by Ryan Rimmel
I noted the tiles’ runes absently, feeling both of them filter into my available rune list for future reference. That would be handy. I was certain Julia would complain about how I paid for the accommodations again. I could explain to her about the magical wards designed to keep her safe overnight.
Sighing, I continued to the room. I still wasn’t sure if Julia was honestly upset that I’d picked the inn without asking her, or if Julia was just confused about how I earned so much gold. She’d only managed to earn a few silvers. I was guessing confused. She was the princess, after all. By default, she was supposed to be the better one.
Using my tile, I pressed it to the door lock, and it clicked open. That was another factor that sold me on the room. The keys were similar enough to magnetic key cards from Earth. That gave me an added feeling of security. Stepping into the door, I closed it quickly. Turning around, I found Julia placidly sitting on the couch with a second woman, who was wearing a mask.
Chapter 15 – Unexpected Guests
“Tea,” said the woman pleasantly enough, and Julia quickly moved to oblige. She poured a cup for me and handed it over, then rapidly sat back down. I had stupidly closed the door before I understood what was going on.
“Thanks for the warning, asshole,” I thought to Shart, activating my Scent skill. They had been in the room for around twenty minutes. That was a lot of time for mischief.
“Hey, not my fault,” screamed the demon. “There are hundreds of you guys down there, and I can barely keep track of you. I can’t possibly keep track of whatever lasso girl is doing.”
Lasso girl?
I brought the cup to my lips and inhaled the aroma. It was poisoned, of course. I stood there, blowing on the steaming brew.
“This is my old teacher. She was in town and was surprised to find me,” smiled Julia. I examined her eyes. They looked normal. She believed the story she was telling me. That was troubling.
“Well, how lovely,” I responded with an air of civility. From the slight bob of her head, I could tell the woman had smiled behind her mask. My Mental Resistance was going wild, telling me that she had an illusion spell covering her face. She was trying to project a calming aura into the room. About the only thing real to her current appearance was a pair of high-quality boots. She was noticeably clumsier about her mental manipulations than Bashara had ever been, though. My skills were more than enough to step on her attempts.
“Why, thank you,” said the woman with a slight lisp. I considered that. While her name was showing as Angela, a name painfully common in this town, I was guessing she was the second adventurer. At least, I hoped she was. If there were a third adventurer, this was going to get even more complicated.
I wondered what her plan was for a moment, until my Magical Traps skill started firing off. I couldn’t see regular spells without being obvious about it, but I could find wards. Thankfully, they counted as traps. She had placed several of them around the room. I glanced at the most obvious one.
● Paralysis Ward: This ward will cause the target to suffer from paralysis for a period of up to two hours, depending on stats and resistances.
That wasn’t a terrible plan. “Angela” would paralyze me, easily kill me, and make off with Julia. The princess probably wouldn’t even notice that anything was wrong. Blowing on my tea, I glanced back at the door. The inner handle had a similar ward that was now active. I wondered if she had some spell that caused the door to close once I’d entered. After all, who pays that much attention to a door you want to close anyway.
Smiling back at her, I realized it didn’t matter. I could Counterspell and talk at the same time.
“You must tell me about Julia in her youth. She never mentioned anything about her younger days,” I began.
Julia started to speak, but I shushed her. That pissed Julia off, which is what I needed right now. Julia hated being disrespected, so I purposefully dismissed her. “Now, Julia, I have your old teacher here. I’d like to hear the stories from her.” For an instant, I could see a flash of irritation across Julia’s face, but it vanished as quickly as it had appeared. The magic had obviously reasserted itself.
That spell is active. There was a difference between an actively maintained magic and a ward. If I started fiddling around with something active, the caster would instantly know. If I started fiddling with a passive ward, “Angela” would only know if she checked on it.
“Well, what would you like to know?” “Angela” began, eying the door. More wisps of magic ran into my mental fortress. I was getting critical successes, so “Angela” didn’t know anything was wrong.
“She did mention something about stealing cookies from the kitchen,” I joked, feeding her a prompt, “But I don’t have any of the details.”
“Angela” considered for a moment, before she started to speak. If she was smart this would be a cute little ignorable story about Julia. The story would be false, but not something that would offend Julia. However, “Angela” didn’t carry herself like someone who would tell a cute little story.
“Angela” began, “Well, you see, Julia was even pudgier than this when she was a child. She had such a terrible sweet tooth. When you are an ugly duckling, you have to compensate somehow.”
She droned on and on with the obviously fake story about the obviously fake encounter. This forced her to focus Mana on restraining Julia and keeping her made-up story straight. Her version of Julia was a whiney, stupid little girl. Every time “Angela” spoke, Julia’s placid face grew angry for an instant. Then, “Angela” would spend enough Mana to calm her back down. Each time she had to spend more Mana as Julia’s rage started to crystalize. Every couple of minutes, “Angela” would glance at the door before continuing the tale. I continued working on the wards while she spoke.
After a good ten minutes of rambling, “Angela” started to look a bit frazzled. I good-naturedly asked, “You keep looking at the door. Are you waiting on someone to join us?”
“What makes you think that?” she asked, an edge creeping into her voice.
“Oh, I see,” I chuckled. “He’s unconscious in an alley. Gonna have a hell of a headache when he comes to. Was that part of your plan?”
She shrugged. “Not really, but I didn’t expect him to be successful anyway.”
Suddenly, the wall behind me rippled with arcane energy, as she activated all three wards in unison. They were fire, acid, and lightning wards designed to fill most of the small room, save the couch where she and Julia were sitting.
The three wards sparked, smoked, and hissed for a moment, before coming to an abrupt stop.
“I think you should have waited on him,” I casually remarked.
“I still have an ally,” The masked adventurer began. I started Counterspelling her mind control on Julia. By now, the insulting story of young, stupid Julia had significantly frayed the mind control. Julia never struck me as a woman that was ever out of control over herself. By giving her ‘teacher’ enough rope to hang herself with her outlandish story, I had allowed Julia time to realize how strange a predicament she was in. The cornerstone of Mental magic was getting your target to buy into the magic, and right now Julia was powerfully resisting that image of herself.
● Counterspell check, critically successful: The target of this spell has powerfully resisted the Mind Control attempt, aided by your Counterspell check.
Julia had broken the spell on her own, as soon as the masked adventurer became distracted. The princess screamed, casting a short-range blast of Holy Energy into the woman’s face. This caused “Angela” to stumble. She recovered quickly and started moving her hands to cast a spell of her own. I shoved my fingers between hers and pulled.
● Basstown Headbutt: Damage, 13 points of Damage, knockback 1 log
The mask shattered, hard shards of ceramic tearing into my forehead. It made me nauseous but did no real Damage. Her name suddenly became exposed as her disguise faded. I could now see that the spellcaster’s name was Su-Kar. She
got the worse end of the mask shattering, as she collapsed to the ground screaming. If I’d had a weapon, this is where I would have killed her. Alas, all I had was my carving knife. With my current arsenal, I was going to be headbutting her until I got a migraine. Even adding in Smite wasn’t going to make this a quick process.
However, Julia wasn’t without weapons of her own. She held up both her hands and started gathering a much larger disco ball of power than I had ever seen her use before.
Unfortunately, even at point-blank range and distracted, Su-Kar wasn’t unprepared. She crafted a barrier just as the spell hit. The spell's energy raged against the barrier for an instant before exploding backward onto Julia, flinging her into the attached bed chamber.
Su-Kar’s disgusting face stared at me, her eyes filled with utter hatred. I glanced down at my carving knife and held it in a more threatening manner. I also cast Renew, because this was about to hurt.
She held up a hand. A blast of lighting powerful enough to scar the wood behind me sizzled past me, as I activated my Evasion perk and dodged the strike. I jerked past her, slicing her with my knife from shoulder to sternum.
● Carving Knife: You cause 10 points of Damage; target resists 9 points.
“Well, this is going to take a while,” I said. Su-Kar looked at my dagger for a moment, then smiled.
“Is that your only weapon?” she chuckled, preparing to cast another spell. As she cast her spell, I dodged to the left, letting the lightning flash past me. She swore and began another spell.
I punched her. The attack was so unexpected that I managed to strike her in the torso. Unfortunately, on Ordinal, a strike at my skill level didn’t do enough Damage to hurt her very much. Su-Kar had a spell active called Arcane Armor that reduced the Damage I could inflict to miniscule levels. She blasted a spell at me, which I evaded. We continued to dance around, with me punching her, and her blasting back at me with magic. My one abortive attempt at grabbing her caused me to pull back a smoking hand. She had been able to channel electricity into the Arcane Armor spell.
About twenty punches in, her Health bar still hadn’t moved. I desperately needed a new strategy. My stupid knife wasn’t going to work, and even my occasional headbutt had been deflected by her Arcane Armor spell. I needed a proper weapon.
● Chaise Lounge: 9 points of Damage. Non-standard weapon, knockback 3 logs.
Slamming the couch down on her for 9 Damage didn’t mean much, especially when her Arcane Armor spell absorbed all that Damage. Slamming the couch down on her so hard that she tore through the abused piece of furniture worked much better. Su-Kar ended up having her arms pinned to her sides by the now smoldering fabric of the poor, destroyed piece of furniture.
● Pinned Debuff: Su-Kar is subject to the Pinned Debuff. She is unable to use her arms successfully and will be unable to cast spells with somatic requirements.
“Well, shit,” grumbled Su-Kar, as she looked at her predicament.
As Su-Kar glared at me, impotently screaming, she struggled to get her arms free. I reached over and picked up one of the couch cushions, sparing a quick glance into the other room. Julia was still stunned. Sighing, I walked over to Su-Kar. Her eyes suddenly grew very wide, as she unsuccessfully struggled to get either arm free.
I shoved the pillow into her face hard enough for her head to dent the wall behind her. Her magical field was causing the pillow to smolder, but that didn’t matter much.
● Suffocation Debuff: Su-Kar has had her airway forcefully blocked for more than 10 seconds. Her Stamina has depleted. She will take 2 Damage per second until she dies.
Part of me felt guilty about crushing someone with a couch and then suffocating them with a fancy pillow. The bigger part of me just wanted this over. I needed to kill Charles, and this was an unneeded distraction.
At the thirty second mark, her struggling had become noticeably feebler. I was trying to push myself into a different headspace as she struggled. Su-Kar had been trying to kill me ever since I met her. O’Really was not squeamish like Jim had been. Just as her twitching was about to stop, the door shot open. A very pissed off Phillip stepped in, still dripping blood that I presumed came from the bouncers.
“Hi,” I began, still holding the pillow.
“I’m going to rip off your arm and fuck you with it,” he declared.
“Well, that’s just disgusting,” I countered. I kept pushing. Phillip’s eyes suddenly locked onto the fine pair of boots that Su-Kar was wearing. For a very odd instant, I saw indecision on his brow. He must not get along with her, either. It didn’t last long. He lunged forward, wielding his hatchets in a spin like a Tasmanian devil.
I had to move away from the couch. Phillip spared a second to knock the lounge down exposing Su-Kar’s arms, before he continued toward me. His partner inhaled deeply and coughed, finally managing to get one arm free from the furniture. Phillip swung in such an erratic pattern that I failed to Dodge a strike. I attempted a parry with my carving knife. Have you ever tried to parry an ax with a knife? The results are not pretty.
● Parry: Hatchet of Cleaving vs Carving Dagger, Critical Failure. Carving Knife is destroyed. The attack strikes, causing 11 points of Damage.
● Carving Dagger has broken and has impaled your arm for an additional 4 points of Damage.
Growling, I stumbled back, yanking the metal out of my arm. Considering how high my Defense was, 11 points of Damage getting through on a glancing blow was troubling.
I cast Renew and continued dancing around. With that active, I could hopefully out-heal any Damage he could do. Phillip’s expression turned concerned when my wounds began to seal themselves. Then, he turned furious. I missed a Dodge, and his blade carved across my arm. My Renew spell ended.
Oh shit, Renew doesn’t work if you take additional Damage. My entire strategy collapsed. I had wondered what “out of combat” meant. At least one facet of it was that you couldn’t take any more Damage.
Phillip’s skin started turning red. He came back at me much faster this time. I tried to Dodge, but he struck me half a dozen times in only a few seconds. Without a weapon to respond, I was relegated to using only Fancy Footwork. Phillip took advantage of my lack of additional defense forms. My few attempts to headbutt him had caused me to suffer additional wounds. His spinning blades caught me several more times.
I was now down over 119 Hit Points, despite all my efforts to defend myself. I’d recover them in a minute, but I doubted Phillip was going to give me that minute. The depressing thing was that if I’d had my sword or any armor, I could have halved that Damage. Suddenly, a shotgun blast of magic slammed into me, knocking me back into the far wall. I bounced off and struck the bed, bounced again, and landed on the floor in a heap.
Su-Kar looked upset. Her Health was back to nearly full, as was her Stamina. She had been drinking potions while Phillip kept me distracted.
“Keep him busy. I’ll get Julia,” she barked, walking to the door to the common area. The carpet Julia had fallen on started to move, as if being dragged by an unseen servant. Phillip’s Stamina suddenly dipped, and he started after me again with a series of powerful strikes.
I had tricks of my own, though.
● One Punch: 221 Stamina expended for 221 points of Damage, knockback, 22 logs. Target has activated Strength of Oak!
My punch landed squarely in the middle of his surprised chest. He slid back a full log before coming to a stop.
He chuckled. For a Hail Mary hit like that to have almost no effect was concerning. I activated Second Wind, recovering three-fourths of my Stamina. That annoyed him. He had been hoping that my attack had drained all my energy. He stepped forward, allowing Julia’s seemingly unconscious form to pass behind him.
“Nice tricks, but I’ve seen most of them before. Why not make it easier on yourself and just go? We are going to get the girl and then…” he trailed off. I looked down, seeing that Julia had wrapped her hand around his ankle. She was chanting something. Su-Kar swore an
d started to prepare another spell.
● One Punch: 285 Stamina expended for 285 points of Damage, knockback, 28 logs. Target is held, Damage increased by 50%, total Damage 428.
Julia’s spell held him in place, making my attack much more successful. Phillip went flying backward, straight into Su-Kar. As he plowed into her, his partner’s spell tagged him in the back. After he struck, he spun like a ragdoll, hitting the nearby wall and slamming into it, stunned. He was damaged, badly, but his armor and defensive perks had kept him alive.
Su-Kar vanished. She had been knocked backward and sent further out the doorway.
Julia was instantly on her feet. She rushed over to me and pulled, but, with my Stamina depleted, I wasn’t going anywhere. That was stupid. When she’d stopped Phillip, I should have run. I wasn’t going to be able to kill Charles if I died here.
Unexpectedly, I felt a twinge of Stamina return, as Julia cast a Heal Stamina spell on me. It wasn’t much, but it got me conscious enough to hear her screaming, “We need to go, now!”
I let her pull me out of the room, and we stumbled down the stairs. There was carnage everywhere. It looked like Phillip had brutally killed everyone he’d seen. There was even a woman wearing fine boots that had been shoved, headfirst, into the fire pit.