Avarice: The Realm Chapter Four: Goblin Invasion

Goblin Invasion

“Goblins, eh?” I say. “They don’t sound too terrible.”

“These goblins are,” says Garnet. “They bring trolls and lesser dragons. I don’t even think you’ll be able to take down a lesser dragon alone.”

I open my binder and don my suit of armor, and then I conjure my trusty bow. I twirl an arrow between my fingers. “Who’s helping us?”

“I’ve called for backup from Fort Lincoln,” says Garnet. “The air support will arrive in five minutes. Two Thunderbolts and five Hueys.”

I whistle. “That’s some serious firepower.”

“The ground cavalry will be here in half an hour,” says Garnet. “We just need to hold out until then.”

Garnet and I are walking through the town’s main street. Everyone is panicking, and the raid siren blares above our heads. Dozens of pillars of light are flying in from all directions and landing to reveal players.

“Is it that serious?” I say, as I watch more than a hundred players assembling in the main square.

“Goblin invasions typically contain ten thousand warriors,” says Garnet. “Without the cavalry we wouldn’t stand a chance.”

The beat of a heavy drum resonates across the landscape. It grows louder with every hit.

Garnet runs up the town’s palisade to stand among a dozen or so adventurers. I climb up after her.

The whole of the horizon is black. A line of fuzz punctuated by towering behemoths.

“What do they want with us?” I say.

“Control of the dungeon,” says Garnet. “Dungeons are valuable sources of all sorts of things.”

The drumbeat approaches. The faces of the players say it all: they aren’t prepared for this.

A low drone builds up in the sky to the east. Ten black dots appear in the sky, on the opposite horizon from the invasion.

Garnet holds her hand to her ear. “Yeah. Okay.” She puts her hand down and turns to me. “It’s the French. Their base of operations is closer to South A Town than ours.”

The helicopters fly overhead, their rotors chopping the sky. Hovering over the landscape, they open fire on the goblins with a volley of missiles. Explosions rip through the goblin army.

A pack of dragons rise up out of the invading army and fly towards the choppers. Fire shoots from their mouths. One helicopter is caught right in the body and spirals, smoking, to the ground.

“Ouch,” says Garnet.

Two French jets tear through the sky, releasing carpet bombs. A line of monstrous explosions races across the invaders.

“It’s going to take more than that,” says Garnet, as we watch the invaders continue to approach.

The choppers and jet planes continue to pound the advancing army. Even though it seems like many goblins are dying, there are just so many of them that it doesn’t seem to matter. Plus, the dragons are keeping the French air support from getting close enough to deal real damage. A dogfight breaks out between the jets and dragons, creating spirals of mist and fire in the blue above us.

The goblins begin to erect siege engines. Several of the engines are destroyed by the air support, but more than enough rise up out of the army and inch towards the wall.

The French air support pulls back.

“They’re out of ordinance,” says Garnet.

Two American Thunderbolt aircraft roar overhead. Their guns sound like the fabric of the world ripping apart—a long, drawn-out “bruuuuup.”

The goblins continue to advance towards the town as the Americans take over from the French on the assault.

“Goblins are tough,” says Garnet, as the army approaches. “I doubt the hits they’re taking will do more than thin them out.”

I have nothing to say. When I joined this game, I had the feeling that I would be seeing something like this, but actually experiencing it is a whole different beast.

“Is there some sort of magic protecting them?” I ask.

“Of course,” says Garnet. “Have you ever seen someone take a rocket to the face and survive without magic?”

“How about Freax?” I say.

“Freax is unique to player characters,” says Garnet. “The NPCs in The Realm use a different kind of magic. Kind of like distilled Freax, but different.”

I tap my fingers impatiently on my bow. The American planes, as they run out of ordinance, draw back. The invasion advances. I can make out the individual mountain trolls. Each one looks to be at least five meters in height.

A frazzled-looking Hob approaches us from the stairs to the wall. “RT,” he says, taking a position near us. “Glad to have you here. We’ll take everything we can get.” He is holding an Israeli Galil. He eyes my bow and arrow. “You’re going mid,” he says. “I didn’t take you for the type.”

“His weapon isn’t actually mid,” says Garnet, with a bit of swagger to her stance. “He uses it aboveground as well.”

“Humph,” says Hob. “So you’re not mid or mod.”

“Um, mid and mod?” I say.

“Medieval and Modern,” says Garnet. “Medieval style weapons like bows and swords have certain advantages against magic and are usually buffed with some sort of in-game ability. However, people can still use modern weapons if they so choose. About a quarter of the players in The Realm are mod, and the rest are mid.”

“I see,” I say. I run my finger along the stave of my bow. I’m pretty unique, as far as Freax users go, as I use this weapon during all my hunts. Most people in the real world use guns, of course. Will I have to face these ‘mid’ players when I have my targets?

“Binder,” says Hob. His binder is decorated with yellow and red racing stripes.

“Cool skin,” says Garnet. “Binder.” Her binder is plain military green.

I did not know that binders could look different. Mine is, of course, plain grey. “Binder,” I say. “Hey, can I have one of these skins?”

Garnet shrugs. “You won’t be able to expense it,” she says.

“I wasn’t planning on it,” I say.

Hob chuckles. “So being a government lackey doesn’t pay for everything.”

“Skins are considered extraneous,” says Garnet. “And I’m not a big fan of them anyways. Some X-marines like showing off their skins, but I’m not one of them.”

“Is there, like, a storefront where I can buy a skin?” I ask.

“Yeah, there’s two here in town,” says Hob. “When this is all over, I can show you around.” He looks out over the army of goblins. “But we’ve got a lot of stuff to deal with first.”

“When it comes to combat,” says Garnet, “The Realm isn’t a game. There’s a gold card that can heal some major wounds, but there aren’t that many out there.” She takes a card out of her binder. “Drop.” A crossbow appears in her hand.

“So you’re a mid,” I say.

Garnet nods.

To the west, a number of black dots resolve into the forms of three Abrams tanks, two French AMX tanks, and a number of Bradleys and VABs.

“Looks like the cavalry is here,” says Garnet.

Hob whistles. “Yeah, times like these make me forget how much I hate you military pukes.”

In the distance I hear a distinctive soundtrack playing. Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries.

I sigh. “Are they really?”

Garnet appears to be amused. “They’re really.”

As the volume increases, undercut by the sound of helicopter rotors, I can’t help but let out a small chuckle. There’s no way this wouldn’t happen, right? Those marines saw the chance and took it.

Hob begins to hum along with the melody. Then, the fat lady starts singing. Hundreds of rocket pods flash overhead in a rippling wave of smoke and fire. Explosions rise up to the stratosphere. The violins screech. Two dozen American helicopters blaze overhead. The tanks and IFVs roll across the open desert, spitting plumes of sand out behind them.

“Looks like the boys are spending all my tax dollars,” says Hob.

“You don’t pay taxes in The Realm,” says one of the other players on the wall.

Hob shrugs.

Garnet leans against the crenellation. “Happy Independence Day,” she says.

We watch and listen as the music blazes and the ordinance rains. The whole view is covered in smoke.

The smoke ripples. At the bottom, some shadows slip through. Ten. Twenty. A hundred. Two hundred. A thousand. The goblins leap out of the dust and smoke, close enough to see their frothing mouths and blotched, mottled skin. Three trolls trundle out of the smoke. Ten more follow, dragging clubs the size of sedans.

A single troll comes within the range of the defenders, who open fire. Bullets and arrows ping off of its tough hide. The trolls approach the walls.

One troll smashes the wall to pieces next to where I am standing. Wood particles fly all over the place.

The players surge forward, joining the battle. I enter the fray from the side. Swords and spears are everywhere. Blood splatters my face. A goblin charges me, cackling with the voice of a maniac. This does not seem at all like it’s any form of a game.

The fighting stretches on. Goblins pour into the city through multiple breaches in the wall. Fires jump from rooftop to rooftop. A dragon sprays fire onto the buildings in the town.

An American jet plane soars past and shoots the dragon down. The monster lands in the middle of the town and smashes a couple of buildings, sending up a plume of dust.

Garnet slides up next to me. She is holding twin curved knives at angles to her wrist. I myself have put my bow away and am wielding a short ninjato. Its blade is running with goblin blood.

“Looks like this is the end for South A Town,” says Garnet.

“It had a stupid name, anyways,” I say, trying to make light of the situation.

Garnet slices the arms off of an attacking goblin. “Eh, the game designers could have done better, I agree.” She decapitates another goblin.

“Someone actually designed this game?” I say, as I parry a strike.

“What, you thought The Realm appeared out of nowhere?” says Garnet.

“I didn’t know people actually built it!” I say, as I slash the goblin in front of me.

“Some sort of elder race from another dimension came to ours or something like that,” says Garnet. She kills two goblins in a twirling motion. “They saw that we were making games and made one of their own. Who knows what they were thinking?”

I shrug. The fight continues, and the players are pushed towards the center of town. We take heavy losses.

A flash of light illuminates one of the shops close to the main road. Debris flies everywhere, and out of it rises a blue fire phoenix. The phoenix emits a resonating cry that causes my bones to shiver.

“Someone used a gold card,” says Garnet, baking away from an approaching troll. “Rise of the Water Lord.”

The blue phoenix smashes through the goblins in the city, tossing them up like chaff in the wind. With one of its wings, it slashes a troll in half. It tangles with a dragon and rips the dragon to pieces. Fiery feathers float to the ground.

“What a waste,” says Garnet.

I follow her, backing up, towards where the bulk of the players are making their last stand.

From somewhere behind me, Santa begins to laugh.

“Binder, Ethereal Shield!” yells Garnet. A ring of yellow crosses surrounds us.

The laughter passes overhead, followed by a blast of frigid air. The goblins in the street ahead of us freeze into comically large icicles.

“Nicholas’s Party,” says Garnet. “Another Gold Card.” She releases the barrier around us.

The air feels like we’re in Alaska in the middle of winter. Little snow crystals tinkle to the ground.

More goblins push through their frozen brethren, cackling and waving their crude metal spears. A troll smashes its way past the frozen goblins. The goblin-based icicles shatter in his wake.

Garnet turns, binder in hand, and faces the troll. “Confusion,” she says. A card rises out of her binder and puffs into black smoke.

Yellow balls of energy flit around the goblins and trolls approaching us. They begin to stumble about, careening into buildings.

A train whistle hoots, reverberating across the landscape.

The corners of Garnet’s lips curl up. “We got lucky,” she says. “It’s the Roving Keep.”