Spiteful Healer

“Listen up,” Quinn shouted from atop Ren’s giant eagle form’s back. Wind was blowing her hair and cloak back with repeated whipping motions as she knelt down, craning her head to the left and right to take stock of the players that were able to join her. “It looks like they used airburst to get into range of Kordas to pick up their crew, so we’ve got a small 10 minute window to take over their ships. Deal as little damage as possible to the vehicles and take out every pirate you see, without mercy.” Quinn instructed them.

She got a multitude of responses ranging from ‘yes ma’am’ to simple head nods. The amount of players that had joined in the pursuit was much higher than she was anticipating - some players had mounted their own winged creatures, while many wizards, druids and warlocks made use of their magic to allow non-flying classes to join in.

With their speed, it only took two minutes for the two sailing Airships to come into view under the clear, moonlit sky. They were both moving side by side at full speed, soaring to the edge of Kalmoore taking the shortest path possible. However, before they could close the gap further on the fully loaded and therefore somewhat slower airships, Quinn spotted out a large cloud of barely visible green smoke hovering in the air between her group and the ships.

“Poison clouds. Fly above it!” Quinn shouted the moment she spotted it. Most of the players were able to react in-time, including Ren. Some, however, flew into it and began coughing violently as they inhaled the smoke and took on a poison status effect. Red numbers began to appear above their heads in rapid succession, to which Sapphire began using her cleansing magic to remove it and heal them up from beside Quinn. She wasn’t the only healer class player to do this either, as Kayliera the druid and many others got to work to save them.

“That spell, it’s tricky to position and takes a bit of preparation to cast. It was positioned perfectly to cut us off or slow us down, though. They know we’re coming, and exactly how we’re approaching?” Yorgi reported to Quinn as he used his fly spell to glide beside her. Herilon, Sapphire, Baffo and Yuki were all standing tightly together on the back of Ren.

“Could’ve just done it as a precaution.” Baffo suggested.

“And got lucky?” Sapphire raised her eyebrows at him.

“I doubt it.” Herilon replied under his breath. Quinn looked Herilon in the eyes, as if to try and read his thoughts. He did his best to convey them by staring intently back at her for a moment.

[Tullan]: Quinn, it’s all under control over here. The fire was started by a bunch’o blast petals. Trexon sent’ya more details though, in a private message.

The green message from the Night Hunter’s guild chat quickly popped up in the midst of her interface. After seeing it, she looked forward to see they still had a few seconds before they were in range of the Shattered Pirates’ cannons, and the mounted pirates were getting their winged beasts ready to engage. She took this time window to open up her interface and navigate to her friends list, where she saw several messages from Trexon waiting for her.

“Our Kordas security didn’t fail, nor did the pirates outsmart them. At least not directly. The guards survived the attack and assured us that no unauthorized players got into the shipyard.” Trexon’s first message read.

“Secondly. There were no flags for off-island players entering the city limits through the guards, or the defensive magic placed on the walls, until after the attack took place.”

After reading this, Quinn opened her mouth and began speaking into the messaging system to reply to him.

“I saw Trellin leaving the area around the Shipyard after the explosion took place.” Quinn sent the message quickly, glancing between her interface and the impending battle ahead of her.

“My detection spell picked up on him and his crew entering the city limits as the explosion occurred. It was a misdirection. We are NOT incompetent. My advanced class defensive magic is not faulty. We took the proper precautions to prevent a surprise attack like this.” Trexon replied firmly.

“You realize what you’re implying happened?” Quinn asked.

“I’m not implying it. I’m stating it as fact.” Trexon answered quickly. Quinn had very little time to contemplate his words, though. She was forced to exit out of her interface and pull her bow from off of her shoulder, as she and the forces of Kalmoore clashed with the Shattered Pirates.

“You’re planning to steal my ships? After all we’ve been through?” Trellin shouted out from the deck of one airship, directing his words at Herilon.

“We’re planning to steal yourships because of what we’ve been through, jackass.” Herilon shouted back as he drew out his greatsword.

“I told you it wasn’t personal, didn’t I?” Trellin sighed back at him as he readied his spear.

“It’s personal to us.” Herilon growled back. Following this final exchange of words, the battle erupted in the skies above Kalmoore. Flashes of magic of various colors exploded outward, lighting up the forests on the ground below. The sound of metal clashing, cannons being fired, and beasts roaring could be heard all about them. Herilon wasted no time in jumping from Ren’s back and landing on the deck of the ship Trellin stood on, several feet away. He took a barrage of attacks, but he was healed up quickly by Sapphire while Baffo leapt to join by his side, using his shield to provide cover for Herilon.

Herilon didn’t waste the opportunity provided to him by his companions and engaged with Trellin directly, their spear and greatsword clashing in a mixture of bright orange and blue flashes. Quinn and Ren focused their aggression on the mounted players, leaving the deck to the melee fighters who had managed to arrive compliments of the casters of Kalmoore.

With Quinn’s leadership, she was able to single out all of the Shattered Pirate’s clerics first, and once they were taken down the others began quickly dropping like flies. In the commotion. Trellin saw the falling of his crewmates and, despite being on somewhat equal ground with Herilon, could tell his ship was losing.

A small glimmer of hope arrived when Trellin saw that the cooldown for Airburst was almost available, so that they could escape, but this hope was shattered when several Kalmoore players took out both Airship pilots.

Losing ground to Herilon, and seeing the battle going out of his control, he made a final, desperate attack against his own airship, piercing his own spear through the deck beneath his feet and releasing a large, deadly blast of glowing orange Dragoon energy. Herilon was forced to jump back from the impact as it exploded outward, destroying the deck and lower deck as it ripped apart the wood and left a gigantic hole in the ship. Instantly, it began plummeting downward out of the sky towards the forest below.

“You’re really going that far?” Herilon shouted at him in disbelief as the orange light from the attack faded, the two feeling the uncomfortable downward momentum that was taking over the vehicle they stood on.

“It’s fine. These airships are worthless since you and your friends found the green dragons.”

“They’re not worthless, they’re still millions of gold in materials.” Herilon shook his head at him disapprovingly.

“Pennies in comparison to what we were paid for this mission.” He replied as he prepared his spear to throw another powerful attack at the remaining airship, still holding strong in the sky above them.

“I don’t think so.” Herilon shouted, dashing forward and slashing his mithral greatsword into his former companion. The blade cut through Trellin like butter, as he’d abandoned any defensive posturing. The damage had been enough to kill him, but not before he released a large glowing orange spear towards the final airship. Baffo reacted in time, though, by jumping to position himself between the spear and the Airship, blocking the damage with his braced shield.

It was a hefty amount, but due to Baffo’s class and heavy mithral plate armor, he was able to survive the blow and land on the other side of the breaking airship. He and Herilon could do nothing from that point onward other than go down with the ship, watching as the remainder of Kalmoore’s forces mop up the last of the Shattered Pirates defending the final Airship.

“Captain’s gone. It’s all yours.” Herilon shouted up to Quinn. She gave a nod back in his direction that he couldn’t see, just moments before the broken airship crashed into the forest below, breaking in half and sending chunks of the ship in different directions as it dragged along the dirt and knocked over several large trees before coming to a halt. Quinn went from observing the destruction of the crash, to looking at the deck of the remaining ship.

There, she saw Garrick of the Black Lions leap off the back of a Black Lion’s guild member that happened to be a druid, ferrying Garrick and several others onto the ship to engage in the crewmates of the Shattered Pirates. They made quick work of the pirates, disabled the cannons and then disappeared below the deck of the ship. The other forces of Kalmoore finished off the last of the mounted players, and in that time Garrick returned above deck with his guildmates.

“The ship is ours!” Garrick declared proudly with a loud cheer, so that all could hear him. Following his words, the skies around the ship erupted in cheers as well.

“Great. Good work everyone!” Quinn shouted as Ren landed softly on the deck to allow her, Yuki and Sapphire to disembark. “Go pick up Baffo and Herilon, if you don’t mind.” She asked, and Ren nodded his large eagle beak at her before leaping off the side. Simultaneously, Yorgi and Kayliera landed softly nearby using their respective magic.

“You wouldn’t happen to know how to steer this thing, would you?” She turned to her guildmates, who all replied with awkward laughter.

“I’ve seen Leonard do it a bit. I can’t use any of his skills, but…” Yorgi looked at the stern and confirmed the wheel was unscathed from the battle. “I should be able to steer it?” He shrugged nervously.

“Good. Get on that. Kayliera…” Quinn walked close to her, pulling her long hair aside to get access to her ear. “I’ve got something I need you to do for me.” She said before leaning in and whispering.

Through Yorgi’s efforts, the airship managed to arrive back in Kordas, approaching the skyport tower. The steering was a bit shaky as it got close to the tower and Yorgi was forced to navigate around the buildings, but he did his best to be careful. During this time, Quinn had opened up Aegis’ livestream to check on how his match was doing, given that it had long gone past the 10 minute mark where healing would’ve been disabled.

To her surprise she saw that Aegis, Lina, Darkshot and Rakkan were all standing back, away from the match with their arms crossed. They were watching as Pyri fought to take on all 5 of the Vindicators by herself, on her own request. She appeared to be having success, as only 2 Vindicator players were still fighting. Seeing this unbelievable scene unfold, she couldn’t help but let out a huff of air in disbelief.

She was forced to stop watching Aegis’ shenanigans, though, as the ship began to shake violently as it bumped into the top of the Skyport of Kordas.

“Secure it as best you can. Force the wing sails shut.” Quinn ordered the nearby players, and everyone quickly sprung into action. Without a pilot class player, they had to manually pull in the ship’s wing sails - and without an in-tact pier due to the recent explosion, they were forced to pull rope from their inventory to tie the ship off to a stump of stone that still remained from the once centrally standing ticket-booth on the top of the tower. They made due with what they had, though, and docked the ship.

“Not bad…” Artaphernes clapped, impressed as he watched them work. Anazia and several others from his guild eyed the ship with smiles and grins.

“And that’s what you get when you mess with Kalmoore!” A familiar female voice shouted. Quinn had to look over to see who it belonged to, and spotted Miranda live streaming to an audience of 2000 viewers as she cheered at the ship's arrival.

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“With this, we’ve secured passage for the kid, huh?” Anazia smirked.

“Yeah, it would seem so.” Quinn smiled back at him, proudly glancing between her guildmates as well.

“I’m glad.” Yuki let out a light sigh of relief.

“You mighta picked the wrong class there, wizard.” Garrick said jokingly as he began walking off the side of the ship alongside Yorgu. “Not bad flying.” He violently slapped Yorgi’s back to encourage him, but ended up bumping him forward a few meters and nearly caused him to topple over.

“Eheh, no thanks. I’m happy being a wi-” He was interrupted as a second force pushed on his back, and Garricks. Everyone, in fact. A gigantic blast of black flames erupted from inside the Shattered Pirate’s captured airship, igniting the wood in flames and sending chunks of wood flying in all directions. Anyone still standing on the ship was sent off from the force of the explosion, and the flames burned rapidly like a hungry beast, consuming anything flammable that it got into contact with.

“You gotta be shitting me!” Sapphire shouted in disbelief as she had been knocked face first into the top floor of the Skyport, alongside many others. She rushed over to Yorgi and helped him get to his feet, healing his wounds from the explosion. “Put it out, quick! Put out the fire!” She ordered him. Yorgi was disoriented, but did his best to draw out his staff and begin casting ice magic on the consuming black flames. He extinguished some of it on the deck, but the mast was gone in seconds and the parts he missed kept spreading.

“Come on! Faster!” Sapphire shouted at him desperately as other players, lacking skills to fight fires, got up and looked on in horror.

“I’M TRYING!” Yorgi shouted back at her frantically. He shot out as much ice magic as his hands would allow, and not long after did Trexon arrive using a fly spell and joined in aiding him, but by the time the flames had been extinguished, the damage had been done. The explosion, coupled with the rapidly expanding flames, had completely undone the airship. What remained of it began breaking apart and falling out of the sky, crashing into the paved streets of Kordas far below as players and NPCs ran away from the area.

“How? How did that happen?” Yuki asked with tears welling up in their eyes.

“You did make sure that no pirate players were still around, right?” Artaphernes looked between Quinn and the others.

“Yeah, of course.” Garrick replied as he wiped sweat and dirt from his face and armor, and stood back up to stand alongside his guildmates.

“Wait, you let the Black Lion’s secure the ship?” Anazia asked in disbelief, staring at Quinn with wide eyes.

“Eh? What are you trying to say there, lil miss?” Garrick growled at her.

“You know exactly what I’m saying.” Anazia put her hands on the hilt of her daggers sheathed on her belt, posturing aggressively towards him.

“Stop.” Quinn raised her hand in-between the two groups.

“She’s right, though, Quinn. It’s a mistake to trust these guys.” Artaphernes said on Anazia’s behalf. “They’ve stooped low before, and with the kind of money that’s being thrown around to stop Aegis, I wouldn’t be surprised if they made a deal.”

“I didn’t make any deal with anyone. I don’t know what the hell this guy is talking about!” Garrick shouted angrily at him, but Artaphernes kept his cool. Quinn carefully glanced between the two as Trexon softly landed on the tower nearby and walked towards her.

“Here.” Trexon pulled from his inventory a rolled up piece of parchment that was badly burned, so that only one half was still visible. “Using my high level lore skills, I was able to recover a lot of what was on this destroyed document. You should be able to see it when I cast the skill, but it only lasts a brief moment.” Trexon told Quinn as he unrolled the parchment and held it in front of her face.

“What is that?” Anazia asked curiously. Neither Trexon, nor Quinn replied as Trexon activated his Greater Sage skills to cause burned away text to appear where it would’ve been on the rest of the missing parchment, floating as blue magical letters for Quinn to read. Once she finished reading it, the words vanished and Trexon pulled the parchment away. Quinn then looked up and glanced between the two angry parties - the Black Lions and Artaphernes’ guild were still exchanging nasty looks with one another.

Miranda had gone quiet with a dejected stare, watching the scene unfold alongside Sapphire, Yuki and Yorgi.

“Aw man, seriously?” Herilon’s voice called out from atop Ren as Ren’s eagle form soared through the sky, arriving at the edge of the Skyport. As his talons dug into the tower, Baffo and Herilon hopped off his back and he shifted back into his humanoid form.

“What happened to the ship?” Ren cried out.

“It was sabotaged, by someone here.” Quinn declared coldly.

“Heh?” Baffo asked.

“You’re sure? It wasn’t something the pirates did?” Sapphire confirmed.

“I’m positive.” Quinn nodded back. Tense silence immediately filled the air, and Quinn could see the bodies of the players around her getting stiff.

“It must’ve been the Black Lions, then, right? They’re the only ones who went to the lower deck.” Anazia suggested nonchalantly.

“How would you even know that? You didn’t join in the attack. You conveniently stayed behind.” Garrick shouted back at her.

“It’s obvious, isn’t it? Who else would do it?” Anazia snapped back at him.

“Your guild.” Quinn answered, crossing her arms and laying her eyes upon Artaphernes with disappointment.

“What?” Artaphernes looked at her with a bewildered expression. “You can’t be serious right now, Quinn.”

“We all acted under the assumption that this attack was due to revenge. You, however, have been speaking definitely that the parties involved were paid to act. Most likely, it’s because you too, were paid.” Quinn’s words stirred up Herilon and Sapphire first, but others were expressing doubt on the situation.

“Quinn, he’s been with us on Kalmoore since the beginning…” Baffo mumbled to her weakly.

“You’re damn right I have. I helped you make this island what it is today.” Artaphernes snapped back at her, drawing his spear out as several of his guild members began to gather at his back.

“Did you really?” Quinn shouted at him. “You’ve been leisuring hanging back enjoying the work that I’ve put into keeping Kalmoore safe, but your contributions have always been minimal. You and Christoph.” She shouted angrily.

“Whoa, now you’re blaming Christoph too?” Anazia scoffed with a huff of forced laughter to follow it. “The big streamer boy is really getting to your head, huh?”

“Quinn, these are serious accusations you’re throwing at our allied guilds…” Yorgi replied nervously, trying to calm her down.

“They’re not accusations. I don’t betray people randomly, for fame or gold. I stick to my morals and beliefs, and when I say I’m going to do something, I do it. No matter what is offered to me to waiver.” Quinn yelled loudly, barely unable to keep her cool as tears began to swell up in her eyes. The seriousness of her expression, and the emotion on her face caused everyone to fall silent.

“The document Trexon just showed me was a list of players that entered the Shipyard. Trellin and his pirates couldn’t have done it, given his detection magic’s implications. He shouldn’t have even known the layout of the city enough to know where the Shipyard was. But you did. And Trexon’s magic had you and your members recorded entering the shipyard immediately after you lost your preliminaries. You wanted us to see you in the preliminaries, but you never got defeated by Seraxus. We confirmed it on his stream. You lost on purpose, all so you could assist in destroying the Shipyard. So tell me, Artaphernes.” Quinn stomped forward, drew her longbow and nocked an arrow, pointing at his head.

He didn’t react, he simply glared back at her silently, as did Anazia and his other guild members.

“After all we’ve been through, how much did your loyalty cost?” Quinn hissed through her teeth.

“Loyalty?” Artaphernes shook his head. “I didn’t betray you. I betrayed the kid, sure, but you? No.” Artaphernes added, but Quinn didn’t reply. “Enough money to live easily. At least for a bit. And all for what? To stop a kid from fighting in a tournament? That was the only condition - make sure he can’t reach the island the tournament is hosted on. It’s not like it’s game over for him, isn’t it? He’ll find other opportunities to accomplish his goals, won’t he?” Artaphernes said while gesturing to the surrounding crowd, as if attempting to get support from them.

“Oh come on.” He shouted angrily. “He’s been nothing but a plague on Kalmoore. We had an easy going, peaceful life before he arrived. Even you have had your hands full since he got here. If you were offered a lot of money to turn on him, you would do it too, wouldn’t you? Think of your real life, and Ren-”

“Leave me out of this, scumbag.” Ren replied, followed by him spitting on the ground at his own feet.

“Whatever. I didn’t do anything wrong. It’s just some airships. We can build new ones. I’ll even help pay for it with the money we got for this job. Forget about this tournament, and taking on these big streamers and their daunting network. Let’s go back to living easy and peaceful.” Artaphernes said as he locked eyes with Quinn.

“There’s no peaceful life left here, for you. You misunderstood what we were hoping to do with Kalmoore. It was to keep the integrity of the game intact, in the face of all the elitists and power gamers. But you never cared about that, you just wanted to be the big fish in a small pond. Aegis, and his party, and my guild… and the people of Kalmoore. We’ve kept our integrity, so much that we’re willing to hold it up even in the face of invading forces. You, on the other hand…” Quinn shook her head and looked down at her feet for a moment. “I can’t believe I thought we were a team in all of this.” She mumbled to herself before lifting her head back up. She began fidgeting with her interface as Artaphernes’ opened his mouth to reply.

“Don’t be so dramatic about this, Quinn, I-”

“Royal Banishment.” Quinn spoke coldly, utilizing a skill that she’d never used before. A bright golden flash of light shot down from the sky, surrounding Artaphernes and causing his body to disintegrate into golden light. When the light was gone, so was he.

“Heh?” Christoph shouted in disbelief as he suddenly appeared atop the tower, looking out of breath as his guild members arrived behind him. “What just happened?”

“What did you do?!” Anazia shouted angrily at Quinn, preparing to lunge at her with her daggers. Artaphernes’ other guild members too began posturing to attack her, but the Black Lions and Night Hunter’s quickly drew their weapons.

“What’s going on up here?” Christoph asked in disbelief. “Did you just…?”

“ROYAL BANISHMENT!” Quinn shouted again, casting the ability a second time. This time, it was targeted onto Christoph, taking everyone by surprise.

“What?!” Miranda screamed in shock, panning her livestream around to watch as Christoph was removed completely from the island of Kalmoore.

“Quinn, using it in quick succession like that has a hefty fine. Anymore, and you’ll completely drain the Kordas treasury…” Trexon warned her.

“Forget the treasury, why’d you banish Christoph?!” Sapphire asked her in disbelief. Before Quinn could reply, though, a blast of green smoke erupted from a tiny rat that was scurrying around the top of the tower. The rat quickly morphed into the form of Kayliera, and she moved to stand by Quinn’s side.

“Because I had Kayliera use her weaker beast shifting skill to hide below the deck after we’d captured it. She watched as Christoph and two of his guild members snuck aboard using invisibility, and set off a warlock enchanted item to destroy the ship.” Quinn explained.

“They both immediately turned on me the second that money was involved. After all the shit I’ve put up with for them. After everything I’ve done - and Aegis has done.” Quinn shouted angrily at the remaining guild members of the Blades of Kalmoore, and Artaphernes’ guild. “Who would’ve thought that the only actual companions we have with integrity, are a bunch of bandits from Kalmoore.”

“What do we do with the rest of them?” Trexon asked, as the Black Lions, Night Hunters and Kordas guards remained on edge, weapons drawn and pointed at their now perceived enemies. Quinn took a moment to ponder her response as she glared at them, until finally clearing her throat.

“You have three options.” She began pacing around them, walking amongst her companions while keeping her arrow drawn and aimed at Anazia in particular. “You quit your guilds, and continue living on my island. You’ll be under a watchful eye and no longer allowed to participate in any major events, or join any of the allied guilds that remain members of our council.” Quinn said, pausing briefly before continuing. “Two, you go to jail, remain locked up until we can rebuild our airships. After which, you’ll be ferried off to join your guild leader on whichever island they chose after their banishment.”

“And the third option?” Anazia asked.

“You try to run, or fight back. And I will make it my personal mission to make sure you spend the rest of your time in this game world either dead, or locked up.”

“But we haven’t committed any crimes. Arresting us, that’s corruption!” A Blades of Kalmoore member shouted at her.

“I’m the leading guild of Kalmoore. I make the laws, and I’m feeling a little bit corrupt right now.” Quinn roared back at him. “Decide now.” She demanded, before turning to Herilon. “Round up every member of their guild and give them this ultimatum. Show no mercy.” She said, and Herilon nodded before jumping away. “Deconstruct their guild halls and donate the parts to the NPCs of Kordas.” She told Trexon, and he nodded as well.

Quinn then stood back and watched as her guild members and the Black Lions managed the traitorous guild members on her behalf, giving her a moment to sit back and watch. She was interrupted, however, as Miranda rushed past the others to approach Quinn.

“Wait, I… I didn’t know anything about what they were doing. I swear!” Miranda called out to get her attention. “They knew better, because I never would’ve turned on Aegis. He’s a classmate from school.”

“You’re still a member of their guild, though.” Quinn shook her head at Miranda. “What do you want to do?”

“I want to stay. I want to help Aegis, and keep having fun with everyone on Kalmoore. Can I join the Night Hunters?” Miranda pleaded, desperation on her face. Quinn looked deep into her eyes as Yuki remained the only player still standing nearby, not assisting in the round up of the other players. Quinn looked to Yuki and saw her smiling weakly at Miranda, and eventually let out an elongated sigh.

“Fine. But we’ll have a close eye on you. Head to our guild hall to begin the registration process.”

“Yes!” Miranda cheered out excitedly, pumping her fist into the air. “We’ve saved.” She said to her audience. “Night Hunters were always cooler anyway. From here on, the adventures are going to get way more exciting!” Her voice trailed off as she turned from Quinn and began skipping towards the stairs that lead off the Skyport.

“I might regret that.” Quinn huffed, causing Yuki to chuckle briefly. It was a short lived moment of joy, though, as the pair slowly turned to look at the destruction that had befallen Kordas’ Skyport.

“How’re we going to help Aegis now?” Yuki asked.

“I don’t know…” Quinn mumbled back.

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