To Kill Gods or Die Trying

Mack Plamer

"Oh man, this is crazy," I huff.

"Dammit, why is it so hard to beat?" Essej asks annoyed. He collapses on the mossy dirt defeated.

For the past hour, we've been trying to kill our first raid boss, The Troll, who stands at eight feet tall, ugly, green, and wields a club. The nine quests we did leading up were pretty hard. They featured rooms of only goblins, standing at only four feet tall, wielding daggers, who were fast and deadly, considering the AI—more or less—have combat experience, and we have none. They would dash and stab, and Alo would have to heal us so we could fight back until we either won or died.

Dying in this game is really weird. You don't feel pain—for example, when the goblins stab me in the side or when the troll clobbers me in the head so hard that my face slams into the dirt, I'll feel the blow or the blade entering my body, but I won't feel the pain. It just feels really strange and uncomfortable. When you die, it's like you are forcefully knocked out or you pass out, and then you wake up at the respawn point. And Alo can only get us 25% of our full HP, which drains almost all of his MP, that is until he focuses on his magic side and really trains to get his healing abilities up.

Alo sits down and chuckles. "We've got to use our normal strikes. Having no abilities, this is pretty hard. And it's hard for me to keep up with you guys with heals."

"Jeez, this is more serious than I thought," Essej admits. "I can barely get a tiny ball of force energy in my hand. We're gonna have to train really hard. Then again, some people are just dancing around gracefully like ninjas," he hints at Rachel.

She grins. "It's really not hard. I can, like, show you how to do it," she suggests.

"I would love to learn. Especially here where I can't break my neck trying flips," Essej replies.

"Alright, I think we should go back to the Capital and try to recruit somebody to help," I suggest.

"I agree," Alo says. "Yep," Essej agrees.

"Like, please," Rachel sighs.

***

It takes us more than an hour to row back to the Capital from the Monsterland continent. We all enjoy riding the small ocean waves as it gives us plenty of time to talk to each other, but it's too time-consuming. Boat rentals are free, and we have the option between a personal canoe, rowboat for six, sailboat for 15, cruise ship for 50, or carrier for 100-200. What we need is a sailboat so we don't have to row. But wind patterns—like in real life—are random, so you absolutely need an elemental class to make wind for you.

We row through the series of moats—we call the moat-maze— surrounding the giant landmass, and anchor at the docks. A few miles of walking takes us to the nearest village, Asfril. We find a quiet tavern, and collapse at a booth, mentally exhausted.

I glance at my stream chat, integrated into my HUD. 100,000+ live viewers.

"Hey guys," I say to my subs and viewers, "if you haven't noticed, the past two hours have been extremely slow. We're kind of pooped, so we'll have an ad break and go back at it."

Both Alo's and my chat fill up with "gg".

"OK, meanwhile, Rachel, you've got to show me that backflip," Essej pleads determined.

***

We log back in to find that Essej and Rachel are outside laughing. "Hey, uh, Ben?" Alo asks. "Are they a thing? They seem like a thing," Alo asks. Our chats flood with heart emotes which makes me laugh.

"They were for, like, two weeks before they were just friends," I explain. "And even then, it wasn't that serious."

"Hey! Check it out!" Essej hollers. He performs a perfect backflip. "Ok, Rachel, you actually got to teach me that one day," I plead, impressed.

We walk back to the port, where it's fairly busy with players and NPC alike. We spot an elemental class upon the pier manipulating the water, moving it up, down, clockwise, counterclockwise, breaking it into in small pieces, then back into one mass.

We look at each other with impressed smirks, then look back at the guy. Most of the Elementals I've seen can barely get a rock to move. He's good. We could use someone like him.

My chat fills up with "he's the chosen one," and "an Elemental!" and "ask him to join your party." I chuckle. We all look at each other, then nod. We walk up behind him.

"Hey, uh, buddy," I begin. The guy turns around with the most bougie and sarcastic look on his face as if I just bothered him. "Hey, we were wondering, if you wanted to join our-"

"Not interested," he replies hastily, looking away from me, turning the water into ice and back above his hand.

"What? Why not?" Essej asks, obviously annoyed.

The stranger scoffs. "I dunno... I just don't want a bunch of... noobs slowing me down. I'm trying to get to Copper-rank quick."

"We're trying to, like, get to Copper-rank too. Like, don't be an ass," Rachel scolds.

"Look. Not trying to make fun of anyone or hurt your feelings. I'm just looking for experienced people to play with," he explains smugly.

"I mean, if it changes your mind, we're trying to beat the Troll raid," Alo says.

His eyes widen a bit and he cocks his eyebrow. "The wood raid? The last quest on the Monsterland Forest on trail three?" he asks.

"Someone did their research," I say with a smirk.

"Let's go guys. It'd be a shame to, like, slow this guy down. We'll get to Copper-rank with someone who, like, has our time," Rachel jeers.

"Wait."

The guy pauses, thinking. He looks up, opens his mouth, then averts his eyes back to the wooden boards of the pier with a scowl, relaxes and looks back up, winces, then groans.

"My name is Mack Plamer. Can I join your party?"

***

"I never asked," I begin, "how do you use magic?"

We're crossing the ocean faster than ever, since with a sailboat, Mack can direct the air around us to the sail. It's not as fast as we all thought or as fast as he proclaimed it to be, but it's faster than rowing.

"Magic in this game, realm, whatever you wanna call it, is based purely off of mental power. The more you concentrate, the stronger your connection with nature will be. Same thing with Spellcasters. The more you concentrate, the more tiers of magic you can control. And as you go up the ranks, you can access higher tiers of magic and train even more. According to one of the devs I met, I already have the magic potential of a Copper rank. So basically, I'm the strongest elemental there is. That's why I got to keep going, so I can stay the best."

I roll my eyes. This guy may be good, but he's a bit full of himself.

At least he's confident...