Trials of a VRMMO Healer

Chapter 25 - Twin Bay

The Serpentine Broodmother spun to face me and while she lacked the facial muscles to make an expression of surprise, it seemed plain to me that she had not expected this.
"TALK. US. FIGHT. NO," I 'said', mustering my best Serpentine. The truth is, I could more or less understand a few dozen 'words', it was the grammar of the language that eluded me more than anything.
"YOU CAN SPEAK?" came the reply.
"YES," I responded. I called out to our forces to stand down. Since they had no way to hear the what was being said, they seemed dubious, but everyone on our side eventually stopped fighting. The healers continued healing the wounded, but soon the plaza became deathly quiet. From here on out I'll translate the conversation as best I can. The Serpentine language is complex and a literal translation would be nearly impossible.
"This is the first time a Shade has spoken to us," the Broodmother said, cautiously.
"We cannot hear each other's words, normally," I told her.
"I see. This changes things."
"I hope so. Why did you attack?" I asked.
She paused for a few moments before continuing. "You fight us. You take resources that we need. Our numbers are dwindling, but the Shade's numbers continue to grow. War is inevitable."
"Is this true? Your numbers dwindle? We see as many as ever," I was starting to get a better feel for how this works.
"We create more clutch-kin when others fall, yes. But our eggs are not limitless."
"Please explain. We know very little about your people."
"I am unsure how much I should tell my enemy... but... I suppose it doesn't matter any longer. I may slay you or you me, but in the end you will return and I will not. This attack is a failure, even if I survive. Very well. What do you wish to know?"
"I suppose I want to know how your kind reproduces. It seems different from how we do it."
"Does it? Me and my sisters, the broodmothers, give birth to all our kind. If we have the deepfathers, we can further strengthen ourselves and create new broodmothers. But without them, we cannot. We can only make more of the same clutch."
"Forgive me, but you said you give birth? What about the eggs?"
"The eggs are inside us. When it is time, we can make more children, as many as we need... but they will all be sisters, all the same."
I thought I understood. A eusocial species, like bees or ants. And like those species, the queen (or queens, in this case) are able to retain genetic material from the fathers and reproduce without them being present. Unlike those species, however, the Serpentine workers are mostly clones. I actually hadn't ever seen any variants other than the mothers or the workers, but apparently there are males, at least.
"The deepfathers you mentioned... what happened to them?" I asked.
"We do not know. They set out to find the other clans, but they never returned, nor have any others found us. We could make more, but it would be unwise to spend resources on ones who cannot work when we cannot find the other clans."
"I see. You don't know what happened to the other clans?"
"No. When we set out from the Deep City long, long ago, we each claimed different parts of the ocean as our own. We had been in contact with the others, but over the past few hundred years, we stopped getting messages from the other clans, one by one."
"Few hundred years?! How long have you been here?" To my knowledge, there was no way that Kedgeport was that old. Certainly the ruins on the island didn't seem to be.
"The years we have been in these waters are uncountable and we have no need to do so. It was a very long time, though, many generations ago. However, it was I who led us to our current den. That much was not very long ago at all."
"Before that... where did you live, if not the island?"
"Beneath the water, of course."
"Why come onto land, then? I doubt the people who built Kedgeport would have even noticed you."
"At first they did not. We both shared fishing grounds, but the seas were plentiful. But even so, humans do not pose a threat to us. That is, until the Shadowstone arrived."
"The Shadowstone?"
"Yes. With it came the Shades. This much you must know."
"I know about it from our perspective, but I would like to know it from your's."
"I see. The Shades... they look like humans, elves, or such. But they are not. A human is weaker than a Serpentine worker, and we were far larger in number. But Shades... they are far more powerful and worse, they could not be killed. Few humans braved the depths of the ocean to fight us, but Shades... there were some which could swim as well as we could, others were powerful sorcerers and even if we defeated them, they would return, time after time. Their only weakness was their numbers. We invaded the human city and took control of the Shadowstone for ourselves. Though we could not destroy it, this sealed its power. After that, no Shades came for quite some time. Until you all arrived. The human town was bad enough, but an entire city of immortal demons? Our only hope was to do what we had done before— to invade and capture the Shadowstone for ourselves."
"I understand now. I am glad that you explained it, because I have something unfortunate to tell you: Your plan was doomed from the start. There is no Shadowstone here and there never has been."
"What?! Lies! We have seen the same Shades again and again!"
I shook my head, though I quickly realized that she would not understand the gesture.
"It is the truth. Your instincts were not entirely incorrect, though. It's true that if we die, we will rise where there is a Shadowstone. However, there are others in the world and some are not very far for us to travel. This town has never had one, its people simply kept returning after your attacks because they wanted to be here."
"I... I see. Then there is nothing to be done. We will disappear as well, eventually."
"No, there is something that can be done. When we could not talk, it was not an option, but now that we can, there is hope."
"Oh? What does a demon know of hope?"
"I'm not insulted, because I know why you do so, but there are things you have misunderstood about the Shades. We're not demons, we're just people. People can be evil, yes, but people can also be reasoned with."
"What... *are* you, then?"
"We're... travelers from another world. I suppose you could say that our souls remain there, while our bodies are here. You can destroy the vessel, but the contents can be moved to a new one. Does that make sense?"
"Yes... it does. Our own history tells of us arriving from a world beyond this one. Then... why have you come? What do you have to gain from hunting us?"
"Each visitor... has their own goals. For some it is fortune, and for others, the thrill of the hunt. Essentially... while in our own world, we are the same as anyone else, here we are free to do whatever we want. Even if those choices are evil or harmful. But the people here, in this town, their goal is just that: To build their own city. That's why they kept returning. But that goal doesn't need to conflict with yours. It could help, even."
"Help? How?"
I was just winging it at this point, but I figured I might as well go all-in. "For instance, they can agree to limit their fishing catch in a region. They can punish other visitors who attack you. They could even help with your search for the other clans. Many of us travel all over the world."
"Why would you do that? What would you have to gain?"
"You should already know the answer to that: The Shadowstone. You were right about it being a place where we respawn, but it is much more. It could be called... a city's heart. Without it, visitors cannot return here whenever they die. If they had access to it, they could impose other rules on the residents of the town, such as forbidding fighting between visitors, or even forbidding fighting with the Serpentine within the city boundaries. You wouldn't need to trust all of us, just the ones who founded this city."
"I... I... see. Could we in some way guarantee that you would honor your end of the deal and that you wouldn't turn the city's heart against us?"
"I'm not sure, because the rules we need to follow aren't up to us, but it's possible that you and your sisters could be considered founders as well. That would grant you the same privileges as the others."
"That... sounds acceptable."
"You can work the details out with the others. I will help translate until we can get a better system set up."
"Please answer me this one thing. A personal request, not as a broodmother. Why would you do this? You said that each visitor has their own goal. I am not a fool. I know that while I could have destroyed most of your forces here, that eventually I would be overwhelmed. Even now, our scouts tell me that there are ships sailing this way from the north. Had you continued, you would have the stone and everything else of ours. So I ask of you: Why?"
I had to think for a bit. It's true that to me, this was a game. But that didn't mean that the things I experienced and felt weren't real. What I did here changed this world, and besides, it changed me. That was absolutely real. I had gotten involved in Holdfast because it seemed interesting and I had fought because it would be fun. But was that it? Was was I trying to accomplish here?
"I guess," I said cautiously, "it's because I just want to be a healer."

***

That evening, I helped mediate a treaty between both sides. I had not been sure what the game mechanics would allow, but as with a lot of things in EO, the answer was: More or less whatever, as long as it was within the spirit of the game. The city core recognized the broodmothers as NPCs, though I wasn't sure what had changed and so they became founders of the new city. Or rather, cities. See, a city core could extend beyond the city. Surrounding towns and villages might need protection as well, and people needed to respawn there, after all. Illium had a core, but a place like Ourth did not. Instead, it was a town managed by Illium. So the new city was named Twin Bay, with Holdfast and Kedgeport both being defined as smaller cities within it. It wasn't a perfect solution, since it meant that the core would be less powerful and less able to defend against attacks due to it being 'spread out'. But the citizens of both towns had been living all this time without any system protection, so it wasn't as big an issue as it might have been elsewhere.
There was grumbling from some players about the rules put in place, and some did not wish to share ownership of the city with NPCs. Not to mention that several raid groups had arrived in search of a massive raid event only to find it over. But the control AIs were clever enough to reward everyone for their participation. We all got citizenship in Twin Bay, which meant we could buy housing and access other city amenities not available to others. Truth be told it was a lot less jubilant on the Serpentine side. They had suffered some major losses, but I hoped that this put them on a better path forward.
If you're wondering what I got, well, I got two things. First of all, the Broodmother gave me her skin. A shed skin, like a snake, right? It was still kind of weird, but it had excellent properties. I had my armor upgraded with it, though there was enough to both enhance my cuirass and to get a new set of pants. [Leggings of the Deep Mother] had nice stats as well a unique effect that let me see, breathe, and move underwater. I could already do some of that with Spiritism but this was free and automatic, so that was nice. The armor I'd had made from Zzixis became the [Cuirass of Two Queens]. The [Curse of Zzixis] effect remained, but it also gained a new effect, [Blessing of the Broodmother].

Blessing of the Broodmother:
When Equipped: Every time you deal damage with a melee weapon, you gain one stack of Tidal Thunder, up to 10 stacks.
[Tidal Thunder]
Decrease casting time on all spells by 5%. Increase all healing done by 5%. This effect ends when the user casts a spell, or after 30 seconds, unless renewed.
When Activated:
Consume all stacks of Tidal Thunder to cast Perfect Storm.
[Perfect Storm: Deals thunder/lightning damage to all targets in a cone 10m in front of you. This effect deals significantly more damage with each stack of Tidal Thunder.]

Basically, it was similar to the other effect, only this one activated when I dealt damage. Being in melee meant I would boost my healing, which offset some of the loss I had from fighting rather than spending all my time healing. And the activated effect was more or less the same one that Broodmother had used. It did less damage, of course, and the range was shorter, but the damage type was thunder/lightning and the split damage type meant that even if one was resisted, the other could still go through.
I also got a raid reward from EO's system (as did Aria and everyone else who participated). Mine was the title [Mender of the Rift], which sounded pretty cool, as well a new unique ability: [Mana Inversion: When activated, the next healing spell's effects are inverted, such that healing damage deals it instead, curing a status causes it instead, and so forth. Spells cost 50% more mana while this effect is active]. It was... interesting. Again, this was another flexible ability that let me balance healing with other roles. It seemed pretty strong, but that depended on a lot of factors. What spells did it work on? Were those spells more useful being cast as damage instead of just getting damage spells? What about other effects, how did those interact?
I would have to do a lot of testing. But for now, I decided I just needed to rest.