by Oliver Mayes
Special Summon – Noigel: Noigel is smarter than your average imp, but only in the company of his peers. If Noigel is not already on the mortal plane, he will be the first imp summoned when using ‘Summon Imp’.
Class Unique Traits
Soul Harvest: Defeating worthy enemies has a chance to drop souls or half souls. These are drawn toward you. Upon contact, they are absorbed and can be expended to cast specific spells. Your Soul Reserve is your maximum number of stored souls. Your Soul Summon Limit is the maximum total soul cost of all minions under your command. Both are increased by wisdom. In addition, when you contribute to a player-kill, you absorb their experience points towards the next level that were forfeited upon death. A kill will result in all experience points being absorbed, an assist will yield EXP proportionate to how many other parties assisted. This ability does not function on creatures or players five or more levels below you.
Shadow Walker: Darkness is your ally. In addition to night vision, your body blends with the shadows when you sneak (translucence 50%). At close range or when moving carelessly, the benefit will rapidly diminish.
Enemy of the Realm: You are a harbinger of chaos, and your existence defies order all across Arcadia. Your reputation with all factions representing the forces of order is set to Loathed.
Damien’s eyes flickered over the page, trying to absorb as much information as possible. Years of homework assignments should have made it a very simple task, but there was a lot to process. His character had undergone a complete transformation. He just couldn’t figure out whether or not it was an improvement.
He lingered longest on ‘Enemy of the Realm’. That explained why he’d received the notification that he was loathed with the Empire. Bartholomew had given him his freedom and simultaneously taken it away. There was no way back now.
At least he understood how his Soul Summon Limit worked. Noigel had a soul cost of 1, which was why he’d taken up 1 out of Damien’s three slots. That meant Damien could still summon two more imps. A sensible side objective for him to fulfill, especially considering Noigel’s description in his skill page.
He was just reconsidering the cryptic message regarding Noigel when the imp in question kicked him in the shin again.
The skill description hadn’t said much. One of the many things it hadn’t mentioned was that Noigel didn’t like being ignored.
“Hey, take it easy. I’m almost done.”
Noigel stamped his feet petulantly before sitting down in a huff. Damien inspected the imp and a new stat page came up.
Noigel
Stats:
Strength 5 - Agility 10 - Intelligence 5
Constitution 5 - Endurance 10 - Wisdom 5
Abilities: We Are Many, Leap, Bite, Claw.
So, he was agility based. Very nice. ‘We Are Many’ stood out among the other more conventional abilities. It was probably what made Noigel different from regular imps. However, no more information was offered. Damien closed the page and took the opportunity to examine his new partner.
Noigel’s body wasn’t bulky, but he still looked surprisingly tough: what little of the imp there was appeared to be all muscle. The torso was lean and sinewy, forming a base for the proportionately thicker legs and arms that ended in sharp claws on both hands and feet.
Two pointed bumps poked out of a hairless head, presumably horns that lay just under the dark red skin.
Feeling himself observed, Noigel rose up to his full, rather unimposing height and twisted his head to look back, sticking his clawed hands on his hips and puffing his chest out. A long slender tail ending in a barbed tip whipped around lazily behind him. He grinned from pointed ear to pointed ear, revealing rows of sharp white teeth that slotted neatly into each other.
It was like looking at what would’ve evolved if the first fish to crawl out of the ocean had been a piranha. The teeth were menacing, but it was the eyes that held Damien’s attention.
They were large black orbs similar to Bartholomew’s, each protruding out of its skull in a perfect round bump. They were wide set, providing excellent peripheral vision while making it almost impossible to tell what it was looking at unless it faced you directly. It would be very hard to sneak up on one of these things.
Damien scratched his head. The imp looked very cool and would be a welcome boost to his damage in the early stages of the game, but he’d been hoping for something a little more powerful. Still, he wouldn’t know for sure until he’d tested ‘We Are Many’. It was time to find Noigel some friends.
Damien turned around to squint into the darkness and stopped. He’d been so focused on Noigel that he’d forgotten. He could see. For the first time since he’d been kicked into the dungeon by Aetherius, Damien was able to get a sense of his surroundings.
The dungeon was much wider down here than it was at the entrance, maybe even wider than the test area Kevin had teleported Scorpius to. Despite that, he could still just about make out the far wall. The bodies of the two rats he’d already dealt with were lying in plain sight, twenty feet or so away. It had felt a lot further when he was sneaking away from them in the pitch black.
A sharp kick in the back of his leg brought him back to the present.
“All right, I get it. We’re moving out.”
Damien moved toward the two prone rats. He had a bag now; he could loot their items and figure out what he needed later. Noigel predicted his destination, skittering across the floor in front of him on all fours and standing on one of the bodies to do a little dance, waving Damien over.
As much as Damien was grateful to be able to see, it seemed a shame his gift was wasted on watching an imp dance on a dead rat. He needed to make Noigel a little more co-operative. He reached the rats and crouched between them, gathering the items up and nodding in satisfaction as the rat fur he’d left behind earlier was noted by his quest UI. One down, four to go. Then he would have a lovely, fashionable rat-fur bag to go with his babbling demonic chihuahua.
Noigel was chilling out on the floor on his back, his arms behind his head as he stared up at the entrance to The Downward Spiral.
“All right, we’re done here. Let’s go find some more rats!”
Noigel glanced over at him before blowing a raspberry and turning back to contemplate the sky. Damien hadn’t expected this much resistance from one of his own minions.
“What are you doing? I want to get on with the quests.”
Noigel didn’t even bother looking at him. Damien marched over and stuck his head over Noigel’s face.
“We’re leaving. Stand up!”
Noigel jumped to his feet. No one was more surprised than Damien himself. He thought about it for a moment and realized what was going on. He stared directly at the rogue imp and pointed to the ground by his side.
“Stand next to me.”
Noigel came and stood next to him sullenly, confirming Damien’s suspicion: Noigel might not understand him, but he was bound to follow any orders. Maybe he could only understand direct orders? It was worth checking.
“So, uh, do you understand me? I mean, the words that are coming out of my mouth?”
Noigel stopped dancing and stared at him blankly. Then, much to Damien’s shock, he opened his own mouth and parroted the noises back at him.
“Ho yoo umersham miiii? Hamim, fuh wormshatta kumin owtta mai moof? Skreeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-katakatakatakatakata!”
Noigel fell over laughing, his arms holding his sides as he rolled around on the ground. Damien sighed. He wasn’t certain, but that answer probably meant no. It would have to be direct orders, then.
“Stop laughing. Stand up straight. Follow me.”
Satisfied he’d asserted himself, Damien scanned the dungeon floor for any signs of movement. His night vision was vastly better than nothing, but it wasn’t perfect. He couldn’t see any enemies from where he was standing but there had to be more nearby.
Crouching, he started sneaking toward an unexplored section of the dungeon, hoping to catch
an enemy unaware. Noigel stamped alongside him, his feet pounding the tiles as loudly as possible while the faintest glimmer of a smirk stretched the corners of his mouth. Damien stopped and covered his face with his hands as the most unhelpful starting minion of all time sniggered openly.
“When I sneak, you sneak. That’s an order.”
Damien started sneaking again and had gotten all of five feet before he realized Noigel was no longer by his side. The imp was about half a step ahead of where Damien had left him and was moving with ridiculous care. He raised his leg and theatrically touched the ground in front of him with one toe before dramatically lowering the rest of his body onto it. He followed it up by looking up at his ‘master’ and urgently pressing a finger to his lips. Noigel was shushing him. Damien finally had enough.
“All right, you want to do it like that?”
He pointed out into the unexplored territory ahead.
“Walk that way until you see an enemy, then run toward it while screaming. That’s an order.”
Noigel’s smile disappeared remarkably quickly. His feet carried him forward, even though all his body language said it was the very last thing he wanted to do. He hissed at Damien as he passed, dropping into a crouch and moving stealthily. Apparently, the little git could remember how to sneak when his life was on the line.
Damien slipped behind him, hanging back a few feet. If Noigel didn’t want to co-operate, he’d make good bait. Damien flexed his fingers, preparing himself for the encounter.
Chaotic Bolt had a three-second charge time, but he couldn’t just hold it at the ready or else after five seconds it would explode in his hand. The skill description had been perfectly clear on that account. So, Damien would start charging as soon as Noigel started screaming. It wasn’t going to take long.
Noigel had already stopped and was looking over his shoulder at Damien forlornly. He pointed off to the left and Damien caught sight of a large black silhouette at the very edge of his range of vision. He took another step forward and the silhouette spouted a health bar.
The imp released a high-pitched battle cry. Then he sprinted toward the dark figure exactly to Damien’s specifications.
The silhouette twisted violently at the same time as Damien closed his hand and concentrated. His clenched fist was forced open by something inside. He looked at his hand, where a ball of twisting purple energy had formed and was expanding rapidly. Damien was so surprised he almost forgot to count.
Meanwhile, having approached the monster exactly as instructed, Noigel chose to act on his own initiative. With ten feet still to cover, his legs pistoned off the ground and launched him across the distance directly into his enemy. The two shadows merged into one as his momentum knocked it even further back, blending them into a furious tumbling ball of fur and claws.
Damien moved closer so he could see well enough to take aim, but he’d only taken a few steps when the pulsing orb in his fist started to whine ominously. It was going to explode soon. He didn’t want to be holding it when that happened, and as much as Noigel annoyed him, he didn’t want to risk hitting him.
Damien threw the screaming ball into the air over his head. It skyrocketed to the level above before bursting in mid-air a brilliant purple explosion.
Noigel and the rat were still locked in combat. Damien abandoned stealth and ran at full tilt toward the pair, grasping his makeshift thighbone weapon firmly in one hand.
Their health bars were both dropping as they fought tooth and nail. Completely entwined, Damien couldn’t tell which health bar belonged to which combatant.
Noigel was in trouble. He’d been pinned on his back by the significantly larger enemy, his arm caught in the rat’s jagged teeth. Sensing it had the upper hand, the irate rodent clamped its jaws down before shaking its head, trying to tear the arm off.
“Noigel, hold it still!”
Noigel screamed in pain, but he still managed to do as Damien commanded. Bracing his shoulders against the floor, he dug the hooked claws of his feet into the rat’s neck and pushed upward, leaving it standing on its hind legs. Damien had a perfect shot. He took it. The bone connected with the back of the rat’s head.
Even without a Sneak Attack bonus, it hit hard enough to knock the rat onto its side. Its jaws loosened enough for Noigel to tear his arm free.
That would be the last mistake it made.
Noigel leapt onto it and clawed out its throat with his uninjured hand. An instant later, Damien swung the thighbone a second time. The fight was over. The rat breathed its last and a stream of silvery vapor poured out of its mouth, pooling on the floor like smoke.
Damien was intrigued. None of the enemies he’d killed until now had done this. After a few moments, the vapor collected itself into a small round ball and floated toward him. It made contact with his torso and was promptly absorbed.
The soul counter on Damien’s HUD rose by one point. Mystery solved. Damien nodded in satisfaction, glad another of his character mechanics had been revealed.
Then again, he wasn’t too pleased with his spell. Chaotic Bolt had proven itself extremely unreliable in combat. In addition to the wind-up time being too long, the price of failure was too great. In his experience, combat situations often required split-second decisions. If he was forced to make too many, he’d lose an arm to his own spell sooner or later.
At least Noigel had shown himself to be more than an irritation. The little imp had held his own – not that he looked very happy about it. He was still sitting on top of the felled rat, nursing his bitten arm with his other hand. His health was down to a mere ten out of his maximum of fifty.
Damien felt a little guilty about ordering him to take the lead. He was considering apologizing when Noigel looked over at him, his face a subtle blend of contempt and self-pity, and started babbling angrily. He probably wasn’t congratulating Damien on a job well done.
“That’s not how I wanted to do it either. Next time, follow my instructions the first time round.”
Noigel scowled at him, but the babbling ceased. He turned his head away from Damien in an unmistakable sulk. Damien made an exasperated sigh of his own before looting the rat. No fur on this one, somewhat amazingly. It was doubly annoying being told the rat had no fur when he literally had to hold a handful of it in order to check the rat’s inventory in the first place.
Oh well. He’d still need to deal with another nine of them before he completed the quest. It wouldn’t matter as long as he got four more rat furs by then.
He looted the rest of the garbage for later examination and looked back at Noigel, who was still resolutely ignoring him. Damien bit his bottom lip. He wasn’t sure he could blame Noigel for being so angry. If he had to do everything he was told, even when it put him at risk, he’d be pretty angry too.
Noigel might not have done himself any favors by being unhelpful, but what Damien had done in response was undeniably worse. He checked Noigel’s health bar. It had already risen back to 15/50. It seemed that despite his constitution being quite low, the imp’s health regeneration was a little more potent than Damien’s own. Thankfully, he’d also avoided being poisoned. Perhaps he was immune? They’d be ready to go again in a few minutes.
Damien took the opportunity to try and build a bridge.
“If you try to be more helpful, I won’t boss you around. Deal?”
Noigel tilted his head up and sideways, apparently considering the proposal. He must have liked it, because a few moments later he faced Damien and stuck his hand out. It looked like he wanted to shake on it. Damien quickly took the imp’s hand and grabbed it in his own before giving it a firm shake. His face erupted into a wolfish grin.
“And I knew you could understand what I was saying, you little git!”
The imp’s jaw dropped. Damien released his grip on Noigel’s hand and the imp immediately made use of it, smacking himself in the head and moaning softly.
Noigel lowered his hand and regarded Damien. For the first time since they’d met, i
t felt like Noigel was looking at him with something other than contempt. Damien wouldn’t go so far as to call it respect, but it was a start. He pressed his advantage.
“I should be able to summon another imp now. That would make your life a bit easier, wouldn’t it?”
Noigel grinned and nodded eagerly. Damien remembered Bartholomew’s demonstration and copied the motion, pointing at the ground with a single outstretched finger and thinking ‘summon imp’. The ground at his fingertip glowed red, melting into a tiny ball of molten flame barely larger than the head of a pin. It started tracing out the sigil, but the process was painstakingly slow compared to Bartholomew’s display.
Nevertheless, it did not take very long for a portal to open above it. A new imp fell through and Damien’s party of two became three.
The two imps looked at each other before throwing gang signs followed by a crisp high four. Damien groaned. He couldn’t believe he’d ended up in control of these things.
Damien checked Noigel’s health bar again. It was already at 31/50. The wounds Noigel had sustained in combat were still visible, but rapidly closing and fading away.
“That last fight was messy. I think we can do better. You ready to try again?”
Noigel stood up and tensed his healed bicep before grabbing it with his other hand. He was good to go.
“You, new guy – follow me and move quietly.”
The new imp pinched its thumb and forefinger together. Without another word, Damien crouched down and started sneaking forward. Noigel and the new imp followed on tiptoes close behind.
9
Growing Pains
