Author's notes
Sorry for the long wait, but I've made aa big mistake in taking on four stories and my own original work at the same time. I will try to do better.
Dyrath had walked out of the Nether gate in his newly bought armor. It covered his whole body but for his arms and head. Dyrath wanted to keep to a mid-weight armor to provide adequate protection but not hamper his dexterous fighting style. The Netherworld style of angular and barbed metalworking had kept true. The three parts of all armor the skill of who made it, what tools were used in making it, and what was used in making it. The skill the Forge Fiend had was decent at best but the tools he had were top of the line, how he got them Dyrath couldn't understand. And Dyrath had spent most of the money on the Dead Man's Steel used in making his armor. The axe he now had was shaped in two fang shaped blades with the bottom one serrated and the top one a bit longer extending over the bottom.
"Oh it's good to be back! Bring on the hordes of screaming fans!" Remus said as he walked out of the Nether gate but to his disappointment there were no hordes of fans to be seen. He now had just barely more improved then the minion rags he started with. They were more complete and resembled actual clothes but not by much. What he put his share of the money in was the daggers he got. He spent all the money in to the best Forge Fiend he could find and the best materials he could buy. The Forge Fiend had mid-tier tools but that was fine. The Daggers he had now had the damage numbers to bring a player down to the red and the poison effect from the green life force would drain them down to zero in a minute. "I thought we are famous…"
"Why is that my neck always hurts after we go through the gates." Honic said as exited the Nether Gate rubbing his neck. His armor had not changed much, only shoulder high gauntlets that match up with what he had before. He had spent all his money on a spell stone, it was a small one that he could hide under his Forge Fiend smock. The Spell Stone was the classic Fire Ball but it still was one of the very few and very expensive Spell Stones that could be bought at this early in the Game.
"I feel fine; you just need to stretch more." Dyrath said as he looked around. The War Camp was a total buzz with energy. Minion Imps, Minion Soldiers, Elves, and Players all were running around the camp. "Hey…" Dyrath said as flagged down one of the Elven Players. "…What the hell is going on?"
"You haven't heard? The fucking hippies were fighting themselves but now a bunch of other sanctuaries are coming in to reinforce them and to put down whatever was going on in the Tree." The elf said before returning back his work.
"So the tree people are having a hard time and the other hippies are cracking down… huh." Remus said as the three walked through the chaos.
"In any case the reinforcements mean that we should have a nice supply of silver rank quests."
"Yeah…or we could try at another Gold Quest?" Honic asked with a grin that made both Dyrath and Remus uneasy.
"Why the hell would we do that?" Dyrath asked.
"Do you not remember the fight we had! Your HP almost went into the red! And you want to take another go at a Gold Quest!"
"But it made us famous. I thought you of all people would be on my side."
"My plan is to survive. And I'd be stupid to take a Gold Quest while the Tree people are getting a boot up their ass from the rest of the Good Players. They have something to prove and I don't want to be the fucking thing they use to do that." Remus said completely serious.
"We are the ones that caused the change of the tide of war, they will be gunning for us so we need to lay low. We might lose a bit of notoriety among the Evil Players but we will do the same for the Good." Dyrath remarked, he was certain that this was the best course of action. They had a few months before the first tournament, and it wasn't even one of the three he wanted to be in. so laying low was acceptable until after. Honic nodded to the reasons his party mates gave, he just wanted to try and help but he knew to follow Dyrath leadership. The three walked through the busy camp and found themselves a nice easy silver war quest, go out on the battle and disrupt the eleven food gathers.
Reglin was waiting in one of the inns in the Tree of Beginning, he was uneasy several other player were currently giving him looks of anger and disgust. The voting at the meeting had gone his way. He was able to cornice enough of the Barkers that cutting ties was not the best move but what happened after was worse than if he had failed. Someone, likely Vrucis, leaked out that the meeting had even taken place and the response was expected.
"Fucking prick doesn't get what he wants and he throws a fit and ruins everything." Reglin thought. The Dryads were furious, they told the other sanctuaries and they were even more upset. They all sent in soldiers to occupy the Tree, and they were making things worse, they blamed not only the Barkers as a whole but also the Dryads. Now even the some of the Dryads were whispering full on rebellion and the Barkers were screaming it. And the person taking the blame for all of this wasn't the one who leaked the information because no one knew who it was so they decided to blame the guy who convinced every one that they needed the other elves that now were occupying their home. Reglin was waiting for his party who most of them somehow still trusted him. He was thinking about taking a gold quest. If they did something like that it might take the heat off them and get people to cool their heads even just a little bit.
"Reglin?" Gilna asked Reglin who's eyes were closed. "You awake?"
"Yes… just didn't the atmosphere." Reglin said as he opened his eyes to see Gilna, Lincus, and Fors standing in front of him. "Where is Selece?" He knew the answer, the Dryad player felt severely betrayed by Reglin despite the fact he was on her side of the argument.
"She said she had other things to do." Fors said, he was one of the few Elven Players that had come to the Tree of Beginnings zone, the Dreamer Elf used to be seen in a quite positive light before the occupation but now he was hated.
"Of course… so I called you here because we have an issue."
'The issue being everyone hates you guys." Lincus said earing him the glare of his party. "What? The hate Gilna for not stopping the SOBs that caused all of this, they hate Reglin for making it worse, and the hate Fors because he's representation of the occupation. These are valid points people."
"He's not wrong." Fors admitted.
"We need to fix this, people are getting restless, the Barkers are calling for blood, mostly ours and the occupiers, and the Dryads are slowly turning towards their side. We have two options in the form of Gold Quests. The first one is to kill the Evil Players that caused this." Reglin noticed Gilna pull back from this. "Or… we open the Under Road. If we can do that, then the Dwarves can resupply and reinforce this Zone, the Dwarves may not like us but they are better to what is happing now." Reglin had been more interested in this Quest anyways.
"If the Dwarves help us in the war then the reinforcement reason for the other elves goes out the window." Fors said scratching his chin. "And then at least some of the elven soldiers would leave, they would be needed elsewhere."
"Right and with less troops occupying then people will be able to breath a bit more. Hopefully long enough for this to blow over. The problem is that the Under Road connecting to the rest of the network is corrupted by nightmare constructs fueled by the suffering of the forest. We have to clear it out and find the root of the corruption and destroy it. Fors this is where we're going to need you."
"Got it."
"Good lay low while I go and get the quest." Reglin said as he stood up. "Remember to keep out of trouble and if you can get Selece on board." They all nodded their heads and watched Reglin walk out of the Inn. They all parted way for the moment, with Fors going behind the Inn. Fors pulled up his menu and contacted a friend through the dream rat construct he gave them.
"Hey, I got some information I think you'd be willing to pay big for."
Dyrath finished off the last of the NPCs and looked at the reward window.
"Hey we're done here!" Dyrath yelled to the rest of his party.
"Already?! We haven't even leveled up once." Remus said going over the loot.
"It's a Silver Quest. We do two more and we level up." Dyrath said as he transferred the Mana he got over to Honic, he was the only one who currently used it. A message popped up in front of Dyrath marked as Connection. The message was a war alert, the connection was to Director Commander Zel. "Hey! We got a little opportunity here."
"What is it?" Honic said as he and Remus walked over.
"One of the Wraith Elf Players got a tip that one of the top Good Elf parties are going to try and open the Under Roads."
"Fuck! If they do that not only will we have to deal with the Tree people but heavily armed Tree people and the walking beards." Remus groaned.
"We can't let this happen, what kind of response is the Netherworld preparing to this."
"Us… at the moment. If we stop this then not only will it keep the Dwarves at bay for now but it will keep the tension in the Treefolk's camp and might led to civil war. If we pull this off, we could single handily cause the complete collapse of one of the Main Good Players' Hubs." Dyrath said getting excited.
"That certainly would be something an Overlord would do." Remus said feeding off the energy coming off Dyrath.
"What happened to laying low?" Honic said looking a little smug.
"Fuck that." Dyrath said throwing the blood off his axe. "We have the chance to become the top Evil Players and all we have to do is make sure that the Good Players fail."
Reglin stood in front of the Under Roads dungeon entrance with Gilna, Lincus, and Selece. They were waiting for Fors. The tension was so thick that one of them could cut it with their sword. Gilna just stood behind Selece hoping that nothing bad happened to Fors while Selece continued to avoid eye contact with the two males. Lincus was loudly tapping his foot and Reglin was just quietly waiting for his finial party member. The waiting ended with a noticed that Fors had left the party and a message saying he just couldn't take the hate and anger anymore and was heading back to Evernight.
"I guess he has every right to." Reglin sighed. He wasn't happy but he respected Fors' choice.
"Well maybe we should just wait until we find someone to replace him, this is a Gold Quest." Lincus said looking at the warning window on the path to the dungeon.
"No this needs to be done now. Any longer and the Barkers might openly rebel." Reglin said then looked over to the Dryads. Selece just looked away. She knew he was right but still felt angry about the meeting between the Barkers and Gilna just nodded in agreement. "Alright lets get this done. We have five levels of monsters to clean out and a three bar boss to kill." Reglin said as tapped accept to the warning window and walked on in to the Under Roads. The rest of them followed him. The entrance wasn't anything like the other Under Road architecture as this was made during one of the Dwarves many wars of greed. Those days were now the past and the Elves were now allies of the Dwarves but only out of a common enemy. The entrance was just a hole and much of this part of the Under Road was just a massive cave created out of blasting through the earth. A few rocky columns for support but nothing much else on this level.
It had been a good half hour before they saw the first of the monsters, constructs of the nightmare, a realm that all elven kind is connected to through their dreams. These Nightmares were created by the suffering of the First Forest but not by the hand of the Netherworld but by the hand of the Dwarves. The Nightmares guard against their return even if it help the forest face down this new enemy. The first Nightmares that the party saw were the Mockery, distorted versions of the Dwarves created out of roots, rocks and bits of metal. The first three were taken down with a few shots from Reglin's bow and Gilna's summoned roots. The party moved deeper in to the cave finding more and more of the Mockery. As they went deeper they could feel in the air that they had been noticed. The cave began to slightly shake to their movements and the Mockery began to show up on their own instead of the party finding them. It was when they found the entrance to the second level that the sound of massive roots moving began coming from under them.
"I think it knows we're here." Lincus said he watched the ground.
"No sense in keeping it waiting."
Nethlio looked over the his new contract, it was one of the best. He would continue to make his brand of Golem and the dead line for each of them was decent. With the money he was going to get he could get a new workshop, one that could be big enough for two or three people. With the extra help he could produce the Golems faster and if his level improved he might be able to leave the Workshop and help command his creations on the battlefield.
"So it seems like you were right." Omarica said as he sipped from his mug. The two of them were sitting in a café on the outskirts of the Elven City of Primus. Nethlio enjoying tea and Omarica enjoying a fine ale.
"Of course I was. Did you see some of my competition, sticks and mud?"
"Yeah… I have to admit to being one of those lazy ass slackers. Sooooo you got this new contact and you're going to be needing help…"
"Yes you can be on my staff." Nethlio said with a warm smile of friendship.
"Oh thank you…" Omarica sigh a deep sigh of relief. "… now I don't ever have worry about stupid design. I just have to work… I like work its simple and easy."
"Well I'm just happy that your happy." Nethlio said sarcastically. "I just am happy to have found someone that actually is decent human being."
"I hear that. A lot of the Sculptors are stuck up because we don't have to fight on the front lines or at all most times. They think we're safe and don't have to worry about PVP."
"Think we're safe?"
"Yeah, think about it. Once this game gets going in full, when we are making mile high Golems that tower above us, you can bet that the Good Players will be gunning for us. We are safe right now because no one knows about us." Nethlio took a sip from his cup, this was really good tea. He thought this over, it made sense. The Sculptors were at the moment the least active of all the Evil Paths right behind the Warlocks. But they had the most potential to be the biggest threat to the Good Players.
"So what should we do?"
"I think we should get a Netherghul. We should get one now, get in good with them before they get all full of themselves."
"So who should we go for?" Nethlio said as Omarica pulled up the Top Players window of the Menu.
"The current top dog of the Netherghuls is a dude by the screenname Elijin, currently the highest level Netherghul in the Wastelands and has completed three Gold Quests. The dude has certainly attracted a serious following, nineteen in his Faction though none are named."
"No, let's not go for the top… what about that Netherghul that was at the Temple before we left for the Hub. What was his name? He was getting famous. But he didn't really seem all that concerned with it."
"A guy that is just concerned with the job… I can like the idea of working for that."
"I thought you worked for me?"
Gilna walked through the finely crafted halls of the Under Road. This was the true Under Road, each and every inch of the hall was chiseled by a true craftsman, each column was built not only for a function but to be a thing of pure Dwarven workmanship. Her party was crossing between the fourth and fifth level. And almost as brief it came, the wonderful architecture was replaced by Nightmare icons and withered overgrowth. The fighting had gotten harder the lower they went too, coming in next the Mockery were hulking beasts carrying mock cannons that fired balls of dark magic. But right now it was quiet.
"All right, everyone back in the green?" Reglin said as peeked in through the crack in the level door. "I'm seeing a ton of Mocks and other things I am not even going to try to describe."
"This is the last level, we need to be on watch for the Boss." Lincus said as he checked his sword for nicks. "According to the Quest log it is a Three bar Boss, Gilna save your mana, we're going to need to keep it in one place so we can whittle it down since we don't have a Tank."
"If Fors was here he could summon something that could take the beating." Reglin said, while he wasn't mad that Fors left he was irritated that they had to do this without him.
"I can do this don't worry." Gilna said trying to hide her worry, she was going to help her party. They had taken her in and helped her survive this death game so far and she was going to help them anyway she could.
"Okay, let's get this over with." Selece said she pushed the doors open. The party followed her through. Reglin fired a few shots pricing through the skulls of several the Mockery while Lincus dashed forward to fight the nightmares head on with Selece keeping him safe with a magic barrier. Gilna was keeping back holding off using her magic, saving it for the Boss fight.
"Yawho! I love this fight!" Lincus yelled out before giving out a deafening battle cry.
"I can only wonder as to why he didn't choose to be a Gladiator." Reglin mumbled as he made a power shot to the head of one of the bigger monsters. The horde of creatures began to thin and once the last of the monsters had fallen the party took a deep breath of relief. They all had begun to dip down into the lower end of the yellow all but for Gilna. "Everyone drink up and let's get moving." The party drank a few health potions and continued on lower into the level. The fights after that were small and easy but stopped as soon as they reached a massive cliff sized wall if only a single ladder down to the bottom. The four looked out on to the flat road to see a enormous corrupted root blocking the path out to the rest of the Under Road network. All around it was Magic nodes and in the center on the root was a unblinking eye staring right at them.
"I think we found the Boss." Lincus said while the others just stared.
"I feel a bit lazy with how easy this is." Honic said as the three Evil Players walked through the third Level of the Under Roads. "We only see at the very least ten of these things and yet this is a dungeon.
"It's because those fucks cleared it out for us." Remus said as he kicked a skull across the hall.
"Settle down, we need to get a plan together for when we meet up with the players." Dyrath said never taking his eyes off the surrounding shadows.
"Kill em… right?" Remus asked.
"The mission is to stop them not to kill them, killing them could work but I want to avoid that moral gray area for as long as I can. I'm thinking taking them captive, works out for us better in the long run, we get info and show the Nobles we're smarter than just some dumb crazies who think kill and more killing."
"Makes sense." Honic said and Remus was just quiet. He wasn't looking forward to killing someone but he felt it should be gotten over with since it was bound to happen at some point.
Gilna watched as her party descended down the shaky ladder. She was waiting for them to get to the bottom so she and Selece could perform a quick reinforcement to the ladder with their roots. Just as she was about to set up the summoning spell felt someone pull her back and was quickly gaged and blinded by a thick cloth.
"Hey Gilna! We're all set down here!" Reglin yelled back up to his party mate. He never looked away from the Boss Ring, the longer they stood near it the more danger they were in of it expanding and the Boss fight beginning. He had never been in a real Boss fight, but from what he had heard and read thy were no joke. This was one of the easier Bosses, it only had three bars of health, it could be beaten by a four-person party but it was going to be hard. Reglin started to worry when he saw the Nodes started to be covered in roots. The last thing they need was the Boss preparing for them. "Gilna! Hurry up!"
"Hello down there!" A deep male voice yelled down. Reglin knew this voice well and it sent waves of anger, dread, and fear for Gilna.
"Vrucis! Where's Gilna?!" Reglin screamed up to the Barker. Gilna was shoved forward and caught by Vrucis before she fell of the wall.
"Me and my boys thought we might have a bit of fun before we throw her down with you." Vrucis grabbed Gilna's face. "Look at that, doesn't it look like it was made for screwing."
"You pig!" Selece raged up at the man before beginning to move to ladder but the ladder fell down, Selece looked up to see one of the Barkers squatting down with a knife by where the ladder was.
"What the hell are you doing you fucking asshole?!" Lincus yelled.
"I have to say Reglin you were quite right, it wasn't the right time to cut ties. But it is now! With the occupation we now have the support of the Dryads and the Barkers have never been so unified! All because of you."
"No it was you! You leaked out that the meeting took place!" Reglin yelled out.
"Maybe… maybe not. But that doesn't matter now, what matters is that I'm on the brink of leading a rebellion and I'll be in charge of the Treefolk."
"For about five days! Then the Empire and the Elves are going to boot your slimly ass out."
"Nope, the Forest and the Tree are so isolated and defendable that we can survive until this whole game is done. If the Goodies win then we win and if the Netherworld is on the brink of winning then we'll surrender to them. In any case we just need to wait this whole thing out."
"That's crazy!" They all yelled,
"Your opinion. But my plan will be ruined if you bring in the walking beards. So…" Vrucis brought out something from the pack on his side. It was a glowing blue orb covered in runes.
"A spell catalyst…" Reglin said in horror.
"Yes." Vrucis said with a savage smile. "I was hoping to use this little beauty to power up a spell stone when I found one but you're making me take desperate actions." Vrucis looked up at the Boss and Reglin in turn looked at it. Reglin's look of horror turned to absolute dread and terror, he knew what Vrucis was planning and he knew in his soul he was not going to live through it.
"You bastard." Reglin mumbled before he watched Vrucis throw the Spell catalyst at the Boss it landing right under its eye. Reglin watched as the veins of the root turn blue starting at at the impact site. An audible screaming sound was heard throughout the hall. The root began growing at an incredible rate. Growing unnatural growths and extensions. The Boss ring rapidly grew and caught up with Reglin's group. The Boss fight initiated and the party turned in shock to the Boss.
"God, what a sight." Vrucis said then looked at Gilna. "Well sweetie you're about to make all our day a hell of a lot more fun." Vrucis said as his party laughed and a few tears ran down Gilna's face. "Are fucking crying? Oh I knew you were a bitch with no back bone." Vrucis ripped off the cloth that blinded Gilna. The first thing she saw was her party fighting the strengthened Boss. The Boss now had six bars of health and the first two were armored. They had no chance, the things coming out of the ground were far different from the things they were facing before. They were disgusting monsters that were nothing but roots and glowing blue metal. She watched in pain as her friends fought the beasts but were quickly dropped down to the red. The only sound in the hall was the screams of the Boss and the laughter of the barkers.
Reglin was the last one of the three, he shooting as many of the monsters he could have but there were too many. As he was finally surrounded he could only think of one thing to do and took his final power shot at Vrucis hitting him in the arm freeing Gilna. Reglin smiled as he watched Gilna run away and felt content when he watched his HP bar dropped to zero.
"Fuck! Damn it!" Vrucis screamed out as Gilna ran back towards the stairs to the next level. She hadn't expected to get very far but when she bumped into metal armor. She was quickly taken by her arm once again but when she looked at her captor she was surprised to she the face of the Netherghul that sparred her life back at the Temple.
"Well what have we here?" A new voice said from behind the Netherghul. "That was some nasty backstabbing."
"Who the fuck are you guys?!" One of Vrucis Barkers demanded while the other three helped him. The power shot from Reglin had been poisoned so with that and the normal PVP effects of a power shot meant that the limb would not be functional for days and that's even if he was able to keep it at all.
"We came here to make sure that these guys failed in their mission but it would seem that you have done it for us." The one holding Gilna said, the way he was holding her was more like he was shielding her from the Barkers than actually keeping her captive but still he kept her under his strength. "Seeing as you guys don't want to finish this quest, I'm content to letting you guys just walk on out of here in exchange for two things, one we get credit for this. Don't want it getting out that you sent your own to death. Might make people think you do that to them." Vrucis thought this over, he was still feeling the pain in his arm but he needed to keep his head cool. These guys were heavily armed and he was basically useless in a fight like this. What the Netherghul said was true, he was going to keep things about this a secret anyways.
"Fine and the second request." This earned some shocked looks from his boys but with a hard glare they got back in line.
"We keep her." Gilna looked up at the Netherghul but said nothing.
"That…" Vrucis was unsure about this. She couldn't come back with them. She was going to be a bit of fun and then thrown down with the Boss. But if they took her then she might give information that would be very damaging. But Vrucis looked back the Evil Players, they would certainly beat them. "…fine. You can have her. Let's get going boys, I need to get this fucking arm fixed." Vrucis said before he walked past the Evil Players. His boys followed he, a bit reluctantly but they still followed. Once they were off the level the Netherghul let Gilna go. She slowly moved away from the Netherghul. She looked back at the three Evil players, she recognized the three as the ones that assaulted the Temple.
"Hey… she's that chick from the temple." The dark skinned Green Minion Player said pointing at her.
"Yeah… does that mean your group was the same one from the temple?" The Forge Fiend asked Gilna.
"Umm yeah, we haven't been the most popular party since then, we came here to try and help that and keep the Treefolk from rebelling against the rest of the Elves… but I guess that's not happening now." Gilna said not really sure if she was going to see the next day. But then a window popped in front of Gilna and the Evil Players. It said that she was now their captive, she then noticed that her party member list had changed to the new names with her at the bottom with the word slave under her Mana Bar.
Guide to DDO
Netherghul Army Tab- The Netherghul Overlord candidates have a special tab in their Menu called the Army Tab. It holds the current resources and allies of a Nehteghul. These are placed under two groups, Assets and Connections. Assets can range from battalions of Minions Soldiers to stocks of magic weapons and to doomsday weapons. Connections are made through interaction with NPCs and Players, it does not need to be positive interactions but simple needs to make the person believe that the Netherghul has a shot at being Overlord.
Evernight- The once conquered forest of eternal night was retaken by the Elves after the fall of the third Overlord and there was never even one attempt at taking it by the Glorious Empire due to the nearby Wastelands preventing a serious incursion. The Forest has now turned into the da facto capital of the Good Elves because of its natural protection.
The Shining Peaks- The Dwarven lands of the Shining Peaks are currently the only proper Dwarven nation. The Golden Hills have fallen in the rise of the third Overlord and the Halls of the Stars fell during the wars with the Elves. The Dwarves of the Shining Peaks are the only ones left other than the scattered few Dwarves out in the world.
