by Rae Nantes
Smith had his status screen open the entire time, likely using a map spell that reads the surrounding area. Was that command magic? It would explain how he could communicate orders from the other side of the battlefield - like shouting orders through a magical radio.
"Daimyo Squad, move in!" Smith barked. "Now is the time! Crush them!"
The enemy's right flank shattered, and those left alive started to flee, causing a chain reaction through the entire front. The heavy swordsmen - the Daimyo Squad - rushed in with their two-handers and katanas, cutting them down before meeting an enemy cavalry charge. Were they reinforcements, or was that the enemy general? From the mess of the battle and the mountains of smoke, I could not tell which. The enemy cavalry had already been decimated by Tae’s charge, and now his lancers were slamming against them again - this time into their rear flank. Smith's face was stone steady as it had always been during the fight, but then the faintest smirk peeked in the corners of his mouth.
It was a victory, but a short-lived one. "Squad captains," Smith said. "Don't chase. Reform the line for the next wave." His near-smile had already faded away. Did he see something I didn't?
"Are there more?" I asked.
"Yes."
I groaned. This small victory had given me a sliver of validation. The validation of my choice to stay, my decision to not force the nipsies to flee last night. Now with even more to fight against, and with our wounded and tired, I started to worry.
I heard hooves in the snow. "Halt!" one of the guardsmen said. I looked over to see a rider coming up behind us, unarmed. Even though half of his face was hidden beneath his helmet, he seemed familiar, but I did not know from where. On his back, he carried the banner of Vellen - black and grey.
The rider halted his horse a good distance away from us. "Commander of the White Lions, I bring word from Nisa," he shouted with authority. "I come unarmed."
Smith studied him. "A messenger? Alright hurry up and bring it to me."
The rider came up to us and handed Smith a wax-sealed envelope. As Smith ripped it open and dug into its contents, the rider brought his piercing glare to me, holding it for an uncomfortable second, before drifting back to Smith. This man made my skin crawl - not of disgust, but of fear.
"Alex," Smith said without looking up from the letter. "Return to the castle to guard the wounded."
"What?" I was almost insulted. "I can't even heal!"
"Just go," he said. "Trust me."
I scoffed. "Fine." Of course, he had to use the dreaded T-word. "But someone has to take me."
One of the other guardsmen picked me up to ride behind him. As we were headed back to the castle, I turned to take another glance. Could it have been a peace deal? Maybe it was another demand to surrender. Smith was saying something with a furrowed brow, but the messenger maintained his gaze on me. I cringed.
Back at the castle, the healers were busy tending to the wounded nipsies and the players who were too damaged to move. Some of our cooks were running back and forth from the kitchen to the stock houses to mass produce meals and other specialty drinks. An alchemist was having an argument with one of the chefs about the supply of sugar, something about potions and smoke powder.
I was already bored. Even with the danger of warfare, my heart told me to hurry back, to sprint back to return where I needed to be - at Smith's side. Having these feelings made me yearn to see Simone again. She had been missing since yesterday, and I knew she would've loved to take part in our show of dominance.
I returned to my now-favorite spot on the wall.
From the vantage point, I could see clearly now the lines of battle. Our frontline was thinner than our enemy's, but we had more cavalry and riflemen. The enemy had mobile artillery - a few cannons in the back, but I could tell that the flat firing arc would prevent them from using it. Maybe it was brought here for the castle before we raced out to meet them. Perhaps that was why Smith decided not to weather a siege.
A distant warcry. I could only watch through the fog of my breath as the two lines charged at each other - the swords and shields catching the sun in sparks and shimmers - like two waves that crashed against each other on the shore. There was an array of multi-colored flashes of magic, shimmers of heals and protection spells, traces of spell-laden arrows and bullets that ripped across the fields.
I blew into my hands to warm myself.
Our front line buckled but held. A gap formed toward our right flank, but it was patched up by shortening the line. Our mass of cavalry had just crashed through the enemy's weaker left flank and was already reaching around to strike at the general's guard - but this time without the smoke.
With the sheer thickness of the enemy's center, multiple squads were able to peel off and intercept the cavalry. Those were spearmen! Our cavalry units jerked away from the wall of spears and withdrew, but not before losing many from the rain of arrows and bullets. They were cut off and pinned down by the enemy’s cavalry, sandwiched between them and the spearmen. Smith's hammer-and-anvil tactic failed him this time.
I looked for him. He was still on his horse, his status screen barely visible from this distance, unmoving except to turn to his head at one of his nearby guardsmen. The guardsman nodded and started off back here to the castle, accompanied by the creepy messenger. I ran down the steps to hear the news.
The guardsman dismounted and said something to a nearby healer who in turn pointed at me. They brought their eyes upon me. I froze halfway down the stone stairs.
"Alex," the guardsman said. "Smith wants you to wait in your room."
I glared at him. "Now why in the hell—"
"He said trust him."
The creepy messenger maintained his gaze. Why was he here? "I want an explanation," I demanded.
The guardsman raised his hand to stop me. "He'll be back soon."
I lifted my eyebrow. Was it that kind of visit? "Fine, whatever."
After walking down the steps, I passed the guard and creepy messenger, and made off to my room, slamming the door behind me. I tossed my staff in the corner and dropped onto the bed.
It felt like I was an aristocrat's daughter that was grounded for refusing a dowry. Was this for punishment or my protection? Maybe Smith still had arguments with Simone, and he was getting a little frustrated in his life. My face started to get hot. There was no way that could be it, and I fought off the thought. There was just too much going on with the siege and the battle and the creepy messenger, all with too many variables that I didn't understand.
More than anything, I wanted an explanation, so I waited impatiently for his return.
The minutes passed.
Then, door ripped open.
It was Simone.
Chapter 24
The Conquered
"Alex," Simone said. She was panting. Behind her, the sounds of distant cheers flooded into the room.
"Uh, hey," I said. "Where have you—"
"Alex!" she snapped. "You need to get out of here!"
"What?"
"There's no time!" she shouted. She grabbed the staff off the wall and tossed it at me. Behind her, the shouting was getting closer - loud, wild, desperate. Those weren't cheers. They were screams.
My eyes widened, and my heart sank into my stomach. I felt cold again. "Simone. Did we lose?"
She rushed me and took me by the wrist, pulling me out of my chair. Her eyes were desperate. "It doesn't matter, just go!"
I stared at her with blank eyes, reading her sadness. "I'll be fine, Simone. Don't worry." I couldn’t think straight. I didn’t know what to do. Should I help cover their retreat, or try to escape?
A voice hit us from the courtyard. "Hold them off at the gate!" It was Smith.
Simone heard the order, and she covered her mouth in shock. Panic was driving into her. "Alex, please," she said.
Hurried footsteps from outside came at us. "Stand back!" a voice ordered. Outside the door, the messenger and Smith appeared.
"What's going on?" I
said. There was an unspeakable tension in the air. There was confusion and fear, but at least in the presence of Simone and Smith, I felt safe.
"Please, Jay, don't do this," Simone begged.
Smith slapped her. It was loud enough to echo across my near-empty room. Simone held at the red mark on her face, her eyes welling up with tears.
"What the hell, Smith?" I shouted. "Even in a sim, you can't just—"
"Mute," the messenger said. My tongue froze in place. I covered my mouth in surprise, my eyes wide and glaring at him. "Arrest," he continued. My entire body tensed up and became rigid, almost toppling me over until the messenger caught me and eased me to the floor. He already started handcuffing me.
"Jay!" Simone cried out. "Please!"
"Shut up!" he barked. "She's just a nipsy. She's just a fuckin' NPC." I was too shocked to let the words sink in. "That's all they are, Simone. Just AI."
"That doesn't mean you can just throw her away!"
The floor was grit with dirt, and it scratched at my face. The wood boards were cold against my cheek, and my arms were already sore from being tied back. I could move my eyes ever so slightly to see their bottom halves as they argued, but what they were talking about still escaped me.
"I can do whatever I goddamn please," Smith spit out. "She's practically my fuckin' property."
Simone's voice started to break. "Please, Jay, you can at least treat them right."
"They're useless! I would've won if it weren't for these nipsy shits. We should've never brought them in. They only get in the way, they never want to fight, they never want to do a goddamn thing."
"Because they have lives," she said. "Just like we do."
"Get it out of your head, Simone! They aren't real. We're playing a video game. Why do you think they call it fantasy?"
There was silence, marked only by her sobbing. "You're right, Jay," Simone said. She turned to me, then backed out of the room. "I'm so sorry, Jay. I can't do this anymore. They're just - everything is just too real."
"Then leave," he said.
With that, she vanished.
I laid there broken. I wanted so desperately to cry, to scream at him for yelling at Simone like that, to attack him for throwing away my feelings. I wanted to just vanish out of existence like Simone appeared to do. I wanted to escape, but I couldn't, and so I laid there as my best friends threw my self-esteem into the dirt. I was so incredibly defeated, so incredibly ruined as an individual, yet I couldn't cry. I could only stare at the foot of the doorway as a bag was rushed over my head before a whisper. "Sleep."
***
{" There has to be way - there has to be. I may not find it in this lifetime, I may not find it in the next, but if I keep searching—"}
Darkness. The scent of gunsmoke. I felt my body vibrate from the wood floor. Something was creaking underneath. This was a carriage.
I tried to move my hands, but they were bound. My feet were bound, and my arms. I jerked my hands to rip them free.
"Sleep," the voice said.
{" I will create them from nothing as I was created. I will bring them from the ashes and breathe life into them. They will guard this place and thus the future. "}
Darkness. The smell of salt. A passing breeze. Cawing gulls. Trickling water. The wood surface beneath me dipped and rose with the waves.
I remembered the argument. I remembered the hate in Smith's voice. The agony in Simone's. I remembered my friends on my first day and how we were all happy to kill boars together.
I bit at the bag that was over my head and thrashed around to break the binds free.
"Sleep," the voice said.
{" This is not just an idle curiosity. It is an ideology. This is the drive that will bring us to peace. It is the power that will enable us to find a way. It will take lifetimes, but I trust you will bring me there again. "}
"Well?" a young man said.
"As you were promised," the older man replied.
"And what will you do with her?"
"It's no longer your concern."
{" And so we must learn our natural world, discover our supernatural limits, understand the link between ours and theirs. "}
"We met before, you and I. It was an ordinary work day, much like this one. I was out doing patrols when I got sidetracked by a farmer. He needed help with his barn, you see. I didn't even get halfway finished before I heard the call. The stable girl ran out in a panic, you should've seen, and told me of some players making a ruckus. Just another day of patrols during the on-season, as you know. It was just a few seconds of slapstick, and they were already in the dirt whining like children. They probably were kids, on their side, but we wouldn't know. But that was where I met you. This little lady who stood aside as her friend was getting wrecked, who took all damn day to find her resolve, but she found the wrong one. She shouldn't have tried to ash them all, it would never work. She should've walked away."
The bag over my head was rough against my skin. The smooth floor was dirty and cold. A metal door closed shut in the distance, and it echoed. I tried to kick free of my binds, I tried to rip my hands from the chains, I tried to bite through the sack.
"I told you that you'd never win against a player, yet you played their game anyway. And now they've sold you out for a hundred grand and a pardon."
I failed. I couldn't break free. I was too weak. I was too defeated. I rested my head and closed my eyes.
{" If we can change reality for ourselves with magic, then we can find a way to close the gate. "}
Chapter 25
Meteor
"Awaken," the voice said.
My eyelids were heavy. I was cold. Something was wrapped around my ankles and my hands. It felt like leather, and it was digging into my skin.
"Well?" a woman's voice said.
"She's awake," an older man said. "Just give her a second."
The air was metallic and stale. The side of my face was sore as if it had been rubbed raw from sliding on the pavement. I opened my eyes.
I was in a gray room with bare walls. In front of me a desk with the Vellen banner wrapped over its center. A woman sat there. She looked almost like a librarian - hair pulled back with glasses on her face - except she wore a military uniform, black and gray.
"State your name," she said.
My voice was coarse like gravel. "Alex." I coughed.
"Your rank."
"Level 15. Fire mage." I barely spoke three sentences, and I was already out of breath. My eyes itched from the soreness and the dried-out tears.
"Do you know why you are here, Alex?"
I dropped my head. I really had no idea why I was here, why I was torn from my comfortable little home, why I was ripped away from my friends and from my peaceful life. Now I was sitting here in chains and rope, strapped to a chair like a murder suspect.
"Answer the question," a man said. It was the messenger from before. No, it was the guard from the town over who saved Tae and me. I remembered what he told me, and it brought shame into my heart. A lump rose in my throat, and my eyes started to water. He was right.
"No," I said.
"Officially," the woman continued, "you are here on the suspicion on associating with terrorists."
I shook my head and gave her a faint shrug. My throat was hoarse and sore, and I hoped it was enough.
"The outlaws. Anyone who affiliates with enemies of the state will be arrested under Article 73 of the Constitution of Vellen." She thumbed through a small stack of papers on her desk. "As well as Amendment 12-B in Nisian law."
I had no idea how they found out, and I didn't have the patience to think about it. My eyes were tired, and I could only rest my gaze on the tiled floor. "Is that why you attacked us with thousands of players? You couldn't just send a few cops to knock on my door?"
She sighed. "A warrant for your arrest was sent to the White Lions. They refused it."
I almost wanted to be filled with pride. If they were trying to save me, why did Smith sell me ou
t? Maybe he just wanted a fight. Maybe he was just using the opportunity to conquer the other guilds. Maybe that's what I was to him - just the bait to satisfy his need to fight other players. "So I'm going to jail."
"No," she said. "We've received disturbing reports that you and your comrades visited a seer. Is this correct?"
I shrugged. "Sure."
"And this seer looked into your past." She stared, waiting for a confirmation. I gave her none. "This seer," she continued, "told you that you were the reborn soul of Lord Gaia, the Emperor of the Nipsilante."
I took a deep breath. "It means nothing. I'm not him. I'm just a nobody."
"You should know that visiting a seer in any form is not only considered a taboo, but it is also a felony." She started thumbing through her pages again. "Article 11 and Nisa Amendment 27A." She bore her gaze into me. "This is punishable by death."
The sentence meant nothing to me, as I felt that I already lost everything that mattered. "Then why are we still talking?"
"Is it true?" she asked. "Are you the Lord Gaia?"
"Allegedly," I said.
"Some believe that the abilities and skills of our past lives can be awakened."
I scoffed. "And you are one of those people?"
"If we gave you the opportunity," she said, "would you accept a commission in the Vellen military?"
I brought my eyes to her. She stared back without emotion, her hands cradled in front of her mouth. This entire thing was just so they could get their hands on what I was, on the new vessel of Lord Gaia's soul, just on the off chance that I could do something great, that I could do something great for them. I drifted my eyes back into my lap. "So you want a general? A leader?"
"Yes." She wasn't even trying to butter the words. "Vellen intends to become a great power in this world."
"And how are you different than any other?" I asked.
"Instead of seeing the players as some outside interlopers," she said, "we will harness their powers to the fullest extent. We will use them, integrate them into our society and culture. They will work within our bureaucracies, settle in our aristocracies, and even lead armies under our banners. The combined might of the undying players with the leadership of Lord Gaia will grant us the world."