“Thank you, but he has told me countless times he is not long for this world.” Timothy sighed sadly. “We tried to save everyone and he blames himself for failing. Please, please make this right so, if he dies, he dies knowing his people are safe from torment.”
Bishop nodded. “We don’t give up easily. We’ll do what we can to save them. Are you safe here? Won’t the Demons know you killed their guard on Yoran?”
“They will come for me, but they won’t kill me,” he said. “They need me alive to keep the surrounding towns thinking all is well while they move to take them over next.”
“Oh my god,” Calista whispered. “She’s creating an army, isn’t she?”
“How many towns are here around the mountain?” Bishop asked, wondering if this was part of the game or if Valen was creating an army for a completely different reason.
“Four. Two of them larger than Chesterville. If all of them turn, there will be an army of thousands to march on Weston, wiping out all in their path,” Timothy said.
“And no one will know to attack because they look like people,” Maverick filled in. “That’s freaking fantastic. And here I thought this territory would be simple. So much for hoping.”
“Well Timothy, stay safe, my friend,” Bishop said as he shook the man’s hand.
“You as well. Chesterville will forever be in your debt.”
“If we survive,” Calista added as they headed downstairs.
“Why are the two of you so doom and gloom about this?” Bishop asked. “It won’t be that bad.”
“Why are you not more worried about this?” Calista challenged. “Whoever is building this army is planning on marching it across Samar. People, possessed by Demons, will be killed in the thousands and they’ll just possess more as they go. This is insane!”
Bishop shrugged and a nagging voice told him he maybe had a sip too many that morning before logging in. “I’m freaked out, I promise I am, but I’d like to have a clear head while we meet with the rest of the group and figure out where to go next.”
Calista huffed, but let it go as they exited the Manor House. The guards said nothing as they stepped out, though Bishop expected the Demons in their bodies to come after them for killing one of their own. But nothing happened. Jimmy smiled until he saw their faces and Bishop tilted his head to the right. Jimmy nodded and, casually, they exited the town the same way they had entered. Bishop wasn’t going to say a word about their upcoming quest until they were far enough outside the town they wouldn’t be overheard. He kept his head high and told himself it would be fine. They weren’t walking into some crazy situation right away. They’d use the map, find the Red Witch, and figure out what was happening in this territory. Everything was going to work out just fine.
Chapter 08
“Let’s not follow the road, they said,” Jimmy muttered, slamming his staff into a Demon’s gut. Hit points exploded, but the thing didn’t go down and he was out of mana. “It’ll be so much fun, they said,” he grunted and brought his staff down on the Demon’s back as it snarled up at him. “Oh piss off and die already!” He managed to get enough mana to do a Life Drain and the Demon collapsed, dead to the ground at his feet.
“Will you stop bitching already,” Maverick muttered as she shifted back.
“No I will not, because I still don’t understand why the hell we split up!”
“We split up because the map didn’t give enough detail to show exactly where she is and we don’t want to waste all day searching.”
Jimmy muttered under his breath. “Fine, fine, but I still think it’s a stupid idea.”
“You can think all you want, but I believe we found her.”
He perked up and looked to where she pointed through the trees. She brought up the map and pinged the location then sent a message to Bishop and Trajan. Jimmy crept closer, peering through the branches. A fire crackled outside the small cabin and a black cauldron was set in them. Yet, he couldn’t see the Red Witch herself, or anyone.
“We’re waiting for the rest of them,” Maverick whispered. “I’m not sure if she’ll treat us the same as she will Bishop.”
“You still think he’s acting weird?”
Maverick shrugged. “He was weird today. The fact that whatever Demon Lord is here is creating an army out of humans didn’t seem to matter much to him.”
“You think he’s getting tired of the game?” Jimmy would hate to see Bishop up and quit the game when they were barely halfway through but then, again, this game had put him through some crazy stuff. “Or maybe he’s tired of us?”
“No, he’s not going to quit the game,” Maverick argued. “It’s something else. It’s almost like he’s numb, or acting numb. But on the bright side, he hasn’t said anything about Valen talking to him the past few days.”
Jimmy knew it bothered her more than she admitted, but he let it go for now. Bishop and the rest of their guild would be there soon enough and he wanted to get going on these quests to save Chesterville and the rest of the territory from Demons. He checked through his inventory to see how low he was on potions since they hadn’t been able to stock up while they were in the last town. Not with Demons watching them constantly.
“Who do you think is doing this?” he asked Maverick, watching the trees behind them for their group.
“I’m going to guess one of Valen’s generals. Demon Lord number five?”
Jimmy heard rustling behind him and whipped around, but there was no one there. The birds stopped singing and it was utterly silent. He frowned, gripping his staff hard as he did a slow turn all the way around. Maverick started to shift when suddenly she stopped and fell to the ground.
“Maverick!”
He rushed to her, but her health hadn’t dropped. Instead, he saw an icon appear by her name, one he hadn’t seen before. He heard the rustling again and, when he turned this time, a woman with flowing red hair down to her knees stood before him, clad in leather and bits of chain mail. She opened her hand and blew powder right into Jimmy’s face.
He cursed, struggling to attack, but his limbs went weak and then he was on the ground, watching the woman close in on him as his world went dark.
***
Bishop pushed through the trees, Willy running on ahead. “We should be getting close.”
“Should be.” Calista paused and looked at the map. “We should be right on top of them? Where are they?”
“Willy,” Bishop whispered and crouched down. “Jimmy and Maverick. Find them, boy.”
Willy yipped and pushed his nose to the ground, sniffing loudly. He growled within seconds, head shooting up, and took off through the trees. Bishop and Calista sprinted to keep up, wondering what they were running into when Willy pulled too far ahead for Bishop to see him. He dug in deep and ran faster, listening for Willy, or any sounds he was in trouble. But when they broke through the trees into a clearing, there was a cabin standing before them, a fire burning, and Willy standing beside a red-haired woman dressed in leather and chain mail, her hair brushing her knees and her right hand buried in Willy’s fur. Bishop and Calista frowned from Willy to the woman, but it was the muffled cursing that drew his gaze towards the fire again.
“Jimmy?”
“Hmm,” his friend tried to speak through the gag tied around his mouth. His hands were bound in his lap as well as his ankles. Maverick sat beside him, tied up just the same.
“This wolf says he is with you,” the woman said, her voice rough, but not from age, from power. It brushed over Bishop and he staggered backwards from the force of it. “I find this very hard to believe.”
“Why? I saved him and his pack,” Bishop explained. “And those two are with us.”
The woman’s eyes narrowed. “They and you are trespassing in my woods.”
“We were sent here,” he said.
“I doubt this as well. Lies, that is all I feel from you. Betrayal and lies and deceit, Bishop half-breed from Harbo
rage.”
“Tavin sent me to find you.”
The woman’s hand paused in Willy’s fur. “Tavin, that is not possible.”
“It is. She sent us to find you so you could help us deal with your son.”
“My son,” she hissed and the tension in the clearing increased. “My son died many years ago and that man on the thrown, he is not mine. I will never claim him as such. Not after what he’s done.”
Calista and Bishop exchanged a look. “So you’ll help us bring him down?”
“I will do no such thing, not until I have taken care of the problem here.”
“Can I untie my friends, please?” Bishop nodded to Jimmy and Maverick, the first bobbing his head and holding up his hands. “We’ve come from Chesterville. Yoran pleaded with us to find you as well to help you stop whoever’s turning the towns here to soldiers to use in Valenastrious’ war.”
The woman, who he realized he couldn’t see a health bar for, tilted her head, studying him intently. “I see determination in your eyes, Bishop, but your thoughts are muddled with something else. Makes it very hard to read your intentions. How do I know I can trust you?” She walked towards him, barefoot through the leaves and dirt, circling him. Calista’s hands fell to her weapons, but the woman saw it and clicked her tongue. “You would not get far, my dear. Don’t even try.”
Her hands fell away to her sides, but she remained watchful.
“Tavin sent me,” he repeated. “She’s been working with me from the beginning to stop the spread of the Demons through Samar.”
“And how is that fight going so far?”
“We’ve killed four Demon Lords,” he informed her. “And I have been banned from Weston for aiding Sir Ulfric Winston against Godfrey and Tavin, the rightful Queen of Samar.” He turned to her and she stopped walking around him. “I know what happened to Lachlan and back in Old Weston. I saw it and I want to make things right.”
She crossed her arms and looked to Calista. “You may untie your friends.”
Calista ran over to free them from their bonds, but Bishop didn’t move.
“I do not trust you yet, Bishop, but if you are willing to fight against the darkness then I will use you and your companions,” she said firmly. “There are more of you coming?”
“Yes, nearly twenty in all.”
She nodded in approval. “When they arrive, we will begin.”
“Begin?” Bishop repeated, not liking the ominous tone she used.
“Yes, begin the fight to take back this land from the Demons and prove to me that you are who you say you are.”
She walked away and Willy followed. Bishop shook his head, grinning at the wolf’s wagging tail. “Traitor. That damn wolf is going to drive me crazy.”
“You think he sees her, too?” Calista asked after Jimmy and Maverick were freed.
“I have no idea. I guess we’ll make ourselves at home while we wait for the others.”
They moved to sit around the fire, but the woman stayed in her cabin and Bishop wasn’t about to try and follow her inside. Valenastrious might be the Demon Queen, but this woman radiated power he did not want to see used up close against him or his friends. In pairs, the rest of the guild arrived and they joined the others around the fire, talking quietly about their journeys getting here. Only a few ran into random Demons like Jimmy and Maverick. Once they were all gathered, the woman re-emerged from the cabin, Willy still by her side, and she bowed her head in greeting to them.
“Yoran was a good man, a fool to think he could hold off the darkness, but a good man,” she started. “He cares for his people as do I. That mountain,” she said, pointing in the direction of the great monolith, “was not always here. No one here can remember when it actually appeared, but I do. When Lachlan was killed and Valenastrious first tried to make her claim in Samar, she sent her Generals ahead of her to clear the way and recruit for her army.”
The woman moved around them as she spoke. With a wave of her hand, the fire beneath the cauldron rose up and an image of the monolith appeared in its depths.
“Demons poured out by the hundreds, led by Demon Lord Kevork. Their mission was to move from one territory to the next, possessing and conquering towns without anyone being the wiser.”
Bishop frowned. “But he couldn’t have gotten very far. There are no towns except Chesterville possessed by Demons. Are there?”
He wasn’t the only one looking frightened by the notion that some of the towns they’d already been to had Demons lurking within their midst. The woman waved her hand again and figures locked in an epic fight rose in the fire.
“They were stopped by Lachlan and Tavin’s army, but they managed to reach High Ridge before they pushed the Demon lines back. Many were lost, human and Demon alike. It decimated the army and is what led to Lachlan’s downfall,” she explained, and the image shifted again. A woman with flowing hair behind her and an aura of pure power stood down against a Demon that Bishop recognized all too well as Valenastrious. “I stood before her, here in this very forest, and pushed her numbers back into their realm, but I could not save those possessed,” she whispered. “Their cries haunt me still, but I sealed the portal, forever banishing any more of her darkness seeping into our lands.”
“Until now,” Bishop whispered. “What happened?”
The scene changed again to show a hunched over form of the woman with the long flowing hair. “I was weakened after using so much power to seal the portal,” she said, glaring into the fire. “For many years, I had to remain here until it regenerated and was unable to keep the portal magic flowing. It failed two weeks ago.”
“And then we got the letter from Yoran,” Bishop filled in. “They took over the entire town in that short of a time?”
“Yes, and now you understand our need for urgency. If we do not close the portal and kill Demon Lord Kevork, he will take over everything in his path and lead the way for Valenastrious’ war to truly begin.”
“What can we do?” Calista asked. “We can’t run around killing possessed villagers.”
“No, no innocent blood can be spilled, not if we can help it,” she agreed. “I will give you all a way to save as many as you can as you start your journey, but know this land will never be safe until that portal is sealed.”
A prompt appeared before Bishop’s face to complete a quest. He selected completed and XP points exploded around him as he neared level 31. The quest tracker updated and he wondered just how many parts this quest was going to have.
“Your first test will not be easy,” the woman told them. “Kevork’s Demons are on the move again and they make for a town south of here, Belias. You must stop them before they can begin their assault on the town.”
“We’re not saving the people in Chesterville?” Trajan asked.
“Not yet. Their hold is strong there and we will need to weaken their hold before we attempt a purifying of the entire town. While you are away, you must collect a list of items so I may create for you a way to save those possessed.”
Bishop looked over the prompt before his eyes.
Accepted Quest: Tools of the Trade. Find and collect all items on the Red Witch’s list to save humans from Demonic possession.
Bishop glanced over the list after he pulled it from his inventory. “Where are we going to find some of these items? I’ve never even heard of them.” He thought most of them were herbs, but then he realized they would be collecting parts of the Demons for the witch to use.
“Their locations will be marked for you, but the rest you must find on your own,” she said. “Now go, time is short and every second we waste, the Demons move closer to taking over another town.”
The guild stood and moved to the edge of the clearing, readying their plan to move out, when a hand fell on Bishop’s shoulder. He glanced back at the Red Witch and read the curiosity in her eyes.
“I’ll be along in a minute,” he told Calista, not breaking the woman’
s gaze.
“You sure that’s a good idea?” she asked. “You said it yourself, it’s been quiet the past few days.”
He wanted to tell her it was probably because of the booze, but swallowed the confession down. “I’m sure it’s nothing. I’ll be fine, promise.”
Calista wandered away with the rest, leaving Bishop alone.
“You are a fascinating creature,” the woman started. “No wonder she wants you.”
“Who?” he asked and glanced around, paranoid, as if Valen was there and he somehow hadn’t noticed her.
“You know who, the Demon Queen. Such a strong-willed man fighting a darkness within as well as without. I am astonished you have made it this far without faltering.”
He listened carefully to her words, but so far she sounded as if she was still speaking from the game script. He was a half-breed so he was fighting a battle within him. “I have my friends to keep me from turning to her.”
“But will they be enough? You think you are strong, but she is stronger still. You can’t resist the pull forever, in this world or in the other.”
Bishop’s blood ran ice cold in his veins. He shut his eyes and counted to ten, pretending he didn’t hear that last line. He wouldn’t have another damn NPC speaking to him as if they knew he was just a guy playing in a game that he had no control over whatsoever. As if they could all get into his mind and screw with him.
“She is not who you think she is,” the witch went on. “The Demon Queen, or Tavin for that matter.” She circled him, dragging her hand across his shoulders a she leaned in and whispered, “Not even me.”
“Why are you doing this?” he pleaded, hating himself for feeling so weak all of a sudden. He just wanted it all to stop. Wanted to be a normal player in this beta and not the one the game chose to torment. “I’m nothing.”
“You are very wrong in that regard. You are different from all the other heroes.”
“But why? I don’t get it! Why can’t you all just leave me alone?”
She stood before him again and her eyes flared red with power. “Because you are our way back. He created this world for a reason, one you have yet to figure out. He needs you, just as we need you.”
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