by Mars Dorian
Grezz danced around me and evaded my attacks with ease. She even found enough time to glance at her cheering audience. “The human dwarf wants to play.”
Yeah, and I played to win.
I changed my strategy and tried a trick: feign a forward dash attack and shoot my harpoon instead. Grezz’ natural weight surpassed mine, but I had medium armor and weapons, which balanced us out.
“Nice try—”
She couldn’t finish her snide remark. I shot the harpoon in short range and pierced her left arm, causing little damage but binding her to me. I caused electro damage, which cut seven percent of her overall health. The shock state hampered her movements, and allowed me to run into her close combat range. I unleashed my blade swipes and sliced her HPs. Before she regained her posture, I had halved her life. And Grezz hated it.
“You’re a nasty little bugger. I’m going to enjoy squashing you.”
The crowd moaned. Some of the beast men bystanders cursed at me and promised to eat my intestines once the fight was over. Looked like Balzac allied himself with the right people.
“Fight me, human.”
With half of her health down and me on my last potion, Grezz changed her attack pattern. She summoned a mantra and entered berserker mode, doubling her speed and, more dangerously, her damage output. Grezz stormed after me and unleashed a volley of jabs and swings. I could deflect maybe thirty percent of her fast attacks while my HPs dove in free fall. The impacts vibrated my chest plate and hammered my real body.
It hurt like hell.
“She’s turning you into breakfast,” Rokkit said from the cheap sidelines.
“Thanks for the notice.”
I was tempted to use a mine but was afraid to kill her. The quest description explicably told me to defeat her, NOT kill her, so I increased distance to the raging attacker and hoped the berserker effect would fade soon. When she stopped her close range jab attacks, an idea dawned on me. I started limping to fake a serious injury and selected the stunner mine from my inventory.
Grezz prepared for a jump attack. The second she landed next to me, I rolled sideways and activated the stunner mine. A smoke blast evaporated from the charge’s holes and engulfed the Preshaar. She staggered and entered confused mode with tiny, semi-transparent stars circling above her hairy head. I dashed forward and rammed my blade into her spine, causing 150% of the normal damage. Her HPs dropped below the twenty percent mark. I was just about to unleash another melee attack when chieftain Kharra’s coarse voice roared along the arena. “Stop. Both of you.”
I froze my action while Grezz returned to her normal mode. She limped across the arena and ground her teeth. Blood dripped from her many wounds. This defeat must have blown her ego, which was ginormous to begin with. Grezz ignored me but stood up straight in front of her leader Kharra and ignored her pain.
Congratulations. You have defeated Grezz in the duel.
Experience points trickled in, but not enough to reach Level 16. The chieftain refrained from shaking my hand. She couldn’t possibly believe that a ‘dwarf’ like me could wipe out one of her warriors; a veteran at that.
“She is a proud beast woman.”
“Hubris comes before the headshot,” I said, channeling Balzac. “She’s a good fighter, but she underestimated my skill set.”
Yumi-D and L’ocean waited in the sidelines and shook their heads like I was treading into a minefield. Kharra’s glance stayed glue on me, but her jaw loosened up. Her sharp teeth retracted and stretched into a smile. “You’re a foul mouth, human. But your war-burn is bright.”
She addressed the audience with her raised chest. “I believe the naked dwarf gets my time. What do you think, my brethren?”
A lot of local Preshaar gurgled a ‘yahhrrr’ which sounded like a half-hearted concession. I wondered what would happen if they’d disagree with their leader. Kharra would probably slice off their heads and play soccer with them.
My team joined me with mixed reactions. Yumi-D and L’ocean congratulated me with shiny eyes, but Rokkit couldn’t muster a smile. “She tore you a new one, Boltzy. I think she was just holding back.”
He mimicked Grezz’ moves and added dramatic sound effects. I didn’t know which world Rokkit was living in, but in mine, I had clearly won the fight. “I didn’t want to use my explodas and kill her.”
“Excuses.”
“You fought well for a skeleton human,” the chieftain said and stepped next to me. “I like your moves.”
“Does that you mean you join our cause?”
My co-player’s eyes perked. This was the moment we came for. The goal of the big quest.
“No,” Kharra said. My shoulders sacked.
Nothing ever came easy in Fourlando.
“But it means I give you more of my time.”
That piqued my interest.
“There’s something you can for us, dwarfs. If you win, we join your fight against Sunblood. Maybe.”
Quest alert!
Hopefully not another player-versus-NPC fight. If it was, Rokkit could take it. His class was meant to participate in one-on-one battles.
Still, the leader spoke exclusively to me, which pumped up my pride. Looked like I was the go-to person now. “What can I do for you, Chieftain?”
“As hunter-gatherers, we get our food from many places. One of the food we eat are Skyscratcher eggs. We find them in the Killa Kanyons. But a few moons ago, our seekers came back without eggs. Something happened, and we need to find out what.”
Quest: An offer to the beast
Type: Bounty Hunter & Retrieval Quest
Description: Skyscratcher eggs have been missing in the Killa Kanyons. Find out the reason why and return to the chieftain.
Reward: 1x Skill Point; cont. Experience
No money, but an extra skill point, which was nice. The quest sounded almost simple. Which meant some nasty surprise would await us. Either way, if this quest allowed us to ally with the beast men, it was worth it. I accepted the offer and received a rough shoulder pat from Rokkit. “Why are you acting on behalf of the party?”
“We’re here to prove our worth to the Preshaar, right?”
“And that means you can bypass our votes?”
Yumi-D stepped in-between. “Maybe you two hotheads should focus on our goal here. Your egos can stand outside the tent and fight it out later.”
Kharra chuckled and made her chest plates wiggle. “You humans are funny. Smelly, ugly, but funny. And maybe useful.”
Rokkit whispered. “Says the furry that smells like cat shit.”
I was glad the leader couldn’t hear our group chat. Otherwise, our heads would have been impaled on wooden spears. Kharra gauged our armor with rolling eyes. “If you want to survive in the canyons, you want to buy better gear. Up there, it’s windy and steep. One wrong move, and you’re blood puree. Human meat trash. Always beware the sky creatures. They own the canyons.”
She pointed her claw toward a tent-shaped building. Edgy symbols that looked like creative claw scratches smeared on a front sign. “Thankfully, we have just the right tools nearby.”
“At a price, I assume.”
“In life, only death is free.”
Morbid poetry, the Preshaar way.
Before we turned around to shop until we dropped, the chieftain said, “If you don’t come back within two bloodmoons, we will think you’re dead. No alliance.”
“Better dip that claw of yours into ink for the signature, because we’re coming back.”
She grinned and exposed her razor-teeth. The lovely smile of a two-legged predator. Let’s hope she agreed to our deal and wouldn’t plunge her sharpened claws into my spine.
Dozens of meters across the red, earthy ground, we tried to enter the shop but failed to find an entrance. A brown-colored facade greeted us instead. The shop itself was round and reminded me of an igloo made out of clay. The only way to enter it was through holes on the top. Tough challenge if you carried armor like me. I outwei
ghed a golem.
“This shop isn’t very human friendly.”
I tried to climb the facade but my gear wasn’t made for mounting walls. My partners failed to climb as well and slipped back to the soil. I shouted toward the window hole. “Hello? Anyone inside? You’ve got customers.”
A slender Preshaar peeked his head from the hole in the round-shaped roof. He wore some kind of old guardsman helmet and ancient glasses. “Humans? Huuuumans?”
“Do you accept credits from the continent?”
The beast man mumbled something inaudible. I only understood ‘credits’ and a bunch of grumbles that sounded like feral curse words. The head of the Preshaar dove into the hole again.
“I think you pissed him off,” Rokkit said.
“By asking a question? I hope they aren’t that sensitive.”
A rope ladder flew out the hole and curved toward our boots.
“You sure?” I said to Rokkit who couldn’t suppress his grin.
I climbed up first and jumped through the window hole. My boots landed in the center of the shop. At first glance, it looked like a standard store, but the showcase curved around the walls and formed a circle. I was literally surrounded by goods. My co-players landed next to me and whistled.
“Now that’s a unique design,” Rokkit said.
For the first time in a while, I agreed with him.
The vendor beast man scrambled along sockets embedded into the wall and eyed us. “It has been decades since I served naked dwarfs.”
“Am I smelling racism here?” I asked, half-jokingly.
“No, no, not at all. To tell the truth, I’m the only Preshaar in the village that has at least one naked dwarf as a friend.” He paused. “And I never call him naked dwarf when he’s around.”
“Let’s do business,” I said to finish this awkward situation. “We’re going to enter the Killa Kanyons. Do you have any gear recommendations to us?”
“Killa Kanyons? Are you insane?”
“You have to be insane to make it through this world.”
“Yahr, that true,” the merchant said. “Hold on, my dwarf, I believe I have something that fits your meager bodies.”
He showed us a bunch of tools and gloves. “Killer Kanyons have no path or roads. If a naked dwarf wants to climb up there, you’ll need special tools. Have a look at these.”
The beast man vendor showed us adjustable, short-range, metal claws and bracelets. According to the data, they could also be used for short-ranged fighting with decent damage. The beast man noticed my interest and pointed toward the claws. “Very useful for climbing, especially when you have little sausages for fingers.”
Weapon tool: Preshaar Claw Bracers
Base damage: 45-55
Attack speed: Very Fast
Range: Very Short
Type: Retractable Claws
Ability: Climbing walls, mountains, trees as well man-made obstacles.
Bonus: 15% Bleed damage chance
Nice bleed damage, probably the highest of any weapon I have encountered so far, but the pathetic base damage was useless. Plus, I hated the very short range. Deadly for a mid-ranged WarTech like me who relied on big, tech toys.
The beast man merchant showed us another item reminiscent of a leathery gear pack.
“It’s windy in the canyons. When you climb high, you fall low. One wrong move and you’re puree. Bong goes the dwarf.”
Tool: Leathery Fallback
Type: Parachute
Description: Useful for adventurers climbing mountains or falling from airships.
At four hundred and fifty credits, the parachute was pricey. But since Fourlando was a permadeath world, I didn’t want to risk my life just to save a few hundred credits. Plus, this shop relied on game logic. So if the beast man sold parachutes, they had a use in the game. Together, our team bought the claws, smart rope, parachutes, and a few antidotes and health potions. The beast man panted when the credits rolled in. Either that, or the temperature in the clay hut was dramatically rising.
“Well, well. Who said that human beings were criminal and useless creatures.”
“Who said that?”
He scratched his ears and grumbled. “Doesn’t matter anymore. What matters is that you are here in my shop. Anything else you need help with?”
I had already spent enough money on the goods. The beast man seller purred. I could swear dollar signs popped up in his yellow eyeballs. “Thank you, dwarf. Return soon. I get some special items for you, I promise. Only a dead Preshaar breaks his promise.”
“You might start with building a door,” Rokkit said.
“Yahr.”
Despite the Preshaar’s odd speaking style, I felt as if he had tricked me into buying more items than I intended to. After all, I had dropped several thousand credits. A little fortune I hadn’t spent anywhere on the main continent.
“Is the buyer’s remorse kicking in?” Yumi-D asked.
“Don’t know yet. I believe the only one who had made a beast bargain was the Preshaar.”
The merchant helped us climb out the roof window. We summoned our upgraded fowls from the local stable and hurried toward the Killa Kanyons.
11
Unfortunately, our fowls were only usable for a short distance. We soon neared the boulder section which was impossible to traverse with our feathered friends. And despite the fowl’s birdy appearance and feathered claws, they lacked the ability to fly. At least the vendor kept his promise—we needed our claws to climb over those steep rocks to reach the higher altitude of the Skyscratcher nests.
In-between the climbing, I looked at the semi-transparent local map of the top-right corner of my vision. The target zone was only half a kilometer away, but the climbing slowed down our advance. Reaching a single meter proved to be a challenge, except for Rokkit. He shot up the rock facade like a semi-pro spiderman. In the middle of the climb, he looked down on me with a sharp grin. “Remember Boltzmann, if you fall, you’re done for. No more WarTech, no more pro player career.”
“Thanks for the pep talk.”
“Just making sure you’re understanding the gravity of the situation.”
He wasn’t going to pull a fast one on me, was he?
The canyon wall had many loose rocks. Rokkit could snap one, throw it at my char, and make me slip down the ravine.
Whoosh went my WarTech.
Let’s hope the pricey parachute upgrade worked.
Below, my female co-players tried to keep up with me. “Are you guys okay?”
L’ocean and Yumi-D experienced similar trouble mounting the rocks, but they refrained from complaining. The higher we got, the harder the wind blew. I could feel the vibrations on the smart chest plates of my real self in the room. The sensors detected the wind breezes and transferred the motion to my chest hairs. As my clawed bracers reached for the next niches carved into the rock, I scanned the area above our heads. Dozens of strange-looking birds arrowed through the air. They ignored us which I welcomed—the last thing we needed right now was an aerial attack from aggressive birds. About ten meters up, Rokkit reached the cliff first. He stood up and bent over. His determined eyes looked down at me. “Give me your hand. I’ll pull you up.”
His face grew serious, which worried me. Was he going to throw me off the cliff? Wouldn’t make any sense, but maybe he wanted to show a dramatic action to woo his audience. Going bad boy all the way for the views.
“What’s going on?” he said with more pressure.
I ignored his request and reached the cliff myself. The mechanized claws pulled my heavy armor over the rugged ground. I did help L’ocean and Yumi-D get up though. Rokkit watched me with his arms crossed. “No trust, eh?”
“Trust needs to be earned.”
“After all our quests and the many times I saved your ass, you still need more proof?”
Yes, I did. He acted like he had a split personality, with the good Rokkit battling the bad one over player control.
“G
ive me more time.”
“Don’t wait too long.”
I had zero interest in conversation, so I looked at the semi-transparent map of my HUD.
Fifty-four meters until the destination.
We marched across the rugged soil and entered a massive, half-open cave entrance in the canyon wall. The path through the inner space revealed an abyss to the left. I was tempted to look down, but I was afraid to slip over the edge and fall into permadeath. Unlike previous locations, this environment counted as a threat just as dangerous as monsters and troops.
“Dash,” L’ocean said and pointed toward the distance.
Deep into the half-open cave, violet particles sparked in the air. I had seen that effect in the Finsterland Forest, one of my earliest quests.
“The Reepo’s here,” Rokkit said, voicing our deepest fear. We unfolded our weapons and marched toward the target zone, now only a dozen meters away. A nest came into sight. The hatched eggs revealed bird-like bodies the size of Chihuahuas. Thank tech I couldn’t smell them, because the possible stench would have hammered my nostrils. Yumi-D knelt next to the dead offspring and noticed tiny shards in-between the featherless babies.
“Reepoisoning?” Rokkit asked.
“I’m afraid so.”
I looked farther into the cave. Violet crystals protruded from the rugged ground like an infection. Their half-transparent surface mirrored our characters as more particles emanated into the air.
“A Reepo coral,” Yumi-D said.
“But what is it doing here, inside a cave?”
“Why are you asking me?” Rokkit said. “I’m not a Reepologist.”
I was tempted to move closer to the crystalline forest of shards but feared an infection; at least I had few vaccines.
“Don’t touch it,” Yumi-D said.
The crystal corals had spread around the cave and its many holed corridors. In the midst of the violet infestation knelt an armored human. Even before the analyzer kicked in, I recognized the crimson chest plating and the bleeding sun crest. I dashed forward and readied my blade for the Sunbleeder.