In the end, in just one minute of battle, our adversaries had lost more than half their fighters. After the last stunned snakeman had been finished off, I quickly looked around. Three supplies next to Pinebogey. Werewolves trying to break through his cocoon. Blinded by animalistic fury, they could not see that the cocoon was gradually growing larger as was the supply within. The Heart of the Forest was preparing a surprise.
On the other side there are two groups of snakefolk. One of them, the one to the left, is being harangued by Gorgie, having smelled the taste of blood. After his every attack, magic supplies are extinguished one after the next.
The group to the right is the most numerous. A dozen snakefolk had formed a circle around their ringleader, whose supply was flashing rapidly. That ugly bastard is also casting something devastating.
Next to me, just a few steps away, the last werewolf is thrashing around. I can hear him snarling. It’s Ulf. He’s pissed off. He’s looking for me, but he just can’t sense me. In the last few days, his level had gone up noticeably. He must have taken our previous encounter into account. He trained for this. Neither lightning or rams could take him ― either he had a good shield, or he’s been levelling resistances to stun and daze effects. He saw the way I was able to stop his youngbloods.
I chuckled ravenously. No, mongrel, today is still not your day. Did you think Gorgie was my only trump card? That’s where you’re wrong. You have underestimated me yet again.
The black armorbug spirit slammed into the werewolf alpha, knocking him off his feet and dragging him several yards over the stones. The telltale magic sparks around Ulf body told me my six thousand damage crit had swept away the last remnants of the shapeshifter’s shield. The ice arrows I cast after him meanwhile had already reached his flesh. Thanks to the transformation progress in Hawk’s Eye, not a single one missed. Honestly though, the icicles didn’t deal much damage. The big wolf just has too much in his life supply. In combat form, regeneration probably works at an accelerated rate, too. And for my part, I was not expecting to take down this mountain of muscle with icicles alone.
The werewolf gave an unexpectedly gleeful squeal and dashed straight at me. The icicles had given away my position. But he had a surprise in store in the form of the ice golem’s breath. That took away one of Ulf’s main trump cards ― speed. But even seventy percent slower, he was still too quick for me.
While the werewolf tried to reach me, I managed to cast another twenty ice arrows. I critted half the time, but that wasn’t what mattered. Every arrow left a spot of frost on the werewolf’s body, sucking energy from his supply. Then, he took a final step, stumbled and collapsed to the ground.
I initially lunged forward to put an end to our faceoff once and for all, but suddenly the cave started shaking. And the shockwave was so powerful that I couldn’t withstand and plopped down on the ground. I heard a very familiar sound of stone cracking on all sides. The first shockwave was followed by another few, but they were weaker. Based on the telltale sound, several stalactites had fallen down from the cave ceiling. Then, over the next second, a dense wave of dust and fine sand came over me.
Rubbing my eyes and sputtering, I looked up at the sound. When I realized what I was seeing, I felt my heart give a treacherous pitter. There was a giant monster hanging down among the stalactites. The serpentine body flickered from its head to the tip of its tail with a magical light. A huge lilac eye with a vertical slit for a pupil was staring right at me.
“Now you’re done for,” I heard Ulf wheeze mockingly. His supply was down to crumbs of mana. The frost, ice golem breath and his own combat form had eaten through all his life force. But still the werewolf was in no hurry to die. “You never should have allowed Shkhan to summon his avatar!”
I glanced back at the gigantic snake, which was preparing to attack, and gulped loudly with a parched throat. So that’s what kind of spell the head snakeman was casting!
All I managed to do before the magic creature lunged forward was activate stone spikes on the cave ceiling. Based on the enraged hissing, the serpent did not enjoy my almost twenty-five-thousand-point crit. The thick layer of lilac haze around the snake’s body grew obviously thinner. So, looks like your magic shield isn’t all that thick after all.
The snake was not able to get off a precision strike. Its big huge carcass flopped down from the ceiling like a huge bag of turnips, sending a new wave of dust and pebbles flying into the air.
We didn’t let the serpent cool off, though. Gorgie’s supply, pulsating with force was already at the brute’s side. Then, an instant later, the cave was filled with a deafening hiss of pain. The harn took down the monster’s shield in a few blows, then got to its flesh.
I saw nearly twenty snakefolk run over to help their ringleader. I already had more spells ready to burst from my hands, but Pinebogey beat me to the punch.
His cocoon had doubled in size and exploded into several dozen flexible tendrils, which greedily raced off toward our enemies.
First to be hit were the three werewolves that had spent all that time trying in vain to break through Pinebogey’s defenses. Their bodies, stuck through with spiny tendrils, started writhing in pre-death agony. I saw their supplies empty and their energy channels thin out. The cocoon was quite literally sucking the lifeforce out of them. The big huge snake didn’t get off any easier, though. Its body was stuck through with a whole twenty of the tendrils. The brute twitched and coiled, trying to break free, but that only made matters worse. Attracted by the squelching sounds, another fifteen tendrils sunk into the serpent’s body. Already knowing what would come next, I didn’t just stand on the sidelines ― I launched several ice arrows at each enemy.
The magic fog dissipated, and I was able to see the cave with my normal vision again. I looked around and breathed a sigh of relief ― we won.
The blood, mutilated bodies, and entrails ― before, the mere sight of all this would make me puke up my stomach contents. But now I took it as a given.
Gorgie, all caked in blood, loomed over Ulf, who was back in human form and gave a threatening growl. The werewolf was on his last breath but even in such a state he was able to rise up on his shivering arms and shoot me a malicious glare.
There was no longer any reason to activate invisibility because Ulf could see me perfectly well.
Out of the corner of my eye, I watched the magic tendrils absorbing their victims and sat down on the ground. I was not feeling like walking up to the cocoon. Better to watch from a distance. From here, where I’m having a chat with Ulf.
“So, I guess the Eviscerators are in for a rough patch. Eh?” I asked with a smirk.
A dull growl tore itself from Ulf’s throat. He tried to move, but Gorgie’s heavy paw easily kept him pinned down.
“You werewolves are so predictable,” I snorted. “Why did you attack us? Or did Nure-onna really order you to kill us? Did she really feel that insulted? Hard to believe. I’m positive she just ordered you to take us alive.”
Ulf gave a dull growl but didn’t say a word.
“I think you must have secretly told your buddy Shkhan to attack us. What do you say about that?”
The werewolf reacted to my question with silence.
“So, that order did come from the Snake,” I said with a heavy sigh. “Yeah, it was dumb to think you could defy the magister’s will. But then why did she want us dead? Why send Dobbess on a secret mission, only to kill him as well?”
I stared at the shapeshifter, but he had clammed up. He seemed suspiciously calm for some reason. Switching to magic vision, I glanced at his supply and my eyes crawled up into my forehead. What insane regeneration! This creep was hard to kill!
While I stood there running my mouth, he had started to recover at accelerated pace. The werewolf interpreted my silence and look correctly, tried to twitch away but Gorgie placed a big fat period at the end of our prolonged faceoff with one swipe of his paw.
Dismissing the victory message, I looked around.
Something had changed on the battlefield. The cocoon tendrils, now finished sucking the mana out of the fallen werewolves and snakefolk, started to gradually fade and disappear. They left behind desiccated mummies. The sight made a chill run over my skin.
The gigantic snake’s carcass held out the longest. Although the Heart of the Forest absorbed its mana with particular relish. And no wonder! Pure chaos energy. A hostile energy.
Strange as it may have been, I found it easy to recognize the emotions and desires of the growing seed. During my showdown with the chaos spirit, I must have somehow activated a special connection with the seeds.
I walked up to the cocoon and saw Pinebogey standing behind its semitransparent wall with his head hanging low. Looking at his energy channels, I saw no damage. More the opposite. They were noticeably beefier. The Heart of the Forest was absorbing the hostile energy at an accelerated rate, passing it into the body of its keeper and thus reinforcing his energy structure.
A quarter of an hour later, the absorption process was over, and the cocoon had disappeared. And along with it the tendrils. Honestly though, Pinebogey still hadn’t woken up. Furthermore, based on what was going on with his energy structure ― he was going to be out for a long time.
“You’ll have to carry him on your back,” I told Gorgie the joyous news.
I chucked the woodsman over the harn’s back and we hurried to leave the cave before any local predators smelled blood and came to join us.
While the Heart of the Forest digested all the mana, I had time to loot the bodies. I must say that, unlike the mages of the order, the forces of chaos frankly were not living so high on the hog. A dozen small mana crystals, six ephemeral belts, a couple pieces of jewelry with minimum level ten, a few dozen phials from the citadel and a bit of food. And that was pretty much all I was able to find. Either they’d packed light for the long journey, or the forces of chaos were going through tough times.
System rewards were another matter. A few hundred thousand esses, five hundred silvers and one iridescent tablet.
The Great System informed me that the Higher Powers were again delighted with me, because I had yet again duplicated a legendary feat. This time, the original deed had been performed by Lia the Scourge.
Either that legendary warrior woman was a frost mage, or I had stood out today by casting ice arrows right and left. But in any case, the rainbow tablet contained a spell from that school.
― Ice Spear.
― Level: 0+5 (0/30).
― Type: Spell.
― Rarity: Legendary.
― Description:
― Using frost magic, a mage can create and cast an ice spear at an adversary.
― Effect:
― Deals 45000 units of damage.
― Requirements:
― Intellect – 60.
― Expends 3000 mana points.
― Note:
― Cooldown time: 4 hours.
― Range: 330 feet.
The spell’s figures made a big impression. The ability to throw a chunk of magical ice over three hundred feet and deal forty-five thousand damage in the process before even considering that it might crit ― the prospects this opened up were impossible to overstate.
The mana expenditure wasn’t so scary either. Ugh, if it weren’t for the cooldown time, this would be a real beaut’ of a spell! I shouldn’t be complaining though. The four hours, just like the three thousand mana expenditure was already accounting for my new talents.
With these ten characteristics, my will had crossed the one-hundred-fifty-point threshold. Despite all that, my intuition was telling me it still wouldn’t be enough. The Steel King’s court mage scared the bejeezus out of me. I hope the oath Midori gave to the Heart of the Forest will keep her free of that ghastly old man’s influence.
I decided to wait before using any more silver tablets. Let Gorgie raise his characteristics by himself for now. After all, the higher his level, the harder it will be for him to find well-matched rivals. This battle, for instance, earned him a grand total of fifteen points, which was actually pretty good for his level.
I left the cave in two minds. On the one hand, Pinebogey is unconscious and we don’t know when he’ll wake up. Dobbess is dead, and he was the only one that knew the way to the portal. But on the other hand, Gorgie and I had scrambled our way out of another jam.
We’re alive. And that’s what matters!
Chapter 16
“ANOTHER UPWELLING,” I muttered, wearily peeking open my right eye. “You feel it too?”
“Hrn,” Gorgie responded positively and languidly stretched his whole body, exposing his claws. Another set of deep scratch marks was left on the wide flat stone the harn had been lying on.
The cave we’d stopped in to spend the night was relatively wide and warm. Plus there was water here ― a little lake in the middle of the cave.
I took a heavy sigh. It had been five days since we defeated the forces of chaos, but we were still wandering the labyrinth. We had yet to find a portal. And that was despite our accelerated pace, stopping just four hours at a time for sleep and food.
I turned my head habitually and took another look at Pinebogey. No change… He had been unconscious the whole five days. Furthermore, his whole body had been covered in a flexible but fairly tough layer of dark green bark. The Heart of the Forest was protecting its keeper while he underwent some physiological change. From time to time, I activated Forest’s Blessing, to which the growing tree always quickly responded with gratitude. Now I understand why the Great System didn’t let me give all the trees to Pinebogey. They would have been his undoing.
While still alive, Dobbess said the Labyrinth of Fright, and more specifically what was called its Awake mode, was in our world. Honestly though, in what corner precisely he did not know. For fairness’ sake, I should note that no one knew. Not even the magister. Although that was again in the words of the goblin traitor. As for the true state of affairs, I could only guess.
Time in Awake and the real world matched up down to the second. Plus, the local creatures bore a striking resemblance to the subterranean fauna I’d seen in other cave systems before. We had so far come across beasts in some way reminiscent of coldunes, giant rants and vipers. They were just higher level.
And so, alas, Gunnar’s amulet was no use here. In the labyrinth’s Dreams, the amulet worked perfectly though, and that didn’t quite add up.
Pinebogey and Dobbess had also said the two modes never intersected, but they could be active simultaneously. In other words, if you landed in a Dream, there was no way of crossing to Awake while remaining inside.
“What do you think, was Dobbess actually leading us to a portal?” I asked Gorgie, who was dozing away. He didn’t even lift an ear, accustomed to my monologues. “Of course not. He was just trying to throw you off track. I can only imagine how mad he was when you kept sniffing out all their ambushes. I do wonder why they killed him though.”
The harn’s stomach was rising and falling measuredly. He didn’t care the least bit about the dead goblin.
“I think they were using him to track us,” I continued to think out loud. “That blood amulet they mentioned. I have seen one like it before, in possession of an overly confident minion to a group of vampires. As far as I can tell, the magic in that amulet allows the bearer’s location to be tracked. Was Dobbess really used for that alone? He’d be pretty surprised to learn that if he were still around. Hm… Why they killed him is still an open question.”
I scratched the back of my head pensively.
“After all, the Snake has to have understood that the goblin would have fresh intelligence after warping back. And I don’t believe the werewolves and snakefolk would act of their own accord. So that means… That information must have held no value to Nure-onna. Had she already learned enough? Then…”
I frowned.
“It remains to be understood why she wanted to kill potential allies.”
But I
didn’t go puzzling over what brought the magister to order us exterminated. Maybe Pinebogey could clear things up when he came to. All that remained was to await that momentous occasion. Beyond that, I was hoping the woodsman knew the way to a portal or at least could explain how to navigate down here.
Because Gorgie and I had already racked our brains trying to discover even the slightest hint at where to go. At first, the harn’s senses weren’t working right. Though that isn’t quite accurate either. It’s all the Labyrinth. It was like it was toying with us.
Labyrinth of Fright (Underdog Book #5): LitRPG Series Page 17