Shadow Sun Expansion

by Dave Willmarth

  Congratulations, Earl Allistor! May you rule long and wisely!

  Shaking his head, he returned his attention to the ladies working on Sam. The man still looked green. Despite knowing that it might annoy Amanda, Allistor cast a heal on his friend. Nobody seemed to notice. Meg, Nancy, and Amanda were deep into a discussion on what to do. Allistor took a knee next to them.

  “We need to get Sam out of here. I’ll stay with him for a minute, you ladies go loot the boss. We can’t pass up a chance at another epic spell or something. Then a few of us can work on transporting him while the rest harvest what they can from the corpse.”

  Meg looked like she was about to argue, but the other two each took an arm and guided her to her feet. Nancy rubbed her back. “It’ll just take a few seconds, Meg. Come on.”

  Allistor put his hand on Sam’s chest as the three walked away. The man’s heart was thumping in his chest like he’d just sprinted a quarter mile. “How you feelin’ bud?”

  Sam groaned, his eyes closed and his face covered in sweat. “Been better, boy. But I ain’t dyin’ to no oversized bug. No sir.” Sam had to grit his teeth and push out the last few words as another wave of pain hit him.

  There was a commotion over near the corpse, and Allistor looked over to see Nancy motioning wildly with her hands, pointing at people and obviously giving orders. Folks began moving quickly, producing items Nancy demanded and following her as she raced back to Sam.

  “Allistor! Did you check your loot from this thing?”

  He shook his head. “Nope. Was a little busy. Why?”

  “Its venom sac is missing. From its tail, I mean. I just looked for it. If we can find it, I can use my Alchemy skills to maybe create an antivenom. I have everyone checking their loot, but you actually got the kill. My guess is you have it.”

  Feeling bad for letting Sam suffer because he skipped the notifications, Allistor quickly opened both his inventory and the loot notifications. Immediately, he saw a green blob that looked very much like a venom sac. The description confirmed it.

  “Yup! Got it right here.” He pulled it out and handed it to Nancy, who was already removing crafting equipment from her own ring. He was about to close his inventory when a pair of words in the notifications caught his attention.

  Venom Cure.

  “Well, shit.” He really felt low as he read the whole notification.

  You have received: Vial of Scairp Venom Cure x 10

  Pulling one of the vials out, he coughed once, then said, “Ummm…Nancy?”

  “Not now, Allistor!” she snapped at him. Amanda, who had escorted Meg back at a slightly slower pace behind Nancy, saw what Allistor was holding.

  “Nancy! Look up.” Amanda said in her best doctor voice.

  Nancy, her attention caught by the strange command, looked up at Allistor. Her eyes focused on the vial filled with purplish liquid, and she read the description. She immediately grabbed it and poured half into Sam’s mouth. The other half she sprinkled onto her hand a few drops at a time and rubbed it into the cuts on his head and neck.

  Sam immediately began to look better. His skin tone returned to normal after only a minute or so. Nancy cast a final heal on him, and his health bar stayed full. Meg helped him sit up, scooting up behind him so he could lean on her. There was cheering from the rest of the group, and smiles all around.

  “Thank you, boy. Though, next time maybe check your loot a little sooner? Every minute of that shit sucked.”

  Allister felt ashamed. “I’m so sorry, Sam. I didn’t mean to-”

  “I know, kid.” Sam held up a hand and interrupted him. “I was just messin’ with ya. You did good, killing that thing. Just proves we were right to put our faith in you back at the start.”

  Meg gave him a dirty look, but didn’t speak. Which for her was huge. Allistor chose to believe it meant she forgave him.

  They took some time to harvest the massive bug’s corpse, taking every usable bit of it, including the meat. Fuzzy helped himself to his share, though Allistor heard Dawn scolding the bear cub about just sitting around doing nothing during the fight. Fuzzy didn’t look the least bit contrite, and simply stepped forward to confiscate a recently butchered scairp steak.

  Upon further examination, Allistor found he’d also been awarded the stinger as part of his loot, along with two thousand klax, a stack of emperor scairp chitin, another stack of meat, and a scroll that didn’t glow any color at all.

  Reassured that Sam was okay, he took a minute to look at his stats. He’d leveled twice since he last assigned points, so he added two points to Constitution, bringing it up to ten, then added one point each to Intelligence and Will Power, now both at eleven. His new title of Earl showed up alongside his Giant Killer designation. He hadn’t looked at his stats since picking up the Seal or Lilly’s new armor, and was surprised to see just how many boosts he had from his gear. Especially his Will Power, which was a natural eleven, but with boosts shot up to a whopping eighteen.

  Designation: Earl Allistor, Giant Killer

  Level: 15

  Experience: 17,000/520,000

  Planet of Origin: UCP 382

  Health: 6,500/6,500

  Class: Battlemage

  Attribute Pts Available: 1

  Mana: 4,400

  Intelligence: 11 (13)

  Strength: 5 (7)

  Charisma: 6 (8)

  Adaptability: 6

  Stamina: 5 (7)

  Luck: 3 (4)

  Constitution: 10 (13)

  Agility: 3

  Health Regen: 400/m

  Will Power: 11 (18)

  Dexterity: 3

  Mana Regen: 130/m

  Chapter 13

  Payback

  It was nearly suppertime when the dungeon group piled into the two newer elevators, which were operable now that Allistor had turned the power on. Nigel’s presence was immediately helpful as he opened the steel gates to let the party through.

  Back on the main floor, there were hoots and whistles from the volunteers who’d been guarding the building. After a quick conversation with the squad leaders, Bjurstrom reported that three different scouts had been spotted moving around nearby, checking out the building. One had actually stepped out to the center of a side street and waved at Allistor’s troops. The other two had seemed content to observe for a while, then fade away. All three had been outside the perimeter when the wall went up.

  With Nigel’s sensors already up and working, Allistor led the entire group, minus four sentries who volunteered to walk the wall, back to the capitol building. Sam began working with the other cooks to prepare a simple dinner while Meg experimented a bit with the emperor scairp meat. By the time Sam had prepared burgers for everyone, she had created a thick broth by boiling a small amount of the meat with some spices and ingredients only she knew. Using a turkey baster, she dripped a few drops of the broth on each burger.

  Allistor was first to dig in. He found that Meg’s addition gave the meat a slightly tangy flavor that he quite enjoyed. And the usual buff of +2 to Stamina the burgers usually gave became +2 Stamina and +2 Health Regen, with the buff now lasting five hours.

  He complimented Meg and Sam on the meal the minute they finished up in the kitchen and joined him at his table. “Great job guys, and this is an awesome buff!” The others around the table all mumbled agreement with their mouths full.

  When the meal was complete, Allistor was told that some of his people who’d stayed behind had buried their lost comrades in a small glade near the teleport hub. The others had seen to the needs of the freed prisoners. All of them now followed Allistor outside, where he stood near the graves and spoke their names one at a time. When he finished the list, he said, “These six brave souls gave their lives for us today. They knew the danger, and went into battle for the sake of all of us. We shall remember their sacrifice, and honor them always. In the coming days, should any of you have doubts about our purpose, about your commitment to reclaiming what is ours, come here to th
is quiet place, and remember them.”

  After a quiet service where a few others stepped forward to speak about their friends, they all retired back to the dining hall, where Sam broke out the alcohol and they held a good old-fashioned Irish wake.

  *****

  Allistor spent the next week putting the Bastion in order. First thing after breakfast in the morning, he assigned Amanda all the rights and privileges necessary to make modifications to the place. He gathered all the fighters from the dungeon together for their loot rolls. It turned out that he, Helen, Amanda, and Nancy were still the only ones with high enough attributes to use the Storm spell scroll. The ladies declined the spell, with Helen saying he could make the best use of it, having a tendency to stick his nose into things. The others chuckled, then applauded when he accepted the scroll. After making a short side trip he, Helen, and Fuzzy escorted Lars, Chris, and Logan back to their Stronghold while she organized sleeping quarters, meeting rooms, crafting shops, a motor pool, and the dozens of other details that needed to be settled quickly.

  Not needing to be stealthy at all, the trip back to Lars’ people went quickly. Once there, Lars called them all together to discuss joining Allistor formally versus entering into an alliance. Initially more than half his people were in favor of remaining independent allies with trade agreements and a mutual protection pact. But as Logan, then Chris, and finally Lars spoke about what they’d seen and heard from Allistor and his people over the two days since they met, their people’s opinion of Allistor rose. It didn’t hurt that both his Charisma and Luck attributes had gone up since he’d left.

  By the early afternoon, and after some occasionally heated debate, Lars’ entire population had sworn the oath and officially become Allistor’s people. They’d been reassured that they didn’t need to leave their homes at the Stronghold, and were welcome at the Bastion if they chose. But the final straw was when Allistor produced and stacked a dozen gold bars in the center of the courtyard. Lars had grinned at his people. “This is our cut, the gold Allistor has awarded us for helping him kill Paul – which we would have done for free – and clear the dungeon. Four gold bars for each of us. That’s a hundred pounds of gold each, which right now is worth just under two million klax.” He paused for a second, then added, “Each. As in, two million for Chris, two million for Logan, and two million for lil ol’ me. Not bad for a couple days’ work, eh?” His grin was infectious, and when he took a knee, so did the others.

  They returned to the Bastion, where Allistor made good his promise to those prisoners who wanted to return to their own Strongholds. As it turned out, there was at least one from each of the Strongholds Lars knew about in Denver. Allistor sent foragers out looking for mass transit, and they returned with a Department of Corrections bus that had been parked behind the courthouse. Seventeen of the eighty-five chose to leave the Bastion, and in no time at all they were all loaded onto the bus along with Allistor, Helen, Fuzzy, Amanda, Lars, and Logan.

  One by one they approached the other Strongholds, honking the bus horn briefly to announce their presence, and asking to speak with the local leader as they released the prisoner or prisoners back to their homes. All but one of the Stronghold leaders greeted them politely, and agreed to a later sit-down to discuss an alliance.

  The one that was less than friendly was a man named Matthew, whose family had been taken by Paul. He’d lost a wife and daughter, and only gotten the daughter back. She explained to her father that, “Mom died just a few days after they took us.” But the old man wasn’t listening. Allistor and his group left that Stronghold more quickly than expected, and without any hope that an alliance would include those people.

  As they drove away, Allistor was already entertaining thoughts as to how they’d deal with the old man and his people, should they become hostile. It was dark by the time the crew returned to the Bastion, and they all settled down to a good meal followed by a relaxing night’s sleep.

  *****

  For the next several months, Allistor stayed close to his people and his properties. They spent time securing themselves and their futures. Structures were modified to fit their needs, fields were planted, livestock rounded up and distributed.

  Allistor went foraging with his crews from time to time, mostly gathering supplies needed for his various crafters. Any valuables, items, or edible food were considered bonuses. When fall turned into winter, the foraging parties went out less and less often, and the hunting parties increased. Only the hardiest and most experienced went hunting, though. Winter in the Rockies was no joke.

  They were helped considerably when a thousand-strong herd of buffalo wandered into Cheyenne, cleverly using the abandoned buildings for cover from the biting cold wind and munching on the likewise protected and overgrown lawns, gardens, and parks that hadn’t been buried in snow. In order not to scare the easy meat out of town with gunshots, Allistor and a few of the others would cast Restraint on two or three of the males, then someone would bang some pots together and shout, driving the others a short distance away. Still others would run in and slit the massive animals’ throats while they were stunned. This job was normally assigned to the lowest level people in the group, to gain them what little experience the kills gave. Then the animals would be looted and butchered. Their hides made great leather gear for their people, or warm bed covers, once they’d been cleaned and treated. The humans also learned, mostly by accident, that if they were grouped in a party, each kill gave more loot. Instead of a single stack of maybe twenty pieces of buffalo meat an individual would loot from a kill, each member of a party would get ten to twelve pieces, as well as horns, hoofs, hide, et cetera. Then, they could manually harvest more from the corpse after it was looted. So, a group of six in a hunting party could take away three to four times as much meat from each animal than an individual. And the experience gain for the group members wasn’t that much of a consideration, as buffalo generally didn’t kill other creatures for food, thus remaining low level creatures.

  Allistor or Helen accompanied every group, making sure they only took a few big males, so that the herd could continue to grow. There were plenty of cattle still roaming the fields and forests to supplement their people’s diet, and no shortage of edible monsters to kill. Helen had unsurprisingly chosen Ranger as her class. Similar to some of the old stories and games, the class was more about being a steward of the lands than a fighter or scout. Though it certainly included those abilities. She got bonuses to her accuracy with every kind of ranged weapon, enhanced tracking skills, and boosts to her Animal Husbandry skill gains. In effect, the Ranger class mirrored her job description as a park ranger. It just made her the most badass park ranger ever.

  Ramon and his people worked like madmen in the library, some reading through books, researching specific topics for crafters, or searching for useful spells. Others copied out hundreds of scrolls containing the various spells Allistor wanted all his people to have. Everyone learned at least the basics – Light, Restore, Flame Shot. He was determined that none of his people would go out into the world without at least those minimum preparations. Ramon had learned a few very interesting things from his reading as well. For example, they now knew that the aliens responsible for kidnapping Earth were an ancient race that had done the same to countless other worlds.

  Those with an interest in fighting, clearing dungeons, or combat for various reasons along with the cowboys, hunters, and anyone else who regularly spent time outside the walls, were given more offensive magic if they had the stats for it. Restraint, Erupt, and Mind Spike were given to those special few who could use them. Many altered their builds as they leveled up, in order to obtain the magic.

  And maybe most importantly, there were new weapons.

  Allistor had given careful consideration to the two options given him as a reward for constructing the Bastion. After a little quick research on the open market, he determined that the ship with faster-than-light capabilities that could take him quickly to other worlds
and other stars was the better option. But it wasn’t an easy choice. His people needed tech right away – and the tech available was pretty amazing. There were actual plasma weapons that burned holes through all but the strongest substances, and equipment that could regenerate lost organs or limbs – which normal healing wouldn’t do, no matter how thick the nanites gathered. There were machines straight out of science fiction that could convert matter from one form to another. Scrap metal could be fed into it to be broken down and used to make tools or nails and screws. The production options were limited, of course. One could not use it to turn lead into gold. But it was great for producing everyday items for his people.

  On the flip side, he could have used his reward to get all the tech, and simply purchased the ship with his billions at the end of the year. But Allistor wasn’t one to gamble with such an important aspect of his people’s future. There might not be a ship available to purchase at the end of the year. His gold could be stolen, or the market price could bottom out if they weren’t careful to limit the supply. Better to use smaller amounts of gold now to get the tech they needed and be one hundred percent sure there would be a ship for them on what they had taken to referring to as ‘Invasion Day’.

  Allistor also made at least one trip per week to one of the local Strongholds, or invited their leaders to the Bastion, to try and build relationships and establish alliances. It was slow going. The leaders of each Stronghold were, by nature, independent, and not thrilled about possibly losing their people and thus their power. And they didn’t know Allistor like Lars did, not having fought alongside him.

  The accounts of the freed prisoners did lend him some credibility, which he attempted to boost by bringing gifts of food, or small alien weapons, skill scrolls, or even bags of gold coins depending on what each Stronghold needed most. The coins had the added benefit of being a hard, tradable currency that different folks could use to purchase things from each other. Paper money was a thing of the past, and credit was rarely offered.