DruSM157

Pariah Online: A Voyage into the Intangible Aether

Location: The Dungeon -- The City of Thorinn, Aetheria

---

“Y’know, if we fail, ol’ Aag’s will put it all on you. No pressure of anything.”

“I know,” Benkei grumbled. “It’s not you I'm worried about.” He looked over to the...newbie squadron he’d put together. It was this group he had to watch. This dungeon was such an odd creation, seemingly focused more on support than actual DPS mechanics. That meant that they were going to rely on the weaker members of their team. Spreading out Graves and Rael was still a better idea than having them close to the party; if they started to argue it would distract them and leave them open for attack. Having the two constantly working instead of bickering was the only chance he had of the two actually working well right now.

Then Alja started gave her own idea of how she should play. Which of course, was counter-intuitive to his plan. She was a better tank, but they were already low on DPS, hence why he had her switch to DPS. Graves was the highest DPS player of the group, and used to solo content, having him take a flank alone would work well to his skillset. Rael’s attitude and skillset led her better to run point with the rest of the party giving her backline support and DPS, meaning her taking point in front was smart. Kalie was another high DPS player, but her playstyle was totally different than Graves; she would need the others to draw aggro so she could properly do her rotation.

“Graves, you move to the right flank then, Kalie, take the left flank ahead of Alja.” He turned to the tall woman. “I need you to play both roles today,” he said, trying to keep his voice as diplomatic as his teenage brain could. He was the leader but screaming about it would only get him labeled a brat, or a kid, or weak. And he hated any of those labels. “You’re our first and last line of defense for the main group when it comes to melee damage output, and we need to keep aggro on us to allow Graves and Kalie to do their best damage ahead of us.” Rael’s agility would keep her safe, and with his support tank magic and Seele’s support magic, they could serve to keep the defense up on the front line fighters.

“Hn. We got anybody with light or fire magic? Or am I going to have to light a torch here?”

Benkei blinked, realizing the party composition lacked fire. If they’d had Priscilica on their team, it’d be different. But here...multiple wind users, earth, lightning, ice, darkness… He closed his eyes and thought back to his science classes at school. “Does anyone have any tonic water materials? Seele, you cook, tonic water is a level three item, you wouldn’t happen to have any, would you?”

The idea was simple. Most tonic water contained a chemical named quinine, which if frozen by Alja’s magic, could absorb and emit ultraviolet light, which darkstones (a very common crafting material) emitted. It’s what made them so easy to mine since they tended to light up small caves. If they charged the frozen tonic water with the light from the darkstones, they’d be able to turn any weapon coated with Alja’s Tundra Glass into useable torches, eliminating the need to carry one in hand.

Benkei also reached into his bag, producing a small gold ring, holding it out to Rael. “It’s a torchring artifact. I use it when I can’t hold a torch and tank at the same time,” he remarked, “Since you’ll be taking point, it’d be best used by you.”

Pariah Online: A Voyage into the Intangible Aether

Location: The Dungeon -- The City-State of Thorinn, Aetheria

---

What else was there to say? He was busy wiping off the blood from his sword; something he’d never had to do before. He looked back to the wall murals and back to Aag’s group. “It looks like your path will have more combat, but I believe your party will put out higher DPS.” They did have some high ranked DPS players, after all. “We have good agility and survivability with Rael and Graves on our team. I think whatever secrets behind these totems and a chasm can be figured out by my group.”

He turned back, before feeling something. A pang of worry, deep within his stomach. Why did it feel so...scary? It was just a dungeon. But the gore, the smells...this wasn’t a halloween or April Fool’s trick. This all felt...too realistic. Like someone had modded the game. Maybe in America violence of this level was fine...but not in Japan. Someone would lose their job over this.

“Look, whatever’s going on in the game...whatever the dev’s are pulling suddenly…” Benkei struggled with compassion to anyone beyond his brother, but these people actually believed in him. For the first time, Benkei felt a tinge of hope that maybe he could belong somewhere. “Something feels wrong abou...all of this. Be careful.”

He made his way facing the entryway into his group’s chosen path. He waved at Aag, Luci and the rest of their group. “We’ll see you on the other side!” He called, doing his best to smile. Ahead lay darkness and danger, the unknown of a brand new dungeon. Benkei’s heart began to pound rhythmically, just like every time his parents began to fight.

It will be over soon, he tried to convince himself.

Pariah Online: A Voyage into the Intangible Aether

Location: Wayfarer’s Retreat -- The City of Thorinn, Aetheria

---

This was bad.

The sudden proposal was nice, in some roundabout way. Benkei was unaccustomed to romance, seeing as how his isolation in his everyday life meant that he had few friends and exactly zero confessions at high school. And marriage? Benkei’s thoughts on marriage were not rose-tinted. He’d watched throughout his childhood the breakdown of his parent’s marriage, and the toxic effect it had left on both himself and his older brother. To him, marriage was nothing more than a vehicle for more misery between two people. Part of him wondered if he was even capable of feeling or experiencing love. It didn’t matter, however, since he’d put so much of himself into the game. Who needed love and affection when you could get the respect of your peers. The reaction of the party to his plan at the same time made him feel...warm inside as if their respect for his plan gave him some semblance of acceptance from the group.

And then the women all got drunk.

“When the hell did they patch that in?” he grumbled, looking at Alja stumbling around like a comedy routine. He was too focused on strategy and combat to ever really get into the world like some roleplayers and had never drunk ale or anything of the sort in-game. Hell, he never even ate anything unless it had some effect to boost his effectiveness in battle.

So why was he suddenly hungry?

“I swear,” he muttered, “If the game designers decided to drop a survival update without publishing a dev letter about this, I’m going to break something,” he let Graves handle the woman. The older man seemed better at dealing with that. Benkei had no idea what to do at all with that.

“I hope everyone can sober up quickly. I doubt we’ll have the luxury of sleeping off a hangover when the dungeon awaits us.”

Pariah Online: A Voyage into the Intangible Aether

@TGM

if only I were drunk

Pariah Online: A Voyage into the Intangible Aether

Location: Wayfarer’s Retreat -- The City of Thorinn, Aetheria

---

Great. He didn’t recognize her from the past-he’d played almost completely public games and why should he remember people he attacked for not keeping their DPS up? But now here he was; given a chance. A test which meant that he couldn’t simply bully other players to quit and gather a new party. No, he had to make do with the group he had right here.

He turned to Seele.

"Alright Seele, you're a support. What are your support abilities, and what is your DPS when you're not supporting the party?” He needed to gauge exactly what she could offer to the party; and whether she’d invested enough in magic that she could provide some small DPS bumps when they didn’t need her support magic up. If she had healing capabilities, she could support Kazuki and take the pressure off his brother.

"Well, I've got quite a few spells up my sleeves! Plenty of defensive and offensive buffs, a fair number of stat and ability debuffs, and a healthy amount of crowd-control--oh! and shields. No damage, I'm afraid, or convention heals, but we've got Kazuki for the real stuff!”

No damage. He felt the words rise up in his chest. A snide remark, a venomous barb, anything to tell this little no-nothing plebian that if she couldn’t add to the party comp in a meaningful way, she could fuck back off to the welcome center and relearn the GODDAMN GAME.

Those words didn’t come out. He felt the glances of Aaginim’s party on him. He knew he was being judged. This was his judgment, his grand trial from the gods themselves for all he’d done. And then Rael came up, spitting venom, and she had the gall to smart off to him-in their own mother tongue! He stared her down, but not out of anger; he was frozen. His heartbeat pounded, and the only thing he could hear was the staccato rhythm of his elevated heart levels. He breathed in deeper through his nose, doing everything to keep his composure. He wanted to smart back; he’d had so many insults from school where the bigger boys would push him around on the way home from school, he’d make snide remarks that would end with him getting a blackened eye or pushed down the hill towards the river. But then…she relented. And he realized he had to make this party work, even if he was dealing with at least one useless player.

“Alja, I’m going to need you to run as a DPS for this encounter,” he said almost robotically, doing everything he could to remain at some semblance of calm. He reached into his knapsack and produced a piece of parchment, and quickly began drawing symbols onto it. The symbols represented each of the players: a spear for Rael, a sword for Graves, a bow for Alex, and so on. “This will be our lineup. Rael will the main tank, tanking the front of the party. Her agility makes her suited for reacting to threats first, without putting the rest of the party in harm’s way. At the same time,” he muttered, drawing a long arc away from the party, “I believe Graves’ skills as a solo DPS player would better fit giving him an entire flank to himself.” He pointed to a central location, where both his symbol and Seele’s symbol were. “I will be off-tanking and adding support along with Seele,” he noted. “Shields first, for Rael and Graves, then offensive boosts for everyone engaging with mobs,” he noted to her. “This other flank will be Alja’s, but she’ll be closer to the party. And here-” he noted a symbol of a scythe that was further away from the party, “is Kalie. With the majority of the party grouped up here, mobs will attack the aggro that I and Alja build up. That will give Kalie opportunities to use her assassin skills and increase our DPS.”

Finally there was the backline, which made up Kazuki and Alex. “Alex will act as ranged DPS, but also will cover our backline. You’ll need to keep awareness around you, especially of mobs that try and sneak around to flank the group. Kazuki, I need you to stay aware of this too.” he looked at his brother, nodding. “We are the equivalent of a public party, and we have expert level players, and newbie level players. I know some of you will play high level automatically...and I have to accept some of you won’t. So the majority of the group will remain central, supporting our heavy hitter teammates and keeping them alive until we can scout out whatever bosses are waiting for us.”

He looked among the group; since-apart from Graves-the rest had practically gathered around. “Are there any objections to this plan?”

Pariah Online: A Voyage into the Intangible Aether

X

Pariah Online: A Voyage into the Intangible Aether

Location: Wayfarer’s Retreat -- The City of Thorinn, Aetheria

---

Benkei will lead Team B. Those words echoed in Benkei’s head louder than his heartbeat now. There was a sense of pride, and of respect that one of the top tanks in Pariah trusted you enough to lead a team into a blind dungeon. At the same time, he looked at who he had to work with.

Kazuki. Backline, of course. As long as he could heal the group, they would be fine.

Rael. Her attitude was terrible, but her skills as a tank were excellent. She would work best taking point for the group.

Graves. The solo player was a wild card for the group, but the fact that he was a solo player spoke for his capabilities as a DPS. He just had to make sure Rael and Graves were separate enough.

Alex. An unknown factor, but he saw his weapon at least. With that bow, he was obviously going to be on the backline. The fact that he could stand alongside the support and healer made Benkei slightly less worried, since if enemies found their way around the archer would be able to deal with them.

Seele. He didn’t know her at all, but she looked like the standard support player. He’d need to talk to her about what skills she used to best fit her into his plans.

Alja. A switch player, capable of playing DPS or Tank. That variation meant she would best fit anywhere in the raid and could fall back to tanking if they were surrounded.

Kalie. The assassin was what worried him. They’d need to create enough diversions for her to strike mobs from the shadows.

”Well, good luck. You’re gonna need it. Don’t fuck it up."

Benkei grinned and nodded to Pris. “Thanks. I’ll do my best not to disappoint.” It didn’t take long for the first member of the group to come looking for him. Of course, people wouldn’t know who he was, and those that did...well he knew his reputation might precede him. Nothing about that now. He had already set the chessboard in his mind at how to arrange all the pieces. He just needed to see what they could do.

”Is Benkei here? Group B support, looking for my fearless leader!” Well, the girl definitely had a good attitude about it. Then again, he’d played with many players who were all “positivity and kindness” at the start of a dungeon, only to end up worthless and crying by the end. Hopefully, she’d be useful. Benkei raised his hand, motioning her over to him.

”I’m Benkei. Nice to meet you,” he started, even if it was just a formality. ”What kind of support do you specialize in?”

Pariah Online: A Voyage into the Intangible Aether

Location: Wayfarer’s Retreat -- The City of Thorinn, Aetheria

---

Priscilica definitely kept vague about who Aaginim wanted to bring in as an off-tank, and Benkei wasn’t sharp enough to catch the hints she was dropping. Then again, he was only 17, and woefully still in that teenage mindset that he knew everything. He nodded to the mage and eyed up the others in the room.

”It looks like there’s enough people to field two raid parties. I guess we’ll go over the plans soon enough. Talking to the girl had been a good distraction; his heartbeat was no longer pounding in the back of his head, and he was feeling the tinge of excitement to take on new content. ”I guess this raid will be a good showcase for prospective guild members,” he mused, grinning. The idea of being offered a seat at the table of Mystic Prophecy wasn’t something he considered lightly.

Then he turned to look at Kazuki.

What if they offered him a place in the guild? Would he have to leave Kazuki behind? Those thoughts twisted Benkei’s smirk into a slight frown. He had to push those thoughts down, below the surface. He needed to focus on the raid at hand, not stupid fantasies of being the best.

Pariah Online: A Voyage into the Intangible Aether

Location: Wayfarer’s Retreat -- The City of Thorinn, Aetheria

---

“I’m sure it won’t be too much longer, so I’d get your bearings. My names Priscilica, though you can just call me Pris. If you have any luck you’ll be in my group, assuming Aaginim is doing the usual two groups for a blind run approach he likes to do.”

Benkei looked at the other tanks; the other options to run the second path of the raid and who would off-tank for Aaginim. “It’s a tough choice,” he nodded to the girl, who only stood slightly lower than him. It relaxed him somewhat, even though he knew he was talking to a player that ran some of the top content of the game. He started looking between Siegfried and Rael. “On one hand, you need a tank that can give off-tank support that will work well with Aaginim’s tools…” he said, eyeing up the room. There was Siegfried; someone he’d ran a raid with some time ago.

It hadn’t been pretty.

”Siegfried will follow orders, but he’s not very dependable when it comes to raid mechanics. Still…” he eyed Rael, “He’s trustworthy and won’t gank the loot.” He looked at the girl, and chuckled. ”Sorry, I got too carried away in thought. Aaginim’s one of the best, and I know he’ll figure out a solid plan.