Rebirth Online 2

by Michael James Ploof

  I had started conjuring a Fireball when the ogre charged, but I abruptly stopped myself when Nanaya happily called out the fiend’s name. “Wally!”

  He guffawed and wrapped his big arms around her in a bear hug.

  “Wally missed Nan,” he said as he buried his big round face in her hair.

  Now that the danger had passed, I looked closer at the ogre, who reminded me of Sloth from Goonies. He was at least seven feet tall and built like the Hulk. Rather than green skin, however, Wally’s was gray and ashy.

  “I missed you too, Wally,” said Nanaya.

  The goblin laughed. “Now that he’s all grown up, you can take the big stupid bastard off my hands.”

  “I will, Brik, thanks.”

  “Come on in then.” The goblin turned and shuffled into his emporium. “You’ve got that look in your eye, and I can tell you want something.”

  “Come on, Nan. Come see my mushroom collection,” said Wally as he bounded back into the place, pulling her along with him.

  Trinity and I were in turn yanked forward by the rope around our wrists and stumbled into a wide, circular room with dozens of tunnels branching off. The place was furnished like a torture museum, except the poor bastards in the many devices were real. Human, elven, and gnome females hung naked inside of large bird cages, and others were chained to the wall. There were men as well, stout dwarves, effeminate elves, and even a minotaur dressed in leather. They chewed the bits in their mouths and their eyes pleaded with me to help them. I read the names floating above their heads and noticed that they were all level zero.

  “Come back to my office after Wally is done with you,” said Brikturd before looking at me and Trinity. “I’m assuming you’re here to sell me these two?”

  Nanaya turned from Wally’s persistent ramblings about his mushroom collection and shook her head. “No, not these two. They’re special.”

  “Mmm-hmm,” Brikturd hummed knowingly. “Have it your way.”

  “Wait here,” Nanaya told us as Wally pulled her down a hall to the left. “I’ll only be a little while.”

  Trinity and I waited in silence, trying not to gain the attention of the patrons who came and went. The sounds of the dying issued from the many tunnels branching off from the main room and listening to it began making me sick.

  Trinity kept shooting me horrified glances, and I knew what she was thinking: how could Nanaya be friends with a goblin who ran such a place? I was wondering the same thing. Nanaya sure seemed friendly with the goblin, and the ogre Wally was practically in love with her. He had treated her like a sister, which was even more perplexing than her relationship with Brikturd.

  Nanaya didn’t return for nearly a half hour, and when she did, she offered us a sympathetic smile. “Sorry, Wally hasn’t seen me in a while, and he’s always—”

  “What the hell are we doing here?” Trinity blurted, and a short, stocky demon that had been entering the place glanced at the warrior with a frown.

  “Never question me again!” Nanaya screamed at Trinity, then slapped her across the face.

  Trinity flared her nostrils and her ears turned bright red.

  “Trin!” I hissed out of the corner of my mouth.

  Trinity seemed to remember the ruse we were trying to pull off and bowed her head, saying grudgingly, “I’m sorry, mistress.

  Nanaya shook her head and pulled us down the hall. “I’ll do the talking,” she said and knocked on a door at the end of the corridor. Brikturd answered the door and let us into his office. Nanaya indicated a shabby couch in the corner with springs sticking out of it. We took a seat as the goblin settled in behind his big desk.

  “Now,” he said, lacing his finds over his little potbelly. “What can I do for you?”

  “I’m looking for a player named Tweak,” said Nanaya.

  “Tweak…” The goblin stroked his chin and looked to the ceiling.

  “He’s a purple ape, one of a kind, you would know him if you had seen him.”

  “Ah, yes,” said Brikturd with a laugh. “That one brings a steep price.”

  “Who’s pimping him out?”

  “Last I heard he’d been sold to Madam Meglamon.”

  “Fuck,” said Nanaya. “Well, I need you to buy him from her for me.”

  Brikturd guffawed. “With whose money?”

  “Yours,” said Nanaya.

  “You’re out of your mind. Need I remind you that it was me that gave you your freedom, and at a great loss I might add.”

  “I saved your life, you ungrateful little turd!”

  “From demons that you pissed off!” he fired back.

  “Listen,” said Nanaya, reining in her anger. “You do me this favor, and I’ll make it worth your while.”

  “Oh really? How?” he said eyeing her up and down.

  “A war is coming, Brik, and Kincaid isn’t going to be victorious. And when he falls the power structure is going to shift. There is a lot of money to be made if you gamble on the right team.”

  “I don’t take sides, Nanaya, you know that.”

  “Bullshit,” she said with a laugh. “You’ve been trying to depose Pygon for years behind the scenes.”

  “I may have done him some favors,” said the goblin.

  “Well I’m about to go speak with him about something that will change everything, and if you do me this favor, I’ll make sure that your name comes up.”

  “That’s pretty vague.”

  “That’s all you’re getting,” said Nanaya. “Take it or leave it, there are plenty of people out there who’ll jump at the opportunity to help me. I just thought I’d offer it to you first, given our history.”

  The goblin sat back in his too-big chair and thought for a long moment. “Fine,” he said at length. Give me a few hours and I’ll have your purple ape. You just better make good on your promise.”

  “Don’t I always?” Nanaya asked.

  Chapter 12

  Two hours later, Tweak came limping into the office led with a glowing chain by a pair of succubi.

  “Tweak!” Trinity cried and leapt from her seat.

  He almost fell over when she bowled into him, and one of the succubi yanked on his chain, pulling him away from Trinity.

  “Get this horrible thing off him!” the warrior demanded.

  “Do not speak to me, slave!” the succubus yelled back.

  “Trinity, sit down,” said Nanaya.

  I pulled Trinity back while Nanaya spoke with the two succubi, and once payment was made in full, they released Tweak.

  He fell to the floor, and Trinity and I rushed to his side.

  “Sam? Trinity?” he said groggily.

  “Here you go buddy,” I said as I uncorked a healing potion and brought it to his lips.

  Trinity held his head and helped him drink, and soon his wounds began to heal.

  “How did you find me?” he asked as we helped him to stand.

  “It’s a long story,” I said.

  “Where are the others?”

  “We don’t know,” said Trinity. “But we’re going to find them.”

  Shortly after, we left Brikturd’s house of horror with Wally in tow. When I asked Nanaya about him, she told us that she had saved his life when he was just a baby, and now he considered her to be his adoptive mother. I had to admit that I didn’t mind having the big lug along with us. Trinity and Tweak had no magic down here in the Underworld, and a little brute strength wouldn’t hurt.

  Nanaya inquired with the many brothel and torture house owners about Anna, Ember, Kit, and Cecilia, but no one seemed to know anything about the women. It wasn’t until a chain gang of furries was marched by that we caught a break.

  “Ask them about Kit,” I urged Nanaya, and she halted the group of little devils leading the furries to the meat market.

  “That’s the entire Purrrrsian Empire Guild,” Trinity whispered, and on closer inspection, I realized that I recognized a few of them.

  “Poor bastards,” I said und
er my breath.

  “We can’t just allow this to continue to go on,” she pressed. “Sam, we’ve got to do something.”

  “What can we do?” I asked, feeling guilty enough as it was.

  “You’ve still got your magic.”

  “You know that I can’t take on a city full of devils,” I countered.

  “Stay cool Trin,” said Tweak, looking around with real terror. “You don’t want to do anything to get captured by these freaky fucks.”

  “You don’t have to remind me of what happens in the dungeons,” said Trinity.

  Nanaya offered us a scowl as she spoke to the little devils, and we promptly shut our mouths.

  A few minutes later, Nanaya returned to us with a look of hope on her red face.

  “One of the furries told me that he’d seen Kit,” she reported.

  “Where?” I asked eagerly.

  “She got picked up in the maze by a demon named Rah’Kon. He’s one of the guards in the Pits of Anguish,” she said solemnly.

  “What the hell is that?”

  “Exactly what is sounds like, and I’m not going to be able to buy her from the creeps who run that place.”

  “Then we fight?” said Trinity with hope in her eyes.

  “No,” said Nanaya. “We sneak in and we steal her. But the way there is fraught with danger, so you might just get the fight you’re hoping for.”

  Nanaya led us through the city to the big black tower at its center. We waited for her outside the tower in an area reserved for slaves as she went inside to speak with the demon Pygon. The visit didn’t take long, and less than fifteen minutes later we were headed toward the back of the big cavern.

  “What did you speak with him about?” Trinity asked once we had left the city.

  “Business,” Nanaya said absently. She stopped at the entrance to a wide cave and untied us all. “We’ve got to travel along the rivers of fire, and there are creatures down here that’ll eat your face off if you give them a chance.”

  “Noted,” I said with a grin.

  Nanaya returned the smile, and I heard Trinity let out a little scoff.

  We ventured into the crystal littered tunnel, guided by the light of the fire in Nanaya’s right hand. The tunnel wound through the red rock that seemed to make up the entire 1st level of the Underworld, and it took nearly an hour for us to emerge from it. When we did, it was like walking onto the sun.

  “Damn!” I said, holding my hand up to the heat to protect my face. I peered through my fingers and saw the source; a giant lake of bubbling lava sat at the middle of a massive cavern.

  “Sam, doesn’t Scorched Earth make your allies impervious to fire and heat?” Trinity asked as she too backed away from the blazing heat.

  “Good idea,” I said, and lit the ground at our feet on fire.

  Buff Received

  Scorched Earth

  The buff instantly made us impervious to the heat of the lake, and I let out a sigh when the temperature around me returned to a comfortable level.

  “Basilisks like to lay eggs around the lake, and fire sprites migrate here sometimes as well, so keep your eyes peeled. It’s going to take us at least a half hour to get through to the other side,” Nanaya instructed us.

  “Then let’s get going,” said Trinity.

  I surveyed the massive cavern as we started around the lake of lava. There were little islands of stone out there near the middle of the lake, and I could just barely make out little rock houses, and creatures made of fire moving about. Overhead, large bats and what looked like pterodactyls from hell flew circles over the lake. It looked to me that they were hunting, but I doubted that anything was living in the steaming lava.

  The fumes were hard to handle. My head became light and a small headache set in as we traveled around the edge of the chamber. There were dark crystals in this cavern as well, but the stalactites and stalagmites were not nearly as large as they had been in Baal’s Wart. The crystals and rock formations offered plenty of places for creatures to hide, however, and I caught sight of more than one strange creature scurrying about between the rocks.

  We were almost halfway around the lake when Nanaya stopped and held up a hand. We all stopped as she sniffed at the air, and then she suddenly dropped to the stone.

  “What ya seein’?” Wally asked.

  Nanaya turned to scowl at him and put a finger to her lips.

  “Get down, you big oaf!” Trinity hissed.

  Wally joined us on the ground, and a moment later a sharp hiss issued in the distance.

  “Shit!” said Nanaya as she scooted back to us on her knees and elbows.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “Hellhounds,” she said

  “How many?” Tweak asked beside me.

  “Like a dozen,” Nanaya said with concern in her voice. “And they’re all level 20’s.”

  “You and I shouldn’t have much problem handling them,” I said.

  “Without a healer?” she said doubtfully. “These ugly bastards are as vicious as they come.”

  “What’s the worst that can happen?” I asked. “It’s not like they can kill us, we’re already dead.”

  “There are worse things than death,” said the succubus.

  “Give me something to fight with,” Tweak said desperately.

  Wally handed him one of the small clubs hanging from his belt. “Smash with this monkey man.”

  “Thanks playa,” said Tweak as he tested the weight of the club.

  “So, what’s the plan?” Trinity asked. Her sword was in hand and her face was grim, and although she was level zero, I knew that she would try like hell.

  “You guys should hang back,” said Nanaya. “No offense, but nerfed as you are, you’ll only be a liability.”

  “To hell with that noise,” said Trinity.

  “She’s right,” I told the overzealous warrior. “Let us handle this one.”

  “Wally help,” said the big ogre.

  “I know you will Wally, but—” Nanaya was interrupted by the howl of a hellhound. They were on our scent, and there would be no hiding from the beasts.

  I popped my head up and peered over the raised stone that I hid behind. One hundred yards away I saw the skinless hellhounds. Bile dripped from their tortured maws, and their eyes burned like green stars. Beside me, Nanaya suddenly began to shift into a new form, and I backed away slowly as the smoking hot succubus morphed into a grizzly bear.

  She let out a growl that was not at all lady like and charged over the stones toward the hellhounds. I sprang into action right behind her, conjuring a Fireball and sending it spinning toward the group.

  My Fireball exploded in the middle of the pack, sending two hellhounds spiraling off to the sides. One landed in the lake of fire and died with a tortured baying, and the other followed close behind. I followed with another Fireball, and three more hellhounds were blasted to the sides. My Fireball only stunned the beasts, as they were quite accustomed to fire, so I switched to Arcane Lightning and zapped the approaching pack as Nanaya lit into them with her wicked claws.

  In her grizzly bear form, Nanaya attracted most of the attention, so I stopped and picked off the hellhounds one at a time with my Magic Bolts. My mana was draining fast, however, and I was forced to stop for a moment and down a mana potion. By the time I was ready, two hellhounds diverted from Nanaya and headed straight at me. I braced myself on the rocky ground and calmly conjured Arcane Lightning. The sparking arcs of white-hot electricity hit the lead hellhound and arced out to zap the other, and I followed the spell with another Magic Bolt. The spell slammed right into the skinless snout of the lead hellhound, and the beast’s head exploded in a satisfying burst of red gore.

  The second hellhound leapt over the destroyed body of the first, and I barely got off another shot before he slammed into me. My spell hit the beast in its exposed chest as it fell on me, and we rolled across the rocky terrain in a ball of flailing limbs and entrails.

  When we
stopped, I found myself pinned beneath seventy pounds of dead dog, and swiftly scrambled to my feet to rejoin the fray. Nanaya was fighting frantically to keep the other eight hellhounds at bay, but she was losing the fight fast. Two of the monsters clung to her thick hide, one attached to the right shoulder, and the other hanging from her furry backside. Others darted in and tried to leap for her neck, but she batted them aside with paws the size of catcher’s mitts.

  I hit the group with Arcane Lightning, knowing that it wouldn’t affect Nanaya since she was my ally. The blast gave her the chance she needed to shed the unwanted hitchhikers. She grabbed one and snapped its neck, and then stomped down on another’s skull as it convulsed on the ground from the effects of my Arcane Lightning. Nanaya smashed two hellhounds together, crushing both their skulls, and I dispatched another with a well-placed glowing bolt that separated its head from its neck.

  I reached Nanaya and unsheathed my short sword, using it to skewer the last hellhound clinging to her back. Nanaya’s body began to shift again, and in three seconds she went from a nine-foot grizzly back to a succubus. She took a knee, panting.

  “Are you alright?” I asked, noting the scratches and bite marks on her body.

  “I’ll be fine,” she said, reaching out a hand so that I could help her stand. She tapped on her interface a few times, and a second later a healing potion was in her hand.

  “Nana!” Wally howled and came running.

  “I’m alright, Wally,” she ensured him.

  The gray ogre was all sorts of choked up, and it looked like he had been crying.

  “This one’s a blubbering mess,” said Trinity. “I thought maybe he would be useful, but he’s like a kid left at daycare who misses his mother.”

  “Wally’s special,” said Nanaya.

  “You can say that again,” said Trinity.

  “We’ve got more company,” said Tweak, pointing back the way we had come.

  The group was far away, but it was apparent that they were humanoid, and there were a lot of them.