Emerilia Series Box Set 4

by Michael Chatfield

  Dragons and DCA came in from overhead, their attacks accurate enough to pressure the Xelur and not put the players into danger.

  “We’re at the capture point and we’re taking it!” Dwayne yelled out over a private chat. It was clear that he was fighting.

  A bar appeared in Josh and Esa’s view, showing that they were capturing the castle from the inside.

  The Xelur now pushed inward to the castle, leaving the walls that were on the southern side to try to push the players out.

  It was too late. Esa checked the feed from Aleph automatons and those that were live streaming from inside the castle.

  There were already barriers and defenses in place. It was a violent and chaotic fight but the Stone Raiders had made a castle within the castle over top the capture point. Area heals were going on constantly as tanks fought back the Xelur. Soul energy attacks broke the walls that had been formed around the capture point. Arrows and Mana bolts destroyed the inside of the castle and the tower above to try to kill the Xelur that attacked them from all sides.

  It seemed like a valiant last stand as Stone Raiders yelled out to one another, attacking with all they had. Heal spells flew around; magic crossed the air in streams of destruction, colliding with shields, tearing up the ground, and sending people to the ground with injuries.

  Tanks placed themselves in front of the ones with weaker defense, taking on all the damage possible in order to let them live and continue their attacks.

  Xelur weapons smashed against Stone Raiders, who were hunkered down, not giving in to their impulses to race out and end the Xelur, playing the objective.

  The Xelur pressure was so strong that the Stone Raiders within the castle had been cut off from those outside.

  Now the other players, hearing their fellow players trapped within on their final stand, pushed themselves to the limit, melding reactions with tactics that they had worked on and perfected. They had built their characters, come to understand themselves on a level that they could now react and draw them out. They took enhancing potions and applied gear that would improve their lethality as they pushed their builds, used their stats and played. For now, they were not players; they were not people of Earth: they were their avatar; they were Emerilians. This was their world and they would win.

  This was the thought of every player. Instead of fear and anger, their faces showed joy as they came together. Even experience was pushed aside as parties reorganized, bringing their most powerful offense into play.

  The Xelur that had been holding the players back were shocked as the players pushed back, more vicious and deadly than before.

  These players had come together to work with their parties, with their guilds. This was what they lived for!

  Esa and Josh watched as the players surged forward, burning through resources that would make entire kingdoms weep if they could see it.

  They didn’t care. To them, saving up these resources and gaining them was a challenge. To put them on display like this—they were excited beyond all reason.

  Here they weren’t bankers, mothers, and fathers; they weren’t students, or wealthy business owners, teachers or computer programmers; they came from all walks of life, all different backgrounds.

  Here they were gamers, they were living the world of Emerilia even as they died. They would yell and swear and curse, but before they did, they knew that those moments would be forever remembered and would bring them back to the game time and again.

  They were mages, warriors, fighters: they were people of Emerilia.

  “They broke through to Dwayne’s group!” someone yelled out in the command center.

  The Xelur that had been fighting from the balconies and corridors that led into the capture point underneath the tower were now getting hit from behind as players swarmed through the castle.

  The Stone Raiders attacked back at the Xelur, suppressing them. As more of the Xelur were killed off, the capture speed increased, moving from a turtle’s pace until it seemed to be sprinting upward as the first players reached the group of Stone Raiders within the inner castle.

  A prompt appeared in everyone’s view, across the entire battlefield.

  Castle Conquest

  The Terra Alliance has captured a contested castle!

  Rewards:

  2,000 Conquest points

  Castle Conquest

  You currently control (5/8) Castles

  Earning: (5) conquest points per minute

  Bonus: For controlling five of the Castles, you earn an additional (1) conquest point(s) per minute.

  Total points: 15,781

  Rights: Administrative (Can spend conquest points to upgrade Castle infrastructure and repair castles. Can also delete Castle infrastructure.)

  Eastern Castle 1

  Status: Under Control by Terra Alliance

  Earn: 1 conquest point per minute

  Evolution: 1 (Second evolution 0%) Can increase evolution to Level 2 by paying (100,000) Conquest points.

  Upgrades: None

  Durability: 12,548/60,000

  Esa dismissed it and continued to look at the eastern castle as players, their minions, and the Affinity spirits surged forth, sweeping away the Xelur. A mix of emotions rose in her chest. She let out a shaky breath, her body weak as she tried to take in what she had seen.

  It took another hour or so for the players to finish off any remaining Xelur in the castle. Once they had cleaned them all out of the castle and surrounding area, the Xelur southern castle started to fire at them.

  The Mana barriers that the players had used as cover were placed all over the castle, giving them cover from the fire as they looted and repaired the castle to the best of their ability.

  “They’ve got a request in for an ono,” Josh said.

  “Well, let’s get it in there. We can start to build it up and we can hit more of the Xelur coming from the portal to the southern castles.”

  As this had been going on, more and more Xelur had come out of the portal, streaming toward the occupied castles. Artillery that couldn’t reach the contested castles fired down upon these streams of Xelur, trying to kill as many of them off as possible so that they couldn’t reach the various castles and reinforce them.

  “Bravo—looks like we’ve reclaimed the eastern castle.” Josh looked to Esa.

  “We lost a number of players who aren’t going to be too happy about losing all those levels.”

  “But they aren’t POE. They can come back,” Josh said.

  “Yeah.” Esa smiled slightly before she looked over her own castle. There were still signs of the fighting that had been going on just a few hours ago. Her smile dimmed as she thought of the POEs who had stood alongside players, knowing that if they were to die that they wouldn’t re-spawn.

  That took a lot more guts than what she’d done.

  People were already checking the loot they’d gathered and checking out the class upgrades they’d received and some had even gained levels and stat points to increase their attributes.

  It had been a bloody fight but their hard earned gains would be needed in the near future.

  Chapter 10: Force Multiplier

  Suzy let out a gasp as she opened her eyes.

  Lu Lu, seeing her master wake up, made pitiful squeaking noises and rubbed her face against Suzy’s.

  Suzy made to pat Lu Lu’s head but found that she was too weak to do so. Her Stamina and Mana were at their lowest point and she felt completely drained. She shivered as she thought of the nightmares she had seen.

  “Suzy?” someone asked.

  “Hi. Where am I? What happened?” Suzy asked.

  “You were struck by a Xelur soul attack. When you were using the skill on your Weapon of Power, your Willpower was boosted a lot higher than normal. It weakened the attack that targets the power of your soul, attempting to rip it from you and be absorbed by the Xelur attacker. But, the backlash from the skill is to greatly impact your soul energy and leave you in a weakened state. In t
his state, the soul attacks were much more powerful. It took a number of people skilled in the ways of the soul to increase your strength and to weaken the attack that you were hit with. They reduced it as much as possible and there was nothing to do but let you fight it off yourself,” the lady said.

  Suzy nodded before her expression froze. Her eyes went wide as she looked to the lady. “Where’s Induca? She was hit by that Grand Demon Lord’s attack!”

  “Calm down, please. You might be awake but your body is incredibly weak!” The lady stepped forward to press a hand down on Suzy’s chest, holding her in place.

  Lu Lu, feeling ignored started to licked Suzy’s face.

  “You damn animal, stop that!” Suzy giggled as Lu Lu’s tongue tickled her.

  Induca pushed open the door, smiling at the scene before her.

  Suzy looked to Induca. Time seemed to stop as relief filled her; tears fell down her cheeks as she started to sob.

  “Oh, come here dear,” Induca said, her voice soft as she wrapped her arms around the fragile Suzy, who grabbed her as if she were some kind of lifeboat.

  Suzy couldn’t stop crying as she grabbed onto Induca, not wanting to let go.

  Induca made comforting noises, stroking Suzy’s hair as she held her close.

  Suzy looked up to Induca, finding that she wasn’t the only one crying. She pulled Induca close, kissing her and once again finding refuge in her arms. “I thought I lost you!” Suzy sobbed.

  “Take a lot more to get rid of me,” Induca said comfortingly.

  “Don’t do that again!” Suzy said, remembering the scenes of Induca being hit by that soul energy ranged attack.

  “I’ll do my best, love,” Induca promised.

  The two of them held each other. Relief filled them both at seeing that the other was all right.

  Anna simply stood by the doorway, looking at them both, with a smile on her face.

  There was the sound of feet and rushing air in the corridor.

  Anna looked to where the noise was coming from before hastily stepping fully into the room. “Incoming!” Anna warned.

  Party Zero crammed through the doorway. All of them looked to Suzy and Induca.

  Malsour was like a black shadow, looking over Suzy and Induca at the same time.

  “Are you okay? How do you feel?” Dave asked, right at his shoulder.

  “Healer, what do they need?” Deia asked the healer who was stuck in the room.

  “Well, Suzy needs bed rest and a good meal,” the healer said.

  “Induca needs the same but there was no stopping her coming here,” Anna said.

  “Should take better care of yourself.” Lox gave Induca stink eye.

  Suzy couldn’t stop crying. She wasn’t normally a person to show her emotions but she had been stretched so far that right now, seeing the care and the way that the rest of Party Zero were doting on them, the way that some of them were still wearing their armor that showed signs of recent fighting, she didn’t doubt that they had raced from the battle to be with her.

  “What happened with the castle?” Anna asked.

  “We secured the northern castle and retook the eastern one.” Steve admired his nails. “No big deal.”

  Suzy and Induca laughed at Steve’s antics, finally coming down off the emotional high they had both been at.

  “If you want, I can discharge Suzy right now. She’s stable, just needs to rest,” the healer said.

  “We’ll look after her,” Deia said. The rest of Party Zero nodded unconsciously. There wasn’t even a question in their minds that they would do everything in their power to see that Suzy and Induca got better.

  Suzy had thought of the rest of Party Zero as her family many times, but it was only now when seeing them all together like this her words became more than just words; she saw them turn to action. She saw their acceptance, their love and fears. She bawled again, hiding her head in Induca’s chest.

  “What’s wrong?” Dave asked.

  “Nothing!” Suzy said, her voice muffled. “Everything is perfect.” She muttered that part into Induca’s shirt softly, as if saying it any louder might break the moment.

  ***

  Party Zero all accessed the Mirror of Communication conference room.

  Waiting for them was Josh, with a complicated expression on his face.

  “Hey, Josh. What did you want to see us for?” Deia asked. The rest of the party took seats around the actual conference table.

  “I came to ask a question, I guess,” Josh said, not sounding too sure himself. “My question is, do you think fighting is the best use of your time? I know that you’re working on something or things—I don’t know what but I know that you place importance on them. You’re one of the most powerful parties within the Stone Raiders but I need to know if your time would be better spent on working on these inventions.”

  Party Zero looked to one another before their eyes turned to Dave.

  “As much as I want to say that being on the front lines would be the best use of our time, I can’t. Malsour and I are working on multiple projects. However, these projects won’t be useful for now and in these fights, well, actually some of them will.” Dave looked to Malsour, who nodded before he looked back to Josh. “The others we can’t use simply because they’ll send the Jukal AI off. They’re too powerful and they’re seen as weapons of war that could be used to attack the Jukal Empire. We can only bring out these things as a very last resort.”

  “What is the thing we can use now?” Josh asked.

  “The citadels. However, we only have one that is mostly operational and we haven’t tested it out yet. We’ve got another three in various stages of production. In a week, the first will be complete; in three weeks, the second will be ready,” Malsour said.

  “What can I give you in order to speed this up?” Josh asked.

  “People,” Dave said. “Right now we’ve got maybe a half-dozen people and the Blood Kin besides Steve, Malsour, and me working on these projects.”

  “How many people do you need and in what capacity?” Josh asked.

  “We need coders, people who can manipulate Dark and Earth Mana. We also need Water mages and Light mages. We need laborers—everything.” Dave waved his hands.

  “We also need people who would be willing to work for us for the next three years but they would be kept where they work,” Malsour said.

  “What for?” Josh asked.

  “We can’t go into that,” Dave said. It wasn’t that Dave didn’t trust Josh; it was that he didn’t want to put more things on his plate. He was already the binding force of the Terra Alliance. Throwing more on him would only add stress to his day.

  “Okay, I’ll do what I can. Now, what about the rest of you?” Josh’s eyes passed over the rest of Party Zero.

  “I’m good to fight,” Deia said.

  “I am too,” Induca said.

  “Same,” Gurren said.

  “I’ll join in.” Anna raised a hand.

  “Might as well help this lot out.” Lox smiled.

  Lu Lu let out a screech.

  “Looks like we’re in,” Suzy said.

  “I’m just computing things anyway. With the upgrades Jeeves has got, he’s much faster and more useful than I am,” Steve said.

  “Okay, well, let’s go off that then,” Josh said.

  ***

  Dave sat down at a desk within Pandora’s Box. His eyes slid over to his angrily blinking notifications.

  He opened up the menu. Different prompts cascaded down.

  Quest: Weapons Master Level 3

  One handed and shield 1000/1000

  Two handed 325/1000

  Dual wielding 458/1000

  Archery 1000/1000

  Rewards: Unlock Level 4 Quest

  Increase to stats

  Passive skills from other weapons increase from 25% to 50% when designated weapon is not equipped. (Example: While using Dual-wield blades, one is able to gain 50% of the archery skill’s abi
lities.)

  “Close.” Dave sighed and continued through the prompts.

  Level 240

  You have reached level 255; you have 75 stat points to use.

  It was only through killing hundreds of the Xelur as well as their beasts that he was able to get such a large increase in stats. There really was nothing quite like killing other sentients in order to raise one’s level.

  Dave felt guilt but at the same time he knew that he would do the same thing again in an instant.

  He moved to his character sheet and placed down his stat points. Twenty-five went into Intelligence, twenty into Endurance, another twenty into Willpower and ten into Agility.

  With all of his projects, he needed to prioritize attributes that would allow him to work longer on these projects and make them as powerful as possible.

  He checked over his new character sheet. His mind seemed clearer and his fatigue and hunger seemed to drift away as an inner strength filled him. His body felt rejuvenated and light, as if he could run forever.

  Character Sheet

  Name:

  David Grahslagg

  Gender:

  Male

  Level:

  255

  Class:

  Dwarven Master Smith, Friend of the Grey God, Bleeder, Librarian, Aleph Engineer, Weapons Master, Champion Slayer, Skill Creator, Mine Manager, Master of Space and Time, Master of Gravitational Anomalies

  Race:

  Human/Dwarf

  Alignment:

  Neutral Good

  Unspent points: 0

  Health:

  50,100

  Regen:

  24.82 /s

  Mana:

  16,280

  Regen:

  59.95 /s

  Stamina:

  5,520

  Regen:

  51.90 /s

  Vitality:

  501

  Endurance:

  1,241

  Intelligence: