by Andrew Rowe
Sera hurled her ball of ice, which split in mid-air and hit several sections of the gunk, freezing it solid. She repeated the process several times, freezing all of the sludge that was visible. Then, with a gesture, Patrick conjured air and carried the slime-cubes out of the junk.
With a little more air, he shifted the pile, exposing more goo. Sera and Patrick repeated the process until they’d separated the goo out entirely — or, at least as close to completely as we could tell at a glance.
“Good enough, Professor?” Sera asked.
“Good enough. Should be safe. If the slime breaks out of the ice, I’ll handle it. Now, go play in the junk, kids.”
Patrick let out a “yay” with surprising enthusiasm and rushed to the pile. The rest of us followed more slowly, picking through it.
Most of the junk was exactly what it sounded like. Useless, broken down items with no obvious value or function. Some of the items were broken or rusted so badly I couldn’t even recognize what their original function was. The majority of it looked like scrap from a factory; bits of misshapen metal and stone, and some still-intact containers of unidentifiable black sludge.
“Store black sludge.”
I took the sludge, because of course I did.
I also stored a few choice bits from the rest of the junk — somewhat salvageable weapon and armor pieces, some cogs, screws, and bolts, and a single seemingly mundane ring. Others handed similar stuff off to me to store in the box.
The remarkable section was what Meltlake had hidden beneath the section of floor she’d shifted; a potion bottle containing a strange silvery liquid. She took it herself, slipping the potion into her robe. “I’ll call that part of my fee for the escort.”
“What is it, Professor?” Patrick asked.
“A specialized type of elixir. Not the type that would help any of us, but I have a friend that might like it.”
I almost asked for more information, but it was obvious even to me that she didn’t want to talk about it, so I held off for the moment. I couldn’t guarantee I was going to be quiet about it indefinitely, but Meltlake still seemed…off. I didn’t want to risk upsetting her this early into our expedition.
With the looting process completed, I briefly debated taking bits of the frozen goop, but ultimately decided against it. That seemed like the sort of thing that would get all over the place when someone decided to empty out the whole Jaden Box at once, which I expected to happen the moment Wrynn reclaimed it.
There was not, in fact, a trap door under the pile like we’d expected — the strange potion bottle had been the hidden treasure. So, that meant there were only two doors to check: one on the right, one on the left. We also could have turned back to the previous chamber…probably.
In a moment of concern, I touched the door and confirmed that yes, we could leave if we wanted to. That was good.
“Next room?” Sera asked.
“Next room,” we all confirmed.
Patrick headed over to the next door. He seemed to be in the pattern of opening doors, which was tactically the absolute worst decision we could have made — he was our ranged fighter, and aside from Sera, probably the least versed in melee combat — but honestly, it was the first floor and no one was really too worried about it. Maybe that was unwise. No, it was definitely unwise. But with Meltlake there, everyone felt pretty secure.
And Mara was right behind him, anyway.
Patrick opened the door on the right side of the room first. The room beyond had a floor covered in alternating black and white tiles, each about five feet by five feet in size. There were three other doors within it, each exactly in the middle of one of the sides.
More importantly, the opposite side of the room was filled with monsters. A barghensi, a line of several skeletons with swords, a line of skeletal archers behind them…with each standing exactly inside one of the squares. Though I tensed when I saw them, none of the monsters moved to attack. Not immediately, at least.
When the monsters didn’t move, I recognized the nature of the challenge immediately. The tiles were a fourteen-by-fourteen game board.
“Crowns,” Sera gave a little laugh. “Excellent. And that’s…a hundred points on the others side. Should be simple enough.”
“Do you think they’ll play by the rules? Moving in turns, only attacking when they are in range, and all that?” I asked.
“Very likely. Given how easy it would be to simply fight our way through with those restrictions, I imagine that the challenge is for us to obey the rules without being, you know, brutally mauled.”
“How do we know how many points we’re worth?” Patrick asked.
“A fair question.” Sera paused, thinking. “I wasn’t considering a deployment limit. If we have one of those…well, Meltlake won’t be able to take to the field at all. She’d be half their points by herself.”
“Only half?” Meltlake leaned heavily on her cane toward Sera. “Aren’t you underestimating me a bit?”
“Fifty is fairly typical for an Emerald-level hero unit. But if you’re saying you’re hiding more power…well, I suppose you could be a solo boss. But either way, you’d be too expensive for us to deploy.”
“That’s assumin’ we’ve got that limit at all, yeah?” Mara noted. “Maybe we should just hop on in there and see what happens. Can’t be assumin’ we’ve got extra rules and bind our hands without reason.”
“Yes, I suppose that’s one possible approach. But I wouldn’t want to be penalized for bringing in too much power…hm. Let’s check the other room first, shall we?”
We moved to the opposite side of the room, checking the other door.
A cool blast of air assailed us immediately, but fortunately, it wasn’t in the form of an attack. The room ahead was simply absurdly cold — but apparently not quite cold enough for the water that filled the majority of it to freeze over.
Not yet, at least.
Basically, the room looked like a giant swimming pool, but with tiny floating platforms hovering above it and a frigid aura in the air. The platforms were circular and just about a foot across, meaning someone could stand on one, but without a lot of room to maneuver. The gaps between the platforms were different distances, but none of them looked too far to jump across at a glance…of course, there would probably be tricks involved.
If I had to guess — and I was obviously going to guess — the room would get colder and colder after we entered, meaning that the water would likely freeze. This would, of course, be problematic for anyone who fell into the pool.
I saw two other doors in that room; one on the right side, another straight ahead. Both looked to be accessible by jumping from floating platform to platform.
Oh, to clarify, when I say floating, I don’t mean on the water. The platforms were hovering in mid-air a few feet above the water…which was actually more suspicious, now that I was paying attention. Maybe they had a weight capacity, or maybe some of them would sink while others remained stable. I started looking for identifying marks on the platforms, but Sera gestured for Patrick to move away from the door. The door shut as soon as Patrick pulled his hand away.
“Problem?” I asked.
Sera shook her head. “No, just sensed that the room was already getting cooler. Hopefully it won’t get any worse while it’s closed.”
“Understood.” I agreed with her logic. Usually, spire rooms wouldn’t change if they were closed. Sometimes they’d even reset completely if you waited long enough, but that would generally take hours.
“Any leanings?” Sera asked the group.
Mara glanced between the doors. “Jumping seems more my fit, but I know you’re a big Crowns gal.”
“Yeah, she’s great at it!” Patrick made an encouraging gesture. “Beats me every time.”
“She is good at Crowns,” I admitted, “But we don’t know what the rules will be in the spire. What happens if we’re limited to whatever abilities a Crowns unit of a specific type should have?”
Sera shrugged. “It’s probable. It’s also probably no problem.”
“With our group composition? There were a lot of skeletons in there, Sera.”
She snorted. “You’re just sad because you’ll be an Enchanter unit and they’re terrible.”
“That is, admittedly, a part of it, yes. But mechanically, we’re…what, four Carnelian-level hero units? Fifteen points apiece against a hundred-point enemy team?”
“In point of fact, there are intermediary measurements between Carnelian and Sunstone, and I think Mara is close enough to count as an Advanced Carnelian unit. And dual attunement units do exist. You might qualify.”
I waved a hand in a “maybe” gesture. “And if they give us the lowest grade possible?”
Sera seemed to ponder that for a moment. “Honestly? I could win with just Patrick and me.”
I folded my arms, giving her a skeptical look. “That’s a pretty bold claim.”
“Not really, if we presume that he counts as a standard Elementalist unit and I can use my summons.”
Summons definitely would swing things, yeah. I mean, Researcher wouldn’t, but…
I ran some ideas through my head, but I still couldn’t see her winning with just summons. Not without Seiryu, at least, which obviously wasn’t going to happen. I had a more pressing issue to bring up before I got too distracted. “Before we get into this too far, is that even the route we want to go? We have an extremely mobile group — two people with air mana, three if you count Meltlake. Then the other two of us have enhancement and transference. Crossing a platform room is trivial, and even if we assume it’s going to freeze over, we have access to both fire and ice magic.”
“Yes, true.” Sera pondered that. “But an agility focused room is likely to lead to others, yes? We’ll wear out our mana taking that kind of path. Whereas a route built around board games and other challenges of intellect is likely less mana intensive.”
She did have a valid argument: going through this way did seem more consistent with our general route strategy, and I hated to admit that my main counter was “thinking is more work”. “Okay.” I nodded. “Any objections?”
There were none. Meltlake simply told us that she’d be waiting outside the room unless something happened to force her to intervene, which we all understood. We discussed game mechanics for a couple more minutes, then headed back to the Crowns room.
It was time to play a game.
At our mutual agreement, Mara stepped into the room first, just in case things weren’t quite what they seemed. It was always possible the Crowns board was just an aesthetic and the monsters were going to charge, or worse, that there were some additional traps beyond the Valor board.
Only one event occurred when she stepped inside: A voice spoke from seemingly everywhere at once, clear and easy to understand.
[Player 1 has placed a unit: Carnelian-level Guardian. Value: 15 Points.]
That answered a lot of things right away, in the sort of way that made Sera acquire a particularly smug expression.
“E3, please, Mara.” Sera explained, referring to grid square locations on the board. The first four rows on our side were available for us to position our starting units, presuming standard rules applied.
Mara walked to the stated position. Nothing special happened, she just waited there.
“Patrick, your turn. E2.”
“Right!” Patrick walked into the room.
[Player 1 has placed a unit: Carnelian-level Elementalist. Value: 15 Points.]
With that announcement made, he positioned himself right behind Mara, as Sera had instructed. Sera’s strategy involved putting us on one side to avoid sustained fire from all the archers, but with some room to maneuver rather than being completely boxed in. I couldn’t say if it would be a good strategy until I had a better idea of whether or not some of her other plans would work.
“Corin, F3.” That put me right next to Mara, in the “front” of our group. Sera would be right behind me. I stepped in.
[Player 1 has placed a unit: Carnelian-level Multi-Attuned. Value: 25 Points.]
I blinked at that. Sera had mentioned multiple attunements showing up being a possibility, but I’d doubted it. Huh.
Patrick gave a whoop of encouragement as I stepped up into my position, but I wasn’t super excited. I had no idea how this would impact the game. I wasn’t aware of any Crowns rules for Arbiters. I doubted even Sera was; as a restricted attunement, they weren’t a part of the normal game.
On a whim, I spoke into the air. “Can I get a list of my valid abilities, please?”
There was no reply.
“Worth tryin’,” Mara offered in consolation. “S’pose we’ll find out soon enough.”
Sera stepped in last.
[Player 1 has placed a unit: Error-level Invoker. Value: 30 Points.]
I blinked. Error-level? Was that because she’d been Carnelian, but dropped down into a Quartz level range?
Either way, Sera was going to be impossibly smug about having a higher point value than mine.
…Wasn’t she?
Oddly, she looked concerned when she stepped into position behind me. I almost asked what was bothering her, but Patrick asked something more practical first. “So…with Meltlake not playing, we’re done positioning ourselves, right? How do we start?”
“I very likely just need to make a declaration. There are some standardized phrases for Crowns. Everyone feel ready?”
We gave her a circle of nods. Sera took a deep breath, still looking worried. “Then…Let the game begin.”
The door behind us slammed shut.
Chapter X – Crown of Fire
A voice echoed throughout the newly-sealed chamber.
[Player 1’s Turn.]
“Excellent.” Sera grinned. “Everyone, stay still a moment.” She gestured to the square next to her, taking a breath. “Vanniv, I summon you.”
Something clicked in my head the moment that Sera called Vanniv onto the board. The reason why she’d been so confident about winning with just Patrick and herself — it wasn’t about her own abilities. Not exactly.
Vanniv was, in effect, another entire Elementalist. His magic was near-identical to Patrick’s, both outside of Crowns and in terms of the mechanics of the game itself. That meant that we now had access to two different people with the types of abilities that Elementalists were famous for: fire and lightning based attacks.
I wasn’t quite certain what her full plan was. Chain Lightning seemed like the most valuable move against a crowd of the size we were dealing with, but Carnelian-level Elementalist and karvensi units wouldn’t have that ability. Inferno would be available, which could blast up to four squares with fire, but that didn’t seem to be fast enough to obliterate entire crowds. Beyond that, they’d have powerful single-target Fire Bolt and Lightning Bolt spells, the latter of which might be useful against the barghensi. Finally, they had a simple Wall of Fire spell to block off up to three squares to prevent movement and attacks through those squares.
All that was useful, but there were simply too many enemies. Even if we could obliterate as many as four units in a round with perfect placement of Inferno spells, I couldn’t see how she was planning to beat them without getting us pelted with arrows. And I, for one, did not like the idea of being pincushioned by skeletal archers.
Vanniv appeared where she’d indicated, immediately turning in a circle to examine his surroundings. “Oh! Oh! Are we in a spire? It’s just like home!”
“Yes, the Tiger Spire. We’re playing Crowns. You remember the rules, of course?” Sera asked.
“Please, Sera. I couldn’t possibly forget after playing with you.” He gave her an exaggerated wink. “Now, since I’ve just been summoned…I suppose I should stand here and look dashing and adorable?”
“Quite right. No movements on your first turn, sadly. Which we’ll be ending in just a moment.”
“So soon?” I asked. “Most of us haven’t moved. You don�
��t want us to at least get a little closer?”
“Nope. We want as much information as possible before they get near us. Assuming normal mechanics, it’s going to take a minimum of two turns for them to get in archery and spell range. More, if we move backward or take some other steps. Let’s see what they do. Everyone good with that?”
We agreed.
Sera said, “End turn.”
[Player 2’s Turn.]
A skeleton walked forward for exactly three squares, then stopped. Then the next one did. Then the next.
It was kind of eerie. Was something giving them telepathic instructions? The same voice as the announcer, maybe?
The skeletal archers moved next – also exactly three squares. Then, the barghensi was last, moving only two squares.
Standard unit movement rates. I nodded to myself. Given that the archers aren’t loosing arrows at us, they may have standard range on shooting at us, too.
[Player 1’s Turn.]
“Perfect.” Sera smiled. “Patrick, lay down a Wall of Fire between E5 and C5.”
Patrick blinked. “Uh, sure. But they won’t get that close this turn.”
“Right. It’s not to stop them from walking. It’s to block line of sight for the archers, which have a range of four squares. Without obstruction, they could fire at Mara and Corin next turn.”
“That wall won’t stop them from shooting me.” I noted.
“Yes, yes. Vanniv will be putting up a second Wall of Fire, between F5 and H5. That will block the archers from shooting you.”
I processed that. “That’s…oh. You’re just going to wall us off entirely, aren’t you?”
“Precisely. A little mana intensive, but they should never get in a shot.”
“We can’t attack through the walls, either, though. So…you’re expecting the skeletons to walk right through the walls?”
Sera nodded. “Indeed I am.”
I sighed. “Okay. And if they don’t?”
“Then we’ll unload on them as soon as the walls fall and run.”
