Infinity Legends

Chapter 20: The Bard

It was no surprise to anyone that the marketplace of Winner City was boiling with activity. It seemed that, every passing year, the chaos of merchants yelling their absurd offers just grew more and more out of control to the point the stands had long spilled out of the designated plaza and onto the nearby streets.

The cacophony of players and NPCs alike haggling was only juxtaposed by the upbeat music blasting from the speaker-drones evenly distributed across the trading floors. The skyscrapers everywhere showcased outdoors for all sorts of public. Some advertisements were recruitment campaigns for high-level guilds while others were informative guides for new players to find quests and cheap items. Just as bright as the billboards were the marketing holograms each shopkeeper deployed just in front of their business, illuminating the night with logos, prices and product exhibits.

As the four travelers marched down the street, they were all individually approached. Takol receive at least a dozen propositions for rifle upgrades, while Barry was constantly harassed by food vendors with exquisite glowing treats on their menus. Serry had been offered several dark-matter crystals, and ended up buying an ice-crystal necklace from a jeweler protected by two war-mechs. Gurm had dismissed an offer or two for brighter, more colorful clothes, despite being tempted. She needed to save money for the new staff components.

Their final destination was a rather empty stall where a goat-fish-humanoid alien screamed out his offers to no avail. While Gurm conducted her business, the other three spacefarers hanged back, taking in the busy Friday night.

“Any idea where we’ll find our bard?” Serry asked while inspecting her glorious—and surprisingly powerful—new necklace.

“Not really,” Takol shook his head. “To be honest, I never met the man, but I heard about him.”

“Why is he so famous?” Kramen asked.

Takol lifted his chin to look at the nocturnal sky. There was not a cloud in sight, so the sheet of stars and the twin moons shined unimpeded, but Takol’s eyes were stuck to the orange blight stamped on the darkness, a nearly invisible manifestation of a black-hole not extremely far from the world they found themselves on.

“Potathunder was at the Battle of Spruce,” Takol said, finally.

“On which side?” Serry asked.

“Does it matter?” Takol raised his arms. “He’s a bard, so he was on the winning side, for all anyone knows.”

“I’m back!” Gurm said, rejoining the group with a new staff. This one, however, was not topped by a time-bending gem, or any gem for that matter. It was just a long, intricate piece of woodwork. “They had no time crystals. I’ll have to go get them myself at Bibelo III.”

“There must be something somewhere here,” Takol looked around.

“I don’t think so,” Serry interjected. “Fish-goat-guy over there is the best dark-matter dealer in Winner City. If he doesn’t have it, whoever does will be charging more than your ship for one.”

“Guess we’ll be visiting the Bibelo System then,” Takol sighed. He was tired of flying from star to star. “But first to hunt down our bard.”

“Right!” Kramen punched his own palm with conviction. “I’ve been thinking of a plan. This city is huge, putting together players and NPCs we’re looking at over a million people spread over at least a dozen districts. If we’re going to find the bard, we’ll need to split up and cover more ground. We have to look smart, not hard. I have selected key spots where a bard would be more likely to be seen, including shops, clubs, plazas, restaurants and concerts. We’ll divide each…”

“Ahem!” Gurm interrupted. “Or we could go to the bridge on this flier I got from the shop,” she handed Kramen a colorful leaflet.

Kramen frowned and ran his eyes over the piece of paper.

Come hear the Spacebound Chronicles from the legendary, unequally skilled and overwhelmingly awemazintastic Lord Potathunder!

Every Friday, 9PM WCT @ Victory Bridge.

“Yeah, or we can do that.”

***

Even though no portion of Winner City came close to beating the marketplace in terms of business and overcrowding, the whole city was more than alive, with countless beings of all species and backgrounds transiting from parties to business, delivering quests, playing street games or just chatting over a cup of tea by the sidewalk.

Some areas, however, were noticeably more crowded than others, including the gallery that went under Victory Bridge. There, a pack of players, most of whom wearing low level gear, had been herded to silently listen to the melodious tune and vigorous rhymes propelled by a bard perched onto the railing of Victory Bridge. Kramen and his friends had no trouble finding their way there and sneaking into the audience.

The bard, while skillfully stringing his lute, told stories of years past, about the day he allegedly met the most famous player in Fantasy Stars history: Logan Spacebound.

“That’s Lord Potathunder?” Takol asked, unimpressed, while pointing a long nail to the man dressed entirely in green with a bright golden hat.

“Shh!” one of the nearby newbies turned to Takol and raised a finger to his lips.

Takol rolled his eyes. “No wonder only noobs come here. I was around long before Logan Spacebound started poking his nose into everyone’s business. I know how things really went down.”

“Hey, shush!” this time who silenced Takol was Gurm. “I wanna hear the story!”

“You may want to keep it down,” Kramen whispered next to his reptile friend. “We’re already sticking out like sore thumbs for our high-level gear alone. No need to cause a scene.”

With a quick look around, Takol verified his friend was right. No one among the crowd of new gamers wore anything nearly as flashy and elegant as Takol’s bright armor, now topped with blue bone plates in key locations, or Serry’s gown and jewelry. Even Kramen, who wore nothing but civilian clothes, stood out for the blinking implants on the back of his head.

And the bard on the bridge seemed to have noticed. The lips behind the short bear had stopped singing as his eyes brushed over the four most experienced players of his audience, taking specially long on the reptile. The bard never stopped stringing his music, even as a somewhat gloom shadow weighed on his features. After a moment he resumed his song:

“As soon as Logan’s feet touched the crane, he fell for his death. He screamed as if he was insane, until he ran out of breath… When I looked down, I expected to feel sorrow, but what I actually saw you’ll find out tomorrow!” as soon as the bard sung his last verse, he spun his legs over the railing and took off running down the bridge, faster than anyone present would have expected.

“We can’t lose him!” Kramen yelled as he shoved confused spectators aside. “Gurm, stop him!”

“I can’t!” Gurm waved her wooden staff, still lacking the critical dark-matter component to it.

“I got this!” Serry yelled as her open palms fired a freezing blast over the noobs gathered between them and the bridge. The dozens of humanoid-shaped ice statues were then all connected by a thick layer of ice that allowed Serry to, given a running start, slide right up into the air and land onto the bridge.

As she took off after the bard in green, Takol and Kramen were already climbing up the frozen noobs to try and join the pursuit.

Serry was fast, but Lord Potathunder was faster, jumping over crates, rolling under trucks and nimbly dodging passersby. That forced Serry to use her powers to freeze the ground ahead of her so she could ski after the target. Such maneuver had caused more than one civilian to slip and curse Serry. Even then she was no closer to reaching the bard, his golden hat always in sight.

“Guys?” Serry screamed into her wrist communicator as she skated down the busy streets.

“Here!” Takol’s voice replied. “We got a car, catching up to you.”

“He’s headed for the market!” Serry informed. “If he reaches it…”

“We’ll lose him, for sure!” Kramen completed. “Cut him off!”

Serry nodded, knowing exactly how to do that. As she slid down her frozen path, she redirected her powers to create a ramp of ice going up a small parked truck. The speed she had gathered sent her flying once more, and from the air she could see the golden hat down the street getting closer to the market plaza. In fact, there was already a crowd forming, and that was perfect. In a heartbeat, Serry fired a ball of icy dark-matter into the crowd in front of Potathunder, freezing another few dozens of civilians into a solid ice barrier.

The bard tried to stop, but his momentum had him crash face-first against the frozen citizens. After falling on his butt and looking back to see the ever-approaching huntress, Lord pushed himself up and ran into a side alley, making Serry lose sight of him.

As Serry landed back on the ground with a swift roll, she kept on running and reached the entrance to the alleyway where she had lost the target just as a red skycar with a broken window descended next to the frozen civilian barrier. As soon as the car had landed, Takol and Kramen ran out, joining Serry on a charge into the dark, empty and uncomfortably moisty alley.

The small stretch ended in a tall fence, and to either side rose solid walls of bricks, most of which covered in graffiti tags of low-level guilds.

“He must’ve jumped the fence!” Serry pointed, already summoning a block of ice to help them climb it.

Takol, though, had a more practical idea and simply shot a continuous laser beam to cut down a man-sized hole in the fence.

The three readily started running, but stopped as a green and golden blur jumped from behind a trash can, swinging a silver lute directly against Takol’s head. The reptile went down holding his snout, and the Potathunder rapidly switched targets to smash his musical instrument of pain into Serry’s knee, before kicking Kramen’s gut into a pile of garbage bags.

Serry screamed in pain, but quickly shot a frost-blast at the bard, who ran up the wall and pushed himself off just in time for the building to be frozen white while he landed with both feet over Serry’s shoulders. As she went down under his weight, he bonked her once again on the top of her head.

Takol, too, was getting back up when another lute strike sent him back down. With a wide smile plastered to his face, Lord Potathunder sauntered away, removing a cord of his lute and using said cord to improvise a garrote against Kramen.

“I know who you are Takol Scaleback, but I’ve flustered your attack!” the bard yelled, still smiling behind Kramen, now his hostage. “If you wish to avoid further blunder, never again challenge Lord Pota…”

Before the rhyme was concluded, a boink of raw wood smashing against Potathunder’s stupid golden hat echoed through the alleyway, and the bard collapsed forward. Kramen wasted no time untangling the ropes from his neck before verifying that the bard had dropped cold, and right next to the unawaken man stood Gurmonya Bearius, holding her unfinished wooden staff like a baseball bat.

Kramen looked at Gurm, who smiled and looked at Takol. Takol pushed himself up, massaging his head, then looked at Serry. Serry, who was holding some ice against her temple, looked at Kramen and shrugged:

“Guess we have our bard.”