Watcher's Question: A LitRPG Saga (Life in Exile Book 2)

by Sean Oswald

  This led to a pair of Lesser Repulsions cast back to back. The first one targeted at the lead ogre and then the second aim at the legs of two shapes to the right. Both worked as intended, pushing the ogre back a step and the other knocking the two smaller ogres off their feet.

  Next came the riskier tactic, but it was needed. He began casting Lightning Bolt. It was too high of a level for him to quicken, so he could only hope that he could cast it before Ballie’og or another of the ogres who were still on their feet reached him. One of the ogres wasn’t moving. That must have been the one who liked the intoxicating effects. That left the leader and two other ogres. The repulsion had slowed down Ballie’og, but the other two were charging forward full force. Blind as they might be, they were still living wrecking engines.

  As they exited the cloud, he could see that they were wildly swinging the spiked clubs that they wielded. There was no finesse to their actions, but they likely didn’t need any. Dave wanted to move out of their way but couldn’t risk them getting past him and attacking his companions from behind. Just like they had his back, he had theirs, and he wasn’t going to fail at this, especially now that the creatures were smaller than him.

  The impacts of the clubs were daunting. The pain and damage were greatly reduced by the Ablative Armor he was covered in, but it was still quite a thing not to lose the focus required for his spell as he saw clubs the size of small trees descending upon him. The damage from the blows was split between the armor and him equally, but he still ended up taking (32) and (31) damage respectively. The individual blows were only taking five percent or so of his life with each swing, and they were missing more than they were hitting due to being blind, but that didn’t mean that he could keep taking hits forever, especially after his armor wore off. The only good thing was that twenty percent of the damage absorbed by his armor buff was transformed into mana, so he was slowly regaining the cost of his spell.

  The combined attacks triggered a concentration check, but Dave passed it with flying colors and held onto the spell form for Lightning Bolt. He split it once and then twice managing three forks of electrical energy each striking one of his targets. The strain of splitting the spells on the back of the concentration check briefly staggered him. A back corner of Dave’s mind realized this could be a real weakness to this new build.

  Energetic bolts slammed into each of their targets with the same toe curling, jaw clenching shock. (397) He could see where the two lesser ogres succumbed to the stunning aftereffects of the current which pulsed through their bodies. The more interesting effect was the way the third fork of lightning lit up the alcoholic cloud. There were spaces of alternating shadow and light and the charge seemed to jump around within the cloud for a couple of seconds before finally contacting its final target. Ballie’og didn’t take the same amount of damage as the other two, whether that be because of the cloud or because of some damage mitigation skill he had, Dave couldn’t say. Yet his prized lightning bolt only did (198) damage to the ogre leader. It was still enough to make him bellow out with a far too high-pitched scream for something his size.

  Dave had cast the best of his new spells except for Thunder Arc and his rhino summoning spell, which he didn’t want to risk in the middle of a battle, at least not till he got more confident in his ability to control the beast. He was however still a nine foot tall warrior encased in a magical shield and wielder of a flaming magical sword. So, melee was the next in the order of events. He couldn’t say for sure how long the two ogres would be stunned, so he didn’t want to waste a moment. His sword came free from its sheath, and he was whirling into the closer of the two monsters while simultaneously activating his Offensive Stance and Sneak Attack Skills. The first slash came at a forty-five degree arc down onto the neck of his target. With the creature stunned and its muscles locked into painful spasms by the electrical charge, it was standing there more like a training dummy than a creature. These conditions created an automatic critical hit and separated head from body with devastating force. (1206)

  As he saw that damage notification, he couldn’t help but feel his heart sink for the briefest of moments. Maybe his magic would never be able to compete with his melee for raw damage output. Just as quickly though, the surging confidence with which he had entered this battle pushed that thought out of his head. It was the magic which had made the melee so effective. There wasn’t anything wrong with combining skills. Whatever worked was good, and he would take any opportunities available to him to slay his enemies.

  Dave continued his momentum from the first slash and twirled forward with as much grace as a nine-foot man could muster. His energy continued on as he turned the movement into a spinning kick planted firmly into the chest of the second stunned ogre. The beast only took minimal damage (90) when compared to the sword, but Dave would have sworn that he felt ribs breaking under his boot before the creature was sent sprawling onto its back. Its muscles were still spasming from the shock so that it wasn’t even able to put out an arm to try and catch itself but instead tumbled backwards like a felled tree.

  Not wanting to waste his advantage, he kept pressing forward just like he had taught students many times when talking about self-defense. So this time his sword thrust forward like a striking serpent into the exposed neck of the ogre. The body hadn’t even fully stopped bouncing against the ground before the twelve inches of steel had been shoved through its neck, severing the spinal cord behind and pinning it to the ground. Dave didn’t bother to look at the damage notification. He knew that with the creature stunned and prone like that it would be a critical strike. More importantly, his time in Eloria had acquainted him with what a dead foe looked like.

  From there, the next thirty seconds of Dave’s life turned into him casting Lesser Repulsion as quickly as he could to keep the remaining ogres in the cloud for as long as he could. The frenzy of battle combined with his overwhelming success made Dave feel a high which could be just as addictive as any drug. His eyes practically gleamed with it. So much so that he let out a little bit of cold laughter when one of the lesser ogres managed to crawl far enough forward to extend an arm out of the cloud. He swung his sword in a low arc and mercilessly chopped of the hand. In his mind these creatures were not worthy of any quarter as they had hardly offered such to the elves. He was the spirit of cold justice in his own mind.

  Once the ogre who was enjoying the drunken mists keeled over, Dave dismissed the spell, prematurely ending its duration so that he could go in and finish them off. As the mist cleared, he saw that each of the monsters were covered in bruises from the repulsion blasts and all clearly wobbly from the alcohol, beyond the one who was passed out. Unfortunately, while waiting for the cloud to sufficiently intoxicate the massive creatures, Dave’s Minor Enlarge had worn off.

  Ballie’og seemed to be shaking off the blindness, so Dave had to decide if he should take out the incapacitated ogres first to keep them out of the fight or go after the biggest challenge straight off. To him it was a simple question. He always believed in finishing off a foe so they couldn’t come back to haunt you later. Quick casting Minor Enlarge again, he stepped forward and first beheaded the passed out ogre. Then keeping an eye on their leader who was still shaking his head but clearly becoming more alert by the moment, Dave charged at the other two ogres.

  They were drunk enough that they weren’t even swinging their clubs around blindly. Neither wore a heavy chest piece, but the way they leaned on each other had their heads together and would make an attack at the neck harder to land cleanly. So he switched tactics and went for a straight up heart thrust. Assuming that their heart was situated like a human. The assumption proved to be true enough as Dave used his forward momentum to plunge two feet of steel through the chest of one of the ogres. The creature spasmed around the blade but was dead too quickly to muster more than a dying exhale which never even became a cry of pain. The blade burst forth from its back and sliced into the bicep muscle of the other.

  The pain star
tled the creature to enough alertness that it raised its uninjured arm in defense even while pulling back the cut arm. Dave allowed the energy of his attack to push the first body forward and once it hit the ground, he placed a foot upon its unmoving chest and yanked his blade out. Grimly looking at the fumbling ogre before him, a part of Dave wondered how he had ever been worried about these creatures. Instead of feeling fear, he mostly just felt sickened at how pathetic these monsters were and all the harm they had caused. His new attitude felt easy and comfortable, a path of little resistance.

  As is often the case though in his arrogance, he left himself open. What was intended to be a final thrust against the last of the lesser ogres was knocked off course and only ended up being a stomach wound to the creature. (123) The wound was still serious but not fatal. That wasn’t Dave’s concern at the moment though. Instead, he found himself forced to the ground with Ballie’og’s arms wrapped around him. Well at least trying to be wrapped around him. For the moment, the Ablative Armor was holding up. Still the impact of being blind-sided by the ogre elite’s bull rush had knocked the wind out of him and the continual squeezing was making it hard to breath.

  Size wasn’t everything because even at his increased size Dave felt trapped underneath the monster. The impact had hit him for nearly one hundred damage of which the armor absorbed half and every few seconds he was taking another dozen damage even through his protection. In this form, Dave’s Strength stat hit one hundred and twenty-two yet he still felt like a baby. Anger rose up in him. A moment before he had felt untouchable, now he neither his melee side nor his magical side were saving him. He couldn’t focus his thoughts enough for a spell, and his martial skills couldn’t be brought to bear while he was pinned like this.

  None of the spells he could quick cast would have much impact on this behemoth, and he couldn’t even reach his sword now. Still he wasn’t helpless. Grappling had never been his strong suit, but thanks to the Watcher’s Preparations, his skill in unarmed combat had skyrocketed and was now at journeyman tier. He pushed fear away and leveraged his arms up and through the squeezing grasp of his strong but unskilled opponent. Once weakening that hold, he was able to slide his legs up and lock them around the massive creature. It might not be a proper guard position because the ogre’s great width prevented that, yet he had regained some measure of control.

  The two of them jockeyed back and forth while Dave looked for an opening, a moment where Ballie’og would over-extend himself. He knew that grappling was often a game of patience. Waiting for the right moment and then seizing it. Adding to the stress though was the fact that his situation would get far more dire once he shrunk back to regular size. So as much as he wanted to be patient, he couldn’t wait forever. Not that ending this sooner would be a bad thing. His spell armor might protect him from the physical damage, but it didn’t seem to stop the ogre’s sweat from rubbing all over him. The thing was practically dripping with it, and the stench was awful. Then a path to combine magic with his unarmed combat occurred to him.

  Dave slid his left hand up against the inside of the creature’s arm at the elbow. He timed it just right and then cast a Minor Binding on the arm when the ogre’s forearm and bicep touched. A magical link was formed between them, and suddenly, the upper and lower arm were inseparably bound, metaphysically turned into one object for the duration of the spell. Ballie’og freaked out at the sudden impairment of his arm, and this provided the opening Dave needed. Shooting a leg out, he was able to generate enough force to roll the ogre over and assume the top position.

  Once there, the ogre’s lack of skill and bound arm came into play. Dave quick cast a Magic Missiles spell straight into Ballie’og’s face. At this range, the spell critted and the beast took another (144) damage. The greater effect being that he completely released any hold on Dave who scrambled up and away from him. Now standing, Dave wanted to cast his Thunder Arc spell as it was the only spell left to him which might pack enough of a punch to end the ogre elite that is until Lightning Bolt came off cool down in another thirty seconds. The problem was that the cast time was a full twenty seconds, and so without the ability to quick cast Tier 3 spells at this time, it was impossible to use in close quarters combat.

  So he was back to his binding strategy. Dave lurched forward and attacked before the ogre could scramble to his feet. The bound arm seemed to be bothering him more than even Dave had expected. A couple of quickly cast Minor Bindings and both of the beast’s legs were stuck on the ground. He then felt secure enough to go and retrieve his sword from where it had landed when knocked out of his hand by Ballie’og’s bull rush.

  A part of Dave would have liked to think that after this he delivered a clean and honorable death to a worthy if evil foe. The truth was that it was much messier than that. The ogre was trapped on the ground by its bound legs and impaired by its arm, but Ballie’og wasn’t going to simply die easily. He swung both arms and they were solid enough in and of themselves to be a dangerous weapon. Dave tried to get in to deliver a killing blow, but instead had to content himself with hacking away at the creatures outstretched hands. A rapid series of blows removed fingers and then hands till eventually the ogre had nothing but stumps below his elbows. Still he fought on, and it took three blows to finally remove his head from his body.

  The grim task resulted in Dave being sprayed with arterial blood, and when he turned to check on his companions, he was a gruesome sight, though no more macabre than the image which greeted his eyes. Raddick and Fumihiro were covered in small cuts and what looked like bite marks, but all around them were piles of goblin corpses laid low in clusters. All around them, the only creatures still alive were elves and most of them were silent awaiting the outcome of the fight.

  Dave was glad to see that at least three of the elves had risen up and helped in their own defense. One was a woman in a torn dress with her beautiful face marred by three claw marks running down her cheek. Her haunted eyes glancing left and right as her hands clenched the makeshift weapon she held. Dave zeroed in on the weapon and saw that it was a goblin arm with jagged twin points from where the ulna and radius had been broken off. He could only wonder how she had come upon such a weapon. It seemed gruesome but appropriate to the situation.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  “More than anything what I regret is how this life exiled in Eloria has made me so often exchange the quality moments of life for choices made in a simple effort to survive. Some of the moments can never be had again and yet their loss can echo throughout the future.” — excerpt from the private journal of Emily Nelson, Daughter of Redemption

  The evening before had been one of the best in Sara’s life maybe in part because it stood out so much against the backdrop of all the scary things which had happened in the past couple of months in Eloria. She and mommy had eaten sweets and entirely skipped dinner. Just the two of them hanging out in mommy’s big bed. Mom had offered to use the Tabernacle thing so they could watch tv, but she preferred just lying there with her head in her mom’s lap. When she said that, it almost looked like mommy was going to cry, but after a moment, Sara realized that it actually made her very happy.

  So there they laid for hours before she finally drifted off to sleep. Mommy had spent a long time brushing her hair and talking about Eris’ Rise and how a school was going to be coming. Sara could hear it though in her voice. There was something bad that mommy wanted to talk to her about. When it finally came, it wasn’t what she had been afraid of. She had been worried that it was going to be something about Krinnk. No, it was just mommy talking about how she had to go on a little trip the next day. Sara didn’t really understand everything that her mom said about getting stronger and responsibility, but if she understood things correctly, her mom and Mira were going to go to the dungeon which had hurt her dad so badly before. That scared her and mommy seemed to notice.

  Slowly over time, her mom convinced her that it would all be okay. She told her about how Daichi, Jaselm and even the big mino
taur would be with her. Sara actually rather liked Rak’kar who had taken to calling her ‘Tifl’ although she didn’t know what that meant, but it still sounded nice. It made her feel better to know that those people she trusted would be with her mom and sister. In the end, she had fallen asleep secure in her mother’s arms.

  The next morning, after waking up alone with only two guards outside of her room who responded as soon as she called out for her mother, Sara went and got some breakfast. Emmaline made sure she had the best goodies and seemed extra nice as if to make up for the fact that her mother and sister were gone. She trusted mom when she said that they would all be back before the end of the day.

  So it was a couple of hours after waking up that Sara ran through the streets of Eris’ Rise. Given her choice, she would be playing in the forest, but neither Balayria nor the nice man that her mother had told her to obey would hear of such a thing. She loved how almost everyone was willing to let her play around them even though they were all so busy working. Most of the other children seemed to be afraid to play with her, so it was nice that the adults didn’t try to shoo her away.

  Still, she wracked her brain trying to imagine what she might have done to make the other kids angry with her. Sara tried to always be nice and as is so often the case with gentle spirits, she had a hard time understanding why everyone else didn’t treat her the same. She wasn’t entirely clueless; she knew that part of it was Krinnk. To her, the goblin was just so squeezable, but everyone else, including her parents, were either annoyed by or afraid of the goblin.