The Herald (The World of Geoe #1) Read online

  The Herald

  The World of Geoe, Volume 1

  Shawn McGee

  Published by Assetstor, 2022.

  This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

  THE HERALD

  First edition. July 20, 2022.

  Copyright © 2022 Shawn McGee.

  ISBN: 979-8201901080

  Written by Shawn McGee.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  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

  Argrenn’s Spell Book

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  Further Reading: The Regnant

  About the Author

  This book is dedicated to the memory of my friend Ben. He would have been the first to tell me to use his passing as a sign to quit putting off my dreams.

  Chapter 1

  A tree limb cracked nearby. I opened my eyes and clenched them shut. Sun reflected off the snow and now I only saw red through my closed eyes.

  I shielded my eyes until the red disappeared and the red lights became a small dot. I turned my head and peered until I could open them. Did I see snow?

  This morning, after a huge breakfast of eggs, sausage, bacon, and French toast, we traded old military stories with friends and sauntered to the convention room for the demo. Now, I sat in the snow in a small grove of strange trees on a hill. The bulbous tree across from me had tiny leaves, stood thirty feet high, and drooped with fresh snow. Underneath, the ground remained uncovered.

  A single bird chirped.

  “Talindra,” I called out. I needed to find her.

  Panic settled quickly as I still held on to her hand. She sat next to me and shook, so I squeezed her hand and smiled. I exhaled and saw my breath blow away.

  “Are you okay?” I asked. When I focused on Talindra’s face, she looked so much younger, but her wide-open eyes, open jaw, and frantic glances let me know our experiences matched.

  “Are you okay?”

  “Shh,” she shushed me.

  I whispered then. “I need to know you’re okay.”

  Talindra smiled and punched me lightly. “Shh.”

  I rubbed my arm. Her punches never hurt me before. Was Talindra stronger? Younger and stronger?

  Did Gormesh tell us the truth?

  “I remembered,” I whispered.

  My soaked jeans clung to my legs, covered in snow. A fallen tree made a good seat after I brushed the snow off. I brushed a seat for Talindra and patted it. Before I pulled my arms into my shirt sleeves, I rubbed them vigorously.

  Don’t panic.

  Gormesh’s story that Earth was under attack and we escaped in a ship made no sense, so I focused on what I knew. This was a survival situation and step one in survival is to recognize the situation and inventory everything around you. I needed to get my bearings. A few trees and shrubs surrounded us and gave us cover. We sat between hills and the sky above us was blue with a few clouds. Nothing close by could help.

  What did I have?

  A pad in my hand, empty pockets, and no wallet. I lost my glasses, but nothing appeared blurry. That fact needed to wait.

  Talindra showed me the pad Gormesh had given each of us and shrugged. He stressed to keep hold of them and grasped my hand so emphatically it struck me as odd, since these pads were for a game.

  I recalled the last statement from Gormesh before... before the light and everything changed. We had to get ready for danger and we needed to go west to Sardyna.

  He also said our situation was abnormal. I stifled a laugh.

  Talindra glared at me. I winced when I noticed she held herself.

  We should be in a room with computers at the yearly Worlds Project event testing out the new game. I invested in the company and I gamed. When Talindra found out how much I invested, she tagged along to understand why, despite the requirement to take part in a full day of gaming.

  We met up with friends, skipped the keynote speech, and showed up in time for the gaming session. We met Gormesh and everything crashed, glass, walls, the ceiling and then nothing made sense.

  Gormesh brought us into a reinforced room and said we traveled to another world to escape the Vrelth. I needed to ignore that part of the story for now. Alien invasions needed more proof.

  There was no rubble, but I counted plenty of sparse trees, bushes, and tons of snow around us. Since I trusted Gormesh, I decided that before we gathered wood or did anything else; we needed to follow his advice. We were wherever we were because of choices I made, so I needed to help Talindra deal with this and skip my feelings. To project confidence, I straightened my back and pushed my shoulders back.

  Talindra thrust her screen toward me and shrugged again, this time with her eyes open wide. The game screen with her character displayed. Talindra did not game, and I had only prepared her to play a paladin, not to create one. She joined me at the conference to hang out together.

  In for a penny, in for a pound. I pointed to the initial inventory on her pad. A disclaimer popped up, and I nodded to accept. I walked her through the screens. I built her as a Charisma Paladin, so we choose chain mail, a shield, and a long sword. She also chose two devotions. I pointed to Faith Heal and Smite of Sol. A pop-up appeared on her pad and asked her to accept her build.

  She tapped accept, and she stood up wearing full chain mail with a shield on her left arm and held a long sword on her right. A white cape draped over her back.

  I fell backwards. She wore them in real life. My wife wore leather boots, leather pants, and a leather jerkin with a full set of chain mail. She had a white cape on her back. Without working out in her life, she sported broad shoulders, muscular arms, and looked like she did when we first met. She wore the scabbard and shield alongside the chain mail.

  “Why do you look scrawny?” she whispered.

  A branch snapped in the distance and crashed through a tree and landed with a thunk. I verified we had a clear view of the sky without tree limbs and no widow makers.

  I shrugged and watched her slide her shield down her arm and grab it while sliding her sword from its scabbard. She stepped through a burst and then a lunge. Then she practiced three sword stances: the ox ward, plow ward, and fool ward stances.

  She never held a sword before and I did not know those terms until she practiced them in front of me.

  She stared at me.

  I didn’t know those terms. The information appeared in my head.

  I wanted to curl up and hold myself, but I needed to project confidence. Cracking sticks and rat sounds interrupted my attempt to straighten. The bird stopped chirping. Talindra pointed to my pad.

  Right, follow instructions.

  I rolled a wizard to play this weekend. I punted strength and kept everything except dexterity average, so I exceeded the limit on intelligence. My gear and spell choices — two glamors, a belt pouch, a two-inch square, and a quarterstaff — were what I received. This made no sense. Mages should not start with so little. The test games gave me something for defense.

  Rat screeches came closer. I chose Fistful of Fire and Planar Pull, then accepted my stats, and stood. [1] My clothing did not change: jeans, sneakers, and a gray t-shirt. I wore a belt pouch and held a quarterstaff with a piece of amber inset into the wood.

  Where did the quarterstaff come from? How do I cast spells?

  The staff was my height. I stood next to Talindra and stood at least four inches shorter than her. It used to be reversed. Several cracks from tree limbs reverberated in the forest.

  “Help,” called a male voice. The voice sounded firm, with a hint of desperation.

  Others traveled with us. We had to help them.

  This might be someone from the room Gormesh shuffled us into. Gormesh said the room became a ship and–wait-an emergency escape for the hotel? It made no sense to me. I needed something to latch onto.

  Talindra poked me and pointed to the noise’s location. I gave her the thumbs up.

  “We will help,” I whispered.

  Take actions with confidence and figure the rest out later. This is how we’d survive: compartmentalize and continue.

  She smiled and put her hand on my back to follow me.

  We crept through the few trees and the scrub. The snow crunched underfoot despite our light steps. I peered around a tree and glimpsed a blue tinted elf in splint mail fighting two rat looking creatures.

  The elf swung a mace and the two rat creatures swung sticks. The thwack sounds the sticks made when they hit the elf’s armor sounded painful.

  Talindra took a step back at the site of three-foot-tall rats fighting an elf.

  Okay, I had no facts I trusted, but I had to survive. I followed Talindra’s example of compartmentalize and go with the flow. I had entered a game, and games were my domain. If this game pulled me in, it would learn not to mess with Argrenn Dawnstrike.

  “I’ll pull, and you stab
,” I whispered.

  This staff and my spells completed my options. I grasped how to fight with a staff now, only I was too weak to be effective. I wondered if the spells I chose worked, and then I realized I understood how to cast magic. It had always been in my head, but now I understand it. That made no sense, so I filed it away for later.

  Planar Pull fit. Again, the knowledge existed in my mind. I knew I didn’t know it before. That problem had to wait.

  I opened a barrier, pulled something from the other side, closed the barrier, and channeled this something through a rune I drew in the air with my hand. A thin line of smokey gray material exited my hand. It snagged the creature and pulled it to me. The creature’s snout and ratty whiskers had seen other fights. Its eyes opened wide with horror.

  Talindra knocked it to the ground with her shield.

  “That’s awesome,” I said. My voice broke this weird silence. It felt good to talk.

  I focused on the second rat creature. The spell-casting process matched for my Fistful of Fire spell, except I had two choices for the rune. The second choice projected it at my target. I chose that rune, and a fist-size ball of fire shot above the head of the creature.

  I cast it again and hit the creature. Fire cascaded through its brown fur and smoldered its pink flesh. It screamed in pain.

  The rat creature near me rolled on the ground and squealed with a high pitch. Talindra held it with her shield. It thrashed underneath her shield, but Talindra held firm.

  I cast Fistful of Fire. Pink blotches of skin replaced the burned hair.

  I cast it again and again.

  Miss, Hit, Hit, Miss, Hit, and Dead.

  My hair fell into my face. I tucked it behind my ear. I couldn’t see through the dark hair.

  The screeches stopped. Talindra never even let it grab his weapon. She never pulled her sword.

  The creature was a gobelyn, and it used cudgels to fight. It made sense to call it that. Knowledge popping into my head needed an explanation.

  Compartmentalize and continue. We should find the others in our group. Find the others, go west to Sardyna, and figure out what happened.

  The elf jogged over. “I’m looking for the team I flew in with,” he said. He stood shorter than me, had four-inch-long ears, and a blue tint on his skin. He stared off into the distance.

  “Are we supposed to kill things?” asked Talindra. She fiddled with her medallion of the Archangel Michael on her necklace.

  “With gobelyns, it’s kill or be killed,” said the elf. He made eye contact with Talindra and gathered his composure. His voice sounded familiar, but I barely recognized anyone at the event except Talindra and our friends Grehn and Thralk.

  Talindra. I needed to check on her. She has never gamed before, so she must be confused.

  I put my arms around her. “You did great, honey.”

  She gave me a quick hug back. She waved her shield at me. “How can I hold something this heavy?”

  “Did the information on how to use the sword and shield pop into your head?” I asked.

  My hair fell into my face. I poured sweat despite shivering. I pulled my hair back to see.

  She hung her shield on her armor.

  The elf agreed. “Me too. Man, I don’t know what’s what. I just did the pad like Gormesh said and gobelyns attacked me.”

  Talindra broke her stoic demeanor. She spun on me. “What is going on? Is this one of your game things? You told me you’d be geeky for a couple of days, and I’d play on a computer and tag along as a pal who helped protect and heal. Now I’m wearing armor, carrying a sword, and you tell me to kill a creature I’ve never seen! You’re short and look like a teenager.” Her hands clenched on her sword hilt and her face was flush.

  Given this crazy experience, the outburst seemed tame.

  “Very fair, but I understand nothing right now except we need to stay alive. Pinky promise, I will look things up when we make it to the city.”

  I held up my pinky, but she didn’t take it.

  “Hold on.” I put my hand on her upper arm and felt her biceps, triceps, and quad. She had no natural flex, but I couldn’t squeeze her arms.

  “My baby is buff,” I joked.

  She patted her stomach and smiled. “The fastest diet ever, too.” She gave my scrawny arm a playful squeeze. “What happened to you?”

  Talindra’s face and hair belonged to her. Her complexion and voice belonged to her.

  My skin was tight and didn’t have my scars and blemishes. I must have lost over one hundred pounds and eight inches in height. “I’m shorter and in much better shape.”

  “You look like a kid.”

  “You two must be the old couple who walked in before the hotel hall collapsed. I’m Marick, the black guy who sat across from you on the shuttle. Thank you for helping me.” He offered his hand.

  I shook it and checked him out. Brown hair, tinted blue skin, ears that stuck up four inches, he wore leather pants, a leather jerkin with boots, and splint mail. “No cape?”

  “I chose a cleric, not paladin, but your wife’s cape is sharp.”

  More tree limbs cracked from the weight of snow and crashed into other branches. This sound echoed in the woods and to my right, a plume of powdered snow rose into the air.

  A woman’s voice called out. “Help! Daisidian is in trouble.”

  “Compartmentalize and continue,” I said aloud this time.

  Talindra and Marick nodded and jogged to find the voice.

  We crested a mound and noticed five gobelyns surrounding a female fighter in chain mail wielding a long sword. Her ears stuck through her hair, just not as far as Marick’s did. She stood back-to-back with a male halfling holding two daggers. He bled from his shoulder.

  Cudgels thumped against swords and daggers. The gobelyns chattered while two other gobelyns with crossbows shot at the two below. The gobelyns had easy shots with a height advantage on the two. No one could withstand that.

  The halfling and half elf should have disengaged and found cover, but I didn’t blame them for panicking. They needed saving.

  I cast Planar Pull and pulled one gobelyn shooter next to me. Its long hairy snout face had gray in it. It dropped its crossbow and pulled out a cudgel. I realized Talindra had followed Marick to help the others. I blasted the creature next to me with Fistful of Fire.

  Missed.

  A crossbow bolt whizzed over my head.

  The gobelyn next to me swung at me with a cudgel. I jumped back and cast Fistful of Fire. We traded and dodged these blows while crossbow bolts alternated at me and those below from the last shooter. My fire blasted in the gobelyn’s face. Its eyes emptied and the creature’s face turned red with missing flesh. He lay on the ground, burned, while his torso contorted.

  I ran to a tree, took cover, and cast Fistful of Fire at his writhing body.

  The fire hit and it quit moving. I grabbed my gut and tried to rub where the gobelyn got a hit on me. I needed to think. Two solid hits or three partial hits with fire to kill a gobelyn.

  The fire continued on the dead gobelyn and melted the surrounding snow. A crossbow bolt hit me in the Achilles. I screamed. My leg jolted like they had hit it with a hammer and then jabbed it with a screwdriver. Games were not supposed to hurt. Blood filtered out onto the ground from my leg and stained the surrounding snow. I yanked my exposed leg behind the tree with me. Whoever turned that screwdriver in my leg needed to stop.

  My breath barely filled my lungs. My hair fell into my face, and my pants soaked through with blood. I pulled my hair off my face and tucked it behind my ears, and did math in my head. Planar Pull cast every five or six seconds. Fistful of Fire cast twice as fast. It hit 60 or 70 percent of the time.

  Marick screamed in pain. I had to think faster.

  If I tempted the gobelyn to shoot an errant crossbow bolt, I had time to cast two Fistful of Fires and still have a fifty-fifty chance to get off a third. Approximately an 80 percent chance of survival?

  Ugh. The others had their hands full. We should have planned this. I couldn’t fight on my own.

  I grabbed a stick and threw it out from behind the tree. The gobelyn shot, and it stuck in the tree an inch from my hand. I rolled over and cast Fistful of Fire. Hit. I cast it again.

  Missed. A third cast of Fistful of Fire hit with a massive shot. The bolt of fire shot into his mouth and exited the back of his head.