Dave and Ela-Dorn walked forward toward this portal. Nerves fluttered through Ela-Dorn’s stomach as she looked upon the portal prototype. She had seen many of them in her life, but this would be the first time she knew of anyone attempting to make one by themselves. If this worked, then it would mean that they were no longer restrained by the number of portals that Dave still had within the seeder under Cliff-Hill.
Ela-Dorn used her senses to reach out to the portal and looked it over. It seemed to work with the plans in her mind and matched up with what she understood from the knowledge she had gained and also learned from Dave, his notes, or other Aleph who worked with teleporters and onos.
Dave walked up to the portal, putting his hand on it as he closed his eyes. Ela-Dorn watched it all, forgetting to even blink lest she might miss something.
Dave took some time before he took his hand from the portal and nodded. “Okay, well, it looks like everything should be good. All of the internal structure is laid out. Nearly all of it is made from magical coding and the compressed runic lining instead of the overly complex Magical Circuits that had been coded into the massive metal plates,” Dave said. “Well, let’s fire it up and see what happens!”
“Ready when you are,” Ela-Dorn said.
They moved back from the portal. Dave sent out orbs that erected a Mana shield around the portal. That way, if something did go terribly wrong and it was destroyed, then it wouldn’t hurt anyone else.
Dave raised his arm and moved the different bracelets that were there. He wasn’t wearing his full armor but he kept the bracers on, allowing him greater control whenever he might need it. He moved the final slider into place as power started to move through the portal. Being made out of soul gem, it was able to use its own power to start itself up.
The portal’s runic lines started to glow and change colors. Ela-Dorn’s eyes focused on it as the light increased on the portal, becoming brighter and brighter. Then the lights started to blink in and out; the lights dimmed and then burst into myriad colors.
“Shit.” Dave’s hands moved, his eyes closed.
Ela-Dorn pushed out her arcane senses, watching as Dave fixed the portal’s weaknesses as it started up, creating more robust magical coding contained within the runic lines.
The portal’s faltering lights became stronger, and the shuddering lights of failures started to calm down. The portal seemed to gather itself together. The lights swirled and then settled down.
Ela-Dorn looked at the portal, her eyes wide as she looked into the seeder at Cliff-Hill. “It worked!” Ela-Dorn practically screamed out.
She had been nervous before, knowing that the chance of connecting was low. Then, with all of the different things they had to work on and the repairs he had made, she was sure that it was going to fail. Instead, it was holding a wormhole open with Cliff-Hill—star systems away.
The wormhole collapsed as the lights dimmed around the portal. A few of them flashed here and there; some sections looked as if they had been melted under the strain of opening the wormhole. But they had done it!
“Going to need some tweaking, but I think from that we’ll be able to figure out what works and what doesn’t.” Dave sounded a little tired as he wiped sweat from his face. Doing such complicated changes in such a short time had put a strain on his mind as well as his magical abilities.
“I never thought that it might work out with the first try! With this, we can truly start to make a network across everything! We can start to connect the different bases to Emerilia, not just the moon, shipyard one and Ice City, but the asteroid refineries, the asteroid, Cliff-Hill. We can even start to put portals inside of the different ships that we have so we can move personnel from one ship to another without worries,” Ela-Dorn said.
“We’ll get there eventually.” Dave smiled. “Now, I was having a lot of problems with the location data down to the ten-kilometer range. Variations in that were messing up the calculations between the different portals and their location data. I think that’s something we need to look into.”
“If it’s just the one thing that’s causing the issues, maybe there’s a hidden variable we haven’t accounted for. If the meters, centimeters, light-years, months, minutes and all of that is working, then we’ve got one weird issue going on,” Ela-Dorn said.
Their initial excitement was there but now it was tempered by the issues that they had encountered and the ways they were figuring out to improve upon their prototype and turn it into a working model.
Ela-Dorn and Dave talked to each other, moving toward the portal. They used different sensing spells and tools to take readings from the portal. Once that was done, they headed back toward Ice City. There was still more work to be done before they were able to mass-produce their own portals.
Chapter 8: Purpose
Frank looked around at the different people in the room with him. All of them were players and all of them were interested in fighting the Jukal.
They could help out with different manual labor jobs, maybe even stretch their minds to help out the different people who were building the amazing machines that they had seen.
What ignited their passion was not bending and breaking magic to their will; it was paying back those who had imprisoned them within their own minds and within a simulation of Earth.
A thickly built man with scruff on his face and a deep tan stood at the front of them all, looking over them.
Frank could see by the way this man held himself that he had been part of a military unit. Frank didn’t flinch from those cold eyes that scanned the room.
“Welcome to reality, brains! My name is Dwayne. Like you, I’m a player. Unlike you, I’m a player from this generation.” Dwayne’s voice echoed through the room. A number of people started to talk as soon as his words sunk in.
“That’s right!” Dwayne’s voice cut through them all, once again returning their attention to him. “Right now, I am fighting on Emerilia with other players and people of Emerilia against the creatures and people of the events, the aggressive species that are connected to Emerilia via portals. And, according to our intelligence, it seems the Pantheon is going to have an all-out brawl as well!”
Everyone in the room was focused on Dwayne. They wanted to get into the fight to be able to help out; just watching it all was driving them insane.
“I’m not here to welcome you to reality, nor am I here to tell you what to do. Instead, I come with an option: join the fighting force of the Pandora’s Box Initiative, or go and do something else. You have one minute to make your decision.” Dwayne sat down on a seat behind him and started to move through his interface screens.
Frank looked over Dwayne. He had heard about Dwayne from the different Emerilians. He was one of the leaders in the Stone Raiders Guild. He fought on the front lines with his people, leading players and POEs alike. It also seemed that he was one of the few players on Emerilia who knew the truth.
Frank had not only heard of him, he’d seen him in action as he’d checked out the different battles the Stone Raiders had been in. It was clear that all of this was being run mostly by the Stone Raiders Guild, which had led to a number of people looking over their battles and information. It was stunning the things that they had gone through. When thinking of it as a game, it was an impressive list of achievements.
When finding out that the list of fights and tribulations that they had gone through were not part of a video game but were instead part of real life, it led to the newly awakened players to feel deep respect and awe toward this guild that had essentially made it possible for them to wake up to reality.
A few people left the room, but the majority stayed there. They were now a few thousands of the players who had been woken up. Every hour, more of them were joining. These were all of the players from rural areas that could be covered over by the AI bots that Jeeves had inserted into the Earth simulation.
Dwayne closed his interfaces at the one-minute mark, stood and looked at them all. �
�Good. Well, seeing as this is the first time I’ve even been in this place, I’m learning everything the same time as you. However, Malsour Dracul will be our guide today!”
From a side door, a nondescript man stepped through. “Follow me and listen to all of my commands. You’ll get a party invite in a minute—accept it,” Malsour said.
Almos as soon as he thought about it, a party chat invite appeared in front of Frank. He clicked on it and opened it up.
“Good, seems that all of you are now connected. Follow me. We’re going to head to the asteroid base. Stay in an orderly line and make sure that you aren’t separated.” Malsour turned for the door.
The players moved to follow him. With their speed and reaction times, it didn’t take them long until they were all following after him.
“As you know, Emerilia is a world based off fantasies that the human race came up with. Dragons, elves, dwarves, human sub-races, magic spells and the rest. This was made possible through the changing of the planet now called Emerilia as well as growing humans, inserting powerful energy-based conductors, material synthesizers, nanites, and a number of complex different systems that come together to make Emerilia seem as if it is a video game. The Jukal Empire does not live on worlds that are like a fantasy video game. They are a multi-system spacefaring empire made up of a total of thirty-nine different races. Thirty-eight of which are under the command of the Jukal Empire. The Jukal were the first spacefaring race and the most powerful. They had the fastest ships, portal technology, and weapons. Using these, they were able to expand rapidly, taking over multiple different systems. Expanding their empire and making those they ruled over members of the empire. The Jukal Empire is a powerful and dominating creation. Each and every race is constrained to making limited things and live at the empire’s pleasure. If they are to disagree with the empire, the empire can quickly dispatch a carrier group to remove them or destroy them. Rebellions happen but they are rare and not one of them has succeeded.” Malsour led them out of where they had gathered and into Ice City, headed for the portal that was connected to the asteroid base.
“Emerilia was made to make up for the loss of their military power. Humanity hit them a heavy blow and they needed to keep the aggressive species, or at least the groups that they didn’t agree with, at bay. Using humans to soak this up was a risky plan, but it worked and has done so for five hundred years. The Jukal Empire was able to recover a lot of their power. However, the empire was on the decline. With the Jukal only trusting their race, there is no new blood coming in. They can’t trust the other races because they’re all suppressed, too. If they were to gain freedom, there’s no telling what might happen. Now you’re probably all wondering what this means. What this means is that the Jukal don’t fight on the ground that much; they don’t like to risk their people. It’s much easier for them to use ships. So, there’s not much use in training you all in hand-to-hand combat or even how to use spells if you’re not in a place where you can use them. So, we’ve adapted a few things that you can use in order to fight the Jukal. Everyone grab a necklace from over on that wall and turn the dial until the letters turn blue.” Malsour pointed to a wall filled with necklaces.
Everyone quickly grabbed one and pulled it on. A humming noise filled the air.
“These are simple Mana barriers. Stronger versions can be used to protect yourselves—these ones have been made so that you have enough oxygen that you don’t pass out and die in the asteroid base,” Malsour said. “Come with me!”
Malsour walked through a few more armored doors and past armed automatons that protected the portals.
Frank swore he could feel them scanning him as he passed.
They made it into the center of the armored building, finding a portal with carts moving back and forth at a terrifying speed.
Malsour stepped forward without a care. The carts paused as he stepped up to the portal. On the other side, there seemed to be a room identical to the one they were in. A number of people hesitated. Frank pushed forward. Others, seeing him, also stepped up, passing through the portal and onto the other side.
They quickly passed through the portal, Malsour not slowing in the slightest as he walked ahead of them. They moved quickly to catch up with him. They exited the portal’s armored location and entered the asteroid base.
It was illuminated by the soul gem constructs. But instead of the blue glow of Ice City, this was instead darker, making Frank think that he was tens of miles beneath the ground.
“We are now in space, people. That means no atmosphere. If you deactivate your necklace, then your Mana barrier will give way and you will be exposed to vacuum!” Malsour warned, not stopping his steps.
Carts moved at an even faster pace within the asteroid base. People here were all using Mana barriers that shimmered as they moved around in groups. One couldn’t hear them talking even if they were beside one another. They studied the players but they were all hurrying to and from jobs; they didn’t have the time to look over them closely.
They passed shops with automatons, others with missiles, more with cannons.
Frank kept looking into these rooms but he didn’t slow his pace for fear of losing Malsour.
Dwayne and Malsour were walking ahead of the group, talking to each other. Malsour seemed to be explaining things to Dwayne, who had a look of surprise on his face. It looked as if it was his first time being in the asteroid base as well.
Quickly, they passed all of these different workshops and secondary areas, and reached a massive armored door.
“What we need are not people who know how to simply wield a sword and use their magic in close combat roles. We have hundreds of thousands of people—more powerful than you can truly comprehend—we can use. What your mission will be is to get them to their battlefields,” Malsour said to the group.
They passed through the armored door, finding another behind it. The armored door closed behind them and the one ahead of them opened, revealing a massive open space.
Frank’s eyes were drawn to the spaceships in front of him.
“What we need you to do is learn how to crew and fight in these ships, to get people where they need to go, gather information about the Jukal and fight them in space,” Malsour said.
All of the players looked to the massive warships with stars in their eyes. It was impossible to look away from these machines. Their runic lines, the way that they seemed to dominate the area—they pressured the players.
“As time goes on, we will be able to move more people to assist you, like the dwarven artillery crews, who will be able to look after and maintain the weapons on these vessels. While Emerilia is a planet of fantasy, we have found allies in a group of humans who have spacefaring abilities. With their help and training, we hope to bring you up to fighting standards. These ships are not made from pure technology like the ones you know on Earth. These ships are a hybrid of Earth ideas and technology, matched with Emerilia’s magical constructs and practices. These ships will be faster than the Jukal’s; they will hit harder and have stealth capabilities that the Jukal could only wish for. To be able to crew these vessels, you must be worthy. We will be running simulations again and again. Only those who do the best will be allowed to crew them. This does not mean that you must have the best reaction times; you must be the best at everything that is in the realm of your activities. While you are not training, you will be building more of these ships, their weapons, and their ammunition. You will build their reactors, their armor plating, come to understand magical coding. These will be the beasts you ride into war with. Do not slack on your training or your work. If you slack, then your mistake could kill your friends. There is no respawn ability for you folks. We’ve taken you out of the simulation and off Emerilia. One mistake and you are dead!” Malsour looked over them all, his dark eyes solemn.
Many looked away from him at his words.
“The Jukal feared humanity not for their technology, but for their tenacity and training. We nev
er give up and we train to be the best. We will be using simulations and Mirrors of Communication to train with. We have the luxury of time, so we will train against simulations of Jukal groups of all kinds in all different types of systems. You will fight one another to sharpen each other’s skills. In the simulation, you can blow one another up in a hundred different ways and come back again. From each of these turns, you will learn! If you do not learn, then you will die.”
Malsour’s last sentence was not loud nor was it quiet but it shook those in front of him, hitting home that everything they had seen and gone through wasn’t a game; it wasn’t a simulation—if they messed up, they wouldn’t be coming back.
A few looked nervous as this hit in; for some, it didn’t. But others like Frank nodded, understanding that this was it: do or die—it was all on the line.
I’d live here for an hour with the possibility of dying instead of eternity in my old life, Frank thought.
“When going into battle, we will do our best to see that you are prepared for it and we will be standing right beside you, ready to face the dangers that you do together,” Malsour said.
Dwayne, beside him, nodded.
“This is something that you will all need to think on. There are plenty of other positions that need people. Not everyone is meant to be a fighter, but we are willing to help you find your place to see where you fit in and what you can do,” Malsour said, his voice reassuring.
***
Sato watched the plot where multiple stealth ships were moving from the Deq’ual system through various other systems. Their path looked random and they went in random directions at times. However, all of them that had left the Deq’ual system were all headed to the Nal system. They carried the materials and people who would be setting up the outpost within the system. It had been a massive undertaking to get everything sorted out and organized. Sato had a number of sleepless nights as he planned out everything to the last detail.
The Pantheon Moves Page 10