Touch of Decrepitude
Expert rank: No limitation on the number of victims targeted, doesn’t add to overall spell duration. Draining victims till death increases the gathered essence by 50%.
These spells’ new effects sounded underwhelming, but I had to reserve final judgment until I had the chance to test them out.
That was enough for now. I would burn too much energy bringing both skills to the Master rank, and I had to field test them before enhancing them further.
I looked up from my notifications and realized Lirian and Riley had moved away from me while I was busy. The two seemed to be talking animatedly and, as I watched, my daughter lifted her head and let out a hearty laugh.
I felt a pang of resentment as my fatherly instincts took over. How dare he speak like that to my daughter? She’s a princess, and he’s just … just. I deflated as common sense kicked in. Riley was my friend, and he was just being nice. The two were only talking, nothing more. There was nothing for me to get excited about. I knew all that was true, but the goblin in me still raged against the rude traveler and fought to be released, to put him in his place. I resisted that urge.
“All done,” I said cheerfully, shoving the negative feelings deep inside me. “You ready?”
“Sure am,” Riley answered merrily. He bowed theatrically to Lirian. “After you, Princess.”
My daughter smiled. “Why, thank you, Esteemed Priest.”
I went in first through the glowing archway and was instantly teleported hundreds of kilometers away, to Nihilator’s temple in Everance.
There were a few believers in the church milling around aimlessly as if unsure what to do. Most were humans, but a couple were elves whose eyes were probably sharp enough to notice a goblin in their midst.
I muttered a curse for not having prepared for that possibility in advance and quickly pulled down the hood Vic had created to hide my face. Then I hastily called for the nearby shadows, making them obscure Lirian’s form as she too exited the portal.
It seemed like I was just in time. A few people glanced our way, but none of them seemed to recognize us as monsters.
“Oh, damn,” Riley said as he stepped out last. “Looks like the new guys have no idea what worshiping an evil deity looks like.”
“That’s why you’re here,” I said.
“Right. I’ll start a basic ceremony. Hmm … probably shouldn’t sacrifice anything just yet, you know – ease them into the whole ‘dark and evil’ practice.”
“Probably a good idea,” I agreed.
Lirian had no trouble seeing through the magical darkness that surrounded her. “What about me, Father?”
“Stay next to the walls where the darkness is deepest,” I told her. “If you’re noticed, there’ll be trouble. The people here aren’t used to seeing goblins walking among them. If anyone spots you, I want you to jump straight into the portal, alright?”
“Yes, Father,” she replied calmly. “No one will see me.”
“I’ll see you soon,” I said and stepped toward the exit.
The sun was setting, but there were still a few pedestrians on the street. I wasn’t too worried. It was dark enough for my Vicloak to conceal my features, and as a tier 4 boss, I was a tall enough goblin to pass as a short human.
The ring of ivory tusks still surrounded the temple, containing the darkness from pouring into the city, but the guards stationed outside seemed bored and inattentive. I spotted an alley a few dozen meters away and teleported into it, leaving the guards behind.
It was nearly time for my meeting with Crowley.
I hurried through the quickly dimming alleyways, taking care to avoid running too close to the night traffic as I headed for the harbor district.
I reached the Leeway Pub with ten minutes to spare and made my way toward the bouncer guarding the door, again stowing away my magical necklace before reaching him.
“What’s the password?” the bulky man grumbled at me just as Vic hurriedly spoke in my mind.
I growled. “Ballsy.”
The guard nodded and opened the door while Vic erupted in a mad laugh that echoed through my mind.
How long have you been planning this? I asked.
The pub was almost empty. The regular clientele preferred later hours.
Crowley was there, though, and he had several thugs next to him, some high-level. The crime lord acknowledged me. “Ah, here’s our enterprising monster friend.”
I removed the cowl from my head, revealing my goblin face. Almost everyone but the crime lord gasped in surprise, and many hands reached for their weapons. I raised an eyebrow at Crowley. “You didn’t tell them who I was?”
He chuckled. “It’s alright boys, ease up, we’re just here to talk.” He winked at me. “I wanted to see which of these guys was gonna soil their panties.”
I looked at the others. A couple of them shivered as my red eyes met theirs. “Are they aware of my proposal?”
A scarred-faced bald man sniffed. “Yer a ruddy monster and ye wanna beat them stuck-up nobles outta here? I’ll play ball. What’s innit for us, eh?”
“As I already told Crowley,” I said, “once we take over the city, those who helped me will be favored. You’ll get gold, power – hell, you can even replace the city guard as far as I’m concerned and do as you please … as long as it’s to our mutual benefit.” I stared at the people around me. Crowley had promised to gather the city’s criminal leadership. The people in this room could have probably amassed a big enough force between them to conquer a large town.
“Suppose we agree to work with you,” another man who wore an eye patch said. “What will we need to do?”
“There are several people I’d like killed,” I said, then snickered, suddenly remembering Vic telling me those same words when we’d first met.
“Killing people is what we do,” said a third gang member who was picking his nails with a needle-thin dagger. “Who are you thinking of?”
I shrugged. “Army officers, high officials, and other influential people who make up the backbone of the city.”
“In short, you want us to cripple the city’s leadership from within while you attack it from the outside,” Crowley said shrewdly.
“Essentially,” I agreed. “For the first phase.”
“What’s the second?”
I smirked at him. “I’ll tell you about it when it’s time.” I was allying with these people, but I didn’t trust them. Any of them could turn on me and bring the city’s forces down on my temple.
More people started to talk, but then the building’s door flung open and the bouncer rushed in, slamming the door behind him. “A large patrol is closing in on us,” he said, pale-faced. “They’re being led by Master Sleeve escorted by holy knights.”
“The spymaster is here?” Crowley jumped to his feet, his eyes ablaze as he drew a curved scimitar. “Which one of you dogs snitched?”
“Who’s Sleeve?” I asked, frowning. I’d never heard the name in my previous life.
“Lord Everance’s spymaster,” Crowley spat. “He’s not supposed to be here.”
“Well then, I’ll just be off,” I said. “I’ll give you some time to settle your differences with the guards and we can try to conclude our business at a later time.”
Before any of the others had a chance to react, I teleported away.
Or at least, I tried to.
The spell rebounded on me, causing me to stagger. I narrowed my eyes. Someone had put up a teleportation ward. A powerful one.
The bald, scarred criminal narrowed his eyes at me. “Trying to escape, are ya?”
The atmosphere instantly turned hostile as the other criminals studied me with obvious malice.
“This isn’t right.” Crowley shook his head. “We have an understanding with Sleeve. He lets us operate as long as we don’t take things too
far.”
“I reckon’ working with goblin scum is considered taking it too far,” Baldy growled at me, putting his hand on a cruel-looking mallet.
There was no doubt where this was going. The man was level 90 – higher than me, but not beyond my Master-ranked skill. I froze him with a wave of my hand, the cost of 300 MP barely nudging my mana bar.
“Now listen here,” I snarled, unleashing the full force of my tier 4 boss aura, causing everyone around me to stagger. “The next person who thinks he can turn on me is going to find himself strung up by his guts. I’m taking over this city one way or the other. You can work with me, or you can all die.”
“Residents of the Leeway Pub,” a booming voice came from outside. “By order of the high lord Everance, you are all under arrest. Step out peacefully, and you shall not be harmed.”
“Your Master Sleeve sure knows how to smooth talk a guy,” I told Crowley.
The crime lord winced. “That wasn’t him. Sounds more like one of those knights.”
“They can be troublesome,” the calm one with the thin dagger said. “You have to slip the blade between their armor plates just right to get to their kidneys. Amateurs try to go for the heart. Fools; it’s the densest part of their armor.”
With a tremendous bang, the pub’s door exploded inward, and I could feel the residual mana from the spell that caused it. It came from a level 250 mage, at least.
“Just come out nice and slow, and we’ll talk,” a dry, controlled voice said. “Come on, Crowley, you know better than to resist.”
The crime lord turned to me. “Sorry, kid. It was a nice plan, but it looks like the jig is up. I’m not going against Master Sleeve when he can see me coming.” He turned to the door and raised his voice. “We’re coming out, Sleeve, put a leash on your bombers, will you?”
I felt my anger well up inside me. “I said, you’re either with me, or you’re dead.” I hissed and raised a double-layered mana shield around me. “Are you sure that’s the move you want to take?”
Some of the criminals in the room were already at the door, but a couple of the closest ones turned and hurled a bunch of blades and potions at me. One of them exploded in a green mist. My shield stopped them all. I bared my teeth at them and let loose two volleys of drilling arrows, using my new Master-rank ability to instantly power them up.
Each volley impacted a target, inflicting over a thousand points of damage. The body of the man closest to me was torn by the multiple spinning bits as if put in a blender. The person who hurled the potion was also injured, but a faint magical aura flared around him, mitigating some of the damage.
Half of the remaining men ran out of the pub while the other half charged at me. I let loose an empowered direball at their feet while casting teleport, this time diverting more mana into the spell to try to brute force through the spatial lock.
But things didn’t go quite as I’d planned.
The direball detonated with a force strong enough to crack the stone floor, making the ceiling above the point of explosion collapse, instantly killing three of my attackers. But again, the teleport didn’t take. The direball’s volatile energies washed over my mana shield and ate through the outer layer but were stopped by the second one.
Knights and mages were charging into the pub now, pushing aside the fleeing criminals, while Sleeve was shouting something I couldn’t hear over the cacophony.
I cursed and unleashed the monster in me. I summoned my shadow clone and recast the second shield layer while ignoring the enemies’ attacks. My clone started gathering the nearby shadows while pouring out a copious amount of mana to empower a new spell. I called for more shadows from the outside to rush into the building and shroud the place in darkness, then I let loose another direball. My high-level attackers, however, were able to see through the magical darkness somehow, and the waves of destructive energy washed over them without inflicting too much damage.
I snarled as my clone froze while it continued to pour in more mana. More weapons and spells hit my shields, but surprisingly, none of them made it past even the first layer. I targeted a group of what looked like spell-wielding fighters with a shadow web, and the enhanced spell pinned them against the wall. I growled in pleasure as the dark webs pulsed, draining their mana, robbing them of their ability to cast more spells.
I noticed a woman wearing a bright red robe muttering an incantation. The tremendous swirl of mana around her alerted me to the danger. I targeted her with a Drain Mana spell, and the ray passed through her magical barrier, hitting home. She stumbled and stuttered as my spell’s secondary effect robbed her of her own.
A thin, sharp-featured man walked into the building looking calm and calculating despite the chaos around him. He pointed at me and shouted something, but I was beyond listening.
My shadow had finally finished empowering the spell it was working on. The darkness amassed and built into a huge three-dimensional form of a gigantic mastiff. The summoned creature roared as it took shape, its upper body bursting out of the pub that was too low to contain it.
There was a brief lull as my enemies gazed up in shock at the titanic creature. The mastiff was only level 65, but its size gave it an advantage over my smaller enemies.
It lashed out but was instantly countered by a team of three knights with blazing shields. It still reached over them, biting an archer and hurling him away through the torn roof.
Despite the injuries they had sustained, my enemies didn’t back off. A glowing chain of pure gold light suddenly wrapped around my shield, and I could feel the dark mana running in my veins being forcefully drawn from me. A second chain formed, increasing the pressure. I glanced at my mastiff, but the beast was too occupied with the knights to help me. I couldn’t move away. My mana was draining rapidly, and it was only a matter of time before I’d lose the battle.
I didn’t mind dying. I would merely be transferred to the shadow realm and make my escape, but getting captured was out of the question. I couldn’t teleport away either. My enemies had the foresight to put up teleportation wards before they made their first move. I needed to burst out of there, and I needed something powerful enough to shake them off me.
“You asked for this,” I snarled and started casting.
The darkness and shadows began to swirl around the room, quickly condensing into a sphere, then further condensed into the size of a small pebble as I empowered the spell. The swirling darkness also swept away my clone as the empowerment reached its third stage.
With the spell so highly charged, it needed little time to build up its strength. Discarded items – mugs, and foodstuff – went first, zooming through the air to be swallowed into the dark sphere. The pub’s unanchored furniture came next, then the roof caved in, flowing into the gravity well.
Everyone in the room staggered as they felt the powerful pull, desperately looking for ways to anchor themselves.
I laughed.
The knights had finished dispatching my giant hound and were stubbornly holding their place, using whatever skills they had to remain immobile. But the other, lighter skirmishers weren’t as lucky. An archer soared and got stuck midair as the building’s very walls started to crumble and hurtle toward him. Then a mage who didn’t think to use an anchoring spell came flying, then another.
I felt the pull as well, tugging my sideways, but I diverted more power into my muscles, which was enough to keep me anchored in place. For now. The pull of the Singularity was growing. The wooden beams that framed the pub were now all gone, and the very stone was getting pulled apart.
Master Sleeve shouted something, but no one heard what he was trying to say. A moment later, he turned and fled. A few more people got sucked in, then one of the three knights lost his grip.
I noticed an opening and pushed against the powerful force. My shield helped keep me anchored somewhat, but it was taking all my strength just to stay put. An empowered surge of mana concentrated on my legs fixed that problem, and I slowly made my wa
y out of the pub.
Everyone around me was desperately clinging to lampposts and nearby buildings to keep themselves from flying over. At least six people were suspended in the air.
I noticed the red mage woman from earlier muttering something and gesturing her hands toward the Singularity. I knew she was about to dispel it, and then my enemies would close in on me.
“Time for the big finish.” I hurled a direball. The spell got sucked into the Singularity and disappeared. Everything froze for a fraction of a second before the entire thing exploded.
Shrapnel tore through unenchanted armor as the Singularity expelled its contents, piercing the nearby buildings as if they were made of cardboard.
The concussive force was also strong enough to hurl back everyone who remained. The red mage was slammed into the nearby building and I instantly felt a change in the ambient mana around me.
The dimension lock was off.
I considered staying. I could have lingered to exact more vengeance on my attackers. Every little bit of damage I inflicted on the capital’s forces would aid us in the long run. But then a notification flared in front of my eyes, taking the choice away from me.
Warning: Vow breach is imminent.
A cold pang of fear ran through me. Lirian was in danger.
I abandoned the thought of vengeance and summoned my mana to teleport away. The spell worked this time, and I found myself inside the familiar walls of Everance’s temple.
“Father!”
I slowly turned around to see a ghastly sight. Lirian and Riley were both restrained by knights in glowing armor. Two swords were held at each of their throats.
A familiar thin man stepped forward. “A pleasure to make your acquaintance at last, Shadow Lord Oren. You’re a hard man to reach. Let’s talk.”
7 - Revelations
An intense, white-hot rage boiled in my stomach. “Let. My. Daughter. Go,” I hissed. I didn’t know how Sleeve had gotten here before me, and I didn’t care. Lirian was all that mattered.
Life Reset: Salvation (Life Reset - Neo Book 6) Page 13