She stood up to hear them better, but continued to stare at her monitors so that she appeared less conspicuous.
“I know all about your procedure, but it’s not good enough. I need those bodies burned,” explained Milner.
“Listen, I saw to the preparations myself. Those rounds have been mixed and dipped to produce effects that are highly concentrated. Believe me when I say, nothing’s getting up after we’re done with it. Remember, my people have been doing this for a very long time.”
“Yes, centuries apparently, but you all have also had the nasty habit of putting your belief in God for as long as you’ve been active. Blame the scientist in me, but I just don’t leave anything to divine intervention. Now, take all those bodies that you’ve tapped and burn them. The disposal facility is below. Alphonse will show you. Speak of the young devil.”
They stopped halfway up the aisle and waited for the young man coming from the doorway. The boy looked fresh out of high school with a shock of blond hair atop his head and thick rimmed glasses on his face. Alex couldn’t help but to stare at him as he walked by, taking note of his barely visible face freckles, light brown eyes, and of how nicely he was dressed in his grey micro check suit sans blazer.
“Alphonse, I need you to show Stephen here where the disposal facility is.”
“The incinerator, sir?” asked the young man.
“Yes, what else would I be referring to?” replied Milner with snark.
“You had a freaking incinerator installed in this building?” asked Stephen incredulously. “I can’t imagine why you’d even think you’d need that.”
Hearing them talk made Alex more and more nauseated. They were sick, all of them. Especially Milner.
“It was already here. It’s the reason I picked this particular building.”
“I see. You really are a sick freak, you know that?” said Stephen with overt disgust in his tone. It was the first thing he got right as far as Alex was concerned.
“I prefer to think of myself as someone who thinks ahead and plans accordingly. Now go, both of you. I need you to do this as quickly as possible.”
“Before I go sir, I came to tell you that no one has reported any of the testers missing as of yet. Their vehicles and mobile devices have also been disposed of. Everyone was shuttled over from facility A so that’s their last known location as far as GPS tracking is concerned,” said Alphonse.
“And what’s the status of that facility?” asked Milner.
“It’s set to be destroyed at your command, sir.”
Destroyed? Just who the hell were these people? Who was footing the bill for all this? And why?
Wait, she thought, that’s probably the same facility they had us shuttled from as well.
The only reason they’d want to destroy anything would be to cover the whole situation up. Friends, loved ones, and other curious minds would come looking for all of the testers and other people working on the project once that happened.
Even if he blew up that building, it was to be only a matter of time before the authorities would check this building next. They have satellite imagery for goodness sakes! They can stop this madman as long as we can buy some time for them to find us.
“Good, keep me updated of any reports of missing testers or staff. You two can proceed now.”
Stephen followed behind Alphonse, grumbling as he went. On his way out, he made a show of staring at Alex menacingly and threatened, “You better forget everything you just heard, girl.”
She gave him one cursory glance and continued to watch her monitors.
“You should listen to him, Ms. Madura. Learning too much about our operations may prove dangerous. You just want to continue playing your role.”
Alex took her eyes from her monitors and gave Milner a stare filled with ice.
“Maybe you guys should just have your conversations outside then so that I can’t accidently hear them.”
“I’m not concerned with you hearing me. It’s what you do with that information that concerns me. Remember what you signed up for and the consequences for breaking our pact,” said Milner.
Alex nodded her head, thinking of Randy, and went back to staring at her monitors.
“I do want you to hear what I say next, so pay attention please.”
She watched him go to the center of the room as one of the other armed guards with a mask joined him from the front.
“May I have your attention, please?” Milner yelled.
All of the voice chatter from around the room died down and everyone stood up and focused on him.
“We are nearing the moment when the time released second area of this alpha build is accessible to each of the testers. We will soon be unlocking the Stone Lands, to the south of the Assassin’s Forest. I would like you to communicate this with all of your testers, but do not tell them anything else about the area, not even its name.
“Keep in mind the penalties for revealing this information to them. Soon after that, we’ll be allotting breaks en masse. All of you who have worked more than fifteen hours straight will be escorted to a resting area where you will be able to sleep for as long as you need. There is also a cafe that many of you already know about. During your resting period, we will have other staff members take your places as consorts to the testers.”
He looked around the room at all the faces of the worried developers, including Alex’s. She knew that there would come a time when the testers would have to move along to other areas of the game, but to do so now when many had just had their morale shattered would just ensure the deaths of a great many of them. She didn’t think that they were ready especially with all the challenges that were presented in the Stone Lands. She also didn’t think it was fair that their most trusted lifelines would be out resting while they were off to this new area. Feeling suddenly hot, she stood up and raised her hand.
“Sir, when will the Stone Lands be open to the players?”
Milner looked right at her, blankly.
“Soon.”
That wasn’t at all what she needed.
“Are these breaks of ours mandatory?”
“I’m afraid they are. All of you have already worked much longer than you should have, with this abrupt shifting to the next phase of the project. Not only will the quality of your work drop in these situations, but so will the quality of your health. I need fresh and alert employees for all of this to succeed.”
Damn, she thought. Even though she really needed the rest, she really wanted to be there for her testers. Sam, Dan, and Jacob needed her.
“I can see what you’re getting at Ms. Madura. The next area won’t be opening for another couple of hours. If you’re a light enough sleeper you’ll be able to come back in time to assist your testers personally. Is that satisfactory?”
The only thing that would be satisfactory would be for Milner to end this hostage madness, but his answer was good enough for the question she asked.
“Sure, thank you,” she said unenthusiastically.
“Now, I’ll also be ready to announce a new stipulation to the game very soon. I think many of the players will actually like this one. However, I’ll wait until they are acclimated with the current environment before doing so. Alright, carry on everyone,” he said as he walked towards the exit.
Alex was left to wonder what he had planned. At this point, what would the testers actually like about the game? Was it another contest? Milner was as hard to predict as he was to understand. All she could do was wait and watch and provide support to those who came to rely on her. Hopefully her testers would accept her help when the time came, especially Sam. As Milner walked by, one burning question came to her mind and she had to ask it.
“Milner. I have to know, what’s all this for? Why go to such extreme lengths for a videogame alpha test?”
Milner stopped in front of her office and stood in the doorway looking bored as he stared at her.
“Ms. Madura, I see you aren’t heeding my earlier w
arning, but I can appreciate a curious mind. If you’re lucky, you’ll never know the true reasons behind this test. I think most people are better off blissfully unaware of the dangers that surround them.”
“That may be true for most people, but I’m more interested in the truth, especially if it involves my contributions,” she told him.
“For your sake, I’ll tell you only what you need to know about this project and what our aims are. We are simply looking to cultivate the best players in our game, by any means necessary. Through the hard fought efforts of the testers and developers, we will accomplish that goal and that is all you need to know. Now remember that and keep in mind that in here, too much curiosity can make you a risk. And I won’t tolerate that.”
He turned and left the room leaving her with just as many questions as before.
30 Rest and Reflection
A giant brown oak came crashing down, followed right after by another. Dirt, grass, and leaves were kicked up when the giant limbs descended. Sam made sure to avoid being near those, but the female Knight down the way was not so lucky. She was brushed to the side by the lizard beast’s leg and lost a sizable portion of her HP. Sam did his best to aggro the creature by stabbing its right leg with fervor. Finally, it attempted stomping down on him again.
“If she’s having trouble with this part of the fight then there’s no way she’ll survive the next part.”
Sam made sure to make eye contact with the Knight and knocked against the front of his own head with his knuckle. The Knight couldn’t hear him, but Sam yelled anyway.
“Hellooooooo, use your head!”
The knight mouthed “sorry”, healed up, and rejoined the battle. Sam found that fighting the Will of the Forest was even more difficult without King Herke’s assistance. It was even worse trying to do it and help another player stay alive throughout.
His partner this time, was CrushKills, the blond, green eyed knight he had defeated before Survival Mode was active. She had a better shield now, the same one Robert had used and was using the same Arming Sword that Robert and everyone else seemed fond of using. It was a solid weapon for those who emphasized strength in their playstyles, unlike Sam.
She still had a long way to go, however, if she was going to survive this game. Her reactions were pretty slow and she seemed to struggle with spacing and timing her attacks. It was amazing that she had even come this far into the game. Judging from the way she played, this had to be the first time she’d fought the Will of the Forest. She was not anticipating any of its attacks, as telegraphed as they were.
Maybe she was just terrified. Sam looked back and saw her slashing at the oaken leg of the monster with quick one handed light attacks. She would have been better off two handing her weapon and doing heavy and charged attacks. Sam had no way to tell her that though. He sighed and continued attacking.
“I may be doing this girl a disservice helping her like this. She’ll never improve at this rate.”
He left the leg he was attacking with a little over ten percent of its HP and jogged over to her. He rolled in front of her to get her attention and when she looked at him, he took his weapon in both hands and started attacking the same leg she was and doing much more damage. She slapped her forehead and again mouthed “sorry” to him. She must’ve been nervous or something. She equipped her sword in both hands and began a series of heavy slashes.
Her damage output had outstripped Sam’s own by about forty points a strike. That could only mean that she had upgraded her weapon at Barrington’s, put a lot of points in leveling up her strength, or both. She could’ve also found some type of ring that upped her power, but Sam wasn’t too sure about that.
Together they crushed the left front leg and moved to the one at the rear. Sam had already weakened all of the Will’s limbs, so crushing each leg wasn’t hard. Once they finally got it to the ground, Sam signaled for CrushKills to pull her shield out by pulling and lifting his own. She complied and Sam ran forward to attack the snakelike body of the beast.
It took much longer to whittle the beast’s HP down since they were lacking the damage output that Sam and the king possessed together. Sam was able to see some attacks that he hadn’t seen the last time including a belly flop that nearly crushed and killed CrushKills.
If there had to be one thing Ms. CrushKills was good at, it had to be blocking. Her timing with blocking was actually on par with Sam’s own, and her tower shield had made it even easier for her. She knew when to reserve her stamina and her dodging had improved a little since the beginning of the fight. Now that the battle was winding down, all of it was put to the test.
Much to Sam’s chagrin, the Will was much more interested in attacking CrushKills than it was him. Since he was the one that was summoned, CrushKills would have more to lose by dying here. He took advantage by getting in a ton of damage with heavy attacks and several Skyward Thrusts.
Once the Will’s HP was down to critical levels, it wrapped its body around CrushKills and initiated the same attack sequence that it had trapped Sam in before. Sam was struck outside the ouroburos that was its body. He quickly equipped his bow and took several shots at the creature’s plant looking head, with only a few of his arrows landing. It was enough to stop that particular head from attacking and all CrushKills had to do was block or dodge the lizard-like head.
He could see her health bar through the Will’s massive body and it hadn’t decrease yet, so she was at least doing well with her blocking. His arrows weren’t doing much damage, so he would need her to actually start damaging the creature if they were going to win this anytime soon. He saw the lizard head go down for a really fast attack and saw CrushKills health go down by a small margin. The entire red health bar was moving forward though, so she didn’t seem to be knocked back. Maybe it had only clipped her. His questions were answered seconds later when she unloaded some nice damage and finally finished the creature a minute later.
“Nice! We got ‘em.”
Great Beast Slain
Sam got five thousand souls for his efforts, half of what he got for defeating the creature before on his own. He also got a second Otherworldly Token of Appreciation since it was his second time helping someone complete the boss fight.
Returning To Your Own Plane
CrushKills did a little curtsy and Sam gave a victorious bow before he was transported back outside the boss gate in his own plane. Here, the Will of the Forest was already defeated and there was nothing ahead but an empty boss area. Sam whipped out his Charity Scriber, signed his initials unto the ground in glowing gold letters, and waited to be summoned by another needy player. He breathed deeply and thought of the battle ahead.
“Just one more before I go back. I need the training and souls anyway.”
******
Sam returned to Sedwin and Barrington after helping another player with the Will of the Forest. He hadn’t spent any of the souls he had recently gained yet, so he was sitting on a hefty stack of them. Now was the time to prepare, because he would be leaving soon for a new area. Alex had vaguely told him that the area south of Caesar’s cabin would be opening up soon. He knew nothing of what to expect, so he opted to upgrade himself and his weapons as much as possible.
“Maybe a poison weapon will be good there,” he thought out loud as he read over the stats of his Dagger.
He wanted to do something special with it since he also had both of Rondo’s daggers. Both blades were Silenced along with the greatsword he had gotten from Caesar. Sam had read up on what the Silence effect entailed, but Sedwin had explained the rest. The bear had told Sam that weapons procured from any strong willed warriors he killed would Silence themselves once the Quintessence was taken from their masters. That meant that the weapons would be unusable until Awakened by a skillful blacksmith. Barrington was such a Blacksmith, but his rates for his Awakening services were not even close to reasonable.
“Silenced weapons need to consume an abundance of souls before they can be Awakened,?
?? Sedwin had explained after Sam had yelled at his smith master.
Sam returned to Barrington’s camp and was amused that the smith was apparently still upset with him for yelling about his prices. He avoided acknowledging that Sam had even walked into his camp. When Sam walked up to him, he continued his feigned obliviousness. Sam couldn’t help, but have a laugh at the realism or the sulky blacksmith’s attitude. He had known people to act this same way in the real world. All the same, he was all business when it came to talking to the smith. He had too much ahead of him to take this transaction lightly.
“Mr. Barrington, I have a request,” Sam said.
“What is it, boy?” the smith asked with more gloom than usual.
“I need you to imbue my Dagger here with poison.”
“Do you have the necessary materials?”
“I believe so. I have five Blightstone Pieces in my inventory and have absorbed a sizable amount of souls into my Dagger from before.”
“Remember, you need to strengthen your Dagger with enough souls before I can reforge it with these blightstones. These five should be enough to permanently imbue your weapon with a light poisonous effect. You’ll need more stones after that to increase the affect or more mithril to increase the pure strength of the weapon. It’s your call.”
Interesting, very interesting, Sam thought. The weapon crafting in this game offered more flexibility than the previous Death Planes games.
“I’d like to use all the souls in the weapon to increase its power.”
Sam presented his plain Dagger to Barrington and he laid it on his anvil. The smith then sprinkled some kind of salt unto the Dagger and rubbed it into the sides of the blade. It began to glow and emit a faint pulse that Sam could feel, like a heartbeat.
“Your Dagger has been strengthened, but it is not enough.”
Sam looked at the blade’s stats as it sat on Barrington’s anvil and saw that it was only at level eight.