by M Helbig
Dirt Elf Guard
Level: 22
Resists
Type: Regular
Light: ???
Race: Dirt Elf
Dark: ???
Faction: Kingdom of Dirtsee
Earth: ???
HP: ???
Water: ???
MP: ???
Fire: ???
AP: ???
Wind: ???
AC: ???
Special Attributes: ???
Weaknesses: ???
The guard I’d inspected grunted. “You aren’t welcome here, surface dwellers. Begone or face my blade.”
Alizia peeked over her shield. “Well, that’s not so bad. We only have to face his blade. He never said he’d be holding it while we faced it. Offer accepted.”
The guard’s shield dropped, as did his mouth. “That’s—that’s not what I meant.”
“See, I am learning,” Alizia said in group chat. “I didn’t go charging in and used my noggin for once. Just like my hero, Horus. But I defer to the master. Finish them off with your words, fast. I don’t think I can stand to look at these alleged elves much longer. Jeez, they look like used candles made of mud.”
“We’d be happy to leave you be,” I said. “But the passage behind us has been blocked.”
The guard growled. “Must be those dirty stone gnomes. They’ve made it so we can’t travel the passages without a pack of them trapping us in and suffocating us. We’ll dispatch a team of diggers to clear them out.” He motioned to his partner, who left. “Once that’s complete, you must leave.”
“Thank you,” I said. “How long will that take?”
“If Dilenalu can find a free one, about a day, though it’s more than likely there aren’t any available. My best guess is two or three days.”
“Three days!” Olaf said. “But we need to get through now. My son is in danger farther in this dungeon.”
The guard snickered. “Good. The fewer gnomes in this world, the better. If the king hadn’t forbidden harming surface gnomes due to that stupid treaty with the Kingdom of Gorismaiden, you’d already have my blade in your belly.”
It took all my strength and Alizia’s to hold Olaf back.
“My friend’s son isn’t a gnome,” I said. “He’s a dirt elf. Adopted.”
“Yup,” Alizia said. “Handsome fellow, his son is. Skin that looks like chocolate pudding, pointy ears, voice that makes panties drop. You know, like you.”
The guard winked at Alizia, and she smiled back shyly.
“God, I just threw up in my mouth,” Alizia said in group chat. “You owe me for this, Olaf.”
“Would it be possible for us to get passage through your kingdom?” I asked. “We don’t need to stay or anything, only to get through.”
You have gained 1 skill point in Diplomacy! 4/25
The guard put his hand on a roll of flesh that I assumed was his chin. “Surface dwellers aren’t allowed within our kingdom, unless they are diplomats, sanctioned traders, or have performed a number of tasks for us.”
“Here it comes,” Alizia said in group chat while continuing to grin like an idiot to the guard. “More stupid faction grinding. We’re gonna have to deliver mail, kill the same stupid mobs over and over, find some guy’s missing socks, and pick underground berries until our fingers get numb for the next week.”
“You could try flirting with him for faction instead,” Olaf said in group chat.
“Nah. Sacrificing gnomes to their god, Lenny the Bulldog, is probably worth more,” Alizia said in group chat.
The other guard returned and whispered something in his companion’s ear.
“Follow me,” the first guard said. “I happen to have exactly the task in mind to begin your journey.”
The second guard pointed the tip of his sword at Olaf as the rest of us passed. The first guard shook his head and the other one finally lowered his weapon.
While the sudden light we’d noticed when we first neared the door had seemed a little brighter than normal, we’d not been expecting the almost blinding brightness as we finally took in the city itself. The roofs of every building were made of a glass that magnified the constant stream of light coming through the hole at the top of the large cavern. If I could’ve held back the tears of pain, I probably would’ve found the rainbow of colors on the top of the cavern mesmerizing and beautiful. It took every ounce of my being not to vomit on the floor. Even closing my eyes didn’t help, as I could still see the light through my eyelids.
“So pretty,” Alizia said.
“Guggh,” Olaf said as he collapsed.
I put both hands over my eyes, which barely helped. “Mr. Guard, do you have anything that could help us mitigate the light? Our eyes aren’t used to this.”
“Yeah, I can’t even wink at you all prettily like this,” Alizia said. “I look even cuter with sunglasses on, by the way.”
The guard laughed wickedly. “One minute.”
“One minute to wahhh—” Alizia collapsed before she could finish.
“You tricked us,” I said.
“Our best defense against outsiders,” the guard said. “None but a true dirt elf can withstand more than a minute looking at the City of Light. And they all fall down.”
“Ashes. Ashes,” I tried to say as consciousness left me and the world went blessedly dark.
Nobody Ever Died Playing Checkers
I woke up with my legs held to a chair by some sort of magic force. The only things I could see in the dark room were my hands, a table with an empty chessboard before me, and an anthropomorphic mole seated opposite. It was surprisingly warm, and there was a thick musty smell wafting through the room.
“Hi, there. Do you know where we are and what the dirt elves want?” The echo from my statement seemed to go on for over a minute.
The mole-person's head tilted nervously as my question repeated itself on each new echo.
“Unless you speak Molefolk, he won’t understand a word you say,” a deep, resounding voice said from just above us.
“Great,” I said and waited for the word to finish echoing. “So, I don’t suppose you, O Mysterious Voice, could tell me what you want? Torture, friendly game of chess, or torturous game of chess?”
“Well, that entirely depends on you . . . you . . . you . . . you,” the Voice said.
Waking up in a dark room while strapped to a chair had left my nerves a bit frayed. Like it would most people’s. Fortunately, my natural defense mechanism kicked in: sarcasm. “Did you really add your own echo to the end of that? Serious breach of ominous voice decorum. I’m going to have to report you to your supervisor, unless you let me out.”
“Exit will not be permitted until after the match is complete.”
Miniatures appeared and the board lit up. I was expecting it to be some game that looked like chess but had different rules they wouldn’t tell me, but the pieces appeared in the correct spots for a normal game. At least something was going right. As I finished looking at the board, my eyes met the molefolk’s. “No idea if you’re working with the dirt elves or you’re a fellow prisoner, but it looks like I have no choice in this. Do you want to go first?”
I’d forgotten he couldn’t understand my language, but he must’ve still caught my meaning, because he let out a squeak and pushed his pawn forward. We continued with the pawns for a couple more moves before we moved our big guns. He started with a knight and I went with a bishop. Two moves later, he drew first blood and took out one of my pawns. As the mole person set the piece down, the knight figure drew his sword, and in a blur, it swung for the head of my emaciated pawn. The pawn screamed and exploded in a fountain of blood as a red 43! floated from his headless corpse. Raucous cheers came from everywhere in the room, when they finally died down three minutes later, the pawn’s body faded into the board.
I countered with my bishop, who clubbed the knight off his horse and then continued to pummel him until he stopped moving. Each blow drew a new damage num
ber and a spray of blood, though the last three only drew 0s and small squirts. My bishop finally raised her blood-soaked hands in triumph and drew a much bigger round of applause.
The game continued like that for another half an hour. He’d take one of my pieces, and I’d counter in a move or two to take one of his. Each piece that moved into an occupied square would pummel the occupant into a bloody mess and loud applause would follow. At one point I thought his rook was going to put up a fight as she raised her mace to block my queen’s scepter, but the queen’s blow broke the mace in two and then proceeded to do the same thing to the rook. I was afraid she was going to break the board as the red 467! that shot out was bigger than my head. By the time I was able to steady myself from the resulting deafening applause, I swore I saw his other rook cover his ears.
“What happens if I win?” I asked.
“Your question will be answered,” the Voice said.
“Which question?” I waited for the echo to die, but no answer came. “The one about me winning or one of the previous ones like, ‘What do you want’? Or are you saying you’ll answer one question of my choosing?”
“Please move a piece,” the Voice said.
“That was less than helpful.” The mole squeaked again. I pretended it meant he was agreeing with me. “What happens if I lose?”
“Your question will not be answered.”
“Because I’ll be dead or I just don’t get a reward for losing?”
“Losers can lose again but the dead cannot.”
“Fantastic,” I said. “If this whole voice-over thing doesn’t work out, I’m sure there’s a job waiting for you writing terrible fortune cookies.”
Silence answered my echoes.
“Can you at least tell me if my friends are still alive? Are they playing a game like this somewhere else?”
“Your game is not over. Please move a piece.”
I grumbled obscenities under my breath and the chair shocked me. When the feeling returned to my fingers, I moved one of my pawns forward. The mole squealed in glee as he pushed his other knight forward to behead the hunchbacked pawn in retaliation for my thoughtlessness.
Anger welled in me as my poor mangled pawn faded into the board. I grabbed my bishop to take out one of his few remaining pawns and make him pay. The mole salivated more and more as I moved the piece forward. I stopped at the last second before I released the piece and double-checked the board.
“The rook, you moron. Watch the rook,” a deep, gravelly voice said.
I examined the room and it was still too dark to see anything besides the board and the mole person. As I looked back at the board and found the aforementioned rook, the mole’s eyes reflexively widened for a split second. I moved a pawn instead.
“Congratulations, you’re not brain dead,” the deep voice said.
I glared at the mole person and he squeaked in response after moving his rook forward and setting it down.
“I know it’s you, moley moleman,” I said as I defensively moved my bishop away. “You can drop the ‘don’t understand English’—or whatever they call what I’m speaking.”
“It’s called ‘Standard’ and I may have to withdraw my ‘not brain dead’ comment,” the deep voice said.
The mole continued to stare at the board, rubbing his stubby hand on his lack of a chin. I hadn’t seen his mouth move when the comment came out, but I was sure the voice originated nearby, so I looked down at the board.
“Which one of you said that?” I whispered to the pieces on the board. My hope that my voice wouldn’t carry enough to echo across the room was fulfilled. At worst, only the mole person would think I was an idiot for asking that if I was wrong.
One of my wood elf pawns raised her hands and spun around. “I did, you dolt. Now if he moves his knight into position to take out your bishop on his next turn, move your queen up to take his. If he leaves it be, take it out with your rook.”
“Got it.” I moved my hand forward to shake her tiny hand but just before I could, the mole stomped his knight down on top of her.
“Can any of you other pieces talk?” I moved a pawn another space to again keep her away from the hungry knight. As I pulled my arm back, I could hear a faint whisper. “We all can.”
“Which of you said that?” I whispered at the lowest decibel I could muster.
One of my rooks wiggled his stony legs slightly.
“Why aren’t you talking now?” As the mole set down his bishop into position to take my queen, I leaned forward like I was reaching for a piece to get closer to the rook.
“No help from the pieces!” the Voice said from seemingly everywhere at once. “As punishment, you’ve activated Hard Mode.”
The hands and weapons of the mole person’s pieces began to shine. His wide, fat face took on an ominous glow as he touched his queen. Without him even moving her, she put her hands above her head and unleashed a blast as big as my head, obliterating three of my pieces. To add insult to injury, he then slid her across the board, and she bludgeoned my hapless rook to death.
“Shouldn’t Hard Mode involve harder weapons?” I asked the room as my sarcastic self-defense mechanism took over to protect me from the shock. “I’d personally call that ‘Sparkly Death Mode,’ but that’s just me.”
“Ah, excellent point,” the Voice said. Suddenly my opponents’ weapons grew three times bigger. I didn’t know how all of the pieces didn’t immediately topple over.
“Help,” I squeaked.
All at once my pieces began to talk. Sadly, that left me with seven different options on what to do. The mole squealed in anger until his chair shook violently and shocked him. The smell of burning fur wafted through the room.
The prevailing opinion involved sacrificing my queen so that I could follow it up by taking out a string of his remaining pieces. As I moved my knight into position to ready for that, my eyes focused on my poor queen, and in particular on her multi-colored headdress—a familiar headdress from my first group outing. I accidentally released my knight in shock. “Alizia!”
The tiny, green-skinned piece turned her head around and waved her scepter at me. “Horus! Thank God. I was beginning to think whoever was moving me and my fellow captives was some moron, but now I know I’m in good hands.”
I called out to the Voice, assuming it was the referee. “I let go on accident. Can I redo that move?”
“Is a redo allowed in the official rules?” the Voice asked when he finished laughing.
“I have no idea—wait. The rules of which officiating body?”
The mole squealed out a laugh and grabbed his rook. He opened his mouth in either a grin or to bare his teeth—with his tiny, circular mouth it was hard to tell. He moved as swiftly as he could, though with his stubby arms and the long distance he had to bridge, it wasn’t that fast.
I winced and closed my eyes as the rook wound up a massive, rocky fist, but I forgot that you could still see damage numbers even with your eyes closed. A succession of red numbers floated by. 36. 57! 42. I opened my eyes to see Alizia on her knees, holding her shield up high. My fingers knew what to do even if my brain hadn’t quite realized it yet. To my surprise, the spell landed to heal her for a whopping 470.
“’Bout time,” Alizia said as the rook stopped swinging in shock. “Getting rusty without not-new-Yary to pick up your slack. Don’t let it happen again, or I’ll start singing.”
The mole let out a series of high-pitched squeals, and the Voice responded with squeals of his own.
“That didn’t sound good,” Alizia said. “Quick, move some reinforcements in to take out this mook.”
The rook raised his fists and began his assault anew. Alizia tried to counterattack, but she had to give up and focus on blocking almost immediately. I grabbed the closest piece I could find and dropped the pawn in the same spot. As I felt the thick mustache on the gnome’s face, I knew I’d grabbed the right piece.
Olaf drew his daggers from his waist and gleefully began
his assault on the rook’s kneecaps. “Thank you, Horus. It seems that whatever magic shrank us and rooted us to these circles under our feet also prevents us from talking until you’ve touched us once. What is this?” His daggers clanked uselessly against some sort of invisible barrier surrounding the rook.
I cast another massive heal on Alizia.
The mole squealed again in protest, and the Voice responded in Standard. “If one were to make an illegal move, the piece might find extra difficulties.”
I glanced back at the spot Olaf had been in and the one he currently occupied. He was a pawn and I’d moved him completely across the board. I grabbed him and put him back, hoping the game would allow me to make a legal move with my knight so he could help Alizia. The mole reached forward to counter me as I moved the knight closer. In his haste, his fat, stubby arm caught the edge of the board, flipping it over. Thankfully, Olaf and Alizia survived the fall, unlike about half the pieces. Deafening sounds of shock rocked the room.
“In most cultures, it is considered a forfeit to knock the gameboard over,” the Voice said. A smattering of modest applause followed.
The mole abruptly spasmed and collapsed. A thick smoke wafted from his fur and a second later, the force holding me in my chair disappeared. I had to close my eyes as a blinding light came from behind him. When it finally dimmed, I could see the outline of a doorway.
You have received 250 Faction with the Kingdom of Dirtsee. -750 Kingdom of Dirtsee (Untrusted).
“Please continue sitting until a new opponent can be brought in for more faction or exit through the doorway to attempt a new challenge,” the Voice said. The sound of a moving crowd followed his words and continued to bounce across the room for several minutes.