Just finishing up and editing the next chapter, should be out early morning tomorrow after I finish work this evening!
Time and a half makes hungover work slightly more bearable haha
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As Andrew looked in confusion in the direction where Lisia lost herself in her gaze, his body shuddered slightly. Soon after, an almost palpable aura of anger and death emerged as he slowly approached the figure, who was struggling to loose himself from the surrounding corpses. As soon as a hand was pushed out of the decaying mess, Andrew grabbed it.
With a bone shattering grip he held the hand tightly before rotating his shoulder, freeing the struggling figure in one moment and slamming him down on to the hard ground the next.
“ANDREW! STOP! HE DIDN’T MEAN ANY HARM,” shouted Lisia tugging on Andrew’s wrist to let the small boy go, but Andrew simply asked, “let’s just assume someone tried to rip out your ovaries, how would you feel about it?”
Although stunned for a moment, she knew she couldn’t give him any more time to punish the boy, lest it turn into something more brutal. Thinking quickly, she pleaded with Andrew, “please, I beg you! This one is like a brother to me, we lived in the same village. There must be an explanation!” With the boy no longer whimpering, well, nearly as much anyways from Andrew’s grip, he quirked his eyebrows.
Sensing the deathly silence, she sighed to herself, ‘luckily I’ve got his attention, but for Kai this likely won’t end well, no matter what.’ Even so, she steeled her courage before speaking, “Kai, you have to tell us what happened. And apologize for almost making a woman out of Andrew here,” while she tried to lighten the mood, a deep cry of agony was heard from the boy’s lips, “I-I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that, anyways... speak now!”
“W- w- what do you mean I never did anything!” Cried the boy defiantly, trying to hide his small iron dirk behind his back.
Andrew turned to Lisia holding a small pebble before speaking coldly, “you know the one I used on the Den Mother? This is the same type. Trust me when I say even your magic won’t be able to stop the slow, agonising pain. Physical wounds and poison are much different, you know?” Lightly tossing up the pebble up and down, Lisia reflected on what happened before.
‘In his pain-induced frenzy from the wolf mother’s ‘gift’ to him after he severed her leg… which didn’t even bother her in the least… he threw this at her… and… and oh my!’ almost shrieking now, she slapped Kai on the face before speaking in a grave voice, “apologize now! You should know the stories about the leader of the monsters in the night,” to which she got an obedient nod from him, ”this man punished one of them with that stone he is playing around with right now. She who can create and destroy almost an entire species, even after taking her leg, she still didn’t utter a sound… until he threw that rock.”
Although the message was conveyed in an extraordinarily grim manner, Andrew found it almost comical how she described his recent events. As soon as the sentence left her mouth he lost the majority of his animosity towards the child. At second glance, the child looked to be around 14 or 15 years old. The delicate features and small frame made him seem as though he was a slightly larger toddler.
When he broke out of that train of thought, he noticed the child bowing with his head on the ground, quivering uncontrollably. Looking at the frightened child he felt a small sense of guilt, but Andrew was still somewhat upset over the incident so he didn’t let it bother him that much.
Speaking casually he turned to Lisia before nodding, “feel free to heal him, he’s your burden, however,” paused Andrew dramatically, before adding, “Taryk, you see it every day, let him too,” while she was still feeling content over his declaration, she failed to notice the latter part of it. Taryk, on the hand, quickly caught on and approached the boy. Taking the same iron dirk thrown on to the ground previously, he efficiently cut an extremely large cross shaped scar on to the boys undamaged forearm.
Even as she saw this happening, Lisia could not even react. Earlier when he was speaking about her village, he gave her a clear concession about his future treatment of the villagers. And clearly this was him acting on the lenient side of things. If it were to have an older man or woman who attacked him - in a bandit group, no less - then he, and many others. would have acted in a much more ruthless manner. The only saving grace was the child’s face, giving him a small sense of guilt in regards to bullying someone so young. However, that was only the immediate reaction as after he noticed the stature of the child, he saw what simply looked like a small, malnourished teenager.
“Brat, so tell me this: why were you hanging out with bandits? If I don’t like your answer…” spoke Andrew light-heartedly, however, the young elf began to shake even more. “Lisia, are you going to help him or what?”
“Huh? Oh, yes!” With a green tinged glow radiating from her palms, it crept away from her own body before landing on the young elf’s wrist. Blissfully ignoring the rest of surroundings, the young elf, Kai, stared at the maiden who was healing him, with enamored eyes.
“It makes so much sense now, hey Taryk?” Quipped Andrew as if in sudden realisation, entirely forgetting about the boy’s circumstances.
“Boss, do you mean the pre-pubescent attacking Lisia with his eyes? Hell, even us goblins are not even as obvious sometimes,” replied Taryk, nodding his head in agreement.
“She’s probably just into that sort of thing,” spoke Andrew with a smirk.
It took a moment for Lisia to register the comment and further still to notice the boy’s relatively innocent gaze colored by something darker. Still not entirely sure as to the meaning of such an odd combination, she backed away a little bit in trepidation as soon as she finished her treatment, unwilling to let him approach her.
“BIG SIS-” screamed Kai in untamed excitement, but as he approached a small, normal pebble hit him square on the back of his head causing him to flip forwards, landing face first on to the ground a few feet in front of Lisia.
‘Something… well actually, a few thing about it him absolutely rub me the wrong way. Is there some abandoned elves orphanage somewhere around here?’ thought Andrew with wry smile..
Lisia, who saw the running boy fall flat on his face, released a forced smile, “Kai, don’t bother to stay around here if you can’t restrain yourself. Or else, well, it can hurt a bit. We are going to explore the mine so can you do us a favor and give them a proper burial… or at least pile them up as you read the ‘prayer of the departed,’ so that those here may rest in peace?”
“Before you go gallivanting about in an open grave, tell us what the deal is with the mine,” questioned Andrew as he rolled a smooth pebble between his fingers.
“I-I-It, it’s the home of those bandits!”
“Thanks Sherlock, now how about something we didn’t know?”
“Ummm, the first level is alright, the second has their treasures, but the third is supposed to be really, really, really scary!” Added Kai as he began to back off from Lisia, hoping Andrew would finally drop his pebble.
“Really? Well one was enough anyways. Basically remnants of their forces, treasure, and scary monsters, correct?” Said Andrew unceremoniously while Kai nodded his head frantically.
“Well, what are you all waiting for? Is Kai going to help pillage the mine or do a eulogy to those careless bandits? Realistically, it doesn’t matter either way as both will likely be dangerous for a child at least.”
Gathering some courage, Kai spoke defiantly once again, “I’m not a child! I am 15 years old, a full grown man!”
“As a ‘full grown man’ are you willing to take the punishment for fighting alongside criminals who stole away my brothers’ home?” Cut in Taryk venomously, still somewhat vexed about his kin being slaughtered here earlier and for some reason pinned Kai into the same group..
“WAH! I’M A CHILD SEE?!” Cried Kai as he dramatically started to suck his thumb. Andrew was annoyed at his total lack of self respect so he launched another pebble.
“Whatever, do as you see fit. Lisia please remember he’s your responsibility,” spoke Andrew as his voice trailed off slightly when advanced to the mine’s entrance.
Entering into the eerie darkness of the cave, the man, goblin, and two elves advanced further into the pitch black cave. Kai was scared witless and became almost glued to Lisia, who hated the contact with such a shameless child, however, she beared with it for her agreement. While Andrew did get annoyed at the inability to see for a bit, his high perception came into effect as soon as his eyes adjusted to the low light levels, granting him and his two companions the ability to see to some degree in the dark cave.
Kai, on the other hand was entirely blind so Andrew forced a Iron Dirk into his hands and told Lisia to escort him out where he would be less of a hindrance - to Andrew that is.
‘He’s just going to go on without me afterwards, might as well stay outside,’ thought Lisia as she essentially dragged the blind boy back, with him taking every chance he could to cop a feet. Occasionally she would throw him forward and step off to the side. Causing him no small amount of anxiety being left in a dark place with no reasonable way out.
Leaving just the two of them, Andrew drew both of his swords as he came up to what seemed to be a small storehouse. Somewhat stealthily unlatching the door and entering, he saw a dimly lit room with a greying man hunched over a desk, scribbling onto a book.
More so out of curiousity than anything else, he recited [identify] in his mind and opened the flashing window.
Alfre the Blind
Level 14
Description: Though he was once blinded in a grueling, vicious battle against the human who held the lineage of the dragons, he had taken it upon himself to write the legendary tale that was his battle. Additionally, chronicling the exploits of the progressively more infamous hero.
“Eh. Who's there? Rae, is that you?”
“Yeah, yeah,” replied Andrew casually waving his hands slightly, though to a blind man it would hardly make much of a difference. Sheathing his swords, he heard the man continue.
“Are you sure? You sound… different. Well either way, Boss was looking for you on the second level.”
“The panther bastard?”
“Nah, I know you’re new here, but you aren’t that green. Anyways, he was just a lackey. Though it likely would be a hard fight between the two of the them,” laughed Alfre as he stopped his scribbling.
“Hey, I feel like I must’ve asked you this before, but may I see your book? Honestly, just a little bored hanging around here all day, could use a bit of reading material,” lied Andrew naturally, going with the flow of the conversation.
“Sure, thing. It took me two years to get to this point though so be careful with it, ‘ight?”
“Yeah, of course Boss.” spoke Andrew casually, however, Alfre did stiffen up a bit at the mention of the term. Without any resistance Andrew grabbed the book and began reading.
Laughing charmingly after a few minutes he spoke once more, “it’s quite a tale from what I’ve read so far, though the last couple pages you seemed to to run dry, did you have another vial of ink I can grab you?”
Cursing softly, Alfre spoke after a small breathe, “would be so kind? Also what was the last part you could see?”
“Ah, well it was a little too advanced for me I’m sorry. I can read it somewhat, but it has never been my strong suit, ya know?” Setting down a new vial of ink and book, he guided the man’s hand to the inkwell. Andrew continued, “if I had to say though, it would be something along the lines of… Dragon Kid? Oh well, after that guy’s battle with you he seemed to fail for a temptress who led him astray? And then he become progressively more and more dark. While I can make out something about a massive dragon - not the kid, it seems like he’ll be fighting more of them, hey? Anyways, big dragon fight after the smaller ones. Wait - the fuck? This place actually has dragons?”
Due to the fact he was making it up as he was going along, he did have a few breaks and arbitrary questions to stall of time. ‘I simply can’t handle being rude to this guy, seems far too nice to hate,’ thought Andrew with a wry smile.
If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
“Ah, good. Only a little bit behind then,” smiled the man warmly before flipping his book back about ten pages, “by the way kid. You realise it isn’t polite to lie to an old man, a blind one at that?” smirked the greying Alfre.
“Ah, so I’ve been found out ‘Boss,’ anyways, I don’t think you are the type for material possessions so I was planning on taking a bit of gold here and there and checking out the bottom level. Well, just because, honestly,” Andrew attempted a sardonic smile while fingering his sword from his holster.
‘Although he is blind, he is still basically my level, it’d be an interesting fight,’ mused Andrew as he waited in anticipation. Yet, the fight never came. All that came forth was a mocking laughter that seemed to roar throughout the small shack. Even Taryk who had waited on Andrew outside was concerned and entered.
Sniffing the air, Alfre’s expression brightened even more, “a halfblood, hey? Interesting, anyways I won’t stop you. Actually, after you’re done - assuming you are still alive - take me back to someplace with fresh air with pocket full of gold and all tell you where the ‘vault’ is, ‘less of course, you want to trek miles underground aimlessly.
“Do tell, old man,” probed Andrew, as he signaled Taryk to lower his spear.
“What? Still, no respect for your elders? Alas, this generation is truly horrible,” sighed Alfre dramatically, “Well, either way you might as know about the whole story..”
Beginning by waiting patiently, Andrew slowly lost his nerve after two minutes of deep silence. As he wasn’t worried about the man’s skill due to his inquiry on his level, he flung a pebble at the senile man.
Crying pitifully for but a moment, Alfre regained his calm as if nothing happened. With another dramatic sigh and cough, he continued, “there is no hope for you at all, is there? Abusing a poor, old blind man-”
“Who happens to be the leader of a bandit group? Surely people will make an exception for such circumstances?” Interrupted Andrew, completely tired of the shirade.
“Fine, the vault is going to be on the second level of the mine. You will have to go down a shaft, but the little bastards shouldn’t have moved anything recently. If you reach a fork in the road turn right and look on your left side after about 7 or 8 feet. Oh, watch out for suspicious rocks, but whatever I don’t really care to tell you anything else.”
“Taryk let’s go raid that vault!”
“Yes, Boss! Spears are for me though, just saying.”
As the pair exited the storeroom into the darkness excitedly, the old man smiled devilishly as he muttered, “should I have told them they needed a key? Or that the second floor was evacuated for a reason and no one was even able to set foot in there? Doesn’t matter now,” finished Alfre drowsily as he started to drift off into a deep sleep. Twinkling in the torch light, a small silver key slipped from under shirt to expose itself to the room.
As he started to pace through the utter darkness again, Andrew thought to himself, ‘‘little bastards’? I wonder if he was referring to the bandits or the ‘really, really, really scary monsters’ that the brat was worried about. I suppose it doesn’t really matter much at this point. Kill whatever is guarding the treasure and hopefully I’ll be able to arm those little green midgets to do my dirty work with the elves for me,’ smiled Andrew devilishly.
After exposing themselves the lit storeroom previously, it took a few moments of walking into walls, pickaxes, and piles of excavated dirt to right themselves. Moving forward with slowly adapting vision, he heard a small cry from Taryk. Grabbing to his side where the goblin-turned-elf should be he only touched the stale air of the mine, calling out loudly, “Taryk, where ya at, buddy? Don’t run off now.”
With a muffled voice coming from below, he instinctively looked down. Though everything was in shades of black and grey, the spot immediately to left was even darker than the floor he was standing on. “Bastard, there was kind of a giant hole around here, not exactly my fault, now is it?”
Testing the black pit, which he assumed to be safe as Taryk was still complaining to him, he nudged the area with his foot until he got a basic layout of the hole. A rectangular shaft about three and a half feet wide and two and half feet long. How deep, he wasn’t certain, but since he couldn’t find a ladder or rope he simply jumped.
Although he only fell for what seemed like a second, he still felt the pain course through his legs and lower back.
Rubbing his aching legs, he muttered, “definitely not my brightest idea, you good though?” to which he felt the butt end of the spear prodding his body.
“Yeah, legs hurt a bit, but nothing too major. Now, stupid question, but shouldn’t we have brought a torch or something?”
“Think of it as training? And yeah I’m with you there, next time we will, remind me though. Rope would’ve been nice too.”
Although now their vision would extend to about ten or twelve feet in front of them, it still wasn’t nearly enough for the cavernous shaft that they fell into. At around twenty odd feet, from their spot, to each wall on either side, the shaft was at least 40 feet wide and there was no telling how long. Deciding that sitting around wouldn’t accomplish anything - let alone, tell them where to go to climb back up, they set off forward in hopes of finding the vault.
While they did leave a spear impaled into the ground, which Taryk adamantly protested against, it would serve much of a purpose besides giving them some landmark in the dark, empty space that was the mine. Walking for about ten minutes they hand yet to find anything major. With twists and turns in the shaft itself, nothing pointed to a fork in the road. Luckily they did eat before this excursion, but that would only last so long in such a place.
Taryk was the first to complain, albeit mostly out of boredom, “Boss, I’m hungry. Did you leave any food in your bag thing?”
“Nope, just deal with it, it’s been like an hour tops. Next time bring a backpack around with you so you can stuff it full of raw meat.” replied Andrew indifferently, though the tediousness of walking with seemingly no purpose was getting to him as well. To Taryk, however, it was a revolutionary idea. One that would be start of him wearing clothes for the rest of his, should he get out in one piece, or so he thought to himself.
Unwittingly, they began to near the wall instead of staying in the middle of the tunnel. With a low rumbling, which previously was heard every couple of minutes or so, they ignored it and kept walking. As Andrew was about to say something to the goblin to kill time he felt a sharp pain on his shoulder.
Taryk cried out as well, as he rotated his spear-turned-walking-stick into an aggressive stance. After both of them jumping forward, they slowed down to turn around. Andrew also immediately pulled out his twin swords.
In front of them stood two, five foot tall inuit inukshuk type statues. Taking a giant rock for example, their body was marked by a small cavity between what would be their legs for mobility, two outstretched completely straight arms, a tiny head, and a gaping hole where their stomach would have been located. Beyond that they were almost completely indistinguishable from the rock walls that surrounded the two men.
With feet that seemed melded in with the shaft’s floor and their stiff bodies, they attacked the two with a decent amount of speed - for what could be considered a pile of rocks. With puppet like actions, they charged forward, never lifting their feet as the ground seemed to move around them, and rotated their torso, using their arms to a produce a startling amount of force.
As they approached, Andrew and Taryk both dodged to the side, swinging their weapons to meet with the approaching statue. As their weapons connected to the chest of the two inukshuks, Taryk’s spear and Andrew’s sword slid of their respective targets, sending sparks as they grinded against the statues’ course stone bodies.
Cursing loudly, Andrew spoke up to the irritated goblin, “finally got what you were asking for, hey? Anyways now isn’t the time, I’ve got a plan… though I don’t know if it will work, you down?”
“What’s Plan B?”
“Run?”
As the goblin grumbled about the statues ridiculous bodies, Andrew dodged another blow while operating his inventory screen. As he deposited his two swords, he withdrew two spiked maces, in their place :
[Rusted Iron Morningstar
Damage Rating 5-8
Description: Although this weapon was intended to be far larger, the owner decided to trim the handle so that he or she could use it with one hand. Due to the modification, the mace head will be disproportionately larger, affecting the weapon’s centre of gravity, granting it increased blunt and piercing damage dealing capabilities in exchange for decreased attack speed. ]
Grabbing them both out of the air, he tossed one to Taryk, as he yelled, “Plan A! Catch! Hit them really fucking hard with this thing!”
Ducking under a sweeping arm, Taryk jumped to reach the morningstar, as he complained, “the hell is this? How are you supposed to hit something with this thing’s balance -”
“You were using a half-rotted wood spear for how long? Though it had a decent point it wasn’t any fucking different than an arrow head. Anyways, like this,” backstepping for a moment, he moved out of range just in time. Swinging the morningstar to meet with the statues arm - borrowing its momentum, Andrew heard a satisfying crumbling sound. Although his hand had gone completely numb, the statue lost one of their entire forearms.
Returning the shaking mace into a decent grip, albeit with two hands this time, he brought the mace up high before letting it speed downwards towards the statue’s head. Although it seemed to move backwards, the blow swept through the rocks that acted as its hand and chest before stopping new the stomach cavity.
The statue kept sliding backwards as it finally slowed. Andrew exhaled loudly while brushing off dust and debris from his stinging face. When his morningstar smashed into the statue’s head, the rock fragments peppered Andrew’s face, dealing shallow cuts with each fragment that tore past - and into - his face.
Looking over to Taryk’s side he noticed that while the statue was missing its arms and head, it still kept moving in for the kill. Slowly craning his head, he just had time to glimpse the legs of the statue moving towards him rapidly. With no time to move he could only brace himself. It was as if a linebacker tackled his legs, but the inukshuk obviously didn’t have any equipment to protect himself or the target. Feeling his legs give way and lose contact to the ground, he found himself on the side of the shaft’s wall.
With a strange premonition, he immediately forced his battered body off the stone surface. As he moved, he caught the sight of two more stony arms reaching from the walls, shattering the surface of the wall he was just at. Growing more and more angry as he felt the pain radiate from his body, he gripped his morningstar to meet the charging pair of legs. ‘If it’s broken into shards it won’t exactly be able to tackle me then, now could it?’ Thought Andrew, as he smashed the morningstar into one side of the creatures stony legs.
With a sickening crunch, the legs leaked out a viscous brown sludge and one of the two legs was out of commission. The other stopping momentarily was promptly smashed almost immediately after the first. Taking a quick glance around he began to charge, not at Taryk’s statue, who was on it’s last leg - literally, but at the arms which were still reaching out battering the wall continually.
With a well timed swing, both were smashed from above, leaving only a stub that seemed to slow while dripping the peculiar brown liquid.
As Taryk finished pounding the fragments into a fine dust, Andrew commented jokingly, “good form, we’ll make a man out of you yet.” Shortly after his face turned serious, “aim for the closest thing to the ground, wall, and my God lets hope we don’t see them on the ceiling,” seeing an obedient nod on the goblins battered face, riddled with cuts from the exploding fragmentation, much like Andrew’s, he withdrew another weapon.
Grabbing the double headed ax which seemed far lighter than before, though that could have been stat boosts acting up, he deposited his morningstar and Taryk’s spear. With a few swings of the nearly six foot tall ax, Andrew finally got himself used to such a weapon. Or for what one can reasonably expect, considering the circumstances.
“We definitely fucked up. Not much other choice than to go through,” sighed Andrew whilst speaking to himself, he hefted up the axe on to his shoulder and began walking on his sore legs.