Chapter 14
The raid took less than an hour but I wasn’t around to see it. After I killed Ed and got the lovely notification that I was now level 5, everything coasted for a bit before going downhill entirely.
Bear showed me that if there were multiple groups defending an area, the attackers would divide up and try to get whoever they could. That meant that if I wanted to take a breather, I could crouch way low down and ride it out for a bit without much interference from the raiders.
It was a great plan. Bear and I talked for a bit about raid tactics and then I remembered the tattoo on my arm. I checked my view counter and was surprised to see that my numbers weren’t super high. I had just over forty people watching me and it was going down. Obviously, it was dropping because I was sitting on my ass on a rooftop in a town where action should be easy to find. Viewers were bored.
That was my first ‘oops,’ of the raid. Yes, only my first one, because I wasn’t going to count Coot’s dying. I did my damnedest. It isn’t my fault that he keeps getting himself cornered in the middle of a raid.
Seeing that counter reminded me of Winnie and why I had the counter in the first place. So, I stood up and started looking for people to kill. When I couldn’t find anyone on the minimap, I expanded it to take a look at what I could see. The entire map filled my HUD.
That was my second ‘oops,’ of the raid.
My map was open for less than half a second, but when a bullet hit the ground directly in front of my feet. During my discussions with Bear, we had shifted toward the front of the building so he could show me where the raiders were entering alleys and how we could best rain down our fiery death on them. The bullet and the spray of rooftop chunks that it kicked up startled me.
I spun.
I tripped on the ledge.
I fell off the roof.
It wasn’t even that I fell off the roof, so much as how I hit everything on the way down. My head hit a sign on the front of the building. That sent me into a spin that gave my mild hope when my leg broke a window. I figured that maybe I could hook it and slow my fall, but that didn’t happen. The next things that I hit, in the order that I hit them, were an awning, a lamp post, and a horse carriage. I didn’t land anywhere fun or safe like the back of the horse carriage. That would have been nice. I landed sideways on the armrest, more specifically the board on the side of the driver’s seat, and spun over and onto the street.
The picture of my death, in that familiar, yet annoying, sepia they liked to use, had my body, broken and abused, twisted up in the spokes of the same wagon. It was a great picture that I’m elated I didn’t have to experience. My actual death was caused by breaking my back on the side of the horse carriage.
The only positive thing that I can take from the experience is that nobody gained any levels from my death.
I didn’t bother looking at my watch when I resurrected. As I expected, I was about a mile outside of Aberdine. I took the long hike back and sent a message to the guys to meet me at camp. I got the alert back that Bear was still dead, but Coot answered with excitement.
D0C70RC007: Camp? We have a camp? I can’t wait!!!!!!
Sammy#0421: You’ll probably beat me there. Don’t say anything, I want to see it for myself.
D0C70RC007: What’d you think of Panda_Bear_Polka?
Sammy#0421: Already added him to the gang. We’ll talk more in person.
To my surprise, the broadcast turned itself off when I died. That meant that either my viewers would see me be triumphant, or they would see me fail at the end of every ‘episode.’ If I didn’t want to lose viewers, I would need to keep a healthy mix and the only way to control that would be to get into a few fights that I had more control over than the feed would see.
I had no guilt whatsoever about trying to rig the streaming stuff. If I could cheat my way into a better life for Winnie, then I’d be damned if anything was going to stand in my way.
Of course, I didn’t want to rig the feeds, but I was going to take advantage of choosing when the button was pressed at every opportunity.
I examined my notifications and saw that, instead of being just barely into level 5, I was already level 6. My other notifications showed why. Even though my team had died, we had been part of a successful defense against a raid. The XP had been through the roof.
The pay wasn’t bad either. I had an extra $287 in my account.
If this was what I got for defending a town, I could see why someone would raid one. The Colossals were using them as farms for experience and money, as much as they could get. If all that I cared about was leveling up, I would probably do the same thing.
Except, Easter was a problem. The Colossals weren’t raiding Aberdine or Saint Emile every day because that’s where the veteran players hung out. They were raiding Easter for the easy raid wins and the even easier rookie player kills. It felt wrong, like they were cheating. Taking advantage of new player ignorance to cash in without any repercussions. It only made me want to be one of those repercussions even more.
Smoke filled the streets, but the damage that could be seen was minimal. Aberdine had seen better days, but because of the little bit of help I had to offer, today wasn’t the worst of them.
Yes, that sounded corny as hell to me too.
The Fast Travel was untouched. I touched the sign, saw the money leave my account, and sat on the bench.
When I blinked, I was no longer in Aberdine.
The table that I sat at was small and consisted of several boards nailed together to form the surface. It was held up with two barrels. On top of it sat a lantern.
I was sitting in a folding wooden chair. Twisting around in my seat, I took in the rest of camp.
The center of camp was a fire pit with a stew pot hanging over it on an A-frame. There was a small tent with what I thought looked like a sleeping bag and a crate in it off to the right of the fire. I’m sure they would call it a bedroll or whatever, but it looked like a sleeping bag.
To the left of the fire was a large covered wagon. The horse was separate and tied to a nearby tree. Horse was keeping him company. Joan sat on her own folding chair by the wagon. She was prying open a box of something. When she got it open, she pulled out a brown bottle before leaning back and throwing her feet up on the opened box. She pulled out a cork and started drinking.
“It’s about time you got here,” she said. “Your bed is all made up. I ain’t your mother, so try to keep it tidy.”
On the other side of the table, across from me, were two more tents. The wagon and the tents made a circle that enclosed the camp. From the logs being sawed from one of the furthest tents from me, I could tell that Coot had already made it.
“Which tent is mine?” I asked Joan as I stood from the table.
She pointed at the first one that I had noticed. “In there you will find your wardrobe, past recordings, a safe place to rest, and an inventory of all of your weapons if you end up purchasing the weapon locker.” Joan shifted and pointed at a red box on the ground near the horses. “Mail can be picked up there.”
Not only did I have a safe place that I could, essentially, teleport to, but I could check my mail there as well. That was great news and I filed it away in the back of my brain to plan my trips around if I didn’t have time to hit a town for the post office.
The mailbox was my first stop.
The box had a latch with a spot for a lock. The lock wasn’t there, and likely had never been. I opened it and was greeted with the same clipboard that had been at the post office in Easter. Picking it up, I started scrolling through the list.
I had several gifts from EveNet, which included ammo boxes, another gold nugget, and a wardrobe coupon that I put directly into my pouch. There wasn’t much need for me to change my clothes yet and I could examine it later.
There was a letter from a man who I had never heard of, but because of the way this game worked, he spoke like I had been the one who reached out to him. Basically, since I had passed level 5, he was offering me jobs.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
Another coupon said that I could get a new type of mount at the stables for a discounted price since I had reached level 4. I pocketed that, but had no intentions of using it. Horse was beginning to grow on me.
Passing level 5 also gave me access to the Volcanic Pistol that Coot was using, but I needed to stop by a gunsmith to buy it.
That was about it for the mail and I wasn’t sure if I was disappointed or not. That’s a lot of mail for checking twice in one day.
My pocket watch said that it was just past seven and the sun looked like it was ready to drop. I decided that the rest of my day could be spent in my bunk, but not without stopping by the crate at Joan’s feet first.
The beer tasted better than I had expected, which was more of a failing on my ability to expect things than it was on the beer. The flavors of this world were supposed to be based on things pulled from our minds. I knew that. So, when the beer tasted like a craft beer I remembered liking a lot when I was in my forties, or maybe fifties, I should not have been surprised.
I clinked my bottle with Joan's and walked over to my tent. I wanted to review the feeds, but I also needed to finally force myself to read the manual.
That's what I did for the next two hours. My bedroll wasn't actually as comfortable as I had expected it to, and I learned why on the section about camps in the manual.
The standard camp had only what we had, minus Coot and Bear's tents. Their tents were here only because the gang was still formed. If I was on my own, their camps would be wherever they wanted to put down their camps.
By design, my camp was not the most comfortable. If I wanted to improve my camp, I would need to talk to Joan and mention making upgrades. She would give me a list of things that I could do to the camp, including increasing the tent size and comfort, putting a Fast Travel at the camp, and even getting a dog. I just needed to be able to pay her for it and by the next time I was back in camp, it would be taken care of.
The gangs were another part of the manual that offered me a few surprises. I was worried that if I disbanded the gang then I would have to go through effort and cost if I wanted it back up. That wasn't the case. The Pink Flamingos existed until I deleted them. I could disband them at anytime, which mostly just meant I could release everyone until I needed the gang again. I could also reform the gang, let everyone keep doing their own things, and just be a one person gang until Coot or Bear decided they wanted to rejoin with me.
More interestingly, I could join up to 5 gangs total at any time. I made a mental note to send a message to Jemmy about joining up with each other now that I knew it wouldn't lock me out of my own.
Gangs led into raids and jobs. Raids could only be started by gang leaders. Jobs were different in that there were jobs meant for people to do by themselves and there were jobs that could only be done by a gang. Gang jobs always paid more and nothing paid as well as the raids.
The manual encouraged you to do raids. I didn't disagree, but the more I read about it the more it was obvious that they didn't really want you raiding the areas where new players came in. That included Easter, and two towns that I hadn't heard of yet, Rooster and Juniper. The wording on that part of the raids description stated:
While it is easier to get experience in areas where people are less knowledgeable about Wicked West, negative reputation bonuses will be doubled during raids on Easter, Juniper, and Rooster.
That took me to the reputation page. Reputation had two sides. You had to be considerate of the reputation you made but you also had a gang reputation. If your gang was doing things that negatively effected the group, than certain towns would react negatively when we went to them. It wasn't clear what it meant by 'negatively,' but I had to assume that they meant prices would go up. That's how the word was used when explaining the effect on individual reputation.
I kept reading, only breaking when Bear showed up and made stew. I grabbed bowl and migrated from the tent to the table again, choosing to read while I ate my stew so that I wasn't completely ignoring my crew.
When I finally got bored with reading the manual, which was about two hours in, I put it back into my inventory and turned to my gang. The stew was gone from our bowls butwe were all still at the table. Coot was digging through his bag while Bear was cleaning his rifle.
"What do you guys want out of all this?" I asked.
They both started at the sudden conversation breaking the long silence of the camp.
"Want out of what?" Bear asked finally.
I shrugged. "Out of this second life, maybe? Or out of being in this gang? I don't know. I want to know you guys better. You're the only friends I have made in this new life and that's a very lonely thought."
Coot nodded slowly. Then he stood up. He was trying to make a pose. He straightened his back, jutted his beared chin out, and twisted his hips so that his left shoulder and hip were facing us, with his arm out. He tucked his right arm behind his back. It looked like he was trying to thrust out his chest.
Then he cleared his throat and said loudly.
"If I were to win this award, I would use it to expand the knowledge of our youth. Not only our youth, but the youth of the world, by creating the first Miss Iowa Center for Advanced Learning. With it, we would offer a safe space for children under the age of 16 to opt into college level courses of their choosing. Each would be provided in both one on one tutorial labs that are both fun and educational, and virtual spaces, with Virtual Reality headsets that will give children without the monetary means to travel and experience wonders from around the world." Coot slouched and somehow stopped being the weird supermodel contestant before plopping back down on his chair. "I want to learn and teach. I am still in the learning phase."
"What the hell was that?" Bear echoed my thoughts.
Coot looked at Bear and then at me and then back to Bear before down at his empty bowl of stew.
"I didn't plan on telling anyone," he said, "but I've been lonely in this world too. You," he was looking right at me, "you've made me feel less lonely. I am hoping this gang can be my new friends, so if you tell anyone what I am about to tell you I will be very disappointed."
We just sat there staring at him. Finally, I gave him a nod.
"We won't say anything," I smacked Bear. "Right?"
He nodded.
"I was the 2046 Miss Iowa winner."
"Huh?" Bear and I said at the same time.
Coot slapped his knee and let out a cackle. I was expecting him to say it was a joke, but suddenly he wasn't slouching anymore and his voice didn't have his old prospector accent.
"That was part of my speech I had to give." He shrugged and crossed his arms, obviously uncomfortable opening up. "I won, and never got to make the education center. I had three doctorates and was working on my fourth. Miss Iowa seemed like a fast track toward paying off some of those while also making me more marketable on my CV." Coot let out a long and slow sigh. "Being what the general population considered attractive meant that no one expected me to be smart. I grew familiar with it and then I started using it. When everyone thinks that you're a dumb blonde, they don't expect you to manipulate them." He shrugged. "I signed my retirement contract as a publicity stunt. Then I was dead the next day. I'm told it was a car accident and I'm happy that I don't remember it."
Bear waved at Coot. "What's all this then?"
I smiled because I knew. Coot shrugged, but I answered for him. "Dumb blonde to dumb prospector. You didn't want to give up the power of being ignored."
Coot smiled. "It really is a super power." He returned to slouching and his dumb accent. "It's fun too."
"Wow," I said, finally. "First, thank you. Thank you for sharing that story with us. That could not have been easy." Coot shook his head. "Second, our lips are sealed. As far as how we're concerned, you're just the crazy prospector in our group."
"Except," Coot smirked, "now you know my power. You," he was looking right at me, "can use that."
"What?" I was genuinely confused.
"I have doctorates in Anthropology, History, and Mathematics. Consulting with me in chat when we have big decisions as a group will help you out."
He was right. His Miss Iowa experience was one thing, but Coot was describing himself as a genius. That would be helpful.
"And it would take a lot of the suspicion of your intelligence off of you." I winked, knowing that his plan had a second piece to it.
"Agreed."
"What about you, Bear?" I turned to our newest companion. "Are you secretly a horse trainer with years of sky-diving experience?"
"Me?" He laughed. "In life I looked a lot like this. A few less furs. I worked in an IT support center. Eve told me I died of an aneurysm while on a call." He set down his rifle on the table. "No doctorates. I gamed a lot. I was good at grinding and figuring things out." He shrugged. "I'm an open book. No superpowers."
"We'll see about that," I winked.
"What about you?" Coot asked me.
I touch of sadness creeped into my voice. Guilt, I think. Guilt at surviving and living a full life when these kids didn't.
"I was a lonely widow. Died at 89 years old." I pointed at the broadcast button. "Signed up for this to help my family out. I gamed a little when I was younger, but that was more my husband's thing. I wanted to join a game that was peaceful and like those old frontier shows." I spread my hands out. "This is as close to that dream as Eve could find me."
Coot and Bear both laughed. "Your first few days haven't been anything like that," Coot said.
I shook my head. "That's part of why I'm asking you all what you want. Bear, what do you want?"
"I'm here to have fun until it's not fun anymore."
I nodded, completely understanding.
"I want to make it so that people like us don't have to have a rough first few days."
"How do you plan on doing that?" Bear asked.
"She wants to use the Pink Flamingos as a defending force for the rookie towns," Coot answered for me. "The Colossals have been using the rookie town raids as easy XP farms. Sammy wants to put us between them and the people of Easter, giving the NPC's and noobs a chance to learn to love their second lives before they are covered in the gore that drenches this place."
"Thanks, Lovecraft," I smirked. "That's weird how you switch so easily between the guy we know and the woman you were."
Coot dipped his head. "Thank you."
"He's right," I confirmed. "They don't have a chance to be happy in Easter. They have no time to live and be themselves in a town that is constantly under threat of attack." I turned the lantern on the table up a bit and then asked them both. "Knowing that's my plan, are you guys still in?"
"I've always been in," Coot nodded.
Bear nodded too.
"I've always wanted a crusade."