« (Jasper) »
Jasper spent the first morning in her new hideout resting and doing a little light housework. She also figured out how to use the shattered core to claim the cave she had settled on as her new home.
Around noon she went hunting. She was frustrated that ever since she had lost her bond to Vlad, she had to eat. And deal with all the messy results of eating and drinking. It made maintaining a habitable cave difficult.
She found lots of small animals living near her new caves. Annoyingly they were all skittish and hard to catch. During her journey she had found catching prey rather easier. There were also an abundance of overly large bugs.
It was evening when she returned to her cave dragging the corpse of a large horned and fanged rabbit. She dropped it by the entrance to her home, intending to eat it later.
It was at this point that the System, as it pertained to dungeons, intruded on her.
« New creature discovered. Absorb Horned Rabbit – Yes/No »
Jasper said, “Yes.”
« New templates available: Zombie Horned Rabbit – Skeletal Horned Rabbit »
Jasper bounced with joy and spawned one of each. Then she collapsed to the floor as her mana dropped precipitately. She panted as she felt as if she had been flying all out for an hour. She examined the new denizens of her cave. She started giving them orders, and a bubble of joy rose in her breast, at the way they obeyed her.
Her joy was cut short when she realized she had just wasted her meal. She moaned to herself for a bit, then left her lair and went hunting again. She was lucky, almost immediately she found a weasel eating a horned rabbit. Not fancying a fight she conjured up a fireball and threw it at the weasel.
She returned home dragging a badly burnt weasel and a partially eaten rabbit. She didn’t notice the small being that watched her disappear into her lava tube cave.
She only gained one new template; apparently the weasel was too damaged to serve as a template for a zombie. Jasper was soon watching her new skeletal weasel follow her commands.
* * *
Jasper woke abruptly to the sound of conflict. She looked round her new home with bleary eyes. By the entrance a strange grey skinned being was attempting to fight off her three mobs. It had small yellowish tusks protruding from its lower jaw. It stood about one meter thirty tall and looked frankly unimpressive. Despite that, her skeletal horned rabbit was no more and the zombie one was dragging its unresponsive hind legs.
Jasper panicked when she realized that she couldn’t summon more mobs while there was a combat going on. She grabbed her dagger and flew at the intruder while it was busy trying to scrape of the zombie rabbit that was attached to its right leg while, at the same time trying to fend off the hyperactive weasel skeleton.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
Jasper lucked out and managed to embed her dagger in the intruder’s throat. It sank to the hilt and became stuck. Luckily for her it succumbed to its accumulated wounds.
« New creature discovered. Absorb Lesser Curseling Troll – Yes/No »
“Yes,” whispered Jasper, even as she savoured the inrush of energy, the shattered core was feeding her.
« New templates available: Zombie Lesser Curseling Troll – Skeletal Lesser Curseling Troll »
Thinking furiously Jasper spawned another skeletal weasel and a zombie curseling troll. Then she claimed a length of the lava tube and created another small cave at the end of the claimed stretch. She sent the zombie and the new skeletal Weasel to guard the new cave.
An hour later, cursing the itch, begrudging the energy it took; she surrendered to the inevitable and attached a drop to her mobs.
* * *
Shortly after dawn, Ritenzag the curseling herder found his count short by one. He was missing a food curseling. Not a great loss, but it was frustrating. He squinted painfully out into the day and decided to leave the main search for the morrow.
In the meantime, he sent out two tracking beetles to locate and return the miscreant who had dared to try and escape. He watched fondly as his two-meter long pets scuttled out of the cave.
* * *
Next day Jasper went hunting again. She spent most of the day at it before returning home in the late afternoon with another horned rabbit.
She started to relax when she entered her domain, but then she noticed that her first cave only contained the scattered bones of her skeletal weasel. Of the zombie curesling troll there was nothing. It was missing.
Her heart beating rapidly, Jasper scuttled down the lava tube connecting this outer cave to her home. She almost collapsed in relief when she was greeted by her other skeletal weasel. And her shattered core was safe.
« (Vaspedian) »
Vaspedian was cursing his luck. That thrice cursed Duck Tarwin was leaving. He should have been happy, but he wasn’t. Circumstances had changed.
He stood at the door of his crude Guild house and watched the duck drive his four-pony chariot north along the crude treaty road. He watched until the cloud of dust disappeared in the distance. Last week he had done the same as Faldara Swifthands had ridden north with a string of three horses.
His danger sense was screaming at him. He really didn’t like how the elves and the centaurs were visiting back and forwards. It all screamed war preparations to him.
He turned and looked towards the mountains and confirmed his suspicions. The nearest centaur patrol was being accompanied by several mountain rockfolk. It seemed the dwarves were getting involved.
Vaspedian dropped into one of the chairs on the porch of the Guild building. He watched as the armoured dwarves marched by, most of them bore their strange tube-like thunder weapons. By the time they disappeared into the fort, the second centaur patrol was close enough for him to discern that they were escorting Trolls.
He looked across at the tavern. Watching him from the door were Aristophon and Kalanthe of the Sable Tribe. Today Aristophon was wearing a sable tabard emblazon with the yellow moon of the Empire, and his helmet bore the silver crescent moon of an Emir.
The man grinned at him while his wife and second inclined her head fractionally. They strode out of tavern, followed by the other members of their party. Vaspedian felt a sour taste in his mouth as he realized, by their costumes, that they were an official embassy from the chaos loving Empire of the Blood Moon.
Vaspedian dragged himself to his feet and returned to his office. He went to the small collection of bottles he kept for his guests and filled a glass with the most potent brandy he owned. He returned to his desk and drank his brandy slowly while the looked at his map.
The Solars were surrounded. If they came south the Lunars would gobble them up. And he didn’t believe they ever contemplated an alliance that contained both Trolls and Elves. He settled back in his chair. Maybe he was safer here than somewhere up North where the war would occur.