Aether Mechanic

I open my eyes to a blue sky. I blink a few times, unused to the sunlight.

This wasn’t where I went to sleep last night.

My hand moves through grass, the soft strands moving easily under my fingers. I hold my hand up, blocking the sun. My hand is in a leather fingerless glove, something I don’t remember putting on.

I look closer at my fingers. Soft skin is marred by calluses used to working with rough materials.

These aren’t my hands.

Or rather, these aren’t the hands I remember. And these gloves, they look familiar, but I can’t place them.

I drop my hand to my forehead, and stare up at the sky. My hand brushes up against something and I pull a pair of goggles off of my head.

Aviator goggles. The kind you’d see in a First World War movie.

My brain finally starts moving again as I stare at the familiar goggles, and I sit up.

I look down at the airman’s uniform that I’m wearing, a brown leather with red lines covering the seams. At my waist is a small flintlock pistol. This isn’t my body, and these aren’t my clothes, but I know them. I know them well.

Aether Online, an old mmorpg set in a steampunk world. I’d spent hundreds of hours on the game when I should’ve been working on my homework. These are the clothes of my character; goggles I’d looted after killing the progenitor dragon, gloves of the mechanic earned from the academy storyline, and finally, the Captain’s uniform earned by solo raiding the Airships of Colota multi-level dungeon.

I’ve somehow entered the body of Amador Lux, max level Aether Mechanic.

Hah. Fuck no. There’s no way.

I touch my face, feeling the strange differences in cheek and nose structure. What’s the last thing I remember? That’s the most important bit.

I close my eyes, searching my memories from before I’d woken to the bright blue sky.

I’d logged into the game, just a regular vr game, nothing special. My guild had messaged me about trying a new raid with the expansion coming out, and then…

Error Screens.

Lots and lots of error screens. And a voice…

Then nothing.

I open my eyes, and stare out at rolling hills of grass, a small dirt road making its way through the hills and into a forest. I don’t recognize the area from the game, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist there, the world map is huge. I kneel down and pick a piece of grass rolling it between my fingers.

No bad computer graphics, and I can actually feel the sensation between my fingers. Aether Online has decent graphics, but it was still clearly not real. This… this is reality.

I drop the blade of grass and stretch, the body feels real too, responding to every movement. Deeper inside me, something stirs, an endless ocean waiting for me to call it.

I gulp. Some of the things I can do as a max level aether mechanic kind of, well, break the rules of reality.

Already the class is a strange one, working as a mix between a crafting and summoning class, but the clockwork advancements are something else.

“Status.” I say.

Nothing, just a warm wind blowing by me.

“Info. Log out. Help. Messages. Contact Admin.”

Nothing responds, but I hadn’t really hoped for anything after calling my status didn’t work.

Carefully I put my hands together, knowing what I want. My first creation in my early levels. I need my Mechanic’s Assistant.

The ocean inside of me eagerly answers my call. Aether rushes to my fingertips as I cast the low level spell.

My hands open up, creating a small portal, and the Assistant rolls out. I hurry to catch the baseball sized sphere.

The sphere opens up, revealing two large eyes that stare at me with hope. Tiny hands pop up, eager to help me with my next project.

“Hey there. You recognize me, right Billy?” I ask the little guy. The little guy nods.

The AI of the game was pretty good, and you could even have conversations with the NPCs, still there are tests I can do.

“If I tell you China is a terrible country, do you agree?” I ask the little guy.

Billy looks at me in confusion, then gives a little nod.

I smile and pat his little head.

Aether Online has a Chinese parent company, which means that all of the AI has been programmed to not respond to any subjects badmouthing China. It’d been a fun little game among my guildmates and I to see if we could trick the NPCs into saying something bad about the “fictional” land of China. Arabelle even got banned for convincing the General of Alethia to publicly consider plans to invade Chi-Nya.

I chuckle remembering her outrage at the game. They’d let her make a new account, but her old one was perma-banned.

Arabelle… I wonder if she’s okay. I was going to meet her after the guild meeting tonight. Maybe if I get out of here soon… nah, I’m kidding myself. This feels like… reality, and there’s no way I’m getting home before dinner, if then.

I sigh, then give Billy a pat for good measure. “Think I should summon the airship? Or a puppet horse?”

Billy tilts his head, pondering.

I shake my head before he can respond. “Nah, I don’t want to attract too much attention until I know what’s going on.” I pat my shoulder, and the little guy quickly moves up there, holding on with those tiny mechanical hands of his.

I make my way down the hill, half-sliding half-walking until I make my way to the dirt road.

I pick a direction away from the forest and start walking. It’s uphill, but I have a feeling that I’m more likely to find a settlement in this direction.

Walking actually feels nice. The air is clear, without all of the pollution I’m used to living in the city. And the silence, it’s so comforting. No hum of machinery, or the sounds of people nearby. No cars driving by. All I hear is the birds, the insects, and the clopping of hooves.

I pause at that last one, turning around to look behind me. A carriage slowly makes its way up the road, flanked by four guardsmen on horseback.

The carriage slows as it approaches, and I notice the guards place their hands near their weapons. They all carry swords, and the two towards the back carry muskets. I can sense the aether inside their equipment.

The carriage stops a couple paces away from me, the horses stomping the ground at the sudden stop.

The coachman acrobatically jumps out of his seat and opens the carriage door.

A young man waves at me as he jumps down, ignoring the hand of his coachman. “Ho there! Sorry to startle you. Are you heading to the Academy exam?” He wears a long coat, his undershirt ruffled. On his head is a surprisingly ornate tophat.

“Manners Max!” A girl’s voice calls out from the carriage.

“Right. Sorry again, I’m Maximus Vi Garruta of the Garruta family. Are you on your way to the Academy?” He looks at me expectantly.

I give a small nod. I am the kind of player that enjoys the lore of games, and I’d spent more time than I’d like to admit listening to dialogue and reading the small selection of “books” the game had. So I do actually recognize the name Garruta.

There’s only one problem.

It’s the name of a house that had been \wiped out at least a hundred years before the events of the game.

“That’s good to hear! We’re actually on our way there ourselves. Would you like to join us?”

“Sir, are you sure-” One of the guardsmen starts.

“Don’t you worry your pretty head, Herald. Look, he’s wearing a uniform of the… well, he’s wearing a mechanic’s uniform, he can’t be all bad.” The young man pauses, turning to me, “ah, I’m afraid you’ll have to give up your weapon, but I promise it’ll be returned to you.”

If this is the setting of the game, then the Academy is a good place to go to get my bearings. Plus, either way, I’m curious.

I share a look with Billy on my shoulder. Something tells me that no one here would be able to harm me, even without my pistol.

“I’ll take you up on that, thank you.” I say.

I slowly reach to my side and pull out what I’d thought to be a flintlock when I’d first woken up. It’s actually an aether pistol that I’d crafted for myself. It’s technically a low level weapon, but I’d thought it looked cool on my character.

One of the guards rides over to me, and the retinue seems to relax with the weapon out of my hands.

“Come on up then.” The young man says. He jumps back into the carriage, again ignoring the outstretched hand of the coachman.

I do take his hand, grateful for the support as I make the second step. This body is shorter than my old one, and younger than my eighteen by a few years if I had to guess. I’d designed the character to look young, since I’d wanted to fit the image of a young genius mechanic.

I step into the carriage to see a young woman and a boy no older than nine, his clothes are an almost exact copy of the young man’s, just smaller. The young woman wears a yellow dress held tight by a corset, and an intricate metal flower rests like a hat on her carefully braided hair.

The young man sits down and pats the spot next to him. I sit down gingerly, surprised at the comfortable cushion. Across from us sit the boy and the young woman.

“As I said before, my name is Maximus, but you can call me Max. This is Charlotte, my little sister by fifteen minutes, and this little rascal is-”

“I’m Karl! Is that a construct on your shoulder?” The boy leans closer trying to look at the little guy.

I nod and hold out my hand for the Mechanic’s Assistant to jump into. “His name is Billy, and mine is- it’s Amar.” It feels weird to introduce myself by my real name. My character’s name, Amador, is just something that’s less likely to be taken during character creation.

All three of the people in the carriage lean closer to stare at Billy, who looks back at them wide-eyed. He looks back to me, a sad little trill coming out.

I move him back to my shoulder. “He’s a little shy.”

“I’ve never seen a construct like that.” Karl says, “It’s so small.”

“I designed him myself.” I smile. That was true. The game had a fairly intricate and complex crafting system for the Aether Mechanic class, and I’d heard that the Runesmith and Alchemist classes had something similar.

Max whistles. “No wonder you’re going to the Academy. They love getting their hands on every talented mechanic this side of the Boulders.”

“Amador is an unusual name. Where are you from?” Charlotte asks.

“I’m from a small town down south on the coastline. You wouldn’t have heard of it.” I answer.

“By the coast? You’ve traveled far.” Charlotte says, looking closer at me.

“Have you seen Aether ships?” Karl asks. “Da keeps talking about how they’re the future of the imperial navy.”

“Call him Lord Garruta, or at least call him father.” Charlotte says. She sighs as Karl ignores her, his attention focused on me.

“I’ve seen a few.” I say, scratching my arm nervously. I mean yeah, I’ve only ever seen them through VR, but I’ve seen them. “That reminds me, I got turned around a while back, how far from the Academy are we?”

Max turns around and opens a wooden window shutter I hadn’t noticed between the two of us. He sticks his head out, his words with the driver muffled.

He pulls back and shuts the window, “Two days. Good thing we found you when we did, huh? You would’ve missed admissions on foot.”

“Thank you for stopping.” I say, giving them all a smile.

Charlotte looks away, unable to meet my gaze. Karl smiles wide at me, “Max likes helping people! Da- Father says he’ll be a great Duke one day.”

Max laughs. “I’m hoping that won’t be for a very long time. I like my freedom.”

“Heaven knows the young ladies will be missing you.” Charlotte says with a roll of her eyes.

“Hey! I’m a perfect gentle-” The carriage stops suddenly, throwing all of us forward.

Shouting can be heard from outside.

“What is it now?” Max mutters. Stepping towards the door.

Musket fire echoes out, and Max pulls his hand back sharply. Horses winnie, metal hits metal.

Then silence.

Max looks at me, his eyes meeting mine. “Keep them safe.”

He opens the door, revealing a grisly scene, blood lines the road, and the guardsmen lie dead against the grass, their metal punctured by long spears covered in darkness. Max steps outside, leaving the door open.

“It’s okay, he’s strong.” Karl whispers to me, but I can hear the fear in his voice.

I stare at the open door for a long second, then follow Max out.

Everyone is dead, except for the coachman, who huddles behind the horses. His eyes meet mine, then turn to the road ahead, I follow his gaze to see Max and a man with long raven black hair staring at each other.

Aether flows from Max, creating a light blue barrier around him. Aether in a darker form gathers around the assailant.

Billy shivers against my neck, and I pray to whatever gods are real that all of my abilities work like they did in the game.

“Identify yourself!” Max yells, a spear of light aether appearing in his hand.

Aether Lord, the class closest to Mage in Aether Online. Of course there are many specializations that appear as you level up, from Dark Aether Lord to Blue Aether Lord.

I recognize the spell Max is casting, a low level spell before specialization, although judging from the barrier around him, he should be specialized as a Blue Aether Lord. It doesn’t make sense why he’d use such a low level spell.

My gaze turns to the assailant. I almost want to call him an Aether Lord as well, except for the ravens watching the scene nearby.

They’re his eyes, and mark him as an advanced specialization of the Caretaker Class, a beast taming class similar to Druid. Whoever the man is, he is far more powerful than Max.

The man changes before my eyes, his face turning more angular until it’s a beak. Black wings sprout from his back, and spears of darkness gather in his hands.

He disappears, and Max’s bubble pops as one of the spears pierces him through the chest. Blood splatters out behind him, hitting my cheek.

I blink, as I remember this isn’t a game. Max is dying before my eyes. Everyone is dying.

“Goodbye,” The man says, he leans forward, ignoring me as he stares into the eyes of Max. “Don’t worry, your siblings will be joining you in the afterworld soon.”

Max groans as the spear of darkness is pulled from his chest.

“Sorry Max.” I say, as Max falls to the floor. He looks at me questioningly with his last moments. The strange man turns to me. “I forgot myself a little bit there.”

The man frowns. “Who are you?”

I ignore him, focusing on Max. “Don’t worry, you asked me to keep them safe. They’ll be safe. And so will you.”

My aether gathers to my fingertips as a small pocket watch attached to a thin chain lands in my hands.

“You think you can stop me?” The man yells, then he disappears.

“Billy.” I say softly. Aether flows from me into the construct on my shoulder.

A giant mechanical hand extends from behind me, stopping the man midair. His dark spear bounces off the metal, leaving a small scratch. Billy jumps from my shoulder, his gears clicking and clanking as he expands into a large ball-shaped golem, twice my size. A tick-tock sound escapes him as his eyes turn into tiny clocks.

“Thirty seconds.” I say, and the golem’s eyes go back thirty seconds, starting a countdown.

I turn my attention to the small stopwatch in my hands, as the man clashes against the clockwork golem.

I click the stopwatch open, revealing a watch with its numbers in the wrong order, starting from twelve and going down to 1. Aether gathers into my fingertips as it responds to my desires. A twist of my fingertips, and the clock moves forward.

Reality twists around the carriage, the guards, and Max. Clocks fill the air as I use one of the highest level spells available to me as an Aether Mechanic.

Slowly, blood returns to Max, then the guards as their armor repairs themselves. In the game, this was a simple revive or healing spell to be used on allies. It’s strong, but its cast-time is notoriously long. Twenty five seconds in-game is unviable when you have to deal with unstoppable boss attacks.

A giant clock forms out of the aether in the air behind me, twisting with the power of the spell as it ticks backwards.

The last of the guards draw in a heavy breath, their musket-shot returning to their muskets.

The clock stops, and the aether disappears.