Chapter 340: Ruin

Calikgos stood beside Lilya aboard the Sages of Destiny’s flagship, looking down at the destruction in the distance. They’d already parted from Kalmoore Airspace, hovering high above the black mist of the abyss as the island's edges submerged. 

The nearby ships were filled with celebratory cheers of victory, but he and Lilya remained silent. They both received notifications that Aegis had started streaming, and a message came through to Calikgos from a level one character named Atrophy.

“Turn the ships around. Kill Aegis.” 

Calikgos wasted no time copying the message and sending it to every single guild leader, including Lilya standing beside him.

She turned to Calikgos, her eyes widened in disbelief. “Are you for real? The islands are gone. It’s literally one kid, he’s not even a combat-focused cla-”

“Turn it around, now.” Calikgos interrupted her. From across the skies, he exchanged glances with Feng and a few other guild leaders before the orders were relayed to the Airship captains. The fleet of 117 Airships turned around, facing back towards Kalmoore, and as word spread, the celebrations died off.

***

Aegis sprinted through the streets of the City of the White Tree, rushing up the winding stairwells and across the many bridges that were strewn about between the upside-down tree branches. The citizens were frantically rushing into nearby buildings, the guards' eyes looking upwards toward the soaring reapers, loosing arrows with incredible precision.

They had no time to care about Aegis as he ascended the tree onto the Royal Ring. All the while, he had his livestream viewer open. There were questions he needed answered, exact data points for events that had transpired over the past two months that he hadn’t put nearly enough thought into. Now he needed to know every detail.

“After their third attempt, the coalition of guilds led by Feng and Lilya finally managed to hold out, protect their seedling, and grow a Wildling Tree within the abyss. It was a grueling process, holding out against a day-long siege of abyssal monsters, led by not one, but two Avatars of Darkness.”

A VGN broadcaster recapped the events. The background showed highlight clips of two Avatars of Darkness fleeing from the light of the now fully grown Wildling tree, whose branches gave off light not dissimilar to that of the City of the White Tree. The glowing bark and leaves, and the roots tangling through the earth, caused the black mist around it to recede. 

Through a few more clips, Aegis caught glimpses of indescribable monstrosities. He couldn’t help but wonder what sort of sick mind imagined creatures like those, and briefly recalled Lina’s desire to become a game developer for Averon.

VGN’s coalition wasn’t able to defeat most of the attackers; they held out against them for 24 hours. That likely wasn’t going to be an option for me, Aegis thought.

He switched the live-stream viewer to track the positions of Feng’s Airship, and in turn, the other Airships that were outside of Kalmoore airspace. They’d already turned back and were coming. He expected as much.

In front of the magnificent palace gates carved into the upside-down tree, Kaef’aktos and Krael stood, giving out orders left and right to nearby White Tree guards. Kaef’aktos spotted Aegis approaching and showed desperation on his face.

“What is happening, Aegis of Eirene?”

Aegis closed out of his interface. Planning time was over, and he was painfully aware that every single action he took in-game was being observed and relayed to VGN, and no sage privacy bubble could protect him from it. One of the many limitations forced upon him that made this ‘impossible’. 

“Kalmoore’s going down. We’ve got to act fast to protect it. You’ve got any archmages available that can open portals?”

Krael answered for Kaef’aktos. “Yes, we have several.” He motioned a White Tree guard over who was wearing robes and wielding a staff rather than a bow.

“Is evacuation the only option?” Kaef’aktos asked.

“This city is indefensible. We can save your people, but you’ll need to evacuate everyone to the surface and work with those in Kordas. Open a portal to Kordas for me, and gather your people here. In about 10 minutes, you’ll need to be done with preparations and ready to portal to Kordas if possible, else to Rene or another settlement. Understand?”

Kaef’aktos nodded. “I understand.”

”I’ll go ahead and organize the forces of Kordas so that we can put up a meaningful defense, but without the light of your tree, the void hydras and abysslings will tear this place down in no time.”

“You mean to survive, even if this island lands in the abyss?” Krael looked at him with furled eyebrows.

Aegis let out a sharp breath. “The requirements for a Kingdom don’t regard whether the Kingdom is on a floating island.” He spoke with little confidence. Even he thought this plan, being built in his head, was flimsy, at best. 

If I’d had more time and been paying more attention to the game world, I could’ve had something better prepared.

The dark elf mage opened the portal for him, and Aegis pushed these thoughts to the back of his mind. Through the portal, he found himself standing in the midst of chaos. 

Towers were collapsing, fire blazed, explosions erupted all around him, and the sky was blackened by smoke. Screams mixed in with the crackling fire. 

Aegis used his unnatural strength to make a few hops up, landing on the roof of a nearby tall structure to get a better view of the city. The black mist hadn’t yet reached the walls, but it may as well have. There were holes in the fortifications, and not all fire that burned was red.

All manner of magical destruction was present, with some buildings being entirely encased in ice, and others having been quaked and cratered into dust by earth magic. The VGN guys didn’t hold back. 

The recently improved, once proud Skyport of Kordas was gone, with only a few burning airships scattered across the nearby rooftops as evidence that it was ever there in the first place. 

A cloud of poison magic was settled around the Kordas Palace, but a tornado of wind magic was swirling through the black smoke, gathering up the poison and sending it up towards the clouds. 

Aegis’s eyes wandered around the base of the tornado, his eyes bearing witness to the panicked NPCs fleeing in all directions, with beasts of burden let loose from their stables and carts and stampeding through the streets alongside them.

“Headmaster Jael,” Aegis muttered when he spotted who he was looking for. The powerful elite NPC was using his magic to draw the magic poison, while several high-priest NPCs from various churches were rushing inside, cleansing royal guards as they went. 

Aegis double checked; the Kingdom of Kalmoore still existed. Savika wasn’t killed, but VGN most certainly would have targeted her. Quinn must have done something. Like how she hid the island stone, Quinn always had contingencies, planning for the worst-case scenario, and it may have just saved them.

It wouldn’t matter, though, if he couldn’t find Savika.

Aegis hopped down from the building and took off towards Jael, who stood on the outer palace walls, managing his magic. He opened his interface, this time checking his messages. He had several waiting for him from Rakkan, Lina, and Darkshot.

[Lina]: “No one was defending Savringard. The prison break was easy. We got everyone out. I think it’s a trap.”

This message came much earlier than the rest.

[Lina]: “It was a trap, they attacked Kalmoore!”

[Lina]: “We’re watching your stream. We can’t help. Leonard said even if we forgo all subtlety and focus solely on speed, it’ll take us three days to get back to Kalmoore.”

It was just text, but Aegis could feel the anxiety coming from Lina’s words. He was glad they were okay. He already knew he’d be on his own. She wasn’t the reason he opened his friends list; he was looking to see if anyone from Kalmoore was still alive.

Chax, Ruffily, Amlie, and Tullan. All were alive, all were in Rene. Tullan was assigned as the guild leader of the Night Hunters. 

[Aegis]: “Tullan, you guys in Rene are alive? I thought Rene got attacked?”

[Tullan]: “Aye, we barely had enough time teh react. A 10-second warnin’ was all we got. Ask yer friend Amlie ‘bout it.” 

Aegis hastily sent party invites to all of them, so that they could speak more easily.

[Aegis-Party]: “Amlie? You got a warning?”

[Amlie-Party]: “Yeah, my brother, Zuon, started banging on my sim-box and told me to get everyone around me to log out or we’d be screwed. Never seen him act like that before. Seraxus made him do it.” 

Aegis pondered for a moment. Seraxus was trying to help them? Or was he after something else? How’d he know that the attack was coming? Questions he’d have to put off until later. 

[Aegis-Party]: “I don’t have time to explain, but I’m glad you guys are alive. We might still have a chance.”

[Ruffily-Party]: “Woof! A chance at what? The island is already gone, isn’t it?” Her voice carried a hint of sadness.

[Aegis-Party]: “Nah, we’re just moving on to the next phase of the Shattered World Online. VGN was kind enough to give us a little boost. Sit tight, I’m going to secure Kordas and get a portal for you guys to come help out over here. Chax, we might need some gold for this next part, so I’ll transfer some money over to you. Think you can convert it to in-game gold?”

[Chax-Party]: “I can, but I don’t see how gold is going to help us right now.”

[Aegis-Party]: “Better to have it and not need it, right?” 

Aegis closed his messaging interface and opened his account menu, where he could see his bank balance. It was an uncomfortably high amount of zeroes. This part of the plan, he couldn’t fake. He could only hope that Mike wasn’t able to see this part of his interface through how he was being observed, or that Mike wasn’t able to figure it out fast enough. 

Aegis hit a 5, followed by a bunch of zeroes, and sent the money to Chax.

[Chax-Party]: “... Aegis?”

[Aegis-Party]: “Can you, or not?”

[Chax-Party]: “It’ll take a while. I’ll get started.”

[Aegis-Party]: “Where’s Savika?”

[Tullan-Party]: “In the Palace. Quinn gave her an artifact quality item that lets her phase out of existence for an hour, but she can’t move while phased. That’s why VGN doused the palace in high-level poison magic, so she’d choke on it the moment the phasing wore off.”

Aegis let out a sigh of frustration, arriving in front of Jael. “How long to clear the poison?”

“It’s powerful, and enchanted to linger, cast by multiple high-level wizards,” Jael strained, his focus on the tornado he was wielding with glowing, flailing hands. “The Queen is trapped inside, the clerics can’t get to her, and the poison is too powerful. The royal guards within are all already deceased.”

“Give it up, send everyone to the front lines, take command of Kalmoore’s defenses. Backup from Rene and the City of the White Tree will be arriving soon,” Aegis instructed him. His high-level leadership skill was doing work, and Jael looked at him with compliance, only a slight hint of hesitation as he eyed the palace.

“What of our Queen?”

“I’ll get her out of there.” Aegis gave him a nod and put his hand on Jael’s shoulder. “Do not join the front lines; command from a distance. Somewhere that I can see you when I get out with the Queen. Understand?” Aegis locked eyes with the elite NPC, making sure he was on the same page.

Jael nodded obediently, cast Fly on himself, and sailed into the air, swirling wind around his body to push away the black smoke billowing out of the burning city.

“Clear out of the palace. Man, the southern walls, the abyss will arrive from there first. Kordas must not fall!” Jael’s amplified voice echoed across the city.

The clerics and priests who were rushing into the palace turned back, following his orders. A few looked up at Aegis, where he stood on the palace walls, as they passed through the gates. He recognized a few of them, including the High Priest of Shiva.

He waited for them to all clear out before turning his attention towards the front doors leading into the palace. He could barely see the outline of the structure from how thick the green clouds became, now that Jael’s tornado was gone.

“Aura of healing. Bless. Aura of beauty.” Several bursts of light exploded out from him. He hopped off the wall, ate his high-level food, and took a deep breath before sprinting into the dark green poison clouds.