Asphodel was grand but intimidating; it was surrounded by moat filled with dark water and had guards that wore thick black armour, with a red plumed feather protruding from the top. Aquila would have liked to say that they patrolled vigilantly, but they were more loitering about carelessly. What was more surprising, though, was the fact that even after they crossed the drawbridge, they still hadn’t entered a safe zone. This meant that the whole city was probably PvP.

  ‘Do we really need in the city? I thought Bega said the quest was just out of Asphodel?’

  ‘He gave me directions, but they were complicated and I didn’t write them down. I know the name of the NPC who gives out the quest though. Besides, don’t you need supplies.’

  ‘Caution comes first Slie. We don’t need to eat and we have enough arrows, and potions.’

  ‘Fine, we’ll get in and get out as quick as we can,’ Slie said.

  The buildings towered around them. They were all made of some kind of black stone; which only added to the cities grim aesthetics. The NPCs all looked shady, like they were ready to pickpocket you at any moment. There was a man in a cloak standing in the corner of a dark alley, fiddling with a rusty dagger. Aquila spotted an older lady with a crooked nose, and what looked to be a glass eye. To their surprise, there were also players in the city, though they were sparse, in groups, and much less common than the NPCs. It was a hard choice between the dark alleys, and the main streets where players could attack them. But as Nixie pointed out, most of them had bright green tags.

  ‘What does that have to do with anything?’ Aquila asked.

  ‘Didn’t you know?’ Slie said, ‘players who’ve killed another player within the last twenty-four hours have tags that glow bright red. You can only see it if your perception is high enough – otherwise you’ll just see the standard green. But if their tags are glowing green, they’re probably safe.’

  ‘Just when I thought I was catching up to you guys in this game,’ Aquila remarked.

  ‘You’ll never catch up to us. That’s a good thing though. It means we’ll always be there to carry you,’ Slie teased.

  Alister’s face flashed through his mind.

  I’m expecting you to carry us Seb.

  ‘Unfortunately, for you it’s not going to stay that way,’ Aquila smiled, ‘I’ll be the one watching you before too long.’

  ‘Okay tough guy.’

  ***

  They ended up approaching an older lady as they passed her in the street; she was the only NPC who looked somewhat friendly. But that turned out to be a ruse. As soon as they started speaking to her, she pulled out a knife and threatened to cut their throats if they didn’t pay her ten coins. She was only level 8, not too much of a threat for the three of them, but the last thing they wanted was to get into a fight in this city. Even if it was with an NPC who had started the conflict. Nixie paid her ten coins without even thinking, she called them suckers and then disappeared.

  They passed a potion shop, but it had boarded up windows and a skull nailed to the door. They decided that wasn’t for the best. Eventually they just decided to ask one of the guards.

  ‘Excuse me,’ Aquila said to one that wandered down the street, ‘would you be able to help us; we need directions.’

  The guard stared at them from behind the narrow slit of his helmet.

  ‘What do I look like – the town guide? Get out of here before I get you thrown behind bars. Or worse, sent to the gallows.’

  ‘Maybe this will change your mind,’ Slie held out a handful of gold coins.

  ‘Slie don’t…let’s just go,’ Nixie protested.

  Aquila was about to agree with her, but the guard reached out its hand and took the money in its gauntlet.

  ‘Okay, what do you want to know?’ the guard asked.

  ‘We’re looking for Baldamir,’ Slie said, ‘he’s supposed to live somewhere close to this city?’

  ‘Old Baldamir,’ the guard laughed, ‘who’d want to visit him!’

  ‘We do,’ Slie said, ‘now can you tell us where he is?’

  ‘I can tell you. For another ten coins.’

  Slie grunted, and pulled another handful of coins from his inventory.

  ‘Stupid NPCs,’ he muttered as he handed the coins over to the guard.

  ‘Take that road out of the city,’ the guard pointed down the road they had just came, ‘and keep going until you see an awkward tree by the black pool. Once you see that, go off the road and head north. Cross two hills. His hut is on the third one.’

  ***

  It turned out that the NPC they needed to talk to wasn’t actually that hard to find. Aquila and Nixie were both worried that the guard might have lied to them, but sure enough, on the road out of the city, they found an awkward looking tree, next to a pool of black water. They headed north, and after crossing two large hills, they came to a small little hut. It was nice in comparison to the rest of the places around that area. It was made of wooden planks, it had a thatched roof and a small little veranda out the front.

  Slie knocked on the door. They weren’t really sure what to expect, but it certainly wasn’t a frail looking old man; who answered the door and beamed at them as though they were three angels who had come to visit.

  ‘Travellers! Come in, please. Come in, come in.’

  Aquila, Slie and Nixie followed the man inside. He led them into what looked like a surprisingly ordinary cottage; they found themselves in a cosy little living room with a large table in the middle, a couch with cushions against one wall, and a stone fireplace with a small little fire crackling in its hearth.

  ‘Oh you three are exactly what I’ve been looking for. Please, come in and have a seat.’

  Nixie, Slie and Aquila each took a seat around the small living room table. The old man sat on the opposite side and placed down some biscuits and a cup of tea in front of each of them. Aquila gobbled his down as soon as the old man let go of the place.

  ‘We heard that you needed a hand with something?’ Slie said.

  It seemed as though he was wasting no time.

  ‘That I do, that I do. And thank goodness you’ve come! Just in the nick of time too; the three of you all seem well equipped for the job at hand.’

  Aquila nudged Slie gently.

  ‘What is it?’ he whispered.

  ‘You going to eat your cookies?’

  Slie rolled his eyes and then moved his plate over towards Aquila, who joyfully grabbed the two cookies on Slie’s plate and shoved them both in his mouth at once.

  ‘Sorry about my friend. What is it you need us to do?’

  ‘Well, you see, quite some time ago, my daughter decided to investigate an abandoned mansion about a half hour walk from here; and hasn’t returned. I’ve ventured down to the mansion, but it seems as there are monsters guarding the entrance. I have a feeling it isn’t as abandoned as I first thought. Please, please, will you find my daughter.

  A text appeared in front of them.

  Rescue Baldamir’s Daughter.

  Accept/Decline.

  ‘Don’t accept it just yet,’ Slie whispered to them.

  Nixie stilled her hand, and it wasn’t a problem for Aquila, who was now gulping down the tea that Baldemir had put in front of him.

  ‘What will our reward be?’ Slie asked.

  Baldemir smiled.

  ‘Experience of course. Oh, and…this.’

  A white scroll appeared in his hand.

  ‘It’s called counter spell. And you can have it if you find out what happened to my daughter.’

  ‘Sorry, not good enough. We want one each,’ Slie said.

  ‘One each. But this is all I have!’

  ‘Three people doing the quest. Three rewards. It’s only fair,’ Slie said.

  Baldemir huffed.

  ‘Fine, if you complete the quest you can have one each.’

  ‘Then we accept.’

  The three of them pressed the accept button on the window in front of them.

  Quest accepted.

  ***

  ‘Well, the two wolves at the front don’t really look all that intimidating. I feel like getting in isn’t supposed to be the hardest part,’ said Aquila as they observed the mansion from a hill in the distance. It was a typical mansion just like any other that you might see in a rich neighbourhood. It was three stories high, it had an iron fence with pointed arrows on the top of each metal bar, a fountain and large windows. However it definitely also looked abandoned. It was run-down, the windows were boarded up, the fountain was dried out, and the iron fence was rusted all over. The gates were open, but there were two level 3 wolves out the front.

  ‘No, that’s definitely only the beginning. We can only survey the place for so long though,’ Slie said, ‘let’s get in and then get, get those spell scrolls and then get out of this wretched land.’

  ‘Race to see who can kill the wolves the fastest?’ Aquila smiled.

  Slie didn’t even answer. Instead he was on his feet, with his bow out – flying down the hill.

  ‘That’s so not fair,’ Aquila said, as he pulled his own bow out and raced after him.

  Aquila was faster than Slie, which meant that he caught up to him quite quickly. But Slie was already shooting at the one of the wolves. One arrow was all it took; and wolf collapsed to the side, dying. Aquila shot at the second wolf, and although he did a substantial amount up damage, the wolf was left with about a quarter of its health. Slie shot another arrow and finished the wolf off.

  ‘I think I win,’ Slie teased.

  ‘Yeah well you did get a jump on me.’

  ‘Will you two stop arguing about who killed a couple of stupid level 3 wolves,’ Nixie ran down the hill after them, ‘let’s just think about conserving our arrows shall we. And our stamina. I can restore some of it, but I don’t have unlimited manna.’

  Slie turned to him and winked. Aquila grinned back. The three of them made there way to the entrance of the rusty gates. It all seemed normal; they walked right through, and along the path that led to the large double-door. They had almost gotten all the way too, without anything out of the ordinary happening, but just as they were meters away, they heard a light pattering sound, and then a hoard of medium sized spiders began crawling down the roofs, through the slits in the boarded windows and around the walls. They all seemed to be level 3, but there was so many of them.

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  ‘Scratch the stealth plan. Shoot! Now.’

  Aquila had his bow out before Slie had even finished his sentence. The two of them began firing arrow after arrow as they ran back toward the gate. The spiders were going down quicker than the wolves had, but they still weren’t going down quick enough. They’d be overrun soon.

  ‘Run Nixie! Go’ Aquila said, shooting off another two arrows and taking out two more spiders, ‘Slie can go invisible, I can outrun them. We’ll hold them off when you put some distance between them.’

  A spider caught up to Aquila, he let go of his bow, it disappeared and before the spider could actually land on him; he slashed it through the torso and it disappeared. But it seemed like another one had just taken its place.

  ‘Move over,’ Nixie said.

  Her hands were glowing white, she stepped in front of them and let off two blasts of wind, one with each hand. It didn’t do enough damage to kill the spiders, but it seemed to be an area of effect spell – and every creature that got hit by the spell staggered back slightly. Not much, but more than enough time to give them the edge. Aquila slashed and slashed. He slashed so fast that his stamina began draining fast.

  ‘Nixie!’

  She knew exactly what he meant. She let off another wind blast sending several spiders flying backwards this time – and with her other hand she let out a green aura which shone around Aquila. Meanwhile, Slie was struggling to defend himself from the creatures that were now swarming him. Nixie unequipped her wind blast spell and equipped a healing spell; so that with one hand she was refilling Aquila’s stamina, and with her other hand she was refilling Slie’s health. Her manna bar was draining extremely fast.

  Slash. Slash. Slash. Aquila cut down another three spiders before they could even attack him. He could see the light at the end of the tunnel now, they were beginning to thin out. He stole a glance over at Slie, who didn’t seem to be defending himself as well. His health bar was dropping faster than Nixie could refill it.

  Aquila grit his teeth and swung his sword faster than he had ever swung it in the game before. He killed eight spiders in less than two seconds, but his stamina dropped to zero instantly. It didn’t matter. That was the last of them. Apart from the ones that were attacking Slie. Nixie had run out of manna now, so Slie’s health bar wasn’t filling up. With one hand he was waving his dagger about uselessly, and with the other he was quickly activating healing items. Aquila pulled his bow back out, and began shooting without any concern of hitting Slie – they were in the same party so they couldn’t do any damage to each other anyway. Aquila shot and shot and shot again. He kept shooting until the last of the spiders were killed and Slie stood there awkwardly with a quarter health left.

  ‘Thanks…’ Slie said, ‘I owe you guys one.’

  Aquila gave him a thumbs up.

  ‘Just give make sure to give me my share of the loot. My stamina’s drained so I can barely move.’

  Slie looked around. It seemed as though the spiders had each dropped a single coin; because all around them there were single coins littered through the courtyard.’

  ‘I reckon we got us a good fifty coins,’ Slie laughed.

  ‘I reckon we do,’ Aquila agreed.

  Aquila took a step forward. He felt like he was moving in slow motion. Slie wandered around and began picking up the gold.

  ‘Nixie, was that just the standard level 1 wind spell. The default that everyone gets when they start?’ Slie asked.

  ‘Yes. I knew it was an area of effect spell. It was the only think I could think of doing.’

  ‘I think it was brilliant. Why don’t you use combat magic more often?’

  ‘My race is suited for healing,’ she replied.

  ‘Yes, but you can have a second combat skill. Aquila and I both train light handed and archery.’

  ‘I’d prefer to just heal.’

  It was clear she didn’t want to talk about the subject any further so Slie dropped the subject and continued to pick up each individual coin that littered the courtyard.

  ***

  They waited in the courtyard for a little over an hour before they actually entered the mansion. With Slie almost out of health, Nixie completely out of manna, and Aquila down on stamina, they decided it was the best play. Nixie was a little anxious that more mobs would appear; but Aquila nothing would happen until they progressed further.

  ‘If the mobs were going to respawn, they would have by now. This place was clearly designed specifically for this quest,’ Aquila said.

  It only took Aquila fifteen minutes for his stamina to regenerate completely. Nixie’s manna took a little longer to return; and when it finally did, she used it to heal Slie.

  So it was an hour of waiting, a slow hour, and an anxious one – as they waited hesitantly in the courtyard of an abandoned mansion, situated on the edges of the lonely plains, but thankfully it was a tranquil hour.

  The three of them stood before the double doors of the mansion.

  ‘Are we ready?’ Aquila asked.

  Nixie and Slie nodded silently. That was all he needed.

  Aquila pushed the door open, and the three of them prepared for combat, Aquila with his sword pointed forward, Slie behind him with an arrow knocked to his bow, and Nixie with both hands glowing – one red and one green. But nothing came at them. In fact, the entrance of the mansion was enveloped in darkness, an odd darkness, Aquila could tell, because even he couldn’t see through it. There was something magical about it – the cracks of the windows should have at least made the place somewhat visible, not to mention the double doors that were wide open. But it was as though there was a shadow about the halls of the mansion that refused to move. Aquila stepped forward – as soon as he did, hundreds of blue torches lit up upon the walls, revealing entrance lobby, a room off to the side and a grand staircase that led up to a close door. The three of them froze, and held their weapons steady, but nothing came at them.

  ***

  The mansion had looked big from the outside, but it really only had three explorable rooms. A living room, with a torn sofa, a stained little coffee table, an odd chess set, and a dull red rug that looked like it had a chunk taken from it. The second room was the dining room. It had a large table in the middle, surrounded by chairs, along with rusted cutlery and a large chandelier. The third room was the library. It was full of large bookcases, stacked with books that were surprisingly intact. Every other door on the first floor was locked.

  ‘I don’t see anywhere else to go down here. I think it’s time to check upstairs. That’s probably where this girl is.’

  The stairs were rickety, and creaked loudly with every step. They led up to a small landing, blocked by a large door. Aquila reached forward to turn the handle with one hand, his sword still at the ready in the other hand. But the handle wouldn’t turn. It was locked. Almost as soon as Aquila let go of the cold metal door handle, a blue text began to appear on the door as though it was being written by the finger of an invisible ghost.

  Some animals crawl, some fly; but horses run. That is the key.

  Then a high-pitched squeal echoed from behind the door; before silence settled once again.

  ‘Oh great. Riddles. I hate riddles!’ Slie said.

  ‘Aren’t you the one who’s always coming up with our fighting strategies and tactics? I thought you were a thinker?’ Aquila said.

  ‘There’s a difference between co-ordinating a fight, and solving a riddle.’

  ‘Well, the game definitely wants us to go through the door – it couldn’t have made it any more obvious.’

  ‘You want me to think, then I’ll think. It says horses run. So why don’t you try running at the door. Maybe you’ll pass through if you do?’

  Aquila rose an eyebrow, and looked at him like he’d just told a bad joke. Nevertheless, Aquila turned and ran at the door as fast as he could, and, with his high agility level, it was pretty fast. The only thing he succeeded in doing was smacking his head on the door and falling backwards. Luckily pain was much less potent in the game, or Aquila would have been in agony. Instead, he felt an uncomfortable tingle where he’d hit his head. He also noticed that he’d taken 2 points of damage.

  ‘Well done genius. You just convinced me to do the stupidest thing I’ve ever done in my life. Charge headfirst at a locked door.’

  ‘At least we know that’s not the way through.’

  ‘It says the horse is the key,’ Nixie said seemingly deep in thought.

  ‘I think it’s talking about running fast Nix,’ Slie said.

  ‘We tried that, and look where it got us,’ Aquila remarked.

  ‘Look where it got you,’ Slie replied.

  Nixie didn’t seem to be listening to them. Instead she ran down the stairs and disappeared into the living room.

  ‘What’s she up to?’ Slie said.

  ‘Tell you what, she’s braver than I am – running through a creepy abandoned mansion on her own,’ Aquila said.

  Nixie came running back up the stairs a moment later, holding a black, chipped object between her fingers. She moved passed them, inserted the black object into the keyhole at the door, and the object disappeared. There was a clicking noise, and the door swung forward without them even having to pull it open.

  ‘What did you just do?’ Slie asked extremely curious. Aquila looked at her too, they were both evidently anticipating an answer.

  ‘I though that lock was an odd shape! And when it implied that the horse was the key, I knew I couldn’t have been mistaken.’

  ‘And…?’

  ‘It was the horse from the chess set.’

  Aquila scratched his chin.

  ‘Wow. I would never have thought of it.’

  ‘Good job, but it looks like we aren’t done yet,’ Slie said.

  Nixie and Aquila both turned to examine the open doorway. When Nixie had first unlocked it, the path had been covered by the same uneasy shadow that covered the rest of the house. And only seemed to be kept at bay by the blue torches. But as soon as Slie had taken a step into the darkness, another set of torches lit up; revealing, much to their disappointment, another locked door. The blue writing was already up an etched into this one.

  You like light. I like dark. Light and dark are forever at war, and here it will be also. Only when the lights are out, will the light shine.

  ‘Great, another riddle. I honestly think I’d prefer the spiders,’ Slie complained.

  ‘I think…we need to put the torches out,’ Nixie examined the two torches closest to them that burnt bright blue, ‘but how…’

  ‘What if we tried hitting them?’ Slie said.

  A moment of silence passed.

  ‘Don’t look at me,’ Aquila said, ‘last time I listened to you, I ended up running head first into a solid door.’

  Slie pulled his black dagger out from the sheath at his belt and sliced the blue torch in front of him. The blue flame vanished.

  ‘It looks like that’s what we need to do.’

  ***

  They spent the next twenty minutes wandering the mansion, hitting every torch on their way, until they were left in complete darkness. But to their dismay, when they returned to the staircase, the two torches at the doorway, and the ones that lined the entrance, were burning brightly.

  ‘It’s a simple timer,’ Aquila said, ‘I’ve done this so many times in games before. When need to hit them all before the they start turning back on again.’

  It seemed easy enough; but it took them three tries to get it right. In the end, Aquila had to dash down the stairs and through the living room at incredible speed, hitting torches as he went; while Slie ran to the library and began shooting the torches that were hung up all around the walls. When they finally did it, there was a loud clicking sound, like a keyhole turning and a lock opening, but it was loud enough for them all to hear – Slie in the library, Nixie at the entrance, and Aquila in the kitchen. Then, the darkness lifted – and the torches began burning an ordinary orange colour. Aquila knew the darkness had lifted, because he could see the dimmest corners of the room.

  ‘I think we did it,’ Aquila called from the kitchen.

  He ran through the living room, and back to the staircase. Slie and Nixie were already there waiting for him. They ascended the staircase together – this time what lay behind the second door was clearly visible.

  ‘Surprise, surprise. Another door,’ Slie said, ‘and here I thought we might actually get to fight something.’

  Aquila walked forward, putting his hand up against the last wooden door. The blue writing didn’t shine as brightly now that the darkness had been lifted.

  ‘It looks like this is the last one,’ Aquila said.

  Your final task: spiders. You should know about them by now. You fought a hoard of them to get here. If not, why don’t you go searching for information.

  ‘Does it want us to spurt information about spiders?’ Slie said, scratching his chin curiously, ‘Eight legged. Arachnids. Creepy. Scary. Spawn of the devil.’

  Slie continued to call random facts at the door.

  ‘I don’t think it wants us to recite facts about spiders, Slie…’ Nixie said.

  ‘Maybe we go back and search the courtyard then. One of the spiders might have dropped something that we were supposed to pick up – something that we missed.’

  There was nothing in the courtyard. They scoured the area for fifteen minutes, hoping to come across something they’d missed, but all they found was a single coin that had been left behind.

  ‘I think there’s something we’re missing,’ Aquila said, then his eyes widened as though a thought had just clicked, ‘the library!’

  ‘What?’ Slie rose his eyebrows.

  ‘I think we need to find a book about spiders. In the library. That’s the key. I think…’

  ‘It can’t hurt to try,’ Slie said.

  ‘Well, sometimes it can. Especially when you charge into a door,’ Aquila retorted.

  ‘Wait, that hurt?’

  ‘A little,’ Aquila said, ‘kinda. It tingled. Look – let’s just go to the library.’

  ***

  It was easy to find the books they needed when everything was in alphabetical order.

  ‘It’s a little different to a regular library, isn’t it?’ Nixie said as they browsed the spines of the books, searching for any title that had the word spider in it.

  ‘What do you mean?’ Aquila asked.

  ‘Well, usually these kinds of things are organised in genres. And from there they go alphabetically by author surname.’

  ‘How do you know all of this?’ Slie said.

  ‘I used to volunteer on a library,’ Nixie smiled.

  ‘Volunteer at a library? I couldn’t think of anything more boring.’

  ‘I’m guessing that regular libraries usually don’t have books called spiders either, with no author and a plain red cover,’ Aquila pointed to a book in front of him.

  ‘No,’ Nixie said approaching the shelf that Aquila was crouched in front of, ‘they usually don’t. Do you think you think that’s our key?’

  ‘I don’t know. Only one way to find out.’

  Aquila grabbed the book and attempted to pull it out, but it seemed to be attached to the bookshelf. Instead, it tilted backwards, and there was a loud click.

  ‘Did you hear that?’ Aquila asked.

  ‘No. What?’ Slie replied.

  ‘I think that book was actually some kind of lever. Come on, let’s get back to the staircase.’

  They climbed up the staircase and approached the landing. Sure enough, the final door was wide open. It was a dark room, darker than the rest of the mansion, lit with the same orange torches. Aquila couldn’t make out much, but did see the glint of white bone, and he swore that for a second he could make out a skeleton.

  Before they could enter the final room, a text appeared in the air in front of them, it was the same blue text that had spelled out the riddles on the walls earlier.

  You have completed three tests. Now to finish this quest, you must defeat three enemies.

  Slie looked around at both Nixie and Aquila.

  ‘You ready?’

  ‘The usual plan?’ Aquila asked.

  ‘If it’s the usual enemy, but…’ Slie turned and peered into the room, ‘it looks like there are only three measly skeletons.’

  ‘Wait. You can see them?’

  ‘You’re not the only one with dark vision my friend,’ Slie walked forward into the room. Aquila was on his tail, and Nixie followed behind him. Several torches lit up as soon as they entered, illuminating the room brightly. Sure enough, Slie had been right. In front of them there stood three skeletons, each with a sword and shield. They formed a line, and seemed to be standing in front of a young girl, who was bound to the splintered back wall by what seemed to be magical vines.

  ‘Help!’ she screamed.

  The skeletons marched forward, but they were only level 9. Hardly a challenge. Slie, Aquila and Nixie attacked in the usual way. Slie ducked down and disappeared. Aquila took them head on while Nixie stood behind him casting healing spells. They took care of the skeletons in less than a minute; and Aquila also levelled up his light handed skill to 9. As soon as the last skeleton died, the vines that were holding the young girl prisoner disappeared. She stood up and looked at them with graceful eyes.

  ‘Thank you! Thank you for freeing me from this horrible place. There’s something here, something unnatural that took me captive. I never should have come exploring here. I don’t have anything to give you – but please come and see my father Baldemir. He lives in a small hut just outside of Asphodel. He’ll see to your reward. Thank you again!’

  The girl didn’t wait for them to reply. Instead, she ran around them, through the three doors, down the stairs and out of sight.

  Aquila, Nixie and Slie looked at each other with gleeful smiles. They’d done it. They’d finished the quest.