“Husband! Protect me! Kill these intruders that wish me harm. For the Shadows!” The skull woman stood from her chair and her undead maw opened as the voice came from everywhere. The three globes on her staff seemed to explode with power, and the wave of lightning sped across the room in all directions.
I dove to my left and slid behind the closest pillar. The wave of purple lightning passed around me. I didn’t feel anything, but my clothes sparked with static electricity.
Bylem, Mirea, and Wicum’s health bars all dropped by a quarter on my UI, and I heard each of them scream with pain. I poked my head around the column to see Mirea bent over in agony at the bottom of the stairs. The purple lightning seemed to still be flowing through her, but I saw the last bit dance from her feet and into the stone tile.
“Yes my Queen! I will destroy all who wish you harm. For the Shadows!” The other skeleton’s shout filled the room, and the armored figure stood with his longsword raised triumphantly.
Long red health bars appeared over each of their heads, and then the king made a leap down the stairs. The movement was way quicker than I had expected, and his longsword came arcing down toward Mirea’s unprotected head.
Chapter 17
I guessed that the swordswoman was still stunned by the purple lightning magic that had struck her, so I used Guardian of Fortune a fraction of a second before the skeleton king’s blade chopped into her. The longsword hit her on the top of her head, but the woman’s health didn’t drop any, and she brought her shield up a half second later to smack the sword away.
New Quest: Defeat the Iron King and his Queen. Bonus: Destroy Queen Dorni first to free King Belmore’s tortured soul.
“Wicum, Bylem, and Cornalic! Kill the queen! Mirea, keep the king busy!” I yelled to my four companions.
“Aye!” Wicum had already shaken off the lightning shock, and he was charging up the stairs toward the skeleton queen with his longsword cocked behind him.
The queen saw him approaching though, and she slammed her dark skeleton staff into the stone where she stood. A shock of purple lightning rolled across the ground toward the auburn-haired man, and he screamed in agony. The man’s health bar dropped another 20%, and while he was still a bit above half way, his scream had sounded all sorts of agonizing, and smoke began to emerge from his body. The man fell back down the stairs, and dropped his sword when he hit the flat tile of the throne room.
Shit.
“Minions. Slay these assassins!” the queen’s voice rang out from everywhere, and I saw the woman point to the far double door. They burst open immediately, and ten skeleton warriors rushed in. Each of them wore plate armor similar to the king’s suit, held metal shields, and carried curved sabers in their armored hands.
Double shit.
“I got them!” I heard Bylem cry out from the other side of the column, and a streak of bluish yellowish greenish lightning flew toward the group of skeletons. The first one to be hit almost instantly vaporized, as did the next five. The last four stumbled a few steps against the agony of the fenia’s lightning bolt, but their slowed progress only lasted a second, and then they ran toward the part of the room where the cat-man was standing.
“Leo!” Mirea shouted, and I turned to see the woman retreating a few steps from the skeleton king’s sword swings.
The monster’s movements were quick, skilled, and each attack seemed to get closer to bypassing the woman’s shield blocks. The glow from her Guardian of Fortune faded, and I used the ability on her again. My enchantment was just in time, and it managed to catch a thrust that the king made to Mirea’s unprotected right side. The woman was a decent warrior, but it was obvious to me that the skeleton king’s skill was on a whole other level. There was no way that she was going to be able to hold him off unless I kept using Guardian of Fortune on her, and I didn’t know how many more times I could do it before fainting. The second cast hadn’t really seemed to fatigue me, but I knew that the next one would, or the one after that. The enchantment only lasted a few seconds, and I watched the woman struggle to block another flurry of long sword strikes.
Another multicolored spray of light thundered behind me, and I turned to see the remaining group of skeleton soldiers vaporize.
“I used the new wand twice!” Bylem shouted. “I’m gonna work on the queen now!”
I turned to the queen and saw the undead woman shift her empty skull eyes in my direction. If she had eyeballs I was sure that our eyes would have met, but instead I just stared the forty feet or so into her empty sockets.
“Die, servant of Light!” she pointed at me with a bony finger, and an arch of lightning flew toward me like a purple harpoon.
I jumped backward and twisted my shoulders in the air so that I wouldn’t smash the back of my head into the stone floor. I felt a sudden flash of pain across my body, and then all of my muscles went numb at exactly the same moment that I landed. Fortunately, I’d thrown my left arm out against the ground before I’d gone numb, and my face bounced off of my bicep. Unfortunately, the impact caused me to let go of the glowing short sword I’d been holding in that hand, and it bounced a few dozen feet away from me.
I rolled to my side and then used my left hand to push myself up as quickly as I could. I didn’t know if the queen’s lightning bolt had actually hit me, or if I had really dodged it, but the shock and numbness had only lasted for a moment, and now I felt perfectly fine. I’d once gotten a minor electrocution when I’d helped my dad install some low voltage lights inside of our small apartment. This had felt a bit worse than that old memory, but I really didn’t feel hurt at all.
My Guardian of Fortune enchantment had faded on Mirea, so I used it on her again. There was a bit of pressure on my chest, but it felt as if I was trying to do an easy run at a slightly higher altitude than I was used to. The woman’s shield arm was starting to move a bit slower against the king’s sword swings, and I let out a scream of warning when she fell for a feigned attack.
The skeleton kicked aside Mirea’s shield when she raised it to block a blow that wasn’t coming, and then he slammed his sword down into her chain covered chest. We were lucky once more, and the blade was caught by my enchantment. The warrior woman recovered from her mishap, and she managed to get a cut across the sword arm of the king. He let out a hiss of pain that seemed to bounce around the room, and I saw a sliver of his health bar drop.
We were going to lose this unless I came up with a plan.
Wicum had retrieved his sword, and the black cloaked man was attempting to sprint up the stairs again. The queen was waiting for him though and I saw her point downward at the swordsman. I expected another bolt of lightning to leave her finger and fry my companion, but almost as soon as she pointed, a fiery softball slammed right into the skeleton woman’s face. The thing exploded as soon as it struck her, and her purple bolt of lightning missed Wicum by a good thirty feet.
Her health bar dropped by about five percent, and it looked like part of the fireball Bylem had tossed was sticking to the chest of the woman like napalm. She shook her skeletal body for a moment, and then raised her staff to block Wicum’s first horizontal swing. The black skeleton’s staff connected with the man’s sword and a thunderclap of energy cascaded out of the haft. More purple lightning erupted from her weapon, and it laced through Wicum’s arm while the man screamed again.
His health dropped to 20%, and the man staggered away from the skeleton queen. The woman spun her staff in her hand, and it looked as if she was about to stab the pointed bottom into the chest of Mirea’s brother, but before I could cast Guardian of Fortune on him, a small fireball exploded at her face again. The undead woman let out a scream of agony, and I saw her health drop a small slice.
I ran up the stairs toward Wicum, and managed to get Breath of Life on him the same instant he teetered over the edge of the stairs. The armored man fell off of the top ledge, but I grabbed him before he could smash his head into the stairs, and I yanked him away from the burning queen.
>
I turned back to Mirea and used another Guardian of Fortune. I noticed that the king’s health bar was a little lower than it was a handful of seconds ago, and I saw the pretty warrior woman slide around one of his thrusting attacks, trap his arm with her shield, and then cut into his unprotected skull with her blade. The attack had seemed well executed, and she had used plenty of twist when she moved her hips, but the skeleton king’s skull didn’t cave inward, and his health only dropped a bit.
“Good job Mirea!” I shouted over to the woman as I set down her brother, and she grunted as she blocked a backhanded swing of the king’s longsword.
Another exploding sound echoed from up the stairs, and I turned to see the queen on fire again. Then she was pelted with a red bolt of lightning, a dozen green colored magic arrows, two white showers of magic ice, and a barrage of strange ethereal hawks. Her health bar whittled down rapidly with each of these magical attacks, and the undead woman screamed with a frustrated agony.
“I’m almost out of wands!” I turned to my left and saw Bylem yank another foot long piece of twisted wood from under his cloak. The tiger-striped fenia pointed it up the stairs at the skeleton queen, and a blast of frozen looking wind erupted from its tip. The magic slammed into the woman, and she staggered back a bit from the power of Bylem’s wand.
“I’ve got one—” my friend started to say, but the skeleton woman pointed the globed end of her staff toward him, and a wave of lightning poured down the steps like a wave of radioactive water.
Bylem turned to run, but the electricity was all over the ground, and it moved as fast as an actual ocean wave. He screeched as the purple energy reached his feet, and his body seemed to seize immediately. His health bar began to plummet, and I used Breath of Life on him in an effort to counteract the damage.
My friend continued to scream as his body roasted, and I watched with a sick panic as his health bar continued to drain. Then I noticed a large piece of Mirea’s health bar drop, and I spun around to see the warrior woman staggering back from a stab wound to the stomach. She was at 75% of her health still, and I thought about healing her, but I could only use Breath of Life once every ten minutes on the same person, so it would probably be the last heal she would receive until the battle ended.
It seemed as if the battle was going to be ending quickly, and not in our favor.
I used Breath of Life on the armored woman and felt a bit of air leave my lungs with the pressure of using it again so soon. Then I hit her with another Guardian of Fortune and let out a sigh of discomfort as my chest contracted. I guessed that the liquid in the VRIU was tightening around my ribs, and I wondered if the game would really log me out if I fainted from mana fatigue.
I spun back around in time to see Bylem collapse onto the stone. The wave of electricity had faded from the floor, but my friend’s body was smoking like a barbeque, and his health bar had only a sliver left of red on the left side. If I hadn’t used Breathe of Life on him he would have died. The cat-man looked to be unconscious now, and his health bar was moving up thanks to my heal.
Wicum was also unconscious on the ground, and I swung my head around to look for the half-orc. I couldn’t see the man, and I felt rage claw inside of my stomach. Fucking coward. I should have guessed that he would run when the going got tough. He was probably back in the treasure room grabbing whatever items he could fit into his pockets. I now regretted giving the muscular man those swords, and it looked like we were all going to die here.
But I was the only one that would respawn. The other NPCs, who had been my stout companions, would not resurrect.
What could I do? Using Guardian of Fortune on Mirea every three seconds wasn’t going to help kill the queen. It would only delay the inevitable when I fainted. There was no DPS on the queen because Bylem and Wicum were down, and while it was possible that they could jump back up in a few seconds, the fenia had used all of his wands to blast down the skeleton Sorceress, and he probably only had another few magical abilities he could use.
I glanced up the stairs in time to see the skeleton queen point her finger at me again. I threw myself to the left side, and her purple bolt of electricity flew past me like the spray from a deadly fire hose. The monster was actually a little under half health. I wished that Bylem was standing, and had another dozen wands so that he could unload on her again.
I landed next to my dropped short sword, and I scooped the thing up in my left hand before I sprung to my feet. The undead woman’s skull was pointing down at me, but I didn’t see any other choice at the moment. I was going to have to finish her off.
Or die trying.
I turned my head to Mirea and used another Guardian of Fortune on the woman. Almost immediately after I used the ability I wheezed with the pressure of something invisible punching me hard in the stomach. The next use would probably really hurt, but I figured I might be able to crank three or four more enchantments out in the next minute before passing out. I could also use my broadsword’s ability to reset my fatigue before then, but that wouldn’t help with healing my party. Wicum, Mirea, and Bylem all had the ten minute cool-down timers with Breath of Life.
I sprinted up the stairs toward the skeleton queen, and the robed creature pivoted her staff toward me. I knew she was about to use that crazy ocean wave of lightning attack on me, and I used Breath of Life on myself with the hope that the heal over time would let me live through the magical attack. This was now the third time I’d used the heal in the last ten minutes, and while it didn’t hit me in the chest as hard as the earlier use of Guardian of Fortune had, I was still fighting off the pain from that fatigue. It felt like someone was standing on my chest, and the edges of my vision started to blur so that the queen was almost the only thing I could see that was in focus.
Then a pair of blades emerged from her skeletal chest, and the monster’s health dropped down to 35%.
The queen screamed with surprise and twisted to counter whatever had attacked her from behind. The movement made her robe flutter, and I could see the muscular half-orc duck under the skeleton’s swing.
“Half-breed interloper! I will rip your soul from your body and feast upon your endless agony.”
“No thank you!” the half-orc said as he cut into the woman with his two short blades. His arms were a flurry of movements, but the robe the queen wore concealed part of where his blades landed. Her health chiseled down a few more percentage points after his first flurry, and I felt a little mad at myself for thinking that the man had fled.
Cornalic’s attack had distracted the skeleton woman from my charge, and I cut into her with a horizontal slash of my magical broadsword. Before she could turn around to attack me, I got a stab in with my glowing short sword. This sword wasn’t magical, and the difference of penetration into the woman’s dark robes was noticeable. My thrust had been strong, but it looked as if the shorter blade took half as much of her health off as my longer weapon.
“Husband! They are killing me!” The sound of the undead queen’s shout echoed from all around, and the woman spun around to try and hit me with her black bone staff.
I recalled how she had electrocuted Wicum when she blocked his sword strike, so I decided it was probably best to not parry with either of my swords. Fortunately, the undead creature didn’t seem to be very well trained in melee fighting, and she telegraphed her swing like a child playing tee ball. I easily ducked under the strike, and then shoved the guard of my short sword into the bone of her elbow so that she couldn’t make a return swing. The woman’s skull eyes actually seemed to grow a bit larger, and I slammed my broadsword into her unprotected chest.
Then Cornalic shoved both of his new swords into her skull from the other side. The tips erupted out of her eye holes, and a horrific scream filled the air of the throne room.
“My Queen!” I heard the king screech, and then I turned to see him kick Mirea in the chest with his armored boot. The woman hadn’t expected the attack, and she was thrown a good ten feet back from
the melee.
The king ran toward us, and I risked another strike to the queen. Her health was almost gone, but she let out another shriek as soon as my sword cut into her, and I felt my entire body go numb.
Then I was falling down the stairs, and purple lightning ran over my body like an angry sea of ants. I couldn’t move my arms, or my legs, and the only thing I could do was think about using Rwunidar’s Might.
My shoulders hit the steps near the bottom a second after I saw my UI flash with the stance, and I bounced once more off of the floor before I landed on my ass. I should have been in serious pain from the lightning attack, or the tumble down the stairs, but the dwarven stance ability must have saved me from the worst of it, and I was able to get my broadsword up in time to block the skeleton king’s overhead sword chop.
The metal of our weapons met with a sharp snapping sound, and I predicted that he was going to yank his longsword away before trying to thrust the tip at my face. I dove forward on my knees, and pushed the hilt of my broadsword against his blade to keep it tied up, and then I feinted a forward stab with my glowing short sword. The king fell for my maneuver and moved his shield in the way. But instead of following through with my thrust, I let the blade slide off of his shield and fall to the outside of his leg. Then I hooked the guard of my blade around the armored king’s knee, and shot to my feet with an explosive deadlifting movement.
The skeleton king was caught off balance by my modified grapple attack, and he stumbled back away from me. Mirea had gotten up to her feet at this point, and she smashed into the stumbling skeleton with a shield hit that probably would have floored my giant personal trainer Calic. The skeleton king fell to the floor with a cry of panic, and the woman started to beat against his shield like she was chopping wood.
“Die! Servant of Light!” I saw the skeleton queen point at me, and another ray of lightning death shot out of her finger. I tried to twist away from the purple light, but I was half a moment too slow, and the thing hit me in the chest like a car accident. I was suddenly flying through the air, and I felt my back slam into the column behind me. My skull bounced off of the stone like a tennis ball, but I somehow landed on my feet. My chest was smoking, and it felt like someone had smacked me in the back of the head, but I actually didn’t feel any serious pain because of Rwunidar’s Might.
Lion's Quest: Dual Wield: A LitRPG Saga Page 24