Artwork by: Lindsay Joy
Galandar the White was as noble a warrior as the land of Ameroz had ever seen. He was a captain in the noble Knights of the White Lilly, from which he took his name. Every week, he and his valiant comrades gathered together and rode about the land, fighting evil, rescuing the weak, and reaping their just rewards. Galandar was one of, if not the, best of them. He struck fear into the hearts of his foes and inspired courage and virtue in the hearts of his friends. He was a true hero.
Maxwell Gross was not a hero. He was an assistant manager of the computer section at the Big River City Best Buy. He lived in a small two bedroom apartment that he shared with Chad Avery, a fellow employee. He owned a small 1992 Honda that was finally beginning to give him trouble after five years of ownership; he had no idea what was wrong with it. He had $1,234.89 in a bank account and made around $500 every week. He was nothing special.
Galandar had started like any other hero, a simple young adventurer with little skill but great ambition, in the western Port City of Raethea. He, like his peers, had found work in the city, questing for lost jewelry, defending homesteads, finding lost children, exorcising haunted mausoleums. He had earned enough money to outfit himself and move on to bigger and better things, to new cities, new quests, and new rewards. He rose through the ranks of the average and mediocre and became great and exceptional.
Maxwell had not started out like his fellow co-workers. He had arrived in Big River as a scholarship student at the prestigious Carson College located on the south edge of town. He had studied to be a biochemist. He had worked hard and done well. He had met and dated a beautiful, wonderful girl that was everything to him. He had asked her to marry him. She had said yes. He had been on top of the world.
Galandar had done all the great things there were to do, gone on all the great adventures there were to go on. He had journeyed deep into the Ragnack mountains, slain the Greegian Rock Wyrm, found and wielded the Adamant Hammer of Meniphis. He had tamed the wild Drakes and taken one for his mount. He had fought in the great battle of Oximit along with scores of his fellow adventurers to fend off the Goblin hordes. He had fought in every city coliseum from Foreilen to Muscar and everywhere in between and been champion of them all. He had reached the level cap. He was like a god.
Maxwell had not seen his parents in over five months. They thought he was still in Big River City as a college student; they were wrong. He had lost his fiancée to another man; she had said he was smothering her. He had had no idea what to do without her. He had met new friends: Jim Beam, Jack Daniels, Jose Cuervo and had became completely immersed in their relationship, just has he had done with her. He had lost his scholarship. He had failed his exams that semester, and not come back for his final year. He had purchased a computer and a copy of Knights of Ameroz and created a warrior named Galandar. He was a god.
Galandar stood alone on the top of a hill, overlooking the deep, evil forest of Azenia where the corrupted Treevils dwelled. His glinting Sword of Razure’s Wrath was held in one hand, his glistening ebony shield of Gantz’s Protect in the other. He was resplendent in the complete set of Ascendant Armorage, a set few others possessed. He flexed and stretched idly as he stood there, waiting for the command to go forward and restore order and goodness to the forest below. He had stood there for nearly 29 hours.
Maxwell Gross lay slumped facedown on his desk, inches away from his glowing monitor. Scattered around him on the desk and the floor were empty cans of beer and bottles of liquor. Next to him on a coaster was a glass of what had once been whiskey on the rocks, but was now just whiskey dissolved in water. He had passed out after 6 days of nothing but booze and the adventures of Galandar the White. He had lain there for almost 29 hours. He had only been alive for the first three.
Two days later when his roommate would get back from Thanksgiving break and find him and call for an ambulance, Maxwell’s noble avatar would still be standing there, facing away from his collapsed creator, eyes fixed on a glowing, pixilated horizon that faded away into gray indeterminate mist, powerless to lift a finger to help the fallen god that had breathed life into him.
D. A. Heiserman writes in Marshalltown, Iowa.
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13 Responses to “LEVEL CAP • by D.A. Heiserman”
Comments
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February 23rd, 2008 at 3:23 am
So sad and so terrifyingly real.
February 23rd, 2008 at 4:10 am
Interesting and sad. Seems like Galandar should have done something. *sniff*
February 23rd, 2008 at 5:57 am
Loved it! Best story in quite a while!
February 23rd, 2008 at 6:10 am
The ending makes this story work. The way it shifts characters from paragraph to paragraph in the beginning made me impatient. I liked the line about the avatar being powerless to help the God who had made him.
February 23rd, 2008 at 7:02 am
Nicely done. I wasn’t bothered by the shifts. It served as a structural set-up for me. Good work.
February 23rd, 2008 at 8:41 am
I liked the flow and the shifts. Poor Galander; left to stand and gaze at the horizon forever.
February 23rd, 2008 at 10:10 am
Cool story! Sad, but cool. For some bizarre reason I have this urge to open up my Guild Wars game and do some playing….
February 23rd, 2008 at 12:27 pm
The paragraph structure and the comparisons worked well. Good last line. Probably a true story somewhere!
February 25th, 2008 at 1:17 am
I liked that it wasn’t blaming the game for his downward spiral. The game and the alcohol were symptoms but the woman was the cause.
February 26th, 2008 at 9:29 am
As all your work is, it was well worth the read.
March 4th, 2008 at 8:06 pm
[...] Level Cap [...]
March 15th, 2008 at 12:05 am
[...] most-read author is new to the craft. D.A. Heiserman’s Level Cap garnered an impressive 1400 reads throughout the [...]
March 15th, 2008 at 9:49 am
Good story, well crafted. Better than most I’ve read. Subject new to me, so enjoyed it perhaps all the more. I gave it 5 stars.