“Come on, it will be fun,” they said.
“Then you'll be like us,” they said.
“Yeah, but who wants to die if they don't need to?” I asked.
My friends and I had been playing Dragged into the Deep for the past three months. As a pirate crew we'd sailed the mysterious seas of Mnaseum, daring danger for a fabulous treasure. Now, on the verge of finding it, my crewmates were asking me to change course.
But it would be best if I began when the ship left the harbor.
….
We pieced together enough clues to raid Goldbeard's fortress on the Carved Island. Sven held the narrow parapet against a dozen foes; sword bare and staring down their shots and sabers without flinching.
As I stood, securing ropes to aid our, John returned to our rally point with a small box clutched in his arms.
“I've got it,” he said, as he knelt, breath wheezing from his heaving chest. I pulled him to his feet, yelling “It's time to blow this joint.”
As John and Sven slid down on the ropes to the ship which Jacek held in readiness, barely visible against the foggy night sky, I activated our encore. I flung new stars of flaming red into the sky. For an instant the eastern battlements looked like the rising sun, as our explosives lifted fire and rock into the air.
I'd explain my cunning, and the execution of our plan to plant the dynamite, which involved an upturned ale cart and the disguise of a milk maid, but that would be irrelevant to the topic at hand.
The four of us stood for a moment on the creaking deck of The Ancient, before hurrying to our duties. John and I unfurled the sails with mouse clicks, while Sven prepared the cannons in case of combat. Jacek sailed the ship from the hidden alcove and we were on the open sea. There was no pursuit, for which we were thankful at the time. Later we would wish that a competent commander had sank our lives and our theft.
A day's sail, in game time, we stood on the deck and opened the ornately appearing box. Folded neatly inside was a letter which John opened with a click and read aloud.
“The Mystery of the Monster's Prize. Ye mateys have discovered the deadliest mission in Dragged into the Deep. To complete it, and receive your eternal reward, follow the clue on this parchment to the next secret. Follow the chain to its terminus and the treasure is yours. To accept the quest, pick up a coin from the box. Beware, touching a cursed coin binds the player to a magical contract that can not be broken except by the player's success, or their death.”
We looked at the box's inventory. It showed a gold doubloon marked with three.
“What's this?” said Jacek, his anger clear over his mic. “Why aren't there four!”
“Did anyone check the player number for this quest?” asked John.
I alt-tabbed, and brought up Gamepedia. “Looks like it's only a three person quest,” I said.
Though Sven had demonstrated his bravery more than any of us with his deeds, his voice quavered over the headphones. “I don't need one. I'll join you on your adventure, but I'd rather not touch one.”
Despite the rumors, I thought he had little reason for fear. We'd heard tales of the curse from fellow players on Reddit and on the developer's Steam page. We'd been warned that once we grasped this coins there was no abandoning the quest. It would hunt us to the ends of the sea, even the ends of the earth. Players spoke in spoiler hidden posts about the monster which haunted their dreams. The Kracken of the Deep.
We weren't daunted. These dangers had convinced us to purchase the early access game, like crashing waves draw the courageous youth to the sea.
Still, Sven's acceptance made any decision unnecessary.
I clicked on the icon of a doubloon.
That was when I first heard it sounding through my headphones. A wailing which seemed to rise out of the waves, like a call of death on the wind. A deep rumble swelled from under the sea.
If I could have said something to stop John and Jacek, I would have, but I saw only the empty area on the screen, as they'd already grasped their doom.
We looked at our digital representations of each other, their faces smiling, and we laughed through our mics, anxiously standing for a moment.
“I guess that's it for me tonight,” I said. “Best to begin this quest another day.”
I disconnected from the game and prepared for bed. My mind raced with the possible hiding places for the next clue, but lurking in the background was a darkness like a void. I pushed it down with a laugh. The warning reminded me of the threat of permadeath in Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice. The developers intimated that dying too often would erasing the player's data. It was a lie. This must be as well, I thought.
We didn't find the next island on the next session. It took three days of puzzling, and scouting, before we found it buried in a shallow land bridge between The Isle and The Dour Rock. Only viable for ten minutes at the lowest tide, John, Sven, and I dug as quickly as we could click, while Jacek, our irreplaceable navigator, stood at the helm, steering the ship so it wouldn't wreck against the shoals. As our shovels struck the wooden chest, and it reverberated with a thunk in our headphones, we heard it again, a deep quake in the ocean depths.
“Quick, go” yelled Sven, and we grabbed the chest, while John prepared the dinghy (The Courier) to return to The Ancient. We flung the chest onto floor, and Sven joined John at the oars while I scanned the horizon.
“Look,” I said.
“Can't” they replied simultaneously.
“Jacek are you seeing this?”
“NO! I am preparing to bring you aboard when you are near enough,” he said in frustration.
“The ocean is welling up into a wall of water underneath a...”
A flash of lighting and crack of thunder, like drums in the deep, rendered the rest of my sentence unnecessary.
“What do we do?”
“Keep rowing, don't panic!”
“I shouldn't even be here, I don't have one of those doubloons.”
“It's getting closer!”
The wall of water receded, but the storm was all about us now, blotting out the sun, like ink spilled across a pristine paper. I looked about to predict the next event, as the sound of the wind whipped through my ears. Without warning ten massive tentacles burst from the water and wrapped themselves around The Courier and The Ancient. I slashed desperately at the slimy, wine colored limb and it bled black blood into the foul, foaming sea as it severed.
“Row!”
“I've got you!”
“Get on board!”
“It's got me,” yelled someone.
“No!”
“Take the coin Sven,” yelled John. “To carry on the quest. I'll join you guys...”
His voice stopped abruptly, as we saw him, standing at the bow of the dinghy as it was pulled underwater, a merciless appendage attached to his leg.
“We still need to flee,” Jacek yelled at John and I as we stood in shock. Under his command we performed a harrowing escape escaped. Yet it seemed odd. Sometimes, after a video game deals a blow, it lets the player escape, like a cat playing with a second mouse after it's already caught its first. It's not letting the second go. It's saving it for later.
“I'm surprised you took the coin, after your initial hesitancy,” I said to Sven.
“How could I say no,” he replied. “It's just a coin. It would be silly not too.” Something in his voice indicated he wished John hadn't offered it to him.
We signed out of the game, then joined Discord to talk to our erstwhile companion.
“What's it like down in the Deep,” we asked, laughing at John's virtual death.
“It's not bad. It's actually sort of boring, a bit underwhelming. When the Krakken dragged me down I thought the screen would go black, but there is a shadowy otherworld down here in the depths. Like the Upside Down, but ocean themed. I hope I can leave it to you guys next session.
I don't think any of us absorbed his words. We were too shocked by the sound that came through our speakers. His voice sounded bubbly, almost as if he were speaking while gargling water. It had a sort of croaking quality as if he were part toad.
“John, are you ok?”
asked Jacek, and understated
question said more than the wavering voice.
“I don't know. I was feeling a bit ill before we started, and the excitement of that final engagement exhausted me. I'm sure I'll be better tomorrow.
“Yeah, rest up.”
“Well, good night everyone.”
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