Trial by Fire: A LitRPG Dragonrider Adventure (Archemi Online Chronicles Book 2)

by James Osiris Baldwin

  Blindfighter’s Fold

  Magical Item

  Glasses Slot

  Special: Obscures normal vision while granting the Blind-Fighting ability.

  Created in a ritual by a Khatvaana, a priest of the Left Hand Path in the cult of Burna, the Blindfighter’s Fold is an important teaching tool used to train Baru for the ranks of the Dark Moon Brothers.

  Ancient Kamanocha

  Magical Weapon

  Item Class: Relic

  Item Quality: Masterwork

  Damage: 50-74 piercing

  Durability: 100%

  Weight: 0.5 lb

  Special: Mercy Strike - This weapon has a specific, special enchantment. If the dagger is drawn to commit an act of euthanasia, this knife deals x15 piercing damage to the target. If the weapon is ever used to strike a target in an act of aggression - offensive or defensive - this enchantment is lost and can only be regained by taking it to a temple of Burna.

  Special: Brittle - This weapon is made of specially tempered bone that is as hard as steel when used to stab, but is still weaker than metal against certain forms of stress. Tuun bone weapons take x2 damage from bludgeoning weapons or crushing damage. Slashing with a Kamanocha degrades the weapon quality normally. If they are used to Pierce, they take no loss to durability. Tuun bone weapons cannot be reforged.

  A long dagger made from the chemically and magically tempered bone of a human femur, Kamanocha (Kah-mo-notch-ah) are special ritual tools carried by Tuun as religious heirlooms. Kamanocha are created and consecrated by priests or monks for specific purposes, and may not be drawn or used for any other purpose lest the spirit of the person who donated the bone.

  Baru traditionally carry a special Kamanocha which is used only for acts of euthanasia so that the monk may grant terminally ill or injured people a swift, painless death.

  Boots of the Winding Path

  Magical Armor

  Item Class: Artifact

  85 Armor

  Durability: 78%

  Weight: 3lb

  Special: +10 movement-related checks on unstable surfaces; +5 Stamina

  Boots made of hookwing leather and enchanted to be supernaturally resilient. There are small metal cleats on the soles that make them suitable for hiking in mountains and wilderness.

  “Holy shit,” I whispered. Now that I looked, certain things about this corpse were recognizable. His hair was long - very long, separated into two narrow braids that reached past his knees. This guy was Tuun - and he had to be a baru, one of Matir’s warrior-healer monks. But that made no sense. Tuun weren’t from this continent - we came from Daun, the Western continent on the other side of the ocean. There had been no migration between Daun and Artana before the invention of airships. Had there?

  “Vlachian cloak, Tuun gear... but we don’t bury our dead in Tungaant,” I muttered aloud. “We do sky burials with giant insects. This baru was injured really badly when he died. Broken ribs, crushed skull. He died fighting. A hero? Yeah... but a hero in Vlachia who was given a burial in pre-Khorsian times.... which means I have to be in Taltos. Somewhere in the underground.”

  Call me old-fashioned, but I didn’t like the idea of robbing graves, especially now that I was marked as an oathbreaker. But as I studied the body, there was no sense of judgement from either him or Matir. Instead, I could almost hear the monk whispering to me. Take them.

  Reverently, I lifted out the knife, and then carefully removed the other objects. I pulled on the chain shirt and belted the Belt of Tiger’s Spirit on over it. The gauntlets were powerful weapons, but they were obscenely heavy. I equipped them anyway, testing out the range of motion. As the description said, they were surprisingly flexible, allowing me to properly ball my hands into fists. I put on the blindfold last, acutely aware that I was now wearing everything but pants.

  The blindfold didn’t help me see - but the world around me opened up in a silent rush without the need for vision. When I tied it on, I could somehow sense the location of nearby objects. The edge of the open sarcophagus, the small altar to Matir, the body of the fallen baru… I knew exactly where they were. It was more like sonar than darkvision, but it was almost as good as seeing in the dark.

  Feeling more confident - if no less breezy downstairs - I went back to the altar and gathered up the offerings of jewelry. The rings were ordinary treasures, but I could sell them once I had Tidbit back and this shit was over and done with. I no longer had an Inventory to store items, so now I had rings on along with everything else - except underwear.

  I belted the Kamanocha on my hips, then pushed toward the iron gate and brought up my mini-map. It was mostly a big blank space beyond the door - a big round space with little nooks and narrow corridors coming off it. I stepped out, and as the sound open up, I could ‘see’. What I perceived made me gasp.

  Dragons.

  There were six colossal biers arranged in a ring around this room, and each stone platform held the skeletal remains of a dragon. They were all curled up the way that Tidbit liked to sleep: balled on their side with their tail wrapped around their body, one foreclaw clasped over their snout, the other arm, wing, and both legs drawn up. I wandered over to the closest one, awe-struck. Taltos had used to be a dragon city… and I’d respawned in one of their tombs.

  There was an inscription at the base of the bier. I crouched down to have a look, but this one was not in three languages - only one, the sticks-and-triangles script. Is that draconic script? Draconic writing?

  I moved out into the dragons’ crypt, turning and waiting to face each corridor to see which one was the windiest. That was the one I chose. When I left the security of walls, the Blindfighting ability was less useful - for a couple of minutes, I had nothing but the disturbing groan of the wind rattling through ancient tomb corridors to guide me. The tunnel was easier to navigate than the open tomb. I broke off into a jog, trying to put the pieces of my memory together as I headed back up, toward the surface.

  Thirty minutes or so later, my HUD chirped. [You have a new message from Rin Lu.]

  “WRU??” It began. ”We’re in the Imperial Crypt and Andrik will be here any minute now! (O.O!)/”

  Andrik. That’s right. “I died. Andrik had some crazy-powerful monsters guarding my dragon.”

  “OMG! Is Karalti okay!?”

  Relief washed over me as I heard her name again… and with it came a few lost memories. She wasn’t Level 3 any more - she was just barely Level 6. I knew there were other things I’d forgotten, but piecing the gaps together was going to have to wait. “I don’t know. I hope so.”

  “What monsters did you fight down there?” Rin asked after a minute or so.

  “Two ‘Void Wraiths’. Ring any bells?”

  There was a short pause before she replied. “No way.”

  “Yah way.”

  “Void Wraiths shouldn’t be in Artana! They shouldn’t even be able to spawn yet!” She messaged back. “You’re sure!?”

  “They hit me for over 1000 points of freezing damage by looking at me, so yeah.”

  “Oh no! Void Wraiths are endgame monsters. Minimum Level 40 (T__T)”

  “Do they have any weaknesses? Restrictions?”

  “Umm... they’re undead, so they’ll be weak to Dark and Light magic, immune to fire/earth/water/air and physical hits… but even if we had Shadowfall or Holy magic at our level, I don’t think we could beat one.”

  There was a slight pause before she sent another message. “Hey! You just appeared on my map! You must be close /(TwT)/”

  I was heading up a flight of hollowed out stairs. When I glanced at my own map, I saw Rin’s icon. It was dim, meaning she was on a different floor to me. I wasn’t sure how many I had left to go. “I see you, too. I must be under the Imperial Crypt. That’s good news for us re: wraiths - this place is consecrated to Matir and there’s magic active on the premises. That’s why I respawned here, I think. BRT.”

  “OK… but hurry! I think Andrik is here, and-”


  “What?” I picked up my pace as much as I could, breaking out into what looked to me like part of the Lethos Cellars. “Rin?”

  There was no reply.

  Chapter 43

  I ran through the levels of cold catacombs, through halls stacked with old bones, reliquaries, and - eventually - torches. There were no monsters down here, the undead kept at bay by the many small, active wards that flared to life on the walls whenever I passed them. As I got closer to Rin’s blinking marker, I heard the sound of steel clashing against steel, shouts and screams... the sounds of combat.

  I wrenched open the first door I found and squeezed into a narrow corridor barely wide enough for my shoulders to pass - like a maintenance shaft, or some kind of secret channel for sneaking behind the walls of the Imperial Crypt - effectively the basement of the biggest church in the city - to eavesdrop.

  Wincing, I shuffled like a crab down the confines of the passage, chafing all the way. I still didn’t have any pants, which made this more of an adventure than I would have preferred. The sounds of combat grew louder, but there was little light and no sign of an exit. I was beginning to think I needed to go back when I finally realized what this stupidly tight corridor was for. Above my head, about eight feet off the ground, was a ventilation panel.

  “Hmm.” I narrowed my eyes while I considered how the hell I was going to get myself and the Spear out through such an awkward exit. I experimentally reached up to jab at it with the blunt end of my weapon. As I did, there was a weird whomp sound that cut through the air with a wave of bitter cold, and a hoarse feminine shout - Ebisa’s voice.

  “No time.” I clamped my teeth together and started to bash the grate in earnest. The plaster around it crumbled, and the wire dented with every blow. A dozen hits, and I knocked it out to the ground. I threw the Spear through first, jumped up, Spider Climbed up, and pulled myself through.

  I slithered out to land on awkwardly on an altar, scattering candles, flowers, a white silk runner and an urn to floor. I desperately lunged out to catch it. It smacked into my palm, and had I not been wearing the Cold Iron Gauntlets, it would have stopped. Instead, the delicate porcelain slid along the leather and thick iron plating, toppled to the floor, and shattered in a cloud of ash.

  “Oh my god,” I moaned, trying not to breathe as I backed up, dusting myself frantically. “I am so sorry.”

  There was nothing I could do for the remains of Emperor Wizimir the Second, so I pulled the silk runner, beat the ashes out of it - wincing the entire time - and tied it around like a girdle. Or a diaper. It was better than nothing.

  The Imperial Crypt wasn’t a single room - it had no fewer than six interconnected chambers, about the size of a ranch-style home. I ran toward the combat, and turned the corner to see a scene out of a schizophrenic’s nightmare.

  More than thirty people were brawling in the tight confines of the crypt. Ebisa, Rin, a dozen Nightstalkers rogues fought against a line of soldiers without faces. They wore the silver and orange uniforms of the Taltos City Guard, but their faces were shifting, morphing walls of pixelated blackness. Reality distorted subtly around the soldiers as they moved. Even worse, they were almost soundless. These [???Soldiers] didn’t grunt, didn’t cry out in pain. There was something almost hallucinatory about them, but their steel was very real. Longswords tore through fur and flesh with ferocious strength.

  I stormed in, blasting straight into the back of one soldier with the Spear. The Spear punched all the way through his chest. I followed up with an Umbra Burst, blasting a streak of energy up along the polearm that engulfed him and two other [???Soldiers] nearby. They thrashed without sound, clawing at their faces, and then collapsed into black dust - like pinprick holes in reality that danced, then vanished.

  Void creatures. They have to be. And ironically, void creatures were weak against the Darkness element.

  [Warning! Your primary weapon is badly damaged! Durability 15/100]

  “About time you showed up!” Ebisa snarled. She was being driven back toward me, battling two [???Soldiers] with unnatural speed. Her limbs glowed with magic - a Haste buff. “Push through the mob! Help Ignas!”

  “Where is he?” I called back, searching the pack for Rin. She was hanging back by the edges, casting spells from behind a glowing blue barrier while her turrets tanked for her.

  “Head west - they’re in the Founders Vault!” Ebisa teleported behind a soldier and plunged her knives into his neck. “We got separated - these freaks just appeared out of thin air and cut us off! Ignas is alone in there!”

  I plowed my way through the scrum, belting a soldier across the jaw with a fist, pushing another away from me with the Spear of Nine Spheres, and sprinted toward the Founders Vault - the only room with tombs instead of urns. Huge, ornate steel coffins with life-sized statues stood behind them, dressed in layers of scrollwork. The Kingsguard had been decimated, the survivors shivering and groaning on the ground. Ignas and Andrik battled in the center of the room. Ignas with a light mace and shield, dressed like a master thief; Andrik in his ancestral armor, a mageglove, his sword and the Ravenstar dagger. He was fencing against Ignas’s heavy blows, his sword wreathed in flames. His glove glowed brightly. Andrik is a Spellsword?

  “How can you commit such deeds? In front of our ancestors, our blood!?” Ignas caught a blow on his shield, pushing the sword away before it caught the wood. “How can you act so dishonorably toward the men who protected us!? Against me? Against our home?”

  “How could you stoop so low as to murder my citizens? Are you that petty about being outmaneuvered at court?” Andrik could move faster than Ignas. He was younger, faster, and he had magic. “Father always praised your wisdom, but a very wise man told me that victory belongs to the strong.”

  Even as Ignas threw his brother’s sword back, Andrik barked a string of Words that sent a bolt of freezing energy into Ignas’ body, knocking him back toward the biggest sarcophagus at the end of the room. The tomb was flanked by a pair of thick pillars. An androgynous, veiled statue stood behind it, arms spread in a gesture of benediction.

  “I did what I had to do to reclaim this kingdom before you destroy it!” Ignas snarled with effort, swinging in. His mace clipped Andrik in the shoulder, but the weapon rebounded off an invisible barrier, sending out a cloud of blue sparks. Andrik didn’t slow. He pressed forward, herding his brother toward the back of the room. “You are a pretender! A vile heretic who would corrupt this place as your ‘Master’ corrupted you!”

  Andrik scoffed, dodging “Master? I don’t have a Master. I am the master of my destiny and the destiny of Vlachia, not you!”

  I dropped into a crouch, but as I passed the threshold, I paused as both of my arms throbbed with a strange pulsing sensation. Confused, I looked down and saw sparks of deep, indigo-black energy crawl through the seams of the iron gauntlets. They were warning me. Something was wrong here.

  Void Wraiths, I thought to myself. Where the fuck are the Void Wraiths?

  Ignas feinted and tried to break past Andrik, but the younger Corvinus didn’t let him. They were two thirds of the way down the vault now. Andrik was definitely pressing his brother toward the back of the room.

  “You thought you could look down on me!” Andrik panted. “But now look at you!”

  “I never looked down on you.” Ignas eye briefly caught mine, but his expression didn’t change. “And if you surrender now, I will show you mercy, brother.”

  “Becoming a common thief didn’t teach you to lie any better,” Andrik sneered. “And besides... Mercy is weakness.”

  I broke off from the shadows into a sprint, Shadow Dancing to cross the distance and power the blow I dealt Andrik from behind.

  The Spear hit him in the back of the neck, and there was a shattering sound as his magical shield discharged and blew out. The explosion threw me back and sent both brothers stumbling forward onto the sarcophagus.

  [Your primary weapon is broken! It can no longer be used in combat!]


  The Spear spat and sparked in my hand. Cracks had appeared along its length, discharging small puffs of mana gas. I threw it aside in frustration and rolled up to rejoin the fight.

  “No! Leave us!” Ignas barked at me. He was grappling with Andrik. The Volod had lost his sword, and was straining toward Ignas’ face with the dagger – the one that could cause instant death on contact.

  “You bought a friend, did you? Well, so did I!” Andrik snarled a string of foul-sounding words as he pinned Ignas against the sarcophagus, and I saw the shadows cast by the pillars stir.

  The wraiths! I equipped the Blindfighter’s Fold, plunging the room into darkness – but I knew where they were about to emerge. The pools of shadow were drawing life energy from Ignas and the injured Kingsguard.

  “What is this!?” Ignas struggled, weakening by the second.

  “Don’t look at them! Keep your eyes shut!” I ran forward.

  I sprinted forward, determined to disrupt the summoning – and as I did, the statue above the sarcophagus moved. The long veil and shroud fell away, and Kanzo leaped down from the niche onto Andrik.

  “Wh-!?” The Volod toppled under the Mercurion’s weight.

  Kanzo took Andrik to the floor, stabbing at his neck. Red blood sprayed across the stones, but not before the king – choking with confusion and rage – plunged the Ravenstar dagger into Kanzo’s chest. The Mercurion’s blue-on-blue eyes flew open, and he toppled to the side.

  “Damn you!” Andrik pushed himself away. He managed to get to his feet, but stumbled back against the sarcophagus and slid down it as the Void Wraiths slowly rose from the floor. Their forms were like cutouts of reality. Vaguely humanoid, vaguely reptilian, impossible to look at. Impossible not to look at.

  I squared up and thought of Karalti in that circle of magic, and prepared to fight, but the wraiths didn’t advance. Their billowing faces turned down to regard Andrik as he gurgled on the ground, clutching at the blood that poured through his fingers.