Chapter 18

  Bound To The Tower

  The clearing, even in the absence of the king’s shadow, felt cold. The iron scent of blood lingered, the pool below Jason spreading in tendrils over grass and earth. A twig snapped. Their collective concentration on Jason had been broken. The wounded orc was trying to pull herself to her feet.

  “Grab her! I’ve got some questions to ask her. So far as your friend is concerned, we wait to see if he messages back or despawns.”

  Moving before Sir BlackDagger had even finished his sentence, Stabitha and David rushed the orc, grabbed her by the arms and held her in place.

  Beatrice’s thoughts went to the small green skinned creatures lying on the forest floor. “Oh no. The dead goblins, they never despawned. What is happening, Eric?”

  “I really hope this is some sort of sick dream, but this is looking a lot more like some ‘you die in the game, you die for real,’ anime or B-list horror movie type of B.S. This whole situation seems really messed up, but we don’t have enough to go on to determine anything yet.”

  Mark began pacing as Raj swayed side to side.

  Mark’s voice was walking a dagger’s edge between fear and anger as he said “We can determine that my frat-brother is missing one of his eyes. This doesn’t just seem really messed up; it obviously is! And you’re saying Jason might be dead, like dead, dead! This is a nightmare, man. No, this can’t be real.”

  Sir BlackDagger placed a hand on each of Mark’s shoulders. “I just checked and my livestream went dark, too. From what I can tell, we are cut off. We need to find that kobold and get some answers, but we’ll start with trying to figure out how to interrogate the orc. I’m sorry about your friend, but if he’s dead, then that leaves us with more questions... More questions and in a lot more danger.”

  J.D. was working to keep Neal calm in the aftermath of the unexpected loss of his eye. “Come on, let’s go over there by that large tree so they can talk here,” he said, half dragging a still erratic Neal away from the group.

  Beatrice rubbed the toes of her shoes together and ran her thumbs in circles around each other. “So, I might be able to help with that. You were being such a jerk when I came back from being held prisoner, so I never told you. The kobold, the one who rescued me, and I both got a linguistics skill that let us each make out some of what the other was saying. I only have one level in the skill, but I can understand some of what the orc says.”

  “Are you kidding me? Why would you keep that part of your story to yourself? Nevermind, I don’t care right now. How does the skill work?”

  “Wait, you got what?” asked Raj.

  She ignored them, responding only to BD. “It’s a linguistics skill, it basically does what the name implies. It might be enough to get some answers.”

  “That is bloody insane, they added a skill to talk to monsters? Why?” Raj interjected again.

  “I don’t freakin’ know, alright. They must’ve added it a couple of patches back. The kobold had the skill, too. There’s either a lot going on with kobolds in general or this one kobold has been up to a whole lot lately. Either way, we were talking about the orc, we need to try to find out what they know, right?

  “We do need some answers,” Eric replied, holding his hand up to silence Mark and Raj.

  “Then I need to talk to her,” she said.

  Beatrice walked over to where her brother, David, and Stabitha were holding the wounded orc in place. Her brother’s fingers danced with sparks and Stabitha had her axe held aloft towards the orc. She was their prisoner now.

  “Okay, orc, my name is Beatrice. Can you understand anything I’m saying to you?”

  She received nothing but a glare from the orc. It couldn’t just be easy, could it? That would be fair, and we can’t ever just have something be freakin’ fair for once.

  She let out a sigh, took a deep breath in, and started over.

  “We need answers and communication seems to be pretty one-sided. So, we’re going to have to get creative. What was that thing? You called it, Drutha?” she said pointing at the dead orc who’d been cloaked in shadows. It might not have aided anything, but she added several gestures to help articulate her question.

  To the orc’s credit, she spoke. The sentence was like speaking with the kobold all over again. Only a few words made any sense.

  “I’m not sure how helpful it is, but I got just a little bit of what she said. ‘Drutha, master, hunt, and all dead’. It sounds like there were others with them before she ran into us.”

  She watched as the orc’s eyes went wide with recognition.

  Beatrice’s heart skipped a beat. “Holy crap, guys. I think the orc just got linguistics, too.”

  “Linguistics skill?” the orc asked, her thick brows scrunched in confusion.

  “That’s a strong confirmation there. She can understand bits, just like I can. It will be broken speech and hard to get things across, but it’ll be better than nothing.”

  “Ask her if she knows anything about a kobold,” Sir BlackDagger demanded.

  As much as she wanted to sigh at being commanded around constantly, she held it in and directed her attention towards the orc.

  “Do you have a name? Mine is Beatrice.”

  The orc was looking at her with a tilted head, the confusion evident in her expression, but she gave her name.

  “Okay, you’re called Mor. Do you know anything about a kobold coming through here, Mor?”

  Again, she tried miming the height and features of a kobold while she spoke, in case it could carry some of her meaning through to the huntress.

  Beatrice thought, Any information I can gather about whatever is going on would be valuable, but the creature we fought off talked about the kobold, too. It’s possible that the little kobold holds some of the answers they needed.

  After a few moments of back and forth half-understood dialogue, she had a general idea of the orc’s situation.

  “Alright people, I’ve got the gist of things. This guy was her mentor, their hunting leader, I guess. Anyways, they were tracking the kobold, and apparently he’s killed several monsters that should have killed him on his journey this way. They were tracking where the goblins had escaped to, but they were attacked by this shadow. The shadow took over her mentor, Drutha, who then killed the other students before chasing her our way. Whew, that’s everything.”

  “Can she continue tracking them?” asked Mark.

  She didn’t hold back the sigh. I definitely wasn’t built for being an interpreter. Still Mor seems to be opening up to me a bit more as we’ve talked. Maybe it’s that she doesn’t sense any threat from me? she thought.

  This time, however, her efforts had returned something more interesting than the last exchange.

  Mor returned with her own question, and Beatrice could only make out 2 words. “Protect”… and “guide”…

  The orc stared into Beatrice’s eyes as a ding sounded for each of the adventurers. All at once, they had each received a new type of notification. It was close to what quests looked like, but the system displayed it as a deal.

  You Have Been Offered A Deal!

  Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.

  Offer Protection To The Huntress

  In Exchange For Guidance.

  Penalties For Failure: Unknown

  Rewards For Mor’s Survival: Potential Ally

  0 of 8 Adventurers Have Accepted

  Acceptances Required: 8

  They all saw it immediately tick up to one out of eight. The two groups of adventurers were looking at each other for clues as to who had already agreed to the deal when xGreenWardenOnex ended their questioning looks.

  “It was me, I accepted the deal. Now are we all going to just sit here, or are we going to find this kobold and get some more answers?”

  The two players who’d stepped aside returned to the group as the number ticked up a few more times to five of eight. It looks like my party had her back. What are we going to do about the others, though? she thought.

  “Screw it, that little kobold has been nothing but bad news, and whatever that shadow thing was, it was after that little lizard. It messed Neal up, and if Jason is really dead, then I want blood. You guys with me?”

  “I don’t know what to do. That thing, it took one of my eyes, man. How am I even supposed to fight like this?”

  Raj was the first to respond, saying, “You can do this Neal, we have your back. We’ll just have to take on whatever comes our way as a team.”

  “Yeah, we have your back, bro,” said Mark.

  The number filled in one at a time, to six, to seven, and then, after just a moment of hesitation, to eight.

  * * *

  Lana watched as a wall of white shifted around her and spat her out onto an outcropping near the base of Mount Vulpin. She was high enough to see the emberwood forest stretching out towards the horizon below and the Black Tower in the far distance climbing up, endless into the sky.

  It’s been a long time since I saw your tower. Not since they took it from you and split it into parts. I’m going to take it back, piece by broken piece.

  It looks like Wolf got in on time, who knows when the doors might be shut behind us. His username is WolfNinetySix? Easy enough to remember. If he did everything properly from his end, then he’s started already at level five, like me. He just needs to finish his task and meet with me near Nik’s location.

  She was just waiting on a chat response from him now, so they could connect with each other and move forward as a unit. He’s a loyal friend, but he doesn’t know this world or its dangers, not like I do. He was just a pup when this started, and he never read the architect ascendant’s notes; I never offered to let him.

  She tucked her hair behind a pointed ear and scanned the area around herself, emerald eyes searching for a path down the mountain. Then, she sent out one last message before taking her first step forward.

  * * *

  The burrow somehow didn’t smell very strongly of earth anymore. Either that or Nik was just beginning to get used to the environment. It was probably the latter.

  His students were progressing pretty well, though. It probably had a good deal to do with the Mentor System speeding things along. He could see them improving as the hours went by. It wasn’t levels climbing up, but he could see their understanding and capability increasing regardless.

  It was interesting to see how some people picked up more quickly than others with wind versus the spear. While Worik had taken to the spear like a kelpie to water, Kath had picked up on wind much more quickly than Nik had. Stics seemed to struggle with the learning process more than the others, but he was determined not to be left behind.

  If I had a favorite between them, it would probably be Stics, but I will not be telling the others about that. I wonder if he’d like being called Bonesy?

  Finally, the bell rang again, and he could see that Stics had finally gained the wind skill. Interestingly, Kath had both gotten Gentle Breeze and Wind Slice, when the others had only gained the latter. So, it looked like their paths would not be identical.

  They took a break once they had all three gained the skill, and Nik watched Pearl pull Kath aside. I think she might have a favorite, too, he thought.

  The system rang out again with a slightly different sound from the one he’d gotten used to. The unexpected new sound, annoyingly, made him yelp in front of his students.

  New Message From User: AdminHarper

  Hello, Nik. I’ve been waiting to talk to you. You were the first to experience my changes to the system. I’d hoped to watch you grow stronger before introducing myself, but it’s too late for that now. You’ve become bound to the tower, and awakened the Fifth King from his slumber. There is more at work here than you know. It’s all my fault. I’ll find you soon and explain what I can. For now, get stronger, make friends and do it fast. He’ll be coming for you. ~ Your hopeful friend, Lana.

  That’s new. What am I supposed to do with that? Bound to the tower?

  “Um… Pearl, you might be curious about what just popped up from the system. I think we’re going to be getting some old questions answered pretty soon, but I’ve also got some more now that I didn’t have a moment ago. So, I guess it might even out a bit on the questions versus answers scale.”

  “That is becoming a pretty consistent conversation hook for you, Nik. You should work on making it seem more interesting. When you are trying to get my full attention next time try something different.”

  Partway through her speech, she put on a voice, and doing a poor imitation of Nik, said, “Something like, ‘Hey Pearl, I thought you might want to hang onto every word my system has to say and help me to solve every problem because you are incredible. The fate of the world hangs in the balance, and I cannot do it alone. Also, you are incredible.’ You know something wild like that.”

  Nik’s shoulders slumped a bit as he let out a sigh and responded.

  “You’re right, I should be giving you more thanks and praise than I have. I am very grateful that you’ve been such a faithful friend to me. More than once now you’ve repaid the life I saved, and I’ve taken you being by my side for granted. You are an incredible friend and teacher. And also, the fate of the world hangs in the balance and I can’t—oomf”

  His words were cut off by a faery-sized fist to his sternum. The fist was attached to a sprite with a very smug grin. Her light chuckle made the teasing worth it.

  “Yes, I am. Now, what did your system have to say?” Pearl asked.

  Nik took a moment to get his thoughts in order, and then he said, “That’s the part that has me a bit confused. I don’t know if I should be curious, hopeful, or concerned. It wasn’t a message from the system like usual. It was from a person, I think. Maybe an adventurer. They had a weird name like adventurers do. Each time I’ve defeated one it has said their names, and they all seem like weird words just smashed into each other. This one was called AdminHarper, but the message said they were called Lana at the end, too.”

  “You skipped to the end of the message a bit.”

  “Right, sorry. Umm, it said that they’ve been waiting to talk to me. They wanted to just watch me get stronger, but I’m bound to the tower and I woke the Fifth King up. Not a fun guy to hang out with, by the way.”

  Pearl shook her head and motioned for him to continue.

  “Right. Sorry. There’s stuff I don’t know, but they’ll find me soon and explain what they can. I need to get strong quickly, because the king will be coming for me. Then they signed the message as being from my hopeful friend, Lana.”

  “You do seem rather easily distracted today, but I think I will put that down to stress. That message is interesting, but it hints at you being some kind of pawn, which I do not like. I want to know what it means by you being bound to the tower? I feel like we should be very cautious of this person.”

  “I get that, but the earliest system texts I got said, ‘Error, admin notified.’ This could be the same admin person, and they might be able to tell me why I can level up in the first place. Maybe they could even help me to not travel in my sleep.”

  “Maybe, but we do not know anything about who they are, or even where they are. For all we know, they are on the far side of the tower. Soon could mean anything, it is fairly subjective. We do not know. So we should focus on what is here and now. You, and your clan.”

  “Me and my clan… That’s easier said than done. I’ve been given an honor that I wasn’t prepared for. I will protect them as well as I can, but that’s just the most basic part of it all, isn’t it? A promise to do your best, with no plan to speak of. What will the plan be? Find a place to build a new home for over a dozen goblins with only a few of them able to fight at all. I need to raise my other skills high enough to teach them to my students, and we need to get them more ready for combat. They had the adventurers outnumbered the last time and they almost died. They would have died if we couldn’t get them to the healers in time.”

  “Then that is step one, Nik. We get you and your students stronger. We train and let the elders see to the rest of your people. They know what is needed. Let them do their part while we do ours.”

  “Thank you, Pearl. I mean it. We can do this. We’ll just focus on one step at a time, together. Let’s get to it then. Will you work with the others while I train myself?”

  “Of course, I will have them throwing wind slices at the wall every time they have enough mana, and when they do not have the mana, they will be practicing their form with weapons. They will practice with both their unique specializations, and with the spear in turns.”

  With a nod, she went to do just that, leaving Nik alone with his thoughts and plans to do his own training.

  What do I even train first? Let’s see. I have ranged wind attacks, the ranged earth attack, Wind Claw and Flame Blast as my big abilities, and shock armor for defense… which I really could have used in my fight during the last part of the trials. I forgot about that one. I guess that’s the one I’ll practice then, so next time I won’t forget it’s even a thing.”

  He separated himself from everyone else. The air crackled with energy around him as he trained with his shield and spear. The air would calm until his MP reached back up to 10, after which it would be filled again by the sparks that leapt from every inch of his body.

  Nik squeezed his fingers around the shaft of his spear until his fingers started to tingle with numbness. Next time I face someone or something in combat—I won’t be an easy target. Striking at me or my friends will come at a cost.