“Starting locations in NEMO are strongly linked to your real-life location. The exception to this rule is guilds that preregistered for the game that filed to prefill zones together. It is possible to change your starting location, but it is quite difficult. Characters are permanent and to change you must physically travel to the new zone. Doing this at a low level through dangerous wilderness and with a travel time of two days or more is generally not considered to be worth it.”

  Except from “A Beginner’s Guide to NEMO” by various

  Year 1, Month 1, Day 10, 12:00

  Sir Kelvin and his men glared with irritation at the undisciplined guild forces finally organizing themselves to move from their camp. They had been delayed more than 2 hours from their planned departure. Ron Don Morgan’s loud and irritating voice was making the vein in Sir Kelvin’s forehead bulge. He idly considered just pulling out his sword, killing the man and returning to the city, but no, he had his duty.

  Ron Don Morgan cast a scornful look at Sir Kelvin as he readied his guild and all the allied guilds. He placed his men in the front with the others who agreed to his plans behind them and the ones who weren’t a party to their machinations at the sides. He received word from his agents that the other monster camps had finally been roused and were marching to aid the goblin camp. “Alright you sorry lot of useless maggots, it’s time to march to war. Form up and move fast.” The army fell into a ragged column with Sir Kelvin and his men on the right flank, looking out of place among the players.

  The goblin camp came into view after an hour of advancing. Hundreds of goblins with bows were in position on dirt walls topped with wooden spikes. Sir Kelvin spurred his horse, and his knights quickly left the flank behind, slamming into the walls with massive strikes of lambent energy. Goblin bodies were flung about like leaves in a storm, and a massive hole tore through the lines of the monsters. Troops poured in, slaughtering the disoriented monsters behind the overwhelming might of the knights.

  Morgan led about three thousand of the men straight into the goblin tents, killing only those that stumbled into their path. They charged deep into the camp and out the other side, leaving the fighting behind. Billowing clouds of dirt and smoke obscured the field, giving them ample opportunity to escape the notice of Sir Kelvin. The fighting intensified within the camp as the massive numbers of goblins retaliated against the attackers. Low visibility made for a confused melee where quantity outweighed quality. The knights formed a bulwark against the monster tide, but their compatriots found their numbers dwindling.

  Dark lightning, black and unclean flashed across the clear sky. The very air ripped asunder and streaked with tendrils of wrongness and impossibility. Sir Kelvin faltered as he noticed his body weakening. He took in the field, summoning wind to clear the air and froze in horror. His knights and the 1,500 remaining players found themselves surrounded by goblins, orcs, gnolls, ogres and worse. A formation of malignant arcane power sprung to life around them, powered by orc sorcerers in a dozen nodal points. Each point centered around a makeshift wooden altar where captured peasants were being sacrificed for magical fuel.

  The knights felt their levels drop all the way down to 10 with a proportional reduction to each of their skills. Sir Kelvin lamented that every ability he possessed was at a fifth of what it should be, and his mana reserves were nearly spent. They no longer had access to their most damaging abilities, and they were cut off with no hope of escaping. The goblins inexplicably pulled back, giving them a moment of hope before it was utterly dashed.

  Ogres and gnolls pushed forward with nets and clubs, aiming to take the trapped adventurers prisoner. Bolts of electricity crashed into the line of players, sending large chunks of the army sprawling. The attacks weren’t aiming to kill but to incapacitate. Sir Kelvin understood instantly and ordered his knights to kill as many players as they could. They fell upon the helpless men with swords, sending them to respawn while angered monsters charged in to fight them. The knights slaughtered hundreds of players before they were either killed or incapacitated.

  The survivors were herded into iron cages on wheels. The cages were inscribed with runes to prevent anyone inside from using abilities. The surviving players just logged out to escape whatever fate they had in store, going limp inside the cages. Sir Kelvin and the dozen paltry survivors of his troops that lived to be captured knew what they were now, fuel dark magical workings of the enemy. He cursed Ron Don Morgan as he watched the bulk of their army, still fleeing in the distance, not pursued by the foe.

  None of the Red Hat Raiders of their compatriots looked back. They pushed hard towards their destination, the starter city of Carter’s Bluff. The smaller guilds could be absorbed into bigger guilds, and the Red Hat Raiders would finally be able to build their guild base. The city held at least two other large guilds belonging to the Young Masters Coalition. It would serve as the linchpin for the conquest of the Kingdom of Thorn by their coalition. Even better, they were critically weakening the defense of Miller’s Crossing and ending the story of Risk of Injury before it became larger than an accidental footnote.

  The news from the debacle at the monster encampment quickly spread among the players inside Miller’s Crossing. The guild leaders informed Sir Malik and the Baron about the disaster. The air inside the city sparked with tension. Instead of close to 12,000 players defending the city they were down to a mere 8,000 with many of the more experienced warriors gone. The confirmation of the magic formation that countered the most powerful defenders was both horrifying and a relief. Knowing was better than fearing, and they could now adequately plan.

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  Steve finally passed his communication ban and shared what he had learned inside the dark tunnel under the sewers. “It’s a dungeon. Well, it’s sort of a dungeon. The message I got from the system said it was a dungeon seed. I’ll paste it for everyone, assuming the system allows me to.”

  “Warning! You are entering a dungeon seed! Seed of the Forgotten Empire. Clear the seed before it grows into a permanent dungeon and corrupts the area around it. Current Seed Power: 9,793/10,000. Power Accumulation Rate: 20 per hour. Slay five monsters within the dungeon to reduce the power by 1. Conquer the dungeon and capture the seed core to remove the threat permanently.”

  “Less than ten hours before this thing erupts? When exactly are we supposed to be able to focus on something or relax?” Allestor kicked rocks and complained about yet another task on the table.

  Steve continued, “The entrance is pitch black. No light at all. I think it projects a magical darkness. I moved around and fell into some sort of pit. I’m not sure how far down it extends or what I landed on. I woke up at the guild base, and I was unable to tell anyone what happened for half an hour.”

  “Thanks for the information, Steve. I take back at least three of the things I said about you.” Hyperia joked.

  A hasty conference with the guild leaders and the city leaders formed. Baron Abernathy spoke first. “The Forgotten Empire had a massive ancient city in the neighboring zone. The Kingdom of Thorn culls it regularly to prevent the undead from building up and invading nearby cities. Most of the culling teams would have been pulled away to respond to the monster threats in the low-level zones. This seed is an existential threat to the city. If it erupts, it will form a dungeon that keeps sending wave after wave of undead into the city until it’s destroyed. I’ll send immediate warnings to the other new zones to scour their underground areas for possible seeds.”

  “We’re lucky we found the seed in time. It’s easier to deal with than the siege but having it erupt would have crippled our defenses. These seeds use weird spatial magic to maximize their destructive potential. As a result, multiple teams of adventurers can contest it. I’ve ordered my guards to bring everbright torches and provide them to adventurer teams trying to defeat the seed. We’ll need them back, but each group can take a few to combat any magical darkness inside the dungeon.”

  Sir Malik jumped in, “We still need to continue the siege preparation. We now expect the monster forces to arrive within the next two or three days and begin encircling the city, cutting us off from outside aid. Would each guild be able to send their top two or three dungeon teams to tackle the seed?”

  The guild leaders all responded in the affirmative and sent the messages out. Torgon added, “We can keep posting the power count of the seed and if we get it low enough, we can refocus on the siege. I’d love to pop the seed and take whatever rewards we get, but we do have priorities.”

  “Speaking of those priorities.” Baron Abernathy interjected. “Guild Leader Torgon, I would like to purchase 3 of your auction passes for 50 gold each. I will hand them out to the next 3 largest guilds here and provide each of the four guilds attending the auction with a loan of 100 gold to bid on items to help with the siege. The money will be paid back with the fall of Miller’s Crossing, or the loan will be forgiven if the siege is defeated.”

  Torgon quickly agreed, “That will be excellent my lord. The additional funds will make it easy to coordinate and we can get multiple smaller lots to boost the different guilds. I vow that we’ll do everything in our power to preserve Miller’s Crossing.” The meeting broke apart quickly. The guilds dispatched their teams to begin raiding the Seed of the Forgotten Empire, racing against the clock to prevent another disaster from befalling the city.

  Torgon spoke with Ovarrix and Hyperia before deciding the team allocation for the dungeon seed. “Dirk, take your best dungeon team and see how far you get. Mark, you take your team and try it too. The leadership team is going to raid the dungeon, and we can allocate three other teams to hit it up. Any takers?” Three groups of younger players volunteered, tired of the other tasks they had been accepting around the city.

  A bustling scene greeted them on arrival at the site of the dungeon seed. A team of a dozen city guards had organized a rest area outside the dungeon and making sure each team had everbright torches. Small stands with food and potions sprung up to supply the teams if they ran low on consumables. Torgon spoke with a group that had just emerged from the site.

  The haggard form of Jon Thomas Sadweather shared what his team discovered. “The start is just a room with holes in the floor dropping into a deep pit filled with spikes. The only danger there is the magical darkness. We made it two rooms in. There are zombies, ghouls and skeletons. The ghouls and zombies inflict a stacking damage over time disease. A heal spell removes one stack, a potion removes one stack. It’s one damage per second but each hit can add fresh stacks. We took down maybe ten of them before we wiped the first time. We did better the second and retreated intact. The count has dropped to 9,696 so we’re making headway. The experience debt will be rough, and we have no clue how big the dungeon is. There are enough instances to support all the groups with no sign of it capping out.”

  “Thanks Jon, that helps a lot. We ‘re going to start our progression on the dungeon shortly.” Torgon messaged all the guild leaders to ensure that they rotated teams in and out and used the quests for the siege to clear debt between runs. There was no benefit to crippling top dungeon teams just out of desperation. They were delaying the danger and with luck, they could push it back until the siege had ended.

  They watched as each team of adventurers from Risk of Injury entered the dungeon seed, then they made their way inside.

  “Warning! You are entering a dungeon seed! Seed of the Forgotten Empire. Clear the seed before it grows into a permanent dungeon and corrupts the area around it. Current Seed Power: 9,656/10,000. Power Accumulation Rate: 20 per hour. Slay five monsters within the dungeon to reduce the power by 1. Conquer the dungeon and capture the seed core to remove the threat permanently.”

  The torches dispelled the darkness, showing a circular stone room about twenty feet across with seven holes spaced irregularly across the floor. An archway beckoned on the south side of the chamber. Dusty took point and the leadership team of Risk of Injury prepared to conquer a dungeon that threatened the city they called home.