by D. Rus
The mage sat upright. His feline eyes focused on me loyally. I checked the map and waved my hand in the necessary direction.
"Go to the shore as fast as you can. Objectives: recon and map making. I should be able to follow the movement of my troops via my interface. Don't get into any fights and avoid the enemy! Find me an outlet to the sea and better yet—to the Bering Strait."
The mage rushed to the exit.
We wearily sat down at the table, pausing for a second to relax our minds and taste the floral bouquet of the Elven wine.
The front door creaked again. A sour-faced dwarf Hero squeezed into the tavern, followed by a half-decomposed General Lich from Necropolis.
I inquiringly looked at Fuckyall. "Are the building's resources endless or what? How many do they think we can hire?"
The paladin took a sip from his tall glass, curiously glanced at the shiny thingy that hung from a platinum chain above the Lich's cloak, and nodded. "Yep, you can hire all you want until your money runs out."
I shook my head. "Very expensive, almost senselessly so. They’re too weak to join our group. They can’t defend the castle, either, without an army of their own. Let's take a look at the treasury first and see what we have there. It doesn’t accept AlterWorld's gold though: apparently, it’s too light.”
Having robbed the innkeeper of a few more bottles of the weak, sweet Elven wine, we set off to inspect the captured castle. Our legs quickened their pace as our backsides warned them of an impending threat.
The interior of the citadel was austere and uncomfortable: minimalism at its finest. There was almost nothing to loot. The barracks were empty. We still had three days before the beasts resurrected. I frowned. Without these disposable troops, there was no way we could hold the castle.
Besides, the very fact of the existence of this demonic nest meant that things were bad for the people of Earth. And then there was the ziggurat. Six hundred and sixty-six thousand souls—that was practically the entire population of Alaska. Were any living people left on Earth? Or was this the worst possible shit-hits-the-fan scenario?
The massive doors of the treasury screeched aside, obeying my mental order. The first thing that caught my eye—and caused a bit of disappointment—were the neat palletfuls of crushed stone and the cubic yards of wooden bundles along the walls.
Fuckyall grinned cheerlessly, "At least the castle has a quarry and a sawmill."
Dan was more categorical, "What the fuck do we need here? Guys, we've got to call it a day and get out! If they trap us here, then no one will fucking resurrect."
I nodded in agreement. "The mercenary has already moved out and illuminated the road. Now let's quickly examine the castle and get going."
Meanwhile, Fuckyall had reached the far corner of the treasury. "Hey, guys, it's not all bad! The demons managed to develop the surrounding land! Apparently, there’re deposits of gems and gold somewhere nearby!"
I walked closer to assess his findings. A large compartmentalized iron-clad chest sat majestically against the wall. One of its compartments was a third filled with coins: ten or twenty thousand—I could check the exact number later in my interface. The others were packed with fat leather purses covered in taut lacing and elegant monograms.
Fuckyall had already undone the drawstrings, shoveling out a handful of gold dust from one purse and a handful of multi-colored stones from another.
"There's a pound of gold in each bag,” he commented with the air of a connoisseur. “It looks like this is the daily output of the mine—the minimal unit of the resource. As far as the stones are concerned, I couldn't say exactly. I'm not an expert. But they closely resemble sapphires, only they come in all colors. By the way, do you know what they call red sapphires? Rubies. So there! The dust and crystals here are two-weeks' worth of extraction. I like the stones most of all. If they're real, they're worth quite a lot."
I nodded. "We'll take them all! Snowie, how's your load capacity? Think you can carry it?"
The troll chuckled ironically. The word "overload" wasn’t even in his vocabulary. He shouldered Fuckyall aside and began stolidly shoveling the treasure into his bottomless inventory.
The paladin took no offense. He was already hurrying to the adjoining room which was most easily discovered by smell. The aroma was... hmm... specific. The persistent stench brought tears to your eyes, forcing you to breathe through your mouth.
"Is this Inferno or Necropolis?" Fuckyall muttered, lighting a Firefly under the dark ceiling.
I glanced over the large room. “Holy mother of Jesus!”
The demonic legions had clearly managed to invade the surrounding towns and villages stripping them of everything they could reach. The hellish creatures were no magpies, but they too were greedy for gold and other shiny objects. They pilfered weapons, armor, and whatever else took their fancy, like ornate chrome-plated gadgets, brushed brass trinkets, cascades of crystal chandeliers, the entire contents of costume jewelry booths and posh boutiques of Swarovski crystal.
All this junk ended up here, and by no means in sterile condition. Kevlar helmets, still containing the brains of their former owners. Earrings and gold teeth, with lumps of flesh still attached. Body armor, smeared with putrid blood.
The castle wasn't heated, but Inferno inhabitants didn’t like the cold, anyway. The castle rooms bathed in thick lava as if the citadel was rooted deep in the earth's crust, greedily pulling the magma out of the planet. The temperature in the rooms was well beyond 120 degrees Fahrenheit, and going down into the basement was only possible with a fire resistance buff.
"Aladdin’s cave...” even the normally-unruffled Dan was impressed.
Trinkets were of little interest to him, although there were multiple tons of various jewelry here. Our expert was drawn to the weapons.
He compassionately stroked a machine gun brutally torn from its mounting frame. He kicked through a pile of assault rifles until he fished out a sawn-off double-barrel shotgun held together with some blue duct tape. Last time I’d seen one of those was in a movie about the 1918 Russian Civil War.
I thoughtfully looked around the storage space. "Don't take too much, guys. Back on the Arizona, we got some elite gear and this is just ordinary army junk. Only heavy weapons are of interest to us. But I don't see any ammo for them. Demons don’t know shit about firearms."
Fuckyall shook his head. "Maybe we could open a portal for half an hour and get Harlequin's goblins to come round? This loot could outfit an infantry regiment hung with gold like an Indian bride!"
I thought about it. My heart was a battlefield of greed and caution.
What if or another powerful being of hell Asmodeus paid us a visit? He’d crush our frail outposts in seconds and burst in on us in the very heart of our Super Nova? He’d desecrate the First Temple, capture the souls of our clanmates, and destroy the Altar and Lurch. How could we live without the gods, how could I look people in the eye, justifying the catastrophe with a handful of garbage loot? OK, OK. The gold and weapons were hardly garbage. Add to it some beautiful ladies and this would be the quintessence of a soldier's values.
I grabbed my inner greedy pig by the scruff of his neck and shook my head. "No, I shouldn’t risk it. Not for the sake of this junk. Until we know what exactly happened on Earth, we’ll limit ourselves to recon missions."
Looking back, I caught Snowie’s gaze thoughtfully inspecting a dull yellow cube pressed from thousands of wedding rings. The chunk of gold disappeared momentarily within the albino's inventory, then reappeared in his hands.
"Sixty-six pounds and six ounces," Snowie read from his internal interface. "And why are demons so fond of these three sixes?"
Zena fished a gorgeous diamond bracelet out of the heap which looked as if it had come from the showcase of the best jewelry boutique in Soho. Trying it on her hand, she admired its sparkling brilliance.
"It's from the Bible,” she answered Snowie’s question. “The number 666 stands for the name of one of the Bea
sts of the Apocalypse."
I nodded in agreement and summed up, illustrating Zena’s theory with AlterWorld's practice. "For centuries after the Bible had been written, people tried to endow the number with the power of their own faith. Anyway, numerology isn't very relevant right now. Dan! Pick up a couple machine guns, preferably with ammo. Load up Snowie. Everyone else, you get my permission to dump half your inventory of food and drink. It doesn't matter what you get rid of; just rake in the jewelry. Make sure you don’t go into overload though. You’ve got three minutes!"
My heart bled as I rid my inventory of a couple stacks of elite drakeflesh sandwiches. Oddly enough, hamburgers weren't only useful and gave long-lasting buffs, but were also crazy delicious. After dumping a bunch of flasks of fruit drink—which quenched thirst for eight hours and gave +30 to Agility—I scored pounds of what looked like a museum coin collection.
I was saving them for posterity. There weren't many genuine artifacts from Earth in AlterWorld. Junk found in a tourist's suitcase or a rust bucket dumped at a parking lot could hardly be considered artifacts, were they?
We’d barely made a dent in the contents of this militarized Aladdin’s cave. Still, we moved on, walking around the castle structure.
The Magistrate building promised to bestow on me two thousand gold coins every day, which was equal to about seventy pounds of precious metals of the highest standard. Not bad at all. The castle-controlled mines kept sending in heavy bags of gems and heaps of native gold daily. We hadn’t discovered any oil or sulfur deposits, but the area abounded with stone and wood.
Creatures of Inferno slowly matured in the Mad House, the Kennel of Fury, and the Hall of Temptation. It was an unappetizing and rather hot sight, like looking into some sick foundry.
Another surprise lay in wait for us in the Market building. In addition to the useful opportunity to exchange useless wood beams and quarry stone for lightweight gems, an Artifact Trader was discovered among the colored tents.
A dark-complexioned demon motioned around his modest storefront, inviting us to purchase a dozen items. Rings, armor, amulets, clothing. The prices were astronomical—everything had three or four zeros after it.
I thoughtfully looked over these alien artifacts.
A Traveler's Ring increased the speed of allied troops in combat by ten percent. How it combined with items from AlterWorld wasn't yet clear. Would it increase attack and cast speeds? Would the effect combine with identical buffs from druids and enchanters? And who the hell were these "allied troops"? Was it the raid under my command or just one summoned pet and a meowing familiar?
The Levitation Boots allowed one to cross water and mountain barriers. I immediately had loads of questions. How would I cross the mountain barriers? Would I be able to cross Everest on foot? With an altitude of six miles, I could touch the ozone layer with my hand! And what's with the ridiculous additional condition, The player's course must be terminated on the ground?
And the price... Yep, ten thousand gold. That's over three pounds of gold! Were they out of their minds?
Not wanting to upset myself, I walked out of the shop.
Snowie demonstratively patted his faithful club, which sparkled with the magical flashes of three gods, and raised a quizzical eyebrow.
I shook my head—no good trying to beat the artifacts out of the trader. The game mechanics were too different. Now, if we managed to drag him into AlterWorld and keep him there for a couple weeks to ensure a full immersion experience, then maybe...
Hmm. With an evil smile, I made a mental note.
Next building. It was a looming black tower with monsters grinning from the reliefs and the moaning figures of hellish martyrs in the frescoes. The building blazed with heat, power, and human agony. Hair crackled from the temperature and tried to stand on edge, responding to the induced fear.
My inner animal bared his teeth and gave a muffled growl. They dare frighten me? In my own house?
Instinctively I slowed down time and burst forward, diffusing into a blurred shadow to the outside observer. My uncomprehending clanmates drew their weapons unbearably slowly. I had already burst through the invisible film blocking the doorway and frozen in place, staring at a widescreen service message:
Welcome to the Magical Guild. Level of building: 4. Possible improvement: construct a building of the Academy!
There are four level-1 spells: Agony, Deceleration, Magic Dispersion, and Fire Arrow. Minimum requirements for study: a Hero on the path of Magic, Intellect: 50.
There are three level-2 spells: Mass Agony, Plague, Stone Skin. Minimum requirements for study: a Hero on the path of Magic, Intellect: 100.
There are two level-3 spells: Fireball, Creation of a Phantom. Minimum requirements for study: a Hero on the path of Magic, Intellect: 150.
There is one level-4 spell: Earth Shock. Minimum requirements for study: a Hero on the path of Magic, Intellect: 200.
Warning! You have studied ten new spells! Would you like to place them in a magical book?
Once again, time stopped. Slowly turning my head towards my clanmates bristling with steel, I gestured my hand reassuringly and wearily exhaled. "And now we absolutely must open a portal home...”
Chapter Eleven
Tearing open the fabric of two realities proved to be difficult. The spell fell out of step, its cast being repeatedly interrupted, eating up my mana pool for some unknown reason. At the fifth attempt, the wizard's scroll disintegrated. My soldiers were covered in a cold sweat. Our chances of remaining on Earth forever increased dramatically.
I took a sip of hundred-year-old cognac to calm myself and noisily tore out another parchment from the tome. Spatial magic—all those portals and gates—took at least a quarter of my finances. With personal immortality, the last thing I wanted was to get stuck in some lethal medium or be trapped in an abandoned well.
Finally, when the area of the future breach had been sufficiently primed by dozens of failed attempts and the surrounding astral had been sated by the pilfered mana, the progress bar obediently filled to the end. The majestic arch of a portal burst open in the middle of the infernal castle's basalt slabs.
Insubordinately the men crowded around the rainbow canopy, eagerly taking in the smells of our home world. We were a bit like astronauts on the ISS meeting a freighter from Earth, pushing at the opened hatch for one breath of home air.
I nodded to the rogue. "Dan!"
He understood. Wrapped in stealth—which was almost useless in the case of an emergency—he dove into the portal.
We waited the exhausting forty seconds that was allocated for the identification procedure. Chat and private only worked within the cluster, so there was no connection whatsoever. These last few hours we found ourselves in a terribly unfamiliar information vacuum. Normally, the chats were buzzing like a crowd on market day. General, guild, trade, group... they were legion.
A barely audible buzzing in the sky distracted us from our forced meditation. We looked up, instinctively reaching for our arms. Blinking with landing lights, a large drone with a gray-blue navy camouflage quickly descended onto the area.
"Wait!" I managed to stop Snowie's club in full swing—his standard response to everything he couldn’t understand.
Eight motors strained at their maximum RPMs, cutting their incoming speed. The spring-mounted supports absorbed the shock of a rather hard landing. The propellers died down. The frost covering the machine began to rapidly melt, showing us an anonymous hull number and two tiny flags on the horizontal planes of its surface: our homeland's tricolor flag and the white-blue saltire of the Russian Navy.
Sailors? Our own?! In the middle of Alaska?!
We silently looked at each other and shook our heads in confusion. No idea. Who had dropped this copter on us and why? Was it intentional or had we just happened to witness the emergency landing of a spy intruder?
Fuckyall spoke up, "Maybe they want to make contact with us and want us to write a message on the copter’s s
ide? I have a couple vials of paint lying around somewhere—I wanted to decorate my cloak with some noble purple, but I never made it to the dyeing tool...”
I shook my head. We didn't need brushes and coachwork on the sides. I always carried a letter kit with me—a fountain pen with five hundred and twelve colors (two hundred gold with the Parker logo and five hundred without) with registered forgery-proof ink. Plus, I had watermarked paper with monograms of my own creation.
I meticulously surveyed the sleek copter. Well, where was I supposed to shove the note? I blinked and struggled to open my interface windows. They might tell me something I didn’t know yet.
Hmm... the system kept evolving, adjusting more finely to the realities of Earth and more precisely identifying the degree of danger. In addition to the fairly logical level 20, the mechanoid drone was assigned an additional "weapons index". In this case, a pitiful bonus of zero.
The clack of the maintenance hatch as it swung open brought me back to earth. It revealed the drone's electronic innards: tidy bundles of wire, service connections, and a tiny LCD screen with three system error codes. Then our attention was drawn to the exclamation points that flashed on it.
A gust of cool air from the portal alerted us to Dan's return.
"Well, well, well..." he whispered in interest, immediately cutting into the situation and squatting on his haunches by the six-foot body of the spy-copter.
As if waiting for the audience's attention, the screen turned off for a second and then switched to marquee mode, slowly scrolling a looped message in front of us.
... ... !!!... ... Warning, danger! The US Air Force will carry out a nuclear strike on the castle in ~10 minutes! Fellow countrymen! Follow the drone to the meeting point! Course 97, distance 50 miles. We are interested in cooperation! Max, your body is OK, and your friends say hello. Daniel, your wife and children are well... ... !!!... ... Warning, danger! The US Air Force...