “I wanted to get back here as soon as I could.”
“What a crock of shit.”
“Screw you, Vlisil – ”
“Guys,” Lotan said weakly. “This isn’t helping us get out of here.”
The rest of the group fell silent.
“How are you doing?” Daniel asked.
“How does he look like he’s doing?” Vlisil snapped.
“I was just – ”
“GUYS,” Lotan yelled.
Everyone fell silent again.
“I’m not feeling so good,” Lotan said quietly. “In fact, I feel really, really bad.”
“Okay, let’s work on getting out of here,” Daniel said. “We can argue later. Agreed?”
“Absolutely,” Lotan said.
“…okay,” Drogar relented.
“…fine,” Vlisil grumbled. “What happened when you went back to Varidian? Did you log out?”
“No, they had to physically pull me out of the machine. No log out or anything.”
“How about when you came back just now? Did you log in then?”
“No – I came straight back, no White Room or anything.” The White Room was the staging area players first entered during log-in before they started the game.
“So if somebody pulls the VR mask off of our heads, we’ll be okay?” Lotan asked.
“In the Real World, yeah. Do you guys have somebody at home who can do that?”
“My mom will probably come in sooner or later, but I don’t know if she’ll figure out she has to pull me out,” Vlisil said. “Maybe.”
“Same with me,” Lotan said.
“No,” Drogar said grimly. “I live alone. I could die in here.”
“Nobody’s going to die,” Daniel insisted. “If worse comes to worse, you can just give me phone numbers of friends or family, or I’ll call the cops in your home towns when Varidian pulls me out.”
“…that would work,” Drogar admitted.
“But before we get to that, let’s work on figuring a way out.”
Daniel looked around. All their weapons were still encased in stone so that they couldn’t pull them out. And all their feet were encased in stone, too, which meant they couldn’t move.
“Did anything happen while I was away?” Daniel asked.
“What, like incredible boredom and searing heat?” Vlisil sneered. “No, nothing like that.”
“I mean, did the AI or Korvos come back? Did anybody come by?”
“No,” Vlisil said.
“No,” Drogar grunted.
“Actually, there’s the fire monkey,” Lotan reminded them.
“What?” Daniel asked, surprised. “There’s a monkey here?”
“No, we just call him that ‘cause he’s about the same size.” Lotan pointed. “Some little fire creature. He’s hiding now.”
Daniel peered out into the cave. It was hard to see much, since the only source of light was the glowing rivers of magma – but that actually helped, in this case. Amongst the hundreds of black stalagmites jutting up from the ground, there was a little tiny speck of fire that peered out from behind one of the black columns. If it was the creature’s head, then its height had to be less than two feet tall.
As soon as it saw Daniel was looking at it, the thing jerked back into hiding.
“How close did it get?”
“Not very.”
“Did it say anything?”
Vlisil gave him a withering look. “Yeah, he quoted the Gettysburg Address. NO, he didn’t say anything.”
“I’m going to try to contact it,” Daniel said.
Drogar frowned. “Are you sure that is such a good idea?”
“Before I left, one of the techs said that the game was designed around the principal that it wants to help us advance and beat obstacles – and that if we can’t get out of something on our own, the game will try to help us.”
“Uh, it didn’t exactly try to help us while you were gone,” Vlisil pointed out.
“It sent you a fire monkey, didn’t it?”
“Which did exactly nothing for us.”
“Maybe you didn’t try to use it the right way.”
Daniel looked out at the cave. The creature was poking its head out again from behind a stalagmite.
Daniel waved both his hands. “Hey! Hey, can you understand me?”
The thing jerked back behind the stalagmite.
“Oh, come on,” Daniel muttered, and for the next five minutes unsuccessfully tried to lure the thing out from the stalagmites.
“Keep going, you’re making great progress,” Vlisil taunted him.
Daniel stared out in frustration at the stalagmite field. “I could have sworn it was part of the game trying to help us…”
“Great,” Vlisil grumbled. “We’re roasting in Hell, and the game sends us a shy wiener dog made out of fire.”
“At least we’re not burning to death,” Lotan said.
“Dude, you’re drying out like a sardine on a windowsill,” Vlisil said. “I’d say that’s pretty bad.”
“I’m pretty sure it’s not as bad as burning to death,” Lotan wheezed. “Burning would just be quicker.”
Something in Lotan’s words clicked in Daniel’s mind.
“What if we died?” he thought out loud. “Would we respawn somewhere else? Or would we get kicked out of the game and logged off?”
Drogar and Vlisil looked at him in surprise.
“Huh…” Drogar mused.
“That’s possible,” Vlisil conceded. “But we’re going to have to wait awhile before we find out.”
“Unless… we speed up the process,” Daniel said, like he was realizing something for the first time.
“How are we gonna do that?” Vlisil jeered. “Kill ourselves?”
Daniel just looked at him calmly.
The goblin’s mouth dropped open. “You gotta be kidding me.”
“Why not?”
“Are you crazy?! I’m not gonna kill myself!”
“You’re not going to actually die.”
“I don’t care!” Vlisil shouted. “I’m not doing that!”
“What’s the alternative? Hang around here for days until we die of thirst?”
“Lotan’s not going to last long – he can test it out,” Vlisil said, then turned to the fish-man. “Sorry, dude.”
Lotan shrugged dully, his bulbous eyes closed against the heat. “It’s the truth.”
“That could be hours or days from now,” Daniel pointed out. “You really want to wait that long?”
“No, but I really don’t want to kill myself.” Vlisil’s voice dropped to a whisper for no discernible reason. “What if… what if something goes wrong?”
“What? Nothing’s going to go wrong. We either get ejected from the game, or we respawn. That’s it.”
“What if we respawn, but the damage isn’t fixed when we come back?”
“People always come back with the damage fixed. You guys came back just fine when you died in the mines, right?”
“Yeah – but that was before a creepy computer program messed with the game. What if we don’t come back? Or what if we can’t die? What if we all cut each others’ throats, but we don’t die, and now we’ve all got slit throats?”
“Then congratulations
, you’re immortal,” Daniel said crossly.
He thought back to Eric getting hit with six arrows in the chest.
Daniel didn’t want to admit it, but the image gave him pause.
Vlisil’s voice dropped to a whisper. “We can’t log out, we can’t access the menu – what if the AI changed something else, huh? What if we get… stuck somewhere else?”
Daniel narrowed his eyes. “Are you Catholic or something?”
Vlisil bristled. “So what if I am?”
“Are you afraid you’ll go to the real Hell for killing yourself, even in a video game?”
“Shut up, man!”
“Do you really believe in Hell?” Daniel scoffed.
“Well it sure feels like I’m stuck there now!” Vlisil snarled.
“You know, you were going to kill me a while back in the forest. You don’t think murder’s going to land you in the Real Hell, too?” Daniel taunted him.
“Screw you, man,” Vlisil fumed. “I don’t care, I’m not killing myself.”
“What about you, Lotan?” Daniel asked. “You up for trying my plan?”
“No… but I think I’m going to be gone soon, anyway,” the droth murmured.
“Drogar?”
The barbarian made a face. “I dunno, doot. It’s like vhat dreams may come.”
“…what?” Daniel said, seriously impressed that the musclehead was quoting Shakespeare.
But he wasn’t.
“Dat old movie with the funny guy, where he dies and goes into the afterlife, and part of it’s like a painting. Vhat Dreams May Come.”
“I don’t know that one.”
“Yeah, I don’t watch old movies,” Vlisil said.
“It’s good,” Lotan said, barely audibly.
“Right?” Drogar said. “But the thing is, it’s kind of like the afterlife is a lot of different things to different people. So vhat if that’s how it is here? Vhat if you think something bad’s going to happen… and then it does, because you believe it?”
Everyone was silent for a few seconds.
“I hate to sound like Eric here,” Daniel said, “but it’s a game. Nothing’s going to happen.”
“You seem awfully enthusiastic about offing yourself,” Vlisil said.
Daniel had to admit, it was odd being forced into the position of advocating suicide. Nothing he would ever do in REAL life, but… when it wasn’t real, and the only other option was a slow, lingering, torturous death…
Also, Drogar had reminded him of what Eric had said about when he ‘died.’
This time I was just in darkness. I mean, I was fully conscious, and I was aware that time was passing… but there wasn’t anything there. It was just all… black.
At first I was terrified – you actually feel like you’re dying, and it freaked me the hell out – but then once the pain was gone, I didn’t mind. Of course, it didn’t last too long. I might have gotten a little more freaked out if it had gone on for an hour. It only lasted for about a minute, and then suddenly I was back. Anyway, long story short, it’s nothing to be afraid of.
If real dying was like the game, I wouldn’t be afraid of it. If you just stopped ‘being,’ and went somewhere dark and peaceful, and that was it… that wouldn’t be so bad.
To Daniel, Eric’s words had sounded horrible.
To be stuck in some eternal darkness forever, with nothing but your own thoughts to keep you company? He would go insane.
What if the darkness Eric had described was what would happen now?
What if the AI had rigged things so that they would up in some sort of limbo?
At least he knew the team at Varidian would eventually pull him out, and the darkness would end.
But what if it went on for hours?
What if it felt like days – or weeks?
He shook off the fear. It was the only option he could see right now, and something he was going to have to risk if they wanted to get out of here.
“They’re going to pull me out of the VR mask in thirty minutes to check on me, which is two hours in the game. So maybe an hour forty-five from now.” Daniel paused, then forced himself to buck up. “It’s worth the risk.”
“Aren’t you getting ahead of yourself?” Lotan wheezed. “How are you going to do it? All our weapons are stuck in stone.”
Oh yeah.
Crap.
Daniel remembered the throwing knives Merridack had given him so long ago – but he’d stashed them in Inventory, and there was no way to pull up the menu. He supposed he could take off his armor and see if they were still strapped to his belt, but he doubted it.
“Does somebody have a knife or something?” Daniel asked.
“I do,” Drogar said, and pulled one from a pouch on his leather belt.
It was a small blade, more suited for cutting meat at dinner than for battle.
He offered it on his outstretched, open palm.
Daniel took it hesitantly and looked at it.
He was definitely less enthusiastic now that things were real instead of hypothetical.
He looked at the other three warriors, who watched him with wide eyes.
“Alright… here goes nothing,” Daniel said. He winced, held the blade to his throat –
And hesitated.
Okay, come on…
One… two… three –
His hand stayed where it was.
He made a small, shallow cut – nothing more than a scratch, just to see what it felt like.
The sting of pain was real.
“You’re gonna have to cut deeper than that,” Vlisil said.
“I know – shut up,” Daniel snapped.
He placed the blade to his throat again… paused…
His hand fell down to his side.
“I can’t do it,” he muttered.
“See? Not so easy, is it?” Vlisil taunted him.
Daniel held the knife back out to Drogar. “You’re going to have to do it for me.”
105
Everyone stared at him in disbelief.
“You vant me to kill you?!”
“Yeah. Make it quick and painless as possible.”
“Doot, I cahn’t do that!”
“You were going to kill me back in the woods outside Blackstone.”
“Yeah, but… that was when I thought you screwed us over!”
“Well, now I’m trying to save us, so you have an even better reason to do it.”
Drogar made a face as he took the knife back.
“Daniel… are you sure about this?” Lotan asked.
Sick dread filled his stomach. “No, but it’s the only option I can see.”
“What if he can chip his way out of the stone with the knife?” Vlisil suggested.
“Try it.”
Drogar struck at the rock surrounding his boots, but the blade didn’t make a dent.
“Don’t break the tip,” Daniel said after the barbarian’s third futile strike. “I don’t want you killing me with it if it’s all jagged and blunt.”
For some reason that sounded funny to him after he said it.
If you’re going to kill me, make sure all the implements are as pretty as possible, he thought with a good dose of gallows humor.
Although hopefully a sharp blade wouldn’t hurt as much going in.
“You don’t have to do this,” Vlisil said, his voice frightened.
“Well, otherwise we can stay down here for several days until we all die of thirst. And Drogar might actually die if he can’t get out of the game in the Real World, so…” Daniel looked at Drogar. “Just make it quick.”
Drogar winced. “Are you sure about this?”
“Yes,” Daniel said, though he didn’t feel sure at all.
He closed his eyes, a feeling of sick dread overwhelming him…
But nothing happened.
He opened his eyes again. Drogar was just standing there, not doing anything.
“What’s the holdup?” Daniel demanded.
&nbs
p; “Doot… this is hard.”
Daniel stood there in silence for a second… then thought of something.
“I totally lied to you,” he said.
Drogar looked at him in surprise.
“Eric and I planned everything. We wanted to kill all of you. We were going to take all the gold for ourselves. We laughed at you guys behind your backs – especially after he killed you.”
The barbarian’s face contorted in rage – and then suddenly relaxed. He looked at Daniel out of the side of his eyes. “You’re just saying that to get me mad so I’ll do it.”
“You were about to – I saw it,” Daniel said. “Just think of it as revenge for the Mines.”
“Doot – ”
All this waiting was even worse than dying.
“JUST DO IT!” Daniel screamed.
Drogar winced, drew back the knife –
And stabbed Daniel in the neck.
106
Daniel’s eyes widened.
The pain was intense.
Then suddenly it lessened to nothing more than a dull throb.
As Drogar drew the knife back, blood sprayed out onto the ground.
Daniel tried to speak, but only a gurgle came out as blood coursed over his lips.
He could taste it – coppery like a penny.
“WHAT THE HELL, MAN!” Vlisil screamed.
“What?! He vanted me to!” Drogar shouted.
“Yeah, but you didn’t have to DO it!”
Daniel wanted to hold out his hand, to wave them off like No, it’s cool –
But he was a little preoccupied with dying at the moment.
The already gloomy cave began to grow even dimmer.
His knees grew weak and buckled beneath him.
However, seeing as his feet were fixed inside rock enclosures, there was nowhere for him to go except backwards.
His legs hinged at the knee and he fell backwards – although the armor wasn’t flexible enough for him to fall all the way to the ground, so he fell backwards at a 90 degree angle and hung there, suspended above the ground as he clutched at his throat.
The voices from the others were fading away.
Help him!
What do you vant me to do?! I can’t reach him!
His eyes defocused and his vision blurred.
Darkness began to iris in like a slowly retracting camera shutter.
Shattered Lands 2 The Fall Of Blackstone: A LitRPG Series Page 24