by K R Dimmick
Congratulations! You have discovered: Dozen Range Mountains.
The gray mist receded to show me that the single remaining red dot was close by, right up at the base of the closest mountain. The air was definitely colder up here, and I was wishing I had a hat and coat.
We crested the last rise and there, in front of us, were what looked like five tents. I motioned for Allion to get down as I quickly hugged the ground.
“It looks like those same Dragon Hunters are still here, unfortunately,” said Allion, squinting toward the area.
That wasn’t good, I thought.
I smell five of them. Soter said in my mind.
Five on two. Not good odds.
Five on three. Soter turned to stare at me.
“Sorry, five on three,” I mumbled.
“How do you know there are five of them?” Allion looked surprised.
“Err, just a guess, since there’s five tents,” I said, not wanting to let him know Soter and I could communicate. Mikael had said it was a rare ability, and the thought of letting anyone else know filled me with a sense of unease.
“So, it looks like these plants are right in between their tents,” I said, trying to change the subject.
“They are,” Allion replied. “From what I could tell last time, they are camping out here to stop anyone from Gathering them. Andrew must really want to stop you making this potion.”
“He must. I just don’t understand why. It’s not like it matters to him whether or not I die,” I whined.
“Really?” Allion looked shocked. “You can’t see how someone solving the traveler riddle goes against everything Andrew proclaims is true?”
Hmm. I hadn’t thought about it that way.
“I don’t know him well or anything,” Allion quickly declared. “But I’ve heard him talk in several towns before. He’s always asserting that the dragons are myths and the only way for you travelers to live is to join the Dragon Hunters and take his potion. If you prove otherwise, you’ll essentially be the downfall of his entire empire.”
“Oh. I guess I hadn’t thought about it that way.”
“He seems extremely power hungry, so I can’t imagine that losing all his existing power and influence would go over very well with him.”
“You’re right. It wouldn’t. Still, I can’t let that stop me. If I don’t get this stuff, I won’t exist in two days’ time. So, we need to work out how to get in there, despite them. We need a distraction,” I stated. “Soter, can you go in and try and draw them out?”
I turned to Allion.
“Once he’s got their attention, I need you to try and sneak in from the front of the camp. You have to do it badly, so they notice you and assume Soter was trying to distract them for you,” I said. “Then, while they’re off chasing you and Soter, I’ll slip in through the back of the camp in Stealth and try and grab one of the plants. What do you think?”
“It might work,” Allion hesitated. “Wouldn’t it be better if I was the one who snuck in from the back, though? My Stealth is higher than yours and they’re more likely to chase you.”
“Yes, it would work better, except for the part where I’m the only one who can pick the plant,” I glared at him.
“Ah yes, I forgot that,” he mumbled.
“I’ll cast Minimizer on all of us before we start so you’ve got some protection. Do as much damage and be as distracting as you can, then run. If you can buy me five minutes, I’ll hopefully manage to get something,” I said. “Head back toward El Sanctum and we’ll probably meet up along the way.”
We crawled back down the hill a little so we wouldn’t be seen.
I cast Minimizer and watched as Soter disappeared around the edge of the hill so he could approach the right side of their camp. I then left Allion and headed in the opposite direction. I’d told Allion to wait and Stealth in as soon as he heard people at the camp trying to chase Soter away.
Tell me when you are ready.
I climbed around toward the left side of their camp and crouched down low behind some bushes. If I ended up dying, at least I’d get a fast trip back to get help, I thought morbidly.
Ready, I thought at Soter, hoping he could hear me.
A couple of seconds later, I could hear swearing in the camp.
“Shoo!” one of them shouted, presumably at Soter.
“Just shoot it,” said a bored voice I recognized as Joe’s, Andrew’s second in command.
I heard the twang of an arrow, followed by a yelp, which made me start to panic.
I’m fine. I want them to think they hit me.
Well that was a relief. I had no idea a wolf could think of bluffing, but I’m very glad he did.
“I think I wounded it. I’m going to go and finish it off.”
Hopefully, Allion would take that as the cue for his distraction. Unfortunately, I could hear no sign from the camp that they knew he was there.
There was a loud thud. A howl followed by another yelp split the air.
Injured. Leaving.
Not good. I hoped he didn’t need healing.
I’ll live.
Well, it was now or never. Allion had obviously failed for some reason. I dropped into Stealth and carefully made my way out of hiding.
Slowly, I crawled toward the closest plant I could see. Every time someone in the camp moved, I froze and stopped breathing in case that gave me away. I was watching my stamina bar drop little by little from holding Stealth for so long. I had to be at the plant before it reached halfway empty, otherwise I’d be out in the open when I popped out of Stealth.
Three agonizingly slow minutes later, I reached the first plant and bent down to pick it. As I touched the plant, it moved slightly. Before I could pull it up though, pain ripped through my back and I fell to the floor, landing next to the plant.
“Someone’s here! I just saw a plant move,” shouted a familiar voice.
Crap. I hadn’t thought of that. Somehow, the gash in my back hadn’t brought me out of Stealth. With my health down to 70%, I slowly turned my head to see Colt wildly swinging his sword in the air, trying to hit me again. At least he’d assumed I was still standing.
At that point, arrows started falling out of the sky. Desperately trying to stop myself from screaming while my health plummeted down to 20%, I dragged myself across the ground and toward the back of the camp. I couldn’t use any of my skills or I’d be kicked out of Stealth. I just had to hang on and hopefully get far enough out of range to get away.
“The trail,” yelled Colt, pointing to the line of disturbed dirt I was causing by dragging myself along. Why did he have to be so observant, all of a sudden?
He rushed toward me and started stabbing and slashing at the ground around me. Somehow, he managed to miss me. If I hadn’t been in such a bad position, it would have been almost comical how inept he was.
All of a sudden, I felt a searing pain in my side.
“No!” yelled Colt.
I just had enough time to look behind me and see a furious looking Joe holding the dagger that was sticking out of my ribcage before my vision went black.
Commiserations! You Are Dead.
You will respawn in 30 minutes at your last spawn location
All stats are reduced by 10% for 10 minutes after respawn.
Please note that death penalties are level dependent.
Have a nice day and Rest in Peace.
The thirty minutes passed in a blur of self-recrimination, worry for Soter and Allion, followed by anger at Andrew, before I finally decided I’d had enough. I was going back there with a group and I was going to wipe them out and get my Solomon’s Seal. This was hard enough as it was, I didn’t need the extra grief from another player. I’d had enough.
The darkness of the respawn space receded, giving way to a view of dappled sunlight. I was back in El Sanctum. Something rough and wet swiped across my face, bringing me back to the present moment with a start.
“Ewww,” I said, sitting up a
nd pushing away something warm and fuzzy to my left. I opened my eyes fully to find it was Soter licking my face.
I collapsed backward onto the soft grass around the marker stone with a thud.
“Ugggh,” my head hurt, and I felt like I’d been run over.
I focused on the little red icon of a bed in the bottom left of my vision to find the death debuff was the cause of my misery.
Glancing down at my XP bar, I realized I’d lost 10% of my progress. I’d gone from 25% of the way to level 11 all the way back to 15%.
“Ugggh,” I moaned again.
It finally dawned on me that the last I’d heard from Soter was him saying he was injured. I sat back up quickly and tried not to fall back down again as my vision swam from the sudden movement. I looked over at Soter to see if he was injured.
It is not serious.
So, he was still hurt. And yet here I was, whinging and not helping. I grabbed my staff out of my inventory and cast Wound Seal on Soter. Sure enough, a couple of the blue lines on the far side of his mostly transparent form were broken. I joined them back together and came out of the spell.
Much better. Thank you.
Another wave of guilt descended as I realized I had no idea how Allion was, either.
He is fine. He arrived just before you.
I slowly stood up and gingerly walked back to the center of El Sanctum, ready to find a strong group to help me with my quest.
49
Give Me One of Those Beers
I walked out into the center clearing to find yet another argument in full swing.
“No, I won’t have you going again,” yelled Mikael.
Allion’s face was so red I thought he was going to explode.
“It was not my fault,” he shouted back. “It was her idea we were executing, not mine. Besides, she has the advantage of being a traveler. If she dies, she gets to be reborn. I don’t. So, while it didn’t work out the way we’d wanted, I for one am glad I’m still in the land of the living.”
Mikael snorted, while Aliz and the Herbalist looked like they were about to start adding their own objections to it as well.
Soter let out a menacing growl and everyone fell silent, turning to look in my direction.
“What happened?” I asked Allion. “You were supposed to run a distraction for me.”
“When the rabble went after Soter, I moved toward the camp. Unfortunately, I didn’t notice a foot-sized hole in front of me. I tripped when my foot went into it and ended up knocking myself out,” he looked extremely embarrassed and pointed to a red lump on the side of his forehead. “By the time I came to, you had both already disappeared. So, I headed back here as fast as I could. Then this buffoon started yelling at me.”
Mikael took a step toward Allion, raising his fist and I quickly stepped between them.
“He’s right. I respawn, he doesn’t, so I’m glad he’s still alive,” I said as a look of surprise flashed briefly across Allion’s face.
“Besides, it was an accident,” I added, trying to get Mikael’s arm back down. “I’m here, I’m fine and I’ve decided we’re going back and we’re going to wipe them all out.”
“Fine,” Mikael growled, “But he’s staying here.”
He pointed at Allion, who looked like he was about to start yelling back.
“He helped me with the harpies we encountered. It was simply bad luck. If you want to hit anyone, hit the Dragon Hunters that killed me, okay?”
Allion was now grinning smugly.
“At the same time, I want to take a group that is used to fighting together, so I think it’s best if you stay here and sit this one out.”
The smug look vanished off Allion’s face and appeared on Mikael's.
Before anyone else could say anything, I passed all the ingredients we’d collected up to that point to the Herbalist, along with the extra parts of the Belladonna plant, which made him extremely happy.
“Now, since I have another seven minutes of this annoying death debuff, how about we sit down and plan this out? Plus, you can tell me what you found out at Ratters Town,” I said to Mikael, belatedly remembering where he’d been while I was out doing this quest.
Mikael sent one of the elf children that was playing close by to go and fetch Damir, Kira and one of her hunting parties, while I gratefully sat down on a handy tree stump with Soter at my feet.
Allion wanted to help, despite the fact he wouldn’t be coming with us. So, by the time Mikael sat down, Allion had managed to find somewhere out of Mikael’s line of sight that was close enough that he could still hear what was being said and chip in with suggestions.
“Things at Ratters Town are better than I’d hoped,” Mikael said as we waited for the others to appear.
“Apparently, there’s an underground anti-sigil movement. It was started by a woman named Kaylin Gemma. I asked around to find her, and it turns out she is the girl at the jewelry stand you were talking to before we got captured last time,” he grinned. “We chatted for a few minutes while I looked at getting another ring. She told me she took what you said about staying strong to heart and she’s been spreading the word, telling people to avoid getting a protection sigil. So far, she’s convinced nearly half the women in town to refuse a sigil, both for themselves and their children. I congratulated her and told her that if she needed either of us, she could find us with the elves. I’ve already spread the word that she should be allowed to enter El Silvam safely.”
Kira, who’d just walked over, nodded in agreement.
“Wow, I never thought anyone would run with my comment and end up doing so much. That’s awesome. Hopefully, Andrew will never find out who’s behind it, or who knows what he’ll do.”
The others had finally all arrived, so we set about planning our attack.
The nine of us, plus Soter, were finally approaching the same crest in the hill that I’d planned my ill-fated attack behind.
“Okay Mikael, you’re up. Let us know when your traps are in place,” I said, watching him crouch down into Stealth and vanish around the side of a large boulder.
I cast Minimizer on everyone, and we all ate some kind of food for the buffs as we waited. A few minutes later, Mikael confirmed he was ready. The elven scout had seen no unusual movement from the camp up above us. They clearly had no idea we were here, and they were simply sitting around the campfire eating, drinking and chatting away like they were on some sort of vacation.
Kira held up her hand to indicate the countdown. Three, two, one.
Chaos erupted in the camp as the five Dragon Hunters suddenly found themselves bombarded by seven sets of Rain of Arrows. Before they could scramble out of the way or grab their weapons, I focused on calling up a Fireball. I felt the pressure in my hand as the ball of fire formed almost instantly, then I let it loose and guided it directly at Joe, who was desperately trying to whip his group into some semblance of defense.
The Fireball, along with all the arrows, took him down to 25%. Before I could throw a second one, I saw lightning leave Damir’s hand and arc straight into Joe’s chest, taking the rest of his health in one shot.
Mikael, Kira and the other elves were rapidly making inroads on the health of the other four.
Colt had gotten his shield out of his inventory and was hiding underneath that, but the others weren’t so lucky. Screaming and shouting, they started to drop one by one, their health bars going up and down like yo-yos as they desperately tried to fend off death with their HP potions.
I spotted one of them grab yet another HP potion and pop the lid. Before he could down it, however, I threw a Fireball at it and watched in satisfaction as the potion bottle exploded in his hands. A well-aimed arrow from Mikael finished him off. The elves had taken out the other two at the same time.
“Stop him,” yelled Mikael.
I turned to see we’d lost sight of Colt who was still hiding behind his huge shield. He’d reached the first plant and was doing his best to destroy it before we could ge
t there.
“In!” Kira shouted.
All six of the elf hunters ran into the camp, pulling out their swords. Damir cast shields over the remaining plants, so they at least would stay safe, while Colt did his best to completely finish off the first plant.
Before the elves could reach Colt, Soter launched himself from the back of the camp. He dove underneath the edge of the shield and attacked Colt’s unprotected back. He managed to get out one scream and then the elves descended on him as well, finishing him off.
It had been a one-sided slaughter, over in less than a few minutes. A part of me felt guilty. I told that part to shut up.
The plant that Colt had been kicking and tearing was completely destroyed. He’d managed to put his sword through the root, as well. I had no idea if a broken root would do for the potions, since it had to be cut up to be prepared, but given that there was liquid seeping out from the root, I guessed it was probably a no go. That one small mistake to the recipe for the Frost potion I’d created that time had made me extremely weary of altering existing recipes.
I walked over to the second plant and bent down to pull it up. It was covered in white, bell-shaped flowers and little blue berries. I brushed the soil away from the roots on each side while carefully moving the plant back and forth. Somehow, I knew I couldn’t just blindly pull and expect things to work out.
You have received: Solomon Seal Root
Quality: Raw
Level: Apprentice
Uses: Poisons, Alchemy and other undefined
I popped it into my inventory and went to gather the other two plants as well.
As I looked around the campsite, I could see the others were collecting all the gear the Dragon Hunters had left behind.
“I’ve been needing a good longsword,” declared one of the elf hunters, holding up a huge, intricately engraved sword that he’d found in one of the tents.
“Jackpot!” shouted Mikael.
We all rushed over to see what he’d found.