by Sean Oswald
Dave’s long legs made it difficult for them to keep pace with him, but they did their best as he ran forward. A slash to the right cut down one elven archer who was trying to pull up a fallen comrade with an arrow in the thigh. Without even looking, Dave spun to the right and took the head from the shoulders of a wounded man who was leaning on a slightly less wounded elf.
Some watching Dave might have called him a berserker. In actuality, he was anything but that. His actions were deliberate and focused as he mowed down enemies. Each step, each swing of the arm meant to end an invader, and at times when none were within reach, he would cycle through his spells casting Lesser Repulsions or Minor Bindings, and when targets were even further away, he would launch a Minor Force Stomp or Magic Missiles depending on which was off of cooldown at the moment.
The warriors and citizens of Eris’ Rise saw him as a veritable wrecking ball against the enemies. Some looked on with pride in the might of their Baron, others in fear of his ferocity as Dave fought back against the enemy. His spell armor took more than one sword blow and turned it from dangerous to a mere inconvenience. He would dodge and spin amongst his enemies.
One archer launched three arrows point-blank at him, but a timely cast Lesser Repulsion, while not sufficient to stop the penetrating power of the arrows, was angled just right to sheer the metal arrowheads off. Instead of becoming a pin cushion, his spell armor and the armor he wore underneath took the brunt of the force. The most injury he would have in the morning was a colorful bruise. The archer was not so lucky as he was unable to get his bow turned in time to use it as a staff and block the descending blow. Instead, the flaming blade sheared off half of his face and a quick thrust into his chest finished him.
The pursuit of the fleeing invaders ranged far enough that after a couple of minutes the healing spells of priests stopped landing on him, but it didn’t matter. His human and elven lieutenants were cut and bleeding but fighting right alongside him. All three men’s chests were heaving, and by the time his ablative armor finally fell and the duration of his second enlarging spell had ended, they were at the gate of the city and not one of the five attackers had made it out of Eris’ Rise alive.
Dave almost kept going on past the wall, but multiple voices called for him to stop. Finally he came to his senses and heard the voices of the needy around him over the cry of exultation, the voice within him that sang songs of his invulnerability. He turned and saw that despite the fact that this had been a resounding success in military terms, his people were still hurting. Some had been killed, more had been injured, even more had some part of their property destroyed, and all were deeply emotional. The joy of victory swept through the town tempered by fear and a sense of vulnerability from being attacked twice in a single day.
As he stopped, Dave got a notification indicating that the battle was truly over, and he shouted out orders for everyone to rally in the town square. When asked about sending men to guard the wall in case of another attack, he said that it wasn’t necessary to send more than a token guard to warn of any further attacks, better that the wounded should rest and the fit should help in other ways. With a thought, he sent his rhino, bleeding and limping after the elves who fled to the east. Then he looked at the notification in more detail.
You have won the military-style event: Defend Eris’ Rise from Elven Rebels Part 1.
* * *
Combatants on your side: 428
Friendly combatants killed: 7
Non-combatants killed: 1
Number of Enemy combatants: 305
Enemy combatants killed: 251
* * *
XP gained: 40,630 each participant on the victorious side receives 95 XP per level possessed before any personal bonuses or penalties.
* * *
Leader of the Battle: David Nelson receives +10 morale bonus to the population of Murkwood. Personal faction bonus offset by new found fear caused by actions in battle.
* * *
Leader of the Battle: Steffen Eikhorn receives +10 faction with Eris’ Rise. You can see your people are thankful to this leader, and you feel a measure of that as well.
* * *
Personal XP gained: 47 *tier penalty* racial bonus= 71
Well once again it was demonstrated that battlefield XP was not the way to go, but it had still needed to be done.
Chapter Twelve
Only from the greatest struggles come the greatest gains — Way of the Dragon
Dungeon: Tomb of David Nelson - Emily, Mira and Dave Nelson
The monk was moving fast, and for as slender as he was, his grip was as strong as iron. After he had gone a dozen running steps, she stopped trying to break free from his grasp and assumed her most commanding voice. “Master Daichi, I command you to set me down this instant!”
At first she didn’t think he had heard her because he kept running for another half dozen heartbeats before he finally slowed and called out, “Halt!” The command brought Rak’kar to a stop, and both men set their burdens down.
An outside viewer would have immediately noticed the mirrored body language and the same imperious tone adopted by mother and daughter as they both shook themselves and then placed a finger on the chest of the one who had been carrying them before saying in unison, “Don’t you ever do that again.”
No sooner than they had said it than they both turned and looked at each other. Emily broke into a grin that her daughter had sounded so much like she her, and the levity of the moment made her anger relax. Mira on the other hand was horrified to have acted just like her mother.
Before either of them could say anything else though, Daichi said, “Lady Emiri, you may assign whatever punishment you deem fitting, but the only task more important for the Meiyo Eihei than obeying your will is protecting your life.” He stared at her intently for a second, and when she said nothing, continued, “Now we are still not in the clear and I don’t know how long the paladin can hold that beast at bay. We need to get out of this dungeon.”
“Wait, we aren’t leaving …” Again, both mother and daughter had started to speak simultaneously as though choreographed.
“Let me,” Emily said without even turning towards Mira who mumbled, “Sure thing.”
“We are not leaving Jaselm to die.” The command within her voice was obvious.
“Lady Emiri, if we don’t leave now then we risk his sacrifice being in vain,” Daichi responded.
“Oh screw this, I’m not waiting to talk about it!” Mira exclaimed as she ran down the hallway in the direction they had just come from.
Emily watched her. She couldn’t help but be proud of the decisive young woman that Mira was becoming, even though being her parent was frustrating at times. The good thing was that her decisive action saved the time of arguing with the monk. He was too distracted watching the running teenager to stop Emily from following after her.
Emily got close enough to see that the creature’s breath spewed forth not flames but large green droplets, and a green mist filled the hallway and covered Jaselm. He was instantly lost from sight as was anything beyond the cloud. The sizzling sound of the acid eating into the stone was soon interrupted by the screams ripped out of the paladin’s lips as his golden magical shield was overwhelmed by the breath weapon.
She accessed Jaselm through the group interface, and even though she couldn’t see him in the acid mist, she was still able to target him with a quickened Minor Heal (120) and then a Lesser Regeneration. It didn’t come any too soon as his health displayed on the party interface had been falling far too rapidly. The healing didn’t stop the screaming or remove the pain, but it at least kept him alive.
Meanwhile, instead of healing, Mira set into motion her plan to destroy the acid cloud. She recalled some theory from one of her science classes about being able to lower the pH of acid by dropping its temperature. She wasn’t sure if it would work, but hearing Jaselm scream while surrounded by the acid spray made her desperate to do something.
; Once she was close enough, she used her air walker trait and took two steps up into the air where she hovered just long enough to quick cast Frost Wave. Mira focused all of her will into shaping the spell and felt the magic form bend to her will. Instead of spreading out to cover the entire area of the tunnel, the wave spread and expanded to cover the sides of the tunnel and the area above human height. She didn’t want her spell to cause any more harm to the paladin if she could help it. As the wave of frost blasted off of her fingers, she focused on intensifying the cold, dropping the temperature rather than creating more ice.
While doing so she got a notification which almost cost her the focus required to hold the spell form and channel mana into it.
Warning! You are attempting to force an existing spell form, Frost Wave, into that of another established spell form, Inferior Cone of Cold. The new spell form exceeds your Evocation Magic capacity and will fracture with unpredictable consequences.
* * *
Proceed? Yes No
It only took her computer-like mind an instant to process this and a fraction of a second more to realize what the solution was. The problem was that she didn’t know if she could maintain this spell form with the rate mana was flowing out of her and still be able to do what was necessary. Oh well, only one way to find out. Mira’s risk-taking was a leap from the timid teenager of a few months ago. With determination, she opened her notifications and scanned through quickly before assigning the character points necessary to increase her evocation.
Your party has defeated:
Drake Hound Alpha: Warrior Variant Level 22. 152 XP (After applying numerical bonus, Tier penalty and racial bonus)
* * *
Your party has defeated:
Drake Hound Alpha: Shaman Variant Level 22. 152 XP (After applying numerical bonus, Tier penalty and racial bonus)
* * *
Your party has defeated:
10 Drake Hound Warriors Level 16: 715 XP (After applying all applicable bonuses and penalties)
* * *
Your party has defeated:
8 Assorted Bestial Warriors Level: 11: 393 XP (After applying all applicable bonuses and penalties)
* * *
Total XP gained: 1,112
* * *
You have gained levels 20 and 21
Total XP: 7,420
XP to next level: 540
You have gained 56 Character Points
Total Character Points: 135
You have gained 13 Stat Points
Total Stat Points: 13
There wasn’t even time to celebrate that she had passed into Tier 3. Instead, she simply slammed 20 points into Evocation along with 20 points into Shape Spell. Then she clicked on Yes to proceed with altering the spell form. In the briefest of moments it took her to go through that process, she had already directed half of her total mana supply into the spell form trying to maintain it. And it was working.
The acid mist was turning into a green snow of sorts, and a quick glance at Jaselm’s life bar in the group interface was no longer precipitously dropping, but was instead stable or even climbing again, no doubt thanks to her mom’s healing. She also found that the spell form was much easier to control. It was like she had been running with ankle weights on and they finally came off. Everything about it seemed easier. The spell did exactly what she wanted.
You have learned a new spell:
Inferior Cone of Cold.
She minimized the notification without even looking at the text of the new spell. No time for that now, for as the mist cleared, she saw Jaselm who still had some gruesome injuries– places on the exposed skin of his face eaten through to show bone. She wasn’t sure how he had survived this, but there he was still standing. His golden, magical shield was gone, and the metal shield clinging to his arm looked like it had been chewed up and spit out. She raced forward descending to the floor as she saw the monstrosity in front of her coiling backwards like it was going to spring at them. She couldn’t help but admire its beauty. It was a majestic creature, a majestic engine of death, but majestic all the same. Its front claws were gouging into the stone of the level above them, and still Mira raced forward.
She landed on the floor next to Jaselm and grabbed onto his arm only to pull it back from the still acidic liquid clinging to his corroding armor. “Come on, we have to go,” Mira implored him, and when he didn’t respond, she yelled, “Now!”
The paladin, who normally always had a kind word or bold jest to make, didn’t do more than mumble as he started walking backwards. Mira was then able to see his face and saw that his lips looked melted together. Her heart broke for the suffering he must be enduring, and her stomach did flips over the wreck of his face. “Turn and run. Let me hold it off for a second.”
About that time, Rak’kar came up and started helping Jaselm even though the residual acid on his armor made sizzling sounds against the bullman’s hairy flesh. Behind her, she heard Daichi and her mother arguing, but she simply yelled back, “I can gate, remember? Now run!”
Then Mira activated her staff’s final charge of a magical shield and held out her hand with the ring of spell storing on it to cast the final Lesser Repulsion. The creature’s front foot sped towards her with eight-inch claws ready to rip her open. The spell wasn’t meant to stop the swiping attack, only to knock it off course. She then quick cast a web spell straight into the creature’s face. The hope was that as it was overextended and off-balance from the disrupted swipe, the webbing covering its face would slow it down even more.
It worked even though the creature seemed to be recovering faster than she would have liked. Still, Mira began running and waited for a count of five before turning back. The rest of the party was further down the tunnel. She could see Rak’kar aiding the limping Jaselm, and it looked like the monk was carrying her unconscious mother. There was sure to be a story there, but there was no time to consider it as the now much smaller drake was following her down the tunnel. It was back to being horse-sized, but Mira had no illusions about how that would change the outcome of a direct conflict.
She had one last trick to pull out, and so she quick cast her Elementaling. She hadn’t used the spell other than to test it out once, and casting it like this ate up all the mana she had left except what she was reserving for her Gate spell. At the behest of her magic, a vaguely man-shaped creature of earth and stone formed up out of the ground, leaving a hole where it had been.
She instructed it to stop the oncoming drake. The elementaling didn’t have a face, but Mira still swore that its expression revealed how incredulous it thought the situation was. The little stone man surfed along the tunnel floor before impacting the furious drake. Then rather than striking at the armored lizard, it hugged the drake’s front leg and reshaped itself to cling to the floor as a trap for the creature’s leg.
The surprise attack caught the drake off guard as it somersaulted over the trapped leg before rising back up to start slashing and biting at the rock creature holding it. Mira thought that it might be enough for her not to have to Gate, and sure enough, by the time the drake broke free, the rest of the party had already exited the dungeon, and Mira was only a few seconds behind them. It had been a panicked race out, but now that she was panting and leaning up against the side of the cave, she couldn’t help but grin from ear to ear.
After catching her breath, Mira asked, “So what did you do to her?” while motioning over to her mother’s inert form on the ground.
The minotaur said nothing but was busy passing multiple water bottles to Jaselm in an effort to wash off the residual acid left. Daichi looked like he was going to blush in embarrassment if his complexion would have allowed it.
“Don’t get me wrong, there have been lots of times in my life that I would have liked to be able to get her to shut up,” Mira said with a playful grin.
That seemed to get to the monk, “You should not speak like that about your noble mother. Lady Emiri is a great leader, and from what I have seen,
she is a caring mother.” Then looking down, he added, “I only had to contain her for her own good.”
“Contain, like how? Did you use magic on her or something?” Mira’s nose wrinkled up a bit as she reached out with her class based innate ability to sense magic. “I don’t feel any magic.”
“No, little lady, I am not a caster. I did not use magic on her,” Daichi answered.
Mira stood up and walked over towards where her mother lay all the while looking at the monk as if waiting for him to explain further. When he didn’t say anything else, she asked, “Well then, what did you do to her?”
“I simply used a pressure point knock out,” He replied nonchalantly.
“You mean that actually works? Back home the only time it works is in the lame-o kung-fu movies my dad and brother watched,” Mira answered snarkily.
“Kung what?”
“Never mind, it’s a thing from our home. It isn’t important,” Mira said before changing the subject. “So will she be okay?”