The Lake Hotferver Arena, after Henry's departure.
The excitement of the thrilling finale was fading, having climaxed when an elated Queen Suhita logged back on to initiate a vote disqualifying the co-conspirators, and now the mob's attention was shifting to the 6v6. A grey cloud did continue to hang over everyone, however. Despite the Villagers' claims of victory, inside all of them festered the wound of defeat, throbbing with a dull pain. The sloppily-sewn stitches threatened to loosen at the next jolt.
Outside the venue, Byzantium had been gathered by Justinian. The Crusader was deliberating on two replacements for the 6v6 after Henry and Rose had ditched.
Cathy, meanwhile, was busily taping up the loincloth of Abby, who'd already been selected - during the 1v1 tournament, there'd been several incidents of immodest slippages. She simultaneously explained to Dan, shielding his handsome eyes, the reasons for 'Big Bro' running away, pointing out the crowd's obvious anger at their friend's underhanded tactics.
"It's not on, Big Sis! We all watched Big Bro thread the turkey through the capital H. Spy Sis lost that duel fair and square."
"He paid the spy to throw," countered Abigail, remembering the saga of the snacks, her mouth salivating. "That's kind of what he does: blackmail, bribery, evil. He can't help himself. That's why everybody hates him."
Dan disagreed handsomely. "Ninja Sis, I think your character judgement is mistaken. You know, the first day I met him, Big Bro beat up these bullies trying to steal a guy's rabbit and he saved the world from a giant beetle-octo..." He wasn't meant to share this last one. "Big Bro might be a bit shy about it, but deep down he's a good guy. That's why he's Big Bro."
"C.," asked Anderson, decorating A.'s hair with flowers, "on the topic of H.'s absence, wasn't there a contractual obligation to hang out with us?"
Cathy smiled wickedly at the question. "I gave him the rest of the evening off - as long as he sticks around the event grounds."
"What's up with the smile?"
"What's up with the what?" Cathy applied extra tape to Abby's top to hide her cleavage. "She who is trustworthy in spirit keeps a thing covered. Dan, remind me, what was the closing line of our bedazzling team introduction?"
"Defeating! Evil! With! Love! And! Friendship! Team Friendship Forever!"
"That's right!" Cathy stepped back to give Abby a patronising nod of acceptance. "Defeating evil with love and friendship. Friendship AND love...the universe has two miracles."
Her thoughts flashed back to the 'stalker' and the 'heliophobic guard' running out of the arena to pursue Henry. Initially, by colluding with Alex Wong to bring their depressed friend to this zone, she'd hoped to cure his affliction through the miracle of friendship. Never would she have predicted that her efforts would be bolstered by the arrival of another, even more persuasive, more purifying force.
The Seat in The Heat, an exhibition of Carcassworkers hammering together chairs from monster bone.
With the majority of Villagers spectating the 6v6 tournament, these exhibition grounds were comfortably uncongested. Judges meandered idly about inspecting the craftsmen and pocketing bribes. Enough space even existed for two Arcanist kids, with no adults monitoring to them, to sprint around blasting holes in each other with magic.
Henry was quietly observing the battling pair. Re-armed with his notebook, his pencil paused, he was contemplating how to transfigure their game into a scene for his story. Maybe an argument, an exchange of blazing wits?
That's right, folks, the time had come to return to the sexier climb of writing. With his duelling itch scratched, he'd reclined back into the armchair-tranquillity necessary for the creation of art, necessary to shape the dust of this plebian earth and breathe into it life. That minor disruption would be utilised to create an abrupt tonal shift in the story's second section, in which the trio of the bawling girl and her beta-orbiters reconnected with the last corner of their love quadrilat—
He was interrupted by a sketch thrust into his vision.
"Big bro, please offer an impartial judgement on my lack of talent."
Rose handed him a sketch with the pride of a cat presenting its owner a dead rat.
She'd had an ulterior motive in agreeing to practise the Floating Leaf sketches for so long this evening.
Yesterday, while she'd plied Cripple-gege for his preferences, he'd revealed that the most attractive trait of the 'optimal persona' was competence in multiple domains. For every 5 years after one's eighth birthday, one should have attained a level of Rank 6 High-Patrician in one area or Rank 5 Low-Patrician in three.
Rose was actually able to fulfil these impossible requirements. Her father, in wanting her to grow up into a young lady of refinement, had insisted she study the three perfections of painting, poetry, and calligraphy. The childhood lessons she'd despised, now they were giving an unexpected payoff.
At Cripple-gege's dumbfounded reaction to her latest sketch, she could see that'd she'd knocked this attempt out of the park.
"So?" Rose leaned in, batting her eyelashes.
Henry—staring at a Godzilla-sized version of himself stomping the event grounds, incinerating screaming people with his flame breath—held back his vomit. "...it's pretty."
"My inspiration was you stomping the noobs."
"Yeah, I got that. The subject matter is…the technique is impressive as always, a classy expressionism with economical strokes - you're a Low-Patrician in this respect."
"How about overall? How am I on the whole," she batted her lashes again, "big bro?"
"Overall...oooo...my art climb's a...speaking of brothers, do you have the same tutor as Geno?"
Henry changed the subject. He'd noticed stylistic similarities with her penmanship and the older sibling's calligraphy.
"Mhm," Rose replied flatly, her mood instantly killed by her creepy brother intruding once again.
"Huh?"
The last word came from Silver Wolf behind them. The alpha-pleb was staring at the underside of a cup she'd been drinking from, the bottom half of which had been incinerated by an
5 miles south-west of Lake Hotferver, a pocket of especially dry terrain, where Suchi's blood-red soil wasn't hidden by grass, where solitary buttes and mesas stood in placid observance of the land's desolation.
The Singaporean trio had summited one of the area's flat-topped hills. They sat with their legs dangling over the edge of a cliff, their hands and faces smeared with dust from the climb.
And the sun was rising.
A serenade to the dawn and their nocturnal adventure was being piped by the flute-player. His melody carried a sensitivity unfound in his voice. The notes, bending with a hard-to-grasp affection, seemed to flow out into the sky, and an azure hawk that'd lured them up this cliff was flying shapes, swooping and diving on the currents of the song. The bird's dance was merry, musical, mesmerising...and mischievous?
"It's pretty," said the girl in the middle with a sigh.
"It is." The indecisive beta-orbiter secreted a glimpse of her face glowing in the morning light. "What a marvellous endi...huh?" He felt a tremor. "Away from the edge! Get away from the edge!"
The trio frantically scrambled back to avoid being thrown off the cliff as the ground began to shake violently.
But, at a sound of cracking, a new danger arrived: the hill's roof was collapsing in on itself, like coffee draining through the base of a broken cup.
A blast of wind from out of nowhere struck them. They were picked up, tossed into the forming hole.
Above their plummetting figures, the azure hawk flaunted the strength of its wings while performing a mischievous barrel roll.
Lake Hotferver, a tower draped in banners of blue and white with an uninterrupted panorama of The Empire's camping grounds.
On a tower top terrace, two figures were conversing over tea.
One of the interlocutors happened to be Pope Berbahaya, a small man of 5'2 with ruddy-cheeks from centuries of stress dealing with nuisances. Despite his divine status, he was a rather uncouth individual, who carried himself in a crass, bearish manner. As he leaned against the parapet, scratching his balls through his frock, his eyes sifted through the ongoings of the festival beneath with the disinterest of a middle-aged father sorting recycling.
"…and the second %$#!#$^ goat, following this genius epiphany, trotted up to its old foe and whispered in its ear, 'Ay, brother, what you say to striking a deal?'"
The Pope had been recounting a bedtime parable about a pair of greedy goat twins from Nerin's flock. The animals had been fierce rivals since birth, always scheming to pilfer each other's feed. Their bickering in adulthood got so rough that the Goddess was often forced to replace one or the other's meals to prevent starvation. Then, one day, it occurred to the feuding twins that they'd been taking the wrong approach. Rather than stay on the alert, resisting each other's theft, they should collaborate. If one goat let their meal be stolen, because a replacement was guaranteed from their master, they could reconvene in secret afterwards to share their spoils, netting one and a half meals each. Thus, they pulled the wool over Nerin's eyes, the greedy pair grew plump.
"And so much fat dripped from their carcasses that it extinguished the cooking fire. Can you believe that, King Ramiro?"
The other was Ramiro.
"It's a peculiar story to tell sleepy children," replied the King.
"A very peculiar story, but it imparts an important lesson to the youth. No matter how smart you think yourself, you're still a kid, with stumpy %$#^#@ legs and a dependency on mother's milk. Those who forget their place end up spit-roasted."
Ramiro, sipping at his drink, didn't miss the unsubtle implication.
If one combed Suchi's history, they would find rare eras when the Slumdwellers managed to amass power despite the monthly burndowns of The Cleansing. All these burgeoning movements had an uncanny way of fizzling out - leaders would be exposed for corruption, The Church's annual rain ritual would fail, causing famines that devastated The Slums which had no means to stockpile food.
But the King was pleased by the warning. He was but one of two goats being threatened, the other being a third figure looming in the shadows, the anonymous owner of the WBAE. The Pope, by making this arrogant boast, had shown his hand - or, rather, one of the cards missing from it.
Only Ramiro seemed to have recognised the wolf lurking amongst them.
He could work with this.
Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author's preferred platform and support their work!
The Lake Hotferver Arena, a 6v6 preliminary round.
32 squads of loin-clothed Villagers were packed into the arena for the preliminary stages. To the cheers of the mob, the strong survived and the weak spilt their guts to dagger and monster claw.
A Reincarnation Monument had been installed by the arena side. There, along with the other respawning slain, were six people with gold and purple armbands, led by a 7-foot tall Crusader squatting with his golden locks hanging in defeat.
Lady Kittykat pounded her fist on Justinian's back. "Have heart, brave soldier of God. 'Tis but a Kingdom-grade tourney of the six warriors contending with the six warriors."
"Allay your fears, Lady Kitty," the Crusader answered heroically. "My sword of faith is unbent. I hold it poised now only so that my mind can incorporate today's tuition into the next swing."
But Justinian was grieving.
Past Plains Day tournaments had been one of his saving graces. Since the contestants were constrained to armourless dagger-fighting, his standard rush tactic would fail less often, allowing his teams to finally obtain a couple victories after weeks of defeat. This, in turn, provided a source of hope, preventing a portion of his trainees from jumping ship until the true battle at His tournament.
Their performance today, with Justinian having expanded his RP-congruent command repertoire to include 5 variants of the rush, should have been even better. With the talents of Sir Henry, Lady Zhangmei, and Lady Artemis, they might have won.
Alas, all three of them were absent, and then The Empire added these monsters to complicate matters. Justinian, at a loss for how to orchestrate Byzantium's movements through the maze while maintaining character, had panicked and reverted to his old habits. He'd ordered his team to slay a Goblybeast, a more pressing evil than their match-opponents. And they died without meeting the enemy.
An anthropomorphic cat, a member of the opposing team, scampered past sassily to rub salt in the Crusader's wounds.
"Most people say that they do not like fighting," the man-cat sang, "yet once in a way! They will now and again join in to the fray! And they,"
"Bark, bark, bark," answered a chorus of feline roleplayers following in a sassy train, "bark, bark, bark, BARK, BARK!"
"Until you can hear them all OVER the park!"
They were from Jellicle Village Oceania, based around the beloved classic Cats (2019). This avant-garde film, being too ahead of its time, had been subjected to a phase of disgrace in the early 21st century before achieving universal acknowledgement of its genius in the 40s.
The man-cat roleplayers hissed tauntingly at Byzantium for being home to that anti-roleplaying, anti-Queen HF. But one empathetic kitty purred a sassy commiseration to Justinian, a fellow comrade trapped in roleplayer limbo.
5 miles south-west of Lake Hotferver.
Through pitch-black darkness floated the glow of the Singaporean trio's Lightstones.
After their fall, the three had landed in the ancient ruins of a dwarven mine. The place didn't seem to have housed a living soul in aeons. They'd been exploring for hours, picking up one treasure after another: expertly-forged armour, razor-sharp weapons, an immaculate flute of glass for the musician. Guiding them from prize to prize was a trail of azure hoofprints whose creator they could never catch up to. Whatever it was, or whoever it was, it seemed to be leading them deeper and deeper into the dwarven mine, an ominous fact that would have scared the trio off had the value of the treasures not gradually been increasing.
They'd considered messaging their Village to join them in collecting this subterranean bounty. However, one of Merlion Village's leaders was a person whose presence none of them could stomach right now. Oh well - more loot for themselves.
"Where are the dwarves, by the way?" asked the flute-playing beta-orbiter. "I've never met one. Elves and orcs, neither."
"The elves haven't been unlocked yet," answered the indecisive beta-orbiter. "The other non-human factions, no one rolls them except roleplayers. They all start in the Western Continent, where they're enslaved. If they can escape east, they get hit with a permanent debuff due to some blood-magic. There's a demonic castle in Nilke."
"Nilke?"
"Forget about it."
"There." The girl spoke up, indicating a twinkle in the dark. Treasure.
The trio came upon a skeleton of what appeared at first to be a child huddled in a corner. Up close, the barrel-like ribcage and the bone thickness indicated that it'd actually belonged to a dwarf. The skeleton was facing the wall, as though it had been unable to bear looking at whatever had reaped its life. A necklace dangled from the dwarf's fingers that it'd been clutching in its final moment – the blue-violet metal of the item's chain had caused the twinkle.
The indecisive beta-orbiter felt creeped out. "Let's skip this one."
But the flute-player was less timid. "Lyna, m' lady, allow me to procure you this bright bauble!"
Saying this, the bolder of the betas wrenched the item from the dead dwarf's grip, the skeleton collapsing into a pile of a white. When he tried to give it to the girl, however, she returned a deadpan rejection.
"Scared of a curse?" The flute-player mocked. "Fine, it's mine, I'm sure it'll complement my bone structure." He proceeded to equip the necklace and his eyes flashed white. "AT LAST, AFTER A THOUSAND YEARS OF SLUMBER, I AWAKEN TO BRING THE ETERNAL NIGHT!"
“AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! ELVIN!" The girl leapt on the indecisive beta-orbiter. "SAVE ME! ELVIN!"
The flute-player frowned as his pupils rolling back down. "It was just a prank."
"Woops." The girl released her hostage with an apologetic look, then grabbed a humerus bone from the dwarf skeleton and used it to bludgeon the hilarious flute-player to death.
The indecisive beta-orbiter, watching her attack, trembled. Throughout his body sparked the electricity of the accidental embrace, and his head swam with the realisation that, in her panic, the one she'd sought for protection had been himself.
Lake Hotferver, a Metalworker exhibit.
Henry and co were decked out in treasures collected during their wanderings of the festival. Most dazzling were a set of beautiful robes enchanted to glow in sync with the wearer's movements, highlighting body gestures like jangly earrings do the turning and tilting of the head. Henry'd overpaid the Textileworker and slipped them a contact from his guild's local branch.
Dressed in style, he was presently sketching Silver taking her sweet time inspecting someone's wares. For the purpose of his story, he transformed her into the indecisive beta-orbiter fretting over what jewellery to purchase for a grand confession - a classic seduction tactic.
In terms of tracking down his three muses, Henry'd had no luck. A couple members of Merlion Village, including a few in the audience for the 1v1 tournament, could be found about, but not the bawling girl nor her latcher-ons. The doomed trio had most likely been abducted by Karnon.
But Henry wouldn't worry about that. This moment was for romance.
Although a pleb-genre by tradition, romance had a stable of useful character archetypes, elaborate devices for plot convolution, and the end-goal of love with its near-universal appeal made for—
"Big bro," Rose interrupted.
"What is it this time?"
She wordlessly deposited a necklace in his palms.
He stared with deep contemplation at the item. "This is a girl's necklace...why would I want this?"
"Me. I couldn't get it on."
"Oh...fine then, spin around."
While Rose drew back a curtain of hair to expose the slender curve of her neck, Henry moved in to help, draping the pendant down her chest before connecting the two chain links around the back. He then hit a stumbling-block with fixing the clasp, the ring attachment being bent from inferior craftsmanship.
"Couldn't you have chosen something less trash?"
"I like the colour."
"Stop squirming. You're making it harder to fit in."
"The metal's cold."
While he fumbled away, his spidey senses remained untingled. Being a veteran duellist, he was habituated to much more intimate contact, having racked up many hours with his head wrapped between women's legs - and men's; and monster's. What's more, from his war days, he'd—
"I understand now." Henry stopped. "No, this is inappropriate."
Rose froze. Busted?
Henry—with romance on his mind, with his recently rising social IQ that'd pierced the clouds, and with enough duels against Rose to know her freak Mechanical GQ enabled her to put on this necklace while backflipping—couldn't help uncover the charade.
He returned the trinket to her. "No, the optimal persona rejects the low-grade feminine device of requesting unnecessary assistance a.k.a. The Damsel in Distress play. This age-old trick does indeed generate opportunities for high-impact social interactions and an ego rub on the part of the helper."
Rose, safe, pretended to record the awful lecture to come.
The note-taking pleased Henry. "It is, however, a trap. This cheap play comes with a hidden cost. At best, you will receive a boost with the request-target, while lowering yourself to the much more numerous observers, who must witness your ineptitude without compensation – already, a mathematical loss. At worst, should your target be a Low-Patrician or higher in the social realm, you disfavour yourself to them, too, for they will be disgusted by the grave error in your cost-benefit analysis, the underlying flaw of which is not too dissimilar to that illustrated in the French economist Claude-Frederic Bastiat's Fallacy of The Broken Window."
Silver, having spectated this entire exchange in agony, threw a ring at Henry's stubbornly-dumb head. "So close, yet so stupid."
He failed to dodge. "No, the only stupidity is that of a society tearing out its fingernails to feel the alleviation of their regrowth. Returning to Bastiat, Rose, what you neglect is that the energy expended on this manipulation could have been devoted to any alternative social manoeuvres with a higher expected R-ROI or Reputational Return-on-Investment – e.g., improvising a mood-fitting haiku, showboating with a one-armed press-up, and so on. More critically, when caught, you also risk infuriating the Low-Patrician by having wasted their resources - although, if they've specced into the Machiavellian tree, they might be impressed by being out-finessed..."
Elsewhere in Lake Hotferver, a pop-up restaurant serving spice-rich cuisine from Saana's western continent.
Most of the diners were gathered around a projector screen. The broadcast showed a hundred thousand people spread out on the savannah as they awaited the commencement of The Plains Day's final, most sensational event, The Grand Hunt.
Queen Suhita delivered the opening address. Arranged on the stage behind her, her hunting party had been expanded to include the fake 1v1 winner, the captain of the winning 6v6 squad, a raid leader of PVE team with the fastest dungeon clear, and a Carcassworker voted 'The God-Armourer' for fashioning the most majestic baby-lion-fang dagger.
The Queen was followed by an Ibanpita Cardinal giving a talk on the partnership between The Slums and Central. For many in the crowd, his speech contained an extra, sinister dimension, this Cardinal being the same one who'd directed the arson of King Sejeong and Queen Atusa's Kingdom Headquarters after The Community Event. NPCs listened with sombre attention; players, fuming in private channels, were restrained by their Village Heads.
Ignoring the broadcast, London Tremor sat at a table in a distant corner of the restaurant, rubbing the belly of his Grey Wolf napping in his lap.
The intern wasn't interested in The Grand Hunt after a kid he'd bribed in Byzantium informed him that HF wasn't attending. Knowing this, London Tremor would have logged out to sleep, but he'd yet to come down from the highs of the evening.
His veins still pulsated with the adrenaline of commanding such a large viewership.
There were zero doubts on his end that HF had pulled some funny business during the duel. London Tremor lacked the combat expertise to identify the trick itself, even after several reviewings. Nevertheless, the teen's nervousness had to be a charade according to London's observations of earlier sparring matches. HF, a veteran of virtual combat without its risk of death, was fearless when serious. Sometimes, he didn't even flinch when stabbed in the face.
Whether or not Artemis had colluded with him was less certain. The few remaining members of HF's fan club had offered conflicting analyses. Bob from San Francisco had listed 4 different martial arts employed by the Greek girl roleplayer, plus 2 more of unknown origin. Another, more conspiratorial member inferred from this that Artemis and HF could both be part of a secret team of Company multi-stylists assigned to investigate Saana's various martial arts. 'Artemis' may be a false persona designed to extract the secrets of Unshakeable Arrow from Master Ocunuco, with whom 'she'd' been studying before HF's arrival.
London Tremor found this theory quite persuasive. It explained Artemis's fake identity, the familiar tone used when addressing HF before the duel ("You're fond of ridiculous bets. You win, I'll clear up this misunderstanding."), and the willingness to perform that humiliating post-defeat speech. Moreover, it resonated with London's intuitions that the mysterious teen was a much more substantial personage than others suspected.
So persuaded was the intern that he made the fan-club private. He cited their need to avoid discussing these theories in public where The Company might be eavesdropping. Truthfully, he didn't want this career-defining scoop being leaked and poached by another reporter.
"Who?"
"The Saviour."
"The Saviour?"
"The Saviour!"
"The Saviour?!"
"The Saviour!!"
Several diners rushed out of the restaurant without paying their bills.
London Tremor looked at the source of the commotion. On the projector, the camera had shifted away from the Cardinal to a chubby figure in the backdrop. King Ramiro, having failed to slip covertly into the Queen's hunting party, was cringing in embarrassment at the crowd's applause as if he were undeserving of their adoration.
"Strange people," the intern mumbled.
5 miles south-west of Lake Hotferver, the mine's lowest level, where Karnon's final treasure resided.
The Singaporean trio had been exploring for so long that they would have lost track of the hours if not for the in-game clock.
While two of them were having a blast collecting loot, the indecisive beta-orbiter trailed behind, wallowing in suffering.
His depressed crush had shown an increasing amount of animation as their quest progressed. At each instant, though, the one drawing her out of her shell had not been himself but the flute-player. Not once had he been able to achieve the same, all his attempts at cheering her up being ignored or extracting one-word replies.
Perhaps, he'd been wrong to assume that her choosing him in her panic had held significance. After all, he'd also been physically close to her at the time - maybe he'd just been conveniently positioned, like the tree one climbs to escape a rabid dog. After the danger was gone and one descended, did one's thoughts ever turn back to the tree?
And if she did harbour the same feelings, would it be in her best interest for him to encourage her on? Their journey through the night had revealed again and again the limits of himself. Unlike his flute-playing friend, he didn't possess the gifts to charm, he didn't have the courage to grab her in her lows and lift her high. Whatever could potentially exist, it might best to let it fizzle for her sake.
Again…
This wasn't the first time. He was enacting a story that'd unfolded before, with him. Because of his indecision back then, he'd missed his chance and ended up wasting a year and a half in the torture of being a 'friend' – decaying on the fringes, waiting, hoping, hurting. It sucked. And now, when the gates of opportunity had finally flung open, he was watching them slowly being closed shut by another, himself once again too afraid even to approach and peek through the crack in case what lay on the other side was nothing but his vain imaginings.
History repeated itself again; the loser continued being a loser.
It was in this state self-loathing that he spotted three sparkles floating in the distance ahead. They were moving – the first living beings they'd encountered in hours.
"Hide your Lightstones," ordered the flute-player. "I'll check them out."
The indecisive one suddenly charged ahead. "No, I'll do it."
Not again.