The Merchant was nervously chewing on his worn nails as we returned, his clothes in surprisingly good condition despite apparently sitting in the forest for over a day. The crowd of players had died down, with only a few stragglers standing staggered around him. Ani jumped up on the log next to him, butting his head against the Merchant's hand. He startled, pulling his hands from his mouth and giving Ani a hesitant pat on the head. A branch cracked under Sinbad's foot, startling the Merchant once more.
His head snapped up to us, his fear changing into relief. "Oh, it's you!" he exclaimed. Lifelessly, he directed a question to me. "Did you find three stories? You have two more days until the Djinn returns."
"We have what we need."
Briefly, the Merchant looked curious. Excluding the odd Storyteller and Sinbad, it was one of the first times an NPC had burned with life due to my actions, and I felt a strange feeling of satisfaction.
Uncertain he could trust us, the Merchant glanced between us, searching for reassurance. Finding it, he nodded, his shoulders slumping down. "Best get it over with then, I suppose."
He tilted his pale face back and roared. "DJINN! I'M READY TO FACE YOU!" Ani darted away into the trees, startled by the sudden noise. The Merchant's wary eyes leaped from tree to tree.
The ground rumbled, and a cloud of thick, black smoke welled up from the ground, swirling into a small tornado that darkened before it exploded outward into a barrier surrounding us, revealing a tall being hovering proudly above the ground, his skin quite literally as black as the smoke he'd appeared from. His gray eyes shifted from person to person, his head as still as a statue.
"WHY HAVE YOU SUMMONED ME? I GRANTED YOU THREE DAYS"
The Merchant's eyes leaped to mine "I-I have finished my goodbyes. I want to get it over with."
"VERY WELL!"
My hand reached out, "Wait!" falling from my mouth.
The Djinn's entire body turned as though it were on a turnstile, his eyes the only muscle that moved as his full attention landed on me. Slowly, he hovered closer, glaring down his nose at me.
"I WILL KILL YOU FOR YOUR INSOLENCE!"
I swallowed down the fear that was rising inside of me, reminding myself of all the times I'd stood firm before. Smoke whirled around his body once more, dispersing to reveal a huge midnight black wolf. The wolf's golden eyes glared at me from above, my head hardly reaching the joint of its front knee as it crouched low, its tail whisking back and forth as it bared its teeth at me.
The merchant fell back off his log, crab-crabling back until he smacked against the black smoke barrier. His hands reached up behind him, and he twisted, pounding pointlessly on the mini-boss barrier.
The wolf lowered its head and snarled, saliva dripping down from the needle-sharp points into great hand-sized gobs to slip down the grass beneath his feet. Unbidden but welcome information boiled up in my head, vague recollections from the guides I'd read and skimmed through.
Dire Wolves were an earth attribute creature, most encountered in dungeons as the mini-boss about halfway through. Mostly peaceful in the wild, the ones in dungeons had been corrupted with dark magic that caused poison to contaminate their saliva and claws, making them more deadly than the few huntable Dire Wolves any player would be lucky to encounter while hunting, their uncorrupted versions teeth, claws, and pelts worth tons of in-game money.
The attribute of the standard Dire Wolves, however, did not mean the wolf that stood before us was an earth attribute. There were Djinn of every attribute, and they were not restricted to transformations of their attribute. Too late, I remembered that anyone who completed the quest early had to defeat the Djinn, which was more dangerous but gave the possibility for greater rewards.
I jutted my chin up, looking definitely back and shifting into a defensive stance. Next to me, Sinbad did the same, a machete, the basic weapon of the explorer, materializing in his hands. As classes could be changed at any time, the explorer class was one of the only classes not built for enemy damage, instead being created to be used for exploration. Since exploration could often result in wild animal or random enemy encounters, the machete was able to be used for the basic attack, strong enough to defeat minor enemies or to buy the player enough time to switch to a more combat-oriented class.
In the novel, Sinbad also used the system to upgrade to the Swordsman class, downloading a multitude of abilities into his suit and utilizing sword styles from multiple planets to create his own devastating style he used with his trusty Machete, given to him by his parents upon his appointment to captain of his ship.
His footing changed slightly, and we made eye contact, Sinbad ready to defer to my expertise in the matter. I nodded slightly, and he twirled his machete in his hands, eyes moving back to the threat.
I jumped to the side as the wolf leaped at me, its claws gouging deep chunks out of the ground where I'd been standing. I spun on one foot, keeping my eyes trained on the dangerous animal as I kept track of Sinbad's movements in the back of my mind. Sinbad used the opportunity to swipe at the Djinn, who hunched back out of the way, before lifting a massive paw to swipe at Sinbad, who ducked.
"Mage," I uttered, watching as the icons changed before me.
If I wasn't sure of the Djinn's attribute, I'd simply have to try an attack of each kind and see what stuck.