“They must have seen the rumors about Parzival and Aech that were posted on all of the gunter message boards,” Shoto said. “That’s how we knew to look there.”
Daito winced, then punched his little brother in the shoulder. “Didn’t I tell you to keep quiet, blabbermouth?” he hissed. Shoto looked sheepish and clammed up.
“What rumors?” Art3mis asked. She looked at me. “What’s he talking about? I haven’t had time to check the boards in a few days.”
“Several posts were made by gunters who claimed to know Parzival and Aech, saying they were both students on Ludus.” He turned to Aech and me. “My brother and I have spent the past two years searching for the Tomb of Horrors. We’ve scoured dozens of worlds looking for it. But we never thought to look on Ludus. Not until we heard that you attended school there.”
“It never occurred to me that attending school on Ludus was something I needed to keep a secret,” I said. “So I didn’t.”
“Yeah, and it’s lucky for us that you didn’t,” Aech said. He turned to the others. “Parzival unintentionally tipped me off about the tomb’s location, too. I never thought to look for it on Ludus, either, until his name appeared on the Scoreboard.”
Daito nudged his younger brother, and they both faced me and bowed. “You were the first to find the tomb’s hiding place, so we owe you our gratitude for leading us to it.”
I returned their bow. “Thanks, guys. But actually, Art3mis here found it first. Totally on her own. A month before I did.”
“Yeah, for all the good it did me,” Art3mis said. “I couldn’t defeat the lich at Joust. I’d been at it for weeks when this punk showed up and did it on his first try.” She explained how we met, and how she finally managed to beat the king the following day, right after the server reset at midnight.
“I have Aech here to thank for my jousting prowess,” I said. “We used to play all the time, here in the Basement. That’s the only reason I beat the king on my first attempt.”
“Ditto,” Aech said. He stretched out his hand and we bumped fists.
Daito and Shoto both smiled. “It was the same with us,” Daito said. “My brother and I have been playing Joust against one another for years, because the game was mentioned in Anorak’s Almanac.”
“Great,” Art3mis said, throwing up her hands. “Good for you guys. You were all prepared in advance. I’m so happy for you. Bravo.” She gave us all a sarcastic golf clap, which made everyone laugh. “Now, can we adjourn the Mutual Admiration Society and get back to the topic at hand?”
“Sure,” Aech said, smiling. “What was the topic at hand?”
“The Sixers?” Art3mis offered.
“Right! Of course!” Aech rubbed the back of his neck while biting his lower lip, something he always did when he was trying to gather his thoughts. “You said they found the tomb less than an hour ago, right? So any minute now, they’ll reach the throne room and face off against the lich. But what do you think happens when multiple avatars enter the burial chamber at the same time?”
I turned to Daito and Shoto. “Your names appeared on the Scoreboard on the same day, just a few minutes apart. So you entered the throne room together, didn’t you?”
Daito nodded. “Yes,” he said. “And when we stepped on the dais, two copies of the king appeared, one for each of us to play.”
“Great,” Art3mis said. “So it might be possible for hundreds of Sixers to joust for the Copper Key at the same time. Or even thousands.”
“Yeah,” Shoto said. “But to get the key, each Sixer has to beat the lich at Joust, which we all know isn’t easy.”
“The Sixers are using hacked immersion rigs,” I said. “Sorrento was boasting about it to me. They’ve got it set up so that different users can control the actions of every one of their avatars. So they can just have their best Joust players take control of each Sixer avatar during the match against Acererak. One after the other.”
“Cheating bastards,” Aech repeated.
“The Sixers have no honor,” Daito said, shaking his head.
“Yeah,” Art3mis said, rolling her eyes. “We’ve established that.”
“It gets worse,” I said. “Every Sixer has a support team made up of Halliday scholars, videogame experts, and cryptologists who are there to help them beat every challenge and solve every puzzle they encounter. Playing through the WarGames simulation will be a piece of cake for them. Someone will just feed them the dialogue.”
“Unbelievable,” Aech muttered. “How are we supposed to compete with that?”
“We can’t,” Art3mis said. “Once they have the Copper Key, they’ll probably locate the First Gate just as quickly as we all did. It won’t take them very long to catch up with us. And once they have the riddle about the Jade Key, they’ll have their eggheads working around the clock to decipher it.”