The next afternoon I got up and exited the inn, making sure that my guild button was prominently displayed and that I had my disguise hood up. The players ran about their merry lives, never suspecting a thing about the cloaked figure walking the streets. Probably because I saw no less than twelve other players hiding behind hoods despite the heat of the day. As I neared the bazaar, there were a lot more guard patrols but I paid it no mind. More people meant more crimes of opportunity, so it made sense to me.
Unfortunately, the vast majority of merchants weren’t too thrilled with my presence. I didn’t even have to ask a question most times, as they would sit up immediately upon seeing my shadow, see my face, and slump back down and grimace. I just shrugged and moved on, not interested in dealing with anyone who behaved like that. Bastards would probably try and fleece me. Towards one of the edges of the crowd, I saw a group of old men taking turns smoking a hookah. Walking up, I was surprised that none of them gave me a second glance.
“Excuse me sirs, would one of you happen to sell armor?” I asked.
They all looked me up and down, casually blowing smoke. “Salmahim. He’s got the look of a rogue, you’re up.”
A balding, portly fellow lumbered to his feet, obviously this Salmahim fellow. “Let’s see what you got on.” Peering at me, his brow furrowed. “Tunneling worm leather, eh? How did you manage to take one of them down? They’re as notorious as the colossal sandsharks you can find in the deepest desert.”
Hoping that the truth of the story would help out, I told him, “Built a trap. As it came at me, spikes came up and spitted it. The thrashing just hastened its death.”
“Heh, can only do that in the rocky tunnels though, a sandshark’ll just swim right around traps like that. Might even tap it with his fin outta boredom.”
“No doubt.” I agreed with a nod. “The biggest part of my traps success was that the worm could only come at me in one direction.”
“Alright, what level range are you looking for?”
“Level 100 leather set if you have it. Pay by trade and coin, whatever you’ll take.”
“Heh, I’ll be takin’ it all if you keep talking like that. Now, I got some leathers, that part’s easy. What I don’t have is the set to go with it.” Pulling out a few samples, I saw some lightly enchanted leathers made from the hide of the lizards.
“I didn’t realize the lizards dropped leathers. All I get is a bit of meat and some of their armor plates.” I mentioned in an offhand manner.
“Ah, you lack the skill. Get skinning and butchery up to at least advanced and you’ll start getting the skins of most beasts. Or have someone in the party with the skill.”
“That makes sense. And let me guess.” I said. “There’s a lizard equivalent to Malignatalis out there.”
“MIND YOUR TONGUE!” Salmahim hissed, as he and several others made some sort of sign against evil. “Lest the nine tails come and hunt you!”
“I fear no scorpion of these sands.” I said, pulling one of the bracers I had taken from Malignatalis out of my inventory for a second. All their eyes widened at the sight, and the hookah was forgotten as they sat upright.
“I’ve not heard of any teams heading to the deep desert, how did you come across that?”
“Why, I took it from his corpse. Right after my nightliger and I slew the beast.” Seems these people respect feats of strength.
“Hold the stone and say that again.” One of the men asked, tossing me a blue stone. There was a golden etching of some flowing script on it, similar to Arabic.
“No problem. My nightliger and I slew Malignatalis.” The stone glowed blue in my hand, and I saw some of the men start to tremble.
“Unbelieveable. To think, one person could go toe to toe with such a creature. Then, I don’t think you are an ordinary adventurer, are you Angus?”
“Not at all. So, is there a lizard equivalent?” I prodded, hoping there was.
“There is, but finding him is the difficult part. You need a special potion, made from three dripping heart’s and five blue moon blossoms. Combine them with two parts of oil from the desert beetles, and five blasted winds harvested from the djinni. In the center of the three oasis, there is a depression in the dunes. Spread the potion on the sands there, and you will summon Einlorkis.”
“Hmm, I’ll have to find some of the oil and the djinni, but that doesn’t sound too bad. Can you tell me more about this Einlorkis?”
“You intend to hunt him?”
“I do.” I said with a feral grin. “I’ve already taken out one king of the desert, one more wouldn’t hurt. Besides, if he gives me some leather drops like what the scorprican did, my next quest will be that much easier.”
“I shudder to think what your quest is, that hunting the desert kings is considered easy young man.” One of the other men said.
"I’ll not name him, as you seem scared enough of the desert kings. But I hunt the lich that calls this place home.” All the men froze, before frantically signing against evil again.
“Thank you for not uttering his accursed name. Should that truly be your quest, we must help as we may. Slay Einlorkis, and return here with what he gives you. I will trade one for one, parts of his set for those of Malignatalis. After, if you still wish, I can point you to the last of the desert kings.”
New quest alert!
Your past feats have impressed Salmahim, and he offers you a quest. Slay Einlorkis. When that is done, trade the parts of the Malignatalis set you have for the missing pieces of the Einlorkis set, and learn of the final desert king.
Accept? Y/N
“I will definitely be back then, after slaying Einlorkis.” I said, accepting the quest.
“May the gods of the sands give you strength and show the way.” He made another sign with his strange blessing, and I wondered if there was a response. I went with my gut.
“May your walls stand tall and your wells never dry.” Hoping that was close to what they would wish for in a desert, instead I got a few chuckles.
“Not a bad return, friend, but not what is traditional. We say, ‘May the winds be at your back, and good fortune within your grasp.’”
“Then may the winds be at your back, and good fortune within your grasp.” I said with a small bow to all of them. “I must head out now, I have to see about learning to brew some potions.” The men nodded in farewell, and I headed towards Mad Mardigan’s shop.
Everything was going too well for me, which is why I wasn’t that surprised to find a group of three guards blocking my path only a few streets down from Mardigan’s shop. Well, one seemed confident while the two behind him were shifting their weight nervously. Indecision in the ranks?
“Halt, and state your business.” The leader demanded in an imperious tone.
“Just an adventurer headed to the potion shop to learn some things.” I replied, hoping they would let me go.
“As if we would trust the word of a monster.” He sneered. Great, guard on a power trip.
“The alchemists guild trusts me, in fact I’m a member in good standing.” I said, tapping my badge three times. Hopefully Mardigan will get here soon, but I wasn’t going to get jerked around by these three. The leader sauntered forward, drawing his scimitar.
“Bah, I can tell that’s a fake trinket from here. Looks like I’ll have to place you under arrest.” As he said that, I saw him angling his blade for a strike. Without thinking about it, I had two stone hands come up from the cobblestones and grab his ankles, just as he started his swing. Without the ability to step forward, his blade swung up impotently, missing me by several inches.
“You dare assault a noble? I’ll have your head for this!” That’s it, my patience was gone. From the shadows of a nearby alley, a chain shot out and speared him in the wrist.
“So, any idea what the punishment is for murder in these parts Mardigan?” I asked the figure hulking behind the two guards.
“Normally death. Unfortunately, your assailant is both a guard and a noble, so we can’t go killing him. Bad for business.”
“Understandable.” I replied. “Just how big is the family? Can they go toe to toe with the guild? Or are we talking calling in favors just to make this area uncomfortable for a while.”
“The second one, why?”
“Just wondering out loud. They would probably retaliate somehow with their son losing a hand, but would they for a finger?” Turning to the guard, I poked him in the chest. “What about it? Are you willing to lose a finger instead of your head, with the condition that this doesn’t come back on the guild or myself?”
“YES! YES! PLEASE DON’T KILL ME!” Figured, the damn bully would want to keep his head.
“Alright, let’s just swear a binding magic oath on the subject, and I’ll let you off and only take one of your fingers.”
This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it
“O-o-oath?” He stammered, and I grinned.
“You just tried to kill me. Of course I’ll have your oath on this, I don’t trust you. So, here we go. I, Angus_MacG, swear by bonds of magic that in reparation for the attempt on my life will only take one finger from this guard, and not involve any other form of punishment for him or his family.” Blue light swirled around me, and strands of it wrapped around my torso while pointing towards the guard, awaiting his end of the oath.
“I, Nahir ibn Nazeem, swear by the bonds of magic that I shall not attempt any form of retribution for the punishment of losing one of my fingers. I shall hold Angus_MacG and the alchemists guild blameless, and shall impress upon my family that this was the end results of my own action.” Light swirled around him as well, and linked together with the strands from my body before fading away.
“Drop your sword.” I ordered, and it fell with a clatter to the street below.
“Which finger are you taking?” He asked with a shaky voice.
“[Keen edge].” I drew my weapon and sliced off his thumb in one swift motion, not wanting to give him time to worry about it. I walked away from his cries of pain, passing between the remaining guards who rapidly got out of my way.
“He’ll never hold a sword again in that hand.” Mardigan commented as he fell in step beside me. “Especially since they can’t graft the old one back on. I saw you pocket it.”
“He should have thought of that before negotiating his contract.” I replied. “That seems to be the deal around here, right?”
“HAHAHAHAHA!” He bellowed out. “I didn’t realize you had picked up on that so fast. Yes, everyone here sticks to the exact wording of each contract. Some are as bad as the drow when it comes to exploiting loopholes.”
By this time we had entered his shop, and there was one adventurer who looked like they were perusing things. When we walked by, however, I noticed his hand was stuck clutching a potion. “Are you, uh, gonna leave him like that?” I asked.
“Hmm? Oh, yeah. He’ll spend about an hour stuck there before the enchantment lets him go. Keeps me from having to do a bunch of paperwork for petty thieves.” Waving off the adventurer, we entered the back room. “So, I assume you need something from me?”
“I have the reagents for several of those potions you were talking about, and I was wondering if you had some rare ingredients.”
“I’m the vice guildmaster! Of course I have rare ingredients!” He replied indignantly.
“Sorry, I meant rare as they come from here and I haven’t seen them yet. I need two drams of oil from the desert beetles, and if you have any of the blasted winds.”
“Oh? Going after Einlorkis? Didn’t expect you to tease out the recipe for that one so soon. You haven’t even been here a week. I have the oil, but you’ll want to get the winds fresh. They tend to decay, even in enchanted jars.”
“Pity. Oh well, I’ll have them soon. Can I use the potion room after hours?”
“Sure, five silver and I’ll give you a temporary key. That’ll cover the room usage and the oil from the beetles.”
“Done.” I said, handing over the coins and receiving a copper key in return. “So, what do I have to do for this potion that’ll help with the lich?”
“Sunburst potion. Ok, start with one portion of your pristine oasis water. Add in three measures of sunlight flower pollen and one dessicated bone dust. Heat until the potion turns a deep purple, and pull it off. DON’T LET IT BOIL!” He stressed the last part. “If it heats up to boiling, there will be a cascading reaction and the thing will explode. Strain and bottle the resulting mixture.”
I started off with his directions, adding in a bit of my own as I went along. When I first dropped everything in there, I gave it a swirl without heating until everything was dissolved. Once per minute, I would swirl it as well, just to make sure it was heating up evenly. As the potion cooked, I kept a close eye on it, though it ended up not being needed. The purple color came gradually, and once I felt it was deep enough I pulled it off the heat and swirled it for a minute straight.
Sunburst potion (elixir)
When given a kinetic shock, this potion will release a blinding flash of light that will disorient and damage nearby undead. Damage will only occur in undead that have their reanimating magics exposed, though the disorientation will occur in all undead.
Disorient: -75% accuracy, -30% defense for 15 seconds (double if undead)
Damage: 300-500 if undead with reanimation magics exposed.
“Can you clarify something?” I asked, and when Mardigan turned to me after finishing whatever he was doing on his own potion I continued, “What’s this about not damaging all undead?”
“Good question. I’ll assume you’ve seen skeletons before. They don’t have anything protecting their magics, and would take full damage from this type of potion. However, flesh golems are also classified as undead. The magics reanimating them are covered by the flesh, so they take no damage.”
“Any options for damaging them?”
“Fire works well. They tend to be on the greasier side, and go up like a torch. Other than that, go with holy damage.”
“Damn, and I’m all out of my pyrophoria potions.” I muttered as I looked through my backpack.
“You can do a burst potion if you want. Beetle oil and those blasted winds. Anything flammable in the immediate area has a 75% chance to catch fire.” He pointed out.
“Thanks, I guess I’ll be buying up a good bit of your beetle oil stock if you don’t mind. I’ve killed a good bit of those things and still haven’t seen any oil drop from them. Is it another skill I’m lacking?”
“Yep. Animal harvesting, it’s a subskill of butchery. Not many of you adventurers have it, so don’t worry about it.”
“Shit. Who knows how much stuff I have missed because I don’t have any of those skills? And I’m too busy to really learn them now.”
“Are there any skills you have built up you would be willing to lose?” He asked, and when I shook my head no he continued, “There’s your answer then. You didn’t need them to get where you are, and you aren’t willing to go back and build them up so it isn’t an issue. You’ll be fine without them.”
“Just how is it that someone who seems as crazy as you can make such a sound argument?” I chuckled.
“Because I’ve been there before. Soon you’ll realize that there are things that you wouldn’t change and will start looking forward instead of back.”
“Fair enough. Speaking of looking forward, any tips on Einlorkis?”
“I’ve not fought him, but I’ve heard from those who have. Bring poison clearing potions, and a lot of them. As big as he is, he doesn’t move around a lot. He does like to spin, so there’s that to watch out for.”
“Really?” I said, drawing out the word. “If he doesn’t move much, I wonder if there’s a way to bury his legs and keep them there.”
“Bog him down in the sands? Could work. Course, he buries himself regularly, so that wouldn’t work for long.”
“I’ll think of something. Right now, I need to get going and hunt down some of those djinni.” As I was leaving, I made sure I took all of my new potions. Spending an hour and a half, I ended up with only five potions. If I was going to spend 20 minutes per potion making them, I would need at least one whole night before assaulting the lich’s lair. One night of djinni hunting, one for the giant lizard, and one for the final king. Hopefully by then I would be at the level cap for the drakelings and be able to avenge Alnoss.
I headed out of the city, and once I was out of eyesight of everyone I summoned Inkler and removed my concealing hood. The summoning was rather lackluster, as a ball of mana exited my chest before expanding and turning into Inkler with a flash.
“Hey buddy, sorry to do it like that but I wanted to see how the summoning worked.” I said, patting his head. The summoning scared him, as he had his back arched and fur poofed up, but my words calmed him down fairly quickly. Once again we headed into the desert, stopping only to kill lizards. As we traveled, any scorprican we met scurried away from us, even if it had the advantage in levels. We skirted around the area where Einlorkis was summoned, as the closer we got the more abundant the lizards became. Eventually we came to a spot where the dunes died out and gave way to a large plain of endless sand. Small clouds of dust could be seen flittering to and fro, and as we got close to one I saw it was what we were hunting.
Djinni
Level 78
A spirit of air and fire that inhabits the desert, these formerly neutral creatures now attack humanoids on sight. The animosity stems from the habit of enslaving these spirits and forcing them into small containers, forcing them to use their magic to grant small wishes. These enslaved spirits soon learned to take advantage of every loophole they could in a poorly worded contract, influencing the culture of the humans around them.
The djinni was an odd creature, well elemental if you wanted to get technical. Where it should have had legs, there was instead a small tornado that supported the body and caused the cloud that was so visible. The body started with a golden belt, and it had an incredibly muscled physique. The skin was the dark brown of wet sand, but there were cracks everywhere that glowed with an internal red light. Each of the four arms ended in a golden bracer, and a ruby choker was the only other bit of adornment it had. The head was completely hairless, and four slanted eyes kept watch around it. Instead of normal eyes, these were the same color as the inner fire, slanted with two pairs stacked on top of each other. A fiery topknot was the last thing of note.
“Any ideas for weaknesses on this thing?” I asked Inkler, who just looked at me like I was crazy. “Come on, I have no idea what you have hunted in the past, and it would be stupid to assume you never had any ideas.” His reply was to chuff in my face and study the creature some more.
“Let’s see then, it says it is a creature of air and fire. Which means it should be weak to earth and water. Alas, I have no actual spells of earth, just manipulation which is rather pointless on sand here. Can’t bog down something that flies, and I highly doubt it actually has bones and muscles to sever.” I groaned a bit as I stood up from the kneeling position I had taken to study the creature, and prepared for a slugfest. Loading my arbalest, I went with a decapitator bolt.
“Urk!” I groaned and immediately covered my eyes, staggering back a few steps. I had tried looking at the thing with [Mystic vision], and the amount of magic in the thing was incredible. Blinking my eyes, I had to wait about ten seconds for the blue afterimages to dissipate. “Note to self, do not look at elementals with mystic vision.” I muttered.
“[Binding shadow chains].” I decided to start off with immobilization, but unfortunately I could only grab three of the arms. This enraged the elemental, as it gave a roar in my direction that sounded and felt like air leaving a blast furnace. I charged the decapitator bolt and fired it directly into the body, as it used its free hand to try and shatter the chains binding it. To my surprise, it was actually making a bit of headway until it got hit. “Arrow of darkness, cleave your way. Beware the danger, of arrows that pierce the day. [Dark bolt].”
The bolt of darkness tore through where a human heart would be, but didn’t seem to do much extra damage if any. Chains broken, the djinni charged at me. Just before it entered my range, it flexed its stomach so that the tornado was blasting sand up into my face. I staggered back, rapidly blinking my eyes as I got hit with the equivalent of a magically fueled sandblaster. Blinded, I took a double punch to my chin that left me reeling, but Inkler saved me from further pain by leaping onto the djinni’s back.
“I’m good, clear out.” I called when I had recovered, and Inkler used the spinning djinni to add momentum to his jump. I don’t know if it was dumb luck or he was just good, but his leap staggered the djinni right in my direction. Perfect for me, I smashed the djinni on the chin with a hammer blow, the force of it shattering the skin on its head. A blast of furnace air seared my face, and the djinni was no more.
“Ugh, that was a pain.” I said as I looted the body. No blasted wind, but I did get a set of djinni bracers and a small desert mana core. “That was some dismount.” I said to Inkler as I patted his head. “You sent him crashing right into my hammer, which was what did him in. Think we should make that our plan of attack?” I was knocked down by a happy nightliger, who took great pleasure in keeping me off balance for a bit as I tried to get back up. “Alright, alright I yield!” I laughed. “Just stop knocking me over.” At that admission, Inkler went off a few steps and sat down smugly.
Plan in hand, we started in on the djinni population. I stopped using any specialty bolts with my arbalest, as they didn’t do any extra damage and had an annoying habit of shooting through the elementals and getting lost. Those blasted winds were blasted hard to find, and it took twelve djinni deaths before I finally got one. It was beautiful though, resembling a blue and red elongated S. I had imagined a vial, but these were actually crystals. It also took us almost an hour just to get those twelve djinni, as they were spaced deceivingly far apart. Resolving to a long grind, Inkler and I kept it up for another five and a half hours before heading back to the city with our prizes.