Court of Thorns: A LitRPG Story Read online

  Internal strife is never fun, Hawke thought as he nodded, accepting what the Elder told him. With those words, the Evergreen Circle had committed to keeping the peace even if it meant fighting their fellow Wild Fae. He appreciated the gesture, although he knew it wasn’t completely disinterested. Subduing rebellious Woodlings had no doubt cemented the Circle’s hold on the entire area.

  “What terms do you seek for this alliance?” he asked.

  “To stand alongside each other against any who threaten both of our lands. We are currently being beset by foes. We would ask for your aid.”

  Hawke had suspected something like that was going on. “I need to know more before I commit my Domain to war.”

  “There is no war, at least not yet. First, you must know that the unclean thing who once was Huntsman Laryn of the Seelie Court was not acting on its own. It served not only Undeath itself but also the Court of Thorns, a faction of the High Sidhe which all others – Seelie, Unseelie, and Wild – fear and hate. The Court of Thorns claims to fight for the freedom of all Fae and seeks to overthrow the Makers themselves. They are mad. When Laryn spoke of alliances, we turned against it. It corrupted some of us, however. In time, he might have turned us all into Undead monsters.”

  “I thought I took care of that.”

  “So you did. But new emissaries have arrived. Living ones, untainted by Undeath but ridden with Chaos. They demand the same thing Laryn did: allegiance, or rather subservience. Ultimately, they seek to enslave us, root and branch.”

  “And you told them off.”

  “We refused to bow to them, yes. We feared retaliation, and we were not wrong. They have begun to send raiding parties against us. Woodlings are being killed, trees cut down, beasts slaughtered for pleasure rather than meat. Some of your people have been attacked as well.”

  “So I’ve heard.”

  Over the past few days, there had been three encounters with new enemies: Elves, or Elf-like gangs. Each group had consisted of six to ten members, with an emphasis on missile classes but always with a mage of some kind and a few summoned Fae-attuned Elementals for muscle, levels six to nine. One encounter had resulted in a party wipe for a group of low-level Eternals; another had been an inconclusive skirmish, and the last one had happened the day before. Tava and her Rangers had chased down the attackers and wiped them out. Nobody had been able to figure out where the raiders had come from, until now.

  “We have a common enemy, then,” Hawke said. “We can fight it together. I will send more of my Guild members to the foothills, provided that they are allowed to do so and supported by your own fighters.”

  Quest Accepted: A Common Foe

  Raiding parties from the Court of Thorns threaten the Shadowy Foothills. You have agreed to assist the Evergreen Circle to repel them.

  Quest Objective: Kill sixty Court of Thorns servants.

  New Guild Quest Available: Kill Six Court of Thorns servants (2,000 XP, 8 gold, 1 Good Quality random item). Progress in Guild Quests will count towards the main Quest’s completion.

  Quest Rewards: 5,000 Experience, 25 gold. +250 Reputation with Evergreen Circle. Formal alliance. Free passage through Shadowy Foothills except for three areas designated as Restricted: Elder’s Woods, Grove of the Circle, and Tribal Meeting Grounds. The Circle will provide military assistance if the Sunset Valley Domain is attacked (actual level of assistance will depend on circumstances but will never represent less than ten percent of the Circle’s total military strength).

  Failure Penalties: -300 Reputation with Evergreen Circle. Alliance will be broken.

  Seems fair to me, Hawke thought.

 

  Which means they want us to get involved. And doing what the enemy wants is never a good idea.

  Problem was, sometimes you had no choice. Hawke accepted the Quest, which formalized the alliance and committed his Guild and Domain to fight the Court of Thorns. Since he had been fighting their agents for a while now, his decision simply formalized the conflict.

  He and Tava exchanged a glance before Hawke finished going through the rest of the formalities. War was back on the menu, just in time for his wedding. Which meant that his present for her couldn’t wait for the honeymoon.

  Six

  They lay together inside Saturnyx’s private domain in companionable silence before Hawke spoke.

  “I brought you something from my last trip to Akila.”

  “Something pretty? Knowing you, it is something practical, isn’t it?”

  “It is something practical,” Saturnyx said. She was lying on Hawke’s other side. A Hawke sandwich you might say, and there was no other place he’d rather be.

  “What can I say? I’m a practical guy.”

  “And I love you for it. Fripperies are something I can find for myself and your taste in such things is somewhat lacking. I’d rather see a dagger or new arrowheads from you.”

  “This is something a little different,” Hawke said, and summoned the Soul Jar from his Inventory.

  At first glance, it looked like a bulbous container made of some glasslike substance, deep green with marblelike veins of purple and blue, about the size of a two-liter soda bottle. Tava gasped when she examined it with her Mana Sight and saw the dense energies running through those veins: Death, Life, Time and Soul magicks. All those Elements and Forces had been folded and hammered together into a structure that could contain the unique energy pattern that was the sum total of a living being: memories, personality, and the events that had shaped them.

  “It is said that those devices are impossibly expensive,” Tava said, awe in her voice.

  “If by impossibly expensive they meant a hundred and fifty thousand gold denars, they were right. Turns out that Greg was sitting on a treasure trove. The Soul Shards. Had to pay fifteen Shards per Jar.”

  “Per jar? You bought more than one?”

  “The Emporium had three. I cleaned them out. One for you, one for Gosto, one for Kinto.”

  They were family. You did everything you could for family. He’d plunked down the forty-five Soul Shards (leaving him with 68, after counting the two Shards he had gained for killing Kaiser Wrecker) without a second thought. What better way to use blood money than to preserve the lives of those he cared about? A part of him still felt guilty about using them at all, but that didn’t stop him from doing it.

  “Hawke… Hawke, I love you.”

  “I love you. I do not want to lose you because of a moment of bad luck. But before you start thinking you’re immortal, using these things isn’t as easy as what Eternals like me get.”

  “Of course not. I’ve watched you die three times, after all. I suppose this Jar will bring me back only once.”

  “For starters. The process isn’t free, either.”

  “Tell me what I need to know.”

  “First, you have to bind yourself to the Jar. That requires a permanent Mana Sacrifice of 2 points per level, and every time you gain a level, you will lose another 2 Mana.”

  “Not a small price to pay, but worth the expense, I would say. What else?”

  “When you die, your body will not disappear like an Eternal’s. It will be like any other body, and your possessions will stay behind as well. You could lose all your gear and equipment if you die somewhere where they cannot be recovered.”

  “I will endeavor not to die alone, then.”

  “The Reincarnation will take place in twenty-four to forty-eight hours. You will arrive at the location of the jar, in a perfect copy of your original body from the last time when you bonded to the Soul Jar. So you’ll want to ‘update’ the bond whenever you gain a level or acquire new abilities or you will lose them if you die. That takes a few seconds, so you might as well do it as often as possible.”

  The whole process was eerily familiar to Hawke. It was like saving a game in progress. Except it applied to living people.

&n
bsp; “Finally, you will lose some Identity if you die. Three points. That’s not a lot, but you’ll still forget stuff. Childhood memories. The name of an acquaintance. It could be anything.”

  “I have forgotten much already. I barely remembered the face of my mother before I saw her again in my vision. As long as I remember the important things, I will be fine.”

  “Okay. Here you go.”

  She took the Soul Jar with both hands and concentrated. Soft green light flowed from her into the device as her Mana created a bond that would transcend death. Hawke felt as if a huge weight had been lifted off his shoulders. Even if something went wrong, even if he screwed up, Tava wouldn’t pay with her life. At least once. Soul Jars couldn’t be reused; once they released someone’s spirit back into their body, the device would crumble into powder. That was a lot of trouble and expense to provide something that Hawke and his fellow Eternals had just for existing.

  Not for the first time, he wondered why the Makers didn’t simply turn everyone, or at least every Adventurer, into immortals like himself. Surely they had the power to do it.

  “If they did have that ability, what need would they have of you and the tens of thousands they took from your world?” Saturnyx said, snuggling closer to him. “The answer is simple: they do not.”

  “Not fair, reading my thoughts even while I’m inside your pocket dimension.”

  “You keep being surprised by the lack of fairness in the Realms. It’s almost endearing, like finding someone who is amazed by every morning’s sunrise.”

  Being in a relationship with someone who could read your mind – two someones, since Saturnyx rarely saw fit to hide anything from Tava – should have been a complete dumpster fire, but everyone seemed to be happy with it, Hawke included. At the very least, he knew that people trying to spread lies against him would get nowhere with them. Even better, Hawke didn’t need to explain himself to them. They knew what he meant whenever he said something. And they let him know if anything bothered them rather than waiting for him to figure it out.

  “Anyway,” he went on before he drifted off to sleep. “Don’t think you’re immortal. I’ll tell the same to your brother. Kinto will figure out for himself.”

  “That he will,” Tava said. “I can only hope that one day you will as well.”

  “Hey. The last time I got killed it wasn’t my fault.”

  “True for once,” Saturnyx agreed. “But you went on to ambush a sniper team by yourself right after, and wandered off alone into a city full of Undead not once but twice, all within a day of your demise.”

  “She’s right, you know,” Tava added.

  Hawke knew he couldn’t win that argument, so he didn’t try.

  Seven

  “Welcome to my home, Lady Kassia.”

  “Thank you, Lord Hawke. Where is my daughter, may I ask?”

  “Tava is on patrol but will be arriving shortly. But please, sit down. Would you care for something to drink?”

  “That would be lovely.”

  Tava had inherited Kinto’s green eyes and expressive eyebrows, but her facial features and curly brown hair came directly from the imposing woman who strolled into Hawke’s home as if she owned it. Kassia looked more like Tava’s older sister than her mother; one would guess her age to be in the early thirties or even late twenties, rather than someone close to Kinto’s seventy-seven years. Something about her eyes showed that she was no inexperienced girl, though. Hawke had noticed the same in her ex-husband; they had seen a lot.

  Kassia’s mouth was set in a thin smile as she looked around. The floating stat box over her head was filled with question marks, but her Health and other Characteristics were a match for Horosha’s. Unlike the mysterious swordsman, she didn’t have any Mana Channeling abilities or a Tier level. One glance using his special senses told him that all her Chakras were closed. Interesting.

 

  Their loss, Hawke thought as he showed Kassia to the central open-air atrium where he and Tava (and, until recently, Nadia) entertained visitors. Despite being late Juno, it was a nice enough afternoon, although in an hour or so the temperature would rise to uncomfortable levels until sundown brought it back down. Four Roman-style reclining couches were arranged around a low circular table. Orelia, an older widow that Hawke had hired to help with the household, soon showed up with tall glasses of chilled sangria and a bowl of dried fruit.

  The Adventurer sat on one of the recliners. She wore black leather pants and a jerkin, a peasant blouse of white silk, and knee-height boots. Her only visible weapon was a ten-inch dagger hanging from a belt. She moved the scabbard out of her way with practiced ease before sampling the drink. She nodded appreciatively and nibbled on some dried peaches, looking just like Tava when she enjoyed a snack.

  “Horosha spoke highly of you,” she said. “And in the days since I’ve been here, people hereabouts do nothing but heap praise upon their Eternal Lord, who brought peace to the Sunset Valley and prosperity to all.”

  “Wait until tax season and you’ll hear plenty of them curse my name.”

  Her smile widened into something friendlier. “I haven’t met many Eternals, but all of them seemed to take themselves quite seriously. I am glad you are not one of them.”

  “I try.”

  “You have done quite a lot with this place. When I was last here, the town was withering away; the last mine had closed years before and many people were leaving, looking for better prospects. I was one of them, of course.”

  Hawke nodded but didn’t say anything. That simple statement covered up a lot of drama. Kassia had abandoned her family and gone back to adventuring, sticking Kinto with the job of raising two children, one of them barely a toddler. Hell of a thing to do to three people who had become Hawke’s friends and allies. And future wife in Tava’s case.

  “I spoke briefly with Kinto before coming here,” she went on. “He has done well since returning to the Path.”

  Kinto had reached level fourteen. A few skirmishes with Woodlings and a whole slew of administrative and guild quests had gotten him there. He had also regained much of his former youth, something that Kassia had managed as well. Hawke supposedly would never get any older, which he still didn’t quite believe in his gut. He’d been twenty-seven when he’d gotten here, only a few months ago, so getting old wasn’t much of an issue for him.

  But Kinto and Kassia had spent almost three decades adventuring in the Common Realm without making it to level ten. Without access to Proving Grounds and high-power Quests, you could spend months without earning any Experience, and years without gaining a single level. The Common Realm had also been going through a low-Mana phase at the time. Monsters had been rare and most adventures involved normal mortals and animals. Kassia had overcome those hurdles after leaving Orom; Hawke wondered what price she had paid to get to her current level.

  “Kinto is a good man,” was all he said.

  “That he is.”

  He nodded while Kassia ate a few more dried apricots in silence. Hawke wondered how that reunion had gone, but he figured that as long as nobody had been murdered, it was none of his business.

  “Even in my home – Crystal City, the gateway to the Elemental Planes – we have heard rumors of thousands of Eternals appearing in the Common Realm,” Kassia said after the uncomfortable pause. “None have yet risen to the greater Realms, but such a momentous event has resonated everywhere, for immortals have a way of swiftly advancing on the Path. As you yourself have done. Imagine my surprise when my own daughter informed me that she had taken up with one of them.”

  “Tava mentioned speaking with you. She thought you were in the Warring Plains.”

  Kassia smiled. “She guessed correctly. I was under hire in Eastern Valhalla. The Giants there have grown restless, and the Aesir were in need of mercenaries. Horosha and I earned out salt during that campaign. After it was over, I made arrangements to visit Orom. Tava had mentioned
your betrothal and your plans to marry in Juno.”

  “You made it just in time. The wedding is in two days.”

  The local calendar was very similar to the one Hawke was used to in Earth, which made sense; both were based on the Roman version. Juno was considered to be a lucky month for marriages, and they were going to barely make it, having set the date for the last week of the month. Next to last day, to be exact.

  “I was not certain I’d arrive in time to witness your union, to be honest. There were things that needed tending to, unfortunately.”

  You didn’t care enough to make it in time for your daughter’s wedding. And you haven’t asked me one question about your son, Hawke thought. The beautiful and deadly woman sitting in his living room clearly didn’t give two craps about her family. Tava had been right.

  “So what brought you here, Lady Kassia?”

  “You, of course. I wanted to meet the savior of Akila, the new Lord who unified the Sunset Valley and overthrew the dreaded Necromancer. Among many other deeds.”

  “With a lot of help from Tava, Gosto, and Kinto, among many others.”

  “True, but irrelevant. The fact remains that before your arrival, Domort ruled Death Spire and dominated Orom through fear and manipulation. You brought the townspeople together and led them to victory. Your renown grows in leaps and bounds. You have advanced on the Path quickly and in unexpected ways. That is why I came here. To make you an offer.”

  “I see,” was all Hawke said.

  “Come with us. Horosha can train you in the ways of Mana cultivation. He says he’s never seen someone so advanced at your level. You can join our guild, the Silver Fists. We are under the protection of the Red Spear Sect, one of the most powerful organizations in the Realms, with Chapter Houses everywhere from Alfheim to Elysium. We will provide you with gear, magical training, and numerous opportunities to advance on the Path. This minor Domain offers you nothing but stagnation. Come with us, and you will truly live.”