World of Eternia: The Complete Collection (57 page)

The two lock stares,
with neither man willing to back down.

Finally, Charles gets
up from his seat and grabs his staff. He points one end of it close
to Richard’s face. “I just changed my mind. I want to settle this
with you personally. I challenge you to a fight. Winner takes all,”
he says.

Richard gently pushes
the staff from his face and slowly gets up from his seat. “You
know, we are in the entertainment business. And this tournament has
been entertaining to the viewers out there." The man pauses for
a moment and continues to speak. "I think the audience will be
equally entertained when I give you a good spanking. So I accept your
challenge,” he replies.

The King of Eternia
takes the golden shield leaning next to his chair and straps it to
his arm. Richard then pulls his long sword from its scabbard, left
leaning against a leg of the table. He sees that Charles is waiting
on the ground in front of the platform, tapping his left foot on the
ground impatiently with a scowl.

The Non-Player
Characters, who were congregating in the Town Square, have backed
away from Charles to avoid being accidentally hit in the crossfire in
the upcoming duel.

Evan quickly gets the
video technician to turn the camera back to the two bosses. “In a
surprise, spurious move, the CEO of Virtuous Gaming Co. has decided
to challenge the CEO of Eternia Development & Entertainment, Inc.
personally to a one-on-one duel. The winner will take the loser’s
stake in his company.”

Antoinette is confused
by the new development. “What about the Hundred Man Tournament?
Will we simply negate the result?” she asks.

Evan shrugs. “We’re
entering new territory here. If this CEO duel ends quickly, do we end
the event immediately afterwards or keep in running? If the match
continues afterward but the winning CEO’s players lose, which
result will trump the other?” He lists the possibilities out loud
for the audience to ponder along with the host.

“There is also a
possibility that the CEO duel does not produce a result prior to the
end of the tournament,” Antoinette notes. “In that case, I think
it will be up to the duelists to decide whether to continue fighting
or not. There are certainly a lot of possible outcomes now, but it
really depends on whether the duel can finish prior to the end of the
tournament. So I think we need to let the duel play out first, and
see if it will change the outcome.”

“Or everything can be
settled through mediation. But I guess we’ll find out,” Evan
shrugs. “In the meantime, let’s have a split screen showing both
the duel and the match,” he suggests to the technicians.

* * *

When Richard enters the
center circle in the Town Square, Charles quickly attacks his rival
with a jab to the chest.

Richard expertly blocks
the blow with his shield, and slashes at Charles’ chest.

Charles turns his staff
to his left, and jams the end of his weapon into the sword guard.

Richard hops back. “Not
bad,” he says. Actually, the staff almost knocked the sword out of
his hand, but Richard isn’t going to admit that publicly.

“My girlfriend is a
good training partner,” Charles explains. “Since she insisted on
participating in the tournament, I told her she’ll get my
permission to enter only if she can beat me. And obviously she did,
many times over,” Charles winces at the memories. Testing his
opponent, the monk quickly feints a jab at Richard’s face.

Richard blocks the
strike with the long sword and tries a shield bash into Charles’
face.

The monk ducks under
the shield, and trips the knight with his staff.

Richard’s avatar
drops on the ground, but he quickly rolls to his left to avoid
getting hit in the face with the staff. He deftly kicks out a foot to
the monk’s left knee, which is over-extended for the attack.

Charles’ knee buckles
and he loses his balance, falling to the ground too. He blindly rolls
to his left, and suddenly finds himself atop Richard! Seeing the man
pinned under, the monk tries to strike Richard’s face with a right
fist.

However, the knight
brings up his shield in time to block the punch, counters with a
punch to Charles’ gut.

The punch shifts the
avatar back, and Richard uses his “Shield Bash” skill to knock
the monk off. BAM!

* * *

Seeing the approaching
ninjas, Lucious quickly reshapes the earth into a high, concave wall
cutting off Conrad and Laura from the rest of the mountain. The wall
leaves the side facing the portal open, however, so that Conrad can
fire his arrows to protect the portal.

Wesley takes a glance
backward at the wall and turns to face the ninjas again. “Nice
move, Lucious,” he compliments.

“Unfortunately, it
took out almost all my remaining mana,” the mage replies. “But
now it’s five-on-five, so the odds aren’t bad,” Lucious adds as
he prepares to enter a melee fight using his magical staff.

“You heard the man,”
Wesley says aloud. “Each defender takes one opponent. Time is
expiring. If we can protect Laura until the end we will win. Now
let’s do it! For Eternia!” he roars and charges to attack the
closest Virtuan ninja.

“For Eternia!” the
three defenders with him join in unison.”

* * *

“Just sit tight,”
Conrad says while keeping his eye on the portal. He didn't expect
Lucious to blow his mana to create a wall of earth around Laura,
because now this means the mage has to engage in hand-to-hand combat.
And Lucious abhors melee combat as much as any magician in the game.
Gotta hand it to the shorty for
putting the mission ahead of personal idiosyncrasies,
Conrad thinks.

“Right, like there’s
anywhere else for me to go, except down,” Laura rolls her eyes at
the obvious.

Unfortunately, the
archer is running low on arrows, so he has to conserve them unless
Virtuans find a way to break through the wall and enter the portal.
In the meantime, the duo has the perfect spot to watch Heimdall fight
the players trying to break down the wall.

“Ladies and gents, we
have only twenty minutes remaining in this Hundred Man Tournament!
Let’s summarize what is happening right now,” Evan says.

“On the ground at the
passage way, we have Virtuans trying to break down the Wall of Bones
enclosing the Portal to Eternia,” Antoinette replies. “The two
factions representing Virtuous Gaming were originally fighting each
other until the wall appeared, and apparently formed a quick truce
afterwards. However, it seems that the attacks from the players
aren’t doing much damage against the wall. And don’t look now,
but Heimdall is slowly approaching the Virtuans’ position at the
portal.”

“And up above them,
on the mountain top we have five individual, one-on-one melee
fights,” Evan notes. "Wesley is leading a bunch of Eternian
spell casters against five Virtuan ninjas. This looks to be
interesting match ups all around."

“Last but not least,
right here in the Town Square, we have the heads of Virtuous Gaming
and Eternia Development & Entertainment fighting in a duel,”
Antoinette adds.

“Well, that
summarizes all the current action in the field. Please continue to
watch this live stream. I can’t wait to find out who wins this
crazy match!” Evan says before the camera returns to show a three
part screen.

* * *

“What the heck is
wrong with my sword? I am doing only one point of damage per hit!”
Quentin Blade Dancer complains.

“We can file an
official complaint afterwards,” Divine John replies while hitting
the wall with his mace.

WHACK! “My horse is
getting tired of kicking the wall,” Burton says.

“Heads up! Heimdall
is coming!” Rogeta Pathfinder cries out as she starts shooting her
arrows at the man.

“Hey you with the
horse! Continue hitting the wall. The Wall of Bones requires
continuous mana upkeep, and the necromancer above us is bound to run
out of mana sooner or later. When that happens, you will dive through
the portal and end this event. In the meantime, the rest of us here
will take on Heimdall and delay him,” the priest orders.

Gentatsu nods to
confirm the order; it is as good as any that the second in command of
The Returned can come up with. “Do what the man said.”

“What about the bet
between our leaders?” Krystal asks. She belongs to Marcus’ The
Returned alliance.

“It was a personal
bet between Virgil and Marcus on which faction will enter the portal
first. Since both bettors are knocked out of the game, and our
weapons can’t hurt each other for whatever reason, a truce between
the two sides is our only option. Otherwise, we mercenaries won’t
get paid beyond our meager advances if Charles loses control of his
company. And you folks in The Returned won’t be in much better
shape either since you were booted from the game originally and it is
doubtful that WoE will rescind the player bans and let you back in,”
Divine John explains.

“As much as I hate to
admit it, he’s right. The Returned’s goal is to win the
tournament; that will be our revenge against the company running The
World of Eternia for booting us out. To realize that objective means
working together with Easy Money,” Gentatsu adds.

"Hello Virtuans!"
Heimdall booms out in a loud voice. "Lovely weather we're having
today, no?" he muses aloud. The fearsome man turns his head from
left to right, and notices something strange. "I thought you
guys were fighting each other, weren't you? A group of horsemen
trampled over the guys on the road, while I was fighting that pesky
ranger. But now I see everyone working together, and leaving the
horseman kicking the wall unharassed. What gives?" he asks.

"Nothing for us to
discuss with you stinking Eternians," Quentin replies with false
bravado.

"It was just some
internal matters," Divine John adds politely.

"Curiosity killed
the cat," Rogeta says and unleashes an arrow at the warrior's
chest.

PING! Heimdall looks at
the arrow lying on the ground. "You wanna know what annoys me
the most in World of Eternia? It is rude people, like you folks here.
I was just having a peaceful parley with you guys because I was
feeling generous."

"Generous? You?"
Quentin scoffs at the notion.

"Yes indeed,
because the outcome of this match is obvious. You lost. Time will
expire, and you will not be able to break through the Wall of Bones,"
Heimdall says while getting down on one knee to retrieve the arrow on
the ground. "I was going to allow you all to remain on the
battle field until the last seconds tick down to zero. But now, I
feel like booting you all out of this game." He crushes the
arrow in his hand and slowly gets up. Heimdall points the tip of his
halberd at the group. "It's time to die," Heimdall says and
activates his "Spinning Blade" skill. It offers less damage
than Whirling Spin, but allows greater movement and longer duration.

Gentatsu tries to block
the fast spinning halberd with his samurai katana and wakizashi, but
his blades quickly snap under the tremendous force of the spin
generated by Heimdall's skill. The avatar is cut in half before the
player can hop back to safety.

Divine John sees the
effect of the halberd's blade on Gentatsu, and uses his unnatural
speed to dive onto the ground, and move away from the dangerous
weapon.

Rogeta fires multiple
shots at Heimdall, but every single arrow gets deflected by the
warrior's armor because the shots are doing no damage. Suddenly an
arrow punches through her skull, and her avatar drops dead as a
stone.

Seeing that the pesky
archer is already dead, Heimdall quickly guides his halberd toward
the horse rider and cuts the horseman from behind before the enemy
can react. Finally, the duration of the skill runs out, leaving just
two Virtuans standing in front of the portal.

Tchk! Another arrow
punches through Divine John's skull. Feuk! And a final arrow takes
out Quentin.

Heimdall takes his
helmet off, looks up, and salutes Conrad. The warlord isn’t going
to admonish the sniper for stealing Heimdall’s kills; for this
event let player etiquette be damned. If the damage bug expires
before the fighter can take the two Virtuans down, then Heimdall
would be the one going down. After all, the man has not received a
single healing spell in the entire event, and even his enormous
health bar is down to just ten percent of normal.

The sniper returns the
salute to the warlord, oblivious to the sin he just committed. As far
as Conrad is concerned, their match is over. Now it’s up to Wesley
and his band of unlikely fighters to stall for the remaining dozen
minutes or so left in the tournament.

Once the two sisters
are settled in a corner by themselves, Diana starts to talk. “How
long have you been spying on us?” she asks.

“Why would I want to
spy on you?” Priscilla asks innocently.

The priestess
disregards the innocent act. “I’ve always wondered why you are so
interested in my plans with Lucious. In the back of my mind, I
actually thought you had the hots for him,” she says.

The ninja laughs aloud.
“You thought I was actually attracted to that midget? Please,”
Priscilla dismisses the disgusting notion. “I like men who are
masculine and tall, not a tightly wound, height-challenged guy like
your boyfriend. My boyfriend is a successful business man who runs
his own company; your little guy is probably running around getting
coffee for his boss in the morning,” she smirks.

Again, the sister
refuses to take the obvious bait and lose her temper. “But you were
always nearby, trying to listen in on my conversations with Lucious,”
Diana thinks aloud, in a clear and calm tone of voice. “If you
weren’t interested in him, then why would you do that?” she asks.