by G. R. Cooper
Seated on a large throne, just to the left of the stairway, was the dark, winged man, watching over his domain. Wulfgar gently closed the door, raising a finger to his lips to ensure Nop’s silence, then moved to the door on the left side of the room.
Wulfgar repeated his reconnaissance, and discovered that this door led to the same room. This side was similarly appointed, and he saw that the stair-case was matched by a twin on the left side of the throne.
He shut the door and stepped back.
Looking to Nop, he whispered, “There is absolutely no way that we can get through this room without being in Stealth. None. It’s impossible. And there must be ten of those things, whatever they are, in that room. One male, the rest female.”
He stood strait and looked down at the Canis Arcturus, “Are you ready? We should activate Stealth, then make our way through the left side of the room, making sure that we stay as far away from anyone as possible, then head up the staircase. We have to get through and upstairs before your timers runs out. We have a minute and ten seconds for you, so we should have plenty of time as long as we hurry.”
Nop nodded.
“OK,” continued Wulfgar, “let me go first. I’ll open the door and move into the room, and if I haven’t come back in twenty seconds, you follow and close the door as quietly as possible.”
He turned and reopened the door, activating Stealth as he did.
Taking a deep breath, Wulfgar moved into the room and began walking down the left-hand wall. The pillows and their occupants were mostly clustered around the center of the room, in front of the throne, so he was able to make good time to the foot of the staircase.
He glanced to the creature on the throne and saw that it didn’t seem to be disturbed, so Wulfgar slowly let out his breath as he climbed the stairs, circling around to the far left side of the ascent. He reached the top, where the two staircases met, and looked back down into the room, slowly drawing in a new breath.
The smell of the place hit him; similar to the smell of the nymphs the previous night. He grabbed onto the railing overlooking the throne room and tried to calm himself. He saw down over the winged man to the harem spread before it. His jaw dropped as he saw that on the far wall - in between where the two doors of the store-room had been - was an elf. Chained into a standing position, as nude as the rest of the room’s occupants.
The prince.
Wulfgar grimaced as he noticed the store-room door close. He looked over the rest of the room, trying to see if anyone had noticed the closing door. On the far left, on the opposite side from where he had entered, several of the women rose and began moving to the center of the room. Wulfgar froze and put his hand to Shepherd’s Bite, ready to leap over the balcony rail and take the fight into the room if necessary.
The women moved not to the side of the room that Nop was currently stealthing through, but to the far end. To the left of the elf prince another figure hung, chained from another marble pillar.
They surrounded the man and began running their hands over him. Wulfgar could see the effect they had from his vantage - and being nude, there was no way for the captive to cover his rising erection. The women began to fight each other, pushing their rivals away from the human. One got in front of the man and bent over, taking him into herself from behind. The man shuddered and flashed red, losing hit points.
The woman fell away and to the floor, squirming in ecstasy as another moved into her place. The next one dropped to her knees took the man in her mouth. With shocking rapidity, the man shuddered and flashed again, and one of the others pushed the kneeling woman to the side; she fell, wiping her chin and rolling her eyes in lust.
The third woman took the man in both hands, freeing him from the chains. He dropped to the floor and she rolled him onto his back and mounted him, riding him roughly as one of her sisters straddled his face and writhed just as fervently. The man flashed red several times, then stopped moving. The women crawled away, sated for now, and a child moved out of the shadows and began dragging the corpse out of the throne room.
The smells that hit Wulfgar even from the distance of the balcony were disabling. He knew that there was no way that he’d be able to overcome the concerted attack by the women.
Succubi, thought Wulfgar. That makes the leader an incubus. He frowned. Demons. Ten or eleven demons. He knew his entire party could not survive a fight with these creatures, and there was no way that an unhidden party could move their way through this room without being captured and killed. None at all. He was relieved - at least he’d made the right decision in preventing the rest of the group from entering this place. If he couldn’t Stealth, a player would be trapped here. Forever.
Wulfgar turned, and made his way through the tapestry that hung over the exit; he moved to one side of the opening to disturb the elaborately stitched wall hanging as little as possible.
The other side was a dimly lit hallway, about ten meters long, with a door at the end and two on either side, each about halfway down. He moved through, letting the tapestry fall gently back into place and made for the door on the right. After listening for a moment, he lifted the latch and peeked through. The space was dark, and the low light from the hallway barely revealed a small closet, lined with shelves.
He felt more than heard Nop reach him - and marveled at how silently the werewolf seemed to be able to move - then stepped through into the alcove. As he shut the door behind him, the room pitched into darkness. Wulfgar removed his cape and pushed it against the door where it met the floor, completely cutting all light from the outside. Then he activated his Illumination spell.
Nop grinned up at him as the light flooded the small room.
“How are we going to get the prince out of there?” asked the little werewolf.
“Good fucking question,” replied Wulfgar. He thought for a moment, “I think we should probably stick with our plan and see what we can learn about this entire place before we try to come up with a rescue plan.”
The Canis Arcturus nodded.
“And you’ll need to wait here until my Confer spell cool-down is complete. I’ll check out the other two doors as soon as my Stealth cool-down is done.” He frowned, “I’m not too happy to be trapped here, but I doubt those creatures,” he pointed downward in the direction of the throne room, “come in here very often.” He looked around the shelves; they were lined with what looked like cleaning supplies - brooms, mops, buckets and the like.
“When I leave,” Wulfgar continued, “you’ll be in complete darkness. Is that OK?”
The werewolf just smiled and held up his two front paws, extending his claws.
Wulfgar nodded, grinning.
The pair sat, facing each other on opposite sides of the closet. Wulfgar checked his Confer cool-down. He still had a half an hour or so. Five minutes on Stealth. He sighed and leaned back against the shelving. He took the opportunity to reread the description of Confer.
Grants the spell-caster the ability to confer temporary non-magic skill to another player. The skill level granted is half of the current level of the spell-caster’s modified skill level. Duration is one (1) minute per Confer level or the natural duration limit for the skill at the conferred level, whichever is lower. Mana cost is one (1) per level of skill conferred, and skill level transferred is capped at half user level or mana pool, whichever is lower. Restricted to Evening. Cool-down 1 hour.
He wondered what the chance was that he would fail at casting the spell. And whether that would initiate a cool-down period. When he had taken his professional quest to join the Magic User’s Guild, he had failed his first attempt at Fire Shot, and that had been his only failure so far. But Fire Shot had no cool-down period, so he couldn’t tell if the wait would be triggered on failure. He assumed so, but hoped not to have to find out - at least not in this place.
He read the description for the Sorcery skill.
This profession skill gives access to specific spells. The player’s Sorcery level adds to the spell
level in some cases, as well as helping to determine amount of mana. Spells success depends upon relative relationship between Sorcery level and spell level. If Sorcery Level < Spell Level Then Success % = RND - Spell Level + Sorcery Level.
It all modified the percentage chance of success. Wulfgar began to calculate.
If he was activating a spell that was equal to his Sorcery level, then it would be 100 - 4 +4. So if his Sorcery and spell level were equal, they would cancel each other out. There was no chance for failure.
His Confer level was ten. His Sorcery level was four. That meant he had a six percent chance for failure.
That’s it? That hardly seems like a lot.
He thought about it for a moment. The difference between level four and level ten didn’t make much of a difference. As the levels increased, however, it really would matter. If he read, for example, a scroll for a spell at level one hundred, then the calculation would be wildly different.
100 - 100 +4
He would have a four percent chance of succeeding. Failure was almost assured. If he was at level fifty and tried a level one hundred spell, it would be a coin toss whether or not he would succeed. If he tried to activate a spell that was more than one hundred levels above his Sorcery, he would have zero chance to succeed.
That made more sense. A few levels difference wouldn’t really increase his failure rate a great deal, but a huge difference would almost guarantee failure. He supposed that was logical - if players continued to come into this world over time, then the earlier arrivals would be much more skilled than the new characters. Since the method for transferring spell knowledge was through scrolls, and since players could create those scrolls, it could conceivably be used to create extremely powerful new players if this factor wasn’t in place.
Wulfgar nodded. He was relieved to have the assurance that there was a ninety-four percent chance he would succeed in granting Confer.
The seconds of his Stealth cool-down dwindled toward zero, and Wulfgar stood and moved to the door, picking up and donning his Cowl of the Wolf as he reached it. He smiled over his shoulder toward Nop.
“Be back soon.”
Wulfgar stepped across the small hallway. He wasn’t in Stealth, yet; he wanted to save that. Just in case. He listened at the door, the twin of the one he’d just exited. He could hear nothing. Looking quickly first to the left and then the right to make sure he was alone, he slowly pressed down on the latch, then pushed the door in. A startled gasp came from the room.
He was just about to activate Stealth and get back into the closet, when he saw the same little girl from earlier. Wulfgar smiled as broadly as he could and raised a finger to his lips. She nodded again, but looked within the room. Wulfgar opened the door further and stuck his head in. Several blankets were spread around the floor. On each was a sleeping child. Four of them.
He looked to the fifth child and whispered, “Is there anyone else in here?”
She shook her head, and he moved through the doorway, gently closing and latching it behind himself.
“Are there any others of you here in this place?”
She nodded, looked around and whispered, “One.”
“Are they in the throne room now?”
He grimaced at her nod, then smiled down at her.
“I’m going to get you out of here. All of you. Alright?”
“You have accepted the quest Children’s Crusade!”
She looked even more frightened.
“I won’t let anything happen to you. I promise.” He smiled outwardly but worried about his ability to keep that promise. He knelt in front of her, “I’m going to go away for a while now, but I’ll be back. I need to find the way out. Do you know it?”
The little girl shook her head, “We are only allowed in here and downstairs. We don’t go through the other door at the end of the hall.”
That was what he’d been afraid of - they had no information to give them about the rest of the lair.
“Where are you from?” he asked.
She just shook her head, “We’ve all been here as long as we can remember.”
The NPCs had no back-story. They were just props. Just slaves. They were nothing to anyone. Except Wulfgar.
“On my oath, I will get you all out of here.”
“You have promised to complete this quest. You will lose reputation if you fail.”
He stood, glad that she seemed assured by his oath. He knew that adding the vow greatly complicated the problems he would have for failing.
But I don’t plan on fucking failing, he growled inwardly. As far as he knew, these six children were all orphans. Wulfgar was an orphan. I’m going to stay in this fucking place as long as I have to. I’m going to get these kids out if I have to kill every fucking thing in this little hell-hole.
“Tell the others. Be prepared. I’ll be back.”
Wulfgar turned and left the little room, closing the door and turning toward the end of the hallway and the mystery behind the door.
Wulfgar approached the end of the hallway, moving on the tips of his toes. He just had a feeling, he didn’t know why or where it came from, that whatever was on the other side of this door was going to be unpleasant. A deepening dread filled him as he approached it. He began to feel an increasing nauseousness as he touched the door handle. Before the latch released, he was almost overcome with a rising panic; a sense of horror he hadn’t felt outside of nightmares.
He activated Stealth before pushing the door open.
Taking a deep breath, he leaned lightly on the door, getting his face as close to the opening as possible. He wanted to be able to see as much as he could before opening the portal more than a crack. A smell of horror assaulted Wulfgar. His head recoiled involuntarily before he could control himself.
Steeling his nerves, he pushed his head forward again and looked into the room. It was as large as the throne room below, and similar in that it had marbled floors and pillars, and candelabra and oil lanterns. But there were no pillows. Splashes of blood played across the floor from the center of the room. Darkened stains spoke of layers of gore laid down over time. Centuries from the look of it.
Some of the blood showed darkly, glittering in liquid freshness in the firelight.
In the middle of the room was a rectangular plinth. A low platform that might have been marble as well, but was so covered in fetid ichor, both dried and viscous, that its original composition was impossible to tell. On each corner of the bed was attached a short chain and each of those chains led to the arms or legs of what was left of a woman.
Her midsection was erupted outward, as though something had eaten its way out.
That something still stood in the gaping hole, pulling her viscera into its fanged maw. The woman’s face looked toward Wulfgar, her lifeless mien frozen in a mixture of horror and agony. He was filled with a righteous anger, and he pulled Shepherd’s Bite and pushed his way through the door and into the room.
Approaching the tiny creature, he took a good look at it for the first time. It was half a meter tall, but with long, wide wings sprouting from its back. The demonic face narrowed to a pointed chin and the eyes, upthrust toward the ears, narrowed into a hellish glare as it seemed to sense something from the doorway. It paused in its matricidal feast and bared fangs, growling at the open door.
Wulfgar moved to the other side and advanced on the creature. His nausea increased as he realized that newborn or not, this creature was well above his level of combat. It crouched and hissed, and Wulfgar thrust his blade with all of his strength, aiming for the area just in the middle of the wings.
“13 points of damage!”
“18 points of damage, Hidden Stab!”
“Your target is stunned!”
Wulfgar smiled in exultation, and stepped back. Raising his left hand, he launched a Fire Shot.
“1 point of damage!”
“Target resisted!”
“Dammit!” Wulfgar hissed as he stepped forward. He stabb
ed again, as quickly as he could to take advantage of the temporarily immobile imp.
“11 points of damage!”
“You have poisoned your target!”
“Your target is no longer stunned!”
The creature hissed and turned, leaping backward and taking to the air as its wings unfolded and flapped once. It smiled, its fangs dripping gore, as it moved through the air away from Wulfgar, its wings blowing a horrific stench over him as it flapped away.
Wulfgar’s jaw dropped as the demon’s hit points rose. The poison seemed to be healing it. It raised both hands toward Wulfgar before backing into an open passageway on the far end of the room.
Thunder cracked and Wulfgar was blinded for a moment as he was enveloped in a large bolt of lightning.
“The Baen Si’s Cloak protects you!”
The demon disappeared into the darkness of the hallway as Wulfgar fell to the ground from the force of the blast, but didn’t take any damage. His cloak had resisted the demon’s spell. Once per day, it had a twenty-five percent chance of completely negating one magical attack. Wulfgar was going to be fine - as long as the demon was gone for more than a day and Wulfgar could find a weapon that didn’t have a fifty-fifty chance of providing it with a healing dose of poison.
“Hurry. It will be back soon,” said a voice from behind Wulfgar. Startled, he turned on his ass and looked. Chained to the wall, near the door he’d come through, was a creature much like the one he’d just fought. It was larger, almost as big as an elf, and it was bound with hands high to the wall.
Whoever he is, he’s right. I need to hurry.
Wulfgar stood and made for the door he’d come through, rushing to get Nop to help with whatever little hell beast was in the further hallway. The chained creature saw where Wulfgar was heading and snapped its taloned fingers. The door, still only partly opened, closed swiftly. Wulfgar reached it two steps later and tried to pull the latch. It wouldn’t move. No amount of strength Wulfgar used could budge it.
