by Eric Ugland
The creature tripped over the windowsill, his legs going skyward for a second before flipping around and flying out the window.
Somehow, though, the jerk managed to grab hold of the tiny ledge.
I grabbed a dagger from my belt, the sword left forgotten on the floor, and I brought it down as hard as I could, slicing through two of the creature’s four fingers. That seemed to be enough for the creature, as his grip slipped, and he dropped. His legs clipped the windows below, and he cartwheeled to the cobblestones below, hitting with enough force that his bulbous head splattered like an overripe melon.
GG! You killed a Grey Madarial (LVL 14 Monster)
You’ve earned 1550 XP! What a mighty hero you are!
The door behind me swung open with some force, hitting the other wall hard enough to drive the knob into the plaster.
A man stood there, his face a grim sort of rage, a club in his hand, that at a second glance was more a rolling pin.
“You—” he started, then his daughter rolled out of bed and grabbed him around the legs.
She seemed too afraid to speak, but she was shaking her head and looking up at him.
“There was a thing in here,” I said, “uh, it’s down there now.”
The man kept the rolling pin between him and me as he stepped around the bed and peered out the window.
“What was that?” he asked.
“A, uh, madarial?” I said, taking his momentary distraction as a moment to pick my sword up. “Grey one?”
“Here? Gods. How did you, how are you here? Who are you?”
“Saw him coming in the window,” I said while I looked around for the sheath, which I distinctly remembered having thrown over my shoulder, and yet, it wasn’t anywhere to be found, “and, you know.”
“You climbed the outside?”
“Yeah, it seemed faster.”
He came towards me, not aggressively, but I was still a bit worried where this was going, so I took a step back, and I put my sword in my belt, hoping it’d stay there.
“What is your name?” he asked.
I didn’t have a good reason to remain anonymous, except that I kind of wanted to, I wanted to avoid anyone knowing who I was because fame was somewhat at odds with my goals. Not that this singular act would make me famous, but, you know.
“Let’s just say I’m your friendly neighborhood, uh, man.” I started the sentence really hoping my brain would come up with a way to end it. Clearly, my brain did not.
I sidestepped the man, and quickly climbed out of the window and started down the building.
The man stuck his head out the window above me.
“You are a hero! Let me thank you!” he said.
“Not necessary,” I replied.
The trip down was exceedingly faster than the trip up, though not quite as fast as the monster.
“Wait!” The guy shouted.
I didn’t. My feet hit the street, and I was running.
And then I skidded to a stop, and I ran back to the corpse of the creature, hoisted it over my shoulder, and then started running. No reason to leave potential loot behind.
Chapter 54
The madarial stunk. Bad. I put it in the second-floor storage apartment, wrapping it up in some spare canvas sheeting that had been wrapped around some crates and then dumped it into an empty barrel. The tavern had closed for the evening, and the area around my building was pretty much dead. It was certainly late enough, past midnight. Seeing the way that the world here worked, I wondered about the economic differences this city had. Late-night activities had to be severely limited. You couldn’t really stumble home after a rough night, I imagined there’d be hotels all over the place to cater to that specific need.
I went up to my apartment, and I hopped into the shower. I wondered how much of a luxury a shower was in this world, and was I getting spoiled having such easy access to it?
A problem for another night.
I’d done a good deed, and now I was going to revel in hot water, and no longer having blood and body fluids from a monster on me. You know, the little things.
Under the running water, I took the time to think. I’d stuck my neck out for someone, and, really, that someone wasn’t going to be able to repay the favor. Or were they? Was it possible that they might be willing to tell I was at their house the night I was actually robbing the palace? I was reminded of The Godfather, the scene where Don Corleone is given the orange. Sure, I’m pretty sure he was shot in that scene, but the people of the neighborhood loved him because he kept them safe. Maybe that was what I needed to do, help keep the neighborhood safe, and then they’d return the favor by keeping me safe.
An idea.
I’d also need to watch out for drive-bys and Tommy Guns.
Out of the shower, I dried off, got dressed, and since I’d run out of other tasks to do, finally got around to the cleaning I’d neglected the other night. And, honestly, since I’d moved into the apartment. It was getting a bit gross. Not pit gross, but pretty close to frat filth. I washed the sink, did the dishes, swept the floor. Also, I swept up tons and tons of feathers. I got all the broken wood together and chucked it into the fireplace. As well as the ripped sheets. All of it went into the fireplace, and I had my first fire. It was very quaint.
The trap daggers I put into a pile near the staircase, ready to go to Gideon’s.
I tossed the pile of feathers on the flame, and my quaint fire disappeared under a bunch of smoke. Turns out that feathers do not burn so much as smoke.
And then the smoke started to fill the apartment. I’d never had a fireplace before, and there was the feeling I might have done something wrong.
I ran around the apartment and threw open all the windows. Then I got a bucket of water from the bathroom and chucked it into the fireplace. There was a great big ka-phwoom, and more smoke and sizzling as the fire went out.
This wasn’t my night.
I went and leaned out the window to get some fresh air.
Down below, there was a man and a little person, you know, like a child, they were hurrying across the open space between buildings.
A shriek echoed across the square.
Something was coming. Something bad.
Chapter 55
I was very tempted to shut my window, deal with the smoke, and accept that it wasn’t my business. That whatever was making the noise could just do what it wanted to do, and I could do what I wanted to do. Just ignore, live, and let live. Besides, I’d already jumped into the fray and put my life on the line to save someone else I didn’t know. I’d done my good deed for the day. Or week.
Naturally, the kid had to start whimpering, and that played off my heartstrings in just the way where I started to groan. I uttered a few choice curses, but reached for my sword, and then stomped down the stairs like a petulant child being forced to go out and mow the lawn.
I kicked my door wide and looked out over the open area.
The father’s eyes and mine met.
I gestured for him to come to me.
He looked up into the sky, all around, then he grabbed his kid’s hand, and made a break for it, running as fast as he could.
There was a heavy thump as something landed in between him and me, wings flared out to the sides. The something was purple, with thick skin and a long tail. I couldn’t see anything else.
I walked out of my apartment, thinking it was definitely one of the dumber maneuvers I’d engaged in within my time in Vuldranni, and yet, I couldn’t stop myself, I was committed. And it wasn’t walking after a second, it was strutting. This overwhelming sense of confidence, basically arrogance, was flowing over me, and I got right behind the creature, which sounded like it was menacing the father and kid duo, and I cleared my throat.
“Hey, dickbutt,” I said, “why don’t you make like a tree and get out of here?”
The creature stood up slowly, and what I had taken for something only mildly larger than a human, turned out to be significantly la
rger. About the size of one human standing on top of another human. The wings shot out to either side, and there were large horns on the creature’s head. It turned around, very slowly, until it was looking at me. A vaguely humanoid head sat on top of a thick neck. Still purple. Spikes and horns were all over its head, some of which looked a bit like a beard. It tilted its head and then turned it’s whole body around until it was facing me. He was pretty scary, not gonna lie.
I held the sword out, doing my best to appear menacing.
“You going to get out of here?” I asked. “Or do I need to stab you?”
Just a blur, and the creature hit my sword right out of my hand, and it made a delicate tinkling noise as it bounced off the cobblestones and out of sight.
The creature growled and leaned closer and closer to me.
It started making noises, low rumbling sorts of things.
And then, up popped something delightful:
Smashing! You’ve learned a new language, Primordial Terran
“… are worthy of little more than being my plaything’s plaything,” it finished saying.
“Your mother is a hamster, and your father smells of a dead donkey’s putrescent butt.”
His gigantic purple eyes went wide, and he recoiled back from me. Then he squinted and came within an inch. I could feel his breath on my face, hot and rank. Like death. Like many things had died in his mouth, and all of them left their stench.
“I will use your intestines to decorate my horns,” the thing said to me.
“That seems like a terrible look for both of us.”
As fast as I could, I grabbed a dagger from my belt and jammed it straight up into the creature’s jaw, firing off a quick identification spell while I was there.
Robeachon’s Gargoyle
LVL 18 elemental
He roared.
The dagger bent, it had not penetrated his skin.
He made a chuffing sort of noise I think was laughter, and he got closer and closer to me.
I slapped him across the face.
And then I ran.
I figured embarrassment was really the only way to get him to chase me, and if he was chasing me, that gave the father and kid time to run into my building and get out of danger.
The bad part of that plan was me having to outrun a big monster that could fly.
No problem, right?
Well, minor problem.
I didn’t even think about running to my sword, I knew there was no chance I’d reach it with enough time to pick it up and make a stand. My best chance at survival was losing the monster, or elemental, in the alleys. I had to make the tight turns and twists work in my favor, and I had to really see how my parkour training was coming along.
The gargoyle’s taking off was not a quiet affair. He made quite the ruckus, and I knew he was after me. It was the roar that made it initially clear, followed by the phrase:
“I will kill you, elf.”
Pretty specific.
I cut hard to the left, slipping between a set of barrels to get into an alley.
There was a great crash, and I snuck a glance over my shoulder. The gargoyle had been much closer than I’d anticipated, and it was sheer luck that I made the move when I did, the gargoyle had been ready to grab me, and had, instead, grabbed the barrels.
I barreled down the alley, already going at full sprint and already cycling my mana into my stamina spell. I really wanted a soundtrack to my life at this point, I thought it’d really add something to my performance. Back on Earth, when I was deep in it on some game, and I needed to break a record or have the game of my life, music would always be there for me, and I always wanted a thigh-mounted cassette player like Doug Masters in his F-16. But I didn’t have that, I only had the songs in my head, which were sadly lacking and mostly consisted of It’s A Small World. The alley wasn’t going to be a safe space for long, either. It was narrow, but not so narrow that the gargoyle couldn’t make it through. I was reasonably sure he couldn’t fly with wings out full but walking, sure.
So instead of just running straight, I kicked off a wall, and did a few back and forth jumps, making my way up, aiming for the roof, thinking this would shake the beast.
It did not.
I looked up to get my next handhold, and there was the gargoyle, arms outstretched with one clawed hand on either side of the buildings, straddling the alley, looking down at me, his eyes blazing in anger, and his mouth wide.
He lunged at me, practically throwing himself straight down
Shadow step.
I pushed myself out of his way and climbed up a bit, but as I was climbing, I saw things in the shadow realm for the first time. Lots of things. Creatures. Things with more limbs than made sense. Things with teeth, things with fur, things with things I couldn’t identify. Big things and small things, and they were all moving towards me. I got back into reality faster than I wanted, but I was only a few feet from the top, and I pulled myself up and rolled over the edge of the roof as quickly as I could.
There was a screech of frustration from the alley, the gargoyle clearly mad and confused that I’d slipped his clever trap.
I darted a few feet, moving as quietly as I could, tucking myself into the dark side of a chimney.
The gargoyle’s claws made a crunching noise as he pulled himself on the roof, leaving holes in the roof tiles. He took a hop up onto the top of the chimney, and squatted on it, his big purple head slowly looking around.
My view of the gargoyle was not one I wanted, being that he was just a few feet above me. I got a good up-close view of his butt and claws and all the rest of him, from a rather unflattering perspective.
“I smell you,” he rumbled out. “You cannot hide.”
The smart move would have been waiting there, seeing if he found me. Less smart, but still a decent idea, sneaking away. Naturally, I did neither.
Chapter 56
I pulled the KrakenTooth dagger out of my pouch, then I jumped up, and I stabbed the Gargoyle in the foot.
This time, the dagger pierced his skin and sunk into his flesh, nice and deep.
I wrenched it free with a spurt of blood that steamed in the midnight air, and I was running before I saw any reaction from the beast.
While I leaped from the roof to another building, I heard the telltale sound of bricks crumbling, and a quick glance behind showed me that the gargoyle had pushed the chimney over as he leaped off, meaning that I had the slimmest lead on him. He was trying to get his bearings, his foot clearly in pain, and having launched poorly.
I ran up and over a roof, then dropped onto a balcony, and again and again until I reached the ground. Then I was sprinting again. I had one real move to make, and that was to get to the gate into Old Town, where there were standing guards. As soon as they saw the gargoyle, they’d take it down, and I’d be in the clear, and could go back to the apartment and deal with the strangers I’d invited into my home.
Sprinting through one alley, across the street, and to another, I looked over my shoulder, and I saw no gargoyle. I felt he had to be following me somehow, but I wasn’t sure where he’d gone. I wasn’t ready to stop.
I slid to a stop at a corner and got my bearings, and something passed between the moon and me. I shot a look up, the gargoyle was looking down at me, gliding with his wings spread wide. His eyes seemed to glow in the dark, a hazy sort of purple, at least enough that I could tell where he looked.
I figured out where I was, more or less, and my path to the gates required me to run across an open square. There was a lone statue in the middle of it, and some carts left overnight by the shopkeepers who set up their wares in daylight hours, but nothing concrete enough for me to take cover under. The gargoyle would rip apart any wood cart. And me.
Still, I might be able to dodge him. Might the key word there.
I ran for it.
My legs pumped as hard as I could make them. My breath was coming in gulps, and my mana was dropping precipitously fast. I knew
it was really really unwise to go into the shadow realm again, but I was trying to make sure I had enough for one more shadow step just in case I needed an emergency exit.
I glanced over my shoulder: no gargoyle in sight.
Maybe I was going to make it.
Then I tripped.
My foot caught on the slightest raised edge of a cobblestone, and I fell hard on the ground, busting my chin open on the road.
I rolled over immediately and saw the creature diving. He was fully tucked, wings, feet, everything, and his body made a whistling noise as he fell. If I hadn’t fallen, I’d have been dead for sure. As it was, now I was just most likely dead. I’d definitely overestimated my ability to parkour, though there was the possibility that free-running was never going to let someone outpace a flying monster from another plane of being. Tough to know for sure. I needed another plan. And in that second of watching the gargoyle zoom towards me, I had a terrible idea. My specialty.
Grabbing the KrakenTooth dagger, I gritted my teeth and cast shadow step.
Immediately, I was moving in the shadow realm, and things were coming for me. But I only needed to take a step. One step forward, stand up and assume the position. Dagger raised up, both arms locked behind it, legs braced for impact. I shoved myself back into reality just as I saw a mouth full of shadow teeth open up to take my face in.
And time was back flowing normally, colors restored.
I blinked, and the gargoyle was on me. Or, more precisely, it was crashing into me. The dagger punched through the gargoyle’s chest. And it, in essence, made a path for me to follow. The incredible momentum of the gargoyle, combined with its weight, meant the dagger went all the way through the beast until it poked out the other side. At which point, the gargoyle’s body slid along the cobblestone streets until it burnt out the remainder of its momentum.
