Terramyr Online: The Undiscovered Country: A LitRPG Adventure Read online

  “Yeah, if the professor found evidence of an oracle at a Chilean volcano, we could just as easily say that the Pythia at Delphi got the idea from Mapuche colonists,” Brian leaned forward and tapped the table in front of him. “Plutarch’s debunked volcanic vent theory has been replaced by newer evidence that ethylene was possible coming up through the porous rock below the temple’s basement instead. I think the idea’s got play,” he said with exaggerated enthusiasm. “What do you think?” Brian gestured with a laugh to Rhonda.

  “I’d love to get in on one of these conversations with you three boys someday,” Rhonda laughed. “Not only have the oldest mummies in the world turned out to be from Chile, not Egypt, but a German toxicologist published a paper a good while back saying she found cocaine and nicotine in samples from Egyptian mummies, and nicotine in hundreds of additional old-world mummies from all over the place. If you accept that wholesale, it would seem that there was pre-Columbian exchange of plants, since those substances only come from plants in the new world. Why not the concept of being inspired by volcanoes to predict the future?”

  “And here’s the man himself!” Mike stood and hailed Augustin as he came down the stairs. It was impossible to read Augustin’s mood based on the look of his avatar. “We were just discussing the possible pre-eminence of Chilean archaeology in all the world,” Mike said, slapping Augustin heartily on the back.

  “Well, what we should probably be discussing is how to move along our game play. Meredith logged back in a minute ago and chased me off. Told me to get my butt in gear… only she used a different word. The professor is talking to her now. I’d rather not be around to see how that plays out.”

  Brian and Mike burst out laughing and Rhonda’s eyebrows shot up.

  “Come on, let’s walk and talk. Chris and Barry are already out there in the world doing amazing things I’m sure,” Brian suggested as he rose to his feet and started offering food and silverware to the other members of his party. No one seemed interested, so he pocketed the lot himself to sell or use later.

  “How much gold do you have?” Mike asked, picking up with his jumping exercises again now that they were getting ready to move.

  “I spent it all on sword training, but I could sell the manticore pelt maybe. Which reminds me, I also harvested a manticore heart. Do you think you could use that, Rhonda?” He dropped the heart on the table for her to examine.

  “Yes, I can actually make a very nice potion using this. Thanks!” Rhonda pocketed it.

  “Hey, I thought you’d be done with the constant jumping by now. Haven’t you maxed out your acrobatics yet?” Augustin pushed Mike toward the door, gesturing with his head for Rhonda and Brian to follow.

  “Not yet, just passed level seventy in acrobatics. I’m up to level seven though, so it’s definitely been worth it. As for gold, the plates and silverware we just grabbed should get us maybe a hundred or so at the market.” Out on the street now, Mike started looking around, probably scouting for a pickpocketing target.

  “What is it you’re planning with the gold?” Rhonda asked, stepping in front of him, breaking his line of site to something he seemed to have locked onto.

  “I’m glad you asked, my friendly neighborhood alchemist. We’re probably going to need your help.”

  “Did you want to take up potion making in an effort to finally go straight?” Augustin joked.

  “Never, my friend, never! What I have in mind should be fun and fulfill one of Meredith’s demands. I did some digging around and discovered that for five thousand gold we can purchase a house lot in Fezhik and found our own Great House. We may not play long enough to enjoy all the benefits of course, but it would give us a good central save point of our own. It would also make us independent from the starting room with the prof and Meredith.”

  “Just the four of us?” Augustin asked.

  “We could invite Chris too, if he wanted to join us,” Brian suggested.

  “Hmm, not your favorite frenemy, Bob?” Rhonda pushed him gently in the arm.

  Brian laughed guiltily but didn’t answer.

  “I hadn’t actually planned on telling him about it either,” Mike laughed. “How does that seem, Augustin?”

  Augustin shrugged in agreement, smiling broadly.

  “Great, but I still don’t see what that has to do with alchemy specifically,” Rhonda sidestepped as a drunken NPC came stumbling through where they were standing.

  “Potions can make a lot of money in a place like this,” Brian explained.

  “Even more than pickpocketing I’d say,” Rhonda replied slyly as Mike’s hand shot out toward the robes of the drunkard who had just stumbled past.

  “Meredith did tell us to buy property. Perhaps while we work to earn the necessary gold, we should also work on the main quest line. Have you talked with the scholar yet?” Augustin asked. “Each book we retrieve earns one thousand gold.” They all nodded.

  “Great, Augustin and I can retrieve the first two books on the list and you boys can retrieve the other two,” Rhonda suggested, starting to already walk away from the group. Augustin waved to Mike and Brian and followed after her. Brian felt a little pang of disappointment that she hadn’t picked him to work with, but figured she probably wanted to ask Augustin how his conversation had gone with the professor.

  Mike and Brian headed the opposite direction, passing by shopkeepers who were locking up their shops for the night and the occasional brightly lit, open window from which sounds of music or conversation came spilling out onto the street. A couple of women walked past, the scent of sweet perfume trailing behind them for several steps. While Brian was observing and appreciating the in-game atmosphere, Mike was still jumping with each step until his stamina dropped too low.

  “Tell me more about the manticore,” Mike said once he was finally forced to walk.

  “It was cool, came out of nowhere, swooped down and pounced on a woman. Killed her and a guard before we could put it down. Weird thing though, I looted the dead guard, but after the fight was over the other guards came up to me and demanded I give them back the armor and sword.”

  “Ouch,” Mike said. “That’s rough. Would have been a nice free set of equipment.”

  “Right?!” Brian stopped and opened his map. “Looks like Rhonda and Augustin are going for the two books to the southeast. So that means we’re headed southwest.”

  “Sounds good to me,” Mike said. “Did the manticore shoot its spikes?”

  “Yeah, impaled me in the chest,” Brian replied. “It was a pretty powerful beast.”

  “And no warning whatsoever? It just flew in over the walls?”

  “Yup.”

  “That’s so cool. Well, I have some spells that should work if we get into a tight spot. Plus, I actually have a sword I can give you.”

  Mike dropped a sword on the ground.

  “Please tell me you bought that,” Brian said.

  “What’s the fun in that?” Mike asked. “I broke into a house in the lower district. The sword was just sitting out in the open. Easy-peasy.”

  Brian picked up the sword and equipped it.

  [Iron longsword equipped. Slashing damage +14]

  “So, how much gold do you have?” Brian asked.

  Mike laughed. “That’s a rather personal question,” he teased, taking off running instead, his stamina evidently fully replenished. Brian shook his head but took off after his friend.

  The two of them ran to the southern gate and then headed out in a southwesterly direction. The first marker was about twenty in-game miles away. They ran past a trio of deer grazing in the hills outside of town, slowing down to a normal jog once they reached the forest line.

  “So, what sort of quests have you been given from the mage’s guild so far?” Brian asked.

  “Simple things, like interviewing a recently returned explorer about the effects of a magical ward he had taken to test against some low-level baddies and then enhancing the potency. The benefit to that quest w
as really the pair of enchanted daggers I lifted from the guy’s trophy case when he wasn’t looking. Then I had to perform an experiment with one of the fire drake spines the explorer had given me. That was sort of a fiasco. The whole training ground was like, kawoosh!” To emphasize his point, Mike struck the ground with a fireball and laughed appreciatively at his own pyrotechnic display.

  Brian laughed too and was just about to suggest they move a little more quietly when an ominous sound caught his ear. Glancing to his right, he saw a pair of moondust wolves emerging from the tree line into the small clearing they had just entered. Brian tapped Mike’s arm to get his attention while holding as still as possible. The pair of wolves started snarling. One of them, a creature time-and-a-half as large as the other, circled around its partner and cried out a warning. The sound was more of a lion’s roar than a wolf’s bark, but it lay somewhere between the two.

  Just before the wolves charged at Brian, the larger animal’s hackles raised up, showing a line of green, luminescent quills running along its spine.

  He drew his longsword as Mike let loose with a fireball. The flames hissed through the air and crashed into the larger moondust wolf’s face with tremendous force, knocking the animal to the ground in one hit.

  The second wolf was able to lunge at Brian, but he swung just right with his sword and cut the animal down before he got hit.

  “Looks like we’ve both gone up a few levels,” Mike said.

  Brian looted his kill and Mike moved to the scorched wolf.

  [+50 XP]

  [+1 moondust wolf hide]

  [+1 moondust wolf heart]

  “Got a hide and some quills,” Mike called out.

  “Hide and heart for me,” Brian said. “The heart should be good for alchemy,” he added, thinking of Rhonda.

  The two continued on, slowing their jog as they encountered larger beasts in the forest. Brian recognized them as the strange, scaly giraffe things he had seen from the rooftops in Fezhik. They were much larger up close than he had thought. The creatures shook the ground with each step and traveled in a small group of four, a juvenile between the adults.

  One of them lowered its head through the tree canopy, snapping branches with ease as it craned its head down to investigate Brian and Mike. Big, dark eyes regarded them curiously, and its ears twitched.

  “Paraceratherium,” Mike said. “My dad dug up a nearly complete skeletal fossil in China when I was twelve. I’d recognize them anywhere, though I don’t think I’ve ever seen them with scales before.”

  A moment after Mike announced the name, the words “Armored Paraceratherium” appeared over the top of the creature with orange letters. Orange wasn’t as bad as red, but it informed Brian that the two of them had less than a fifty percent chance of winning in a fight against the thing.

  “Probably should stay away from the baby then,” Brian said.

  “Good call.”

  Mike and Brian backed up and circled around to the north, leaving about a hundred yards between them and the behemoths. Due west they could each see glimpses of the sea through the trees as they crested a tall hill.

  “Smaller fiends on the beach probably,” Brian said. “Bigger ones inside the forests.”

  Mike didn’t respond, but they both made a straight line for the coast. Along the way they encountered something that look like an armadillo had gotten amorous with an Ankylosaurus at one point, but they left the creature alone and continued on their way. As they exited the tree line some fifty yards from the water, they saw a pair of short bipedal reptiles chasing a sea turtle along the sand.

  “Want to hunt?” Mike asked.

  Brian shrugged. “Not sure what they are, but if you think we can take them, then sure. Extra loot and XP right?”

  “Exactly.”

  The two split up, Brian trying to cut off their northward advance as they slowly picked at the turtle’s hard shell and Mike circling to come in from behind.

  Putting away the sword, he equipped his bow.

  [Wooden shortbow equipped. Piercing damage +6]

  Oof. Should have spent some skill points on my bow mastery. He snuck in close, hoping his stealth would give him a critical hit. The monsters looked like juvenile raptors, about half as tall as an adult and covered with mottled green and brown, spiny feathers. They chirped loudly as they bit down on the sea turtle’s spiked shell. The HP bar above the turtle flashed, but the damage was minimal. One of the dinos jumped atop the sea turtle and raked the creature with its claws, uncovering a layer of abalone-like material beneath the leathery exterior. It didn’t increase the damage done, but it did stop the turtle for a moment before it could regain its momentum again.

  Waiting until the crosshairs lined up perfectly, he released the arrow. It arced beautifully through the air and thunked into the first monster. The hit dropped about twenty-five percent of the monster’s HP. Screeching, the creature looked up from the turtle—its eyes locked on Brian and it sprinted toward him.

  Brian fired another shot. Another twenty-five percent disappeared from the HP bar. He lined up a third shot as he watched a fireball slam into the other dino. The second dino abandoned the turtle and charged for Mike, having lost half of its HP in the first salvo.

  Brian fired his third shot, but his target dodged the missile and then leapt at him with blinding speed. Out came the deadly raptor claws as it swung its legs out to pummel him. He flew backward to the ground and saw about ten percent of his HP bar drop from the impact. The juvenile raptor then bit down twice, dropping the HP bar another fifteen percent.

  He punched the dino. The HP damage was negligible, but it did knock the creature off of him so he could stand up. He quickly traded his bow for his longsword.

  [Iron longsword equipped. Slashign damage +14]

  “All right you prick, let’s see how you deal with this!” Brian swung hard, connecting with the dino’s left shoulder. Blood splattered to the ground as the dino lost all but a sliver of its HP—it bit Brian once more before he could land the final blow.

  A flash of firelight appeared to the south and Mike let out a victorious cheer.

  [+100 XP]

  Brian looted the juvenile raptor, finding a pair of raptor fangs and feathered scales.

  Mike and Brian then turned their attention to the sea turtle still hastily crawling toward the sea. Rushing forward as a third fire bolt sailed through the air, Brian tagged the sea turtle. Nearly half of its remaining HP dropped. He reached the turtle an instant later and slashed down with his sword. The HP dropped by a bit, but a fourth fire bolt sailed in and finished the creature off, pushing it through the sand a couple of feet after it slumped its head.

  Brian was closest, so he looted the turtle, finding two sea turtle eggs and an item listed as “burnt shell casing” worth 0 gold. Brian discarded it from his inventory.

  [+25 XP]

  “Anything good from the turtle?” Mike asked.

  Brian shrugged. “Not really. Just a couple eggs. They look like alchemical ingredients. I’ll give them to Rhonda. I think we might have been able to harvest the shell if you hadn’t burned it to a crisp.”

  “What? Oh, sorry. I guess some of the creatures around here need to be taken down with a specific technique to get the most benefit. I’ve actually seen inventory items like that a couple of times now—“burnt ichor” and “burnt pelt.” I guess I need to expand my portfolio of spells,” Mike commented with a shrug. “I just haven’t taken the time to hunt for spell tomes or meet the masters for the different spell categories yet. I got a fang and two scales from my juvenile raptor though.”

  “I got two of each,” Brian said.

  “How’s your XP?”

  He paused and checked his stat sheet. “I’m sitting at four thousand seven hundred.”

  “Wow, that’s it?” Mike jabbed. “I’m at twenty-five thousand. You really should jump around and do other things to build up your acrobatics. Each time you level up in acrobatics or one of the other main skills
it gives you a hundred XP. I mean, the effect won’t be so large once we’re higher levels—mine has already started to see less returns compared to the XP I need—but if you’re not even level five yet this could help round you off a bit.”

  “I’m good,” Brian said. “I’m sure I’ll get moving as we go through the quests. Besides, the XP for the main quests should be good.”

  Mike shrugged. “I guess.”

  Brian resumed course for the first book and Mike followed beside him, jumping like a kangaroo.

  “Meredith sure doesn’t seem to like being here,” Mike said.

  Brian shrugged and started jumping along with Mike. “It’s all right, I guess. We don’t really need her to be amiable so long as we get to play a game and use her tech to help with the research.”

  “Yeah, it’s still pretty cool that we can play this ahead of the official release. Think she’ll let one of us keep this copy so we can continue playing the offline version?”

  “I don’t know, but she doesn’t strike me as the giving type.”

  Mike laughed.

  As they walked, Brian ate a few apples and loaves of bread he’d taken from the table back at the pub near the group save point, which restored all of his HP. They moved along the coast, pointing out small birds or schools of fish swimming in the waters just past the drop off beyond the shallows. A shark fin broke the surface about fifty yards beyond that, removing any temptation for Brian to jump in and catch the smaller fish.

  Sharks were his kryptonite. He had turned down a scuba trip in the Bahamas once simply because he couldn’t get the thought of sharks out of his head. There was something supernatural about them. The idea of being alone in the water and having a predator that could literally strike from any angle at velocities that could easily snap bones before it even chomped down with its jagged teeth was something he couldn’t come to terms with.

  Maybe if they outfitted him with a full suit of chain mail. With spikes. Plus two spearguns. Then maybe he’d swim in the real ocean.