by Sarah Lin
Part of him wanted to smile back at her, but he couldn't stomach being so soft and warm. But she was right. Bloodwraith turned away, trying to search through himself and determine exactly what it was that he really wanted.
Why had he wanted to conquer in the first place? It had all started with anger over how poorly the world was run, certainty that he could do better. He could see that was arrogant now, yet he didn't shrink away from it. Fine, he was arrogant. If he got a chance to rule, he was sure that he could do better than Daek the Knife or so many ineffectual kings.
Had he ever really wanted to burn down the world? No, that had been the Master Lich's desire and he had gradually made justifications and lost track of his original goals. It was difficult to reconstruct his exact thinking now, but he didn't need to. What mattered was where he decided to go from this point.
Eventually he turned back and found Meara waiting silently. "You're right. Thank you, Meara."
She nodded and opened her mouth, but he kept speaking.
"I'm not going to be some selfless hero, though. Quite the opposite. But what I want, first and foremost, is to find out who is manipulating our world. This is my world and they have no right to meddle with it. Until we eliminate that threat, all personal choices are meaningless."
"That sounds good to me." Meara gave him a lazy smile and another realization hit him like lightning.
Raigar was the one who wanted to pin her down and take her, "conquer" her according to some childish view of the world. What Bloodwraith wanted was the Meara with a mocking smirk on her lips, coming to him willingly. Though the impulses of Raigar's body rushed through him, he couldn't deny his part in all his own thoughts.
For now, he could live with that. What mattered was that Meara was his ally in this, more than anyone else he had ever met. He smiled at her and extended his hand. "So, Meara, I told you who I am. Do you trust me now?"
She smiled back and took his hand. "Pleased to be working with you, Bloodwraith."
Chapter 16
They stood like that for a time, the warmth lasting for a while before it grew a bit awkward. Bloodwraith pulled back his hand and looked at her seriously. "I'm not withholding any more information from you. But before we wandered onto this very long tangent, I was saying that we needed to do more experiments."
"You're right. That's a good place to start." Meara's eyes flickered toward the amulet's box, forgotten amid his personal revelations. She looked away when he dismissed it. "I think we need to start with what these boxes actually are, at the most fundamental level. I was concerned that the Outsiders might be using them to monitor you, since they were able to send you messages, but you don't seem concerned."
"I thought the same, but I changed my mind after something I hadn't mentioned to you yet." Bloodwraith told her about the message he'd received at the bottom of the crypt and his theory that the system was fully contained within himself, an automated system of sorts. He never simplified for her and Meara seemed to follow without difficulty.
"So the boxes are a mix of your perceptions and the deeper magic the outsiders put in place."
"That's my theory. They don't reflect the truth of reality perfectly, since my impressions can impact them, but they're definitely more than the sum of my senses. On the other hand, I was able to defy the default settings when it came to your potions."
"How much do you think Daek knows? Based on the message, he isn't working with the ones responsible for all this, but is he fighting them, or just meddling with forces he doesn't understand?"
"That's hard to say." Bloodwraith turned back to look at Cresthaven for the first time in what felt like an age. "It's odd that he targeted me. Perhaps he can sense that I'm different and thinks that I'm one of the Outsiders. If that's true, then perhaps he's an ally."
Meara immediately shook her head. "I'm not saying you're wrong, but be careful. I have an intuition that Daek is not on our side - maybe it's just a feeling, but we've established that I'm in a strange place in all this."
"Yes, I'll take your impressions seriously. Do you have any other guesses about him?"
"Actually... give me a moment." Meara closed her eyes for a long time and he could see her eyes shifting beneath her eyelids. Gradually she opened her eyes with an odd expression on her face. "Okay, this is strange and might not be completely right... but I have an impression about all this..."
"Go ahead."
"For his first life, I gave Raigar a grand quest to defeat the Master Lich. But for his second, all I had for him was directing him toward Daek the Knife. If he wanted to live a different kind of life after reincarnating, why would that be his objective?"
Bloodwraith folded his arms. "I feel certain you'll tell me, once your pause has been long and dramatic enough."
She flashed a quick smile. "I think it was to give him a way to acquire stable power. Think about it: no matter how much Raigar did, he wouldn't be that much worse than Daek."
"Ah. And it gives him several options. If he wanted to take over the Thieves Guild, he could do that, but he could also create a rival organization to replace it. Cresthaven could support both. If he became worse than Daek, the city was already used to a capricious ruler. But if he was even slightly softer, then he could satisfy all his desires while people appreciated that he was better than his predecessor."
"Exactly! I think the Outsiders have the ability to nudge our world a bit, but not control it completely. So there are always loose ends and pieces that don't entirely work. Perhaps like this crypt Daek found."
"If he actually knew how to use the power of the ritual, there'd be nothing we could do to stop him." Once Bloodwraith said it, he realized that it was true. "Daek must have stumbled onto some of the same sort of power that the box gods control. There have always been theories about multiple worlds and ways to pass through them magically. The enemy has just mastered those abilities to an unprecedented degree."
Meara considered that thoughtfully. "Why do you think they're doing it, though? Is it all really just for a game? That feels... extravagant beyond even the most decadent kings."
"I'm not sure they have motivations we can understand. They might be insane gods gibbering madness in dark realms beyond ours. Even though they fashioned these boxes to appear in a language I know, not some alien tongue, it's still filled with incomprehensible concepts and other nonsense."
"You might be right... but I don't know, they feel a bit more comprehensible to me."
"Until we learn more about them, there's no way of knowing."
"Very true." Meara gave him a quick smile. "So we'll set aside the grand philosophical questions for now. Regardless of where we're going in the end, what do we do today?"
Bloodwraith turned away, folding his arms behind his back and considering the question. He had some immediate errands to run... but that felt too petty, given everything he had learned. Plus, it was completely ignoring their most valuable new resource. "I think we need to learn more about what you can do. After all, they used you to give new adventurers new quests."
Meara blinked as if this was a new thought. "I suppose that's true. But I don't think I really give them, at most I just hand them off. Though I suppose I gave you the quest to retrieve cureleaves... but it's not like I can just say, 'Raigar, bring me ten cureleaves!' and hav-"
[Quest Accepted!
Find 10 Cureleaves for Meara.
Rewards: Meara Affection, Alignment]
When his eyes shifted, Meara noticed, and a broad smile spread across her face. "Did I just create a box?"
"Yes, it looks like you did." Bloodwraith stared at it, shaking his head. "But we already knew that you could give me this quest over and over. I was hoping that you could create quests that I could finish simply and repeatedly. Even if they had low value, it-"
"Raigar! Take off your left boot and stick it on your head!"
"...no luck, Meara."
"Damn!"
"Maybe you can't create more than one at once? We
should resolve this one before we make assumptions about further experiments. Follow me - I handed you dozens of those things before, the least you can do now is help."
He didn't need to order her, though, Meara was eager to help. Cureleaves were much more difficult to find in the crags outside Cresthaven than in the Forest of Beginnings. They had to range around further, though Bloodwraith always stayed within range of Meara just in case there were more bandits in the area.
Though her words had troubled him, his mind felt clearer than it had in a very long time. So what if some of his impulses had actually come from within himself? Someone devoted to being pure "evil" was just as foolish and provincial as some paladin who sought a naive ideal of "good" at all costs. He'd figure out what he actually wanted in life, then find a way to acquire it.
At last they found ten cureleaves. Meara handed the ones she'd gathered to him, then he handed all ten back to her. They stood there awkwardly for a moment.
[Quest Complete!
Found 10 Cureleaves for Meara.
Meara Affection +10
Alignment: Good +5
EXP +25]
Exactly as it had been before. As Bloodwraith stared at the box, he found Meara gazing at it as well. "Can you see it now?"
"I don't see anything with my eyes, but the more I get used to it, the more I have an impression of them. You finished the quest, right? And then... oh, apparently a few bundles of leaves are worth 10% of my total affection! Take me now, brave adventurer!"
Bloodwraith just chuckled. "What matters is that I still gained the power attached to the quest. Though 25 points may not be a lot in the long term, it's still remarkable. Right now, killing wolves only grants me a single point of EXP each. Your quest was worth an entire pack."
"Wow, so I just granted you raw power?"
"Indeed you did, oh Goddess of Plant Collection."
Meara gave him a mock curtsy, but soon refocused on the box more seriously. "I'm more curious about the line before that, though. It has... something to do with morality?"
"I believe so. The box gods have seemed concerned with a simplistic morality system from the beginning, offering me a binary choice between good and evil. Many of the actions I take change my 'Alignment' on a continuum - based on my actions so far, I've been pushed over to the 'Good' side of things. It is an exceedingly stupid system, utterly reductive of any concept of morality."
"Perhaps that's the closest these Outsiders can come to understanding morality? Just imitating things we say and do without understanding them."
"It might be. But I want to do some more experiments first."
The first thing they tried was repeating the quest by Meara giving him back the cureleaves, then starting the quest again. She was able to generate the box, but when he handed the leaves back, nothing happened. Bloodwraith cursed his ill luck, not to mention the fact that they'd have to go collect ten more. But Meara suggested that they try buying a set, which was a good idea, so they headed back into town.
"How many Evil Points have you gotten?" Meara asked.
"I'm not sure. There are a lot of boxes I suppress, otherwise they would drive me mad. I think I've received a few for various actions, but... not very many. Oh, stop smirking. Why do you ask?"
"Just curious how they compare to the 5 points you get for giving me cureleaves. I mean, helping a stranger is a kind thing to do, but not that kind. The system doesn't seem to care that you're just doing it to receive a reward, and nothing changed even now that we're allied with each other."
"That's a good point. Does it matter?"
"I'm not sure. Does the system have an impact on how people view you?"
A good question he hadn't considered. Bloodwraith thought back to how the other adventurers had assumed that he had been acting benevolently when he abandoned them, even though that explanation made limited sense. Was that luck, their foolishness, or the system at work? "It might."
"Heh. Then the system is completely meaningless, since it's established that one 'Good Point' is worth two cureleaves. Even if murdering someone you didn't like cost 100 points, you could just turn around and hand me 200 cureleaves and it would be all better."
"Possibly. There's also an idiotic 'Reputation' system to consider, and I don't think the boxes can rule all of reality. They won't make all the people around us as stupid as the creators of the boxes." Yet Bloodwraith found himself chuckling as he considered the thought. "But it's even worse than you said. Cureleaves cost almost nothing, right? If I robbed a bank, I could spend a fraction of what I earned on cureleaves and come out more 'Good' than before."
Meara laughed freely and he enjoyed the sound. That took him back into territory where his mind was less clear, so he pushed the thoughts aside and concentrated on walking. As they headed back toward Cresthaven, they chatted and joked with one another.
How long had it been since he'd interacted with someone like this? With the undead, he'd only had minions. The Master Lich had been his superior and Skullcrusher had been an idiot, so they weren't truly equals. Before that he had known a few colleagues, but not friends. And in his living life... that was so long ago, and he'd been such a child...
He was pulled back to the present day by a growling sound. When he looked up, he was surprised to find a wolf prowling near. It was extremely thin, clearly attacking out of desperation.
Though Meara should have retreated and let him deal with it, she stayed in place, staring at it as if in a trance. Just when he was about to go help her, she whirled toward him with a grin. "Raigar! Slay ten wolves for me!"
[Quest Accepted!
Slay 10 wolves for Meara.
Rewards: Meara Affection, Alignment]
"It worked!" Bloodwraith stared at the box in surprise. That disproved the theory that she could only give one quest at a time, since the quest for the cureleaves was still active. In fact, he noticed a new box appeared that seemed devoted to listing all current quests. Useful, but something to consider later.
"Does it say how much it's worth?"
"Nothing about that." Bloodwraith absentmindedly put the wolf out of its misery with a swing of his greatsword, paying more attention to the box. "None of the quests have specified exact rewards beforehand, though. We'd have to complete the quest first to find out, but I'm not sure I have the patience for that right now."
"That's reasonable. Besides, it's getting late."
They'd talked for much longer than he'd thought - in fact, they risked being shut out of the city by the Cresthaven Guard. Both of them moved at a faster rate along the path. But along the way, Bloodwraith glanced over to her and asked the obvious question. "What led you to try that?"
"I'm not sure." Meara bit her lower lip, considering. "It just felt right. I don't think that I can ask you to do just anything and turn it into a quest. There are... patterns in reality, I think. It's easier to make things follow one of those patterns than to try to forge entirely new ones. They, uh... seem to like collecting or killing ten of things."
"Having done more than a few quests around Cresthaven, I'm not surprised."
Just before they reached the main gates, Meara stopped walking and turned to him. Bloodwraith stopped as well, still smiling from their conversation, but he adopted a neutral expression when he saw how serious her eyes were. Meara took a deep breath and spoke carefully.
"I just wanted to say... thank you. For being the friend I needed in all this."
Having someone thank him was a strange thing. Plenty of people had done so for his work as an adventurer, but the gratitude had been perfunctory and he didn't really care about them. Meara staring at him and speaking like this was something else entirely. "You are welcome, Meara."
"Right now, there's just too much to think about. I'm not sure what I want in the end. And you said you're not sure either. But... I think I'd like to stay with you, while we get all this figured out."
"I agree." Many other things were still confused in his head, but he was sure of that muc
h. Meara's smile filled him with a warmth that left him uncomfortable, yet he prevented himself from shrinking back from it.
"Then I'm glad I'm with you, Bl..." Meara coughed into one hand. "Gods, I'm sorry, that's hard to take seriously. Are you sure you don't have another name you'd prefer to use?"
Bloodwraith scowled and folded his arms. "It's been my name for hundreds of years."
"Then... I guess I'll have to get used to it. Thank you... Bloodwraith."
They smiled at one another, then hurried into the city to find an inn. Though he'd barely fought for the entire day, Bloodwraith was exhausted.
Chapter 17
The next morning when Bloodwraith woke up, he stared at the unfamiliar ceiling and took a moment to remember where he was. It was better than waking up to boxes announcing that he was being attacked, of course. Slowly he recalled that he and Meara had gone to a small inn that wouldn't ask questions. He'd bought two rooms, which was a waste in a monetary sense, but worth it to avoid any confusion.
Slowly Bloodwraith sat up in bed and pondered the small room. Thinking about the previous day was strange, but... not entirely disagreeable. With Meara on his side, he finally had a real ally in this conflict. No need to act carefully around her, unlike Danniah.
Thoughts of her soured his mood, however, so Bloodwraith refocused on his upcoming day. He'd slept with most of his armor on as a precaution, but now he pulled on his boots and generally prepared for the day. Since this was a small inn there was just a simple table below with whatever the family had made, but he could smell sizzling meat and eggs.
When he went downstairs, he found Meara sitting at the table. She gave him a wry smile when she saw him. "Morning, adventurer."
"Good morning." He sat down and examined the food on the table. If he needed to deal with such desires, he might as well do it in a pleasant fashion as opposed to adventurer rations. "There is a great deal we should do today."