Chapter 4.
Correspondence between Canned Heaven Incorporated and Sword, Board and Song™ from the 5th of Pompluy to the 8th and a final note on the 15th of that same month, 2103.
(Sent on the 5th of Pompluy)
Dear Bob,
After looking at the terms and conditions for different options, my manager has requested that we come to the following terms.
1. We get the option of pre-stated Herald Accounts for our company (starting with 20).
2. Fifteen of our products are included in in-game stores and taverns for strictly server-world currencies, including but not limited to; Canned Heaven, Puffy Delight, Celestial Bubbles, Angelic Apple, Seraphic Spring Soda, Exalted Lemon Flavored Treasure, Elysian Elixir and their more popular variants.
3. We want each drink to have a hard-coded different effects, for instance Canned Heaven should allow the drinker (regardless of class) to be able to spit fire! A full list is included here.
4. A non-compete clause with Lester Works, Falstaff’s Foundry Incorporated and all foreign brands. Our marketing team is pretty pleased with this idea and doesn’t want undue competition stealing their idea.
For payment offered see the attachment.
Felix Y.
(Sent on the 5th of Pompluy)
Greetings Felix Y,
That is a very interesting sum being offered. Understand that my superiors have very firm ideals, but while they have been badgered into generally agreeing with the advertisement as you have suggested, they want to be clear that these company owned characters will not be able to advance into the older server-worlds. To do otherwise they insist would be a breaking of promises to paying customers, but so long as this is agreed to, we should not have any major issues.
Code for your recommended drinks is being worked on, we would note that the effects, Paralysis or similar effects are not available for balance reasons. See the attachment for further notes.
Bob
This letter is from a SWORD, BOARD and SONG™ verified account.
(Sent on the 8th of Pompluy)
Dear Bob,
Just a heads up that our new ‘Ambassadors’ have turned on their accounts and are in the world. Is there a reason that we cannot see our products in all markets yet?
Felix Y.
(Sent on the 8th of Pompluy)
Greetings Felix Y,
As was covered in the previous attachment, we cannot add products to non-player characters without upsetting a number of hardcoded considerations, such as taxes and assessments in guild standing. A difficult coding problem. This is covered by our contract in paragraphs 35b 78d and the whole of page 300.
Bob
This letter is from a SWORD, BOARD and SONG™ verified account.
(Sent on the 15th of Pompluy)
Dear Bob,
Due to the recent letters of complaint, we would like to simplify all effects down to energy boosts or spitting fire. I am not sure if you have or have not seen the video of the five year old who sang your game’s opening musical track, took a drink of her can of Canned Heaven, then sprayed it over her younger brother who she had just punched and then screamed, “healing!” At him. It is sadly not the only video, but it is the one that has generated most of our complaints.
Felix Y.
Jake. 8th of Pompluy.
The walk to the ruined fortress became more talkative after a while. Jake told them about his Copper ranked skill with one-handed swords and was congratulated, though the others were hesitant about it. Most of them did not want to spend that long in a training arena, even if it was kind of fun. Michael did start stabbing at plants as he passed them and when questioned, insisted that this probably had some positive effect. He did not report any levels going up, but it was possible.
After a while the road degraded into a virtual mud pit. John commented that the priest had mentioned a recent rain on this side of town, but they mostly just watched as their characters became muddy. It wasn’t like it slowed them down that much.
The ruins were comparatively not that large. The road’s pieces still marked that they were going towards where the gates had once stood, but now there were just raised hills of dirt and rotted wooden posts. No flagpole stood and the place looked devastated.
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“So, where is the treasury?” Jade said with a smirk.
“If there is one, it should be near the middle of the fortress, as that is where the commander’s tent would be.”
“Tent?” Jade asked confused, “I thought this was like, a castle. Like in Inflame 5?”
John explained, “From what I have read for the lore for this world, there used to be a Lawful empire that would send its legion-phalanxes to fight Chaos. They did well for a while, but something happened. Then they fell apart, like three times and 3000 years have passed. The world was briefly ruled by a dragon cult, more recently by a cabal of giant sorcerers, and then the current age of kings.”
“And queens,” Jade sniped.
“Queens are dumb,” Michael counter-attacked.
“Shhh, we can argue about that later. Anyway, this is an old legion-phalanx fort and it was probably just used for a little while. Probably, has been repaired in more recent times.”
Jake had what he thought was a more pressing problem, “Uh, guys, I see something.”
There was confusion at that before they all saw the ancient skeletons. The skeletons were covered in a mix of dry and cracked looking hardened leather, rusted looking metal coats and unpolished bronze. The figures struggled beneath their heavy gear and formed a formation of massive square shields, three lines of spears, while others stood on the walls and picked up stones to throw at them.
Jake counted and said, “I don’t think we can take them like this.”
John turned his character and said, “It is a pity none of us rolled up a good anti-undead Patter.”
“I think I can handle this, but cover my character,” Jade said as her character moved back and began to sing.
The skeletons stood in their ranks, at first unmoving, but then it seemed as though a cold wind had moved through the area. They began to look at each other and then see where they were. Some began to step out of line backwards, while the most intact looking skeleton, dressed as an officer, his armor glowing a sickly green, used the flat of his sword to drive his undead troops back into line.
“Go forward, now!” Jake said as she frantically typed and her character’s song seemed to reach a new crescendo.
They rushed and cut their way forward. The light troops on the walls threw their stones, but they were extremely inaccurate and the three fighters crashed into the wavering line. Jake parried the first spear thrust with his sword and then let his shield bounce the other hits. The skeletons were still strong, but they lacked his character’s weight and they were forced back and out of formation. His sword smashed a head and the skeleton dropped. He parried and his opponent’s spear broke. John was pushing towards the leader, while Michael held back somewhat, trying to spear fence with two of the enemies. Jake couldn’t assist and he drove his shield into another, pushing it over and tangling the legs of the second rank with the fallen spear. He broke others, slashing through breaking leather or tearing rusted rings apart with his sword. It seemed to gleam copper every few minutes and he would receive a log report of a lucky hit.
Then John crossed his vision, axe smashing the arm off of the leader. There was a shriek over the battlefield, muting Jade’s song, which emboldened the strange skeletons. Micheal let out a yelp and then they were silent except for the clash of weapons and the weakened song.
Jake’s character took hits, but none were unlucky and he was really good at parrying. Better yet, the danger from the broken spears was much less than the fresh ones and as the ancient spears tended to break when parried, even if he had not been attacking, his position would have gotten better. Micheal finally started more aggressively helping and Jade’s song suddenly reached a new point of power and the skeletons all stumbled. Jake and John took advantage of their second lapse of formation and concentration to smash their way through the group and begin attacking the rock throwers that had climbed down.
“Well, may they rest in pieces,” Michael laughed at his own joke as he joined the clean up and the last of the skeletons collapsed into a tumble of bones.
“Ha ha,” Jake muttered without any humor and said, “I don’t think we can carry this much back with us.”
John looked over the piles of bones and broken weapons before saying, “We should see if we can find a loose Camper, and see they will agree to carry some of it back, or just buy a mule.”
“I hate encumbrance. Why can’t we have an ordinary inventory system like in the other computer games?” Jade opined irritably.
“Hey guys, look,” Michael said as his character wiggled about and waved his hand up in the air. A dark red ring faintly glowed.
“What does it do?” Jake asked as he heard John facepalm in the background.
“Uh, I don’t know. Should it do something? It just says ‘item not appraised.’”
His sister laughed and said, “Did you just put a cursed item on?”
“Guys, it is not coming off!” Michael said panicking.
John sighed heavily and said, “It probably just has a binding so you can’t switch it out for another one. Just leave it alone and help us collect everything else into a pile.”
A few minutes of work later, the skeletons and their ruined leathers and clothes were a pile to one-side, while the bronze weapons and mostly intact shields were collected. John had his character pick up the pieces and then on a separate piece of paper he wrote out the values, while Michael punched the grumbling walls, hoping the ring would break before it did something bad. Jake explored the fortress ruins for doors or holes in the ground, while Jade parked her character off in a corner and typed noisily on her cell phone.
John finally said, “I think our best option is to break off the spearheads, collect those and the swords and a few of the best shields. Find anything?”
“Yeah. I think so.”
Jade’s character jerked around as she collected her controller and the players grouped up with Jake’s character.
“What is it?” Jade asked as she surveyed the broken bricks of the courtyard.
“This oxne right here is a trigger. Should I push it?”
Michael started moving before John said, “Stop! Jake, don’t push it with your hands. Traps exist. I’ll get one of the broken spear shafts and we use that to test it.”
When this was done the ground shook and a cave’s mouth opened into the earth.