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“I stabbed it right through the mouth,” The crowd gasped as I explained. “And I knew I didn’t have the strength to drive my blade deeper into its skull. But do you know what possessed the strength necessary?” They all looked confused before I explained. “The jaws of the beast itself.”
Their hands slapped to their faces as I acted out my own deadly move. “Right as the mouth began to close, I pulled my hand out at the last second. And the blade of the sword went straight through the top of its head like the feather in my own hat.” I happened to be wearing a hat with a feather on it at the time but I usually don’t.
The small crowd erupted into applause. Though one little girl was quite worried, “But Elrin, what about Syrielle? Is she okay?”
“Of course,” I exaggerated the truth while mentally noting the young one literally didn’t care about the men who died. “Our friend Nydorri took her to a nearby garden where she’ll be able to rest and recover in a few days.” That was definitely true, but saying Syrielle is okay right now wouldn’t be accurate at all. The skin of her arm was almost completely ripped off along with tons of muscles and other stuff.
Thankfully I was distracted quickly by more questions about the combat, and others I had been a part of. Most residents of Kayos were a bit bored, but some of the new folk were amazed at the tales of my comrades and I.
Right as I was hitting my grove, Roan nudged me from behind. “My room, 20 minutes.”
“Is this a sex thing?” I asked.
“Doesn’t have to not be,” He was dead serious. “But that wasn’t what I was thinking.”
“Well then what are you thinking?” I asked.
“Let’s just say…” He rubbed his hands together. “We’re going to steal, the stealing of the stolen, from the stealers.”
“What?” Having had a lot of troll, I had to demand he, “Stop being so cryptic you goon.”
“No.”
He walked away, and I for some reason had yet another round of troll with Barney. He was grumpy about having lost his latest job at a nearby farm. Apparently they only needed him temporarily during harvest season or some shit. I don’t know I wasn’t actually paying attention which is bad because I’m always complaining when people don’t tell me their story.
I was a little preoccupied thinking about whatever weird shit Roan was plotting. He’d spent a large part of the evening talking with Conor and Burt, who decided to celebrate with us after we successfully saved them from the Streax. Being Yarrick’s friends they were obviously a shady bunch.
When I walked into his room, the first thing I saw was Glish, confirming nothing sexual was going on. Because nobody wants him at their orgy. Nydorri and Zorthos were also in the room, and I couldn’t imagine a group sex act without them there. Though I was a bit confused by the absence of one person in particular, “Where’s Vergusson?”
Glish shrugged, “Last I saw him we walked into a corn maze by The Johnson Mine.”
I needed to make sure we were on the same page, “He’s lost in a corn maze?”
“Unless he’s doing something else,” He was irritated. “What are you his dad?”
Zorthos was defensive of the half-orc, “He’s like 3 years old dude.”
“He could find better dads than Elrin,” Nydorri added, “But not in Kayos.”
“Uhm…” I was a bit confused. “I’m not Vergusson’s dad.”
“The boy needs a father Elrin!” Roan shouted. “Are you going to abandon him like everyone else has his whole life? Do you even know about his witch mom? Or his orc chief dad?”
“Those two didn’t abandon him.”
“And neither will you.”
After accepting the responsibility I decided to move the conversation onwards. We had a mission ahead of us, and I didn’t know what was going on. “What’s going on?”
The sailor clapped his hands, rubbing them together again with pure ecstacy. “So you remember how we just did a job for Yarrick’s little buddies?”
“I literally did that yesterday, and I’ve been bragging about killing that thing ever since.”
“Right,” He rolled his eyes annoyed at my ego as did everybody else. “So… I got the little dude drunk and started asking him about treasure hunting. There’s a place not far from here, where they suspect some stolen treasures were taken years ago. He didn’t have much information on it. But he wasn’t gonna go there without his friends.”
“So we’re his friends?”
“No…” Roan was confused. “He’s not coming. We stole the job from him. Dude way underpaid us.” That wasn’t true at all. He actually paid us well. He was just rich so Roan was being greedy. “Besides. They’re just treasure hunters. It’s not like he’s got a claim to this place. He’s being sleazy by keeping it a secret.”
“But he told you about it.”
We walked along for a few hours to the Northwest. Finding ourselves at the base of a tiny hill, with a large cave, that quickly led to a tunnel going deep into the Earth.
“This is it,” Roan quickly peaked deeper. “Looks like there’s a steep drop.” Standing right behind him, I saw a wide hole in the ground, covered in branches and shadows. It had just an ever so slight incline.
The sailor decided to cannonball down. Crashing through the twigs sticking out of the wall, stumbling down the tunnel out of sight until we heard a loud thump. And after a brief second an, “Ow!” The rest of us climbed down the tunnel after him with ease. Despite the way he tore through most of the branches, there was still plenty to hold onto. I happened to stumble for no apparent reason and injured myself as well. It was embarrassing, I feel like I should mention it but I really don’t want to talk about it.
We walked along the long dimly lit corridor. Luckily some of us could see in the lowlight. Not me, I couldn’t, but others could. Zorthos began sniffing at some mushrooms he found on the ground. He attempted to eat them, because he heard they make you feel good, but I convinced him otherwise and we continued on with our journey through the crypt.
Not long after, we entered a large room with a huge gong sitting in the middle. There was a language written on the instrument not of the standard tongue. Surrounding the instrument and behind it were three large statues of naked warriors holding spears. They had relatively small features from my perspective if you catch my drift.
Roan leaned forward and inspected the gong as the rest of us searched around for anything else interesting. The seaman took a few steps back and held his hand to his chin. “Guys,” he exclaimed with a rare tone of concern. “We are standing in the stronghold of Malfeasance.” From what he’s told me of himself, and the images I was looking at, I was guessing those words were in Arcanic.
“Who?” I had never heard the name before.
“A dark sorcerer,” He scratched his chin, very concerned. “Knowing men like him, it’s probably dangerous to be here and he’d like us to leave.” He pondered for a moment but was clearly not done talking. Carefully considering the consequences he slowly but firmly declared, “So I suggest we hit the gong.”
Without hesitation Glish punched the gong. Everyone of us was overwhelmed with the vibrations the gong emitted. Zorthos immediately began to sing.
It’s Just A
Good Vibration
Many of us joined in.
I was envious I didn’t start it.
After nothing happened, Roan snickered, “That’d be hilarious.”
Nydorri asked, “What?”
“That’s just a regular gong,” He chuckled some more.
Zorthos walked over to one of the statues. “So we’re definitely gonna fight these right?”
We all looked at him, then to the statute nearest ourselves. I confirmed, “Yeah probably.”
Roan began to inspect the one nearest to him, “What do you think activates them?”
“Why wait?” Zorthos summoned an ax in his hand.
Glish whipped out his hammer and a sharp tool from his belt. “I like the way you think.”
“What are you doing?” Nydorri crouched preparing for combat.
“Something dumb,” The hafflin jammed the tool into the ankle of the nearest statue and then slammed his hammer into the back end. The moment the ankle cracked the arm of the sculpture moved. All three of the massive rock warriors were moving immediately after that.
Zorthos unleashed a scorched blast of fire from his mouth at the one to the left of the gong. When it walked right through his attack, Roan dashed between them pulling the glove off of his left hand, “Fire is notoriously useful against enemies made of rock.”
The last of our foes had a variety of vines crawling up its legs preventing it from moving. The stone beast shoved its spear down to tear through the vines. I charged at it, though its arms were free to attack me. It was slower than me, so I was able to roll away. There was no way I could cross weapons with this stone beast.
“Nydorri we need you…” Zorthos loudly shouted.
The elf patted me on the shoulder, “Keep him busy.” Then she ran away, and I didn’t even have time to see what they were doing. I was far too preoccupied surviving as the living statue relentlessly swung its long rock spear at me.
Out of my peripheral vision I could see Zorthos and Nydorri fighting another. While I simply ran from mine. Even though I was moving backwards, I was very fast. Still, there wasn’t much room to move. I circled around a pillar, but my larger, much stronger foe smashed straight through it to get to me.
As scary as it was, it never really came close. After about a minute the vines were back around its legs, Zorthos kept the arms busy, Glish climbed up the back to start chipping away at its head. Afterwards the hafflin declared, “Got one…”
I was overly defensive, “I distracted that thing by myself for forever.”
“And never took him out did you…”
Roan was sitting down next to an undamaged stone warrior poised perfectly still. The sailor’s left hand was smoking. “What took y’all so long?” He shook out his steaming extremity then stood up.
Glish promptly asked, “Why didn’t you shut them all down?”
“Because it’s exhausting,” Roan replied.
The giant door had a puzzle on it. My allies figured it out pretty quickly when I wasn’t paying attention. Wish I could give more details. The long hallway that followed led us into yet a room even larger than the last with no pillars at all.
Along the back wall were several glass cases with a variety of objects. On the far left there was a long spear with a blue rod and a silver blade at the end. To the right was a broad sword with an assortment of emeralds on the hilt and blade. In the middle, was a small treasure chest, next to a large hunk of black metal.
Scattered throughout the walls were paintings of bizarre creatures prepared for war. Most notable a massive Rat with 10 legs on each side. Above that was a snake with the arms of a man and the wings of a bird. There was a creature with a bug-like face and pincers on the body of a gorilla. Along with a bipedal wolf in a turtle’s shell holding a spear.
“We’re being watched,” Zorthos pointed way up above the painting of the winged snake.
There appeared to be another altar near the ceiling. Sitting at the altar, was what I could only refer to as The Eye Of A Titan. “I say we shoot it,” Glish pointed his crossbow, but Roan placed his hand on it to stop him.
“Do we have a smarter idea?”
Nobody had one.
Then Roan changed his mind, “Alright blast that shit.”
The bolt bounced right off the ocular object. At first nothing happened, but then the iris of the eye glowed red and the sphere floated from its location. We all prepared for combat. It spun around slowly, then blasted a blue ray of light at the painting of the massive rat.
As the frame of the painting glowed, the nose of the rat extended out of the painting and protruded into the real world. After a second the whole beast had escaped the wall to begin its charge. I could just barely see the blue beam blast the snake painting.
Also a bird was flying towards the eye.
Zorthos charged the massive beast coming at us. It breathed fire, but he sprinted straight through the flames. I ran around to assist him, but the flying snake surged towards me from above. I successfully dodge, but lost my balance and fell over. From the ground I saw Roan chopping the head off of the turtle-wolf, before it even successfully exited its painting. The buglike gorilla was chasing Glish around the perimeter of the room.
I hopped to my feet and provided cover fire for him with my bow. My attacks landed, but bounced off the bugrilla’s thick shelled sections.
“HELP!” Nydorri screamed from above. She was standing on top of the eye, being harassed by the flying snake. I shot at the winged reptile a few times, but missed all three shots.
Eventually the elf dove from the eye, towards the snake, transforming into a bear on the way. The two of them fell hard, crashing into the floor with the bear on top. As she rolled off, and transformed into an elf, she was covered in paint and her enemy appeared completely squished.
The blue beam blasted next to her. Despite Roan having just killed it, the turtle-wolf was back on the wall in the same position he was when we entered this room. As the painting frame glowed the shelled beast stepped off the wall. The sailor was a bit busy fighting the gorilla bug, while Zorthos was still dealing with the giant rat. Nydorri didn’t seem to notice the wolf in time, so I stepped in the way, deflecting its spear before it could stab her.
“Thanks,” She scurried away, giving me space to back up. I needed the room, my opponent was better protected behind its shell and I needed to move. Despite being a painting monster, my foe was very skilled and tactical. Constantly keeping me at a range where I wouldn’t be able to get to its head.
I continuously attempted to deflect the spear far enough away that I could dive in to attack, but he never over reached. So when I had the chance, I stepped into range to cut his open arm. The attack landed, but he instantly bit my hand with his wolf head. I dropped my sword, and he shoved me away with ease.
The rat was crawling off the wall again, while Roan was climbing on its head. Zorthos was now fighting the gorilla-bug, while the snake attacked Nydorri and Glish. When the wolf released its grip, I punched it with my other arm only for it to smack me with the back of its pole. Thankfully he was only swinging with one hand, because I cut the other. I avoided the next few stabs before I grabbed the long rod. We wrestled around for a minute, until I pushed it aside and stepped close to punch him again.
This time he tripped me to the ground. His spear was descending upon me, but an arrow stuck into the side of his neck. He burst into paint that covered me entirely. I had no idea who shot the arrow, all I could see was Zorthos unconscious on the ground nearby. The snake was flying straight for him, but I dove at it from the side.
I just barely tackled it in the air. We rolled around on the ground giving Glish the opening to smash it on the head. Roan was battling the gorilla-bug again, while the rat was pulling itself off the wall. Nydorri was staring it down, but she looked pretty exhausted.
I dashed to Roan as he was overwhelmed by the second largest of them. As I arrived it swung its arm at me, I dodged and Roan stabbed it in the back. It burst into paint around us as he claimed to be, “A hell of an artist.” Then a spear soared into the side of his stomach and the wolf turtle came chasing after his weapon. Glish smashed the furry knee below the shell before he got there. I went to help Nydorri, only for the snake to be on me again.
Roan cut it off as it wrapped around my neck. Though he was bloody and worn.
We all were, and the enemy kept returning fresh anew. A moment after we killed the snake, for what I thought was the third time, it was back, but I was preoccupied with the bugrilla. I picked my rapier back up with my secondary hand.
The first few attacks were blocked, but his pincers eventually chomped down on my uninjured arm. It didn’t cut my bicep in half, but I couldn’t hold a sword at all. With either arm.
Nydorri was unconscious. The rat had somehow died, but was coming out of the wall once more. Roan was fighting the wolf turtle, and Glish was being carried around by the newest flying-snake.
A pincer came at my throat, but I leaned back, falling to the ground. And I thought of what to do. That’s when I remembered an arrow had come out of nowhere just a minute ago. And then I noticed that the spear with the blue rod and silver golden blade was no longer in its case.
There was a loud roar that shook the whole crypt. Followed by a blast of blue light which hit all of the creatures attacking us causing them to burst into their own colorful origins.
The Eye Of The Titan crashed into the ground, and my suspicions were confirmed. A tiny man was standing on top of our spherical enemy gripping the blue rod while the rest of the weapon was stuck inside the magic iris.
Roan clapped proudly. “Deus Ex Yarrick Motherfucker.”
Zorthos loudly asked, “Who the fuck is he?”
His question was of course not answered.