Liar King (Tower of Babel Book 2)

by Adam Elliott

  Your Justice hit Temujin for 316 damage Physical (Reduced)

  Your Justice heals you for 1312 HP.

  Temujin roared in agony and fury, the haft of his spear sending Cayden tumbling end over end once again. A regular attack rather than one of his special moves, the damage dealt by the swipe was comparatively minor, meant more for opening distance than causing serious injury. He'd pissed it off. More than that, Cayden thought he'd actually hurt the Warden.

  Pity he wouldn't have the chance to do it again. His shield hung in two halves from the remaining straps on his left arm, and the cooldown for Justice was a full sixty seconds. And considering the Warden had all but killed him in less than ten... nah, he'd be fine.

  “Not a chance.” Sarah shouted as Temujin began to advance upon Cayden once more. Even in the Warden's rage, her blows were not to be ignored, it's attention drawn squarely in her direction after a few short exchanges. Its attacks were a more wild this time, less elegant artistry and more terrible ferocity. It thrust and parried, swiped and retreated as the two began their dance once again. A dance with an abrupt hitch as Sarah took the lead. “Custom Skill Use: Psycho Dragon Combo.”

  Temujin's Western God Desdaemona for 717 Physical/Magical

  Something wasn't right. The counter had been fast, too fast in fact. In one fraction of an instant, Sarah was on the offense, her fists raised as she sought to land a variant of that same four hit combo from a minute earlier The next, Temujin hand thrust, the point of his spear struck deep into Sarah's belly, reducing her HP to an alarming low.

  “Is it...” Cayden murmured, his eyes growing wide as he cut away the remnants of his shield. “Sarah! He is a bugger!”

  The girl's expression was one of total bafflement for just long enough to worry Cayden. He could explain his theory further, of course, that the enemy before them was just like the armies Cayden was now sure it commanded. You could fool it once, but the same trick would never work twice. It had suffered at the hands of his leap attack, then it had expertly countered his leap attack with Western God. Sarah had pummeled it half senseless, but the next time it preempted the very first blow.

  Just as worry started to settle in, Sarah grinned. She sunk lower in her posture, hands coming up in a new form of guard as her eyes sought out those of her opponent. “Let me show you some new things then.”

  What followed was a chain of skills, each thrown one after another with barely a second of gap between them. The point of her elbow thrust up against an exposed jawline, a hard kick to the left instep, an over the shoulder throw, even a flying side kick that would have looked at home in any number of Bruce Lee films. She applied pressure with every move, adjusting her posture, stance and positioning to keep him pinned with his back to one of the towering infernos that lined the city street.

  “It is over.” She declared as Temujin slumped to a knee, the Warden's HP bar down to the final hint of red. “Skill us-”

  Her skill choice was interrupted by a cough. Then another, and another. Unable to talk, she lashed out, taking another sliver off that insignificant tick of health. But she couldn't do enough, not as it seized upon her weakness, not as the hacking cough made any sort of skill use unbearable.

  So close, yet so far. Even damaged as he was, without Sarah, this was a lost battle. The Warden would gut Cayden if he were fool enough to advance without some sneaky tactic or well thought out plan, and he had neither. And even if he could, the only skill he had left to use that could do any damage at all was Southern Cross, an attack that would never land without Sarah in the wings drawing most of the Warden's attention.

  There was only one thing to do, as much as he hated to do it.

  “Ileia” Cayden whispered, drawing on his mental fortitude as he formed the runic magic into a physical form. The stones of the street lifted, flying in large numbers directly towards Temujin, who predictably raised his guard at their approach. The projectiles stopped short however, soon joined by hundreds, then thousands more as the street became a stone wall, a several foot thick barrier that should buy him just long enough to-

  A crack like thunder disrupted Cayden's plan, his wall exploding outward in a shower of rubble that peppered him with stinging, but non-damaging debris. On the other side of the impact, stood Temujin, none worse for the wear even as part of the stone wall collapsed just to his left.

  “You have got to be...” Cayden said in dispair. He began another wall, then a second, a third and a fourth, dispelling one of his own personal buffs to free up unused MP as he advanced. Each new spell was accompanied by the sound of an impact, of stone shattering into fragments at the hand of the Warden general. It was everything he could do to keep ahead of it. And even then it might not be enough.

  “Natha Sere!” Cayden cried out with everything he could muster.

  What he didn't do was focus. Simply speaking the runes was not enough to invoke their power, which was good, because Cayden didn't want to. Instead, he knelt beside Sarah's crouched down body and spoke two more words, hoping that the cracking flames and the officer's own attack would conceal the sound of his voice. "Teri Antha."

  One of his hands was outstretched, palm facing towards the wall as the Warden broke through, the other wrapped tightly over Sarah's mouth, doing everything he could to muffle the sound of her coughs.

  For just a heartbeat, Cayden thought they were dead. Temujin stared directly at them, violet painted eyes all but glowing in the firelight as the Warden loomed impressive and powerful. Then his head turned left, then right. The fury of its expression softened to mere frustration as one hand rose to its temple and its drew closed.

  Not the time to be meditating. Move you dumb bastard, move! Cayden inwardly begged. Summoning wall after wall had depleted the majority of his remaining MP, and his illusionary barrier was not a cheap spell to begin with. Thirty-five, no, forty seconds at the most.

  That pool of time ticked by both faster and slower than any period in Cayden's life. His MP ticked down with exaggerated slowness, each sip from the pool an eternity, only for vast swaths of this to vanish in as long as it took his eyes to focus on the officer before them. Temujin was searching for them, of that much Cayden was fairly certain. Some sort of psychic connection with his troops. There was little sense to search for them on foot when he could order his troops to do it for him.

  Ten seconds left. They wouldn't make it.

  The angry sound of metal biting into stone opened Temujin's eyes, the Warden officer looking down in befuddlement at the slim dagger embedded in his shoulder. He stared just long enough to watch as a second, then a third dagger joined the first before turning their attention to the obvious source, a heavyset man clad in black leather, perched precariously on a rooftop only a few buildings down the street.

  Temujin's reply was not one of words, but of actions, the now dirt and gravel road grinding under his footsteps as he advanced, first at a brisk walk, then a run as he saw Shifty starting to retreat.

  Cayden turned as the Warden passed, the barrier kept interposed between the two of them until well after the Warden had darted down an alleyway. Until well after Cayden was sure they were safe.

  “Could you be any more irresponsib-” He started to say, his eyes growing wide as he looked down at Sarah's limp body. At some point during their concealment, the smoke had finished the job, draining the last remnants of her HP and putting her into bleedout. Another minute and she'd be dead.

  “You know...” Cayden grumbled as he snapped his fingers and searched his bag for a set of bandages. “At this point we are even for that whole 'getting you kidnapped thing'.” He adjusted her body to lay flat so he could bandage her more easily, but not before making a show of nodding her head to what he'd been saying. “I'm glad you agree.”

  "We destroyed the temple alter in the city, plus the whole building is kind of on fire, so you should respawn in Sunè, assuming everything goes well. If not, well, you've got my number, right?" He resisted the urge to bob her head again as he
tightened the last of the bandages, watching as her HP slowly crept up towards full.

  "When you get there, let me know you are safe. And, once you're ready, I think you and I need to have a talk." He smiled down at her as light began to pour from her body, the sign that she was about to return to her respawn point. "Wish me luck, Des."

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  “Shifty, you still alive?” Cayden asked.

  “Yeah.” The thief's voice replied across Cayden's headset, a bit more ragged and fearful than Cayden was used to. “Turns out that Stone Men can jump though.”

  “Well, at least one of them can. Sure you lost him?”

  “Must have, because my comms are back on. Thought the persistent bastard was going to camp my hiding spot until it burned down around me, but something else got his attention. “ Shifty replied.

  “I'm not even sure I want to know what that was. But thanks, I owe you.”

  The other man's mocking grin was almost palpable over the call. “Wait, you were there? I was just trying to save the pretty girl.”

  Cayden rolled his eyes and turned his attention back to his display. First, he sent Shifty a party invite. Once that was done, he reopened his party chat. “Michael, Asch. You two alright?”

  Asch replied after a brief pause. "Barely. We've downed some potions, but the smoke is canceling out all of our health regen, and then some.”

  "I'm about the same," Cayden admitted with a wince. They didn't have long before the smoke inhalation upgraded to major. "Did you-"

  “Yes Cayden.” Michael snapped.

  “We got the enemy caster, yeah.” Whether she knew the source of tension between the two men or not, Dinah wasn't saying anything about it. “Turns out he could resurrect their soldiers, so it is good we got him when we did. Score one for the good guys.”

  “I'll take it.” He agreed. “How far are you from the sewer entrance?”

  "As the crow flies? Not far at all. But most of the paths that were setup earlier are collapsed by now, and the ones that don't have Warden soldiers in the way. We might just have to burst through the back of a house somewhere."

  "Yeah, I see you on my map now," Cayden replied. "We'll come to you, then find a way through together."

  "Roger that," Dinah replied.

  It didn't take long for Cayden to get to Shifty; he ran where he could, and abused his Flame Walk spell whenever an obstacle impeded his progress. Past that, however, things began to slow dramatically.

  Just as Dinah had suggested, the Warden troops were everywhere, occupying nearly every intersection and crossing listed on Cayden's map. The two of them managed to skirt a few patrols, by way of alley or an as of yet unburned rooftop, but at a certain point, it became clear that the Wardens were not going to let them simply waltz into the sewers.

  He had to give the enemy officer credit; it was a decent enough plan. Most of the Warden troops they'd already come across were wounded to varying degrees, and Cayden knew that it would only get worse for them. The smoke was a killer for the players, but the heat would be what eventually did in the Wardens. By dawn, most of the soldiers in the city would be destroyed. So rather than cower them in the coolest locations, in an attempt to save them, Temujin had decided to dedicate hundreds of them to make sure that the Players who had killed his spellcaster, humans who had nearly killed him would have nowhere to run.

  If the plan hadn't been directed at killing him, Cayden might have given it a grudging thumbs up.

  "Yeah, this isn't happening," Cayden said from deeper into an alleyway as Shifty kept guard from its mouth. "We've got Warden troops everywhere. Temujin knows we can't wait him out.”

  “Who?” Michael asked.

  “Temujin," Cayden repeated before he realized his mistake. "The enemy officer."

  “Ah.”

  “So we try fighting our way out?” A small cough accompanied Dinah's reply, a worrying side of what was to come.

  “Mix it up a little, yeah.” Cayden grinned in spite of himself. “Got a weak point in mind?”

  “Only about twenty of them between us and the sewer entrance if we go this way.” A glowing line appeared on Cayden's display, drawn from Michael's current position to the sewer entrance.

  "We'll cut through them and pile in behind you then," Shifty said, throwing a glance back to Cayden for his approval.

  “A better plan than I've got.” He shrugged. “You all ready?”

  "As we're going to be," Dinah replied.

  Michael agreed. “No sense wasting time.”

  Cayden strolled to the edge of the alleyway, taking up a position alongside Shifty. His heart was pounding, and he desperately wanted to take just a few seconds, just long enough to calm his frayed nerves. But Michael was right. Every second they wasted here was a second closer to asphyxiation. “On three.”

  “Three.” Dinah shot back impatiently.

  Just outside their alleyway, the Warden troops jerked in unison, as though a universal puppeteer had tugged their strings all at once. Their heads turned North, to where Dinah and Michael must have begun their assault. The behavior was markedly different from the haphazard warfare they'd encountered on their sortie from the Royal Quarter. No doubt Temujin had time to focus this time, without the distraction of Sarah trying to punch him repeatedly in the face.

  "Go," Cayden instructed. Shifty didn't need the encouragement, his knives already flying at the foes guarding a nearby alleyway that was their initial destination.

  On both ends of the street, the focus of the Warden troops shifted. Eyes focused on Shifty, and then on Cayden. Metal weapons gleamed in the firelight as soldiers brought them to a ready, and the mob charged.

  “Move, move!” Cayden insisted, the back of his hand slapping at Shifty's right shoulder until the man got the hint and let Cayden sprint past him. One of the three soldiers guarding the entrance to the alley was still alive when Cayden hit him, the flat side of his replacement kite shield striking with enough force to bare the soldier clear off his feet. That was one thing too many players forgot when it came to Babel. For all its mechanics, sometimes a simple shove could do more than the best skill usage.

  “Earth Wall.” The words fell from Cayden's mouth as Shifty ran past him. With so many on their heels, this wall wouldn't last much longer than the ones he had cast earlier, but it didn't have to. A minute, perhaps half a minute would be enough to keep them from getting mobbed down as they cleaned up the immediate opposition waiting on the far side of the alley.

  Only two blocks had separated Cayden and Shifty from Michael and Dinah. During better times he could have run the whole of that distance in a matter of a minute, but with Warden soldiers blocking their path at every turn, it took them closer to three. Three minutes with the timer counting ever downward.

  “Are you guys almost to the entrance?” Cayden demanded.

  “Just about!” Came Asch's reply, the words filed with exertion, the clang of swords audible in the background.

  “Good, because we're coming up on your tail now.” He said.

  "Try not to be too close," Asch replied. "We've got a lot of them right behin-"

  "Right behind?" Cayden asked. When there was no immediate response his eyebrows knitted together in consternation. "Asch. Asch? Dinah? Michael?"

  "Well, that can't be good," Shifty said with his usual mastery of understatement.

  Cayden wasn't sure whether to laugh or to glare. Instead, he turned his attention to the map in front of him. "She's right; we probably don't want to follow their exact path. This way."

  Even on the alternate route, they had to cut their way through a half dozen Warden soldiers, and barricade out over twice that number before they were firmly back on track. Only a few hundred feet, a single long alleyway, separated them from the sewer entrance. Only a few hundred feet, when Cayden's map went blank, then vanished entirely.

  "Stop. Stop!" He shouted, forced to physically grab Shifty as the other man tried to surge passed him.

  "
We're almost-" Shifty started, before he too realized the danger. "An officer. Damnit. Is there another way?"

  "Not back that way," Cayden said, jerking his thumb in the direction they'd just come. The Warden troops that had been chasing them were chasing them no longer. Instead, they had closed ranks with one another, forming up in defensive posture along every possible route at their rear. They weren't pursuing, merely cutting off retreat.

  "A trap?"

  "An invitation." The voice echoed from every surface, unmistakable in its origin, even if Cayden could not yet lay eyes on its source.

  "Well, how can we refuse that?" Shifty asked with a tone that spoke volumes about how much he wanted to.

  As they advanced, so too did the Warden soldiers behind them, the stone men taking up a position at the mouth of the alley. There wasn't much point in trying to run, Cayden knew. Temujin had guessed their exit strategy. Even if they tried for a different sewer grate, the officer would have his minions herd them around until he could get in front of them. Assuming they didn't die of inhalation before they could reach their next destination.

  The alley ahead of them opened to a public common area where overturned carts and other flaming debris had been pushed aside or stomped out to leave a wide open space. Nearly a hundred Warden soldiers occupied the plaza, with Temujin at its center, mere feet from the exposed sewer grate that should have been their salvation.

  Asch and Michael were there as well, guarded but still armed despite the horde surrounding them just out of arms reach. Considering Temujin could probably kill the four of them from full health with ease, it somehow seemed more humiliating that he let them keep their weapons, despite having the upper hand. As if taunting them to make an attempt.

  "Crawling from the madness you've wrought and the crimes you have committed, like the vermin you are. How fitting for a group of Bloodline descendants."

  "Technically it is a waterway." Was Cayden's only reply.

  Temujin was not amused.