by Erik Rounds
When playing games, Tasha hardly ever used fast travel because it made it too easy to miss interesting or useful diversions or side quests. Fast travel also discouraged combat, ultimately leading to underleveled characters. As a game developer, she understood that even though fast travel was often convenient, it was the enemy of fun.
In her situation, however, there could be practical advantages in being able to quickly warp between cities and dungeons. This was a world where traveling time between distant points was measured in months. She was working against the clock, so the ability to fast travel could mean the difference between success and failure. Level 40 was still a long way off, particularly given the higher experience curve. It was ten levels higher than she had intended to go in the class, but that fast travel ability was just too useful to pass up.
Though they had traveled for several months, there was still a good distance left to travel. They had been avoiding the roads and had to travel in a far less direct path over the open terrain. Their stores of consumables had grown thin, and soon they would have to rely on Kiwi’s magic for healing. They did eventually find relief in the form of an NPC village.
NPC villages were abnormal spawns that provided a place to rest, buy supplies and equipment, and earn some extra experience by performing procedurally generated fetch quests.
This NPC village had an item shop, a weapon shop, a clothier, and a pub. There was also the mayor’s house. Tasha counted, and the entire village had thirty-one men, women, and children who wandered around randomly spouting the same scripted lines over and over again.
Pan pulled on Tasha’s sleeve. She was pointing to the weapon shop.
Tasha nodded. “Sure, let’s go. I need a replacement for Namaka anyway.”
They passed by a bunny girl NPC who wore a sexy leotard. The bunny girl spoke to them as they passed. “Would you care for a puff-puff massage?”
Pan just shook her head. “I’m just a kid, so I don’t understand.”
The pair of them entered the shop. A bearded dwarf was standing at the counter. “Buy something, will ya?” he demanded.
“Good sales pitch, that,” Tasha muttered under her breath.
Tasha and Pan both opened up shopping windows and examined what the dwarven NPC had for sale.
“Let’s see,” Tasha said, “how about this one? It’s called ‘Grasscutter’ and deals wind damage. Plus 31 attack. That’s way better than my Namaka’s +5.”
She looked at the item details. Its trigger action, Air Slicer, added a 75% boost to attacks and applied air elemental damage, but the effect would only last for 0.25 seconds with a 1-second delay. That meant she’d need to work on timing her strikes. It made sense that a more powerful weapon would be more difficult to use.
The Grasscutter certainly didn’t come cheap. The cost in GP would consume most of her savings to that point, but she’d put off upgrading her weapon for far too long. She made the purchase.
While traveling over the past month, she’d gained an additional two levels, bringing her to level 24. She’d divided her stat points between charisma and intelligence. Her strength stat, combined with the attack bonus from her new weapon, brought her attack from 24 to 50, which would be a major help in combat. If she used Air Slicer, her attack would rise to 88, if only for a quarter of a second. The new weapon cost her nearly everything she had, but it was worth it.
Normally in an RPG she would have purchased new weapons regularly as she leveled, but since they had been avoiding towns, the upgraded weapons attack rate was many times higher than the weapon she’d used previously.
Pan tapped at an option on her shopping interface. It was a dwarven-made handgun with a +20 attack damage rating. Pan was sad to part with her trusty crossbow, Josephine, but she’d outgrown it many years ago. She had long wanted to use a firearm rather than a crossbow, but this was the first time she’d saved up enough to afford the higher cost. After purchasing the weapon and naming it Winona, she ran off to practice.
Having already interrogated the entire population of the NPC village and looted the houses for treasure chests, Tasha headed to the pub. She saw Pan and Hermes out of the corner of her eye. Hermes was teaching the young girl how to hold a firearm. Kaze was watching from where he was perched on top of the mayor’s house.
She shoved open the saloon-style door and stepped inside, allowing them to swing shut behind her. In the corner of the room, Ari was drinking some ale and relaxing in a chair. He got up as she approached and set the book he was reading on the table.
“Hey, Ari,” Tasha said. She purchased a pint of ale from the NPC bartender and joined him. “What are you reading?”
“It’s a romance novel. An old friend of mine wrote it, and I’m just now getting around to reading it. It’s painfully bad. There are so many interlocking love triangles. I had to diagram them to keep everything straight in my head. It seems just like the kind of thing she would have written.”
“If it’s that bad, why do you keep reading it?”
“Well… I have come this far already. Now I’m emotionally invested, and I need to find out how it ends.”
“I prefer science fiction,” Tasha said. “Or maybe fantasy. Or sometimes video game strategy guides. Anyway, I wanted to ask you, what are our plans from here?”
“Why are you asking me? I’m not the leader,” Ari said.
“Yes, you are, you’re totally the leader. You planned our route and usually make decisions about which enemies to fight and where to train.”
He shook his head. “I’m the last person who should be in charge. We have an actual princess here. She should be the leader. If not her, then maybe you.”
“I’ll pass,” Tasha said. “Leading is boring. Just give me a thing to do, and I’ll go do that thing. I’m not someone who tells people to do things. I’m a thing doer.”
“If you say so. I actually do have a plan of action for us. There’s a farming village to the south of here called Slime’s Row. If we can hire a covered wagon from there, we might be able to take the main road, right under Murderjoy’s nose. From above, it will look like any other raptor-led carriage. We should be able to make better time that way.”
“See, I told you that you were the leader,” Tasha said. “I wouldn’t have thought of that. I probably would have just blundered toward our destination in a straight line like an idiot.”
“But you would have found a way to make it work.”
“Enough of the mutual admiration society already,” said Hermes, who had been standing in the doorway for who knew how long. “I take it we have a plan?”
“Yeah,” said Tasha. “We’re headed south. Let’s get some rest. The village will probably despawn in the morning. That’s how these things work, right? I don’t know about the rest of you, but I want to rest on an actual bed for once.”
Hermes nodded slightly. “Say, Tasha, before that, how about some more of that historical documentary that we’ve been watching? I’ve been finding the history of your people strangely compelling. In fact, I’m eager to learn more about the downfall of this tyrant king we’ve been learning about. What was his name again?”
“His name’s Lord Frieza, and like I keep telling you, Dragonball Z isn’t a historical documentary. It’s an anime.”
“But, anime is real, right? Anime is real! Right?”
Tasha didn’t have the heart to destroy his happy worldview, so they spent the evening watching several episodes of the Ginyu saga. Although Tasha enjoyed Dragonball Z, her main purpose in watching it was to unlock a couch potato ability called Zenkai Boost.
Dragonball Z – Zenkai Boost
Classfree ability, unlocks at level 6
When lowered to one heart, gain triple experience when the fight ends. Usable once per calendar day.
While she didn’t want to be in a situation where she was less than a heart container away from dying, the benefit of triple experience was hard to pass up.
♦ ♦ ♦
When she awoke the next morning,
Tasha considered her situation. She was on an adventure, precisely like she’d wanted. She had become the strong person who she had always wanted to be. She was surrounded by a fellowship of companions who she viewed as friends.
Everything in her world was perfect. That’s how the day started, at any rate, but good things were never made to last.
The NPC village didn’t actually despawn until after they left. Slime’s Row was still several days of travel to the south. Or it would be if they could just manage to travel in a straight line. Unfortunately, as was often the case, they were frustrated by a large zone of high-level spawns that prevented them from traveling in the direction they wanted. They spent the entire day trying to circumvent it, but the arbitrarily shaped zone just seemed to go on forever.
Finally, Ari had Kaze scout the high-level zone from overhead to find the shortest path through it. Upon the dragon’s return, he reported that there was a narrow four-mile strip of land which would take them straight through to a lower-level zone.
Their plan was to cut straight across it. Once they were through they would have nothing but manageable monster spawns for the rest of the trip to Slime’s Row. It was a risk but a reasonable one—or so everyone thought.
It turned out that Murphy’s Law was in full effect, and after they reached the halfway point, a mob spawned—one of a much higher level than they had anticipated. There was only a single enemy:
Jabberwock (Level 47)
Bringer of death and devourer of the weak. Flee now, lest you become part of the Jabberwock’s balanced breakfast.
ATK 71Mag ATK 51
DEF 36Mag DEF 30
Weaknesses: none
Resistances: Fire, Lightning, Earth, Poison
Special ability 1: Rage
Special ability 2: Drain Mana
Special ability 3: Dismiss Summon
Special ability 4: Gravity
It was an enormous beast with forty heart containers. It had a huge catlike body with great batlike wings and six tentacles that each originated from its side and waved about in a threatening manner.
The usual strategy involved Ari, Slimon, and Tasha engaging it directly while Kiwi hit it with debuffs. Kaze would try to pull aggro from above, leaving Pan and Hermes to flank it with gunfire.
This wasn’t the first time Tasha had faced enemies that employed a rage ability. Rage buffed a fighter’s damage output but made any actions other than direct physical attacks impossible. It was devastating to magic users but mostly ineffective against frontline fighters since fighting was what they probably would have done anyway. Sometimes the mobs would even cast rage on themselves to increase their own damage.
Drain Mana was troubling, and it changed their strategy somewhat. This ability reduced a target’s mana pool. Rather than conserving MP to use later in the fight, Kiwi would need to spend as much as possible on buffs and debuffs, holding back only enough to not receive aggro.
The Dismiss Summon ability looked like it was used to dismiss conjured beings. She remembered Kiwi telling her about the summoner class back at Brightwind. Summoners were children who invoked conjured beings known as figments to fight for them. She assumed Dismiss Summon wouldn’t be any threat since none in the group were summoners.
The Jabberwock started by invoking its Gravity ability on the group. Gravity magnified a person’s personal gravity field, making them heavier and slowing their movements. It also had the effect of bringing Kaze to the ground, holding him down. Running from this battle was now impossible given their inability to move faster than the mob.
The monster cast Drain Mana on Pan, draining all of the girl’s mana. She wasn’t a magic user, so that didn’t concern Tasha overmuch. They were lucky that the Jabberwock hadn’t used the ability on Kiwi.
“Pan, Hermes,” Ari said, “take sniping positions along the side. Kaze, protect Kiwi and draw aggro. Tasha, Slimon, you’re with me!”
For a time, the strategy worked. Kiwi buffed everyone and focused on recovery spells. The creature performed AOE fire breath attacks, but since the group was mostly spread out, damage was concentrated on only one or two people, and Kiwi was able to patch them up with heals. They steadily chipped into its health, bringing it down a quarter heart at a time.
The Jabberwock was now down to half health. Just over twenty heart containers remained when the horns on the creature began to glow. The battle log read:
Jabberwock (Level 47) is charging for Firestorm.
“Everyone spread out!” Ari yelled. The mob must be getting prepped for some kind of high-yield area-of-effect attack.
The sun disappeared from the sky, cloaking the land in a crimson red. Hundreds of fireballs were forming in the skies above them.
The Jabberwock screeched, and a rain of fireballs fell from the sky, each impacting the ground at a different place. Spreading out was not the right strategy against this kind of attack. Half of the team was hit—Hermes and Kaze, who had been clustered together, were hit the hardest. They were both down to critical health.
Hermes pulled out a potion and ran to the dragon. “Drink this quickly, dragon!”
The dragon snapped the glass bottle from his hand, shattering the vial and drinking the recuperative liquid, which brought him back to full health. Hermes turned around and pulled out a second health potion, but before he could bring the bottle to his lips, an ice lance shot forth from dragon and impaled him. The potion fell from his hands and rolled onto the rocky ground, useless. The dwarf’s heart containers had run out, and he collapsed to the earth. The life left his eyes, and he died on the battlefield.
“Hermes!” cried Kiwi, but the Jabberwock was already stomping toward her.
“There’ll be time to mourn later,” Ari said. “We need to finish this.”
“O-okay Ari.”
The Jabberwock reared back on its hind legs and dashed across the battlefield. Pan was sniping it with her handgun over and over from the sidelines, dealing a quarter of damage at a time. Slimon was hitting it repeatedly with his tentacles but was dealing even less damage than Pan.
Kiwi backed away. “I’m out of mana!”
The Jabberwock still had nine hearts left. Tasha sliced at it again and again but dealt only nominal damage. It swiped at her with its foreclaws, knocking her away and costing her five hearts. Her defense buffs had already worn off. She quickly drank a health potion before returning to the battle, but the creature had changed targets. Pan had been shooting at it nonstop throughout the battle and had earned much of its hate.
“Pan, stop shooting! Wait for me to gain aggro.”
The Jabberwock leapt into the air and landed right in front of Pan, towering over the small girl. Ari appeared in front of her and struck a martial-arts pose, ready to defend his daughter. Tasha and Slimon kept attacking from behind the creature, but there were still five heart containers left to go, and each one cost precious seconds.
Instead of attacking, the Jabberwock began to invoke an ability. The combat log read:
Jabberwock (Level 47) invokes Dismiss Summon.
For a moment Tasha wondered what would cause the mob to use Dismiss Summon at a time like this. There weren’t any summoners here. That’s when she saw Ari’s eyes. They were open wide with panic and realization. Tendrils of blue energy circled his form and motes of lights flew away from his body. He looked directly at Tasha and mouthed the words, “Tasha… I…” before vanishing into mist.
Tasha collapsed to her knees in shock and confusion. Why had Ari turned into mist as though he were a mob? Before she could react, the Jabberwock unleashed a fire attack, shrouding Pan in flames. Operating on instinct, Tasha ran forward and drove the sword into the Jabberwock’s mouth and pulled the trigger, dealing critical water damage to the creature’s brain, killing it. The Jabberwock faded away into ethereal mist.
Tasha just stared at the place where Ari had been standing, confusion evident on her face.
Kiwi was the first to recover. She got to work handing out health poti
ons and retrieving Hermes’s items for safe storage.
Kaze approached and thought-spoke to her. The dwarf gave his life to save my own. He gave me the potion rather than use it to save himself.
“I’ve known Hermes since he was young,” Kiwi said. “I know he can be greedy, stubborn, and quick to turn to violence, but deep down he’s fiercely loyal to his friends. I suppose we won’t see him again until we return home.”
As Kiwi and Kaze were speaking, Tasha approached Pan. The girl was curled up on the ground, shaking and holding her legs in a fetal position.
“Pan, what happened? Why did Ari vanish?” Tasha asked. She already knew the reason but didn’t want to believe it. There had to be some other explanation. Pan looked up, but it was clear that she was barely holding her emotions in check. She was on the verge of a meltdown.
“I’m… so sorry,” Pan said.
“Why are you sorry? What did you do?”
“I lied to you. I d-d-didn’t tell you.”
Anger filled Tasha’s voice. “Tell me what? That you’re a summoner? That Ari was a figment of your imagination? It’s true, isn’t it? The ‘thief’ class is just for show.”
Pan nodded. “I wanted to tell you…”
Tasha’s anger continued to grow hotter. “But you didn’t tell me, did you? Instead you kept it a secret.”
“I know.” Fresh tears were running down her cheeks. “I can explain.”
“You can explain? You can explain how the man I’ve known for months was nothing more than a figment of your imagination?”
Tasha was consumed by a rush of rage and bitterness. “I don’t want you to explain. I don’t want to hear anything you have to say.”
“Tasha,” Pan said, “you’re… you’re my only friend. I love you.”
“I’m not your friend. Friends don’t lie to each other.”
Congratulations! You have reached ability Level 1 in: Pretentious Jerk
People whom you belittle are now 8% more likely to question their self-worth.
Tasha instantly regretted the words as she spoke them but was too angry to apologize. She pushed the notification away. She was too angry to trust her words and didn’t want to say something else that she would regret. “I’m going to bed.”