Mia had worked tirelessly in her corner of their hideout. Her hands, calloused and stained, bore witness to her newfound determination. She knew that Hector had been struggling, both physically and emotionally. It pained her to see her friend in such a state, and she was resolved to help him in any way she could.
She had come up with just the right thing for him.
With a soft smile, Mia approached Hector. She carried in her hands a newly crafted shield, one she had put her heart and soul into. Its design was unique, her Crafting really shined in this one. A strong fabric guige was attached to the shield, designed to loop around Hector's shoulder, allowing him to secure it firmly without relying on the hand he had lost.
"Hey, Hector," Mia said gently. "I made this for you." She held out the shield, her eyes filled with empathy and hope. "I know it's not the same but it should help you in battle, and it's something I thought would help."
Hector looked at the shield, with a barest hint of interest. Mia took it as a good sign.
“Let me show you how this works.” She put on the shield and the strap around her neck, showing Hector how he could control the angle of the shield with his neck. It was far from perfect but with a lot of practice he could use his shield arm again.
“You want to try it on?” Mia asked hoping he would say yes and that it would be his first step towards recovery.
“Yeah let me try it” He said and Mia stepped in to help him put it on.
Hector was obviously uncomfortable with the help but they adjusted the shield's guige on his shoulder and he gave it a few experimental movements. It was different from what he was used to, but it felt actually alright. He looked touched by Mia's thoughtful gesture, but Mia thought there was also something else there. Maybe reluctance? That didn’t make any sense though, why would Hector be reluctant to go back to fighting.
She shrugged mentally as she watched her friend start practicing with his new shield right away. It was a step in the right direction, maybe the item would help him deal with his trauma just like the bow helped her with hers. It was not all roses obviously but she felt more like herself and under control.
----------------------------------------
Frank stood in the dark corridor waiting for Diana, he was twirling his daggers. It was a habit that started as practice for his Sleight of Hands but it has since become almost instinctive for him, he didn’t notice that he was doing it any more.
His thoughts went to his daggers this time though.
“You guys need names, all cool weapons should have a name, especially if they are a pair.” He muttered to his daggers.
“Fang and Claw?” He said, as his eyes followed the spinning dagger. “Meh, lame”
“Maybe … Heartseeker and Soulreaver” he chuckled to himself “Yeah that's a bit too epic for my taste too.”
“How do you like Slicer and Dicer?” The daggers remained silent, which he took as refusal. “Yeah you’re right, that also feels wrong but closer.”
He wondered what was taking Diana so long. They were supposed to plan on which exits to collapse today to make their building safer. While he was looking forward to the big booms he was not so eager about the planned climb to the rooftop. It sounded tiring.
Finally Diana showed up “Took you long enough, I’ve gained a new level in Waiting” Frank quipped.
“A Wizard is never late, my young padawan” Diana responded with a small smile.
Frank’s jaw dropped in mock surprise“ Was that … humor? From you? I need to mark that in my little diary. I mean it even had not one but two references. I must be rubbing off on you!”
“No rubbing Frank, hands where I can see them” she said in a dry voice.
“I didn’t mean.. I … I’m not…” Frank was uncharacteristically at a loss for words.
“Lets just go before you get stuck like that” Diana said, the smirk returning to her face.
The whole conversation made Frank take a second look at Diana. They knew each other since high school and he thought about her as a friend for years now. She has always treated him with a cold distance and didn’t have much patience for his antics but it definitely felt like that changed in the last week.
He glanced at her when her head was turned the other way, their torn clothes revealed more than was usual and he felt something he almost forgot about stir inside him. The curves of her body certainly looked interesting but he was surprised he was thinking about stuff like that in their current circumstances. He shrugged, guess biology is hard to cheat at least in the long term.
He slapped himself, get your mind out of the gutter, you both could die any minute, it's time to focus.
He was focused for all of like five seconds.
“Hey, I’m trying to name my daggers, you got any suggestions?” He asked Diana.
“How about Stumble and .. Mumble?” Diana mocked.
“Hey i will let you know i haven’t stumbled in …” Frank checked his imaginary watch “ all of twenty minutes.” He chuckled to himself. “What do you think about Dusk and Dawn."
Diana just groaned, that was more like the friend he remembered. “Sure, go with that if you want us to drop dead from embarrassment in front of the first person you share those names with.”
“So what should we explode first?” Frank said changing the subject.
“I figured we should block the ramp from level minus one to the lower ones, that's the most likely to let centipedes in and should be easy to collapse the ceiling onto it”
“Makes sense to me” Frank said as he took the lead and they walked towards the ramp.
When they arrived, Frank surveyed the dim corridor, his fingers dancing over the handle of his daggers. The air was heavy with the acrid scent of centipede residue, and he kept thinking about the endless maze that stretched under their building. He was glad they would block this entrance first.
Frank glanced at Diana and exchanged a knowing look with her. It seemed she was feeling the same way. With a nod, they stepped forward, heading towards the ramp leading down, an inky abyss all that was visible beyond it. Their steps echoed softly in the narrow space. Frank could never get used to the weird way sound carried in these halls.
"Diana, it's a bit too quiet, don't you think?" Frank whispered, his eyes darting around.
"I agree. Be on your guard," she replied, her voice equally hushed.
As they moved further down the corridor, the hair on the back of Frank's neck bristled. He couldn't shake the feeling that there was something dangerous nearby.
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
"Here," Diana said, pointing at a weakened section of the ceiling overhead.
Frank nodded in understanding and passed a flat stone for Diana to cast her Explosive Rune on. He watches as magic gathered around her staff and the rune came into focus. Then it was like it teleported onto the stone in his hand.
With agility born from Acrobatics, Frank leaped and somersaulted his way up the corridor, his movements a fluid dance of grace and strength. He defied gravity, his fingers finding purchase in the smallest cracks on the walls. With precision, he placed the small stone into one of the fissures. The stone wedged securely in place, hopefully enough to collapse the ceiling.
He looked at Diana and she triggered the rune.
The result was an explosion of debris and dust, as the ceiling crumbled and sealed off the ramp before them. The noise of falling rubble echoed through the corridor, and it felt as if the world had descended into chaos. The dust that the explosion threw into the air brought bad memories with it.
Frank turned back to Diana, his chest heaving. "Well, that should slow anything coming from below down. Even if something tries to get through here we will hear it coming.”
They stood silently for a while straining their ears to hear if anything would come to check what made all the ruckus.
“I’m really glad we did this one first, I get a bad feeling about those underground corridors.” Frank said, feeling goosebumps on his forearms.
After a moment Diana nodded, her expression unreadable. "Seems clear. We should move on."
“Where to next?” Frank asked with a shrug.
“The ground level entrances” Diana responded confidently.
Frank hoped that those would go as easily as this ramp went.
It felt like a recurring theme, patches of boredom intertwined with pants-staining terror. Oh well, what can you do? As they walked Frank started air drumming a song that was a lot on his mind recently trying to not focus on the more bleak parts of their current life. The song was heavy metal, and it was no wonder Diana asked:
“Everything ok, or are you having some sort of an attack?” Frank could almost hear the song so he didn't stop headbanging.
“Yeah just got this one song in my mind that just won't leave me alone” Frank said.
He saw Diana’s eyebrows rise but he had just gotten to the good part. He stopped mid movement.
“I’ve got it!” He shouted and immediately looked around in fear. “Damn sorry, too loud”
“It's. Fine.” Diana said in a way that made obvious it was not fine but there was little she could do. Frank saw her eye twitch. “You got what exactly?”
“The names, I’m going to call them Pain and Killer. Fitting names for daggers don’t you think? And they even have their own theme song” Frank was really happy with his choice, and his daggers glinted in approval.
Diana just rubbed her forehead. “Theme song?” She looked like she was starting a headache.
“Yeah, you know? Faster than a bullet, terrifying scream?” Frank tried explaining but stopped when he saw no understanding on Diana’s face. Well not everybody could have good taste in music he supposed. “You know what, nevermind” He didn’t need her approval, at least his weapons liked their new names.
“Lets focus on the mission” Frank added with a mock salute.
Diana just led them towards the closest exit to the streets. Once they got there Diana prepared her rune and gave it to Frank. He placed the demolition charge and moved to a safe distance.
The door shuddered, debris flew, and the ground shook as the explosion sealed the entrance with rubble. Diana and Frank stood their ground, coughing as the dust cloud enveloped them. When the dust settled, they could see the door was now a mound of stone and earth, blocking any further passage.
“Explosives are kind of neat,” Frank grinned like a child.
“I reluctantly agree,” Diana said as they watched the result of the blast. However they didn't take into account one thing. That they were now in the open and that sound carried much further in the streets.
As the dust settled they moved towards the next exit to collapse.
“Hey? I just thought of something” Frank said.
Diana made a hand motion for him to continue.
“You got that Identify skill right? It said you would learn more after you killed some more Abominations right?”
Diana slapped her own forehead. “Damn, how could I forget about that. How could I make such a dumb mistake!” Frank saw that she was clearly angry with herself. He didn’t get that. There has been a lot going on and it was a small misstep on her part. Not really worth flogging herself over it, she was definitely too harsh on herself.
“It’s fine, let's just find a bug and you can use your skill on it.” Frank tried to console her but it felt like a wall grew around her and she didn't respond beyond a nod.
Once they found a small group of Abominations she Identified one of them
CTHOSARUM ABOMINATION
TYPE: ABOMINATION
LVL. 2
HP: 80/80
MP: ??/??
SKILLS:
LUNGE - THROW YOU BODY FORWARD AND PIERCE YOU OPPONENT WITH YOU FORWARD CLAWS.
BITE - CHOMP DOWN WITH YOUR POWERFUL JAWS, HAS A CHANCE TO DAMAGE YOU.
PASSIVES:
CORRUPTED - TAKE 50% LESS DAMAGE FROM CORRUPTED SOURCES OF DAMAGE AND 50% MORE FROM HOLY SOURCES.
WEAK ECHOLOCATION - SUPPLEMENT YOUR SIGHT WITH SOUND, INCREASE SOUND DETECTION RANGE BY 50% LIMITED ABILITY TO SENSE THROUGH WALLS.
WEAK SIGHT - -80% SIGHT RANGE AND QUALITY
TWISTED INHABITANTS OF THE CITY OF CTHOSARUM. NATURAL ENEMIES TO CTHOSARUM DUSKSHRIEKERS, WHO TREAT THEM AS A FOOD SOURCE. THEY HUNT IN PACKS USING THEIR EXCEPTIONAL HEARING WHICH IS ONLY ENHANCED BY THE CITY’S ARCHITECTURE. CTHOSARUM ABOMINATIONS FEED MOSTLY ON THEIR OWN DEAD AND ANYTHING ELSE THEY CAN FIND.
“Damn, I kind of suspected that with how they behaved but it could have been useful some time ago,” Frank said after Diana had shown her screen to him.
“We’ve managed without it just fine” Diana responded with a hint of defensiveness in her tone.
“Yeah lets just deal with this group and secure more entrances” It was clear that Diana felt guilty about the subject so there was no need to rub it in. Frank nodded to Diana and jumped down to have some fun with the bugs, his daggers theme song playing in his mind.
"This. Is. The. Pain-killer," he sang to himself steadily as he kept stabbing with both weapons. If he couldn't get that song out of his head he was going to at least put it to good use.
----------------------------------------
Deep within the dark and tangled underbelly of the city a group of centipedes, skittered through the tunnels. They moved without grace, their elongated bodies twisting and coiling as they prowled through the inky blackness.
Suddenly, a distant explosion rocked the very foundations of their world, sending vibrations through the ground. The centipedes halted in their tracks, raising their heads in alarm. Their sensitive ears listened in the inky blackness but they could find no source of the disturbance. The creatures clicked their serrated mandibles in anger, the only feeling they knew besides hunger.
They stood motionless for a long while, as they remained still, the earth rumbled once more, and the faint, distant echoes of more detonations reached their ears. That was too much and the centipedes started milling around snapping their jaws at each other in anger.
With each successive blast, the once-modest group of centipedes seemed to multiply, drawing others from the depths of the underground. The abominations were a nightmarish menagerie of deformities. Some had extra legs protruding haphazardly from their segments. Others had glistening, misshapen carapaces, cracked and irregular no single one like the others. One particularly monstrous centipede had two heads, their mandibles clashing and snapping at one another in a frenzy.
The relentless explosions continued, feeding the unease that coursed through the centipede horde. Their elongated forms undulated with a bizarre synchrony. With each blast the direction they had to go in clearer.