There was no response from Bone. Damn nOOb, D_Light thought. He must be sweating something in his own spank. Multithreading with me? He’s definitely not getting extra props when it’s time to do an eval.
D_Light was about to close the blink and flame his so-called “guide” when Bone blinked in. That map was solid when I made it. Dunno, according to the OwnYoAss Cloud Service, that ghetto you’re in is high-morphing. If that’s true, you might have to find a local to help you out. Or play it old-school. Bone sent over an animated shrugging zebra to emphasize his bewilderment.
Indeed, Smorgeous had already warned D_Light that the dro-vine that made up these apartment mounds was a high-morphing variety, one that grew quickly. For this reason, he had already feared that any map more than a few weeks old would be obsolete. Discouraged, D_Light replied, Yeah, okay, I’ll improvise. Thanks. D_Light terminated the blink with Bone and sent him a few complimentary points, a kind of “thanks anyway” tip. D_Light almost always did this, even for fairly poor service. You didn’t want gamers thrashing your profile or, worse yet, to find yourself on a blacklist just because you were too stingy to throw a hustler a little something for his time.
Having no reliable map, D_Light decided it was time to go where the action was and snag himself a local guide. The first sign of said action was the high-pitched sound of metal clanging against metal, a sound that travelled far, serving as a signpost pointing out the nearest spankers. As they ran closer, he started making out the yells of the spankers and the snarling of the nasties. The anticipation always raised D_Light’s pulse. He looked back at Lily, and despite the sounds of the brawl ahead, she appeared a bit more at ease now. She returned a look that hinted she was unimpressed with his escape plan so far, although she did not complain out loud. Just then, a particularly blood-curdling scream jolted out from ahead of them, and her apprehensive look returned.
D_Light slowed his pace. Although in a hurry, he did not want to find himself in some gory mess that resulted in his death and ejection from the game. There was a flickering light from around the corner ahead, probably from the lanterns the spankers were carrying. From what he understood, the nasties in this catacomb, known as “Salem’s Corrupted,” did not need light, as they could see in total darkness.
D_Light motioned to Lily to stay put. He then crouched down low, crept up to the corner, and peered around. This was definitely where the action was.
Before him was a large chamber with a dais that swept up to a long altar. Atop the altar was a statue of a tall, proud woman who wore a dress that swept out in all directions like an explosion, the skirt part interwoven with stone leaves and flowers. She cradled a delicately carved baby who, with wide eyes, stared up adoringly at his mother. The statue and altar below were rusty in color and bore dark smudges that, D_Light assumed, were the marks of years of sacrificial blood. The eyes of both mother and child were inlaid with large emeralds, bringing realism and beauty to an otherwise perverted depiction of motherhood.
All around the statue the corrupted and the spankers battled. There were over a dozen nasties and four players. Several of the corrupted had already fallen, but it was evident to D_Light that the good guys were hard- pressed.
There was a lot of virtual blood. The nasties flailed about dramatically as they got sliced by the warriors’ blades or blasted by the sorcerers’ lightning bolts. The spankers were having a devil of a time since the alarm had been sounded; nasties were making their way in from the various tunnels that intersected the large room.
D_Light feared that it would only be a matter of time before a set of nasties, attracted by the commotion of battle, came upon him from behind. Time to work fast. He slunk back completely out of sight from those inside the room and began his incantation. He spoke the words of the spell as quietly as he could, although he doubted very much that the combatants would hear him over the din anyway. He waved his arms in an intricate pattern, and as he finished, he cupped his hands together to create a small, hollow sphere. He shifted a thumb to allow himself to see inside his cupped hands. A tiny icicle had appeared.
D_Light blew into the improvised womb. With a few more arcane words and several additional breaths, the icicle grew and transformed into a cube, which melted into the shape of a mouse nearly too tiny to recognize. He continued to breathe life into the creature, and with every breath he knew his manna-his spell casting power-was diminishing. It was worth it. In fact, he was willing to pour a good deal of his strength into this spell. One shot. This needs to work, he thought.
Gradually, he opened his fingers to give the mouse room to grow as he peered around the corner again. One of the spankers, the wizard, had died since D_Light had last checked. The corpse was on the ground, and the player’s ghost was standing over the body, throwing a silent tantrum. The rest of the party, now numbering three (a hulking barbarian-looking fellow, a stout battleaxe-wielding dwarf, and a mace-swinging cleric), stood back to back in a triangle, hacking, bashing, and stabbing for their lives.
D_Light decided this was about as good a time as any. He let the mouse go. Its tiny translucent body glowed with shimmering blue flame, and its portly belly dragged along the ground, leaving a thin trail of ice behind as it scurried toward the combatants. D_Light whispered arcane commands to the mouse under his breath, urging it to the left and the right until it had made its way under the nasties and right up to the foot of the gnarly bearded dwarf. D_Light did not dare to wait any longer. If the mouse were stepped on, the spell would end. He shouted out the final command word, and not a moment too soon. The dwarf looked down at the mouse, and his eyes widened with surprise. His thick lips curled into what was certainly going to be a curse, and he raised his foot up to squash the rodent. But before his foot came down, the mouse exploded with a terrific crack! Countless shards of ice eviscerated those nearby, and cold blue flames washed over them like a boulder crashing into a pond. Everyone, spankers and nasties alike, was struck down.
D_Light called for Lily, who was at his side so quickly he wondered if NeverWorld was playing tricks on his perception of time. The blue wave and the ice shards strewn about like shattered glass suddenly vanished in a torrent of steam. The sliced and stiff dead were lain out roughly in a circle around ground zero. All the nasties had fallen, as had the barbarian and the cleric. Only the dwarf moved. Now, two additional ghosts joined the first one, their heads swiveling around wildly as their mouths opened wide in quiet rage. D_Light was not surprised to see the dwarf still alive. Dwarf warriors were the definition of hardiness.
Reflexively, D_Light stepped out of the hallway and prepared to finish off the dwarf with a nicely placed lightning bolt, but then he remembered that the dwarf needed to live at least for a little while longer. The dwarf raised his ax slightly while crouching, preparing to charge.
“Don’t move, good dwarf, or surely I will finish you!” D_Light rallied his most commanding voice. The dwarf raised his ax higher but did not move his feet.
D_Light motioned for Lily to step out. “You are outnumbered, and we are fresh. You cannot possibly triumph against us. However, I do not ask for your surrender; nay, I ask for your aid!”
D_Light always felt a bit embarrassed using words like “nay,” but the game system rewarded good role- playing with extra points. He was not particularly good at fantaspeech, the quasi-medieval form of speaking used when playing in this fantasy world, but he at least tried to use enough to avoid a point penalty.
“We need a good guide to lead us from this foul place,” D_Light said. “I suspect you are our man. In return, you will keep your life and a third share of the treasure taken. What say you? Let us plunder and move on fast before more of Salem’s fallen hinder us!”
“Why should I trust a bitch-ass pisser like you?”
The term “pisser” was game slang for “player-slayer,” which was not at all in character, nor was his use of the term “bitch-ass.” D_Light realized this spanker must either be truly angry or a nOOb.
“No choice!” boomed D_Light. “You are either useful alive as our guide, or you are useful dead, less your valuables. Quickly now!”
The dwarf reluctantly agreed. Apparently, he had enough sense to not end up a ghost like his friends, who were then shouting thinly heard obscenities at D_Light and Lily. However, the logged-out spankers did not dare physically interfere with them. Such activity was a clear violation of NeverWorld rules and would likely result in a stiff point penalty. Instead, they just hovered nearby, waving their arms around in an attempt to distract D_Light and Lily. Lily stared at them, but D_Light was used to this. It wasn’t the first time he had slain other players’ virtual characters for loot, but on those occasions the players he smoked were evil in alignment. According to the coat of arms adorning the armor of one of the nearby fallen, these characters belonged to a good-aligned guild, and so his misdeed would surely come back to haunt him, perhaps the next time his witch character visited a village or city of civilized lands.
As the ghosts made obscene hand gestures at D_Light and made pelvic thrusts in the air near Lily, D_Light instructed Lily to start rummaging through the virtual bodies on the floor and grab anything that looked valuable. The dwarf was already at work on the statue, attempting to pry the large gems from the eye sockets. D_Light
