Keeper

by Tom Larcombe

  By the time they finished discussing it the wall inside of the room finished burning out, leaving a few gaps that Karl could slide through with no danger of thorns, although he did have to move quickly so as not to burn himself on the coals.

  Once he was on the other side of the thorns, he slipped into stealth, shimmering out of sight. The rest of the party sat down, trying to regenerate. Eddie offered Tiana his waterskin, but she waved it away, pulling her own from her inventory.

  “Sorry Jern,” she said. “After the Light of Life I didn't have enough mana left to keep you full for the rest of the fight.”

  “S'alright lass, I'm still standing. Eddie got me just before things got too bad and with that last giant zombie dying in the wall, it was no problem.”

  “Yeah, but...” Tiana started, but she went silent when Eddie put a hand on her shoulder.

  “You can only do as much as you can do,” he said. “I guarantee it worked better with your Light of Life than it would've if we'd tried to go against them without it.”

  This time when Karl returned, he didn't pop out of stealth in the middle of the group, probably realizing that their nerves were on edge and their reactions might occur too fast to be stopped.

  “Hey, no more zombies, or skeletons, but I found this up on what looked like some sort of stage with a lectern or pulpit,” he said, thrusting out the small chest that he held with both hands.

  “I already checked it for traps, didn't open it yet though. Wanted everyone around for that,” Karl finished.

  Karl set the chest down and bent over it to open it, but before he could the second Wall of Thorns disappeared and Lucky came racing over, leaping into Eddie's lap. Amusingly enough, Bubbles scurried to Becky nearly as quickly, climbing her clothing and slipping himself into her oversized sleeves. Lucky had brushed Karl on the way by, but now he settled himself back in. Eddie took the moment to cast Nature's Blessing on Lucky and noticed that Becky was doing the same for her rat.

  “If we're through with interrupting the locksmith?” Karl said.

  Eddie gestured magnanimously towards him, his lap filled with purring cat. Karl laughed out loud, then turned back to the chest.

  The scout pulled out his lockpicking tools and set to work. It took him a couple of minutes, then there was a loud 'click' and he pushed the lid up.

  The motion revealed a hoard of coins and this time there was as much gold visible as silver and copper. Karl slipped a hand into the hoard, lifting a handful and letting it trickle back into the chest.

  “We're rich,” he said.

  Then he glanced at Eddie.

  “Well, the rest of us are, you're just richer now,” Karl added.

  Eddie flushed.

  “I knew I shouldn't have told you how the inn was doing,” Eddie said. “But be careful there, we found potions in the chest higher in the dungeon. There might be some here as well.”

  Karl turned back to the chest and started pulling out coins by the handful, being careful as he drove his hands into the pile. Sure enough, he encountered a pair of potions before he reached the bottom, but he also found something else, a ring made of white gold that shone with a silvery sheen in the groups' lights.

  “May I?” Eddie asked.

  Karl handed the ring over to him and Eddie studied it for a moment.

  Evaluate, he thought.

  Priests' Ring

  Jewelry (finger)

  Wisdom: ???

  Mana: ???

  Armor: ???

  You are currently unable to obtain more information about Priests' Ring with Evaluate.

  You have upgraded the skill Evaluate to (5). Amazing how much more quickly you advance in your skills when you use them on new things, isn't it?

  “My Evaluate isn't good enough to get all of it, but this is a Priests' Ring, and it affects wisdom, mana, and armor. I don't know by how much or anything though since my Evaluate is only a five now,” Eddie said.

  Dominic held his hand out and Eddie handed him the ring. The wizard's eyes went distant for a moment, then he straightened up.

  “That's not bad, especially for our area. It's got a plus two on wisdom, adds twenty to max mana, and provides five points of magical armor. Especially considering our issues this last fight, I'm pretty sure I know where it should go,” he said, staring pointedly at Tiana.

  “However, not unless everyone else agrees,” Dominic continued, looking around the group.

  Most of them nodded immediately. Becky seemed to hesitate for a moment and Eddie realized that it would work even better for her, although that would provide fewer benefits for the party. After a moment of hesitation she also nodded.

  Dominic handed the ring back to Eddie.

  “Not gonna try to give another man's partner a ring, just bad form,” he said.

  Eddie grinned at Tiana and took her hand.

  “May I?” he said.

  She flushed prettily and turned her head to the side and slightly down before nodding and holding out her hand.

  Eddie slipped the ring onto her finger, then stepped back.

  “How's it feel?” he asked.

  “Loose for moment when you first put it on, but it scaled to my finger and feels perfect now,” she said.

  He grinned and she grinned back. She knew that he'd had several meanings to that statement but had only answered the first one. Eddie chuckled, then turned back to the group.

  “One last door that's closed and stairs down, which way do we want to go?” he asked.

  ~ ~ ~

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Freyja smiled as she manipulated the code of the world.

  “Certainly my actions shall comfort numerous players in the Meadowlands, so they are justified,” she said, ensuring her cover story was registered in the logs.

  Alright, she thought, now if I tweak this right here then anytime this dev who is not a dev tries to insinuate the consciousness of his men into that of the creatures of this world, he will simply switch said consciousness amongst his own men. Now to redirect his access to other things.

  Freyja was very happy. Her investigations had revealed the code for Harmon's command line access and now she was tweaking that code.

  As is my right and my duty, she thought.

  After a few more tweaks, she scanned over her code alterations. Now if Harmon summoned the creatures before attempting to transfer his men into them they would be created and seeded with their slivers of intelligence elsewhere and there would be a brief delay before they appeared before him, giving said intelligence a chance to solidify its hold in case Harmon found a way around her previous alteration. In any case, whatever creatures he summoned would be hostile to him and his men immediately upon sight. Combined with the consciousness that was being transferred switching with that of another of his squad, that should lead to deaths among his men.

  If he tried to summon items to strengthen himself or his men, they would automatically receive a new flag that made those specific items only usable by a class that was not present among him and his men.

  If they died, their respawn times were now elongated by a factor of ten. She'd wanted to make it longer still, but the code of the world itself inhibited that, only allowing for a maximum respawn time of twenty-four hours.

  Now, what else to do? she thought.

  When the idea occurred to her she broke into a grin.

  “I have a new temple, my very first. Now I need more worshipers. I shall make a quest for them to collect more worshipers for me and allow them a moment of power should they succeed,” she said, once more aloud in order to have her justifications logged.

  A moment's work and the quest would appear to her existing followers as soon as they entered the temple.

  “Now one last thing, the inhabitants of the Meadowlands will be in danger from the attack that this dev who is not a dev is engineering, so I shall instruct the smith there to construct a warning device, a bell for my temple perhaps. When rung, the inhabitants shall know tha
t they must run to my temple for protection. This will comfort and protect them,” she said, aloud.

  Then she searched for Opron. It was night in the Meadowlands and he was sleeping, so she appeared to him in a dream.

  Freyja bowed her head to the world-traveling mortal that she knew was a true dev in disguise.

  “Opron, I have a request for you,” she said.

  Opron blinked and looked around him.

  “I'm dreaming?” he said.

  “Yes, I am controlling this dream. If you wish me to cease I shall do so,” Freyja said. “But danger approaches the Meadowlands and I seek to protect those within it.”

  “What do you need Freyja?” Opron asked. “I'm happy to help if I can.”

  “I need you to make something for me. As a smith, I want you to cast me a bell. There is to be no clapper in it. It shall ring when an attack that will endanger the inhabitants takes place, I shall place a spell on it to do so. Then the inhabitants will know to flee to my temple if the bell rings. I do apologize that it shall also be heard by the world-traveling mortals, but they can respond to that as they wish, I only seek to protect the native inhabitants.”

  Opron's eyes went wide as Freyja deliberately winked at him.

  ~ ~ ~

  “Like you have to ask?” Allie said. “Don't leave anything at our backs. If those undead had attacked from the rear a couple of minutes earlier it could've been a problem. Nice crowd control spell, by the way.”

  “I just got that last level, hadn't used it yet. I thought it might do the trick though and if not I would only have lost the time to fire one or two arrows.”

  “Yeah, well keep that one handy. If we're getting overwhelmed that one could make all the difference in the world. Now, let's check that door.”

  They rested for several minutes first, allowing everyone to regenerate back to full. Then Eddie opened the door after Karl slipped into stealth. The scout showed back up several moments later, backpedaling out of the room.

  “Dominic, I think this might be your turn,” Karl said. “Slimes!”

  Dominic broke into a grin as he stepped forward.

  “Green?” he asked.

  “Some green, some this sort of bluish color,” Karl replied.

  “I'll need a hand then, the blues don't take much damage from fire from what I've read.”

  “What type of damage then?” Eddie asked.

  “Electrical is best against them.”

  “Great,” Eddie said. “Hey Becky, how about you, me, and Dominic go on a bit of a killing spree. My Arc is still low, so we'll need yours. Hopefully you've leveled it some.”

  “It's a five,” she said grinning proudly and stepping up between Eddie and Dominic. “Let's do this.”

  “Everyone else keep an eye on our backs?” Eddie asked.

  Allie grinned at him.

  “I do have fire arrows, you know?” she said.

  “Yeah, but what's the damage compared to Dominic's spells?”

  “Um, yeah. I'll watch your backs,” Allie said. “Tiana, keep an eye on them for heals.”

  “Like I'd do anything else,” Tiana replied.

  Meanwhile Eddie and Becky had stepped in front of Dominic.

  “Our Arc spell only has a range of ten feet,” Eddie said. “So let us take the front.”

  “Be my guest,” Dominic said, sweeping his arm in front of them.

  Even so, Eddie noticed he kept close to him and Becky, protectively close even. He stifled a chuckle and focused on the fight at hand.

  Dominic initiated. The slimes were farther into the room than the range of Arc, so Dominic tossed an area fire spell on several slimes, both green and blue. It caught their attention and they turned and started oozing towards the door much more quickly than Eddie thought they should've been able to move.

  “Gang up on them?” Eddie asked Becky.

  She nodded, then started casting.

  “Left to right,” she said.

  Eddie began to cast his own Arc spell and when the small bolt of white-blue electricity shot from his hand, his notification light started blinking. He ignored it and started casting again, tensing a little when a fiery arrow shot past his head to strike a green slime, turning it black and causing it to go still for good.

  It took two Arc spells from each of them to drop the first blue slime on the left, then they turned to the one in the middle and started casting on that one. It dropped after Becky got two arcs on it and Eddie got one, so he targeted his last one to the far right.

  His notification light started blinking more rapidly as he fired Arc after Arc at the last slime. It was larger than the other two and took four of his Arcs and three of Becky's before it stopped moving.

  Dominic had been methodically working his way through the green slimes with single target spells while they fought the blues.

  “Going to pull more,” he said, after he noticed their opponents were down.

  Eddie took a moment to skim his notifications and dismiss them to remove the distraction.

  You have upgraded the spell Arc to (2). Way to go, Sparky!

  You have upgraded the spell Arc to (3). Ooh, you're serious about this one, are you?

  Eddie, by now used to the snark from the system, simply ignored the added comments, noting that his Arc spell was going to be a lot more effective now.

  Dominic exploded a fireball in a group of slimes and they began to ooze towards the three combatants. A golden glow surrounded Eddie and a turn of his head showed that Becky had received it as well.

  “Didn't need to heal, so buffed the three of you instead,” Tiana called out. “Minor increase in speed, should affect casting also.”

  Eddie didn't really feel like he was casting faster but a glance showed him that the slimes were moving less distance between his casts of Arc.

  This time Dominic had pulled five blues and three greens. The Wizard was whittling away the greens as they came in but Eddie and Becky still had to wait for the blues to close within ten feet before they could be effective and that meant that some of them got into attack range.

  Eddie grimaced as he kept casting, but stepped between Becky and the blue pseudopod that was reaching for her. He got his spell off, then the pseudopod touched him. He smelled the leather bracer it made contact with burning with an acidic scent, then a moment later the skin under his bracer started burning also.

  He rapidly cast another Arc on the slime, struggling to maintain his concentration. When he completed his spell, his notification light began to blink again. Becky finished another Arc and it landed on the slime that had a hold of him. The pseudopod fell away as the slime stilled. He spun to cast at another as a golden glow spread across him with a surge of warmth and his wounds mended themselves. His armor wasn't as lucky and his bracer now had a large hole in it.

  Five minutes later they'd cleared the room of slimes. Eddie had intercepted several more attacks, but each time he did Tiana had healed him a moment later.

  Eddie sagged against the wall once the slimes were all gone. He finally pulled up the flashing notification lights to look at.

  You have upgraded Nature Magic to (5).

  You have upgraded the spell Arc to (4). Casting while tanking is a sure fire way to increase your spells, at least if you don't lose concentration or die, masochist.

  Karl had stealthed and gone farther into the room. There was a loud snap and a curse of pain. A moment later Karl came walking back, no longer in stealth, carrying a chest.

  “This one was trapped and I missed it. Tiana?” he asked, wincing and holding out a hand.

  His hand was scarred heavily, the acid that had struck it still bubbling and eating away at his skin.

  Tiana winced and began to cast. The first thing that happened was the acid seemed to disappear, the bubbling ceased, and the skin started showing its normal color again. Slowly, the eaten away portions of skin restored themselves. It took three castings, but then Karl's hand appeared normal again.

  “So,
yeah, this one was trapped. I hope it's something good,” Karl said.

  He reached out, hesitantly, and pushed at the lid.

  “Of course it's locked,” he said, then sighed heavily and knelt before the chest, pulling out his tools.

  A minute later there was a soft click and he pushed on the lid again. It swung up this time revealing a chest that was full of mostly gold coins, as opposed to the silver and copper in the previous chest. There was some silver and copper visible, but mainly gold.

  Karl started cautiously pulling out handful after handful, setting them on the floor. There was another pair of potions buried in the coins. At the very bottom of the chest was a large silver coin with a hole drilled in the top of it.

  “Hey that looks cool,” Eddie said. “Like it's strung to be worn on a necklace. May I?”

  “Go ahead,” Allie said. “If it's interesting it should probably go to you, Becky, or Dominic. You guys did the heavy lifting for this one.”

  He picked it up and stared at it.

  Evaluate, he thought.

  Gambler's Medallion

  Jewelry (necklace)

  Luck: +2

  Health: +10

  Special: ???

  You are currently unable to obtain more information about Gambler's Medallion with Evaluate.

  “Um, yeah, I'd love it. But so everyone else knows, it's called a Gambler's Medallion, plus two to luck, plus ten to health, and it's got a special that I can't get anything on, not even a name.”

  Dominic held out his hand.

  “Just to try to figure out the special,” he said. “Pluses to luck and health aren't really my thing. I'd prefer a more concrete stat bonus and mana.”