One moment I was on the ground with a blinding light appearing from behind me as Torian stood and tried to warn his asshole friends to get the hell out of there, and the next there was a spectacular explosion. It blew holes in the buildings on either side of the alley, and it did far worse against the flesh and blood people standing there looking like idiots staring at Torian as though he’d lost his mind.
They hadn’t learned their lesson about standing all bunched up. Even the assholes who’d been guarding the entrance went through the death animation as shrapnel took them out. Hell, the stealthers who’d been hiding out on the roofs were pulled out of stealth as the buildings they stood on collapsed into the alley or the explosion sent them flying.
Torian was the only one in that death animation who’d realized something was terribly wrong, and even he didn’t get farther than maybe a step before the explosion took him.
There wasn't even any decomposing animation this time around. There wasn’t enough left of them after the close quarters explosion, it seemed to be magnified since it happened in an alley where there was nowhere for the force of said explosion to go, for the decomposing animation to kick in.
No, there were just a bunch of small treasure chests on the ground or on top of piles of rubble where my torturers had met their end. I figured it was the least the fuckers deserved for what they’d done to me.
I only had that brief moment of satisfaction before I was ripped out of the death animation. It felt as though someone had taken a massive hook and pulled at me from my stomach. I wondered if this was what it felt like for a fish that suddenly found itself on the hook being dragged up out of the only world it’d ever known to its almost certain death.
I appeared at the edge of town in front of a giant black obelisk with glowing runes running up and down the thing. Runes that pulsed as I looked at them. All around me were graves, as though the designers hadn’t been able to decide if they wanted the respawn point to be a magical place or a traditional MMO graveyard.
I figured I should be glad I even got sent to this respawn point at the edge of town. After all, there was a chance I could’ve been sent back to the clearing where I’d originally started the game. There were some MMOs where you had to bind your respawn point, though it would appear that Lotus merely sent you to the nearest convenient graveyard.
I knew I didn’t have long. I’d died a few seconds before Torian and the others because I’d been the first one taken by the explosion, but they’d be appearing all around me any moment now.
They’d be disoriented, and they’d have the same equipment as me, which is to say none at all, but they’d be pissed off and they still might be able to beat the crap out of me. They’d have the numbers.
And since I’d gone on a suicide mission back there to teach them a lesson I didn't have anything left in my inventory to save my ass if they did decide they were going to try and kick said ass all over again. My last water gem was in a little chest in the rubble I’d just created.
I was defenseless, and there was an alley full of shit that was mine for the taking if I got there ahead of my tormentors. So I turned and ran for town in nothing but my skivvies.
"Where are you?" Keia's voice came into my head.
"Running from a bunch of Horizon assholes I just blew up," I said.
A party invite appeared. I went ahead and accepted it. The danger from Horizon Dawn trying to ambush her and give her what they were giving me had passed the moment all those stealthers were killed by the explosion, after all.
I didn’t doubt there’d be more Horizon Dawn people appearing around that exploded area soon enough, but it wasn’t an ambush this time and I’d sure as shit need some help when I got there.
“So that explosion was you?" she asked.
“This thing has all the looks of Conlan,” Kris said.
“You’re by the explosion?” I asked.
“Down the street keeping an eye on things,” Kris said. “So far people are staying back, but I don’t know how long that’s gonna last.”
“Wanna tell me what the hell happened and why the hell you didn’t want us to know where you were?” Keia asked, the sound of her teeth grinding carrying through group chat.
"They pulled me into an alley and were beating the shit out of me,” I said. “And Torian positioned stealthers all around because he was trying to get you there too. It sounded like he was going to do some bad shit if they managed to catch you.”
"Bastards," she said. “I could’ve done something.”
“You would’ve been caught and tortured the same as me,” I said.
“Still, I would’ve been there,” she said.
“I’m touched that you like me enough to get tortured with me, but I like you enough that I don’t want that happening to you,” I shot back.
A group of Horizon Dawn people appeared out of the crowd in front of me. Recognition dawned on their faces and their hands went to their weapons, but I ducked past them and disappeared back into the throngs before they had a chance to do more than that.
This was going to get interesting if I got a trail of those assholes behind me. I could only hope I’d lose them in the crowd. They shouted behind me, but the frustration in their shouts would seem to indicate they’d gotten caught in the crowd since there were several of them and only one of me.
Not to mention I got the feeling the crowds around here probably didn’t care much for Horizon Dawn people even on the best of days.
“Why didn’t you just log out if they were torturing you?” Kris said. “This is just a game. You don’t have to put up with that shit.’
“Turns out I do,” I said, my breath coming in gasps. “The game sees getting the shit kicked out of you by other players as combat, and you can’t log out during combat.”
“Sounds like something you should maybe tell Trelor about,” Kris said.
“No shit.”
"Where are you going now?" Keia asked. “Should we head to the forest and lay low for awhile?”
“Not a chance. I’m doing a good old-fashioned corpse run,” I said.
“Were you carrying anything valuable?” she asked.
“Not really, but it’s not about my stuff," I said. "It's about taking their stuff and making this really hurt.”
"You sneaky bastard," she said. “Where did they hit you?"
“The alley across the way from Jonhurtz Wands near the entrance to the Magic District,” Kris said. “You’ve still got time. People are staring, but no one wants to go near an unexplained explosion.”
“They’re probably worried another unexplained explosion might happen,” I said.
"I'll be there in a few,” Keia said.
I skidded around a corner and the arrow pointing me to my corpse became a dot on the minimap to go along with Kris’s. I walked up to her and patted her on the shoulder, then nodded towards the massive cloud of dust.
Kris had been right on. Players and NPCs alike were hanging back from the carnage. Which was just fine with me. I didn’t want anyone stepping in and trying to bogart the loot I’d gotten fair and square with my suicide attack.
“We doing this?” Kris asked.
“It’s the only way we’re getting their stuff,” I said, purposefully striding towards the alley.
“How far behind you are they?” she asked.
“Probably not far,” I said. “And there are Horizon Dawn people all over town. We need to assume any one of them could be the enemy even if they aren’t the head assholes.”
“So a Matrix sort of situation where anyone can turn into Elrond,” Kris said.
I missed a step trying to work through that, and smiled as my brain followed the same convoluted paths as the logic train that’d just pulled out of the station in Kris’s brain.
“Something like that.”
When I got back to the alley I was pleased to see that not only had I beaten Torian and company to their corpses, but there also weren’t any other Horizon people ther
e running interference. Yet.
I figured it was only a matter of time before some of them showed up to help their buddies. And I planned on being out of here before they got here to render any of that assistance.
Treasure chests were scattered around the dark alley, so I did the same thing I did the last time I blew up a bunch of Horizon assholes.
“Tap as many chests as you can,” I said.
“On it,” Kris replied.
We didn’t have long. Me and Kris approaching the damage seemed to be enough to get other players to move a little closer, but none of them were entering the alley yet.
It seemed that a lot of players were of the mind that if there was something obviously magical blowing people up then they weren’t going to go near it, but it also wouldn’t be long before the braver and stupider among them threw caution to the wind when they realized there were dozens of treasure chests dotting the alley ripe for the picking.
For the moment, though, they were holding back. Which gave me time to gather chests and rob Horizon Dawn blind.
I tapped chests and took their contents. I’d discovered an option to take everything in someone's inventory when a chest was tapped since the last time I was in this situation. Usually that was a combo button press in older MMOs, but all it took was a thought in Lotus. I took full advantage of that feature this time around.
One of the advantages of having been blown up and relieved of what few things I still had in my inventory after my Auction House run was I didn't have to worry about encumbrance this time around.
Torian seemed very concerned about me taking their shit, he seemed almost obsessed with keeping it from me or getting it back from me, so I figured I’d twist that knife just a little and steal their shit again!
Just another moment and…
"Hey! What are you doing?"
I whirled around and saw a goblin guard standing at the alley entrance eyeing the destruction. The guard finished by locking eyes with me.
“Uh-oh,” Kris said.
“What’s wrong?” Keia said. “I’m almost there.”
“Might be some trouble with the locals,” Kris said. “I don’t know that there’s much you can do there.”
“I can try, damn it,” she said.
I didn’t think Keia would be able to do much against the guards. I’d seen what they did to people who crossed them. They were a powerful force in Nilbog that so far refused to exercise that power to throw out their tormentors for some reason.
Though that didn’t mean they liked Horizon Dawn. I decided I was going to take a chance. After all, so far the goblins had been pretty friendly with yours truly.
"This is all that’s left of a bunch of Horizon Dawn assholes who were torturing me," I said. “Those assholes are going to be back here pretty soon. I intend to steal all their stuff before they can get back here and finish what they started."
The goblin smiled and shook his head. He stared around the alley in obvious wonder. "How did you do this?"
I grinned. "Trade secret, but I might be able to share that secret with some local enterprising friends if they were willing to, say, help me out a bit here and there.”
It was a shot in the dark. Sure I was relying on the general reputation goblins had for acquisitiveness in games, but I figured it was a safe bet. And I figured it was a good way to figure out exactly how good my reputation was getting with these guys.
The goblin guard put a finger to his nose. That grin never left his face, but it did seem a lot more rapacious now than it’d been a moment ago.
"There might be something to that," he said. "I'll try to hold them off. You should be able to go through that hole you made in the building behind you. There's an exit in the building on the other side nobody's watching for the moment. Saw it on my way over here.”
"Thanks," I said, going back to the business of grabbing as many chests as I could. I figured that’d been a pretty good test of my reputation with the goblins.
"New plan," I said. "Everything's under control here. Meet me at the edge of town.”
"You sure about that?" Keia asked. "What if they find you while you’re trying to escape?”
"I'm going to stick to the main thoroughfares for a little bit," I said. "Something tells me as long as I'm within sight of the guards I'm going to be safe. Besides. I have Kris here to protect me if things go bad again.”
Kris grinned. I’d meant it as a sarcastic comment, but I didn’t have the heart to tell her as much with her standing there puffing up with pride.
"Your funeral if you're wrong," Keia said.
I turned and looked to the alley entrance. Towards where I could already hear a goblin guard shouting at someone and a ruckus starting. Clearly that little guy had been serious about keeping me safe from Horizon Dawn.
The more I learned about the goblins, the more I thought there was definitely something I could exploit there. Something that would be even more exploitable than what I was doing with the Spellcrafting system.
“Time to go,” Kris said.
She disappeared through the hole into what looked like an abandoned shop, and I followed.
52
Gathering Attention
“You’ve been drawing all sorts of interesting attention, my friend,” Trelor said, shaking his head from behind his desk.
“I assume you’re talking about our complaints about the way the combat logout system can be exploited?” Keia said. “Because it’s bullshit that someone can torture someone like that and have it counted as combat.”
If her words were weapons then they would’ve taken Trelor’s head off. For a wonder, though, he merely shook his head and chuckled.
“Oh don’t you worry,” he said. “Someone’s going to be taking care of that soon enough. That’s not what I’m talking about though.”
“Then what are you talking about?” I asked.
My voice was a touch testy. I figured it was deserved. Every time I thought about being tortured in that back alley it got my blood boiling. Mostly at Horizon Dawn for doing it to me, but also at Lotus for putting me in the situation in the first place.
Not to mention the incompetence from Lotus in this instance was reminding me of another time their poor design choices got someone in trouble. Horizon might be the ones who sent some sort of weird feedback through Diana’s earbuds to kill her, but Lotus were the ones who created the hardware that allowed that to happen in the first place.
But I knew I had to play it nice for now. Trelor was a man on the inside, and he seemed to be on our side for the moment. I wasn’t going to risk pissing him off.
“You’ll see when you get to the Auction House,” he said, a twinkle coming to his eyes as he glanced at the spot on his wrist where a watch would be if this wasn’t a pseudo-medieval fantasy setting. “You should probably go check that out. You’re pretty close to the twenty-four hour bidding period coming to an end, after all.”
My eyes narrowed. He was hinting at something. I’d be willing to bet good money he had access to the auction system and could see what was happening, but I didn’t bother asking since I knew he wouldn’t tell me even if I asked.
“I still have questions,” I said.
“And I’ll have answers,” Trelor said. “Well, I might have answers depending on what you ask. I’m deeply flattered that you decided to make my shop your first stop when you logged in today, but you really need to go to the Auction House.”
“And risk getting tortured all over again,” Kris grumbled.
“If you don’t like the current political situation in Nilbog then it might be a good idea to take steps to fix that situation so that it’s more in your favor, don’t you think?” Trelor asked, again with that twinkle in his eyes.
I held his gaze, and he winked. I sighed.
“We’re clearly not getting anything out of him until we get back from the Auction House,” I said.
“Whatever,” Keia said, walking across the room and pressing her finger to
his nose. It was slightly amusing watching him go crosseyed in the face of her fury. “You get those assholes at your work to fix that thing about logging out, or else.”
“I’m on it!” he said. “I’ll write another email now.”
“You do that,” she said.
We stepped out of his shop and I did my usual check of our surroundings. It was something I’d been doing since last night when I’d learned the harsh lesson that everyone in this town was potentially out to get us, and I needed to avoid dropping my guard under any circumstances.
Unless, of course, I was with Keia and Kris. If I couldn’t trust them then life wasn’t worth living.
“That was productive,” Keia said.
“We had to do something to kill time while I waited for the auctions to finish,” I said with a shrug.
“Besides, watching you laying into him again was pretty funny,” Kris said. “I didn’t think anything would top that screaming session last night.”
Keia blushed as she no doubt relived some of the things she’d said to Trelor about how stupid it was to have a game system that didn’t let people log out during combat in a hyperrealistic game world where unscrupulous trolls could exploit the hell out of something that was nothing more than a minor annoyance in more abstracted games where you didn’t feel every stab or hit as it was being delivered.
“C’mon,” I said. “Keep an eye out for Horizon Dawn.”
“As if I’d do anything else,” Kris said, her hand moving behind her back to her hammer.
“Likewise,” Keia said, her bow and arrow appearing in her hands and disappearing to let me know it was also ready at a moment’s notice.
We moved through the Magic District, but we didn’t start seeing much in the way of Horizon Dawn people until we got to the town proper. Once we stepped into the circle and made our way to the Auction House we had Horizon Dawn people looking at us and chatting, but for a wonder they also left a healthy bubble around us.
Which was odd considering all of Torian’s threats about what he’d do to me if I tried using the Auction House ever again. I figured there would’ve been a whole host of guards out in front of the physical Auction House to keep me out of the place.
Spellcraft Page 40