New Eden: Live to Play, Play to Live

On the western part of the Bastion, outside the walls, the landscape had changed in the last few minutes, with craters now everywhere. Standing in the middle of one of those craters, a dwarf, towering over a battered woman with translucent wings.

Blue Peacock was on her back, her torso completely caved in, air becoming more and more difficult to take in. Standing over her, a huge two-handed mace in hand, Gulnur, with almost no health left.

He was out of breath, and his health was still steadily falling, now dangerously close to emptying out. Blue Peacock was one attack short of dying, too, but she was grinning.

"I guess you win this time. I will be back, though. This siege will only end when you take out our mobile graveyard."

*Huff huff*

"Why are you telling me? Isn't the whole point of sieging here so you can take this place? Why tell me how to break the siege?"

Gulnur wanted to end this quickly, since he was about to burst into pixels himself, but he somehow believed Blue Peacock was being honest with him.

"I couldn't care less about your base. I joined to know the layout, if I ever needed to come back in the future. It matters not who wins or loses today."

"Then will you tell me where the graveyard is?"

Blue smirked at him.

"I would never make it that easy for you. You'll have to find it. Until next time, little man."

Finishing her sentence, Blue Peacock lifted her Kama to her throat, and with one swift motion, slid the blade across. Gulnur watched her burst into particles as his own health reached zero, and his body did the same.

Silence reigned on this side of the Bastion, burnt earth, ashes everywhere, and craters dispersed everywhere. To anyone that would see this in the future, they would believe a rain of meteors had struck the ground at this spot.

Gulnur opened his eyes, standing in the graveyard, with everything in his vision grey.

"So this is what it looks like, to die in New Eden."

He sat on the top of a headstone, waiting for the timer to reach zero so he could go back to battle. While he waited, he sent a message in the guild chat about the info Blue had given him.

He didn't know when someone would have the time to go check it out, but knowing was better than not. He also wondered what the others were up to.

***

In front of the palace doors, chaos had ensued. Where stood previously twenty players, gloating over Phoenix's tired body, were now only ten people, running circles, as they dodged giant icicles hurtling at them.

The other ten players were encased in ice, slowly dying, or already gone into pixels, where splatters of blood remained of them, along with shards of broken ice.

Standing over Phoenix, a giant figure made of water, with its extremities icing up as she swung them around. Chunks of ice kept getting lobed at the assailants, who couldn't leave there, since a giant ring of ice had cut their escape route.

Phoenix was on her back, laughing her heart out, as Violette's massive form protected her from any projectile thrown her way.

The vice leader of the assailants got a notification, showing his leader had died, and his face became glum. He was expecting her to arrive at any moment and save them from this mess.

But now, he had to get out of here on his own. Infiltrating the palace was no longer a viable option, so retreat was his next best bet. So he issued the order.

"Retreat! Retreat!"

The last nine of his subordinates suddenly turned tail, trying to head to the nearest part of the ice ring. They slit up, trying to guarantee at least one would make it out alive.

But Violette was having none of it.

Her massive hand picked up Phoenix before her body elongated, reaching the lowest branches of the tree. As her form snapped up next to Phoenix on the branch, her body shrinking, she looked at Phoenix.

The same mouthless voice came into Phoenix's head as when she talked in her avatar of flames.

"Wait for me here. I won't let any of them escape. I promise."

The determination in her voice made Phoenix grin even wider.

"You get 'em, sweetheart. Show them who the greatest mages are in this game!"

Violette's watery head nodded before she stepped off the branch.

The drop was close to a hundred feet down, but Violette seemed to ignore that fact.

As she fell, her body once again expanded, twisting into a corkscrew shape, as she hit the ground, spreading thin. But she took no damage from the fall.

And as her body reformed, her arms were raised. From the ground beneath her, the land shook.

Geysers of water suddenly burst from the solid stone and compacted dirt, rapidly filling the zone she had closed off with the ring of ice. The players fleeing suddenly got swept up in rough waves.

They tried to swim to the surface, but only a few of them were good enough swimmers to fight the currents that were dragging them back to the center.

As they were all washed back to the center of the grounds in front of the palace, the gigantic water figure of the girl they had laughed at earlier watched them with her empty gaze.

It was hard to grasp any emotion from a featureless face. And given that even her eyes were only the shape of them, it was impossible to tell what she was feeling.

But with her raised arms slowly freezing, starting from the top, and going down her body, it was easy to guess her intentions. The vice leader knew they were all going to die.

Rather than let her get the Exp, he ordered all his men to commit suicide. Even though the penalty was higher for suicide, costing two levels instead of one, they obeyed.

They would rather lose time levelling, then give the Exp to the enemy. But Violette was faster than them.

Seeing them pull out their weapons, she didn't hesitate to slam her iced-up hands into the lot of them, turning them into paste.

And just like that, Phoenix and Violette had taken down fifty players, outnumbered one to twenty-five.

The water receded into the ground, leaving an exhauster but smiling little girl on the ground.

"I did it!"