by R. A. Mejia
“I don’t think it’ll be a problem for me to sneak in after dark. I’m small and can fly right over the walls. It wouldn’t be safe for me to travel around during the day but getting in shouldn’t be a problem,” Mary says.
“I hate to wear them, but I can disguise myself as one of the Imperare Empire’s soldiers. I have enough of their armor to create a convincing disguise.” I say, then look at Vrax, “The bigger problem is Vrax. I don’t think he’ll be able to sneak in on foot, and he can’t scale the walls unnoticed like you Mary. How are we supposed to get him in?”
Vrax thinks about this for a moment then tells me, “We could find a big cloak for you, and I could hide under it.”
I remember a movie where they tried that and say with a small smile, “Sorry, we don’t have an invisibility cloak. Your name isn’t Ron, and I don’t have a lightning bolt shaped scar on my forehead.”
Mary giggles at the reference but Vrax just nods, only understanding that his idea won’t work.
We sit and think for a few minutes before I say, “I don’t see any way that we can get Vrax into the city unless…”
“Unless?” Mary prompts.
“…unless he pretends to be a slave,” I finish quickly.
A low hiss escapes Vrax and his hand moves to the shortsword at his side.
“Look Vrax, if you can think of some other way to get you in the city, let’s hear it. It’s either this or you stay behind while we look around.”
Vrax looks angry for a moment. Like he’d like to stick a sharp object into me for even making the suggestion that he’d be a slave. Then his face takes on a resigned expression, his small shoulders sag, and he sighs, “No. I cannot think of anything better.”
I kneel beside him, put my hand on his shoulder and tell him, “I know this is hard for you. But it’s for the tribe. You taught me that we put the tribe before ourselves. We’ll suffer any indignity, any pain, any trial if it helps the tribe. That’s what this is, a trial. This is what you’ll have to do to help rescue our tribesmen.”
Mary flies up to Vrax and hugs him, “Don’t worry, you’ll only be pretending to be a slave. On the inside, you’ll still be a powerful kobold warrior.”
Vrax straightens up a little upon hearing Mary’s and my words. Instead of anger, or resignation, I see a look of determination on his face.
I’m proud that my kobold brother is willing to do what it takes to save our people. I open my [Inventory] and take out a set of manacles that I looted from the dead soldiers at the kobold tunnels. The restraints look like something out of an old prison movie. There’s a set of manacles that look like iron bracelets that are connected by a thick short chain. The wrist manacles are then attached by chain to a pair of metal ankle bracelets that are meant to restrict how fast someone can run or walk. Each wrist and ankle restraint has its own lock to make it as difficult as possible to open them and escape.
The sight of the chains and arm restraints makes Vrax twitch slightly, but he doesn’t say anything.
“Good. Now here’s how we’re going to do this. I looted these manacles from those assassins that attacked us in Restrian. I thought we might need to take a prisoner, but it looks like we’ll be using them to get Vrax into the city. I don’t have a key for them though,” I admit.
Mary gives me a funny look, but I continue on, “Instead I’ll damage the locking mechanism on the things. They’ll still close, but one good tug and they’ll just fall off.”
Vrax looks relieved that he can take the manacles and chains off himself.
“However, Vrax, you’ll have to look and act like a slave.” I continue, “Our cover story is that you're my slave and that I’m visiting a friend in the city.”
“No, that won’t work!” Mary interrupts. “Soldiers don’t keep slaves. If slaves are around, they’re property of the Empire, not the soldiers themselves. Even high ranking officers don’t own slaves, they’re just rewarded with their use by the Empire.”
“Then why are all those soldiers down there entering the city with people in chains?” I ask
Mary sighs and slaps her forehead. “I told you already. The soldiers capture people, mostly non-humans, on raids. They bring them back here to either work directly for the empire or sell them at auction to others. The soldiers get a reward for every person they bring in for sale with a larger reward for bringing in rarer creatures.”
Oh. I just thought all the soldiers had slaves. That puts some holes in my plan. Not sure what to use as a cover story anymore, I ask, “Well, what are we going to tell the guards then?”
Mary considers the problem for a moment, then suggests, “We tell them the truth.”
At my and Vrax’s look of confusion, she continues, “At least part of it. Imperare Empire soldiers were sent to Restrian and have taken it. A group was also assigned to take a local tribe of kobolds. You were left behind to chase after the few remaining ones, and Vrax is the only one you caught.”
“Then how do we explain why we didn’t come in with the other soldiers coming back from Restrian?” I ask.
“You bad!” Vrax blurts out. Before I can ask what he means he continues, “You bad soldier. When a member of the hunting party is bad they are made to do hard chores or boring things. To teach them to do better next time. Tell them you bad soldier and they made you walk all the way here.”
I consider the plausibility of Mary and Vrax’s stories. It should fit with the records of what happened in Restrian.
I nod in acceptance. “OK. That story does make more sense than what I came up with. We’ll go with that.”
I sit and take out one of the knives in my [Inventory] and fiddle around with the locking mechanism of the closed left manacle. After about 10 minutes of messing around with the lock, I hear a click and get a notification.
You've learned [Lock Picking]
Lock Picking
After examining a locking mechanism, you’ve begun to understand how you can override that system. With more advanced training and specialized tools, your proficiency in the skill will increase, and your chances of unlocking a lock will increase.
Bonus: 1% increased chance to unlock unknown lock.
Sweet. I love getting new skills.
Now that I have the manacle open, I spellwrite a small ‘fire’ symbol over the locking mechanism and pour my mana into it. The metal starts to get warm after a minute. I pour more of my mana into the symbol, and the metal takes on a red hue. I close my eyes and try to focus my mana and the heat energy being generated by the magical symbol inside the lock. I feel sweat pouring from my brow as I imagine the heat energy forming as a tight small ball gathering inside the lock instead of dissipating evenly throughout the manacle. Even with my eyes closed, I can feel the heat from the manacle in my hands increase. I hear a pop, and my concentration is broken.
When I open my eyes, the metal around the locking mechanism is white hot, and the lock itself is now fused, stuck in the open position.
I notice that I received a notification.
You've gained a level in Aura Projection: Novice 6.
I check my skills and see that my other spell skills have all grown closer to rising another level, but aura projection is the only one that actually leveled. Guess me imagining where the heat from the spell went raised that skill more than the others. Maybe there’s something I can do with that later.
I repeat the lock picking process and fuse the locking mechanisms for the other manacle and each ankle restraint. I feel quite tired when I’m done, and my mana is mostly gone. Thankfully my skills get an excellent workout for my effort. My newly acquired lock picking skill goes up to novice level 3 and my aura projection skill levels past novice 7 and half-way to level 8. My other spell skills almost hit novice level 7.
Once the metal cools down on all the parts of the restraints, I double check to make sure that the manacles close without locking. When I close them, they look just like they were locked to a casual observer but open with a good tug. Perfec
t.
I hand the restraints to Vrax. “Here you go, buddy. Test them for yourself. They’ll open and close whenever you want them too.”
Vrax takes the chains and manacles hesitantly. He tests the parts that are going to go around his wrists, closing and opening them multiple times to make sure they won’t entrap him. Then finally, Vrax closes his eyes, puts the first manacle on his left wrist, and closes it. He peeks through one slitted eye as if expecting some great magical force to take hold once he’d put on the object. He looks at the manacle again and opens it once more, just to make sure it still won’t lock. He nods once, finally accepting the situation.
Vrax can’t put on the right manacle with his left arm restrained so instead puts on the ankle restraints, and I help him close the last manacle over his right wrist.
Looking at my friend with his blood red leather armor and the shortsword sheathed at his waist, I realize, even in the restraints, he doesn’t have the appearance of a prisoner.
I glance at Mary and see her biting her lip, likely thinking the same thing I am.
“Uh, Vrax. I’m real proud of you for putting the manacles on but you’re going to have to take off your armor and weapons.”
Vrax looks up at me and glares slightly but says, “I know I won’t get to keep them. Will you put it in your inventory? Keep them safe?”
“Of course. I’m just at the limit of how much I can carry. Let me drop some of my things.”
I look through my [Inventory] and see that the heaviest things I have in there are the Imperare chainmail shirt and pants. They provide five defense each when worn, but when I tested them were a lot harder to wear and move in than the clothing I’m wearing now. I think I may need special training to wear heavy armor like that effectively. I drop the chainmail armor on the ground and take the custom-made leather armor Vrax wears and his shortsword.
Looking down at Vrax, I feel slightly nostalgic. The sun glistens off his dusky red scales, and he looks particularly fierce with the two black horns over his eye ridges. Even though he’s only wearing a loincloth and restraints, he still looks ready to fight. If he weren't chained up and had a stone knife in his hands, then he’d look just like he did the first time we met.
Holding Vrax’s armor in my hands, I recollect that we got the material to make him this armor from the boss monster in the Restrian dungeon. It was a giant boar whose tusks were longer than Vrax is tall. Once we killed it, it dropped a rare hide as a reward, and we made armor for both Vrax and Mary out of it. Thinking back on our time in the Restrian dungeon it feels like a lifetime has passed. I know it’s only been days, but so many bad things have happened since then.
I feel a slap on the back of my head, and hear Mary say, “Hey, stop day dreaming Snorlax. We have work to do.”
I smile up at her hovering form. She’s right, no time to reminisce, focus on the now.
The armor and sword Vrax hands to me goes right into my [Inventory] and I take out the set of Imperare Empire leather armor.
Imperare leather armor (set)
A set of leather armor crafted in mass by the Imperare Empire. It includes a leather shirt, pants, gloves, and boots. Not made from the best material it provides adequate protection.
Defense: 11 as set
The armor isn’t as good as what Mary and Vrax have, but it’s still better than the six defense my regular clothing provides. Plus the armor has gloves that will hide my red hands, a very distinctive trait of mine.
I equip the leather armor and look down at myself. The leather is dyed black and is otherwise unadorned. I rotate my arms and legs to adjust the fit of the armor and stretch out the leather slightly. My hands feel a little weird in the gloves, and my movement feels slightly restricted.
“You look like a soldier,” Vrax hisses through his pointed teeth. Looking at my friend’s expression, I can tell it’s not a compliment.
I nod, understanding how I must look to him. “Yeah, I’m not exactly comfortable wearing this stuff but I’ll put up with it till we finish the mission.”
I also equip the battleaxe and shield from my [Inventory]. The weapons appear in my hands and I look like I’m ready for battle, so I sling my shield on my back and attach the battleaxe to my belt. After everything is stored, I pull up my [Status] screen.
Name: Armon Ellington
Age: 19
Level: 4
Class: none
Titles: none
Experience Points to next level: 640
Unspent Stat points 5
Health: 46
Stamina: 62
Mana: 16 / 76
Str: 16 Int: 22
Dex: 17 Wis: 12
Con: 18 Cha: 12
Defense: 23
One handed Damage: 5 - 8
Woah. I just went from seven defense to twenty-three. Having decent armor really makes a difference. Too bad the set I have now is tainted by the Imperare. Maybe I can find a heavy armor trainer, and I can get some nice plate mail. The amount of damage I can do with the axe is a lot less than I could do with my spear but that makes sense since I don’t have a weapon skill for the axe yet.
Looking over my [Status] screen, I realize the stat points I received upon reaching level 4 remain unspent. I figure my intelligence is rather good right now and the amount of mana I have hasn’t been an issue so far. My wisdom and charisma are my lowest stats, but I’m still not exactly sure how they affect me. I know my Charisma influences how people view me, but beyond that, I don’t know how useful it is. One of my bigger concerns is how few health points I have and how quickly they disappear in a fight. I’ll spend three points on constitution and two points on strength. I figure I can’t go wrong increasing my ability to wallop things.
The changes to my stats gain me an extra point of damage with my axe, raises my stamina to seventy-two and my health to fifty-four.
That all settled, I close my [Status] screen.
“Everyone ready?” I ask.
“It’ll be just you and Vrax until nightfall. I won’t be able to fly over the walls until then.” Mary advises.
I nod in understanding. Then Vrax and I begin our journey towards the city gates of Valse.
Chapter 1.5
Vrax and I walk down the hill we’ve been using as an impromptu base and through the forest towards the main road leading to Valse. Our pace is slowed down by Vrax’s leg restraints and the extra weight of my leather armor and shield. It takes us half an hour to get to the main road instead of the fifteen minutes I expected. Along the way, Vrax and I keep a constant lookout for Imperare patrols or other people heading towards the city. We’ve already decided to act the part of ‘soldier’ and ‘captured prisoner’ just in case anyone is listening or watching.
It’s still mid-morning by the time we finally get on the main road, but with our reduced walking speed I don’t think we’ll reach Valse until the afternoon. There are other people on the road with us. Individuals carrying packs, groups of two or three pulling handcarts, and merchants with horses and wagons. Just about everyone passes us. We keep to the right side of the road since traffic flows both ways on the broad trail. A few times we even have to get off the road entirely for someone coming through on a horse in a hurry.
I’m feeling annoyed by our slow pace and probably show it on my face since just about everyone turns away from me when I look in their direction. So, it’s a little bit of a surprise when I hear a voice call out from behind, “Hey soldier!”
I turn my head slightly as if I’m trying to keep my kobold prisoner in sight and see a heavyset man waving at me from the top of a covered wagon being pulled by two draft horses. I yell for my kobold ‘prisoner’ to stop and he does so while keeping his head down.
As the man driving the wagon gets closer, I see that he’s in his mid-thirties, got quite the belly going, is balding on top, and doesn’t seem to have shaved in the last couple weeks since he has a patchy thin beard coming in. He maneuvers the wagon to the side of the road where I’m stand
ing and pulls on the reins bringing the whole thing to a stop. He sets the brake on the wagon then shimmies over to the edge of the driver's bench and says in a gruff voice, “Hey there soldier. Been watching you for a while. Looks like it’ll take you all day to get to Valse at the pace you're going. Want a ride? You can put your cargo in back with mine and sit up front with me. Don’t worry about it escaping, the others will keep an eye on it.”
I look at the driver and can make out several figures behind him. Should I take the man up on his offer? It’ll speed up our journey, and it may give me a chance to get some information about Valse before I get there.
I smile at the man, “That’s a mighty kind offer, sir. I’ll take you up on it. My feet are killing me.”
He smiles back, and I see that he’s missing one of his front teeth. “Just throw the kobold in the back and join me up front.”