The Phantom Castle (The Way of the Shaman: Book #4) LitRPG series

by Vasily Mahanenko

  “A portal?”

  “Whenever I leave you, I leave through a portal…or maybe simply something that I perceive as a portal…but at the moment, I can’t use it. There is like a barrier hanging over it! Brother—I am afraid!” Draco folded himself into a ball at my feet and began to whine like a dog that had just been kicked. I had never seen my Totem like this before!

  “Nilirgnis, listen to me carefully,” straddling Draco, I grabbed his head with both hands and forced him to look me in the eyes. “No one and nothing can hurt you! You are my Totem. Anyone coming for you, has to get through me first and take everything away from me!”

  That’s odd—I’d never noticed that Draco had green eyes. Bright, practically flaring with an unearthly fire, they were so enthralling that I almost ‘plunged’ into them, merging my consciousness with that of my Totem…The green wall of Draco’s emerald eyes surged up at me, coloring the entire world in the colors of spring and…

  Class ability unlocked: ‘Totemic Merger’ You may merge your consciousness with your Totem. The outcome of using this ability depends on what you want to accomplish…

  What a nebulous description for an ability: You’ve unlocked a new skill, but you can find out what this skill does on you own. But that’s not even the main thing. The main question had finally occurred to me—how many such hidden abilities did a Shaman have anyway? Manipulation of items’ essences, communication with teachers, mergers with Totems. What else didn’t I know about? And why is it that not a single teacher would simply give me a comprehensive rundown instead of just yammering to me to keep working with the Spirits?

  “Brother, can you hear me?” Draco’s voice sounded in my head. “Oh boy! Is that what our father looks like?”

  “Yup, an enormous, green Dragon.”

  It seemed that my Totem’s Imitator had accessed my logs and looked up my encounter with Renox. Let him look—it’d do him good. Looking around me, I noticed that one of the patches of foggy vegetation that we had found ourselves in stood out against its surroundings. It was as if it was screaming: ‘Look at me!’ As soon as I concentrated on this patch, a screen appeared before my eyes, as in a movie theater, and one after another, various titles began to scroll upon it: ‘first summon,’ ‘second summon,’ ‘third summon’…Judging by the glow surrounding them, I could activate the titles, so I selected ‘first summon’ and…

  …A Shaman’s terrified, blazing eyes were locked on mine and a hypnotized hand reached out towards me. As it crossed some invisible border, it began to glow green—‘access granted’…A wave of pleasure washed over me—the hand had just caressed me…Suddenly it vanished and returned holding a handful of peas! Mmm! Delicious! The arm’s green glow was replaced by a pleasant blue halo—its owner appeared before me—this was my friend, standing before me…

  My first encounter with my Totem…So it turned out that here I could see not only the story of Draco’s life, or rather what he remembered since becoming my Totem, but I could also feel his feelings! I could understand what he liked and didn’t like and determine in which way he should develop himself…Why didn’t I know about this cool trick earlier?

  “So we’re with the Sirens? But they’re our enemies! Why did our enemies’ leader take you on as her apprentice?”

  “Because she wishes to strip me of everything. This lovely Siren only has one goal—to prove that I’m not worthy of being High Shaman. Show me the portal that you use to leave…”

  “Look.”“

  In a flash, the green world around us gave way to darkness, pierced by the light of a glowing portal. However, there was something wrong with the portal—a shutter was covering it as if someone had mounted a thick slab of glass over it to prevent Draco from leaving this world.

  “I cannot pass through this.”

  “Have you tried breaking it?”

  “Yes…it shakes but won’t give. I couldn’t even scratch it…”

  It shakes? Imagining that I had grown two huge, virtual arms, I reached for the glass barrier. If this shakes than I should shake it until it breaks…or pry it aside so that Draco could squeeze through…

  “Help me!” I wheezed, mentally heaving against the slab’s edge. What difference did it make whether I was actually helping Draco or my brain had overheated and my feverish imagination was simply casting forth various images—the important thing at the moment was to send my Totem back. The last thing I wanted was for him to die in this Labyrinth.

  “Hold it a second, I’ll manage to slip through!” I heard Draco say a minute later. Regardless of our being in a virtual unity—and notwithstanding that all of this was happening in a virtual computer game—the sweat was pouring from me like from a faucet, covering my eyes and causing a burning desire to rub them. A moment later, this desire was replaced by another—to simply drop this unbearable, titanic weight that very instant. By this point Draco had given up trying to slide the shutter back. Meanwhile, my back creaked in agony, my arms were being torn apart, and even my teeth were grinding themselves to dust from the unearthly tension. Treacherous thoughts began to pop into my mind: Why should I suffer for this Totem, who is, after all, merely a program? Why am I being such a masochist, if I could simply progress to the end of the Labyrinth with the Totem and thereby maybe level him up several times? Even if he dies—all that will happen is he’ll lose ten levels or so. What’s the big deal?

  “Just a little more, brother!” came my Totem’s thought. “I can almost squeeze through! Hold on a little!”

  Hold on! Easy to say ‘hold on’ when you’re not being torn in half! And all because, someone decided to grow up over the last few months! When Draco was little, he was agile and minute, he could fit anywhere, but now, at Level 54…He was…He was a fat, clumsy Komodo! Who knows—maybe it’d do him good to lose 10 levels?

  A cold sweat chilled me to the bone when I realized what I was thinking about. These were not my thoughts! Hold on! Perish, but hold on! And even in perishing, I’d need to hold on, while Draco made it through the portal! Labyrinth of Desires…more like a labyrinth of temptations! What kind of monster would even suggest the thought of killing Draco to me?!

  “I am inside, thank you brother!” the Totem’s thought flashed through my mind, and the world around me changed again, returning me to the stone corridor and its torch light. Phew! Draco had returned and now I could move onwards!

  I managed a single step when a new notification appeared:

  Elemental Shaman confirmed.

  So this was a trial?! But how would the Dungeon designers guess I would summon my Totem? Or did they have some way of adjusting the trial on the fly, in response to the actions I took?

  “Ere ages past, the Dragons were a weak breed—useless and helpless creatures!” Hardly had I dismissed the notification when the Siren’s voice blared in my head. “Being but mere slaves, they would destroy anyone that the Tarantulas singled out to them. Millions of innocent souls were sacrificed at the altar of the arachnid masters of Barliona, feeding their strength. The Tarantulas are no more, but the Dragons are the same slaves they were—they cannot conceive of freedom.”

  Clenching my teeth, I moved down the corridor. I wanted to offer some retort, but I restrained myself understanding that the Siren was provoking me. When I get a chance to speak with Renox, I will discover the truth, so now it’s best I listen to whatever my new teacher is telling me.

  As soon as made the turn, I was forced to stop again. The corridor ended in four doors, and something told me I’d have to choose the correct one.

  “Long, long ago, the great ruler of the Sirens, the incomparable Shaldange, approached the head of the Dragons with an offer to unite against and overthrow the Tarantulas. The Sirens had the support of the Cyclops, the Titans, the Minotaurs and the Almagerians. If the Dragons had joined them—the Tarantulas could have been destroyed right there and then…Yet fear…fear and the thirst for power, the desire to be the most powerful of the slaves…The Dragons accepted the offer a
nd agreed to show the allies the way to the Tarantulas’ home…Bloody traitors…That day, Barliona almost acquired a new god. The world had never seen so many victims. The Minotaurs and Almagerians were exterminated entirely. A weak shadow remained of the Titans and the Cyclops, and only the Sirens, who lived deep beneath the waters, managed to survive. That day was when the famous proverb was born: “You may trust even the hangman who places the noose round your throat—but trust not a Dragon willing to help…”

  What a tenacious Siren, this one! All races had, have and will have their traitors—irrespective of whether they fly or dwell in palaces. Such is the nature of the sentients—to want more without considering the feelings of other people, sirens, titans. But to hate an entire race because of this—in my view, that’s too much. Take the Plague for instance—a girl who destroyed Dragons by the handful. Killing several hundred lizards over one stupid Dragon is taking vengeance too far. Everything must have its measure, even one’s personal anger, otherwise the anger will take over the mind and extinguish reason forever.

  Sitting down on the floor before the doors and doing my best to ignore the Siren’s ravings, I closed my mind to the world and tried to understand which of these four doors was the right one.

  By the way, what did ‘right’ mean in this case anyway? What is right for me as a player, as a Shaman, as a husband, as a head of the clan, or as whatever else I was? Gold? The recognition of NPCs? Of players? Top rankings in the leaderboards? My release from imprisonment? Kornik’s approval? The title of Harbinger? As it turns out there are very many things that qualify as ‘right.’ I am practically certain that as I pass through this labyrinth, I will have to choose that which is truly right for me and that which is a mere echo of habit and social norms.

  And so…

  No sooner had I closed my eyes, than I understood that I should not choose the leftmost door. It was an odd feeling—to reject that door without having the slightest reason for it. It was like, well…I can’t even think of a good analogy. Oh! It was like shutting your eyes and deciding which of the four candles before you was lit…All you have to do is reach out your hand to feel the heat. It was the same thing here—all I had to do was shut my eyes and surrender to my feelings, when they shouted: “Do not enter the left door!”

  I rejected the next door after barely suppressing my gag reflex. I don’t know what the developers had done to it, but imagining all three remaining doors in my inner sight, I mentally opened the leftmost of the three, took a virtual step inside and instantly opened my eyes in an attempt to suppress the wave of revulsion that washed over me. I had never experienced such an odious, filthy and disgusting feeling in my life, even when I had been betrayed by people whom I had considered my friends. One thing was clear—that door was off-limits.

  I spent another ten minutes staring with astonishment at the four doors, unable to comprehend what I was meant to do. Even the Siren had fallen silent, cutting out her songs about how weak of a Shaman I was and how I’d never manage to complete this labyrinth. I was at a loss because I had mentally opened the other two doors and—in the first case, almost fainted from the headache that struck me—while in the second, became paralyzed for an entire minute, unable to move even a pinky. All four doors turned out to contain a surprise of their own, and I had utterly no idea which one to choose. Just in case, I walked back to the Dungeon’s beginning, holding on to the wall and naively listening to my premonition—in the hopes of finding some secret passage. Eh…I could really use that amulet of Stacey’s from Bigeye’s cavern here, but…

  Ab-so-lute-ly no-thing.

  The corridor seemed monolithic, complete, without any secret passages. It terminated at the four doors that I didn’t dare enter. What a lovely place!

  Okay…So what do we have? Aside from an intense desire to avoid, nausea, paralysis and a migraine? But if I had to choose one, which one would it be? The answer is obvious—either paralysis or the headache, since the other two aren’t even an option. Although…why would paralysis be an option? If I can’t move, what’d be the point of choosing that door? It’s decided then—I’ll open the door on the right.

  “Once upon a time, the head of the Dragons decided to hold a competition. Each of his warriors was to collect the heads of children without destroying any defenders in the process. Children would be always secreted deep in the caves, so the Dragons would have to be cunning to get to them without killing anyone along the way. Wishing to demonstrate his own valor to the others, the head of the Dragons took part in this ‘entertainment.’ Humans had only just appeared in Barliona. They were still huddled in its caves, not even considering the idea of building cities…And yet this game of the Dragons almost cost people their meagre place in this world. The heads of twenty thousand children were piled into immense pyramids, damned for all eternity. Are you familiar with a place called the desert of Dalmashar? To this day, in the heart of this desolate place, stands a monument to the Dragons’ mad frenzy…”

  No sooner had I made my decision than the Siren popped back into my head and went on with her tales of the Dragons’ ‘glorious’ deeds. I wonder what the point of all this was? I already understood that the Dragons weren’t the angels they were considered today—that they were evil, vain and jealous beasts—and yet all this took place before Renox decided to change. As for the massacre of children, I was of the view that this was simple disinformation—somehow I have trouble believing that the developers would go through with something like this. And anyway, the myriad explorers of Barliona would long since have discovered such a horrible monument in the center of the largest desert in the Free Lands. Why, Barliona would have been shut down in a flash over something like this!

  My chosen door opened with a terrible squeal that set my teeth on edge. Another detail of the scenario—you couldn’t typically feel your teeth under normal game conditions. But okay, I’ve made my decision, all that’s left is to step forward and hope for the best—I couldn’t think of anything else to do.

  I had already almost raised my foot to step further into the corridor beyond the door when I realized: Really, I’m not very good at this Shaman business…Why would I go in there on my own, into these incomprehensible traps, if I’m technically the ruler of Spirits? Okay, not a ruler but a person who can communicate with them. Why hadn’t this occurred to me earlier?

  The Shaman has three hands…

  In order to summon Spirits, a High Shaman doesn’t actually have to dance around with his tambourine and beat his head against the wall as if trying to pass into the Astral plane. However, for me, this ritual had become a kind of psychological key which I used to tune my mind to working with Spirits. I should probably give up this habit in the future, but not right now because at the moment, it didn’t matter how I worked with the Spirits. It was the result that was important…

  “WE CANNOT PERMIT AN ELEMENTAL SHAMAN TO SUMMON HIS REFLECTION,” roared the Supreme Spirits of the Higher and Lower worlds, sending me into renewed despondency. What was going on?

  For twenty minutes I tried to summon the Spirit I needed, or rather, imagining this Spirit in my mind and performing the summoning, but nothing worked. Only my head began to hurt as if reminding me that the door was open and I needed to get on with it…and do so on my own instead of forcing innocent Spirits to do my dirty work for me. When my headache became unbearable, I ceased my summoning attempts and entered the Astral Plane—if I was going to make progress, better try to do it here. And yet I couldn’t even anticipate that the Supremes would be so, well, mean-spirited…

  “You were the ones who declared me High Shaman to begin with!” I tried to remind them, but they cut me off on the spot:

  “NASHLAZAR IS RIGHT—YOU WERE PROMOTED TOO QUICKLY, WITHOUT FULLY UNDERSTANDING THE PURPOSE OF THE RANKS. IN MERGING WITH YOUR TOTEM, YOU BECAME A TRUE ELEMENTAL SHAMAN, BUT YOU MUST PROVE THAT YOU ARE READY TO BECOME A HIGH SHAMAN NOT THROUGH YOUR TITLE BUT THROUGH YOUR DEEDS. FOLLOW THE WAY OF THE SHAMAN. ONLY THEN CAN YOU
BECOME A HIGH SHAMAN AGAIN!”

  Once again, like I was some stray kitten, the Supremes kicked me out of the Astral Plane and into the ordinary world—demonstrating what they thought of me. I’m really at a loss with those guys—when they need it, I’m just great, a true hero, etc. But when they don’t—I’m a run-of-the-mill Elemental Shaman and get outta here! Moreover, they just openly reneged on their own words, revoking the title of High Shaman which they had granted me in the presence of official witnesses. It’s like there’s a renegade developer among the others who really really dislikes me and keeps trying his best to harm me. Recalling my meeting with James, this seemed like a reasonable explanation. What if he had bet on us winning the battle at Altameda?

  It was looking like I wouldn’t be able to complete this labyrinth—they had even blocked my apprentice quest. In that case…What’s the point of heading further down the corridor if all I’d get in return is a headache? If I collapse from the pain—I’d be utterly useless…And then…

  As I grasped the handle of the leftmost door, I almost lost it completely. I have experienced fear before in my life, and I can say with certainty that it had never been as intense as it was now. My terror was so distinct that I could barely take ahold of myself and open the door. My hand shook treacherously, my legs were weak, but I clenched my teeth and took a step into the corridor. They could all go to hell with their dumb trials! I’ll test my own self!

  At the fifth step, I collapsed to the ground and rolled up into a ball. Shutting my eyes, I tried to tell myself that everything I was experiencing wasn’t real and that none of this existed. However, I simply couldn’t convince my wavering legs that I had to move onward. If Barliona simulated bodily functions a bit closer, my diapers would have lost their immaculate appearance. The terror fettered me, destroyed me, suppressed me, and so, whining shamefully, I began to crawl back to the door. I simply did not have the strength to stay in this corridor any longer.