by JK Galioto
Quest Offered: “Befriending an Enemy 2.” Successfully befriend three additional enemies, moving them from hostile or lower to friendly. Reward: Increased reputation with those creatures. 600 experience. Accept? Yes or No.
Jack quickly accepted the quest, seeing no downside to it.
Getting to his feet, he returned the lute to his backpack. He glanced at Dobby, unsure of what to do with him. He decided it would be best if Dobby stayed at the camp; most days he could barely take care of himself, and he surely didn’t have enough levels in the responsibility skill to take care of another sentient being. Also, Dobby’s stealth, or lack thereof, would be a liability. He faced Dobby, placed his hand on the goblin’s chest, and pointed to the small campfire. “Dobby, stay.” Motioning to his own chest and then indicating the direction of the cavern he said, “Jack, go.” He repeated this a few more times, unsure if the goblin understood, but eventually Dobby squatted down on the skins, looking uncertain.
Jack pulled out two more steaks and set them on the warm rocks, along with the rest of his travel rations and one of the poor-quality daggers. Dobby’s eyes darted toward the meat and then back at Jack, his foot thumping the ground. In a blink, he snatched a steak and began furiously chomping away at it. Jack sighed. He hated treating Dobby like a pet, but the language barrier left him with no other option. He departed the camp, walking back toward the cavern, and wondered if Dobby would still be there when he returned.
In a scene that was becoming all too familiar, he once again found himself standing adjacent to the cavern entrance. He waited motionless for a few minutes, doing his best to tune out the ambient noise and focus his heightened sense of hearing on the cave innards, listening for any sign of breathing, scuffling, or any other noise. Not hearing anything, he made his way inside, the sun highlighting his form behind him. His luck held; the cave was unchanged from the day before. Jack made his way toward the secret door, which he had shut on his way out. He chuckled to himself, imagining a large S scribed into the entrance as he came upon it, and for just a moment he swore he could actually see it.
As the rock door swung open, Jack shifted into Darkvision. He moved silently forward, leveraging his enhanced stealth skill to step as quietly as he could, though his enhanced hearing made every scrape on the ground by his boots or slight creak in his leather armor into a loud crescendo. He used his newly improved hearing to focus on smoothing out his steps while moving in armor, aiming to improve his ability to walk quietly.
Continuing down the tunnel, he reached the room where he’d found Dobby and was relieved that the room had remained undisturbed. Jack assumed the dead goblins were sentries and wasn’t sure how long it would take for their friends to check in or replace them. He searched the immediate area and found no secret doors or additional loot and debated which of the two exit tunnels he should choose when he remembered his lodestone. Pulling it out of his bag, he dangled the string and was met with an immediate response as the stone shot toward the tunnel on the right. “Right it is,” he whispered to himself. Slipping the lodestone back in the bag, he lightly padded his way down the right tunnel. He continued to use his keen hearing to improve his stealth skill, so when he heard a soft click as his foot stepped on a portion of the tunnel floor, he was caught completely unaware.
“Booby trap!” he screamed, channeling his best Goonies’ Data voice as a blade emerged from the wall, slicing through his leg just below the knee, nearly severing it. His cry turned from surprise to pain as he fell, his injured leg unable to support his weight. He had been so focused on his listening that he completely missed the crude trap before him. His health was at thirteen of twenty-nine and a bleeding icon flashed ominously in the corner of his screen. Opening it up, he read the notification.
Your left leg has received a severing blow, causing a major bleed effect. You will lose 10 hit points every 10 seconds.
Crap on a cracker! At this rate he would be dead in twenty seconds! Hurriedly grabbing the healing potion out of his backpack, he uncorked it and poured it over his wounded leg, watching the healing magic knit together the flesh and the bleed icon mercifully disappear.
Sighing, he leaned back, breathing heavily as sweat dripped from his face, his hands trembling. It was then that he heard the slight scuffling of feet ahead, and he quickly realized the sound was getting louder. For a moment, he had a deer in headlights look as he stared ahead, waiting for whatever came next. Shaking himself out of the daze, he glanced around for a place to hide, but there was nothing to hide behind in the small, smooth walls of the narrow tunnel. Then inspiration hit him.
* * *
Gringaczeliosk and his companion Liranezenaoud soon came upon the body of the humanoid that had set off their trap, enthusiastic cries erupting from them.
“I told you this would work,” grunted Gring, pride showing on his scarred, pockmarked face. Gring had lost a hand in a fight with a mountain lion a few years back, and since then was treated poorly by his goblin brethren, who gave him the worst jobs like patrolling the upper tunnels. But Gring was intelligent for his kind and worked to offset his handicap by improving the way he and Liran patrolled, setting traps to catch the unwary. Looking down at the dead humanoid before him covered in blood, he couldn’t help but feel that his hard work had finally paid off. Wait until the guys back at camp hear about this! Maybe my wife will stop sleeping with my brother and take me back? Or maybe I could even get the voluptuous Marcindeliond?
Liran had never actually seen one of Gring’s traps work before and didn’t hide his surprise. After prodding the creature harshly with his spear to make sure it was truly dead, he turned to look at Gring and gave him a congratulatory pat on his shoulder, happy that something had finally gone right in the miserable goblin’s life. Then all hell broke loose. The formerly lifeless figure on the ground sprang up, a shortsword taking off Gring’s remaining hand while a dagger planted itself firmly between Liran’s thighs, permanently severing little Liran from the rest of his body. Liran immediately jumped back, falling to the ground as his legs gave way and using his free hand to try and staunch the blood flowing from between his legs. Meanwhile, Gring brought both of his handless stumps up before his eyes in disbelief and outrage.
“C’mon man!” Gring cried, cursing Bargrivyek, the goblin deity, for allowing this to happen to him again. He died moments later, his last thought of the beautiful Marcindeliond and what could have been.
* * *
Jack stood up slowly and wiped his weapons on the nearest goblin’s tunic, removing most of the blood and gore. He went over to where the other goblin lay, unconscious and bleeding out. That little bugger had poked him with its spear hard enough to draw blood! It had taken all of Jack’s willpower to not move or make a noise, but the ruse worked. Say what you will about me, but at least I’m smarter than the average goblin, hey Boo-Boo! He was glad that his friends weren’t around yet, because he could only imagine the ribbing he would receive if they knew his primary tactic was targeting the gonads. He wondered if the system would create a perk for that, like Junk Jabber or Crotch Crusher, before he refocused.
He rifled through the now-dead goblins for any loot, only finding a poor-quality spear, a standard-quality dagger, a few more copper pieces, and copious amounts of dark green blood. They weren’t wearing anything resembling armor; their threadbare clothes barely covered their bodies. Putting the usable items into his adventurer’s backpack, he continued moving down the passageway, hoping the quick battle had gone unnoticed.
After about a minute of creeping forward, this time looking for traps as he walked, he turned around a ninety-degree bend as the hallway opened into a giant circular room bigger than his entire house back home. The ceiling soared above him, at least a hundred feet high, and it was covered with stalactites that sparkled in the dim light provided by moss that lined the cavern walls and gave off a faint green glow. Jack heard a small stream babbling over rocks on the left side of the giant cavern. The air, which had been dry and
stale to this point, seemed fresher and more humid, though whether that was from the moss or water, he wasn’t sure. Continuing to glance around the room, he saw a large portcullis on the far side, opposite of him, and a field of small- and medium-sized boulders littering the right side. The cavern was spectacular, but that’s not what caught his attention.
In the center of the room was a statue of a kneeling woman, one hand touching the ground and the other holding a medallion. A look of fear and surprise was perfectly sculpted on her face. He stared at the statue, transfixed by how lifelike it was, and wondered if there was a touch of magic involved in its creation. He also noticed that the stone woman looked to be wearing a thin necklace with a large pearl at its center. Although the pearl was currently covered with stone, Jack felt in the very center of his being that his search had ended.
Listening intently, he didn’t hear anything besides the slight noise made by the flowing water and began slinking toward the statue in the center of the room. To get to it, he had to cover sixty to seventy feet with nothing to hide behind. Fortunately, he reached the statue without incident, though he arrived with a bundle of nerves, and sweat dripped off him in the damp, humid air.
The room appeared empty, but something didn’t feel right. Jack may have been a low-level Rogue and a complete novice at fighting, but he was a veteran game player. He’d never played an adventure where the prize at the end was left unguarded. No, in his experience, if something looked unprotected, it just meant there was a trap or other nasty surprise headed your way. The last time he’d experienced this feeling, he found a drunk Lee Boden skulking behind his car in a nearly empty tavern parking lot after a gig at All Aboard. Lee had come to “set things right” over a misunderstanding with Marcy, his girlfriend, and Jack. Well, less of a misunderstanding and more of a Lee’s girlfriend was a skank and didn’t mention she was with Lee. He set those thoughts aside; he was probably just being paranoid.
Getting a closer look at the statue, he noticed for the first time how beautiful the woman was. She looked human, except for slightly elongated ears, with almond-shaped eyes, a small, narrow nose, and full lips. She wore a robe that flowed to her ankles, a belt cinching it tight across her narrow waist. The medallion she held formed the shape of the sun, a large circle with rays radiating out from every angle. Jack was again drawn to the pearl that lay at the end of a chain between the woman’s bountiful bosom.
He slowly reached his hand out and touched the pearl, feeling a slight vibration of magic radiate through the stone covering. Pulling out a poor-quality dagger, not happy about what this would do to its durability, he chipped away at the stone, making unavoidable clinks and clanks as his dagger worked to free the pearl from its rocky prison. Unlike the rest of the statue, which appeared to be solid, the stone covering the pearl seemed to be thinner and flakier. He wondered if the power of the pearl, seeking release, was softening the stone.
Jack nearly had the pearl free when his danger sense flashed urgently in his mind. Not again!
Chapter 15
He really hoped his skill was wrong as he stopped his work on the pearl and lowered himself behind the statue. Becoming as quiet as death, he held his breath, waiting for whatever had tripped his danger sense to reveal itself. That’s when his acute hearing detected a slight scuffling sound coming from the field of boulders on the right side of the cavern. He peeked around the statue and glimpsed the side profile of an eight-legged reptile the size of a large dog, with a grey scaly hide and a forked pink tongue darting in and out of its jagged, toothy mouth. He quickly cast Analyze before hiding behind the statue again.
Name: Daryl. Race: Basilisk. Level: 4. Hit Points: 45/45. Spell Points: 0.
Daryl? Basilisk? Wait, didn’t Harry Potter kill a basilisk at the end of one of the Harry Potter movies? Jack wracked his brain, trying desperately to remember the movie he had seen years ago and the book he had read long before that. He thought their basilisk was more snakelike than an eight-legged reptile, but if he remembered correctly, looking directly at a basilisk could turn you to stone, or maybe even kill you. For some reason, mythology on Earth and reality on Rigara shared a heavy correlation, and as Jack leaned up against the very realistic statue, a few more pieces of the puzzle began locking together in his mind.
He remained behind cover, weighing his options. He needed to get the pearl from the statue, but on the other hand, he needed to not die or get turned to stone. I mean, just because I rock, doesn’t mean I’m made of stone. Jack chuckled to himself. Not the time, Jack! Not the time! Focus!
He could attempt to sneak out and try and find another pearl, but time was of the essence. Maybe, if he remained quiet, it would get bored and go back to sleep? Jack silently pulled his shortsword from his sheath and waited, concentrating intently on his enhanced hearing. Unfortunately, the eight-legged shuffling grew louder and louder as the beast moved closer to his location. Where is my luck when I need it? Closing his eyes, Jack prepared to leap out at the beast, hoping his seemingly preternatural hearing would give him a chance to strike something, but he felt a little like Scrappy Doo attacking a much larger Old Man Withers. Better to go out backstabbing than go out hiding; at least, that was what Grandpa liked to say. Well, something like that anyway.
When Jack heard the creature’s breathing and smelled its rancid breath, he decided it was time and readied himself for a suicide leap. That’s when he heard a high-pitched scream and the patter of tiny goblin feet coming from the tunnel leading back to the surface. Sneaking a glance, he saw Dobby running at full speed toward the basilisk, a dagger raised high in his fist, clearly intent on stabbing the creature that dared threaten his new friend. It was a glorious sight.
The goblin made it about fifteen feet into the room and thirty feet away from the creature before meeting its gaze, which turned from regarding the statue to regarding Dobby. Dobby stopped running midstride, his body turning from grey-green flesh to grey stone in an instant.
Jack wasn’t sure how Dobby had found him, but he wouldn’t let his new friend’s sacrifice be in vain. Moving behind the basilisk, he leapt in for a sneak attack, using Dual Attack, his fine-quality shortsword finding purchase under a scale near the creature’s neck and puncturing deep into its body, while his dagger slid harmlessly off, only drawing a dull line across the basilisk’s hard, grey scales. Jack could see blood leaking from the creature’s neck as it began turning around, forcing Jack to close his eyes. He tried to use his hearing to guide him, rolling backward when he heard the whoosh of an impending claw strike and putting his acrobatics skill to good use, but he dodged just a little too slowly. The claw sliced through his weak armor and gashed his stomach. If he’d laid off the carbs, there was a chance that strike would have missed him. Jack stood up from his roll and said a silent prayer to Dr. Atkins as he listened to the creature’s shuffling gait move toward him.
Jack’s main advantage was the creature’s lack of speed; if he could dart in for a strike and then disengage, he might be able to avoid the creature’s strikes altogether. Eyes closed; he waited until he thought the creature had moved close enough for a strike, then lashed out with both weapons. He missed completely with his dagger, but his shortsword punctured what he hoped was the head. With Jack off-balance from overextending on his missed dagger attack, the creature scored a strike along Jack’s right pectoral muscle—okay, his man boob—causing Jack to grunt in pain. Where was a bro-ssiere when you needed one? He darted back in full sprint mode, trying to stay out of melee reach of the basilisk. He glanced at his health and saw he was nearly down to half after the quick exchange. Oh, joy. I’m definitely going to die.
He pulled up his combat log to see how much damage he had done to the creature with his first two attacks.
You hit Daryl with your shortsword for 21 damage. Base damage 7 (5-9) +2 agility bonus, times backstab multiplier of 3, minus defense of 6. Your attack has caused a bleed effect. Daryl will take 5 points of damage every 10 seconds for 30 seconds.
> You hit Daryl with your shortsword for 2 damage. Base damage 6 (5-9) +2 agility bonus, minus defense of 6.
Doing some quick math, barring any regenerative capabilities that the basilisk may have, the creature should have twenty-two health remaining, and would receive fifteen points of bleed damage over the next thirty seconds. Jack had to hope it did not have regenerative capabilities, so he said a quick prayer to the RPG gods, because he would be meeting them soon if he was wrong. He needed to do another seven points of damage to the beast and let the bleed effect do the rest, although with the heavy scale armor it would be difficult to land the hits. The most he could do without a critical attack was five points of damage, which meant at least two successful attacks to bring the beastie down, all while never looking it in the eyes. Jack decided to keep moving and stay away from the lumbering creature until the bleed damage had run its course. He was faster than Daryl and turned away from him, opening his eyes to assist with his run.
After playing the high-stakes game of Marco Polo for what Jack hoped was at least thirty seconds but felt closer to a minute, he decided on one last gamble. He kept moving away from the creature, keeping it about ten feet behind him. The creature bellowed something between a bark and a roar as it chased Jack, clearly agitated from this game of cat and mouse. Jack feigned a stumble, slowing his pace enough for the creature to catch him. As it moved forward to finish him off, Jack pirouetted quickly around and thrust his dagger and shortsword out in front of him with all his meager strength, eyes still closed. The ruse worked, and this time it was his shortsword that slid uselessly off the creature’s right shoulder while his dagger plunged deep into the creature’s mouth.
Glancing at his combat notification, he noted that his dagger had done critical damage to a mouth that had no defense, easily claiming the last health from Daryl. Cracking open his eyes, he peeked and confirmed that Daryl was indeed dead. As he fell to the ground, exhausted, Jack hoped there wasn’t another brother Daryl still around to seek vengeance.
