A Gamer's Guide To Beating The Tutorial

The silence in the room was deafening, but it was enough to rouse Emil to use one of the few trump cards Kitty had left the Server Alliance. “We have called for his execution as of a year back, and he is currently an outlaw. His actions do not represent the Server Alliance, nor the wishes of all hoeksak, and—”

“Is he dead?” The king’s simple question cut the well-trained, well-used line short, leaving Emil slack-jawed, the echo of the question weighing heavy on his mind. “Is he dead, hoeksak?”

“—We can’t…” Emil bit his lip. “No. He isn’t dead.” The mere thought that Kitty could be killed was, at this point, almost laughable. He’d survive, no matter what. Emil could only envy holding that kind of conviction. “But if we ever catch him, then…”

The king strode up to him. Although Emil was kneeling and the king was standing, the height difference wasn’t very significant. Still, the king was looking down at him, and that was all the king wanted. “If you catch him, you’ll let him go.”

Emil blinked at him. “You—Your Majesty, what are you…?”

“He will die here.” His resolute words were as steadfast and heavy as iron chains. “I know he will. He will return to this place, because this is where he was born. He is the phoenix that burns, but all phoenixes must return to their home eventually. And when he does, he will meet our justice. Not yours. You are a creature of fraudulent mercy.” A scowl crawled across his face, narrowing his eyes into disdainful slits. “You would spare even a four-winged dragon if it told you it was sorry.”

“We… We simply strive for a world of forgiveness. Where we come from, death for death is an ancient philosophy that we are moving away from.”

“So your world is without war?”

Emil bit his tongue. “I believe that we may have come off on the wrong foot, Your Majesty.” Gathering his spirits again, Emil smoothly spoke the lines he’d been taught. “As an envoy of the Server Alliance, I have come to ask that you open your nation and city to our influence. As the Acheron Capital contains the only known instance of a church of the Goddess of Fire, we ask that you grant permission for challengers to enter into Her service to complete the quests She grants them.” He paused to take a breath. “Furthermore, we also offer services in construction, communications, dragon-slaying, healing, bodyguarding…”

The king held up one hand. “You ask that I should allow a swarm of hoeksak into this scarred city?”

“Yes,” Emil answered confidently. “It may not be to your pleasure to hear, but even if you refuse, it is likely that those seeking the quest of fire may still attempt to sneak inside the city. And, as you may know…” It took a moment for Emil to gather the courage needed to twist the knife in fully. “An untethered hoeksak is a dangerous hoeksak.”

Simel the Survivor’s face twisted into a grimace of indignant horror. “You dare threaten me?”

Emil quickly shook his head. “I am merely speaking the truth. As a hoeksak, and as someone who has met the one you fear, I know the damage our sort can cause.”

The king’s expression softened considerably. Then, he turned around again and went over to look out the window again. For almost a full minute, he simply watched the hustle and bustle out there; the men and women moving up and down the streets, the patrolling guards, the salesmen and their wares… “Stand.”

Doubting his ears, it took a moment for Emil to actually follow the demand, rising to his feet. Now, he was looking down at the king.

Simel the Survivor briefly glanced behind him, at where Emil stood, awkward and confused. “And remove that yitteh.”

Silently, Emil took the headscarf from his head once more, pressing it to his chest.

The king’s lips twitched down into a frown before returning to neutrality. He turned away from him to look at the throne—or, rather, at the little flakes of red on and around it. “You look nothing like him,” Simel noted. “You are both hoeksak, but you are dignified.” His eyes moved back to look at Emil, a newfound, newborn clarity glistening deep inside them. “Tell me. Have you ever killed one of our kind?”

“No,” came Emil’s quick and honest reply. “Never have I killed either goblin or hoeksak.”

A small smile formed on Simel’s pallid face. “Good. I only wish I could say the same.” He turned back to look at the window, the light turning his ears reddish, his crown glistening in the midday sun. And for a moment, he didn’t look like a king, or an adult, or even a goblin. He looked like a child, wistfully gazing out the window, hoping for snow, or for the rain to end. “You shall have it.”

“...Have what?”

Simel turned his head and smiled at Emil, no longer a child, but once again an adult; a king. “Permission to exist in this city—in this nation. I grant it. I will give you the housing you’ll need, and your kind may enter and exit with the same scrutiny as any goblin.” He became thoughtful for a second. “What is your kind called?”

The question caught Emil off-guard, to the point where he forgot to thank the king. “We are called humans,” he answered, hoping that this was the word Simel sought.

“Humans,” Simel repeated in a whisper. A slight frown marred his face. “Doesn’t have the same ring as goblins.” After a small silence Emil spent fighting the urge to disagree, Simel nodded to himself, turning his eyes back to Emil, as though surprised to find him still there. “Was there anything else to discuss, human?”

Emil almost bowed again by pure instinct, recovering himself by wiping at his forehead. “Yes—it was in regards to Grief… To the human suspected of attempting to assassinate you? We have good reason to believe that he was falsely accused, and if you’ll allow me, I would like to argue in his favor, or at least against using capital punishment against him.”

“Ah, that one…” Simel mumbled, his voice trailing off. “I’m afraid that he’s dead.”

“He’s…?” Something sharp and hollow stabbed through Emil’s chest, impaling his heart on dread and the inescapable premonition that something was very, very wrong. “Wh—what happened? Was he…?” A shake of the head. “I completely understand if you chose to execute him, however, even a posthumous acquittal would—”

“He was killed en route,” Simel said, enunciating the ‘en route’ part. “Not by any order of mine.”

Emil paused. Curiosity clawed at his insides. And yet, deeper down, suffocated by the need to know, a tiny voice tried to pipe up, telling him that some things aren’t worth the pain of knowing. He shut it down. “...How did it happen?”

The king’s lips twitched. “We are lucky to have a first-hand account. A young sailor survived the encounter.” Something familiar, downright nostalgic warmed his smile. However, his eyes showed a different emotion. Mourning. For himself, or for someone he saw himself in? Emil couldn’t tell. “Not only an encounter with pirates, but likewise an encounter with yet another hoek… a human.”

Warning bells rang inside Emil’s head and he took a step towards Simel, trying his best to keep his face from appearing as panicked as he felt when he asked, in a trembling voice, “What was the name of the sailor boy?”

“Vann,” Simel answered unhesitatingly. “Son of… I can’t recall.”

“But he…” He clenched and unclenched his hands. Even when he balled them together as hard as he could, he still found himself trembling. “He couldn’t have…”

“Since the situation related to him, I had the sailor tell me his story personally. It was lucky he was rescued so soon after it ended, lest he might have been forced to use the bodies of his fellow-victims as provinte.”

It was wrong. It felt wrong. He shouldn’t have been hearing it. It wasn’t right. “Y—Your Majesty, this is…”

“The sailor was very descriptive. He had a way with words. Though he didn’t see everything, his captor was more than willing to share details.” Simel scoffed. “And to think that I had been under the impression that humans might show each other more mercy than they did goblins.”

Everything Emil wore felt stuffy and hot. Too much. The corset: tighter than ever. He could barely even breathe. Kitty wouldn’t. He’d been getting better. Hadn’t he? So why would he… No, this wasn’t… He couldn’t be certain. Simel hated Kitty. For good reason, perhaps, but hatred twisted everything. Surely, there had to be some explanation, something that tied all of this together and showed that Kitty was, at the very least, doing what he thought was right.

“As for the events that led to the young sailor boy, alone on an iron ship filled with mutilated, half-eaten corpses…”

Emil buckled over and emptied the contents of his stomach.

The king jerked back, almost as though he thought the puddle of vomit staining his carpet was going to start eating through the floor next. “What are you…?”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I…” Trying to talk made the nausea worse and another mouthful of stomach acid and bile soon shot up his throat. He tried to swallow down whatever was left. His teeth hurt. His throat hurt. The world was misty. His trembling hands frantically groped through his pockets for his handkerchief, only for a light-purple one to be handed to him by the king himself. Hesitating only for a moment, Emil mumbled his thanks before taking it and wiping his face and eyes. Gulping down whatever remained in his mouth, he readjusted himself to speaking Aetongue properly. “I’m sorry, let me just…”

“I’ll handle it,” Simel casually replied, pointing at the stained carpet with a non-ringed finger before mumbling the prayer to clean. After only a few seconds, the carpet was clean once more, the king standing next to him with an expression of worry and enlightenment. “You humans… to think that you would have your types, as well.”

Emil smiled sheepishly. “We’re alike in that way,” he muttered, using the clean spell on the handkerchief before returning it to Simel. The king gave it a slightly suspicious look before accepting it with a nod. Emil took a few deep breaths. “I thank you for the permission you have granted the Server Alliance, and for the information you have given me.”

“I will have it in writing for you by the end of the day,” Simel casually noted. “One of my servants will bring it to your abode.”

“Thank you,” Emil said. But if he were to be honest, he was more-so thankful for not having to hear any more about what the young sailor had experienced. Maybe, if he was lucky, the young sailor had simply aggrandized the situation in order to… Because… Something. There was sure to be some reason. There had to be a reason.

If there wasn’t, then…

What did that make him?