Clans War

by Mahanenko, Vasily

  The ship’s crew heaved me to my feet and surrounded me. No one even thought of doing damage. In fact our captors generally treated us like esteemed guests, as if this wasn’t a game but reality — where human life actually means something. Strange.

  One of the players — a Level 389 Warrior named Bihan, brought a hand to his mouth and his voice resounded across the deck:

  “We welcome our dear friends from Kalragon to the ship of the Era of Dragons clan! We are especially happy to see a Dragon in their midst! I had heard rumors that one of your players earned the ability to transform into this legendary creature, and today I have seen this miracle with my own two eyes. Please accept my sincere apologies for your inconvenience, but I cannot allow you to destroy my obelisk. We need the Tomb and we shall have it.”

  I raised my head and beheld another shocking detail — right over my head, my new ‘dear’ friends from the Celestial were stretching out a net. Even though I had only just now thought of turning into a Dragon and toppling the statue, our continent’s guests had eliminated any chance of my suddenly taking flight. We were being outplayed and our opponents stayed several moves ahead constantly. This was something I really didn’t like one bit.

  “I invite our guests to my cabin, where we can discuss all these matters in the appropriate setting. No need to struggle, Vampire. As you have already guessed, the PvP ban affects all of Barliona, not simply your continent. Thank you for arranging the tournament!”

  Stacey glanced over at me with surprise and immediately lunged forward from a jolt to her back. The Celestial players began to use their bodies to push our trio in the direction of the cabin doors. A bald Level 313 Warrior who had been standing behind Anastaria was trying hardest of all. I didn’t hear what he said, but the expression on his face made it clear that he was enjoying pressing up against my wife and letting his arms run free along her body. Stacey couldn’t do anything to him — she couldn’t even turn around and show this bastard that what he was doing was wrong — so she pursed her lips and took a step forward, and then another. And another. And another.

  “Dan, it’s okay, he’s barely touching me! ” Before a white film descended over my eyes, I managed to hear Anastaria’s thought. It’s too bad that it appeared too late. The bald Warrior was working the crowd, closing his eyes in ecstasy, sending virtual kisses and casting meaningful glances at his neighbors to show what a Casanova he was — and this ugly pantomime was finding a favorable reception among the crowd too. However, there was at least one noble spectator among this clown’s audience — me. Anger fogged over my mind, so when the system notified me that I could not cast a Spirit of Lightning at this jerk, I resorted to extremes.

  Minor Battle Shadow…The power that Geranika had granted me and which allowed me to summon the enemy of all that lived — the force that sought only to cast Barliona back into Chaos. I’ll be a ballerina in a provincial theater if the developers hadn’t made the players vulnerable to Geranika’s gifts! I selected the Warrior and pressed the Shadow icon with pleasure. The moment of truth had come — was I a ballerina or a Shaman?

  When the world vanished, a thought flashed in my mind — I’m not much of a dancer.

  Images flickered. The Alabaster Throne from the previous vision. The blackened creature sitting upon it. A crystal in the form of a heart on his knees. Flickering. A laughing man standing before the throne. Flickering. The crystal vanished but the charred creature remained on the throne — impaled on its own staff. The creature was alive! No corpse ever had eyes so filled with pain. More flickering. Geranika, pensively regarding the throne and the creature on it. Flickering. There was neither throne nor Geranika. Only the charred creature surrounded by a hundred small orbs. Crastils!

  When Barliona pushed the hallucination out of my head, the first thing I saw was a thick Shadow coiling like a snake around the Warrior. A look of astonishment filled his face when his HP began to fall — yet this was almost instantly replaced by a malevolent gloat. The Minor Battle Shadow was consuming him only at a rate of a tenth of HP per second. At this rate, I’ll be killing this Warrior over the course of several years. The bald player met my eyes and with his laughter showed everything that he thought of me as well as what he was planning on doing to Anastaria.

  Bad move on his part…

  “Geranika, I require your assistance!” I whispered in an icy voice. My emotions left me as if they’d never been. I felt nothing at all as I looked at the Warrior, eyes rolled back, laughing. Neither hate, nor the desire to kill him, nor wrath. Only cold and ice. Stacey’s thoughts were sounding in my head, but my condition didn’t permit me to assemble the sounds into meaningful words. At the given moment, I didn’t care about anything at all — Reputation, Empires, the game in general and Barliona in particular. The thug was pawing my wife right before my eyes. The thug had to die. There was no other way.

  “I am listening attentively, oh Shaman!” Geranika’s voice sounded right above my head. The entire deck of the ship had gone quiet. All the players had their faces turned up. They could hear Geranika despite the Sphere of Negation.

  “I would like to cast into the Abyss all Free Citizens on this ship that do not belong to my clan.” I raised my head and saw the Lord of Shadow standing several meters from me on the taught net. Geranika was again dressed in his typical navy suit — which seemed as natural to Barliona as a submarine to Ancient Egypt.

  “Nice request,” smirked the former Shaman and, ignoring the net, descended through it to the deck. He pushed away the Celestial players surrounding us with an invisible field, to keep them from interfering with our conversation and getting underfoot. “What would you give me in return?”

  “What do you want?” I answered his question with mine. At the given moment, I was ready to agree to anything.

  “Two months of service to Shadow,” the Lord of Shadow replied, as if he’d been waiting for this moment.

  “A week.” To everyone’s surprise, especially mine, I began to barter by reflex. Geranika shook his head.

  “Two months, Mahan. Two months. You will do my assignments, as strange as they might seem to you. No questions, no demands, no explanations. In return I will grant you the ability to destroy the Free Citizens on this ship here and now.”

  “I don’t need the power to kill them,” I cut him off, understanding that having to respawn wouldn’t hurt the bald player one bit. “I need to send them to the Abyss.”

  “Oh! The Shaman knows his way around punishment!” Geranika said, surprised. “Everyone’s used to seeing you as a docile little lamb, and here it turns out that you’re a real bad apple! I have a condition. You…”

  “What’s going on here?” Bihan roared emerging from the hold. I suppose that someone had told him through the chat that something was going off plan, so the head of the clan decided to personally dispense his punishment. “Who dared enter my…”

  “Silence,” Geranika barked with irritation. He waved his hand and everyone on the ship turned to statues in the manner I’d seen back in the Dark Forest. The Lord of Shadow had not lost any of his powers.

  “As I already told you, I decided to change the terms of my assistance to you,” Geranika turned to me, as if nothing had happened. In my peripheral vision I could see dozens if not hundreds of players on flying mounts smash against an invisible sphere that had appeared around the ship — slipping along its circumference into the sea, unable to reach their goal. Summoned by my call, the head of the Empire of Shadow made sure to keep us safe. “I will send everyone on this ship, aside from your clan mates, to the Abyss. In exchange you will take part in the tournament under the banner of the Empire of Shadow. What do you say?”

  “Dan, what the hell are you doing? What Shadow?” Anastaria broke through my stuttering mind, but before I could find something to reply, Geranika got ahead of me and demonstrated that an NPC of his level has no problem reading telepathy:

  “What Shadow? Why the finest Shadow in all of Barliona, I assure you,
” he said. “There are several Free Citizens who have chosen the way of the Shadows, but they are singular and aren’t capable of organizing a tournament. I need Mahan precisely to show all of Barliona that the best fighters fight for me. Everything else is a cheap imitation.”

  Quest available: ‘The Shadow Warrior.’ Description: During the tournament, you will fight for the Shadow faction. Lead its players at the tournament! Reward: Friendly status with the Lord of Shadow, the Emperor of Malabar, and the Dark Lord of Kartoss.

  “I agree. Send them to the Abyss,” I cut off all ways of retreat and agreed to a catastrophic drop in my Reputation with the monarchs of the two empires. Given that I had Exalted status with the Emperor and the Dark Lord, agreeing to a decrease in this status…To hell with it! This is a game after all! I can always win it all back! And if not, to hell with it again!

  “Wonderful!” Geranika smiled sincerely, and unable to contain himself rubbed his hands like a pawn shop dealer. “Very nice doing business with you, Mahan! Until we meet at the tournament! And, oh yes, I am very sorry about Tamerlane…”

  I froze, unable to understand the meaning of these words, yet when the ship emptied as at a wave of a magic wand, I cursed earnestly — the Phoenix’s tank had been on the ship and yet wasn’t in my clan. In accordance to our agreement, Geranika dragged him down to the Abyss too.

  Ehkiller will, eh, kill me.

  If Stacey doesn’t do it first.

  “What happened here?” Bihan asked menacingly, once he’d regained the ability to speak.

  “Plinto, the statue!” I ordered, trying to avoid looking at Stacey, who was standing still now due to my own actions rather than Geranika’s orders. I’d figure things out with her later. In the evening when she eats my brain. At the moment only two things concerned me — the obelisk that Plinto needed ten minutes to deal with and Bihan, who for some reason had stayed on the ship. I didn’t have anything against the NPC sailors staring at us anxiously from the masts. But the player should have been sent to the Abyss!

  “Deal’s off, Geranika! You left one of the Free Citizens on the ship!” I shouted into the air, understanding that under the game mechanics he’d hear me even on the other end of Barliona.

  “The Lord of Shadow made no mistake, Dragon,” said a dark-haired woman emerging from the hold, demonstrating a fine understanding of Kalragon’s geopolitics. I did a double take — the woman had bare appendages that resembled spider legs or wings that had been picked clean sticking out from behind her back. Azari the Patient (such was the name of the Level 400 Priestess) watched closely as Plinto set upon the obelisk. I shuddered even more — the appendages were alive! This player could actually control the spindles on her back! “Every player was sent to the Abyss.”

  “These two are golems. Perfect clones of the real players that the players can control from afar,” Anastaria said without looking away from me. “Mahan, meet Azari the Patient. Race — Kumo. She’s a were-spider. Her appearance should tell you as much. She likes artifacts. She’s the deputy head of the Era of Dragons clan. And she’s also a proper bitch.”

  “The great Anastaria. A Paladin Healer. Siren. The brains of the Phoenix clan who abandoned it all for her husband,” Azari didn’t remain in Stacey’s debt. “A hysterical and useless doll that has nothing aside from a cute face and her daddy’s money.”

  Azari smirked and as she did so the obelisk collapsed from a pretty statue into a pile of rocks. Got it!

  “Two minutes! Fascinating!” Azari hummed, nodding her satisfaction. “I was hoping to occupy Plinto for five minutes, no less.”

  “Goddamn it! ” Stacey cursed telepathically. “This is a set up!”

  “Judging by your calm face, you’ve already understood,” smirked Azari. “I suggest we head down to the hold and discuss the terms of your capitulation. I don’t think anyone has anymore doubts that our clan will be able to entrench itself on Kalragon territory. By the way, what is the Abyss? Where did you send our players?”

  Chapter Seven. Betrayal

  “Polarius liquor, highly recommended,” Azari decided to play the role of the welcoming host, offering us a drink. Understanding that there wasn’t much else to do, we passed into Bihan’s captain’s cabin and took our seats around a small round table. In doing so, the head of the Celestial Empire took the only armchair, allowing us to choose from a red and green chair. Even though the round table made everyone equals, someone wished to show that he was more equal.

  “Stacey, why weren’t they sent to the Abyss?” I was still beset by the mystery. Geranika couldn’t avoid fulfilling our agreement to a T; otherwise the system would’ve already punished him and freed me from the stupid quest. As soon as the bald Warrior had vanished, my ability to think clearly returned to me and with it the shock of my forthcoming drop in Reputation. But there was nowhere to run — I would have to represent Shadow at the tournament.

  “Because these aren’t players. Or rather, these aren’t the players’ characters.”

  “Erm…”

  “Judging by your furrowed brow, I’m sure you two are having a fascinating exchange on the telepathic channel,” Azari didn’t bother concealing that she knew all about our ability to communicate without speaking aloud. I was about to freak out that the Priestess knows too much when her next words put everything in place. She didn’t know a damn thing! “I received a notification that you’ve already crafted my Pendant, Mahan. When will you send it to me?”

  “Speak to my manager,” I replied, sighing in relief in my mind. This spider needed a Pendant and that’s what she thinks we’re using to speak to one another. This means that if something goes wrong, she will try to block the item and not a unique ability. That alone was good news. By the way! “So why aren’t you two in the Abyss? Any player who isn’t in my clan should have been sent for a time-out in that closed location, and even Mages wouldn’t be able to get you out, so you simply shouldn’t be here. Yet you’re still here!”

  “So that’s what the Abyss is,” Azari smiled. “I’m even curious about the penalty you had to pay. Sending a hundred players to a closed location through an NPC…Your karma should have taken a hefty blow.”

  “You didn’t answer my question,” I insisted once more. “Why aren’t you in the Abyss?”

  “Because I’m not here to begin with. Neither I nor Bihan are on the ship at the moment.”

  “And we’re speaking to ghosts?” I gibed, though Plinto’s eyes made it clear that there wasn’t anything funny about my joke.

  “Not quite ghosts. Didn’t your lovely girlfriend tell you about the singular and unparalleled beauty — I mean myself here — who has been crushing her in every possible and impossible battle for the last four years? Raid tactics and strategy, improvisation in the face of evolving situations, decision-making accuracy, an actual social life outside of the game. She’s only second. Everywhere and always! The one time that she surpassed me was the one time I didn’t compete — I mean the Miss Barliona contest. Nature must compensate for a lack of intelligence, so it granted her a homely appearance. But even there, this doll only managed to earn second place. Habit, I suppose. She’s just so…”

  “Maybe you’ll stop demonstrating to the whole world how much you envy my wife?” I interrupted Azari’s fascinating monologue. “You didn’t answer my question.”

  “Why should I answer it at all, Shaman?” The Kumo asked surprised. “You’re not in a position to dictate terms. This ship is surrounded by thousands of players who want nothing more than to tear you into little pieces. Only the will of my master keeps them from doing so. I’ll be the only one doing the talking here, while you agree to my terms and sign on the dotted line. Do you understand?”

  Azari decked the last question in so much ice and charisma that if we’d been out in reality I’d already be a piece of ice sitting in front of her and trying to make myself even smaller and less noticeable. But we were in Barliona and this silly girl had permitted herself to say some bad words
about my wife. So I have the full moral right to forget about decorum. I’m really getting sick of everyone walking all over me today!

  “Big words,” I began to work myself up. “Dictate. Master. Dotted lines. Capitulation…Do you even know how to speak normally? Are you like this in real life or are you just taking this roleplaying thing too seriously? Personally, I understand one thing clearly — if you don’t tell me why you stayed on this ship, you can forget about the Pendant. It’s like you’re trying to frighten a porcupine with the sight of your bare ass. Don’t you need that item, or what?” Using the search filters, I quickly found the Pendant pair in question, which I had created in the Hermit’s cave. Making their properties accessible, I went on:

  “It just so happens that I couldn’t give a damn about what a certain Azari the Patient and Niaz the Triumphant thinks of me. I’m even ready to compensate them if you don’t end up receiving the Pendants in exchange for the work you’ve done for my clan. You do remember that you’re going to have to work for me, don’t you? Practice shows that you can’t quite pick me apart at the moment — it’s just not the right time of day — so you can take all your players, restrained by this windbag that, in your feeble mindedness, you call your master,” I pointed at the grimacing Bihan, “and shove the lot of them into a location whose name is currently blocked by the profanity filter. And now that we’ve measured and established who’s longer and thicker, I suggest we get back to a more constructive conversation. I’ll repeat the question — why did you remain on the ship?”

  “Dan, you’re really asking for trouble here…”