The Grind

by Dante Doom

  “That is intense,” Savannah said quietly. “I wonder if we can exploit that somehow.”

  “I doubt it,” Timon said. “Just be careful—he could try to win you over to his side again.”

  “Yikes,” Savannah said, her eyes shooting back to Timon’s. “Well, don’t worry about me, Timon. I have zero interest in a relationship right now.”

  A flash of disappointment came across Timon’s face and Savannah realized immediately what she had said. “I mean, I have zero interest in a bad relationship,” she quickly amended.

  They stared at one another for what felt like an eternity then, neither of them speaking or able to cut through the awkwardness of her meaning, which had been far clearer than she’d intended it to be.

  “Right…” Timon said, breaking the silence as he abruptly turned around.

  As Savannah pondered how to salvage the awkward conversation, Ten-Thirty walked up to them. “I have ascertained that the only way to open this door is to sacrifice points. There was a series of instructions carved on the stone over there. These instructions say that we must be willing to spend points to open up each door within the place.”

  “Well, after that last attack on those players and that raid boss, I think we should have more than enough points to get to where we’re going,” Timon said. “Or, at least, I hope that’s the case.”

  “I’ve got plenty of points to burn, too, but hopefully there should be some doors open inside of this place,” Savannah replied. “I mean, Leopold’s been in there for a while.”

  “Okay, so how do we sacrifice points?” Timon asked Ten-Thirty.

  “Place your arm through the hole over there,” Ten-Thirty said as it pointed to the small hole in the center of the door, which had been opened up by the android. “The points will be extracted.”

  Timon shrugged and thrust his arm through the hole. The door immediately began to glow. Points Required = 100 hovered above his head. Y/N? Timon selected the Y option and his point total dropped to 325,990. As the points vanished, the door slid open, allowing them entry into the base of the Citadel.

  “Whoa!” Savannah gasped as she walked through the door. They were in an atrium of some sort that was blanketed in flowers growing out of every crevice. Urns mounted to the walls housed cascades of flowers of every shape and color, all of them blooming as though they grew in the brightest sunshine. Walking to the spiraling stairwell in the center of the room that appeared to lead up to the next level, Savannah looked around in awe. “These are so pretty,” she mumbled, looking at the many plants on the ground.

  As her eyes ran across the wide variety of colored flowers she had never seen before, she noticed a large sign on a pedestal. It was a directory. It read:

  Floor 1: Medicine

  Floor 2: Agriculture

  Floor 3: Psychology

  Floor 4: Economics

  Floor 5: Communications

  Floor 6: Transportation

  Floor 7: Technology and Science

  Floor 8: Entertainment

  Floor 9: Maintenance

  “What’s p-sickology?” Savannah asked as she read the third floor’s label.

  “It’s pronounced sigh-cology,” Timon replied as he read the directory along with her. “It means the study of the human mind. Curious, to see that philosophy is missing from this list.”

  “Well, philosophy never put food on my table,” Savannah replied.

  “No, but it did teach you right from wrong,” Timon said. He placed a hand on the plaque and ran his fingers along the letters. “So many options. All of civilization’s most valuable information is here. This place can teach us everything we need to rebuild Verre. Mankind could prosper once again.”

  “That’s for later,” Savannah said as she looked at Ten-Thirty. The android was inspecting a bright yellow flower with a brown center. “So, where do you think Kireen’s eyes are?”

  “That’s a hard question to answer,” Ten-Thirty replied as it walked over to the words written on the podium. “We should search every area.”

  “I don’t think we have the time for that,” Timon said as he shook his head. “Who knows when Leopold is going to return? Besides, there’s no way he left this place unprotected.”

  “Well, where would Kireen keep the artifact?” Savannah asked. “Which floor seems most likely?

  “Communication seems like a sure enough bet,” Timon said. “She talks an awful lot.”

  “She also likes to laugh…” Savannah said as she looked at the entertainment option. “What if she was in charge of entertainment? That would make sense, since her Aspect seems to make a game of everything. Notice how she’s always getting us in trouble and only half-explaining things? That’s a clear sign of a prankster.”

  “That’s probably the best guess we can make,” Timon replied agreeably. “Come on, let’s get moving.”

  The three began to ascend the stairs, heading towards the eighth floor. It was quite a bit of walking, but eventually they reached their destination without any encounters to slow them down. Despite her curiosity, Savannah hadn’t even bothered to poke her head out of the stairwell to see what was happening on the other floors. Instead, they’d stayed focused on their objective—finding Kireen’s artifact.

  “There are hundreds of doors!” Timon exclaimed as they left the stairwell. The hall seemed endless, with hundreds upon hundreds of round golden doors cut into the walls. Above each door was a placard that told of its function.

  “Drama… theater… radio dramas…” Savannah read aloud as she walked along the corridor. “They must have catalogued every kind of entertainment that existed in the World Before. You know, I remember hearing about communication systems capable of watching moving pictures and playing games, all in the palm of your hand. Unlimited entertainment at the touch of a button.”

  “That’s all well and good, but which door do we choose?” Timon asked as he pointed to one of the doors that read “Dancing.” Below the words was a point value indicating 6,000 Points Required.

  “If we opened all of these, we’d be out of points in no time,” Savannah said. “We’ve got to choose wisely.”

  “Who goes there?” cried a voice from behind them. Everyone spun around to see two men in golden armor, each carrying a laser sword and standing at the entrance of the stairwell. Apparently, these two had followed them onto the 8th floor.

  “Oh, crap!” Savannah said as she pulled out her gun and aimed down at them. “Those are Leopold’s thugs.”

  “It’s the girl!” one of the guards exclaimed. “I can’t believe we found—” his words were cut off as Savannah blasted him with her Arc Rifle, killing him instantly. A few paltry points sailed to Timon, barely offering enough to make up for his entry fee into the tower.

  “I surrender!” the other guard said, throwing his sword to the ground and holding his hands up. “Please don’t kill me!”

  Savannah glanced at Timon, who shook his head at her. “It’s a trick; blast him.” She complied, firing a second blast and taking the guard far, far away from the Grind.

  “Well, that confirms we aren’t alone,” Timon said. “Let’s move. Where did Ten-Thirty go?”

  Savannah looked around and realized that, in all the hubbub, the android had vanished. “Where the hell did Ten go?”

  “Maybe it’s looking for clues. We gotta open up one of these chambers before we get more guards on us.”

  “Did you see how quickly I blasted those two? I’m pretty sure I can kill an army of guards,” Savannah said with a chuckle. “This gun is stupid powerful.”

  “Don’t get overconfident,” Timon replied. “You can still be taken down. They’ll have to get smarter about how they approach you.”

  “Poetry!” Savannah shouted, completely changing the subject and surprising Timon.

  “What?”

  “Every single time Kireen gets all serious, she uses all sorts of powerful words, remember? Poetic, almost. The door has to be poetry or literature. M
y money’s on poetry. Come on—let’s find the door!”

  “That makes sense,” Timon said as he began to walk down the hall opposite Savannah. They searched for a few minutes until, finally, Savannah found the poetry door at the far end of the hallway. The words 10,000 points hovered above it.

  “Ugh, that is expensive,” Savannah groaned. “Timon, I found it.”

  As Timon jogged up to her, she placed her arm in the door and took a deep breath. The points drained away, causing the door to slide open. Within the room were thousands of books lining the walls. The bookshelves rose to impossible heights, and there were ladders that stretched farther up than the eye could see.

  “I imagine this is what heaven would look like,” Timon said as he walked up and pulled a book off the shelf. “Yeats. Fascinating. I have only heard this name, whispered amongst the intellectuals. They said a man in Chi had the last copy of his work. But, the entirety of what he wrote is in this book! All of his work.”

  “Timon!” Savannah said, snapping at him to pull the Noble out of his trance. He looked up from the book with a surprised expression on his face.

  “Yes?”

  “We don’t have time to sit around and read. Look at what I found!” Savannah exclaimed as she pointed to a large chair. The big, red chair was sitting next to a fireplace. The fire crackled even as they spoke, illuminating a book with a pair of spectacles sitting atop it.

  “I’m guessing those are Kireen’s eyes?” Timon asked.

  Savannah picked up the blue-tinted glasses and looked at them. “Yeah, they are.”

  “Now I am become death, destroyer of worlds…” Timon mumbled.

  “What?” Savannah asked as she turned to see that Timon was reading from the book that was on the table. “What did you say?”

  “I’m reading an underlined passage from this book. It says, ‘Now I am become death, destroyer of worlds.’”

  “What a weird thing to say.”

  “I think that’s what is going to happen to us,” Timon said softly as he closed the book and put it back on the table. “We are literally going to destroy two worlds here. We will destroy the Grind as we know it, and we will destroy the world of Verre once the people know the truth.”

  “The philosophy floor was left out for a reason, Silvarspoon,” Savannah replied with a frown as she put the glasses on. “Now, let’s go find Ten and get the hell out of here.”

  “What do the glasses do?” Timon asked.

  “Nothing, from what I can tell,” Savannah said as she slowly looked around the room. “I mean, they tint everything blue, but that’s about it. I’m not even seeing any stats on the item.”

  “I sincerely hope that the Aspect didn’t lure us out here on a lark,” Timon groaned. “That would be most cruel.”

  “Knowing her, that’s probably exactly what she did,” Savannah said. “I’m sure this is going to be helpful in some way or another, though. At least, I hope so.”

  “Do you hear that?” Timon asked as he put his hand up to stop her from commenting further. “Sounds like… hoof steps.”

  Savannah readied her weapon and aimed it at the door. The clopping grew louder until, finally, the shimmering silhouette of a yellowish-purple horse appeared at the front of the door.

  “It’s a Viral,” Savannah said. “I thought they wouldn’t be in this place.”

  “Well, let’s kill it and get moving,” Timon replied as he brandished his own weapon.

  As the phantom horse entered into the library, it began to warp and contort. A large, pulsating mass emerged from its back. The mass began to twist and change as they watched, until it became the image of a man wearing golden armor.

  “So the scouts did report the truth,” the man said as he pulled out a flaming sword. “There are intruders here.”

  “What the hell?” Savannah gasped. “How did you do that?”

  The man laughed heartily at her words. “You have no idea what kind of power Leopold wields! A player by his lonesome is weak, but when fused with the power of a Viral, he grows ten times stronger. You can’t even begin to imagine what you face here.”

  “Well, I am going to take a quick second to tell you ‘I told you so’ about being cocky,” Timon said to Savannah, his eyes still on the Viral. “I’m not proud of taking the shot, but it needs to be said.”

  “Oh, shove off!” Savannah replied as she squeezed off a shot of her Arc Rifle at the target. The horse leapt out of the way and began to gallop towards Savannah while the rider held his flaming sword high and cackled with wicked glee.

  “Look out!” Timon yelled as he grabbed Savannah and pulled her clear of the flaming blade just as it swung overhead.

  “You idiots think that you can break into this tower and find it guarded only by a few simple guards?” The horseman laughed as he came sliding to a halt by the fireplace. He turned around and raised his sword. “Go ahead and run into the halls—I’ll be sporting and give you a head start.”

  “Wow, does that sound like a trap or what?” Timon whispered.

  “So, we kill him here,” Savannah growled as she fired her Arc Rifle again. The bolt of lightning crashed towards the man, but once again, the horse was able to leap out of the way.

  “You can’t hit my Viral; it has superior reflexes. The strongest computer system in the world is powering this creature, making it easy for me to calculate every single action with perfect precision. You will not win. Run!”

  “Choke on this!” Timon shouted back as he lobbed a grenade at the horseman. The grenade spun in the air and crashed into the ground before the horse could leap away, the explosion causing several books to fall from the shelving around them. As the smoke cleared, the horseman stood in the middle, still resolute and uninjured. 50 damage hovered above him, dropping him from 10,000 to 9,950 points.

  “Ah… that’s a lot of health for a Viral infused with a human’s intelligence,” Savannah gasped. “Maybe we should run.”

  “Oh yes, please try to outrun me!” the man said with a laugh. “I’m sure that will work.”

  The horse kicked up and began to whinny. As it snorted, little puffs of flame came out of its nose. The word Charging appeared above it.

  “He’s going to be way faster than us,” Savannah whispered back. “You gotta distract the horse so I can shoot it.”

  “At 10k hit points, we don’t stand a chance,” Timon replied. “Not with only the two of us.”

  “Arrrgh,” Savannah growled at the impossibility of the situation. There was no easy way to solve this problem. “So, we can’t run and we can’t fight—what can we do?”

  “Climb!” Timon said as he leapt onto one of the ladders and began to climb upward.

  “Ha, there’s nothing up there that will save you!” the horseman shouted at Timon as he tugged on the reins so the horse would come closer to the shelves. Swinging his flaming sword at the ladder, he chopped at it, making the wood splinter, but Timon leapt to another ladder nearby.

  Savannah scrambled to the ladders on the other side of the room and began to climb up, as well. The horseman turned his attention to her.

  “Are you seriously trying to escape by going up? There’s nothing up there! This entire place is nothing more than a collection of information.”

  Savannah ignored him and continued to climb. Once she was high enough to be well out of the horseman’s reach, she pulled a bunch of books from the shelf, making a foothold for herself. She climbed off the ladder as the horseman below tried to hack away at it, placing her feet atop the solid bookshelf’s surface rather than the ladder he seemed intent on destroying.

  “Now what?” the horseman shouted at her. “There’s nowhere for you to go!”

  Savannah cautiously turned around and leaned backwards into the shelves, so that she was precariously perched against the bookshelf. Her heels were the only thing keeping her at the height. “Looks like I’ve got free aim now!” she replied as she aimed her rifle at the horseman. She fired blast after blast
as the horse leapt around, desperate to avoid the attacks.

  Meanwhile, Timon had swung around the opposite side of the ladder and was also taking potshots at the horse, hitting it a few times and dealing 300 damage with his various blasts.

  “You think you’re so clever?” the horseman shouted. “Well, guess again!” The horse began to run towards the bookshelf at full speed, and slammed into it hard. Savannah felt a few books smack against her skull as the bookshelf warped and wobbled. She tried to keep her balance, but it was difficult even as she clung on with both hands.

  “Timon, do you have any sticky grenades?” Savannah asked.

  “Yes, I have one!” Timon replied.

  “Throw it on my mark, okay?”

  “Got it.” Timon produced a grenade from his satchel.

  Savannah didn’t need to kill the Viral—she only needed to kill the man attached to it. His hit points were lower than the horse part. The horse moved far too quickly, but if it could be delayed for a second, she could take out the taunting horseman. The horse backed up to the other end of the library and stamped its feet, preparing for another charge.

  “Ready….” Savannah hissed as the horse made a dead run towards the bookshelf again. She waited three beats and then shouted, “Now!”

  Timon threw the grenade at the base of the shelf just as the horse arrived. It was too busy charging forward to be able to change directions. The grenade exploded, covering the entire area with webbing. The words You are Restrained hovered above the Viral a moment later.

  Savannah didn’t hesitate. She aimed her rifle straight down and fired on the human sticking out of the horse’s back. 350 damage: Lethal Blow, hovered above the man as he fell over, limp. The horse immediately faded away into the ether.

  “Haha! It worked!” Timon cheered. “I can’t believe you pulled it off!” 30,000 points flowed to him increasing his score to 355,000/1,500,000.

  “Yeah, that was some good timing on the grenade,” Savannah replied as she climbed down the ladder the horseman had abandoned when she’d left it for the shelves. “Really impressive.”