Travail Online: Resurrection: LitRPG Series (Book 2) Page 4

  “Me neither,” Ivan said. “I thought we were just going to bash up some dwarves. But Diardenna? That place is packed with elves, and they don’t mess around. They’ll kill us all before they let us anywhere near the forest.”

  “And the monsters that live in there,” Chauncey said. “I hear they eat people alive.”

  “Come on,” Ivan said, “you’re just messing with me.”

  Coral knew that the elves’ forest was heavily guarded and full of enchantments, but she hadn’t stopped to question whether they were all strong enough for this trip. Sybil and Sal were higher levels that her and Daniel. On the other hand, suggesting that the group couldn’t handle this might not be taken well.

  “Coral, did you hear that?” Sal asked.

  “She heard, she heard,” said Marco.

  “Heard what?” Coral asked, running to catch up with the others.

  “Sybil is having a party for her little sister and we’re all invited!” Sal said.

  “It’s Farah’s thirteenth birthday,” Sybil said. “She won’t want me pestering her friends, so we can hang out while I supervise from afar. It’s a last minute thing, and it won’t be fancy. Tonight at 7 o’clock.”

  “That’s great,” Coral said, “I’ll bring a cake from the diner if you don’t already have that covered?”

  “Thank you,” Sybil said, a quick smile flashing across her face.

  Marco added, “I can’t wait to meet you guys in person!”

  The group continued west, through Havenstock’s shopping district and out through the west gate from the city. They walked for a few miles before approaching a wide trench.

  “Alua,” Coral asked, “how did you become a Medium, if you don’t mind my asking?”

  “When I was a little girl,” Alua said, “and this was hundreds of years ago, mind you, I was fascinated by the old stories. Where the gods came from, what their relationships were to each other, how they decided when to intervene in mortal affairs, or not to intervene.

  “I prayed to them. Not the same way that a Priest does, praying for something. I just prayed to them, talked out my problems, told them how much I loved various parts of the world that they had created or reshaped, thanked them for little things throughout my day.

  “Then one day, they started to speak back. I learned that prayer could be a two way street. Now, of course, I do more than pray. I commune with them. I tap into the ancient source of ethereal energy that animates them and I can feel their thoughts, their joy, their pain.

  “At my level, I can also Channel their powers. Not all of their powers, and not often, because the cooldown on my ability is very long, but when I need to I can draw down the power of the gods themselves.”

  “Channel sounds like a pretty amazing ability,” Coral said. She wondered whether that option were ever given to players, or if that was an NPC-only class.

  “The footbridge is out,” Daniel said, pointing to two wooden posts on the close side of the trench. Two more posts sat on the other side, but nothing bridged them together. The posts looked blackened and singed, like someone had lit them on fire. Whoever had destroyed the bridge took it down on both sides. Planks of wood and burnt cords of rope sat at the bottom of the ravine.

  “Whoever did this used fire,” Coral said. “Elves?”

  “Not necessarily,” Sybil said. “Fire is pretty basic. Most mages can cast it. And most muggles know how to light a match. Still, the elves might have burnt down the bridge after they crossed it on their way to attack Havenstock.”

  “The Regent is a wise leader,” Alua said. “I don’t share his fear of outsiders generally, but if he says the elf queen is amassing an army, we should be careful. She may well have spies afoot.”

  “How do you feel about the Regent stealing mines from the dwarves, is there wisdom in that?” Coral asked sharply. She was keen to see how Alua would defend that one.

  “I care deeply about the future of Havenstock, and about the Regent,” Alua said. “The dwarves have their own god watching out for them. If Podonos wants the dwarves to keep the mines, he will intervene.”

  In other words, Coral thought, let bad men do what they will and blame the gods if they succeed. The Regent really has Alua wrapped around his little finger. She seemed smart and tough otherwise. How does a woman like Alua fall for a man like Harold?

  “Are there other bridges we could take?” Sal asked.

  “Not nearby,” Alua said. “There is a bridge to the south, but it takes us out of our way.”

  “Anyone know how to build a bridge?” Marco asked, smirking.

  “We could climb into the trench,” Daniel said. “It looks like we can climb back up that slope to the other side.” He pointed across the chasm. The empty riverbed was a quarter of a mile across.

  “We should be wary of Mud Golems if we do that,” Alua said.

  Coral watched Daniel contemplate the next move. She wasn’t afraid of a few Mud Golems, not with such a large group. Marco probably couldn’t withstand a single hit from a high level mob though. It couldn’t be an easy choice.

  “We should cross here,” Daniel said. “If we have trouble, we’ll need to flank our teammates with lower HP and protect them against any mobs. We’ll cross as fast as we can, ok?”

  Everyone agreed. Coral climbed ten feet down into the river’s rocky embankment before her sahuagin boots touched the muddy bottom. Sal struggled to lower his considerable weight gracefully, and then just let himself fall into the ravine. He probably lost a few hit points in the process, but at least he got down quickly. Marco was the last to climb down. It looked like he had a tough time climbing in his long, white robe, which now had streaks of mud down one side.

  Coral wondered if this was what the game was usually like, walking long distances on quests without having to worry that some murderous menace was always two steps behind. Then she heard a faint rumbling coming from the north.

  “What’s that sound?” she asked.

  She turned her head south and watched everyone stop to listen, and one by one, their faces dropped. Why was everyone panicking? Then she turned her head north again and saw it. A wall of water rushing toward them with the speed of a bullet train.

  “The River Rove is coming!” Ivan yelled.

  There was no time to run, no time to ask what to do, no time to think. In the next instant, Coral was blasted off of her feet and tumbling uncontrollably through the raging waters of the River Rove, a river she was certain had been a few miles east of here just an hour ago.

  She could barely see through the onrush of white water whirling and crashing in every direction. The sound of her friends’ voices didn’t distill into words, it just sounded like gurgles. She dove under the water to try to swim against the current, but it was nearly impossible to make any headway. Underwater, away from the turbulent splashing overhead, she could see. Thanks to the Aquavision from her Sahuagin Suit, the outlines of a few people struggling against the current became clear.

  Alua was a dark shadow with pale legs, her purple clothing pressed tight against her body from the water’s pressure. She was swimming toward the embankment on the other side of the river. There was a guard, tumbling head over heels as he held his helmet in place, but still generally going in the right direction. And there was a flailing white blob that could only be Marco. He was tangled up in his robe and couldn’t manage to swim properly.

  Coral didn’t know Marco, but she knew she didn’t particularly like him. He was rude, and seemed to want her out of the group. Nonetheless, she wasn’t going to let him drown. She swam forward, a cerulean shape against blue waters, and grabbed him by his frock.

  Swimming was a stamina drainer, and Coral’s 150 Stamina Points were diminishing rapidly. She also had a weight penalty added to her for carrying Marco while she swam. She needed to get out of the water, quickly.

  Voices yelled out overhead. Daniel, Sybil, Sal? Coral popped her head above water to look around, and saw only Alua and one guard. They had
pulled themselves from the river and were now running alongside it to keep up with Coral as she was washed downstream. Coral kept swimming with one hand, kicking her fish-skinned boots as fast and hard as she could, pushing closer and closer to the river’s edge. She was close now, an arm’s reach away from hoisting herself and Marco back up to safety.

  With what she thought could have been her last breath, she pressed herself into a nook between a large rock and the river’s wall, escaping the force of the river’s water. She pushed Marco onto the rock, then herself.

  Marco untangled his robe, gulping air into his lungs. Coral leaned against a muddy outcrop and caught her own breath. Chauncey loomed overhead, staring down at her with his hands on his knees. “A little help?” she asked, reaching an arm up toward the guard.

  “I don’t take orders from you,” he said, glowering at her. “Or him,” he finished, gesturing toward Marco. “Where’s Sir Daniel_of_Manayunk?”

  As if Coral was supposed to know any better than Chauncey did. She pulled herself up to ground level and then leaned over to help Marco climb up too.

  “You saved me,” he said, still panting.

  “Of course I saved you,” she said. “Where did that water come from, I thought the river was way east of here.”

  “The River Rove,” Alua said behind Coral, “originates far to the north. It spontaneously changes course, either sending its waters down the trench to the east of Havenstock, or this one, to the west. What awful timing for it to switch while we were down there.”

  “Where is the Knight?” the guard asked again. This guy was really obsessed with Daniel.

  “The others must have been washed further downriver,” Alua said.

  “We should go after them,” Coral said.

  “We can’t,” Alua said. “It’s too dangerous.”

  “Alua’s right,” Marco said. “The area west of here is all desert. The Sand Barrens. It’s a player killer zone that extends all the way here to the river. If we head north, we should be able to avoid it. It’s exactly what the others would do if they were in our position.”

  Coral was worried about what would happen to Sal, Sybil, and Daniel. She had a hard time believing that they would abandon her if she were the one that ended up further downstream. “But they’re our friends. They’d stand a better chance against PK’ers if we traveled with them.”

  “I’m too weak to be any help. If anything I’m a liability,” Marco said.

  “We should go north,” Alua said. “The real danger is by the riverbank, where attackers more often lie in wait for people to cross into this zone. If we press on through the open desert, we will encounter fewer threats and have a better chance of seeing attackers from afar.”

  Coral sighed. She could part ways with them and head south on her own, hoping that her friends really were further downstream. It would be foolish to split up though. She didn’t want to travel with just Marco and two NPCs, but for now, it was the best option. “Fine,” she said.

  As the four trudged away from the river, the air got hotter and dryer. River water evaporated quickly from Coral’s clothing, leaving her wet from sweat more than anything else. The scorching sun was also drying out her clothing. Her durability had gone down a point since she climbed out of the water. She rolled up her sleeves in the hopes it would help her cool off. Chauncey was less modest. He had taken off his breastplate and undershirt. With his pasty skin, he was begging for a sunburn.

  Marco’s white robe probably kept him the coolest out of the whole group. His short black hair was matted down against his tan skin.

  “So,” Coral said to Marco, hoping to build some rapport with him, “do you look like your avatar too?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “In real life, I mean,” she said.

  “I suppose you’ll see tomorrow night,” Marco said. “The big reveal. One thing’s for sure, Sal won’t look like a big green ogre.”

  “No,” Coral said, “he’s a skinny guy in real life, but he has the same face. Minus the tusks.”

  Marco stopped walking. “Have you met Sal in person?”

  “We all met last night at a diner,” Coral said. She remembered, too late, that the group had never met in person before that.

  “Ok, I get it,” Marco said. “You’re not going anywhere.”

  So much for being friends with Marco.

  “I don’t believe it,” Alua said, and started running through the desert, kicking up sand as she ran.

  In the distance sat what looked like a tremendous pile of granite rubble. As Coral got closer she saw that the rocks were chunks of wall, with mortar still binding some of the rocks together into larger boulders of destroyed construction. It was a long, dry walk, but eventually they caught up with Alua.

  “I can feel him, but he won’t speak to me,” Alua said. “These are the ruins of Sagma’s temple.”

  “I thought Podonos killed Sagma in some war of the gods,” Marco said.

  “I know it’s impossible,” Alua said, “but I sense him.” The rock pile was massive, and Alua started to circle it, feeling each stone with her hands. Marco followed behind her.

  Coral slouched against the rocks and slid into a sitting position. The hot sand warmed her skin through her pants.

  The sun was inescapable. Heat rose from the ground in the distance, distorting the horizon in a constant shimmer.

  Chauncey sat next to her as Marco traced the perimeter of the ruins with Alua. “What I wouldn’t give for some water,” he said. If Coral had water, she’d have already drunk it by now. Not that she would have been inclined to share it with Chauncey.

  “There’s a way in!” Alua called. Coral got up to find Alua. Chauncey stayed put.

  Alua was half inside a dark passage that led into the heart of the rock heap. Coral followed her inside and readied her bow just in case. There was a light flickering from somewhere inside, which meant they weren’t alone.

  “Hello?” Alua called out. There was no response. The deeper they walked into this cavern the less outside light reached them. The faint flicker further ahead did little to alleviate the darkness. This felt like some kind of trap. The only benefit to the long dark tunnel was that it gave Coral’s eyes a chance to adjust somewhat.

  Step by step they got closer to the flickering light until they reached the end of the tunnel. On their right was a large opening, leading into a room with a domed ceiling comprised of rocks and debris. It looked like a massive building had collapsed and spared this pocket of air from total displacement. The floor was smooth and flat, made of the same granite as the rest of this heap.

  Coral gripped her bow tighter as they walked into the large chamber. A dark figure knelt before a slab altar with a single flickering candle behind it.

  “Hello?” Alua said again. The woman stood slowly, a shadowy figure wrapped in a black shawl. When she turned to face them, Coral could barely see the woman’s eyes. They were narrow indents in a face that looked like a rumpled curtain of wrinkles.

  “Long have I waited,” she said, “for him to return.”

  “Sagma?” Alua asked.

  “The god of wisdom, king of knowledge, imparter of intellect. He lives!”

  “I feel his presence,” Alua said. “I am a Medium, but I cannot hear him.”

  The shriveled old woman walked over to Alua and looked up at her face. “He will not speak with those of clouded mind.”

  “What does that mean?” Alua asked. The old woman walked back to her altar and picked up a stick of some kind. Coral couldn’t make out the details, but it looked like a staff. She squinted at the old woman.

  >> Vernagi. Level 20 Devotee.

  “I am Vernagi. I oversee the rebuilding, one brick and one mind at a time,” the woman said, ignoring Alua’s question. She leaned on her staff and a red orb began to glow on top of it. Coral couldn’t help but look into the soft red light.

  “Alms for my master?” Vernagi asked. “Please share your gold so that Sagma’s temple
may be rebuilt.” The light pulsed with Vernagi’s speech, growing bright then dim again, bright then dim.

  With her eyes still fixed on that glowing red orb, Coral wondered who in their right mind would donate money to an in-game religious sect. People were here to earn money to take out of the game so they could pay their bills. They certainly didn’t come here to put more money into the game. Well, except for the few wealthy players that bought up all the best gear and kept the in-game economy supplied with the gold scraps that everyone else clambered for.

  Coral looked away from Vernagi’s staff and saw that Marco was staring into it. Alua, however, had her eyes fixed on the old Devotee.