World: MSS - Loading...

  My head went blank. “Stole.” I whispered.

  She was out there. Alone. With Darwin and the little girl, she wouldn’t escape even if she could. She’d stay behind.

  Skaris snarled, cursing, and made to get up before Doror stopped him.

  Even before I had spoken, the others had begun moving. Aurora ,especially, stood up so fast that her chair left grooves on the floor. Kyrian was looking out the window as well. It was just as well because we all had the same thought the moment that Doror had mentioned having a monster living inside the City.

  “Are ye deaf? I told ye, the beast comes at night. And we won’t be opening the door until tomorrow anyhow.”

  I glared at the Master Smith, the rushing blood in my head slowing down.

  “Explain what you mean by opening this… door.” I said, as the others took their seats. Still, Aurora kept glancing at the door with worry.

  I had my own theories about what was going on in this City now that I was getting first-hand information. But I needed to hear it from Doror.

  Doror’s expression was caught somewhere between a smile and regret –shame and resignation– as he explained.

  “I told you when you first got here Lad… that we hid.” He closed his eyes. “Aye, we hid. Being hunted by the humans for so long, that’s all we could do. This strange island, even if we knew how to stave off its magic, the monsters were too strong.” He opened them and his eyes were focused in on us. “Do you know how to keep a monster away lad? Without killing it?”

  “...Yes.” I said, already knowing where this was going. “A Field Boss.”

  “Aye, that’s what you adventurers call it. But we call them Rulers.” Doror’s voice was tinged with fear. “In the old tales, we learned that if you build your City around a Ruler’s nest, other monsters tend to stay away. Aye… but not for free.” Doror smiled and said, “Luckily for us, the monster lived underground. So we built our city on top of it, building a door around its lair.”

  “And you’re saying you built your City on top of this nest?!” Kyrian’s voice was thick with outrage. “And what… you… you offer up a sacrifice every couple of days to keep it in check?”

  “Do not take that tone with me, Boy. If it wasn’t for your people in the first place, my people would never have had to resort to such a thing!” Doror snapped. Then much calmer, he said, “It was either that, or take our chances out in the wilds. With the curse of this island and the monsters living above ground… there was no other choice.”

  “You had a choicssseee.” Skaris said, his eyes flat. “To die with honor.”

  “Aye, yes. I did.” Doror answered. “Then ask your leader over there,” He pointed to me. “If he had to choose between having you lot die with honor or live on in shame, which he’d choose.”

  He didn’t wait for me to answer. “Unluckily for me, my decision decides the fate of hundreds. Hundreds of men, women and children, aye all of them families.” He growled. “I will not have my people die, ripped to pieces by monsters.”

  When Doror spoke about his people, the emptiness in his voice was invaded by the presence of something hot and intense. It had been only an instant, but it had been present and I wasn’t the only one who detected it. The Dwarf who had seemed all but void of passion spoke hotly, his alcohol breath washing over us.

  “The weight of a leader is a heavy one.” Aurora said at last. “But I fail to understand why… why your people chooses to sacrifice them.”

  She was asking why the Dwarves had chosen to sacrifice young girls.

  Doror studied his hands before answering.

  “Because the Monster asked for it.”

  And that sent a shiver down everyone’s spine.

  It was like the temperature in the room had suddenly dropped by a couple of degrees. Aurora actually wrapped her arms around herself and Kyrian went deathly pale. Skaris muttered a curse, making a strange hand gesture that I recognized as warding off evil.

  And I felt life drain out of me.

  In case you forgot… MSS very closely resembles the folklore of my world. Earth. A lot of the monsters here are esoteric forms of myth that one could find on the Internet, or even by visiting a Bookstore. Hell, some of the research I did on MSS had me reading through articles about the creation myths and rumored weakness of Yokai, Demons and Monsters from different cultures.

  And there were many nights when I went to sleep at night after doing my research, a haunting seed of fear in my heart that a face might be looking at me through my window.

  But so far, we haven't encountered Monsters with intelligence.

  Oh sure, I often describe monsters as having an instinctual intelligence’. But I’m talking about intelligence in the way a Eagle might have, or a Dolphin. Some of them, the rare few, do have the capability of forming strategies, marred by cruelty and spurred by the desire to inflict pain.

  But so far, we hadn’t encountered the Higher Forms of Monsters.

  Why? Because those monsters are exceedingly rare.

  If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

  First of all, in the game, only Boss-class monsters could gain enough intelligence for NPCs to comment on it. And not all Boss-monsters either. They had to have killed hundreds of NPCs, thousands even. How do I know? Because of item-descriptions that usually litter the dungeon lair of these monsters. Every one of them says similar things: ‘Weapon left behind by an adventurer who tried to slay a monster in its lair’.

  Hundreds of those things.

  If the people of MSS commented on a monster in the way that Doror did… it pointed to one thing.

  A Boss-class Variant that had the ability to communicate.

  To talk. To Reason. To express its desires.

  But in the game, that didn’t mean you could have a full-on conversation with the monster. Every single time, the monster had been limited to a script –repeating the same lines over and over again. In combat, the AI had been smarter, always knowing just what ability to use and then. But from what Doror was saying, it almost sounded like this monster had Reason on top of intelligence.

  Not intelligence just used to corner prey and make it suffer. Reason –leading to Empathy.

  Not Hunger. Desire.

  Was it possible? To have such a creature? And what were the chances that we were about to encounter one such creature deep down underground, where it had been kept hidden for centuries, away from prying adventurer eyes?

  And how many others like it were out there?

  …Could the Shadow Wolf Mimic that took my eye have something to do with this?

  If these monsters truly existed… This world wasn’t just creepy. It was Cursed –capital C.

  I shivered once more.

  “The monster can talk?” I finally composed my thoughts enough to form coherent sentences.

  Doror’s chin shook. “...Aye.”

  “What does it say?”

  “Just enough.” The Dwarf replied, “Just enough to get us to do what it wants.” He looked away in shame.

  So the possibility was there, that it wasn’t a Monster with reason but just repeating a few words like a parrot. Intelligent enough to get its thought across, but not enough to have a full-on conversation. Like those dogs that press the pre-recorded buttons with ‘food’ and ‘potty’.

  Except the key words here would be ‘young’, ‘girl’ and ‘hungry’.

  “Impossible.” Kyrian muttered. “A monster cannot talk. It’s… it’s unheard of.”

  “Talesss of monsssstersss that rule vast territoriessss exisssst among my people.” Skaris said, the skin of his hands turning white as he gripped his spear. “Talesss that tell of monssstersss that could talk as we do. Walk as we do.”

  “That’s just stories. Stories that they tell children.” Kyrian replied. “It’s folklore. A myth. Fiction.”

  I held up a hand to stop Doror before he could comment on Kyrian’s ‘human-mage hubris’, unable to comprehend the possibility that a monster that he didn’t know about existed. I was just about to talk but it was Aurora who brought an end to the disbelief.

  “They exist.” She muttered.

  “The Empire does not advertise it as common knowledge, but in the archives of the Great Houses, one can find first-hand accounts of such creatures.” Aurora stared out the window at the City. “Creatures with greed, lust, wrath… that act the way we do.”

  Kyrian wrapped his cloak tighter around himself. “That… makes no sense. Why hasn’t anyone talked about it? Why is this not public information?”

  “Ssssurvivability.”

  “What Skaris said. If it’s smart enough to talk, even if a little bit, it can trick people. Add in the fact that these guys are probably strong enough to be classified as a Field Boss…” I shrugged. “Not enough eyewitness accounts. Even if a whole party survived, would you want to go around sharing this information? When you have information like this about Monsters? Most adventurers would sell it to the highest bidder. I bet you a hundred gold coins that information like this is all over the Black Market. We just never bothered to look.”

  I shook my head, turning to Doror. “You said the monster has three heads? Six Arms?”

  “Aye.”

  “Ssslaveborn, you know thissss monsssster?”

  “...I’ve never seen one able to talk. But I know the base form. This sounds like a variant.” I bit my lower lip, trying to recall information about the monster. “...You’re holding back on us.” I turned back to Doror. “Are you absolutely sure it wasn’t armed?”

  “I ain’t holding nothing back, Lad. The monster wasn’t holding anything. It ripped apart my… our fighters with its bare hands.”

  “You’re sure it had three heads?”

  “...I never got a direct look at it. But more than one, aye. It’s voice…” Doror shuddered. “More than one voice. By the forge, it’s definitely more than one being in that body.”

  Kyrian looked away, pupils shaking in disbelief. As I said, adventurers are a superstitious sort. And Kyrian who didn’t have information about the monster like Aurora did beforehand was starting to freak out a bit.

  Fuck. There were more than a dozen humanoid monsters off the top of my head that had two or three heads. The only differentiating factor would be what item it would be holding.

  “You sure it wasn’t holding a sword? Or mace? A shield even?” Certain Boss-class variants held Legendaries or even Artifacts.

  “I’m a Master Smith,” The Dwarf’s brows furrowed together, trying to recall and be annoyed at me at the same time, “I would have recognized what weapon it was holding.”

  “But you said you never got a direct look at it, Mister Stonehammer.”

  Doror shook his head. “Dwarves can smell metal, Lass. The monster had no such arms to speak of.” He stared at me for a moment too long, his eyes pensive. “You mean to actually take me up on my offer.” It wasn’t a question.

  I looked at my Party members. “We’re going to talk outside for a bit.”

  “Aye, take your time.” Doror went back to the corner and began drinking.

  As soon as we stepped outside of the workshop, Kyrian began.

  “We can’t do this on our own, Lock.” He glanced back at the workshop door. “If what he says is true… then this one’s out of our depth.”

  “No.” Skaris’ licked his lips. “This prey is ourssss.”

  “This isn’t just your run of the mill monster out on a field. This…” Kyrian waved his arm around. “I don’t even know what this is. Even in all my time in the Mage Towers, I never heard about anything like this.”

  Sometimes I forget that Kyrian had only been a Grade-8 Mage when we met. As social structure for Adventurers went, he was still pretty low on the ladder.

  Realistically, all of us were still pretty low on the ladder.

  I said as much. “The moment we ask for help, we lose our claim on Doror’s services.” I crossed my arms stubbornly. “I hate to say this, but I don’t want to share.”

  Kyrian grimaced. “You want to get ahead of the other parties.”

  “Like I said, this is a race.” I answered, “And if we pull in other parties, we’ll be helping them.”

  “Do you have a plan then?”

  I looked to Aurora. “Before I say my plan, I want to hear everyone’s thoughts. You still haven’t spoken, Aurora.”

  “I…” Aurora seemed torn.

  “Jussssst sssspeak. Sssslaveborn will be making the decision anywayssss.” Skaris gave me a meaningful look. “And whatever happenssss, he will take ressssponsssibility.”

  I nodded.

  That’s what it meant to be a Party Leader.

  To take in everyone’s thoughts, making the decision and taking responsibility for it. I never meant to take advantage of this position anyways.

  Being a Party Leader meant carrying my party on my shoulders, not the other way around.

  And hearing that Aurora nodded, suddenly sure. “I believe we should do this. Without bringing in the other parties. Mr. Lock is right, we need to get ahead. From my estimation, we are far from where we need to be if we mean to take the Autarch’s key for ourselves.”

  “Aurora, you will be in the most danger.” I said. “Are you sure?”

  And suddenly Aurora looked at Kyrian instead of me.

  “I’m an adventurer and a member of this party. To my last dying breath, I will be the Shield this party needs. There is no other choice for me in the first place, if we are fighting, I will be at the front. Always.”

  Something unspoken was exchanged between Kyrian and Aurora. Kyrian giving her a slight nod while Aurora looked away before the moment was dragged on just a bit too long.

  Huh. Interesting.

  I thought the two had something going on between them, as a man and a woman. But I was starting to think different.

  No matter. Now wasn’t the time.

  “What about Stole’s opinion?” Kyrian quipped.

  “Moot point. That’s three votes.” I answered.

  Kyrian threw up his hands in the air, exasperated. “Even if three of us said no, you would have overruled us anyways.”

  As I walked back into the workshop, I threw him a sly grin over my shoulder. “Yeah, but you got to complain.”

  The Mage rolled his eyes in response.

  Back in the workshop, Doror was still drinking. He looked up as I entered.

  “Well?”

  “It’s done. We’ll take the request.” I told him. “But we’re not going in tomorrow when the Monster is all awake and ready. We’re going to hit it tonight.”

  He narrowed his eyes. “You’re going to enter its lair? Are ye mad? How are you going to-”

  “That’s for me to take care of. What I need you to do is something else.” I pointed out the window.

  “There’s a list of items that I’m going to need for this raid. Armor, charms, and certain types of weapons. Your people need to get them ready by tonight.” Then I sat down and began writing the list.

  Doror gave me the side-eye but his curiosity got the best of him. He leaned forward to read what I was writing.

  “...You write like a child.”

  I didn’t dignify that with an answer.

  He waited a moment longer and said, “...What is that?”

  “Those,” I muttered, flipping the page over so he could see it. “Are the key to this raid.”

  “One question though.” I said, still writing. “Once the monster is gone, what will you do? Now that the Field Boss is gone, the other monsters will start to come underground.”

  “...That’s for me to take care of.” He said, more than a little prissy.

  Slowly, I looked up at him.

  The dwarf was looking down at the paper, scratching his chin.

  And the words slipped out before I could think about the consequences.

  “Then come with me.” As I said this, the dwarf froze, his body becoming still. “I’ll get you and your people off this island.”

  “I’ll find a Home for you all.”