Let’s focus on coming up with a plan, I said, taking position beside Cuby on the rock.

Are you sure you’re okay?

Dunno, I said. The intense physical feelings are gone, and I feel lucid. I might be able to fight without the focus potion, but since PvP is already the most dangerous situation we’re likely to find ourselves in, and the buff is nice anyway, so there’s really no reason for me not to use it.

Great! Cuby said, immediately shifting into her usual baseline cheeriness. More and more I was suspecting that phrenodine had their emotions on a dial, or something. So what do you think the plan should be?

There’s too many of them to take all at once, obviously, I said. Maybe we can do a flyby. Their weakest members might be susceptible to getting one-shot. Now, if Haroshi has even a single mage, and a brain, the weakest members will have Supercharged Mana Shields on—but the missile might still do enough.

Haroshi has Charm of Gliding, said Cuby. If they’re organized, he can take anyone else with Charm of Gliding—which is magic or psychic affinity. That’s four classes, plus rogues, who can use it, right? He could have a squad ready to come after us—players picked for exactly this situation.

I thought about this for a moment. We’ll be able to check, I said at last. See how many people there are awake, watching. The sleepers won’t react fast enough to catch us by gliding—in a long chase, we’re bound to pull ahead because of Mighty Leap, the grapple gun, and even potentially Haste. His whole pack won’t be able to match that toolkit.

You mean if there aren’t many people on watch, and Haroshi isn’t one of them, it should be safe?

Yes.

But we’ll need a good count of how many guards there are on watch, Cuby said. And it’s too dark to see that through the spyglass. We’d need to get closer, scope out the camp, tag everyone asleep and if we’re lucky, count empty tents.

Again, I had to think. We can try and sneak through the valley, I said. Come at them from below at first, scout the camp, and if everything checks out, return to the mountain to gain some elevation for the fly-by. After we hit them, we fly toward the mountain slope rising just behind their camp, then climb as fast as we can and glide away when we’re sure we’ve got a sound lead.

Cuby waited a moment before answering. We can’t sneak through the forest, she said. The trees might be sparse, but the underbrush will still be too loud for us, even with Sneaking.

I thought of the noise of the gravel and branches we’d stepped over while ascending mountains in the dark. You’re right, I admitted. It probably won’t work.

It would take forever, too.

We’ve got time, I said. They’re sleeping. Actually….

I stopped and thought about this for a second. Why wasn’t I feeling tired at all? I’d felt a little groggy when the attack began, but that had evaporated in the seconds after rising.

What time is it? I asked.

About two hours to dawn, Cuby said uncertainly.

Oh, I said. That explained why I felt so alert. I’d thought that maybe an hour had passed between going to sleep and being woken. But then… why were they camping at all?

Why do they still need to sleep, if it’s been so long? I asked. This doesn’t make sense.

They probably farmed through the night, said Cuby. Their levels were all quite high, and they would’ve gained experience slower than us because so many of them would require a large area. Think about it: for an attack on the first day, wouldn’t you want to run your adventuring clock down to zero, or near-zero—make sure that you’ve outleveled all but the most dedicated potential defenders?

When I thought about it, it made sense. Many of the players we’d seen in town had started at higher levels than us despite the fact that almost everything we’d done through the day had been gaining us experience—and we’d been very efficient.

Haroshi would’ve been a higher level than me, I said, remembering that we’d both been level 7 when we met. Except we killed so many players I caught up.

Yes, said Cuby. She paused, then added: maybe we’re thinking about this wrong. Maybe we should just farm while they sleep, kill as many monsters between here and the dungeon as we can to starve them, then get ahead and scope the terrain to prepare an ambush.

There’s an idea, I said. Though…. I paused, deep in thought for a moment.

What is it?

I think I have a good plan, I said. One second.

I brought up a pane to show Cuby an item from my inventory:

Common Spell Card – Auditory Illusion

Cost: 17 Mana + 4 Mana / Minute

Cast Time: 3.6 Seconds

Effect: Auditory Illusion for 32 Seconds at 22 Illusion Strength

This spell conjures sounds of your choosing. For example you can conjure a scripted conversation, a sophisticated piece of music, or any simple, repetitive noise of your imagining. The volume of these sounds can be as quiet as you desire, but cannot be so loud as to harm nearby creatures.

Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

The spell lasts until you cancel it or cast it again. The listed duration indicates how long the sounds you conjure can be unique; it is the maximum duration that the illusion can last before repeating itself.

That’s… a spell, she said. What am I supposed to be getting?

Yeah, when I took it I sort of figured it was the least important card there, I said. But now… we have a vicious weapon at our disposal, and it’s called sleep deprivation.

Cuby turned to me, blinked. You know about sleep deprivation?

Uh. Yes. Look, people can’t function without sleep. Lose a little and you’re cranky and unfocused. Lose a whole night and you just… won’t focus. Or be able to regulate emotions. Remember: the fact that the focus potion balances my emotions as much as it does implies that we can naturally reach emotional states that keep us from spellcasting. We could potentially deprive them of their abilities—along with their ability to strategize, to react quickly, to make decisions.

I know what sleep deprivation does, she said, mouth curling into a smile. She looked back down at the pane in front of her, read the spell again.

I should cast it first, I said. Imitate the cry of an animal or something to make sure it works the way I think it does—that I can fix it to a point in the air.

Cuby was quiet, still thinking. You’re right, she said hesitantly. I think that’s what we should do. But, she added, emphasizing the word. We won’t break their morale. At best we’ll get a few of them to desert him when they’ve got the chance and it won’t get them killed.

I was no military strategist, but they’d lost something like half their force—and unlike real battles, every casualty in this game was a death. Surely a sleepless night could break them?

But then I hadn’t lived in the Hierarchy, and Cuby had.

Why are you so sure? I asked.

Because probably half of his followers are either karox or lamue, she said.

I practically ground my teeth, frustrated yet again with my decision to keep Cuby in the dark. Somehow, I was supposed to know—as an assisting AI—that obviously karox and lamue wouldn’t desert Haroshi. It was apparently so obvious that Cuby had offered no explanation, and if I asked… well, that would just be suspicious.

And yet not knowing could be harmful, even lethal in the future. If we were going to fight these people….

Lamue are followers, Alatar, Cuby said, unprompted. Under the directives, they’ve curated and shepherded the faith such that it has become the galaxy’s greatest work of art. But the natural devotion that makes them so effective at policing, at laboring, at forming and administrating the Army of Wealth—that total devotion that makes them seem so alien next to phrenodine or taxin el—it makes them rigid. Unbending. If Haroshi asked them to throw themselves into a pyre, they’d do it, and they’d think that the feeling in them that enabled them to sacrifice their own life at his command was the highest good they could attain. They won’t desert him just because half of them have died.

From where she lay beside me, she looked over, her expression neutral, unreadable. Understand?

I think so, I said, my mind wanting to wheel away in two directions. One, I tried considering an entire species whose assigned purpose, as I understood it, was to act out dogma and be obedient. Two, I had to wonder what it meant that Cuby thought I needed the explanation in the first place, given that she’d implied earlier, while speaking about her nutrient gel, that as an assistant AI who worked in waste management I was supposed to have worked with plenty of lamue.

And karox, she said. Well, they’re a bit… strange. Great to work with, once you know how they work—not that I ever saw many in my old job. But you can’t really trust them in a normal way—you can only trust them to be exactly true to their stated principles.

I blinked. Surely she could hear how ridiculous she sounded, was joking? So… they’re trustworthy? I said.

It’s trickier than that, Cuby said, shaking her head. Take Karrol Stir: he’s helping us now because he thinks we’re doing the right thing by helping the NPCs of Oromar’s Bastion. But even that desire of his is driven by some principle—that he values life, say. If we somehow act against that principle of his even while acting in defense of Oromar’s Bastion, he might betray us.

Okay, I said, thinking that all she was describing was a person who stuck to their principles—probably the least tricky morality I could think of, and the easiest to trust.

Even if he’s made a bargain about it, she said. Even if he’s given his word. Even if his principles have come into conflict with the people he’s closest to, his loyalty will be to the principles, not the people.

You’re right, I said, trying to keep my voice from sounding sarcastic. That does sound confusing.

All you need to do is know the principles, said Cuby. And always frame your requests to a karox in terms of their principles—they like that, it’s respectful. Anyway, she said, peeking once again through her spyglass. The karox with him won’t desert just because they’re losing, either.

I nodded. She’d made them sound like they were fundamentally decent folk—but then that judgment relied on their principles. Clearly, whatever karox were with Haroshi had some principles that I—and their brethren, Karrol Stir—took umbrage with.

So what’s the plan, exactly?

I gain a lot of height, I said. Cast a Supercharged, Fragmented Auditory Illusion. Then fly over their camp—out of range of a mage’s magical senses, out of range of a devour magic or any other dispel effect—then loose the illusion over their camp, where it creates the loudest sound it can, one that initially causes them to go to high alert, but then just keeps them from falling asleep even after they’ve realized it’s an illusion. Unlike the other illusion, realizing this one is an illusion doesn’t let you ignore it.

We could even use this in the most unsubtle way possible to cover the sound of our sneaking, she said. Alatar—I think this plan is good. Either they move camp, or they suffer the consequences. And we don’t even need to be near them, unless the spell has a hidden range limit. We can still leave to farm, as long as we’re cautious.

We’ll find out, I guess, I said. I looked back toward their camp, where shadows still milled about—people still awake. In the meantime, we can think of ways to improve the plan.

Actually, said Cuby. Since we’ve got the time, there’s something else I wanted to do with you.

Oh?

I want you to show me everything, Alatar. Everything.

Uh. What?

Abilities! she said. Show me all your abilities, and I’ll show you all mine. We’re working so closely together, but we’ve each only got the gist of one another’s class. Now that we’ve got the time….

Oh, I said. You’re right, that makes sense. Here….

And I opened my abilities pane.