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Six Sacred Swords

Page 22

by Andrew Rowe


  Then I was falling, and not toward the platform.

  I reached out, one hand managing to catch the edge. My hand stung from the force of the impact, and it began to slip almost immediately. The surface of the platform was smooth, which wasn’t great for forming a grip.

  I changed that.

  Reshape.

  My practice with Dawnbringer’s crystalline scabbard was enough to give me a vague feeling of the structure of the crystal, and that in turn was just barely sufficient for me to try to alter it. The edge I was gripping reshaped around my hand, forming a handle. From there, I was able to pull up my other hand and repeat the process.

  Just in time, too, because the whole thing trembled when Reika landed on it a moment later. I would have fallen if I hadn’t been gripping onto the self-made handles.

  Reika knelt down, looking concerned. “Can you manage? I don’t want to cheat unless we really have to.”

  “I can get up, but you’re going to have to give me some room.”

  I pulled myself up. The platform began to wobble dangerously, but fortunately, it didn’t fall immediately.

  As I reached the top of the platform, I processed just how bad of a situation we were in. I didn’t know exactly how long we had before each platform fell, but I didn’t think we’d make it all the way across to the other side at this rate.

  “Could you go into dragon form and just float nearby?” I steadied myself as I finished getting to a standing position and measured the distance to the next platform.

  “Not going to be enough space for that in the corridors, and we didn’t bring enough food for me to eat as a dragon.”

  “Maybe just make wings in your human form, then?”

  “I mean, I could, but making wings in my human form always ruins my shirt. And we are critically low on shirts right now.”

  She did have a point, but I felt like falling to our deaths was a slightly greater concern. “I will buy you shirts, Reika. I will buy you all of the shirts. Infinite shirts.”

  Reika rolled her eyes and stepped backward off the platform.

  I heard a tearing sound a moment later, presumably from her wings bursting through the back of her outfit, but I didn’t wait. I rushed forward and jumped straight to the next platform while I still could.

 

  I couldn’t possibly roll my eyes hard enough.

  It’s a scabbard, Dawn. It’s meant to be a tight fit.

  I heard a ‘hm’, as if she was considering.

  We can discuss this later, Dawn. I’m busy not dying right now.

 

  Don’t remind me about my poor life choices.

  I steadied myself after landing on another platform. A distant glow reminded me that the uncertain time the platforms would hold my weight was far from my only problem.

  When someone sees an attack coming from a distance, ordinarily people do the obvious thing and get right out of the way. On a tiny floating platform, however, that wasn’t an option — unless I felt like taking my chances with the eternal abyss instead of the blast of light that was likely to be heading in my direction a moment later.

  I might have tried jumping to the next platform, but it was one of the moving ones. It was currently floating off to one side. It looked like it’d be several seconds before it got into a good position, and I didn’t have that long.

  And so, when I saw the attack coming, I followed an instinct I usually resisted.

  My hand flew down to the Sae’kes hilt.

  Unlock.

  The blade sang as it escaped the scabbard, flashing upward as the blast of light finally approached me.

  The air tore apart in the wake of my swing, slicing the blast of light cleanly in half. That didn’t dissipate it entirely, but the remainder of the blast was weak enough that I barely felt the impact.

 

  Thanks, Dawn.

 

  I groaned. You’re not going to convince me that the energy beam was sapient, Dawn. I am not going to feel bad about dispersing a magical attack.

 

  I’ll try not to lose any sleep over it. Anyway, Dawn, I know you’re jealous that I’m using another magic sword, but you’re going to have to come to terms with that. I’ll give you some attention when I’m done with this place.

  Her voice in my mind sounded quieter than usual.

  She was definitely jealous.

  I smirked.

  I’m sure you have plenty of special abilities, just like this sword does. Maybe you can cut beams of light, too.

 

  Maybe. Is it working?

 

  Ahhh, so you can’t cut beams of light. Got it.

 

  She suddenly went quiet.

  Heh. I got you.

 

  Uh-huh. Real believable.

  I snickered, waiting for the perfect time to hop to the next platform.

  Reika floated up nearby, her arms folded. She still looked mostly human, save for the wings that had burst through the back of her shirt.

  The distant glow was beginning to get brighter again, so I didn’t pause to chat. I kept my sword drawn, judged the distance, and jumped to the next platform as soon as it came within range.

  Another flash of light, another swing to cut it into pieces. I went for quarters that time, since I was feeling fancy.

  I found myself moving into a pattern.

  Wait. Jump. Slash. Ignore snark from sword. Repeat.

  The light blasts were fast, but not nearly as fast as some light spells. I suspected they were primarily constructed from transference mana, with a bit of light mana to give them extra damaging power. Once I’d figured out the timing, cutting through them was easy work. Almost instinctive.

  That worked pretty well up until the point where I reached platforms that were moving up and down, rather than left and right.

  There were two main problems at that point.

  I took another graze when a second source of light fired at me from my side, rather than right in front of me like they had been. Fortunately, I managed to steady myself and avoid falling off the platform, but at that point, bursts of light started firing at me from all sides.

  I groaned and fell into a flurry of swings, trying to judge the sources of the attacks and evaluate any patterns. I was close enough to the far end of the cavern that I could see the origin point for the original attacks — it looked like a metal tube built into the wall, etched with runes.

  As for a pattern, the original one seemed to fire a blast every three seconds. The others didn’t follow the same timing, but after waiting for each to fire a few times, I noted that each individual tube had a set period it waited. Four seconds for the left, five for the one behind me, and only two seconds for the one on my right.

  That also meant that some of them were firing at the same time, depending on when their timers overlapped. That made finding a good window to jump forward tricky, but that wasn’t my pl
an, anyway.

  I cut down another pair of blasts, concentrated the aura around the Sae’kes, and then swung forward and pushed on the aura with my mind.

  A shockwave of destructive energy lashed outward, tearing through the air and ripping the metal tube apart on contact.

  I’d avoided using the Sae’kes offensively when I’d first been attacked because I didn’t want to hurt whoever was attacking. But if these were just magical items, rather than people?

  I didn’t have the slightest bit of hesitation about tearing them apart.

  It only took a few more moments to eliminate the other three tubes. The only brief pause was for taking a moment to adjust when Reika floated into the trajectory I’d been planning to swing, and she quickly got the idea and flew out of the way.

  The platform below me started to shake. A glance backward told me that the ones closest to the entrance had finally fallen, but it had taken a while. I was still nervous this one was going to drop, but I didn’t rush my timing on the jump. I couldn’t, because there was still another problem.

  The next platform wasn’t floating quite low enough for me to jump directly onto it.

  When I’d been at the entrance, I’d thought that the platforms had been lowering just to the point where they’d be directly in line for a jump. That had been easy to assume, and easy to perceive incorrectly at a distance.

  Unfortunately, the platform ended about five feet above me, and a good six feet in front.

  I could jump six feet ahead without a problem. Maybe I could make five feet vertically with some space, but that was trickier. I definitely couldn’t reliably do both in a single jump.

  Velas would have flown through this place in a second, I complained to myself. Maybe she should have been the one dealing with this.

 

  Ugh. Velas is not my girlfriend. She’s just a friend. Or an enemy. It’s a little unclear at times. I’ll explain more later.

  Not being able to make a jump definitely made things harder. I resisted the urge to just ask Reika to float me over, since that would have defeated the point of the test.

  Instead, I concentrated on the Sae’kes again.

  Reshape.

  The blade of the Sae’kes rippled and changed, with metal sorcery altering the blade into a length of chain.

  Most of my paladin friends would have thrown a fit if they’d realized I was altering a sacred artifact, and in a serious way, not like how Dawnbringer liked to complain about rocks.

  Still, time was of the essence, and this was the best plan I had at the time.

  The tougher part was focusing on the destructive essence around it and pulling it into the blade itself. To do that more effectively, I temporarily passed the sword to my left hand, focusing some of my own essence into it to keep the aura of the sword constrained. If I didn’t keep that aura tightly packed around the surface of the sword, it’d cut right through anything I hit, which would have made my plan fail immediately.

  With the aura temporarily wrested into position, I waited until the platform was at its lowest point, then whipped the chain forward. I’d used the sword in this shape several times, so I had a pretty good idea of how hard I needed to swing it and the right angle.

  The chain bounced right off the platform the first time I tried it, and it took me a good five attempts to do what I was going for. I got the chain wrapped all the way around it, then commanded it again in the instant that the chain made contact with itself.

  Connect.

  The touching parts of the chain connected with each other, forming a solid loop of metal around the platform.

  See? This sword has some other tricks, too. Much more interesting than firing blasts of light, don’t you think? I sent the thought toward Dawn. The reshaping wasn’t actually a function of the Sae’kes — it was one of my own abilities. I could have done the same thing with virtually any weapon...but she didn’t need to know that immediately. I’d tell her eventually, but teasing her was a welcome reversal of our usual pattern.

  And it was just as effective as I’d hoped.

 

  Oh, is that so? How do I use them, then?

 

  I’ll keep that in mind for later, but you’re going to have to really put in some effort to impress me with a beam of light. I’ve seen tons of those.

 

  I smirked. Mission accomplished.

 

  Never mind.

  It was easy to forget she could sometimes hear what I was thinking even when I wasn’t deliberately sending my thoughts toward her. She obviously couldn’t glean everything, or she would have realized immediately that I’d been baiting her with that whole line of commentary. I’d do more testing on that later, but for that moment, the platform below me was wobbling dangerously, so I had to move.

  I had a couple options. I could have tried to drag the platform closer to me with brute strength, but I was worried that would disrupt the enchantments keeping it afloat.

  Instead, I used the chain more like a grappling hook. I jumped forward, then used the chain to pull myself up to the platform. Since the chain was wrapped all the way around it, I didn’t have much difficulty grabbing each section of chain and pulling myself upward until I was atop it. It was a little strange, since I was technically gripping the blade of a deadly weapon, but it didn’t cut me.

  The Sae’kes never cut me, even when the blade was in its normal form. Not the aura, not the metallic edge — none of it ever harmed me. I still didn’t know why. It wasn’t sapient, as far as I could tell. I presumed that the enchantments on it prevented it from harming the wielder, but I had very little idea how it worked.

  That was something to learn more about another time, when I found an expert who could study the sword in detail. For the moment, I made my way to the top of the platform. Then, from there, I repeated the process with two more — and then I was finally at the entrance to the next chamber.

  I took a moment just to breathe.

  Reika flew over next to me. “Good work!” She hugged me. The platform below me shook.

  I accepted the hug. “Thanks, Reika. Think I’d better keep moving, though.”

  “Okay!” She grinned. “Let’s do this!”

  Unlike the previous doors, the two tall metallic doors in front of me actually had a standard door handle. I felt pleased about that, since presumably it meant I didn’t have to do any other sort of puzzle just to get them open.

  I reshaped the Sae’kes back into a sword and sheathed it at my hip. After that, I reached for the door handle and pulled.

  On the plus side, the door opened immediately and without effort.

  On the minus side, I felt a pinprick on the pointer finger of my right hand.

  Son of a—

  I raised my hand, examining the finger. A single drop of blood was visible where the something had pierced my skin. I could see a hint of greenish fluid, too.

  Oh, good, I’m poisoned. That’s going to make my day more pleasant.

  I squeezed the finger, hoping to flush out any poison that I could before it spread too far. I wasn’t sure if that was the right approach, but I didn’t have the time or expertise to identify the specific type of poison.

  I was familiar enough with poison to know that there were an absurd number of varieties, and that there was no such thing as a universal antidote. That meant that even if I had been carrying any sort of antidote on me, it was unlikely to w
ork.

  Instead, I focused the destructive aura inside my body into my right hand. I felt a surge of pain as I collected more power in my hand than it was used to holding, then a lingering burning sensation after I released it.

  I hoped that I’d be able to use my aura to purge the poison immediately, but blood moved even faster than my reaction had. I’d probably gotten some of it, maybe even most of it. But not all of it.

  The burning in my right hand faded, but not in a good way. It was going numb.

  I reached into my bag and pulled out my purestone, pressing it against the injury. Unfortunately, it wasn’t likely to do much. It was built for removing toxins in water. I’d speculated that it could help with poisoned wounds, but that wasn’t the intended function.

  “What’s wrong?” Reika asked. “You stopped.”

  I showed her the finger. “Poison trap on the door handle.”

  After a moment of consideration, I realized that a standard needle trap couldn’t have pierced my skin under ordinary circumstances.

  I briefly searched the door, finding runes on the bottom side of the handle, as well as the tiny spike that had pierced my finger. I wasn’t an expert on local runes, but I was pretty sure one of them was a variant on a rune for the poison dominion.

  Hm? Yeah, Corin, I guess I remember that one pretty well. It looked about like this.

  It was one of the few runes I’d seen that looked like the ones I was used to from my homeland. There were a few extra swirly things — I don’t know the technical name, I’m not an Enchanter — and the bracket looking things around it, but aside from that, it was pretty standard.

  Another one of them probably gave the tiny spike on the bottom additional sharpness. I don’t remember what that one looked like.

  There we go.

  I reached back to the handle, careful to only touch the top part of it rather than the part that had injected the poison into my hand, then stretched my senses into the handle.

  Reshape.

  The door handle detached from the door.

  I carefully lifted it and dropped it into my bag. I didn’t know what I was going to do with an enchanted door handle, but you never knew when a magical item might come in handy.

 

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