The Once King

by Rachel Aaron

  “A fitting response, considering you were demanding that I surrender my base,” Fiona replied without a hint of remorse.

  “Dame Fiona is the new captain of Bastion’s Royal Knights,” Gregory said in a rush, clearly eager to escape. “She’s heard about your plan to assault the Once King, and she believes she has some advice that may help. I’ll just leave you two to discuss it.”

  With that, His Majesty scuttled off to join the crowd of Roughnecks, who welcomed him with laughs and slaps on the back and generally way more affection than one might expect given how the king had been tossing them into trees yesterday. The mood had been very different the night before when Tina had finally called a halt to practice, but then Gregory had swung by the Roughneck camp to apologize for getting carried away. More importantly, the king had brought booze as a way of making amends. Tina had no idea where he’d managed to find booze, but it had worked like a charm. The moment the Roughnecks saw the barrels of wine, Gregory had become her guild’s new best friend. The king seemed to enjoy the revelry as well. He barely touched the wine himself, but that hadn’t stopped him from partying just as hard as all the others while his guards cowered in alarm.

  As a fellow giant person, Tina completely understood. It was hard to relax when you had to constantly worry about hurting the people around you. But—as they’d proven over and over again yesterday—the Roughnecks could take whatever Gregory dished out, and the effect on the usually timid king was profound. He was laughing just as loudly as the players now, taking Killbox’s slaps on the back with infinite good nature and no lectures about proper decorum for a monarch. If she hadn’t been in such a shit mood, Tina would have joined in. But she was in a shit mood, and she had shit to do, so she turned her back on the ridiculousness and returned her attention to the glaring knight.

  “All right,” she said, resting her giant stone hands on her hips. “What’s this advice?”

  Fiona Steelwall’s hard face grew even harder. “Despite your unrepentant criminality, the king has informed me that you are now Bastion’s last hope. Therefore, as a sworn defender of the crown, it is my duty to help you in whatever way I can.”

  Tina snorted. “No offense, Dame, but how can you help us? We’re not bringing any royal troops to this shindig, and my Knights have already trained up all their skills. That said…” She trailed off, looking the three-skull Knight trainer’s heavy armor up and down. “You want to come with us and try your hand at some real tanking? Because I could really use another geared meat shield who knows what she’s doing.”

  Dame Fiona looked mortally offended. “I have no wish to engage with you or your rabble,” she snapped, shooting a pointed glare at Gregory, who seemed to be testing just how many Roughnecks he could lift with one arm. “I could not leave even if I wished it. I am needed here to lead the Royal Knights in the battle you decided to leave at our feet. But.”

  Tina arched an eyebrow. “But?”

  Dame Fiona pulled herself even straighter. “While I still believe you to be a brigand and an honorless mercenary, His Majesty’s forthright efforts toward peace have inspired me to give you the benefit of the doubt. With everyone giving everything they have toward our victory, it would be dishonorable of me to hold back, which is why I have come here in earnestness to tell you what I know of battle with the Once King.”

  That last part caught Tina’s ear. “And what would that be?” she asked, without a trace of sarcasm this time.

  Dame Fiona’s voice grew somber as well. “I know a legendary Knight technique.”

  Those words sent Tina’s brain screeching to a halt. “You know a what?”

  “A legendary technique,” she repeated, annoyed. “The Nightmare gave it to me ten years ago but didn’t allow me to teach it to any players. I believe I am now the only one in the world who knows of it.”

  Tina nodded rapidly, fighting the urge to squeal with glee. Ten years ago this-world-time would have been one year ago Earth-time, which lined up with the release of the Deadlands expansion. “Is it for the Once King?!”

  “The Nightmare called it ‘One For All,’” Fiona said reverently. “I suspect it was intended to be revealed at the end of an epic Knight-class questline. I was already given some of the opening dialog, which is how I know that this ability was indeed intended to be used during the Once King encounter. How or in what capacity, though, I am uncertain. The Nightmare ended before the full quest could be implemented.”

  “That’s fine,” Tina said, grinning widely. “You’ve already said the magic words! So what does ‘One For All’ do?”

  “It is a technique that allows you to focus a wide-area magical attack onto yourself alone,” Fiona explained, removing the tower shield from her back and affixing it to her armored arm. “Bring me a Sorcerer, and I will demonstrate.”

  “You got it,” Tina said, turning to bellow over her shoulder. “Richard!”

  At the edge of the bawdy Roughneck circle, a tall Sorcerer with a crown of ever-burning flames on his head looked up from the book he’d been reading. “Yes?”

  Whipping her arms excitedly through the air, Tina waved him over. She yelled for Anders as well, because having a healer on hand was always a good idea. It sounded like an even better idea after Fiona revealed what she wanted Richard to do.

  “Let me make sure I’ve got this straight,” Richard said, pointing his long finger at the dour knight captain. “You want me to cast a fire tornado near her but not on her. Correct?”

  “Correct,” Tina said, nodding at Dame Fiona, who was positioning herself several dozen feet down the road. “Fiona’s a level-eighty three-skull. She can take it, and Anders will be ready with heals in case anything goes wrong.” She glanced back at the ichthyian priest, who nodded and gripped his staff. Satisfied no one was going to die by accident, Tina turned back to her Sorcerer. “Light her up!”

  With a final shrug, Richard obeyed, weaving his hands through the air in whip-like motions. Tina felt her stone skin heating as the magic built, and then a dust devil of orange flames twisted into being on the road ten feet behind Fiona’s position. It rapidly grew in size, going from dust devil to full-scale tornado in a matter of seconds. When the cyclone of raging flames was as tall as a two-story building, Richard threw his hands over his head for the finish, unleashing a whirlwind of fire as wide as the road.

  The nearby grass immediately caught fire. Naturalists from the raid stopped yakking with Gregory and ran over to douse the flames with frantic bursts of water magic. Since they seemed to have it in hand, Tina ignored the pending prairie fire and kept her eyes on Fiona, who was definitely living up to her name. Despite the wall of spinning flames roaring her direction, Fiona Steelwall didn’t so much as flinch. Instead, she stomped down her feet in a wide stance, slammed her armored fists together with a loud clang, and yelled.

  “One For All!”

  Tina felt the pressure all the way to her core. The moment the old Knight spoke the words, something in the air inverted. Tina had no name, no words for that power, but it felt like the entire world had turned into a sinkhole with Fiona as its center. The size of it was staggering, leaving Tina gaping in awe as the roaring flame tornado shrank to a single frantically swirling pillar that charged down the road toward Fiona as if the blond knight were sucking it in.

  When the spell reached her, her whole body was engulfed in roaring flames, but only for a moment. The fire looked no less powerful, but the storm was shrinking before Tina’s eyes, condensing to a ball the size of a car, then a post box. As the tornado got smaller, the roaring flames that formed it increased their pitch, spinning faster and faster until, at last, the spell spun out of control. In the blink of an eye, all of Richard’s expertly woven fire magic unraveled, collapsing into a pool of screaming flames.

  Tina nodded appreciatively at what looked like a successful defense, and then she realized the screaming wasn’t the flames. It was Fiona. Though it was no longer spinning, the raging inferno of Richard’s Fire Tornad
o was still going, and it was stuck to Fiona like napalm. The Knight trainer fell to her knees as she watched, roaring in agony, and Tina screamed for a rescue.

  “Put her out!” she ordered, voice booming. “Extinguish and heal now!”

  The road lit up as Roughneck Naturalists conjured a torrent of bright-blue water at Fiona Steelwall. Anders moved at the same time, casting a pillar of golden light over the gasping Knight. When the flames were out, Tina rushed forward to help the woman up.

  “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine,” the blond Knight wheezed, knocking Tina’s hand away to stand under her own power. “That was unnecessary.”

  “No offense, but it looked pretty damn necessary,” Tina snapped. “You were a human bonfire.”

  “I can take one player’s spell,” Fiona said stiffly, tossing her sopping-wet braid over her shoulder. “But do you see now how difficult this skill is to use? One For All takes an attack meant for many and directs it solely at yourself. There is no reduction in power, no scaling down of damage. You must take all the pain meant for others as your own, hence the name ‘One For All.’ Activating it takes immense determination and discipline, as well as most of your strength. It is a tool meant to be used only in the most dire situations.”

  “It’s definitely a skill that’s only for the hardcore,” Tina agreed, and then her face split into a giant grin. “I love it! Teach it to me!”

  “Hold up! Are you crazy?” NekoBaby cried, shaking the water from her robes as she scampered over. “Did you see what that ho did to herself? That’s a martyr skill!”

  “She’s right,” Killbox agreed, coming over as well. “I didn’t think anything could be too hardcore, but this is totally it. You should pass, boss.”

  “You guys don’t get it,” Tina said, turning to face the crowd of disturbed Roughnecks gathering around her. “This is the piece we’ve been missing! Think about it: One For All is an epic skill that was never launched, one specifically designed to let a single tank redirect a wide-area magical attack off a raid and onto herself. You know what that means, right?”

  Everyone stared at her like she was mad.

  “The Million Damage Blast!” Tina cried, throwing out her arms. “You know, the Once King’s bullshit ultimate move that guaranteed wipes everyone when he reaches thirty percent? Of course we could never beat it. Because we didn’t have this.”

  She threw her hand out toward Dame Fiona, who looked insulted, but not as insulted as Tina.

  “I can’t believe this bullshit,” she snarled, clenching her stone fists. “I always thought the reason we hadn’t beaten the Once King yet was because we hadn’t figured out his trick, but there was no trick. Those stupid-ass developers put a legit unbeatable boss into the game! It was never our fault. We were up against an unwinnable fight! I bet we were mere weeks away from the patch that would have introduced the One For All questline, and then everyone would have the secret to getting the Once King from thirty percent to zero!”

  At this proclamation, many in the crowd went “Ooooooh!” but not all. Among those who didn’t was Zen.

  “At the cost of the main tank’s life,” the Ranger said, stepping forward. “What good is an ability that gets you killed? Even if we do get the Once King to thirty percent, we can’t finish him without you.”

  “You’ll still have Frank,” Tina argued, pointing at her off-tank, who looked terrified by the prospect. “He can handle things for the last third, and this is assuming the Once King can be tanked anymore. In case you didn’t notice yesterday, I was doing a piss-poor job of keeping Gregory in line.”

  “That’s a separate issue,” Zen said, crossing her arms. “Forget the MDB. You’re the only one with enough Stamina gear to not get one-shot killed by the Once King’s normal attacks. You can’t take those hits for us if you’re dead.”

  “I bet I could survive if I paired One For All with Earthen Fortitude,” Tina said. “That would reduce the damage.”

  “Not enough,” Richard said in his dry, practical way. “Focusing an area-of-effect spell down to a single target seems to amplify its damage by an order of magnitude. I’m not sure what the exact multiplier is since we can no longer see the combat text, but concentrating the Million Damage Blast down to only yourself might result in a total hit of ten million damage. Even with Earthen Fortitude’s ninety-percent reduction, you’d still be taking a one million damage hit, which is three hundred and fifty thousand more hit points than you possess. There’s not enough buffs, barriers, or healing in the world to make up for such a large deficiency.”

  “Then fucking rez me,” Tina snapped. “Cinco’s raid will be there as backup, don’t forget. If I die stopping the train, I expect all of you to haul my ass back into the fight. This is our only option, people. I don’t mind taking a turn under the ax if that’s what we have to do to save the world.”

  That response earned her lots of nervous looks from the dusty crowd. Given that their track record for in-battle resurrections was exactly zero, Tina couldn’t fault their anxiety, but this wasn’t up for debate. This skill was obviously how the Once King was meant to be defeated, and since she was the best geared and most experienced Knight in her raid—possibly in the world—that meant the task fell to her. Tina was fine with that. She trusted her people to save her even if they didn’t. And if everything did go tits up, well, there were worse ways to go out than being the hero who saved an entire world.

  Honestly, Tina’s biggest problem right now was the way the crowd was looking at her. More specifically, the way they were looking at her and SB. The raid group had actually shuffled out of the way to open a clear path between him and her, and Tina resented the hell out of it. SilentBlayde had nothing to do with this and zero right to comment.

  But despite that, a small, weak part of Tina was still hoping he’d ask her not to do this, not to risk herself so recklessly, not to die. But Blayde said nothing. Instead, Fiona clanked up to Tina’s side.

  “Well spoken, Knight Roxxy,” the old knight said, reaching up to clap Tina on the shoulder. “We may have been enemies, but I respect your courage. It will be my honor to teach you One For All so that you and your soldiers may scour the Once King from the face of this world.”

  “Thanks,” Tina said, ripping her eyes off SB. She gave herself a shake and then clapped her hands together. “All right, everybody! Frank needs to practice being the main tank, so he’s on point today while I’m off getting flambéed. One For All is the chance we’ve been looking for, but it doesn’t mean anything if we can’t figure out how to last more than ten minutes against Gregory over there, so no slacking!”

  There was much grumbling at that, but no one actually tried to argue. They all just shuffled off down the wagon-rutted road toward Gregory, who was standing ready at the end. As they left, Tina caught several backward glances filled with what appeared to be genuine worry for her, which only made her even more determined. She would not let them down, not after she’d worked so hard to earn that caring.

  Body stiffening with determination, Tina turned back to Fiona. “Let’s get to this,” she said, flashing the Knight trainer a cocky marble grin. “We’re burning daylight when we should be burning me.”

  The stern captain nodded back. “Then let us begin.”

  To reduce the damage done to people and things, Tina and Richard both took off all their gear for the practice. This resulted in Tina making a spectacle of herself as she stomped around the trade road in her shorts, yelling and getting burned while Dame Fiona corrected her technique. Fiona Steelwall in teacher mode was a true hard-ass, too. Tina quickly learned that the Knight trainer was utterly demanding and had a brutal eye for imperfections. She took as much damage from Fiona’s corrective swats as she did from Richard’s fire.

  Through it all, Tina had never been so glad she was a stonekin. There was no other way she could have put up with being engulfed in flames over and over, all day long. Richard tried to limit the damage as much as possible, but e
ven without his robes and staff, he was still a level-eighty Sorcerer, and his fire hurt. Another person probably would have felt guilty over burning her alive again and again, but that was the great thing about Richard. The computer-like man was as solid as a stonekin in his own way. He understood this was how training had to be, so he just accepted it and did his job, paying Tina’s screams of agony no more mind than he did her praise.

  The healers were another story. As morning turned to afternoon, Tina had had to rotate through her entire roster of Naturalists and Clerics. Not because they were out of mana—she was a breeze to heal with no armor boosting her health—but because no one could take watching her get repeatedly burned alive for more than thirty minutes at a time. Even Dame Fiona started to hesitate as the rounds mounted up, but Tina refused to stop. Dogged persistence was what she had, and Tina needed every bit of it. Learning new techniques now wasn’t as simple as hitting “accept” on a quest box. She had to actually practice, which started by learning how her other Knightly skills actually worked.

  Before today, Tina had never thought to question how a nonmagical class like a Knight did obviously magical things like Ground Stomp or Iron Wall. Since all of her class skills had become instinct when FFO stopped being a game, she had very little understanding of the mechanics involved in using them—a fact Fiona Stonewall seemed to take as a personal offense.

  “No!” the Knight cried when Tina failed yet again to suck in the fire properly. “I keep telling you, it’s not in the feet. You have to feel the magic of the ground pulling toward you!”

  “And I keep…telling you…I don’t feel magic!” Tina panted, resting on her singed knees as the latest Naturalist in the healing rotation poured soothing magic over her burns. “How can I get my feet lined up with something I can’t feel? Stonekin don’t even have mana! That’s why we can’t be casters.”

  “Just because you don’t have mana doesn’t mean you can’t move the world,” Fiona said sternly. “Sorcerers, Clerics, and Naturalists grab magic and give it shape, but Knights work only with their will. You have to grab the enemy’s spell with your determination and force it to you!”