by Eric Ugland
"You think it might be a trap?" Skeld asked.
"That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard," Ragnar said.
"Prep in case," I said, pulling spears out of the bag and handing one each to Skeld and Ragnar.
They took up positions by the other wall, spears extended and ready. Anyone charging out of the room would get a nice impaling as a welcome.
I had to test a few of the keys before I found the correct one, but I got the door open.
Light spilled around me, and I walked in, trying to portray confidence and hide my trepidation.
"Nikolai," I said, "you feeling groovy?"
Chains rang out as someone crawled across the floor, and then a face that might have been Nikolai's at one point came into view.
"Montana?" came a rough whisper. "How— I told you to leave!"
"You look like shit," I said. And he did. His face was beyond gaunt, it was pale skin stretched tight over bones. All of his fat and muscle seemed to have disappeared. His clothes had been replaced by what I had to assume were burlap sacks. I itched just looking at them.
"I feel worse than you can possibly imagine."
"Can you move?"
"I am in chains."
"Yeah, that much is clear. But can you move?"
"Not well."
I pulled out the keys, unlocked Nikolai from his chains, and helped him to his feet. It was bizarre, because the dude was beyond light. Even that bit of movement caused him to wince in pain, but he did not cry out. He took a tentative step, his legs wibbling and wobbling underneath him, barely able to support the man.
The hirð boys' jaws dropped open when they saw Nikolai. In the light of the hallway he looked even worse. He only managed a few steps before he had to lean against a wall. Nikolai closed his eyes.
"What the hell happened to him?" Ragnar asked.
"A fate worse than death," Nikolai answered, his voice barely above a whisper.
“Glad you’re being so clear with us,” I said.
“They took my levels,” Nikolai snapped.
I shot my spell at him, needing see what he was talking about.
Nikolai Petroff
Human
Lvl 1 - Nothing
“That’s possible?” I asked, suddenly feeling remarkably vulnerable.
“I did not know it was,” he said.
“Stats?”
“Barely there. My strength is down to one. As is my constitution. He said he left my intelligence alone because he was going to attempt to drain my spells tomorrow… then he would finish absorbing everything else from me.”
“Holy shit. This is some bad news.”
“Yes. It is.”
“I’m guessing you have very little in the way of hitpoints?”
“Four.”
“Four. Well, that’s fucked.”
“One of Skeld’s crawfish farts would kill him,” Ragnar said. His statement was quickly followed by the sound of Skeld’s smack.
“What’s the play here?” I asked.
“The play? You take my spells then kill me.”
“That’s stupid. You’re much more useful to me alive. And you kinda promised me you’d be my mentor, so, I’m holding you to that promise.”
“Then you are a fool.”
“You’ve got me there,” I said with a smile. “Now, how about we make a plan to get out of here?”
“You do not have a plan for our escape?”
“Sure I do. Just, well, I think it might need to change ever so slightly. Given, you know, your current condition.”
“Was it fighting our way out?”
“No, it was going through the dungeon.”
“There is no dungeon.”
“I think there is.”
“I assure you—”
“Agree to disagree for now. I doubt we have time for an in-depth discussion about this.”
“Also there is the girl,” Skeld said. “You have yet to save her.”
“Okay, we, we have yet to save her,” I corrected. “I’m not—”
“A girl?” Nikolai interrupted to ask.
“Yeah,” I said, “I was thinking of that as a more optional part of the quest.”
“You said you would do it,” Ragnar countered. “That means you need to at least try.”
“Aren’t you supposed to be the devil on my shoulder?”
Everyone looked confused. Too many of my idioms fell flat here. I should have felt fortunate most of my slang seemed to translate.
Finally, Ragnar seemed to come up with a possible interpretation. “Are you offering to carry me?”
“Not what that means in the slightest, and no, you walk on your own. I’m probably going to be carrying our level one nothing here,” I pointed to Nikolai.
He frowned at me, and I could tell he was trying to work up the strength to punch me.
“Just tell Skeld to punch Ragnar when you feel like punching me.”
“Hey,” Ragnar said.
“Punch,” Nikolai said.
Skeld smiled, and socked Ragnar.
“If you said you would get a girl,” Nikolai said, “you should get the girl. Especially if she is trapped in this pit of despair.”
“Okay, fine,” I said, leaning against the wall and trying to kickstart the ol’ noggin. “Thing is, we have no idea where she is.”
“But you know she is in this prison?”
“She was in this prison. She might be dead.”
“The guards were diligent checking me in, they took plenty of notes making sure they knew everything going on,” Nikolai said. “You need to see the logbook.”
“Any chance you’ve got a copy of that laying around?”
“No. But there are plenty around this institution. When I was being taken in, I noticed that the logbook is a magic item, all the books are updated when any are.”
“So we just need to find a guard station, and there’ll be a book, right?”
“I believe so, yes. Provided I am correct, we will find this woman. The jailers are meticulous in their note keeping.”
An idea started to form. We needed to sneak around, find out where the girl was being held, then rescue her from her cell. This all seemed really familiar, like I’d seen this in a movie. A movie I knew well, and, maybe one we could emulate…
“Okay,” I said, “I think we got this.”
Chapter 112
Nikolai looked perfect in the grey robe. He was the spitting image of all the grey-robed assholes we’d seen in the jail. All two of them.
Ragnar and Skeld were a different matter entirely. I had Ragnar stand on Skeld’s shoulders with his tail wrapped around Skeld’s chest so they could look like another one of the skinny grey-cloaked dudes. From a distance, it kind of appeared like a real person. Closer, with the hood pulled up and Ragnar keeping his furry face deep inside, he just might pass. But it all fell apart when Skeld tried to walk. Ragnar couldn’t balance, and Skeld couldn’t see. So instead, and though I tried to veto this, the Lutra climbed underneath my shirt and held on to my back.
Since I still had the manacles on my wrists, we used them as a prop. Nikolai hauling me up the stairs behind him.
The stairs were a pain in the ass. Not that it was hard carrying the two fur boys on my back. It was having to wait for Nikolai to continually catch his breath. We had to stop at basically every landing. I gave Nikolai the excuse of stopping to look down the hall for a guard station, something we just weren’t finding.
The first test was coming up, as a set of four guards tromped down the stairs from above. They stood aside as we passed, deferential to the grey robes Nikolai wore while sneering at me. And then we were gone.
Finally, after countless stairs and significantly more break time than climb time, we opened a door. Twenty yards from us was a guard station. Two guards stood, drinking something out of wooden mugs, chatting. The one on the right had a tattoo peeking out of his sleeve, while his conversation partner was missing both his front teeth. It wasn�
�t a great look. A third sat at the desk, bigger than either of the other guards, both with more muscle and more fat. He was a man who enjoyed his donuts. I know because he was enjoying some sort of fried pastry at that very moment.
As we got closer, I could see a book laid open on the desk.
“What is this?” he asked, sugar and crumbs flying out of his mouth in a rather gruesome display.
“Prisoner transfer,” Nikolai said.
“I received no word of this,” the guard replied. “I need to check this out.”
Nikolai looked to me, and I lunged at the guard.
“He’s loose!” Nikolai yelled.
I grabbed the guard’s flabby face, and slammed it down on the desk, then scooped up the book, and tossed it back to Nikolai.
“Emeline Rogers!” I yelled.
Fatman’s nose was bleeding profusely. He fumbled, trying to get out of his chair, but collapsed to the ground.
Both guards dropped their mugs. Toothless drew his sword while Tats pulled his mace.
I grabbed the plate, the pastries dumping off, and frisbeed it right into Tat’s throat.
The plate hit solidly, Tat started to choke.
I threw the pastries at Toothless, sugar flying everywhere.
He brought up his arm, trying to block some of the shit hitting his face, and that caused him to stop for a second, which gave me enough time to look around for a weapon.
There was a pencil on the table. Or the table. Indecision struck, and apparently that meant I needed to fire off the identification spell.
Table
Item Type: Improvised
Item Class: Two Handed Why-Are-You-Using-This
Material: Wood
Damage: Bludgeoning
Durability: 80/80
Weight: 24.8 lbs
Requirements: Str 20 and a willingness to use a table as a weapon
Description: A table made of wood. Four legs, one top, plenty of desperation
Desperate did describe my state of mind. I planted my legs, grabbed the table, small back swing and big fore swing. I have no idea if Toothless brought his weapon up to block, or, really, what he did. There was just too much mass moving too fast. I do know the table slammed into Toothless and he went flying. I couldn’t and didn’t want to stop the swing of the table, so I kept it going, smashing into the back of Fatman’s head as he was starting to get to his feet. I heard a hollow thunk and a solid groan as Fatman went to ground a second time.
I completed the swing, and saw the destruction.
And the problem.
Clearly Tats had seen what I’d done to his compatriots, and he’d taken off. He was already pulling open another door at the end of the hall, shouting at the top of his lungs about escaping prisoners.
“We’re going to have company,” I said.
“No shit,” Ragnar said, startling me because he was talking directly into my ear, his head poking out from my shirt.
“Why don’t you run after him?” I asked.
“No chance we’d reach him in time.”
I pulled Ragnar out of my shirt, tearing the collar along the way, and dropped him next to the groaning Toothless.
“Tie them up,” I said. “Get them in a cell.”
There was, as per the norm, grumbling from Ragnar while Skeld did most of the work.
“Emeline Rogers is the girl’s name?” Nikolai asked.
“Bingo,” I replied.
“What?”
“Yes.”
“There is an Emeline Rogers in cell 40.”
A quick moment of thought, going over all the cell numbers I’d seen, and I estimated forty was two floors above where Nikolai had been held. Which meant a sprint downstairs. Check one up for luck.
“Boys,” I said, “time to motor. And Nikolai, this time you’re riding me.”
I shook my head, realizing how much shit I’d have gotten back on Earth for saying that.
Nikolai gave me a look, clearly trying to communicate there was no way he’d allow something so debase to happen to him. So I had no choice but to pick him up and sling him over my shoulder in a fireman’s carry.
“Montana—” he started to say, but I just ran, and bouncing him on my shoulder forced all the air out of his lungs.
“Hirð,” I yelled, “follow. Double time.”
Going down the stairs was much faster than going up. I could basically jump from landing to landing. I wasn’t sure how fast the otters were going behind me, but I figured they’d handle it on their own. I slammed into the door where, by my count, the hallway holding cell 40 would be.
I was wrong.
Too low.
“Back up,” I shouted, hopping over the Lutra as they skidded to a stop.
Up the stairs we heard a cacophony of feet, arms and armor. A lot of guards were coming. Like, a ton.
We slipped through the door to the next floor up, and I could see some of the guards coming down the stairs. One of them threw a spear, missing me but slamming into the door with enough force to stick in the wood.
“Nice shot,” I said, then snatched the spear.
I slammed the door shut and jammed the spear in the jamb, across the door, hoping the spear would hold the guards back for a hot minute.
“Cell 40,” I called out.
The Lutra were already sprinting down the hall, checking the numbers.
“Here!” Skeld yelled.
“Put me down,” Nikolai snapped.
I ignored the man, fumbled the keys off my belt, and threw them towards Skeld.
“Try those.”
The Lutra scooped them off the ground, and slotted one into the hole, then another key attempt. Another. And another. One last.
It popped the lock.
Behind us, the guards reached our level and slammed on the door. The spear wasn’t going to hold long.
Skeld pushed the cell door open, and this disheveled feral-looking creature leapt out.
I shot my arm out and snatched the thing by the hair out of the air, and threw it right back into the cell.
“In!” I shouted, and Ragnar and Skeld bolted into the room. I snatched the key from the door, then pulled it shut.
I heard the spear shatter in the hallway, and the thud of boots filled the space. The guards quickly spread out, searching for us.
“Who are you?” came a small voice.
“Quiet,” I hissed.
“Can you set me down?” Nikolai whispered.
I did.
Then I flexed that internal change, and my vision flashed over, allowing me to see. The cell was depressing as hell. The ceiling was rather low, the walls completely flat, and there was nothing in the room except for the hint that some straw had once been there. Plus, the ever-present hole in the ground with the wastewater of the prison flowing by at a steady clip. The smell in the place was overwhelming, and I saw Ragnar lose the battle with his stomach, and puke all over the floor .
The Feral Thing was definitely a human woman now that I had more of a moment to see her. She’d just been in the cell for some time, so she was filthy. Her hair was matted and rank, somewhere in the process of dreading up. Her clothes were tatters, barely covering her body. She was skinny, and had more than a few cuts and bruises about her body. Still, all things considered, she looked substantially better than Nikolai.
The guards went from quiet searching to running around, yelling at each other quickly, and I had to guess that they were checking the other stairwells. We had maybe a minute or two before they realized we hadn’t left the floor and started going through the cells to find us.
“Who are you?” she asked again.
“I think this is where you say I’m a little short for a storm trooper?” I replied.
“Excuse me?”
“Ignore him,” Nikolai said. “He is an idiot.”
“Hey—” I started to protest my innocence.
“The idiot and his friends are here to rescue you,” Nikolai said, totally interrupting me.
“I was already a prisoner here.”
“Maybe,” I interrupted, “instead of calling me an idiot again, you can put your remaining attributes to use planning a way out of this cell and off this level.”
“You only made the plan to get in,” she snapped back, “but nothing to get out? Some rescue.”
“You want to stay in this literal shithole forever?” I asked, and that jogged my mind a little. I walked over and looked at the shithole.
It was a literal hole in the ground where a small river of shit drifted by on repulsive currents. I gritted my teeth, knelt down, and shoved my arm into the effluence. Let’s just get it out of the way in the beginning: it was disgusting. There were so many foul things I could say about it, but let’s just leave it at revolting. Notable, however, was the size of the poop chute. It was big. Enough to where I wasn’t able to reach the bottom without fully extending my arm. And the edges around the hole were thin. They’d been worn down by an eternity of poop flowing on by.
I stood, and looked at the shocked faces around me.
“No,” Nikolai said. “Absolutely not.”
I just gave him a wide smile in return.
Chapter 113
As much as I hated to pull anything out of the bag of holding knowing I’d be forced to leave it behind, it was rather important. I got some of the busted furniture from the first castle, and we used that to wedge the door closed. We laid the pieces of a broken table along the floor, then the busted dresser, and finally two chairs, making a reasonably solid line of wood from door to wall. Anyone wanting to get through to the cell was going to have their work cut out for them.
Sadly, I had my work cut out too. I got the ol’ pickaxe out of the bag — part of my starting gear — and I started wailing at the floor around the shithole. I had to enlarge the thing enough for my giant ass to fit through. Everyone else sat around, looking nervous, listening to the guards get closer. Something that happened very quickly once the noise of the floor being broken got out.
