The Renegades

by Vasily Mahanenko

  “Sayid?” Reed echoed, puzzled. “Who’s Sayid?”

  “It’s a long story. Just watch White Sun of the Desert sometime. It’s a good flick. We’re about to head out and I still need to stop by Pirus’ place.”

  “Song of Demolition allows me to clear obstacles like fallen trees, flimsy walls and so on. As my stats grow, the spell gets stronger. The Charming Song causes the enemy to stop and listen. It lasts as long as my performance lasts or until the target takes damage. The Stunning Song stuns enemies for five seconds. The Heroic Song removes fear, suppression and similar negative effects from the party, and makes them immune to further negative effects during its performance.”

  “Sounds absolutely perfect! Do you need to do anything before we set out?”

  “No, I’m free whenever.”

  “In that case, let’s run to Master Pirus. We’ll take his quest and then hurry to the Market Branch.”

  We almost made it to our rendezvous in time—Chip and Sloe were deep in conversation and greeted our appearance with an expected question:

  “Hello, oh my mellifluous Tinker Bell. I see you’ve brought me a new shrubbery. Who’s he?”

  “This is a prospective member of our crusade into the dark and scary wood,” I introduced Reed. “If you’re not opposed, I would like to invite him to our party.”

  Sloe and Chip stared at Reed who tried to melt into the background.

  “He has some nice crowd control spells,” I played my trump without further delay.

  The pirc’s face took on a stumped expression:

  “Sorry…is mounted police a class in this game?”

  “Sort of. He’ll come in handy if we encounter a mob of angry mobs,” Sloe assured him and then turned to me. “I don’t understand: You’re both bards and his level is lower than yours, but at the same time he has AoE spells and you don’t? What’s the deal?”

  “I don’t really understand it myself, but it looks like every bard develops along her own plan. Unlike him, I have various buffs and debuffs in my arsenal.

  “That’s better,” Sloe perked up. “Tell me what spells you have and let’s brainstorm some battle tactics before we descend…”

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Everyone remember everything?” Sloe asked sternly after we had unanimously reelected him our party’s leader.

  “What’s there to remember?” Chip asked surprised. “It’s not exactly the Iliad. Shouldn’t be hard to memorize.”

  “Good. Let’s go then.”

  Reed, Sloe and I activated our natural camouflage, while Chip (who had switched back to warrior after all) tossed his halberd over his shoulder and stepped off the leafevator with a carefree whistle. Just like last time, a few seconds passed before the blighted lynx came flying out of the foliage right at the pirc’s face and was warmly welcomed by the halberd’s edge and our necromancer’s spell. I quickly healed Chip and camouflaged again, out of sight of any aggroing mobs. Reed remained hidden the entire time, nurturing his low HP pool.

  “As we get further from the Tree, make sure to only play music when a canopy’s cast,” Sloe reminded us. “We don’t know whether the noise aggros monsters, but we can experiment with that before leaving the game when dying won’t be a problem.”

  “Roger that, cap,” I replied.

  Meanwhile, Chip picked up the loot that the lynx had dropped.

  “What a bunch of junk,” he remarked, dumping it into his backpack.

  We had agreed to entrust Chip with the goodies. No one wanted to waste time and effort on picking up the dropped items, opening us up to potential attacks, and no one had any doubts about the honesty of our tank. In fact, as we were discussing how to divvy up our profits, the pirc announced that none of this interested him and he was willing to forgo his share. In the end, we decided to distribute our winnings on a ‘per need’ principle and later split the proceeds from whatever we sold. There really wasn’t much to divide up though: The blighted beasts didn’t so much as drop useful items, to say nothing of treasures.

  “Halt! There’s some flowers up ahead.” The necromancer halted us and squatting down beside a blue bonnet among the grass, began to examine it carefully from various angles. Chip watched Sloe’s movements with curiosity and then coughed politely:

  “What’s up? Have you encountered a butterfly cousin of yours?”

  “I’m trying to identify the place where I should cut the stalk, my uneducated friend. What are you waiting for, Lori? Don’t you want to level up your gathering skill?”

  “Of course I do!”

  “In that case, have a squat. You should gain some XP just for identifying the place of the cut, let alone gathering.”

  Feeling a bit stupid, I squatted down beside our fearless leader and looked as intelligently as I could at the flower. It looked a bit worried by such unwarranted attention. But nothing happened and recalling my PE classes in school, I began to waddle about like a clumsy duck trying to see the flower from all angles.

  “Bunch of vegetable voyeurs,” the pirc remarked and turned to Reed who was standing to the side a bit shocked. “Don’t you want to take part in this fetish? It seems that this is a hobby for you green folk.”

  “No,” Reed hastily declined to participate in such a strange activity. “I’d rather hang back and cheer them on.”

  As he said this, he somehow produced his enormous cello from thin air and began to play some ditty in a major key, perfectly suited to the scene unfolding before him. I was about to remind him that making music in these parts without a canopy was a bit risky, when a system notification appeared before me:

  Buff received (Song of Creation): +4% to skill growth.

  “Whoa!” You didn’t tell us you had that buff,” Sloe said, surprised. “I’ve never even heard of this.”

  “I didn’t know it before,” Reed seemed no less surprised. As soon as his bow stopped, the buff vanished. “I simply figured that this tune was a fitting tune and ended up accidentally unlocking a new song.”

  “Song and dance helps us build and live,” Chip mimicked the Soviet slogans of yore. “What about you, commissar? Can you do the same?”

  “Noodle knows,” I admitted honestly. “Yesterday I couldn’t, maybe today’s different. I finished a class quest, so maybe something’s different now.”

  “Well, we can experiment later. Let’s harvest this flower and move on toward the Arras.”

  I’m not sure what the reason was—Sloe’s words or Reed’s musical accompaniment—but a short while later, I noticed a barely shimmering section of the blue bonnet’s stalk.

  Skill increase:

  +11% to herbal gathering.

  +4% to One with Nature.

  “Got it,” I told the necromancer.

  “Excellent,” Sloe gingerly cut the flower and placed it in his inventory, after which he picked off a piece of the turf and coddled it in his hands pensively.

  The pirc’s face expressed a barely restrained desire to make some comment, but I had figured out what Sloe was doing and picked up some earth in my hand to examine it more closely as well:

  Humus. Rich in minerals, salts and organic matter. Good for the majority of plants.

  And that’s it? I went on examining the clod of earth.

  You have learned the properties of the Hidden Forest humus.

  Rich in minerals, salts and organic matter. Good for the majority of plants. This ingredient increases the rate at which plants grow as well as the rate at which biota gain experience.

  Skill increase:

  +15% to One with Nature.

  “Cool,” muttered the necromancer, who I guess had increased his trait too. “I see no practical use for it, but it’s cool nonetheless.”

  I suppose that since he had no culinary or alchemical skills, he’d only been able to see the general description.

  “Biota use humus in their cooking and alchemy,” I shared my knowledge, placing the humus in my flask. “It’s worth it to gather several clumps.
It’ll come in handy.”

  “So it’s like that? I’ll need to study that,” Sloe grew animated. He produced several flasks and began filling them. “All right, let’s move on. We need to try and reach the border of the Arras.”

  The further we strayed from the Tree, the higher the monsters’ levels grew. I was beginning to heal regularly during the random encounters—Chip’s health decreased noticeably after each attack. As luck would have it, my current Intellect sufficed: I had enough to maintain a small canopy for Reed and me as well as to heal. Sloe’s Intellect allowed him to slay any mob with two spells at most and once I’d buffed him with my Song of Encouragement, he became the scariest monster in the forest.

  “Oh look, the poor thing lost its claws from fright,” said Chip, picking up yet another bit of loot. “We can use them to make bracers.”

  I was about to congratulate the pirc on his newest acquisition, when a sharp though mild pain struck me in my shoulder and knocked me flat down:

  Damage taken. -76 HP: 87 (damage from Blighted Wolf) - 11 (physical damage resistance). HP Remaining: 14 / 90.

  At the same time, the Stun debuff appeared on my character.

  While Chip examined my suddenly empty health bar in the party interface, a bluish-black orb began to grow in Sloe’s hands. I looked helplessly at the monster looming over me. Unlike the wolves I’d seen before, this specimen bore a striking resemblance to a biota. Its fur was made of stiff-looking, little leaves, while his fangs looked quite ordinary and very sharp. Like the rest of the blighted beasts, this one did not look like he was in very good health. Various thorns grew out of his body and he was enveloped in a shadowy fog.

  The apparition was so terrifying, shocking and hypnotizing that I forgot about my party, the goal of our mission and even that I was in a game. It was more like I was in a dream and the sensation of the unreal remained in the background—at once keeping me from panicking and at the same time making me live every terrifying second to the utmost.

  In the moment when the monster’s fangs were almost upon me, I caught its maddened eyes and plunged headfirst into the series of visions that I was already growing accustomed to…

  Drawn by an untamable will, the animal stopped at the border separating the green grass from the black stretch of blighted earth slowly creeping in all directions. The animal senses the danger, but the call is stronger than instinct and the paws carry the wolf forward against his will. Each step gives rise to a change in the creature. The body grows, thorns pierce the hide, the color darkens until it is indistinguishable from the coal black grass underfoot. Suddenly I realized that I was seeing all of this through someone’s eyes: A hand reached out and scratched the blighted animal’s scruff. The hand belonged to a biota, but was covered with the same thorns. The fingers seeped a dark fog.

  The vision ended. The wolf was shaking his head in puzzlement over me, while a melody from the cello wound its way through the forest. In the next moment, a blue-black orb of magic smashed into the wolf turning him into a quickly evaporating wisp of smoke.

  As soon as the battle ended, Sloe camouflaged from any potential reinforcements.

  “Excellent work, Reed,” he praised the bard. “You stunned him just in time. Camouflage right away or the next mob will make mincemeat of you. Lori, what are you resting for? Heal up and camouflage too. That wolf knocked off your canopy. Half the forest heard Reed’s ditty. Pay more attention, Chip.”

  “Sorry, I blinked,” the tank muttered in a guilty voice, offering me a paw to help me up.

  “It’s okay. It happens,” I replied a little absentmindedly. I was still distracted by my most recent vision.

  Bardic Lore isn’t quite so helpful when the information comes pouring out in the middle of an encounter. Or does that happen when I don’t have control over my avatar? I quickly grabbed my lute and recast the canopy. Then I healed up, took a swig from my flask, camouflaged and sat down on the grass to give my mana time to regenerate. Reed sat down beside me. Even though he had managed to level up to Level 5 during our trip, his Intellect was still low and every spell he cast would drain his mana pool.

  “Hey there, guppers.” A voice sounded from nowhere, making us jump from surprise. “Whatcha up to?”

  “Well, personally, I am considering the voice in my head and how that affects my further notion of my mental health and self,” Chip admitted sincerely, looking in the direction where the voice was coming from.

  “We’re grinding,” Sloe replied with a note of tension in his voice.

  “Seen anything interesting?” the voice went on.

  “Blue bonnets and daisies,” I joined the conversation.

  “You should move on,” the stranger advised. “It’s a bit dangerous here for you rugrats. The mobs up ahead are tougher. Why a party of guppers like you lot will get your bones picked clean.”

  “Well, we’ll give it a shot at least. It’s interesting after all,” I objected.

  “Don’t even try it. I promise you, you won’t get out alive,” the voice warned a little ambiguously.

  “Where do you suggest we go grind in that case?” Sloe inquired with unexpected accommodation.

  “At the Tree. And to the south. That’s right. South of the tree, there’re some nice places to stroll. A kilometer and a half, no more. Everything after that is perilous.”

  “Thanks. We’ll head back,” the necromancer promised to everyone’s surprise.

  “Very good. See you around then.”

  The voice didn’t say anything else and we looked inquiringly at Sloe.

  “What are we waiting for? Let’s go head back to the Tree. Lori, cast the canopy so that the nearby monsters don’t hear us.”

  “Whatever you say,” I muttered and began to play a soft melody, creating a canopy four meters in diameter. I had enough mana to sustain it for just a few minutes, yet Sloe wouldn’t have issued the order without having some reason for it. And really—no sooner had our party set out on the return journey, than the necromancer began to gesticulate at some random branch without slowing his pace and said:

  “Make a show of heading back and looking for resources along the way. Those were cutthroats back there. They won’t let us onto their territory.”

  “What cutthroats? And what’s so scary about them that they even have their own territory?” Chip became indignant. As he did so, he pointed at the trunk of a far-off tree.

  “The kind who cut throats. This is a new location so there must be some new dungeon here. Some of the guilds have hired biota and pirc players to form scouting parties. They helped them level up and sent them into the forest to look for any dungeon entrances. A part of these scouting parties are kill groups, charged with eliminating any potential competition. If you stray into their search quadrants, they’ll cut you down. We are potential competition after all.”

  We had walked up to the tree Chip had indicated and he now produced his handaxe. Squinting at the tree, I saw that it was an ash. Just the kind of wood that Master Pirus had asked for.

  “And if we kill him?” I floated the most obvious way out of our predicament.

  “I doubt we could so much as lay our eyes on him,” Sloe shook his head. “Imagine a biota rogue with insane agility and a dozen levels on us. He’d wipe us in one fell swoop. He should easily be at Level 20.”

  “Level 32 actually,” the pirc suddenly announced. “His name’s ‘Otolaryngologist.’ My dictionary informs me that this is a surgeon who specializes in throats and ears, but if you ask me, I think that plant’s got his tongue planted firmly in his cheek.”

  “How’d you see him?” Reed asked with surprise.

  “As an experienced cartographer, I am blessed with a keen eye and a sharp mind,” Chip replied modestly. “Also I hate it when people tell me what to do. I vote we kill him.”

  “We don’t have any options,” Sloe shook his head. “He’ll eat us alive. It’ll be like Garfield and his lasagna. And that’s not mentioning that the rest of his party is l
urking around here somewhere. The best option is to double back, level up, do some quests related to seeds and herbs and then go back to the Tree. We’ll craft some gear, build up our strength and head out again tomorrow. There’s a chance that by then they will have scoured their quadrant and moved on. Then we can go through unimpeded. In the meantime, Reed will get a chance to increase his Intellect and Lori will pick up some extra spells.”

  “All right,” Chip agreed unwillingly and something in his expression told me that he wouldn’t forget Otolaryngologist or his insult.

  We spent the next three hours circling around the Tree, doing our best to not stray too far from it and complete the quests we had. I should say that neither mining nor woodcutting were my forte. I waved the axe around for half an hour and gave up. I ended up asking Chip to chop me enough ash to complete Master Pirus’ quest. Chip let fly several quips about murderers who would slay their own kind and then quickly and stylishly chipped up the lumber I needed. Meanwhile, Sloe and I went crawling on our knees (to the amusement of whoever happened by) in search of herbs and other alchemical ingredients. The sun smiled on our little, green meadow and Reed played on, so basically the entire thing looked like a Teletubbies episode. The only consolation was that no one around us had the reputation to record video for posterity.

  After all was said and done, I reached Level 7, Chip and Sloe reached Level 10 and Reed reached Level 6. Here and there we’d encounter player parties. Two of them even contained huge and mighty pircs.

  “I see your brethren are drawn to the Tree,” the necromancer remarked.

  “I wager caravans have arrived in time for the festival and the pircs arrived with them as their guards,” I guessed.

  “In any event, soon it’ll be harder to level up,” Sloe warned. “They’ll clear all the mobs at the Roots of the Tree, while the higher-level parties might not let us stray further afield. That’s to say nothing of the PKers.”