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Hellflare VIII started as a marble-sized pinprick at Honest John’s finger and expanded rapidly. Light rapidly filled the chamber, followed by an all-pervasive heat.
Jedd held the shield with both hands, his Banded Boots of Fireproofing smoldering as the flare grew ever wider. And somewhere amidst the miniature star, there was a manic, unhinged cackling.
Over in the far corner, Gael threw up a barrier with some magic on instinct. A moving blurr jumped up to the ceiling as Mikail fled rather than face obliteration.
Not a shadow filled the room, aside from the wide block directly behind Jedd’s Exquisite Shield of Fireproofing +2. Calaf’s hand fell outside the shadow and was immediately brought reeling back. The gauntlet was fried black and smoldering, racking up a paltry loss of HP and a ‘Burn’ status.
The cooler shadowed zone shrunk as the flare caught the floor on fire. Still, Jedd stood firm. His shield was pushed back slowly, raking along the floor. Soon even the shaded area was smoldering.
Karol crawled back against the wall, only to find it was scalding as well. As the flare grew to encompass the entire center of the room, both the shield and its wielder appeared only in silhouette, gradually fading into the blinding light. Karol crawled forward on her hands and knees but was held back by Calaf.
Hellflare released a miniature star’s worth of pent-up energy all at once. Only the corner masked by the shield, Gael’s barely functioning barrier, and some alcoves in the ceiling remained unscorched.
When it was over, fires raged throughout the room. But none of the books burned. Indeed, smoldering desks and floorboards rapidly extinguished under the Battletower’s magical anti-siege blessings.
The Exquisite Shield of Fireproofing +2 remained, its 100% fire defense rating having stood firm and true. There was a noticeable discoloring in the area behind the shield where its defense had at least partially spared Calaf and Karol behind it. Their armor was damaged but their HP was still within a healthy range. But there, too close to the shield, too close to the flare’s epicenter, was a pair of Banded Boots of Fireproofing. Their fire resistance had stood firm despite it all.
So immolated was Paladin Jedd that there wasn’t even a Menu designation left to describe his status. Ash pooled in the boots, while a thin layer of soot covered the space between the shield and the far wall. Soot that caked over Calaf’s shoulder and most of Karol’s body.
The Longsword of Duran +4 lay melted in a puddle on the floor. Its hilt was the only part remotely recognizable.
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The carpets had all burnt away in the flare’s light. A trapdoor in the far corner collapsed in on itself, the only structural damage to speak of.
“I can summon another with five seconds casting time,” Honest John said. “Is anyone alive behind that thing? Come now.”
Calaf emerged with his own, far less fire-resistant shield held in front of him.
“What are you?” Calaf asked.
“Just a humble treasure hunter, curio collector,” said John. “Nobody important. Got a contract to poke around some ruins and find relics, ah, outside the church’s zone of influence. So I haggled for some looted relics from Granite Pass on a lark. A little tinkering helped me find these Baubles in storage. And, well, that’s when the benefactors truly got interested.”
“For who? What benefactors?”
Honest John shrugged. “Some noble type. Not my problem. Poke your head out from behind that shield and it won’t be your problem either.”
The humble merchant/cult leader/curio collector took a lateral step towards the trapdoor. Calaf made three great strides to block his path.
Karol, meanwhile, reached out, futilely, towards her brother's shield.
“Lick your wounds.” Honest John motioned towards Karol in the corner.
“Yield,” Calaf growled.
He’d killed – nay, disintegrated – a Paladin twenty-plus levels his senior with a single spell! Honest John’s hit points were not so high, but what could Calaf truly hope to accomplish?
“You can get out of the way, or I can cast another Hellflare,” Honest John said.
Rather than give the merchant the chance to cast anything, Calaf lunged. He jabbed with his spear, then thrust his shield forward. Ever nimble, Honest John did a dive-roll past Calaf’s spear.
Calaf swiveled, jabbing and swinging horizontally to try and smack John. He got a lucky hit in and threw John off-balance with a swipe to the knee! Pressing the advantage, he tried another shield bash, only to find John rolling aside, two fingers pointing and thumb angled up.
Spell:
Bullet Lightning
Effect:
Deals Stupendous Lightning Damage At a Target Within Finger-Gun Range. (INT: 75, ARC: 99)
Description:
Short-Range Recommended.
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Calaf held his shield up, only for the Bullet Lightning to splinter the shield and keep going. He regained his senses embedded in another bookshelf, sending tomes and scrolls cascading this way and that. His muscles seized up as some deep-burrowing electric current coursed through him.
Name:
Calaf, Crusader
Rank:
Squire
Level
40
Status:
96/120 (Electro-Shock)
“Get…” Calaf went through a full-body shock. “Back here.”
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But Honest John merely walked towards the trapdoor, flashing another joyless smile at the shock-paralyzed squire.
C’mon. Move. Try as he might, Calaf couldn’t rise to his feet. Who else was still in the fight? Gael? Crumpled up on the floor, his barrier only having barely blocked Hellflare VIII. Mikhail? Disappeared into some alcove in the ceiling.
“I’ll find you.” Calaf spat, still shocked.
Honest John stopped. “Oh? Ah, well, might as well fry you all with another flare then…”
He turned, but the counterattack did not come from Calaf’s side. Instead, Karol rushed up behind John, having looted Gael’s dropped Mage’s Overlarge Melee Club from off the floor. She held it one-handed, Strength stats be damned, beating John upside the head and throwing him to the floor. Then, she clambered on top of him and swung again and again. Taking off twenty HP for a broken jaw, eight HP with a distorted eye socket, ten HP and the whole right side of his face began to sag like melting wax.
A mighty war cry, unintelligible babbling, came from Karol as she struck Honest John’s face.
With a snap of his fingers, Honest John summoned forth:
Spell:
Miniflare
Effect:
Fills a Modestly Sized Room with Blinding Light. Deals Minimal Damage.
Description:
Perfect for Close Quarters. A Useful Distraction.
Blinding light filled the room, during which Honest John was able to kick Karol off of him.
Calaf shielded his eyes from the light and hazarded a look just as the flare wound down. Honest John had by then stumbled over to the trap door and gave a look back, revealing the cratered remains of his face.
Name:
Honest John, Humble Cult Leader
Rank:
Trailblazer
Level
35
Status:
37/85 (Degloved)
Weapons:
- Merchant’s Ordinary Stabbing Knife +5 (x1) (Str: 2, Agl: 20)
- Poisoned Pristine Gunknife(x1) (Agl: 68, Arcane: 14)
Breathing heavily, Honest John dived down the trapdoor.
“He’s getting away,” Karol cried out, anguished, and ran after him with the Melee Club in hand.
Calaf took a deep breath. His Effect Resistance took hold, dispelling the Shock status prematurely. He rose and joined Karol in the chase.
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Bullet Lightning flew down the hall at Honest John’s back. Being blind-fired, it was hardly accurate and barely a deterrent. Karol and Calaf ran, club and spear in hand.
Honest John was down to half a face and less than half his HP. He was heading into the Battletower’s basement storage areas. Surely there was no place to run and nowhere to hide.
“… killed my brother!” were the only coherent words out of Karol’s mouth in some time.
With no shield left, Calaf’s role as a defensive wall was hampered. Still, if he could just get his spear within thrusting range…
Honest John turned a corner. When Karol and Calaf followed, they found a locked door.
Still screaming incoherently, Karol took to this door with the mallet. The hinges buckled, but the wood shattered before they did.
An oblong archway with a blue keystone above waited along the far wall. Instead of leading back into another underground hallway, it displayed an evening scene of dense forest. Sunset reflected off the golden leaves. Honest John was there, framed in the center of this scene, within reach but seemingly with one foot already stepped out elsewhere.
Karol bellowed out a roaring “Stop!”
Just then, the outdoorsy scene between the archways seemed to shrink and grow dimmer all at once. He was getting away!
With no time to rush up there and drag John back in, Calaf assumed a stance:
Special Technique: Thrown Spear
Effect: Chuck Your Spear at An Enemy (Not Recommended Mid-Fight!)
His Steel Spear O’ The Plains, a trusted ally all these many weeks, flew straight and true. It hit Honest John straight in the midsection, scoring a critical hit.
Name:
Honest John, Humble Cult Leader
Rank:
Trailblazer
Level
35
Status:
2/85 (Degloved, Crippled Hip Bone, Impaled)
Staggering down on both knees, Honest John crawled to safety through the portal. He looked up at Calaf, the busted half of his face warped in some rough approximation of a smile.
“No!” Calaf ran up and lunged, his burnt gauntlet balled up in a fist.
The portal archway closed, giving way only to a cold stone wall. Calaf hit nothing but rock, breaking his hand.
Name:
Calaf, Crusader
Rank:
Squire
Level
40
Status:
92/120 (Crippled Off-Hand)
“We were so close,” Calaf said, gritting his teeth through the pain.
“He got away.” Karol fell to her knees.
At two HP, but still alive. He’d level up or pop a healing item or spell in time, then John’d be back in action to down prodigious numbers of level-up baubles again and cultivate even harder next time.
“And he’s got my spear!” Calaf yelled, biting his tongue for another 1 HP damage. “Damnit!”
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The pair were left there, Karol sobbing and Calaf failing to maintain a chivalrous mindset. If he’d gotten his hands around Honest John’s neck…
Half-broken shield. No spear. At least he still had a knife.
There was no rest or time to recuperate. Footsteps down the hall commanded the pair’s attention. They turned and prepared to face fleeing cultivators or whatever else was down here in the college basement, with what little weapons they happened to have available.
What entered the portal room, though was not a horde of low-level stat-manipulators, but a group of heavily armored Paladins and Clerics straight from one of the cathedrals. At their head was a man in full demon-bone plate armor. He scanned the room, lips in a perfectly neutral thin line.
“You two seem better equipped than these rebels.”
This man’s interface designated him as:
Name:
General Perarde, Hunter of the Church, Hammer of Faith
Rank:
Paladin Exemplar
Level:
95
Status:
25568/25568 (Indomitable)
Weapons:
- Claymore of Gold (x1)
- Shield of Impenetrable Defense +15 (x1)
“You’re…” Calaf managed. “A church hunter…”
No, the church hunter. The Hammer of Faith, the Paladin all other knights strived to emulate. Highest level among currently active church folk, even higher than the Archpope! A grizzled man of about fifty or so with close-cut white and jet-black hair, he gazed upon Calaf, then Karol, without paying them much heed.
“I see he got away.” Paladin Perarde looked to the archway. “Pity. But he’s just a patsy. We have top-level Battlemages storming the dungeon proper even now and putting these apostates to the sword without quarter. The remains of this unauthorized ‘cultivating’ operation will be dealt with in this region.”
Again, Perarde looked to Calaf.
“And you two are?” His sword hand twitched.
“They’re with us!” Mikail said, running in behind the General.
“I didn’t think they’d send a church hunter.” Calaf was too exhausted to panic.
Perarde looked upon the scene implacably. Impossible to read. A far cry from the disinterested but ruthless Baldr or the sociopathically stoic Walter.
Gael, too, limped onto the scene. “They’re with us, good sir. Part of our sellsword company. Or were, before our leader tanked a Hellflare point blank. Suppose there’ll be no keeping the party together after that.”
“We were… just supposed to climb the Batletower.” Karol rasped, hugging her torso with her arms. “It was just supposed to be a simple mop-up to get some hinterland brigands to repent for some extra coin. Then we’d have time to climb the tower…”
Utterly disinterested in Karol, Perarde just looked at Calaf instead.
“I’ve read a report about you.”
Calaf’s heart skipped a beat. “You have?”
Who could have sent that? Baldr? What did it say?
“Reports of every official church mission cross by my desk. A mere Shielder at the start of this pilgrimage season, sent north from the Riverglen Cathedral in search of some relic thieves. And you managed to recover most of these relics and track the thief as far as conceivably possible for your rank. Your career will be watched with great interest. We may yet have use for you in this campaign. Not at this battlefield but…”
Again, Perarde looked to the portal archway.
“Autumn’s Redoubt.” Karol’s voice was hoarse. “He’s at Autumn’s Redoubt.”
Perarde nodded in a way that indicated he already knew.
“Well,” he said with a tenor like gravel. “Come, you may stay among my officer’s tents for the night.”
The Hammer of Faith, first among the church hunters, left the room with a retinue of knights, out to secure the remainder of the Battletower’s lower levels. Calaf, Gael, and Mikail were left to get Karol off the floor and help her walk the long route back outside.
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