It felt like they could feel every bump in the road as the wagon advanced onward to Kreis. The lush farmlands of Haelshire had faded away to a land of barren rock, the number of travellers decreasing as they entered a wasteland. Even the sky clouded over as they travelled onwards. The wagon was not taking the transition from tiled road to dirt track well, and the wheels were almost certainly about to fall off as it jumped back and forth. Delarius for his part didn’t seem to mind, but the party and the horse most definitely did. Still, it was the only way for them to get to Kries, and James and Amelia most definitely appreciated the ride.

  “Why is this area so barren?” Grey asked, trying to keep the immersion up as best he could.

  “It was a war hundreds of years ago,” Delarius explained, “with them.”

  He pointed to a cliffside as the cart rounded a corner. The party looked up to see a massive skull jutting out of the side of the cliff, big enough to swallow a house whole. A long, jagged string of bone ran parallel to the road, clearly the remains of a massive spine that eventually led into a tail. It didn’t take them long to realise what they were looking at: the fossilised skeleton of a dragon.

  “When Corinth was still a new nation, it went to war with the Draconic Enclave of Phalanx. Dragons scorched the earth here, with such ferocity that it never regrew. Some say their shambling corpses are still here, risen by Necromancers who planned to strike at Kries.”

  “Zombie dragons?” James repeated.

  “Don’t you dare,” Amelia growled back.

  “If we have time at the end of this session, I think we should explore this place,” Grey said, “see if there really are any around here.”

  “You really think we’re gonna find anything? It’s just gonna be a wild goose chase.”

  “Even if what James is looking for isn’t there, there might be sidequest stuff. Might be a good place to grind, especially for him.” They gestured at Patrick.

  “Well I’m sorry I got killed,” Patrick replied, “that was completely my fault.”

  “Our levels should balance out eventually anyway,” Grey added, “provided we don’t wipe or something.”

  “That’s fine and all,” Amelia said, “but do you actually believe what James said about that whole incident?”

  “Maybe…maybe a little,” Grey admitted. “You have to admit something is wrong with this game.”

  “Yeah, but there's nothing that wrong with it.”

  “Is that why you asked me about hacking the game?” Patrick asked.

  Grey nodded. “And there’s another thing. That old guy we ran into yesterday? I checked his name in the player database. He doesn’t exist.”

  Patrick raised an eyebrow. “So what the hell was he? Some kind of poorly coded NPC?”

  “He had a player name tag, though,” James pointed out, “and even a class. He sure didn’t act like a player.”

  “The database doesn’t lie. Unless he deleted his account two hours after we met him, he’s not a player.”

  The group sat there in silence for a second, processing the information in their own ways.

  “We wait until my people get back to me,” Patrick said, “then we’ll see where we go from there.”

  “We’ve almost arrived,” Delarius shouted. “Enjoy the view.”

  The party turned around to see a massive city that had somehow snuck up on them as they travelled. The sky was darker now, letting the green light that spilled out from the city illuminate its gothic towers as the only thing standing in this barren, mountainous waste. The city was circular, filled with dark towers connected with bridges reaching up to the sky, ascending in height the closer they got to the centre: a far cry from the haphazard layout of Haelshire.

  “This is Kries, the city of magic,” Delarius explained, “home of the study of the arcane. I imagine they decided to be here because of the dragon war. Magic from dead dragons often seeps into the land. That or they’re just very theatrical. Mages often are.”

  “Speak for yourself,” Patrick muttered.

  It was a little longer before they reached the city itself, which had no kind of wall to protect itself: presumably there was nothing in this dead region to attack it. The streets were orderly, with a proper roadway for the cart to travel down and sidewalks that seemed to rise out of the rock. The green light they’d seen earlier was radiating from street lamps with flickering whitey flames that were placed evenly along the roads, and a few that hung from the towers above. Said towers were ornately carved out of black metal and stone, with gargoyles and statues of knights perched everywhere. The further they got into the city, the more needlessly complex these structures got, like the city was trying to one up itself.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

  “Those gargoyles aren’t living, are they?” James asked.

  “Not yet!” Delarius replied, smiling.

  “I feel like you’ve just created more questions.”

  “This place is definitely richer than Haelshire,” Grey commented. “Everything looks so clean.”

  “Kries is a city of scholars and universities,” Delarius explained. “It naturally receives a lot of funding from the monarchy. Most of Haelshire’s money has gone to the technological revolution. Here, there is no funding required to cast magic, it all goes to the infrastructure.”

  “Sure, I’m certain it’s not due to a corrupt upper class or anything,” Patrick muttered.

  “I swear you infer that in everything,” Amelia replied.

  Their rickety cart got some stares from the finely dressed inhabitants of the city, many of whom were wearing the pointy hat of classic wizards, and were clearly unimpressed by Patrick’s much more beaten up version. Soon, they reached the heart of the city, a circular area with a huge tower in the centre, the tallest in Kries. It didn’t even start at ground height, with a hole being carved out of the centre of the circle and a large chunk of the tower descending into the ground below, with only thin bridges to enter the tower at this level. Standing on arches above these bridges were statues made of dark metal. The one in front of the party was a figure draped in a cloak so thick it was impossible to discern the rest of their body, who was carrying a book in one hand and a staff in the other.

  “Who are those?” Grey asked.

  “The gods of Sable,” Delarius explained, “where all forms of magic come from. Each school of magic is drawn from a different god. That is Mechadon, the god of Clericcraft. You have faith in him, and he has faith in you, so he grants you a part of his power to exploit the magic innate to this world. The magic they made this world with.”

  “I don’t know how much faith I have in my god,” Patrick said.

  “I think we’re just meant to roleplay this out,” Grey replied. “Locking out magical classes because you don't believe in a fictional god does not sound very fun.”

  “All of you use magic to an extent,” Delarius continued. “Even our Saber and Guardian draw from Mekan, the god of Alchemy. But enough talk of gods.” He jumped off the cart. “I shall go and park this in a stable. Now we’re in a much nicer city, we can probably get a better cart. Meet me back here shortly.”

  Fast Travel Unlocked

  Kries

  The party glanced around, examining their surroundings as the NPCs gave them more incredulous looks. There didn’t seem to be many players around this area, although none of them were familiar enough with the area to know why. In fact, most of the city had felt weirdly empty when they entered, with the wizards being the only people around. James opened up the quest menu.

  Quest Objective

  Court of Spiders

  Wait 29:54 for Delarius to return to the Tower of Night in Kries.

  “I hope that’s minutes and seconds,” Patrick said, glancing over James’ shoulder.

  “It’s ticking down, so it should be,” James replied. “Well, I think we could spend some time sightseeing until he comes back.”

  “I wanna get some new gear,” Amelia said, “and if the blacksmith here is the same guy, I swear to God…”

  “Which one?” Patrick asked, pointing at the statues. Amelia gave him a glare and walked away.

  “Do you even know where the blacksmith is?” Grey asked.

  “We’ve got enough time to find it,” she responded, not even looking over her shoulder. “C’mon, last one to find it has to buy us drinks.”

  “Implying that you’ll ever find it,” Patrick shouted back. Amelia kept walking and vanished into a side street. Grey sighed.

  “Guess we’d better follow her...and hope we don’t get lost.”

  The group marched forward to begin their new adventures in the city of Kries.

  James Stats: Level: 5 VIT: 300/300 STR: 15 DEF: 15 DEX: 5 SPL: 15 INT: 1

  Amelia Stats: Level: 5 VIT: 200/200 STR: 25 DEF: 5 DEX: 10 SPL: 5 INT: 0

  Grey stats: Level: 4 VIT: 150/150 STR: 5 DEF: 15 DEX: 5 SPL: 20 INT: 0 Healing Pool: 400/400

  Patrick stats: Level: 3 VIT: 100/100 STR: 20 DEF: 5 DEX: 15 SPL: 15 INT: 0 Mana: 150/150