Valhalla Online 4: Hel Hath No Fury: A Ragnarok Saga LitRPG Story Read online

  Valhalla Online 4

  Hel Hath No Fury

  Kevin McLaughlin

  Role of the Hero Publishing Company

  Copyright © 2019 by Kevin O. McLaughlin

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, businesses, events, or locales is purely coincidental.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Author’s Notes

  Other Books by Kevin McLaughlin

  Afterword

  About the Author

  1

  It had been three days since Samantha left her friend’s life and very existence in the hands of the AI-turned-goddess Heid. Three long days where she spent most of her time wondering what kind of hell she had signed up for. Now if her contact was right, she was about to get some solid answers.

  “It’s a rock and a hard place, Gurgle,” Samantha said as she brushed the drake’s scales. They’d been waiting in a dark Vanaheim alley for half an hour, and she wondered if this person would show or not.

  “Rock is hard place,” Gurgle murmured. His eyes were half-lidded from his enjoyment of the scratching.

  “You know what I mean,” Sam said. “If there was even a chance she could restore Harald, I had to take it. But c’mon, Gurgle. How are we supposed to beat this?”

  “Great One beat all the other things,” Gurgle reminded her. “Even when told she could not win.”

  Which was true, after a fashion. Sam could even admit that to herself. She hadn’t just beaten the odds in some of her fights. She’d taken the odds out back, drowned them, set them on fire, and buried them in a small, unmarked grave. No one had expected her to get as far as she already had. Least of all herself. But this next mission was a whole new level of fucked up.

  Heid wanted her to go after her “sister AI” - Hel. Goddess of death, in Norse mythology. From the sounds of it, the Valhalla Online version could completely live up to the reputation of the legendary one. Sam didn’t want to meet her in a well-lit school playground, let alone try to beard her inside her fortress.

  She’d done a little looking around, begging rumors from other Valhalla players. It turned out that getting to speak with people was easier than she’d thought. Vanaheim, the realm she was in, was a bottleneck for players trying to work their way up into the final realms of the game, so there were plenty of people around. Maybe thousands; Sam couldn’t be sure.

  Winning the Great Joust had given her a certain notoriety though. That was the ticket out of the realm, after all. Win the Great Joust or the Great Race, and you were allowed to ascend to the next realm. Two players every week, out of all the people pouring in. It was a hot contest. She’d won by the skin of her teeth, barely beating Thorsten in the final round.

  And then she hadn’t left. That made her a curiosity to the other residents. Most people took off for the next realm, Svartalfheim, right away. Sam had stuck around, which made her something of a celebrity. That status meant she could gather information with little difficulty. Everyone wanted to tell her a story. She’d worked that angle hard, using all her skills as a military police officer to drag information from people. Until at last she’d arranged this face to face.

  With whom, she wasn’t sure. But supposedly, this person had already been to the next realm. Any information might help her once she got there. But looking around at the lengthening shadows, Sam was wondering if this had been such a great idea after all.

  One shadow was growing faster than the others around it. That didn’t look ominous at all.

  “Look alive,” Sam hissed. “I don’t know if this is our contact or not, but I think we’ve got company.”

  “Gurgle ready,” the drake.

  The darkness spread away from the wall, spilling into an inky pool in the middle of the alley. Sam reached down reflexively toward her sword. No, she wasn’t jumpy or anything! She moved her hand away from the weapon. There was no visible sign of a threat, and she didn’t want to risk scaring off this contact. Sam needed the information he had.

  The shadow rose, swelling from the ground, taking on the shape of a man. Or more or less a man… His skin was a dark blue hue, as was his hair. He wore armor made from black scales and carried a sword belted at his waist. He was a little taller than she and thinly built.

  “You’re the one who beat the man with black arrows?” the strange being said in a soft voice.

  Sam froze for a moment. She had told no one in Vanaheim about the black arrows. The word might have spread… Her friend Brianne had seen them in use and might have talked to someone. But it felt more likely that this ‘contact’ was someone who knew more about the arrows than anyone from around these parts had a right to.

  “I won the Great Joust, if that’s what you mean,” she replied carefully.

  “Just so. And where are the arrows now?” he asked.

  “You’re asking a lot of questions. Who are you?” Sam asked.

  “My name is Inglalf. I am a dokkalfar,” the being replied.

  “A what?” Sam asked.

  Inglalf rolled his eyes at her. “A dark alfar, human. We reside in Niflheim. You wanted to know more about the place. I wanted to know more about you. So I came.”

  “A trade, then?” Sam asked.

  “Of sorts. My mistress wishes to know the nature of her sister’s champion before she meets you,” the dokkalfar said.

  A memory clicked in Sam’s mind. Helheim was supposed to be in Niflheim, somewhere. A separate but connected realm, or something like that.

  “Iggy - I can call you Iggy, right? That other name is too damned hard to pronounce,” Sam said. Her hand slowly easing over to the bow strapped to Gurgle’s saddle. “I’m going to guess that when you said mistress, you’re not talking about your on the side girlfriend?”

  Inglalf laughed. “No, child of Midgard. You would know her by the name of Hel.”

  “I figured. What does Hel want with me?” Sam said as she pulled the bow free. She figured it was worth taking a chance at intimidating Iggy. Having a weapon in her hand made her feel a lot better.

  “That is not your usual weapon,” the dokkalfar said.

  “Nope, but I’ve been practicing. Getting pretty good with it,” Sam said. The fingers of her right hand strayed near a pouch at he
r belt. That pouch created magical arrows, hacked things that would permanently destroy whatever they hit. One scratch would be enough to completely erase the existence of the target. No respawn, no coming back, just complete erasure from the game’s servers. She didn’t like using them, but this seemed like a moment where she might have to.

  The dokkalfar took a step back. “You have the arrows here, with you? You carry them on your person?” He seemed astonished.

  “Well, I didn’t think they would do me much good sitting at home,” Sam said with a sarcastic drawl. Her fingers reached into the pouch, barely large enough for her to fit a fist inside, and found the tail of an arrow. Grasping it, she drew it out and nocked it with one fluid motion.

  “I thought you wanted answers,” Inglalf said. He backed away another step.

  “Iggy, are you sweating, dear?” Sam said. She raised the bow a little but didn’t draw the arrow. “I do want answers. I’m willing to bet that you can’t pull a disappearing act faster than I can pop an arrow into you. What do you think? Care to gamble?”

  Inglalf growled, but held himself very still. Which told Sam she was right. He didn’t think he could get away unscathed. Or at least, he wasn’t confident enough of it that he was willing to take the chance.

  “I’ll give you the answer to three questions, in exchange for my freedom. Fair?” Inglalf asked.

  “Fair enough. What am I heading into in the next realm?” Sam asked.

  “You’ll arrive in Svartalfheim, where the dwarves rule. It is connected to Niflheim - my homeland. A war rages between the two realms,” the elf said. “You people choose a side and enter the conflict, which rages ever on.”

  Sounded like some sort of realm versus realm scenario, which matched what Sam had heard from other players. Rather than one realm like the places Sam had been so far, this next level combined two realms together into one massive combat area. Three, she supposed, if you counted Helheim. Hel’s private domain was supposed to be somewhere in Niflheim.

  “Why does Heid want Hel dead?” Sam asked.

  “They have always hated one another. An old disagreement dating from the day they were born,” he replied. “You have one final question.”

  “How do I get into Helheim?” Sam asked.

  “At the center of Niflheim is a river. Follow it downstream. When it turns into a frozen salt marsh instead of a river, then you have entered Hel’s domain,” Inglalf said. “That was three. I have your leave to go?”

  Sam hesitated a moment. She had the upper hand. If she wanted, she could probably keep this guy here all day, peppering him with questions. Or if he refused to answer, she could just put an arrow into him. One less servant for the other side wouldn’t be a bad thing.

  But she’d agreed to his terms. If she wanted to feel good about herself at the end of the day, Sam felt like she needed to keep her own word good, her honor clean. In Valhalla Online, very little mattered. But deeds still did. Actions still counted for something.

  Sam lowered the bow. “You’re free to go. Tell Hel I look forward to our upcoming chat.”

  “I’m sure she does as well,” Inglalf said. He bowed to her. Then he melted back into the shadows, fading away in moments as if he had never been there at all.

  2

  Sam pulled back on Gurgle’s reins gently, guiding the drake into a slow spiraling descent toward Heid’s palace. They were clearly expected. The massive storm wreathed about Heid’s mountain-top home had parted for them as they approached, giving Gurgle a straight flight path into her lair.

  The structure itself looks like the mongrel half-breed born of an ancient Greek temple and a medieval castle. Sam snorted. It was flat out of place in a virtual Valhalla, an eye-sore that the game designers would never have tossed in. Most of the world around her was carefully constructed to at least feel like it was done in a ‘Viking’ style. Whether it was historically accurate or not, she had no idea. Sam rather suspected it drew more inspiration from a Hollywood view of the Norse realms than anything else, but history wasn’t her specialty.

  People were. Even people who were not really people at all, like Heid. She was an AI, an artificial intelligence accidentally created by the game world as the computers worked overtime to adapt themselves around the human psyches that had been uploaded. It made sense if you thought about it. Take a powerful supercomputer. Upload several hundred human minds a data. Then ask the supercomputer to adapt a world in response to the actions of those people.

  The result might even have been inevitable. Valhalla Online had produced not one but two artificial intelligences. They didn’t seem to like each other all that much, either. In fact, the one Sam had met so far wanted the other one dead.

  She couldn’t quite figure out Heid, the AI she’d encountered. It was hard to precisely gauge her reactions since some of Heid’s visual tells were real and others were things she put on in order to seem more human. Her thought processes were indeed human-like, though. It made sense after a fashion. Heid was born from a computer analysis of human needs.

  Gurgle landed on the rooftop. Heid was already there waiting when they landed. She was dressed in the same flowing white garments Sam was used to seeing her wear. Again, the clothing felt more like a throwback to Hollywood films of ancient Greek gods than something out of a Norse depiction, but for all she knew sheer white cloth was actually a thing in old Scandinavia. The gold chest brooches and arm rings helped her look the part of a Norse goddess, anyway.

  “I’m glad you returned, Samantha,” Heid said.

  “It’s the third day,” Sam replied. That was when she promised she would return.

  “Yes, and I have done as you asked. Harald is restored to life.”

  Sam sucked in a deep breath. She’d been torn between hope and fear for her friend. Harald was the first person who’d treated her with any sort of kindness after her arrival in Valhalla Online. Then he’d given his life defending her. He was slain by a hacked arrow that wiped all traces of the target from the game servers forever. Usually death just meant a quick respawn, but not from those weapons.

  A special amulet which should have protected him had been around Sam’s neck instead. She hadn’t known at the time that it could protect against the deadly arrows, or she never would have accepted the gift. The amulet had a saved version of Harald though. Heid said she could recover the saved version.

  “He won’t be quite as you recall, though,” Heid said, leading the way to a wide stairwell. Sam and Gurgle followed, the drake’s wings scraping the stone walls despite how expansive the passage was.

  “What do you mean?” Sam asked.

  “Well, for one thing, the save in his amulet was from before you journeyed to Vanaheim. He won’t remember anything past that moment when he wakes,” Heid said.

  That made sense. But they had only just arrived when he was slain. It might be a little confusing for him at first, and Sam would need to catch him up on all that had happened since. But it didn’t seem that bad.

  “As for the rest, well - you’ll see in a moment,” Heid finished.

  That sounded more ominous. Sam pursed her lips. Heid had promised to restore Harald. What was the AI not telling her? Sam opened her mouth to ask more questions, but Heid had already come to a big door and opened it, ushering her inside.

  It seemed like her questions were about to be answered for her. Sam cocked an eyebrow at Heid to let her know this discussion was nowhere near finished and then stepped through the doorway.

  Sam all but held her breath as she went inside, wondering what she was about to see. Harald was her oldest friend in Valhalla. He was a mentor who’d shown her how to survive and even to thrive in this strange virtual world. That he’d died fighting to save her after handing over his protective amulet to Sam still left her plagued with guilt.

  Which Heid knew full well. The AI-goddess had been all too willing to use Sam’s guilt for her own ends. It wasn’t like Sam was ignorant to the AI’s manipulations. She knew damned well wh
en her strings were being pulled. But she wasn’t willing to leave Harald dead if there was anything she could do about it.

  The room was about twenty feet by ten and dominated by a stone platform in its center that stood about waist height. On top of the table rested a massive statue of a man, like an effigy atop a tomb. The figure was hewn from a marble-like stone. It was perhaps eight feet tall, with roughly masculine features.

  What she didn’t see was any sign of Harald. Sam whirled back to Heid, her eyes narrowing with suspicion.

  “What sort of trick is this?” Sam snapped. “Where’s Harald?”

  “He is there in front of you,” Heid said. “You recall from when I restored Gurgle that I am locked into the materials available to me?”

  “Yes,” Sam admitted. That’s why Gurgle was a dragon now, instead of a kobold. There were no kobolds in Vanaheim, so she’d had to remake him into a form that was available there. “But there are plenty of humans here!”

  Sam looked down at the statue again. Was it possible? Could Harald actually be inside that stone form, sleeping? It seemed beyond the craziest thought, but she’d seen too many weird and impossible things in Valhalla to discount the idea. The more she looked at the face, the more Sam could see hints of Harald’s features hidden in the stonework. It really was him.

  “Why?” Sam asked. There had to be a reason.