Delvers LLC: Welcome to Ludus

by Blaise Corvin

  Uluula gasped when she noticed the blood-splattered Jason appear out of nowhere. Bezzi-ibbi, on the other hand, clapped his hands in glee and hissed in excitement.

  Jason gruffly said, "Uluula, Bezzi-ibbi, get ready to leave." His speech was punctuated by a crash and a scream from the hallway outside. Jason winced and resisted the urge to check on Henry. Part of the plan was that Henry would hold the hallway while Jason assessed the situation in the cell. "Are you restrained in any way?"

  "No," Uluula said and shook her head. "I can only use a bit of wind magic, and I'm not sure about Bezzi-ibbi. He doesn't talk much. We were apparently not difficult to control." Her eyes tightened in frustration. "Give me a bow or a gabeda, a jaalba, or better yet, a tylen, and I'd show these..." her voice trailed off, and she looked away. Jason swallowed and tried not to stare. He didn't understand all the words she was saying, presumably they were in a different language, but her accent and attitude were very attractive.

  He shook his head again to clear it and stammered, "Okay, Bezzi, Lula, the door is going to come down at any moment. Stand clear of it, please. We are breaking out of here."

  "Excuse me? You should immediately--"

  "Just be ready," Jason coughed. He was twenty-seven years old and in the middle of a fight. He had literally just killed people. How was this woman distracting him so much? He deliberately settled into the ruthless frame of mind he'd had earlier and teleported back to the hallway.

  Henry was standing over a total of five corpses, his HEMA gambeson and sweats covered in gore and his arm blades slowly dripping blood. Jason wondered if he looked as horrible as his friend and concluded he probably did. Jason said, "They're not restrained. We just need to get the door open."

  "Roger," Henry said. He stepped up to the door and sliced right through the thick wood with a demonstration of incredible power. He made one more cut then kicked the whole door down. Jason figured it would have been easier to just find the key on one of the corpses but shrugged. Whatever. Style choices.

  Bezzi-ibbi squealed in joy and scampered out of the cell, examining Henry's blades closely. Henry tried to shoo him away, but the boy either didn't understand or didn't care. He stuck to Henry's side like glue. Strangely enough, the Mo'hali kid seemed to calm quickly, and his ears flicked forward, his eyes scanning the hallway.

  Uluula paled and swallowed as she saw the carnage in the hallway but didn't shy away. The woman had backbone. Jason coughed again and looked away. He said, "Please don't speak unless you have to. We will have to find the exit, and Henry is listening to let us know if reinforcements are coming." Uluula nodded.

  Jason quickly stooped down and rifled through the clothing of the dead men on the floor. He took all the small, metal items or anything else that looked valuable and stashed them in a sack made from torn clothing. He passed this to Henry, who tied it to an equally rough-looking sling fashioned from a dead man's leather armor. Looting had been Henry's idea, and as long as they were quick, Jason didn't see any reason to object. If they lived through this, they would still need to eat, after all.

  He had to admit it felt satisfying to get back their stolen money pouch too.

  Jason replaced his stone spike with a bronze dagger, this one almost long enough to be a short sword. He handed a dagger to Uluula and one to Henry, along with both short spears. Bezzi-ibbi reached for a spear, but Henry slapped his hand away and growled. The kid seemed to get the point, albeit with some sulking.

  Henry suddenly held up a hand. "More are coming from this direction," he pointed down the hallway.

  "Okay, it's time to move anyway. The fire is spreading. Let's go this way." Jason began moving down the hallway in the opposite direction of the approaching reinforcements. They needed to find an exit or an outside wall. Then maybe Henry could do his smashing thing again.

  They traveled quickly, but suddenly Henry shouted, "There's more..." The warning was too late. Four people had been lying in wait down a side hallway and attacked.

  With blinding speed, Henry threw one of the short, bronze-headed spears clear through the first guard. Jason didn't hesitate either; he teleported next to another guard, whipping one knife forward in a golden blur. The startled guard blocked with his spear, barely stopping the attack. Jason slammed his other knife into the man's lightly protected side. He teleported again as soon as he'd pulled his blade out, absentmindedly noticing how short-range teleporting used up surprisingly little magic.

  The last two guards didn't have much of a chance either. Jason appeared above one and ruthlessly stabbed both knives into the guard's neck as he came crashing down. After pulling his knives free, he teleported behind the last guard. The guard reacted quickly... but not quickly enough. The guard fell, and Jason breathed heavily, baring his teeth. He'd kill them. He'd kill them all!

  He eventually noticed the resounding silence. He glanced up to see Henry staring at him with a strange expression. "Are you okay, dude?" his friend asked.

  "Yeah, I'm fine." Jason reined in his bloodlust with an effort of will and breathed deeply to calm himself. That was when he noticed that two of the guards had been women. One was dead by his hand. He was a woman-killer now too. Well, he'd made his choice. There was no use second-guessing it now. He wanted to live, and he wanted to save these people. He would live with the consequences later.

  Bezzi-ibbi, the Mo'hali boy, began to rummage through the dead guards' belongings, but Henry pulled him back. "No, we don't have time for that anymore. Let's get moving." Bezzi-ibbi growled at him but hopped back to his side and was soon slightly smiling again.

  Weird kid, thought Jason. Shouldn't he be terrified?

  The building was huge. Jason thought it was a warehouse converted into some sort of criminal hideout. They quickly realized they were in the middle of the building. Jason was glad that Henry hadn't started noisily tearing down walls. The group hurried down a new hallway when Henry warned them there were more guards coming. This time groups were coming from both directions. They had nowhere to go.

  Henry and Jason each faced opposite ends of the hallway, Uluula and Bezzi-ibbi between them. They didn't have long to wait before the guards ran into view. Jason noticed most of them were female in a detached way. Strange. He saw one of the leading guards from his side of the hallway raise her hand. Jason was about to attack when his entire group was bowled over by a powerful gust of wind. "Mage," he snarled.

  As he was getting back to his feet, he saw the guards start thundering towards them again. He seriously wondered what his odds of survival were. There were six guards on his side of the hallway, including at least one mage. Jason still had no idea how to get out of the building or how many more guards would show up. Things were looking grim.

  Suddenly, a huge explosion knocked everyone off their feet, including the guards. It felt like a huge hand was shaking the building. Another explosion went off after that, then another. Smoke shot down the hallway, and Jason couldn't see anything. He blindly reached out and caught someone's hand, pulling them with him as he moved towards a doorway he'd seen earlier. He managed to get the door open, more explosions and screams echoing in the hallway behind him.

  Jason fell to his hands and knees, coughing. Through the thick smoke and blurry vision, he saw trap door in the floor. A cellar! He opened the hatch and tumbled down the angled ladder, pulling the person he was leading with him and landing in a heap. The smoke from the building above followed. Jason couldn't stop coughing; he couldn't see where the hatch was anymore either. He had to get away from the smoke, but that meant he had to cut off the source. He groped up the ladder and managed to close the trap door, but the room was a death trap. He knew that they were in great danger--even if the smoke didn't kill them, falling debris could.

  He got low and walked forward slowly, blinking his stinging eyes and coughing as he tried to breathe, his efforts just making him cough more. His plan was to walk until he found a wall and then get as low as possible. It wasn't a good plan, but it was the best he cou
ld come up with in the moment. He knew he could teleport himself away, but he wouldn't do that unless he absolutely had to. He wasn't a hero like Henry, but even the new, murderous version of himself wouldn't leave someone behind. He knew he wasn't a good man, but he'd never stoop that low.

  He kept walking, towing the other person behind him. He realized he wasn't finding a wall. What was more, they weren't walking on hard-packed earth anymore. The smoke was dissipating, and it was starting to smell like something other than smoke. In fact, it was starting to smell... bad.

  He realized he was in a sewer.

  He glanced behind him and saw he was holding Uluula's hand, her face covered in snot and tears, her hair in wild disarray. How the hell could she be so sexy even now? It just wasn't fair. Jason needed a clear head, but every time he looked at the Areva woman, his brain went stupid. He turned around and doggedly looked straight ahead, pulling the coughing Uluula with him.

  Jason kept walking, looking for a way out of the sewer. It seemed to take ages until he found a ladder leading up. He ascended a ladder and pushed off the access cover, finding himself in an alley. He reached down and helped Uluula up before walking to the nearest door. He didn't know where he was, and he smelled horrible, but he was so tired he didn't care. The first door was locked. He stumbled into a deep entryway in front of a second doorway, but it was locked too. In the covered area in front of the door, there was a little pot, some bedding, and a few other cooking items, leading Jason to believe someone had been living there.

  He mentally shrugged. If someone was still living there, they would get over it. He sat down in the shade, and Uluula sat with him. He leaned back against the wall and almost immediately passed out with Uluula asleep on his shoulder, both of them snoring loudly.

  * * *

  Daymin liked his life. He had no rules, nobody to please, and he enjoyed where he lived. He preferred the relative solitude. Where he slept was fairly safe too, and nobody usually bothered him. He wasn't used to anyone coming anywhere near his little home, so he was shocked when he saw the two filthy people sleeping against the wall on top of his bed. How dare they! Then he caught a whiff of them and felt even more indignant. He was homeless, but he took pride in himself. These people were just nasty.

  Daymin ambled off to find one of the Guard. He'd teach these folks to trespass in an honest man's house, he would! Plus, it looked like the stinky people were covered in blood, and ol' Daymin wanted nothing to do with that. No, not at all! Daymin whistled as he wandered around, looking for Mirana authority. Like most other problems in his life, this one would be over soon, and he'd have his solitude back.

  Mirana Guard

  Mareen stomped her foot in agitation. She should have known that those two would run off!

  She was standing near the Mirana city south gates, where she'd told the two men from Earth to wait for her. They weren't there. When she'd first arrived, she'd looked around and walked into nearby shops, but she couldn't find them. Eventually she'd asked around and managed to find an old woman who'd seen them walk off with a street kid down an alley.

  They followed a street kid... down an alley. Mareen's brain hurt. How stupid could they be? She was a farm girl, and she knew better than that! Then again, these were the same idiots who'd attacked a cave full of goblins while armed with nothing more than sharpened sticks.

  Mareen hefted her satchel and felt the lumps of what was inside through the leather. The lumps were probably what she'd gotten at the Adventuring Guild, but what she'd asked City Counselor Hirine for was in there too.

  She needed to find Henry and Jason. She wasn't doing her self-appointed job watching over them very well if they were running off with street kids; she needed to make sure they were safe. She also needed to follow through with her indentured-servant plan before she started losing her nerve again.

  She shook her head, hair whipping back and forth. No, she would definitely follow through. The honor of her family and her village depended on it. Not only that, a small voice deep inside whispered that if she went back to being a farmer, if she turned away from the new path she was following, she'd regret it forever.

  First thing was first: she needed to find Henry and Jason. Luckily, she was not dumb enough to walk into some random alley after them and hope for the best. Based on her limited knowledge of the city, they might have been heading in the direction of the poor quarters or the industrial area of the city via alleyway. Mareen began walking that direction, taking the main roads, dodging the occasional zebra droppings in the street, and trying to blend in with other people despite her plain, rough dress.

  As she walked, she decided to see what else the Guild clerk had put in the satchel. She rummaged around for a moment and eventually exclaimed, "Oooh!" The clerk had been generous indeed.

  The first item was a cork-stoppered glass bottle full of red liquid; it glowed slightly even in the afternoon light. Mareen immediately recognized it as a healing potion. Healing potions were rare. The second item was a small red stone that glittered in the sun and felt warm--a fire-nature magic stone. Mareen was excited. This type of stone was what powered all the technology on Ludus. Not only was it valuable, it was useful. Since it was a fire magic stone, if she activated it, she could use it to start fires.

  The last item in the satchel was unfamiliar to Mareen. It looked like a cylinder made of... horn or something. It had a little glass window on the bigger end, and it had a small glass eye inside. She thought it might be a magic torch, but she wasn't sure and decided to stop messing with it. The small glowing light on the back made her nervous.

  After a while, she started to get tired. She'd been walking almost nonstop from the time she'd woken up. She also realized her odds of finding Henry and Jason while just wandering around the city were not very good, but she didn't know what else to do. She'd already decided to bet her entire future on the belief that those two would accomplish great things and that she'd be able to help them along the way. Perhaps even do something great herself.

  Mareen was growing increasingly frustrated. If she'd had time to give Henry the ring she'd gotten from City Counselor Hirine to seal her servitude, she'd be able to sense where he was. Well, it could work that way in the future if Henry allowed it.

  She stopped thinking about the difficult conversation she needed to have with Henry because it was just giving her anxiety. The fact she kept catching whiffs of interesting smells and seeing pretty things at merchant stalls but couldn't stop wasn't helping her mood.

  Deep down, she was worried that the two men might be in trouble.

  Mareen stopped to take a break in a city square just outside of the market district. There was a small but pretty park in the middle of the square where she took a seat on a bench. Her feet hurt. She was also becoming increasingly worried and foul-tempered. The general direction she suspected Henry went didn't have a direct approach from the gate, so she had to take the long way around the city.

  Now she couldn't go any farther without committing to a smaller district. She didn't know whether to head to the poor quarters or the warehouse and business area.

  What do I do? What do I do? All of her determination would be for nothing if those two idiots went and got themselves killed. She couldn't help them form an adventuring company if they were dead!

  Mareen really didn't want to cry. She hated when people fell to pieces over problems, but she could feel unshed tears in her eyes as her frustration grew.

  Get it together, farm girl! She clapped her hands to her cheeks and took a deep breath. I can do this. I just need to be patient. Knowing those two, I'll see some sign of them before too long and..."

  A large explosion shook the ground slightly. Mareen saw debris and smoke shoot into the sky from deep inside the warehouse district. People in the square were staring, and a few children pointed excitedly. Then a second large explosion followed the first. A number of women screamed, shooing children into buildings.

  Mareen just stared in the direction o
f the commotion. Finally she blinked and said, "You have got to be kidding me. There's no way... right?" She called after the fleeing people, "Right?" They ignored her.

  Mareen studied the rising smoke and sighed. She adjusted her satchel's strap and began walking in the direction of the warehouse district, slowly shaking her head in resignation. She wasn't a gambling girl, but if anyone in this city was blowing stuff up, she'd have bet money Henry and Jason were somehow involved.

  * * *

  Henry couldn't see a thing. The smoke was so thick it almost physically weighed on him. He could barely breathe. He stumbled around, tears streaming down his face as he tried desperately to find breathable air; it thinned towards the floor, but the smoke there was still acrid and foul. He had no idea where anyone was. He stumbled into someone in the hallway, and after taking a second to verify it wasn't Jason or one of the prisoners, he quickly stabbed the person with a wrist blade and bodily threw them down the hallway behind him.

  Fighting fair was for chumps. Then again, fighting at all was probably futile at this point since they were all going to die anyway. Henry knew he was probably only still lucid due to his Endurance skill. He still thought it was silly to think of his skills as "skills," but he wasn't creative enough to come up with a different name. Maybe he should call it an ability or "kick-ass magical parasite endurance". Would that be lame?

  But they were more like powers than skills or abilities. Should he call them powers? Henry realized his thoughts weren't making a lot of sense and he was probably not getting enough air. There was nothing he could do, though. If he'd been a normal person, he probably wouldn't even be conscious anymore.

  Without warning, Henry felt a small hand slip into his and start pulling him forward. He quickly let his arm guards disappear. He didn't want to accidentally cut the person leading him to ribbons. He chuckled. It wasn't actually funny, but thinking so just made him laugh harder. Laughing in the first place was a bad idea. His laughter lead to coughing so violent he would have thrown up if there had been anything in his stomach.