Everlast Online

Liz descended down the staircase quickly, it wasn't really that deep; only about a dozen feet below the surface.

The sight before her was slightly disturbing: A degraded tomb full of discarded bodies and undead.

The moment she entered, the undead came at her. There were 3 immediately aggroed onto her but she quickly took them out, gaining yet another level, she was glad undead had a greater weakness to magic than physical attacks, she was glad for having chosen the mage class really.

Bolts of mana flew through the air as Liz began killing skeletons and zombies as she found them. The dungeon's only real danger was that there were groups of enemies, but this was mitigated by the environment. The tight halls prevented any more than 2 undead attacking at a time, so when more, like the group of 6 Liz found, attacked it was easy to dispatch them. 

Liz simply attacked from a distance with magic, backing up when necessary.

With this she quickly rose to level 7. She chose not to distribute her stat points for the time being as she was doing perfectly fine as she was. She would much rather see where she was most lacking in. Except her rise from 3 to 4 where she used all 3 points in END.

I might have a good skill to mitigate damage, She had thought, But right now I have no means of using it. I lack subordinates.

As she was walking in the dungeon, reaching an hour of dungeon diving, she fell over. At first she thought nothing of it, perhaps she simply had not fully adjusted to her weird new body, but as she got up she noticed an abnormal crack in the wall.

The object she had fallen over was a piece of rock she had failed to notice that had fallen from the roof. As she was looking at what she had tripped over she felt confused over why a piece of debris was in the centre of the hall. All over debris was near the sides, falling from the crumbling rocks; but this one was in the dead centre of the path.

That's a bit weird. She had thought, looking around until she noticed it had fallen directly from the roof.

She began to turn, dismissing the rock as just debris, but at the last moment noticed the damage was weird. Besides that single missing chunk, there was a single, long, unbroken crack, running from the edge of the empty chunk on the roof, all the way down the left wall and ending as it met the floor.

Again Liz thought nothing of it until she noticed it was weird. Along both sides of the walls there was a platform, built into the wall where dead bodies were laid to rest, every 2 metres or so, but not here. It was present on the right side, but not on the left.

Liz, being the quizzical person she was, decided to look closer at the crack. She couldn't see through it and as she began to think it was merely a weird design fault; she felt a breeze from the crack. 

"There's a room behind here!" She exclaimed, jumping back.

Liz was beyond excited, she had found a secret room within a dungeon. The information alone was phenomenal, but there may also be treasure she could sell or just gold she could transfer into credits to pay for Piper's medicine.

Liz regained her calm quickly, deciding that she needed to keep a cool head. But soon a message laid overhead:

For a moment Liz just stared as the world announcement rang over her head 3 times. Just looking at the gold reward for a first clear was exceptional, she did not know this was a thing that occurred in games. Liz had not played any games since she was 9 and they were almost never online games, so she was not familiar with world announcements or first clear rewards.

She had considered leaving the dungeon and selling information about this secret room, but now she knew could earn so much money for gaining the first clear, any thought of giving this up fled straight from her mind as she tried to figure out how to enter the secret area.

She looked for a while but couldn't figure it out, she began thinking she would need to knock the wall down, not that it would be possible with her strength, but still tried looking  for another way.

As she surveyed the crack for the hundredth time she saw something different. For the most part the crack was incredibly shallow, a fingernail's depth at most, she assumed it swept sideways, hence why she felt the breeze, but one  part of the crack was deeper.

At standing height it would be hard to tell it was even there, but Liz had been moving around to look from different positions and finally noticed a difference with the crack.

She bent down so she could more easily inspect the hole, seeing it was about the size of a finger. Liz had little control over her fingers yet, but by god she was about to learn.

She stuck the longest of her fingers into the hole and started moving it around as best she could until she felt a loose part. She began fiddling with it, but her cloth fingers struggled to get any real traction. After some time she finally got a grip and pulled on the loose part of stone, she was then rewarded by a distinct clicking sound as the wall tilted open. A secret swivelling door.

Liz giggled in delight like a little girl, despite being 18 years old, and pulled the door open before stepping inside.

The secret door closed behind her and she turned to see a set of intricate and complicated cogs lining the wall.

Was it that complicated? She thought.

Soon a system message floated in front of her, setting her glee to the highest level.

"S-RANK!" Liz yelled out, literally jumping up and down; resulting in her falling over due to her puppet body.

The place she was in was equally eerie, but much cleaner. There was no scattered debris, or poorly placed corpses and their parts. The walls were the same dull grey stone from the dungeon but not at all of the same level of standard.

The [Forgotten Tomb] dungeon walls were horribly degraded, the stone masonry being unclear in most parts, but here, that was not the case. The carving of the stone was as fine as the day it was carved.

Liz progressed down the hallway, noticing the lack of enemies and corpses anywhere. Judging from the name this part of the tomb was reserved, solely, for this 'Conspirator'. She began thinking that the entire 'Forgotten Tomb' was just a cover for whatever hid in here.

Soon she walked through the entire hallway, on edge the whole time, but never meeting any enemies. The hallway then opened up into a giant room, on the other end of which was a beautifully ornate door.

In the centre, stood perfectly still, like a statue was a giant hulking undead. Dressed in black armour that only revealed dirty bones lying beneath it. On its waist hung 2 items, a jagged black sword, with chipped edges and degraded metal; on the other side was a jet black key, polished and clean, like it had never known even the concept of dirt.

Thoughts began swimming within Liz's mind, it was pretty clear what this was.

The big scary undead is guarding something. She reasoned, And it's locked behind that door, which you need the key to open.

She was working only on guesses but was entirely right. Realising the moment she stepped into the room she would awaken the guard she thought about what she could do right now to beat it.

She had no chance of killing it, she knew this, but whatever it was behind that door would be worth a lot of money. There was no way that such a well guarded door would hold something of no value. It was hidden in a beginner dungeon, behind a secret door Liz had only found by accident and guarded by what looked like Satan's nanny.

It's money making time!

Liz was desperate for anything she could get her hands on and wouldn't even dream of giving up now. If she died, it was a level, but if she won, great, unforeseen riches awaited.

Eventually, she came up with something resembling a plan. So, she dumped all 9 of her remaining points into AGI, hitting 20. Next she stepped confidently into the room, and like she had expected, the monstrosity before her came to life. 

Its head rose and its red eye's met Liz's. Liz was confident in her plan, arrogantly confident really, but now she began to doubt herself. 

No! It's too late for that now! She steeled her resolve and went over the plan in her head.

Judging from its size, it's a strength type. So, with my heightened speed I might be able to evade it for a while. She thought, Then I will aim my mana bolts at the key, hopefully this will knock the key off of the monster's belt. I grab it, rush to the door.Bing, Bang, Boom! I win!

The entire plan was shoddy and relied heavily on 'What-Ifs' and 'Hope', but still Liz was confident, mostly due to her impulsivity.

The monster came at her, and like she had anticipated, hoped it was slow. At least slow enough for her to evade it.

The monster was slow, yes, but not to the point she could easily outrun it, had she made a single mistake it would have crushed her below the slab of metal it called a sword. Liz maintained just enough distance to safely 'kite' the monster, pulling it away from the door it guarded.

Soon the opportunity presented itself and 3 [Mana Bolt]s were fired, all aiming for the key. Liz's attempt failed, but the final attack grazed and jostled the key, creating... No reaction.

YES! Liz cheered within her mind, the monster didn't care she was targeting the key, meaning there was a chance she could just take it after cutting it from his side.

For a few minutes, this pattern repeated, Liz firing mana bolts and just barely missing the key, then running away as she realised the monster had almost caught up to her. Eventually, the key fell with a clattering sound as metal hit stone, Liz, knowing that running by the monster would get her caught, lured the monster to the opposite side of the room from the door. When she felt the distance was safe she set off sprinting, looking quite comical as she ran, literally a puppet without any strings, towards the key.

She ducked down, quickly grabbing the key from the ground as the monster stomped behind her. She continued running, making her way to the door and fumbling around with the key, trying to force it into the keyhole.

"RRAAAARGH!" As she reached the door, a wrathful scream echoed through the large room behind her, followed by the stamping of feet at a speed Liz had not anticipated. Sweat began forming on Liz's head (or it would have if it could've) as she desperately tried to use her uncoordinated hands to force the key through the hole and twist.

Right as the door unlocked, the stomping stopped; and as Liz pushed her way through the door she looked back and saw the monster swinging where she once was. But now she was 'safe', leaving behind the monster to its hateful roaring.

Liz relaxed, looking at the new room she was in, it was large. Almost as large as the hall with the monster, but in much worse condition. The stone carvings of the wall were faded and cracked and some of the tiles that covered the floor had cracks and dents on them as well. 

There were 2 novelties of this room: The wide open door that led into a room blanketed in darkness; and the glowing writing directly above it.

Ye who wishes to pass this trial

Beware stepping up thy regular flooring

Lest thy wishes to reunite with Gaia early

"Regular..." Liz  mumbled, looking at the floor, "Does it mean the square tiles?"

But they're all squares! Her mind felt the paradox of the trial starting to hurt.

What was worse was she was given no chance to contemplate; the room began to shake as a rumbling noise started behind her. Liz looked and saw that the wall was closing in, forcing her forward towards the tiled floor.

"SHIT! SHIT! SHIT!" Liz began yelling, in her panic she acted impulsively and jumped onto the first tile she saw.

She barely escaped with her life as the moment her feet touched the floor it collapsed leaving a gaping pit full of spikes in plain view.

Liz jumped back, pushing up against the wall. Trying to buy time in a pathetic display of hoping to slow the wall pushing her forward.

THINK! THINK! THINK! Her mind was in chaos as she looked over every aspect of the tiles on the floor, until something clicked.

She was barely hanging onto the safe platform at the room’s entrance by the tips of her toes when she stepped forwards onto one of the tiles and...

Stayed perfectly still. She didn't fall. she had figured out the trial.

This room isn't rundown! She congratulated herself in her mind for discovering it, It was DESIGNED that way!

Her assumptions were indeed correct. The room had been designed to look deteriorated, covered in cracks and faded stone in order to allow an observant rial goer to pass through.

The trial had said she could not step on 'regular flooring', and while most of the tiles were identical, some had cracks, some were dented, some were faded: They were no longer regular!

The cracks and dents formed shapes and images, so she never stepped on 2 of the same tile all the way until she reached the other end of the room; the threat of the closing wall no longer within her mind.

As she stepped through the door, it slammed shut behind her, like a shutter for a shop, and Liz was left in the darkness.

Her blind state only lasted a moment as 2 at a time, green torches lit up the room she was in. She expected some kind of fight or test, but there was nothing. Just a dirty old desk covered in papers and an aged black book, a chair housing a skeleton (not an undead) and a beautiful coffin made of fancy black marble in the centre of the room.

"What were all the theatrics for?" Liz muttered, slightly annoyed at the excessive display. 

She first went towards the coffin, trying to open it, but the beautiful marble lid did not budge even an inch so she gave up.

She then moved over to the desk, carefully pushing the chair away, freaked out by the skeleton sitting in it. As she did, a quill dropped from its hand onto the floor.

There was a great difference between the furniture in the room, the desk was covered in dust, layers upon layers sat on top of the book and documents on the table; but the coffin was exceptionally clean, so much so it cleaned Liz's dirty hands when she tried to push the lid off.

Pretty important body I guess. Liz mused, looking over the documents.

In ELO, players could understand the common language of Galdrash as the AI translated it for them so theoretically Liz should have been able to understand what was written on the paper, but the writings on here were truly beyond her.

The paper was covered in symbols, calculations, runic languages and words that were beyond her even if she did understand them. Liz had no way of knowing what a 'phylactery' was. Other than that there were various diagrams and images, crystals and the word soul appearing over and over again. Annotations of monsters, animals and even intelligent races like humans and elves. The writing began degrading towards the end, it became unsteady and eventually illegible. Nothing more than scribbles on paper.

The pages were numbered so Liz was able to make use of the leather and string on the desk to form it into a book, she had done this a lot for Piper after drawing stories for her to read so was familiar with the process.

How did this leather and thread survive so long? Was the only thought she had during the making of the book.

[Incomprehensible Research (???)]

[You have discovered and ordered strange documents. You cannot understand the topic of the research as you lack the necessary knowledge. All you can tell is that 'Souls' were one of the primary focuses of the researcher]

Liz placed the papers in her inventory, but not before questioning the item ranking.

Question marks? She thought, I may have found something even more valuable than I initially thought.

With the haphazardly placed papers taken care of she moved her attention to the old black book.

It was leather back, the pages were frayed at its edges and the leather was discoloured and peeling in places. When Liz had entered the room it was open on the last page, but she hated spoilers so closed it quickly before moving the papers.

Let's get reading then. She thought, picking up the book.

'To whomever may read this, this is the first entry in my final journal'

'I can feel the curse inflicted upon me by my enemies all those years ago is finally catching up with me. My research is my last chance to fight it off, but I have little hope'

'My name is... I can't remember, my mind is beginning to erode, leaving only what my subconscious decides is important.'

'Please... Gaia help me.'

'But to ye, mighty challenger who may read this should I fail, I offer my research and my legacy. Please, I beg of you, don't let it go to waste.'

That was the first of the pages and Liz was immediately hooked, an intriguing story was playing out before her in full so she kept on reading.

The Author, who never named himself, explained he discovered a secret that should never have come to light, one that could change the very world. He said he explained it in his other journals, when his enemies - who he had also forgotten the name of - gained light of this, they did everything to dispose of him.

He was forced on the run with his 'Beloved', chased day and night by those who couldn't risk the secret being exposed. In that time, the Author began studying , improving himself, but one day he and his 'Beloved' were hit with a powerful curse. The 2 fled to this tomb, hiding themselves deep within. After that it stopped giving details, that page was covered in what looked like dried up tears. Following that it began to explain the Author's research; and Liz finally realised what he was looking for:

"Eternal Life!" She muttered, becoming enraptured with the story unfolding before her.

If I can make money off this game, I should begin studying this world's lore afterwards... She thought to herself before returning to the book.

'Nothing is working. I'm so scared.'

'Please.Please.Please.Please.Please.Please.Please.Please.Please.'

'I can't let them get away with -'

'With what?'

'HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!'

Liz saw 3 pages pass by with nothing but HAHA being scribbled over and over again, it was greatly unsettling.

'I don't even remember what was wrong any more! HAHAHAHAHAHA!'

The unstable handwriting began to descend from barely readable research to illegible scribblings, with the occasional word written down over and over again: 'LEAH'

It soon became every other page: 'LEAHLEAHLEAHLEAHLEAHLEAH'. Over and over, this name appeared, like it was the only thing the Author could remember anymore, like he was grasping desperately at his final memory. 

Liz felt... Fear. Someone had done this to him, turned a brilliant man into a raving lunatic, remembering only a single word.

Soon she came to the final page after nothing but ‘LEAH’ for more than 10 straight pages, the one she had glanced at as she entered the room.

'I am about to die.'

'I can feel it. This is merely the calm before the storm.'

'But in this fantastical mome- LEAHLEAHLEAHLEAHLEAH'

The handwriting got worse and worse, the repeating word continued.

'This is all I have, but to ye who passed my trials I offer my legacy. My memory. Everything I am, I offer to you'

'LEAHLEAHLEAHLEAH'

'But I beg you to ensure they pay. Find my journals, finish what I started'

There was a gap again, a large one, before the writing started again and ended:

'I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.'

'Please. Please forgive me Leah.'

The entire page was covered in spots of dry water where the Author had been crying

A line of ink extended from the 'h' on Leah, as if the Author had died writing it. Liz looked up, staring at the skeleton, the pen, the coffin. She began to understand, everything was for her. She put the journal in her inventory quickly, tears forming from her button eyes.

[Mysterious Author's Journal (Volume 5) (???)]

[A journal of a man searching for eternal life. Tales of conspiracy and intrigue. Was the Author's descent into madness a result of selfish desire, or selfless love]

Liz got up, but was interrupted by a series of system alerts she had not expected:

[You have begun WORLD Quest: <Eternal Lovers>] [Eternal Lovers (I) (MYTHIC)] [Plot: You have discovered a journal and research of a man who went mad looking for eternal life. It details a secret that may shake the world to its very core, were his actions selfish or selfless? This you must find for yourself] [Goal: <Find the Author's journals (1/5)>] [Reward: <Eternal Lovers (II)>, <???>] [Accept: Y/N] [«WARNING» The outcomes of WORLD Quests will permanently alter Galdrash forever]

As Liz was reeling over the first 2 messages another quickly followed, and this one repeated 3 times:

The announcement occurred 3 times and with each of its grand bell chimes, Liz stumbled until she fell to the floor.

She had achieved an advanced class. She started a world quest, and everyone knew about it.

"Fuck..."