Morning came and Brivaria sighed. Her mana was at 104 out of 136. Rest was still active so it was slowly ticking upward. It would take about 20 minutes to recover the last vestiges of her mana pool. That was just enough time to have breakfast with the cultists which they’d planned to do anyway.
Everyone emerged from the cabins and made their way to the communal eating area around a fire pit. There was already a fire going but the morning meal was light. At least, it was light until Brivaria made her way to one of the outdoor tables and began emptying out her inventory.
The angel ate most of her purchased meals on the road and her water supply was finally dwindling. The result was that she had a lot of room in her inventory. When all of the fish had been cooked on the previous day, she offered to store whatever was uneaten so it would be fresh and hot the following day. The Inventory skill was extremely rare and very few people had bags of holding with preservation capabilities so no one else in the group could replicate that feat. Of course they’d all agreed immediately.
“We need to pray for this skill next,” Zed half-joked as they watched Brivaria take out the fish. That got a few laughs from the others in the group and a smile from the angel. There were worse things in the world than a few good-natured but slightly eccentric folks in the woods praying for their own entertainment. Besides, if there was a god of inventories then Wodan’s group would probably find it. The angel wished them luck.
“Change, come on, I want to see it,” Nyx was saying a little while after Brivaria explained that she now had a human form. Kseniya was amused but Nyx was downright excited.
“When we get closer to the city. I don’t want to spend all day traveling without my wings. Also, I might need to borrow one of your outfits. It won’t be much of a disguise if I’m walking around wearing my usual clothes.” Brivaria would have asked the lamia since their figures were a bit closer but the snake woman had some very elaborate attire for her lower half which wouldn’t work for the angel.
“Oh you can definitely borrow some things but you know what this means for when we get back, right?” Nyx asked with a manic glee that somewhat unnerved the angel. Kseniya’s eyes flashed with understanding and then the lamia grinned.
“Uh, no?” the angel said, looking between her friends.
“Two words. Shopping trip!” Nyx exclaimed. “You need new clothes anyway. You’ve got, what, three outfits in there? One blouse has a massive hole in it and your armor still has holes from Pemburne. You need new clothes and armor. Also I need new boots. The ones I have weren’t made for the amount of walking we do daily.”
“Boots. If our little angel had a proper tail then she wouldn’t need such things,” Kseniya commented with a smirk.
“If she had a ‘proper tail’ then she’d have needed to spend half an hour cleaning herself after that farm we visited before Barton, like a certain someone who stank for entirely too long,” Nyx countered. Kseniya’s cheeks colored.
Since no one was paying too much attention to them, Brivaria let her tail out and hang down from the bench she was sitting on. Trixie saw it and began playing with it. Brivaria delighted in pulling it away from Trixie every time the dog caught it between her paws. It was good practice controlling it and Trixie was having a great time.
Overall, it was a lovely morning. The sky was a beautiful shade of blue, the fish was tasty, and she was surrounded by her friends. She really wanted to stay with the cultists and spend another day fishing. Brivaria knew that wasn’t going to happen. She had work to do. That didn’t mean she couldn’t envision another afternoon on the river.
That thought was just starting to percolate in her brain when Charles Wodan approached. The man was still unnaturally good-looking, no doubt thanks to the original demonic patron of the cult. Brivaria wasn’t certain if it was all physical or if there was magic involved as well but she somehow found herself smiling when he did.
“The others and I talked it over. We’d like to name you three among our members. You’re welcome to stay out here if you like and join us on future trips,” the cult leader said, looking between the three women.
“Uh, is there a ritual or ceremony to make it official or something?” Nyx asked with a little trepidation. Mr. Wodan snorted.
“No, nothing like that. We don’t do any of that anymore. Just let someone know when you’re in town and we’ll get you dates for fishing trips,” the man replied.
“I guess we can accept?” Brivaria looked to her two companions and they shrugged. Trixie had emerged from beneath the table when Brivaria pulled her tail up and the dog had no objections, not that the golden ever did. “What made you decide to make the invitation?”
“You seem like good people. A lot of adventurers are high strung types. Stab first, ask questions later. Jasmine wouldn’t have brought you here if she didn’t think you were a good lot. After meeting you I’m inclined to agree. Plus we’re all hoping you find Terrance. He’s a good man and I’m happy to help the good folks looking for him. What do you say?” Wodan finished speaking and extended his hand toward the angel. Brivaria reached up and took it.
Three more handshakes later and they were all newly anointed cultists. Even Trixie got a handshake making her the first cultist dog of the group and potentially ever. Brivaria was almost certainly breaking some angelic bylaw that read along the lines of “thou shalt not join a cult” but she liked these people. True, it had been less than a day but they were friendly, outright disdained all the things that usually made cults dangerous, and, most importantly, Trixie liked them. Brivaria’s own moral compass might have been skewed by the demon living in her head but the happy golden had never lead the angel astray.
After exchanging goodbyes and thanking Jasmine for taking them out there in the first place, the group headed back to Barton. Brivaria took to the sky to fly while the rest made their way on the ground. The angel’s Current Control skill was speeding everyone up so they were making the same time as the day before if not better. However they’d not made it an hour away from the cabin area when they ran into monsters.
Now, most monsters on Zlithia were vaguely animal-shaped. The creatures of a planet, animal or monster, usually stuck to certain parameters. A planet as large as Zlithia was bound to have many more creature varieties than a smaller planet but generally there were a subset of things you could expect rather than all manner of monstrosities the wider multiverse held. That was why the monsters the group encountered deeply worried the angel.
At first glance it was a trio of brown horses galloping through the forest toward the adventurers. If one was looking at them from far away, they would seem normal to a distant observer until they noticed the smoke. The horses possessed large and oddly shaped tails. They were like abstract art but as fire. That’s not to say they were on fire but rather they were oddly-formed shapes entirely made of fire.
The flaming tails were not even the strangest part of the things. Instead of four legs, the monsters had six. Where the knee joint of a normal horse’s leg would be was instead an elbow joint and a metal gauntlet. The metal gauntlet went all the way down to the ground where it ended in a large, clawed hand. They galloped on six metallic hands rather than hooves. Finally the beasts had the long neck and prominent head that resembled that of a horse at a distance but, in battle, the entire head opened up like an enormous, webbed starfish. To say they were unusual by Zlithian standards would have been a gross understatement.
“Monsters ahead. Eyes on chest, don’t touch the fire…” and that was all Brivaria was able to say. The trio of horse-shaped abominations had reached the group in the time it took her to descend.
“What the?” Kseniya asked while pulling out her scepter and staring in shock at the things. Even Trixie stopped to stare at the oncoming beasts. Brivaria didn’t. She flapped her wings and rushed ahead to meet them, shield raised. Her sword wasn’t drawn yet as she had something else she wanted to do first. A Bolt of Decay blinked into existence, a black orb rather than its usual yellow, and zipped toward the first horse. Two more were cast toward the other three beasts. Two hit as the creatures pulled up and rose onto their back arms but the third flew wide as the last beast changed course, galloping around the angel in a wide arc.
The two in front of Brivaria dwarfed the small angel as they stood up. Their heads opened up revealing rows of teeth and a lamprey-like mouth at the center. At the same time, their tails flared to life. Orange fire slithered from the tail across their bodies to infuse the six metal gauntlets causing each to glow brighter and brighter as they heated up. The smell of burning plants filled the air as the very undergrowth beneath the monsters was charred.
Both monsters advanced on the winged girl until the sound of barking filled the area and one turned toward Trixie. The golden sunchaser was barking loudly and insistently. To Brivaria’s shock, the second one in front of her also turned. The angel used the opening to activate her skills. Her shield glowed with Bleak Radiance and her sword was infused with withering. She zipped forward to plunge her blade into one of the distracted monsters. The health-draining wither effect took hold and the thing’s star-shaped head swung back toward Brivaria.
At the same time, the first horse still facing Trixie began moving toward the dog. It received a surprise as Nyx appeared between it and the dog then jumped forward to claw it. The cat girl activated Kinetic Discharge, converting all of her stored momentum into a single, powerful strike. She aimed for the two eyeballs at the top of its chest and just below the neck.
The monster’s eyeballs were completely black and positioned to see whether it was galloping on six legs or walking on two. The eyes were, unfortunately for the creature, one of the few things the cat girl could attack. Nyx didn’t like the idea of touching one of those impossibly hot arms and the cat had the sense that the starfish-like mouth would close around her arm if she attempted to strike it directly. The center mass of the body and eyes were the only safe places the cat could attack. Trixie seemed to agree as the golden sunchaser launched herself forward. Nyx’s strike left the thing temporarily blinded so Trixie used the opening to give it a powerful shove. It fell backward onto the forest floor with a crash.
Brivaria was glad the two were having some success. The angel activated Defensive Bulwark and raised her shield to meet one of the oncoming strikes. The skill dulled the impact but the creature was so strong that the sheer power of the impact still caused the winged girl to cry out in pain. These things were way too strong to battle fairly at their level. Her decay magic was mitigating some of the difference in power but the group was still outmatched.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
At least, they would have been outmatched without the lamia sorceress in the back. Kseniya was a venom or poison sorceress. Her green bolts of poison worked best against normal, living creatures rather than mana spawn, demons, or half the things the team had faced in the last month. The things before them now were also problematic but where the demon they’d fought in the past had a supernatural ability to purge her toxins, these did not.
As a result, Kseniya calmly cast trio after trio of her green missiles. Every bolt that struck one of the monsters quietly began eating through its health reserves. For how different the two were in origin, Brivaria’s Withering Ray and Kseniya’s Insidious Venom had similar effects. Withering Ray attempted to break down the object or creature which resulted in a steady loss of health as the creature attempted to resist the effects. As Insidious Venom was a magical toxin rather than a mundane one, it directly attacked the body’s organs in an attempt to force them to fail which in turn also caused a loss of health as the target’s body attempted to fight off the poison.
In essence, every creature that the angel and lamia fought was put on a simple timer. Could they kill the two casters before their bodies gave out? Nyx and Trixie didn’t need to kill their opponent, they just needed to occupy it until Kseniya’s venom did the job for them. Any damage the two inflicted in the meantime simply sped up the process.
However the one monster that broke away from the pack was a problem. It had not opted to rise up onto two legs and continued to move around on all six. The lamia quickly realized it intended to trample her. The sorceress calmly watched it circle around. The gauntlets heated up leaving smoldering hand-prints in the abomination’s wake as it charged at the sorceress. Kseniya hurled a small, yellow bolt at one of its legs. Where Brivaria’s Bolts of Decay had been a sickly yellow prior to the angel changing their color, this one was a bright yellow. It struck the horse’s leg and all the muscles within locked up.
Brivaria turned just in time to see a horse monster careening out of control tumble straight into a massive green hammer produced by the lamia’s scepter. The sorceress definitely had that one under control so the angel turned back to her foe. The winged girl was doing admirably in the fight up until the monstrosity’s upper arms began to grow in size. The super-heated metal fists grew larger and larger until it was forced to fall forward on four legs instead of two. That’s when Brivaria noticed the back legs were digging into the forest floor. She grimaced as she knew what came next.
A circle of fire quickly formed around the angel and her opponent. The walls of the circle rose upward and came together in a super heated dome. The air inside started to rise. The angel could see the same happening around Trixie and Nyx. The two were trapped as well. This was a strategy the creatures employed and one that the winged girl was familiar with. The beasts would trap their victims and prevent escape then use their oversized fists to crush their prey before devouring them. It was a gruesome and terrible way to die. Thankfully the angel had no interest in such a fate.
She drove her blade into the ground and began casting. The forest around them was beginning to ignite as the magical flames sparked natural ones. The air was growing hotter and hotter. Trixie’s barking was getting louder and more distressed. Out of the corner of her eye, Brivaria could see Nyx and Trixie being forced back. The brave golden was standing protectively in front of Nyx even as the hands drew closer. The world stopped as Brivaria finished her spell. Luminous Desecration.
A wave of decay pulsed out from the angel. The natural mana of the forest was eradicated and decay flowed into the vacuum it left behind. The domes of fire flickered and vanished as the entire area was suddenly fighting them for existence. That was just the start as the angel threw a Withering Ray at the fingers of one of the flaming gauntlets supporting the monster willing the ray to affect the metal rather than the creature itself. The fingers disintegrated.
The angel was already up and moving before the creature could react. Magical winds carried her upward and she descended on one of the enormous flaming claws, slamming it straight into the ground with her shield. The beast lost balance while the angel catapulted herself upward a second time. This time she soared over the thing’s head and landed on its back. Spinning the blade to point down, she strengthened the withering infusion and stabbed down, again and again.
Every thrust into the horse monster’s flesh stole more of its life away as the withering continued. With the domes down, the constant barrage of Kseniya’s emerald projectiles resumed. The horse abomination attempted to shake the angel off by rolling, a wholly unnatural movement for the beast it resembled. Having some experience with this particular foe, the angel expected the maneuver and was already airborne. Her shield went back into her inventory as she began casting Withering Ray on the creatures below.
The battle was going well, more so now that the entire area was emanating decay and further weakening the monsters. Recovered and back on its feet, Brivaria’s opponent attempted to grab her but she just drifted further outside of its reach. Nyx and Trixie were managing to hold their own. The catfolk girl had Duncan’s old axe and she’d hacked off one of her foe’s upper arms. However much health it had left was obviously not enough to regrow a limb.
Meanwhile Kseniya and her one opponent were completely enclosed in a green fog that Brivaria could not see through. The desecration spell purposefully left her allies’ magicks alone but while her abilities were friendly, she knew the lamia’s were not. The only evidence for how the sorceress was faring were the bolts of viridian energy that periodically emerged from the green cloud to strike the two creatures the rest of the party were fighting.
The battle lasted only a little longer. The horse monsters were dangerous but they were fighting at a disadvantage. Brivaria’s Bleak Radiance was draining their attributes as well as lowering their health, mana, and stamina. They had small mana pools to begin with and the fire traps were costly skills. Losing two or potentially three of those to a single Luminous Desecration was a crippling blow and the adventurers saw no more fire traps for the rest of the battle.
Perhaps most importantly, the horse monsters were big. On an open field or road then that would have presented a grave problem as the adventurers could have been run down. In a forest where the trees were so wide and heavy as to be completely immovable obstacles, it was trivial to play keep away. With Kseniya’s venom and Brivaria’s withering whittling away their health, it was a battle the monsters were destined to lose.
One after another, the beasts collapsed and died. Brivaria’s foe died first as keeping up with the highly mobile angel in the air was untenable. Its only hope had been to pin her to the ground with the fire trap. Trixie and Nyx’s opponent came next. To the angel’s surprise, the pair had done exceedingly well. They were both highly mobile and chasing one simply meant the other could do as they liked. Mostly this created a situation where Trixie barked and Nyx attacked from the flank.
The final beast was laying on the ground, dead, when Kseniya’s emerald miasma faded. Triumphant smiles faded when they saw that the lamia sorceress had not escaped unscathed. Her tail was badly scorched and bleeding. Judging by the marks, a couple of those super-heated metal gauntlets had gotten a hold of her.
“Kseniya!” the angel shouted, flying over to the snake woman.
“It is fine, I am alive and they are not. I call that a good outcome,” the lamia wore a good-natured smile as she spoke but Brivaria could see the brief expression of pain as she touched the injured tail and began to channel Healing Touch.
“We need to work on tactics or something,” Nyx said as the winged girl began healing the group. The exact situation was one of the greatest benefits of having a healer in the party. One’s health was a System-granted force of stabilization. That is, it would heal life-threatening wounds but sometimes leave painful but non-lethal injuries alone. The sheer relief on the sorceress’ face as the healing magic began to mend the wounds was partly why healers were always in demand for adventuring parties.
“We do,” Brivaria admitted. “With just the three of us, we don’t have a great way of protecting any one person.” Trixie padded over to Kseniya and made sad noises while looking up at the lamia sorceress.
“Aw, are you worried about me? I will be okay,” she said while petting the golden. Her tail was already feeling much better thanks to Brivaria’s healing. “And I concur—we should discuss tactics. If we are going to be an adventuring team in more than name only then we must find ways to complement one another as well as knowing exactly what each person here can do. We may even want to find a fourth person.”
“Well, we were planning on asking around to see if we could find the pyromancer so it wouldn’t hurt to be a little more sincere in our efforts,” the angel mused aloud.
“That sounds like a plan to me. If something like this happens again then we’ll be ready. Speaking of, what were those things? They’re freaky,” the catfolk girl finally asked. All eyes turned to the angel. Brivaria had finished healing Kseniya, given Trixie a once over, and was just about to look at Nyx.
“Monsters from the Between,” the angel replied to which she received blank looks. Realizing that meant very little, she explained.
“I believe most people call them ‘Eldritch Horrors.’ They’re entities from beyond the stars who are not native to any universe that we know of. They don’t manifest as natural, normal-looking creatures. The more dangerous and powerful they are, the less comprehensible they become. In some cases just looking at them can leave you with mental scars that will last the rest of your life.” Nyx and Kseniya were both just staring at Brivaria in fright.
“And those things just exist?” Nyx asked, a note of incredulity in her voice.
“They do. If you’ve ever seen something late at night just before turning off a mana lamp only for it to be gone when the light comes back then you might have seen them. Things that move at the edge of your vision but are gone when you turn to look are places where the boundary between this universe and the Between is weak.” The angel was going to go on but Nyx held up her hands.
“No more. Enough of that. I change my mind about wanting to know the details.” Brivaria smiled at Nyx’s words but Kseniya frowned.
“And what are three of them doing here?” the lamia asked.
“I don’t know. They were very visible from the sky so I’d have seen them on the way here if we passed them. It’s extremely rare for one to cross the boundary let alone three. While they can manifest on their own, they must usually be invited.” That last word gave the sorceress and claw fighter pause.
“I do not like the sound of that. They were coming from the direction of the city. Either they came from the city itself or…” the lamia trailed off in thought. Nyx spoke up as she realized something a moment later.
“Wait, if they have to be invited then does that mean someone left the city, invited them or whatever, then sent them in this direction?” Nyx asked.
“Yeah,” Brivaria nodded, “I’m fairly certain someone just tried to have us killed… again.”
“I am honestly unsure what to say to that,” Kseniya said, truly at a loss for words.
“This is ridiculous. What do we do?” Nyx looked from one party member to the other. Brivaria shrugged.
“Keep going. We should also probably get word to Zenith Penrose that she might have assassins coming after her if she doesn’t already know. It didn’t occur to me until now that she’s probably in as much danger as I am.” Kseniya looked doubtful at that statement.
“Well, she has an entire mercenary band so maybe just a tiny bit less danger for her,” the lamia corrected. That was a fair point, Brivaria admitted silently.
“Regardless, I think our plan for today is still the same. Get back to the city, use my new disguise, check back into our inn, and figure things out tomorrow. Any objections?” the angel asked the team. There were none.
The group attempted to harvest anything of value from dead monsters but the things were already starting to dissolve. Strangely the one gauntlet that Nyx hacked off the second beast was still present. It was still hot to the touch but Brivaria poked it to store it in her inventory. Who knew when something like that could come in handy?
Finally, she checked her System notifications. There was one waiting for her and she smiled. The number of people seemingly out to kill her or Zenith Penrose was too high for her liking but at least she was getting levels out of the situation.
You have reached level 35.
Gained +1 Physique, +2 Arcane, +2 Spirit, +2 Presence.
Name: Brivaria
Race: Angel
Class: Apprentice Shaper of Flesh
Level: 35
Stats: Health 73/73, Mana 45/139, Stamina 63/95
Attributes: Physique 59, Endurance 36, Arcane 66, Spirit 70, Awareness 36, Presence 73
Active Skills: Current Control, Defensive Bulwark, Healing Touch, Wind Formation
Passive Skills: Alternative Form, Flesh Sculpting, Infernal Seed, Inventory, Lesser Flight, Lesser Shapeshifting, Lingering Decay, Natural Weapons, Rest, Traits (Angel)
Magic: Light of Decay
Affinity: Corruption, Decay