by Galen Wolf
To despise pecuniary reward
To fight for the welfare of all
To obey those placed in authority
To guard the honour of fellow knights
To eschew unfairness, meanness and deceit
To keep faith
At all times to speak the truth
To persevere to the end in any enterprise begun
To respect the honour of women
Never to refuse a challenge from an equal
Never to turn the back upon a foe
I look it up and down. Yes, I can keep to that. I’m not really tempted by torture and rape.
We walk some more miles and we come to a small village called Croglin. It stands, a few rough houses and a church under the shadow of the looming hills to the east. We’re going up that escarpment to get to Alston Moor, where St Ninian has his chapel. As we enter the village boundary I get a message:
The Inn there is called the Vampire’s Grave. We go in and book a room for the night. Looks like we’re all in the same room, which is okay because I plan to log and come back in the morning.
When I get to the room I see that the others have each grabbed a bed, but Luc isn’t there. There won’t be a bed for him. “Where’s the paladin sleeping?”
Bernard says, “Private room.”
“Oh?”
“Maybe he snores and doesn’t want to bother us,” Adele says.
Gearhart is lying on his back on his bed, hands behind the back of his head. “Maybe he doesn’t trust us?”
“Nah, he’s just a snob,” Bernhard says, sorting out his pack. I see he has a bunch of potions. He sees me looking. “You got any health potions?”
I shake my head.
He hands me two small blue bottles. “Should be fifty sips in each.”
I turn them round in my hand. “What are they?”
Adele puts her hand to her mouth to stifle a giggle. Bernard says, “My, you are green, aren’t you? They’re health 30s. Each sip restores 30 health.”
“For fighting — when you get hurt,” Adele says.
I nod. “Yeah I got that.”
“Everyone’s got to learn,” Gearhart says.
I sit on my bed. “So what’s the plan?”
“It’s dark outside now,” Adele says. I peer out the open shutters to see the sun has sunk in the west and its last light bathes the mountain escarpment behind the village in a deep golden light. Stars are already visible as pinpricks in the darkening sky. A bat flits past the window, hunting flies.
“So we don’t go out at dark?”
Adele says, “Not at our level. There will be evil creatures out there, but we should be safe in the Inn and we’ll make our way again in the morning.”
“So we sleep?”
“Set an alarm on your Virtual Reality rig,” Gearhart says. “If anything happens in the game, it’ll alert you and you can log back in.”
So I do.
It’s the middle of the night in the real world when my VR rig starts buzzing and the red light flashing. I’m groggy but I tumble out of bed and put on the goggles and the neural net headpiece and then I’m back in Camelot Overthrown.
I’m in the bedroom at the Vampire’s Grave and a fight is going on. Gearhart has put his bow to one side and is using two knives. Bernhard is lobbing flasks of acid towards the door; I hear the crash of glass and smell the acrid stink as they smash. Adele has a mace and shield and is laying into our enemies. Luc is nowhere to be seen.
Luckily I slept in my plate armour. I leap up and rush at the enemies. I don’t actually know what they are. Luckily there is no friendly fire in this game, so the acid flask bombs thrown by Bernard don’t harm me. I’m between Gearhart to my right and Adele to my left and I hack down with my copper sword. We’re faced by three wizened yellowy creatures in leather armour. They have swords and bucklers. Behind them is a taller and meatier version of the same kind of creature.
While the messages are useful, they distract me from the fight. I jab the boggart.
Then the boggart goes down under as a flask hits him and he screams as the acid hisses and burns into his skin. Bernard has killed the boggart.
One of the other boggarts hits me.
Great. The copper armour means he can’t really damage me. Then the big guy behind him smacks me with a mace.
I reel backward. The bad guy sees his advantage and brings his mace down on me again.
I scrabble in my inventory for the Health 30 potions Bernard gave me but before I can get it to my mouth a wash of silvery energy hits me. And I feel good.
That’s good. I turn to thank her, but she’s fighting her Boggart. I jab at the big Boggle.
I simply can’t harm him at this level. I see Gearhart finish his boggart and turn to stab the boggle, but the boggle sweeps him with the mace and knocks him into the corner. Adele goes to her knees as her boggart jabs her in the guts and, bright blood wells from between the plates of her armour. Then the door behind is kicked in and Luc appears. He’s in full plate and his sword looks amazing — it’s blazing with holy white light. He hacks into the big boggle sergeant who turns to face him. I jab the boggle, but still miss. I wondered if there was an advantage from positioning. Certainly not at my level of skill — maybe higher in the tree.
I see him run the boggle through, with a smug smile on his handsome face. The boggle goes down but then one of Bernard’s acid flasks cracks open on the back of the boggle’s head. Bernard shouts, “Got it!” as the thing collapses and dies. I see Luc scowl, but then disguise the scowl. “Well done, Bernard,” he says.
The enemies are all dead now.
Gearhart wipes his knives on the tunic of the dead boggle. He looks at Gearhart. “You took your time.”
Luc wipes his blonde hair from his eyes. “I heard a commotion and thought you chaps could do with my help. Seems I was right.”
Adele goes forward. She’s clearly healed herself. “Thank you, Luc. You saved our bacon.”
“Not really,” Bernard says. “We had that.”
“Of course.” Luc smiles.
“But you really helped,” Adele says.
I turn to Gearhart. “What’s with Adele?”
“She’s sweet on Luc. Thinks he’s the bee’s knees.”
Luc gives a gracious bow and withdraws. Without turning he says, “Keep my share of the loot. You’re welcome to it.”
“Not like he needs it,” Bernard mutters.
“Be nice!” Adele says. “He’s a really sweet guy. And kind too.”
“Whatever.”
“Loot though?” I say. Lying on the floor now the boggle and the four boggarts’ corpses have vanish
es are four sets of leather armour, one set of studded leather armour, 8 groats, five iron shortswords and five wooden bucklers. There’s also a scroll of Prayer to St Theodosius, three empty glass flasks, three silver tipped arrows and a helmet mould.
We divide it. The Prayer scroll goes to Adele, the flasks to Bernard, the arrows to Gearhart and the helmet mould to me. I also get a set of leather armour and a shortsword to sell.
“You should try the studded buckler, Gorrow. You don’t have a shield I see. ”
“I don’t know.”
Gearhart raises and eyebrow.
I shrug. “Just prefer my own stuff.”
“You got a helmet mould too.”
I nod. I’m really pleased with that. It’ll improve my armour. I have a lump of copper ore still and when I get to a forge, I’ll be able to smelt that and have enough to make myself a copper helmet with this mould. I do pick up the buckler. It’s wood with studs and gives a further 5 armour. I’ll use that.
We split the groats between us at two each. Only 150xp to go to Level 2 then I can allocate some more skill points. I’m enjoying myself.
The next day we gather outside the Vampire’s Grave Inn in the middle of the village of Croglin. The sun is shining and a V-shape of geese flies past high up, heading towards the river. A stable boy brings out Luc’s fine spirited grey stallion and he tips the kid who mumbles and bows. Then Luc turns towards us. “Lovely morning. I thought we’d head up the slope and by early afternoon we should be on the plateau top.”
It seems he’s taken the role of leader, but what he’s saying is reasonable. I shrug. “Sure.”
There’s no disagreement from anyone, even Bernard, so we head off.
Adele is walking alongside Luc, but as he’s mounted, she has to hurry sometimes to keep up. The morning sun shines from her silver plate. My copper glints nicely and I’m pleased with my buckler. Soon, I’ll get to a forge and make myself a helmet with my new mould.
I’m walking alongside Gearhart. He’s a nice guy. He points out the animal tracks and the different plants. Apparently he has skills in Herbology so he can make them into useful poultices and pills. As we pass the centre of the village, Adele says points to the name milestone that says ‘Croglin’ in incised letters. Lichen grows on it. “Hey, I forgot. I’m going to bind here in case I get killed.”
I look quizzically at Gearhart. “She’s right. Bind here then if you die, you’ll come back here instead of Camelot, less far to walk back to the quest.”
“Ah ok.” The others gather momentarily around the stone. There’s a haze of green and then they step away. As I walk within two feet of the Croglin milestone, I get a message.
I hit
Then we leave the village and begin to climb, following the path through the tall bracken. We’ve been walking about fifteen minutes when an animal steps onto the path. It’s a red fox.
Gearhart takes up his bow, but Adele pushes it aside, spoiling his aim. “Don’t kill the fox.”
“Why not? I’m a hunter? Foxes are vermin.”
“No they’re not. They’re beautiful.”
But the fox has wisely vanished, so Gearhart stows his bow, muttering about do-gooders.
It takes us two hours game time to climb the high slope. Gearhart and Bernard, who both have Herbology, keep stopping to nip the heads of flowers, pluck leaves or grub for roots, which they put in their inventories. When we crest the final slope, we stop to look behind us. We’ve climbed about two thousand feet up from Croglin which nestles below, smoke rising in a homely fashion from the clustered houses.
“Tell me what I can see,” I ask Gearhart.
I see the river valley below, with the river Idon glinting in the sun. There is a wide area of low wooded hills stretching maybe fifty miles to the west and beyond that the sea. Beyond the sea are more hills. To the north I see the tall walls of Camelot and the castle within in.
Gearhart points ranger points. “Past Camelot are the hills and mountains of Scotia. The River Idon comes to the sea just yonder and forms an estuary called Meryn Rheged. Those hills past the estuary are also Scotia, but if you follow the line of hills down, on a clear day you can see Ireland and further south, you can just see the island Inis Mannan. The big bulk of hills to the south west are the Cumbrian Mountains, known to the ignorant as the High Mountains. And...” He sweeps round east to gaze over the rolling moorland, all purple with heather. “...Oh,” he says.
Luc is beside us, looking tall on his stallion. He really does have the best gear. He’s shielding his eyes and looking east.
“The Dark One’s corruption has come closer than we were led to believe.”
I narrow my eyes to see what they’re looking at. A band of twisting black and brown buzzes on the horizon. There are flashes of red and sickly green within it. “The corruption?”
Luc nods. “The influence of the Evil One, brought there by his servants.”
Bernard says, “They set up their unholy altars and the land around gets blighted. Nothing will grow.”
“And creatures come up from holes in the earth where they were long hidden,” Adele adds.
“Like the boggarts and boggles who attacked us last night.”
Adele shakes her head. “Much worse than them. They were low level.” She points at the twisting band of corruption. “In there you can expect vampires, werewolves, ghouls, ghasts, all manner of horrible things.”
Gearhart says, “We wouldn’t stand a chance against them at this level.”
Luc sighs. “Let’s hurry to make sure St Ninian is safe.”
We redouble our pace and cross the moor. We’re walking on paths through purple heather now. We see the odd sheep or shaggy haired pony as we go. Bees float among the blooming heather, taking the nectar back to their hives. Hawks hover above, and skylarks rise up, bright with song. It’s hard to believe the land is threatened, it seems idyllic.
But then, as we get closer to the village of Alston things change. The heather becomes stunted and the blooms sickly. There are no more bees, or creatures of any sort. The band of corruption flickers closer to us now, maybe only a mile away. Then the ground grows boggy and is harder to walk across. My leather boots sink ankle deep in patches of sucking black mud. It stinks.
“This is disgusting,” Adele says, trying to extract her boot from a patch of mud.
“Keep going,” Luc says.
Bernard mutters, “It’s okay for our lord and master up on his horse.”
Then Gearhart snaps his head round. The others are looking too.
“What?” I see a black flying shape coming out from the corruption.
Gearhart says, “A cockatrice. Let’s hope it doesn’t spot us.”
The creature is quartering the ground and from afar we see it swoop. There’s a scream. Adele says, “It got a pony.”
Gearhart says, “Explains why there’s not many of them around as you get closer to the corruption.”
“Ah,” Luc says. He can see further from horseback.
“What is it, Luc?” Adele asks, always keen to speak to her hero.
The paladin points. “The village of Alston.”
“That’s good, isn’t it?” I say.
“It would be. But the corruption has enfolded it.”
“Can we go in?”
Adele says, “I guess.”
Bernard scratches his bony nose. “But it’ll be dangerous.”
“Well, let’s go then. We’ve got a Quest.” I start forward. This time I’m the leader. Bernard laughs, I guess at Luc’s expense, and they follow. Soon Luc has spurred his horse ahead so he’s in the lead again.
If that’s what he wants that’s fine. I’m not entering into any ego wars.
And then we stand in front of the wall of corruption. Even outside the zone of strange radiation with its sickly coloured flashes, the vegetation is all dead. The land is all black with patches of mud
that looks like leaked engine oil. Everyone is hesitant, so I step in. Once inside the corruption it doesn’t do much to reduce visibility, it’s more like tinted windows in a car, but it pongs. It’s the strangest smell, vaguely sulphurous, hints of ammonia. It smells demonic.
The village is about five hundred yards in front, so I hurry down the oily path. There is no sign of life at all. I hope St Ninian isn’t dead.
And then I reach the village of Alston.
There’s no one around. The dark radiation swirls around the village streets. All the plants and bushes in the cottage gardens are dead and wilted. The windows are smashed and the wooden doors hang from broken hinges, or in some houses are splintered. I see a charcoal mark on one door. I point. “The Fangs of Koth.”
Bernard is beside me. He rubs his chin. “Yeah, they’re a bad bunch. Mostly high level, though there get people joining all the time. I’m guessing they led the assault on Alston.”
Luc dismounts and comes to stand with us.
I say, “They’re players though.”
Luc says, “Probably leading the evil NPC army. Doesn’t seem they’re around now.”
Bernard says, “But Alston’s lost. That’s a blow for the king.”
Explaining, Luc says, “Alston is famous for its silver mines. They’re a big source of revenue for the kingdom.”
“So why don’t we take it back?” I ask.
Luc gestures at our small party. “With whose army?”
He has a point, but I’m not happy at just accepting the advance of evil. At this point, Gearhart and Adele return from where they’ve been scouting towards the heart of the village. Gearhart jerks his thumb back over his shoulder. “St Ninian’s chapel’s this way.”
We follow them through the heart of the village. It has been well and truly trashed. As we pass the milestone that says Alston, I go up and get the message.
You bet I do. I’ll be back here. I’m surrounded by a shiver of green. Seeing me do it, Luc turns round. “Really?”
I nod. If they want to accept this defeat, that’s their business.
Bernard, more kindly, says, “You’ll get killed, bro. A lot.”
I shrug. He winks. “Courage eh? I can see you’re going to be a knightly knight.”