The Greystone Chronicles: Book One: Io Online Read online

  “Ahh… but we have a wizard! Who’s like a zillion years old and probably knows how to make portals. I bet we could bribe him to come along. We could be there and back with party supplies in a few hours!” Alexander chuckled. The dwarf was nodding his head vigorously.

  They headed back inside, and had no sooner sat down to eat when said wizard appeared. “I smell food! Why didn’t you wake me, you ungrateful louts!” he complained as he sat down and stabbed a wolf stead with his fork.

  “I didn’t want to wake you twice in one day,” Alexander winked at the old man, who was too busy piling potatoes onto his plate to notice.

  “Yes, well,” the wizard harrumphed. “How did your trip to the dungeon go?”

  “It went very well, actually. The spells you taught me came in very handy. Thank you.” Fitz just nodded as he stuffed his face. “We cleared the first two floors, and killed the second floor boss in record time,” he added.

  “Then we got ambushed by some PWP assholes in the cemetery!” Sasha added with a wicked grin. “We killed six and let the captain arrest the other three. Now one of them is lurking about outside our gate.”

  Fitz didn’t show that he’d heard anything they’d said, being focused on a more important issue. “Excellent steak! Can I assume you are the chef, Sasha dear?” he smiled at her as if she were an angel come to bring him endless yummy treats.

  “Yes, though I just followed Lydia’s recipe, and Alexander helped.” She returned his smile.

  As if summoned, there was a brief knock on the front door followed by Lydia’s voice, “Kids, did you know there’s a man outside watching you?”

  “We’re in here!” Sasha called out, “Please join us for dinner. And yes, we’re aware of mister creepy outside.”

  “I’d be happy to go and tell him to move on,” the captain said as he and Lydia joined the group in the dining room.

  “Thank you Captain, but I think I’ll deal with him myself. Since we’re on the topic, Fitz, what are the current settings of the main gate ward? Kill, or teleport? Or have you made some changes?” Alexander asked.

  “Hmmmm?” The wizard looked up from his meal, apparently just realizing that Lydia and her husband had joined them. “Oh, hello Lydia. You’re doing a fine job teaching young Sasha. This food is excellent!” he waggled his eyebrows.

  “Pay attention old man!” Lydia scolded him. “There’s a bad man outside the gate, and Alexander needs to know about the wards.”

  “Yes, yes! I heard him. The wards at the outer and inner gate are currently set to teleport intruders to the city dungeon. To change the settings or turn them off and on, you need only hold your amulet and focus on what you want.”

  “Thank you, Fitz. I think I’ll go deal with him now. Captain, I intend to set the ward to kill. If you have an issue with that, please tell me now. I don’t want to end up sharing a cell with the PWP morons later!”

  Sitting down and helping himself to some steak and vegetables, the captain considered for a moment. “As long as you do not force him into the ward. Or if you do, it is only after he has attacked you and you are in defense of your life. We will have no problem with that.”

  Alexander nodded his head. “I will not be the aggressor. I’ll let him kill himself with his own stupidity. Though, I’ll have to ask you to take my word for it. If he sees the captain of the Guard watching, he’ll simply bide his time till later.”

  “That’s no problem. I’ll cast a scrying spell. We can all watch and listen from here while we eat!” Fitz volunteered.

  “Perfect!” Alexander said, getting up. “Wish me luck. If nothing else, this should be interesting. Do me a favor, if he does manage to kill me, try to get my sword back?”

  Alexander headed out the front door, walking straight to the bailey tunnel and out to the outer gate. He took one step beyond the warding, out into the street. Addressing the man in black armor, who was still casually leaning against the wall of the palace keep, he asked, “Can I help you with something? You seem to have a special fascination with my gate.”

  “Not with your gate, but with you,” the man said. “You and your friends seem to have a problem with me and mine.”

  “I don’t even know who you are. What problem do I have with you?”

  “Well, you have made a habit out of killing my men, and launched some kind of campaign against us on the holos.”

  “Ah, so you’re one of the PWP assholes!” Alexander pretended to be suddenly enlightened. “To be clear, I’ve killed nobody that wasn’t trying to kill me. Your moronic friends have just been complete failures at it so far. I suppose you’re here to do better? Did I kill your boyfriend or something? What is your name, by the way?”

  The man simply chuckled. He pushed himself off the wall and walked about halfway across the street. Alexander backed up a step, putting himself back inside the ward. The man stopped advancing.

  “If I were to decide to kill you, there is nothing you could do to stop me. I’m here to give you a chance. Go to the king, tell him there was a misunderstanding, and to let my men go. Then we’ll kill you and all your friends one time for appearances sake, and let you go on about your business.”

  “YOUR men? So you’re the leader of PWP? And you came all the way here to tell me this?”

  “Yes, PWP is my guild, and one of the men you have locked up, Frank, is my brother. I came here to get him out, one way or the other. I’m giving you the opportunity to help yourself by helping me.”

  “I see. So what you want me to do is drop the charges against an asshole player killer who tried to kill me, then allow you to kill me and all my friends in order to save your reputation. Why would I agree to this?”

  “Because the alternative is worse for you. I will get my brother out either way. I have brought my entire guild, and we will storm the prison and rescue him and the others, killing as many NPC’s as we can in the process. Then we will hunt you down every time you leave this city. You will stay level one forever.”

  “And all your guildmates have nothing better to do than wait around to kill a level one noob over and over?”

  “They do what I tell them to do. As you said, they are mostly morons, but they’re useful morons who follow my orders.”

  “Wow,” Alexander shook his head. “You know that your brother and the others killed some NPCs in front of witnesses, right? That his bind point is now the prison? That rescuing him won’t help if he dies again anytime in the next year? I don’t believe you’ve thought this through. Is everyone in your family stupid? Or just the two of you? You know that there are something like ten thousand guards in the city? There’s no way your little guild overpowers them all.”

  The man’s face turned a livid shade of red. “That’s where you’re wrong, dead man. I thought through every detail. We have the layout of the prison. We killed a guard for his keys about an hour ago. And once we’ve freed my men from their cells…” he reached into his bag, and Alexander took another step back, acting afraid. The man smirked at Alexander’s reaction and produced a scroll, “we will simply teleport out. Each of my men has a scroll. They will start fires and kill as many as possible all over the city before they port out. We will teach this city not to mess with PWP!”

  “As my dwarf friend would say, BWAHAHAHA!” Alexander took a single step forward, remaining inside the ward. “I warned the king you’d be coming, and as of this morning, only incoming teleport spells work anywhere in the city. Guild Master Fitz saw to the teleport block personally.” Alexander hoped Fitz was paying attention. “So go ahead, moron. Raid the prison. It’ll save them the trouble of dragging you there when you’re caught!”

  Looking at the scroll in his hand, then man said, “You’re full of shit!”

  “Be my guest. Prove me wrong. I’ll wave at you as they drag you away.” Alexander waved both hands at the man. “Seee ya!”

  Putting away the scroll, the man said, “Maybe I’ll just kill YOU, then, and post the video for all to see.”
/>   “I’m sure you’ve spoken to your men who died this afternoon. Did they tell you I burned them to death? And I wasn’t really trying. I wanted them locked up, not dead. I think you’ll find I’m not so easy to kill.” Alexander raised his right hand, “With a thought, I can incinerate you where you stand!”

  “Oh, please. You’re, what? Level 15?”

  “Level 16, actually. Since I killed your guys today!”

  That did it. The man pulled out two nasty looking daggers and charged. Alexander held his hand up and moved his lips like was chanting a spell. Just as the man reached the ward, he said “Die!”

  The PWP leader died the moment he crossed the threshold. Unfortunately for Alexander, his momentum was enough that his body continued on far enough to push a dagger into Alexander’s thigh as it fell against him. His health dropped instantly down to 20%. His UI flashed a bleed debuff that would kill him in about 10 seconds.

  Ah, well. At least I took this asshole with me!

  He felt the rush of a major heal from Sasha just as he heard her yelling his name. His health went back up to about 50%, but quickly began to tick back down again.

  Then the body was flung off of him. Brick yanked the dagger from his thigh, then used his Lay on Hands ability. There was a flash of holy light, and Alexander was instantly healed and felt a rush of energy like he’d never felt before. Taking Brick’s offered hand, he was pulled to his feet. He barely had time to take a breath before a sobbing Lainey tackled him, knocking him out into the street and back onto his ass.

  “Don’t you EVER do stupid shit like that again, you ASS!” she screamed at him. “You nearly DIED! And for what? To teach some asshole a lesson!?” She squeezed him harder.

  Alexander waited for her to calm down a bit. The others stood around in awkward silence, except for Rufus, who ran up onto Alexander’s shoulder and patted Lainey on the head. She eventually released her death grip on him and stood up. She kicked him half-heartedly before he managed to stand up himself. “Idiot,” she mumbled.

  Mindful of his audience, he gathered her into another hug, and whispered to her. “Lainey, I know you love me, and want to protect me. I love you too. And I know this seems really real, especially with the immersion. But we’re still in a game. I wouldn’t have died for real. I’d have just respawned over there in the courtyard. Just like when the bunnies ate Brick’s ass”

  Lainey laughed despite herself, remembering the screaming dwarf and how upset she’d been when the others laughed. Alexander knew she understood then. She was going to be okay.

  Seeing her laugh, the others all relaxed. Max stepped over and looted the body of the PWP leader. He whistled. “Whoa! This is a matched set of unique epic armor. And the daggers are a set, too. All rogue gear. It must have taken this dude a year to round all this up. I bet he’s PISSED right now!” They all got a chuckle from that. Even Lainey.

  Remembering what the PWP had said, Alexander frantically looked around for the captain. Not seeing him, he looked to Lydia. “Where’s the captain!?? The PWP are planning to burn the city! We’ve only got about 8 minutes before they get the command to attack!”

  Lydia smiled at him, and Fitz chuckled. “We saw what he said in the scrying spell. The captain immediately teleported to the palace to alert the king and every guard in the city. They were arming up and spreading out, preparing to hunt down these raiders, when he attacked you. The moment his knife touched you, the entire raid party would have been marked with red criminal skulls. So I imagine they’re suddenly much easier to spot!” the wizard smiled. “If you say we have a few minutes yet, I’m sure most of them will be rounded up before they can cause much trouble.

  Attention all citizens and adventurers!

  The King has declared all members of the PWP Guild to be enemies of the realm. All guild members have been permanently marked as criminals, and will be instantly recognizable.

  Effective immediately, any citizen or adventurer who encounters them within the realm, and is able to apprehend or kill these criminals will be given a reward of 100 gold each.

  “Woohoo!” Max shouted, kicking the body. “Does that mean we just made 100 gold?”

  “We need to get out there and help round these guys up,” Alexander said. Everybody get geared up. We leave in 5.” He headed toward the house to get the rest of his own gear.

  Walking next to him, Lainey said, “Don’t you think you’ve had enough for one day?”

  Not pausing to answer, he reached for her hand and whispered to her again. “Lainey, you heard what he said. These guys are going to try to burn the city. They’ll kill as many players as they can. Worse, they’ll kill NPC’s who won’t respawn. We have to help save as many as we can!”

  Lainey stopped dead, jerking him to a halt. She waited for Lydia, Fitz, and the others to enter the house. “Alexander. Like you said, this is just a game. I’m concerned for your real life health. Your mental health. It can’t be good for you to die in here!” she hissed at him. “Besides, these NPC’s you’re trying to save are just programs. They aren’t real people. You ARE.”

  He let go of her hand. “I know you’re stressed out right now, but you need to get over it. I wasn’t hurt. I wasn’t traumatized. I’ve died maybe a hundred times in this game, and hundreds more in others. It doesn’t affect my mental state any more than an especially violent sneeze! And I’m going to forget you said that last part. These people here, they may be programs, but they’re intelligent and self-aware. They don’t follow a script. They respond to you as a person would. They have histories, families, emotions, and they feel pain. Many of them are my friends. Are you saying you’d be fine slitting Lydia’s throat because she’s just a program? That would make you just like the assholes we’re fighting.”

  He began to walk again, not really caring at that moment if she followed. She did. As they entered the house and headed up the stairs, he said, “I’m sorry to be so rough on you Lainey, but if you can’t wrap your head around dying in game, or you really feel that way about NPC’s, then you should consider leaving the game. Going back to your old position taking care of me in the real world. I would rather have you here with us, but if you can’t wrap your head around those two concepts, it’s not good for you to be here.” He left her to head into his suite and gear up.

  When he emerged and headed downstairs, he found Lainey with the others ready to go. Without a word they headed out. Fitz was going with them, so Alexander sent him a party invite. When they got outside, Lydia was leaving her shop wearing armor and carrying a staff, so he sent her an invite too. They jogged toward the central square where they expected the captain would be. He could tell them where they’d be needed most.

  As they reached the wide open square, the group were able to see a few small columns of black smoke rising here and there. Much less than they’d expected. There were more than three dozen men and women with red skulls over their heads on their knees and under guard. More were being led, pushed, or dragged in by a combination of players, guards, and groups of citizens. Alexander estimated maybe 50 that he could see. With nine locked up in the jail, and the leader freshly killed, that was roughly three quarters of PWP’s total membership accounted for, but that still left roughly twenty of them at large.

  Alexander informed the captain of this estimate, which earned him a grim look. “More have been captured and are being escorted here, but I don’t know how many. The good news is that they seem to have been targeting public places like taverns and markets. Hoping, I suppose, to do as much damage as possible. They had no warning before their criminal marks appeared, so many of them were caught by surprise and subdued without doing any serious harm. A few still managed to kill some citizens or guards before they themselves were killed or captured.” He lowered his head.

  “Have you secured the king?” Max asked. “The leader was a rogue, as many adventurer killers are. If I were planning this raid, I’d have had a group of stealth players targeting the king.”

  The cap
tain nodded. “They did indeed. We captured 4 rogues who had infiltrated the throne room and were discovered when their criminal marks made them visible. The Royal Family are all secured in the throne room surrounded by fifty of my best men.”

  “The sewers,” Brick said. “It be a standard way to infiltrate a city, and a good place to hide if yer hunted.”

  The captain looked surprised for a moment, then called over a lieutenant. He gave quick instructions, and the soldier ran off to start a sweep of the sewers. “Thank you, Brick. I’ve just ordered a sweep of the sewers beginning at the palace and working downhill to the harbor.”

  “Did you find any of them in the dungeon?” Fitz asked. “The man said a group of them would be trying to rescue his brother.”

  “We did not,” the captain shook his head. “We did find a half dozen of them in a tavern just a block from the prison complex. We think they were waiting there for their leader to take them into the prison. One of them had prison keys on him. Those poor fools were drinking in a room full of off-duty prison guards when their marks appeared. We’ve not yet found the body of the guard he claimed to have killed, but they will be questioned. Vigorously”

  By that time roughly another dozen PWP’s had been brought into the square. Alexander counted them carefully. Fifty nine here in the square. One dead leader. Nine in jail. Four at the palace. That was 73 in total. Alexander’s father had told him roughly 80 members of the guild. Would the 6 that they’d killed earlier in the day have teleported here for the raid? That was a big expense. Then again the leader had said that each of his men had teleport scrolls. And “roughly 80” could mean anywhere from 75 to 85. There are just too many variables. How can we know if any were still loose?

  Alexander had an idea. He asked the captain a few brief questions. The captain was able to confirm that 4 of the PWPs had been killed, and that at least 2 had managed to port away.

  “Captain, may I have your permission to address the prisoners? I may have a way to find out how many we’re missing, if any. I promise not to physically harm any of them, but I’ll need you to play along with any threats that I make.”