by Rachel Aaron
For three entire heartbeats, the ringing gong of the giant’s blow was all Tina could hear. Then the noise of battle resumed, the shouting and clanging of steel on bone creeping back into her consciousness as Grel’Darm’s weight lifted.
Her abilities wore off a second later, and Tina staggered to her feet. Silvery blood dripped from her gauntlet as she lowered her shield, and her left eye could only see the world in a white haze. She was blinking rapidly in an effort to clear it when something enormous and heavy crashed beside her. Jumping at the impact, Tina lurched her spinning head to the right, but it took her several moments before she realized that the car-sized hunk of dark wood lying on the ground next to her was the upper half of Grel’Darm’s wooden club.
“Ha!” she shouted, staggering backward. “Ha ha ha! A ha ha ha!” Punch-drunk laughter bubbled out of her as Tina stabbed her sword at the giant, who was standing in front of her, looking at his broken weapon in stupid confusion. “That’s right! Don’t mess…with…the ROUGHnecks!” she slurred.
She made a rude gesture with her free arm that Grel’Darm didn’t see or care about. He just tossed his shattered club into the fort behind her and reached down to grab a boulder-sized chunk off of one of the gatekeep’s broken towers. While the monster hefted his new weapon, Tina shook her head to clear it and turned to see if “Team Hulk” was still on mission or if they’d all been flattened by Grel’s weapon-breaking strike.
She should have had more faith. Though knocked back by the blast wave of Grel’s attack, all of the raid’s Berserkers and Knights were back on their feet and back on task, lined up against the walls to her right and left where the huge chains that had once operated the fortress’s massive front gate now dangled broken from their busted housing.
Not counting Tina and Frank, there were twelve Strength-based players in the raid. As Tina had discovered personally when fighting Killbox, each one was as strong as Hercules, and that crazy strength was the core of her plan. Just as she’d told them to, they’d divided themselves into two groups, one for each side of the boxed-in courtyard. Like two halves of the same whole, they ran to the broken chains, grabbing up one foot-long iron length each. Once they had the chains in hand, they began to pull, unspooling the chains from their gears until they’d dragged the oxen-sized solid-iron counterweights that opened the gates all the way up to the top of the pulleys, where they caught.
Too big to pass through the ring of the pulley and too sturdy to break off, the massive iron counterweights were trapped inside the gear boxes, which were themselves trapped inside the walls of the still-standing corners of the gatehouse. This meant the chains were now stuck inside the stone, creating an anchor for the Berserkers and Knights to pull against, hauling on the chains with all their strength until the stone cracked and the towers themselves began to groan.
Tina watched the whole thing with glee. This was the “no tanking” plan. In front of her, Grel was exactly where she wanted him—in the middle of the gooseneck, halfway between the inner and outer gates, where the side walls were weakest and the gatehouse’s guard towers were directly above him. At Killbox’s command, Team Hulk dug their feet in and pulled on the locked chains with vein-bulging might. The masonry groaned and popped as the cracked towers they were hauling against began to tilt backward toward Grel’s skeletal head, and for a soaring second, Tina thought they were going to get this in one. But then a red-faced Knight suddenly gasped for breath, and his grip on the chain slacked. He was followed by several others as both pulling teams reached their limit.
They were all huffing for breath when Killbox yelled, “Heave HO, chumps!” and they all sucked in their breath for another try.
But though they were all clearly pulling with every bit of their might, the listing towers and cracked walls didn’t budge again. Tina was opening her mouth to yell at them to keep trying, that they were almost there, when a shadow fell over her.
She turned back to Grel’Darm with a curse. After several tries, the giant had finally located a truck-sized piece of rubble that would suit his purposes. He was raising it to crush her when Tina suddenly remembered that she had nothing left.
“Frank!” she cried, stepping to the side. “You’re up!”
Frank was there at once. He shoved his way in front of her and smacked the skeleton’s giant, ironclad foot with the flat of his sword. “You’ve got osteoporosis!” he taunted.
With the same ghostly howl as last time, Grel slammed his stone down. Tina barely had time to jump clear of the impact zone before the blow landed. “Steady Ground!” Frank yelled, hunkering down as the boulder exploded against his shield.
It looked like a good defense until Tina looked over her shoulder and saw Frank’s head wasn’t low enough. As a result, the full force of the hit drove Frank’s shield straight onto his skull rather than his shoulders, and he crumpled like a crushed paper cup.
“Shit!”
Tina hurdled over the remains of the boulder that was now crumbling out of Grel’Darm’s hand to grab the still form of the other tank. When he didn’t even groan, she turned and yelled over her shoulder at the casting camp. “Frank’s unconscious! Healing approved!”
The order was barely out of her mouth when she rushed forward to taunt Grel’Darm again. The giant responded by pulling his foot back for the Big Boot attack. Skidding to a stop on the broken stone, Tina frantically slammed her shield down for the deflection. It was only the year of fighting Grel that allowed her to land the perfect forty-five degree angle in time before the wall of Grel’Darm’s ironclad toes smashed into her.
Tina smiled at the sparks flying over her head as the majority of the force went up and over her, but even with the perfect deflection, her shield arm still exploded in pain. Flexing her fingers to make sure they still worked, Tina risked a look back at Frank. Golden-and-green light was exploding like fireworks over his body as the healers showered spells on him, and he stirred with a groan. But as happy as she was to see he wasn’t dead, there was no way Frank was getting up in time to catch the next attack. Grel’Darm had already found a new rock and was raising it over his head, his giant jaw opening for another of those horrible howls.
Cringing at the sound, Tina forced herself to her feet. To do what, though, she wasn’t sure. It felt like ages since Grel’s first Howling Strike had broken his weapon across her shield, but it couldn’t have been more than thirty seconds, because she could still feel the weakness in her chest that meant her key abilities were still on cooldown.
Frantically, she looked at Team Hulk. They were still pulling on the chains exactly as she’d told them to, red-faced and clearly giving it everything they had. But though the stone walls on either side of Grel were buckling inward, neither had reached the point of collapse yet, and that was a serious problem. Tina had never expected this to be an easy win, but those walls were really supposed to be down by now.
Cursing under her breath, she looked down at her battered armor. Back in the game, she could have tanked Grel’s normal hits forever, saving her special abilities for the really big stuff. Now, though, every blow felt like getting hit by a bus dropped from orbit, and with all the damage she’d already taken, Tina was depressingly certain that whatever hit he landed next—special or otherwise—would probably be fatal.
“Stupid physics,” she muttered, clutching her shield. “Stupid hundred-ton monster.”
Above her, Grel’Darm appeared to have given up on finding a new weapon, or maybe he just wanted the pleasure of crushing her with his own hands. Either way, he didn’t grab another rock. He just curled his giant iron-gauntleted hand into a fist and punched straight down. As the shadow of his hand enveloped her, Tina realized there was no “probably” about it. When that thing hit her, she was going to die. She lifted her shield anyway, just to keep up appearances, but when she glanced over her shoulder for a final look at SilentBlayde, she found him in the caster camp, pointing at her and yelling at the top of his lungs.
“External!” h
e screamed. “External on Roxxy now!”
NekoBaby raised her staff in answer. “Circle of Thorns!”
Green-and-brown light sprang up from Tina’s feet as a dense hedge of thorny ironwood vines surrounded her. They’d barely finished growing before the giant fist smashed into them. Black vines as thick as Tina’s waist splintered under the force, but by the time the monster’s fist crashed through the barrier into her shield, the remaining force couldn’t do more than drive her to one knee. When Grel tried to pull back to hit her again, his armored hand got caught in the hedge, pulling the whole ironwood thicket up with it. Rumbling angrily at his tangled hand, the giant stopped attacking to rip the vines from his fingers, giving Tina a chance to push herself back up.
“Thanks, guys!” she yelled, grinning at Neko and SB over her shoulder. “I can’t believe you remembered!”
During the Roughnecks’ early raiding days when they’d had fewer abilities and much worse gear, they’d had to rotate defenses across the whole raid to survive. The term “external” meant that the tank was out of tricks and needed another player’s defensive ability cast on them. It had been five years at least since they’d had to use it, though. She was amazed that SilentBlayde and NekoBaby had remembered, but the fact that they’d had to was a bad, bad sign.
“Plan’s not working!” she yelled, keeping her eyes on Grel as she pointed her sword at the straining Team Hulk. “The wall’s too strong!”
“I know!” SB yelled back. “What are we going to do, though? Mana’s running low over here. We’re gonna be neck deep in zombies if we don’t end this quickly!”
“Why don’t we use the last of our mana to blast the boss?” KatanaFatale yelled. “Maybe we can burn him down!”
“No!” Tina roared. “Keep all ranged DPS on those gates!”
The constant stream of fire was the reason she was only fighting one boss and not one boss plus every-other-undead-in-the-Once-King’s-army. There was no way their ranged damage could burn down the Great Wall of HP that was Grel’Darm before the zombie hordes they’d been keeping back overwhelmed them. Once the walls fell and Grel was buried under thousands of tons of rubble, they’d have time to kill him and keep the small fry under control. Until that point, though, they were stuck. Those walls had to come down for the plan to work, and as the wha-chunck of the catapults sounded again, lobbing two more ghostfire shots over their heads, Tina knew just how to do it.
“SB!” she yelled as Grel shook the last of the ironwood vines off his hand. “Take the Assassins and go capture those catapults!”
She didn’t have time to say more. Fortunately, with SB, she never needed to. He’d already given her a thumbs-up and turned to the other Assassins. After some quick pointing, all three of them vanished into the shadows. Satisfied that her second was on top of the situation, Tina turned her attention back to Grel’Darm.
The monster had freed his hand and was using it to pick up the long iron bar that had once held the front gates together. He turned back to her, hefting the twisted beam menacingly. Tina raised her shield in reply, sighing in relief as she felt the first of her defensive abilities come back for use again. Behind her, Frank finally staggered back to his feet. He tried to take her place, but Tina waved him back, lifting her shield instead.
“Steady Ground!”
The ground under her feet hardened as Grel slammed the iron bar down on her like a whip. She winced as the blow went through her, leaving her head ringing. Swallowing the silver blood that pooled in her mouth, Tina stepped aside to let Frank pick up the next one, hoping against hope that they could hold out long enough for the Assassins to save their hides.
Chapter 16
James
“Are you done yet?” Arbati growled.
“Almost,” James said, moving yet another letter to the neat pile he was making in his lap.
It had been over an hour since Thunder Paw had left with the gnolls to clear out the rest of the dungeon. James had spent the entire time in the lich’s chamber, sorting through the pile of papers that covered the ancient sorcerer’s surprisingly non-magical, very cluttered desk. Anything that looked important got added to his pile. The rest he swept to the side, possibly to be burned. James hadn’t decided yet, but research notes on how to make corrupted elements definitely didn’t feel like knowledge that should be kept around.
He kept himself moving quickly, reading just enough from each paper to determine whether or not it was worth keeping. Even so, it was exhausting work. The papers were endless. Apparently, this lich had been quite prolific, and he’d been down here for a very long time.
“What are you even looking for?” Arbati demanded, tipping backward in the chair he’d snitched from one of the alchemy tables. “It’s not like you’re planning to become a necromancer. Burn it all, and let’s go.”
“I would,” James said. “But it’s not just research notes.” He held up a letter for Arbati to see. “There’s lots of quests in Bastion relating to the Once King’s spies and plots, including several involving this lich. I was hoping to find a letter I could use as proof, maybe something with some names, but I keep finding letters to new collaborators and reports from new spies. I need everything so I can tell the Royal Knights who the traitors are when I go to Bastion.”
That last part was key, because after what had happened in Windy Lake, James was certain he’d be attacked or arrested on sight the moment he set foot in the royal capital. He really, really wanted to have something of value to use as leverage for his safety when that happened, and vital military intelligence was as good as it got.
“There’s also this stuff,” he went on, pointing at the third stack he’d made of ancient-looking papers. “Those are written in old elven, as in the Unbounded Language. I’m not educated enough to read what they say, but someone in Bastion is. These papers definitely weren’t here in the game, because you can read everything on the lich’s desk, and I’ve never seen a mention of them on the wiki. That means they’re new information that no one, not even players, knows about. I’m betting that’s important.”
“Fine, fine,” Arbati said, tail lashing in irritation. “Just tell me when we can leave.”
James was about to say it wouldn’t be long when he opened the last drawer and spotted a sealed scroll covered in silver-inked runes.
“Bonus!” he cried, holding it up with a grin.
“Is that the last one?” Arbati asked hopefully.
“Better,” James said, tucking the scroll carefully into his bag. “It’s a portal scroll to Bastion!”
The warrior blinked. “A what?”
“A transportation spell,” James clarified. “When you break the seal, the scroll will open a portal that can take up to fifty people to the Room of Arrivals on the east side of Bastion. They’re super expensive to make, which makes them hella rare.”
Arbati shot up from his chair. “Into the center of the royal city? As in past the walls and the guards?” When James nodded, the warrior’s eyes narrowed. “Why did the lich have this?”
“To invade with, I’d wager,” James said grimly. “I keep telling you, everything going on out here in the questing zones was part of the larger plot. This lich was just one cog in a multistage effort to isolate, infiltrate, and eventually invade the capital city of Bastion. According to his papers, and his questline, the lich of Red Canyon was supposed to corrupt the gnolls, use them to conquer Windy Lake, then turn all of the important characters—including you—into boss-level undead that he would then send straight into the heart of the city using this scroll. And he’s not the only one. Every zone in the game has got some undead baddie planning a different version of the same thing. It’s all set up for the Invasion of Bastion plotline that was supposed to be the culmination of the Once King’s expansion, but—”
“Then why are we sitting around here?” Arbati cried. “We’re on the brink of war! The undead could be ready to invade Bastion as we speak!”
“I know. That’s what
I’ve been trying to tell you,” James said. “But if it makes you feel better, we’ve ended the threat here in the savanna. With the lich gone, his minions are mindless and easily killed, but his spies in the city won’t know they’ve been found out for a while yet.” He picked up his stack of letters. “If we move fast, we can get to Bastion and give this information to the king in time to shut this whole thing down. Meanwhile, I have a plan to help you and the rest of the clans strengthen the savanna against what’s coming.”
The head warrior scowled. “What plan is that?”
“One that’s already in motion,” James said with a grin, carefully placing the letters—and the lich’s mysterious ancient elven writings—into his bag as he walked over to touch the teleportation crystal. “Come on. Let’s go talk to Thunder Paw.”
There was a bright flash and a moment of disorientation, then James stumbled as his feet touched down in the open ravine at the bottom of the Red Canyon. His eyes were still adjusting to the bright morning light when Arbati arrived with a flash of his own and started immediately up the switchback trail to the canyon’s rim.
The gnoll village was already looking a lot better when James and Arbati made it to the top. Under Thunder Paw’s direction, the Grand Pack was quickly sweeping away all vestiges of undead rule. Orderly patrols and guards were everywhere, and despite being a famous former chief, James was challenged at every checkpoint he passed. Eventually, they found Thunder Paw and his newly appointed chiefs holding a council in the village’s largest building, a tall, open-fronted lodge on top of a stony hill that overlooked the entire city.
