Chapter 18

  “Why?” Mie asked . . . again.

  “Just do it,” I sighed.

  Commander Matt fell to a knee, his head down, and facing toward us.

  A moment later, Mie’s Flash Heal fell through him, and as it did, he looked up at us. The black bled away from his eyes as if a drain had been unplugged, and his nameplate . . . turned white.

  He got out a ‘oh my—’ before his entire body shuddered. Then he heaved.

  An explosion of black ink and bile came pouring out of his mouth.

  I have seen a lot of people throw up in my life. Normally it doesn’t bother me . . . but the way this guy vomited, the sound he made . . . I cringed. It sounded like he was being tortured. It was a cry of absolute pain mixed with a guttural shout of anger. So . . . in other words, it looked and sounded like we were witnessing an exorcism. There was so much black grossness coming out of him.

  It was . . . pretty freaking weird.

  A moment of silence followed as the stream turned to a trickle.

  He was gasping for air. “You saved—”

  He heaved again.

  Clara had a hand to her mouth, Fred was flat on his back, passed out, and Mie’s face was wide eyed. I set about looting all the corpses and gathered my spears, glancing at my map. There were only two green gates now. And only one on our side of the mountain. We need to hurry.

  Finally, the vomiting stopped.

  The commander stood up on shaky legs and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. He walked toward me, got on one knee, and said “Thank you—I—I thought that was the end for me.” He tried to keep talking, but his throat caught and more black ink dribbled down his chin.

  “No problem . . .” I trailed off as I combed through my logs.

  You killed Recruited Black Domain Swordsman x6!

  You received 3600 XP!

  You killed Recruited Black Domain Archer x2

  You received 1200 XP!

  You killed Recruited Black Domain Healer

  You received 600 XP!

  You successfully cleansed a unique mob!

  You received 2000 XP!

  You gained multiple levels!

  You reached level 20!

  You received {Gold Coin} x14

  You received {Raid Key}

  Roll for {Bow of the Gods}

  You gained a unique follower!

  Commander Matt is now a follower!

  I took a deep breath. There was a lot to dig into there.

  “Are you good to walk, Commander?” I asked.

  “Call me Matt, sir. Yes, I can walk,” he responded, his voice quavering, as he got to his feet. Now that he wasn’t doing his best to kill us, I took him in more fully. He was a large man, tall and strong, his hair cut short and even. His voice, though it still quavered slightly, was strong and rough around the edges. Like Loc, he wore a mustache fantastically. I also noticed a couple battle scars on his chin and cheek.

  Okay, cool. He’s sentient. Wanting to test the follower system, I pulled open that menu and found the row for Matt. It had a yellow border, indicating his uniqueness, but there were no actions available. Instead, there was a missing requirement. I inspected it.

  1/2 Requirements Met

  Cleanse Commander Matt of {Recruited}: Complete

  Gain Commander Matt’s Allegiance: Incomplete

  Huh. Gain his allegiance? As if queued by my thought process, Matt said, “These lands have been corrupted by the Black Queen, a horrid witch from the south. She has killed our king and corrupted my friends, and if not for you, I would have spent the rest of my life mindlessly doing her bidding. I owe you a debt, but if you help me rid these lands of her grasp . . . I will owe you my allegiance.” He trailed off and looked to the city in the distance, a grimace on his face.

  “O . . . kay,” I said. I looked at the map and saw the gate on the opposite side turn from red to green. Only one was left, but I didn’t see any other yellow dots in the area. I’ll have to dig into all that later.

  “We have to move. Now!” I said.

  Fred groaned.

  I took off at a sprint across the field, and I was glad to see the others—along with Commander Matt—follow without question.

  As we ran toward the mountain. . . at Mie’s pace—which was more like a jog really—we rolled for the key and the bow.

  Mie of course got the key. I wasn’t bitter. It didn’t even matter . . . probably. It better not even matter. I won the bow, which I inspected real quick before handing over to Clara.

  {Bow of the Gods}

  Rank: Epic

  Grade: Masterwork

  Slot: Two-Handed

  +15 Agility

  +15 Endurance

  The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  +3 Constitution

  Passive Ability: {Double Shot}

  Passive Ability: {Double Shot}

  Description: Every time you fire this weapon, instead of firing one arrow that deals 100% damage, you fire two that deal 70% damage each.

  The bow was good, and the damage increase alone was amazing . . . but I was also pretty sure firing two arrows at once would mean double the stacks of poison.

  We kept running, and I whistled as I passed it Clara’s way. She gave me a little smile, but her reaction made it feel like she didn’t really realize how good of an upgrade it was. Man, she looks just like Ada. It was uncanny. A message came in from Mie in our party chat. She was breathing really hard, so maybe talking this way was just easier for her? I didn’t know.

  Mie: I just realized something.

  Sam: Oh?

  Mie: You know how we can see all the activity on the map in this area?

  Sam: . . . yeah?

  Greg: I see where this is going.

  Mie: We basically don’t even need Greg anymore.

  Sam: Did . . . we ever?

  Clara: Who’s Greg?

  Mie: :fire emoji: :owned emoji:

  Greg: Hilarious.

  Fred: Hello Greggory!

  Greg: . . . Hi Fred. It’s just Greg.

  Mie: It really is just Greg.

  Fred: Is this . . . normal guide treatment?

  Mie: Yes.

  As we neared the mountain and city, I checked my map . . . and my stomach fell out. A yellow-nameplated group of four players was making their way from the west side of the area as we approached from the east. They were almost to the base of the mountain, while we were still a mile or so out. It was going to be damn close on who made it to the gate first. Too close for comfort.

  “Mie, hand the key over to Clara,” I said.

  “What? No! I won it fair and square!”

  “There is another party on their way to the last gate! We need her to go grab it before them!”

  Mie harrumphed and handed the key over to Clara, who looked at me as if to confirm we were both thinking the same thing.

  I nodded back.

  “Go.”

  She took off at her top speed . . . which was something to watch. She blinked forward, activated her Diving Shot, then blinked again. I watched her blue dot anxiously on the map when I lost sight of her over a rise. She continued to speed way ahead of us. The other party must have seen what we were doing, because I saw one of their yellow dots separate from the rest and shoot out ahead toward the last green gate.

  My abs clenched as I watched the two move at their top speeds. The city walls rose up in front of us now, some fifteen meters high. Past them, the mountain and an inner wall with the gates stood tall before us. The exterior walls’ gates were open, and as we passed into the city proper, words showed up across my vision.

  The City of The Black Domain

  Windows snapped closed as we passed, as if the city’s inhabitants were afraid. They . . . probably are, I realized. Uhh . . . yeah, if spiders were digging into my friends’ necks and making them go all braindead I’d hesitate to leave my house . . . like ever.

  Part of me wondered if we were making a huge mistake heading into the heart of this area. Gaining five levels definitely helped, but we were still on the very low end for this zone. I hoped we weren’t getting in over our heads.

  I looked back at my map, still running with Mie, Fred, and Matt on my heels. The other yellow dot was closer than Clara . . . No . . . They were both about to reach the gate. I zoomed in. Right before the yellow dot reached the green gate, Clara’s blue dot transported ahead—another blink, I assumed. Thatta girl. I grinned. The green gate turned to blue, indicating it was ours.

  At least someone in our party is competent. I watched Fred stumble into another stream of black ink. They were everywhere here. Crisscrossing the city streets, going up building walls, and running parallel with us. Matt took his sword and cut through the Corruption Vine, dealing more damage to it than Mie or I ever had with my spear or her staff way back when. Huh, I guess that effect can be cut away with enough damage. Or maybe Matt deals bonus damage to it? I wasn’t sure. I’d just thought you had to stretch away from it. That was good to know.

  I took a look at the logs hitting my feed now that our party had locked in a gate.

  You completed the event ‘Join the Black Queen Boss Raid’!

  You received 4000 XP!

  You gained multiple levels!

  You reached level 22!

  You discovered a Boss Raid!

  BOSS RAID: Slay The Black Queen!

  Description: The Black Queen has enslaved the area with her corruption. Slay the Queen and save the realm!

  On successful completion you will receive rewards, experience, and reputation based on your current level.

  The instant two-level bump was definitely nice. I checked our levels. I was twenty-two. So was Mie, and . . . so was Clara. I thought about that for a moment. The leveling system had to be exponential to some degree for her to have caught up like she had. We were—I assumed—still ahead of her in XP, but were at a point where each level was taking more and more XP to get to, and so the difference between me and Mie, and Clara was probably within the same level. Fred was level twenty-three, which confirmed my suspicion there. If the level requirement was linear, he would have stayed three levels ahead.

  It took us a couple more minutes to reach the gate. The gate . . . was . . . yeah. It was basically just a classical castle-like metal gate you’d find in any number of video games or fantasy movies.

  The inner wall was higher, about the same size as the exterior and made of the same gray stone material, and now that I looked closer, it looked more like it was just part of the inner keep. There were walkways on top of the walls, but there wasn’t much beyond this gate that was outside of the mountain. This gate . . . goes into the mountain, I realized.

  I walked past the groaning player whom Clara had worked down and Knocked and looked through the bars of the gate. It was . . . a short tunnel that was blocked by a wooden door. Maybe a staging area? I thought. I wasn’t sure.

  I turned my attention to the Knocked player. She was one of those Forest Shades I had seen during character creation. She sort of faded in and out with the eclipsed lighting. “Tell your friends to back up, and we will let you live.” I checked my map. They were still a couple hundred feet away.

  She coughed up some dark red blood. “Okay.”

  Her party members stopped, and so we let her continue to crawl away. It was painful to watch. Clara had dumped at least ten arrows into her and must have kited her mercilessly. Clara herself seemed unharmed.

  There was a groan as the metal gate rose up slowly. I took a deep, inhaling breath and looked at Mie and Fred. They both had their hands on their knees, just breathing.

  I looked to what I thought of as the staging area, watching my logs update.

  6/10 Parties Confirmed

  7/10 Parties Confirmed

  This . . . was potentially a really bad idea. It was going to be absolute mayhem in there. I looked back at Fred. Would his Arbitrary Blast work on the queen? Would he be . . . good enough? I thought about my family. About Lily and how I still didn’t really know if she was alive or dead. I thought about how I had no idea if my wife had made it through all of this hell. I . . . thought about Jessica torturing Greg and the company in charge of all this . . . allowing that to happen. My fists clenched. We had to win right here. Without the experience from this raid, I knew to my very core . . . we would get left behind. We had to be brave. We had to try.

  I looked at Clara and Matt. Clara gave me an affirmative nod. She understood. Matt beat his breast plate with a fist, gripped his massive sword at his waist, and unsheathed it with a long ring.

  The gate, now at its summit, jolted to a stop with a loud metal KATHUNK!

  8/10 Parties Confirmed

  9/10 Parties Confirmed

  I exhaled. “Phhhhhhhhhh . . . okay. Here we go.”

  I stepped forward.

  10/10 Parties Confirmed

  Boss Raid Confirmed

  Mode: PVP

  Unlike its slow rise, the gate slammed down with a crash behind us . . . locking us in.

  I looked at the PVP mode log in confusion. Wait what?