by ilo man
“Cheers, Little Red,” he said in his mind, his words brimming with love.
“Used nearly half my mana,” Little Red moaned.
“I owe you,” Vinnie whispered to her. “I’ll find you more mana.”
“And I’ll protect you.”
“What does it mean?” Vinnie asked.
“What?”
“HOTCL?”
Heavy-on-the-Cock’s level.
The system chortled, and Vinnie began to wonder about that as his conscious pulled itself to the forefront of his mind, and he knew that not only was he healed, but also in some way he was more powerful as if his bond with Little Red was now complete.
He jumped up and ambled over to his Demon Core, picking her up and tucking her into his pant pocket. Gold shimmered around his groin, sparkling, and then sucked back like a thick smoky backdraft.
“Forget it,” Little Red whispered, “you got a hole in your pocket. I just fed off your ring.”
“You and the ring will make a good team,” Vinnie said, and then smiled at Atrixa and Angel.
“Ladies,” he said. “Shall we get some food? I could eat a horse.”
“You want one?” asked Little Red, her laughter echoing through his subconscious.
Vinnie staggered and fell into Angel’s arms—his energy not quite replenished.
Congratulations! Your party killed forty crackcrawlers. Crackcrawlers are a hideous grafting of human NPCs and a vicious species of frog that lives in the bogs of Neverwood. Crackcrawlers are the servants of Sivatious. They are the forerunners. If they come, evil is close behind.
The land awards your party 50 XP per kill. Your share is two thirds as you are gifted your core’s share – 1333. Your current XP is now 15,633. You are still level 6. You need 4,367 XP to get to your next level.
He woke in a tent. Both Angel and Atrixa looked down at him, deep creases and rippling frowns on their foreheads. Their lips pursed and skin pale. His eyes flickered open, a faint grin dancing on his lips, changing Angel and Atrixa’s tight lips to nervous smiles.
“I told you he’d be alright,” Atrixa crowed.
“He’s filled with her magic and the ring’s magic,” Angel muttered, her voice packed with awe.
“Hey,” Vinnie said, his own voice croaky. “Where am I?”
“My camp,” said Atrixa. “Sorrell’s cooking up some broth for you, and Gorbon and Borbon are waiting outside, ale ready. How are you feeling?”
“I think I’m fine.”
“Think?” asked Angel, leaning forward.
Vinnie shrugged. “Never been shot by an arrow and healed by a Demon Core-Cock Ring combination before.” He gave himself a mental once-over. “I’m definitely hungry, and ale sounds nice.”
Atrixa threw her arms around him. “It’s good to see you, Vinnie.”
“So, how comes you’re here, not Slaughterhaven?”
“We rode north after we sent you on your way. Sorrell’s in touch with the land’s stone, being a half-giant and a rock-brother and so he senses things. The night after you left he felt a terrible wrench, a dire wrong like something had been torn from the earth’s heart. We knew dread forces were at work and decided to travel north and see.”
“Hell’s Bane,” Vinnie hissed.
“We think so.”
“So, you’re the resistance?”
“Yes.”
“And there’s more,” Angel said, reaching out, squeezing Vinnie’s arm. “They saw Fin.”
Atrixa laughed. “We saw The Wanton Witch. I have no idea who this Fin is.”
“What did she look like?”
“The Wanton Witch? She was riding a black horse, an elegant beast, and she held her staff by her side, its tip glowing gold. Her hair was jet black, same as her cloak, and her face was powder-white.”
“Did she say anything? Do anything?”
Atrixa shook her head. “No, she just rode up the road, through the fleeing refugees, the NPCs, and they parted like sea-swell cut by an elegant galleon. She said nothing, didn’t even turn. Her eyes were solely focused on the Twin Mountains, on the purple storm and on Sivatious’s lair.”
Sorrell eased his way through the tent flap. “I heard someone say her eyes looked distant, like her soul had been frozen.”
“Or her heart broken,” Little Red chimed in.
“I brought you some broth,” Sorrell said, handing it to Angel, and then pulling Vinnie up, resting him against a pile of bulging sacks. “Yeah, they say she was dead focused. We think Sivatious has found his match. The Wanton Witch will smite him for sure.”
Vinnie glanced at Angel, and they swapped concerned looks. Neither of them truly knew what powers The Wanton Witch had, they only really knew Fin, pretty Fin, vulnerable Fin, and scary Fin, but only if you bonked her intended.
“So, you think she needs your help, Vinnie?” Atrixa asked.
There was more than a hint of humor lacing Atrixa’s words, and Vinnie understood why. She’d known him as daft Vinnie, easy Vinnie, not the committed Vinnie he was now.
“Things have changed,” he said, seriously.
“I told you they would, once you see her. Did she make you fall in love with her, Vinnie? Did she bewitch you?”
Vinnie couldn’t lie to Atrixa, his memories of her too full of pleasure, and of love, as Little Red had told him.
“She bewitched me, but not how you think. She’s not the person you believe. Fin needs help.”
“And there’s that name again,” Atrixa said.
“Fin,” Vinnie repeated, and then he told her about The Wanton Witch and Fin, her alter ego.
“So that’s how she stole people’s hearts,” Atrixa mused.
“No, I think that was the real her.”
“But how do you know? If someone has an alter ego, how do you know which is the true person?”
Vinnie’s brain decided to start hurting. His stomach rumbled.
Angel handed him his broth.
“So, what’s the plan?” Sorrell asked.
Angel and Vinnie swapped glances again. “We didn’t exactly have one,” Angel admitted.
“So you were just going to ride up and offer to help her?”
“We hadn’t exactly thought that far,” Vinnie admitted.
“Sorrell, get Gorbon to go fetch Tallahassee.”
Sorrell grunted, pushed himself up and struggled out of the tent flap. Borbon popped through in his wake, a hearty jug of ale in one hand, and a cluster of mugs in the other. “I knew I could rely on yer, Vinnie,” he said in his gruff way. “I said, ‘If anyone can get themselves into a bind, it’d be Vinnie’. When they told me someone had killed all the crackcrawlers, I told everyone it’d be you. So, are you off to fight Sivatious once and fer all, like you did the World Serpent?”
“Not quite,” Vinnie replied, taking a mug of ale from Borbon. “And I’m not on my own.”
“So I see, and who may this beauty be? Borbon’s the name.”
“Angel.”
“Yer sure are,” said Borbon, and Vinnie grinned from ear to ear, pleased to be back with his friends. Sorrell came back, Gorbon in tow, and accompanied by possibly the most gorgeous mouse Vinnie had ever seen. He assumed it was Tallahassee, so never worried about a perception check. She had a light covering of walnut-brown hair, a pointed face, and whiskers protruding from a little pink nose, beady eyes above. A shocking white mowhawk ran from her forehead vanishing into the folds of her hooded, green tunic.
“Tallahassee,” the mouse said with a fluid bow.
“Vinnie, Angel,” Atrixa introduced them both.
Tallahassee offered her hand, more a hand-paw-cross. She had a lithe body, thin, and Vinnie could only think, efficient—Tallahassee had an efficient body.
“Tallahassee’s our scout,” Atrixa told him.
Tallahassee crouched down between Atrixa and Angel. “So, you wanna know the coup?”
Her quiet voice still punched his ears with her word’s intent—soft yet strong, demanding
an answer. “Yes,” said Vinnie, setting his ale mug down, bringing his pot of broth back up, spooning it greedily in. He felt like a king, sitting up in his bed, his servants crouched along its edge.
“The Wanton Witch is about fifty miles out from the Twin Mountains. She’s carved a rent in Sivatious’s army, golden magic spewing from her hands like a dragon’s breath—but these are just orcs, none well marshaled.”
“And now?” Vinnie asked, globs of fat spilling down his chin.
“Now, she waits. I think she wants Sivatious to come to her. I think she must doubt her power, doubt it will prevail under the mountains where the goblin and the Hell’s Bane rule.”
“So we can catch up with her there?” Angel asked, hope filling her voice, but nerves tempering its enthusiasm. She reached out a shaky hand, grabbing Vinnie’s thigh. Her eyes challenging Atrixa as her palm staked her claim.
“Why? Do you have something to offer?” Tallahassee asked, her little eyes darting from Angel to Atrixa.
Atrixa rested her palm on Vinnie’s upper thigh. “He has The One Ring; its virility fills him, its magic flows through his veins.” Her eyes challenged Angel’s. Mini Vinnie perked—an unwelcome intrusion. Vinnie put his broth down, adjusting his modesty. Tallahassee’s eyes lingered on his pile. Her whiskers twitched.
“Can you get us to her?” Vinnie asked.
Tallahassee stroked her furry chin. “A small party, maybe. Five, possibly six of you? Certainly no more than that.”
“Then it’s set,” Borbon’s gruff voice rang out. “Me, Gorbon, Atrixa and Sorrell will accompany him, just like we did through Roarforst—and we made it through that dread place unscathed.”
Angel lifted her hand from Vinnie’s leg, dumping it straight on his crotch. “I’m coming, it’s Vinnie and me, and while we welcome your help, it is just that. We need to get to The Wanton Witch, and with all your help, we might just get there.”
Vinnie understood it wasn’t the time or the place, but he couldn’t help but get quite aroused by the possessiveness of the two lush women before him.
His eyes though settled on Tallahassee.
“So will you take us?”
She nodded her head. “We leave just before dawn.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
“Equip chainsticks.”
Vinnie faced the slathering beast. It towered over him, fangs dripping yellow saliva, eyes narrowed with rage. The chainsticks appeared, Vinnie moved them fluidly from one hand to the other, just like Angel had taught him, relentlessly, every single damn morning.
“Come on then, you ugly fucker. Let’s get it on,” Vinnie growled, the orc immobile, like a beast mountain looking down at a dog, wondering whether to swat it out of the way. It lunged—its first mistake. Vinnie skipped to one side, flicking the sticks behind his back, catching the lead one behind his shoulder and snapping his outer arm down, the trailing stick arcing toward the nape of the orc’s neck and connecting with a sickening crunch. The beast ’s knees crumpled, its head bent in defeat. Angel rode past, decapitating it, pulling her mount around, offering Vinnie a hand. He pulled himself up, swinging his leg over, sliding in behind her.
“Unequip chainsticks.”
“Thanks,” he shouted in her ear, his hands now free, reaching around her perfect waist. She pulled alongside his horse. Vinnie sprang across.
“Equip Morningstar.” His old friend appeared in his hand. He forged back into battle, crunching orc heads as he joined the fray. Borbon’s hammer rose and fell. Atrixa’s arrows rained down from afar, and Sorrell stood front and center attracting the agro, his staff a blur of splattering blood and flying orc fangs.
The battle turned, like they all had, victory coming their way. This time Little Red had been useless, the trap had been sprung too fast and the field of battle too compact, too confused. The last of the orcs fell. The party’s way now clear. Tallahassee wandered back through the fray. “It’s like they can sense you,” she told Vinnie.
Congratulations! Your party killed an orc patrol. Orcs are fearsome creatures, but none too bright. You should be ambushing them, not the other way around. Orcs are the servants of Sivatious and are considered a stain on this land. They are the evil that is close behind.
The land awards your party 150 XP each. Your share is one-seventh of the total. Your current XP is now 19,494. You are still level 6. You need 6 XP to get to your next level.
“Tight bastard,” Vinnie muttered. “Six short!”
His XP had been climbing, encounters with Sivatious’s troops had become more and more regular as they’d closed on the mountains. They soon rode away from the blood and guts, leaving the ever loot-thirsty dwarves to pick their enemies clean.
“That’ll do for the day,” Tallahassee declared. “There are two decent spots for the night. One up there,” and she pointed to a rocky bluff poking out of a tree-lined hill, “or at its feet, there’s a river where we can wash up.”
Angel laughed. “No water for Vinnie.”
Tallahassee scrunched her tiny nose up. “He’s smelling a bit ripe; surely we can guard him while he scrubs up? I’ll bet Sivatious’s forces can smell him from those damnable mountains.”
And damnable they were too, and close now, rising black monoliths under a roiling black and mauve, cloud-filled sky. The lightning was near constant, slashes cracking down, the thunder vibrating through their bodies, dousing the fire in their hearts.
“We seem to be getting ambushed far too much,” Angel agreed.
“I don’t stink that much,” Vinnie protested but knew the truth of it. He’d steered clear of any water but the ale variety since his encounter with the nymphs.
Six returned stares confirmed he did stink.
“Sod all loot on them orcs,” Borbon moaned as Sorrell helped him on to his destrier.
“Evil clearly doesn’t pay too well,” Gorbon muttered, as he too mounted up.
Tallahassee led them toward the river, Vinnie’s heart beating faster with every passing stride. When they did arrive at the river, he would have happily camped on its meander, if it weren’t for the memories of those twisted, blue faces. His humiliation was completed as he stripped and washed while his six companions watched the water around him. Though Vinnie did notice Tallahassee hadn’t taken her eyes off his manhood and ring. She began pointing at it, whispering to Angel, who nodded in agreement.
He waded farther in, nervously scanning the rippling, blue water, until he was chest deep and cock-under.
They were well into the foothills now and shadowing the road north. Vinnie finished up, dressing as fast as he could, letting the others do their thing, then scampering into the cover of the trees. They climbed up toward the rocky bluff. Tallahassee had chosen well.
The rock promontory gave them a clear view of the wooded valley and plain sight of the stone bridge that spanned it, that headed north to Sivatious’s lair. The river was some kind of endpoint, the clouds above lining its edge.
“Definitely giant-built,” Sorrell muttered, pointing at the bridge.
Vinnie stretched out, trying to warm up, the last of the day’s sun beaming down on him. Shade stifled the valley’s other side, the very edge of the ominous, billowing cloud like a wall of hatred.
“Make the most of it,” Tallahassee said, sitting next to him.
“The sun?”
“Everything. The sun, the peace…”
“We’ve just fought off a band of orcs. What peace?”
She scoffed. “Trust me, once we cross that river, we’re the band of invaders, and they’ve got the home field advantage. Once we cross, there’s no going back.” Lying down, she twisted around to face him. “So, what’s the endgame here? You can’t possibly hope to beat Sivatious with just seven of us.”
“Eight,” he said, grimly. “Fin will survive.”
“Seven, eight…”
“We have to stop them coming south—interrupt their flow while Tinderell readies her defenses. I’ve seen what these cores can do.
If a fledgling one can swallow a whole load of crackcrawlers, imagine what an ancient core can do.”
Tallahassee considered his words. “I’m not sure it works quite like that. I think they reach a peak and then fade. Magic is like desire; it needs a strong fire burning to achieve its purpose.”
“Trust me, Tinderell still has plenty of desire. Her magic is pent up, spent wisely, not frittered away on pointless things.”
“I do hope you’re right.”
Tallahassee lit up a pipe, and Vinnie sat up and joined her. Sorrell made a fire, soon putting a pot on and cooking up. Angel wandered over. “You smell better. I’ve made a few beds in the caves behind. We might as well enjoy a bit of luxury before we’re under that dread sky,” she said, pointing at the clouds. “Oh fuck.”
Those two words again.
Vinnie looked up, a black blot crossed the sky, edging the billowing gray and mauve.
“A Witherer,” he whispered.
Tallahassee sprang to her feet, pulling him up. “Into the cave,” she barked, dragging Vinnie back. “All of you apart from Sorrell, into the cave.”
Vinnie scrambled back, the cave’s entrance only twenty yards away. Bursting into its intense black, he stumbled forward as soon as the passive light failed.
“Equip staff,” he muttered. “Oh star in the sky, lend me your light, thanks.”
The dwarven light’s soft glow showed him the way, illuminating glistening damp walls and a fissure. Angel gave him an enquiring look, then accepted his magic and pulled him into a crack ahead. Edging down it, the path twisted around until it opened onto a smooth ledge. Angel crouched and Vinnie did too. Borbon and Gorbon slumping beside them.
“We’ve gotta do something about that,” Tallahassee's words echoing. “All joking aside, I’m sure they can sense you.”
Vinnie chanced a look over the edge. It plunged down into the depths. Silence fell. Vinnie wondered why they’d left Sorrell outside.
“Why’d we leave Sorrell outside?” he hissed.