Chapter 8: [8] : The Blockade, The Extortionist

The Weeping Thicket was starting to get annoying.

Declan, Sloane, and Kendra had been walking for another two hours. The rain never stopped. The mud just got deeper. Declan was fine, but his two new employees were shivering violently.

"My boots are full of water," Sloane complained for the fifth time. "I think my toes are actually pruning. Do avatars get trench foot? I feel like I’m going to get trench foot."

"Keep your voice down," Kendra hissed from the front. She had an arrow nocked on her bowstring, her eyes darting through the thick, gray fog. "You’re going to pull aggro from something we can’t see."

"It doesn’t matter what we pull," Sloane grumbled, pointing a thumb at Declan. "The psychopath back there just snaps his fingers and turns them into meat confetti. We haven’t been in danger for two hours."

It was true. Over the last two hours, Kendra had scouted six different groups of monsters. Giant spiders, mutated badgers, and more of those iron jawed hounds. Every single fight went the exact same way.

Declan walked up. He let them attack him so they would bounce off his +10 Predator’s Coat. He gave them one shallow scratch with his +20 Carnage Cleaver to apply the bleed effect. Then he snapped his fingers.

Boom. Blood Burst. Instant death.

He was farming them like an assembly line!

Declan was now Level 6. His inventory was overflowing with junk drops like rusted daggers, wolf pelts, and copper coins. And more importantly, he had racked up a solid 200 Origin Points.

"We need to get out of this zone," Declan said. He stepped over a puddle of glowing blue slime. "The EXP from these Level 4 and 5 monsters is starting to drop off. The system gives diminishing returns if you out level the enemies."

"I see an end to the trees up ahead," Kendra called out. She jogged forward a few steps.

"The fog is clearing up too."

Declan and Sloane caught up to her. They broke through the final line of rotting, twisted trees and stepped out onto a rocky cliffside.

The view was bleak. A massive, bottomless gorge stretched out in front of them. The other side of the cliff was barely visible in the mist. The only way across was a long, terrifying suspension bridge made of thick steel cables and wooden planks.

[Area Discovered: The Howling Gorge]

[Warning: Crossing leads to Sector 5 Ashlands Level 5 to 10 Zone]

"Finally," Declan said. "Better hunting grounds."

"Wait," Kendra said. She dropped to a crouch behind a large boulder. She peered around the edge. "There’s a problem at the bridge."

Declan crouched next to her and looked.

At the entrance of the suspension bridge, a makeshift barricade of spiked logs had been set up. Behind the barricade stood about fifteen players. They didn’t look like the desperate, starving newbies in the spawn alley.

These guys were organized. They all wore matching dark gray armor pieces. Some had iron helmets. Others had chainmail vests.

They were carrying actual weapons like real swords, heavy maces, and crossbows. They looked like a private militia.

In front of the barricade, a long line of miserable, wet players was waiting. They were the regular survivors who had managed to scrape their way through the Weeping Thicket.

"What’s going on?" Sloane asked, crawling up next to them.

"Looks like a toll booth," Declan noted.

Down at the bridge, a tall, muscular man with a shaved head and a glowing red broadsword was shouting at the crowd. He stood on top of a wooden crate so everyone could see him.

"Listen up, rats!" the bald man yelled. His voice boomed over the sound of the wind.

"This bridge belongs to the Black Vanguard guild! We secured it. We defend it. If you want to cross into the Level 5 zone, you pay the toll."

A skinny player in the front of the line stepped up, shivering. "How much is the toll?"

"One hundred copper coins." The bald man smirked. "Per person."

The crowd erupted in angry shouts.

"A hundred copper? Are you insane?"

"We just started! We barely have five coins!"

"You can’t do this! The game just started!"

The bald man, whose floating name tag read Gideon, raised his hand. Three massive bruisers stepped forward from the barricade.

They were huge, easily six and a half feet tall, carrying gigantic two handed warhammers.

They slammed the hammers into the rocky ground. The boom silenced the crowd instantly!

"I don’t care if you’re broke." Gideon sneered. "If you don’t have the coins, you can trade your gear. If you don’t have gear, you can go back into the forest and farm until you do. Anyone who tries to cross without paying gets their legs broken and thrown into the gorge. Next in line!"

The skinny player looked terrified. He reached into his inventory and pulled out a rusty shortsword and a pair of leather boots.

He handed them over to a Vanguard guard.

The guard laughed, shoved the skinny guy past the barricade, and let him cross the bridge.

"Extortion," Kendra whispered, her eyes wide. "They are literally holding the map progression hostage."

"That’s one hundred copper," Sloane did the math in her head. "Or equivalent gear. We don’t have that kind of money. We have to go back and farm."

"No we don’t," Declan said. He stood up from behind the boulder. He brushed some dirt off his black coat.

"Declan, what are you doing?" Sloane hissed, trying to grab him. "There are fifteen of them! And those three big guys look like they are Level 7 Warriors at least!"

"I don’t care what level they are," Declan said calmly. "I am not paying."

He walked straight past the boulder and headed down the rocky path toward the bridge. His boots crunched loudly on the gravel.

Sloane and Kendra stayed back, watching him in absolute panic.

Declan walked past the line of miserable players. A few of them looked at him. They saw his pristine black duster and the confident way he walked. They quickly stepped out of his way.

He walked right up to the front of the barricade, stopping a few feet away from the wooden crate where Gideon was standing.

Gideon looked down at him. He took in Declan’s appearance. The high tier coat made Gideon’s eyes light up with greed.

"Nice coat," Gideon said, leaning on his glowing broadsword. "That looks like it’s worth way more than a hundred copper.

Hand it over, and I’ll let you cross. I might even let you keep your pants." 𝐟𝐫𝕖𝗲𝘄𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝕧𝐞𝚕.𝕔𝕠𝐦

The Vanguard members behind the barricade laughed.

Declan didn’t laugh. He looked Gideon dead in the eyes. "Your blockade is in my way. Move it."

The laughter stopped instantly. The crowd behind Declan gasped and took several steps back. Nobody talked to the Black Vanguard like that!

Gideon’s smug smile vanished. A vein popped out on his bald head. "Do you have any idea who you’re talking to, you stupid rat? We run Sector 4. I was trying to be nice. Now I’m just going to kill you and take your stuff anyway."

Gideon waved his hand at the three massive bruisers standing in front of the barricade.

"Crush him. Make it messy so the rest of these idiots learn a lesson."

The three bruisers grinned. They stepped forward, forming a half circle around Declan.

They raised their massive iron warhammers high into the air.

"Say goodnight, edgelord," the middle bruiser grunted.

All three hammers came swinging down at the exact same time. They aimed directly for Declan’s head and shoulders.

Declan didn’t block. He simply took one quick step backward.

The three hammers smashed into the rocky ground right where he had been standing a second ago. The impact kicked up a cloud of dust and gravel.

Before the bruisers could lift their heavy weapons back up, Declan moved.

He didn’t pull his cleaver from his inventory.

He just materialized it directly into his right hand. The pitch black, serrated blade caught the dim light.

He stepped into the dust cloud.

Schwing.

Schwing.

Schwing.

Three fast, fluid motions. He didn’t try to chop their heads off. He didn’t try to cut them in half. He just flicked his wrist, dragging the crimson edge of the cleaver across their exposed arms and chests.

Declan stepped back out of the dust cloud.

He rested the cleaver on his shoulder.

The dust settled. The three bruisers were still standing. They looked at their chests. They each had a very thin, shallow cut on their armor. It barely bled. It just looked like a paper cut.

"Is that it?" the middle bruiser laughed loudly. "You brought a butter knife to a hammer fight?"

Gideon sneered from his crate. "Pathetic.

Finish him!"

The bruisers raised their hammers again.

Declan raised his left hand in the air.

He looked at the three giant men. He smiled.

It was a cold, empty smile.

"Boom," Declan whispered.

He snapped his fingers.

SNAP.

The Blood Burst trait triggered simultaneously on all three targets. The remaining 450 bleed damage was applied instantly as internal kinetic force.

The three bruisers didn’t even have time to scream!

All three of them exploded at the exact same moment. It wasn’t a small pop. It was a violent, catastrophic detonation of flesh and bone. Their iron armor shattered outward like shrapnel. A massive geyser of dark digital blood sprayed twenty feet into the air.

Chunks of meat, shattered helmets, and broken warhammers rained down on the rocky ground. The three men were completely vaporized from the chest down!

The heavy, wet sound of their remains hitting the dirt echoed across the gorge.

Then, absolute, dead silence fell over the bridge.