Patch 17 (Realm of Arkon) (44 page)

"So, Holmes, what do you believe to be the cause of these soldiers' demise?" the warrior asked, turning his head toward his companion as they entered the fort through a wide passage in the bushes.

"It's not just the soldiers," Luffy tried not to take any unnecessary breaths as he pointed toward a number of corpses wearing green druid cloaks. "Everything else is the same—marks left by teeth and claws." He shrugged. "Or maybe not," the mage took a few steps forward and bent over two corpses lying next to each other, barely managing to keep from retching. "These two were killed by regular weapons."

"Do you think they're the werepanthers Leek was warning us about?"

"Max, why would you care? Let this Ibrahim handle it himself..." Luffy could no longer hold it in and vomited onto the grass. "Daaaamn," he muttered as he wiped the tears from his eyes, "let's leave this place, I didn't subscribe to this shit."

"Hold on, we need to loot the bodies," Max examined one of the closer corpses. "This is the very Neytan who was supposed to receive the letter from us."

Trouble in Maeglyn Woods quest has been modified.

You've accessed the quest: Trouble in Maeglyn Woods.

Quest type: rare, chain.

Return to Armilan and report to Garrison Commander Istadior on what happened in Yltarin.

Reward: experience, increased reputation with the Dark Elves, 2 gold and a rare weapon of your choice.

Attention! The time for completing this quest is limited: 14.59.59… 14.59.58

"Do whatever you need to—I'll wait for you outside the palisade," Luffy pointed in the direction opposite to where they came from. "It should probably stink less there."

"You doing all right? Back to your senses yet?" Max sat down on the grass next to the mage and passed him a flask. "Have some of this."

"It appears I'll have to get used to some things," Luffy returned the flask and stretched out on the grass with his hands clasped behind his head.

"We'll all have to get used to them," Max fiddled with the tinderbox, lighting up, and took two deep tokes. "This never happened before—the corpses didn't stink like this, and there weren't as many worms, either."

"Why didn't you throw up right there?" the mage nodded toward the fort.

"Well, I've never been the squeamish type," Max shrugged. "By the way, there was no loot on the corpses."

"None whatsoever?"

"None at all," the warrior nodded. "Let me finish the cigarette, and we'll head back—I don't like it here. Werepanthers are only supposed to come out at night, but better safe than sorry, as they say..."

That very moment a loud female scream of pain and despair sounded some twenty yards away. Without thinking twice, both dashed in that direction. Once Max tore through the bushes, he saw a young level 40 woman with dark hair, and a gray tentacle coming from a nearby stump coiled tight around her ankle. The girl's HP bar was in the yellow, and the expression on her face reflected such unbearable pain that the warrior had a chill run down his spine.

"The scroll! Luffy, heal her!" he bellowed, grabbing his sword and attacking the vile gray thing that was stretching forward from the stump.

"But it's... Ah, damn it!" Luffy realized he was doing something exceptionally stupid, yet he took out a scroll and used the spell of complete restoration on the dying werepanther woman.

A moment later he noticed that Max, who had slashed through the gray tentacle, losing more than half his HP in the process, was falling down on the grass with a moan, letting the sword slip out of his hands, and that the girl whose health they'd just restored still couldn't quite come to her senses, while the severed tentacle was reaching for her leg again. Afterwards, Luffy tried to explain to himself what had happened, but without much success. He quickly jumped forward, grabbed the girl with both arms, and started to roll with her across the grass. Something hit him hard in the teeth, and his mouth filled with salty blood. In another moment, the girl, who was already fully conscious, threw him off with strength that was incredible for her constitution, jumped to her feet and started walking backwards in the direction of the forest, casting haunted glances around herself and hissing loudly.

"She's strikingly beautiful!" the mage whispered as the girl turned around sharply, licking off the blood from her split lip, shifted into a black panther and vanished in the trees in a few short leaps.

Your reputation has increased. Tasha, a fighter of the Night Hunters clan, relates to you with suspicion.

Your reputation has increased. The Night Hunters clan is unfriendly to you.

"What did we do just now?" Max got up, wincing from the pain, and picked up the sword that had fallen out of his hands. "I even had my Toughness increase to three percent."

"She's so cool," Luffy kept staring at the spot where the girl that he'd rescued just stood.

"Hey, snap out of it," the warrior gave him a shove. "Pick up your jaw already."

"We're both idiots," the mage turned toward him with a happy smile on his face. "No player in their right mind would rush toward a woman's scream coming from the bushes—even if they did, the last thing they'd do is save a hostile high-level NPC. They'd be more likely to finish off the NPC and get a ton of experience."

"Do you regret what you did?"

"By no means... Like you, I can't bring myself to behave as a player—vestiges of real world ethics, you see."

"I never raised my hand at a woman in my previous life, and I don't intend to change my ways in this one," Max was still recovering from the pain. He sat down on the grass, drank some wine from the bellied flask, and lit a cigarette. "Of course, if the woman in question tries to kill me or someone dear to me, I'll have no such qualms. But this wasn't the case here. By the way," he blew out a puff of smoke and looked at the mage inquisitively, "what's the deal with those reputations? I don't remember reading anything about 'suspicion'."

"It's your personal reputation with an individual NPC. The ones I know are hatred, suspicion, respect and friendship. You must have looked at faction reputation statuses—that's your reputation with different social groups. They're as follows from the bottom up: hated, hostile, unfriendly, neutral, friendly, honored and exalted."

"Unfriendly means we shouldn't be attacked on sight, right?" Max pointed toward the forest—four tall wide-shouldered elves had emerged from the trees and were approaching the friends. Their recent acquaintance followed, her head bent low.

"The morning adventure continues," Luffy chortled. "Do you think we might expect a quest from them?"

"Yeah, like wasting all the elves in Sunlit Forest," Max chuckled as he rose from the ground. "It's bad manners to welcome your guests sitting down."

The guests looked very impressive indeed—each of the four was armed with paired blades and had a level between 50 and 55. Their calm faces may have been carved in wood for the amount of emotion they demonstrated.

"I am Phylatrim," the leader of the group eyed the companions with saturnine green eyes. "Who are you? And why did you save my daughter?"

"Are you saying we shouldn't have?" replied Luffy with a challenge in his voice.

"As for you, mage, we need to talk separately," the werepanther's scowl deepened as he glanced at the young woman behind him, trying to make herself as small as possible.

"I'm Max, and he's Luffy," the warrior decided to take the initiative in conversation. "We were just passing by. As for your question, I find it insulting."

"Indeed?" A shadow of surprise crossed Phylatrim's face. "Are you trying to say you consider it normal to save your enemies' lives?"

"She is no enemy of mine," Max nodded toward the girl, "and neither are you. I have no idea what causes you may have to regard us as enemies."

"But you're a dark elf," the werepanther spat out the last two words.

"So? You don't look like an orc to me, either."

"Our clan is part of the Nightcrawlers—the Fifteenth High House, one of the strongest before the War of the Great Rift. Nakilon, the so-called druid king, the swine who would later start the war, banished us to the southern part of the Great Forest, and also the wildest. No one can withstand the onslaught of four High Houses waging war against you—if the Great Forest hadn't stood in the invaders' way..."

"So that's why you slew everyone at the outpost," the warrior gestured behind him.

"Do you think it's pleasant to be hunted by scum such as these, as well as the likes of you—'just passing by,' eh? A few days ago we felt as though scales fell from our eyes, and we remembered who we really were. The ones out there," Phylatrim pointed towards Yltarin, "killed two of our kin with these foul traps," the werepanther pointed at the dried-out gray tentacle. So we came to take revenge. It was a fair fight—we lost five, but Kirana must be pleased with us."

The whole thing felt surreal to max. He looked at Luffy for support and realized his friend was a goner—the mage couldn't take his eyes off the dark-haired girl, completely ignoring everything that transpired around him.

"You do realize the locals will want to take revenge, don't you? In about twenty four hours there'll be at least fifty rangers here," Max noticed how Phylatrim and his three companions suddenly grew tense.

"How do you know that?"

"We were tasked with delivering a letter to the outpost commander. If we don't come back in twelve hours, they'll send a party of soldiers that I fear will be too large for you to handle."

"Well," Phylatrim sighed heavily, "the news is even worse than what had saddened me in the first place—learning that my daughter mixed her blood with that of an elven mage." He sighed again, threw a sideways glance at the girl, then looked at Luffy, and uttered: "Go."

The young woman stepped out from behind the backs of her escort, and then approached the petrified mage, her chin held high. She looked him right in the eye, and then licked off the blood that was still dripping from the wound on his cheek. Then she stepped back slowly. Max was flabbergasted by this turn of events, but he noticed there wasn't a hint of unease in her eyes.

"I... er..." Luffy gave his friend a look that made Max worry that the mage was in danger of losing his marbles right there and then. "What was that?"

"It appears that you're as good as married, brother."

"But how..."

"You do not consider my daughter worthy of yourself?"

"Perish the thought, of course I do! But she... it was an accident... you see..." the young man grew red as a beet, and looked down bashfully.

"Nothing happens by accident in this world," Phylatrim said in a low voice, adjusting the handle of one of the swords on his belt. Your blood mixed the very moment you saved her life. And Lata must have considered the price acceptable. Or do you think it's easy to mix your blood with a woman of our kind? You can lap up all of her blood and force your own down her throat, but it still wouldn't happen." The werepanther made a dismissive gesture with a frustrated look on his face. "What do elves know, anyway..."

"Lata? The Goddess of Love, Lata? But..." Luffy came to life all of a sudden. "What are you going to do next? You can't stay here!"

"We'll try to launch a breakthrough at the Origin Gates. Many will perish, but some are bound to survive and be able to reach the Wild Wood."

"That plan stinks!"

"You have a better idea?"

"I do! We'll make you members of our group," he turned toward Max, as if calling him to witness. "A group's reputation in a raid is measured by that of its leader, and our relations with them are neutral. For as long as Armilan receives no word of what happened here, it should work." He looked at the four elves and explained: "The guards won't attack if the leader of the party that passes through the Origin Gates is someone like myself, for example. At least, that should work until they find out about Yltarin."

"A mage cannot command a party of fifty warriors," Phylatrim shook his head.

"How about a warrior?" Max gave him a long look.

"Are you ready to share our Blood?"

"I don't have to marry anyone, do I? I have nothing against your women, but I already have—"

The werepanther smiled for the first time.

"No, you don't." He looked back at his daughter once again, sighing, and she responded with a firm and stubborn stare.

"In that case, I agree."

"Karten," Phylartim turned to one of his taciturn companions. "Gather the rest, we must make haste."

Having waited for his companions to vanish in the woods, the werepanther unsheathed his dagger, thrust his left hand before him with the palm facing upwards, and slowly sliced his wrist with the blade. He passed the dagger to Max and then produced a small white chalice, using it to catch the blood trickling down his wrist. Max took the dagger without any hesitation, did the same thing as Phylatrim, and then handed it back. Phylatrim nodded approvingly, sheathed the dagger, took the chalice in both hands and drank about half of it.

Attention! Lord Phylatrim, also known as Instant Death, invites you to join the Night Hunters clan.