by Kyle Johnson
As Phil moved to intercept the charging creatures, Meridian screamed, “On the left!” Phil’s head spun to see more of the monsters burst on their flank.
“On it,” McBane said shortly, moving to the side to protect the vital healer. So long as Meridian held, they’d be okay…
“Aw shit, the right!” the woman yelled, her voice sounding resigned as she hefted her warhammer to take that flank. “Shortfellow, I think you’re getting those three hours you wanted!”
As more of the creatures swarmed toward the healer, Phil realized she was right. They were all about to head for respawn. Suddenly, the world in front of him exploded in flames, and as a beast from a nightmare leapt over the fire directly at Phil, he wondered how they would ever even reach the city.
Martina watched as Liam cast the Spell that bound the weakly struggling lizard, tying it to him so that he could summon it later. The creature had been tough to fight; it was immune to Liam’s magic, and the caster refused to call any of his more powerful summons to help them. She’d learned that part of his uncanny ability to summon a huge number of creatures quickly was that, if they died in his service, they were dead and couldn’t be recalled. Even so, he hoarded the creatures the way a miser did coins, and both she and Hector had come closer than she liked to respawning this time.
She’d tried to take Liam to task for that, but her old confidence was gone, and he’d simply stared at her while she railed until eventually, she’d floundered and caved under that gaze. He’d grown more dismissive of her as the days passed; he no longer even pretended that she was Party Leader and simply issued orders, expecting them to be obeyed. Part of her wanted to take Hector and go off on their own, but she knew that the two of them wouldn’t survive that way. Liam was arrogant, but his Spells were powerful, and his tame Rogue did a lot more damage than she probably should have for someone of her level.
It hadn’t escaped Martina’s notice that all of Liam’s damaging Spells were Darkness-based, either. He had lots of draining, debilitating, and debuffing Spells, but not many that used fire, lightning, or the other elements that most Wizards relied on. Like his Rogue, he was more powerful than he was letting on, and it was clear to her that she needed him a lot more than he needed her, to her great discontent.
She’d taken to avoiding Liam by scouting whenever possible, but the caster was currently busy with his new acquisition, so she had a bit of time out from under his gaze. Her thoughts were a jumble, and the quiet inner voices in her head that told her she wasn’t as good as she thought, couldn’t do anything by herself, and wasn’t worth being Party Leader anyway had grown louder the longer they’d been in the Blightlands. They mocked her mercilessly, now, and she was tired; tired of fighting them, tired of denying their words; tired of insisting it wasn’t true. She needed help, and there was only one person she could turn to.
Hector sat before the fire, oiling and sharpening his double-bitted axe. Most Warriors, she knew, preferred swords, but Hector loved his axe. “Swords are great,” he’d said time and again, “but nothing chops like an axe, lady.”
As she approached, he glanced at her sideways but didn’t speak. She took a seat across the fire, staring moodily into the flames. “He’s busy grabbing that lizard-thing,” she observed softly. “More help when we get to Antas, I guess.”
Hector sighed. “I don’t know about all this, Martina,” he told her slowly. “I mean, is any of this really a good idea? We’re trying to steal a Quest from some guy we never even met, just because some other guy says we should. Doesn’t that seem fishy to you, sister?”
“We’re not stealing anything,” she retorted hotly, feeling her temper rise and enjoying the brief warmth of it. “We’re hitting that city so we can get some loot and glory. If that Aranos guy wants to liberate it, hey, that’s great, so long as he doesn’t get in our way.”
“That’s another thing,” he told her, staring at her calmly, unperturbed as always by her anger. “Why wouldn’t we want to liberate the city, too? Strategically, this city holds the High Roads heading up to the Human Kingdoms; if we free it, Stoneleague can garrison it and we’d hold the whole damn mountain pass all the way back to the city. We could spend the next week clearing out the pass, kicking the ass of every bogez chief and uruk witch doctor all the way back to civilization. We’d get some great Advanced Classes, and we’d probably be as famous as this Aranos guy by the end of it.
“And tactically,” he went on, bowling over her attempt to protest, “if we don’t, we’re gonna be running away from a hostile, heavily defended position, through enemy territory. We won’t be able to stop like this, or we’ll get swarmed. We’re gonna have to run our asses all the way back to Stoneleague and hope we don’t drag a whole damn army back behind us. Worst case, that happens, and we’ll be lucky to just get banished, girl, and not end up in prison.”
“Fine,” she snapped. “We can try to take the damn city. Whatever. But like I was saying, Liam’s grabbing that lizard-thing, and…”
“And why the hell do you care about that?” Hector interrupted curiously. “Or about him, while we’re on it? Dude’s got a ton of those creatures already – why’s he need more?”
“Because they’ll help us in Antas,” she replied, exasperated, although her quiet voice reminded her that she’d had exactly the same thoughts.
“They’ll help him in Antas,” Hector corrected. “Seriously, girl, do you really trust him this much? I mean, it seems to me that he’s building up a decent little army, but that’s not gonna help us in this city. We want to get in and out, smooth as glass and quiet as the wind, and giant spiders and flaming worms aren’t great for that. So, what’s he really want that army for?”
“I…don’t know,” she admitted, looking down at the ground as a spike of anxiety swept through her. “I mean…I guess I do. I’ve heard him talking, when he doesn’t know I’m there – my Stealth has finally hit the Adept level – so I know that all this is for that Aranos guy. He’s got a real hard-on for the guy, Hector. I think he’s gathering all these to take him out, and if he does…we’ll be part of the team that took down a legend!”
Hector stared at her, suddenly stone-faced, before looking away. “Nope,” he shook his head. “I won’t be part of that, Martina. Not gonna happen.” He sighed and looked up at her seriously as she made a noise of protest. “You know Phil’s gonna be in that group, girl. And while you two didn’t see eye-to-eye, that’s not the same as turning on him. I don’t stab my brothers in the back, and Phil never did either of us wrong.”
“He sure as shit did me wrong,” she hissed, her temper flaring again. “Going around, spreading rumors about me so that no one wanted to party up…”
Hector rose silently and stepped up to Martina, staring down at her with a face that had gone icy. She rose, suddenly feeling nervous and trapped, but he moved until his nose was only a few inches from hers. “That’s what you think?” he asked her in a quiet but furious voice. “After all the times that man went to bat for you, all the times he sold your mistakes to Neela and me, you think he went around and trash-talked you? What, just because you kicked him out of the party? Bullshit.”
Martina stood, stock-still. Hector had never spoken so harshly to her before; he always had her back, no matter what. Before she could say a word, though, he shook his head.
“I’m disappointed in you,” he told her flatly. “That man has had your six since day one. He has never once talked shit about you outside the party, even though you damn well deserved it. You wanna know why no one will party with you, sister?
“This,” he stepped back, pointing directly at her face. “This shit right here that you’re pulling. Everything is someone else’s fault. Every mistake is a personal attack on you. Nobody wants to deal with that shit, girl! You need to correct your attitude, and I mean right now.”
Martina stood, frozen, staring at Hector. It’s just what Phil told you, the quiet voice reminded her. It’s all your fault. You’re the screw-
up; not Neela, not Hector, not even Phil. Just you.
“I – I don’t…” she stammered, but Hector wasn’t done yet.
“And now,” he finished, “you’ve got a problem with this Aranos guy. Why the hell would you care about him? He’s been doing good things, girl. He’s been doing the kind of things we should be doing. And they’re the kind of things we could be doing, if you just get your head screwed straight.”
He tossed down his axe and gently took her by the shoulders. “Look, Martina,” he said quietly, his tone gentle once more. “This is our chance to fight the good fight and to be the heroes. if we get the chance, I say we ask this Aranos if we can join up. We’ll all work together, we’ll clear the place out, no problem. We get loot, we get glory, and we get to do the right thing. Win-win, all the way around.”
You know why you can’t do that, the voice mocked her. You don’t make those decisions, do you? “Liam won’t go for it,” she said hesitantly, her anxiety doubling as she realized what she was admitting. “He wouldn’t let us…” So, I guess we know who’s really in charge, huh?
“So, we don’t ask his damn permission,” Hector grinned. “You’re Party Leader, right? No matter what he says, it’s your decision, far as the game is concerned. You ask the man if we can join, and when he says yes, you agree, and boom. Liam wants to object…he’ll be dealing with all of us. Phil, Aranos, Phil’s new party, all at once. I don’t think his army’s that big, and if it is, at least we’ll all be respawning together.”
Martina hesitated, fear fluttering through her belly. “I—I don’t know,” she stammered.
Hector shook his head. “This isn’t like you, girl,” he told her in a concerned voice. “You may not always make the best decisions, but you never hesitate to make them. What’s going on with you?”
“It’s…it’s this place,” she confessed, her shoulders slumping and tears welling in her eyes. “There’s something about it…it’s like my brain is always reminding me of everything I ever did wrong, every screw-up. Everything I do, every choice I make…I just…I don’t think I believe in myself anymore, Hector.” Tears spilled from her eyes as she spoke those words, and Hector enfolded her in a gentle embrace.
“That’s okay, girl,” he told her softly. “I still believe in you. And I’ll make sure you don’t get too lost in your own head. Just…stop listening to Liam. I don’t trust that man.”
Martina settled down, feeling oddly comforted by the man’s embrace. It wasn’t anything romantic – Hector had never looked at her like that, and she’d never thought of him that way, either. It was just…good to know that he had her back, no matter what. Hector believes in me, she told herself. The least I can do is show him that he’s right. Now get your tits up, girl!
She took a deep, shuddering breath and stepped back, smiling a genuine smile for the first time since they’d entered the Blightlands. “Okay,” she breathed, wiping her eyes. “Okay, I can do this. No more creatures for Liam; he’s got plenty, and we need to get moving. We’ll get to Antas, we’ll find this Aranos guy…and we’ll do the right thing, Hector. I promise, we’ll make it right.”
Five hours of meditation, doing nothing but Skill training, identifying new metals, and reading a lot about elven history and culture restored Aranos’ lost Wisdom, to his very great relief. He hadn’t been able to practice replicating any of the metal types, since using High Mastery would have stopped him from regaining his lost Stats, but he’d managed to catalogue a few more types that were closely tied to elemental mana. Rusilver had a red-orange sheen and naturally collected and channeled fire mana; blue-green nemsilver did the same for water mana; translucent, cloudy vilsilver channeled air mana well; heavy, rust-colored ontsilver was connected to earth mana. Each was made from a composite of arcane silver and a specific type of mana crystal, which made them unsuitable for weapons or armor – the crystal impurities in the metal acted as stress points and made the alloys easier to shatter – but they would work well for crafting Enchanted or Runecrafted items.
The next morning had proceeded much like the one before, except that the urukkai patrols they encountered were a lot more torn up than normal and didn’t really present any significant difficulty…or XP, for that matter. The party’s best guess was that forces from Antas might be responsible for the tattered condition of the patrols, but they hadn’t encountered anything unusual except for a swarm of large, red-backed spiders that fired webbing and spit poison at them. That battle had been trickier, at least until Aranos had discovered that the webbing was highly flammable.
They’d left the High Roads before reaching Antas, and Aranos had been excited to enter the forest surrounding the city. Unfortunately, this forest was heavily Corrupted and proved less than suitable for some of his Natural Lore Abilities. He could speak with the plants, but they were all hostile, and their only thoughts involved killing the trespassers in various horrific ways. When he’d tried siphoning some of the forest’s energy to sustain him, the power he’d taken in was so befouled it actually gave him a Corruption Point.
To make matters worse, his Sense Mana Skill located several wards strung throughout the trees. As far as he could tell, the wards acted like beacons; once you crossed one, you’d begin emitting small pulses of magic every few minutes. He had no doubt that there were things in Antas that would easily be able to track them if they’d set those off. One side effect of that, though, was that the Skill leveled up, meaning it was finally considered trained thanks to his aleen heritage:
Skill Boost: Sense Mana (T) has gained a level!
New Rank: Student 1
Student Level Ability: You can sense hostile mana – defined as mana that is part of a Spell or Ability that will adversely affect you in some way – at double the normal range.
His approach to dealing with the wards was simple and straightforward: he'd disjoined any ward they encountered with his Mana Vampire Perk. He assumed that by doing so, he was announcing his presence in a different way, but he was pretty certain that once they entered the borders of Antas, they’d start being hunted right away anyways. While he could have bypassed the wards without removing them, it was time-consuming to do so, and he was eager to meet up with Phil now that they were this close.
The biggest issue was that the wards meant Silma couldn’t range ahead as she usually did. The fenrin was skilled at Stealth, but Aranos was pretty sure that Stealth would lose against magical detection. Silma had chafed at this, and Geltheriel pointed out how much harder it would be for them to find the humans without Silma’s keen senses hunting in a wide circle. Aranos racked his brain for a while before coming up with a solution. It took him some time to Enchant a silver charm that would hang from Silma’s collar, but when he was done, he was satisfied with what he’d come up with:
High Enchanting Success!
You have Enchanted: Charm of Concealment
Type: Amulet
Rarity: Rare
Quality: Fine
Effects: Increases Stealth and Camouflage by 87%. Increases Magic Resistance by 44%.
On activation: Cleanse Aura – This charm can remove all active Spells on the wearer. Disjoining a Spell requires an Opposed Check: Wearer’s [Cha + 65] versus spellcaster’s [Int + Spell Level]. If the Spell to be disjoined is actively maintained, the caster adds their Mana Manipulation Skill to this check.
Charged Item: Cleanse Aura requires 3 charges per use.
Current Charges: 771
The Charm wasn’t the best thing he’d ever done and required him to use a fair amount of void mana, but he’d empowered it with a bit of soul mana to get larger bonuses and to improve the Cleanse Aura power. He instructed Silma in its use and told her to be sure to use the Cleanse Aura every few minutes to be sure she wasn’t being tracked magically. While it wasn’t foolproof, since Silma’s Charisma was her lowest Stat and a powerful caster would win the Opposed Check easily, he doubted a really powerful caster would have spent the time and SP to weave these simple wards. With
his new soul mana, Aranos thought that now he could probably create a ward that would detect living creatures and damage or imprison them while leaving specific ones alone, or at least let him magically ‘tag’ his minions so that they were immune to the wards. Surely, if he could do it, a Wizard powerful enough to resist the Cleanse Aura power could do the same thing; that meant that whoever laid these alarms was probably low on the totem pole. The whole arrangement honestly smacked of grunt work to him.
As they traveled, both Aranos and Silma picked out myriad tracks among the trees, but none of them were human. Plenty of the tracks were humanoid, but all moved strangely and inhumanly. Some had a strange, shuffling gait, while others seemed to gallop about. A massive set of tracks was made by a swarm of creatures that seemed to move on all fours, except that two of those limbs were obviously hands.
What really concerned Aranos, though, was the unmistakable stench of decay that followed each track. Besides the traces of several swarms of flying creatures, every trail either he or Silma spotted was covered in a foul odor of rotting flesh and decomposing meat. Aranos knew what that meant, of course, and he passed the information on to the party.
“Undead,” Rhys spat, shaking his head. “Foul creations of necromancy. That we would encounter such here…”
“Makes a great deal of sense, in truth,” Geltheriel interjected slowly. “Twice have the elves attempted to retake Antas, and both times they have been defeated, with none returning to bear the tales of their loss. Battles with undead would explain such tragedies, as the fallen would rise to attack their former comrades, and any survivors would be hunted without rest.”
