Intermission #16: Captured

Tacey surveyed the scene unfolding before her. Vina appeared to have emerged victorious in a gruesome battle, reminiscent of the macabre tales she had heard about those with blood classes. Seated on the blood-drenched ground, Vina's eyes reflected a soul-deep exhaustion.

Signaling Saryne with a flick of a skill, Tacey warned it to keep an eye on the creature, now fully healed through some method she didn’t know but curiously placid, seemingly content to observe the imminent confrontation. Tacey knew she needed to understand what had happened during Vina's duel with Amaya.

"In Trina’s name, Vina, your work is remarkable," she feigned admiration, her eyes noting the peculiar way the pool of blood around Vina flexed and rippled in response to her words. With slightly less enthusiasm, she added, "Let's kill this one now."

"Is there any chance that we can just leave?" Vina's whisper barely reached her ears.

"Unlikely. That creature is faster than Saryne," Tacey replied, her gaze fixed on the slow trickle of blood pooling around her.

A heavy sigh fell from Vina's lips as she spoke, seemingly to herself. "How did it manage to force this?" She shifted her gaze towards the creature. "Tacey, I need to speak to Stine."

"No!" Tacey's refusal was swift, her voice nearing a shout. "That'll only create more confusion. What are you thinking, Vina?"

Vina encircled her knees with her arms, the blood strangely not sticking to her, "I’m thinking you're wrong. My understanding is quite clear. I can choose to forgive you for exposing my family to Stine and the consequences that followed. The only thing we have to be in conflict with now is Stine's knowledge about my mother. I couldn’t satisfy our bargain, but there might still be a way for me to get the information. Give me access to that. We can uphold our other agreements once we're out of this place."

Tacey's mind raced, trying to make sense of her predicament. Amaya might be dead, but Vina was teetering on the brink of ally and enemy. Despite the mounting tension, Tacey felt she could still control the situation. Disabling Vina, if she became a threat, seemed doable, then she could focus on the creature. She knew the town was overrun, but none of the weaker creatures here were an actual threat to her and Saryne. “Vina, once I disconnect them, I do not let people speak with The Darkness again.” Tacey said tensely. "That's a boundary I don't cross. I am trying to protect you."

Vina rose laboriously to her feet, revealing the toll the previous battle had taken on her stamina. "Why are so many of the twelve uncompromising? You’re just like Faer and The Shaper. Never any room for cooperation. Just undo what you've done to me, and we can continue our partnership!"

Tacey shook her head. She had plans for Vina and Ann in the future, but there would be no chance either of them would be brought to Lampasa as an equal.

“Fine!” Vina acquiesced angrily. She nodded to the spiked creature, and it moved to engage Saryne once more.

"You're in no shape to challenge me alone," Tacey scoffed.

“Yeah. You’re probably right.” Vina said with a growing venom in her voice. “But I saw how you did against that creature. Only managed to chip away a quarter of its life. You’re more of an assassin aren’t you? Not really built for straight up combat.”

Tacey felt a surge of anger at Vina's words, acutely aware of the truth herself. She felt Saryne taking skills and releasing them as it clashed with the creature. This fight with Vina could be a delicate balance of managing skills to ensure Saryne had access to what it needed to hold its own against that thing. "With so many eyes on me, the Aspect of the Hidden is out of the question. It would exhaust too much divinity," she mused. "Perception is the key."

As she took a step forward, she felt something shift beneath her foot. Regaining her balance quickly, she noticed a red spike had sprung up where she had stood. The force was weak, however and barely scratched the bottom of her boot. "A trap?" she wondered. “Low leveled, though.” She looked and saw a small spherical blood crystal forming near her. It looked like a smaller version of Langternem. For a moment she watched in fascination as the blood from the ground rose to form the crystal. Then she swung the shaft of her spear around and knocked it away from her.

Tacey turned back to Vina thinking, “I don’t know what that does but…,” She felt something impact and detonate against her back, knocking her forward onto all fours. Shards bit into her back, but her armor had absorbed the damage from whatever had exploded behind her. She cast a hand out toward Vina, activating her aspect, and taking Vina’s sight and hearing away. The divinity activation cost was cheap and almost always effective. Sustaining the effect was another matter. She double checked the divinity maintenance cost and groaned when she saw it was draining faster than her previous targets. “Does she have enhanced senses or something?” she wondered. She remembered how her Aspect of Perception was completely negated by her sister, Etana.

While Vina looked around in confusion, Tacey got back to her feet and quietly circled around her, preparing for her next steps. “No skills” she told herself, watching Saryne’s struggle on her skills page. “Can’t kill her…” she mused as she fished around in her hip pocket for a vial filled with a potent paralytic. She warily eyed the creatures that still watched her in return. “So weird… They’re actually going to let me do this.” As she pulled it out, she looked up to see another small, perfect crystal floating at eye level. She covered her face reflexively with the vial still in her hand. “Shi…”, but she never got the word out as it exploded in her face, knocking her backwards off her feet once again.

Her mind raced as she tried to figure out how Vina knew where to attack her. Her face burned with pain, but her eyes were protected by what remained of her gauntlet and the shattered mixture. Grave Reflection was already healing her wounds twice as fast thanks to being double slotted. In her vision she saw two afflictions.

You have been afflicted with Hemophagic Fever x6. Stamina Recovery is reduced by 60% for the next twenty-three seconds unless the affliction is refreshed You have been afflicted with Blood Rites. Your blood is being converted to someone else’s for the next twenty-three seconds unless the affliction is refreshed.

.Thanking Trina for her excellent resistance to infection, Tacey focused on what to do next as she rose to her feet. The answer dawned on her as soon as her boots splashed in a puddle of blood. “Blood perception…?” she pondered. Scanning quickly through the library of perception skills that The Watch was aware of, Tacey silently thanked Ebba for her diligence. She scrolled through them as quickly as she could until she found the most likely answer: “Blood Sense.” She had never tried turning a skill like this off before and attempted it now, but received yet another notification.

System Warning: Divinity Sustainment Cost - Extreme Are you sure?

Tacey noticed more blood crystals materializing, heading in her direction, and quickly chose to proceed with disabling the skill. Instantly, the crystals seemed to lose their purpose. They wavered aimlessly before collapsing back to the ground. Vina gasped and clutched at her head with a cry. Tacey grinned, attempting to formulate her next strategy, but a quick glance at her rapidly draining divinity told her she was running out of time.

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Vina suddenly took off running. Despite being blind, deaf, and unable to sense blood, she ran. Tacey cursed and gave chase, wary of Vina's ability to perform remarkable and unexpected feats. However, she didn't get far. The Blood Weaver stumbled after just a few steps and rolled onto her side in a fetal position. Tacey loomed over her, feeling uncertain about her next move without the poison in her hand. The only idea she had was to incapacitate the woman. She momentarily borrowed Saryne’s strength and brought her boot down hard on Vina's left forearm, feeling the bones break under her boot. Vina cried out and rolled onto her side, clutching at her broken arm. Without mercy, Tacey kicked her onto her back.

She lifted her boot once again, aiming for her right arm, but this time, the armor did not yield. It felt as if she had kicked a rock. She recalled Vina's warning about her armor too late. Vina yanked her arm out from under Tacey's boot and lashed out with her own leg with surprising force, throwing Tacey off balance and onto her backside.

"Damnit, Vina!" she barked futilely at the deaf woman, or so she thought until she locked eyes with Vina. Glancing fleetingly at her divinity bar, Tacey felt frustration flare once again at not being able to physically sense when her divinity was exhausted.

Vina leapt to her feet and began to run again, cradling her arm close to her body. Tacey set off in pursuit, but she stumbled and fell back to the ground again. A sharp, stinging sensation shot up from the impact point of where Vina had kicked her, and a translucent red icon of a leg flashed briefly in the corner of her vision.

You are afflicted by Muscle Strain. Movement speed reduced by 32% for 3 days. Agility reduced by 12 points for 3 days.

The creatures parted as Vina disappeared from her sight. Tacey gritted her teeth in frustration as she waited for her abilities to heal her body, thankful she didn’t actually need to wait for three days to recover. Just fifteen seconds later, she jumped back to her feet, activated her tracking skill, and gave chase. To her surprise, relief, and confusion, the creatures also allowed her to pass without conflict. While she ran, head down, following Vina’s tracks, a blinking notification on her Aspect of the Hidden demanded her attention, revealing…

> System: Vina (Hidden) has activated the Hide in Plain Sight skill specialization.

>

> System: Vina (Hidden) has activated stealth.

>

> System: Vina is no longer hiding.

Grinning, Tacey quickly checked the last known location of Vina on her map from where she had first activated and then deactivated stealth. Slowly she discerned the path her quarry had taken while stealthed. "She’s heading toward the town’s Refuge!" Without delay, she ran towards the destination, arriving at the building just a few minutes later.

Observing the broken door from outside the glowing barrier, Tacey wondered about Vina's motives. Even the doorframes had been torn out and left discarded by the entrance. The threshold of the entrance was carelessly replaced, and Tacey stepped over it without a second thought, intent on averting a surprise attack despite the protections the refuge now provided her. She was tempted to activate one of her skills to locate Vina, but decided to save those for Saryne.

Cautiously, she entered the refuge, noting two doors leading left and right. The typical structure of these smaller refuges held clinic rooms to the right and the main hall to the left. "Is she after medical supplies? Trying to create a mixture?" Tacey speculated as she headed toward the door on the right. She meticulously checked each of the numerous rooms along the corridor. Any closed doors were cautiously opened and scrutinized for traps, specifically checking for blood. However, there was no trace of Vina anywhere.

Returning to the foyer, Tacey warily opened the door on the left. The long hallway stretched down the left side of the building and led into a spacious gathering room located almost precisely in the middle of the backside of the building. There she found Vina seated sideways, her knees wedging her broken arm tightly to her chest. With her right hand, Vina was feverishly inscribing something on the ground. As Tacey approached, she noticed that Vina was etching into the floor with her nails.

“Vina… what are..?” Tacey started, but her question died on her lips as understanding dawned. “You’re changing the refuge’s runes?”

Vina turned her head, and Tacey could see the fight had left her. Slowly the sound of Vina’s nails on the floor faded away. “I was trying to.”

“That’s not going to achieve anything. We’ve tried altering them many times. Trina’s runes reinforce themselves. You can’t change them; she simply changes them back again,” Tacey informed her.

Vina sighed heavily. “Yeah, I just learned that. The integrity rune, right? She puts a memory into each of them, so they remember what the original rune form looks like.”

“Er…” Tacey hesitated. “Faer might have said something about that. Vina, did you come here to be safe or are you doing something else?”

“Both of those,” Vina confirmed. “I tried to modify the identity runes on the barrier to keep you out. That didn’t work, so I came in here to try to change the protection runeform to protect only me if you followed me in here.”

Tacey’s heart stopped for a second, worried the blood rune crafter might have succeeded. She checked the afflictions on her screen quickly.

You are in Trina’s Refuge. In this place, no harm can come to you.

“So, that plan didn’t pan out either,” Tacey observed, inwardly sighing in relief.

Vina shook her head. “No. Trina’s integrity rune kept reasserting itself and undid those alterations.”

“We both know you can’t leave without Langternem. Do you want to stay here until Saryne and I have killed that larger creature? It’ll alleviate your pain. If you promise me that you'll remain here, I’ll come back for you with Langternem in hand once we’ve cleaned up this mess,” Tacey offered, hoping to end their needless conflict.

Vina shook her head. “No. I can’t fight against your aspects. I might as well help you. Once we both get outside the refuge barrier, I promise I won’t try to kill you until we reach Lampasa, under the penalty of death. Let’s go.”

Vina Esca has offered you a promise under the penalty of death. If she does not keep her promise, Trina will kill her. Do you accept her promise? Yes? No?

Tacey received the notification in her vision and accepted it. Relief flooded her as she selected 'Yes'. Everything was going to be okay. “Thank you for finally being reasonable, Vina. We have to hurry back to Saryne!”

Awkwardly cradling her broken arm, Vina rose to her feet and led the way out of the building. She remained silent the entire way, which was fine with Tacey. She reveled in her victory, while being distracted by her concern for her creature. Now she just needed to get back to Saryne and help her companion before it was overwhelmed. Her mind went back to its status, watching the skills it took and released as it battled. She could tell Saryne was growing more desperate without her.

As Vina exited the barrier ahead of her, a small explosion erupted at the door behind them. Tacey whipped around, still within the refuge’s protections, to investigate the cause. She saw only a cloud of dust and a further ruined entryway to the refuge building.

Tacey whirled back to face Vina. “What are you doing?” she demanded, her voice a low growl.

“A final experiment,” Vina said, her voice weak. “Just don’t kill me for trying. My promise holds if you can still leave.”

“Leave?” Tacey questioned, her mind racing. She tried to push her hand through the barrier and found it to be solid.