Couch Potato Chaos- Gamebound

by Erik Rounds

“Aye,” Captain K’her said. “The prisoners have already been transferred to yer facility. Three of them are from the Elsander royal house. The capital city of Adreála has been destroyed an’ the Crystal Keep be no more than rubble.”

  Captain K’her was one of the few people in Etheria who didn’t fear Queen Murderjoy. Though her level and stats were far beyond his, they were both orb bearers, and the raw power that the orbs possessed far exceeded the power of either of them.

  The queen walked toward the pirate, stepping carefully around the pile of ash. “It is agreeable to see you again, my love. Will you be staying long?”

  “We’ll needs be setting sail on the morrow. I must be honest wit’ ye. I don’t mind killing fer a bit o’ filthy lucre, but slavin’ be dark business. What need have ye of so many slaves?”

  She hesitated before offering a small smile. “Even though you don’t approve, you still captured them and sold them to me. Why is that?”

  “Why, for the filthy lucre, o’ course! Pay me enough GP an’ I’ll do whate’er needs doin’. Be at ease, me love. If I ever had a conscience, I’d have sold it many years ago.”

  She looked the dark elf straight in the eyes. “Listen, I’m no more a fan of slavery than you are, but the truth is that I need as many slaves as possible, as quickly as possible.”

  “But why?” he asked.

  “Come with me, my captain. Come with me, and I will show you the secret to my power.”

  The left the castle and walked through the city streets of Bastion, escorted by her royal guard. People lowered themselves to their knees in submission as she passed. One man was too slow in bowing to the ground, so she incinerated him.

  Finally, they arrived at a large building in the heart of Bastion. “This is our slave orientation and reeducation center. There are similar structures throughout my kingdom, but all new acquisitions pass through here before being sent on.”

  It was a multilevel building with cells along the outer edges. There was a save point situated at the center of the room, enclosed by metal bars. As Captain K’her regarded the save point, there was a flash, and a dark-elven woman appeared wearing a simple white shirt and short pants. The moment she appeared, two elven slaves pushed a bar on the outside of the cage, which forced the newly spawned dark elf through the single opening. She tumbled out, and another slave chained and collared her before she was led to one of the cells.

  On one edge of the room was a giant vat of boiling acid. Two elven slaves carried the dead body of an elven child and threw it into the vat.

  “What dark place have ye brought me to?” he asked. The building was eerily silent but for the occasional scream of pain or the sound of weeping.

  “Follow me. Everything will be made clear,” she said. She motioned to a guard, who guided them to a small room on the bottom floor, closing the door behind them as they entered. The room was dimly lit by a magical torch along the wall.

  The queen indicated two captives. “Behold, the Elsander royal family.”

  Two elves were chained to manacles, suspended against the brick wall. They both wore simple white shirts and pants—the same clothing they had worn when they respawned.

  The elven man tried to stand, but his feet were too high above the ground for him to be successful. “Are you… Queen Murderjoy?”

  “Indeed, I am,” she said. “And you are Count Sigred Elsander, leader of the once great city-state of Adreála.”

  “What do you want with us?” the elven man said. “What have you done with my people?”

  She smiled. “Your people will serve us, and so will you. Tell me, where is your son? He wasn’t on the manifest.”

  “The prince is beyond your reach. He was on a level grind when the attack came.”

  “Oh yes, that’s right. You Questgivrians force your children to fight monsters despite their tender age. In Zhakara, we would never be so cruel to our own children.”

  “Ye mean to say that yer young don’t fight mobs to gain experience?” Captain K’her said.

  “No,” said the queen, “we have found a better way to level them up. A safer way. Come here, my love. Let me show you.”

  She drew a long dagger with a jagged edge. Taking the captain’s hand, they both grasped the handle. She thrust it into Sigred’s heart, dealing five hearts of damage. She pulled it out and struck again and again and again as his wife screamed. Finally, the elven count expired, and a combat notification appeared:

  Victory! All enemies have been vanquished.

  +112 experience gained. (103,067 to next level)

  The queen grinned, dismissing the combat notification. “He will return in a few hours, and I’ll kill him again and again until I’ve drained him of all of his levels. Every day, I kill thousands of elven slaves. This is how I’ve gained a higher level than anyone else in Etheria, through the mass blood sacrifice of my enemies.”

  The elven queen was weeping quietly, so Aralynn killed her, earning another 99 XP.

  “This is diabolical,” the captain said. “Your ambition and bloodlust is truly without equal, my lady. I tip my hat to ye.”

  “Stop it, you’re making me blush!” she said. “Don’t get the wrong idea. I’m not the only person to benefit from our prisoners in this way. Like I said to the good count here, we don’t force our children to fight mobs. Using elven sacrifices, we power level them to level 5. This gives them a major advantage over our enemies. Once the elves are drained of their levels, they are reeducated and sold as laborers or domestic servants. Some of them are forced to level grind so that we can extract additional XP from them.”

  The captain nodded. “That’s why ye have need of elven slaves.”

  “Elves have the highest level curve, and as such are worth the highest amount of XP when killed. Due to the recent ceasefire, raids such as yours are our only source of new elves.”

  If the captain was fazed by this revelation, he didn’t show it. It was an impressive use of resources, nothing more. This was an opportunity for him to earn GP, and he cared about little else.

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  A few hours later, the unfortunate messenger, whose name was Paula, came back to life. She had resurrected at the save point in Bastion’s town square. An elderly man greeted her and helped her step down from the platform that held the glowing save point.

  “How did the queen take the news?” he asked.

  “Not well, boss,” said Paula. “She was furious. She said she was going to burn the ninja village to the ground. After saying that, she set me on fire and killed me.”

  “I’m sorry you keep having to go through this,” he said.

  “It’s okay,” said Paula. “Dying and coming back to life in a new body is a rush. Becoming someone new over and over again is just about the best thing ever. Besides, being a professional bad-news-giver is a good job and easy money.”

  “And the painkiller we gave you?” the man said.

  “I didn’t feel a thing.”

  The man nodded. “That’s good. I have a feeling that we may have need of your services soon. The menu countdown spells troublesome times ahead.”

  He gave her a sealed yellow envelope. “Here’s your payment with a nice bonus. Please stay in the city. I may have more work for you soon.”

  “I always do.”

  He looked toward the queen’s palace. “Without us to advise her, the queen’s madness could consume this realm. She needs us, even if she doesn’t realize it.”

  The man left her, and Paula opened the envelope, adding the 4,500 GP to her inventory. This would be enough money to pay for all of her living expenses for the next three months, allowing her to maintain the lifestyle to which she had grown accustomed.

  Chapter 23

  Level Grind

  A foreign human named Tasha Singleton was arrested last Wootsday morning in connection with the Marketplace Massacre. Three of the city’s guardsmen were killed in the incident and two were wounded, along with at least fifteen civilian injuries a
nd four fatalities. Property damage from the scuffle was estimated to be in the hundreds of thousands of GP, and at least one orphanage was damaged beyond repair.

  The human in question escaped captivity briefly but was arrested again that evening when she was spotted entering through the western city gates. After a brief but intense trial, which involved lots of shouting, the human was found to be not guilty by reason of being a completely different person.

  The prosecutor, Borgrim Deathhammer, had this to say when asked about Ms. Singleton’s not-guilty verdict: “This is a travesty of justice! Tash-AH Singleton, if you are reading this, I want you to know that Borgrim Deathhammer is coming to bring you to justice!” Borgrim Deathhammer then started laughing maniacally, and it is against this newspaper’s policies to transcribe maniacal laughter.

  Article from The Brightwind Tribune, Doguary 4th, 3205 3E

  Tasha was still in dreamland when Pan shook her awake.

  “Wha? It’s too early,” she whined, retreating deeper into the fluffy bedsheets. The bed needed her and refused to let her go.

  “Breakfast,” Pan said.

  Hmm… sleep or breakfast. Breakfast or sleep. That was the eternal conundrum. “Are there pancakes?”

  “Mmm hmmm,” said Pan.

  It was a tough decision, but eventually her desire for syrup-drenched pancakes dripping with butter won out over her natural morning laziness. She pried herself out of bed and put some early-morning clothing on.

  Tasha and Pan met Ari, Hermes, and Slimon in the dining hall and shared a light breakfast consisting of fried eggs, sausage, bacon, the pancakes she’d been promised, a blueberry muffin, the elven equivalent of grits, and lots of coffee.

  After eating enough pancakes to send a mid-sized elephant into a carbohydrate-induced coma, the gang met up with Princess Kiwi. Together, they left the castle and made their way through the city streets. Kiwi was riding her own mount, a smaller grayish velociraptor. The rest of the party visited the rent-a-raptor station. It wasn’t cheap, but moving quickly was the best way to face the highest number of random encounters. They wanted to level quickly, after all.

  Aralogos indicated a lightly used path which wound its way through the hilly grassland. This path was not protected against random encounters. “If nobody has any objections, I’ve already consulted the map and found some good hunting areas to the southwest. We’ll mostly be facing level 14 through 20 mobs. Once we all reach level 15, we can move on to higher-level opponents.”

  “Sounds good to me,” Tasha said. “Stronger enemies means we can level up faster.”

  “Just remember,” said Hermes, “don’t put too much stock in an opponent’s level. With the application of care and strategy, a level 1 warrior can defeat a level 100 mob.”

  “Is that really true?” Tasha asked. “From what I’ve experienced, my attacks barely did any damage to the Ginormosaurus Rex, and it was only level 38.”

  “It is,” he said. “While it is true that low-level attacks will barely do any damage to high-level monsters, they will still take damage from natural effects like fire, drowning, or a fall from a great height. The greatest advantage we have over them is that we are capable of complex thought and they are not.

  “If a level 1 warrior can trick a monster into running off a cliff, that monster will still die, and the warrior will receive all of the experience points. Until you came along, it still wouldn’t be enough to gain a whole level, but now it just might. Mr. Aralogos, I say we go farm the Ginormosaurus Rex rather than spending time fighting weaker enemies. I’ve gained multiple levels from killing it once. If we can set a pit trap for it, we might be able to finish it off easily.”

  “He’s right,” said Kiwi. “We only have two days before we must set out. This might be the only chance we have to actively farm monsters.”

  “Tasha, what do you think?” asked Ari. “In the past, Pan and I have always worked within our capabilities, erring on the side of caution. On the other hand, Hermes’s plan could gain us levels much more quickly.”

  Tasha thought for a moment. “Do we even have any shovels? I mean, digging a hole big enough to contain the G-Rex could take days.”

  Hermes laughed at this. “Ha! I’m a dwarf. We were born to mine and dig into the earth. I could have a pit of sufficient size dug in a few hours at most. Besides,” he said with an evil grin, “if the pit doesn’t work, we can just throw Tasha into his mouth, and she can finish him off from the inside. Now that we know its weakness, defeating it should be easy.”

  “Don’t worry Tasha,” the princess said, “he’s just joking. Probably. Hermes has a dark sense of humor.”

  “Thank you, Kiwi,” Tasha said. “I knew you would be on my side.” She turned to the slime. “What do you think, Slimon?”

  “Pppft!” Slimon suggested.

  Ari nodded. “Slimon is right—there is little to be gained without risk. Besides, the worst that could happen is that we all die horrible, agonizing deaths and respawn to try again.”

  So, armed with a plan, the party headed back to the fallen watchtower. It took an hour of riding before reaching G-Rex territory.

  They were attacked by several groups of plant-based mobs called tulicoptors. They had propellers allowing them to fly, and they fired seeds. Kiwi and Tasha belted them with fire-based projectile attacks, making short work of them. After each battle, Sir Slimon used healing magic on any injured party members. It was nice to have a healer in the group.

  Finally, they arrived at the plateau overlooking the now destroyed watchtower. Pan used her binoculars to scan the area and found a spot not too far off that formed a natural pass and was surrounded on either side by low cliff walls. If the G-Rex gave chase, they could lead him through the narrow canyon. Assuming Hermes could make good on his claim to dig a pit in two hours, that would make the perfect point for a trap.

  Fortunately, there were no new monster encounters as they approached the small canyon. It would still be difficult to defeat the G-Rex in a conventional fight.

  Tasha spent the next two hours watching Hermes dig a hole. She didn’t really think he could do it but quickly developed a newfound respect for the dwarf’s hole-digging capabilities. His hole-digging technique was unconventional to say the least. He casted a spell that separated large parts of the ground into cube-shaped blocks of dirt. He then put his right hand on the segmented ground and simply added it to his inventory. It was not unlike watching someone play Minecraft in real life.

  After about an hour of this, they had a hole that looked like it would be big enough to contain a G-Rex. They carefully covered the pit with sticks, leaves, and dirt in order to conceal it from their prey. It didn’t really look natural, but hopefully it would trick the mob.

  “Don’t f-forget where the pit is,” Pan said.

  “And what kind of idiot would be foolish enough to forget where they dug their pit trap?” Hermes said.

  Dozens of Pokémon episodes ran through Tasha’s mind where Team Rocket dug a trap but covered it up so well that they forgot where it was and ended up falling in themselves.

  Tasha smirked and snorted out a laugh. “Good point. Yeah, who would do that? So, which of us will pull the G-Rex and bring him here?”

  Kiwi patted Denver on the neck. “I think that will be you, me, and Denver.”

  “She’s right,” said Ari. “Other than Pan, you two weigh the least among us, and Denver will need to move fast to keep ahead of the G-Rex. Also, most of our mounts are rentals. They won’t follow us into combat like Denver would.”

  Kiwi equipped her staff. “And you need me to cast the vine spell to slow it down.”

  Tasha steeled her nerves. “Okay, let’s do this.”

  She mounted Denver ,and Kiwi got on behind her, holding on to her for balance. She spent the better part of the next hour riding in circles, but most of the mobs were lower level. It turned out that the G-Rex was a somewhat rare spawn.

  Finally, a large amount of mist began to form all around
and coalesced into the form of the mighty Ginormosaurus Rex.

  “Hit it!” she yelled, and Kiwi raised her staff with her free hand and shot a bolt of lightning directly at its face, dealing six hearts of damage.

  Not wasting any more time, she pulled the reins to one side, turning Denver about and leading him back the way they had come. The chase was easier this time, but there were still some close calls. Every two minutes, Kiwi cast the vine spell, which added some distance from the G-Rex. They took care not to allow too much distance to form, as that could prompt the mob to despawn.

  When they finally reached the cavern, they led the G-Rex right into it. Tasha circled around the area where she knew the pit was, careful not to travel over it. As the monster stomped over the pit, the sticks and leaves that concealed the hole snapped apart, causing the G-Rex to lose its footing and tumble inside.

  Though the G-Rex filled the hole, the hole was only covered part way. They were gambling on the G-Rex’s inability to pull itself out of the hole on its own. It began to struggle, trying to climb out, but it wasn’t making any headway. Its tiny arms were ill-suited to climbing.

  “Okay, everyone,” said Aralogos, “hit it with everything you’ve got!”

  Slimon cast some sort of debuff on the monster while Hermes opened fire with his machine-gun arm, and Tasha shot it with a Kamehameha blast. Aralogos had jumped on its back and was punching it on the neck repeatedly, pulverizing it. Pan shot it with her crossbow over and over again.

  After less than a minute, the G-Rex let out one final cry and vanished into the mist.

  Victory! All enemies have been vanquished.

  1840 experience gained. (1,365 to next level)

  1200 GP found.

  Level Up!

  Level Up!

  You have reached level 14.

  You have 8 unassigned stat points.

  Choose either a heart container or mana container.

  Tasha put everything into agility and took two heart containers. She now had 18 agility and ten hearts.

  She jumped up as high as she could and was shocked to find the ground racing away from her. She wondered if she could pull off ninja-style moves like jumping from one tree to another. Of course, what goes up must come down, and her landing was far less graceful than she would have liked. Her landings were something that she would need to work on.