part0015

I SAT ON THE KNEES of a large blond woman with a weathered face and listened to the drawn-out negotiations between my master Sergeant and three authoritative humans of a small forest settlement with the curious name of Pan’s Landing. I meowed louder than usual. Nobody taught me to do it, but the annoying sounds I seemed able to make apparently delighted the woman. She smiled and stroked my ginger fur. The woman’s name was Anna. She was a level 26 Healer and wife of the strongest player in the village, Jonathon Gripson, known as Grip, a musclebound Warrior with a terrible half-moon scar across his face. I don’t know what beast dealt him that wound, but the man was insanely lucky not to lose an eye.

☠ Grip. Human. Male. Guild: Pan’s Landing. Level 44 Warrior.

Grip turned out to be the only one in the room with a skull next to his name. The game manual said the symbol meant “has killed many players,” and a blue nameplate meant “strong for current level.” Grip wore studded leather armor covered in toothmarks and scratches from dangerous creatures. His hand bore wrought-iron rings and a huge club inset with shark spikes, which he brought to these negotiations ‘just in case.’ All this showed Grip to be a fearsome and experienced man, used to relying on brute force.

The second player arguing with Sergeant was, naturally, Pan himself, after whom the island was named. A level 40 Hunter, a scrawny man dressed in skins, with a salt-and-pepper beard, he was the oldest inhabitant of the village. Not only in age, but also in time spent in the new world. I’d already heard the story that Pan was one of a group of seven players that were the first to get through the Icy Pass last year and find themselves in these lands. Only a year had passed, but the old Hunter was the only survivor; his six comrades spent all their lives learning the world the hard way, falling prey to new conditions, dangers, unfamiliar food and harsh climates.

Another present for the conversation was a level 34 Engineer called Max Dubovitsky. He looked about forty-five, and unlike the other villagers, he was dressed in a camo hunting outfit that was obviously from the world of before. His sculpted beard and clean crew cut gave the appearance of an intelligent man who looks after himself. The Engineer was the one asking my master most of the questions, and many of them had a hook. He clearly wanted to catch him out. That incident with the New Pharaohs, for example. The Engineer didn’t believe that a noob could have escaped the slavers’ pursuit. And it was Max Dubovitsky who was putting the heat on my master now:

“How do you not understand, Sergeant?! Three cans of food, a bag of pasta and a bag of sugar is far less than you and your little sister Julie need to buy a place in our village! Yes, we value food here. It’s hard to get. But what you offer is barely enough to feed all seventeen of us villagers once! You feed us once, and then the rest of us will have to feed you all the time! Not good enough!”

A breakdown again… Before this, all Sergeant’s attempts to prove his usefulness by telling them of his past in the army, of his bravery and his discipline, had failed. My master had brought no firearms into the new world, and his army experience couldn’t help him use a club or a primitive sword. The tools Sergeant brought didn’t particularly interest the locals either — their Engineer had already managed to build a forge and a smithy, and then outfitted the village with all they needed.

Just as the skills of the two new players also failed to interest the people of Pan’s Landing before that. That made sense, of course. One-day-old noobs don’t tend to have unique and in-demand skills. All Sergeant’s attempts to talk about how useful he could be in guarding the village, or his wish to catch fish and feed the village, were met with no understanding. According to the natives, the ‘river creatures would swallow up a noob in less than a minute,’ and it was ‘just funny’ to imagine a level four player trying to guard anything!

With one hand, since his left was injured and hung in a bandage, my master put the cans away in his backpack. He didn’t hide his disappointment that he’d failed and wasted time. He looked at his watch, although the old mechanisms were terrible liars in the new world; the day wasn’t the same length, which took them more out of sync every day. Then I looked out of the window. The sun was dropping to the horizon, and these villagers weren’t at all eager to let us stay. True, they hadn’t kicked us out either, just had a long debate with their potential new resident.

Personally, I already saw that we’d be able to come to an agreement with the villagers in the end. And I’d overheard Anna speaking to her husband Grip: “The young man has his head screwed on, and the girl has spirit. And they have a nice kitten! Let’s bring ‘em in!” Trouble was, due to my cat body I couldn’t speak human and calm down my upset owner. Sergeant knew none of this and was obviously worried, and getting worse by the minute. Finally, my master broke and shouted:

“I just don’t understand you people. How can an extra couple of hands be a BAD thing?! Sure, we’re low-level right now. But we’re going to work as hard as we can to help you and get stronger ourselves! And you’ll see, in a month or two, we’ll be at a higher level and we’ll be more use to you!”

The villagers exchanged glances and Pan said something strange that made me prick up my ears, ready to take in important information about the game.

“He’s a newcomer. Doesn’t know anything about the game rules or the night beasts. So he doesn’t see the obvious. Explain it to him, Max!”

The Engineer sighed heavily, put aside his carving knife and wooden figurine of a kitten, and started to tell it.

“The beasts are the true scourge of this new world. Our eternal nightmare. There’s a lot we don’t know about them yet. All we know is that they’re nocturnal creatures — they come out after the sun goes down and disappear in the morning. Coming close to one is certain death unless you can surround yourself with a ring of bright flames in time. But in the wilds, there are relatively few beasts, and the pack’s call can be heard far away, just as the light of their burning eyes can be seen. So you can get out of their way. Settlements are another matter…”

Max took a deep breath and for some reason looked at his right hand, as if wanting to make sure it was there. He must have had some bad memories of those creatures of the night. He continued:

“Settlements attract the night beasts. They lay siege to them every night. We noticed a long time ago that the beast pack appears out of thin air right outside our walls. And we also discovered a pattern pretty early on — the more people in the village, the larger and stronger the pack that spawns outside it. And we aren’t the only ones. The Traveling Cartographer spoke of the same thing happening, as did the werewolves.”

I didn’t ask who the Cartographer was, but I’d seen a ‘werewolf’ (actually a member of the veich race) with my own eyes today. The huge and terrifying six-foot-five upright creature had pulled the unconscious Sergeant from the water and placed him at the feet of an awestruck Julie. The veich was distantly reminiscent of a wolf walking on its hind legs, only with a more human-like face and clad in leather clothes — a sleeveless vest and shorts. The sharp-toothed creature by the name of Darius shook the water out of his fur just like a dog and growled loudly, clearly asking the girl something, but neither of us could understand a word.

Without waiting for an answer to her question, the veich spat in displeasure, picked up Sergeant, tossed him over his shoulder. Then, he bounded along the riverbank in long leaps. Julie and I could do nothing but follow the strange ‘werewolf.’ Only Sergeant’s backpack turned out too heavy for the little girl, so Darius carried it as well. The girl picked me up after I started lagging behind too far with my lame leg. In half an hour of fast walking, sometimes turning into a run on four legs, the werewolf brought us to the human village. There he placed the body outside the fence and hid in silence, not wanting to speak to the residents. Julie and I, along with Sergeant as he steadily came back to his senses after all his knocks, had been in Pan’s Landing since then. We’d been fed and then they’d started interrogating my master.

“One ‘Feeler’ appears for each villager,” Max continued his story, and I felt a strong stench of superstition from the man. “They’re shadow creatures with bright burning eyes. There’s no point shooting them, or cutting them with blades. The Feeler is incorporeal and only takes on physical form at the moment of its attack. Then a long mouth full of teeth like a crocodile’s appears out of the clouds of darkness. At that moment, the Feeler is vulnerable to any weapon.”

“The Feelers are the most numerous, but also the weakest monsters in the night beast pack,” Pan said, picking up where his ally left off. “And they fear the light and can’t go near fire. They don’t like running water either, for some reason. Basically, well-built defenses mean that we don’t even have to deal with the Feelers. They just can’t get into the village. Although sometimes we find Feelers that spit poison, there aren’t many, and they aren’t particularly dangerous. But for every full ten residents in the settlement, one ‘alpha’ is added to the pack.”

Pan fell silent and everyone looked at Grip — it seemed he was the expert on these ‘Alphas’ in Pan’s Landing. The huge Warrior scratched his scar and spoke flatly:

“Uh-huh. The alpha is a stronger beast. It can walk through flame and seep through wooden walls. Alphas look similar to Feelers, but much larger, and they glow red. They can roam for hours along the campfire line, choosing the perfect time to attack. Then they suddenly rush forward, especially if they catch a defender snoozing or not paying attention. They can cut a man in half with two bites. A Warrior with a lot of health takes three or four. Fortunately, if you kill the alpha, then a new beast won’t appear in the pack again until morning.”

“Now judge for yourself, Sergeant,” the Engineer spoke up again. “There are seventeen of us here in the village, including one woman about to give birth any day now. We barely repel the night attacks. And then you two show up… You’re not much use, and you’re definitely some harm — the beast pack will strengthen. And in a few days, when our twentieth resident comes along, we’ll be in real trouble! We’ll have a hell of a hard time against two alphas. People will die. And the three cans of food you offer… Too low a price for the death of our people!

Sergeant sighed heavily and made to grab his backpack, considering further negotiations pointless and clearly planning to leave. I noticed Max Dubovitsky suddenly tense up and start gesturing to the others. Apparently, the locals had planned to just put the fear into the newcomers and warn them of the dangers, but not chase them away. Sergeant suddenly froze, unclasped his backpack again and dug around for some time, then pulled something out from the very bottom. Finally, my master proudly raised a package in his hand:

“You said you can’t farm because you haven’t found any edible vegetables suitable for growing in the new world. How about beans? Here’s half a bag of red kidney beans that you can grow! Want it? Or should I take these seeds to another village?”

Judging by how Anna’s entire body stiffened at the sight of the seeds, I knew at once how immensely valuable that half pack of beans was for these people. They meant a future without hunger, without the need to risk their lives to hunt too-strong monsters just so the village would have something to eat. And the Engineer’s face changed instantly too, breaking into a smile and losing all its anger.

“You should have led with that, Sergeant! Canned meat and sugar are one thing… These seeds are enough to ensure you and your sister get a place in the village. You can stay in my workshop for the time being until the village builds you a new house. As for today, look around, talk to the others, eat in the common house. And as of tomorrow morning, you can get to work. Julie can help out Anna. We have plenty of peaceful women’s work in our village. We’ll find a use for your skills too. Somewhere safe for now until you level up, then we’ll see. You might become a Hunter eventually, like Pan. Or a village defender like Grip. No matter what, though, there is one unbending rule: try anything with my daughter and I’ll kill you!”