Sbirciare [EUnovr]

Several minutes of racking your brains later, you get the password right on exactly the third try—and the screen fades away—

To be replaced by the howling sound of wind that reaches your ears as you come to a landing. The ice crunched underfoot as you took a few steps forward, and you realized that you’d spawned somewhere…

What was the last thing you remembered doing before that fateful disconnection eject you’d done?

“Cazzo,” you hiss; had the winter gotten even colder in the time that had passed since you’d last come in here? By reflex—or by instinct—you reach behind you—and find the handle of your trusty battle axe there. Just like old times, huh?

[tangent=“Might as well see what everyone’s up to, if they even still play,”]“Tanto vale vedere cosa stanno facendo tutti, se giocano ancora,”[/tangent] you hum, finding a quiet corner behind a snow-covered tree and flicking your in-game menu open. Navigating through the game had already become second-instinct to you, since technically you play two versions of the game—one here, and one in the North American servers.

[tangent=“As I suspected…”]“Come sospettavo…”[/tangent] you rumble, adjusting the little black ‘hat’ that was sitting askew atop your head.

[tangent=“I thought so.”]“Così ho pensato.”[/tangent]

Most of the names in the guild list scrolled by, offline—although… there was one name that caught your attention.

Who else was online? Despite everything that happened?

You felt your blood run cold as you saw that name with the ‘online’ icon beside it—

Alioth.

benetnasch is home. for now.

[tangent=“Funny you ask that, Benet. I should turn the question back on you—what are you doing here?”]“Strano che tu lo chieda, Benet. Dovrei rivolgere la domanda a te: cosa ci fai qui?”[/tangent]

The quiet, disconcerting smile from Alioth throws you off-guard—you remember how you both bantered in-game whenever your guild’s services weren’t needed and everyone was off doing their own thing. The same careless, doesn’t give a damn attitude was there—

[tangent=“Why’d you return now? After all that time had passed?”]“Perché sei tornato ora? Dopo tutto quel tempo che era passato?”[/tangent]

You’re faced with a wall of silence; your brain working too fast to keep up with what you want to say.

[tangent=“Is it a homecoming? Or are you just here to—”]“È un ritorno a casa? O sei qui solo per—”[/tangent]

[tangent=“Leonn, what are you even saying? I thought the Princess got you?”]“Leonn, cosa stai dicendo? Pensavo che la Principessa ti avesse beccato?”[/tangent] you finally manage to break the awkward silence. [tangent=“I know, I remember, it was just the both of us running away from that sweeping, suffocating mental presence—”]“Lo so, lo ricordo, eravamo solo noi due che scappavamo da quella presenza mentale travolgente e soffocante—”[/tangent]

[tangent=“Running away after everyone had gotten taken, you mean.”]“Vuoi dire scappare dopo che tutti erano stati rapiti.”[/tangent]

[tangent=“Exactly that! Don’t you remember what Dubhe did, shoved us both out of the way and made us run as fast and as far as we can to escape the—”]“Esattamente! Non ti ricordi cosa ha fatto Dubhe, ci ha spinto entrambi via e ci ha fatto correre il più velocemente e il più lontano possibile per sfuggire al—”[/tangent]

[tangent=“The question is, why did we run in the first place?”]“La domanda è: perché siamo scappati in primo luogo?”[/tangent]

Your hands tense on the handle of your weapon.

[tangent=“Leonn, you don’t understand what you’re saying, have you lost—”]“Leonn, non capisci cosa stai dicendo, hai perso—”[/tangent]

“Enzo,” the shorter blonde continues in that same quiet, dangerous tone. One you were all too familiar with whenever he was reaching his breaking point and wanted to lash out without warning. [tangent=“What I don’t understand is—why did you run away? From the promise of eternal salvation.”]“Ciò che non capisco è: perché sei scappato? Dalla promessa della salvezza eterna.”[/tangent]

You felt your blood run cold at that last sentence.

uh-oh!

The cold was leeching into your blood; sapping away your strength the longer you fought out here. The frigid weather really meant to subsume, devour everything in its frigid finality and leave nothing behind; yet you fought it off as much as you could manage, white-hot pain from your right elbow aside. The lightheadedness due to the pain was starting to set in, but you shoved it aside—shoved it aside because there was something you had to settle out here, once and for all.

[tangent=“Why didn’t you come back, Enzo? Why did you leave us after the failed attempt to take everything back?”]“Perché non sei tornato, Enzo? Perché ci hai lasciato dopo il fallito tentativo di riprenderti tutto?”[/tangent]

And for that question, you only have silence as the answer.

(If you were being honest, you didn’t have an answer for that either.)

[tangent=“Did you just give up on everything?”]“Hai appena rinunciato a tutto?”[/tangent]

The dread sunk deeper into your very being at those words.

[tangent=“…if I told you the answer, Leonn, will you stop attacking me?”]“…se ti dicessi la risposta, Leonn, smetteresti di attaccarmi?”[/tangent] you tried; you knew that you were terrible at bluffing; but what other choice did you have? You still couldn’t move your right arm due to the pain that throbbed through it.

[tangent=“Then you have no right to be here.”]“Allora non hai il diritto di essere qui.”[/tangent]

And there it is again, the flash of pink that you saw from earlier—maybe it was—maybe that was a sign of the claws of the Noble Court. The problem here was, you didn’t know anyone else who played on this server actively anymore, unless…

Unless…

The keys click into place; maybe there was someone you could seek out on the North American server to confirm a few things—for now, though, you had to fight your way out of this sticky situation!

Another thing would come flying past you; and you blinked—was that… the hairs on the back of your neck prickled the more the strange projectiles came flying your way.

[tangent=“…you’re trying to kill me, aren’t you,”]“…stai cercando di uccidermi, non è vero?”[/tangent] you hiss; the belated realization that the flying ‘objects’ that were being hurtled at you were actually razor-thin blades of psychic energy—however your mind also prickled at the contact, why did it feel like it was also laced with poison?!

[tangent=“So be it.”]“Così sia.”[/tangent]

As more and more of the psychic ‘blades’ came flying your way, you would hoist up the battle axe with your left hand; before spinning it in a wide arc; the attempt was to deflect as many of the incoming projectiles headed your way as possible, before taking a running start—boots crunching on the ice before risking it and swinging the axe handle back to your right arm—it still hurt like fuck, but not as bad as it had earlier—and then taking a leap into the air once you were close enough.

[tangent=“I’ll have to cut you down,”]“Dovrò tagliarti giù,”[/tangent] you hissed as you bit back another cry of pain, forcing all of your weight onto your right arm as your figure cut through the cold, howling dark—axe blade whistling as it came down for a two-handed strike. If Alioth—no, if Leonn had been corrupted by the Noble Court, and then sent out like a ‘lure’ to trap other players—then it fell upon your shoulders to cut them down here.

But that would only be a temporary measure, wouldn’t it…?

The axe blade screamed through the air and landed with a heavy thud on—on the snow-covered ground. Shit, wait, where had he disappeared off to?!

[tangent=“Behind you,”]“Dietro di te,”[/tangent] came the dangerously quiet whisper of Leonn’s voice, before a blow to the back of your head knocked you clean off your feet, face-first into the snow. Dark spots of pain along with bright spots of light danced in your field of vision on impact; yet you forced yourself to get up despite being knocked down.

“You sick fuck, that hurt,” you hissed—but not in Italian, you snarled it in English, and now you have visual confirmation; you know that Alioth’s eyes are normally blue, but the strange pink color you saw flashing earlier was indeed there, muddling the blue and turning it some sort of deranged purple hue.

[tangent=“What did you say? I didn’t catch that.”]“Cosa hai detto? Non ho capito.”[/tangent]

Oh, that quiet, snarky voice of his was really getting on your nerves! Making a grab for the axe, you would hold it with both hands as even more of the psychic ‘projectiles’ came flying out at a ridiculously close range—and you would swing in another wide arc; trying desperately to reach something, any part of his body if but to throw him off for a few moments!

[tangent=“You’re not taking me,”]“Non mi stai prendendo,”[/tangent] you hiss back; for a few moments you thought you saw red on his player figure; but the pain from both the blow to the back of your head and your arm is starting to overwhelm you. You swallow down another scream of pain as you continue your reckless attack (what kind of idiot brings an axe to a magic fight, anyway?!) trying to whittle or at the very least chip him down.

“You will never fucking take me, Alioth.”

uh-oh!