by Neven Iliev
Then she remembered she was still in her sleepwear, so she sheepishly ran back inside, got dressed, and started having second thoughts. What if this was her imagination after all? What if she blamed an innocent man and was even more ostracized by the human community? Her mind remembered that ‘guard’ who dropped in asking about Boxxy and how she’d threatened him with a Lightning Thrower. Gnomes already had a bad reputation for being nutty. What if there was some inkling of truth to that stereotype? What if she was the crazy one after all?
But, there was a way to find out. A way to prove to the world, and to herself, that she was not insane. She ran into her workshop and started throwing together an orb that would discharge electricity when a button was pressed. A small, carefully calibrated charge that wouldn’t do much to a human besides zap them, maybe cause some numbness at most. There was no danger of Boxxy dying from this. He was bound to be a strong adventurer, considering the amount of money he spent on Artificer supplies while suspiciously maintaining the outward appearance of a pauper.
That was, of course, assuming she was wrong and he was not what her nightmares said he was. But if the true identity of Boxxy T. Morningwood was indeed that of a shapeshifting mimic, then the jolt would be far more devastating. Cornie was very knowledgeable when it came to electricity and magnetism. Hardly surprising, considering those areas of study were what Arclight Artificers like herself were most concerned with. She was well aware that a powerful enough current would make a shapeshifter’s body go haywire. She just had no idea she would use that knowledge to assault the only person in Erosa she could truly call a friend.
Wait, why was she so convinced about that fact? Why was it that whenever her thoughts drifted to Boxxy, they always saw him as a strangely lovable person. He was incredibly suspicious, however one looked at it. Was this more mind-fuckery at play? Come to think of it, weren’t people in the street giving Boxxy weird looks? How come she saw nothing wrong with the guy? Were her eyes even real?
Fizzy slammed her forehead against her workbench, silencing those spiralling thoughts. She had already decided on a course of action, so she willed herself to focus on that rather than the unknown. She completed her gold-plated Stun Orb (tentative name) in just under an hour, using whatever spare parts she had lying around. It was a hack-job creation that would only work once before its internals fried themselves, but it was more than enough. At least the highly conductive outer shell would make sure its payload was delivered without issue.
She stared at its slightly reflective surface. What would she do after she presented it to the man? On the off chance she was wrong and he came out unfazed, she could play her ‘gift’ off as a malfunction and offer a discount for the trouble. The real problem was: what would happen if her nightmares were indeed reality and her only pupil turned out to be a monster? Would she be able to actually … kill it? Would she be able to bring herself to do that sort of thing?
She slammed her head on the workbench again. Monsters were cruel, heartless, and thought nothing of others, and anyone who believed otherwise was a fool begging for death. That was the harsh truth of this world. And although one could argue that monsters were mindless creatures merely following their instinct, it was also true that intelligent ones existed out there. Beings who knew full well what they were doing and were perfectly capable of communicating with the so-called ‘enlightened’ races such as dwarves, humans, and elves, yet continued to act in much the same way. They chose to hurt others.
Fizzy’s dilemma should not have been an ethical or a moral one. If her ‘friend’ was a monster and she exposed it, then it would definitely try to kill her, and she would have to fight back. The real question was whether the gnome was physically capable of fighting back. She may have been Level 56, but that did not make her a combatant. Sure, she had high DEX, INT, WIS, and PER Attributes thanks to her Job and Skills, but she knew no Spells, had no idea how to swing a sword, and her END was truly pitiful. If a fight really broke out, she would surely be eaten. If she had the ability to stand up to the monster in the first place, then it wouldn’t have been able to pin and restrain her as completely as her nightmares said.
That was when she remembered her father’s security measure: the ‘Insta-Cage’ hidden beneath the floorboards. It had always been there, but it never got used on account of nobody being stupid enough to stir up trouble in the middle of the city. Especially not inside a poor-looking Artificer shop like this one.
But it was still there. And knowing her old man’s formidable mechanical Skill, it would probably still work. The only problem was, she had serious doubts simple steel would hold back that monster. So she closed up the shop and started modifying the trap. The gnome worked frantically throughout that entire day and most of the night but still wasn’t finished. Her work continued undisturbed on the second day, and then, at noon on the third day after her revelation, she finally finished electrifying the cage. She was in the middle of double-checking all the connections and preparing herself mentally for the encounter when the door swung open.
Gnomes were creatures of habit, even in seemingly stressful conditions. And Fizzy had a habit of unlocking the front door every morning and locking it only when the sun started setting. Which was why Boxxy was able to easily enter the place as if nothing was wrong. It was honestly a miracle the target of her suspicions hadn’t visited during those two-and-a-half days she was busy. Her confrontation could have ended very differently.
Though considering the events that followed, many people would argue that would have been preferable.
Chapter Four
Chaos
Part One
A squad of twenty armed guards marched steadily down the city street. The disjointed clanking noises their plate armour made with every step sounded like a stampede of steel. A female gnome with pink pigtails who went by the name of Fizzy was among them. Her adorable appearance and the slightly comical way she had to half-jog to keep up were completely at odds with the military formation.
“I swear to Teresa, pipsqueak,” complained the squad leader, “if I find you’re messing with us and –”
“I. Am not. Messing with you!” insisted the gnome. “I really did capture a mimic in my store!”
“Right, right, so you say,” said the old soldier, readjusting his steel helmet. Looking down at that gnome any longer was going to give him a crick in his neck.
“Hey Sarge,” called out one of the guards, “do we really have to do this?”
“Yes, we do, moron. A citizen demanded our help, so we’re helping. Whether there’s any credibility to her claims is another thing entirely.”
He tossed a dubious look at the citizen in question.
“I already told you I’m telling the truth!”
“We’ll see about that,” the sergeant said without even trying to hide the doubt in his voice. “This the place?”
“Yeah, that’s it. It should be locked up inside.”
The fully armed squad of soldiers stood in front of the store where the little gnome had led them. It was perfectly quiet and completely ordinary aside from the flashy sign that read ‘Fizzy’s Fidgety Widgets.’ The squad leader pointed to three of his men and ordered them to enter the store. The slightly undisciplined guards idly walked to the door and opened it. Peering inside, the man at the front saw a ransacked shop, a mangled cage, and a pair of metal-clad fists flying towards his face.
“ORRAH!”
“Ge-hut!”
Kora’s powerful twinned punches sent him flying into the other two men who were with him, knocking them all to the ground. The fiend went out the door with a jump and slammed her heels right into the first man’s broken face. His head splattered against the cobblestone road as if it were an overripe tomato.
“To arms!” shouted the sergeant, doing his best to rally his men. “Rogue demon on the loose! Prepare to subdue it.”
“Ooh-rah!” replied the guards in unison, drawing their weapons and assuming a formation.
> The gnome screamed and ran for cover. The other civilians followed her example. They all scattered and ran for their lives the instant they saw the grotesque scene of a man having his head crushed inside his helmet. As for the perpetrator, she didn’t skip a beat. Kora crouched down, grabbed the other two men at her feet and tossed them into the rest of the armoured platoon. They collided with their squadmates, nearly knocking them over.
*CRASH*
Something flew out of the door’s dusty window. Something wooden, rectangular, and multi-legged.
“HRRRAAAAAKKH!”
It let out an unearthly sound, somewhere between a hiss, a growl, and a scream.
“Reform the ranks!” shouted the sergeant.
The guards in front quickly formed a shield wall while those in the back prepared to cast magic or pulled back their bowstrings. While their attention was focused on the new threat, Kora threw a Mass Panic Spell Crystal towards their front line. It shattered open, and magic-induced fear gripped all the soldiers caught in its effect.
“Lion’s Courage!”
One of the backliners, a Priest, quickly chanted a Spell to combat this effect. A blue wave spread out from his position, dispelling the Mass Panic from his squadmates.
“Fireball!”
“Ice Spear!”
“Sniper Shot!”
The rest of the rearguard unleashed various ranged attacks and magic on the rapidly approaching Mimic, but they didn’t find their target. Kora leapt in front of her master and activated her defensive Demonic Carapace Skill. Grey metallic scales instantly covered her red skin, mitigating a significant chunk of that barrage. Boxxy jumped onto her back and wrapped its legs around her waist, shoulders and chest, firmly attaching itself to her like an oversized backpack. Now that it no longer had to worry about its footing, the Mimic could focus on other things for the moment.
Like chanting magic of its own.
“Hark Inhusion!”
“OOORRRRRRAAAH!”
The fiend roared as the power boost of the (slightly misspoken) Dark Infusion Spell surged through her once more, filling her with a temporary burst of strength and speed. She ran forward, crashed into the guards’ disorganized front line and went on a rampage.
“This isn’t happening,” mumbled Fizzy.
The gnome had ducked into a small alley between two buildings during her panic earlier. However, instead of doing the wise thing and running, she simply stood there and stared in horror at the scene some twenty metres away from her.
A towering four-armed demon was fighting a bunch of guards. Her heavy fists dented their plate armour and crumpled their shields. The metal scales that protected her body had fallen off and she received multiple wounds from those in front of her. But rather than following common sense and growing sluggish, her movements actually became sharper. Faster. Deadlier.
The gnome had no way of knowing this, but it was simply the effects of the demon’s Side Job. As a Level 14 Berserker, Kora had two of the Job’s Skills available to her: Level 5 Bloodlust and Level 3 Brutal Fervour. The first of those amplified damage dealt whenever she landed a killing blow, with the second increasing the effects of her DEX and AGI Attributes in direct proportion to her missing HP.
Berserkers thrived on battle. Hungered for it. These personifications of bloodshed and violence fought without regard for their own safety until either they or their enemies were dead. It was a truly reckless Job with a high mortality rate that demanded a primal and intense inner rage not many people had. There were not many willing or suitable to go down the path of a Berserker, and fewer still lived long enough to develop it in any meaningful way.
Kora was a prime example of that. Her reckless behaviour got her killed with frightening regularity. However, unlike the fleeting existence of mortals, she was a demon. A being whose soul could not be extinguished outside the most extreme of circumstances. All she needed was a master willing to summon her and fling her into battle over and over. Boxxy was a perfect fit, and she took advantage of that arrangement by fully immersing herself in the destructive rage only a demon could muster. She stood covered in wounds and neck-deep in enemies, but not showing a single sign of slowing down or taking a step back.
“This isn’t happening,” Fizzy repeated.
As terrifying as a practically-unchained demon was, the thing clinging to her back was far, far worse – a chest-shaped monster with three red tentacles growing out of it, each one gripping a bloodied longsword. Anyone who dared approach the fiend from the rear got slashed up or covered in hissing, putrid green acid. Anyone who attacked it from range saw the fiend abruptly turn around and take the hits in its stead. It was plainly obvious that, rather than covering the demon’s back, the Mimic was simply using her as a shield ... a cold-blooded, pragmatic, and overtly violent approach to combat that Fizzy never dreamed existed.
“This. Isn’t. Happening!”
The overwhelming shock of seeing the terror from her dreams lay waste to a squad of fully armed guards gripped the gnome’s heart in terror.
“Oh, but it is,” came the cold, emotionless female voice directly above her.
Frozen in fear, Fizzy could not even look up, too afraid to confront what was undoubtedly another of that thing’s minions. She felt the oddly familiar sensation of a slender hand being placed on her head.
“Sleep.”
It took about two minutes for Boxxy and Kora to completely dismantle the guards. Even if they were around Level 40, their actual offensive abilities were closer to Level 25 or so – an unfortunate downside of power-levelling. Their bodies were still much stronger than they would have been otherwise though, so it took a while to beat them down at first. Then Xera joined in halfway through the battle, raining red-hot flames and molten magma on the ground-based troops from the rooftops. Granted, she almost died from getting hit by one Spell, but her Pyroclasm Spells were an excellent diversion and deterrent, even if their damage didn’t seem like much.
“What now, Master?” asked the succubus as she clutched at the gaping hole in her stomach.
“Where is Fizzy?” Boxxy replied telepathically.
“Over in the alley.”
“We’re bringing her with us.”
“ … We are?”
Xera thought Boxxy wanted to drain the life out of her, then absorb her corpse. Any other demon would’ve done that, and the murderous box’s thought processes were quite in tune with the rest of her kind. Admittedly, its way of thinking was more akin to the fiend’s simplistic logic, but ‘mercy’ was definitely not a concept the Mimic understood. Meaning that, if it wasn’t going to kill the tiny twerp, then it must have had a very good reason for not doing so.
“Yes. I want her Artificer Job.”
Ah, there it was. Apparently even in this situation, it still wanted to take advantage of the runt’s training. It was a surprisingly good call, as there was no telling when – or even if – it could find another Artificer trainer as capable as that gnome. Or as gullible, for that matter.
“Understood, Master.” Xera limped off towards the alley where she had stashed the comatose gnome while Boxxy surveyed the empty streets.
The civilians had already abandoned the area and the road was quiet. The only sounds that could be heard were the gentle crackling of the flames left over by the pyromaniac’s magic, as well as the echoes of screams from nearby roads. Even the shops had already evacuated by that point.
However, this calm would likely not last long before more guards arrived on the scene.
The succubus returned less than a minute later, holding the little person who had been unfortunate enough to catch her Master’s attention. “Here she is, Master.”
The Mimic wasn’t sure if it was even possible to convince her to teach it again even though its cover had been magnificently blown. Snack’s sleepy-time magic tricks couldn’t be relied on anymore, either. Well, bringing the small, pink-haired woman was still worth it. She had more value alive than dead, but the Mimic coul
d just kill her and attempt Cadaver Absorption on her if she refused to … cooperate.
The materials necessary to put together various Artificer gadgets and gizmos would not be a problem, at least for the time being. Boxxy had already taken the liberty of cramming as many bits and pieces from the gnome’s workshop as would fit into its Storage, so it was good on springs, screws, cogs, and bolts.
“Get her over to the south wall without drawing attention,” it commanded.
“At once, Master.”
Not three seconds later, the succubus had assumed a variant of her village girl disguise. Her hair was a mess, her clothes were dirty and her skirt had been ripped. The gnome in her hands was now wrapped in a thick blanket to conceal her shape, completing the image of a distraught mother carrying her sickly, slightly big-headed child to safety.
“I will be off, Master.” Xera gave a tiny bow and trotted off towards the south.
“What about me, boss?” asked Kora.
Boxxy quickly confirmed she only had 290 HP remaining out of a total of 1,512.
“Did you use Second Wind?” it asked.
“Yeah.”
As expected. There was no way this reckless demon survived that many wounds without tapping into her only means of HP recovery. Even though they had not been as durable as the murk dwellers, the guardsmen still did a considerable amount of damage in the short scuffle, mostly due to the presence of magic users among their number. She had also been used as a meat shield, so there was no way she wouldn’t be near death.
This was an untasty situation. Boxxy wanted to use Arms as a diversion to draw the people’s attention away from itself and Snack while it made its escape over the wall. And Arms would not be much of a diversion if she only lasted a few seconds. Thankfully, it could easily solve this problem. First it chugged two of its newly-bought mana potions to replenish a significant chunk of its missing MP. It then dismissed Kora and started re-summoning her. Doing this would not only restore her back to full HP but also bypass the day-long cooldown period on Second Wind.
