I was hardly an indecisive guy, but I knew every small decision here mattered. While I thought over my options I knew for certain that shivering and being cold sucked. I needed a fire orb and a spot to hide. At the same time my new mana pool was the largest it had ever been. That sealed the deal for me it was time for a risk.
I tugged on Beargor’s orb, spawning him and his army onto the landscape of village one.
A magical blinding light of baby blue burst over the area. The startled Justicars were thoroughly confused for the briefest of seconds. A few pointed, a few readied weapons, and most shrugged. Suddenly there was a snap of magic that materialized thousands of bears.
At first there was an eerie silence as they swarmed the area. That faded quickly as the sound of battle erupted. I groaned feeling my core drain quickly.
The shrieks of the Justicars in the air were drowned out by the roar of the bears. I could only see so much because a bear stepped right outside my minimal view. There were cries of death. A lot of death. The bear blocking my vision moved to show me the dozens of Justicars being mauled.
My stomach turned at the ferocity combined with the suddenness of the savage deaths. The bears, well, they were eating the dead. The fight was over in less than a minute. When thousands of warriors spawned around you suddenly you tended to die. This was why these orbs were so valuable. I returned the army to my core that was dangerously low on mana. I saw it had a six hour twelve minute cooldown.
Maybe that was from the injured or killed parts of the army needing to regen. I’d have to ask someone later. Now was the time to get a new outfit!
With an empowered heave I busted the rusty grate open. A quick inspection of my arm showed I’d jumped to 3981 in levels. My gasp was covered by the groan of a survivor not far away. I stumbled out of the pipe and onto the forest floor by village one.
Deeper into the forest, nestled between the trees the groaning of a wounded male increased. I shifted around finally able to see the bigger picture. There were roughly a hundred bodies sprawled around the area, their rigid frames fixed in gory final poses. Some had orbs littered around them, while others would require work. My time was unfortunately short; there were already air scouts rushing from Beargor’s castle to see what happened.
I went deeper into the forest to kill the wounded man mainly because he would bring attention and he was close. My footsteps over the loud pine needle type vegetation was ignored by his cries of agony. When I bypassed a few trees, I finally saw the victim.
The male ork was missing his guts. Literally the bear who mortally wounded him decided to eat his intestines before finishing the task. He wore black robes with red trim and carried a really nice fire staff.
Before he could scorch me into oblivion, I ran to his side with a dagger out. His blue eyes locked to mine. Those eyes spoke without words, pleading for mercy. I smiled and said, “You got a thorn in your eye that is causing you to hallucinate. I just need to -”
He smiled with a nod as my dagger slid into the eyeball with a squish; the tip finding the brain. The ork’s legs flopped and he gasped in shock until the body stilled. With him silent I saw these robes would fit me. The transfer of loot started again. The fire mage had an extra-large bag. Score. I tossed my entire bags worth of orbs into the new larger sack. I found a strap he used to carry an extra staff.
There was a fancy water staff a dozen paces away where he must have been ambushed. I attached the diagonal staff carrier from shoulder to hip and set my new fire, healing, and the water staff into the holder slots. I spawned a spear and cracked his heart. Yellow orbs spilled out, telling me again that the Justicars valued nice gear and skill over numbers. I quickly shoved the four fire spells into the bag and noticed the last orb was a pet horse. Yes! Not only was there a pet but he dropped the full amount.
While his body was a nice find, I was forced with a tough choice. Did I spawn the horse? Did I ride for all I was worth to get away? Or did I head back to the flowng waterways and hope to get another exit, letting this massacre distract my foes. I paused to scan for the enemy. Up above the canopy there was the flickering reveal of blimps moving to this area. The sight of reinforcements made the decision for me.
I had to leave now. With the enemy having air superiority I hesitantly picked moving underground. It was the best of a bad situation. Or so I hoped. I ran back for the grate, opening, and slamming it shut as backup troops arrived. While I walked down the drain, I groaned at the fact of going back into the water. Before I took the plunge back in, I had a single thought.
I will do whatever it takes to make it home to Vin.
CHAPTER 8
My teeth chattered together as I shivered in the torrent of water pushing me further downstream. There were X marks on the tunnel entryways in which I could see light, meaning I was still behind the team sent to check for me. A god awful stench hit my nose as I neared an intersection.
Yup, I was in a sewer. Honestly, this was probably all sewer water, just the dungeon bears probably didn’t shit, so the first bit I was in was relatively clean. One thing was certain, the nasty stench of fresh shit meant real beings lived up this next exit. The kind I could blend into on my journey home.
Getting off at this intersection was tougher than the other one. My grip was harder to maintain and I was laden down with extra gear. I used enough of my recovered mana to get into the nauseous tunnelway.
I have heard of people saying they could do sewers with ease. Well, not me.
I hurled, and then I hurled some more. The entire time I gagged and eventually I slipped in my rush. My slide down was halted, but the damage was done, I was soaked in feces. A fresh bucket was dumped down when I made the midway point, causing me to retch more.
I climbed out of a box desiring nothing more than to be free of the confined shit tube. The box was just as nasty as the dumped contents inside. My exit went unnoticed on the edge of a town. I saw there were guards at a checkpoint and the town held a wall twenty feet tall. There was a river that cut through the settlement and based on the fact I saw kids using the water to get back and forth, it meant I could bypass the guards.
My steps were immediately for the river. I expected the flowing water to be nasty, I mean there had to be lazy residents chucking shit down in the water. When I saw the flow I clenched my fists and shook them happily. I was upstream of the town.
There was concern in the back of my mind that there would be some massive monster waiting in the river's depths. I just hoped shit covered humans were not on the menu.
I ran and jumped into the water. My plunge brought a very interesting revelation, the water up here was warm. Not like a hot spring, but the bitter chill was replaced by a temperature I wouldn’t shiver from. With a few powered kicks, I exited the water for the shoreline. The process of washing everything bit by bit was going to be tedious. I had just removed my boots when a little harpy girl saw my efforts and flew to me.
“Excuse me mister. Not supposed to bath in the river, there’s a fine. Auntie Triso runs a bath house. I get a coin if -”
“A bathhouse you say,” I said, sticking my boots back onto my feet. “I take it there’s a laundry service too?”
“Yes Sir,” the little girl said. I reached into one of the three purses I acquired and found a durca coin. Her eyes lit up when I extended it, only to pout when I yanked it back.
“We go through the broken fence, and you tell no one. You get this when we get to Auntie Triso,” I said and she squirmed uncomfortably. “What is it?”
“Not my actual auntie, but Triso will pay me for bringing paying customers. She looks out for us street kids,” the girl said. Her sad eyes were tugging at my emotions.
“Thank you for being honest. Lead the way please,” I said with squishing boots.
We followed the river’s edge until we arrived under the massive walls. There was a flipping door here, not a tear in the fence. A set of kids scoffed and then plugged their noses as I wa
lked by. The harpy girl stuck her tongue out at the others, happily leading me into the town.
The interior of the town gave a vibe of being constructed as needed. Everything was built in stone and at varying levels of skill. I noticed the clay roofing and lack of any wood, which meant maybe they were worried about fires.
We stepped onto a stone road built with big tiled squares. Off to the sides there were sidewalks and in the middle there was a main carriage way. Roofs belched smoke, vendors cried out to sell their wares, and some asshole tossed shit in the road not far away. The place probably had a horrible odor, but me, I was numb to the smell at the moment.
We walked on the main road for a few minutes, passing orb stores, restaurants, and inns. Most of this was small scale, but they would probably have what I needed in the sense of a new set of clothing and a different mount. A looted horse was not something I should be riding when trying to be discrete.
She turned down a side alley with a few burly harpies at the end who were startled from our appearance. They went invisible with spells. Of course, why get one durca when you can get all the gear. I wondered if I could kill people in this town and realized the answer was probably yes if the person you killed didn’t matter.
I stayed in the street as my guide burst high to get on top of a building. I kept walking down the road, trying to blend in and failing. A glance over my shoulder showed the harpies eyeing me from their alley but not following.
Only four buildings further I found a bathhouse with an inn attached. When I went up the stairs I waved the watching thugs my direction with a grin. They retreated to their hangout spot, and I hoped that was the last I would see of them.
The lady at the front desk was a catgirl. A pretty one too. She however did not find my charming smile… charming.
She pinched her nose and said, “Three ducra for a bath with gear cleaning. Six for a bath and night’s stay.”
I dug into the purse and found three ducra in the mage purse. The price for a bath here was robbery. Absolutely insane. But… I desperately wanted to be fresh again. When I handed the coins over she waved for me to follow her. We went through a door and the roar of people casually chatting over each other hit my ears. I was guided to a side room where I could get naked. I saw robes for sale and halted her retreat.
“And the robe? Why no price displayed?” I asked.
“Included with a membership, it's more of a sales gimmick. A few silvers for the -”
I fished out another durca coin and grabbed the robes. She nodded with a thanks. I waited for her to leave, to strip down. Both nice daggers stayed on my legs. The staves also went with me along with the bag. When I exited the changing room there was a team of ladies waiting.
“Private or public. No charge difference. Sala, get the gentlemen’s clothes cleaned,” a cyclops woman said. Sala darted into the room and the head mistress sniffed the air. “A sewer adventurer, we’ll fix ya regardless. Okay, add a durca and pick a girl to scrub you down. This is your only warning, no funny business.”
I opened my bag, found the purse and couldn’t find a durca coin. “Got a silver?” one of the girls asked, a naga.
“Sure,” I said with a pause. “At the very least.”
“I’ll do it. I’m Leelo. Blasted sniffer’s broken. Can’t smell anything since I washed that ogre,” Leelo said, taking me deeper into the bathhouse. Her over the shoulder glance was judgmental about me refusing to part with my weapons. “We going into battle?”
“Yeah, so… I hope not. Some little harpy girl tried to lure me into a back alley. I think the guys who were supposed to kill me were too busy chatting and not properly set up. The… this place leaves me on edge,” I admitted with a grunt.
“Well, the thugs don’t come into the businesses. Doesn’t mean they won’t wait outside, but they probably saw your fancy staves. We don’t get Justicars in here often. Probably why they didn’t stop you in the streets,” Leelo said.
“Wait, you can just abduct people off the road here?”
“Welcome to Ries, this is a freedom town. On the surface that means no oversight, the populace a mash of random folk making ends meet. The result is nefarious vagrants tend to live here,” she said, opening a door to a small room.
“And the guards at the entry?” I asked.
“A con, and a highly frowned upon one. Must be desperate,” she said and I was starting to understand Ries was not a freedom town. It was a bandit town.
We entered a small room with pegs, a bench, and a section of a pool. There was a flowing bath in here connected to other baths with a dividing wall; you merely had to swim under the water to go one over. I sighed knowing I would be unable to relax. She grabbed a cloth and soap while I hung my stuff on hooks.
“So Ries is avoided by the big guilds. You’re probably thinking that we should be taxed heavily and ruled. There are a dozen of these little towns on Maswe where we flee to when one is conquered. So yes, we lack a central authority and the crime lords do as they please. If you roam the streets alone, it is possible you will be dragged into an alley and murdered.”
My furled brows caused her to giggle. “So I can go back and murder them?” I asked.
She smiled, showing her fangs were covered in a rotting yellow. “Now you’re catching on. Speaking of murder, your hair is in need of a cut and there is some stuff in here I must use scissors to remove,” Leelo said and I scoffed. She rolled her eyes as I stepped into the water. “As if I’d kill you. You’re a warrior, Justicars are the last people I want hunting after me. Apparently they’re relentless.”
“Yeah, don’t piss off the Justicars.” My tone was even, and my smirk large. “Fine, you can cut my hair... while I hold my dagger,” I said and she shrugged uncaringly.
The weapon was on my thigh and getting it out was a breeze. I faced her to watch her hand while she went to work with the scissors.
My hair had grown long, the longest I’d ever let it. The original intent was to get Pipi to cut it when I got home. There would be this big reveal that I was gone for ten times longer than they experienced, my hair being the proving factor. Of course, that plan went to shit with literal shit from the sewers.
I also found myself oddly unaroused. Normally being naked around women meant I was going to try to score. With Leelo, I wanted to get clean and get the hell out of this dump of a town. So that was how our time went by, to the point and mostly silent. When my stolen Justicar robes arrived clean I had her hurry up. When she finished I dried off hoping most of the stench was gone by now. The bathrobe went over the mage robes because there was no point in not using the stats.
My departure was halted by an open hand. Right. I owed her money.
“I can do better than a silver,” I said to her, she hissed out a snicker.
“Males prostitute me during bathing, not once they are dressed. What do you need?”
“A vendor you trust. I need new gear and preferably an actual horse with a carriage,” I said, finding a zadium.
Her eyes widened. “This is a year's income for me. Who are you?”
“Let me be honest. I’m not your friend. I need new gear, I need a ride, and I need silence. Look at me,” I said, violence in my eyes and my tone deadly serious. She rolled her eyes so I figure now was a good time to level with her. “The Justicars can and will level this town with the snap of my fingers.”
“Sure, sure. I get it. You're a big bad guy. Let me take you to Urbet. Just… be nice and pretend you’re not some overlord,” she said accepting the coin. “Urbet is actually trying to reclaim a lost shop in Hes. The portal cities are expensive to maintain shops in.”
“Excellent, lead the way,” I said gesturing for the door. She slithered out and I followed her.
The trip to exit the building resulted in some twists and turns leaving me unsure of where the road was. We exited into an empty alleyway, the evening setting sun unable to light the dark passageway. My ability to smell was bac
k, and it was evident in this shit town, well, shit and garbage were everywhere. A quick scan showed there were three ways to go and a busy road directly ahead. It was my turn to roll my eyes at the situation.
“Why are we taking the backway out?” I asked and she paused her slither.
“This is the safest way, follow me,” she said, pointing to the busy road at the end of a dark alley.
I decided to follow her since I could see the road. A few steps later and there was the briefest unnatural wisp of wind. The dark alleyway was perfect for an ambush and I knew it was coming when Leelo sped up her slithering retreat. With only a fraction of a second to react I spawned my spear and cast a heal.
The spell illuminated the dim alleyway. The green glow revealed about what I expected. Three invisible naga were only a few feet in front of me waiting for an ambush. While I wanted to summon a bear army, I held my rage in check.
“He’s healing us! Attack,” the closest enemy said.
A fireball blasted into the robes sputtering when the Justicar gears devoured the flames. My lunge for the targets was halted mid-flight as I was encased in mud. The substance covered my entire body so rapidly I was frozen. This was new. I had to give it to the enemy; that was a decent spell.
“Phew, he almost got us. What did you bring us this time Besna?”
While I could hear, I was struggling to breathe in this magical prison.
“A Justicar. Be sure to dispose of his body properly. You owe me at least a zadium, he was going to -”
Leelo was Besna, and I was fed up with this town already. Ries was the worst and I was trying so hard to stay the good guy. I wanted to be the purveyor of innocents, the righteous man with a cause. Except, being the good guy was failing me, again and again.
I burst out of the mud casing with a simple empowered flex of my body. The mud exploded away from me, smashing into everything. My foes were stunned as clumps of dirt slammed into them at startling speeds.
The tip of my spear buried into the face of a shocked naga. I yanked the weapon out to find Besna recovering from the alley floor. A quick jab sent my spear diving into her heart. The two remaining naga fled in opposite directions. I stabbed one in the back, shattering its spine as I ran it down.
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