Chapter 4 - Defence of the Nexus
The tendril of light curled gently around Rufians hand. The swarthy teenager stood for a moment caressing the light with his fingers.
As the tendril reached back for the teenager it tapped gently as if tasting, and finding Rufian palatable it looped itself around his forearm and violently tugged. Rufian fell to the ground bonelessly, his arm out in front of him only partially stopping the teenager hitting the ground face first.
“Rufian!” Both Palinus and Bruchts yelled as they watched him collapse.
Bruchts crawled over to his friend and tried to pull him away from the rift by the ankle. But trying as hard as he could he couldn’t move Rufian. He seemed to be stuck in place with some invisible force.
“He’s still warm,” Bruchts turned back towards Palinus. “Still breathing.”
The big teenager sat on the ground and rubbed at his blonde hair deep in thought. After a few moments he appeared to have made a decision.
“We're going, he needs someone to watch over him.”
He gestured to Palinus to follow and crawled towards the darting tendrils of the rift with the iron poker still in his hand. The heavy piece of metal would be better than nothin as a weapon in the rift and Palinus was glad he was going in with something. Bruchts crawled up next to Rufian where a white tendril of light caressed his back before wrapping around his neck as he too collapsed.
Palinus was alone in the alleyway standing over two unconscious teenagers he barely considered friends staring at the rift.
As he stood in indecision he considered the loose tendrils of white tendrils of light as they swayed and danced hypnotically. They were thicker at the base and moved like they were alive. This impression was reinforced as whenever a tendril got close to Palinus it would stretch and reach out towards him, moving with intent.
The sense of the rift being alive repulsed Palinus and watching Rufian fall to the ground like he was dead had filled him with a deep sense of dread. It would have been logical to turn and run, and Palinus was definitely close to running. He hadn’t exactly agreed to do this with the other boys but if they made it out they would absolutely call him a coward.
“Rifts are common, people go into them all the time… I’ll just go in and pick essentia off the ground… It will be OK, we can be safe and the Nexus will just revive us if we get into trouble…” Palinus repeated Rufian’s arguments to try and convince himself,”... We can get loot.”
This was a chance, in the rift he might find something that could set him up for life far away from Erulea. Rufian was wrong, he didn’t want to fight, he just wanted to leave. But maybe he was right, it might be safe and he said they would get back in time to secure the wool. If they found something good he could sell it to pay off Domitia Commodus and they wouldn’t have to worry about the wool anyway.
He wouldn’t have to worry if he was dead in anycase.
Checking that he had the wand secure in his hand and with grim determination he sat on the alley floor and scooted awkwardly backwards on his bottom towards the rift.
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Palinus’ body jerked forward as he regained consciousness and hit his face on a curved albumstone wall.
He found himself in a narrow cylindrical space. Just as he started to panic about being stuck in the dark confined space, a pin prick of light appeared in front of him and rapidly expanded as if the stone was melting. Through the hole he could see a room that looked like a generic Erulean temple with a huge fire in the middle.
As he looked through the rapidly expanding hole he could see several enormous columns around the room. In the column opposite several fingers were sticking out, struggling ineffectually to widen a similar hole to the one Palinus was looking through. The owner of the fingers was an unfamiliar older man who seemed to calm as the hole opened wide enough to see through comfortably.
The hole opened itself quickly and as soon as it was big enough Palinus climbed out. Rufian and Bruchts had done the same and were grinning back at him as they climbed out of their pillars.
“I knew you would come, but I thought you might have taken some time to work up the courage!” Rufian laughed.
Bruchts and Palinus shared a look and while they didn’t say anything, Bruchts did give a faint nod of acknowledgement.
“Let's go-!” Rufian started moving towards the door on the right.
“Keep your pants on kid,” a gruff voice came from the man from the column who was stepping casually out now. “Foolish to be diving a rift so young…”
“Haha, we would have been younger when we ran our first Marc.” A woman stepped out of the final column. She familiarly put her hand on the man’s shoulder before she addressed the boys. “First time?”
She asked it as a question but it was delivered as a statement.
“It’s ok, we can show you the ropes and make sure you get out safely. I am Minucia, and this is Marcus.” She gestured to the boys to sit with her by the fire at the centre of the room.
“I don’t think we need your help-” Rufian started trying to brush her off.
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Marcus walked calmly over to Rufian and punched him solidly in the jaw, knocking him down.
“Shut it boy. All of our lives are on the line here. So pay attention and do what we say.” Marcus stood over Rufian.
“You have time to sit and listen even if you do choose to rush off to die on your own.” Minucia placated, “the first 5 minutes of a rift are preparation time. There are no spawning minions or creeps. More professional teams in a match rift might march off straight away or posture and poke at each other, but for newbies like you that wouldn’t be a safe option.”
“How did you know we were new to this?” Palinus asked as he sat.
“If you look closely at an avatar, a minion or a creep you will get some information about them. ”
Palinus looked at his team members more closely to see what she was talking about. If he let his eyes rest on one of his team members, boxes appeared above their heads with colourful writing and information on their avatars. Once he had the knack of adjusting his focus he could instantly see the information at will.
Minutia Gavros 580/580 | Level 0
Foam Witch - Sorcerer / Foam Witch / Mage
Marcus Gavros 732/732 | Level 0
Bloody Maceman - Bruiser / Bloody Maceman / Defender
Rufian Ramirus 650/650 | Level 0
Unformed
Bruchts 610/610 | Level 0
Unformed
Palinus 600/600 | Level 0
Unformed
“Whoa, the colours must be our attunement!” Palinus remarked excitedly.
“‘Ooohh pretty colours!’” Rufian mocked and got an idle cuff over the head from Marcus.
“...unformed?” Palinus wondered, ignoring the other boy.
“It means you have never levelled up in a rift,” Minucia explained and laughed, “we’ll pop your cherry today. So, you’ll see what it all means.”
“This rift is an internexus conflict, a hardcore, five vs five, Defence of the Nexus with two lanes,” She started explaining rapidly, but sensing an interjecting question from Palinus she sighed and explained with a gesture at the turquoise calculii on her temple. “I can see information on this rift using my essentia sight, and yes there are other types of rifts.”
She launched back into explaining quickly.
“An internexus conflict rift occurs when opposing nexuses converge over an essentia pathway. In this case it is between an Erulean sub-nexus against a nexus in the Silvanian Kingdoms cluster. This rift is a common battlefield but of little importance so the essentia investment of the nexuses is low. Be aware that a very low essentia investment from the nexuses means that our nexus is unlikely to revive you until a threshold of essentia is collected, which is why we call this a hardcore rift.”
His eyes had glazed over as he got lost in the details but the reminder of his mortality and the sympathetic look in Minucia and Marcus's eyes as she explained that bit brought him back to focus. They had committed now and he needed this information to survive.
“This conflict is over two essentia pathways which means two lanes in the rift. It is a single stage battle and we call this map type a Defence of the Nexus because both sides will have an avatar of the nexus to defend.” Minucia pointed out this was the fire for them. “The nexuses will battle by spawning minions which will march down the lanes towards each other in an effort to destroy the opposition nexus. They are always evenly matched, which is where we all came in. We have been spawned into the rift as avatars of ourselves to fight on behalf of the nexus. The rift will end when either nexus is destroyed and you will be returned to your bodies in the overworld.”
“So are you just here to shepherd the minions and get some easy essentia?”
Minucia’s question barely cut through the information overload in Palinus’s brain and before he could even nod a confirmation Rufian blurted out, “No, we are here to fight!”
The two experienced rift delvers laughed at the bravado. They gestured for the boys to wait as they turned to have a quiet chat between themselves which involved several gestures at the boys. Rufian seemed pumped up and impatient to go but hesitated with a side eyed look at Marcus’s fist.
“That is a very stupid idea, but Min wants to give you the chance, so we will see,” Marcus said before asking. “How do you plan on fighting?”
Palinus showed them the wand, Bruchts his iron poker and Rufian just raised his fists and shrugged which made the two adults laugh again before Marcus suddenly got deadly serious.
“Right, if you are set on fighting the opposition avatars instead of just shepherding the minions just be aware that you are putting our lives on the line as well as your own. At the first sign of real danger we will be backing off and I suggest you do too.” Marcus warned, “Two generalised melee with a wand user is not a good combo for this rift configuration. You will either push too hard or barely get any essentia and besides, your attunements are not balanced as a trio. You two go down that lane.”
Marcus pointed at Palinus and Bruchts to the door on the right.
“Min will support this one in the other lane,” the big man pointed at Rufian, “and I’ll roam.”
Not wanting to separate, Rufian and Bruchts quickly objected to the orders.
“Let me take the wand and I’ll go with Bruchts,” Rufian moved to take the wand from Palinus who offered it out for him. As Rufian tried to grasp the weapon in Palinus’s hand he didn't seem to be able to grip it. Palinus tried to give it to Rufian but the wand just slipped out of his grip and just clattered to the floor.
Minucia and Marcus laughed, shaking their heads at the boys' antics.
“You can’t loot avatars, idiots. Also this is a low essentia rift so there is no exhange and you can’t really change your loadout. But if you do see a drop coalesce from essentia you have to let us know and we will decide who can best use it,” Marcus growled and a hint of menace entered his voice as he warned, “Don’t be loot thieves or I'll push you under their tower myself.”
Minucia rolled her eyes at her husband’s threat but her voice took a serious tone as she finished her lecture.
“We do not know what we will be facing. It might be a group of shepherds, or it might be Myrthelwhynese Rift Slayers. Until we say otherwise, stay near the tower, behind the minions and maintain contact.” Minucia wrapped up, “We will help you through this where we can but I’ll leave you with this:
Absolutely do not go into the forest unless you know what you are doing.
Assume the nexus does not have enough essentia to revive your avatar and do not let yourself run out of health. You will die in the overworld
Surviving is the primary goal, not essentia, not loot and definitely not winning.”