“Look out!” Van shouted as he threw himself forward, crashing into one of the spearmen. They fell to the ground and began to roll around, violently wrestling each other. The Grappled status appeared over the pair of them, with a corresponding bar indicating who was winning the grapple also showing itself.
Sang leapt back, narrowly avoiding the spears jabbing at her. “Is that all you got?” she shouted as she pulled her sword out and dropped her bow at the same time. Her heart was pounding and she could feel the adrenaline coursing through her body. She was determined to win this fight at any cost. She wasn’t going to let Draco win, no matter what.
She held perfectly still, crouched down and poised, waiting for one of the men to strike. One had moved to the left of her and the other was coming in on the right. They were extremely coordinated and disciplined. No one struck. She continued to back up, waiting for one of them to make a move, but neither of them did.
“Come on, you bastards!” Sang shouted. “You really think you can take me down?” Neither of them moved—they just continued to wait on her. Sang knew that, if she struck first, they would react and take her down, but if she waited, they might catch her off guard with a coordinated assault. She didn’t have time to think, but what was she supposed to do in this situation?
Bidane, who was still trying to stand up, grabbed one of her daggers and threw it hard at the back of a spearman’s head. It wasn’t a good enough throw to stab him, but the weapon thunked hard against the back of his skull, causing him to temporarily lose focus. Sang took advantage of the moment and spun toward the distracted guard, pushing closer to his body so that his spear was no longer of any use. Once she was inside the strike zone, she grabbed his right arm, looped her arm around it, and thrust her short sword right into his stomach. 10 damage floated above him. He grunted, but otherwise made no noises.
“Look out!” Bidane yelled. Sang spun around just in time to narrowly avoid being stabbed by the other spearman. His long, pointed stick flew at her, jabbing multiple times, but she kept backing up away from it. Dodge, dodge, dodge appeared each time she avoided the attack.
“One on one, I’m not giving you good odds here,” Sang said. She glanced over to see that Dolly had crawled over to where Van was wrestling and grabbed one of his opponent’s arms, throwing her entire body atop it. This had just allowed Van to get the upper hand as he rolled atop the spearman and began punching as hard as he could.
Sang blocked a few blows from the spear, feeling more confident with each block. It seemed that these men worked best when they were working together as a unit. Even though the man she faced was trying to maintain an air of being expressionless, she could see that fear and worry had cropped up over his face. He knew that he was in trouble and he didn’t know how to act as an individual.
Sang crouched low and raised her sword high. “Last chance,” she said. “Get out of here while you still have the chance.”
The spearman shook his head at her and took a step back, lowering his spear for a charge. He took a deep breath and screamed at the top of his lungs, “For Draco!” as he ran toward her. Sang waited half a beat and then lunged forward, rolling to the left so that she’d be outside of the spear’s range. The long wooden shaft moved past her. He pressed right into the danger zone of her sword and, with a single flourish, she lopped his head clean off. Critical Hit, Lethal Blow went flying along with his head.
“Holy crap!” Sang shouted in terror as his head went flying off. Blood spurted from his corpse as it fell to the ground, twisting and writhing.
“Oh God,” Bidane said. “That is gruesome.”
“A little help here!” Van wheezed. He was in a headlock with the last remaining spearman on his back. The other spearman, the one who had taken a shot to the arm, had bled out and was lying on the ground, unconscious.
“You’re done!” Sang said as she shoved her sword against the guy’s head. “Give up.”
“Ack!” Van gasped. “Choking… can’t breathe.”
The man didn’t let up his grasp, so Sang pressed her sword against the man’s back, where his heart would be, and thrust down as hard as she could. Coupe De Grace floated above him as he gasped and stopped moving.
“Urgh, that was horrible,” Van said as he crawled out from the man’s body. “Whoa!” he said then, once he spotted the headless corpse.
“I don’t understand—they didn’t say a word,” Sang said as she dusted herself off. “Why fight to the end?”
“Probably indoctrinated,” Van replied. “Too far gone.”
“Yeah, speaking of too far gone, what in the hell is going on here?” Bidane shouted. “Lizard people? Obliterating planets? Why can’t I log out, Van? I’ve been stuck in this game since yesterday! What’s going on?”
“It’s a really long story,” Van said. “But the short version is that this game is being run by crazy aliens, and they have the power to kill us if we’re in specific areas. You better get out of this place quickly and then log out. Maybe you shouldn’t come back in the game for a while.”
“I feel really sick,” Dolly said. “I think I might be dying of dehydration in the real world. I use a haptic set, but I can’t move my body.” She was lying on the floor, unable to stand.
“Bidane, please, get Dolly out of here,” Van ordered.
“Alright, fine, but I’m going to need answers when you’re done with whatever the hell you’re doing here!” Bidane said as she knelt down to help Dolly up. They struggled to get her to her feet, but eventually they were able to do so. They quickly limped out of the ship.
“Okay, I’ll watch the door,” Van said as he knelt down to pick up one of the spears. “You get to hacking.”
“Right,” Sang said as she walked up to the large computer console that was in the center of the room. She looked at the keyboard and sighed. It appeared to be constructed entirely in a different language from her own. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” she mumbled as she tapped a few buttons. The computer screen in front of her activated. She could see dozens of surveillance feeds showing the entire area of Bloodrock. She could see the castle where there were hundreds of Iron Dragon mercenaries fighting against the hundreds of Kyrissians. The battle was quite fierce, too, and she could see that it was attracting more players from the surrounding area. A large icon floated above the battlefield, indicating that anyone who joined either side would receive x10 experience points for fighting.
“Find anything?” Van asked.
“I’m trying, but this isn’t in our language. I really wish we had Jet with us.”
“Tell me about it,” he replied.
Sang fumbled around with a few more keys, pressing buttons at random. As she tapped, though, she suddenly felt an intense pain surge through her head. “Gah!” she cried.
“You okay?”
“I’m fine...” she wheezed. Her head felt as if it were being crushed by a vice. Was Draco killing her? Words began to surface to her mind then—alien words that she didn’t quite understand. She glanced up again at the screen. Flashes of symbols came to her mind, each of them showing symbols that she had first seen in her vision when she had made contact with the Xevovs. These symbols, she remembered, perfectly matched a few symbols that were now on the screen in front of her. Shrugging, she navigated the computer’s cursor to those matching symbols. When she clicked on them, another display appeared. This display showed a variety of different panels, each with different kinds of symbols and words on them. One offering set said: “Native Language.”
“Hah! I found an English option!” Sang cheered as she clicked on the native language button. Immediately, the displayed offerings turned into English.