End Online: Volume 3 (20 page)

“Lost, wasn’t it?” The man
asks with a cruel smile. “You caused me quite the problem a while back.”

Almost like a veil of mist
dispersing in my mind, I finally recall who he is.

“Chronix, as I recall, you
have no reason to chase me. Not for just running away from your extortion.”

“If it was just you
refusing to pay your dues. No, I would not bother travelling this far for
revenge. But you, that girl, the knight and the wolf made a fool of me which is
absolutely unforgivable.”

“I don’t know what you’re
talking about!”

I am getting a little
nervous. I know just how high this player’s level is, and it is somewhere
around 250.”

“Speaking of which, where
are the others. None of them seem to be around. Did you lose that massive wolf
pet of yours too?”

“It’s none of your
business!” I growl at him.

“Anyway, enough of the
small talk. I will now be sending you all the way back to Iceridge where I will
see you again, and repeatedly kill you until you quit the game.” The fake smile
on his face completely disappears as he makes a circular waving signal with his
sword in the air.

A few bushes around us
rustle and the sound of twigs snapping echoes from all directions as nearly
thirty players surround us.

“These people aren’t
particularly strong. As a matter of fact, their levels should be even lower
than yours. But they have me and a lot more numbers. Say your farewells quick,
as that is all the time you will get!” Chronix roars at us.

“Mason! Matrix! Take
Shai’en and break out through the rear. Fen, get ready to flee!” I bark out
orders as fast as I can think. The two NPC’s are the only two people we cannot
let die.

“No!” Fen shouts next to
me while giving me a stubborn look.

Letting out a sigh I
charge forward at the same time as the brothers lead the elf to break through
the rear of the encirclement.

I leave an afterimage
behind as rather than attacking Chronix, I aim for the two archers standing a
little behind him. The leader himself still doesn’t attack, clearly waiting for
me to attack him first so he can kill me without getting a player killer’s
status.

All the attackers eyes
widen in surprise as their arrows, emanating a fleeting yellow colour, pass
right through my body and disperse it like it was made of mist. They may have
used sacred arts that aid in the guidance of their arrows, but they can only
aim at my after image in the end.

I cover the ground between
us in seconds, flashing my twin blades mercilessly at their throats and causing
large critical hits that take away nearly half their health each. Damage dealt
to players is a lot less than what is done to monsters, but using my speed to
negate an opponent’s defensive rating with my attacks still works at 100
percent efficiency.

Fen sends down a barrage
of ice bolts on a few swordsmen who try flanking me while I finish off the two
archers before moving onto them. In mere moments, five of the enemy are dead.

‘That’s strange,
isn’t his guild supposed to only have high level players. These people are
rather weak.’

“NO!” I cry out at seeing
the situation with the other members. Matrix and Shai’en managed to escape the
encirclement and are now currently running as fast as they can, Matrix carrying
the elf princess styles as she was a bit slow by herself. But Mason, had been
trapped by the enemy and is now currently on his knees, his health plummeting
at a drastic rate.

Only fifty meters away
from me, I see Mason die to the onslaught of about ten players.

This isn’t good, not for
the fact that Mason died, he can revive back in town. But Matrix carrying the
elf can’t possibly outrun ten players. Chronix knows this as well, changing his
current frown over his sides losses to a look of glee.

“Hurry, you ten go
slaughter them before they get too far away. We will only have these two here
left over after that.”

I am currently facing
another fifteen of these weaklings and one Chronix. Seeing how difficult I am
to fight, the silver armoured man also readies his sword, clearly not caring
about getting a player killer status anymore.

“Fen, retreat. Go to the
others and help them escape.” I speak quietly in a commanding tone at the wolf
girl next to me.

“No… I do-“

“Retreat, Fen. I am
ordering you to.”

A hint of indecision and
turmoil glazes over her eyes before she obediently nods and flashes off faster
than the enemy can react to stop her.

“Are you sure that’s wise,
Lost? Now you are all by yourself.” Chronix laughs at me.

Making up my mind, I
decide that I will go down swinging, doing as much damage as I possibly can
before they kill me. That way, I should at least be able to kill a fair few of
them and hamper their efforts in chasing the others.

Dashing straight at the
group, I wipe the smirk off that arrogant knight’s face as I silently activate
‘multi mirage’, transforming in eight bodies. The moment I do, I also launch
the throwing knives attached to the calves of my legs. Only ten knives are
real, but a massive eighty projectiles seem to be attacking them.

Arrows quickly disperse
the fake images, but they have served their purpose of allowing me to close in
on them relatively unharmed. Suddenly appearing right in front of Chronix, I
slow down time by using ‘perceptual sight’ while activate ‘back stab’ the
moment his swords falls on me. The sword passes straight through the image with
no resistance as I appear behind him and stab both my swords into his fully
exposed back. A critical hit follows but unfortunately, it is only enough to
take off ten percent of his health.

Two arrows land on me
before I jump back away from him, each taking away a further eight percent of
my health. Despite the slight headache that ‘perceptual sight’ is once again
giving me, I use my heightened senses to tuck one of my shortswords into my
belt mid air and extend my hand upwards.

“Minor Dire Flame!” I call
out as 800 mana is drained and a small, crimson lightning coalesces on my palm
and forms a small fireball of the brightest flame.

I immediately throw that
fire ball at the now turning Chronix, and it hits him square on the centre of
the chest. As my feet land on the ground, the flame splashes over him, clinging
to everywhere it can. It doesn’t seem like much, but his health slowly depletes
from burn damage. Currently, is seems to be taking away nearly two percent of
his health a minute.

“What the hell is this!
You ****.” The man curses at me as he tries to get rid of the flames on his
body. Only, no matter what he tries, the flame just won’t come off. All the
other low level players are also standing there like statues, utterly stunned.

While he rolls around and
tries to suffocate the flames in other, bizarre methods. I notice that slowly
but surely, the flames are gradually spreading to the forest floor and even the
trees.

‘What an overpowered
spell! And this idiot is even starting a damn forest fire!’

I cry inside, my only two
options are to either put the fire out and be killed by Chronix, or to leave it
and escape in the confusion, letting god knows how much of this forest burn
down.

I made the mistake in town
with the fire, assuming that houses and the environment would be indestructible
in the capital city. Apparently, they are not.

The flaming knight starts
calling out for water, he even pours his drinking water from his inventory on
himself. It is safe to say, that water does not put this fire out, only a ‘Burn
Remedy’ will.

He runs off into the
forest looking for a water source in a panic. Given that he only had eighty
percent health left, he only has forty minutes to do so. I wonder what he will
do when he find out this fire can even burn underwater.

From my previous
experience, I learnt that my fire is nowhere near as powerful as Grael’s is.
Rather than burning for six days and six nights, mine will dissipate after six
hours. It is still more than enough though to put an end to this level 250
player.

Before all the other
players realize what they are doing here and bring their attention back to me,
I immediately flee away from them and out of the forest. Given my speed, there
is no chance they will be able to catch up to me.

I enter the grasslands
outside of ‘Eldenweiss Forest’ and sprint back towards the eastern city gate.
As I am passing through all the low level players working diligently to raise
their levels, I start hearing loud voices.

All the players around me
are suddenly running away, half of which are cursing at me as they try their
hardest to get away as fast as possible.

Stunned, I stop and have a
look around at the area which is now practically devoid of all players.

“Oh, just great.” I say
with a sigh, looking at the icons of the current statuses on my player in
the corner of my vision. There is a few, such as my hood shrouding my face with
a shadow, fire and ice resistances from my equipment. But the most important
one is the large red skull. The symbol of a player killer.

-Lost-

"Mason,
I see you have revived. Did you lose many stats?" 
I private message the moment he respawns back at the church in
Grenton. Fortunately, he isn't from Iceridge like I am, else it would be a
catastrophe for completing this quest.

"A
bit, I lost a total of ten points all round. How did everything go on your end,
did you die as well?"

"Well...
I didn't die. Which is good news."

"So
you won?"

"I
wouldn't necessarily say that I won either. More like I escaped."

"There
were so many of them, how did you manage that?"

"I
took care of the boss, then ran during the confusion."

"Took
care of him? Wasn't he insanely strong."

"To
tell you the truth, the battle didn't really go for that long. He did have an
insanely high defence though."

"Then
what did you do?"

"...
Set him on fire."

"..."

"..."

"Then
what?"

"...
I ran during the confusion."

"...
I feel like there's more to this. This conversation wouldn't be so awkward if
it was just this. What else happened?"

"...
I also got a player killer's mark from killing one of the lesser players who
apparently didn't attack me first."

"...
Still not a big deal. What haven't you told me?"

"...
Once he was on fire, he started to roll around and such like an idiot, and
spread the fire around a rather large area."

"...
You set the forest on fire?"

"...
It was all him being a foo-"

"You
set the forest on fire, didn't you?"

"...
Yeah... I'm sorry."

***************************************************

A little
after Chronix had fled to search of a body water in the futile attempt to snuff
out my 'Minor Dire Flame' covering his body, I received a notification.

***************************************************

"You're
the idiot!" Mason cried as he hit me over the back of the head.

We are
all standing on the grasslands area a good 500 meters away from the 'Eldenweiss
Forest'. It is currently night time in the game, but not even the stars can be
seen tonight. Not with all the black smoke rising from the forest and blocking
out the sky. The light coming from the forest is extremely bright as the flames
emit a large glow up into the sky.

All I can
smell is smoke and burning wood. The stench covers the area as thick as the
white flakes of ash that rain down from the sky

Off to
one side of me, Shai'en stares at the sight in tears. There are a lot of
players with water style magic and even Grenton's royal magic corps are
drenching the forest in water, but nothing is stopping this fire.

"We
have been here for five and a half hours now, there shouldn't be much longer
left." I said submissively, counting down the time until the fire should
naturally go out.

This fire
here is magnitudes more devastating than the one I released in Grenton. Clearly
the city must have had some form of magic protection against the destruction of
property to mitigate the damage as much as it did.

Half an
hour passes and slowly the smoke billowing out from the forest comes to a stop
and the light from the fire fades away, almost as if it never existed in the
first place.

Even from
where we are, we can see the damage those six hours caused on the forest. Only
about twenty percent of the forest is burnt, but the area of that twenty
percent is enormous.

"Lost,"
Mason says morbidly, "You are to never use that spell again. Ever."

"Please,
Lost." Shai'en looks at me with her red, teary eyes, "When we are at
Eltreant, promise me you won't use that spell."

"But
wouldn't it be a great way to flush out all the bandits at once?" I ask
jokingly, trying to lighten the mood.

"Not
a good time for jokes." Mason says seriously.

"Sorry."

"Don't
worry about it. When all this is over, I'm going to go find all the boxes of
matches we have around the house and change the warning labels from "Keep
away from children", to "Keep away from Lost"."

"Didn't
you just say this wasn't a good time for jokes?!"

"I
didn't start the fire..."

Everyone
except the two NPCs had a quick laugh at that. If anyone lightened the mood, it
was Mason.

We
quickly head off towards our destination, the northern forest. Ensuring we
circle the currently damaged forest in front of us, we decide it is best to
avoid a place full of players and NPCs trying to find out who caused the
damage. I am in a hurry to get away in case anyone recognizes me as the person
who came out from the forest the moment it caught fire. Meanwhile, the others
would rather be elsewhere in case they were pinned as accomplices.

We travel
throughout the night and slowly make our way around the forest. Beyond the
grasslands, we arrive at some spring fields. The grass was a rich green, with
patches of moist dirt throughout and tens of thousands of medium sized flowers.
Reds, blues, and whites sprouting out of the ground as far as the eye can see.

There are
large trees littered about in no particular systematic order, all of which are
covered in small or large leaves of various greens and pinks. Most of the trees
are separated from each other by vast distances, but there are a few crops of
trees that all grow together. From underneath one of these groves I get the
sensation that I can collect herbs there.

With the
party in tow, I lead us through the field and towards the cluster of trees and
smell a strong scent of pollen. From the corner of my vision, I see a couple of
blurs head in my direction, making a constant buzzing noise as it moves.

Without
thinking for more than a fraction of a second, I immediately dive to the side.
Unfortunately, I am not fast enough and the stinger of an enormous hornet lands
an attack on my hip. Five percent of my health instantly vanishes as a dizzy
sensation attack my body. A flashing green icon appears up next to my current
row of status effects and enhancements, indicating a poisoned status.

My loss
of health from the poison is minimal, but the dizziness it induces is a
problem.

There are
a total of three hornet attacking our party. One attacks me, while the other
two split up between Fen and the brothers. At least, until one of the oversized
hornets attacking the brothers falls under my aggravation and starts flying to
me at breakneck speed.

"Creature
analyse!" I call out hurriedly.

I
understand exactly why players prefer to play the roles of a 'tank'. These bees
are incredibly quick, to the point where it is simply pointless trying to
compare with them in speed. The only way to properly fend off their attacks is
to use a shield and block them as they strike.

With two
hornets coming my way, I activate one of my own skills. Disappearing into smoke
as two stingers pierce through me, I appear behind one of the wasps and land a
critical hit with my blades, taking away the majority of its health. It is
unfortunate, but the creature is too quick and flees before I can land any
further blows on it.

As it
backs away, Fen's rain of ice bolts comes down on all the hornets, narrowly
missing them as they zig-zagged through the air.

"Everyone,
they're not strong, but they're incredibly quick. Be careful!" I call out
loud enough that everyone can clearly hear me.

Mason and
Matrix follow the orders I gave them earlier, making sure they remain close to
Shai'en to protect her from any danger. As such, Matrix becomes relatively
useless in battle while the older of the two brothers is somewhat less useless
with his bow.

"Mason,
do you have a spare, low levelled bow?" I ask him while attempting to
redirect one of the stingers attacking me, barely managing with a combination
of my strength and dexterity.

"I
do. Did you want it?" He responds while rapidly firing off arrows at my
aggressors, each missing by only a hairs breath, but at least managing  to
open some distance between me and the hornets.

"No,
I don't. Could you please give it to Shai'en along with some arrows? Also, make
sure you don't kill the monsters, just bring them near death. That goes for you
too, Fen."

The wolf
girl is having no problems with her hornet. She has taken it outside of the
range of my aggravation area and is easily fending off its high speed attacks
with two short ice daggers in her hands. Being an AI with extremely high
agility, she has no problem following and reacting to the giant insects strange
movements.

I also
activate my first sacred art, 'triple thrust', at an incoming hornet which
manages to land just one of the thrusts on its body before it retreats and
causes the other two attacks to miss. It is unfortunate that the insects move
far too fast and don't allow me to move around much, preventing me from
creating an afterimage to defer their attacks.

As soon
as she receives the bow and some arrows, I tell her to attack the weaker
enemies. It appears that my predictions are correct. Not just the elven guards
back in the Eldenweiss Forest, but also Shai'en, has immeasurable accuracy with
a bow. The arrows she launches, seem to almost predict where the hornet will be
as they home in on the creatures.

Several
arrows later, the level thirty companion successfully kills all three of the
weakened level 85 Giant Hornets, gaining two full levels in the process.

"They
seem to drop quite decent experience, but they are incredibly difficult to
hunt." I say to myself as we all reform together.

"Indeed,
they do." Mason nods his head in agreement, "I'm a little confused
though. Why have Shai'en deal the finishing blow? The stronger we are, the
easier this quest will be."

"Wrong.
A part of this mission is to protect Shai'en." I speak as if she could not
hear me. "The stronger she is, the harder it will be for her to die. This
is what will make our quest easier."

Mason
makes an "ahh" sound as he understands where I am coming from. Rather
than making it easier for us to pass the quest, I am aiming at making it harder
for us to fail. As things are right now, we simply have too much risk.

We spend
the entire day in the fields of green and pink. A warm scent of pollen and bees
replaced the morning freshness around noon when sun reached the apex of its
journey through the sky. It was also around this time that the number of Giant
Hornets, along with other various Mutated Wasps, and even a few Hive Mothers
appeared.

The Hive
Mothers were the most difficult to battle. They had an incredibly high health
and would constantly send out either Giant Hornets or Mutated Wasps, depending
on the breed of Hive Mother.

In the
space of about four hours, we killed hundreds of various monster insects. Well,
Shai'en killed them at least. The rest of us killed a few, but that was mostly
by accident. The enemies definitely gave quite a lot of experience with each
kill, but there was something odd going on with Shai'en's levelling speed.

Even with
the high amount of experience the insects dropped, the elf gained levels at an
incredibly frightening speed.

'Could
this be some form of racial trait?' 
I
wonder to myself.

In the
period of a single day. Shai'en went from being level 30 to level 82, higher
than anyone in the party could have possibly imagined.

We all
sit around once the day ended and I cooked up a full meal based off some ingredients
I had stored away and some local wildlife. The meal was rather lively with the
elf's incessant complaints about how eating red meat is wrong and Mason
rebuffing her and trying to explain while it was good. In the end, she ended up
only eating a few sparse vegetables and that was it.

"Well,
let's call it a night, shall we?" I look around at everyone through the
darkness. We don't have any torches and the moon is only half full, so fighting
monsters in these conditions is unfavourable.

They all
nod their head in agreement. Mason and Matrix pull out their sleeping bags, but
the younger of the two brothers hand his over to the elf, telling her to use it
as he will remain on watch tonight. At the same time I pull out my sleeping bag
and have a sudden realization.