Sean Wolfe - The New Order

First published in the USA by HarperCollins Publishers Inc in 2015

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Children’s Books 2015

HarperCollins Children’s Books is a division of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd,

HarperCollins Publishers

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

The HarperCollins Children’s Books website address is

www.harpercollins.co.uk

Copyright © 2015 by Sean Fay Wolfe

Cover art © 2015 by Max Gonzalez

Design by Victor Joseph Ochoa

Sean Fay Wolfe asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008152833

Ebook Edition © 2015 ISBN: 9780008152840

Version: 2015-10-16

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Epigraph

PROLOGUE

PART I:THE NOCTEM ALLIANCE

CHAPTER 1:The Second Election

CHAPTER 2:The Voice in the Night

CHAPTER 3:The Spleef Quarterfinals

CHAPTER 4:Viva La Noctem

CHAPTER 5:The Tennis Machine

CHAPTER 6:Elementia Day

PART II:THE DEVILS WITHIN THE WALLS

CHAPTER 7:The Coup

CHAPTER 8:Tensions

CHAPTER 9:The Battle of the Base

CHAPTER 10:The Villager’s Visit

CHAPTER 11:Home Again

CHAPTER 12:Clash of the Saviours

CHAPTER 13:The Nation of the Noctem Alliance

CHAPTER 14:The Spleef Semifinals

CHAPTER 15:The Labyrinth

CHAPTER 16:The Leak

CHAPTER 17:The Prisoner of Brimstone

CHAPTER 18:The Warnings

CHAPTER 19:The Spleef World Finals

PART III:NIGHTFALL

CHAPTER 20:An Emergency Meeting

CHAPTER 21:Return to the Village

CHAPTER 22:The Decisions

CHAPTER 23:The Battle of the Archipelago

CHAPTER 24:The Elementia Sea Base

CHAPTER 25:The Two Tribes

CHAPTER 26:The Greater Mushroom Island

CHAPTER 27:The Traitors

CHAPTER 28:Atop Mount Fungarus

CHAPTER 29:The Hostages

CHAPTER 30:Lord Tenebris

The Quest Continues …

From the Author

Acknowledgements

About the Author

About the Publisher

Leonidas gritted his teeth and shook off his discomfort. Having been raised in the desert, he was foreign to the frigid wind and snow that now racked his body with shivers. He resented that, of the three generals of the Noctem Army, Lord Tenebris had assigned him to oversee the construction of the tundra base. Leonidas turned and looked at the marvellous stone complex rising from the snow-hardened earth. He couldn’t help but take a little pride in the fact that the Noctem Alliance’s first true base was now in its last phases of construction.

It dawned on Leonidas that it was probably time for another patrol. He pulled out his watch to confirm this. He had to squint to see the golden clockface through the heavy snowfall, but he could still make out the time as midday. It was time to send two of his ten men out to circumnavigate the construction zone, searching for trespassers. Leonidas found these patrols to be pointless. They were in the middle of the most expansive and desolate biome on the server, so the chances that anybody would run into them out here were slim to none. However, on Caesar’s last inspection of the base, he had made it very plain to Leonidas that Lord Tenebris felt the perimeter patrols were vital.

Ever since it had been founded on Spawnpoint Hill, the New Order had gathered almost a hundred and fifty followers, and had since been renamed the Noctem Alliance. Lord Tenebris, however, remained in a foul mood. He refused to let go of his anger that Element City had been so successful since King Kev had fallen. He had expected the city to struggle to support itself under the rule of Stan2012. However, Element City was now thriving to a level not experienced since the Golden Age of King Kev’s rule, and Stan had only been president for a few months. Tomorrow was the day of the second election of the Republic of Elementia, and Stan was expected to win in a landslide.

Given Lord Tenebris’s foul mood, Leonidas reasoned that his own head would be on the chopping block if Lord Tenebris somehow found out he had missed a patrol. Therefore, Leonidas called out to the two nearest workers, “Corporal! Private! Get over here!”

Immediately, Corporal Emerick and Private Spyro pocketed the stone bricks they were building with and hastily hustled over to Leonidas.

“Yes, sir, General Leonidas,” the two soldiers responded in full salute.

“It’s twelve hundred hours now, and it’s time for the midday perimeter check. Ya know what to do,” said Leonidas.

“Sir, yes, sir!” said the players. They spun on their heels, drew their bows and arrows, and marched off until they disappeared into the heavy snowfall.

Leonidas sighed. With two players gone, work would be slower for the next hour. He turned back towards the construction, about to continue his work, when something caught his eye. There, approaching from the general direction that Emerick and Spyro had just disappeared, a light flickered through the snowfall, getting brighter and brighter. Leonidas briefly wondered if one of his men was coming back, but he quickly realized that this was neither the corporal nor the private. A figure adorned in flowing white robes came into view, a jack-o’-lantern clutched in his hands.

“I need food, Leonidas,” came Caesar’s battered voice, breathing heavily from his long trek through the barren plains. Leonidas was taken aback, seeing his comrade and equal-in-command here when Caesar was supposed to be catering to the personal needs of Lord Tenebris. He pulled two pieces of bread from his inventory and quickly handed them to Caesar.

“What brings ya here, Caesar?” asked Leonidas, showing Caesar into the modest dirt-block shack, lit by torchlight. The structure served as Leonidas’s personal quarters during the construction of the new capital. “I thought Lord Tenebris told ya to stay with him, and help with whatever he needed.”