I took an involuntary step back from the hulking animal as it strode between the two of us and sat in the center of the square room. Its presence was, in a word, intimidating. I felt like there was an invisible pressure that was making it hard to focus.
Neither Ascilla nor I moved an inch until the wolf spirit had settled into its posture. And after a moment of staring at us, it did something I didn’t expect.
The wolf lowered its head to the ground in what looked like a deep bow.
“First, this one must beg your forgiveness. Twas This one’s own hubris that led to your capture at the hands of the forest’s knights. To discern the level of their corruption, This one used you as, what you humans would call, bait. Full glad This one is that you made it out of their temple alive… though This one does feel guilt over the circumstances you have now found yourselves in. ”
I stood in stunned silence. After a minute, Ascilla was the one who spoke up.
“Wait, what do you mean used us as bait? Aren’t those knights on your side? They certainly didn’t seem like they were against the forest when we were there…” Ascilla said. The wolf spirit shook its head.
“A history lesson seems to be in order.” The wolf said, closing its eyes.
“The Order of the Verdant Knights is ancient. Spanning back long ago to the first time your kind entered This one’s domain. Their predecessors hunted for a future that only they could see, and so they were blind to the damages they caused as they felled trees and hunted my kin for their homes and their furs.” The wolf said. It stood and did a full circle before finding a more comfortable position to sit in, the other wolves that had arrived alongside it all took up various places by the doors.
“It was due to that intrusion that This one entered into a pact with three others. This one’s now brothers and sisters. With our combined might we would destroy any who entered the woods. There would be no exception. That was our promise to those who defiled our home.”
“These ones descended like a curse onto those who would invade. Onto those who would destroy our home. Flesh was rended and sundered. Supplies were tainted and rotten. Fields freshly plowed were cursed to never bear fruit. It seemed to this one that it was only a matter of time before those foolhardy enough to disturb our peace would be carved out of our home, their damages rebuilt by the strength of nature and the flow of time.”
“And yet, one day, a man appeared in that town. For his age, and for his time, he was a brilliant magician. With a single tap of his long walking staff the trees that those lesser men had felled for their homes sprouted anew. Those grasses trampled by horse and carriage burst back into life. Those homes taken from the wild were returned tenfold.”
“O great spirits who rage in anger at our folly. O great spirits who hate because of our transgressions.’ The boy had said. ‘Please see this sacrifice as penance and proof that through our great efforts and your benevolent forgiveness that we may coexist!” The wolf spirit almost seemed to laugh at the notion.
“The fool used his greatest magic to bind his own life to that of the forest. This one could not understand his actions. Each cut of a branch. Each snap of a twig. He would feel them as severed limbs and shattered bones.” The wolf trailed off. “An unimaginable symphony of agony, just to prove a point.”
“Ten years. He stood in the abandoned town for ten years.” It said, before taking another long pause.
“Though we did not wish to admit defeat. These ones had seen that man struggle. We had been connected to his heart through the very forest itself… We saw his pain, felt his suffering, and knew that his deeds were true and just.”
“That was how the pact was started… So long as man protects these woods, we shall lend them our blessing. So long as man rallies against the darkness, so too shall we lend both tooth and claw.”
“But now…” The spirit let out a guttural growl so low that I felt my bones start to shaken inside of my body. “Now that pact is broken! This one’s brother and sister lay slain. The scent of those knights and their blessings ripe at the scene… and others… darker ones… the power of the great evil that once sundered the world. The Great Darkness.”
“Wait a minute. You said earlier you thought the knights didn’t betray you? When we were in their temple it seemed like they were trying their best to calm down the spirits, not to-“ Ascilla was cut off mercilessly.
“Silence! After generations, the bastard Knights have lost all love for these woods! They take the powers of the spirits as powers for themselves, and now the cost of that hubris is my own kin. Those fools are blind to the poison already in their midst. I could smell them… their stench lingered on the souls of my departed brother and sister… Such transgressions… such evil… were it not for the warmest of memories I would destroy every human who dare set foot on my land.”
“But alas, This one has been weakened. Curse This one and her lack of foresight. As This one is now, she is incapable of both holding back the Darkness and protecting these fools from themselves. And the dangers of these woods.”
“It is for that reason, as well as This one’s guilt about your circumstances, that This one has led you here. You are strong. Perhaps, with enough time, strong enough.” The wolf closed its eyes and laid its head on crossed paws.
“Unfortunately, as you are, you are… insufficient. And thus if you are to aid me you must grow in strength and power. A trial… This one shall grant you a trial. Should you prove yourselves capable then perhaps there is still hope in these once beautiful woods. Should you prove yourselves weak, well, you shall not be alive to see the dire consequences of your failure.”
“What kind of trial?” I asked. The wolf seemed to grin at the question.
“A trial.” The wolf said with a sneer.
Great… I did not like where this was going…
“And it’ll just be the two of us?” Ascilla asked. The wolf nodded.
“This one thought she was being clear.”
“Wait. Are you sure there’s no way that we can bring anyone else along for this? People that we can trust?” Ascilla asked. Huh I hadn’t even thought of that possibility. Given how big Levin was, and how many players were back in Oaktree… if we could get enough people together on this quest then this would become a lot easier. I guess there were perks to not having an empty friends list at times like these.
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Unfortunately, it seemed like the spirit didn’t share the sentiment.
“No. This one has made clear her mistrust of your kind. Were it not for This one’s own blunder putting you in such a distasteful situation, This one would never even consider extending her aid. Be grateful to be granted even this much of a boon. This one’s powers are not what they once were.” The wolf said. Ascilla clicked her tongue.
So we’d be going into whatever this was alone, huh? Can’t say I loved the sound of that… at the moment, besides a little bit of passive healing over time, neither Ascilla nor I had any way to recover after a tough fight or if we wound up in trouble.
Oh well. If the wolf spirit said that it was possible to clear, then the game could have designed it to be cleared by us specifically… if that was the case all we’d have to do was our best… and it wasn’t like this thing would really let us leave and go out on our own… not that we could even get out through the fog if we wanted to.
“Come. Fate waits for none, least of all us.” The wolf said, pulling itself to its feet and beginning to walk towards the large doors leading up to the forest. I didn’t fail to notice that the quest that still told me to “Clear my name” now also included a line about passing the wolf spirit Lapina’s trial. I let out a sigh.
The fog in the forest was as thick as I’d remembered and as soon as we’d left the clearing I completely lost my bearings. It was only the presence of a circle of wolves, headed by a wolf that was about as tall as a house, and the red-haired girl walking next to me that grounded me in reality.
We walked in silence for a time before the circle of wolves dispersed leaving us alone with the spirit. A few feet later, the spirit turned and faced us.
“We have arrived. Are you prepared?” Lapina said, I spared a glance to Ascilla who nodded to the spirit.
“Might as well get this over with!” She said with a grin. I couldn’t tell if she was putting on a brave face or was actually excited for what this “trial” could be. To be honest, I was also a bit curious. I nodded as well.
“Very well.”
We had stopped in front of a large tree. Not nearly as large as the one that housed the Wolf Temple, but still large enough to leave me in awe. Where I’d grown up I’d never really been around nature like this, and so seeing a tree that was thicker than a city bus and that was tall enough to where you had no hope of seeing the tops of its branches was still a new experience to me…
The wolf spirit walked up to the tree and placed its paw onto the bark. A flash of golden light forced me to look away, and when I looked back, an archway had been cut out of the tree and a path led down past its roots and deep underground.
The wolf took a step back before slowly starting to plod off into the mist back towards its home.
“This one must return. These woods are not as safe for spirits as they once were. Should you best this trial, return to this one, and this one shall attend you once more. The woods pray for your success.”
I stood for a minute at the entrance to the tree watching as the spirit vanished into the mist. “Shall we?” I asked, my partner turned her head towards me and nodded.
----------------------------------------
A large man in larger metal armor ran down the road and into the town of Oaktree. At his hip, a large mace rested on his belt. A square shield rested on his back.
He was anxious. How could he not be? Just a few hours ago he’d received a message that his friends had been chased out of a so-called safe zone, and now just minutes ago they told him they were about to tackle a dungeon all on their own…
The idea made his head spin. Going into a dungeon without a healer? With only a tank and a DPS? That was more than stupid, it was suicide. Games with healers were designed in a way where if you didn’t have one you’d be at a real disadvantage, and to his knowledge Rain didn’t think that either Corian or Ascilla had access to any healing spells…
Still, if there was anyone who was able to take on something like that, Ascilla would be his choice. In the three years he’d played with her she was completely untouchable… and as for Corian… well, his first impressions were pretty damn positive.
He ran past another odd group of green cloaked NPCs huddling on a street corner. They matched the description that Ascilla had given him in her message. NPCs in green cloaks, and knights in silver armor with deer antlers on the chest. They were apparently a faction known as the Verdant Knights, and they had apparently accused the two of them of a crime they didn’t commit.
Normally, a quest like that wouldn’t cause such drastic changes to the world. The fact that these Knights were still around town hours after the two of them had left meant that whatever quest they had stumbled upon was capable of changing whole towns… that in and of itself was a terrifying thought.
More than anything, though, he just hoped that his friends were okay.
He had only known Ascilla for the last few months, but her work ethic was something that put anyone he’d ever met to shame… and Corian… well, he owed Corian a lot for what he’d done for his little sister. Either way, it sounded like the two of them had really found their way into some deep shit, and there was nothing left to think about other than how to get them out.
Rain finally reached the end of the road and came upon the guild hall. He wasted no time bursting into the building and taking a look around. There weren’t many people up at this early of an hour, but there were still a few people sitting around some of the tables. Maybe one of them would-
“Yo! Big man! C’mere for a sec!” A voice called from across the guild hall. Rain turned and found a familiar man standing in a crafting apron over by the guild’s quest board.
“What’s up, Takuro?” Rain asked.
The crafter just put a thumb over his shoulder towards the list. His expression was… well, Rain walked over to the board to have a look.
He scanned its contents with his own eyes. There were dozens of quest fliers and he hadn’t gotten a good look at it before he’d turned around and left the day before. Was there some sort of new quest that had been posted?
Yes. There was. Down near the bottom of the board, one new quest was posted over and over again… It was the only quest he’d ever seen posted more than once, and it’s contents were…
Rain pulled one of the pages off of the wall and looked at it with fire in his eyes.
[Quest: Wanted! Dead or Alive! Bounty, 150,000 Gold Each, two individuals description as follows:
One Male: Black hair, one handed sword, light-medium metal armor, Identified by the name of ’Corian’
One Female: Red hair, two handed axe, medium leather armor, Identified by the name of ‘Ascilla’
Please report any information on the whereabouts of these two fugitives to Verdant Knights Captain Atras]
He crushed the paper in his hand and twisted his face in fury as a knot formed in his stomach.
“Takuro! Has anyone accepted this quest?” He asked. The crafter shrugged.
“I only saw it myself not too long ago, nobody’s grabbed it since I’ve been here but that don’t mean nobody came in… I mean really, that amount of cash? That’d probably turn some heads… Even if player killin’ in this place is… well, you know?” He said. His voice was strained.
Rain knew all too well. Players were greedy. 300,000 Gold? The next highest reward on the board was only thirty five thousand… He had no doubt that if anyone had seen that quest they would be hard pressed to just leave it be. The quest didn’t even say anything about the two of them being players. That meant that right now, a whole host of the highest level, best geared players in the world were looking for his friends… and if the wrong group found them…
“Make sure not a single person accepts those quests, Takuro.” Rain said. His voice was as cold as steel.
“Plannin’ on it, boss!” The man said with a salute.
“Get a message to every member of the guild you have on your list, and get them to pass it on to every player they see. Tell them that monsters can attack you in the safe zone, even inn rooms aren’t safe, and tell them that NPCs can post quests to hunt and kill other players.” Rain said. His voice was stern, but behind his stony demeanor his stomach was doing flips. What the hell was this?
Rain turned and walked out of the guild hall. He had to find those two, and fast…