“Um…” Pepper wrings her fins. “Dave? We’re winning… right?”
We just jumped out of a perfectly good kaiju into a nightmare factory… armed with a space bathtub. Sure we’re winning. Nervous, I check the rifle I borrowed from Hank.
Pulse Halberd (Rifle)
Ammo: 1000 | Class III Damage
I cycle the bolt action like I’ve seen Hank do. The weapon powers up, but my HUD flashes a warning.
Rifle Proficiency: 15%
Would you like to select a more appropriate weapon?
Great. I’d be a better shot with my eyes closed. I realize I’ve never held a loaded weapon in RiftBorn and haven’t built up any proficiency. I have more shooting practice IRL than in the game.
But killing mobs isn’t my job. That’s what Matchstick does best.
“Absolute weapon.” Mick eyes the Darkforge, excited.
My HUD pings and my minimap is suddenly filled with red dots, indicating way too many enemies. I glance up, and one of them peeks from a tunnel, and I see the description.
Sub-Boys lvl3 Wrenchmen
Drilling tunnels for pay, these bottom feeders will follow commands from anyone big enough to bark. You don’t have to tell them twice — being on their knees is their natural state.
Mole-men appear in the shadows, blind with big teeth, sniffing at us. Each one of them wears a white jumpsuit and carries a red power drill that looks like it could be plenty deadly.
“I got this!” Pepper’s eyes glow pink as she fires up her Flash Mob Mentality. She attempts to draw the Wrenchmen into a video like she did with the C4ts, but they don’t go for it. Matchstick jumps out of the bathtub and opens fire with blue jets of flame, screaming bloody murder. He torches three Sub-Boys, then an alert flashes my HUD.
B.A. Barackous Activated!
Enemy DEBUFF: Fear
Terrified, the Sub-Boys run for cover. “Yeah!” I land the bathtub by Matchstick as the mole-men flee. “I pity the fools!”
Mick shoots me a look. “Pity the fools? What was that, Shakespeare?”
“Yep.” I pocket MacBoatface and scout ahead into a gigantic hallway that looks like a big cylinder. I keep an eye out, but the Sub-Boys aren’t interested in fighting back. At least not yet.
Mick strides ahead, his hands on fire. The pyromancer is deadly as hell, but I’m not good enough with a gun to be much help. I miss my Kaboomerang. We need a plan. “Mick, whatever comes at us, we—”
Darkforge Hex shudders with thunder. Music explodes from hidden speakers in the walls.
? “Pump It” — Black Eyed Peas (2005) ?
I realize what’s happening. There’s no time to plan. The Boss Battle is now.
Something drops from a hole in the ceiling; something the size of a house. Darkforge Hex shudders with a BOOM as the giant spheroid hits, two-toned, white and pale blue. It rolls and looms over us like a billiard ball over a trio of ants.
Final Deathmatch!
Dig Duggler: Outlaw Refinery Boss
Look upon my works, ye mighty, and despair! Once an upstanding hydrogen miner, Dig Duggler was…
I can’t pay attention to the rest of the description because I can’t stop laughing. I doubt you remember Dig Dug. It was an early arcade game where you drilled paths through rock to reach treasure. The hero (the titular Dig Dug) was basically Tunnel Smurf. White hat, white pants, blue skin. Apparently, RiftBorn decided to rip off the Dig Dug idea, but perverted it into a three–story wadded-up Smurfball. White top, blue middle, white bottom, with stupid-looking red drills where its hands should be. It looks like someone told Artificial Intelligence to make a 4k Dig Dug but never checked the result—the Level Boss is AI slop.
Every comic book has tried to make a scary floating-head villain, from Marvel’s MODOK to Krang in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and they always look about as scary as the Annoying Orange. As if Dig Duggler’s bowling ball body wasn’t ridiculous enough, he’s held in place on a kickstand that sticks out the front of his Smurf pants like a giant blue dong.
“Foolish mortals!” Dig Duggler thunders, waving his stupid drill bit hands. “You dare trespass in the sacred shafts of Darkforge Hex? I am Dig Duggler, Breaker of Bedrock, Devourer of Ore, the Mole who Mined a Thousand…”
I tune out his monologue and survey the battlefield, which is just a long, perfectly cylindrical tunnel. My Hey You Guys trap detector highlights about thirty different danger zones circling the construction.
Weak Spot
Caution: This section of Darkforge Hex is ready to fail. No Step.
Now why the hell would the designers intentionally put in weak spots? Are they going to blow up and kill us? Or blast us into space?
“If you think you can defeat me, your ego is over-inflated.” Dig Duggler thrusts his giant red drills at us. “Let’s see how much pressure you can take!”
A long white hose flashes out of the Smurfball’s waist like a flaccid white python. It smashes into Matchstick's belly. Mick stares down at the thing, stunned. Dig Duggler starts violently rocking back and forth, humping a giant red tube.
Oh crap. I forgot Dig Dug’s weapon from the arcade game. It’s not a drill.
It’s a bicycle pump.
Matchstick Mick inflates. He suddenly expands like a cartoon body filling with helium. His eyes bulge out as his head expands to five times its normal size. “Aigh!” he shouts. I run for him, but his flames lash out everywhere and I dive for cover. The flames blast Dig Duggler’s hose and it breaks.
Matchstick Mick flies across the room like an emptying balloon. Deflating until he’s empty, the pyromancer hits a wall and collapses to the floor like an empty bag. I hear Mick yell into his mic at home. “What the f#ck was that, then?!”
MatchstickMick
Health: 1% | DEBUFF: Deflated (1 minute)
I feel camera-drones zoom past my head as the music rises. Dig Duggler turns to Pepper and I. “I hope you appreciate the gravity of the situation!” His kickstand dong smashes a button, and warning lights flare.
WARNING: Gravity Forge Up
The world flips. One heartbeat, I’m planted on the floor, the next I’m shooting into the air. I fly fifty feet and slam into what used to be the ceiling, which is now the floor. Pepper whacks into my hip as each of us takes 25% damage from the impact. “Oh!” Pepper cries out.
The whole station is upside down. I glance at Mick, whose body hangs limply from a pipe above us. He’s still griping into his mic. “Aw for f#cks sake!”
Dig Duggler’s massive bulk slams down near us and his cannonball body bounces and rolls with a purpose, speeding to attack and crush us. I blast him with the Halberd, but it barely scratches his Health bar.
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WARNING: Gravity Forge Down
I fall straight up. I plummet to the ceiling-floor headfirst. Disoriented, I fire the Yeetlejuice somewhere that feels like up. My Yeetline catches the tunnel wall, but my angle is bad, and we hit the ground for another 10% damage. Chubby Smurf drops with us, picking up speed.
He bounces when he hits. He angles his fall to crush us on impact. “Time for pancakes!”
I yeet us away right before he crushes the spot we just were.
60’ Knockback
The concussion blows us into a wall. We skid against the curved surface. Dig Duggler fires his bicycle pump hose. It nails me in the chest and I feel my ribs start to expand. I blast it with the Halberd and it snaps. I hit the ground, and I’m suddenly at half Health.
RiftVid: “DigDugDanger”
Filter: Panic Mode Hype: +?250
For a breath, I think: This is it, this is how I die, farming views on RiftTok. I can’t get enough steps to activate my Parkour Pulse, and most of Pepper’s Mindblender skills are useless against Bosses. But I don’t plan to get killed by something this dumb.
No one could defeat Dig Duggler hand to hand. Which means there’s got to be another way. I try to see Darkforge Hex through Nintendo eyes. The environment is a big-idea design, while Diggy Smalls feels like an afterthought. More effort went into the Darkforge itself. Designers did this a lot in Legend of Zelda.
And Dragon Slayer.
That’s it. The forge tunnel is a perfect setup for a ball-crusher run, with Duggler as the ball. At the end of the tunnel is a huge fifty-foot smelter that boils like an overexcited pool of lava. I check the Darkforge Weak Spots and suddenly get the idea of the boss lair mechanics. This is Dirk the Daring, ride or die.
“Pep! Start counting when the gravity reverses!”
“Okay!” The world flips. I fire Yeetlejuice and swing like Batman on a bad night. We spin crazily at the end of the line; Pepper makes a gurgling sound like she might throw up. As Dig Duggler rolls at us, I jam my pulse rifle into Pepper’s flippers. “Shoot the Weak Spot!”
“Okay!” The penguin jams her eyes shut and blasts away blind, but it’s almost impossible to miss the giant target. The Weak Spot explodes and sends shrapnel flying into Diggie Smalls. “Ugh!” He shouts in pain, but his Health bar barely moves. The explosion only slows him down. “I’m coming for you, DDD and PEPPER!” He rolls, closing ground fast.
Timing is everything. Swing, shoot a Weak Spot, slow him down, gravity reverses, rinse and repeat. The next time gravity flip-flops, I take over counting so Pepper can focus on shooting. I pop a California Roll in her mouth, another in mine. We just might survive this thing.
On the fifth round, my timing is off, and Dig Duggler lands too close. The blast drops us to quarter health.
Desperate, I skip the last Weak Spot and fly to the end of the tunnel. Gravity reverses, but this time I don’t fire. I let myself skid along the wall, run down it to get 21 steps, and Parkour Pulse my way to our final destination. I skid to a stop, out of momentum.
“What are you doing?!” Pepper yells. “We have to run!”
“Mwa-hah-ha! I have you now!” Dig Duggler thunders, smiling. “Time for pancakes!”
He jumps to obliterate us. I keep the count, and my nerve, as a three-story blue wrecking ball hurtles down to crush us. 3… 2… 1…
I fire the Yeetlejuice into the ground at my feet as gravity reverses. I don’t go anywhere, latched in place, but Dig Duggler drops.
Right into the smelter.
I hear his screams as the giant blue meatball is boiled alive in his own forge. I just watch, hanging from the ceiling, staring down at him. “Noo!” he yells as molten ore sprays like fireworks and his bicycle pump hands melt off. “Curse you, DDD and PEPPER! Curse you forever in helll!!”
“Mean boys don’t get pancakes!” Pepper yells as Dig Duggler disintegrates into a meat-stain fatality.
“We got all the Doomfangs!” My comms suddenly ignite with the cries of the Night Shift. “Coming in hot!” I watch Rincewind’s flying saucer land next to us. Hank and Wahoo run out, ready to fight until they see the last globs of Diggie in the smelter. “You beat him!” The wizard and the barbarian jump up and down, laughing an ecstatic noise of triumph. “Yaaa!”
VICTORY!
Dig Duggler has pumped his last tunnel and returned to the fires from whence he came, dying the only way he could: by dig-dugging his own grave.
Murder Points! 3000XP ea. | 100,000 gold ea.
Smelter Loot! Platinum Ingots +100
Exotic Medkit +1
Party Exotic LootBoxes +5 (5:00)
Party Epic Skin-to-Win +5 (5:00)
Bicycle Pump +1
Trickster Elixir (4/5)
Quest Prize!
Reforged! All surviving Players receive a free respawn!
You Did a Thing!
Never split the party! It’s the oldest rule in the book, but you threw the rulebook out the window and killed a monster with it! It may be stupid, but it worked!
Badge Unlocked!: Two-Front War
The Ottoman Empire couldn’t pull it off! Napoleon couldn’t pull it off! But you managed to conquer two massive opposing fronts at the same time. In your face, Bonaparte! Dubba dubya!
Rince looks frustrated as hell as he surveys the carnage. “I missed it! I missed the whole damn thing!”
LootBoxes appear around the smelter pit like a shining necklace of diamonds. I gather them up, and hand out treasure like I’m Santa Claus with Pepper as my Buddy the Elf. The gamers shout victory as they celebrate their first big win, and the swag that goes with it. They open the five Exotic LootBoxes and gaze lovingly at the shiny new gear. A Refinery Exo-Suit that carries big armor bonuses, a Fusion Lance that treats steel like butter, a Needle Blaster that fires dozens of spikes with a chance to Paralyse an enemy, Pocket Atmo bubbles that make you immune to open space, and a Gold Keycard that opens… who cares what it opens?
We won.
The Night Shift goes nuts, shouting and eagerly testing the gear. Matchstick uses the Fusion Lance to burn straight through an industrial steel kiln, grinning like a lunatic. As the inevitable discussion of who-gets-what begins, my eyes snag on a piece of machinery that’s not part of the treasure.
It’s tagged IFF Rebrand, a little computer node that’s been clipped to the Darkforge controls. Small, rusted, and industrial, it looks like it’s been used hard for decades. Perfectly unremarkable, but tagged. I pop it into my inventory and examine its properties.
IFF Rebrand
Programmable industrial beacon used to certify illegal pirate ships hauling contraband. Spoofs vessel manifest logs and transponder tags to appear labeled as ‘Medical Supply Ship” followed by a random designation #. Didn’t follow all that? Basically, when the cops run your license plate, instead of being labeled “Bloodthirsty Murderers,” your ship is tagged “Puppy Rescuers.”
Huh. Interesting. Rincewind arrives, holding several ingots of platinum. “How do you want to divvy up the loot?”
I wave him off, thinking. “You five keep it.”
“You sure? We couldn’t have done this without you LivingLegends.”
I hate to admit, his words give me some pride. Damn right you couldn’t pull this off without us, but it’s still nice to hear. “Maybe give Hank the armor. We can’t spend the gold. Besides…” I check Pepper’s RiftVids depicting the ‘Immigrant Song’ attack, the exploding Spaghetti Monster, and Dig Duggler’s Death Drop, complete with a walkthrough of how to beat him. Another ?20,000 for Hank and me already. “We got what we came for.”
As the Night Shift continues to celebrate, I feel an unexpected wave of anger wash over me. The players are thrilled, but only because they don’t know they’re getting ripped off.
Two guns, some armor, and some air bubbles? Hank’s entire loadout is better than that. I’ve been on RiftElite quests that awarded Legendary armor for every player, including me, and ten times the gold. RiftElite boobytraps are easier to find, RiftElite monsters are easier to kill, and RiftElite players get more loot. The rich get richer, and the road is paved with gold.
It’s what these corporate leeches do best.
Sure, the top local salesman in the company gets a three-day cruise, and he feels pretty good about it. He gets to take his family on vacation, maybe his kids respect him a bit more, maybe his wife is more affectionate. He’s told to be happy with his cruise, and he is. What he doesn’t know is it’s just another Participation Trophy.
But the CEO? The elites? They don’t get a cruise. They get super-yachts.
“It’s not enough,” I say it out loud, and everyone hears it.
“Dave?” Pepper tilts her head. “What do you mean?”
Everyone looks at me, confused. I get to my feet. Screw it. “It’s not enough. You guys are a better team than any RiftElite party I’ve seen. You try harder, you grind harder. You’re better than them.”
For the first time in days, I hear that familiar receptionist’s voice.
EmpathyEngine?: Exercise Caution
Please refrain from disparaging RiftElite players. They are worthy of your respect and admiration…because they pay for it. Remember: Your tone is a guide for others!
I ignore it. “You deserve a shot to be on top. But you’ll never get it. The people with the money are always going to win. They get better tools, bigger weapons, easier quests, and more loot. All you’re ever going to get is scraps.”
“Yeah.” Wahoo laughs. “That’s why they’re called pay-to-win games, Triple-D!”
That’s what’s wrong with this whole system, inside the computer and out. And I hate a rigged game. “If you want a shot at that Leaderboard, you need RiftElite Quests, RiftElite gold, and RiftElite gear.”
“Yeah, well, none of us has the money for that.” Rince snorts. “And F2P memberships don’t get access to RiftElite quests.”
It may take me some time to catch on to new things, but I pay attention in class. I remember one of the first things this game showed me. “No. You don’t have access to Elite zones.” I tap my chest and display my LivingLegend Perk for everyone to see.
All Access Pass: Restricted areas + Elite zones.
“But I do.”
Oooo, we're reaching the boiling point now! What happens when Dave and the Night Shift break into a RiftElite zone?
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