“My Climbing skill is so low that I’m still at the bottom of the tower!” Van called back. “I fell like three times!”
“Are you kidding me?” Sang muttered. She glanced at her health bar. It wasn’t bad, but it also wasn’t too good. Spellcaster enemies were harder to face in this game if you weren’t prepared. She aimed her bow with her improved arrows and fired once again at the woman. This time, the words DEFLECTED appeared atop the woman’s head. A thin film of flickering blue energy appeared. The words DEFLECTION SPELL circled her head.
Sang decided that it would be a better idea to pull back and ambush the caster, so she made a dash for the only exit. She rolled through the door and rushed down the stairwell. “Come back here!” cried the sorceress as Sang ran deeper into the tower. She hustled down the steps. It didn’t seem like there was a lot going on in the tower when it came to design. The designers probably hadn’t work too hard on it, she figured, considering that it was just a side quest.
Sang came across two doors, one leading downwards into what seemed to be the basement and another door that was slightly ajar on the right. She peeked through the open door and saw there were several strangely ghoulish creatures walking around, chittering to one another in a hideous imitation of language. Their scent was horrific. Sang quickly shut the door and decided to try the basement. She pulled open the door and rushed through, slamming it behind her and bolting it. Maybe the princess was in here.
Sang’s eyes had trouble adjusting in the pitch-black darkness. She couldn’t see a single thing. She checked her inventory for a torch, but didn’t find anything of value. “Great,” she muttered as she got a message from Van. The Rope Broke! She considered sending back a string of swear words at him, but ignored the message instead. This was still her show, and she’d be able to salvage this somehow. All she needed to do was think on her feet and everything would be okay.
She walked around in the darkness, holding her hands out as she tried to navigate. The ground seemed to be sloping downwards in some kind of spiral, but without her vision, she had no idea of how far she was going, though she seemed to walk for quite some time. A strange noise finally greeted her as she went deeper into the dungeon. Oooaaaooooo went the noise.
Sang stopped and grabbed her longsword. Without her sight, she wouldn’t be able to shoot her arrows, so she figured it would be better to use a bladed weapon. The noise continued for quite some time as she got closer to its source. The strange noise sounded more sorrowful than menacing, Sang noticed as it got louder and louder. Finally, Sang felt the ground beneath her stop sloping to grow flat. She felt something rustle and snap beneath her feet. She reached down and grabbed what felt like straw to her.
“Who’s there?” said a deep, powerful voice. Sang felt the ground beneath her shake as the voice spoke.
She didn’t say anything. She activated her Stealth skill instead and saw that she was at 100% translucency, meaning that she was essentially invisible in the darkness.
A sudden puff of flames burst out of the darkness, catching a few torches on the sides of the wall on fire. The light was blinding for a moment, as Sang had gotten used to darkness. When her eyes adjusted, she could see there was a massive purple dragon resting in the center of the room. Around its arms and legs were large iron chains.
“I see you!” said the Dragon, with a deep and yet feminine voice. “You cannot hide from a Dragon’s eyes!”
“Crap!” Sang said, expecting to be cooked alive at any moment. The Dragon did nothing, however, but stare at her.
“Are you here to kill me finally? Has the evil sorceress finished her research on my scales?” the Dragon asked.
Sang sent a quick message to Van. FOUND A DRAGON. HOW DO I KILL???
A message immediately came back. Don’t kill the dragon! She’s the princess! We’ve got to free her.
Sang squinted as she read the translucent words hovering above her face. She didn’t particularly know how to react to this kind of news. It was strange and somewhat confusing, but then again, what about this world wasn’t confusing? She decided to go with it and see what would happen.
“Umm, I’m here to rescue you!” Sang said.
“Really?” said the Dragon. The words Princess Grimscale Level 25 appeared over her head.
“Yes!” Sang said as she walked over to the Dragon and looked at the chains. There was a picture floating above it. It was shaped like a Rubik’s Cube. She reached out and pressed it, causing a large menu to appear in front of her it. The menu created an image of the inside of a lock. She could see a pin inserted into the lock and there were four tumblers lined up. The words PICK LOCK appeared in front of her next. She shrugged and began to try to use the mini-game to the best of her ability. The tumblers in front of her twisted and moved as she fiddled with the locks. She didn’t particularly know how to pick a lock, as that sort of thing would only have been covered in the clandestine affairs department, and she was was in the cyberterrorism department, meaning they wouldn’t bother teaching her things like this.
DENIED the lock pick puzzle read as it reset itself back to the way it had been. Sang grimaced at it. She tried again for a few minutes, but it didn’t work. As she gritted her teeth, working on getting the tumbler pins to line up perfectly so that she could push the pick through, she realized that there was a button on the right-hand side that read: FORCE LOCK 57%. Breaking through the lock seemed better than her wasting the rest of her life trying to get this thing open, she reasoned, so she pressed the button. There was a sharp cracking sound that greeted her, followed by the word SUCCESS drifting over her head. She yelled out with elation as the chains around the Dragon’s arms fell off.
“You have freed me!” said the Dragon as she used her newly freed claws to rip the main chain from around her neck. “These powerful bonds will hold me no more!”
“Yes!” Sang said, feeling pretty excited about the fact that she had just completely liberated the Dragon from its prison without the need of Van’s help. Maybe she wasn’t so bad at this after all.
“Come and let us leave this place!” said the Dragon as she lowered her head. “Climb atop me and we shall fly far from here!”
Sang quickly scrambled atop the purple Dragon and held on to its neck tightly. She had never flown on a Dragon before and she felt a thrill of excitement run through her as she took a deep breath. The Dragon raised her massive claws and shattered a hole in the wall, revealing the beautiful rays of sunlight coming from the outside world. The Dragon quickly bounded out of the tower. Sang could see Van was still staring at a piece of broken rope in his hands. “Van!” Sang shouted. “Hop on!”
“Whoa! You found the princess!” Van replied as he rushed up to the Dragon. The Dragon waited for a moment as Van scrambled atop of her and grabbed onto one of the bony protrusions sticking out if her wings.
“Yeah!” Sang called out, reveling in her victory. She was still shocked that she had managed to navigate successfully through the entire quest. While it had been somewhat difficult, she had been able to improvise enough to the point where she now felt proud of her accomplishment.
“Where are we going?” Van asked as the Dragon took off, flying high into the sky. They both gasped at the view. The higher they went, the more beauty that they could see. The valley, the jungle, the nearby mountains... all of it looked so much more beautiful from a higher perspective.
“It’s gorgeous!” Sang said as she held on tightly. She didn’t have any points in the Ride skill, though, so it was harder to hold onto a Dragon in flight... especially without any kind of harnesses or saddles. “I can agree there,” Van said, “but where exactly are we going?”