Continue Online (Part 4, Crash) (24 page)

Status effects for
[Deafened]
and
[Dizzy]
came up. I swung wildly, unable to fully appreciate the neatness of
[Power Armor]
.
[Awareness Heightening]
made each moment with my head in this creature’s mouth feel like an eternity. Seeing anything past this visor while my arms were pinned was impossible. I didn’t even have time to consider where
[Wild Bill]
had gone.

The monster kept chewing. Viper was saying something. Smaller barks could be heard in the middle of other ones. I shifted
[Morrigu’s Gift]
to a one-handed short sword and tried to jab at the monster. I couldn’t see its health bar, and all the chewing was starting to make progress even on my
[Power Armor]
.

My other hand stuck out, one foot pressed hard against the monster. Knees ached from trying to push back. Using
[Recall]
brought
[Morrigu’s Echo]
into my free hand. I couldn’t tell what shape it had and
[Dizzy]
screwed up my concentration. Both weapons flailed at the monster and the barks sounded strained.

A solid stream of blue shone through a hole in
[Charge]
’s cheek. The energy didn’t hit us but did get the walkway.

“Sshit! Android Sseven!” Viper’s loud hiss sounded muffled but close. Had we walked forward? Did
[Charge]
try to get him while still munching on me? Everything tipped to one side.
[Charge]
gave up his grasp on me and tried to stay upright.

We were falling off the edge. A second stream of blue came through while I tried to get my bearings.
[Dizzy]
made my eyes cross. A film of glowing slime made it harder to see. Viper was falling along with the rest of us.

I managed to
[Blink]
closer to the other player as all of us fell from the ledge.
[Morrigu’s Echo]
dropped from my hand into the abyss while I tried to get
[Morrigu’s Gift]
into a pickax type shape.

Viper’s hand was close enough to clasp onto mine. The Traveler had an instant death hold. A message talking about
[Constrictive Grip]
flashed by but I had no time to read the text. We were falling. Sparks flew as
[Morrigu’s Gift]
struggled to find purchase. Our path downward slanted enough and I pumped my arm into the wall, hoping that my fledging
[Mountain Man]
skills from training with Shazam might kick in.

“Hang on!” I strained to keep a hold of
[Morrigu’s Gift]
and Viper. Dusk clung to a wall chirping as we slid down. He might have been thinking something clever, but it was blocked by
[Power Armor]
.

I almost regretted saving the other Traveler. With just myself I could probably have survived or even made it back to the top. Even neater, I probably could have found Android Seven,
[Blink]
ed to him and then pulled him from whatever perch he hid at. Still, going back up would have been a death warrant because of all the remaining
[Heavenly Body Clone]
s.

More energy blasts poured in from above. They were growing increasingly accurate. I tilted my head back and managed to see a body up above, glowing with blue light. That must be where Android Seven was, hanging from the ceiling, trying to kill us and take the boss loot for his own.

We slipped even farther.

“Viper! Will you be okay?!”

I had no idea what he said. The man shook, another bolt of blue came down along with more
[Heavenly Body Clone]
s. The grip on my free arm vanished. [
Morrigu’s Gift]
slid again under the sudden change of pressure.
[Power Armor]
still weighed me down. Dusk’s anxious chirping, undead monsters’ fading barks as they fell, and a hum of energy as we descended were all magnified under
[Awareness Heightening]
.

I let the
[Power Armor]
go and felt a wash of grossness as my clothes turned back into a gore-drenched toga. Vision tilted down as I tried to get a handle on how far we were from the bottom.

Dusk dove, and let out a fireball lighting up the path. It vanished like a penny down an endless well. It was far, far below. I looked back up and saw a fifth blast of blue.

“Voices above, I hope you’re enjoying yourselves,” I grumbled and tried again to halt my impending decent, but the weapon slipped.

Down I went.
[Awareness Heightening]
slowed time as I fell. My heartbeat was racing now, no longer a dull thud in the background. Moments like this were what nightmares were made of. Falling, dead bodies around me, death being rained from above. Dusk gave one chirp that was lost. I looked up and saw those two points of frozen starlight growing faint in the distance.

My body jerked and I had a small eternity where I expected pain to radiate from my legs upward. My arm jerked out of its socket and side slammed into a wall. Those parts of my body hurt and numbness shot down one leg as my kneecap jerked into something.

“I’ve got you,” Viper said. He repeated the words a few times as I looked around trying to find some place to
[Blink]
to safely. Gravity had driven the thought of trying a last minute change of direction out of my head. I ground my teeth and felt like a newbie, despite all that I had been given or trained for.

The ground was close enough to see. I
[Blink]
ed down and got onto hands and knees for a moment as my heartbeat settled.
[Awareness Heightening]
faded and the world once again had taken on its normal speed. My belly shook and quivered as I tried to push forward.

One foot at a time. Both legs slowly worked and I stood. My healthbar was under half. Mana barely existed.
[Morrigu’s Gift]
and
[Morrigu’s Echo]
clattered on the floor nearby. I stumbled to pick up my weapons and felt better.

“Hermess? Are you ssound?” Viper said. He must have climbed down somehow. His words seemed off to me. I looked around and tried to figure out what had happened.

[Charge]
lay there on the bottom floor. One arm reached out awkwardly as it tried to go for a debilitated
[Heavenly Body Clone]
that had fallen with us. Gouged out chunks of flesh littered its chest and face from my wild stabs. Multiple smaller monsters looked like broken pancakes. I felt only mildly surprised when all these creatures managed to move arms and fingers in twitches. This fight had gone on too long. The boss barked one last time before my weapons gouged through the creature’s eyes.

“Yes. I feel much better now,” I said, satisfied that this fight had gone a much different route from
[Barricobbler]
. This creature’s death was added proof of my recovery. Xin’s return only served as part of my improvement. My bravery and willingness to leap into combat and save someone, the abilities I had. I had changed. I was better. My eyes closed briefly and I dared to feel just a little bit of happiness.

Session Seventy Six - The Breach

Stabbing creatures was excruciating with one arm barely functional. I tried to use the trick Shazam had taught me to get an arm back into the socket. The failure cost me health each time. Try number three popped up a message as game mechanics resulted in success.

“Nngh.” I grunted while flexing fingers slowly.
[Morrigu’s Echo]
would be easier to wield now. Shoving a blade into
[Charge]
’s eyeball with the limb out of joint had hurt intensely.

My monster ending spree didn’t stop with the boss. There were other
[Heavenly Body Clone]
s that were even now falling down. Some piled up together. Luckily
[Undying]
was subject to the whims of
[Gravity]
. Their bodies cast of a small amount of illumination, but most of it came from the now dead
[Charge]
.
[Dipped in Starlight]
allowed me to finish them off.

“Well,” Viper said dryly after a glance in my direction. “That’ss that. Now we have to esscape.”

“If you’re full of loot, we need to survive and get back topside,” I said and heaved an exhausted sigh.

There were items, but none of them looked interesting at this point. Continue Online didn’t really operate by a magic scroll dropping system so I couldn’t just dig through endless bodies and come up with a ring of stupidity plus seven. Viper seemed to have some system so I settled for re-deading these undead creatures.

“Hurry up,” I said after making sure two more
[Heavenly Body Clone]
s stopped moving. They were falling down and creating an ever heightening pile.

Briefly, my eyes trailed a path upward. Could we let them stack up and then walk back off the ledge? No, that would take thousands of monsters, plus risk our loot. The idea was proof of my exhaustion.

I waved at the system menu to pull up a clock. Nearly four AM, sunlight wouldn’t happen this early anyway. Four days in-game was twenty-four hours of awareness. I needed sleep, food, and sunlight.

“Almosst. All thiss is good for uss,” Viper said while gathering loot. “Pluss, now I know ssecretss to thiss dungeon.”

“Reckless disregard for personal safety?” I quipped before feeling flushed. Well-rested Grant would never say such a thing.

“Yess. And moving fasst. I’m ssure other convictss would pay me a hundred pointss at leasst.” He shrugged then moved to the giant pile of bodies that kept increasing.

Selling information about a dungeon wasn’t my style. My life was more about moving from one destination to the next. If Xin’s jailbreak didn’t happen, I could easily do boss runs instead. Maybe. This one would have been impossible to solo. We were lucky Dusk’s pest control served well as a third member.

Pinging the area showed Android Seven far above. Big-O’s group was nowhere near us. There were marks on the wall where the larger creature had clawed. Even this entire pit we sat in looked like it had been widened out at the base.

My foot tapped the ground. This flooring felt far sturdier than the dirt and rock walls. Was there a paneling here or something housed down below? Had
[Charge]
really liked to dig so much he hit a zone boundary for Continue Online?

[Morrigu’s Gift]
stabbed at the hard surface a few times but the floor didn’t even scratch. This might be a mystery for another person with the luxury of time. I turned to Viper and said, “We need to go quickly before other players can respawn and get in our way.”

“I’m full on loot, forty-six cores, the essence stone is getting heavy too. Any more and movement will be difficult.” Viper nodded. I glanced over and saw him holding a little crystal near the dead bodies. Sparks of energy jumped between the deceased and his small item. I really didn’t live the life of a normal adventurer, so cores, essence stones, and dungeon crawling loot was beyond me.

I shook my head. There were boxes waiting for my attention telling me about our boss fight results. Based on battle contribution and the fact that the two of us were still alive, I had gained about two hundred points. The box got waved away.

Dusk crawled down a wall carefully. He snuck over to a crevice nearby. His face poked through and let out a happy murmur of noise before vanishing.

“Watch for Android Seven,” I said to Viper while pressing a hand to my head.
[Dipped in Starlight]
’s status message flickered while my body felt heated.

Dusk turned and squawked. I faded out briefly while staring at Viper. The man managed to look up while barely tilting his head. Eyes bugged out a little and Viper’s body bowed. Then he shook and returned to a normal posture.

I pretended not to have been staring, in hopes that
[Act: Straight Face]
might keep me from looking disturbed. The crevice pass way led to a steep ramp up. My ball of fire showed fairly solid walls, but our path was narrow. Dusk was small and wiggly enough to not be thwarted.

One arm felt distorted and kept getting stuck. Viper grumbled a bit. I tried to use
[Blink]
to get farther up the walkway. The system happily told me no.

“So, what are you in prison for?” I asked Viper as we crept our way upward. Each step ached and my fingers were barely responsive.

“Bodyguard. A player bribed me with two hundred gold to let him in for a ssecret meeting. Then killed a persson. Who knew letting NPCss die had conssequencess?” Viper said from behind me. He moved slower than I. “Ended up with a thousand pointss to work off.”