The Rifleman - Ch.40 (Patreon)

Chapter Forty

Lava world.

“If you don’t stop that, I swear I will leave you here,” Malia snapped after about five minutes of him hopping back and forth between the two zones.

“Cold, hot.” Wesley chuckled and winked. “Go on, admit you want to do it too.”

“I most certainly do not,” Malia sniffed. “I stopped that kind of thing years ago.”

“Aww, that’s sad,” Wesley said. “You should do things that make you smile.”

“Like hitting you?” Malia asked with a half smile. 

“Sure, sure,” Wesley admitted. “Although I would urge you to find other ways to satisfy your more violent tendencies.”

“Fine,” Malia chuckled. “But you won’t like that option either.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Wesley said. “Not being hit as often sounds pretty good.”

“Just remember,” Malia grinned wickedly. “You asked for it.”

“See, now that was just you being deliberately creepy about it,” Wesley hurried after Malia as she strode purposely away from the zone border.

“That was not creepy,” Malia called back. “You’ll know when I’m being creepy.”

“Okay, now that was definitely creepy.”

Malia laughed as they headed deeper into the new zone.

Wesley found it to be precisely as Malia described it, complete with stretches of black stone broken by rivers of glowing lava. The dry air smelled of sulfur and metal, and everything was warm to the touch. 

Vision was limited thanks to giant boulders and debris thrown out by a massive volcanic mountain that dominated the center of the zone. They would have to pass by it to get out. 

At least he could finally get a clear view of the wall around this game world. It was… beyond words. He imagined it was what an ant would see if it stood at the base of the Grand Canyon and looked up. The sheer scale was staggering, and for the first time, Wesley was faced with the incredible power that the Players who built this world had wielded to do that. 

No wonder they saw nothing wrong with drafting all these different races for their own amusement. Was it even possible to be sane at that kind of power level, or did the sheer number of options available just overwhelm the mind, leaving something alien and deeply uncaring behind? 

“What is that?” Wesley asked as they approached a stone plinth with a large, ornately carved hammer resting on top of it.

“An alter to the ForgeMaster,” Malia said grimly. “Their subjects can come and pray here for small boons and buffs. It is sort of a recruiting tool as well. Like, you or I could pray here to be recruited by that faction. If the Player accepts, we become Player Characters.”

“Ever been tempted?” Wes asked Malia.

“Sure,” Malia admitted. “I guess we all have, at one time or another. The idea of an organized group to look after us and the possibility of becoming a Player’s Champion would be enough to tempt anyone.”

“Yeah,” Wesley’s eyes drifted up to the sheer wall of black rock rising into infinity in the distance. “No thanks.”

“Give it time,” Malia shrugged. “You’d be able to get proper loot and get an empowered class. It’s more seductive when you are here for longer.” She gestured for him to back up. “Honestly, there is only one way to remove that temptation.”

“Which is?” Wesley asked.

“Destroy these things,” Malia laughed as she summoned her hammer. “Doing it blocks you from recruitment.” She gestured him further back. “It also summons some beasts and such from the area, so it’s a good way to get a bunch of kills at once and burn off steam.”

“So, why not let me do it?” Wesley asked. 

“Because you haven’t been here long enough to know what you want yet,” Malia said with a bitter smile. “My first and third partners both gave in and signed up with a Player in the end. They both insisted they never would, right up until they did.”

“What?” Malia asked an hour later. She had smashed the altar, killed the mechanical spiders it spawned, and looted them all herself. He tried to help but she insisted he stay back and not get involved.

They had been walking in silence ever since.

“You’re really condescending, that’s all,” Wesley shrugged.

“What?” Malia snapped. “How am I condescending?”

“I was here long enough to make my own decisions within about a minute of being drafted,” Wesley said simply. “You’re a better fighter, sure. You’ve got more experience than me in just about everything, sure. But you don’t get to tell anyone if they know what they want or not.”

“I do have experience,” Malia countered, “So I know that people change their minds all the time.”

“Probably true,” Wesley admitted. “But people still have a right to make their own decisions.”

“Fine,” Malia rolled her eyes. “Next time, I promise I won't interfere.” 

“That’s all I want,” Wesley said with a shrug.

“Not that I see what the big deal is,” Malia muttered.

“Because it is just about all we have left,” Wesley answered hotly.

“What?” Malia frowned.

“They took our worlds from us, our lives, the ones we loved—everything,” Wesley said angrily. “All we have left is who we are and the freedom to make our own choices.” He huffed. “Without that, we might as well be Player Characters.”

“Uh,” Malia chuckled. “Shit, you might actually be right.”

“It’s been known to happen,” Wesley shrugged.

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Wesley crept forward, the rock hot against his belly as he peaked over the edge of the ridge, eyeing the giant metal scorpion below them. His sims were crawling into position on either side. 

Their path through the zone had been interrupted by a massive earthquake that caused an enormous section of it to drop lower, opening a wide gorge from the wall all the way to the mountain in the center. It was now, slowly, filling with lava. 

If they didn’t cross soon, they would be stuck walking all the way around the zone to get clear, as crossing forty feet of open lava was beyond either of them. 

After three hours of searching, this was their best option, with only a short climb on the far side to get clear. 

Which was great, except the space was occupied by a giant mechanical scorpion the size of a station wagon. 

Every minute they waited, the lava crept closer to this spot, and in under an hour, it would be too late. So, Wesley concentrated hard on their target. Hawk Eye did its thing, and he could see the weaker areas of armor. 

He nodded to the Sara clone and pointed out a spot at the base of the tail while he directed his own copy to fire on the base of the left-hand pincer. Finally, he sighted on the place where the neck connected to the main body. It was a complicated connection point, and it looked weak-ish.  

He cast a single charge of Armor Piercing Round into his rifle. Wesley mentally centered himself, letting out a slow, steady breath and allowing the rifle sights to settle on the exact spot before finally pulling the trigger with a steady, gentle pull.

All three M1s cracked in unison, and three spiral trails were left in the air as the bullets slammed into the target. 

The tail twisted, buckled, and bent plates blocked vertical movement as the left-hand pincer was severed and clattered to the black stone.

As for his shot, it slammed into the scorpion’s neck, causing the head to droop but not detach completely. 

“Shit,” Wesley muttered as Malia dropped down and charged the scorpion. Her massive sword parried the metal pincer before scoring a line down the metal head of the scorpion.

While she fought and danced around the scorpion’s blows, Wesley tried to stay calm. He pushed a new A.P. Round charge into the rifle and aimed again. Wes waited patiently for an opening as his sims waited for orders. 

A dull red glow near the tail caught his attention, and he saw the twisted and buckled metal heating and softening before it reformed. The wicked-looking tail immediately started to curve up and into striking range.

Wesley quickly changed targets, firing his round into the base of the tail as it drew back to strike.

This time, the round did its job, nearly severing the tail, and the weight of the mass of metal completed the job, causing it to tear clear of the creature as it fell.

“Right pincer, Volley Fire!” Wesley called to his sims, hearing them start to fire, two twin spalling shots slamming into the remaining offensive weapon the scorpion had. It wasn’t enough to fully detach the thing, but the quick volley of regular shots finished the job easily enough. 

“Stun rounds!” Wesley called as he rose to one knee, firing off two quick bullets charged with Jolt. 

Below him, Malia took the opening and switched out her weapon to a large axe, which she swung at the damaged but quickly mending neck. The stun effects weren’t strong, but they did lock up the legs for a fraction of the second Malia needed. 

The head drooped, and the powerful kick she followed it up with ended the fight neatly.  

Wesley shifted to wisp form and pushed off, dropping slowly toward the ground with a charge of Infused Flare, slowing his fall to a gentle arc that deposited him not far from Malia and the corpse. 

He cast a Lesser Regenerate to help her recover from the fight. She wasn’t bleeding, but not every injury was visible at once, and Wesley liked to be sure.

“Not a bad job,” Malia smiled. “Let’s get this looted and get out of this death trap.” 

Wesley didn’t need to be told twice. The large scorpion had dropped a few steel bars and a collection of cogs and gears. He put them all in his Storage Box and hefted his backpack carefully, finding that the box seemed to have taken the weight along with the rest of the items. 

He gave Malia a leg up, and she leaped almost twenty feet, grabbing the edge and pulling herself up in a single move. 

“Nice,” Wesley complimented her, shaking his hands out before he shifted back to Were-wisp and pulled himself up the rock, his sims following.

“Not too shabby yourself,” Malia said, summoning a sword and shield before they both headed away from the ravine, having beaten the lava by about twenty minutes.

“Do you have any idea what those gears and things are?” Wesley asked her as they kept up a steady pace. 

“Repair items for machines, I think,” Malia shrugged. “I’ve never used them myself.”

“I’ll add them to the rest then,” Wesley decided. “But I really need to get a fresh supply of cloth scraps. If I knew they would actually be useful, I would never have left so many behind in that dungeon.”

The hours passed, and they eventually decided to set up camp in the center of a cluster of boulders that had settled in a rough circle, with only a single opening leading in.

Wesley figured the area was large enough and cast My Domain, putting the door on the far side from the entrance to the little area. It fit…  just. There was a narrow passage from the entrance to the ring and around one side of the domain to the door. It was only wide enough for them to walk in single file, but Wesley dropped a shield at the entrance and another two at the halfway mark. 

Combined with the five he layered over the door itself, they had an early warning system, plus a reasonable shield before anything made it as far as the door. 

Malia immediately conscripted the Sara clone to run her a bath, she had become increasingly pleased with the creature comforts on offer in the safe room. 

Wes, meanwhile, sent his other sim off to start cooking, calling out instructions as he started sorting out the remaining repair materials. 

He laid them out, checking out his suddenly meager-looking options. 

There were thirty cloth scraps, fifty leather scraps, ten bars of steel, five bars of iron, six wheels, and twelve cogs. 

“Not a bad collection,” Malia came over, drying her hair on a spare blouse. “You’ve almost got the complete set.”

“What am I missing?” Wesley asked. 

“Energy crystals and oil,” Malia noted. “But the crystals only come from dungeons.”

“I never saw any,” Wes complained. “Mind you, I’ve only done two.”

“They need to be mechanical dungeons,” Malia told him as his other sim served them a meal. They are common to ForgeMaster zones; there is probably one near here.”

“Are they useful?” Wesley asked. 

“Sure, if you have powered gear,” Malia laughed at his hopeful expression. “Keep dreaming; you need to upgrade something a lot to get a power function.”

“Can we go check out the dungeon anyway?” Wesley asked. “I mean, are we strong enough?”

“Might be,” Malia nodded, “But I’d rather see if we can get a contract to clear a specific one before doing it just for some upgrade parts, rare or not.”

Wesley didn’t give up on the idea, arguing with Malia all night, even if he wasn’t entirely sure why. Something was just niggling at him. A feeling more than a memory or an idea.

There was something about those repair scraps, about how he almost had every type that was grating at him. Some half-forgotten memory was on the tip of his mental tongue, but he couldn’t quite catch it. 

In any case, his instincts suddenly screamed at him, telling him that going to the dungeon was important.

Morning changed nothing, and about two hours after they dismissed the safe room, Wesley felt a surge of joy as they walked past a small collection of boulders and a passing tremor revealed a portal arch hidden in the middle.

“I don’t like it,” Malia growled. “First, you start arguing about doing a dungeon, and now one just happens to pop up in our path?”

“I’d say I lead a charmed life, but we both know that is bullshit,” Wesley chuckled. “I do want to go in, but if you say no, we go on.”

“Just like that?” Malia asked. 

“Just like that,” Wes confirmed. 

“Arrgh!” Malia swore and kicked at the ground. “Do you have any idea how infuriating that is?”

“What did I do?” Wes protested.

“Being all reasonable is completely unfair,” Malia sighed. “Come on, I can’t say no now, can I?”

Wesley hurried after her, walking into the portal a split second after she had entered.

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“Ugh, I hate you so much right now,” Malia said, lifting one foot out of the deep, oily, fetid water covering them both up to above the knees. “You better hope there is something good in here, or we’ll be having extra training sessions from now on.”

“Hey, you have nice leather and steel armor,” Wesley grimaced. “I’m in cloth. This stuff feels awful.”

The entrance room was far from the entrances he had known in other dungeons, which had all been dry, clean, and empty. This place looked like the flooded boiler room in the basement of an abandoned factory. Rusty metal walls, gratings, and a ceiling full of pipes completed the look. It even had the occasional burst of steam from the pipes, and everything was covered in oily water.

A long corridor stretched ahead of them, rising slightly until the water was left behind. 

Walking was treacherous, with debris lying hidden below the water.

Wesley cheated, shifting into wisp form and walking on the surface of the water as Malia made him promise to clean, polish, and shine her armor once they were out of there.

“I should make you walk down here with me,” she grumbled, “Let you stub your feet against broken pipes.”

Wesley chuckled and ducked slightly to pass under a rusted-out sign, only to find himself staring at a set of metal legs clinging to the roof. His eyes traced them down to the pipe, seeing it deform slightly where the legs joined it.

“Get back!” Wesley called urgently, dropping wisp form and bringing his rifle up as he crashed into the water.

“Watch it!” Malia snapped as water splashed over her, but she gasped a second later when he fired up into the pipework, and a metal creature flailed as it was blown in two.

Pipe Mantis (Tier 5)

Deceased

Ambush Predator

“Okay,” Malia said, summoning her shield and a hammer from her skill. “I think you can stay on top of the water for a while.”

“See, I have my uses,” Wesley said with a cheeky smile. 

“Lose the smile,” Malia warned. “You still sprayed me with this shitty water.”

They came across seven more of the Mantis before they came to the first door in the tunnel. Beyond that, there was an endless tunnel. Wesley fired off a flare shot, and they both watched it wink out a scarce few feet past the door. 

“That’s weird,” Wesley muttered, turning to see Malia frowning. 

“We need to be careful,” Malia sighed. “Come on.” She led the way into the first room.