Chapter 7 RED SAND
News of Floor Six being open in less than a day after Floor Five spread like wildfire, dismissed as rumors until the Aincrad newspaper went out the next morning. It did tell of a squad of the Holy Dragon Alliance partnering with the smaller Aincrad Wrecking Crew guild in order to defeat a boss that the Knights of the Blood Oath were quoted as calling 'circumstantially undefeatable'. The article gave the most credit to the Holy Dragon Alliance, but whoever wrote it did play an angle by emphasizing the size of the Aincrad Wrecking Crew, claiming that even the smallest guilds could be responsible for the greatest victories.
As Nabiki put it, it was propaganda to encourage the players to keep the winning streak going.
Shampoo was just grateful that the newspaper didn't mention her by name or include pictures. As a Beater it was not a good idea for her to get too much public attention until her in-game stats were closer to matching her real life skills.
While her skills were rather good for in the game, helped by the occasional sneaking out at night for late-night solo leveling, they still felt weaker than they were in real life. Something Ranma was well aware of for himself.
-Flashback-
"Hey Shampoo?"
"Yes Airen?"
The two were currently out for some solo practice two days after they had reached Floor Two. They made sure to practice their Martial Art skills when they weren't busy with the basic necessities of life in Aincrad.
"How long do you think it will take for us to get back to normal in this game?"
"Honestly Airen, I don't think that's going to be possible." Shampoo told him.
"What? Why?" Ranma asked, ceasing his kata.
"Think about it Airen." Shampoo stated, pausing for a moment herself. "Remember what was normal for us. Jumping on roofs, ki attacks, all that stuff. Ki doesn't exist here, and the levels and skills were designed so ordinary people can progressively handle them. Not to mention the game emphasizes weapon and survival skills more than anything else. While it's not impossible for us to get as good as we were in real life, it's not something I would expect myself to be anytime soon."
"But it is possible. That's all I need to know." Ranma replied.
Shampoo suppressed a sigh and walked up to be right next to him. "Airen, I understand your desire to be as strong as you once were, but-"
"No Shampoo, you don't understand." He cut her off, then allowed himself to sigh and sit down. The purple-haired girl sat down next to him and he did not refuse her. "My strength is more than just a matter of pride to me. It's a piece of my identity. I've always defined myself as a strong martial artist, so without my strength, I don't know who I am anymore. It's like this one time you weren't around for. Did your grandmother ever tell you about my strength being taken away?"
Shampoo nodded. "Yes, that disgusting old pervert your father is so afraid of used some kind of moxibustion on a pressure point of yours to reduce your strength, so Great-grandmother taught you the Hiryu Shoten Ha to counter him. I was in China visiting my family while this all happened."
"Yep. That was one of the most horrible times of my life." Ranma said solemnly. "I felt so helpless, so... unlike myself. It was like I wasn't Ranma Saotome anymore, just a shell of him. The only thing that gave me hope was getting my strength back, and I wasn't really at peace until I did. So you see? My strength is me. I am not Ranma without it. I need to know I can get it back soon."
"Airen, you're wrong about one thing. I do understand you." Shampoo told him, putting her hand on his shoulder. "Remember, I was champion back home. Champion of a village where everyone is taught how to be a warrior and be the best. You think I got to be that by not valuing my own strength?" She paused for a bit to let him contemplate that, which he did silently. "I value my strength too, but I don't let it define me. Why do you?"
"Because for years it was the only thing I was allowed to have." Ranma confessed. "My old man would not let me own anything. No toys, no books, even school supplies were barely mine to begin with. To him I was only allowed to do two things, train and sleep. My strength defines me because it's the only thing I've ever had, ever. Without it, I truly have nothing."
"You have us." Shampoo told him. "You have me, Akane, Ukyo, Nabiki, Kasumi, and Dr. Tofu. And you have freedom, freedom to find out who you really are. Like Kasumi, you can become whoever you want here. You are not just a martial artist anymore Airen, you are free."
"Free?" Ranma repeated, as if testing the word. "Free from what?"
"Free from being trapped as a martial artist." Shampoo answered.
"Trapped? I wasn't trapped. I enjoy being a martial artist."
"And what else were you?" She asked.
"What else?" He repeated, confused. "What do you mean what else?"
"What else were you besides a martial artist?" Shampoo asked. "Take me for example, I wasn't just a martial artist. I cooked, played games, rode my bike, I had hobbies besides practice. Even Akane and Ukyo did too. What about you? What did you do besides martial arts that you enjoyed?"
Ranma paused to think it over, assuming this would be easy. After all, he had done a variety of non-martial arts things in Nerima, such as...
...
'I know I've done something in my life that wasn't about the art.' He thought to himself. 'School? No, I hated being there except when I had a fight. Jobs? No, I only had one when I needed something or owed a favor. Hobbies? No, I only did martial arts for that. C'mon, there had to be something.'
But as he reflected on his past, he could not recall one instance of doing something other than martial arts on a regular voluntary basis. All extra activities were related to learning some kind of new style, and once the fight was over he never did the activity again.
"I never needed to have anything but the art because I never wanted anything else." Ranma said, though it was hard to tell if he was admitting it as a fact or a problem.
"Not anything?" Shampoo asked. "Airen, did you ever consider that having nothing but the art can be a bad thing?"
"How?"
"Back in real life, what did you do when you weren't fighting or training?" Shampoo asked.
"Eat, sleep, and run from anyone who tried to take their anger out on me." Ranma admitted. "I never thought of it as a problem because I never wanted to be anything other than a martial artist."
"Ukyo wants to be an okonomiyaki chef but she couldn't spend every waking moment making food. Even she needed something else to do once in a while." Shampoo claimed. "Akane was better than an average martial artist, and she still pursued other interests. Even that idiot Mousse put down his weapons once in a while and tried to just have fun."
"Funny, I always thought that stuff was just distractions from the art that made you weaker." Ranma said, then groaned. "Listen to me, I sounded just like my old man there."
"Even the panda had hobbies Airen." Shampoo reminded him.
"Hey, you're right. He wasn't always training. He was often doing other things. Why can't I?" Ranma asked himself, getting a little mad at his father. Then he looked to Shampoo with a smile. "Alright, I'm convinced. I still want to be a great martial artist, but there's no reason I can't do anything else. So what were some things you did for fun?"
Shampoo smiled. "Well we can't go for a bike ride or play video games here, but I think we can go swimming. I've wanted to do that with you for a long time, and without our curses we can now."
Ranma nodded. "Sounds like fun."
-End Flashback-
So with that little revelation of another example of his father's hypocrisy, Ranma was no longer fixated on being nothing but a martial artist. Like Kasumi had said on Floor One, a comfort zone can become a prison if you refuse to leave it, and now Ranma wanted to leave his own. Or at least explore outside it.
"I wonder what Floor Six is like." He said sitting down waiting in a town on Floor Three called Emon, the northernmost town of Floor Three and thus the one closest to their house. Emon was like most of the towns on Floor Three in that it was surrounded by forest and filled with a lot of NPCs to give it a crowded feeling. Kasumi enjoyed shopping here, it kind of made her feel like she was back in the markets of Nerima.
"Well, so far the terrain of Aincrad has been mostly forest, meadow, and mountain. I see no reason to expect anything else." Nabiki said, twirling a dagger just to keep her hands busy.
"Hey Kasumi!" Klein said, coming up to the eldest member of the present group. Tofu was staying home like he said, trying to figure out what he could do with his time in the game.
Kasumi smiled and walked to her old friend. "Glad to see you Klein-sempai." She then looked to the other five with him. "I'm sorry, I don't think I ever got your names."
"I'm Dale." A chubby man with short curly brown hair greeted. He wore a braided rope as a headband, unlike the actual headband Klein wore, a yellow shirt, and charcoal black pants. On his back there was a sheathed broadsword, and his left arm had some basic armor on it to serve as a shield for him.
"I'm Kunimittz." A guy the same height as Klein said next. He had black hair combed back, a bit of a goattee, and a pair of earrings. He wore a dark blue long-sleeve tunic, crimson pants, a green bandanna rested around his neck, and a belt. He didn't have a weapon out, but strapped to his belt was a set of nunchaku.
"I'm Dynamm." A man with a thin mustache said, pronouncing his name as if one said only half of 'dynamite'. He had short brown hair with sideburns, a purple shirt, grey gloves covering his forearms, and dark blue pants with calf-high grey boots. At his hip was a curved sword and he had a circular shield on his back.
"I'm Issin." A man whose face looked unusually thin said next. He had spiked brown hair, a collared green shirt with a thin red vest, brown pants, and a yellow sash where a belt normally would be. He had a sword on his hip, but the placement showed he was left-handed.
"I'm Harry One." The tallest and last member of the group said, finishing the introductions. He had black hair with a straw hat over it, a black shirt with white vertical stripes, and grey pants. He had no weapons out.
"Harry One?" Kasumi repeated, confused.
"I tried just Harry at login but it said the name was taken, so I added the one. And yes, I know now I could have just picked a different name but I was in a hurry to get to the game." He explained.
"Well we're here. Ready to do some exploring?" Shampoo said to the guild.
Klein nodded. "How do we get there?"
"The newsletter said the entry town on Floor Six is called Harbak. Once we get to the teleport pad we're there."
"Then what are we waiting for?" Dale said, raising his fist as if to cheer everyone on. "On to Floor Six!"
The first notable feature of Harbak was that the buildings were made of tan and beige stone and there were no plants in sight. A few statues gave the plaza some decoration along with an elegant water fountain some players were filling bottles at. On the sides of buildings and above most places to sit were some blue canopies, providing shade in the absence of trees.
"Is it just me or does it feel warmer here?" Ukyo asked.
"Well there's not a cloud in the sky and it is spring now. After spending all winter in this game this is bound to feel warm." Ranma commented.
"But we're still in winter." Kasumi said, pulling up a calendar menu. "Yeah, we started the game on November 6, in autumn, and today is January 21. We're in winter. This should be cold."
Weather in Aincrad had been unusual in the three months of the game. Despite the sky essentially being the bottom of the floor above, there were clouds and small fake suns and moons to give light during the days and nights, with a sort of genuine sun just outside the perimeters of the floors that only gave light during the sunrise and sunset hours. It had rained a few times and been mildly cold but it never snowed except for some frost at night, prompting many players to stay in inns or find homes. Overall it had been a mild but chilly winter, likely for the players benefit, but most players predicted the next one wouldn't be so mild.
"Well we got some good weather. What's the problem?" Issin asked.
Kasumi shrugged and closed the menu. "I guess there is none. Should we get anything while we're here?"
"I think we've got enough to at least handle some exploring. We can come back when it's lunch, unless we find another town." Shampoo offered.
"Sounds good to me." Klein said.
The two groups walked around town trying to find the way out, discovering along the way that the terrain was greatly unlevel so the paths had a lot of stairs going up and down. Glancing at shops showed some cloaks for sale along with boots, hats, and even binoculars which until now had not been available.
"Hey look." Nabiki said, pointing ahead. "Looks like they're at it again."
What she was pointing at was a group of players dressed like the Holy Dragon Alliance, standing by a sandstone arch haggling with some other players. By the looks of it, they were again trying to pass a toll on those that wanted to leave town.
"Maybe we've get a free pass. Might as well see." Shampoo considered. "By the way Nabiki, you really should take off that pelt. You're starting to sweat."
"I'm fine for now. But if it gets too hot I might." She said, wiping her forehead.
The two groups went to the gate, where the player from before had already paid to go through, and the Holy Dragon Alliance was there waiting for them. "Hello, to leave it will cost you 50 Col apiece." One of the gatekeepers said.
"I don't think so." Shampoo said. "I'm Shampoo of the Aincrad Wrecking Crew guild, and your guild has a deal with ours not to charge us when you do this."
"Hmm... we were giving a note to let one group go through free." One of the gatekeepers said, pulling up a menu to check through their old messages. "Ah, here it is. Yep, Commander Shakku said this guild is supposed to get free passes on this floor. But the privilege doesn't extend to the higher floors though."
"That's alright. This is just Shakku being grateful and we wouldn't want to take advantage of it." Shampoo said.
"Well then, you're free to go. I just hope you can handle this floor." One of the gatekeepers said, moving aside to let them pass.
"I think we can." Nabiki said.
"Wearing that? Good luck girl." The gatekeeper commented. Nabiki arched an eyebrow but chose not to call attention to it.
Shampoo activated the gate and the two guilds left the safe zone platform, arriving in the field zone of Floor Six. And right away they were immediately surprised.
"Well this I did not see coming." Klein stated, covering his eyes from the sun with his hand.
The environments of Aincrad has so far all had some degrees of similarity. Consisting of mostly meadows, forests, and mountains mixed in various amounts and with differing NPC inhabitants. Floor Five had been unique in that it had consisted of nothing but forest, but this was unique in an entirely different way.
Floor Six was nothing but desert. Sandy dunes in a flat tan stretch of land that went out to the horizon. There was nothing but sand and sagebrush with maybe a cactus or two in sight.
"I don't think we're equipped to explore this terrain." Kasumi noted.
"Should we go back and get some supplies?" Akane asked.
"No." Nabiki said. "We don't have enough to buy several sets of completely new equipment just yet. All we can do is try to get to the next town and hope we can find something that pays well along the way."
"Anyone see a town?" Harry One asked, trying to look for anything on the horizon. While towns always had a lot of space between them usually one was within sight of another. But here, there seemed to be none visible.
"Nope. I guess we'll just have to pick a direction and go." Klein suggested.
"In a desert? You know how dangerous that can be?" Shampoo chewed out.
"Got an alternative?" Klein asked back.
She did not. None of them did.
"Picking a direction and going it is then." Ranma said for them all.
"Sir, I believe I saw the ones you said you were looking for." A teen in a white poncho and red bandanna said to his guild leader.
"Are you certain of that?"
"Yes, I am very certain it was them. They have headed out into the open floor where they are vulnerable." The teen added.
"Good. Let's give them a little bit of a head start, so they won't see us coming."
"With all due respect sir, what is it you want with these people?" The teen asked.
"Just payback for many injustices they did to me prior to this game." The guild leader replied, refusing to go into further detail.
"How long have we been out here?" Ukyo asked, sweating and desperate for some water.
"I think twenty minutes." Kasumi answered, wiping some sweat out of her eyes.
"Twenty minutes? No that can't be true!" Ukyo protested in horror. And no one could blame her. It was very hot here on Floor Six, as if specifically programmed to be hotter than normal. It was so hot Nabiki had actually removed her wolf pelt and put it into storage.
"I still don't see the next town." Klein mentioned.
"Can we teleport back to somewhere more comfortable?" Dale pleaded, looking like he was really uncomfortable here.
"We can't call it quits now." Ranma argued. "There's a hundred floors here. What are the odds this is the only desert in the entire game? Besides, what about the other different terrains that might show up? Like tundra, or swamp, or even ocean. There could be a floor where it's entirely flooded and we have to get around by boat. We can't call it quits just because we're not familiar with the landscape. If we did, how are we any different than the Beginners?"
Beginner, like Beater, had developed into part of the in-game terminology among the players. Beginner was a title that had been given to the three thousand players who to this day remained inside the Town of Beginnings on Floor One. Like the term Beater it was used in a negative way, Beginner was pretty much synonymous with the word 'coward'. It conveyed the idea of a player who refused to leave the comfort of a safe zone and ended up remaining a low level fighter due to a lack of any experience.
"Because we're not on Floor One?" Akane answered, uncertain.
"Point is, what's the point of exploring if we don't explore new places?" Ranma asked.
"Hey look, some cactus." Ukyo said, pointing to some simple local flora. "Think it's got water inside?"
"Worth a try." Klein said, going up to it and using a dagger to cut off a portion of the top. The severed portion dispelled and a menu screen appeared, telling Klein he had two new things in his inventory. The first said 'Cactus Segment - Food' and the second said 'Cactus Juice - Drink Warning'.
"Drink warning?" Klein said, questioning. "That's what it says whenever I've got sake in my inventory. Is this stuff alcoholic?"
"Maybe there's a side effect to drinking it. Or maybe it's poisonous." Kasumi suggested, already familiar with the fact that some edible and drinkable things in the game came with warnings and those that did had specific instructions for cooking or consuming them. Alcoholic beverages always had warnings attached since they induced drunkenness and poisonous mushrooms had warnings since eating them carelessly made players lose some health.
"Anyone want to risk it?" Klein offered.
"I'm not that thirsty yet." Nabiki said, taking out her own water bottle and drinking a small amount to cool off.
Klein got rid of the menu. "Feh, maybe it will come in handy later. But if we could find a water source that would be perfect."
"Should we check out that?" Akane asked, pointing to a group of hovering buzzards in the distance, looking like they were circling something perpetually.
"Buzzards in a desert? No thanks." Issin said.
"I get the feeling that's a place to get a quest. Let's check it out." Shampoo claimed.
The two groups headed towards the buzzards, and when they got there they saw a human skeleton laying on the sand, dressed in tattered white robes. In its hand was a rolled piece of paper.
"Well that's... rather predictable now that I think about it." Dynamm commented.
Shampoo went to pull the paper out of the skeleton's hands. Once she touched it two of the buzzards dove towards the players, crying out like predators. Dynamm and Kasumi got their shields and swords out and braced themselves. Up close, the buzzards had purple feathers and toothed beaks, with three red eyes and a name reading Carrion Claw. The birds hit the shields and rebounded off them, and the two players quickly slashed at them, wounding but not killing them. The Carrion Claws flew off to avoid being killed.
Shampoo came back up and unfurled the paper. Right away a quest icon appeared along with the options to accept or decline. Seeing no reason not to, she tapped accept. With that she was finally able to read what was on the paper.
"Stone stands above sand. Water flows between them both. Death is where none are."
No one knew what to say after hearing that.
"That's it?" Ranma asked. "That's all it says?"
Shampoo checked both front and back. "Yeah, that's all it says. But this is supposed to be a quest. Not a very clear one though."
"Birds are coming back." Kasumi noted, seeing more Carrion Claws ready to dive at them. "And the sun is making it hard to look at them." The sunlight of course made it difficult, it was too bright. But luckily the birds did screech so they could listen for them. Everyone attacked with a weapon, most missing but the birds were kept back and flew back up.
"Maybe it's a clue or riddle, or something." Nabiki mentioned, taking the paper to look at it herself. "Hmm... stone, sand, water, and death. Definitely a desert theme, but all that's around here is sand and death given the skeleton."
"Let's move this away from the vultures." Klein requested. "And maybe set up one of our tents to get out of the sun."
"Oh please yes." Ukyo begged.
The two groups made a move for it to get out of the range where the Carrion Claws were programmed to attack them within. There was a flat stretch of sand for them to walk on, much like most of the floor so far but this time stretched flat and even instead of just some dunes to go over. Right away they noticed a small problem.
"This sand is way too soft." Harry One stated, sinking up to above his ankles. "It's like wadding through pudding."
"Big deal. We've been walking through sand all day." Akane pointed out, struggling to walk at a pace she liked.
Just then, the ground seemed to suddenly shift down a bit, like a floor collapsing. This unexpected happening made them briefly lose balance, and most of them fell on all fours buried up to their knees and elbows in sand. Some managed to stay upright but they sank too, up to their waists.
"I'm stuck!" Klein yelled, unable to break free of the sand.
"Hey Ranma, doesn't this feel familiar?" Akane asked, recalling a part of the famous bathhouse race they were so close to winning. Particularly the part where she and Ranma had nearly died in quicksand.
"Too bad we can't get out the same way." Ranma replied, remembering the same event.
The ground shifted again, this time tilting. Now it looked like a conical depression, and to make matters worse, it started having some suction.
"We got to get out of here!" Nabiki yelled, struggling to crawl out. "This is like a giant ant-lion trap! Or the top half of an hourglass!"
She was indeed right, the sand was trying to pull them under. Fortunately the suction made it easier for them to break the grip of the sand, but unfortunately there was nothing solid for a single one of them to grab onto so they couldn't simply climb out. And with less sand around the epicenter of the suction the players were still getting drawn in, whether they liked it or not.
"We're going to die!" Kunimittz panicked, clawing futilely at the sand like a madman.
Dale was the player closest to the suction point, and he was struggling the most against the sand. Then he hit the center. "Help me! Help me!" He yelled before he was completely pulled under, his pleading hands being the last part of him seen.
"Dale!" Klein and his crew yelled, horrified. Klein had even tried to go after his friend, but Kasumi grabbed his arm.
"There's nothing you can do for him!" She said loudly, just as scared as the rest.
Issin was sucked up next, but before he was taken he grabbed the leg of Ukyo for leverage. Instead he just started dragging her down sooner.
"Ranchan!" She yelled when she was waist deep in the suction point.
"Ucchan!" Ranma yelled back, ignoring all convention and clawing his way towards his oldest friend, not knowing how he could save her only knowing he couldn't do nothing. He got to her when she was up to her armpits in sand and grabbed her arms, trying to pull her out. "I gotcha!"
Naturally this didn't help as Ranma had nothing to stop himself from being pulled down and Ukyo went in up to her chin. Akane grabbed Ranma from behind and Shampoo grabbed Akane, and a human chain was starting. But it wasn't working. Ukyo was completely engulfed by the sand and Ranma was starting to follow face first.
"Wait, everyone!" Kasumi called out. "Stop resisting!"
"What? Are you crazy?" Everyone called back.
"Trust me! Just let it take us!" She insisted, and to prove her point she made herself completely still, accepting the inevitable.
Ranma, Akane, and Shampoo were past the point of getting out on their own and got sucked up, followed by Harry One, Kunimittz, and then Kasumi.
"You better be right about this sis." Nabiki rued, before getting pulled under along with Klein and Dynamm.
Once all the players were gone the suction stopped and the ground reshaped itself back to a flat sandy surface, as if no one had ever been there to begin with.
"Am I still alive?" Ukyo asked.
"I think so, but I can't see anything." Dynamm replied.
"So I was right." Kasumi said, sounding relieved. "Anyone got a lantern? It's pitch black here."
"Where is here anyway?" Akane asked. She pulled up a menu and luckily it gave a small amount of light, which is exactly what she wanted. The others did the same, and Shampoo was able to find a lantern in her inventory. Pulling it out she activated it by pressing an icon and their current location was better lit.
Said location turned out to be an underground cave with stone walls and a floor, and the ceiling made of compressed sand. There was a tunnel leading to parts unknown where it was still too dark to see.
"What the heck were you thinking Kasumi?" Akane asked. "You knew we'd end up here?"
Kasumi looked a bit embarrassed. "Actually, I took a gamble."
"A gamble?" Akane, as well as the rest did. "You gambled with our lives?"
Kasumi nervously laughed. "Well when we were being pulled under, I noticed I wasn't getting any guild member death notices. We've all been told about them right?"
They nodded. While none of them had ever had to experience it, they were well aware of what was supposed to happen when a member of a guild or party was killed. The surviving members were given alerts to tell them of the death. Currently there were no known exceptions to this. But since no one in the Aincrad Wrecking Crew or Furinkazan guilds had lost a member, they never had seen such an alert beyond a small instruction video they had watched back in the first month of the game.
"So I figured if there were no notices, the people who had already gone under weren't dead. Just taken somewhere else. I knew it was risky, but... at least I was right." Kasumi said, still smiling to make the situation less uncomfortable.
"Please don't do that again." Nabiki requested. 'But still, Kasumi willing to take that kind of risk? She's really changing in this game. I wonder if we all are and with her it's just more obvious.'
"Well we can at least get out of here, I hope." Klein said, then looked to the darkened hall. "My guess is the exit's that way."
"Nice to be out of the sun at least." Ukyo noted, receiving many nods. "Though how do we get out of here?"
"Do you guys have any crystals?" Nabiki asked, as her group had none.
"Sorry no. Not teleportation ones anyway. We usually don't bother with them." Klein confessed. "We don't want to risk getting dependent on them since we suspect that there will be times they can't be used."
"Why?" Nabiki asked.
"Standard in games, the quick-escape can't work everywhere." Klein claimed. "Besides I'm sure we won't need them here. It would be pointless to give us a way in here without a way out." Klein claimed.
"Maybe for normal games." Shampoo couldn't help but mutter.
"How long have we been down here?" Ranma asked when the group decided to give their feet some rest.
"No idea, didn't think to check the clock when we were in quicksand." Dynamm remarked.
Nabiki pulled up a menu. "Well it's nighttime by now. We've been wandering underground for at least six hours."
"I never thought I'd miss the sun so much." Ukyo claimed.
"Hey, something's different here." Akane said, moving her hands against the walls. "It doesn't feel like sand or dirt anymore. Now it's stone. Brick. I think we're in some kind of underground dungeon now."
Others started to feel the wall directly, now noticing the texture. "You're right. It's like we're in a corridor now." Dale said.
"That means we're getting closer to a way out." Klein added.
"And likely right into a dungeon." Shampoo noted.
"Cool, then we can actually do something other than walk around all day." Harry One commented. "You gotta admit half the fun of exploring a game terrain is fighting off the monsters you encounter."
"And that's a half we've been missing today." Ranma groaned, making some of the girls laugh at how right he was. "When I get home, first thing I'm doing is drinking my weight in water."
"Get in line, I'm doing that first." Akane said, no contest or argument in her voice but rather going along with the joke.
"Hey look." Klein said, drawing everyone's attention to what was ahead of them. The dungeon hall forked, and the two halls had two kanji painted on the bricks, faded but readable. The hall to the left read 'Water' and the one to the right read 'Sun'.
"Well this doesn't take a genius." Ranma said, going down the left hall without waiting for anyone else.
"Is this really a good idea?" Nabiki asked.
"Who cares? I want some water." Ukyo remarked, following Ranma. Everyone else followed soon after that, even the reluctant members of the two parties. The hallway itself remained level and rather wide, enough for three people to walk side by side with a bit of space between each other and the walls. But there were no signs of water yet.
Then they were stopped by a door, one that looked like it was made out of a sheet of glass. On the other side was a large room where the walls, ceiling, and floor were lined with sparkling blue stone, like they each were carved from giant aquamarine gemstones. It was a room that looked like it was made out of water in a way. The feature that most stood out was this one dark blue block twice the size of cinderblock in the center of the room, looking like someone had just left it there.
"Where's the water?" Klein asked.
"I guess it would be too easy for there to just be water available." Shampoo bemoaned. "If it's like some games, I think doing something to that cube there will give us some water."
"Like open a fountain?" Issin asked. Shampoo shrugged. "Good enough for me."
"Hold on, let's take a look at the block first." Nabiki insisted.
"Probably the best idea." Kasumi said, seeing a handle of a sort on the glass door. She grabbed and pulled, and the door moved rather easily, like a shoji screen, disappearing into the stone walls of the halls until it couldn't be seen anymore.
Everyone tentatively walked inside, cautious of a potential threat. Nabiki immediately went to get a closer look at the dark blue cube. "There's writing on it. But it's upside-down. That's... inconvenient to say the least. But it's at least Japanese."
The mercenary then got on her hands and knees in an attempt to get in a better position to read. And while she wasn't as prudish as her other sisters, even she was a bit embarrassed by the fact that she was basically presenting her ass to a group of men. Nonetheless, she forced that down to try and read.
"You could just do this." Ranma said, getting up to the block and picking it up. The portion of the floor it had been atop was exposed revealing a hole the size of a grapefruit that was pitch black down below. "Huh, it's lighter than it looks." The pigtailed young man commented while turning the block so the text would be easier to read.
Nabiki sprung to her feet. "Ranma! That could have been a very bad idea!"
As if to prove her right, the room started to tremble a bit.
"This is bad!" Dynamm said as the trembling got worse little by little.
"What does it say Nabiki?" Ranma asked, presenting her the dark blue stone.
She struggled to read when it was difficult to keep it or herself steady. "Move... this... stone... and... you will... get water."
"Well, that doesn't sound too bad." Ranma said, hoping for the best.
It was at that moment that a blast of water came from the hole between Ranma and Nabiki, soaking them both and pushing them back with the force of a firehose. The water showed no signs of stopping and quickly started to flood the floor.
"Too much water! We have to get out of here!" Klein yelled, instinctively shielding himself with his arms.
Everyone agreed and ran out of the room, forgoing any attempts to bottle the water or even drink it directly. It was rising really quickly, already getting up to their knees. When they all were out, Kasumi went to the glass door and pulled it out of the wall, closing it and cutting off the potential flood. The water in the hall, now cut off from the source, spread out and became no deeper than a puddle while the room continued to fill up rapidly.
"I think we might be the first people in history to ever say we found too much water in a desert." Kunimittz joked, feeling a lot of water collected in his shoes and bothered by it. He wasn't the only one.
Ranma tried wringing some of the water out of his hair. "Well I'm sure there's some way we can benefit from this."
Crack!
Everyone immediately looked at the glass door. The room was almost completely flooded and the door had a large crack going right across it, with some water leaking out.
Crack!
Another break in the door appeared.
Everyone immediately darted down the hall faster than a group of angry women chasing Happosai.
Then the door shattered and so much water surged out of the room, rushing down the hallway as if preying on the players trying to outrun it. Each was running as fast as they could, which at their current levels was roughly as fast as the average high school athlete, but it wasn't fast enough.
The water swept them all up in its current, taking them down the hallway and past the fork that had taken them to the water room in the first place. There was nothing in the hall for them to grab onto or use to escape the current, so they had no choice but to go where it took them, hoping it wouldn't kill them.
The water led them to a large room, with a lowered floor so it practically poured them into it rather than crashed them instead. But they had stopped moving now since the depth wasn't significant yet and there was no more current.
"Everyone look for a way out!" Shampoo shouted, standing up now and completely certain that staying here would be lethal to them all.
A quick survey of the room proved that suspicion more right than she wanted to be. The room was a large cylindrical chamber with nothing on the walls they could use as leverage. The only way out was the way they had entered, and exiting that way was clearly impossible. But the roof was rather high up and even looked to be potentially open.
"It's like we're in a giant well!" Ukyo shouted to be heard over the roaring water which was still flooding the room, levels right now up to their chests. "Maybe we can float to the top and get out!"
"What if we can't?" Harry One asked, struggling to keep afloat.
"If you have a better idea please give it!" Akane yelled, panicking thanks to her history of being unable to swim. One thing she hadn't been willing to test yet was whether or not game skills would help her swim, but right now sink or swim was her only option whether she liked it or not.
Ranma got up to her and wrapped his arms around her from behind. "I gotcha Akane. I'm not going to let you drown." This calmed her a little, but she was still scared.
Everyone had no choice but to ride the water levels up and hope their salvation was at the top. Problem was staying afloat was easier said than done. Sure, the room itself was big enough for everyone to keep their heads in the air, but they had to be close to do so. And that wasn't the real problem.
"Everyone take off your armor! It's weighing us down!"
Right away each player pulled out their menus and started putting their armor and equipment and pretty much any worn item that weighed more than a shoe into their inventory. Now they were light enough to float without trouble.
Then trouble showed up anyway.
"The opening! It's covered in a grate!" Issin yelled in horror when the way out came into view, and of course was revealed to be obstructed by wooden bars making a grid.
"Why am I not surprised?" Nabiki groaned. "There's still got to be a way out. Can we break the bars?"
"With what?" Ranma asked.
"Hold on." Ukyo said, taking one of her smaller axes out of her inventory. She threw it at one of the bars and luckily the blade hit the bar. It rebounded and fell in the water, sinking to the bottom before anyone could grab it. "There! A crack in the beam! It's not an immortal object!" The chef told everyone.
Everyone of course started attacking the bars with whatever weapon they could pull out once they got in reach. Hacking at the bars proved slow work, and the rising water made them act faster as they would soon run out of air.
"C'mon, hurry and break!" Ranma hissed as they were running out of room. Soon enough they'd be forced to try and stick their heads out the holes in the grate just to keep breathing. And even then there was no guarantee that the next room wouldn't flood and still drown them. Breaking the grate was their only chance to survive.
Akane grabbed a bar that was cracked in two places and pulled with all her game-permitted might. After a few tugs she succeeded in breaking the bar. "I got it!" Grabbed other places she pulled herself up through the new opening and climbed out of the water atop the grate.
"The hole's not big enough for us all to fit through." Nabiki pointed out, judging the area of the hole and calculating that maybe only Ukyo and Kasumi could fit through it without getting stuck. "You gotta destroy it from your side."
Not bothering to look around, Akane moved from the grate and immediately pulled up her menu to retrieve one of her weapons, more specifically a warhammer. It was suggested to her as a joke idea, but the fact was Akane was comfortable using hammers and swords when she wanted weapons.
She tapped on the button in her inventory and the iron hammer materialized in her hands, heavy but she had enough skill to use it here. She reared it above her head, ready to smash the grate like so many boys before had been smashed.
"Get her!"
All of a sudden Akane felt herself being struck from behind by what felt like a rope that wrapped around her, limiting her movements. "You got to be kidding me!" She yelled angrily, falling to her knees and dropping her hammer which clanged on the bars but didn't break them.
"I got her!" Someone yelled, a man judging from the voice.
"Don't kill her. The boss wants them all alive first." Another man claimed. Footsteps showed they were both heading closer to Akane.
"You just made a huge mistake jackasses!" Akane yelled, rolling off the grate as the others underneath were able to make the hole bigger. She was able to get a better look at the newcomers. Both were males, maybe two years younger than herself, and didn't look that different than normal boys to her. One had messy blonde hair but the hair was so unnaturally yellow it was like it had been dyed with lemons. He was dressed in a grass green kendo outfit with a midnight blue vest and had a sword at his hip. The other boy had natural black hair that spiked at the sides and wore a white sleeveless shirt with black elbow length gloves and dirty light blue pants, along with leather armor on his torso and shoulders. His weapon appeared to be a kanabo. The only thing they both had in common was a green bandanna loosely hanging from their necks.
Ukyo crawled out of the hole, pausing only to get her sopping bangs out of her eyes, and with another hole made Klein was able to emerge too. This was good as there was virtually no room left to breathe under the grate.
The new guy with the kanabo tried to attack Klein right away. Klein had no weapon or armor ready thanks to being in the water, but he was quick enough to get out of the hole and dodge before the attack could get him. The studded club instead hit the grate and shattered a good portion of it, allowing the rest of the two guilds in the water to get out and the new guy to almost fall into it.
"Thought I was going to drown." Dynamm muttered.
"Nobody make a move!" The new guy with the sword ordered, weapon in hand now. It looked like a claymore but shorter in length. "By the time you pull up your menus and tap the first button we both will have beaten you to red." He was of course referring to the low end of a players Health bar. "Just stay still and you'll be a lot happier for it."
"Hey boss, this is Kero. Me and Will have some people and we're sure they're the ones you've been looking for." The guy with the kanabo said through an audio message link to another member of his group.
"Who are you and what do you want with us?" Nabiki asked, trying to identify this new enemy.
"We're part of the Glorious Storm guild, members of the wind division." Will answered. "We're the scouts of our guild, and we've been assigned to find some people we were told would be on this floor today."
"Well you're not getting us!" Ranma said, pouncing without bothering to get anything out of his inventory. This surprised the two enemies as they had assumed no one would bother attacking them unarmed, but Ranma didn't need a weapon to fight.
He went to Will, the one he suspected could do the most damage to others, and performed one of the specific attacks of his Martial Arts skill. He attacked quickly with a right fist then a left and a right again, followed by a kick. This move was called a Human Hammer, and did twice the damage it would normally cause if he simply attacked without the skill. And if done right the victim would go flying into another person or two and do damage to them as well. Since there was no one behind Will, he just crashed into the stone wall of where they were now.
Kero made a move to try and hit Ranma, but Shampoo made a move to hit Kero. Also unarmed, she used a Martial Art move called Disarming. This move made her first attack the arms of her opponent then grab them and increase her Strength to heighten the pressure of her grip, forcing them to drop their weapons while she herself spun around to behind them. Not to be used when the enemy outnumbered her of course, but it worked here and Kero dropped his kanabo which sunk to the bottom of the water pit. Speaking of which, in the commotion of the fight no one had noticed that the water level was no longer rising, having stopped just below the rim.
Using her free arm Shampoo got Kero in a headlock and applied pressure to make him fall on his knees. "What does your guild want with us? You spoke as if you were hunting for some specific players. Why? What do you want?"
"I'm just a scout. My job is to locate and trap, I wasn't told why you were the targets."
"And you never bothered to ask? Geez you're as dumb as the boys at my school." Akane claimed, putting back on her armor and reequiping her weapons despite how wet she was. And she wasn't the only one doing this.
That was when a barrage of arrows shot at great speed came at them all, bouncing and denting some armor but essentially not harming them. Even so, it got their attentions. The Aincrad Wrecking Crew and Furinkazan turned and saw four men wielding currently empty bows aimed at them. Each looked different but all four wore light blue bandannas around their necks.
"Are these the ones you want Boss?" One of the archers asked.
"I shall see." The one dubbed 'Boss' replied, heard but not seen.
Several people in the Wrecking Crew got wide eyes and a sense of dread at the sound of the voice. 'No, it couldn't be.'
Sadly, their fears turned out to be true.
"Good job men, you found the ones I've been after." Tatewaki Kuno, dressed in a blue haori and hakama that looked strikingly similar to his real life kendo outfit, said regally while he walked into view. His eyes were locked right on Akane and Ranma, the former still tied up but her sisters were working on getting her free.
"So you made a guild of your own eh Kuno?" Ranma said. "Who's stupid enough to still follow you around?"
"Don't mock our boss." One of the archers said defensively.
"Boss, what moron calls themselves 'boss' in a game? Makes them sound like a monster." Ranma added.
Kuno took out a sword, not a bokken but a genuine sword. A curved sword to be more precise, the same kind Klein used. "I've been looking for you Ranma Saotome. I know you were behind this disaster we've all been put in, all so you can make me weaker than you, and I will vanquish you before you do the same to me."
"Oh for crying out loud Kuno do you even realize how stupid you sound?" Ranma said angrily. "This is low even for you!"
"Were you involved in the creation of this game?" One of the archers asked. "Are you responsible for us being trapped here?"
"No you dumbass! Do I look like a game maker? And why would I put myself in here if I wanted to trap people? Who intentionally puts themselves in their own trap?" Ranma argued.
"Don't listen to him men. He is a monster that is trying to kill us all and we must rid the world of him while he is weakened." Kuno declared.
The men following Kuno chose to listen to him and reloaded their bows quickly. But before they could properly aim, all of the Furinkazan guild moved to shield Ranma, weapons ready as well.
"I don't know who you are or what gave you this stupid idea, but if you intend to become a PK-er that makes you our enemy." Klein stated.
"We don't want to be PK-ers, we just want out of this game." One of the archers claimed.
"And how is killing this guy going to get you out of here?" Klein asked.
"Some of the people who made this game have to be in here too. Maybe if we kill them all the game will automatically end and we can go home where it's safe again." Another archer said.
'What a bunch of cowards.' Nabiki noted. 'They're afraid of being in this game and rather than wait it out they're looking for a way to end it immediately, and thanks to Kuno's idiocy again being taken too seriously they've got the idea that people like Kayaba are in this game and vital to keeping it active. I could go on about how stupid this is, but there's no point in it here. Instead, we should just fight them off and get out of here.'
With everyone focused on the standoff, no one really saw Will get back on his feet and charge at Ranma from the side. Though they did catch the motion before he reached his target, and Shampoo released Kero to intercept him. She repeated her Disarming move again to prevent him from stabbing Ranma.
Archers fired, and Klein's group moved to block the arrows before charging at the archers themselves, who had no choice but to pull back.
"Fear now my men, for I will defend you." Kuno announced for his troops while charging back at Furinkazan, aiming mainly for Klein as he had been the one that spoke back to him. The two had their curved swords clang together and Kuno quickly pulled his weapon back for a follow-up attack, trying to mimic his favored method of dozens of strikes in very quick succession. His stats regarding Speed in Attacks was below what he wanted, but still above Kleins so he was able to strike sooner.
Or he would have had he not been outnumbered and Klein's companions had intercepted the second strike. All this did was throw off the rich boy's trajectory and miss his target, but it didn't defer him. Kuno was never one to quit just because someone got in a lucky shot. Adjusting his wrist Kuno moved his sword to swing at the boys circling him, almost like he was trying to cut their heads off.
Issin raised his arm so that the armor on it would block the sword, then reached once the blade stopped to grab Kuno's wrist. Harry One and Dynamm grabbed Kuno from behind and forced him down on the ground, using their feet to keep him down. Other members of Furinkazan were trying to fend off the archers who were trying to attack from a distance.
Meanwhile, the Wrecking Crew had cornered both Will and Kero against the wall of the hallway. Both scouts were unarmed and presumably helpless, with their health bars in the yellow zone now, but they didn't look like they were going to surrender.
"Let us make one thing perfectly clear to you both so you can tell the others." Nabiki stated, daggers in hand. "Your leader is an idiot and you're being used by him."
"Why should we listen to you? You don't know him at all." Kero asked.
"I was one of his classmates. I know him quite a bit better than you do." Nabiki corrected. "Kuno is not what you can call a down-to-earth man. He sees the world through a filter and puts himself on a pedestal. You are better off having anyone else as your leader."
"Of course you'd say that." Kero said, taking out a knife from one of his pockets and throwing it at the mercenary. The others weren't quick enough to catch it with their hands already full, so Nabiki took the blade in the shoulder given how she rarely wore armor under her wolf pelt, which she currently wasn't wearing.
"You're a dead man!" Akane yelled, pissed that someone had actually attacked her sister like this. She swung her hammer and hit him in the gut, making him collide with the wall again and his health bar drop to red.
Will got the right idea and chose to run off towards Kuno. "Boss I don't think we're prepared for this."
'I hate to admit it but he's right.' Kuno thought. 'I was prepared for just Saotome's group, not a second group with them. My partner's here are not suited for this combat yet.'
"Everyone pull back. We'll call for Lightning and Thunder later and hold off these fiends while we wait." Kuno ordered. "We must not yield this site to these ones. We've found water in the desert, that is an advantage we must not surrender to our enemy."
'He's got that right if nothing else. A spring in a desert is a good thing to have a claim to.' Shampoo thought as Nabiki removed the knife from her and dropped it to the ground. 'We have to force this idiot away from here. Maybe we can find a way to claim it as guild property before he can.'
Kuno's group pulled back, leaving Kero behind. Klein's group followed to see where they were going, and the Wrecking Crew did the same. The hallway soon ended and connected to a large sandstone room that lacked any form of decoration or design save for some skeletons laying around the floor. It was pretty much just a pale yellow brick chamber with three doors, one for each of the three other walls, and two square holes possibly doubling as windows on the center wall covered with leather drapes. Streams of light could be seen coming through, showing it was still day and they weren't underground anymore.
One of the doors was open, implying Kuno's guild had already left. Everyone else stopped inside the room, not sure what to do now.
"We could fight them off, but wouldn't it be wiser to just teleport out of here and throw them off?" Dale asked.
Before anyone could respond, a menu window appeared before Shampoo says 'Congratulations, quest completed' and had a button with the text 'Claim prize' under it.
"Wait, what quest?" Ukyo asked, seeing the window too. "You mean that quest we got when the buzzards attacked us?"
"I didn't accept any others, that must be it. Maybe that note was a code or riddle to fight this place, and now that we're here it counts as completing the quest." Shampoo said, tapping the button to claim her prize now. A piece of paper materialized in her hands, and she could see the word 'Deed' on it. "Oh wow! We have a second base now!"
"A second base?" Kasumi repeated, and got a nod. "That will certainly help us if we ever lose our first home or if one of us occasionally wants a night to themselves."
"Hold on." Akane said, then looked to Klein. "We already have a house here. If you guys don't, it would be wrong of us to have two."
"We have our own base too. Sure we don't mind camping out at night, but yeah we're not homeless here. You guys keep it." Klein reassured.
"Alright, though don't think you can't visit when you're in the area. and if you need a place and we're not here message us and we'll let you in." Shampoo said, pulling up a menu regarding guild property. "What was the name of that guy's guild again?"
"I think one of them said Glorious Storm or something like that." Nabiki suggested. Shampoo immediately set to work on typing. "You blocking access for them?"
"Wouldn't you?" The Chinese girl asked.
"Of course I would."
An interesting feature about owning property in Aincrad was you could forbid some people or guilds entry into either all or part of it if you owned a place and knew how to identify them by name. There was currently no way to confirm that there was a way around this 'No Trespassing' feature, so it didn't hurt to have natural barriers and actual locks on doors too. Especially given how this feature didn't keep out some NPCs like insects or vermin. The Aincrad Wrecking crew had already put Kuno, Kodachi, Kibao, and PoH on their 'Forbidden' list regarding their primary home, and Shampoo was setting that up here for this desert base.
"Oh no you don't!" Kero yelled, coming at them from the hallway behind themwith the knife he had previously used on Nabiki, this time not throwing it but lunging at the purple-haired girl.
Shampoo reacted on reflex and took out her sword to fend him off. She had moved in a hurry due to already having her hands busy at the screen typing and as a result misjudged her swing. Her sword slashed across his middle and left a good cut mark on him, and his HP bar dropped lower. Too low. It reached zero, and Kero burst apart into shards that quickly dispersed.
Everyone was stunned silent, none more so than Shampoo who dropped her sword at this while her cursor turned red.