Village of Noobtown: A LitRPG Adventure (Mayor of Noobtown Book 2)

by Ryan Rimmel

  “That’s quite a bit deeper than I had hoped,” continued the demon, looking down. The creek petered out along the canyon wall. Had it been water below, I might have tried to jump. Instead, the very distant rocks in the canyon bed glinted up. Even from this distance, they looked very sharp.

  “Must be at least 30 logs,” stated Badgelor.

  “Logs are measurements?” I asked.

  “Yeah,” replied the badger. “Three feet to a log.”

  “That’s a yard,” I replied.

  “Yards are much larger than that,” stated Shart, shaking his head.

  “Maybe Earth yards are really small?” stated Badgelor, shrugging.

  “It is a silly place,” replied the demon, sagely.

  “I hate you both. How much longer is this canyon?” I asked, already dreading the answer. I could see quite a ways with my enhanced vision, and the canyon seemed to go on forever.

  “About two days,” replied Shart. “It could be a bit shorter, if we run the whole way. Perhaps, because we are being chased by something or someone. The forest ends on the other side of the canyon.”

  I glanced at my map and realized he was right. I also realized something else. If we got to the other side of the canyon, we could make it back to the Western Fortress in less than a day.

  “That settles it,” I stated. I started heading towards the bridge.

  Chapter 38: Bashara

  I snuck towards the bridgehead. I was dearly hoping that, with my earlier speed, we had gotten far enough ahead of the other bandits to make crossing possible. Moving silently through the brush was something that a Woodsman were easily capable of. I quickly got to the side of the road but was stopped short by something unexpected.

  “Those are Narwal guards,” I whispered.

  “Well, they’re showing up on my scans as bandits,” stated Shart.

  “Are they showing up as bandits or showing up as humans? Do I show up as a bandit?” I asked the demon.

  He paused for a long moment. “They may not be bandits.”

  “We could just walk through really fast, pay the toll, and head back to the fortress,” I said. Even as I said it, though, something felt wrong. The guards shouldn’t have been here with all those bandits about.

  Then again, the refugees were getting killed quite a bit deeper in the forest. These guards probably didn’t even know that attacks were taking place. That made quite a bit more sense than I thought it should. I tried to think about other possibilities, but nothing came to mind.

  They were obviously guards and nothing more than that. I could trust them!

  Stepping out from behind my cover, I started walking towards the Narwal guards. They were all watching the forest, a wise precaution, and one gestured for me to come closer. I activated Lore on him.

  Bashara: ???? Level 7

  HP: 90/90

  Stamina: 30/30

  Mana: 120/120

  Skill: Guarding Novice

  Skill: Guarding Novice

  Skill: Guarding Novice

  That was odd. Lore didn’t usually screw up the class like that. Still, the fact that he was a guard was obvious. Bashara looked just like you’d expect a guard to. He was tall and broad shouldered, with a no nonsense expression on his bearded face.

  “Who goes there?” he stated, in a deep baritone.

  “I am Jim,” I said.

  “Well, that’s different,” stated Bashara, eyes opening slightly. “What are you doing here?”

  “I was going through the forest,” I began, truthfully, because one should always be truthful to guards, “But, then, I ran into some bandits.”

  “Hmm,” nodded Bashara, “I’ve heard there might be a few bandits in the forest.” One of the other guards smiled.

  “Yes, they are from the Puma gang,” I stated.

  “Those bandits are particularly tough and clever,” smiled Bashara. “You’re actually the first person to get this far through them from Narwal.”

  “I don’t think they are that tough. I killed six of them going through the forest,” I replied. Bashara’s eyes widened. The two guards that had been walking around me stepped back a pace.

  “Six bandits,” stated Bashara, his voice going funny. It sounded like he was suddenly speaking in a much higher pitch. The now slightly feminine voice was totally at odds with his manly appearance. I used Lore again.

  Bashara: Wizard Level 7

  HP: 90/90

  Stamina: 30/30

  Mana: 120/120

  Skill: Illusions Initiate

  Skill: Guarding Novice

  Skill: Other Guarding Stuff Novice

  Gender: Female

  “Crap,” I said. That didn’t add up at all. He was a she, and she wasn’t a guard.

  “Indeed,” replied Bashara, as the illusion exploded off her. She raised her hands, while speaking a word of power. With no further warning, two bands of energy sprung out at me, wrapping me at the shoulders and knees. Electricity coursed through my body, causing my limbs to spasm.

  You are under the effects of the spell Lightning Lasso. You are suffering 4 Damage per second. You are shocked and entangled. Spell is being maintained.

  “Get the maul,” she called to her lackeys, brushing a strand of bright red hair off her face. The largest guard went off to fetch the weapon. With the illusion gone, I saw that she was a much shorter woman, with a scar running down one cheek. She was wearing the traditional casting cloth armor, a sort of hybrid between a robe and a noblewoman’s dress. She’d have been pretty, if not for the sneer. It made her look positively wicked and ugly.

  “When he gets good and cooked, smash his skull in with the maul,” she ordered. “There is no sense in taking risks.”

  Glancing at the maul, I saw that it was a clumsy looking weapon. The shaft was thick wood, and, if I wasn’t mistaken, the hammer portion was actually a chiseled rock. It wouldn’t conduct electricity. They would be free to bash my skull in until it splintered open and allowed my brain to ooze all over the ground. Why they had it was anyone’s guess. She did look like a sadistic kind of gal, though.

  “Do something,” groaned Shart, through gritted teeth. He was still on my shoulder, stuck there via a method that I tried not to consider. He was also getting electrocuted. I briefly considered using him as a helmet, but I couldn’t get my shoulder to move toward my head.

  Focusing on her, I saw that Bashara’s Mana was being depleted by her working of magic. Not enough to cause her any immediate concern, but enough that she couldn’t keep this up forever. That was probably why she was going to have them hammer me to death.

  I reached out for the spell thread that let me activate my Counterspell skill. I had failed on the Tanglefoot Bag, but this was far more obviously a spell. Even though the spell was actively on me, it took me several seconds to find it. When I did, the thread was harder to grab than I would have thought possible. It was only my experience, from wrestling with Shart, that allowed me to get a good grip and begin working my own Mana into it.

  Countering this ‘maintained’ spell was more difficult than anything I’d done previously. I’d used a similar process on the Weird Sisters before, and it wasn’t nearly this hard. I could still feel the flow of her magic down the thread, as I tried the simple tactic of throwing my own magic back at her.

  Her eyes went wide. “Kill him now! He’s breaking free!” she shrieked. She suddenly cut off her own flow of magic to the spell. This caused the two magical rings to start sparking everywhere, burning me even worse, as they started to dissipate.

  Two of the guards - no, bandits - were still leery of the task. Electrical sparks were liberally spraying from me. One stepped slightly closer, only to take a shock down his arm. He involuntarily dropped his sword, as the illusion on him peeled away. He was now, very noticeably, just another bandit.

  None of this stopped the massive bandit with the maul. His illusion had collapsed when he’d grabbed the weapon, perhaps because guards didn’t use large wooden maul
s. Stepping forward purposefully, he took aim. The bands around me both popped in unison. I was still convulsing as he positioned the maul, preparing to bring it down on my skull. He wasn’t expecting the badger that abruptly landed on his back.

  Badgelor had crept away from me, transformed into War mode, and proceeded to attack. The maul went flying, as the man tried desperately to get the enraged badger off his back.

  That left two bandits next to me. The one, still in his guard image, slashed at me with his sword. I jerkily dodged the strike, fumbling my own sword out of its sheath. My body was still twitching badly form the shock. He tried to press his attack, but, even in my damaged condition, I was able to fend him off for the moment.

  Then his companion joined him, and both started pressing me, slashing in a combination of up and down attacks. I was forced backwards, where I promptly stumbled over Shart. He was unable to remain on my shoulder in the commotion that followed the breaking of the electric spell. Now, he lay in a puddle of his own drool, directly in front of the bandits. I ever so helpfully kicked him out of their pathway. The demon went flying, and I was fairly certain that he landed in a bush.

  Bashara was picking herself up off the ground. I noticed a trail of blood running from her left nostril, as she began reaching into her pack.

  I parried, and executed a Hack and Slash, striking both men with a powerful blow. They simultaneously began falling back. Finally, the shocked condition left me. The three of us started the serious business of cutting each other to ribbons.

  One bandit sliced me across the arm, as I thrust back at him. I managed to carve a chunk out of his armor. The other rushed in to shoulder check me, but I dodged backward, before executing a Thrust into his companion. The man, already wounded from my earlier strike, collapsed to the ground, clutching the wound. I turned to face the remaining bandit, only to be stopped in my tracks.

  “Clear,” cried Bashara. I had barely enough time to turn and look at her. She performed two odd gestures with her hands, before flicking her fingers at me. Lighting coursed off them, flashing at me in one thick stream. I dropped the blade in my left hand and generated a barrier, just as the lighting was about to strike me.

  The spell blasted around me in all directions. Whatever part of the stream was supposed to hit me got absorbed into the barrier. Whatever was left fired off at a random direction. It quickly became apparent that the lightning was less effective on the barrier than it should have been, because she ended the spell.

  Meanwhile, I decided that the other bandit’s name must be ‘random direction’, as nearly all the lightning had been redirected to him. He was currently on the ground, twitching.

  “A Mage?” she pondered, quizzically.

  I grinned, grabbing my own magical staff from my side. Pointing it at her, I cheekily yelled, “Taste my staff!”

  Throwing Mana into the staff, I formed a large blue icicle at the end. Her eyes went from wide to wider, as I released it. The crystal rocketed towards her at an impossible rate of speed, only to be casually deflected by her own bluish barrier.

  “I like ‘em bigger than that,” she said. Again, she gestured with both hands, before whispering a word of power. A much larger icicle formed between her palms and started spinning. I raised my left hand and reformed my barrier. She smiled.

  I hate it when women smile like that.

  Enhanced Icicle: Water (cold) spell. Damage 36-64, High Velocity, Enhanced Cold, Barrier Penetration. Complex Spell. Verbal Casting can be quieted at double Mana cost. Cost 18-32 mana.

  “You need to move,” groaned Shart. He had stumbled out of his bush, wiping slobber from his face. Moving wasn’t really possible, though. I was too far from her to attack, and my weapon was lying uselessly on the ground. I concentrated on my barrier, making it stronger.

  Her icicle spun faster for a moment, and then, seemed to shatter. The smooth, unsharpened bits of it flew away, leaving only one huge, incredibly sharp icicle. She released it with a flick of her finger. It hurtled toward me like a missile.

  Where the lightning had more or less bounced off my barrier, the icicle struck it and started spinning. My barrier held for a moment, and I even considered that I might be alright. After all, the spell had struck it and stopped. Then, I realized the horrible truth. Part of the spell was propelling the icicle forward, twisting it like an auger through the barrier. Until that energy dissipated, it was going to keep advancing.

  My barrier started to crack, small lines running down it, at first. Those tiny fissures soon expanded into a spiderweb of cracks. For a moment, I considered throwing a dagger at Bashara. As my concentration lapsed for that brief moment, the barrier began wavering. The tip of the icicle broke through.

  I tried desperately to reinforce the barrier, somehow. Alas, now that it had been penetrated, it seemed all hope was lost. The barrier was just outside my fingertips on my left hand. The icicle was now between my fingers, and the cold radiating off it was painful. My Iron Will perk was supposed to reduce pain to a manageable level. Either it didn’t work on magic, or this spell was incredibly painful.

  I wondered how long this had taken, before realizing that the entire process was occurring in mere moments. Ordinal tended to be fast and loose with time progression in even mundane things. In this case, I was operating at matrix level time dilation. Visually, it was cool; mentally, it was the worst kind of horror movie.

  Oh great, it's like another slow motion accident.

  By the time the icicle starting drilling through my glove, I’d come to terms with the fact that it wasn’t going to stop. My hand was directly in front of my face. It not stopping was going to be problematic. I had 310 hit points, less now due to Damage. I’d recently discovered that significant damage to one’s extremities or face caused injuries well outside the proportions of hit point Damage.

  My hand started to freeze, as the icicle pierced it. The barrier was glowing green, now. I realized that I was in danger of losing the hand. I jerked my head out of the way, when, suddenly, time speed back up. The icicle, its magic finally expended, flashed out of existence. My left hand was completely frozen. It was a solid blue color, and I couldn’t move any of my fingers. Severe frostbite causes people to lose fingers. I can’t lose any more fingers!

  “Impressive,” Bashara stated. “Your turn.”

  Seriously. “Shart,” I thought pleadingly, switching to menu time, “Why do I get a turn?”

  “What do you mean?” replied the demon. He appeared in my vision, still stumbling but remaining mostly upright.

  “Why doesn’t she just cast another spell at me? I’m kind of screwed right now. She could just take me out.”

  “I keep forgetting you don’t know any real spells,” stated Shart. “She just cast two powerful spells in a row. Each time you cast a spell, the casting cost increases significantly. Most casters take turns, where one casts and the other blocks. Then, they switch. It cuts down on casting costs.”

  “You mean that I could just stand here, and she wouldn’t cast anything?” I asked.

  “For a bit,” stated Shart. “She has a debuff on her, for the casting. It does expire, though, and she can cast again without blowing through as much Mana. More than likely, she is also thinking that since both your hands are ruined, you probably can’t actually cast anything.”

  “Oh, so she’s just being a bitch,” I stated, restoring normal time. She grinned at me and flipped me off.

  “Basically.” the demon yelled.

  Well, that I could handle. I had the most powerful magic, and the need to use it. Lifting my right hand, I summoned forth my Mana, converted it into magic, and spoke my own word of power. Much to her surprise, I could still cast with my right hand, despite its missing digits.

  “You aren’t really going to do this, are you?” Shart asked. He was making his way over to me with only the barest hint of floundering.

  “Hoopie!”

  The spell pierced her barrier, turning the now useless boundary a bri
ght blue. Her expression was a mix of terror and amazement as the spell bypassed her defenses and impacted her. Her ass exploded in an echoing cacophony of flatulence.

  It was literally the loudest fart I’d ever heard. As someone whose mother-in-law used to regularly drive people from the room with her anal symphonies, I considered myself an expert. I highly suspected Bashara was the kind of lady who didn’t fart in public; she must have been saving that one up all day. She blinked several times, as she checked her status log. It was time to execute the second part of my plan.

  Grabbing Shart, amidst his squawking protests, I yelled my battlecry. “Poke-Shart, Go!” Then, I flung the invisible demon straight at her head. Shart only weighed thirty pounds or so; I was more than strong enough to fling him at a pretty good clip. His cry of “you bastard” slowly faded the further he flew.

  I had hoped that being hit in the face would knock her off balance. That would have given me a moment to pick up my sword and close. Actually, I hoped it was possible to hit her at all; despite Shart’s ability to fly, he wasn’t very aerodynamic. I couldn’t win a spell duel, considering I had only one good hand and didn’t know any good spells. I was going to have to engage her in combat. I sincerely hoped that my invisible familiar would give me an advantage.

  I hadn’t calculated on hitting the top of her head with Shart’s Belly Button of Holding. Her head disappeared, completely buried down to the top of her shoulders. Her body, however, still worked. She was careening around, her hands furiously pushing on the demon. The remaining bandit, coincidentally, looked at Bashara just as her head vanished. Incorrectly assuming that I had some sort of head vanishing spell, he tried to break and run.

  You can’t run away from a homicidal badger.

  I managed to get within arms’ reach of Bashara, just as she had successfully begun pushing Shart off her head. She had freed her mouth and was screaming. As she continued pushing, her nose popped free. I felt only slightly bad when I grabbed the demon and pushed him all the way down. In seconds, only her feet were exposed. Then, I pushed those in as well.