Holy War

by Sugralinov Daniel

  “Zug-zug,” Eytrigg answered. He pointed a finger at Horvac and energetically said: “Yours!” Then jabbed a thumb at himself. “Mine!” Then touched two fingers to his forehead, clenched his fist. “Life!”

  Horvac figured the ore was thanking him for saving his life. The next second, he realized he was wrong; Eytrigg Bardukk growled “Lok’Tar ogar!” and flew at him with fists swinging.

  The fight was one-sided. Horvac was higher in level, clad in epic and legendary gear and had no qualms about drawing a weapon. Eytrigg was fighting bare-knuckle and with no armor to speak of. After the short scuffle, the ore admitted defeat, falling to one knee, bowing his head and raising his hands.

  A couple of minutes later, both had forgotten their disagreement and sat in the sand together, smoking Horvac’s pipe and talking. From Eytrigg’s broken speech, Horvac learned that the sunken ship belonged to the Empire of Shak, which occupied the neighboring continent of Shad’Erung. Emissaries of his Imperial Majesty Kragosh were aboard the ship, which was headed for Darant. They’d almost reached the shores of Latteria when a giant kraken attacked the schooner. Nobody survived but the captain, who managed to swim to shore.

  The game interface helped Horvac to communicate. Eytrigg gave him a real legendary quest chain. The first quest was to help the captain find the corpses of the dead sailors and send their spirits to their final resting place.

  Nearly a year later, Horvac reached the final quest in the chain, earning a personal audience with Emperor Kragosh himself. At the end of that chat, Horvac was invited to undergo the ritual of Om’Riggor. After successfully surviving a range of challenges, Horvac became the first ore player in Disgardium, and with the new class of Chieftain.

  In the same stroke, he became a billionaire. But that’s another tale of space yachts, beautiful models and a permanent place in the society pages, usually in the Scandals section.

  *

  The defensive domes covering Horvac’s tent crisscrossed and overlapped each other like cabbage leaves, cutting off all sound and even sunlight.

  From the outside, it looked as if five people would fit in the tent, and even then it would crowded. In fact, the thirty-three preventers sat inside; the leaders, lieutenants and top strategists of eleven clans. This time the Travelers HQ was chosen as a meeting place to try and confuse the Threat. In reality, the position of Horvac’s clan was almost equal to that of Modus, and it was hard to say which clan was stronger.

  Both Otto Hinterleaf and Horvac Onegut were long in the tooth. They’d seen a lot and they valued stability above all. And although Otto had always had a meticulous and careful nature, those traits came to Horvac only later in life.

  Both clans fought each other fiercely in the old days, and in recent years had decided not to fight anymore. It made more sense economically, and the younger and bolder clans were constantly nipping at their heels. In open warfare between two top players, there could be no victor.

  Horvac cast his gaze across the council table and the map of the Lakharian Desert spinning on it, with markers for the undead army, its base and the temple of Tiamat.

  The leader himself sat at the head of the table. Hinterleaf sat at the other end. On his right was Colonel from Excommunicado, the inseparable Joshua and Vivian from Children of Kratos, Glyph from Azure Dragons and Yagami from Mizaki, representing the Commonwealth’s interests.

  On the other side were the Imperials: Nertagosh the ore vampire and leader of the Warsong clan; Mot ark the ogre from Zuldozer; and that thorn in Horvac’s side, the upstart girl Eileen, the dark elf from Widowmakers. Her young international clan stopped at nothing in the pursuit of new heights on the leaderboard.

  Next to Eileen stood the leaders of two neutral clans: Adda the dryad from Sharp Blades and Fang the gnoll from Ferals. Adda, an elegant version of a centaur with a human head and torso on a deer’s body, needed no seat. Fang, friend and partner to the dryad, stood in solidarity. Many knew that they were in a relationship, although even with all that Horvac had seen, he struggled to imagine them together. The dryad with her large curved horns and the hyena-like gnoll with his ever lolling tongue and dribbling spittle… Horvac shook his head, chasing away unwanted scenes.

  The lieutenants and strategists stood behind the leaders, and one of them, Sayan, a massive titan paladin, reported on behalf of Modus. Periodically glancing at Yary as if seeking his approval, Sayan announced the results of their intelligence operations and the analysts’ predictions. Once done, he added: “It should be considered fortuitous that the mages of the Elites failed to survive in the breakthrough to the temple of the Sleepers. Otherwise the event might as well be over; a portal would be open to all members of the Elite and the temple would be destroyed in mere hours…”

  “Get to the point,” Hinterleaf hurried the strategist. “How much time do you have?”

  “Twenty-six hours in the worst case, if Mogwai, Criterror and Dek won’t negotiate.”

  A sigh of disappointment spread through the tent. A little more than twenty-four hours for all the troops of the Alliance to reach the temple was possible, but only on the condition that they had a clear path. First they had to fight through an army of undead, Deznafar and the Threat, who would be sure to get involved.

  Elite’s departure from the Alliance was a surprise: no sooner had it joined than the young clan declared its exit. Just the kind of thing its eccentric leader would do. Of course, Fen Xiaoguang immediately declared a press conference in which he accused the Alliance of tunnel vision and blind trust in the management of two ’old crocks’: Hinterleaf and Horvac. In his speech, Fen promised that Elite wouldn’t ’fuck around’ and would have a surprise for everyone that very day. The speech took place in the evening, and at midnight Mogwai really did surprise everyone; he started a live stream from the walls of Tiamat’s temple.

  “And we have only nine Armageddon scrolls for all of them,” Horvac said in annoyance. “It’s time to dig deep, colleagues. Who has what left? We have one target. Every script, every artifact could be the straw that breaks Deznafar’s back.”

  “Damn Mogwai!” Yary spat. “He had two scrolls. But he decided to play his own game!”

  “Losing in a straight fight against the Threat didn’t cheer him up,” Ada the dryad pointed out. Her voice, like all those of her race, sounded like singing. “I understand him. To be honest, if he’d invited me to go to the temple with him, I would have agreed without a moment’s thought.”

  “Who would have doubted it,” Eileen snorted, leader of the Widowmakers. “Why don’t you just go to him? Both the Sharp Blades and the Ferals are useless anyway.”

  “Watch your mouth, old crone!” the dryad screeched.

  Horvac slammed a fist down on the table. The dryad and the dark elf girl exchanged hateful glances, but were quiet. Something has happened between the girls, Horvac thought. I need to find out what.

  Raising his hands for calm, he spoke softly:

  “Colleagues, let us put aside our squabbles. Right now we all have the same goal, and time is running out.” Horvac went into his inventory and pulled out an unprepossessing rounded stick. “The Wand of Dark Matter Spar’ks. It had only three charges. Two were spent on… Never mind, the point is I have one charge left. A hundred million pure damage. I suspect that should be enough for that damn lich.”

  “And if it isn’t enough, that’s not all we have,” Glyph added, pulling out a small green orb around the size of a cherry. “Orcus’s Blood. A onetime artifact. I don’t know how much damage it deals, but it says: Destroys any enemy or structure.”

  “Were you saving that for the temple?” Horvac guessed.

  Glyph nodded darkly. The others shifted, glancing at him and Horvac.

  “Marduk’s Second Chance,” Joshua declared, showing a silver disc encrusted with celestial diamonds. “Roughly speaking, it resurrects all allies across a whole zone. And they res in the same condition they had at the start of the fight, with all their buffs. Don’t ask me why
I didn’t use it before. I didn’t want to waste it. The cooldown is a year.”

  “We have Kala’s Advantage,” the ore vampire Nergatosh growled. “A onetime artifact, so we were saving it. It slows all enemies by fifty percent until they die or the battle ends.”

  “Well now, I see we’ve woken up,” Hinterleaf spat bitterly. “If you all weren’t so greedy, we’d already be standing at the temple walls! What are you staring at? Modus gave up a divine artifact at the very beginning, remember? The altar we lost! And we invested more than anyone in the Armageddons, while you all hid your supplies! Come on, tell me what else there is so our analysts can start working on a strategy!”

  The gray-haired gnome didn’t rant for too long. Yary bowed, whispered something into his ear and Hinterleaf suggested that the others not be shy and show what they had.

  The meeting turned more constructive. But even afterwards, Hinterleaf didn’t fail to note:

  1 dare say this isn’t everything you all have up your sleeves. The hell with you anyway. What we have now should be enough.”

  After an hour of stressful work, they had a general battle campaign for the temple and a strategy for fighting the undead. That same day, after taking up battle formations, the Alliance of Preventers moved out to meet the army of the undead…

  Horvac thought furiously the whole way. How were the Sleepers, the Threat and the undead connected? Nothing of what they’d managed to dig up in the in-game legends about the ancient gods mentioned undead. Analysts advanced the possibility that the A-class Threat achieved that class by somehow moving in two directions at once; along the undead storyline and that of the Sleeping Gods. But the suggestion was laughed off.

  When the Alliance scouts encountered the Bone Hounds on watch, the sun was already descending to the horizon, highlighting the tips of the dunes. A subsequent series of furious short skirmishes, then the resounding howl of the battle horns of the living and the bloodcurdling screams of banshees…

  The two armies stood opposite each other close enough to make out the opponent, but not within the range of spells. Squads of preventers were wreathed in flashes of buffs; players wolfed down raid culinary dishes; bards sang out sonorously; gnomish siege tanks cut through the soil with their drill legs to fix themselves in place; heavy orcish catapults and elvish ballistae screeched and drawn bowstrings creaked…

  The undead silently watched as their enemy prepared. At the center, above the crowd of dead men, floated the lich. The Threat seemed to be absent, but nobody doubted they would be out there somewhere. Torches of True Flame covered the ranks of the preventers thicker than crops in a field. The Threat had no route to sabotage, and Nergal the Radiant’s blessing protected against the ‘nuclear explosions.’ Special squads patrolled the air to be the first to find the Threat and knock him from the saddle. Zomba the monk had proved that was possible in the first battle, and then later—the High Priest of Nergal.

  “Envoys!” The word spread through the ranks of the Light.

  Hinterleaf swore with admiration.

  “God damn it! A satyr? Where did that come from?”

  “A pretty ragged satyr. Undead,” Colonel noted. “And very, veiy drunk…”

  The satyr tripped over his own legs as if to confirm the Excommunicado leader’s words, falling over, still waving his white flag. Only the most attentive saw that not a single drop spilled from the bottle of dwarven ale he was holding. The fact that it was dwarven became clear to the raiders when the satyr walked up to them. Next to this spawn of the Inferno stood a succubus, also undead, nervously beating her tail.

  “Attention, little humans!” the satyr said. His voice was magically strengthened and boomed out across the desert. “And their minions too: ores, gnomes and other sentients! My lord Shazz humbly suggests that you surrender and join the ranks of the Destroying Plague, for, to quote my master: ‘Life is death! But there is no death in service to the Destroying Plague!’ Or something like that. Just listen to Nega here, she won’t lie to you. We’re having a blast, right?” he hiccuped.

  “Flaygray always tells the truth!” the succubus declared. “Anyone that wishes to serve the Destroying Plague, throw down your weapons and walk behind that dune over there.” She pointed a hand.

  Horvac looked at the envoys in stunned silence. Couldn’t the lich find anyone better than these clowns? Although at least they could talk, and even with sentients. What about the Threat himself? Was he afraid to appear and make the offer personally?

  Whispers spread through the soldiers of Light. Horvac frowned, realizing what was happening. He knew better than anyone else. At Distival, the founding father had declared that big changes were coming to Dis, and here they were: a new race. Now Horvac had no doubt that those who took the lich’s offer would be reborn as undead. But what did that have to do with the Sleepers…?

  “Well, I think that’s everything word-for-word,” the satyr said. “Enough’s enough. Sharkon!”

  The satyr whistled piercingly and the sand exploded thirty yards from him and the now infamous Sharkon rose up from the hole in the desert. The gigantic undead beast, a mix of a shark, turtle and armadillo, wasn’t as large as Deznafar, whose silhouette towered over the horizon, but was still impressive. That means the Threat must be somewhere nearby. This is his pet, Horvac thought.

  “Come here, Sharkie!” the succubus called.

  The envoys climbed agilely onto the back of the monster as it ran over to them and then cantered away. The players watched them go with their jaws on the floor.

  “To battle!” Hinterleaf roared at the top of his lungs, dispelling the chains of shock among the raiders.

  Armor clattering, the army of Light marched toward its enemy.

  Chapter 10: Smoldering Nether Shard

  ROBINSON CRUSOE spent twenty-eight years on a deserted island. It was far less time for me, but I still went so mad from loneliness that I even started to remember my time at Nine’s castle with some degree of nostalgia.

  At first I tried to stay close to shelters where I could hide if she saw me, but over time it became clear that my fears were groundless, and I got braver. Apparently, Nine decided that I’d left the Nether forever.

  The only thing that stopped me from losing my mind completely was a distant and seemingly unachievable, but crystal clear goal: collect a million Smoldering Nether Shards to make a portal back to my home dimension.

  When I collected my first shard, I sat in the sand and looked around for a minute, seeking Nine’s pursuit, planning, calculating and figuring out how to make what I planned a reality.

  And then I got to it. The shards wouldn’t farm themselves. A minute later I was already fighting a yard-long Golden Hardtail, a long-snouted fish as flat as a board…

  Shame I couldn’t move my respawn point right to the shore. On the other hand, I was lucky that I had it on Kharinza at all—at the place of power where Behemoth’s temple stood in the other Dis. Deaths happened—the sea creatures didn’t just tear me to pieces, they put debuffs on me too. As soon as Diamond Skin fell, I died. It took time to run from the respawn point through to the jungle to the ocean, but at least it added some variety to the monotony of farming.

  There were other fish apart from Spotted Blowfish in the shallows, but I needed more aggressive mobs for my purposes. In the small bay on the other side of the island, I found just what I was looking for. The Rock Grabbers there were similar to the Stone Grabber’s from Tremitelle, only forty thousand levels higher. Little fish around a hand long—fast, nimble and with huge toothy mouths disproportionate to their bodies. All I had to do was throw a stone in the water and it started to boil. I needed as many grabbers as possible to attack me while my invulnerability was active.

  As if it weren’t enough that every trip boosted my level sky-high, I even fully leveled up Path of Equanimity on the same day. Up to my waist in water, I just stood there while the creatures killed themselves against Reflection. Equanimity and Diamond Skin gave three and a half mi
nutes of full invulnerability in total. When it had thirty seconds left, I ran back to the shore, leaving hundreds of grabbers floating belly-up behind me. Fortunately, I had Magnetism, otherwise I don’t know how I would have picked up all the shards by hand—especially considering how dangerous it was in the water.

  The problem was that the grabbers didn’t always drop shards. From a hundred fanged fish corpses, I got around forty or fifty shards. This unpleasant discovery was balanced out by the fact that the beasts never ended. Either they respawned instantly or there was an enormous amount of them in the bay—I’d never figured out their secret in all my time on Kharinza.

  To level up rank four of Resilience, I chose the Path of Torment, and it took me four days. I still didn’t realize what principle the game used to calculate pain experienced, but after every trip into the water, my new resource, Vessel of Torments, filled up by fifteen to twenty percent. Then I could empty it by converting it into a single stat point, which is what I did, deciding to level up my physical stats in balance: strength, agility and stamina. By the end of the Path, the conversion rate was ten times what it started as—a full Vessel gave me ten stat points.

  It’s hard to imagine a duller grind. I wasn’t even fighting, just standing and gritting my teeth through the pain of infinite tearing bites, my eyes locked on the timer so I knew when to run. Deaths took away time, already in short supply. The Rock Grabbers inflicted a Bleeding debuff, and it was important to make sure the DoT ran out before Diamond Skin.

  When I’d completed the entire Path of Torment, two more paths for Resilience unlocked: Path of Time and Path of Desolation.

  The first sped up perception. It slowed the entire world around me, and the more damage I took, the more the world slowed down. I didn’t notice much of an effect at first, but at maximum level, the storming mass of Rock Grabbers seemed as if moving in slow motion. I was moving as usual, and that opened up a new style of fighting—dodging. I never used to care about that; with Destroying Plague Immortality, I never worried about taking damage. On the contrary, I tried to ‘suffer’ as much as possible. Now it became fun to remove my hand an instant before the carnivorous little fish sank its teeth in. The miss put a second-long Confusion debuff on the fish—that promised to be a huge advantage in future battles against more serious opponents.