Soda Pop Soldier (30 page)

I continue forward, ignoring the side passages. There's always Plague to consider, so I keep moving. I know I'm not ready to confront him yet. As I bring up
Deathefeather's
menu, one ability catches my eye.
Harvest.
If everything, if all these undead Ogres, come at me at once, as I thought might happen back in the Vampire's vault, then this ability seems just right. If I have to deal with the Ogre Prince Kal Whatever, and what I assume is some sort of ceremonial guard, then I'll punch
Harvest
and see what happens.

A brief description of
Harvest
reads, “When the Samurai is surrounded and outnumbered, he becomes as the reaper's sickle in the fall of great harvest at summer's end.” Beyond that, what happens next is anybody's guess. But it seems to be his most powerful ability.

I've passed nine alcoves of waiting undead Ogre warriors when the trap springs. There's a sudden, impulsive
twaaang
over ambient sound. Then I hear a slow sandy grinding, building, bone knuckles cracking in anticipation of some impending battle.

All of it, all around me.

Ahead of me. Behind me.

The Ogre skeletons, eyeless sockets filled with yellow malignant hate, shamble from their waiting places, down their passages toward me. I take a quick cut with
Deathefeather
at the nearest one and watch as the thick bony arm of the Ogre comes off with a simple clean cut, dropping the spear it carried in its hand. Instantly the wide battle-axe in its other hand comes over its shoulder, cutting a murderous arc right down on top of me. I leap back as the axe sinks with a wet pulp into the marshy floor. A quick dash forward followed by a slash, and
Deathefeather
takes the other arm. The dying warrior leans forward, wicked greenish fangs wide and open, and attacks with a savage bite, nailing me for 10 percent damage. The snapping jaw cracks loudly, startling me.

I'm down to 44 percent Vitality. I cut wide with the blade, this time aiming for the neck and removing the Ogre's skull from his corpse. It remains standing for just a moment, then collapses into a pile of bones and old rotten armor.

The eight behind me crowd forward as more of them surge out of the alcoves ahead. Time for
Harvest
. I punch the hot key and watch as the frame rate of my POV begins to under-crank, producing a slow motion effect. No lonely Japanese guitar this time. Instead there's only silence, as superimposed red autumn maple leaves drift down across the screen, falling toward the ground. The sound of wind, soft like a reed flute, plays barely, then picks up and the Samurai charges forward. I aim him at the nearest rising monster, two slashing swords and an ogreish raspy roar waiting for me. Taiko drums explode across the soundtrack like the steady rolling gallop of some powerful elephant running me down. The Ogres, all of them moving far too slowly, raise their weapons, opening their overpronounced, underbitten fangs wide in roars of groaning hate-rage as I drive forward, raising
Deathefeather
with both hands. The Taiko drums thunder an urgent cadence as my blade becomes a sweeping scythe, a blur, three times its length. I drive through the closing wall of creatures, slicing heads and torsos, armor and axes, anything that stands in my way.

My Samurai charges forward, deeper into the maelstrom of ancient rotting Ogre warriors, and the drums continue to thunder louder and louder, as if at any moment the world's heart must burst and surely end. The speakers inside the Skyliner suite roar out with startling clarity and I wonder, briefly, if I should turn down the volume. But I know these suites are designed for total privacy. Traders of millions, billions, and, yes, sometimes even trillions need that level of privacy. So I enjoy the battle overture while fighting for my online life. After all, how many times am I going to get the chance to game in total luxury at thirty-five thousand feet?

Ahead, ancient Ogres heedlessly gather too close and thick, as if hoping to bury me with their numbers

As if butter can stop a blowtorch.

The passage opens into a wide chamber as I cut through the last of the dying, disintegrating giants. The drums crescendo suddenly and stop with a harsh slap in the moment after I've crossed into the circular chamber and driven the tip of the blade into the skull of the largest Ogre, a seated giant, twice the size of the others. Gleaming golden armor and two wicked axes remain motionless as the giant's misshapen head explodes in chalky green dust. The body falls back onto the throne it's started up from.

“Kal Tum, I presume.”

How much time do I have until Plague clears the vampires and races up through the last of the Ogres?

The room seemingly ends here, going nowhere else. I move forward, searching the throne. On the left-hand side there's a knob. I right-click it and am asked if I'd like to open the treasure room.

Indeed, I would like that very much.

A panel behind the throne slides away, revealing a pile of gleaming gold coins and ingots beyond. I move into the hidden room and click on the gold. I'm rewarded with two thousand dollars waiting in a coded private account. I enter the password I'll need to retrieve it.

Where were you a week ago?

Then again, when I think about it, if I'd had it then, I'd have paid a month's rent on a now vacant lot.

I decide to let the timing be perfect.

The blast of Plague's blunderbuss fills the once Ogre-overrun passage I've just come through. I hear more Ogre skeletons rushing through the darkness with their grinding bone-chime walk and leathery whispery howls.

A ladder leads upward to a high ceiling in the treasure room. I climb it, and when I reach the ceiling, a recessed stone seems to be some kind of trapdoor. It's the only possible exit I can find. Clicking on it does nothing. I glance below, not fully expecting to see Plague. But there he is, reloading his hand cannons. The skeletons have not survived.

Maybe it's time to face him.

As he loads his pistols, he spits out a wet cough, emitting green flecked wisps of glowing smoke. Probably some sort of personal poison attack, hence the name Plague. Before I attack him I should know what it does. Otherwise . . . I roll over my weapon choices menu and select
Bare Hands.
I place them over the inset slab in the ceiling.

The word
Push
flares in gray across the screen. I tap the mouse and the gray begins to change to blue. Plague fires his hand cannons and grazes me. My health drops to 25 percent. A red mist sprays out along the edges of the desk in the suite as blood drops spatter my screen. I furiously tap the mouse as the blue letters of
Push
change to green then red and finally flames erupt around them. The slab moves aside as blinding sunlight floods my screen. My vision blurs out. I climb up into the sunlight as Plague fires again. Over ambient, a smoking ball whistles loudly past me and shoots off into the bright blinding dazzle I'm climbing into.

I'm blind.

When my screen clears, showing me a washed-out and faded image at first, I'm standing on a stone terrace that juts out from a gargantuan wall, curving away in both directions toward the horizon. The wall is made up of massive blocks of sun-faded stone. Below, a dazzling blue-and-silver palazzo, tiled to look like a postmodern version of a river, separates me from another massive wall. Beyond that, I see the leaning pile that is the tower.

The Marrow Spike.

In the palazzo, live players—they have to be—fight to the death in the shadows of two huge doors that form the gate that probably leads into the tower courtyard.

I'm down to 25 percent health. I have no idea how I'm going to get past the players slaughtering other players below and into the courtyard of the tower beyond.

Much less climb it.

Much less rescue the child.

In the polished reflection of
Deathefeather,
I can see the face of Callard wavering, as though he's underwater. The chat icon is live.

“It's a battle royale, Samurai,” he begins. “I suggest you find another player and take him out quickly, then loot his corpse. You may find a healing potion or something to assist you in your quest, or at least keep you alive a little longer. Then enter the courtyard and climb the tower.”

“Just like that,” I say.

“Yes,” he replies, ignoring my sarcasm. “Something just like that.”

I scan the portico below the wall. The bodies of fantastic creatures lie torn to pieces, hacked apart or smoking amid spreading pools of blood. Beyond the mangled and dying, other players are still locked in a fight to the death, trading blows with fantastic weapons.

A Minotaur, muscles like iron bands rippling, holds aloft a demonic-looking blue-skinned dark Elf maiden. She's flailing wildly at him with two dripping daggers. Seconds later, the Minotaur rips her in two and, tossing her aside, grabs a massive spear sticking from the ground nearby. He hurls it through the back of a silver-haired warrior in full blood-spattered plate, wielding a flaming claymore, who's just finished disemboweling some sort of half man, half snake. A net and trident fall from the snake man's claws.

Near the gate, the classic Wizard type waves wildly with his staff at a small fierce Goblin with wide dangling ears. The Goblin's using a short sword and battered shield embossed with a red fist. He leaps in at the Wizard, cutting at his robes. The Wizard goes down on one knee as he throws sparking, exploding powder directly into the Goblin's narrow eyes. The armored Goblin stumbles backward, slipping in a pool of slick blood and guts. The Wizard raises his hands and shoots a dark blast of ozone-crackling energy at the Goblin, exploding him into a spray of guts and armor.

The Minotaur wrenches the ironwood spear from the back of the dying silver-haired warrior and heaves it once more. This time it hits the Wizard and lifts him off the ground, pinning him to the brass-bound oaken gates of the inner courtyard with a resounding
thuunnk
above the chaos of
bang
and
clang,
sword and shield.

I check the open trapdoor and see that Plague's almost to the top of the ladder, climbing with one hand as he trains his blunderbuss on the opening for a kill shot.

I scroll through the Samurai's menus, looking for something useful. I find nothing. In the
Innate Powers
menu, I notice the Samurai can assume selected defensive postures.

I check the battle in the palazzo and watch as a top-knotted half Orc, wielding two broken swords and bleeding thick gobs of black blood that's seeping through his ornate bronze chain armor, falls back on one knee. A shaven-headed monk rushes him with a twirling staff, planting it, then leaping forward with a flying kick. The half Orc gives ground and cuts the leg off the monk with one savage swipe of a broken blade. Dripping bloody spray decorates the palazzo's river of tile. The half Orc follows this with the other blade, jamming what remains of it straight into the middle of the robed body of the monk. A second later he's bent over and looting the dead monk's inventory.

Now's the time.

I leap from the terrace on the massive wall, landing in a defensive posture. Immediately, a Witch Doctor in full juju mask lunges ferociously at me hoping for the death blow as he circles his shrunken-headed mace above and throws a purple-silver powder across the space between us.

I click a hot key and draw
Deathefeather.
I go all in with my first attack. At 25 percent health, how many attacks can I expect? Not many. So it'll have to be everything up front. I let the Witch Doctor have it with the Samurai's power attack,
Focused Strike,
and cut him in half. I quickly check his inventory and take everything, barely noticing the thirty-five hundred dollars I pocket.

In the Black, it's winner take all.

He doesn't have any healing potions. I head toward the wounded half Orc who's desperately parrying a blow from a one-winged, badly bleeding Balrog who seems to have been everybody's whipping boy. He's covered in cuts and scars, but he's still the scariest-looking thing in the fight. The Balrog heaves a huge flaming sword back over his shoulder, preparing to bring it down onto the half Orc warrior.

I'm running straight for the back of the half Orc, the demon rising above him.

A rangy Elven Knight in scroll-worked armor, carrying a long sword and shield, charges me from the side, trying to cut me off, or just cut me down. I roll to the right and run, not daring to start parrying with so little health. I move forward through a knot of engaged warriors, cutting the head off an unsuspecting lizard man as I pass. I have no time to check his inventory. The Elven Knight's rushing, closing fast.

I circle back around the main body of the fight.

I'm behind the Balrog now. I have a moment to try and at least get him from behind. The Elven Knight has gotten caught up in the thick knot of strange warriors I've just made it through. If there's time, I might get the Balrog and even the half Orc in one go before the Elf can fight his way through to me. Just before I ram
Deathefeather
through the scaly hide of the Balrog's leathery back, a massive spear crashes through the demon's neck, spraying inky blood everywhere. I continue the charge beyond the toppling Balrog and ram the surprised half Orc straight through the sternum all the way to the hilt of
Deathefeather.

I check his inventory.

Looting.

Twenty-four thousand dollars. Two broken magic swords, an item called the
Unending Rope of the Highwayman,
and a gift certificate for a state-of-the-art designer SoftEye from HardImagination, an after-market purveyor of WonderSoft products. I take everything. I don't have time to check the rope's properties. When my health doesn't immediately rise—and why should it, it's just a rope and I don't expect much out of it—I continue on.

Now the Elven Knight comes down hard on me. His sword emits a haunting, ringing chime each time he brings it in close. I'm dodging and only chancing a parry when there's no other choice. He's backing me to the gate leading into the courtyard of the tower. If I don't get out of this, I'm going to lose all my recently looted loot.