by Mars Dorian
“Right.”
“They’re still part of source energy and only need a reminder. Once they rejoice with the Aeonlight, we can bring peace and stability to the region.”
“And help them deal with the corruption of the Syndicate,” Caspian added.
The two followers were finishing each other sentences now.
“Okay, then let’s start this journey. We’re ready to take names.”
Wu and Yumi-D followed the siblings to the nearby stable that stood attached to the church.
“You really have everything,” Yumi-D said.
“Self-sufficiency is part of our lifestyle.”
We packed our fowls and neared the eastern exit of Varmegarden. Yumi-D and Wu rode next to me as the siblings led our little convoy.
“Have you even been to Win Dorado?” I asked my co-players.
Yumi-D answered first. “Never, but I’m curious. I haven’t played the pro-Aeonlight narrative.”
“What do you mean by that?”
I had never checked her stream, which was a shame. I should have been more informed about her style of playing.
“Helping the followers of the Aeonlight win. I’ve always opted for the Blue Flame and similar rebel factions. Creature comfort, I know.”
Wu shared his thoughts. “I want to stay open-minded. I want to see where the quest takes me.”
“And snatch the precious skillpoint,” I said.
Both grinned.
Collecting new experience while doing fun quests with friends made this game incredible. I just had to keep in mind that I was also making money from the game now on, so I crossed my fingers for an exciting AND rewarding quest narrative.
We left the city walls of Varmegarden and blitzed through the hills of the new unknown land. The Great Plains soon transitioned into hills with lavish forests. With trees tall enough to scratch the clouds, the Mediterranean flair of Varmegarden gave way to a more Northern European landscape. Even the perfect blue sky grew gray. Judging by the bluish colors, the temperature seemed to drop, although I received no frost warning. The farther we rode, the more trees dominated my view. Soon, both the left and right side of our road was swamped with plants and wildlife. Celeste looked around and swallowed hard. I knew her well enough by now to tell she was nervous.
“Anything wrong?”
“When Win Dorado was still under Beltar control, the imperial guards dispatched patrols to guard the main road. But with the defeat of the empire, the roads have become breeding grounds for thieves and raiders.”
“Don’t worry about that, Celeste. That’s what we’re here for.”
She nodded but the worry stayed on her face. Yumi-D, riding to my right, observed the surrounding forests. “Do you spot anything unusual?”
“The forest is so dense it’s hard to detect anything in the distance.”
The mini-map showed me the red path leading to the target zone: another five point three kilometers.
Trips raced by when you were surrounded with good friends.
Yumi whistled. “I’m detecting movement.”
She pointed her right arm toward the far-away tree tops. I narrowed my eyes but only spotted moving twigs and leaves. “Maybe it’s just the wind.”
“Wind with teeth,” Wu said to my left and readied his glaive, a weapon that I had never seen before.
Celeste and Caspian halted their fowls when projectiles whistled through the air.
“Ambush.”
I increased the space to my co-players and tried to identify the attackers. The target analyzer encircled but couldn’t get a lock-on. Either the enemies disrupted my ability or used stealth skills to blend into the environment. “Take cover and don’t move into the forest,” I told Celeste and Caspian.
Yumi-D used some kind sniper skill where she received heightened aim and critical damage bonus in exchange for mobility. She pulled the trigger of her tek-crossbow and unleashed a bolt into a treetop. Looked like she was firing at leaves, but then a body fell from a branch and hit the soil with a soft thump.
Yumi-D had taken down our first ambusher.
It was time for team tactics.
“Yumi-D and I will distract the attackers. Wu, you go stealth and try to ambush the suckers. Let’s use their tactics against them.”
“Understood.”
Wu activated his tech-coat which adapted to the colors of the soil and the earthy trees. His quasi-invisible body snuck into the area of the forest where the arrows came from. Yumi-D fired more shots into the treetops in rapid succession. I had never seen her use an advanced tek-crossbow, but that baby fired darts like a semi-automatic.
“I need some back-up, dude.”
“Got it.”
With my advanced gear, I stepped from my fowl and stomped toward the trees. The enemy fire diverted. More arrows flew my way but had trouble piercing my armor. I followed the trajectory of the arrows and finally noticed one of the attackers. He wore a natural camouflage of forest colors.
I hunkered down behind a tree for cover, unleashed a spider drone, and made it crawl up the tree. When the metallic creature reached the treetop, the sniper towering on the branch kicked my baby but faced sudden detonation.
Spider mine meet sniper slime.
The sucker moaned in pain but rebalanced his torn-apart boots on the tree-crown. I could finally get a lock-on.
Enemy: Veteran Forest Sniper
Type: Human Bandit
HP: 4450 / Armor: Light-camouflage (+2)
Drops: Poison grenades, Repeater bow
Ability:
- Ambush. First attack deals 50% extra damage
- Vision range: +125 meters
- Firing range: +50 meters
I aimed my old gunblade, fired a pellet, and brought down his health to around sixty percent. Man, my long-range attacks paled against my close and mid-range encounters. Thank tech I accessed the new electrocute mode that turned my BlitzBlade into a thunder god.
“Don’t worry, I got a clear shot,” Yumi-D said over the chat.
Three rapid fire shots penetrated the head of the sniper and brought him to fall.
“Be careful, Dash,” Wu said.
It took me a couple of seconds to locate his invisible body in the forest. The green silhouette and ally pointer revealed Wu’s position dozens of meters to my left. He pointed at the air above me where movement occurred. Another forest raider targeted me from the cover of the treetops. And he was fast. I tried to evade the trajectory but the weapon’s speed outranked mine—the bane of advanced but heavy-weight armor. The rope-like tool wrapped around me and slowed down my movements. I could only use my legs and tiptoe forward.
Yumi-D updated me. “You just got Bola’d.”
I had no time for jokes.
“What?”
“It’s an ancient weapon used to catch birds and little preys. Looks like this is the upgraded version.”
“Great.”
I flexed my arms and tried to break free. A cylinder-shaped device dropped near my boots and released a green cloud.
“Poisonous gas.”
My armored arms tore through the Bola but the smoke engulfed my WarTech and infected me. Poison damage dropped my HPs by three to five per second.
“Dash, they’re coming after you.”
I squeezed my eyes and saw Wu’s stealthy silhouette throwing his glaive at an incoming attacker. Four or five of them surrounded me from all angles. Thanks to the green smoke, I could barely recognize details yet alone anticipate their attacks. I underestimated these bandits.
“Yumi-D, I could really use some help here.”
“I’m trying, but there are so many. One of them is trying to ambush Caspian and Celeste.”
Smart bastards. They took the battle to the forest while only one of us stayed with our quest givers. I hoped Yumi-D held her position on the road while I tried to survive inside the green cloud. Despite Wu’s attempt to help me, I aimed my gunblade and fired into emerald mist. Couldn’t te
ll whether I hit someone or not, which sucked. I downed an antidote and placed exploda mines a few meters around me, locking myself in my own minefield.
“What are you doing?” Wu’s voice asked over the comm. “You realize there’s friendly fire, even from your own weapons?”.
“A new tactic. Let’s see if it works.”
The enemy shadows approached me while I did the quick math. When four bandits wanted to stab me up close, the mines around me exploded.
Whoooom.
The area splash damage blew them, and me, away. My medium-heavy Defender armor mitigated most of the damage while the quick intake of health potions brought my HP back into the green. I escaped the danger zone of the green mist and saw camouflaged Wu throwing his glaive. The spike-ridden crescent blade tore through the backs of the staggering bandits and caused incredible critical damage. He switched to a tactical blade and backstabbed the last remaining enemy. On the road-side, Yumi-D guarded the Aeonlight siblings and headshot an attacker with her Windcutter bow. The coated arrow penetrated the face mask of the enemy and ripped through. Blood droplets spat out the exit wound of the neck.
Nasty, but glorious.
We were winning.
Back in my place in the forest, the poison cloud dissipated and revealed almost a dozen corpses on the burned foliage. The soil smoked from my mines’ detonations and gave access to the dropped items. Wu’s tech coat became visible again as he approached me. “Did you just imprison yourself inside a circle of mines?”
“Thanks to my Machine Spirit and Enemy Mine skills, I receive fewer damage from man-made objects. So I quickly calculated the area damage of my mines and realized that placing them around me wouldn’t kill me.”
Wu nodded with an approving smile. “Clever and slightly suicidal.”
“Welcome to my world.”
I high-fived my favorite assassin and received a Yumi-D remark as a thank you. “Boys, you know I love a good dose of bromance, but Celeste and Caspian are itching to move on.”
As always, she was right. I often got carried away in battles which took away from the quest. Together, we collected the fallen items:
4x gift grenades
6x antidotes
1x good tek-bow
2x solid crossbow repeater
The upgrade to Level 18 occurred. I invested the new skill point in the Machine Spirit again, which increased my throwing range by 10+ meters and the damage done by man-made electro-devices by twenty percent.
Back on the road, I showed Yumi-D the loot via the trading window. Her reaction? A lackluster shrug. “Decent, but I need mid-rare or rare weapons at this point. But we can always sell stuff and make some sweet money in return.”
It was unlikely that a bunch of forest bandits would drop good gear. Only rare enemies or boss fights released useful weapons. Still, the defense was a success. We collected experience and protected our quest givers.
Speaking of which…
“Are you guys okay?”
Celeste straightened up on her fowl as if to shake off her shiver. She tried to come across as courageous and mature, but in moments of pressure, her young age and lack of life experience surfaced. She’d have enough time to become a grim and grumpy NPC.
“Let us just move on, shall we? These forests are infested with the toxic aggression of lost renegades.”
“At least there’s no Reepo infection.”
“Moral corruption is the bigger threat,” Caspian said.
I disagreed. Corruption turned folks into assholes, but the Reepo morphed them into monsters. I refrained from diving deeper into philosophical and geo-political issues; still, a little ‘thank you’ would have been nice, especially after I almost died from the poison ambush. Whatever. The prospect of an extra skill mattered more than ego stroking.
We replenished our health to maximal HP and resumed our trip to the target destination. In a matter of minutes, we arrived at Win Dorado. The place wasn’t what I expected at all.
38
A township built into the forest, the spire-like houses were either carved into the trees or attached to the bark. Wooden bridges connected the different sections. The larger trees, and we’re talking massive ones the size of towers, had multiple wooden decks and staircases. Crowds gathered on every level while rainbow lights turned the forest town into a open-air club.
“It’s like the tree-hugger version of Las Vegas.”
Both Celeste and Caspian moaned at the same time. “This place has changed quite a lot since our last visit.”
“And when was that?”
“Over five hundred moons ago.”
Wu remained silent, but then again, he had never been the talkative type. He was like a ninja sponge who soaked up all the necessary information and then responded with swift action.
“Well, let’s get our fowls to a stable,” I said.
We took our fowls by the reigns and guided them to the nearest public stable available. The stable master walked out and greeted us. No matter which part of Fourlando I journeyed to, the stable masters always carried lumberjack-styled beards. A running gag from the developers?
“Welcome, travelers. I assume you want to park your fowls?”
“What’s the cost?”
“Fifteen credits per hour.”
My jaw was about to somersault. The stable master just shrugged. “This is Win Dorado. Everything here is nice but comes at a price.”
“It’s fine,” Celeste said. “We’ll pay for everyone.”
She produced a pocketbook from underneath her pouch and handed the right amount of bills to the smiling stable master. “Your fowls will receive good care.”
“With that price, I expect an all-inclusive shower and deluxe fyrekraut.”
“Premium care costs ten credits extra per hour.”
“Forget it.”
“How do we get to the Mayor’s office, sir?” Caspian quickly said.
“If you’re fit, use the spiral stairs around the core tree. If you’re lazy, use one of the nearby elevators.”
We agreed upon using the elevators. The mechanical lifts reminded me of old industrial elevators used in mining operations. This version carried up to thirty people per lift.
“My first time in Win Dorado, at least in this timeline,” Yumi-D said and sounded genuinely excited. Our lift railed up to the higher tree floors. The bridges looked like wooden spider webs and connected the core trees with the massive, center tree which had dozens of shops, chambers, and viewing decks.
Celeste sighed when we stepped out on our floor.
“Another problem?”
“All the lanterns are powered with Reepo-batteries.”
That was true. Unlike Varmegarden, which had ditched Reepo tech for natural energy, Win Dorado’s light pollution seemed to be 100% powered by refined Reepo.
“Of course it is,” Yumi-D said. “Using gas lanterns in a township made of wood would be suicide—unless you want to go full Nero.” She touched the crust of the nearby deck railing. “You see this glitter?”
A transparent substance softened the surface of the wooden material and reflected some of the light. “It’s anti-burn enamel to prevent the trees and bridges from catching fire.”
“Does it work?”
Yumi-D grinned. “Do you want to find out?”
“Please don’t fight,” Caspian said. “We have an appointment with the Mayor.”
We joined a couple of NPC visitors who traversed a hanging bridge leading to the giant central tree. Travelers with rugged clothes, civilians with posh attire and bracelets, as well as soldier types with customized gear; they all differed in size, skin, and attire, but they all stared at us.
“Guess they don’t like class-based warriors.”
“I don’t think we’re the problem,” Wu said.
He was right. The NPCs stared at Celeste and Caspian.
“Looks like they don’t want your religion anymore.”
“They’re great people if they wish t
o be, Dash; they only lack the Aeonlight to show the way.”
“I think I’ve heard that quote before.”
Caspian halted and interrupted our conversation. “This is the way to the mayor’s residence. Shall we?”
“That’s what we’re here for.”
The massive entrance led into a courtyard carved into the giant tree. A couple of guards with angular armor greeted us. Celeste produced the official scroll from her travel pack and presented it like a trophy. The guards nodded with minimal effort and waved us through. We marched toward the stone mansion towering the middle of the tree’s hollow space. A world within a world; Roman architecture, graced with the finest earth colors I had ever seen. We passed another two guards in the garden, passed the reception with the premium, black, wooden floor, and entered the Mayor’s office on the same level.
“Welcome to my modest home,” the man said.
He was a middle-aged balding guy with an aristocratic uniform, unbuttoned halfway down his chest. The Mayor remained in his chair. With that heavy build, it was probably for the best.
Celeste stepped forward. “Thank you for your time, sir. I am Celeste, and this is my brother, Caspian, from the Varmegarden Aeonlight Chapter.”
“Please elaborate on the reason for your visit.”
Straight to the core. Way better than the chitchat that was getting us nowhere. I really wondered how Celeste and Caspian were going to spin their religious mission into a pitch that would sway the mayor.
“As you may or may not know, we’re helping citizens across Fourlando to remember their relationship with the Aeonlight. Whenever they forget about the unity, corruption takes hold of the mind. And according to eyewitness reports, we see darkness creeping into all aspects of the Win Dorado.”
“Darkness?”
Caspian elaborated. “Citizens getting robbed, embezzlement on the state level, rampant social inequality, relentless greed. Just because the town is free of the Reepo doesn’t mean it’s healthy.”
The mayor’s bulldog face grimaced. “My visitors are happy, and my town makes enough profit to sustain itself without relying on other communities. That’s a win in my book.”