Spiteful Healer

Broken fragments of two Airships exploded outward into the skies above the abyss, still several hundred meters out from the edge of the island of Tarolas. Amidst the debris were several players, loots of fear painted on their faces as they found their footing taken from them.

Several players were blasted outward, dying from the damage of the impact. Their bodies could be seen disintegrating as they were flung off and forced to log out. Namely, the pilot and crew members of Seraxus’ unmarked vessel - not a single one survived. Seraxus and his party of five, however, had the equipment, levels, and stats to survive the damage from the impact, and all began free-falling downwards towards the black mist below, with an unknown distance between them and the ground of the gameworld beneath them.

“Mother fucker!” Seraxus shouted angrily, audible to his party.

“Grace of Sloth!” Sylvia, the warlock player of Seraxus’ group, shouted. Her demi-human leopard tail whipped around in the air as she made a quick hand gesture and caused black runes to start glowing along the back of her hands, up her arm under her black robes until re-emerging out the collar of them up her neck and creating rune symbols on her cheek that gave off a deep black light. Following this, a magical glow of deep purple energy encapsulated her and the others, slowing their falling speed massively to the point where it almost looked like they were hovering. This contrasted heavily with the scattered fragments of wood falling out of the skies all around them, with a mixture of torn sails and iron plates flying about and dropping down to the abyss below ahead of the group.

This caused all of them to take in their situation, and all eyes arrived at the black abyss awaiting them below.

“Aint no way I’m boutta get off screened like this.” Seraxus shouted, looking at his companions anxiously. “Can you fly us out of here with this spell?” He looked to Sylvia.

“No, Warlocks can’t fly like Wizards. I learned this spell ‘cause of that Pyri bitch, but it isn’t leveled up yet - I can’t hold us for long. We got about one minute.” Sylvia quickly explained.

“I thought you said Makaroth was cool? VGN was gonna roll out the red carpet for us?” Gambit asked.

“That wasn’t VGN, idiot.” Hajax groaned at him. “Didn’t you recognize the airship?”

“It was that ship that was blockading us in Puagas. Those Schadenfreude guys.” Zuon explained.

“Fuckin’ pains in the ass. Like cockroaches, man.” Gambit complained.

“They’re the only ones smart enough to try and stop us.” Sylvia sighed in annoyance.

“Guys, what we got? Any way out of this?” Seraxus. “Fly potions, portal stones? Anything?”

“We’re not close enough to the island yet for portal stones to work,” Zuon replied.

“No high-level alchemists on Puagas, so no fly potions. We killed ‘em all.” Gambit chuckled.

“What about you, Hajax?”

“What about me? I’m a High Priest. We don’t have flying magic.” Hajax shrugged.

“You’re a high priest of the abyss or some shit, ain't you? Can’t you pray or somethin?”

“I can try calling for help, but usually, they just send reapers. And we already tried using them to fly, they’re unco-ordinated as all hell, remember?”

“Yeah, well, just try it. Call for somethin’. I ain't about to die to fall damage. Do a big prayer, some roleplay lore shit. You know, like Renault used to do.” Seraxus ordered him.

“Alright, I’ll try, I guess…” Hajax hesitantly pulled out a dark holy symbol hanging from a chain around his neck that had been tucked under his high level plate armor. Once he had it clasped in his hands, he closed his eyes and began a quick spell incantation.

“Lord of Darkness, your champion of hatred requires aid from the abyss. We’re falling and we can’t get up.” Hajax mumbled, somewhat serious and somewhat sarcastic. Once he’d finished speaking, a spell completed and released a black shockwave of magical energy outward from the holy symbol, spreading out in a large wave in all directions several dozen meters. “There. I asked for help.”

“Good, let’s hope somethin’ c-” Seraxus' voice was interrupted by the sound of a low, rumbling roar coming from the black mist below.

Feng, Makaroth, Daehyun, Lilya, and several other high-level members of their guilds were being led along a large stone bridge in a huge underground cavern, giant dwarven stone homes carved into the walls and built up as towers all around them. The bridge they stood on was crafted over a large chasm, and on the other side, they could see a gigantic glowing red forge built into the shape of a dwarf wielding a blacksmithing hammer, sitting atop a black iron throne. The forge's flame erupted from small chambers around the base of the statue’s throne.

From it, the sound of hammers hitting anvils echoed outward, carrying through the gigantic dwarven city that had an ever-present red glow from the thousands of lanterns lining its streets. Despite no sunlight coming in from the sky, there was plenty of light from the windows of the many homes around the city, but none overshadowed the deep red glow from the forge at its center of which Makaroth’s entourage was approaching.

The most distinct feature of the city, though, were eight gigantic pillars made of pure Iron that extended from the base of the cavern and reached up to its ceiling, built in a perfect circle around the forge at the center of the city. A large chasm was located on the city's western end, separating the west half from the central and eastern sides of the city, with several large bridges extending over it.

As Feng began to speak, Synopse found himself walking close to the bridge's railing and looking over the side to try and see what was below, but he found himself looking down into a bottomless pit whose depth was hidden by the darkness.

“Careful, don’t want our gladiator to fall off.” Calikgos joked as he walked alongside Synopse, the two trailing a good distance behind the entourage of other players.

“Wonder if it would've been fun starting on this dwarven island. I kinda like cavern exploration adventures.” Synopse replied as he pondered the view.

“We’ve had plenty of cavern exploration adventures anyway, though, haven’t we?” Calikgos asked.

“Eh, yeah. I guess. Not recently, though.” Synopse replied as his eyes wandered to the back of Makaroth’s head as he conversed with his viewers.

It was chaotic to watch, at best. Feng was talking with his viewers, while Makaroth spoke with his and Daehyun his. Like three people having separate conversations with different invisible people, ignoring the presence of each other while simultaneously walking side by side as if companions. Synopse could barely keep up with what was being said.

To make matters worse, it wasn’t just them - several other gladiator teams had joined them to visit the forges, hoping to get their hands on some Mithral equipment at the last minute. Synopse recognized some of them as his potential competition as they walked together, huddled in groups of five. Amongst these players, too, were streamers, so the end result was just noise.

“I’ve just been informed,” Feng spoke loudly, so that he could be heard over all of the chatter. “Seraxus’ ship will be arriving soon. With him, all competitors will have arrived.

“Good. I’m glad he didn’t back down, I was worried he might.” Makaroth chuckled, causing several others to laugh alongside him.

“Uh, actually…” Daehyun turned nervously to Feng and Makaroth, who followed behind him. “About Seraxus…”

“Yeah?” Makaroth asked as they stopped moving forward across the bridge.

“I’ve got this guild on this island. They’re competing in the tournament. Schadenfreude, have you heard of them?”

“I have. Those guys are very just and heroic. They’ve been fighting valiantly to hold back Seraxus for a long while. I’ll be sure to thank them and relieve them of this duty. Well, Synopse will be relieving them.” Makaroth smiled, motioning to Synopse, who was a good distance behind them on the bridge.

“Well, here’s the thing. They think letting Seraxus enter Stormtop for the tournament is a mistake. They seem convinced that if we let him in, he will go on some rampage or something.”

“Really?” Feng chuckled with a forced smile. “You needn’t worry about something like that. I left our third gladiator team at the docks with many of our highest-level players.” Feng assured him.

“He’d have to be an absolute idiot to try anything. It’s not just the Vindicators, this entire island is filled with high level, highly geared and skilled gladiators.” Lilya rolled her eyes at Daehyun.

“Yes, I know, but Seraxus has fought most of them in past tournaments and always wins…” Daehyun responded.

“Relax. Nothing will happen. This showdown will take place in the arena. We’ll be sure to protect Stormtop. You can let him in without a worry.” Makaroth replied.

“Right… okay…” Daehyun mumbled back weakly as he turned to look forward once more. As he did, though, he saw a dwarven player approaching them with a short, scruffy black beard and a shaved head, wearing multicolored leather armor and wielding a smithing hammer. [Jensora - Level 183] was floating above his head, and he had an eager expression on his face as he eyed Feng and Makaroth.

“There he is. The man himself!” Makaroth cheered excitedly after spotting him. “Everyone, let's meet the number one Blacksmith player in all of the Shattered World Online. He’s forged this legendary spellblade - ordered specially from him. The most reliable weapon I’ve ever wielded in any game!” Makaroth drew out his strangely curved longsword covered in deep lines that went around the blade's edge, giving off a deep blue glow.

“I’m glad to hear that.” Jensora smiled. “It’s a pleasure to meet you all after doing so many orders for you. I can see my handiwork is still being put to work.” He motioned to not just the sword Makaroth was showing off, but the weapons that Feng, Lilya, and several others were all carrying in their sheaths on their belts.

“Jensora, rumors have reached their ears about your recent acquisition of Mithral. They’re hoping that you may arm them with the high level material before their battles in the upcoming tournament.” Daehyun explained on there behalf.

“Oh, yeh, I know.” Jensora suddenly lost the excitement on his face. “Thing is, I’m not thinkin’ thats gonna be a possible.”

“Why not?” Lilya asked with a dejected expression. “You don’t have enough mithral?”

“No, that ain't it. Once we were told where to find it, we went swimmin’ in lavapools and started findin’ loads of the stuff. Plenty o’ volunteer miners have been sellin’ their ore to us in bulk. Nah, the problem is workin’ the mithral itself.” Jensora shrugged.

“What do you mean?” Feng asked with scrunched eyebrows, as everyone else around them who had been engaging with their streams went quiet to listen to every word Jensora spoke.

“It’s no ordinary metal. We got a forge hot enough to melt it down, but the process seems to be a complicated one.”

“I thought you had an informant telling you how to do it all?”

“Aye, he could tell us where to find it, but that was it.” Jensora shrugged.

“Can’t you just figure it out? That Aegis boy and his dwarven friend on Kalmoore were able to do it.”

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“It aint that easy.” Jensora sighed. “O’ course I studied their footage to learn what I could, but, they had access to ancient dwarven tablets that explained the process in detail. Without that information, we’re gonna have to learn to forge mithral weapons ourselves, through trial and error. Me and my team of smith’s are workin’ on it. We’ve got a few prototypes done…” Jensora pulled out a long mithral sword from his inventory to show it off. The deep purple hue in the metal was a bit darker than anything that Aegis had ever crafted.

Feng was the first to step forward and inspect the sword in Jensora’s hand, pulling up the item card.

“Wow… it’s incredible.” Feng commented.

“It looks fine to me, this is far superior to any iron weapon.” Makaroth nodded in agreement with Feng.

“Aye, it looks good, but the craftsmanship is weak. Outside of itemcards, I can tell the metal hasn’t been worked properly. I’m worried if I make weapons using these pre-mature methods, they’ll be faulty and fail you all. I can’t have that.”

“That’s nonsense.” Feng shook his head. “I would pay a great deal of gold to have you craft me a Katana using this method, ready for the tournament tomorrow.” He asked with an excited sparkle in his eyes.

“I’m not sure that’s wise…” Jensora hesitated at hearing this request.

“I need to have something of this metal. It’s incredible!” Feng pleaded.

“What about you, Synopse?” Makaroth turned to see Synopse had walked forward to inspect the item card himself.

“Mithral certainly is impressive. Iron doesn’t compare…” Synopse eyed it carefully, “However, I trust Jensora’s judgment. It’s unfortunate, but if he says it isn’t ready, we shouldn’t try to use it.” Synopse shrugged.

“Ah.” Makaroth sighed. “Pity, but well put. We’ll have to go into this tournament with regular ol’ iron.”

“Regular?” Jensora smirked at him.

“Aha, I suppose it's not regular. Your iron hasn’t let us down before.” Makaroth winked at him, followed by the two chuckling.

“Not me. I don’t want Iron. I want this.” Feng insisted.

“Ah…” Jensora shook his head disappointedly at Feng. “Alright. I’ll forge you some weapons, but I won’t but my quality guarantee on it. If yer fine with that…” Jensora shrugged.

“I’m fine with it. Forge me the mithral.”

“Aye, aye. Come with me, then, let’s show the world what we’ve learned so far. I’m sure they’d all be interested to see what it looks like to work the most powerful metal in this world, in the greatest forge in existence!” Jensora cheered excitedly, speaking towards the livestreaming icons above Daehyun, Makaroth and Feng’s heads. He followed this up by motioning everyone to follow them, then turned to lead them towards the forges ahead.

Ryan was standing still, arms tightly at his side with his back straight, head tilted downward as he looked at his feet. Standing beside him was Linda, throwing nasty gestures at Ryan. He could feel her eyes burning into his soul without needing to look, and did his best to stay silent and avoid her gaze.

They were both waiting inside Nicholas’ office as Mike had led them there and was standing over Nicholas’ Simbox, using the Simbox communicator to speak with him as he was currently in a simulation. The far wall of the office which normally had shelves of old gaming collectibles instead was now covered in dozens of screens playing out various livestreams of players all around the Shattered World Online. Among them were Makaroth, Feng, Daehyun and Yumily’s streams.

Ryan could hear Mike speaking, but the words were murmurs - he himself was in somewhat of a daze. A combination of his lack of sleep, the stress and anxiety of constantly trying to hold back Seraxus, and the weight of the drastic actions he had just taken were all weighing on him. He still felt a small rush of adrenaline trickling through his body, though he was slowly coming down from it. His knees were shaking and arms feeling weak - he already knew he was likely finished.

The sound of Nicholas’ Simbox opening up was ominous. Both Mike and Nicholas were silent as they made their way across the office to approach Linda and Ryan, but before they could speak a word the office door swung open. An anxious Andrew stepped inside and looked at the scene.

“Mike told me what happened. One of your GMs did what exactly?” Andrew asked as he quickly glanced between the four others in the room.

“It wasn’t Linda’s fault, I tricked her into doing it.” Ryan quickly spoke up in her defense.

“You’re damn right you did. How could you do that?!” Linda snapped at him.

“Great question.” Mike cleared his throat obnoxiously loud. “You made use of a GM’s player tracking system to locate several high profile players outside of your normal in-game capabilities, then took advantage of this information to crash an Airship into them. That is the Airship that Nicholace paid for, was it not?” Mike asked.

“Yes, but…” Ryan lifted his head slowly. “You told me to hold back the player that was throwing off the alignment balance, and, well, look,” Ryan frustrately motioned to the livestreams on the wall. “Even after doing it for so long, it didn’t matter. The same guys that cheated the system set him loose. I didn’t want to risk letting the imbalance grow further.” Ryan explained anxiously. Nicholas said nothing, but crossed his arms and looked at Ryan.

“Wait, am I understanding this correctly?” Andrew turned to Nicholas with a look of disbelief. “To avoid altering Samantha’s world, you sent an employee in specifically to interfere with the imbalance?” Andrew asked.

“That’s what he did. It doesn’t break the agreement.” Mike replied on Nicholas’ behalf.

“You gotta be kidding me. If the problem is getting that out of hand, just nerf it already.” Andrew let out an exasperated sigh.

“Samantha’s plan is obvious.” Ryan cleared his throat to get their attention. “Keep the evil threat growing, until it can’t be ignored. She wants a force so evil, that it forces good to unite and fight against it. But, there’s two problems with her plan.” Ryan motioned to the livestreams on the wall. “The forces of good are best friends with the forces of evil, and that sword has gotten so strong I don’t even think anyone can kill that guy anymore. I had to do it.” Ryan finished before tilting his head back down.

“That abuse of power is strictly prohibited. It’s just as bad as hacking, cheating, or exploiting.” Mike shook his head disapprovingly at Ryan.

“It’s no different than if you interfered manually, in my opinion.” Andrew replied.

“Oh piss off, Samantha’s world wasn’t directly altered. It’s not the same at all.” Mike snapped back at him.

“I disagree. It’s a shame you guys had to take drastic measures to correct the imbalance in the gameworld, but ultimately it’s your fault your security sucked, isn’t it?” Andrew glared at him.

“I’d like to see you a more intricate and complex system to protect everything Samantha created. I’d be amazed if you could even turn on your own Autopod to get to work.” Mike retaliated.

“Enough.” Nicholas finally spoke in a deep, firm voice. This prompted silence from everyone in the room. “I appreciate you taking your assignment seriously. Thanks to your hardwork and dedication, we were able to contain the problem players caused by the security breach several months ago.” Nicholas spoke to Ryan calmly. “I value your assessment of the situation, however… using GM powers in this way is unacceptable.” Nicholas shook his head.

“Absolutely.” Mike nodded in agreement.

“Linda, you’re innocent and you will receive no punishment, but please do not be so trusting in the future. If you think something is wrong, trust your gut.” Nicholas turned to her.

“Thank you sir.” She let out a sigh of relief. “I will, sir.”

“Ryan, your skills are valued at this company, and I take partial blame for your actions due to the pressure I put on you with this assignment. I cannot allow you to enter the Shattered World again as a player. You will be permanently banned from logging in. But I will allow you to return to your normal role as an offensive security specialist.” Nicholas explained.Ryan let out an elongated sigh of relief, but it was somewhat bittersweet.

“That’s it?” Andrew asked in annoyance.

“Sir, he attacked and killed a very high profile player.” Mike replied disapprovingly, sounding oddly in agreement with Andrew for once.

“Samantha?” Nicholas turned to the monitors on the far wall.

“The wielder of the sword of hatred has not yet been defeated.” Samantha replied in her robotic female voice, which came out of several speakers built into the walls around the office.

“What? How?” Ryan asked in complete disbelief. “I’m sure I hit him!”

“You should be glad. As bad as the situation is, it can go by unnoticed because it didn’t work.” Nicholas groaned.

“Wait, so it's not over? That crazy guy with the sword is still rampaging through your game?” Andrew asked in confusion.

“It would seem so.” Nicholas closed his eyes for a few seconds as he said this.

“Sir, you gotta stop him from getting to Tarolas. You gotta do something.” Ryan pleaded. “I know it seems unfair, but, if you let him on that island he’s gonna destroy it all. So many people are playing there, most of them haven’t even touched PvP. Shop owners, roleplayers, kids, families, I’ve met a lot of them. It’ll destroy the game for so many people.”

“He’s right…” Andrew nodded along with this.

“If you step in now, with this many eyes on this event…” Mike mumbled.

“We won’t recover our image. The integrity of Samantha’s gameworld must remain intact. We will not interfere. If she fails to balance out the gameworld's alignment, then this game is a failure.”

“You’re seriously pulling this ‘captain goes down with the ship’ bullshit?” Andrew asked in anger. Nicholas didn’t reply, though. Instead, he opened his eyes and slowly looked to the wall of livestreams on display.

“It’s up to the players now, to correct their mistakes. She still thinks they can wise up, so I won’t give up hope. Let’s get back to work - we’ll likely see the largest viewership numbers on our game that we’ve ever had.” He took a deep breath, prompting everyone to turn and look at the many live streams on display.

“You’re not joining the other streamers?” [Xiao Bai Mao - Level 161] asked Yumily as he and his party of five walked along the Skyport pier of Stormtop. He was watching as Yumily was helping the crewmates of her Airship unload large crates from the cargo and carry them into carts waiting for them at the end of the pier.

“No, I already have mithral weapons.” Yumily smiled politely in response, briefly glancing over to see Xiao Bai Mao’s entire party watching her unload crates with the NPCs. Beyond them, she saw hundreds of other Vindicators swarming the Skyport, unloading their own five Airships that had recently docked. It was a sea of red tabards mixed in with dozens of Stormtop guards trying to make sure order was being kept.

“Yeah, but that’s made by that Kalmoore kid. Won’t be as good as the stuff from this island.” Xiao Bai Mao shrugged.

“Mm, maybe…” Yumily dropped a crate into the cart then stopped to talk to him properly. “But, they are special to me. Made with a lot of care…” She explained while pulling out a mithral flute that Aegis had crafted for her.

“Yeah. It’s good enough for me.” Kenji said as he approached, also carrying a crate alongside the NPCs from their Airship. He gestured lightly to his sheathed mithral weapon as well, that Aegis had made for him. He let out a huff of air at this motion, then rolled his eyes as he saw Kaito also unloading crates.

“You know you don’t need to help them unload, ri-” Xiao Bai Mao was interrupted by the sound of a loud, ominous roar in the distant skies.

Everyone present on the Skyport heard the roar clearly, prompting a nearly complete halt in all movement. The NPCs froze where they stood, some idle and some still holding crates. Guards and Vindicators alike all turned to look in the direction they believed the roar to have come from, but saw nothing.

It went deathly silent from there, despite the great number of players and NPCs present at the Stormtop Skyport.

“What was that?” Yumily asked worriedly.

“I don’t know,” Kaito replied as he put down his crate and drew out his weapon. Kenji saw this and did the same, while Xiao Bai Mai and his party watched them do this then turned back to the direction of the sound.

The silence carried for a long few seconds, broken only by the sound of rain fall as droplets of water began to trickle down out of the dark gray clouds hovering above Stormtop. Within seconds, the light trickle grew into a downpour of rain, quickly drenching Yumily’s hair and Kimono alongside the armor of all other players present.

“It was probably nothing,” Kenji suggested after no further roars were heard, but he was quickly proven wrong as a second roar, much closer and louder, suddenly erupted out of the skies.

From the dark gray rain clouds above, a large black abyssal dragon soared down out of the skies. Its form was almost skeletal, with tainted black scales and an aura of dark black mist trailing behind it as it flapped its wings. The roar gurgled out from its long neck as it opened its mouth to reveal its black fangs. The glowing red eyes of the creature guided it down to the only remaining free pier in the Skyport, and as if attempting to dock, it crashed its large talons into the pier and shattered it, instead stomping forward to land on the small space of mountain outside of the walls of Stormtop. The dragon was too large to not be seen over the city's walls, however, as it extended its neck upwards to peer over them and look upon the city.

[Kelik’radanir, The Corrupted Silver Dragon(ELITE) - ??] could be seen in dark red letters floating above the Dragon’s head.

“A fucking Dragon?” Xiao shouted at his party, and all of the vindicators drew out their weapons, as did the guards.

“Yo, relax, relax!” A voice called out from the back of the beast, and shortly after, several players could be seen climbing off its back.

Seraxus, Gambit, Zuon, Sylvia, and Hajax landed on the ground before the somewhat tame beast as it peered its intimidatingly large head around, taking in the scenery before it.

The voice had belonged to Seraxus, and he grinned ear to ear as he saw the terrified looks on everyone's faces.

“Ah, I see. Quite the entrance.” Xaio laughed as he realized the situation.

“Thanks, I like to come in with style,” Seraxus said as he fidgeted around with his interface for a moment, turning on his live stream. “Ladies and Gentlemen. The wait is over. We’ve arrived at Stormtop!” Seraxus called out excitedly to his viewers, and his numbers quickly shot up from 0 to 1 million in seconds.

“Feng and their boys have come to greet us. Isn’t that nice?” Seraxus motioned to Xaio. “Even Yumily’s here! Holy shit, she’s a babe. Hotter in person, am I right guys?” He said crudely while motioning across the port at her, and she returned a glare. “Now, Makaroth made me promise not to wreck the place, but…” A devious grin began to grow across his face. Following this, Hajax waved his hands around with a dark spell being cast from his fingertips. The other players nearby did not know the spell he cast, but the results were visible to everyone - swarms of black reapers began to descend out of the rain clouds above.

“My sword can’t resist. There’s just so many fresh souls to feast on.” Seraxus finished, followed by another deafening roar from Kelik’radanir.

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