The Bathrobe Knight (11 page)

I seriously need more coffee.

Valerie:

              Valerie extended her long brown and white feathered wings as far as she could and relaxed her flight into an easy glide. She was at least fifty stories above the ground, and the desert had gone from sands to sheets to one flowing, brown carpet. The only thing that ever interrupted the brown were the edges of the rivers. Valerie had never visited a desert in real life, but she wondered if they looked the same.

Even after a week of playing, she couldn’t help but feel overwhelmed by the sensation as the wind caressed the feathers on her wings. She could feel her wings. She could feel the feathers on each wing. It was amazing to her. Since the accident almost a decade ago, she hadn’t believed she would ever walk again, and here she was flying. It almost made her cry every time. The dive machine stimulated her muscles to do tiny micro movements so she could play all day everyday without ever having to log out, save for sleep and food. Her mom insisted on her eating breakfast and dinner with the family. Other than that though, the winds, the feeling of freedom--Valerie was hooked and never wanted to leave Tiqpa.

“Have you spotted any enemy encampments yet?” her commander whispered to her using the in game notification system. It basically sent the message as a text notification that wouldn’t appear when enemies were present or a player was in battle.

“No heretics have been detected. I’ve found two ore mines though and mapped them with my suggestion of where we should establish the harbor. If we spend a day or two grinding the right resources and hire workers to handle the mines, we should have enough to get a fully functional war harbor up and running by the end of the week. The voice of the Sun God will be pleased.” She knew the Sun God was only a part of the game lore, but the more you played the game, the more you bought into it. Everything was “For the Sun God this” and “for the Sun God that.” It was fun too. Valerie felt like she was a part of something when she served the Empire. She had put off leveling for a bit to scout today at her Commander’s request. She didn’t need the EXP of more grinding, she had gained plenty in the First Missionary War killing the Fire-Walkers who refused to accept the Sun God’s blessing.

“Great work, Valerie. Fly back and turn in the maps. We’ll get some of the Fire-Walkers to start fortifying the mines until we can afford the workers.” Of course, he was an NPC. NPCs never acknowledged that they were NPCs. ‘If you keep up the good work you might get promoted to Herald soon.’

“Be there in no time.” Valerie was going to glide the rest of the way back, but the mention of being promoted to Herald spurred her wings onwards and she darted off like a bolt of lightning across the sky. Heralds could command troops. Just the regular ones could have command of ten NPCs under them. If she reached that rank serving the Sun God Empire, she would be the first PC in the entire Sun God Empire to have her own little mini army.
Imagine if I became High Inquisitor Valerie!
She knew it was reaching for the stars, but being able to fly after a decade of sitting in that detestable wheelchair watching people look down on her with pity like her legs had been the only important aspect of her life made her think anything was possible.

When she finally got back to the town, she was lost again in its beauty. The Fire-Walkers, the ones who, with the Eagle-Wings, were first blessed of the Sun God, had built for the White-Wings a massive city of glass ten stories above the desert sands. The glass buildings on top of the platform were two, three and four stories tall with no flat sides, visible edges or sharp corners. Their buildings twisted and turned as they grew higher like lightning reaching for clouds that weren’t there.

“Welcome back, Valerie! It’s short notice, but are you ready to go out again?” the Commander, waiting for her right where she landed, asked as soon as her feet touched the ground. The Commander, a Raven-Wing wearing a complete set of the heaviest Leather Armor White-Wings were able to wear and still fly, had come out with all nine other White-Wings in her unit.

“I can leave at a moment’s notice. What’s going on?”

“A group of lava- and onyx-skinned Fire-Walkers still devoid of the Sun God’s blessing were spotted to the southwest of our holy city.”

“For the Sun God,” Valerie chimed enthusiastically. She was getting more and more into her character every day. She was Valerie, the dual-wielding, Hawk-Wing of the Sun God Empire, and she would make those pagans taste her Iron Daggers.

She equipped her Daggers, and the group took to the skies, flying in a clean V formation with the Herald in front. As soon as they spotted the enemy, they broke off and started circling their prey.
Deep breaths, Valerie, deep breaths. We’ve done this dozens of times before.

As soon as one of the reddish lava-skinned Fire-Walkers spotted their group, the twenty or so heathens pulled into a tight group and started packing small balls of sand. It was their specialty, and it was scary even for a VR. Valerie started dipping up and down and strafing left and right sporadically as she got closer, trying her best to stop them from guessing her movements.
I’m almost in range. Be careful.
The Fire-Walkers didn’t get their name for nothing. One of the racial perks and key reasons a lot of players liked to pick them--though PC Fire-Walkers started as part of the Sun God Empire--was their racial ability to make and manipulate fire at will. It’s how they made the glass cities, and it’s also how they stuck fire to balls of sand and turned them into flaming glass balls.
Dodge! Shoo . . . that was close.
Valerie had weaved an inch away from one of the glass projectiles as she saw four more coming. No matter how many times she dodged one successfully her brain always convinced her that the next one would hit. A paranoia the accident was likely responsible for.

“Do a barrel roll, Valerie!” one of the others shouted at her. Valerie just rolled her eyes and stayed focused.

Left, left, right, almost there. You’re first, big man.
Valerie finished her dive and with all the force of her descent pushed her two Daggers through the skull of the biggest onyx-skinned man in the group.

• Critical Dive! You have done 216 Damage!
  
• Critical Dive! You have done 216 Damage!
  

Size doesn’t matter if you can’t hit squat,
she thought, thankful the NPC hadn’t had a secret double life as a baseball player. The few Fire-Walkers who were pitchers in real life were a scary sight indeed.

Of the ten other White-Wings with her, only one had been picked out of the air by the balls. The rest had all landed on a mark.
Ten down, fourteen to go.
The Fire-Walker closest to Valerie came at her with his Glass Mace. She charged him, dodging his overhead swing and planting the two Daggers in his back for maximum Damage.

• Critical Hit! You have done 108 Damage!
  
• Critical Hit! You have done 108 Damage!
  

              No sooner had she planted her fresh Daggers in his back and pulled them back out than another one of the Fire-Walkers tried to hit her with a Dull Glass Sword. She couldn’t dodge it and knew if she tried it would probably tear into one of her wings so she let the Glass Sword sink into her arm, catching it as best she could, and used her free unsliced arm to repeatedly stab the Fire-Walker.
Die! Die! Die! Die!

• You have taken 95 Damage!
  
• You have done 54 Damage!
  
• You have done 54 Damage!
  
• You have done 54 Damage!
  
• You have done 54 Damage!
  

              With one arm unusable and her hitpoints having taken a big hit, she looked around happy to see the fight was over. The happiness quickly faded into an eerie, uncomfortable feeling, however, when she realized that of the six remaining White-Wings in her group, everyone was staring at her.

              “What? Is something wrong?” she said, feeling the avian eyes piercing through her.

              “No, it’s just, you really went crazy on that last one. I didn’t expect someone to use their arm as a shield, especially not someone who picked the Scout class. I’m impressed” the Herald said.

              “Oh, well, the Sun God was watching, I couldn’t give her a bad show,” she said. The perfect thing for the NPC herald, but it made the two PCs still alive in her group roll their eyes. Some people always complained that she was too corny with her role playing, but her attention to character had gotten several of her commanding officers to mention the possibility of her being promoted to Herald, so she wasn’t about to stop it now.

              “Indeed! That would be a tragedy. Let’s run a sweep of the perimeter and then go put together a full unit for another patrol. There can’t be any remaining resistance here if we are to successfully bring the word of the Sun God to the White-Horns.”

‘Bring word of the Sun God’ was just a less brutal way of saying ‘conquer in a war.’ Valerie, doing her best to immerse herself in her character, had studied in depth the creation of the Empire. Somewhere along the line in the history of the small, sand-covered continent, one of the many nomadic Eagle-Born tribes and one of the Fire-Walker tribes decided to merge because of their mutual love for the sun. Even though arguments constantly sprung up between the groups over what exactly the Sun God was or wanted: male or female, all knowing or all powerful, or both, demanding of sacrifices or demanding of prayer. They all agreed that there was a Sun God and that the Sun God wanted them to spread his or her word and cleanse the world of all those that did not love him or her. It was confusing at first, but over the years the arguments had grown fewer and the worship grew more political.

“Of course, Commander,” she said. She took off into the air and smiled. She could feel the wind on her wings, and it felt great.

Chapter 3: Deal Me In, Poker Bear!

Darwin:

Darwin admired himself in the mirror as he did a sort of mini spin in the black Iron Armor he was trying on.
I look awesome. This is just like how the jousting knights from the medieval times used to look. Sure it has a huge penalty to speed, 60%, but it’s so cool looking! I’m like a dark knight in one of those medieval fantasy stories. Now all I need is a cool flaming Sword or maybe an ice Sword! I could be the Frost King of the North!
Darwin hadn’t felt this happy since he first came to Tiqpa. Going through the hundreds of outfits that he could possibly wear felt great, but each one had a problem that stopped him from committing to any set--the stat penalties.

“I just can’t buy it. Let’s look around for something else” Darwin said, causing Kass to almost throw the Dress she was holding at him.

It wasn’t that he didn’t like the look. It was that the average Human warrior received 6 stat points per level. The one bonus point was one of the benefits to picking the Human race. That meant that they could put 4 points in Power and 2 points into Vitality all the while ignoring Speed. They not only didn’t need it but the better and better sets of heavy Armor had higher and higher percentage Speed reductions. This meant if he took the route of heavy Armor he would lose his racial advantage of gaining 3 Power, 3 Speed, and 2 Vitality and be left short 1 point against other Humans--a fact he couldn’t ignore given the insane advantages that some of the other races had early on.

“There aren’t any shops left! What was it you said this morning? ‘Don’t needlessly waste time shopping when we have quests to do.’”

“Young man, there is another option. Do you mind if we lend you an outfit and hold on to your Robe and Slippers for a while?” The old Shopkeeper who had been watching Darwin try to find gear that suited him decided that it was about time to help the young man out. “In fact, why don’t you try this on until we’re done making this Robe better, he said handing him green street clothes.”

“Ok, that works. Thank you, sir. Your kindness is appreciated,” Darwin thanked the man and went into the backroom where he changed into the street clothes he had been given. They were simple clothes, but the style wasn’t too bad. The Shirt was like a t-shirt with a button on the collar and the Pants could best be described as white suit pants. When he came out, Kass gave him a happy smile of relief. Did he look okay in the outfit, or was she just happy to see him out of the Bathrobe?

“Don’t thank me yet. This will cost you 400 Gold. Come back when you have finished shopping, and I’ll have this Robe battle ready,” he said, grabbing the Bathrobe before Darwin could argue about the price.
400? 400 Gold Pieces? All 8 Dresses that Kass bought earlier put together weren’t even 300 Gold.

“Isn’t that a bit mu--”

“Nope. It’s not. The good man is helping you out, so don’t be stingy and let’s get going.”

“Fine, fine,” Darwin said, handing the man 400 Gold Coins and leaving with Kass. They had been shopping for over an hour, and he was sure that Kass was starting to get a bit antsy at having to watch him indecisively move from one outfit to another. The irony was that before he had started trying on gear himself, he had the exact same feeling watching her go through forty-odd Dresses. Especially when  every Dress had looked like the same white Dress she was already wearing; and, yet, she insisted they were different and that one was ‘cuter’ than the other.
I know every snowflake is actually different but they all look the same to me
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