“Oh lovely, she's crazy,” Lin mumbled, “like all actors.”
Light flooded the shrine room from the ceiling, showing off a painted dome with starry skies filled with shooting stars and dragons. Painted witches and wizards flew around on brooms and carpets on the walls, holding up crystal shards glowing with light. With the sudden brightness I was able to get a better view of our foes.
The leader of the doll women had short black hair, a long dress with open sides and metal plates on her thighs, arms and shoulder for added protection. In her soft almost real looking hands she wielded her two fans. She opened one of them and hid her viscous smile, leaving her blue and red button eyes to look at me maliciously. The fabric of the fans showed delicate art, one being of a dragon breathing fire, the other a thunderous cloudy sky.
Knowledge Arcane : Failure!
Damn. I could tell they were enchanted, and I got the vague notion they might be pretty powerful. I quietly sent the notifications to the others and I watched their backs tense up. Lin and Snowflake sent me the same notification back, we would be fighting her blind it seemed.
The other doll women spread themselves out on the stage. They wore simpler outfits of blouses, tunics and pants. They wore more armour however, with either thick layers of padded shirts or breastplates with mismatched pauldrons and greaves. We were up against an array of fighters. They carried a wide selection of weapons, from a spear, a two handed axe, a tall recurve bow and one carrying a long thin straight sword with a fat dagger in her off hand.
The leader pointed a fan towards A’rea and we all stiffened up, ready to leap out of the way. The doll woman purred. “We have no qualms with you. In fact we rejoice that you have made an effort to repair the dungeon. Please, take a seat and enjoy the show, you may freely leave after.”
A’rea put away her wand and found a clean spot on the stone benches. “Why thank you. Good luck ladies, just remember to use your man as bait if you have too. We can always get you a replacement.”
Lin growled and folded her ears down in disappointment, and I felt a bit miffed. Snowflake on the other hand sighed in relief and shuffled towards me.
“Between you and me she kind of spooked me. But don’t worry Josh, I still have plenty of healing magic ready. Just stick by Lin and I, we can keep you safe,” Snowflake said, patting me on the back supportively.
“I’m a decent fighter if I say so myself,” I said defensively. I heard Lin giggle and I shot her a dirty glare. “I killed two undead knights in one day, remember?”
“True, but I would say this might be harder than a few bags of bones. Then again, you have found ways to pull some flashy moves, probably inspired by me of course,” Lin said, smiling at me. She twirled a dagger around the palm of her hand and focused on the doll women. “Pretty big stage up there. Do we just walk on and fight you? Or is this more of a dance off?”
The doll women all bowed, their movements perfectly matched. They stepped back to the far side of the stage and waited for us to step up. After an awkward moment of silence the three of us climbed up, seeing this wasn’t going anywhere without our involvement.
At the back of the stage was a statute of…something.
Knowledge Religion : Partial Success!
Worship of Icharn can be difficult because his true form is not well known. As such many followers use abstract ideas to represent the hidden god and the pursuit of knowledge.
It looked like a twisting nest of tentacles, wings and three digit hands all reaching for a central orb made of stone, painted black. There was an open space around the orb someone could feasibly reach into to touch, and in there was a pedestal with a flat top with a stack of books next to a pile of coins, potions and scrolls.
One book in the pile glowed gold and my quest log informed me I found the desired object. The only problem was the five guards between me and it.
Our two groups glared across at each other, ours slightly shifting, or twitching nervously. Mostly it was just me nervously twitching, ready to fire a spell at the nearest target, while the doll women on the other hand were absolutely still. It was eerie, if I didn’t look too closely and ignored the button eyes, they seemed to be living people. Yet when they moved it was with perfect precision, like a machine.
“Do we swap character info to know who we are fighting?” I asked.
“I have no interest in the names of the men and women I’m about to end the life of,” the leader of the doll said with a shrug.
“Do we have to fight?” Snowflake asked, lowering her mace. “This is kind of pointless, we don’t have anything against your god.”
The leader of the doll woman cackled madly, and pushed the tips of her fans into her cheeks, putting tiny tears in her fabric face. “You have magic items that I want. I can also use your bones for crafting, and your blood for summoning. We will bring back our master, and you will help us do it!”
“Calm down sister,” Lin whistled. She glanced towards Snowflake and I. “What do you two think?”
“Damn, she is crazy,” I whispered, taking a nervous step back. I cleared my throat and lowered my sword, jutting my thumb over my shoulder. “You know what, maybe we don’t need the book-”
“He dares to steal our secrets!” the bow doll shouted, taking aim at me. “Bolt of Exploding Winds!”
“Fuck it,” Snowflake shouted, bringing her shield up and charging straight into the fray. “You shall be the final evil creature I must slay!”
The bow string moved and Lin grabbed me by the cloak and shoved me to the side. Ahead of us there was a bright flash of light and the doll women shouted insults. Snowflake’s magic shield had an ability to make a dazzling flash of light, and it lit up the stage so brightly I had to blink sunspots out of my eyes. An arrow sailed past us and hit the stone bench behind A’rea, who was holding a snack. The arrow struck with explosive force, piercing through the rock and sending dust all over the spider woman’s clothes. A’rea dusted off her food, took a bite and waved one of her wands. A long strand of silk rope shot out, connecting to the ceiling, and she started to climb up.
“Don’t worry about me, you three have fun!” A’rea shouted.
Snowflake was already in the thick of it, fighting the axe and spear warriors by herself. Lin and I followed up, standing side by side to cover each other. The sword woman rushed ahead, keeping herself in line with the bow woman. The leader with the fans was content to sit back by the statue, smiling to herself.
“I’ll get the archer, you have a fun little dance with this one,” Lin said, sliding to the side and seemingly vanishing out of thin air.
I rolled my shoulders and held up my sword. The sword woman and I circled each other, lightly poking at the other to test each other's reflexes. I felt confident, since Sliva fixed me up I had started to train harder and already felt gains. I didn’t just flail or chop with swords like I was using a wood axe anymore, I saw myself starting to become a true warrior. The doll woman slashed at my neck and I parried the attack before stabbing towards her core. I forced her face several times as I tried to prod at her defenses with careful swings, keeping myself from overextending so I could block in turn. I had at most two to three inches of more sword than her, and I used it to my advantage to keep her at bay.
“Your foot work needs practice,” the doll woman said, flicking her head to the side to get a strand of red yarn out of the way.
I glanced down and at that moment the woman struck, stabbing her thin, long blade right at my heart. I was shoved back, and coughed feeling the wind get punched out of me. I was fine, as my armour absorbed the worst of the damage and protected me from the deadly thrust.
I snarled and stepped forward, holding the grip in two hands as I tried to feint with a downward diagonal cut from my shoulder towards her leg. The sword woman brought her own blade up and at the last moment I twisted the grip in my hands, pushing the crossguard with my thumb and changing my angle to a mid drift slash.
She was fast, and angled her fat dagger to parry the blow, following it up by repeating my own attack. She gained a sudden burst of speed and shouted loud enough my ears rang.
“Blitz assault!”
I was too slow to bring my longsword back and felt her strike me on the shoulder. The force shook me down to my core so much I felt like my lungs were bruised. It hurt, and I had to blink out the red that appeared in the corner of my vision as tears burned in the corners of my eyes.
“Damn it, she nearly shattered my shoulder,” I wheezed, coughing up blood. I winced as I tried to lift my hurt arm, and felt liquid get in my lungs. “Oh yeah, something ain't right.”
“Rain and storm, grant me a thunderous smite!” Snowflake shouted. The sound of rolling thunder followed as the spear woman was sent airborne. The goat girl jumped back, covering several feet of distance, and spanked me on the ass. “Cure wounds!”
My collarbone popped back into place, the liquid in my lungs went back where it was supposed to be, and the pain vanished in my chest, replaced with a healthy helping of anger. I gripped my sword tightly and tossed a thank you to Snowflake before charging the sword woman again. She parried my attacks, stabbed at me and danced out of reach. As the fight went on she got faster, and each time she hit my arms or side my armour took the blow, but I felt more pain coming through.
I saw the magnifying glass appear for a brief moment and I managed to mentally tap it. The loading bar that appeared over her shoulder was moving slowly, and a tiny window had several question marks beside her stats, with a plus two beside strength and dexterity.
“Do you,” I huffed, holding up a hand. “Have martial momentum by any chance?”
“I do,” the sword woman purred, her red cat tail wagging behind her, a sign she was pleased. “I picked you out as a book type, glad to see you have a thing for a more honourable style of combat.”
“Me? Honourable?” I asked, snapping my finger at her. “Produce fire!”
She stepped out of the way, her feet leaving the stage as the glob of fire took out a chunk of the stage. At the same moment I thrusted forward with my sword using the longer reach of my weapon to attack without retaliation.
“Flame blade!” I shouted, dumping a mana point into my sword, feeling the grip heat up in my hands.
Her dexterity had to be incredible because she twisted out the way causing me to miss her core. Yet I still managed to strike her sword arm, piercing the light padded armour and lopped off her arm. Her sword clattered to the stone floor with a bell like ring, followed by her screaming in fury. She danced back, swearing up a storm as she put out the flames going up her armour.
The sword woman dashed ahead, screaming out, “Blitz assault!” In a flash she covered the gap and slammed the pommel of her fat dagger into my rib cage under my armpit. She followed up by trying to bite my exposed neck with her fangs.
In a red haze I retaliated by headbutting her so hard I nearly knocked myself out. She had some kind of metal core in her skull that rang like a gong when my forehead met it. The now swordless woman stumbled back with a look of shock on her face. I lifted my sword, ignoring the pain and tried to follow up with an attack, but I heard someone shout my name as a dagger flew over the furious doll woman’s head cutting off a thread of yarn.
I turned and held my sword out to block, barely deflecting a spear thrust in the nick of time. The spearhead glanced off my shoulder instead of plunging into my exposed neck and I felt the impact shake my arm numb. I saw the spear woman prepare to go at me again, but when I flexed out my palm to cast a spell she halted in place.
The spear woman backed up and started to circle me instead, leery of my magic. I checked on my companions. Lin and Snowflake were out of reach, locked in combat, and I was on my own with two on one. The two of them seem to be slowing down, as if they had expended too much energy, while I on the other hand was battered, but fine for the most part. I saw the little green crystals between their collarbones were dimming, they were nearing their limit. The sword woman came at me at an angle while the spear woman tried to thrust her spear at my neck again. I backed up to the edge of the stage, dodging the spear and jabbed at the sword woman to keep her back.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
The overwhelming pressure was starting to get to me and I instinctively tried to retreat. My foot was half off the stage when I managed to stop myself, and dust fell into the stone basin beside the stage. In the corner of my eye I could see my reflection in the black mirror resting on the edge of the basin, and I was not looking as good as I thought.
The leader still stood at the back, watching the bow woman duel Lin, the two of them moving faster than I could keep track of, while Snowflake and the axe woman took turns bashing the hell out of each other. Snowflake’s impressive armour was serving her well and to my relief I could see she was handily winning.
“Hey, small man, fight harder!” A’rea shouted, trying to encourage me. “If you don’t you will end up dead soon!
“I get that!” I shouted back, and faced my two opponents. “Ladies, it’s been a blast, but I really must get going.”
The two of them came at me from either side, the sharp spear point going for my legs as the sword woman lunged at me with her dagger held high to plunge into my neck. I stepped ahead and jumped, feeling my boots give me extra air. As I flew out of reach I pointed my hand towards them and tapped the cloak’s gem with my pommel.
“Gust!”
The torrent of wind pushed them off the stage, buying us time while I got more air. I stuck the stage flat on my feet feeling the impact get mostly absorbed by my boots, the rest going into my knees. I knew I would be feeling that tomorrow. I tried to take a step towards the axe woman, and fell down to one knee, dizziness building up in me.
I grabbed a Go Berry out of my bandolier and popped it into my mouth feeling the rush of mint and the stinging taste of gasoline course down to my gullet. I got back to my feet and hefted my sword feeling the weight start to burn my arms. I was ready to aid my friends, only to see Lin stand over the downed bow woman, and Snowflake on her knees atop the axe woman bashing her glowing mace into the chest armour of her foe over and over.
“Why won’t you die!” Snowflake snarled.
“Snow…hey, Snowflake,” Lin said after checking I was relatively fine. “You got her, calm down.”
Snowflake stopped and the doll woman under her was still twitching as energy coursed from her chest down to her arms making her twitch. Snowflake got off the downed opponent and retrieved her shield.
She awkwardly hid behind her shield. “Sorry, got carried away.”
The sword woman got back onto the stage and flourished her dagger. Her voice came out low and gravely, as cold hard fury took over. “I’m going to use your hair for thread and your clothes to fix my arm you stupid wizard.”
Lin readied her daggers and stood beside me. “These dolls are tougher than I thought, sorry it took so long. But, it looks like you ‘handed’ this one pretty well.”
I tried to reply over the sound of the wounded doll woman screaming, but I saw Lin had vanished, as did Snowflake. The entire stage was empty now, with fog pooling around my feet. There was ambient light everywhere, and I looked around to see the lights over the stage were gone. In fact the domed ceiling was gone, and in its place was darkness that stretched for miles.
“Well now, after killing you each one by one I’ll have to use your clothes to fix my little sisters. I think your magic cloak will do nicely,” a woman purred into my ear, and I felt her nail tap the mana gem.
I turned and lashed out with the end of my sword to knock them away, with my foot sliding out low to trip them if I missed. My strike harmlessly attacked the air. There was no one there. Holding my sword in a simple ready pose Yara had drilled into me I pivoted around looking for the speaker.
Sitting on the strange statue was the leader of the doll woman, though now the statue had twisted and transformed itself into a throne for her to sit on, complete with a massive black mirror behind her. I saw two twinkling lights within the mirror, making me feel like I was being watched. She let one of her legs dangle delicately off the cushion she sat on, and she tapped her sharp looking nails on her plump thigh. Her skin had a healthy shine to it and responded by jiggling ever so slightly with her touch. It was then that I realized she was flesh and blood.
“Surprised?” she asked.
“A…little. So are you a doll, or are you real now?” I asked back, lowering the tip of my blade.
“In here, anything is possible,” the woman said, fanning herself. “This lovely book has all kinds of valuable magical secrets. Secrets I need to protect by drinking every drop of your essence.”
She licked her glossy lips and I saw her cat fangs were sharper and more prominent than normal. Her pale complexion and massive confidence made my skin crawl. It was then I noticed in the black mirror framed behind her throne I only saw my reflection.
Knowledge Arcane : Failure!
“Oh for fu-” I rested my sword guard on my hot forehead feeling the cold touch of the steel cool me down. I curiously gazed at it to see the trails of condensation collected on the blade as blue writing was appearing underneath the droplets. “Strange.”
“This place is brimming with the collective pool of magic once held by the four keepers, all of it now at my disposal,” the doll woman said, stepping off the throne as the tentacles moved themselves to form stairs for her. “Connected to that witch’s tower above, giving me power over my dreams.”
With her now on ground level I could see she was a few inches taller than me, not to mention in thick soled, armoured boots. Despite the heavy boots she wore she stepped with a degree of grace that worried me. Worse yet I could see nearly every inch of clothing, armour and boots had a faint glow to it, or writing on it.
“Do you wish to surrender?” the woman asked, purring her question as she inspected me like a mouse caught in her trap.
I wiped the cold sweat off my forehead and gestured to her. I felt my anger build up as I snapped back with a retort. “Ladies first.”
I knew it was a bad idea to goad her. She shot towards me, parting the mist while sweeping the air with her expanded fans. I just ducked, hitting the ground as she overshot, going over me. I spun around to see locks of hair falling down to the ground and lashed out with my sword glancing off her fans.
I jumped back to my feet and circled around her, feeling revitalised. I gripped my sword tightly as the burn in my arms lessened and the taxing use of magic vanished. It seemed she wasn’t the only one strengthened in this place, it just sucked I was already tired. She was incredibly fast, I needed to lessen the gap.
“Mark of the dancer!” I said, slapping myself on the chest as my palm glowed gold. A glinting mark of a figure with flowing sashess appeared, and I felt my pulse quicken. I felt my reflexes sharpen, and my hand eye coordination improved.
She came in from the fog, running with the fans low. I surprised her by how quickly I reacted, hopping over her, and twisting to strike down at her. She was still faster than me, probably with an extra point or two of dexterity higher, and managed to twist at the last second. My sword struck one of her plated pieces of armour, snapping the buckle and sending it off into the darkness.
“You will regret that,” she laughed.
The moment I landed she stepped into me, leaned towards me as she swiped and jabbed the ends of her fans at my exposed legs, or at my armour. I felt my pants get cut and the sensation of fire and electricity ran down my legs. I grabbed my hilt in one hand and my blade’s edge in the other and slammed it into her body, shoving her away with more force than I knew I was capable of.
She spun wildly through the fog, but was back on her feet a moment after, cackling madly and lapping at the ends of her fans, licking up dark red crimson fluid. She kept her distance and leered at me, before curling far out of reach, waiting for me to act. She blew a sweaty clump of hair out of her face as she panted, with her dress and armour marked up from my attacks.
I looked down as I couldn’t feel my legs now and saw they were soaked in my blood, the red fluid gushing out. I needed to keep her off me to heal and I took a chance. I opened my hand as if I was about to cast my fire spell, the words forming at my lips. The woman jumped back further to hide in the fog, creating space to dodge my spell. Instead of throwing my hand at her, I grabbed at the bandolier with haste.
Deception check : Success!
+3 XP gained.
I unstoppered a potion and downed it, feeling my leg muscles knit back together and the veins connect themselves back up. The damage was done however as I was woozy from the sudden blood loss. I felt my vision dim and the crazy woman laughed, amused at my trick. She leapt in from the shadows and stabbed at my armour, unable to pierce it, but enjoying hearing me grunt in pain. Each time I retaliated I ended up short of hitting her, or she blocked my sword with her fans in a cross block. While I might have more agility than normal, she was still able to play around me.
“Just how much,” I said, huffing with effort, “dexterity do you have?”
As she danced away from me as if to prove a point I saw an amulet slip out of her dress and rest on her shoulder. The amulet was a purple amethyst that was surrounded with black metal. The purple gem had an inner light deep within its facets and staring at it hard I could see it was actually several miniscule Icharn shard’s shoved together.
As the woman tipped her head to the side the amulet stopped touching her body, hanging down off her neck. The woman seemed to change, looking like a doll again with button eyes. As she stood back up straight and fanned herself, her amulet touched her body again and she turned back into looking like a living woman. Or maybe unliving since it seemed she was a vampire.
I felt something drip onto my cheek and I wiped my face to find the back of my sleeve coated in blood. I checked my reflection in the icy surface of my sword to see my nose and cheek was slashed and I had a cut along the side of my face oozing blood. I squared my shoulders and narrowed my eyes feeling the magic inside of me straighten out. I had probably one, maybe two spells before manablight hit me hard, and worse yet I had only one more healing potion on hand. The additional power this place was granting us was starting to wane, we both knew we had to wrap up this fight.
I remember Yara said that levelling up during a fight wasn’t possible, or honourable, but what about spending skill points? As the woman circled around me I kept my distance and weighed my options between the new powers I had to choose from. They were the most impactful choices on offer, and I needed some kind of burst damage to finish her in one hit, or I wasn’t going to last.
The woman snapped her storm themed fan closed and jabbed in my direction. The fan glowed with power, and her hair rose up, standing on its ends. “Lightning bolt!”
I threw myself to the side, dodging the pure bolt of energy. Smaller arcs off the side of the main body of the bolt struck my arms and threw me back a few feet, making me cry out as my muscles seized up. I forced myself back up as my ears rang painfully and saw she was casting a second bolt. I gulped and took a gamble.
I kicked off, leaping into the air, dodging the lethal bolt of lighting. The woman ran under me waving her dragon fan. A sweeping wave of fire shot up into the air towards me and I used my cloak to cast gust, dispersing the fire. The smoke and cinders shot down towards her and she closed her eyes, her fans rising up to block me.
Improved Elemental Strike - Burst added!
I brought my sword down as I dumped every mana point I had left into my attack, shouting with a thunderous cry. “Flame blade!”
I heard the woman shout a spell herself and as the smoke parted I heard metal on metal as she blocked my sword strike, the blazing blade stopped dead in its tracks. The end of the sword kissed her nose, cutting it, and making a thin trail of blood course down her otherwise untouched face.
Her amulet was glowing and black tentacles made of smoke and mist were grabbing my legs and waist, holding me in place. We locked eyes and I saw her glance at the end of her cut nose as an Igni rune appeared on her face.
A moment passed, feeling like an eternity, and the woman hissed. “You little-”
The world around me exploded as if I was inside of a furnace. Fire licked my face and hands, but it did not harm me, only warming me up as if I was sitting next to a campfire. The tentacles dispersed and I was thrown to the ground as I felt my gut flop and my head spin. I hit my head on a pile of ashes and I coughed out the grey powder as I looked up to see Snowflake locking the arms of the spear doll as Lin punched them in the face.
“Where is Josh?!” Lin demanded. Her ear flopped to the side and pointed at me. She turned and waved. “Hi Josh.”
Without looking she slugged the spear woman, ending her and ended up punching Snowflake in the head. The two girls separated with Snowflake holding her helmet and Lin shaking out her hand.
I struggled to my feet and felt blood from my face mix with the ashes. I nearly collapsed and Lin propped me up as she checked over my injuries. There was a round of applause and we looked up to see A’rea hanging off the roof, upside down, hollering at us. One of her wands that she stuck into her shirt glowed blue, and a dozen floating blue hands around her clapped rapidly.
“What a show, what a show! I loved it when little Josh reappeared in a column of fire. That kind of showy entrance means you have earned the right for me to call you by a name,” A’rea said.
I gave her a thumbs up and mumbled out some kind of thank you. Snowflake took me off Lin’s hands and used another healing spell to patch up my bleeding face. She helped me sit up right and as a minute went by I was starting to feel much better. Snowflake in turn had to shake out her head, and I assumed she was starting to suffer from over use of magic too.
Constitution Check : Success!
Reduced effect from Manablight!
+4 XP gained.
Party has won an encounter
+450 XP to Josh
+250 XP to Lin
+150 XP to Snowflake
“Hey, why didn’t I get any?” A’rea asked.
Lin stood up, her arms full of fallen weapons, jewellery and the fans. “You didn’t help!”
A’rea scoffed. “I was encouraging you all. Bards do that and still get experience.”
“Bards cast buffing spells on the fighters, use magic or make the aftercare great,” Lin mumbled mockingly.
Snowflake approached the statue with her mace poised to strike. She was shoved back by a magical force as she neared striking distance, and the goat girl shouted in surprise. I looked at it, then the pile of ashes and saw the amulet glow in the pile. I fished it out and dragged my feet to the statue, easily approaching it. I shrugged at the others and claimed the prizes by the statue, and when my hand touched the glowing book I saw a pop up, and the glow vanished.
You have found the quest item!
Keep it safe, or else!
I handed it to Lin for safe keeping and filled up my arms with the rest of the stuff there, walking back to others. I looked at them and asked. “So, want to split the loot?”