The Trapped Mind Project (Emerilia Book 1)

by Michael Chatfield

  “Fuck.” Dave held out his hand and activated his armor. With his sight, he was able to break apart the deadly looking energy that was being sent directly into the stairs. He pulled the spell apart, draining the raw Mana into his armor. He conjured a rune inside his armor, changing his Magical Circuits. Now any similar bolts would just turn into stored Mana.

  “You take the power of the Dark and you do this! Children!” Malsour passed Dave. His eyes seemed to be almost purple, with deep black vertical slits. His hands seemed to be scaled with claws and his teeth were as sharp as some predators.

  A massive black shield formed thirty feet in front of the stairs.

  People flowed around it as Malsour’s shield took hits. Dave stood beside him, putting one hand on his shoulder and transferring energy to him to keep the shield active.

  He closed his eyes; his Touch of the Land had evolved to the point where he could see the makeup of spells. They were like runes, except more fluid, less efficient, and more power than necessary.

  “Well, who said I only had to conjure materials.” A hard grin covered his face as he conjured Mana into the spells’ weaknesses. The spells, without the stabilizing components, were just fleeing energy.

  Already Dave’s armor was gathering any extraneous energy it could find. All of it drifted to Dave, in turn supplying Malsour’s shield. For every spell he unraveled, three more hit Malsour’s shield. He needed more energy, much more.

  Deia and Induca split to either side of Dave and Malsour, pouring in support spells to try to push the necromancers back.

  The other forces ran to get themselves into their positions.

  Dave channeled his raw power and found of those who he had watched—the best fighters—few noticed any differences as their armor or weapons stats got better.

  They weren’t powerful conjurations, but it would give them a definite edge. The power that Dave had been storing for so long was nearly all spent with the fifty conjurations.

  Still, he was sucking power from the Dark Mana bolts headed for the shield. The power was decent but he still needed more.

  The Dwarves’ shields came together, creating walls. The Stone Raiders moved into position as the first casualties were coming back as the undead. The Players took them down as soon as possible, holy weapons and fighters focused on the undead. Healers were draining their Mana stores as people got into position and tried to build a rhythm.

  That was when the second wave of assassins hit.

  Chapter 33: Forward

  The Stone Raiders had moved into their positions, trading out with the Dwarves, who were taking heavy casualties.

  Cassie was moving up with her Golden Sabres when Jonas turned and tried to plunge his sword into her neck. She’d logged off for the night, leaving her more alert than those who had stayed behind and started training to be an Evolver Player. Her reaction was instinctive, turning and letting loose with a Mana bolt right into his side.

  He grunted the pain, slowing him as Naylor and Bok Soo cut him down.

  The two were her unofficial bodyguards. She’d argued that they’d be more useful on the field of battle and they’d firmly refused. Now she was happy that they had.

  She moved onward, pulling her sword free; it glowed with a golden light that was only getting stronger the closer they got to the battlefield.

  What greeted her was chaos.

  Darvos had gone ahead as her second-in-command and secured their position around the citadel. They’d already lost a number of people just trying to get into position. Now their ranks were in turmoil as the second hidden dagger of Boran-al rushed through their ranks.

  Five Dwarves and Esa stood behind a large black shield that was covering all of those who were coming up the stairs. Fire mages on either side were unleashing their talents, leaving burnt ground in the wake of their attacks, bringing the pressure onto them and off the forces moving into position.

  It must’ve been Jules’s squad; she’d heard things about Induca and Deia. She saw Dave with a hand on who must’ve been Malsour. The brother was even stronger than his sister.

  Dave’s other hand was raised out toward the shield.

  The Dwarves were still rushing up the left side of the stairs like a tidal wave of armored tanks. Their training was impeccable; they drifted into position as if they’d inhabited them all their lives. Their lines solidified and they held their ground, their shields coming together.

  Rock golems were forming and moved toward the cultists. The ground was made of black stone; earth javelins sped at the cultists.

  Their Health barely moved even with a direct hit. The cultists faced outward; none of them even seemed bothered with getting into melee range. They ranged from level 107 to 190, with most in the 140 range.

  Black lightning thundered down on the Dwarves. Their shields were left smoking from the attack but Cassie doubted that they could take much of it. The Dwarves weren’t only protecting themselves from the cultists; their edge running along the multiple guilds also had a shield wall.

  She wasn’t surprised to see that the edge that connected to the Stone Raiders did not have a similar shield wall. With the Stone Raiders, it was excessively hard to join their guild and be a spy.

  Unlike my own Golden Sabres. She was kicking herself for letting so many people into the guild after they had opened the portals to the Alturaran lands.

  Dwarven machinery formed behind their lines as Dwarven and Elven attack mages were working on trying to suppress the cultists. The Elves had formed ranks behind the Dwarves. They fired their arrows, the forward rank dropping as the second released; by the time the second rank was kneeling, the first rose up.

  Black shields appeared around the cultists. They sent curses and hexes out.

  Cassie looked away from those who came under those spells. Their deaths were gruesome and terrible.

  Another person tried to kill Cassie but Naylor was there, kicking them off balance and then cutting his flaming great sword right through them as if their armor wasn’t even there.

  “Pull the veterans together. We’ll support the Stone Raiders’ side. Any traitors we find, I want them to never log onto Emerilia again without one of us waiting for them.” Cassie moved toward her people.

  She glanced back at the squad that was holding the beachhead. She hadn’t seen power like that expended by so few yet. They might die just holding the beachhead but it had allowed them to get into position.

  She had come to Cliff-Hill to increase Golden Sabres’ name. With the assassins and betrayal, it had turned the publicity stunt into something personal.

  She accessed her inventory and equipped her helmet. Her hair was pulled inside and out of the way as her helmet descended. Naylor and Bok Soo followed suit. Across the Golden Sabres lines, helmets lowered and weapons were changed, from the flashy and cool-looking ones to their true weapons.

  A private message request pinged on her interface.

  “So, looks like you lot are getting serious,” Josh said, obviously fighting from his breaths and the grunts.

  “When someone starts putting traitors in my guild, I’m not one for mercy.” A smile crossed Cassie’s face. She came to this game to make money, but in the beginning it had been an escape, something to show others just how strong she could be.

  Her veterans grouped together, people she’d known for months, who’d quested with her to get their gifts from the Lady of Light, who had stood with her to take the portal to the Alturaran lands. They worked like a well-oiled machine, heavies protecting casters, healers rotating their heals and their meditation. Leaders keeping it all organized.

  There was every kind of Affinity of magic being thrown across the citadel’s square. The cultists’ Health was dropping, if it be slowly.

  This is what she gamed for, when gamers all came together for a singular purpose; they were a large group of loners and individuals in all other matters. When it came to a battle, that disappeared and they would do incredible things to keep one anot
her alive.

  “We need to move up. Their magic is more powerful than ours and we can’t even deploy our melee,” Cassie said.

  “The lady has a point. I can move my forces up, but those other guilds I don’t much trust,” Koda, the leader of the Dwarves and Elves, said. She hadn’t noticed him as she got into position and started working with other mages to call down holy artillery on the cultists, feeding them her Mana for their large spells.

  “Have the running artillery spells only, spend all their Mana and we can see if they do anything dodgy. I’ll send you a few rogues who will keep an eye on them in case any of them have a change of allegiance.” Josh was always a happy-go-lucky kind of guy. His voice now made Cassie shiver; it seemed he took as kindly to traitors as she did.

  “Good. I’ll have some rangers reinforce them,” Koda said.

  “Fuck, these bastards are strong.” Cassie watched as multiple magical artillery rounds hit the cultists, hitting a shield that descended from the center of the four spikes. A black crystal showed itself.

  “Think of their level as double. The only way for his lot to get experience for their overall level was to train their skills. That means they’ve probably got a whole shitload of stat points behind them,” Josh said.

  Koda grunted in grim agreement.

  “Well, for fuck’s sake!” Cassie yelled.

  “Welcome to Boran-al’s Citadel. Now we need a way to take down that damn shield,” Koda said.

  “Dave,” Josh said.

  “He’s a smith and an okay fighter, but how is he going to do that?” Cassie asked.

  Unseen to Cassie, Josh looked at the two daggers in his hand. They weren’t the blades that he had given to Dave; they were identical except for the fact they had gray smoke around them and they were in better condition than the ones he’d given to Dave.

  “He’s more than meets the eye,” Josh said.

  “Worth a try,” Koda said.

  “Very well, I’m going to work on getting… Fuck!” Cassie watched as Dwarves who had been killed in the first few minutes of battle were now rising from the dead right behind Jules’s squad.

  Esa stepped up, her blade cutting into them.

  “The dead are rising,” Josh supplied.

  “Fucking necros.” Koda’s voice was filled with pure anger as it was his people who were, for the large part, being pulled back from death and turned against their friends.

  Most of the Players had dropped out and were waiting out the two-hour times until they could get back in. A whole six hours in-game.

  They were just ten minutes into the fight: none of the cultists were below eighty percent Health and they’d already lost nearly five hundred people, including the Dwarves and Elves.

  “I’ve got healers and casters. Josh—overall and watch for openings. Koda—shield wall,” Cassie said.

  Now was not the time for division; they needed to work together.

  “Shifting command to you. Kim and Lucy will assist. Koda, you’ve got Dwayne,” Josh said.

  “Wender will support you, Josh,” Koda said.

  “Same for Darvos,” Cassie said.

  “Well, let’s get this fucking thing started. Five minutes to get organized then I want us moving the fuck forward. Interspace Dwarven shield bearers with my tanks; they can add to the magical resistances and buff, moving Koda’s mages from healing and support to Cassie’s command,” Josh said.

  “Got it.”

  “’Kay.” Cassie was working command windows, as Josh sent her lists of people to contact. She sent out messages firming up lines of command and changing things on the fly. She moved people over to the Dwarves to relay the messages as they didn’t have the private messaging function.

  ***

  Malsour’s shield came down.

  “Lock! March!” Lox bellowed. The four warbands under his command came together in front of Malsour, their shields taking the impacts. Among them were Players firing off buffs and creating magical shields, living up to their tank monikers.

  Black energy rained down on them. Chains tried to pierce the shields and drag them out of place. If it was not for the Dwarven shield bearer enchantments, then they would have been dragged free.

  Now they stood and Dave couldn’t help but feel pride at the sight.

  “Eat up and meditate. You’re now my hit squad.” Josh clapped Dave and Malsour on the back.

  Both of them slumped on the ground, eating food to help their regeneration of Mana and to start their meditating.

  Mikal, who’d seen the least action, took over making sure everyone was eating food and drinking potions to regain what they’d lost.

  Dwarven lines interspersed with Players on either side were staggered and slowed in their advance until they linked up with the rest of the shield bearers. It was as if they turned into a solid wall instead of a group of people.

  Rogues and clerics rushed around, dealing with the undead. Here and there, they rose between ranks of the Dwarves. Another use for having the Players was that it was so much easier for them to kill the Dwarves and Elves who came back from the dead.

  It’s so much easier to kill something you just think of as ones and zeroes.

  The guilds other than the Sabres and Raiders had been decimated. With the traitors in their midst, their trust had been broken; a few of them were still left but not many. The new lines were moving to cover their area as they died off.

  A third of the Golden Sabres were shunned as they were new and couldn’t be fully trusted. They were fighting with their all and more than a few rogues and rangers were watching them to clear away any who tried to attack their fellows’ sides.

  ***

  Deia panted. She had spent nearly half of her Mana on constant spells from fire bomb and scorching ray to fire bolts.

  The Dwarves, Elves, Stone Raiders, and veteran Golden Sabres were pushing on three sides. The other guilds and the non-veteran Golden Sabres were along the northern edge of the citadel’s stone square.

  She could see over the heads of many and right to the central area. The cultists were standing their ground, around forty of them firing spells into Players and People of the land.

  It seemed that they had figured out that gathering Players for anything other than their blood ritual happening at the center of the citadel was useless. Black chains tore at the Elves and the rear ranks of the allied forces, pulling them into the center.

  So far they’d been able to keep down the number of dead that the cultists had risen, through a combination of holy blessings and Players quickly killing any People of the land who were re-animated.

  Deia looked to the rest of the squad. All of them were sitting down. Lox and his warband, who were their support, had joined onto the shield wall that was now pressing toward the large shield in the center of the citadel’s square.

  Here and there, the cultists were able to kill people in the shield wall. Their own shield kept taking hit after hit of magical artillery. They would soon run out of the Mana to supply those powerful spells. Deia looked to Dave, who would have looked as if he were taking a nap if it wasn’t for the way his brow was creased. He’d spent ten minutes at it, talking to Malsour, who sat next to him.

  Deia had never seen Malsour so angry. Induca had told her that Malsour was a practitioner of Dark magic. Upon seeing the twisted way in which the necromancers were using the magic, it seemed that the calm and studious Malsour had snapped in anger.

  There was also the minor fact that his skin had appeared to take on a scaly appearance and he had claws. Oh and his eyes were slits and he was a few inches taller and wider. Induca also seemed bigger but less scales—other than on her hands, which now had claws.

  Dave sat up and reached for the black soul gem that resided between the four central peaks.

  “Riiight…there.”

  The soul gem shattered as power rushed toward Dave. Even as it was entering his armor, he was powering his conjurations and creating more.

  It seemed
that losing the shield was a sign to the cultists.

  Dark magic started flying and corpses, even those of the twice dead, were pulled toward the citadel.

  Deia looked at the four peaks and the runes on them that were slowly lighting up. Purple smoke drifted from the runes and surrounded the spikes.

  “We’ve got a new target,” Jules said.

  People cheered as the first cultist’s shield fell and attacks started making contact. Even without the shield, the cultist was hard to kill.

  It took the damage, dropping slowly for all the Mana that they were spending on it. It managed to raise a directed shield to deflect magical artillery. It seemed almost dead as arrows, javelins, curses, and magical bolts hit it.

  Group Chat Weakness

  >Healing spells against the cultists work well, must be because they’re undead!

  Deia watched as offensive mages with healing spells started healing it. Its Health started dropping continuously.

  It let out a Health drain, ripping Mana, Stamina, and Health from its enemies. Most could do that to a maximum of three people. It was doing it to ten.

  Attacks turned from other shielded cultists to the one on its last legs.

  One of the feeding people died; the cultist attached their red lead to another.

  Group Chat Weakness

  >Bless people being drained, cuts the connection!

  “That’s our target,” Jules said. An enemy was surrounded in a red halo. They pulled another body from the masses. It was clearly dead without a head. Scrambling an undead’s brains removed the control and it dropped like a puppet without strings.

  “Combined Scorching Rain,” Induca said.

  Whereas Deia was the better physical fighter, Induca was her teacher in all things Fire. If she called a spell, Deia would follow.

  Deia completed a short chant; Induca, with a more concrete idea of the spell, was able to only say the title of the spell as their spell came together in the shape of concentrated fiery rain.