Larissa howled with pain, and I watched in horror as her left arm was violently ripped away from her body. The white jacket reinforcements were almost all gone. They had gotten separated from one another and were being picked apart one by one.
“Flee, your majesty,” Larissa called, smashing at the tentacles with her free arm.
Player Poppy (Level 20, Barbarian, Human) has devoted her soul to the Light God Montu.
“Okay, hurry,” I said.
Popper grumbled as his small form opened the container, dug a pair of fingers into the glowing blue lotion, and climbed up onto the main part of the troll.
A group of six cable beasts, from the red and white contingent, approached our position. They’d be on us in seconds.
“Keep up the arrows,” I said, pulling Triple Fang free from my waist. I felt the dexterity boost surge through me.
“Oh god, it smells so bad,” Popper called from behind. “And it’s hairy!”
Quest update. Salve applied to 1 of 6 nipples.
“Goddamnit, I gotta do all six?”
“Jesus, quit bitching and get on with it!” I called as I jumped off the arm, landing knee-deep in a foul pool of milky-white pus. I felt my feet crush a larva corpse from the bottom of the pool.
Quest update. Salve applied to 2 of 6 nipples.
I spun up my blades, doing my best to keep them above the pool as I twirled an infinity symbol in the air. I’d been practicing with different patterns, and while this one was simple and not as dazzling as others, it didn’t require the blades to bounce off the ground. The room lit up with my fiery blades.
I sliced through a few sets of tentacles, causing the beasts to howl and fall back. My pattern slipped with each successful blow, and my blades sizzled as they dipped into the pus, causing the white liquid to spray in every direction, including on my face. I choked back the urge to vomit.
“Yes. Is pleasurable. But now not time for such pleasures,” the troll groaned. “But yes, rub harder.”
“Oh my fucking god,” Popper cried. “Please, please don’t ever say that again.”
Quest update. Salve applied to 3 of 6 nipples.
More cable beasts surged forward. In the back of the room, Larissa cried out. Her white dot blinked away. A moment later, the last of the remaining white jackets also fell. We were alone.
The portals remained open, and additional cable beasts gushed into the room. On the left side, with the gold and black flags, a new type of monster also entered the room: a centipede-like creature that scuttled close to the ground as it angled straight at me. It was about 15 feet long, with pincers wide enough to cut me in half. Its black carapace appeared to be made of pure obsidian.
“Please hurry,” I cried.
“I’m going as fast as I can. You really gotta rub it in there,” Popper yelled.
“Miss troll, we could really use your help,” Gretchen called out. She bullseyed another cable beast as I struggled to keep my blades going.
“Is hard to move with such sensual attentions,” the troll said. But a moment later, her scorpion tail smashed down, crushing two cable beasts with a single blow.
I was hoping the cable beasts from the two different portals would fight one another, especially after what Kant had said regarding the conflicts between the different “companies” as he called them. But these two groups appeared to be allies.
Quest update. Salve applied to 4 of 6 nipples.
I sliced through another cable beast. My chest burned with battle fury. I didn’t have to check my notifications to know what was happening. One of the effects of Triple Fang was a chance I would be imbued with Rage each time I landed a blow. That’s what was happening now.
The spell was different from Popper’s Berserk effect. With Berserk, Popper burst into flames, lost all autonomy, and he killed everything in sight, focusing—mostly, but not always—on the enemies. He moved faster and received a massive bonus to damage, but he also became more vulnerable himself.
Rage was similar. I didn’t burst into flames or move faster, but I received a bonus to damage. I would not attack my companions. The game also put me in a strange, semi-autonomous autopilot mode where I became extremely aggressive toward the enemy. Aggressive to the point of stupidity. The last time it had happened, I was on the deck of an airship, and I’d almost jumped off to chase a flying enemy.
Also, Gretchen had explained once that Berserk was actually a skill, not a spell. You couldn’t cast Berserk on someone. They either had the skill or they didn’t. You could with Rage.
My chest pounded. I no longer cared about the quest. I just wanted to kill everything in the room. Come on, come on, let’s do this.
The remaining monsters approached slowly, surrounding me in a semi-circle, keeping out of range of my blades. I felt myself call out in fury. I pulled my second, four-bladed urumi free from my waist and spun it up, no longer caring to keep the blades free from the pool of fluid. The dazzling show of fire and blades and pus exploded around me.
Yes, master. You thirst. You thirst like we do.
Let us play. Let us feast.
Together we shall devour this very world.
Another cable beast exploded under the troll’s tail.
Quest update. Salve applied to 5 of 6 nipples.
They spread apart as the centipede whipped toward me.
“That’s a doom burrower!” Gretchen called, pumping arrow after arrow at it. The arrows exploded against its armor, ineffective. “It has a corrosive attack. Don’t let it spit at you!”
I barely heard her. The burrower launched at me, pincers grasping as it reared up. I launched myself into the air, jumping only a fraction of the height I’d anticipated. One of my boots remained on the ground, sucked right off my foot. Still, I’d moved out of the way just in time as it sprayed an acid mist.
I cut, hard, with my blades, but they sparked and bounced off the centipede’s tough hide. My blades spun to a stop as I skittered off a rocky part of the ground, just south of where I’d been standing before.
The cable beasts lurched forward as I tried to pull my blades back into action. I didn’t see where the centipede had gone. Come on, you coward. Show yourself!
I twirled in a circle, cutting Triple Fang through at least a dozen tentacles. Screams filled the air as cable beasts pulled back. I rushed at them, and they shuffled back, like sheep afraid of an angry dog. I cut and sliced and slaughtered, doing my best to avoid the larvae spread about the floor all around us.
I felt my rage subside as I chased them back. Here, in this open place, I knew I was practically untouchable.
I popped open my spell menu, scrolled down to Hypnotize, and slammed it down.
The spell only worked while I was dual wielding. I’d never used it before, but the description read: Causes enemies to freeze. Can only be cast while dual-wielding urumi blades. Successfully hypnotized enemies will remain in that state as long as you remain spinning your blades. Physically attacking or moving out of their direct line-of-site will break the spell. This spell has a 50% chance to work on all enemies in range.
A little more than half of the cable beasts stopped in place, their tentacles, oddly, raising into the air and waving, like sea anemones. Not all of them were affected, however, which made the spell almost useless.
“The last nipple is down there,” Popper called, pointing to an area just behind the melee. “Gretchen, watch my back. I’m going in!”
He leaped off the chest of the troll, half falling, half sliding down the long, hairy breast like he was on a water slide. He landed in the pus with a plop and promptly disappeared over his head.
“Popper!” Gretchen called. She dropped her bow and jumped in after him, landing hard in the pool, chest deep.
Half of the un-hypnotized cable beasts moved toward them while the others circled around me.
A moment later, Gretchen pulled Popper up out of the pus. He grinned broadly as he clutched the now-empty jar of salve triumphantly.
/> “I did it!” he cried.
Quest Failed. The Chasm Troll’s Teat.
Achievement unlocked! Fail a quest!
I watched Popper mouth “What the fuck?” just as the doom burrower burst from the chest of the now-dead troll, a large, milky sac clutched in its pincers.
I realized then what had happened. The centipede hadn’t been attacking me at all. It had sprayed its corrosive mist at the troll. I hadn’t seen where it had gone because as I jumped away, it burrowed into the troll. It had cut its way through her massive body, finding the mammary sac, and retrieving it, just like it had likely been trained.
Not many creatures could survive something that large burrowing its way through their chest.
“Damnit,” I roared, real rage filling me now.
New Quest: Save Millicent.
Millicent the Banded Sylph has been captured by the Hook Corporation of the Cable Beasts. She is currently in the terrible clutches of a Doom Burrower. Kill the burrower, excise her from the mammary sac, and escort her to safety. If she reaches the portal to the Estuary, this quest will fail.
Reward for completing this task: You will earn Millicent’s undying loyalty and will gain control of her along with an army of her wood and rock sylvan friends. Each wood sylph can heal large groups of warriors in battle. Each rock sylph can increase the physical protection of large groups of warriors in battle. Millicent the banded sylph has additional abilities.
This is a unique quest.
“Stop that centipede!” Popper yelled, pointing up at the doom burrower. Just as he said it, a pair of cable beasts lunged for them. Gretchen, who still held Popper in her hands, fell back into the pus, both of them disappearing into the pool, which was now tinged red.
Shit! I leaped forward, killing as many of the beasts as I could before the Hypnotize effects went away. I turned and ran toward Gretchen and Popper, killing the two cable beasts.
The centipede slithered down the troll’s body, down a long leg, moving impossibly fast. The remaining cable beasts moved to protect the centipede.
Meanwhile, chasm troll larvae started to swarm their now-dead mother, somehow re-invigorated with her death. The cheeping faded and was replaced with the sound of the young beginning to devour their mother.
Pain exploded on my bare foot as a chasm troll chomped down on me. Its tail quivered to strike, but I punted it into the pool.
Popper emerged first, like some beast from the sea. He now clutched his axe, and he swung it savagely at the larvae as he stomped matter-of-factly toward the fleeing centipede. The only reason we weren’t instantly overwhelmed by the larvae was they were mostly focusing on getting to their mother. More and more appeared, coming from all directions. They ignored us, and they ignored the fleeing cable beasts.
We need to collapse this cave, I thought. We can’t let these things swarm up into my city.
Gretchen pulled herself up, rummaging in her bag for her spear. She pulled it out, and without a word, we both turned and sprinted toward the procession.
We weren’t going to make it. They quickly closed the distance between them and the portal.
Gretchen’s mouth moved, and I realized she was casting a spell. A large hole appeared in the ground in front of the fleeing centipede. It squealed as it plunged inside, sac and all. Only 3/4s of its length fell into the hole, however, and multiple tentacles shot out from the cable beasts, wrapping around the centipede to pull it out of the well.
The Create Well spell had given us a few extra seconds, and that was all we needed.
About 15 cable beasts remained. There had been more, I realized belatedly, but all the ones with the red and white banner had retreated. Even their portal was now gone. What was that all about? No matter.
Popper was first into the fray. He screamed obscenities, a stream of curses and shouts that were over the top, even for him. “Fucking troll nipples,” he shouted as he cleaved a chunk out from the bottom of a cable beast.
He burst into blue flames. Screaming, he continued to hack at the cable beasts, who were forced to abandon their efforts to pull out the centipede.
“Ah, hell,” I said, stopping short.
“Stay clear of him,” Gretchen shouted, angling around. I rushed around the other way, moving to cut off the centipede, who had decided to pull itself out of the hole.
Popper’s beetle armor appeared to be highly effective against the beasts. They’d snap out at him, and the armor’s Damage Reflect enchantment stung them enough for them to let go. Last time he’d gone berserk, he’d ended up killed by the chinchillas. Hopefully he’d hold out this time, though I wasn’t too keen on his chances fighting by himself. We couldn’t risk getting close to him.
Gretchen jabbed at the side of the centipede, desperately searching for a hole in its armor. There was none. Each jab just skipped right off. She risked breaking her spear.
I remembered before when it had sprayed its corrosive acid it had reared up before it had attacked. That’s how to kill it. Its belly is unprotected. But could it even attack like that now? It held the sac in its mandibles. With dread, I realized, probably not. The damn thing was practically indestructible.
Then, an idea.
I circled around, so I stood just before the crackling portal to the Estuary. Don’t fall backward. I whipped my blades, unfurling them. They scattered loosely onto the ground, streaming out in front of me like ribbons. The doom burrower pulled itself fully out of the well and charged forward, looking to bowl me over, or worse, tackle me into the portal with it.
No, I thought as Gretchen leaped onto the centipede’s back, her spear striking spot after spot. She didn’t know what I was planning. She was in the way.
Behind her, I caught sight of Popper smashing the final cable beasts into pieces with his small axe. The flames covering him started to fade.
The centipede barreled toward me. There was nothing I could do about Gretchen now.
Here goes, I thought.
Just as the centipede’s bulk rushed over the forward strands of my long blades, I hopped to the left, pivoted off my booted left foot, and I backflipped over the beast, passing Gretchen by inches. She watched, wide-eyed as I whipped my blades toward myself. Having been wrapped almost fully around the monster, I felt the blades cut deep as I pulled.
The centipede dropped dead, dropping the sac barely a foot from the portal.
Gretchen rolled off the centipede, screaming in horror as blood hemorrhaged from where her two legs had been moments before.
I rushed forward, pulling a healing potion from my bandolier. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I said, pouring the drink into her mouth. She fell onto her back, continuing to scream as the new legs started to grow. I gave her a second potion. A second potion wasn’t necessary, but it hastened the healing, thus easing the pain. “I’m sorry,” I repeated.
“Guys!” Popper yelled, rushing forward. He jumped onto my shoulder and leaped, his axe upraised. He pounded down, hard on the tentacle that had shot forth from the open portal, wrapping around the exposed sac.
He severed the limb, and the portal snapped away.
On the other side of the room, the dead body of the troll queen quivered as she was swarmed by an ever-increasing pile of ravenous babies.
Popper pulled at the large sac, trying to drag it over to us, but he couldn’t budge it.
“We need to get this open fast,” he said.
“Are you okay?” I asked Gretchen, looking down at her now-bare legs and feet.
She wiggled her toes and cracked a weak smile, giving me a thumbs up.
“I’m so sorry,” I repeated. “It was the only thing I could think of, and you’d jumped onto its back.”
“It’s okay,” she said. “Really. Like you said, it was the only way.”
Jesus, I thought. First the insanity and then this. I knew how much severed limbs hurt. This game was taking a toll, even if we survived.
Popper pulled out Dolly Trauma, his enchanted knife, and he ca
refully cut along the edge of the pulsating sac. It popped like a balloon, sending chunky, rotten milk in all directions.
The fairy lay prone on the ground, no bigger than my hand. She was red from head to toe, save for a long, beige streak in her wet hair. I guessed that’s why they called them banded fairies.
We huddled around her.
“Is she alive?” I asked, afraid to touch her.
“She’s small for a fairy. They’re usually a bit bigger than that,” Gretchen said.
She looked like a typical, mythological fairy. She was a thin, auric-like creature with butterfly wings. She wore a red, sopping-wet dress. A slow procession of sparkles emanated from her.
“Millicent?” Popper asked. “That’s your name, right? Millicent?”
“Is she dead?” the fairy asked. Her voice was soft, innocent, like one would expect a fairy to talk.
“Who?” I asked. “The troll?”
She nodded.
“Yes,” I said. “Are you okay?”
She nodded again, absently. “Good. I’m glad. Are my babies still here?”
Her babies? “The larvae? Yes,” I said.
“All right,” she said. She slowly stood, stretching her arms. “You three stay back. I have some work to do. It might take a bit, and then we’ll talk about how I can repay you.”
“Uh, sure,” I said, exchanging a look with Gretchen, who shrugged. She suddenly zipped into the air, leaving a trail of flaming sparkles in her wake. She corkscrewed toward the ravening mass of larvae.
Quest Completed! Save Millicent!
See Millicent the Banded Sylph for remainder of rewards.
We watched, open-mouthed as Millicent zipped toward a single larva that hadn’t quite yet reached the troll. She alighted on the fat, baby troll for a moment and bounded away, doing the same to another and then another.
Each troll froze in place the moment it was touched.
After a few minutes of this, Millicent zipped back to us.
The Hobgoblin Riot: Dominion of Blades Book 2: A LitRPG Adventure Page 9