Dodge Tank Page 5

  I focus on her to bring up her character.

  Name: Aiko

  Sex: Female

  Race: Elven

  Class: Ninja

  Level: 85

  Guild: None

  Everyone is watching now. The elven woman Aiko is hard to make out due to her moving so fast. But she has dark blue hair, as far as I can tell, which blends in nicely with her tight fitting ninja garb. I check that next.

  Dark Shinobi Mask: +30 Shadow magic +30 TP

  Dark Shinobi Gi: +150 HP +30 Shadow Magic+30 AGL+30 Dodge

  Warrior’s Tekko: +75 HP +20 AGL +20 DEX +20 STR +20 VIT

  Ninja Hakama: +150 HP +30 Dodge +30 AGL

  Dark Shinobi kyahan: +75 HP +30 Shadow Magic +20 Dodge

  Poison Kunai +5: +30 DEX +30 AGL +50 Poison Damage

  Lightning Kunai +5: +30 DEX +30 AGL +50 Lightning Damage

  I’m blown away by the stats, but even more so to see them in effect. Aiko slowly chips away at Gruzug’s health while taking absolutely no damage herself.

  A buzz starts throughout Val Helena’s team.

  “Is that, ‘The’ Aiko?”

  “It has to be.”

  “Is she going to solo it?”

  “No way!”

  “It’s an LM, you can’t solo a Legendary Monster,” Zeke says as he strolls over to us. “Sure she can dodge its attacks. But she can’t do much damage to it without being able to backstab it. And she doesn’t have a healer with her so her luck is bound to run out.”

  “What do you mean?” I ask.

  “You can’t dodge an AOE attack. She’ll be dead soon enough and then well just reclaim it. She’s doing us a favor really. She’s keeping its HP from regenning while we wait for weakness to wear off.”

  I check the combat log and all I see is:

  Gruzug misses Aiko.

  Gruzug misses Aiko.

  Aiko dodges Gruzug’s attack.

  Gruzug misses Aiko.

  Aiko dodges Gruzug’s attack.

  And then I see.

  Gruzug readies Mountain Buster!

  “See?” Zeke begins to laugh. “Say bye bye, ninja girl!”

  I look to Val Helena but she doesn’t seem to find it funny at all. In fact, she looks more pissed off than ever.

  Aiko’s blurring image comes to a rapid halt as the elven woman stands completely still. I see her face for the first time, and am taken aback by how beautiful she is, even with her mouth and nose covered by the ninja mask. In fact, it only seems to add to her allure.

  She closes her eyes in focus while raising her hand to her forehand in a martial stance.

  Kanji like runes swirl around her right before the Mountain Buster goes off.

  I expect to see her health drop to a sliver or her to just drop dead period.

  But nothing happens.

  Her health bar doesn’t move at all.

  What the heck?

  An unsettled murmur washes through Val Helena’s team as I check the combat log.

  Aiko casts Shadow Copy.

  Gruzug uses Mountain Buster!

  Aiko’s shadow absorbs the attack.

  I’m dumbfounded along with the rest of Val Helena’s crew who now begin to raise their voices in disbelief.

  “That’s impossible!”

  “Nothing happened?”

  “She must be a hacker.”

  “Can she really solo that thing?”

  “Of course she can solo it!” Val Helena’s powerful voice cuts through the chatter. And then her words drip with disdain. “She has Shadow Copy. The most OP ability in the whole damn game… She’s a freakin’ Dodge Tank.”

  Chapter 7 Highs and Lows

  I open my inventory to make sure I’m not dreaming and that I heard Val Helena right.

  She did just say Shadow Copy, didn’t she?

  I look for the scroll I dug up earlier and my heart begins to race when I read the descriptions again with new eyes.

  Scroll of Shadow Copy

  Teaches the Ninja ability Shadow Copy

  Level 12 Ninja Only

  Create a copy of yourself using shadow magic that absorbs your next hit.

  Cast Time: 1 Second

  Recast: 15 seconds

  No way…

  This can’t be the same thing.

  I look back to where Aiko is still soloing Gruzug. She’s got it down to 12% now and shows no signs of stopping. Miss, miss, dodge, miss, miss, dodge, Shadow Copy, poof! No damage!

  I’m still not believing it.

  This can’t be right. Stuff like this just doesn’t happen to me.

  Ever.

  “Hey, Ms. Val Helena?” I ask sheepishly.

  She doesn’t look down at me as she replies, her eyes fixed on the battle. “What?”

  “That ability, Shadow Copy… it’s Ninja only?”

  “Yes.”

  Check.

  “How do you get it?”

  “From a scroll. It’s a rare drop from any of the three beast king boss monsters. The Nasgar World Boss Vulnar drops it too.”

  My elation takes a nose dive. I should have known. What Aiko is using out there can’t be what I have. Maybe I have some low level knock off version of it or something.

  “It can also be mined, but that’s the rarest chance to get it of all.”

  Holy crap! Double check!

  I’m almost afraid to ask the next question. Because this thing can’t be the same scroll that Van Helena is talking about. “You must have to be pretty high level to use it though, right?”

  “No,” she says. “It’s a level 12 ability.”

  Triple check! What the heck??

  I feel like I’m about to piss myself. I have one of the most powerful abilities in the whole game? And to think I was about to junk it!! Thank God I didn’t or I’d be contemplating suicide right now!

  But still. It’s untradeable. And I can’t fight. So how am I supposed to use this?

  I’m starting to freak out and Gilly must notice because she rests a hand on my shoulder and speaks to me in party chat. “You alright?”

  I almost don’t know what to say to her. I don’t know what to say to anybody.

  I link the item to her so she can see. “I dug this up earlier in the mines.”

  Her mouth hangs open for a moment.

  And then she bursts out loud for everyone to hear. “Holy crap you guys! Reece, has a scroll of Shadow Copy!”

  “Gilly!”

  I didn’t mean for her to announce it to the whole world!

  Van Helena looks down at me like she’s just noticed me for the first time. “YOU WHAT?”

  I turn beet red as the focus of everyone present shifts from Aiko to me. I’m bombarded with a hundred questions at once.

  “Where is it?”

  “How you get it?”

  “Link it! Link it!”

  “Okay, okay!” I say and finally link it to the room so everyone can see.

  As the description appears everyone goes dead quiet as they read it.

  A hushed silence descents, broken only when Gruzug’s death cry reverberates through the cavern and the message appears.

  Aiko has defeated Gruzug.

  But nobody seems to even care anymore.

  They’re just starting at me like I’m some kind of freak or messiah.

  “Well, well,” a melodic voice says from behind me. “Looks like you’re the kid with the golden ticket.”

  Everyone jumps startled to suddenly see Aiko standing in our midst. Everyone except Val Helena that is. The huge woman eyes the elf like she wants to tear her face off. “You stole our kill, Aiko. Those drops are ours.”

  “Funny,” Aiko gives her a nasty grin. “Didn’t look like it was claimed to me.”

  “You’ve become a real troll, you know that?”

  Aiko laughs with a high pitched cackle that instantly gives me the creeps. “Enjoy your sour grapes, Val. You should have picked a better team to back you up.”

  The blue haired elf
then scans around the room, perhaps checking everyone’s level. “Slim pickings I guess. Or are you farming yourself out to mid-level guilds now for rent money?”

  “You really need to stop with these games, Aiko,” Val Helena says. “If you want to have it out with me, then let’s just do it.”

  “You know where to find me if you want to do that.” She then looks right at me. “Hey you, with the pretty eyes. If you think that scroll is going to suddenly make you a Dodge Tank, think again. There’s a lot more to it than being a one trick pony.”

  “I.. ah…” I don’t know quite what to say…so I just blurt out, “I’m not even sure I can use it. I don’t have any other classes leveled.”

  Aiko pauses a moment before bursting out in her cackle again. “Talk about wasted potential. Too bad you can’t sell those things anymore.”

  “Sell?”

  “They used to be tradeable before the DEVs changed it,” Val Helena explains. “They used to go for around 8 million credits.”

  Holy crap! I got something worth 8 million credits?

  “That’s how you got yours, wasn’t it, Aiko?”

  She grins. “Can’t all be lucky. Some of us have to work hard for what we want. Speaking of which…” And Aiko turns to me again. “Tell you what, pretty boy. Vulnar spawns next month. I’m putting together a world boss kill team to take her down. If you can manage to get yourself to 85 Ninja and figure out how to tank halfway decent, I’ll give you a spot. Always safer to have a backup tank when you’re taking on a world boss. Ain’t that right, Val?”

  Val Helena sighs tiredly. “Are you done here, Aiko?”

  Aiko gives me a creepy wink. “See you in a month maybe, pretty boy.”

  She vanishes then, leaving behind a couple of leaves falling in her place.

  I’m still trying to piece together what just happened.

  My heart is racing, but I feel numb.

  I just got an invitation to kill a world boss…

  I look to Gilly and see she’s just as shocked. In fact, she’s not even moving.

  Actually… no one is.

  An error message pops up.

  You are disconnected…

  My vision goes black as I’m forcibly yanked out of my rig.

  Suddenly Mike is there, in my face. He’s shouting with spit flying from his mouth. The rapid transition from VR bliss to harsh reality has my brain doing cartwheels, and it takes a second for what Mike is saying to register as a language I can comprehend.

  “I said get up, man!” He looks furious. “What the hell have you been doing all day?”

  “I’ve been right here! What?”

  “Mom’s at the hospital, you idiot!”

  What?

  “She went out on her own. While you were stuck here playing your stupid little game!”

  My blood freezes. “What?”

  “Come on. We need to go get her. Now!”

  Chapter 8 Gimp

  It takes me a couple of minutes to throw on some jeans and a jacket before we exit the container’s hatch and step into the dull light of our tunnel. I have Mutt and Jeff assisting me, of course, as I hobble as fast as I can to catch up my brother, who’s walking at a pace he knows I can’t keep up with.

  I want to be mad at him. Pulling me out of my rig like that was uncalled for. But his reason for doing so has me more worried than angry at the moment. Why did mom leave like that? Where was she trying to go? And how did she end up at the hospital?

  “Hurry it up, man!” Mike shouts from ahead.

  I grit my teeth and suppress a curse I know my mom wouldn’t approve of. “I’m moving as fast as I can, okay!”

  Jerk.

  The tunnel is about as big as the ones I mine in. Large enough for a couple of busses to fit side by side. Not that I expect to ever see a bus down here. Along the smooth walls of the tunnel are hatches to other habitats. That’s the proper word for the container sized houses we live in. In between the hatches are huge letters in yellow reading L32C.

  That’s the address of my neighborhood. Level 32 block C.

  The place I’ve lived most of my life.

  I don’t even know who lives next to us, really.

  With the rigs and nano-processors, there really isn’t much need to leave your habitat at all. Which is why the tunnel is deserted, and feels more like a place that’s been abandoned rather than a real neighborhood. At the hub level on L100 however, there are usually more people and things for them to do—outside of Crystal Shards Online that is.

  That’s where we’re headed. The hospital is there.

  Mike is waiting for me at the door of the lift station by the time I finally catch up to him. Like my avatar, he also looks like a slightly cooler version of me. He’s 26, has a goatee, the sides of his head are shaved and the top grown long and plaited into corn rows. He’s also built like a linebacker, which sort of reminds me of that warrior guy Zeke I met earlier.

  He still looks annoyed when I approach him and the feeling is mutual.

  “About time.”

  I ignore him as we enter the elevator car and take a seat. It’s got seating for forty people and we’re the only ones on here. But like idiots, we still sit close to each other, although we do leave a couple of seats in between us. Guess brothers will be brothers no matter what.

  “Main hub,” Mike calls out and the automated system closes the doors and we begin to descend. The elevator can go up too, of course, even higher than the first floor and close to the surface. But you need special access for that; like my mom had when she used to work up there. Just the thought of my mom has my stomach gnawing with worry again.

  “Did they say what happened to her?” I ask “How’d she wind up at the hospital?”

  Mike blows out a sigh before he replies. “Someone found her passed out down on level 100. Her lung capacity isn’t what it used to be. She must have overexerted herself.”

  “Why would she leave and not tell me?”

  I look to Mike for an answered but he doesn’t seem to have one.

  “You need to keep a better eye on her, Ryan.”

  “Keep an eye on her?” I scoff. “What is she? A baby now?”

  “She’s sick, man!” Mike shoots me a harsh glare. “She could have died today.”

  I open my mouth to retort but the reality of his statement trumps anything I can possibly come up with. He’s right. I could have lost my mom today.

  The lights flicker for a second and then suddenly go out.

  The elevator bangs to a stop and we’re left in darkness.

  Pitch black darkness.

  My heart rate soars as an unexpected terror sets in. “Mike! What just happened?”

  “Relax,” he says in the darkness. And for once, I’m glad to have my big brother with me. “It’s just a load shed.”

  “A what?”

  “There’s not enough power in the city, so the system shuts down any ‘non-essential’ systems.” And then he adds as a dig: “So people like you can keep playing your stupid games.”

  His words get my stomach boiling and I snap. “It’s not a stupid game okay! And that’s not what I play it for. I’m trying to earn us money. I’m trying to pay for mom’s operation. Which is more than I can say for you. What the heck is it you do all day, anyway?”

  I expect a fiery reply but all I get is a laugh. “You wouldn’t understand even if I told you.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “It means, don’t worry about it. What you need to worry about is doing more with your time than digging up fake rocks in your fake mine all day.”

  I’m actually a bit shocked that he even knows what I do. “Well those fake rocks earn real money that you use to eat!”

  Another condescending laugh comes from him. “Dude, you don’t even know what money really is.”

  I feel like punching him. And I probably could have if I had sat closer to him. Landing a shot in the dark was probably the best chance I had at hitting my broth
er. “Oh, and I suppose you do?”

  There’s a pause then and my brother’s tone changes when he answers. Melancholy almost. “More than I’d like.”

  Geez, he could be such a weirdo sometimes.

  “The point is, Ryan. There’s other stuff you can be doing. Stuff that earns steady pay, like customer service or programming. You have to realize your limitations. You can’t play those games like other people can. That’s why you’re stuck in the mines. You’re not going to one day kill some world boss and win a million credits. It’s not possible for you.”

  His words stab like a knife in my chest, but only red hot anger comes flooding out. “Screw you, Mike! You don’t know what’s possible for me or not. I am going to beat a world boss! And I am going to save mom. I’ll show you, man! You don’t know me!”

  Dead silence is all I hear.

  And then he says: “This city is dying and we’re all asleep. We don’t have time for these games.”

  We spend the next twenty minutes in darkness and silence. I sit pondering how this freak and I could have come from the same womb. But out of all the messed up stuff Mike has said thus far, the thing that stays lodged in my brain…is the truth.

  You can’t play those games like other people can.

  The words echo in my mind like a prison sentence. It takes me back to my first time logging into Crystal Shards Online and the World of Nasgar about a year ago when I turned 17. I was already excited that I could walk normally in game, and was expecting the same when I rolled a warrior as my starting class.

  I noticed the -10 agility but I didn’t think much about it.

  Not until I tried to fight my first mob.

  I was in a lowbie area; a lush woodland outside the human starting city of Timberdale. I was decked out in my standard issue noob gear. A green cotton tunic and blue pants. And a beginners practice sword. I can still recall the description on the sword: Practice makes perfect, but at least this sword is dull enough not to hurt you when you mess up!

  The dev’s had a great sense of humor sometimes.