by Jez Cajiao
It barely had time to twitch before it was dead, pinned in place. A small handful of rocks falling from where it had been crouched alerted the group below, and lights were shone upwards in an attempt to see what was going on.
We moved forward slowly and peered down, being careful to remain as hidden as possible, until I felt… something… tingle. I froze as Oracle spun to me.
“Mage!” she hissed, and I frantically waved people back from the hole as a voice rose from below.
“It’s the goddamn Legion!” someone swore, then a low laughter echoed up to us, followed by chanting.
“Fuck; get back!” I ordered the group, scrambling away from the corner as a grey-green cloud started to coalesce and float upwards, filling the room steadily.
We scurried out as fast as we could, while the voice continued to chant and occasionally laugh from below.
We backed up the corridor a dozen feet or so before deciding we were safe, but the fog settled in place and filled the entire small room, making me wonder about its effects. I’d smelled something as we’d backed away from it; something familiar, like rotten eggs… I paused, considering the smell and the way that the cloud was hanging around, before grinning evilly.
“Well, what do we have to lose…?” I mumbled to myself, taking a deep breath and starting to form the magic. I poured mana into my recently evolved Fireball spell, dual casting it and planting my feet before looking back at the people surrounding me.
“Might want to run…” I called, the strain of holding the spell clear in my voice.
“Fuck!” Lydia grunted. “Everyone get back! That’s an order, Legionnaire!” she barked when Grizz moved as though to stay close to me. He glared at her, then nodded once and backed away as she did.
“Maybe see if you can come up with a shield…” I whispered gleefully to Oracle, who frantically started trying to build the spell, reading too late the knowledge in my mind, even as I released it.
The spell had begun to buck wildly in my hands, the stability of my old, tamed Firebolt spell being vastly different to the wildness of the Fireball, and as it flew forward, leaving my hands with a high-pitched whine, I felt Oracle frantically pulling sections of different spells apart and slamming them together, desperately trying to build a shield spell on the fly.
For the first time in our shared history, she wasn’t fast enough.
The Fireball slammed into the poisonous cloud, and the smell I’d recognized earlier was confirmed as accurate. Sulphur.
Somehow, a part of the poison cloud involved sulfur. I had no idea why, or how, but the rest of the compounds acted like a miniaturized, compressed fuel air-bomb.
The first explosion was brief, a burst of flames that washed heat over us, shoving us backwards across the floor. Then, as the air itself ignited, a vacuum formed in the center of the cloud, condensing directly over the group whose foolish mage had been laughing and congratulating himself over the spell he’d cast.
I missed most of the rest of it, having thrown myself over Oracle and pulling my shield atop us, but the enormous explosion that followed, accompanied by the roar of falling steel, the clatter of rock, and the other terrible sounds that rose from the pit that had opened up near us were enough for me to know I’d fucked up. Badly.
The floor under us tilted, slowly at first, then with increasing speed, and the surrounding walls started to slide as well. We fell into the gaping hole, clattering and tumbling into darkness. My DarkVision was unable to compensate after the explosion had wiped it out. And we screamed.
All of us did. We screamed, we shouted… there was a lot of cursing, mostly directed at me… and there were horrific moans from the survivors of the party that had attacked us with the poison cloud.
We all fell for several seconds, and I felt rocks and soil falling down from higher up and hitting me. Solid sections of the walls and floor continued shifting, and then I smacked into something solid. The world exploded in stars, making me cry out as my right knee bent in a direction it wasn’t supposed to. More debris rained down atop me, and I grunted in fear as I realized I could be buried by it.
I frantically reached out, my hands scrabbling around as I tried to push myself forward faster, I grasped rocks and loose soil, and they skidded away under my hands. Suddenly, I felt something solid, larger than the rest, that stayed in place, and I grabbed it, feeling raised sections that I wrapped my fingers around.
I pulled, dragging myself out of the debris, and searched around frantically, seeing nothing at first, until Oracle flew down from above.
She’d fallen free of me and had turned mostly incorporeal, I learned later. Then as soon as she’d gotten her bearings, she’d come looking for me. The rest of the party had thankfully been far enough back that, aside from ringing ears and Jian’s new moustache being singed, everyone was okay. They hurried across to the closest point and looked down into the cavern I’d exposed, staring down at me.
I gaped up at Oracle, feeling my racing heart start to slow as I verified that she was okay. A sound from my right made me look over, and I saw the soil shift before a larger, very pissed off looking Naga dug itself out.
It saw me and hissed, its fanged mouth opening wide enough that it could swallow my head, before tearing the last few feet of its body up and out of the debris.
It screeched at me, coiled its tail beneath itself, and leapt. I froze for a second, my instinctual fear of snakes combining with my recent fall to leave me momentarily distracted enough that the Naga was in the air before I could think of what to do.
It hit me, staggering me backwards, and I felt the long prehensile tail wrap around my waist and back, beginning to squeeze as the onyx-tipped nails latched onto my armor. Hissing again, it lunged forward for my face, trying to bite me.
I panicked further, remaining frozen until its mouth clattered across my helm and a single fang slipped inside.
It barely grazed my skin, tearing a shallow cut down the side of my nose, but it was enough.
My rage roared to life, the flames of it burning through the confusion and fear as I yanked my head backwards. The Naga drew back as if to bite again, and in that moment, I attacked.
I grabbed both its arms and yanked it forward into a headbutt, the Highsteel helm smashing into its unarmored face with the crunch of breaking bone, wasting no time, I hauled back and struck again.
By the third hit, the Naga was frantically yanking at my hands, trying to tear itself free and burbling as blood ran down its ruined face. My blood was up, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to let that happen. As soon as its tail unwound from around me, I let go with one hand, hauled back and punched it, stunning it and leaving it hanging by the wrist I still gripped.
“Motherfucker!” I snarled, lifting my other hand up under the lower edge of my helm to touch my face and bringing it away bloody. I looked at my fingers, then glanced up as I heard a scrabbling sound from my left.
I hadn’t fallen a single floor, I saw now, but actually two, meaning I had found a way to the outer edge of the main habitation level, my mind helpfully informed me. Judging from the writhing mass that was heading across the floor towards me, we’d found an entire nest of Naga.
I drew in a deep breath and felt a grin stretching my cheeks, suddenly feeling more like myself than I had in days. I stepped forward, reaching down and grabbing the stunned Naga by the tail, and dropping the wrist.
It stirred and hissed at me before I started to swing it. Then it started to scream.
I spun it round and round by the tail, slowly letting out a little bit to get it to a comfortable length; then, before the rest of my people could get down, I stepped forward, swinging my new ‘Naga-club’.
“Who’s your Daddy!” I roared, spinning the unfortunate reptilian into another that had just leapt for me. I had a split second to enjoy the view as it clearly realized it’d made a tactical mistake; then its cousin slammed into it, and, with a sound like coconuts bouncing off each other, they went their separate w
ays. My improvised club swung around to hit another Naga and sent it flying into the nearest wall.
The next leapt at me as well and met my left fist coming the other way. Its face folded around the metal-clad limb, causing it to drop to the floor and leave a fang embedded in my gauntlet.
I grimaced and shook it free, stamping down hard on its windpipe and ensuring the cartilage crunched underfoot as I moved on.
“Come on, then!” I shouted, yanking my dagger free and gripping it in my left hand while continuing to lay about me with my ‘club’.
They seemed to come from everywhere, first two, then five, then a dozen, and more, swarming out of a series of holes in one wall, hissing and screaming their hatred.
“We’re comin’!” I heard Lydia shout from somewhere above; then Oracle was there, screaming and lighting up the sunken room with a series of lightning strobes. The bolts slammed out over and over again, taking the creatures down in droves.
I spun, bringing my Naga club down hard on another that I’d sensed as much as seen struggling up through a hole in the floor, feeling both my club and my target’s bones breaking; then another was on me. It had dropped from the ceiling, and I hadn’t even realized in my furious attack that I’d moved forward under another section of steel until it landed on my shoulders, wrapping its arms around my neck and upper right arm, trying frantically to pull my helm aside so it could get at my throat.
I yanked my head back as claws scrabbled across the front of my helmet, catching on the eye slits and digging in, leaving a trio of scratches down my right cheek to join the other one. I twisted and stabbed out, feeling my dagger slice across skin and sink below the bottom ribs. Grunting, I yanked downwards, tearing a good-sized section of its guts out to rain down over my right shoulder onto the floor.
It screamed, and I dropped my broken ‘club’ to reach up and grip its head in my right hand. Tearing it free, I slammed it down onto the floor on its back before me.
I stepped forward, reaching over my shoulder and yanking at one of my swords, finding, as always, that it was a bastard to draw from my back, as the last few inches caught, but with an extra tug, it was free, and I grinned at the gathering Naga, their reinforcements slithering up from somewhere deeper in the darkness.
Then my people were there. Bane, appearing to the left, carved a bloody path through four of them, screams of shock and pain filling the air until he vanished again. Lydia and Grizz took up station on either side of me, and Jian danced through the area behind, making sure that stragglers and the wounded didn’t become an issue.
Then the ranged fighters came into play; they’d clambered down far enough, in Stephanos, Miren and Arrin’s case, to be able to see the fight and were firing arrows and Magic Missiles into the horde, even as Yen and Tang stepped forward, their bows put aside in favor of their swords.
Suddenly, no longer outnumbered, the battle went from fast and furious into a rout. Arrows slammed into the Naga as they turned, trying to flee, and Oracle spun to face me, clearly furious and looking terrible.
I couldn’t see the fight anymore as the others stepped up and took over, my vision overwhelmed by her haggard and enraged expression as she glared at me. Her hair stuck up in all angles, and her clothes‒no, her entire form‒just looked wrong, like it had been put together by someone who’d heard roughly what a fairy should look like, but hadn’t ever seen one, or anything else that should fly.
“O... Oracle?” I stammered, fear in my mind as I desperately tried to understand what had happened to her.
“You… you… arrrgh!” she snarled, throwing her hands up in the air and buzzing in a fast circle as she started to swear, calling me all sorts of names. My companion started with ‘ass-fucking-monkey-ball-licker’ and went downhill from there, getting more and more inventive, until the sounds of fighting entirely ended, and Grizz and Tang started repeating some of the insults in impressed tones.
“What’s wrong… ” I asked soothingly, trying to break her stream.
“… son of a sheep-screwing donkey! You…” she went on, undeterred, as I held up my hands, frantically trying to calm her down. Lightning crackled across her tiny form and between her fingers.
“Oracle!” Lydia snapped loudly, and Oracle spun to face her, glaring her fury at being interrupted. “Tell ‘im what he did wrong, then snap out of it! Yer can kick his ass later, when we’re no’ underground surrounded by monsters!” she snarled, then went back to watching outwards, as the distant sound of snarls and fighting could be heard.
“Fuck!” Oracle cursed, then spun back to me, zipping in close and leveling a finger at my face close enough to scratch my nose. “Remember what a broken spell does, Jax?” she asked me in a low, furious whisper. “Remember what that felt like, in your meaty, muscle-filled brain?” I nodded slowly, eyes widening with every syllable. “Well, now imagine what having the same thing feels like, when you’re a fucking magical creature that doesn’t have meat to absorb it! It hurts a lot more, you asshole! Add to that, I was having to build that goddamn spell on the fly!”
“Shit.” I winced, remembering the spell backlash I’d felt before. I shook my head slowly. “Sorry, Oracle…” I started to apologize, but she cut me off with a sickly-sweet tone as she moved in awfully close to my face and lifted one hand, claws suddenly forming and glinting in the meagre light of the magelights around us.
“Oh no, Jax, you’re not sorry, not yet. But the next time we’re alone? When you’re all hot and ready for me, I’m going to remind you of this, and then I’ll make you sorry…” She tapped her hard-as-steel talons on my helm, her voice ending with a hiss before she turned and zipped away to land on Lydia’s shoulder, where I could her growling and complaining.
“Oh, shit…” I whispered, shaking my head and squeezing my eyes shut. Now that I was relaxed slightly, I could indeed feel the pain that radiated out from her, and I totally understood why she was pissed.
“I’d be staying clear of her for a while…” Tang said quietly, stepping up alongside me as Yen moved over to stand next to Lydia and Oracle.
“Can you hear her?” I asked, and he nodded, flicking a finger toward his helmet, in reference to his elven ears.
“Believe me, you don’t want to hear what the girls are suggesting… I don’t want to hear it, and it’s not me that’s pissed them off.”
“How bad is it?” I asked him uncomfortably, and he shook his head.
“You don’t want to know, and I mean that. You really don’t want to know.” He winced.
“Dammit.” I groaned, before speaking up so that they all could hear me. “Everyone, I’m sorry; that was my bad. I smelled the sulfur and thought it would just burn off; I truly didn’t realize it would be that powerful.” I shook my head, trying to ignore the glares I was getting from the three girls, even as Miren dropped down from the level above into Jian’s arms, pecked him on the cheek, smiled, and then moved over to join them.
Arrin, always the graceful one, fell and landed in the mulch with a splat.
Stephanos jumped down, and he and Jian pulled Arrin up, helping him to strip some of the foul, stinking mess off his armor.
“It sounds like we’ve got more incoming, so we need to find somewhere more defensible, and soon. First, though, we need to find my goddamn naginata and the bodies of those assholes, verify who we killed, and that they’ve not got anything on them that we need,” I said firmly, lifting my right hand and igniting a fireball for light, then holding it over my head.
Grizz was on the outer edge of the light, searching through the corpses that were revealed, and he grunted as he straightened up, calling back to us.
“These are adolescents,” he said, and I felt my gut clench at the fear I’d just killed kids. “Their nest must be nearby. Looks like all ‘Fiends’, so get ready for more swarms.”
“Swarms?” I asked, and Tang spat on the floor.
“Fiends are the lowest caste of Naga; they’re barely sentient, and no matter the age, they’ll
attack anything and try to eat it. The only thing that can control a swarm of Fiends is a Packmaster, so either we’ll be facing one of those soon, or these are just wild, in which case we might get a swarm or two, and then it’s over.”
“So…?” I prompted, still not fully understanding, and Grizz started kicking through the corpses.
“So if we’re really lucky, there’s just one nest of these anklebiters; if we’re not, there could be a lot more… and this is in the sea, so get ready for that.” The Legionnaire grimaced. “I hate Naga…” He grumbled, kicking another corpse out of the way.
I moved back towards the area where I’d first fallen, and while Tang, Bane, and Yen watched outwards, the rest of us started digging.
There was over thirty meters of debris, but thankfully, most of it was large bits, so once we’d moved those aside, it was relatively quick to uncover the bodies.
My naginata was intact, which was a huge relief as I hefted it, and I resolved to take greater care of it as I slid the sword back into its place on my back. I also found my shield, surprisingly undamaged, and decided to slide it into my Bag of Holding, as it was too cumbersome to continue carrying in these conditions.
The human bodies were fairly blackened and crushed, making any real identification difficult, but as they’d attacked us first, and they clearly weren’t Legion, we stripped them of valuables and roughly-made bags, then moved on.
We’d gained a few dozen coins, mostly copper and silver, with a pair of jeweled daggers that Yen asked to keep, several low-grade rings, and three mana potions. I gave two to Arrin and kept one myself.
Beyond that, the gear was cheap and uninteresting, mainly weak and shoddy armor, occasional basic iron daggers and the like, so we ignored them and we were about to move on, when Bane pointed out a small satchel in the corner under a pile of mud.
His Worldsense made it easier for him to identify things, especially in the dark, than it was for the rest of us, and as Yen opened the bag, she smiled grimly, passing it over to me.
