Almost immediately there was a flash of discharging aether to his right, sending a spike of alarm through Eric’s body, prompting him to throw his body to the side in a reflexive roll.
“That was Ms. Jakobin, sir.” Pig quickly informed him.
Eric came out of the roll with sword in hand, his eyes widening as his automatically activated Dragon Sight showed him strands of orange aether spreading outward along the floor at great speed towards the charging crab-creatures. Before he or anyone else could react further, there was a roar of crackling flames as columns of fire surged up from the floor to engulf every single one of the crab creatures!
It was over in a second, leaving nothing of their attackers but piles of cracked, smoking chitin and the oddly delicious smell of cooked crustacean meat lying in still boiling internal juices in a semicircle around them.
“Hellfire!” Eric exclaimed, feeling useless as he looked out over the carnage. With his Dragon Sight still active he could see the fading orange trails of residual aether all leading back to where Serra stood.
“Impressive, Mes Jakobin.” Osar said in a shocked yet approving tone as he walked towards the closest of the dead crabs. Like Eric, the beast hunter had had the presence of mind enough to take his sword out, but had been too slow to do anything else but watch.
Serra was still standing where she had initially teleported in, her arms out in a shooing pose, a shocked expression on her face. Stray strands of expended orange aether was fading all around her. Was that the color of fire aether?
“Amazing!” Cid was looking from the dead crabs to Serra’s hands and back again, his mouth open in amazement. “You got yourself an area of effect fire power! I bet that’s not normally available for beginners!”
Amusement at Cid’s excitement caused a corner of Eric’s lip to twitch upward. At least someone besides him was noticing how Jakobin seemed to always get the cool powers!
“These are low-level Chitterers.” Osar growled from a little way ahead of them, kicking at the steaming carcass of one of the beasts. “Disgusting, filth-eating creatures. With so many here, there’s no doubt they have a nest nearby… and at our power levels I do not think we’d want to meet any of the bigger variants.”
The rest of the group walked over to where the big Urgan stood, Serra walking somewhat unsteadily.
“New ability?” Eric asked as she came alongside, noticing the uncharacteristic paleness of his comrade’s skin. Serra looked at him and nodded curtly, reaching up to brush her hand through her short hair. She looked tired.
“Takes a lot of aether to use, I would imagine.” Eric said sympathetically as Cid came up, holding a small finger-nail sized stone. Colorful visual tabs immediately appeared over the stone, labeling the object as a Chitterer (Common Beast Core) for Eric’s edification. The swirls of aether curling through the stone were glowing a dense metallic gray. Eric shook his head at the sight; he really needed to learn how to begin identifying the color codes his Dragon Sight used to classify aether flows. It was becoming abundantly clear that there was so much useful information he was missing because he still didn’t know what each color meant.
“I have identified some books in Vashanka’s collection that might help us out with that, sir.”
Good job, Pig, Eric thought as Cid stopped in front of him and Serra.
“Osar says this is a beast core, Captain.” Cid sounded out of breath with excitement. “He says that the ones this size are used to power all sorts of small devices. I’ll have to do some tests to establish the average power output ranges, which I’m sure will vary extensively from core to core… but, if one this size contains an amount equivalent to a standard Union power pack…” The scientist gave a nervous half-giggle. “The military and practical applications would be endless!”
Eric smiled, genuinely warmed by the man’s enthusiasm.
“That’s why we need you Cored up as soon as possible, Master Cid,” He said approvingly, placing a hand on the scientist’s shoulder. “You’re our one hope of building ourselves an arsenal so we can blow things up!”
Serra’s delighted laugh rang through the entire large space.
“Luna, where are we and how do we get to the Plunderer?”
[This chamber is the central teleportation hub within the Fortress Belzond, Commander.] The Vessel Interface's avatar appeared within less than a minute upon Eric’s summons, materializing at the very edge of the teleportation diagram in a cloud of pixelated aether motes. [This hub and the Fortress’ fighter hangars are all located at the ground level, where most of the day to day operations were carried out… If the Moon was fully operational and the Fortress claimed, you would be able to teleport from here to every one of the Fortress’ major chambers.]
Looking around Eric nodded, his enhanced vision allowing him to see several other smaller teleportation circles inscribed with geometric precision around the main circle that they had appeared on. In the distance, the dim lighting still allowed him to make out that the chamber’s circular walls were pierced by several large metal doors, evenly spaced and all of them more than two meters high. Eric squinted as something caught his eye, his mouth dropping open slightly as he made out the outline of a gate that looked large enough to allow two combat mechs to walk through its opening without their shoulder pauldrons touching the sides. He could just see deep-etched scenes seemingly cut into its surface paneling, dark and mysterious in the scant illumination cast by the precious few light strips that were still capable of emitting light. Eric sighed as he turned his attention back to Luna; that large gate was a marvelous sight, one that he would want to take a closer look at later, but for now he had more urgent concerns.
“So, the Plunderer is beyond one of these doors?” Eric asked patiently, his hand gesture encompassing the entire wall front before the team.
[The invaders’ ship is in Hangar Three.] Luna answered, pointing towards one of the gates surrounded by chitterer carcasses.
Eric almost laughed out loud at the hangar’s name, although he was hardly surprised. It was a practical, utilitarian name, perfectly suited to a military installation.
The team spread out a bit at Eric’s direction, forming an arrowhead with Osar in the front, Eric and Serra at the flanks, and the coreless Cid protected in the middle. As they headed for the door leading to Hangar Three, they saw signs of increasingly fierce fighting. At first there were a few Chitterer shells and body parts, the rest having been picked clean by their surviving comrades, according to Osar, and then increasing large clumps of the creatures.
Eric paused a moment to examine one such creature, noting how the carapace was sliced cleanly through, cutting the Chitterer in half. Whoever had done that was both strong and precise, which justifiably worried Eric.
So far Eric and his crew had been very lucky; they had faced a couple of strong creatures and thankfully their abilities and training had been adequate to overcome the challenges these opponents presented. However, they had yet to go up against an adept in full control of his or her powers: Osar so far had been their only contact with System-users in this universe, and thankfully the big guy was both friendly, and oddly willing to cooperate with them.
Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.
Eric chewed at his lip as he continued walking forward, his eyes trying to pierce through the gloom of the room they were in, even as he mulled over their situation. Judging by his own abilities and what he had seen of Serra’s alone, it seemed increasingly likely that any violent encounter with an adept fully in control of his abilities would have dire consequences. If his own and Serra’s abilities were already this strong after only less than two days of having them, how could they possibly match anything someone with years of familiarity with their own power set could do?
Yet here they were, marching towards a possible confrontation with an adept that had almost succeeded in killing Osar once, and going by the many Chitterer bodies around them, it seemed that adept was not alone.
Osar stopped at the doorway that would lead them into Hangar Three, waving to the others to stay behind him. The door itself was blasted off from its frame, and a large pile of Chitterers were shoved to the sides, many of them dead but somehow showing no wounds alongside all the others sporting cuts and bullet-like holes. Some of the Chitterers were also larger, with more robust claws, some even having pointed metallic stingers coated with a viscous greenish goo.
Sword and shield held out defensively in front of his body, Osar crept through the ruined doorway and into the expanse of Hangar Three.
The area was huge but also echoingly empty. The ceiling rose up to nearly fifteen meters above them, so high even Eric’s advanced sight could not pierce the darkness. Metal catwalks and various movable ladders lined the sides of the room. Near the entrance, which was a retractable wall that spanned the entire breadth of that area, was a massive hole that looked out into the deep darkness of the void, its shape suggesting that something had blasted its way inside. A few meters from the scorch marks and damage was an elongated wedge of smooth metal standing on four sturdy retractable struts, dominating the room with its menacing presence, and painted a deep maroon, red. The stylized Geludan symbol was painted on its side using light-reflective gold paint.
The Plunderer.
“Beautiful!” Cid exclaimed, just now making his way through the destroyed doorway, his eyes glued to the vessel at the far end of the Hangar.
Serra gave a low whistle, catching Eric’s attention.
Her hands flashed in quick battle-sign and Eric nodded.
In between their small group and the Plunderer were the remains of more Chitterers, clustered here and there, suggesting to Eric and Serra’s experienced eyes that a running fight had occurred here. Osar looked back at Eric, and at his nod, the big Urgan started forward, making a beeline for the vessel.
A few meters from the door the group came across the first non-Chitterer corpse.
Upon spotting the slumped figure, nearly covered with Chitterer dead, Osar stepped aside from his path and dropped to one knee, pulling away the Chitterer bodies to expose the humanoid body. Eric came up, signaling to Serra to keep watch, while he took up a guarded stance beside Osar.
“Talk to me.”
“This dead fool is Mushul, a Killiruk swordmaster.” Eric caught a glimpse of a large head and purplish, scaled skin before Osar quickly and professionally stripped the dead alien of his spatial ring and weapons and placed the corpse into his spatial ring.
“Chitterer poison is a paralytic,” Osar explained as he stood up, pointing out several Chitterer’s equipped with the goo-crusted stingers. “It’s mild and easily resisted, but with so many striking the effect became compounded. Man must’ve just dropped and that was that.”
Serra whistled again.
Eric looked in her direction, seeing that the woman had moved a short way forward and now stood on the damaged carapace of a particularly large Chitterer, her added height giving her a good view of the way forward. Seeing Eric had eyes on her, Serra waved her fingers in a curving motion, held up two fingers, then cupped her palm into an O.
Eric nodded, then turned to Osar, who had also been watching Serra give her signs. He also beckoned Cid to come nearer.
“Theres a mound up ahead,” Eric began, his words pitched low so they wouldn’t carry. “Serra says there might be two bodies there, but no hostiles in sight.”
“That must be Lugthal and Bellin his second in command,” Osar growled. This close Eric could see the fine beads of sweat on the Urgan’s grey-skinned forehead. “Their the last two unaccounted for.”
“So, do we go to them or do we loop around and try to get to the ship?”
“We need to get to them,” Osar answered, shaking his head. “Lugthal’s got the Plunderer’s control gauntlet in his storage device, and we need that to make the Plunderer open up for us.”
“Roger that,” Eric said, rubbing at his chin. “Let’s do it nice and careful. Anyone see anything, shout it out, we green?”
“We are.”
“Yes, Captain.”
Bobbing his head in emphasis, Eric broke off, signaling to Serra to proceed forward.
Moving quickly, the group converged on the small mound of dead bodies.
The two Geludan’s had put up a good fight.
Nearly a hundred Chitterer’s of varying sizes lay in lifeless heaps around them, the creature’s black oily blood giving off a musky, metallic smell.
Beneath a particularly large Chitterer, its shell patterned in white and red unlike the normal dull black of the more common kinds, they found Bellin. The alien was crushed beneath the Chitterer’s bulk, three of the creature’s four arms imbedded within Geludan’s slight body. Pale, pink blood had dried around Bellin’s mouth, and its blue-green skin was grayed with death. The man’s delicate, long-fingered hands were still wrapped around the hilts of its twin shortswords, both embedded into neck region of the Chitterer.
“May Ifni take you into her embrace and guide you home Bellin,” Osar said softly as he went to one knee beside the dead reaver, surprising Eric. Gently, almost reverently, the big Urgan closed the man’s staring eyes, unclenched the man’s hands, removed Bellin’s ring, and finally took the entire corpse into his spatial device. The Chitterer that had killed Bellin fell to the floor with a loud crash, startling the rest of the group. After a moment’s thought, Osar also took that body into his ring.
“He was a friend, once.” Osar said, answering the question in Eric’s eyes. “Before Lugthal… well, you know what Maroan’s do.”
At Eric’s blank look, the big Urgan gave a sheepish smile and slapped the side of his head.
“Oh, yeah,” He said, chuckling morosely. “You don’t.”
Before answering, Osar began searching through the other bodies, shoving piles away and letting them crash to the floor until he finally found the one he was looking for.
“That, Jad-Os, is a Maroan.”
The dead alien was fairly standard humanoid in appearance, except its large conical head covered with pebbly red skin and glassy lidless eyes looked remarkably like pictures Eric had seen of a Terran octopus, complete with eight tentacles that hung limp in death below the creatures’ nose, right where a mouth would be in a human.
“Maroans, Jad-Os, are thrall-takers,” Osar said as he bent down to despoil this corpse. He wasn’t as particularly reverent as he had been with Bellin, but Eric figured the big Urgan must have had his reasons. “They are mind-stealers, puppet-masters, cruel slavers who take not only a person’s body, but also the very thing that makes a person himself or herself, their minds.”
Lugthal’s body disappeared into Osar’s ring, and the big Urgan turned to Eric.
He extended his hand, where now nestled what Eric assumed was Lugthal’s spatial ring.
The Hamarthan Vault was what Pig’s tag labeled it, a unique spatial device.
It was a beautifully crafted piece of art: Three circles of different metal were joined by seven longitudinal bands of orange-gold, and the entire piece was surmounted by a spectacular trilliant cut diamond. Eric looked from the band to Osar, whose face was set and hard.
“Claim it.” Eric said.
“It is yours, Jad-Os,” Osar answered firmly. “As has been my life ever since I offered it.”
Eric paused for a moment, thinking. Then he took the ring from Osar’s palm. The big Urgan exhaled the breath he did not recall holding.
“Take it then,” Eric commanded, pressing the ring back into Osar’s palm. “And use it in my service.”
Osar’s eyes widened and his jaw felt open, but his hand closed over the ring. “Do you understand what you are saying Jad Eric?” He asked hoarsely.
“Yes.” Eric said, and suddenly he and the Urgan were enveloped by silvery, opalescent light. A deep-toned bell sounded, and a bright white window appeared before Eric.
You have gained a new Title: Oath Holder.
Oath Holder
You are now mystically linked to your Oathman Osar Baratuu by bonds of spirit and aether. Breaking or betraying this bond will be deemed an offense against the System and will be punished accordingly.
Effect 1: You can sense the general direction of your Oathman as long as he is within reach of the System. You also gain a general sense of his overall condition.
Further Effects may become available if certain conditions are met.
“What happened, Cap?” Serra shouted, leaping from mound to mound to reach where Eric and Osar stood, the oath light fading from around them.
“I accepted Osar’s Life Oath.” Eric answered, still bemused by what had just occurred. Osar for his part, recovered quickly, clearing his throat as he turned away to compose himself.
“Are you ok Cap?” Serra pressed, eyeing Osar suspiciously.
“I’m fine, Jakobin,” Eric said after a moment, before turning towards the Plunderer.
“Let’s go; we have a ship to claim!”