by M Helbig
Alizia gave a fake smile and backed away.
“It’s been nothing but non-stop killing all day,” Laniel said. “Most of them didn’t even put up much of a fight. The dwarf must’ve been right about the effect killing their queen would have. I’m exhausted but there’ll be plenty of time for sleep when the last of them are gone. Can’t be too many more.”
I stared with dead eyes at my Tracking list. There was still nothing displaying besides us and our new friends. “Hippity hasn’t stopped until now?”
Laniel nodded. “Yeah. Darpel put all the last ten levels of points into Hippity’s smell ability. She can smell things from darn near three thousand feet away. As soon as she smells one of them, she goes charging off.”
Darpel smiled through Hippity’s blood-soaked coat. “I never have to wonder which of my socks is the stinkiest when I pick them out in the morning either.”
I pulled up my map to confirm what I’d already suspected. “Three thousand feet would extend well past their village. Unless they’ve some long-range patrols, you’ve probably gotten them all.”
A weight lifted from Laniel’s body, and she collapsed to her knees. “I can go home!” Her three pets hopped up next to her and she massaged them each in turn.
“Woo-hoo! That means we can too! Now that nasty bartender will have to give us our key.” Alizia high-fived Yary and then Olaf. “Go team! Rousing rounds of ‘We Are the Champions’ all night!” I ignored her attempt to high-five me, and she smacked me in the forehead instead.
“No,” I said. “We barely scratched the surface of the faction gains we need to get to Respected, and now our only source to gain that faction is gone. Plus, we’re still thirty-two kills away from finishing Laniel’s quest, so no potion for you.”
Alizia scrunched up her face in confusion as she seemed to look at her interface. “We could wait for those long-range patrols you mentioned. There might be enough from them to finish the quest.”
“Thirty-two of them could take a week or more to get to. We need something faster. Getting that info out of Clewd so we can find Olaf’s son is our only priority.”
Alizia’s face lit up in anger, but right as she opened her mouth, her eyes found Olaf and she relaxed. “Yeah, all right. Friends come first, but I’m gonna make you fellas pay for it.”
Olaf hugged Alizia in a tight embrace. “You are the best.”
“Ahem,” Alizia said.
Olaf let go and stared up at her. “Sorry, you are the worst.”
Alizia grinned. “Much better.”
Laniel wobbled to her feet. “I wish I had friends like you. I’d even offer to join you, but I think it best if Darpel and I remain here for a couple more weeks to finish off any hylves who return. While I can’t change the terms of a quest after it has been offered, I can still give you these.” She summoned a few pet potions and held them out.
Alizia scooped all four of them from Laniel’s hands in one quick motion and put them in her bag. I considered protesting that we were each supposed to get one but let it pass. Alizia was being good by her standards, and I was fairly sure that the potions didn’t work on people anyway.
“Where to, O Horusy Leader?” Alizia’s eyebrows danced between a quizzical and a questioning look as she stared at me.
I turned to Laniel as much to prevent myself from laughing at Alizia’s ridiculous facial expressions as anything else. “One of the dwarves mentioned there were constructs nearby that’re also the enemies of his people. Have you seen them?”
Laniel shook her head sadly.
Darpel sprung from Hippity’s fur like he’d suddenly found something sharp in there and spun around in seeming confusion. “Mrs. Hippity hates constructs. She told me they’re terrible for your teeth and digestive system.”
I turned to Laniel for a translation. “Oh, yeah. When we first arrived in the area, Darpel mistook some ancient, battered statues we encountered for hylves and ordered Hippity to attack them. Poor Hippity got the second one caught in her throat and I had to pull it out. Almost fell in on that last desperate yank too. I do remember them giving faction with something that might have been Grimrag. Those must be what you’re talking about.”
“It sounds like that is where we must go,” Olaf said.
“Constructs! Constructs! Constructs!” Alizia chanted. Yary joined in a few seconds later.
“How far away are these battered statues?” I asked.
“About half an hour due southeast,” Laniel said. “Be careful, though.”
“Constructs! Constructs! Constructs!” Alizia and Yary shook their arms in time to the beat. Darpel started shaking his arms as well.
Olaf smiled. “It is decided then.”
“Construuuuuucts!” Alizia finished with one last arm shake. “By the way, what’s a construct?”
Construuuuuuucts!
It took us almost the entire trip to convince Alizia that a construct was a mechanical being and not a mixed drink. Luckily, right as she was about to change her vote to go somewhere else, the first one appeared on Tracking. The idea of something new and exciting to smash changed her view yet again and she sprinted through the tall, thick grass after it.
“To the left, Alizia,” I said. “No, your other left.”
Alizia spun completely around and activated Sprint, barreling straight into a large rock. She bounced off it and barely managed to stay on her feet. “Nobody told me left was up and over in your strange language, Horus.” Olaf activated Yary’s bracer to recover Alizia’s HPs.
I grabbed her arm. “This is left in the language we both speak: English.” I turned her slightly to her left. “Or whatever they call our language in this game anyway. Now, go straight ahead, and you should see this construct in about thirty feet. And I mean the distance called ‘feet,’ not the length of your actual feet.”
Alizia jogged forward. “I know that, doofus, though I will at least add a few bonus points in for not assuming these dainty, giant feet of mine aren’t an actual foot long. What do these things look like again?”
“Laniel said they look like statues,” Olaf said as he activated Sneak.
“So mechanical things that look like statues . . . How’s that not a golem?”
“Oh, I know this!” Yary said. “Constructs have genitals and golems don’t.”
My jaw dropped.
“If that is true, it is new to me,” Olaf said. “What most people consider the chief difference is that golems are nearly mindless automatons made and run by magic, while constructs can think on their own and are powered by something mechanical.”
Alizia skidded to a halt and looked around. We were in a clearing dotted with what appeared to be waist-high tree stumps and large rocks—though after we rubbed off the moss coating on a few, they turned out to be the ruins of some very ancient buildings. Nothing resembling statues could be seen, so I flipped on Tracking again. It directed me to a spot five feet to my right. Alizia took up position in front, and I could see the knee-high grass pull back in front of her.
“Soooo, it’s invisible then?” Alizia asked. “Wait! I see it in the grass.” She swung her scepter, connecting hard for 43.
Olaf appeared as it bounced off his skull. He collapsed on his back. “That was not your left either.”
Alizia winced and helped him up. “Sorry. Are you sure you’re not a construct? Taken to eating metal and oil for breakfast recently? Started having naughty thoughts about computers and toaster ovens?”
Olaf rubbed his head. “No, but all of those sound like things you might do.”
“How hard did I hit you, Laffy? I’d never eat metal. Drink it, sure, but never—oww!” Alizia jumped back like she’d been bit.
I thought she was playing another one of her jokes until I noticed the tiny red 1 float up from the ground. A 3 followed shortly after and she began swinging into the grass. Olaf and Yary joined in, but a minute later none of them had connected with anything, while our mystery attacker landed seven more blows. Alizia was s
till safely at 96%, but if more of these things joined in, we might’ve been in trouble. Tracking showed six more constructs nearby, and even after I pointed at the exact location of our current target, we still hadn’t hit it.
“Horus, use that flamethrower spell you have. We’ll burn this invisible jerk out.” Alizia’s next wild swing flattened Olaf for the second time.
“It’s called Heat, and no,” I said. “I’m not setting a fire in tall grass.”
Alizia sighed. “I don’t care what you learned from cartoon mascots. Sometimes fires are a good thing. Light the grass, Boy Scout.”
“You mean the grass we’re currently standing in and surrounded by?”
A 4 floated from Alizia’s foot as she stared at the grass around her. “OK, maybe not. What else you got in that woody arsenal of yours that won’t turn us all into roasted marshmallows?”
I pulled up my spell list. “Unless it decides to hit me, Thorns doesn’t really help. You’re not poisoned, so no Cure Poison. And Regrowth will only do damage to undead.”
Staring at the grass, Alizia shrugged off another 1. “Oh, undead grass . . . no, that’s too stupid even for me. Woodsman kinda sucks as a class. Why didn’t you pick Mage again?”
I held up my bow and nocked an arrow.
Alizia shook her head in disgust. “They asked him, ‘Which do you want to do, shoot giant balls of fire or teeny, tiny arrows?’ and guess which one ol’ leader boy picked? Who’s dumber, him for picking that or us for letting someone who picked that lead us?”
Olaf knelt and swiped his blade in the area around Alizia’s feet. “That is easy. You are, Alizia. Just look what Horus did back at the hylf village. We would have never figured out how to defeat that Overseer without him.”
I threw him a dirty look, though I wasn’t sure if it was because I disagreed with him or felt he actually had a point. One success does not make a pattern. Whatever the case, I still hated him for refusing to help with the decision making.
I gave up on trying to find our target and switched my bow for my sword. As Alizia continued to take tiny bits of damage that Olaf undid by hitting Yary’s bracer, I focused on an area of grass away from the group and methodically trimmed it down to about an inch. When I had a nice patch about four feet wide and across, I turned back to the group.
“Alizia, stand in the middle of this,” I said.
“I can’t,” she said. “According to Olaf, I’m too dumb for that or anything else.”
“Could you focus for one second and move over here?” I asked.
“Nope. Too dumb for it.” Alizia winked at Olaf.
“By that reasoning, you’re also too dumb to argue with me.”
Alizia scratched her chin. “OK, I take back that you’re dumb, but I won’t concede the point that your class itself is dumb.”
“You would make an excellent politician, Alizia,” Olaf said.
As Alizia reached the center of the trimmed grass, a pair of green stone feet trailed after her. The right one reached back and kicked her for 3. Now that she could see them, Alizia easily jumped out of the reach of the left one as it attempted its kick. She reached down with her scepter after that to make short work of the right one. I was surprised that Olaf’s dagger did normal damage against something so hard, but he and Yary finished off the left one before Alizia could join in.
You have gained 550 (500 +50 Group Bonus) Experience Points! 7,611/150,000 to next level.
You have received +5 Faction with Town of Grimrag! Total: -1,780 Town of Grimrag (Hated).
You have received -5 Faction with Followers of Gerinashu! Total: -1,005 Followers of Gerinashu (Hated).
Now that it was visible, I could finally use Inspect on it.
Broken Construct
Level: 6
Resists
Type: Regular
Light: 0
Race: Construct
Dark: 0
Faction: Followers of Gerinashu
Earth: 100
HP: 0/78
Water: -10
MP: 0
Fire: 100
AP: 0
Wind: 0
AC: 30
Special Attributes: none
Weaknesses: none
Alizia knelt to loot it. “Empty and a little light on the XP, but super easy once you find them. Horus, you’re allegedly our resident smart guy: Should we stay?”
Olaf clapped his hands. “Town of Grimrag faction! We stay and kill as many as we can.”
“Love the murderous enthusiasm, Laffy, but you’re not Horus. Or are you? I forgot who we’re currently pretending is the dumb one now—which probably means it’s back to me. Crap.”
I flipped on Tracking and there were a lot of constructs there. It wasn’t nearly enough to get up to the faction level we needed, but I was quite confident we’d at least get it high enough to be allowed back in the town. From there, we could find more quests to hopefully get us the rest of the way. “We stay and destroy constructs. The closest one’s that way.” I pointed behind the group.
Olaf moved toward it; Alizia pulled him back. “Hold on, Laffy. I have an idea.”
“I have nightmares that start like this,” Olaf said.
“Horus, stand here.” Alizia pointed next to her.
I didn’t move. “Not until I hear this alleged idea of yours.”
“There are no ledges involved in this one, Horus. It begins with you starting a fire.”
Olaf groaned. “At least she is not the one starting the fire in this idea of hers.”
Yary stared at the circle of trimmed grass where they stood and then at the tall grass around them. “Ohh, she wants to burn all of the constructs up in the tall grass and thinks we’ll be safe because the grass is cut around us.”
Alizia gave Yary a fake scowl and stuck her tongue out at her. “Thunder stealer.”
“I didn’t steal your thunder.” Yary held her hands out. “If I did, there’d be burns all over these.”
Alizia ignored her and turned back to us. “Brilliant plan worthy of Horus at his bestest.”
“Do they have smoke inhalation in this game?” Olaf asked.
“No idea,” I said. “But short grass will still catch fire, only a bit more slowly—not that you’ll be able to tell when it’s surrounded by an inferno. Also, the constructs seem to be immune to fire. Even if we somehow manage not to get burned, we’ll still be trapped. Do I need to go on?”
“No, but if I were you, I would. Fortunately for me, you’re not.” Alizia looked around, her eyes finally focusing on a long, rusted mess of thin metal with bits of stone in varying sizes stuck to it. “The Horus taketh the plan and the Alizia provideth a new one. Did somebody say thunder?” She ran toward it squealing with glee.
Olaf ran after her. “That was you. And I do not like where this is going.”
“I wonder if there’s a way for us to tape that saying and have the system play it every time Alizia stops talking,” I said. “Maybe followed by a recording of me saying ‘Alizia, stop!’ Which reminds me, Alizia, stop! Don’t touch that giant piece of rusty metal. You might get tetanus, and those bits that look like fingers might put someone's eyes out.”
Alizia scratched her head with what’d once been the inside of a construct’s arm. Flakes of crumbly stone fell into her hair, making it look like she had dandruff. “Oh, I do plan on putting someone’s eyes out, Horus, and if you’re good it’ll be those tiny statue guys and not you.” She pointed the mess of thin metal that were once its index finger directly at me.
Olaf hopped up to try and grab the arm from her, but it was out of his reach. “I do not believe that pair of feet had eyes to poke out. Now give me that. There is something I want—”
The metal creaked like a fingernail on a chalkboard as the elbow of the arm bent back. The hand balled into a fist and smashed Alizia directly in the middle of her face for 60! Blood dribbled down her chin as she staggered back into the waist-high remnants of a wall. A second before she collid
ed with it, another dilapidated arm reached up and yanked her over. After a trio of huge crits, she was already down to 41%.
Olaf activated Sprint and quickly rounded the wall with Yary right behind. In hindsight, I should’ve told her to tap her bracer, but my recent experience as the group’s temporary healer took over, and I instinctively moved into position to cast Regrowth. As I tried to both figure out what to do next and cast a spell, I ended up failing both. Alizia somehow managed to frantically fend the second one off with her shield despite having the first one draped over her back.
After another twitching fumble, I managed to get my fingers under control and coated Alizia with the warming glow of two successive Regrowths. Olaf’s dagger managed to still deal full damage against the wad of thin metal. With Alizia now safe, my curiosity got the better of me and I used Inspect.
This construct had almost four times the HPs as the small feet from before, despite having the same name. Tracking showed everything nearby; besides, our group had the same name too, so we’d have to be on our toes for any pieces of stone or thin metal vaguely resembling a body part. I was both dreading and looking forward to being attacked by noses, ears, belly buttons, and butt cheeks. Now that we knew what to look for, they’d probably be easy. The dread part was for all the awful jokes and prop comedy Alizia was likely to come up with . . . though at least it should distract her from charging off and trying to kill us.
As I Inspected the second arm, I noticed something else. It showed the exact same HPs as the first one. When Olaf and Yary landed their next attacks, I checked the two arms again and confirmed that both of their current and total HPs were the same. I shouldn’t have been surprised, since the pair of feet had counted as one entity too. I’d have to remember this if we found any ears or eyes.
“Alizia, use Shield Slam and then back off,” I said.
Alizia blocked the one in front of her from trying to remove her kneecaps and swung her scepter wildly at the one still clamped on her back. “Which one?”
