The great road seemed like their lucky break. It suddenly snaked into their peripheral view, as wide as ten carts and blessedly not swerving into the knee-deep and fetid fetid muck of the swamp. Rye imagined the three soldiers would also prefer a solid path, what with their heavy scale armor and towering shields and spears.
This was the road. The road to Loften.
The mountains on the north side looked so different compared to the ones on the south. On a business–related trip with Da’, they had come close enough that she had spied the rolling hills and squat mountain peaks. These here were more jagged, more cold looking and worked to beat down on her mood the closer they came.
Signs of past ambushes ran up and down the road, dogs and undead in a variety of armors and clothes lying motionless in between the odd stragglers. Carts were overthrown, laying in smoldering heaps or simply left where they stood in a great congestion of wood and grug. The grugs had made for the hills but for a few corpses of the unlucky ones still bound to the carts and the carts themselves were pilfered of everything except the wheels. In some cases even those were missing.
When everyone abandons their cars – carts, rather– you know the apocalypse has started.
A single look up what she initially thought to be a lamppost and she found the missing wheels and she really wished she hadn’t. At the top, undead were tethered to wheels, bones broken and woven in between the spokes while their heads were fixed, forced to stare forever at the sky. Rye threw up, long enough that Sextus came over to pat her on the back. He led her away from them with slow steps. One of undead moaned as Rye got too close, she nearly broke out in sobs.
Criminals. They had to be criminals. This was fine. The three soldiers, much like Elia, were not bothered by the casual displays of brutality. Or maybe they just knew how to hide it. A group of stragglers and spiky hounds provided a distraction, but not for long.
You have gained: Soul x12
You have gained: Soul x13
Damn, they absolutely destroyed those dogs. Not even a contest.
“Uh huh.” Rye was still too frazzled to be anything but a liability. She had to help, but she couldn’t, not right now. “I feel terrible.”
Chill, they’re letting you mooch off. Adding it up, the souls are just being divided between us, probably evenly and most likely due to proximity. It’s free money! Let the souls tick on by I say.
An undead stood up from where it had its head buried in its hands and lunged at Alexander. Even as the smallest one, he easily met it with his shield, pushed it back and stabbed twice through the chest. All of this happened before Rye could do anything but yell a warning, now unnecessary for lack of any threat.
You have gained: Soul x13
“I don’t know whether I should feel glad or guilty.”
It evens out since you’re still refusing to loot any of the bodies for shards. Or gear. Look, that guy has perfectly fine boots. What’s keeping you from yanking them off and feeling a bit better for yourself, brain bud?
As always, Elia was missing the point and finding ten more. Rye took one look at the corpse and decided her time was best spent not pondering crime.
“My conscience. And the smell.” Rye said, making sure the corpse in question was really just that: a corpse. “Badly fitted boots are worse than no boots. Besides, it’s not moral, especially not if they could wake up again.”
Gee, you sure enjoy sabotaging yourself, don’t you?
“I do not! I’m just trying to carry enough morals for the two of us. It’s–”
A twitch of a body, too fast for her to react jumped at her from a tree. The dagger didn’t glint, it was rusted with blood and the human-like creature holding it hissed between fanged teeth.
“[According to Plan]!” Tertius yelled as an invisible force directed the assassins blade left and herself right. Like a kid trying to catch a falling leaf, Rye glided past her assailants grasp and he buried his dagger into the ground. To her credit, Rye’s scream was more of a silent wheeze escaping her mouth. To Elia’s credit, she knew when her unwanted assistance was equally necessary.
Ya-yoink!
You have gained: Soul x65
The body fell and Rye fell too, but on her butt. She nearly died there, she barely saw the assailant hidden in the forest. She knew it, trees were evil.
“Thank you Tertius, thank you Elia,” She muttered.
No problemo. Also, did that guy hiss at us? What’s up with that? Rye? Hello-o~?
Rye was busy looking at the three soldiers, who were staring at her, like she was a total loon.
“Who is this Elia person?” Tertius asked with appreciable if unnerving suspicion. “Another spy?”
“I um… no…” Beans, why was it so hard to keep people from thinking she was a spy? “I have a boon of invisible friends?”
A wave of ah-hah’s, muttered congratulations, and apologies emanated from the three and Rye was for the first time since the temple pleasantly surprised. The looks they were giving weren’t suspicious. Curiosity ruled and she then realized that she wasn’t the only one interested in this boony business.
“They believed me?” she whispered. “Just like that?”
Sure. Boons can be anything. Wouldn’t be surprised at the number of people who wished their imaginary friends into reality and being openly interesting is a lot better than being quiet, plotting, and mysterious. Shouldn’t you be the one who knows this stuff?
“I know that.” Not looking like a prune and not sabotaging herself with constant panic and anxiety would have helped. It was hard not to think herself into a spiral in this place sodden with undeath.
Is that something you had to study for as well?
“N-no, experiencing people helps.” Sheepishly, she kicked a pebble. “I had a lot of… personal initiative in my sparse free time. I went to feasts and smaller gatherings, I talked and caroused. Da’ always said it was a waste of time, but he already has a lot of contacts from his legion days.”
Uh, we’re still talking about boons, right?
“Y–yes! Of course.” Rye stiffly made her way next to the three legion soldiers.
Boons were never widely spread outside of the military and the elite, especially not the useful ones. With enough wealth, they could buy the shards for a boon and if it turned out poor, they could trade it away until they found a fitting one. She’d have been glad to have any useless old boon just for the status it would give her, but maybe this close to Loften people just had a different understanding of what was considered normal. Rye was curios. Did everyone have a boon here? If so, then what could the soldiers have besides Tertius’ boon that had saved her life?
“Uh, Tertius sir?” Rye asked and nearly regretted it as the rather portly soldier looked down at her. “I wanted to express my gratitude for saving me with your boon.”
“Pah, ‘express my gratitude’.” He waved her off. “A ‘thanks’ is enough for any old decurion. A better thanks would be carrying your weight.”
Ouch. At least we’re fairly light, as weights go.
“If I may ask, how does your boon work?” she asked, channeling all her strength into puppydog eyes.
“’S not something you should tell anyone,” he said but it was obvious he was having a hard time not glancing at her. She redoubled her efforts, adding a thin liquid sheen to her eyes by squeezing her tearducts.
To be fair, he didn’t cave in immediately, but cave in he did. “Ah, pox on it, you’ve already seen it in action. The short and quick of it is that I can help an ally out if I make a plan beforehand and then yell my boon’s name. ‘Course, that means I need the time to actually say it and the better the image of the plan, the less the boon strains my noggin’. Restriction breeds strength after all.”
“Oh.” Restriction breeds strength. That explained a lot. Now she knew how to carry her weight: Make sure she wasn’t an easy target. Where her [Psychometry] didn’t strain her in the slightest, she couldn’t imagine the same for him even with a perfectly detailed plot. “Thank you, again, for the explanation and the help.”
“Feh.” He said, waving her away. “Go bother Alexander or Sextus. I’ll call you if anything weasly needs doing.”
Weasly? “And how am I supposed to take that?” she muttered to herself while walking away.
With dignity and pride. We are the mighty weasels, and we will do what weasels do best: drive every nearby prey species twice our size into extinction.
The march went on in much the same fashion, the soldiers dealing with single undead, Rye arguing with Elia while they passed by broken wall after wall. The final one was growing ever closer through the covering crown of trees. As she looked closer, she noticed large, spoked wheels nailed to some of them and attached to those were more people. Dead, rotted corpses this time.
“That’s a lot of armor.”
“Soldiers.” The legionnaires grimaced while Tertius spoke. “And a squire or two. Get ‘em down boys, their bodies deserve better.”
She averted her eyes as she spied the first of many coat of arms toting the twin peaked dog. No humans, only dregs everywhere they went. The road turned more cluttered; the signs of violence more pronounced. Impacts littered the final wall, broken and toppled ladders next to wooden planks for cover and an array of trenches the swamp had spilled into, dark and thick.
“That’s th’ gatehouse.” Sextus gestured at the stone construction, set into walls easily forty feet tall and only the first of a number of layered defenses. Of course, these defenses only worked as such when they were manned and when the door wasn’t rolled apart like a brittle tin dinnerplate. “And there’s our way in.”
“Is this alright?” Rye asked “S-shouldn’t we wait for someone to come and let us in? This is an empire fort, they should be on our side, right?”
“Whoever closed the gates locked all of us out, together.” Tertius said, plucking at his helmet plume. “Not gonna wait all day for no good reason. And as with all assaults, Initiative is key.”
Yeah, what he said. Don’t be a wuss, between breaking and entering you’ll only be filed for half of the crime. Now go, I’m getting boredom-cramps.
With a whimper and a sigh, Rye followed her three companions through the foreboding portal. The walls encompassed the outermost parts of the castle, leading into a staging ground large enough to house an entire army’s worth of tents, fortifications, and stores. Rings of burnt tarps and charred wood remained from the fires which had eaten through most of the above and a shantytown that had once grown along the walls suffered a similar fate.
Holy shit, a fuckin trebuchet.
Judging by turned-over wagons carrying Rye-sized stones and the odd pile of lumber, there had been more than just a cursory attempt at breaking the castle itself. Distant watchtowers worked into the steep valley at the side looked similarly broken and abandoned with one looking like it had exploded from the inside out. Whatever happened, it did some time ago. All structures that had persevered seemed to have sunken a few feet into the mud and the muddy ground promised only a slight improvement over the swamp itself.
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“Someone must have already started sieging this place long before,” Tertius muttered.
And yet he looks like he already knew this. I told you, they’re hiding something from us.
“They don’t look happy.” She whispered before tiptoeing over to Sextus because he seemed the most amicable and talkative out of the three. “Um, are we actually going to join this siege? Doesn’t that seem kind of…”
“Reckless? Stupid? Futile?” He gave her a knowing look. “Aye, perhaps all three. But not death nor curse’ll stop us an’ we need to get past that keep to die for our empire. An’ Tertius ‘as a plan.”
The keep in question still towered some distance away, an array of moats, dirt hills and the tallest wall separating them from the mess that was the inner castle.
Tertius plucked a stray strand from his plumed helmet. “Only way from here is up.”
Alexander made some complicated hand-gesture, at which the plumed one let out a chuckle. Sextus smiled, as was so counter to his brutal visage.
Rye took in the biggest breath she was able, her plan to examine the tips of her boots for the rest of their journey cut short by an arrow hitting Sextus right in the neck.
“Ambush!” Sextus yelled as he clutched his neck. The remaining two presented their towering oval shields to the right, leaving Rye to scramble towards them. One second Sextus was standing, the next the was on the ground.
“He, he’s–“
Ah fuck, he’s dead.
“[According to Plan]!” Tertius yelled.
Another arrow cut through the air, harmlessly hitting a shield instead of boring past and hitting Rye between the eyes. Rye yelped as Tertius yelled something she didn’t quite catch. A heavy club hit her in the back of the head and her already jelly-like legs gave away. Screams echoed long into the dark, muffled all by the sudden embrace of another death.
You have died
You have lost: Bone shards [Common] x4
You have lost: Souls x3081
----------------------------------------
Elia woke up on the ground, mind running through the last fight piece by piece. The archer was clearly a problem and would need to be dealt with. As was the random ambush of the other dregs.
Someone shook her shoulder and she realized that she was in control again. Right, the hit on the head. She turned abruptly, the worried face of the Sextus guy staring down at her.
“Um… hey?”
“Y’alright there, lass?
She gave a slow nod, pinching his hand and gently lifting it away. Why was everyone in this world so touchy?
Time until lost items and souls dissipate: 14 min
Not a minute of rest then. She got up, taking a few steps towards the doorless exit before stopping short. They would need to fight through half a mile of enemies set along the road just to get past the first wall where her reward would be another ambush.
Funny how that worked. But setting amusement at the cruelty of the world aside, Elia found herself in a predicament: Should she run ahead recklessly to regain her lost stuff or do it the slow, methodical way. Either or, there was an ambush right behind the last wall. Archers and undead to bog them down aplenty. A simple and deadly combo.
Every minute spent grinding her teeth over this decision lowered her chances of success. A third option then: abandon her souls in favor of getting to know the area ahead, find a way through and introduce the archers to the concept of a post-mortem colonoscopy.
The three legionnaires could not be trusted to keep pace with her, if only because they didn’t trust her yet. What to do, what do to?
There was a fourth option. An option that required the greatest effort of will.
“Goddamnit, I hate escort quests. Rye, you still here?”
Mhhh. Pain. Scary. Don’t wanna.
“Look, I may be awesome, but I’ve lived with my head stuck in the maze for the last who knows how long. Frankly, I have no idea how we’re gonna get our souls back without these guys, so if you’ve got an idea on how to get them to move in under five minutes, I’m all ears.”
… if I do that, will you do the fighting?
“That’s always been the plan brain bud. You talk, I fight.”
… I’ll try my best as well. But I will not lie, this might be difficult.
The electric feeling wormed its way across her head and down her throat and with an apprehensive smile, they approached the three soldiers.
“Hello Sextus. Hi Tertius. Alexander. I’m Rye, but you probably don’t know me so will just stand… here.” Rye gave a nod to each before feigning interest in their little model castle filled with stick bridges, stone foundations and tiny trebuchets. The level of detail they could get with simple sticks and pebbles spoke of a masterful mind for tactics or simple boredom. Possibly both and now that she considered it, it was put to good use considering the benefit it gave to Tertius’ boon. “There’re some archers over here. Some dogs and dregs over here. An ambush there – oh, and a bekki assassin in the woods.”
“I knew she was a spy!” Tertius yelled, once again changing a bone shard with Alexander.
They could tell truth from lie, but would never believe what she was going through. Rye closed her eyes and tried her best. “I am not a spy, I was born and raised in the same empire as you all. I have magic I can barely control, I’m no good in a fight and I can understand if you’re suspicious of anyone on this horrid trail.”
Elia nudged her, annoyed at time lost. But time lost was not time wasted. Not for them.
“I have a friend and this friend really needs to get past these walls. If you’d assist me on the way, you would gain her endless gratitude–“
“That last part’s a lie.” Tertius scoffed.
“–Well, I mean, she would probably say ‘thank you’–“
Tertius laughed. “You don’t even believe it yourself.”
Stupid Tertius. Stupid boon. Stupid Elia.
“I– aw fudge, beans, I mean, all I can offer is to help you as much as I am able. But I need to go to the castle, now. I know it’s selfish but even if only out of the kindness of your heart, would you help a lady in need?”
They shared a look between each other, one that could generously be interpreted as a ‘maybe’.
“Oh, also, I can lead you around every single enemy up to the last wall.”
The soldiers grinned, Tertius rubbing his hands together while Alexander quickly rearranged some parts of their model.
“Always.”
----------------------------------------
Time until lost items and souls dissipate: 4 min
“Ambush right!” Elia yelled despite nothing being in sight.
The three legionnaires, ever the professionals, immediately presented their shields. A satisfying thwack vindicated her call, but further dregs were still rising from false death all around.
The soldier’s yells turned muted by professionalism, short and clipped and interspersed with the occasional use of tertius boon. “[According to Plan]! Cover, hundred yards ahead! [According to Plan]! Sextus, Alexander, shield wall right, move quick! Rye-girl, cover left! [According to Plan]! These blasted arrows, I swear they have a fucking immortal shooting us. Let’s go, chop-chop lads, ladies!”
“Don’t fucking tell me what to do!” Elia yelled before her mouth seized up. “S-sorry! We’ll try our best!”
“We!? Who is w– [According to Plan]!” An arrow that was yearning for his kneecap plonked off his greaves, whizzing into the distance.
“Um…” The feeling dissipated, just in time for Elia to flinch away from a flail aimed at her head and axe the undead in turn. Its glowing eyes fell dim, relief filling her as the lost souls and shards returned to her.
Sorry.
With a grunt she wrenched the axe from the corpse, ducking under an arrow as she moved back fully in cover behind the three soldiers currently finishing off a dog and its handler.
“Two front!” Elia yelled and the three legionnaires shifted their formation, spears menacing the torn militia who were completely unaware of the struggle approaching them twenty feet out. Alexander threw one javelin and then a second while the first was still in the air, his arm moving faster than she could follow for a few seconds.
“Boon that allows for quick throwing.” Elia muttered so only Rye could hear. “The way he’s rubbing his shoulder, possibly got a cooldown, or it hurts his arm.
D-did he hit?
That he did, right through the chest on the first one, then the shoulder on other.
“Maybe an accuracy component, though that would make it uncommon at least.” And as far as Rye had said, one shouldn’t expect someone to have more than one boon slot on the regular. She was an outlier with her three, just as much as zero would have been.
The two undead fell just in time for the party to meet a ball of densely packed enemies. Threshers, pitchforks and retooled scythes poked out of the ball of violence as the undead fell over each other to swarm the group of four.
“Cover me!” Sextus yelled while running straight for them. He barreled into the group, flipping one over his shield with a crunch while the others scattered to the ground.
“Definitely a boon. Unnatural resistance? A charge attack? Or just raw stats?”
What are you muttering on about Elia, c–concentrate for the love of AAAAH!
A sneaky undead tried to stab her with a dagger. Elia dodged and swung, tearing its throat from its neck. They fell on the remnants together and cleaned them up one by one.
You have gained: Soul x21
You have gained–
Most of them weren’t armored, and even their clothes of wool and what looked like sheep leather hung in rotten strips from their bodies. Even while Elia methodically chopped at the flailing limbs of a much larger hulking figure, her thoughts were drawn back to the weirdness she had initially felt upon entering this place. The place was built like a funnel, only allowing a certain amount of foes to attack the castle at the same time while being peppered from all around. But what was a peasant mob doing trying to attack a castle?
Tax related reasons, most likely.
Aaah! Eeek!
A group of dogs encircled the formation. Behind them more undead approached as an arrow dinged dangerously off the back of her helmet. They were moving forward, but not fast enough, bogged down by the archers and a constant trickle of enemies. Tertius was using his boon much more frugally. They needed to move faster.
But this loop was not one crowned with success. It took little time for the dogs to find the weakest link. Elia domed the first, but the others wrenched her to the ground, savaging her until she saw her companions blasted apart, surrounded, and cut down in turn.
You have died
You have lost: Bone shards [Common] x5
You have lost: Souls x3405
Back at the bowl, Elia awoke again.
“Rye. Do your thing. And do it with pizzazz.”
She turned to Sextus and in one smooth motion clambered atop the rim of the checkpoint bowl.
“Attention sir gentlesoldiers. I have scouted ahead and can tell you all with one hundred percent certainty where every single enemy is well beyond the last outer wall. No, I am not a spy, yes, I have a boon that helps me with information and no, I am not as strong as any of you. But if I said I could get us past the last wall in under ten minutes, what would you say?”
Stunned silence followed, and she felt as if she could hear a key opening a new door of endless possibilities.
Sextus raised his voice first. “Well I say we show those ‘eartless bastards who locked us out what we legionnaires are made of!”
“41st legion best legion!” Rye yelled and was nearly knocked over by the furious echo.
They could do this. Together.
----------------------------------------
The dogs bayed. Her axe felled the glowing one first, then the rest as she kept close to the legionnaires.
You have gained: Soul x21
You have gained: Bone shard [Common] x1
You have regained…
“Yes! Another!”
Two undead militia brandishing shortswords approached Elia as she finished off the last dog. She ducked, an arrow hitting the first one straight through the mouth and out the other end.
Oh my gosh, we are so sorry!
“Hah! Sucks to be you!”
Elia!
“Forward! [According to Plan]!” Tertius yelled, rudely knocking a preacherly looking undead to the ground before crushing his head underfoot. A strength related boon, a strong soul vessel thing or just a particularly rotten dreg? “We can’t stay out in the open!”
“You ever realize that Tertius only ever uses his boon precisely when things aren’t going to plan?” Elia huffed.
“’ell, that’s somethin’ to chew on.” Sextus said as he speared an undead with spikes growing out of his body like a rose stem. “Fockin’ ‘ell, when will they learn an’ stop?”
Soon, I sure do hope. I can’t– aaah! Eeep! Eeek!
More dogs. More thwacks.
You have gained: Soul x21
“Another!” Elia yelled.
You have gained: Soul x24
A second preacher in coarse robes kneeled in a dark puddle, muttered prayers illuminating a dreg in silver-gold light. The dreg threw itself against Tertius’ shield, frenzied strength leaking from every pore as it managed to force him a step back.
E-elia? Th–they have magic!
“One… sec…” she groaned, locked in a grapple with her own opponent.
As it turned out, they didn’t need her help. A wooden flail snapped against the soldier’s helmet, knocking him over but Sextus bashed it and sent his spear searching for its heart. He turned, only to find Elia pushed to the ground, a dreg’s sword digging into her neck as she lost the contest of strength.
“Am I… the… escort… quest?” she gurgled before a final push severed her spine.
You have died
You have lost: Bone shards [Common] x6
You have lost: Souls x3988
----------------------------------------
Time until lost items and souls dissipate: 1 min
They were halfway to the circle of charred palisades the Tertius-guy had called out as cover and Elia had to face the hard facts: getting this far was not easy, nor quick, nor without its own share of luck. Despite her improved constitution, her arms felt like they were on fire. If she died any further ahead, regaining her souls would become an impossibility.
She picked up her last dropped souls and ducked under another arrow she knew was coming. It didn’t come at all. The second problem reared its ugly head. Unlike in the maze, there were too many variables, too many details that changed between loops. Both her companions and the archer (as she was certain it was a singular, experienced one) was too unpredictable, and she was quickly reaching the limits of what she could do without knowing the future step by step.
She was just one small undead woman after all.
The next group of enemies came and though Rye dodged a pitchfork and slew an unbalanced swordsman, when she stepped back from a wildly swinging wooden flail its pole was just a few inches longer than she had expected. It socked her in the chin and the world tilted sideways.
The next time she opened her eyes, she was lying in the mud.
“–lass, y’alright?” the largest one asked.
“Mhm.” Her voice answered but she wasn’t in control.
Uhhh, Rye?
“Yeah?”
I think we might have… forcibly switched. Again.
“Oh. Oh… fudge.” She stared wide-eyed at an undead crawling along the floor with a rusty cleaver in hand. “D-disco rooster?”
The undead moaned and Rye screamed.