‘No sign of that misty-thing,’ said Jo as he approached the doorway, still watching the exit.
‘I imagine it’s waiting for us,’ said Nicolai.
‘So… what’s the plan?’ asked Beth.
Nicolai clicked his teeth. ‘Might be there’s an easy answer.’ He thought it unlikely but it wouldn’t hurt to check. He moved towards the edge of the upper floor where it opened up, a balcony from which one could see the entrance far below. The girls followed him. Reaching the balcony he pressed a hand into the air, and it touched on a hard barrier. He ran his Soul Sense carefully over it, trying to work out how it was powered, looking for a flow of Oma.
He moved along the barrier, feeling with hand and Soul Sense. He found no way around it nor any way to deactivate it. There might be a flow of Oma but if so, he lacked the ability to find it.
Nicolai pulled back, staring at the barrier. Then he clenched his Soul like a muscle and struck out with the palm of his good hand, his Soul Sense writhing around him, a piercing strike. He stopped himself just before his palm and Soul Sense landed, pulling back.
His Soul was already injured. This was a shot in the dark and one that might bite him. Attacking the barrier could get him through it, but more likely he’d just hurt himself, and it was best he didn’t further damage his Soul.
‘Beth,’ he said, turning to her and waving at the barrier. ‘It might be possible to break through this, but my Soul is injured. I’m afraid of damaging it further. Do you want to give it a shot?’ He phrased his words as a request, rather than a command, because he felt that way she would be more likely to do it. He expected she’d see it as a challenge.
He was proven right when Beth stepped right up, raising a fist. ‘What was that you were doing? I saw your Soul Sense moving, like it was about to strike. Is there some method to this?’
‘That’s how you break shields,’ he answered. ‘But I’ve only managed it on shields which I suspect were far weaker than this one.’ He briefly explained his method for striking with his Soul, and Beth positioned herself.
She threw her palm towards the shield and he saw her Soul Sense flowing around her, reinforcing the strike as her Soul crashed against the barrier in a savage blow.
The barrier didn’t even ripple. Beth let out a pained grunt and stumbled back, and he saw her Soul Sense flinch. ‘Fuck,’ she hissed, clutching at her hand, face twisted with pain.
It looked to be a similar reaction as one might give if they’d punched a concrete wall, and she shot him an angry look.
Nicolai shrugged. ‘It’s just a bit of damage, like when we sparred. Give it a few minutes and your Soul will recover.’ He was glad he hadn’t hit it himself. ‘When you’re ready, we’ll have to go down. Drones take the lead and see what’s waiting. We’ll have to fight our way through.’
Nicolai and the others headed down, slow and cautious through the stairs. Nicolai re-activated his Blue Hornet and took the time to ensure it was charged up and ready as they headed down. They didn’t encounter anything for the first few floors, but as they moved towards the bottom floor the drones skimmed out ahead and revealed what awaited them there.
Furniture packed the stairwell lower down, chairs struggling to climb upwards. The drones zipped above them and exited into the lowest floor, and more came into view. A small army of furniture. It must have been everything left in the library. They filled the space between shelves, creaking eagerly as they watched the doorway into the stairwell. There was no sign of the undead guardian but he was sure it would be somewhere nearby.
The furniture filled the space outside the stairway exit, and they clattered in their attempts to hit the drones which spun past them and quickly rose above the range of their wooden limbs. They’d have to fight those furniture. Nicolai didn’t mind the idea of a fight, but he knew it would be wise to get away from them as soon as possible There was nothing to be gained from destroying furniture, it was just a waste of bullets. The undead, on the other hand, would be worth killing. His goal, then, was to locate it.
Piloted by Threat Analysis, the drones split up and spread through the lower room, searching.
Target located, Threat Analysis crisply informed him a few moments later, sending him the feed of one of the drones.
The undead was simply stood there, holding two books together, one which was glowing orange. It was the book that’d been floating and throwing paper. It had been in quite a state with a few bullet holes in it, the last time Nicolai had seen it, but now most of those had closed up. As Nicolai watched, the last hole was gradually repairing itself. It was drawing material from the mundane book to repair itself, and likely Oma from the undead.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
A rotted visage rose to peer up, the undead’s eyes meeting Nicolai’s through the drone’s camera. It released the book which floated into the air, opening up, pages shimmering. The drone was already dodging out of the way when a piece of paper detached and shot towards it.
Nicolai had two other drones converge on the undead. Threat Analysis worked to find angles where they could land and observe unobtrusively while the book chased after the drone it had spotted. Meanwhile, the final drone took up position to keep an eye on the exit from the stairwell, so Nicolai could observe what the furniture down there were up to.
He gaze rose to Jo and Beth. ‘Let’s go.’ He started fluidly down the stairs and the first of the chairs soon came into view, struggling upwards. Nicolai tugged free a grenade and threw it down to clatter further ahead. A deafening boom sounded along with the sounds of splintering wood. The chair before him rattled upwards, spinning, but Nicolai blasted it in the centre with the shotgun. The pellets smashed it apart and went on into the next in line which suffered a similar fate. With the drone outside he saw the furniture all pressing into the entrance, forming a mass of furiously creaking wood as they tried to get inside, entirely blocking the way.
Nicolai kept moving, shotgun roaring as he turned chairs into splinters, but in a short time he had to stop because the entire space below was simply filled with animated wood hellbent on killing him.
‘Respirator masks,’ he said to the girls, pausing to remove his own from where it hung from the side of his backpack. He’d bought a number of all-purpose full-face respirators because they could come in handy in all kinds of way, such as right now. These particular masks also came with small tanks of compressed oxygen, only good for about ten minutes but they’d need far less than that.
He removed his balaclava then tugged the masks rubber straps over the back of his head, feeling it seal tight around his face, his breath pulling on it, now seeing the world through two glass lenses. He threw another grenade and fired a few more shots, which kept the furniture at bay but did little to clear their path. Whole or in splinters, the mass of wood filled the space just the same. The undead guardian was on the move. It had turned to mist and was heading toward them. He checked on Jo and Beth, making sure they’d put their masks on properly, then gestured Beth forwards.
‘Burn it,’ he said, and dismissed his Blue Hornet’s Art, the lightning fading from his body as he reclaimed some of the Oma that had gone into it. He pulled free an Oma crystal, filling his Node back to full.
Beth reached out for the wood, her hands already wreathed in angry flame. She touched the wood and the flame surged forwards, a crackling, popping sound immediately rising as it spread through the wood and black smoke began to rise.
He and Jo backed up the stairs, keeping Beth in view but ready to move back up quickly. The spiral staircase would act as a chimney and in a very short time, it would be a bad place to be. Already the smoke was everywhere, and his vision through the lenses of his mask was just a blur of smoke. Fortunately that was not a problem, as he could easily find his way with his Soul Sense.
Beth turned away and they all ran until they’d emerged into the floor above. Smoke vomited through the exit behind them. Through one of the drones he saw the fire roaring below, visible now in the entrance to the stairwell, all the furniture within being rapidly consumed. There was now a smokey wind whistling up the spiral staircase, the rising smoke creating an updraft that drew more oxygen into the fire itself, fanning it hotter and and making it burn faster and faster, releasing more and more smoke.
The furniture down there were all shying back and away from the entrance, and he saw the undead observing from the shelf it’d climbed onto, right above the fire-filled stairway. Its book hovered over its shoulder, having given up on chasing the drones.
He kept an eye on it while they waited for the fire to burn out. In the meantime, he turned to Jo, pulling one of the three Pegasi ring’s from his hand and giving it to her. After connecting to it she rose into the air, an impromptu practise session.
‘How’s your Seed for Oma? Is it at all strained?’ he asked, voice faintly muffled through the mask.
She landed beside him. ‘I’m all good.’
He nodded. ‘Once the fires almost out we’ll all go down. It’ll be hot but our clothing should keep most the heat off. So long as we get through it quick, we’ll be fine. You see where the undead is?’ He shared his feed with the girls.
‘Waiting for us to come out,’ said Jo, her eyes narrowing.
‘I’ll go first and block its shots. We will float up above the furniture. Beth, try to shoot the book first, the undead will just turn to mist when we target it. If we can take the book out, this’ll get a lot easier. Jo, don’t worry about shooting, you’ll have your hands full using the ring, just make sure you get up in the air quick before the furniture can swarm you.’
Nicolai paused, watching the progress of the fire. It was going quick. He re-activated his Blue Hornet and started moving his body, charging it up over the course of a minute. By the time he was done the fire was almost burned out, lacking fuel in the stone staircase after consuming all the furniture. The living furniture outside was pressing a little closer as the fire died out, but they were still keeping a healthy distance.
He pulled out a few Oma crystals and refilled his Node to full while charging his glove and rapier. ‘Let’s go,’ he said via Link once finished, and stepped into the stairwell.
He pulled two grenades and when they were almost at the bottom he threw them out to clatter down the stairs. Through the drone he saw them explode at the bottom. The concussive blasts put the fires out while blasting chunks of smouldering wood apart, sending much of it out the door and into the library. The furniture flinched and scrambled away from the burning pieces, an unintended benefit.
Nicolai dashed down to the bottom of the stairs. The heat which had sunk into the stone was immediately on him, a dry pressure. His boots crunched over blackened pieces of wood, and then he was out, looking up and finding the undead on the bookshelf up above, its book floating beside it, already launching razor-sharp paper missiles his way.