Echoes of the System: A LitRPG Adventure (Stonehaven League Book 7) Read online

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  Chapter Fifty

  Chapter Fifty-One

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  Echoes of the System

  Book Seven

  Stonehaven League

  Carrie Summers

  Chapter One

  WITH A LONG screech, the Carrion Vulture died.

  Ashley grimaced as she pulled out a pinion feather that had skewered her through the bicep. Her health bar flashed and began to refill, but the stab wound still ached. Squeezing the muscle with her other hand, she hobbled toward the carcass. Of course, the pain in her feet quickly eclipsed the ache in her arm. She glanced at the debuff icon for Blistered Feet—unfortunately for her, thirty-three minutes remained on the timer.

  Stupid desert. How was she supposed to know that hot sand could burn holes in her boots?

  As Ashley neared the slain bird, a foul-looking thing around the size of a pony, the dwarf woman, Heldi, glanced over. She stood with her husband, Dorden, who was still catching his breath after tanking the vulture. It had been a particularly troublesome fight for the stocky dwarf because the enemy had hovered a few feet up, forcing Dorden to jump and swipe at its belly with his warhammer.

  Almost dismissively, Heldi flicked her fingers. Pearly light leaped from the dwarf’s hand and struck Ashley in the arm, closing the stab wound. Ashley’s health bar returned to full.

  “Thanks,” Ashley said, but Heldi’s attention was already back on her husband.

  Ashley sighed. Stonehaven’s NPCs had accepted her. Sort of. But they still didn’t like her. After all, Ashley had been part of the player raid that had burst into the settlement, intent on wresting it from Devon and her allies, only to find that it had been controlled by the demon forces of Archdemon Gaviroth.

  That had been the first surprise.

  It still wasn’t totally clear what had happened afterward. There’d been some sort of battle out on the savanna—according to the NPCs, the demon army had been attacking the ancient city of Ishildar, and Devon had done something to conjure a massive magical tornado that had wiped out the demon force. But then there’d been a flash and a thunderclap followed by a lurch in reality. The settlement, the player raid, and Stonehaven’s NPCs had been teleported to this godforsaken desert wilderness.

  That had been a couple of weeks ago in real-world time. Three times that in game-world time. At first, Ashley had spent her play time out on solo missions. She’d been hoping to figure out 1) where they were, and 2) how the hell she and the other players from her PvP guild could leave this place. Not that she wanted to spend any more time with her guildmates than necessary—before this mess, she’d been laying plans to form a splinter guild, splitting off with whichever players weren’t assholes. But she couldn’t leave the jerks here because, whether it was weird to worry about the fate of NPCs or not, she didn’t want to abandon Stonehaven’s citizens to the cruelty of the guild leader, Nil, and his sycophants.

  Anyway, the problem with her solo explorations was that the mobs around here were way too high-level for her. After having her ass handed to her around a hundred times, she’d finally caved and started trying to befriend the NPCs so that she could join their hunting parties.

  They’d grudgingly accepted her as a party member, mostly because of her awesome Backstab line of abilities. But they didn’t trust her. Ashley’s reputation with the Stonehaven League, the main faction in the settlement, was just barely neutral, and she didn’t seem able to improve it by more than a point or two at a time.

  Still, the uneasy alliance meant that Ashley’s knowledge of the area was growing every day—her in-game map now covered a sizable chunk of desert, and she hadn’t died once since partying with the NPCs. For their part, the hunting party had gained a solid source of damage and someone who could hamstring fleeing mobs to keep them from getting away. Wild game was scarce in the desert and a challenge to bring down, but without a steady source of meat, both the players and NPCs would slowly starve out here.

  Ashley retrieved a pair of throwing knives that had slid between the vulture’s ribs. “Shall I?” Ashley asked, pressing the tip of her dagger to the bird’s belly.

  Another of the NPCs, a brawler-class character named Jarleck, grunted out what Ashley assumed was a ‘yes.’ Containing a flash of frustration—seriously, these guys could be a little nicer—Ashley slid her blade across the vulture’s abdomen and chest to activate the decomposition process into loot. The carcass shimmered for a moment and then fell apart into a collection of items.

  First, she picked up a small bundle, 7 x Vulture Tail Feathers, and handed them to the ranged fighter, a woman named Bayle. Sturdy with shoulders as wide as the dwarf couple’s, Bayle accepted the loot without so much as a thank you. Ashley did, however, receive a popup message.

  You have gained reputation with Stonehaven League: +1 Reputation

  Well, that was something.

  Despite her outward lack of gratitude, Bayle examined the feathers one by one, nodding in appreciation. She gestured with her chin toward Ashley’s hand. “Got a use for that one?”

  “Huh?” Ashley said before realizing she was still holding the pinion feather that had pierced her arm. “Nope. All yours. I guess that means they’ll work?”

  Bayle nodded. “Stonehaven’s fletchers can make do with almost anything.”

  Ashley handed over the feather, then scooped up the other loot items.

  You have received: 2 x Carrion Vulture Breast Meat

  You have received: 2 x Carrion Vulture Drumstick

  Ashley repeated the tally to the group so that no one would suspect her of thievery when they deposited their earnings in the bins near the settlement’s kitchens. She then tucked the meat into her backpack, glad for the recent upgrade she’d received to her bag space—when he wasn’t drinking grog or attending nightly bonfires or ordering massages for his lieutenants, Nil had been putting the NPCs to wo
rk upgrading guild-member gear. Stonehaven’s head leatherworker, Gerrald, was fairly high level, and beyond that, he had skill points in Improvisation, which he claimed to have inherited from Devon. Ashley had never heard of this skill—in fact, no one in the guild had. Regardless, it allowed Gerrald to create some pretty sweet items. Ashley’s pack wasn’t quite a Bag of Holding, but it did seem to have some pocket-dimensional properties. How else could it easily store one hundred large items?

  Gerrald had also been outfitting the leather-wearing members of the guild in new armor, tricking people out in magic items with stat bonuses that almost always played to a character’s strengths—he claimed the bonuses weren’t a conscious choice. The specific enchantments manifested when he thought of the character’s needs. Sounded suspiciously like overdone role-playing to Ashley, but whatever. Anyway, the head crafters of the other major professions had been doing the same for the guild’s weapons and non-leather armor pieces. The overall effect was that the Blood-soaked Blades had risen in power by probably 30% without anyone lifting a finger.

  Of course, even if the NPCs weren’t crafting the gear under Nil’s orders, Ashley would have suggested that they start. The longer the settlement could keep the guild happy, the lower the chances Nil would decide to burn the place down for entertainment.

  As Ashley stood from her crouch, she noticed that the rest of the party had gone abruptly silent. Jamming her throwing knives into sleeves in her leather trousers, she grabbed for her pair of daggers. Bending her knees to remain agile, she activated Feline Awareness and searched the surroundings for potential threats.

  Having crossed two or three miles of boot-burning sands, the party had arrived in a forest of stone spires and rock hoodoos that punctured the desert floor and cast sharp-edged shadows across the hardpacked earth. Though the strips of shade offered some relief from the blazing sun, the contrast between light and dark made it difficult to pick details from the shadowed areas. Even with her sight and hearing enhanced by the rogue-class buff, Ashley couldn’t spot any enemies. As she shaded her eyes to look up, the war ostrich commanded by the tamer-class NPC, Hazel, ruffled its tail plumes. That motion caught Ashley’s attention, and then she realized that Hazel was shaking her head and seemed to be subtly trying to wave someone off.

  Ashley followed the direction of the tamer’s gaze and noticed a strange lump protruding from one of the already-misshapen hoodoos. She cocked her head as she focused on the form.

  “I swear the lack of prowess amongst you people almost makes me miss Devon, as inept as she was.”

  The lump detached from the hoodoo and limped toward them, a humanoid figure with something of a hunched back and twisted spine. Ashley placed the sniveling voice a split-second before Stonehaven’s lawyer, Greel, stepped into the sunlight.

  “If you wished for my presence to remain undetected, the wiser course would have been to carry on as normal with your little hunt, not fall silent as monks the moment you spotted me.”

  Hazel raised her little chin at the lawyer. “If you didn’t want to be seen, perhaps you should work on your Stealth.”

  Greel sneered. “Says the woman with tier 4 Perception. You would have detected me regardless. Unlike you, I’m not multi-classed as a Scout.”

  “That’s right,” said the dwarf woman, Heldi. “Ye are not multi-classed at all. Ye are a simple, bookish lawyer whose only job is maintaining the town charter and otherwise keeping Stonehaven’s records in order.”

  Ashley crossed her arms, feeling generally confused by this encounter. Given the level of monsters in the region, why would a lawyer follow a party of combatants into the desert? And why did the dwarf woman seem to be stating the obvious? Shouldn’t Greel be well aware of his function in the game?

  The whole experience of grouping with Stonehaven’s NPCs had honestly made it hard for Ashley to remember that they were just digital creations. They acted like real people, even down to their petty arguments and inside jokes. But then something like this would happen, where an NPC would overtly explain something in a very “As you know, Bob” sort of way, and Ashley couldn’t help thinking that it was a performance put on for her benefit.

  To make sure she hadn’t missed something, Ashley inspected the lawyer.

  Greel - Level 28 Lawyer (Advanced)

  Health: 413/413

  Nothing all that surprising there, though now that she thought about it, Greel’s health did seem high for a noncombatant NPC. But seeing as Ashley hadn’t spent much time hanging out with civilian characters, she didn’t have many reference points. She didn’t know what the Advanced designation meant but figured it had something to do with settlement management.

  “In any account,” Greel said, his eyes shifting in a weaselly fashion that suited his profession, “I intended to speak with some of you about—Aagh!”

  The lawyer’s words ended in a strangled yelp when, with a grating sound and a few puffs of dust, the hoodoo Greel been hiding behind came to life. The topmost lump of rock swiveled to expose deep-set eyes that glowed a brilliant jade. Stone cracked and snapped as shoulders extruded from the torso below, and then the monster rose from the earth, floating on what seemed to be a self-contained whirlwind. Inside the twisting air, pebbles and dust spun wildly, creating a hazy effect.

  The creature leaned forward and sped across the hardpan toward Greel.

  Without thinking, Ashley rushed forward, activating her Sprint skill in hopes she could get between the lawyer and the attacker. Whether he had four hundred hitpoints or not, a noncombatant wouldn’t fare well against whatever new mob-type this was. But as she passed by Greel, the man snorted and shouldered her aside.

  “I realize that starborn aren’t known for their intelligence,” the lawyer snapped, “but this is just common sense. The most you will do with those blades is chip off a stone flake or two before your weapons break.”

  “But…” Ashley swallowed her words as, to her abundant shock, Greel leaped into the air, executed a scissor kick, and somehow got his heel up to the monster’s eye-height. The kick connected with a loud thud, and then the lawyer planted his hands on the attacker’s rocky shoulders and somehow flipped over the thing’s head.

  “Uh,” Ashley said as she used Combat Assessment on the mob. “What just happened?”

  Rock Elemental – Level 30

  Created by mages in a forgotten age, rock elementals are focused manifestations of earth energy. Known to waylay travelers by masquerading as stone outcrops, they have been spotted in a variety of arid landscapes across Aventalia. It’s rumored that defeating an elemental of this type only disperses the energy and that in time, another being will coalesce to replace the defeated monster.

  Health: 2531/2810

  Weaknesses: Blunt | Lightning

  Resistances: Slashing | Piercing

  Ashley was still shaking her head, trying to piece together what had just happened when Dorden thundered by bellowing something about Stoneshoulder honor. His wife followed behind, a healing spell on her lips. Ashley took a step back while trying to figure out what to do, and she jumped when she accidentally collided with something solid.

  Bayle stepped around from behind her and held out a rock.

  Ashley looked at it in confusion, then hesitantly plucked the fist-sized stone from Bayle’s hand. With a nod, the heavy-set ranged fighter transferred a second stone into her main hand and then wound up like a baseball pitcher. She unleashed, and her missile sailed into the elemental’s head.

  “Arrows aren’t much good either,” Bayle said. “I found that out the hard way. Don’t let Greel act too superior over this. He’s just bitter because he broke a knife off in the shoulder joint of the last one we fought.”

  Wait. So this wasn’t even the first time the lawyer had gone all karate kid? Now Ashley was really confused, but she wasn’t keen to watch the party get wiped out either, so she took careful aim and chucked the rock at the elemental’s head. It missed, glancing of
f the monster’s shoulder instead. Bayle looked ready to repeat her warning about taking careful aim, but seemed to reconsider. Instead, the woman tossed Ashley another stone, which she just barely managed to catch.

  “Keep at it,” Bayle said. “Given the number of these we’ve run into lately, I suspect you’ll get better at throwing things. I have.”

  Chapter Two

  FEBRUARY IN THE desert surrounding St. George could either be frigid and windy, or it could bring afternoons when brilliant sunshine warmed the landscape, raising the air temperature to a pleasant fifty or sixty degrees. Today was one of those respites from winter’s chill, and Tamara had convinced Devon to head out for an easy hike along a flat trail in Snow Canyon State Park. Out of concern for Tamara’s lungs, they walked slowly, even by Devon’s standards as a dedicated non-athlete. But even with the damage to her lung tissue and the permanent oxygen tubes in her nose, Devon suspected Tamara could move faster. Her friend seemed to be enjoying the day as much as Devon was. Neither of them was eager to get back to the autocab hailing pole.

  Underfoot, patches of orange and cream-colored sand alternated with black lava rock laid down by the region’s now-extinct volcanoes. Jagged sandstone peaks rose up to their right, and the sheer face of the nearest cliff was decorated with a pair of insane people in colorful clothing. An almost-invisible climbing rope connected the couple, one of whom was making steady upward progress while the other paid out rope while hanging from what Tamara assured Devon was a perfectly safe anchor point. Devon wasn’t sure she was buying that, then again, they hadn’t yet fallen to their deaths, so…maybe?

  Regardless, Devon would save that kind of risk-taking for in-game escapades where she could just drink a healing potion, or, worst case, materialize at her bind point if she died.

  “Do you miss it?” she asked, gesturing toward the cliff.

  “Huh?” Tamara asked before following the direction of Devon’s gaze. “Oh. You mean climbing?”