Trial and Flame

by Kevin Murphy

  Chronicle: Trial and Flame

  Kevin Murphy

  Copyright © 2018 by Kevin Murphy

  Thanks to Ruslana Shybinska for the beautiful cover artwork, Dan Williams for editing at an unreasonable pace and criminally low budget, Sally Martin for her brilliant ideas and patience while I write, and especially to my mother, Cynthia Murphy, for going above and beyond in editing edition after edition bringing both patience and decades of experience.

  Without them this book would not be what it is today.

  Chapter 1: Low Profile

  “…in such a short amount of time, the chaotic actions of players have proven that cities simply aren’t as safe as we once believed. Many quick-thinking participants found out that their tournament sigils could be hidden with a bandana, cloth, or helmet. Unfortunately, now, players obscuring their foreheads in town for any reason have become prime targets, even if they’re not tournament participants…”

  “Well, damn. Scratch that idea, I guess,” Dakkon thought to himself. The plan had been to fashion disguises which might give he and Cline a chance to move around unmolested. Even now, Merri was out fetching odds and ends for them to cobble together some sort of temporary camouflage.

  Shortly after the Tournament of the Gods was so abruptly announced, Dakkon and Cline were escorted to the outskirts of Turlin by Lina, the ludicrously strong fire sorceress, and her powerhouse companion, Merri. Turlin was distinguished as a large, centrally-located trade city, and because of that it should have been a safe place to hunker down while the general turmoil settled itself. Over the past two days, however, Dakkon learned that safety near any city was unlikely, no matter the size. The continent was in bedlam. Even ChronCast, the network which had gained a reputation from its fleeting, one-and-done newscasts, found its focus locked tightly on the most disruptive event in Chronicle to date.

  “…it’s been two full game-days since the unexpected start of the Tournament of the Gods, where thousands have been thrust into an unasked-for bloodbath. Though the tournament has caused abundant problems for everyone in the game world, those marked with a glowing crimson, fork-shaped sigil on their forehead are literally being tracked down and killed off by their competition.

  “The ChronCast team is working around the clock to bring you the most complete and up-to-date information on the Tournament of the Gods. Here’s what we know so far:

  “When the global announcement declared the tournament’s start, those selected were given an event-related quest and were branded with a glowing rune on their forehead. Currently, we know that several thousands of players have been marked—but that’s likely just the tip of the iceberg. Since only a few hours have passed in real-time versus the two full days in-game, it’s entirely possible that thousands more will log in to find that they, too, are participants. If you’ve been out of the game for more than an hour, make sure to pay close attention to this next part so that you can log in with a plan!

  “The Tournament of the Gods is a Highlander-style deathmatch with no built-in recourse for those who attack others out of nowhere. While all players will still be held accountable to the same rule of law, don’t expect everyone to play fair. Report after report is streaming in detailing just how bad of an idea it is to log in assuming that everything will be okay!

  “After analyzing a transcript of the quest received by those selected to be a part of this gruesome tournament, we know that each participant starts with a single ‘bonus point.’ When a competitor kills another player marked by a forehead-sigil, they take half of the slain player’s bonus points for themselves, and their unlucky victim will be booted from the tournament in addition to the usual 11-hour downtime that players who die must serve before they can log back in.

  “That’s right! People are killing each other in the streets for so-called ‘bonus points!’ But why? That’s because whenever a player is knocked out of the competition, half of their total accumulated bonus points will be converted into extra stat points. Players in the tournament have been given an unprecedented opportunity to wildly increase their own power!

  Gaining half of a felled adversary’s points means that, with even a single lucky kill, anyone in the tournament could gain several levels worth of stat points. We’ve crunched some numbers and, let me assure you, rewards for playing can get really out of control! Toward the end of the competition, the payouts will be massive! Plus, the quest description even states that there’s a chance for additional, unspecified rewards should any gods be pleased along the way. That last bit may seem awfully vague, but since the gods are associated with a wide array of varying characteristics, many players are hoping to make a big-enough splash to be noticed.

  “While those chosen to be participants tend to be well-leveled, it’s been confirmed that at least one new player has been included on their very first time logging into the game. So, even if you’re just starting out be sure to take additional care. Though it’s certainly possible to cover up your sigil with cloth, leather, or iron, doing so now will be sure to draw a lot of attention! Even if you aren’t in the tournament, be sure to bear this detail in mind!

  “If you have any new information on the Tournament of the Gods, you can contact us by…”

  Dakkon stopped watching the video feed streaming from his personal media console. News stations, forums, and social media outlets each gave their own take on the big new event in Chronicle, but the important information was the same. The tournament was going to be a big part of every player’s life, whether they were selected as a participant or not. Aside from the tidbit about players being accosted for wearing accessories that obscured the view of their forehead, Dakkon hadn’t learned anything new since he read his own quest alert two days back.

  He knew that the networks had at least one thing wrong, though. Cline had been chosen. That meant—aside from players—at least one Non-Player Character had been included in the tournament. In Chronicle, even though players could come back to life after a few days, NPCs tended to stay dead and gone for good. For Dakkon, it meant that this was one contest his buddy, Cline, couldn’t afford to lose. For now, they’d continue searching for any alternative to taking on scores of high-level, well-connected players.

  It was also worth considering that Lina had been selected for the tournament. If there could only be one grand champion in the end, it meant that someday Cline would have to best her. Dakkon couldn’t shake the memory of how easily Lina had obliterated a gang of bandits—of how little the action had meant to her, and of how her nonchalant mastery over a spinning mass of all-consuming fire had thoroughly terrified Dakkon’s usually courageous horse. Between Lina’s jaw-dropping firepower and Merri’s raw strength, the road to Turlin hadn’t seemed quite so perilous. Those two certainly wouldn’t bow down without a fight, and they didn’t know Cline’s secret; save for Dakkon and the gods themselves, no one did.

  When the four neared Turlin they took refuge in a man named Qirim’s modestly sized, though cozily furnished, cottage. Along with Lina, Merri, and the recently-inducted Dakkon, Qirim was a member of the Full-Purse Antiquarians. An order of relic hunters, information brokers, and business partners, the Antiquarians—to Dakkon’s great relief—weren’t above letting other members crash on their sofas in a pinch. Right after they arrived, however, Lina left—alone—for reasons that were, verbatim, ‘none of your goddamned business.’ Since Merri let it go with a shrug, the others followed suit. Her partner knew her best.

  The house’s host, Qirim, had turned out to be an incredibly odd character. He was a bookish sort who made his living by digging deeper into old tomes than most, linking together obscurities, and turning the mess of raw information into something that more adventure-inclined Antiquarians could work with. He was short,
with creamy peach skin that looked to be sponge-dabbed white. Odds and ends of silvery hair spilled out from underneath his rounded hat, which was almost comically oversized. He was also outspoken in his opinions, with a tongue which, at times, could cut like a razorblade. Until Dakkon had excused himself to catch up on news about the tournament, Qirim had spent the last hour educating him about the superiority of study and the folly of taking unnecessary risks—all while glossing over the fact that taking risks and killing monsters was essential to gaining the general sort of experience which allowed players to increase their overall character level. Despite Qirim’s eccentricities, Dakkon was grateful for his help.

  Dakkon pulled out his pair of maps he’d purchased from the cartographer’s guild. Neither were particularly fine maps—one seemed accurate enough to suit his needs in travel, and the other, shoddier-looking map contained odd tidbits which had already paid for itself. Not only had his more bedraggled map led him to efficient hunting grounds just outside the beautiful city of Tian, it had also warned of bandits in the area. Now that he was in the vicinity of Turlin, however, there were no clever annotations to guide him—though there were a few caves drawn to the east which didn’t appear on his other map.

  As Dakkon compared the differences between his maps, Qirim’s gaze eagerly flitted over them. Presented with two potential sources of information, the pale-skinned host couldn’t help himself. Qirim made no attempt to hide his desires—a single glance was all it took to realize he wanted to examine them firsthand. With a sigh, Dakkon handed over his maps. It couldn’t hurt to have more experienced eyes give them a once over.

  “These maps are hideous,” Qirim stated without a hint of sympathy. “You know, when you keep junky things, you end up looking like a junky person.”

  “I’ll try to bear that in mind,” said Dakkon in his best patient tone. He was a guest and, so long as he was still learning how to be a proper relic hunter, he decided that he could abide a fair amount of sass.

  Qirim continued looking over the maps, shaking his head all the while. Then, after a minute, he stopped with a thoughtful, “Hmmm.”

  “Hmmm?” Dakkon asked.

  “Yes,” Qirim said, still looking at the map while his left hand absent-mindedly rubbed the back of his jumbo-sized hat.

  After a few moments of waiting for a reply, Cline’s curiosity was piqued as well. He was grateful for any distraction from the constant fretting which had begun to occupy the majority of his time.

  “I think he means he’d like to hear about what you’ve found,” Cline said to Qirim.

  “I know what he means,” snapped Qirim, quickly. His idle hat-rubbing ceased. “Fine, then. This map here has a rather interesting symbol near some stains—or hills—or whatever type of god-awfully-drawn splotches these are supposed to be. I could barely make it out.”

  Dakkon rubbed his forehead gently with two fingers. He didn’t have a headache. He didn’t know if someone could even get a stress headache in Chronicle, but he used the familiar gesture to temper his mood all the same.

  “Uhhm. What sort of symbol?” asked Cline, fully expecting an unnecessarily testy retort.

  Not wanting to fall short of Cline’s expectations, Qirim replied, “The sort of symbol that denotes something. Now, be quiet for a second while I decide whether or not I care to tell you more.”

  It wasn’t yet clear if Qirim’s sour mood was caused by sheltering unwanted visitors within his domain, or if he was just a bit of a prick. Time would tell, and for now Cline and Dakkon were willing to give their host the benefit of the doubt. Dakkon then remembered catching a glimpse of Lina’s smirking face as she left them in Qirim’s care, as though she had been fully cognizant of his surly disposition.

  “All right, fine,” Qirim said. “There’s a symbol here that looks precisely like another found on an odd, but useless, artifact within dwarven territory… only—if this child’s-drawing is even remotely close to scale—the symbol seems to be in a different area entirely; nearly in the opposite direction, closer to the elves.”

  Suspecting any further inquiry would only serve to draw out more of the little man’s ire, the others waited a moment until his urge to pat his own back won out.

  “This symbol here,” said Qirim as he pointed to a black rectangle with a light ‘M’ made up of negative space, all surrounded by two, thin rectangular bands. “It’s found at the base of a large stone tablet that the dwarves of Yotgard have guarded for centuries. Knowing dwarves, they probably used to worship it then forgot why.” Qirim briefly shifted his massive hat to one side, then immediately readjusted it back to its starting position as if he’d only just remembered it had to stay put. “The tablet’s said to be covered in unrecognizable, foreign runes, yet—supposedly—anyone who focuses on it will see a short vision of some great healer’s grand feat. Don’t bother asking me anything specific about the vision—I’ve never been to see it.”

  Dakkon’s mind reeled as he remembered the experience of coming across a similar large, stone tablet hidden behind a wall of rubble in the Luck God’s temple. That tablet, called Mordurin’s Class, had likewise caused him to see visions from a mage’s life in rapid succession. Though he didn’t know what to make of his hunch, Dakkon suspected that the actions he saw in his vision were those of the uncredited, myth-like man who had first revealed Chronicle to the rest of the world. The tablet did more than show him a vision of someone else’s past, however. It had also given him his rare and unremovable class, edgemaster. Any sense of discomfort Dakkon had felt from dealing with Qirim’s antics had now been completely replaced with curiosity.

  “There are more tablets?” Dakkon asked.

  Qirim raised an eyebrow. “Tablets?” he asked, emphasizing the plural.

  Dakkon simply shrugged. “I meant, are there any more tablets?”

  After a moment of quietly appraising Dakkon, Qirim nodded. “I assume it’s possible more of such tablets exist in the world, but the one in Yotgard is the only one I’ve heard of.”

  “Is the tablet useful?” Dakkon asked. He was legitimately curious about what Qirim would have to say, but he also wanted to draw attention away from his implication that he’d already seen another tablet.

  “Not particularly, no. There are some who believe that the Healer’s Tablet is linked to some greater mystery within the game, but everyone says that about every mystery. It’s already been thoroughly studied, and I assure you there are plenty of dead ends in this world. Without new information, I doubt the tablet will be of any use to anyone.”

  Dakkon nodded his head in understanding, but it was clear from his furrowed brow that he hadn’t given up hope on the matter.

  “Well, if you’re that interested in the tablet, you could go and check out the location on your map,” said Qirim. “It’s not like you can accomplish anything here, cooped up in my den hiding like a fugitive.”

  He had a point. Coming to Turlin had seemed like a good idea, but with things being as they were, going into the city with a glowing-red target on his forehead appeared to be a less-than-ideal proposition. Still, even if he wanted to leave and venture off to unexplored lands, he would certainly need supplies beyond what Merri was carting back to them.

  Seeing Dakkon consider the journey, Qirim added, “If it turns out that this pile of a map isn’t sending you on some goose chase, I’ll expect to examine it again.”

  Dakkon gave a noncommittal shrug and regathered his maps. Cline looked preoccupied, as though he were unfavorably considering his own options. After a moment, there came a knock at the door. Merri’s return was another welcome distraction for Cline.

  “Thanks for helping out, Merri,” Cline said after opening the door widely enough to accept the sizable man.

  The humble giant merely nodded by way of response. He trundled past to unload the contents of his cart onto a large table at the side of the room which had been cleared off in anticipation of Merri’s bounty. Cline was quick to help him with the task. After a bit
of work, the table was covered in supplies and knick-knacks which Cline and Dakkon had requested Merri pick up for them. They had hoped the items might prove useful in disguising their status as tournament participants.

  Headbands, cloth hoods, leather hats, paint, brushes, clay, putty, twine, and performance makeup lay strewn about the table, each waiting their turn to be put to the test. Cline and Dakkon proved thorough in their efforts, testing each item one after the other. The headbands worked, as had been reported on ChronCast, as did the hoods and hats—but only a snug hat looked even somewhat inconspicuous. The sigil could be seen by looking up from beneath someone’s hood and, after hearing about people being accosted simply for wearing headbands, such accessories now seemed more like beacons than disguises.

  The paint, clay, putty, and makeup all shared the same issue: the light of the tournament’s magic sigil shined right through as brightly as if there were no obstruction at all, no matter the amount applied. Even layering putty and paint yielded nothing save for a mess to clean.

  Merri watched the two test out their potential disguises while thoughtfully stroking his chin. Eventually, he let loose a muted grunt as he lifted his bulky frame from the stone floor where he had sat, forgoing the plush cushions of his host’s furniture. The giant man lumbered to his bag, fished around for a moment, then produced a pair of tailor’s shears. He placed the tail-end of a headband against the sigil on Dakkon’s forehead, then snipped the band down to size. Merri held the small, shaped cloth to Dakkon’s face with one, large thumb and scraped at a bowl containing stage makeup. After heaping enough makeup onto Dakkon’s forehead to both cover and hold in place the snippet of headband, Merri smoothed it down with his thumbs then gave Dakkon a hearty pat on the shoulder before turning to sit back down.

  Dakkon could see Cline’s smiling face. The laconic giant had found them a temporary solution. The odd bulge likely wouldn’t hold up to close scrutiny, but walking the streets with no visible markings on their forehead might just deter any players from suspecting them in the first place.