part0043

THE MORNING WAS SUNNY, calm and warm as summer. Perfect weather. And it did nothing to lift the villagers’ spirits. The people trudged along, gloomy and defeated. I counted fourteen survivors in the village. The kitten made it fifteen. Still plenty, if you thought about it. When Sergeant, his sister and his pet first arrived at Pan’s Landing, there had been seventeen villagers, not many more than now. But back then, it had been a group of friends who felt pride for Pan’s Landing. They believed in building it up from a small village into a big town, in defending their home, in working for the good of all its people.

Yes, there had been conflicts even then. Once, I overheard that the second strongest warrior in the village, Rumbler, was refused a seat on the village council and bore a grudge over it. For some reason, Pan wasn’t a fan of Ashot, and the Baker responded in kind, though I hadn’t learned the reason for their enmity. The most senior Hunter, Washington, got into a scrap with Max Dubovitsky for trying to flirt with his daughter. I also heard that one of the Builders that died the previous night had nearly been chased out of Pan’s Landing because of eating narcoshrooms. But all that friction and trouble was local and perfectly solvable. Pan’s Landing more or less fed itself, it was steadily becoming a nicer place to live and it could be defended against the night beasts.

None of that was left now. Not a single Hunter. Not a single strong melee fighter capable of defeating an Alpha. Worst of all, gone was the sense of unity that held the people together. Faith in the river village’s future had gone with it. It was now every man for himself among the survivors. The two Builders took stone and the bony armor plates from the giga-komodos from the storehouse, to reinforce the walls of their rooms. That kid Jerry pilfered what was left of the food in the kitchen, locked himself in the basement and refused to come out. Anna sat in her widow’s veil on the edge of the empty house’s porch, her eyes dull, with a thousand-yard stare and no reaction to what went on around her. Sergeant and his sister were catching up on their sleep. Varya and Shelly disappeared off somewhere, taking Katy and Regina. Edward Samarsky suggested that they were sick of life on the river island and had set off for Orshi-Ur to ask Rumbler for shelter. The Mechanic himself wanted to do the same, but he didn’t know the way to the abandoned veich village.

Nobody cooked breakfast, and there was nothing to cook anyway. Nobody went hunting or fishing. Nobody got ready to defend the village when night fell. It didn’t even look like anyone planned to repair the damaged buildings. Apathy and a sense of doom reigned in the village and all the usual chores were abandoned…

Only the Philosopher stood out from the despondent and despairing crowd. He was enthusiasm itself. Whether from Anna’s healing or from the liquor poured into him to ‘warm him up,’ the Philosopher, who had already been dubbed Diogenes for his night in the barrel, was a fountain of ideas. He suggested building a big raft that the townspeople could gather on at night. They’d take the raft out and anchor it until morning, in the center where the river was deepest and the flow fastest. According to the Philosopher, the night beasts wouldn’t be able to harm the villagers.

Those that had died to the teeth and tentacles of the river monsters quickly shot down his idea. The skeptics believed the raft would be attacked by the beasts that inhabited the river, and everyone on it would be doomed. And they had to keep in mind the possibility of night beasts that were adapted for water, since they’d seen both land and air versions.

Diogenes’s next idea was to spend the night hours under the water — it seemed the night beasts couldn’t smell people through water. Or build some kind of spiky fortress out of one of the houses by hammering hundreds and thousands of yard-long sharpened stakes into the wooden walls, in the hope that the Alphas and Feelers wouldn’t be able to break through the sharp defenses. Or they could spend the night up in the treetops.

The villagers liked the last idea, and I watched from the storehouse roof as some survivors walked across the bridge and looked around for suitably tall trees. The Engineer was in a bad mood after his sleepless night. He told the others that staying in the trees was only a temporary measure, only for warm and calm weather. Living up in the canopy during rains, storms and especially the cold winter was an entirely different matter. And that meant they had to think of something else.

The Engineer himself suggested heading down the mineshaft beyond the nearest hill where Magomed, Yarik and Rumbler used to mine metal. He said that if we built a solid metal door at the entrance, one that the night beasts couldn’t get through, then they could wait out the dangerous nights in the depth of the mine. The trouble was that the metal deposit was a long way away, and it was crazy to hike there and back every day — it would be better to just resettle somewhere else.

Toward the end of the half-hearted discussion, the Mechanic and Engineer suggested returning to the Philosopher’s first idea — a raft on the river. But they wanted to make the raft big and solid, with at least two layers of logs. They wanted it to have a canopy to protect against bad weather, or better yet, just make it a small floating house. If the raft was protected with a strong fence along the edge, and the bottom and sides were protected with sharp stakes for protecting against the river beasts, then it could work, they said.

They discussed all the details of the work to be done for at least an hour while the sun rose high into the sky.

“It’s time to stop this empty chatter and find out who wants to actually build a shelter on the river,” the Philosopher said, casting an eye across the villagers assembled in the yard.

Only one hand was raised — the level 10 mechanic Edward Samarsky was willing to help. Three seconds later, the Engineer’s hand went up too. And that was it. Nobody else wanted to help build the raft. The villagers looked away in shame, but had no intention of joining in.

“Not many, then…” the Philosopher said, his enthusiasm noticeably dropping. “We can’t build a raft like that before nightfall with just three of us. And it won’t solve the Alpha problem, since we’ll have more than ten people… Hell, maybe we really should just go to Rumbler? What do you say, friends?”

I didn’t hear what the Engineer and the Mechanic decided, because a long column of people had appeared on the road leading from the hills. Who were they? The villagers frowned and narrowed their eyes, but went to meet the travelers at the drawbridge. Nobody bared any weapons yet. Not that there were any fighters left in the village anyway. We all looked anxiously into the distance. At least forty people were approaching the river. Most of them were strong men, some with weapons. Although I saw women and children too. And at the head of the motley group was big Rumbler. It looked like he hadn’t had much luck either…

“That was the worst night of my life…” Rumbler said, easing himself down with a wince onto the porch of the common house. “The trouble started in the day. There were already too many people in Orshi-Ur without us, and more and more kept coming in. They had no order, no discipline, just arrogance in spades. High-level and mean, some of them with no limits at all. Yarik went to explain the village rules to some newcomers and they knocked him out with a rock, stripped him bare and took all his weapons and clothes. It was tough, but we managed to take one of the houses for our group. But then the food we’d brought got stolen as soon as we turned our backs on it. Washington caught a zebroid deer and we had to literally fight off those freeloaders for it. I’m not kidding, I killed two of those bastards with my own hands!”

It was true; Rumbler and Washington now had skull symbols above their heads — “has killed players multiple times.” I’d never seen that before. Sounded like true chaos at the abandoned veich village…

“Thieves, low-life thugs…” Washington confirmed. “We couldn’t deal with them peacefully. We tried to convince them that they couldn’t stay more than ten to a house, and that different groups couldn’t get too close to each other. They didn’t listen. They lit fires all over like it was a big party, started dancing. They were cooking some kind of meat. I thought it might be human. Half of them were stoned from eating those blue narcoshrooms and drowseberries. Celebrating their freedom, I guess. They passed around the girls they’d brought. Even tried to drag Rita away…”

“Yeah, we should have come back last night…” Rumbler interjected again. “I could tell it wasn’t gonna end well. We wanted to take two houses at first, but we had no chance. We barely managed to take one, with so many people wanting a roof over their heads… We knew that there were more than ten of us, but we thought we could handle a single Alpha ourselves. We’re experienced, the house was strong, the other night beasts wouldn’t get in. How wrong we were! Far more of the beasts appeared than we expected. And some of them we’ve never even seen before! A huge level 205 Alpha chewed up me and Yarik. Ashot and Rita saw a purple Death Worm, which crawled right out of the ground into our house… Each of us died at least once… We had no chance!”

Wow… It sounded horrible. It seemed the situation at Orshi-Ur was even worse than at Pan’s Landing, although I couldn’t imagine anything worse than the slaughter I’d seen at Pan’s Landing last night.

Yes, the frightened and despairing humans needed support. I had all my abilities on constantly to drive away their fears and heal their mental wounds. But now the question was: what to do next? Especially after thirty more people wanted to go with Rumbler when they left Orshi-Ur in the morning, seeing in the settlers a greater chance of survival. The old Warrior let them join, although he warned the humans in advance that Pan’s Landing wouldn’t take them all.

“Rumbler and Washington, you’re our most experienced players, so take the reins and lead the village!” the Engineer suggested.

Both veterans exchanged glances and agreed a little quicker than I expected. Although Rumbler warned those present that not everyone would like his decisions. And not everyone would have a place in the river village.

Many others had been called into Grip’s former abode one after another before Sergeant. Rumbler was using the house as a headquarters for the new leadership. Some walked out grinning from ear to ear, like Glutton the level 40 Builder, who was made manager of all the construction projects and third leader of the newly created guild, Rumbler’s Refuge. They’d let Varya stay in the village — the level 36 Scout and Shelly had returned from their hunt with rich game, enough to feed fifty hungry mouths. But most walked out in a daze, some even in tears, refusing to talk about what the new leaders had said.

I hurried to climb onto my master’s shoulder; I didn’t want to miss a single word. Sergeant listened to well-wishes from Julie and Shelly and hurried after the level 37 Hunter. Max and Anna turned out to be in the council house alongside the three new leaders. But both sat off to one side. It seemed they could only advise, not make decisions. Rumbler began the conversation.

“Sit!” the bearded ginger level 43 Warrior said, pointing at a spare stool. He seemed to be the leader right now, and the guild name confirmed that. “I think you know why you were called here. There are too many people in this village, and we don’t want a rerun of last night’s debacle. And although Max,” Rumbler nodded toward the Engineer as he humbly sat by the wall, “suggests all kinds of ways to reduce the resident count by night, all the same, we have too many people. We plan to keep only the strongest, the most experienced and the most useful. Seventeen to eighteen people, nineteen at the most. I’ve been told of your arrangements with the last leaders — the right of settlement for the bean sprouts, a free schedule and even a separate room. But the old guild is gone now. All previous agreements are no longer in effect!”

Sergeant looked sure of himself, although he obviously didn’t like the news. He didn’t even look away, just kept his eyes locked on Rumbler until the man turned away first. My master had gained a lot of confidence and self-possession since he’d sat before the guild leaders a week ago. Rumbler continued:

“Among those fifty-four people in the village now, the average level is thirty-two. Yours is just seventeen… Although you are the only Beast Catcher, and your value is obvious. We’d like you to stay. But your little sister Julie is just level fourteen, and the village already has a more experienced Healer…” Rumbler gestured toward the grieving widow in her dark funereal veil.

“I won’t stay without Julie!” Sergeant said without hesitation.

“Don’t interrupt your elders!” Rumbler barked, loud enough that the walls seemed to shake. Oh, my sensitive ears! I was nearly deafened. Rumbler and his ancestors must have earned that nickname (or surname, who knows) for that loud, deep-bass voice. “There’s also your girlfriend, Shelly. She’s far below the average level too, and many believe that there should be no place for a veich in a human village.”

“Essentially, you alone take up three spaces out of seventeen…” Washington began to speak, leaning forward, but Rumbler cut him off with a gesture and continued.

“Spaces are in high demand. And I believe that you must earn the right for Julie and Shelly to stay in the village. There’s one thing… it’s not entirely pleasant, but necessary for all of us. Soon we’re going to sort the people into categories. Some will stay on the island. Some will be allowed to remain on the condition that they leave the village at night,” for some reason, Rumbler glanced at the Engineer as he said those words. “But all the same, there remains a large group of people that we have nowhere to put. We can’t let them stay here, but we can’t throw them to the winds of fate either. I suggest we equip them with everything they need, give them supplies, take them to the energy barrier and send them off into the big wide world. That’s the best our village can do for them. Your girlfriend Shelly said that she went to the barrier with a group of veich Hunters. Take her with you. She can show the way. For her, successful completion of this mission means she has the right to live here. Viking and Yarik will go with you. Just in case the people don’t want to go. Do you understand your task? Then be ready to go in an hour.”