The ringing in my ears signaled that I probably hadn’t died. As my blurred vision vibrated back into taking in the world, it was hard to tell how much of me had made it through the attack. Blood, rotten flesh, and thick mud covered my suit. Some of it was tattered now, my legs looking a little rougher than normal, but they took me to a stooped standing position.
Ahead of me was the elf, who I could almost mistake for being dead if it weren’t for her piercing blue eyes glaring at me. Just beside her was Wolf, who had tried to weather as much damage to protect her as he could. His head hung low, and his breathing haggard. They were both covered in gore.
None of us had found the capacity to talk yet. The explosion having knocked the air from our lungs just as it had rung about our senses in our heads. I turned on complaining legs to see the rest of our Party.
Roger had attempted the same self-sacrifice as the bear, and for his efforts had completely died. Back to Hell, with the empty corpse of the rogue laying inert and in several parts on the mushy ground. Tanya looked shell-shocked, a dent in her breastplate assisting the lack of breath we all felt.
Quinn was clutching at where his eyepatch used to be, fresh blood seeping between his fingers.
“Good thing I’d already lost that eye,” he murmured, his other arm hanging a little more limp than usual.
“Potion up,” I told them. “Speed is of the essence.” Their half-vacant nods were good enough for me.
So, I turned and stumbled over to the prone elf, who didn’t appear keen to move from the layers of filth and rain soaking through her suit.
“Ren,” I hissed. “Ren.”
“What is it?” She held a hand up, requesting my assistance.
With a grunt and a feeling like my arm was about to tear from the rest of my body, I lifted her up to shaky feet and put my arm around her. “Look.” I gestured with a shaking arm toward the outpost. “Our red carpet is finally here.”
The explosion had done a disservice to the horde of undead. Blood, bone, and decaying flesh now lined the corridor of the attack. A carpet of mulched corpses that the constant rain turned into a slurry of deep red and muted green.
“I’m too mad at them to be mad at you,” she sighed and coughed up a bloody chunk. Might even belong to her. She put a heal through herself and then shuffled towards the bear, as I drew a pair of healing potions into my hands.
Still trembling, but it was not fear. Not even elation, actually - my rocked brain unable to even be a bad narrator and pain my maladies as boons for the show. One potion. Two potions. All was right with… well, I was mostly okay now.
“They still retreating? Would have been better to capitalize on our disarray.” Tanya stepped up to us, stowing away a couple of empty bottles of her own.
I looked around at our group. If the necromancer had just led with that and then told his goons to pulp us, we’d probably be as good as dead. There were still zombies standing outside of the attack he had hit us with… but we’d clearly put a greater dent in them than he would have liked.
Possibly part of his ability made it seem as though there were more than there truly were. Now just sparse groups wandered aimlessly, as if their connection to his will had been severed.
“Thinking they might have teleported, Max?” Quinn stretched out as Tanya wrapped a clean cloth over the side of his face where his eye was missing.
I held my right arm out. A fresh flicker of purple spiraled around it as a thrum of energy helped me focus. “No. He is still here. Probably feels as though we would win out at range.”
Not that we were too shabby in melee either, with Wolf and my bullshit. For them to have such confidence, though…
“Traps,” I said. My eyes darted through the mashed bodies of the exploded zombies. “They were here to defend the area, so traps are likely.”
“Magical then,” Tanya said with a nod. “Anything physical would have been ruined by the explosion.”
“Start preparing for that.” I moved past her to walk over to the elf.
Wolf looked glum, but there was still energy in his eyes. Ren was more miserable than anything, standing against the bear with her arms folded against her chest. Outfit totally muddied, bloodied, and worse.
“Cheer up.” I smiled. “We still live.”
“No smiles until I get a hot bath.” Her brow furrowed further as if to nail home the point.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
“Not even if I got you a present?”
Her eyes were too tired to roll, so she just shuffled awkwardly. “Only if it was something to kill these assholes quicker so that I can get a hot bath. Or… Sweet Cakes.”
I shrugged. We had been out of those for too long, unfortunately. “Let’s say it’s the first one.” With my hand extended, my two hell-birds hovered out from behind the bear, a long metal object barely carried between them.
Ren pulled a face and retrieved it. “This is the rifle that they were using. Oh, it’s Legendary!”
Almost a smile. “Do you have firearms in your world?”
She returned a half-shrug. “Very rare and a lot more basic than this. I’ve seen a flintlock pistol before, and some kind of hunting rifle… but this is…”
“Allow me.” Tanya stepped up and smiled. “Bolt-action sniper rifle. Unfamiliar with the make… but it functions the same as things I’ve used. Like your bow, you have to draw this bolt back, but then it goes back forward to chamber the bullet. Which… small capacity magazine, looks like it replenishes like your quiver though - so no need to worry about reloading.” The fateweaver held the weapon up higher. “Got a scope up here with four, eight, and twelve times magnification. I’d keep it low since you’re used to eyeballing ranges. Then click the trigger when you want to erase something.”
Ren’s mouth opened and closed a few times as the weapon was returned. “I don’t know… aren’t I supposed to be more of a cliche?”
“Give it a go, elven ranger princess.” I smiled. “No pressure - save it for later if it’s not something you like.”
She shrugged and pushed away from the bear. While the idea of her using the weapon was amusing—and strangely attractive—she did also look rather awkward with it. Perhaps I shouldn’t be pushing her to learn new things while we were between career-ending performances.
Pouting, she then worked the bolt, dropping to one knee and shouldering the stock. One eye narrowed, she glared down the scope towards a group of zombies further off. A swirl of radiant light rotated along the barrel before she pulled the trigger.
A crack and blaze of golden light, and the imbued bullet pierced through the head of the nearest zombie, followed by three more further away.
Ren clucked her tongue and stood back up, racking the bolt to eject the spent casing. “Will take some getting used to.”
I shook away the hearts from my eyes to see that the rest of the Party were equally impressed and apprehensive. My gaze focused back on the outpost. They were waiting for us and it was burning me up that there wasn’t an easy solution to getting rid of them. No higher ground anywhere for Ren to prop her new skill up, or for me to spy from.
Decay had spread from this location, and needed to be cut out so that the rest of the world could survive.
“Defenders have the advantage in a siege,” I murmured. What use was a cannon other than to destroy the walls? Most of the building seemed like they were stone when I visited briefly, so pelting them with fire wouldn’t do much. With a necromancer, flinging in something dead or decaying wouldn’t move the needle. Time was…
We didn’t have time. They might be hoping for reinforcements.
“They’ll be expecting us to come through the hole we opened up.” Ren tilted her head as she rested the sniper rifle across her shoulder.
I sighed and shivered slightly. Definitely the rain and not the sight of her with the high-powered weapon. She was right, of course. “I feel silly for saying it, but I almost prefer being ambushed.”
“It is easier if the fish jump right into your boat.” Her eyes narrowed at the outpost in case there was any movement.
“We had the advantage of stealth at the fort as well. Being inside the outpost would probably work in our favor, but there’s no way of doing that undetected.”
Ren clucked her tongue. “Really, trickster? Got no extra bullshit for us?”
The cogs whirred around I my head, and I smiled.
----------------------------------------
Two things surprised me. First, was my genius. Second was how high my hell-doves could fly.
Assuming that the groups we were against had some form of invisibility detection, and could pluck my birds from the air - the only other option was to out-range them. And indeed, as I switched places with the small demon, the wind sucked the air from my lungs in surprise.
The outpost sat below me, like a child’s toy I could almost scoop up and crush with my hands. At least, if they weren’t already full of something. With gravity willing me towards the hard earth below, I let go of my radiant payload, and switched back to the safety of the mulched ground. The rain had lightened but not ceased, which should assist in our little ploy.
Our Party stood and watched as the bound sacks of flour tumble down through the sky.
“Saw three, maybe four, in the courtyard. Defensive positions. Some kind of large hatch or underground area has been built.”
Quinn shook his head. “A rat’s nest that we will soon burn out.”
Ren was propped up against the bear, using the sniper rifle’s bipod to aim up at the falling object. I heard her exhale, and then she fired.
All three bags burst, dispensing the fine powder down above the outpost. One of them retained the radiant glow, intending to sprinkle as much of the area with holy energy as possible.
Bolt back and forth and she whispered a word in elven. Dark green spots speckled along the black weapon, before she fired again. I thought a brief apology to my flying demon. A burst of feathers, and then a cloud grew from the struck bird. Green edges to the fluffy white.
We moved. A rain of caustic acid pattered down from the summoned magic as Ren held her hand out. I took the rifle from her so that she could draw Mana potions and down them. Between the five of us, we had an overabundance of them, so she could cast the skill for as long as she could stomach the magical liquid.
Tanya led beside Wolf, one of her idols able to prompt us if we came close to any set traps if they were created via spells. Quinn lagged behind with me, looking the roughest out of the five of us.
Blood ran from the elf’s outstretched hand, soaking through her shredded sleeve. Well, she learned from the best - I couldn’t fault her on that.
The enemy lying in wait would need to seek shelter from the constant barrage of acid that would scour away at every surface it could reach. The holy flour sanctified the ground, our hopes being that no undead could be raised from it.
A simple trick that easily turned the tables on who had the advantage. Now they wouldn’t be able to accost us as we entered the outpost. We’d be ambushing them, and not even from the expected hole we had created.
For when I had been in the sky, I saw the lay of the place. It was important to know the stage well, and I now had an entrance planned that would be unparalleled.
My arm tingled, knowing that one of the Guardian’s chosen would die very soon.