I watched the ugly green ogre, trapped and helpless within his prison, up to the count of ten. Then I said, “We need to have a conversation before I even consider letting you out of there.”
Kragg turned to look at the tunnel entrance. He seemed to expect something.
I shook my head. “Nope, no mount, sorry. The moment the orb encases a subject all summonings, companions, mounts and whatnot are disbanded. Your crazy yellow friend won’t be able to help you now.”
Mudhoof looked confused. “Yo, Snot-rag. What’s the deal with riding around on a yellow unicorn? It makes little sense. Don’t you have any dignity?”
“Shut up!” Kragg roared. He was panting heavily, working himself up into a real lather.
Mudhoof asked quizzically, “Or maybe there’s a more deep-seated reason for prancing around on a horse with a long thing on its forehead. Trying to make up for something, or we? A little short where it counts? Betcha don’t even know that’s why you ride around on it, huh?”
Kragg was now shaking, eyes bulging out of his head, knuckles of his fists pressing hard against the orb.
“I think he’s gonna blow,” Mudhoof said.
Kragg did. The ogre exploded into a fury of filtered expletives and roars as he punched, kicked, and even head-butted his enclosure. This went on for several minutes while Mudhoof and I watched, unimpressed.
Then, spent of energy, Kragg stopped and went silent, panting heavily. He sagged down within the orb, his legs crossed beneath him.
“Berzerker-Rage ability timed out, huh?” I said. “Good, because now we can have a civil conversation.”
Kragg focused on me and leaned forward. “I don’t care what you have to say, little Shadow. It won’t matter. I’m still going to kill you and collect that bounty.” He sneered at Mudhoof. “I’ll take out this walking cheese burger, too, as a bonus.”
Mudhoof snorted and kicked a hoof through the sand on the floor. “You won’t be killing anyone today, Snot-rag. And try not to look so smug. Who’s the one who got his dumb-ass led straight into a simple trap?”
I raised a hand. “Mudhoof, please.”
The minotaur snorted again, but went quiet. Mudhoof knew when I used his full name it meant to chill out. Long-time friends can get away with that.
To Kragg, I said, “Yes, we trapped you. And it wasn’t hard. We’ve been tracking you for a few days now, waiting for a chance for you to ‘find’ me.”
Kragg furrowed his unibrow, “You tracked me? What for? You should be doing everything to avoid me. I’m the bounty hunter, not you. What kind of idiot goes out of their way to get caught?”
Mudhoof took an intake of breath but I cut him off with a glance before he could say anything.
I gave Kragg a serious look and pointed a thumb at myself, “This idiot is sick and tired of being hunted by half the gaming universe. So, to put an end to all this bounty nonsense I decided that, as the game’s most influential bounty hunter, we could come to an arrangement.”
Kragg was thoroughly confused. “You want to split the bounty? Is that it? Let me kill you so we can share the reward?” He made a show of thinking, looking up in the air pensively and screwing a finger against his chin. “Hmm. Nope. Not gonna happen. Still going to kill you, and the bounty is all mine.”
“You’re not in a position to negotiate, Booger,” Mudhoof blurted.
I said, “At least hear me out. It’s not like you are going anywhere for a while.”
Kragg barked a laugh. “Okay, I’ve had enough of this. I’m outta here.” He wore a tiny leather vest that only came down past his armpits. He reached inside and rummaged around.
Mudhoof and I watched expectantly.
With a dramatic flourish the ogre pulled out a large gold coin and held it up for us to see. “Teleport Token, morons,” he said with a wide grin. “Going to port back to my guildhall, round up some friends, and come find you. Bring this to a close.” He rubbed at the Token.
“Not going to work,” I said.
After a few seconds of rubbing, nothing happened. Kragg got more agitated. “What the FILTERED? This should work. They always do!”
I stepped forward and rapped a knuckle against the orb’s clear material. “Not in this, it won’t. In fact, nothing will. It’s called an Orb of Oblivion for a reason.”
Kragg blinked at the Token, then at me in bewilderment. Once it had sunk in he wasn’t going anywhere, he slipped it back into his vest and sagged back down; a look of consternation plastered on his face. “Okay, fine. What do you want to talk about? The latest patch notes? How my class is now gimped for PvP in the war-arenas? I’d be willing to talk a lot about that.”
Shaking my head, I said, “I want to get rid of the bounty on my head.”
The ogre snorted. “Then you shouldn’t have ticked off Ogden Trite. That guy is the definition of over-powered. At least when it comes to gold.”
Ogden Trite. One of the richest players in the whole game tried to renege on a deal we made. I’d been hired to finish a Legendary Quest, which resulted in finding the Cloak of Shadows. But instead of paying me he tried to have me killed and take the Cloak, anyway. Didn’t work out the way he hoped. Now he’s placed a large bounty on my head, mostly out of spite.
The silver lining to this whole dilemma is I now own the Cloak. But questing, even general game play, was made impossible by the stupid bounty. Everyone and their game-playing grandmother is out to get me. I had to get rid of this bounty once and for all.
“Ogden is an idiot if he ever thought this bounty thing would work out in his favor,” I said. “No one wants to give up a Legendary item, regardless of the reward.”
“Oh, yeah?” Kragg laughed. “Why do you say that?”
“Because the amount of Legendaries in the game are finite. Minuscule in number. But making more gold in this game is the easy part. So it doesn’t matter the amount of the payout. It’s money you’d eventually earn, anyway.”
Kragg rolled his big beady eyes. “Yeah, the bounty includes an insane bonus for the Cloak, but I’ll decide what to do with it after I kill you.”
Okay, time to play hardball, I thought.
I pointed at the chamber wall next to where Kragg floated.
Summon Void Portal.
A tiny black dot appeared at the wall’s center. It then grew bigger and bigger. In moments it was as large as the wall itself and looked like a huge black dish. From within the dish could be seen stars and multicolored gas clouds floating in the void of dark space.
Kragg sat up and looked at the portal in unmasked awe. “Whoa,” he said. “What’s that?”
“That is a gateway into the Void Dimension. Heard of it?” I said.
“Yeah,” said Kragg. “People go in, but they never come out again.” He looked at me, worried now.
I said, “Kragg, I know you can’t remove the bounty on my head, not without killing me at least, which will not happen. But you have information which could help me on my way to having the bounty negated.”
“What’s that?” the ogre asked, genuinely curious.
“If I kill Ogden Trite, the bounty is canceled. And, as everyone knows, Ogden always hides in his guildhall, and you know where his guildhall is hidden.”
Kragg blanched, which is strange to see considering how green he is. “I don’t know that. Never been there.”. He folded his arms in front of him.
“No?” I asked, then gave the orb a small push. It, along with Kragg inside, floated a few feet toward the gaping portal. “We’ve done our research on you, buddy, and wouldn’t be asking if you didn’t have the answer.”
Kragg’s eyes widened in alarm. “Wait! Don’t!”