Inferno (Play to Live: Book # 4) (2 page)

Still, the item's stats more than compensated for its lack of visual appeal:

Mithril Ring of Flight.

Item class: Artifact

Durability: 300/300

Effect 1: +40% to air magic resistance

Enhancement: The ring contains a stone of Divine Blood, adding a buff of your choice up to level 200. Skill chosen: Levitation

Customization: This is a unique item, the only one of its kind in the world. +100 bonus to the item effect.

Holy Jesus. Fencing can wait, kiddo! I stepped toward her, catching the airborne girl in my arms. She tried to wriggle herself free.

"Wait! Stand still, I tell you!"

Overcoming the spell's gentle resistance, I set the girl down onto the flagstones and crouched next to her. "Masha? Where did you get this ring from?" I asked in my best stern voice.

She rose slightly into the air and stayed there, rocking like a hovercraft. I just hoped she wouldn't be blown away by the wind.

With a frown, Masha hid her hands behind her back. "It's mine."

"I'm not saying it isn't!"

Admittedly, that wasn't exactly true. I wasn't going to take a precious bauble like that from a baby, no way. But I'd love to be able to borrow it from her for the duration of some especially dangerous raid or even swap it for something seriously valuable — definitely not for African trade beads.

This wasn't just any old ring. Levitation was one hell of a useful skill albeit prohibitively expensive and by far not long-lasting enough for a constant buff. And there it was right in front of me! Imagine being able to chase — or escape — your enemy by gliding a few inches above the ground ignoring all the bumps and ditches, soaring across ravines and fearlessly diving down cliffs. Utterly awesome.

Just think of the disappointment awaiting the gravity mages who deal damage by slamming their targets into the ground. Regardless of what sent your victim flying through the sky — whether it's the whack received from angry mother earth or the touch of a gentle wind — the ring would cushion its bearer's fall, softly setting him or her back onto their feet. I could see the indignant faces of the warriors below helplessly shaking their swords and spears as they were showered by some very painful magic from an impossible height. I loved it.

The girl frowned. "It's Dimka Khaman, an A group shaman," she admitted reluctantly.

"Eh? Khaman the Shaman? What are you talking about?"

"He arrived with the second wave and was nineteenth to go perma. He used to be in Ward Five with the rest of us, the one with the bald head who never left his bed, one constantly hooked up to all those IV drips. Ah, sorry, you don't know about that, do you? So one day we were playing ninjas. All the others were hiding in the walls and on the roofs. But I'm real afraid of heights. So Dimka promised to help me if I gave him two of the red stones.

I had a funny feeling I knew what was going to happen next. "Where did you get the stones from?"

She beamed, her fingers wriggling as if stroking an invisible fluffy cat. "White Winnie gave them to me. He's
so
sweet!"

The albino bastard! I very nearly said it out aloud. So he'd stuffed his mouth full of stones of Divine Blood he'd stolen from me, and now he was walking around giving them away to all and sundry! "Where is he now?"

"Who?"

"Not White Winnie! Actually yeah... where do you think I could find that piece of... fluff?"

She stuck out a dignified chin. "He won't come to you! Winnie hates adults. He only plays with us."

I bet! The Temple yard wouldn't hold everybody wishing to nail his fluffy ears over their respective mantelpieces with gold spikes. Never mind. The earth wasn't round for nothing: our paths were bound to cross in the future. Actually, how sure was I that AlterWorld
was
round? Seeing as our own Galileo hadn't been born yet... "So how do I find this Dimka Khaman?"

She waved a nonchalant hand at the shady nook concealing the divine throne, every crafter's potential El Dorado provided they knew about it. "Sitting on that boulder of his, isn't he?"

I peered through the shade. Recently, the dwarf mallorn had grown dramatically, expanding faster than the proverbial beanstalk and concealing the Fallen One's accidental masterpiece within its generous canopy.

The girl gave a solemn nod and cringed, rubbing her neck. "He's there, where else! He's made an agreement with the tree. It promised to hide him from us if he buried the Fertile Soil artifact under its roots. He thought we didn't see it! We wanted to dig it out but the stupid tree lashed its branches at us! Uncle Max, tell it to stop!"

I wrinkled my forehead, trying to grasp what she'd just said. An agreement. With a freakin' tree. I knew of course that it was emo sensitive, being an old Elven relic and all that. Emo, yes, but
sentient
? Had I just missed something?

In the meantime Masha began to inch away. "May I go now? Big Tooth — oops, sorry, I meant Master Broken Fang, our Orc teacher — he hates it when we're late for practice. And today we'll be using double sais. He's invited Whizz from Zena's squad to show us how to use them! And I'd hate to miss the sparring practice. Last time Nikita cut my arm right off, I'm not leaving it like that! Auntie Bomba showed me the awesomest trick —
Bang!
Your teeth fly out and you have to keep mum for two minutes."

Kids. It wasn't even their full contact fighting practice that worried me, even though the sight of preschoolers slaughtering each other with abandon made me quite uneasy. No — there was something else to that, too. Something much more important.

The sword master — an NPC, believe it or not, who'd cost me a king's ransom — cast a derogatory glance over the excited ranks of his new recruits.

"To arms!" he commanded without further ado.

Cheering, the starry-eyed kids rushed toward a heap of Old-World taboos: razor-sharp knives, predatory scimitars, life-threatening hammers, flails and shurikens.

As the children rummaged for their weapons of choice, Cryl and I stood numbly nearby, silently mouthing the air like grounded fish, watching wizards pick up two-handed swords and rogues choose combat staffs. I knew of course that these children had no idea of class restrictions. They were a hundred percent sure they
could
pick up whatever took their fancy. No wonder the skies immediately protested, cursing us to hell and back and decorating the cloudless blue with flourishes of lightning. Aha — there was the Fallen One himself coming to protect his beloved astral planes! No points for him for having guessed who'd been this world's new pain in the butt.

He didn't interfere though. With a rather amused chuckle, he gave us a nod of approval, then disappeared in the flash of a portal.

In the meantime, the Arena seethed with the most chaotic of battles: everyone against anyone. A kid struggled to wield an halberd, brushing whoever happened too close, then screaming indignantly at a return blow from an eroded pole axe. Somebody else used their sharp epée to poke an old enemy's buttock in full seriousness. Children are like that: perfectly straightforward in their impulses and not yet burdened by society's conventions.

Masha the Levitating Girl interpreted my silence as a permission to leave. She chirped something by way of goodbye and darted toward the sound of steel clanging against steel. Another latecomer had caught up with her and was quickly gaining the lead: a sinewy youngster from Lena's animal farm. He shot past me astride a young hell hound clutching to the beast's armored neck, his fingers fearlessly wedged between its armor plates.

Their blurred outline whizzed past in a series of long leaps, both the rider's and his impromptu mount's eyes shining with ecstasy. They looked rather like those Orc riders from the old Lord of the Rings movie. Oh well. This was one hell of a cavalry we seemed to be raising here. I wouldn't envy the unsuspecting enemy whose flanks were assaulted by a line of these guys. They could guarantee you a few embarrassing pants-soiling moments.

I jumped off the steps and headed for the Fallen One's throne lurking under the mallorn tree's canopy. Far beyond the castle walls, I could hear the rattling of hammers and the cracking of stone being split: there, Thror's dwarves were busy restoring the ancient fortifications.

A stray beam of light cut through the hundreds of tree branches from the garden's far end and hit the fancy gold roof of Taali's tomb, bringing unwanted tears to my eyes. I looked away, grinding my teeth. This wasn't the right time to start whining. In order to mourn our dead at leisure, we had to think about those alive first.

Halfway to the throne, the mallorn leaves stirred. I froze. With a powerful kick, the branches sent a disheveled protesting Gimmick flying onto the path. Rubbing his long-suffering backside, the Golem Master looked about himself helplessly. Noticing me, he sprung back to his feet and, ouching, demanded justice be done,

"This is getting out of hand, Sir! Those brats won't leave the throne alone! And I've got work to do!
Your
order, mind you: fifty custom-made heavy golems with a DOT configuration. And now this freakin' tree has an attitude!"

I suppressed a smile, shaking the Belorussian's hand. "I'll look into it."

I walked over to the mallorn and raised an inquiring eyebrow, staring at its shapely leaves. The tree got the message and parted its canopy, forming a shady green passage. Admittedly, it was beautiful.

I stepped in and headed firmly for the throne finally revealing itself amid the foliage. Gimmick trailed behind, stumbling over my feet, hissing and cursing at the tree as it gave him a hearty slap on the back, punishing the potential freerider.

Dimka Khaman turned out to be a skinny individual about eight years old, with a serious face and the sensitive fingers of a piano player. He rocked in the semblance of a trance, his eyes half shut, mouthing something as he wound the handle of a practice sword with fine silver wire. Where on earth had he got
that
from? The sword's crossguard was already decorated with a few unseemly-looking stones glued to it with some wood resin.

I glanced at the sword's stats. So!

Increases the chances of delivering a crippling hit 90%

Aura of Fear: the target's agility drops 33%

Cripple: a lifetime debuff. Every hit has a nonzero probability to drop the opponent's agility 1 pt.

Fortune's Backside: a debuff. Lady Luck has turned her back on your opponent, doubling his chances of losing concentration and failing combos.

He's done a nice job of this rather ordinary sword. It hurt to see these unique artifact-class stats being wasted on a stupid practice piece of soft metal. The lifetime debuff looked especially scary. I was no walking Wiki of course, but I'd never heard anything definitive about something like that: only some vague rumors about some mysterious mega boss in a blood-curdling dungeon who crippled players by breaking their never-healing limbs with these abilities of his.

I focused on the words he was mouthing,

"I weave and I tie, this spell is no lie. A fool you were born but a cripple you'll die.
A klutz, you said? Let's see which of us two is a klutz now!"

I chuckled. A dark avenger in the making. Apparently, the young genius was forging a comeuppance for an impudent enemy. You really had to be careful with quiet ones like him. Their pent-in animosity may well end with a dose of rat poison in your tea.

Time to put the guy straight and find him something to do before he strayed too far along the road of crime.

I lay a calm hand on his bony little shoulder. "It's not worth it, you know."

Dimka sat up with a startle and was about to leg it, but I forced him back down. "Wait. You've made a great sword. Excellent work, congratulations. But it's too dangerous. A few careless words or an unfair blow — do they really justify a lifetime punishment? Actually, sometimes they do call for a sword job, but you've got a lot of growing up to do before you reach these levels of conflicts and responsibility."

He looked up at me, his stare interested and just a tad ironic. I halted for a moment, confused, trying to determine the fine line between a childish grudge and the kind of adult stupidity that in the good old days was worth repaying in blood.

How many times had I regretted the duel ban in the real world! So many bastards and bullies were walking around unpunished, leaving pain and tears in their wake! All the young would be rattling their swords in gyms instead of gulping beer on street corners or staring, red-eyed, at computer screens. I was pretty sure that introducing a new duel code would have given our communication standards an unprecedented boost, making a quick job of all the scum while keeping tongues in check. When your sword is dangling within your reach, any street corner could turn into a combat arena, making good manners the order of the day.

"Actually, Dimka, what I want to say, what if you take this sword to Durin in the armory? I'll be honest with you: I have a bad feeling about its properties. It's not a combat weapon but rather a torture tool to reset prisoners back to zero. As for you, my friend, I can see I can trust you. I think we could give you a proper job to do."