16 days remain of contest A, Saturday.

The war column of wild air-aspected players charging through the city on mounts is definitely noticed by everyone. When bundled together, the air aspect bonus increases and creates the effect of having it spin dust-devils off as we pass. The NPCs look on nervously, but otherwise go about their business.

We skip stealth and careen headlong down the road, a wild bunch of crazed players with blood and battle lust to spare. We overwhelm several [Art of War] stragglers we come across. There are so many of us hitting them most of us are barely even able to get in an attack. Our mounts huff and spit and complain about being pressed to their limit while we chase the players down.

The Jade Fortress comes into view amid the swamp and trees in the lower-lying areas. The crater from the forward base is still smoking, the portal stone is dust, the tents are shredded. There are no players or NPCs in sight. The war party charges forward, eager to enter the fortress.

Now it is our turn to set up a camp and begin to work to take out the Fortress.

“Saying that you beat the story instance with the dragon; I want this one,” Sauce says to me, walking up with bow out and eyes on the edge of camp.

“That sounds fair. I could use a break from dungeons”

“I have got some info from [Art of War] defectors about this fortress and I think we can take it down,” He says.

“I’ll try to keep it clear out here,” I say.

I watch Sauce walk off and pull in his crew, then I see him put in the call in the alliance chat. I do a similar message about having scouts stick around outside and act as outriders to warn of an impending attack. I know Josie, and there is no way she will take this sitting down. She will counterattack, so we need to set up a supply line. I check on the wagon hauling a temporary portal stone here and see how far they are out—luckily, they’re fairly close. Once we have that set up, we will be able to fortify correctly.

I see Kian typing in the air on the side of the camp, far away from the others, so I walk up to him.

“Anything up?” I ask.

“No, but it sounds like they are on the move. You pissed them off.”

“Yeah,” I say with a laugh.

“I’m gonna go check on that portal wagon,” he says, not meeting my eyes.

I watch him mount up and leave. He was not acting normal, but I have too much to think about here. We need to start getting set up. I see a notification that our first raid group has entered the Jade Fortress.

***

Kian was torn as he rode from the camp. He felt like he had been completely sidelined by Esme in the last couple weeks. They did well in the storyline instance, but outside of that Esme was making a lot of calls that he was not comfortable with—the alliance being one of them. That player Sauce had his own motivations and would turn on [Nightfallers] as soon as he could. There is simply too much at stake.

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When Josie had contacted him saying she was willing to offer him a bonus and do an official clan agreement guaranteeing him a bonus amount if he switched sides, he hesitated for a long time, but finally caved. He didn’t like her, but the guarantee was a way to make sure he took care of himself. And, he knew Josie was a more capable leader. She didn’t sneak around behind everyone’s backs; she was a bitch, but at least you knew that going in.

He approached the supply wagon with the portal stone and un-summoned his mount, then climbed into the wagon. Quickly dropping a bag and pulling a string from the closed top. The driver and the group of players didn’t pay him any mind as he—a founding member—was nobody to worry about.

He heard an explosion from the direction of the Fortress and saw the smoke rising. He had left a much larger bag there, which had just vaporized most of the alliance.

Summoning his mount, he began the ride back toward Port Yarrow, instead of back to either fortress.

Behind him the supply wagon exploded, tearing the players and the wagon to bits, pieces of the stone scattering as rubble.

He selected ‘yes’ next to the dialog box asking, “Do you really want to leave clan [Nightfallers]”

***

The explosion rocked the new camp, I had initially been thrown far from the explosion. Many of the Alliance members all around me, our stacked air aspect provided unexpected protection from the sabotage. I am stunned, according to the interface, and everything is blurry and sounds muffled during the effect. While waiting for the stun to clear up, I hear the sound of an advancing war party. I see Josie on her mount with Alanenon and Braneton just behind. She is screaming and shooting arrows impossibly fast at fleeing players.

She stops and scans the battlefield with a smile on her face. I want to slap her. How did she pull this off, I had been careful to not allow any regular members—possible spies—to know what the plan was.

I see her pull out a box and shake it, pulling out what looks like a domino or a Mahjong piece, then throw it toward me. It lands, sticking into the ground and I see it is a Mahjong piece, North, one of the four winds in the Mahjong set. The ground rapidly freezes around the game piece, the frozen area advances in lines like it is alive, lashing to all players nearby. With each player frozen it creates jagged ice spires above them, reaching to the sky. Me, and many of the remaining are almost instantly subsumed in ice.

My eyes freeze last, I see Josie laughing.

You have died

Thank you for playing Imagine Online

Your respawn point: Eagles Crest Fortress

Your respawn wait time: 10 minutes (9:57)

Experience lost: 0

Items lost: none

How could they have—my eye catches a clan notification.

Sil3nt parts ways with clan [Nightfallers].

Thorn parts ways with clan [Nightfallers].

I see several other names leave the clan. I decide to wait for a while before logging in, so I am not a target for the Knife of Retribution. The knife skill—the players action to remove a leader—is more of a “kill Caesar” kind of thing, but I could see it being used by spies.

Is this it?

Logging back in, I begin to re-incorporate back into the world and find myself back under the tree in the ghost town where I first received this tombstone on my back. This time, however, I do not have chains and shackles on. The little clink of bones hanging from the dead tree is oddly comforting. I had been getting more and more concerned that Toldos had not called me back for my tasks of atonement yet.

“I have a job for you,” I hear a voice say. Turning toward it, I see Toldos sitting on the other side of the tree. “It’s time for you to do me some of your tasks. Though, it might be a bit different from what you had in mind. However, I think you are just the person for the task.”

He turns and gives me a dead smile and says flatly, “The balance requires adjusting. There are others like you who have made my job difficult. I want you to do what you do best … but do it even better.”

***

Appearing in the fortress graveyard, I can barely focus on anything. I scan around at the others who are looking to me. Finally, I open my mouth to say something, then I close it.

“We have been betrayed,” I finally get out. “We have one last hope. Sauce and his team are in the fortress. If they beat the guardian we will take the fortress, otherwise we lost our advantage.”

I go to the fortress control room and wait, staring at the table map. I don’t know what to do now. Kian betrayed me to Josie and he must have brought Briar into it. It’s the only thing that makes sense.

How did this even happen?

I get a message from Sauce saying they didn’t make it and asking what happened. I type back a message.

Kian betrayed us.

I hit send and log off.