by Edward Brody
The man ignored me. “What’s with your outfit, huh? Don’t you Bloodletters usually wear all black? Are you a special or something?”
I sighed. “Talk later, walk now. Dryden won’t be pleased…”
“Oh, fuck off, asshole. I know you guys are going to kill me no matter what I do. You cut our arms and legs off last time. That was the worst pain of my life!”
“The last time?” I asked. Was the guy in front of me a Reborn?
The man seemed uninterested in my question as he stepped forward, swinging his club at me violently. I held my sword up to block each of his heavy blows and ducked when he whipped the club at my head.
He swept his leg at me, which I didn’t expect, and it knocked me onto my back. As soon as I fell, he continued swinging his club, each blow getting lighter and lighter and easier for me to block. He clearly had not regained enough stamina.
“Die! Die! Die, you cunt!”
I kicked my foot out, landing hard in the guy’s shin, and he immediately groaned and fell to one knee, dropping his club.
“Fuck!” he spat as he rubbed at his shin.
I scrambled to my feet and pointed my sword at him again, and when he reached over to grab his club, I kicked it away. “Stop it now! You don’t have enough stamina to do anything. Get up and come with me.”
The man looked down and sighed in defeat. “Just kill me now. Don’t put me through any more suffering.”
“Get up!” I said more harshly.
The man shook his head and slowly stood to his feet. “What the hell do you want from us? We stole from you once, and you got your stuff back. We won’t try it again.”
“Turn around and walk,” I said, knowing that others would be looking for us if we took too long.
The man turned and slowly began walking from where we came.
“You said ‘last time’,” I asserted while we were walking. “What does that mean?”
“The others didn’t tell you?”
“Tell me what?”
“Your little mercenary group has killed us twice before.” He stiffened his back and broadened his shoulders. “And in case you haven’t put two and two together, there’s no point in killing us again. We’re just going to respawn.”
“You’re a Reborn then?”
“That’s what they call us, I guess.”
I saw a fleeting opportunity and decided to take a chance. I grabbed the man’s shoulders and turned him around towards me. “Yeah…”
He creased his eyebrows, paused and scanned me up and down as if he was reading my mind. “Wait a minute… You’re a Reborn too?’
I nodded.
“What the hell are you doing with these guys, man? They’re fuckin’ bad people, dude!”
“Shhhh,” I scolded, raising my finger to my lips. “Do you know of the Freelands?”
The guy shrugged.
“Highcastle? Addenfall? Linden? Have you been across the Serpent Sea?”
The guy shrugged again and shook his head. “I’ve haven’t been too far from the Sands, man. Hell, if I’ve been across the Serpent Sea.” The man turned to see if anyone was coming and leaned in close. “Look, just let me go, please. I don’t know why you joined the Bloodletters, but we’re both real, man.” He pinched the skin on his arm. “We’re both from Earth.”
I took a deep breath and sighed. “I didn’t want to join the Bloodletters. I was forced to. And I’ve got to lead you back to Dryden… I’m sorry, but I have to.”
“You can join us,” he said. “We plan on forming a guild soon. It’ll be sick.”
I sighed again and shook my head. “We don’t have time to talk about this now. Unless you can tell me how to get across the Serpent Sea, I’m going to have to lead you back. All I can say is, ‘I’m sorry’.”
“Come on, bro!”
I gritted my teeth, slowly closed my eyes and opened them. “Turn around and walk.”
“What a fucking asshole,” the man cursed as he turned back around and started walking.
I felt terrible for doing that to him, but I had no choice. If the circumstances were different, I would have done anything to set him and his posse free, but if I failed Dryden on our first outing, it would seriously hinder my ability to complete my overarching goal of rescuing Maleena and getting back home. All I could do was hope that Dryden wouldn’t kill him, but knowing what little I knew of Dryden and the fact that the Bloodletters had already killed him twice, I suspected they were dead meat.
After several minutes of walking through the Oasis, we finally reached clearing with the pond. The other man and woman had been caught and both were on their knees with their heads bent low. Dryden’s soldiers were behind them with sword tips pointed towards their head.
“Excellent job, Gunnar!” Dryden said loudly when we saw me. He was covered in blood from head to toe, and I saw the giant frog that he had fought off to the side, dead and completely eviscerated. It looked like a pile of butcher scraps, and half the pond had turned a deep color of pink.
“Over there,” I said to the man, pressing my sword lightly into his back, urging him towards his friends.
“I was worried you might disappoint me,” Dryden said. “But it seems you’ve exceeded my expectations.”
“I’m glad that you’re pleased, Lord Dryden,” I replied, getting back into character.
Dryden turned his attention towards the kneeling captives. “So you’re caught yet again. I hope that this is the last time I have to kill you.”
“Let us go, and you’ll never see us again,” the young woman said.
Dryden snickered. “I can’t allow that, now.” He turned to me. “Do you know what these are, Gunnar?”
I shook my head, not sure what he was getting to.
“They’re Reborns!”
I jolted my head back and felt a tension rise in my stomach. Dryden knew about Reborns already?
“It’s true! Reborns are real!” he snarled loudly. “They’re springing up all around the area, but these are the only ones we’ve had to deal with three times now.”
“Wow…” I cleared my throat and tried to feign surprise. “I thought that was all a myth!”
“Oh, fuck off!” the guy who I captured looked up and scowled. “This guy’s a Reborn too! Might as well kill him with us.”
My heart started pounding as everyone focused their attention on me. I couldn’t blame the guy for trying to out me; I probably would’ve done the same. But I had no idea how I was going to talk my way out of that one.
There was a long pause, and the tension was palpable.
“Is that true?” Dryden asked. “You’re also Reborn?”
I considered telling the truth. Maybe honesty would have earned me brownie points somehow. But seeing the three other Reborns kneeling under the tips of the Bloodletters wasn’t reassuring enough for go that route. “No,” I said. “I don’t know what he’s talking about.”
“It’s true! He told me!” the man on the ground yelled.
I shook my head and smirked. “He’s willing to say anything for you to set him free.”
“Hmm,” Dryden considered. “I think you’re right about that.” He rubbed his bloody hand through his bloody hair. “But I suppose it wouldn’t matter either way. If I killed you to find out, you’d just come back, and then I’d have to kill you again. So try not to die… Reborn or not, don’t give me a reason to kill you.”
I snickered, trying to act as overconfident as I had when I had been high on kroka. “I don’t fear death, especially as a result of what men like this have to say.” Did that even make sense? I wondered. I wasn’t so slick and cocky when I was my normal self.
Dryden twisted his brow in confusion for a moment, but then he smiled. “I’ll leave you to kill the one with the big mouth.”
“Me?” I asked.
“Sure,” Dryden said. “We’ll cut their tongues out so they can’t scream, and then cut their eyeballs out one by one.”
You have been offer
ed a quest: Executioner
Dryden has ordered you to kill and defile the Reborn.
Reward: 2000XP
Do you accept this quest? Accept/Decline
I tried not to show my disgust, but just his words made me feel ill. I was tired of the gore and gruesomeness. “Uhhh… But they’re Reborns, right?”
“Yeah… that’s what I said.”
“Then there’s no reason to waste time defiling them, right? No one will find their bodies, and no matter what we do, they’ll just come back as good as new. Why waste time on them? Like you said, we shouldn’t be complacent, right?”
Dryden pressed his lips together. “I guess you do have a point.” He nodded slightly. “Okay, just slit their throats, and let’s get out of here.” He looked down to the Reborns. “I’m not certain how to kill you permanently, but I will figure it out someday, I assure you.”
Dryden waved his hand at me, signaling for me to go ahead and kill the man that I had captured.
You have been offered a quest: A Simpler Execution
Dryden has ordered you to slit the throat of the Reborn.
Reward: 2000XP
Do you accept this quest? Accept/Decline
Inside, I was screaming, but outside I was cold as ice. I walked behind the man, and two of the other Bloodletters knelt down beside the other two captives.
You have accepted the quest: A Simpler Execution!
I knelt to one knee, drew my sword back, and grabbed the man by the hair. I placed my face right behind his ear and placed my blade against his throat. “Do you have a bandage?” I whispered as low as I could, trying not to move my mouth at the same time.
The man twitched a little, and I wasn’t sure if that meant yes or no. There was no way for me to clarify with him.
“No matter how much this hurts, you better play dead,” I added softly.
“Do it!” Dryden snapped.
The Bloodletters sliced the throats of the other two Reborns, and I heard them grumble, choke, and begin to die. I slid my sword smoothly across the neck of the guy I was holding, knowing that I was slicing through his skin, but purposely not going deep enough to kill him right away or do any fatal damage. I could only hope that he had a bandage and that he’d play dead long enough that the Bloodletters wouldn’t check.
The man winced and gurgled when the blade left his throat, and he fell face-forward and started to spasm. Either he was incredibly good at playing like he was severely injured, or I had managed to cut him deeper than I intended.
You have completed the quest: A Simpler Execution!
You have gained 2000 XP!
Dryden licked around his lips, removing some of the blood that had stuck to his face from the fight with the frog. He spit the blood mixed with saliva from his mouth and threw us all approving nods as the three Reborns twitched aimlessly on the ground. “Let’s head back to the keep. If anything else interesting come our way, we’ll head out, but otherwise, it’s been a good day.”
A good day for him, I thought. Another horrendous day for me.
Chapter Twenty-Six
1/23/0001
When we returned to the keep, I headed straight for the room I was staying in and sat on the bed, burying my head in my hands.
It was the first time since my earliest days in Eden’s Gate that I really wasn’t enjoying myself, and I actually felt like I wanted to be back on Earth, working as a stock boy, living a mundane life in a tiny studio apartment, whatever.
I had killed lots of things in game already—monsters, insects, animals, humanoids, even humans. But outside of my brief fighting with Ozzy, that day was my first dabble in PvP, and I was on the wrong side of the action. I hadn’t really killed any of the Reborns that day—at least I hoped not—but I was involved in their capture, and at least two of them had died as a result, maybe three. The things that Dryden made the Bloodletters do, and the things I had done were things I wasn’t sure I’d ever erase from my mind.
I went from having some of the happiest moments of my life with a guild family and a great group of friends to being miserable overnight, all thanks to Satorin’s plot of forcing me to the The Sands to help him.
I sat up straight and took a couple deep breaths. I was making some progress, acquired a new sword, and had gained some decent XP. The dead Reborns would eventually respawn, and I could assume that people were constantly getting killed all over the world anyway. If this had been playing any other game, I wouldn’t have given the things I had seen a second thought.
Relax Gunner, I told myself. Let’s just focus on getting the fuck out of here.
I stood from the bed and headed for the stairs that lead to the top floor where I had been lurking around gathering information. It was the only place that I had seen a female anywhere in the keep, and I didn’t want to miss an opportunity to see her or Maleena if they made an appearance.
When I arrived at the top floor, I slunk into a shadowy corner and watched both chamber doors that were guarded by two men.
After some time, Dryden walked upstairs, still covered in blood, and the guard stepped aside as he opened the door to the room where Rina had first emerged. He peaked his head inside, and I could barely make out what he was saying. Nyra, Sasha, Maleena, something about a bath.
Did he say Maleena? I couldn’t be sure from that distance, but I was pretty confident that I heard her name. And if it was the case, that meant that she was definitely sharing the same room as Rina. With Dryden mentioning two other names as well, I could conclude that the room were the quarters for his harem.
There was some bickering coming from deep in the room, and I couldn’t make out everything that was being said, but I heard the word ‘soap’ mentioned several times. Dryden said something back and eventually closed the door and crossed over to the room on the other side. The other room was most likely his personal chamber, and he called women from his harem over whenever he desired.
Keeping girls trapped in a room and guarded like that… It made me hate the guy even more.
A second later, three women emerged from the harem room and scurried over to the Dryden’s personal chambers. Right behind them was Rina, who took a quick turn and was heading for the nearby stairs.
I held my breath as she approached, and as soon as she was on the stairs and out of the guard’s view, I emerged from the shadows and noiselessly grabbed her by the arm.
“Hey!” she snapped and turned to me. “You again?”
“Quiet,” I whispered, reflexively ducking down as if that was going to somehow help. “Just listen.”
Rina smiled and shook her head. “You seem in a rush to die. If Dryden catches you sneaking—“
“I know,” I interrupted. “But I need your help to get out of here.”
“So, it’s not a matter of ‘help me help you’ then? You just want me to help you.”
I sighed. “I know this is hard to understand, but look at me.” I patted my hands across my gear and then turned my face to the side. “Do I look like the other Bloodletters? I’m here for one reason only.”
“That is?”
“To free Maleena.”
Rina snorted. “You’re such a fool… You joined the Bloodletters to free Maleena?” Rina turned her head to each side. “What’s stopping me from telling Dryden what you’ve told me? I might get a reward if I do.”
“I told you before that I’ll free you too…”
Rina shook her head. “You can’t do that.”
“What do you mean I can’t? You want to stay here? You’re happy here?”
“No, it just means you can’t. The rooms are guarded, and you’re just a level 17. There’s no way you can get us out of here, and if Dryden caught us trying to escape, he’d kill us all.”
“There has to be a way,” I insisted.
Rina shook her head again and sighed. “I’m sorry. I need to fetch soap before the guards come searching for me. If I were you, I’d go out and pretend I’m doing some Bloodletter thing and then
run far, far away from here.” She turned and started back down the steps.
“Wait,” I said one last time and grabbed her shoulder again.
“What!” she hissed. “I’ve already told you everything I have to say.”
“Can I just speak to Maleena? That’s all I ask… If I can speak with her once, I won’t bother you anymore.”
Rina looked to the side of the wall and breathed hard as she thought for a moment. Finally, she said “Okay. First floor, third room on the left nearest the stairs. Wait there tonight after the sun goes down. If Dryden doesn’t choose Maleena to sleep with him tonight, I’ll bring her to you. If no one show ups at all, it means he chose me.”
I nodded, and Rina hurried down the stairs.
After speaking with Rina, I headed back to the room I had been staying in to wait until the evening. I lay on the bed and thought about what I would say to Maleena and how exactly I’d get her out without getting caught.
I had only seen one exit out of the Bloodletters Keep, and that was right through the front door. There was no way I could sneak past the guards there, and the guards were high enough level that I couldn’t inspect them. There’s no way I could beat them alone.
If Maleena could fight with me, maybe?
Can Maleena fight?
What level is Maleena?
Could we poison the guards?
Where would I get poison anyway?
Could we distract them somehow?
The door suddenly swung open, interrupting my thoughts, and Dryden stepped inside, not bothering with formalities like knocking. He was clean of all the blood he had been covered in, and his hair was still wet from his bath. A pair of gloves were in his hands.
“Gunnar,” he said jovially.
“Dryden?” I sat up straight in the bed. “Ahem… Lord Dryden.”