Samantha openly gawked at the space Trista had just occupied, trying to process what she had witnessed.
“Hey! That’s just like my antlers when they disappear!” Silas said with mild amazement, sniffing at the spot Trista had stood, “Where do you think she went?”
Broken out of her confusion by Silas’s simple observation, her mind–enhanced by an open meridian and the [Hyperfocus] mindset–started making rapid connections.
“I don’t think she went anywhere. I think you’re more right than you know.” she commented, patting him on the head.
“What do you mean?”
“What if she was made of qi just like your antlers are? There was a skill you could’ve gotten called [Duplicate] that would’ve created another body for you out of qi. It would be similar to that. However, that brings up a lot of other questions. I’ve never even heard of such an advanced qi construct.” she said with a disbelieving shake of her head, “She was so convincingly mortal! I was able to touch her, feel her heartbeat, have a conversation with her, and even heal her wounds. How does that work? Does someone need to control it? Is it completely artificial…?”
“Beats me!” Silas chirped, “I’m happy they’re not real though. It would be sad if they were hurt.”
“Me too.”
Whatever the case was with the constructs, it put her at ease knowing that real lives weren’t at risk. However, given how realistic Trista had been, she suspected that there was a limit to how long she could take to save survivors before they would ‘die’. While some might say risking her life to save qi constructs was foolish, this quest had explicitly mentioned that completion would result in receiving rewards. Unlike standard quests where the ‘reward’ was personal growth or the next chain of the questline, she got the feeling that doing her best progressing with the optional objectives here would pay off in big ways.
“So, what now?” he asked.
“How do you feel about focusing on rescuing everyone we can first?” she proposed.
Silas sat in the middle of the road and faced the town, “Will you be okay without a weapon?”
“Ideally I can extract survivors without causing a scene, but I’ll definitely be keeping an eye out for anything useful while I search around.”
Silas nodded, “I’ll keep watch for you, then.”
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Samantha made a point to do a cursory search through all the buildings in town. The queen and her nest were not hard to find because the building she occupied was completely transformed. Hardly any of the original construction was still visible under the tough, dark material that the scorpis had coated it with. The ‘veiny’ internal structure–for lack of a better description–led underground to a veritable maze of tunnels which eventually led to a scorpis the size of a draft horse. It was surrounded by four only slightly-smaller scorpis, which she guessed were the queensguard. Behind the queen was a small mound of eggs, one of which began shaking violently until it broke open and birthed a new scorpis worker. She received a notification that there were 150/150 enemies remaining and sighed. If the rate of replenishment was consistent throughout the quest, she’d need to kill at least one scorpis every four to five hours to avoid accumulating more than 150 enemies.
After that disappointing discovery, she went on to locate nine other survivors scattered throughout the city, as well as a couple of shops and one private armory. The private armory in question was located in a secret room inside a large, well-fortified mansion at the center of town. This mansion also was home to three of the survivors: a middle aged man, a woman, and their teenaged son. The three mortals were armored, wielding casters powered by spirit pearls, and had strategically piled large pieces of furniture against doors and windows. Their kitchen and larder were stocked with sufficient water and food to last at least a month, but while she might be able to leave saving them for last, she still couldn’t leave them for long. Several spirit beasts loitered around the mansion, poking and prodding at their defenses in search of an opening. A weakness would be found (or made) eventually, and once it was, Samantha wouldn't have much time to help the family escape.
Of the remaining six survivors there was an elderly man on the outskirts of town, a young couple near the house she rescued Trista from, an older shopkeeper and his wife hiding in the basement of their store, and a wounded town guard holed up in a government building. The wounded guard was in the most need of help, but he was deeper into the town than everyone except the family hiding in the mansion. This meant she’d almost certainly need to fight her way in and out, which would require a more efficient weapon than her fists. The store that the shopkeeper and his wife hid in had a small assortment of weapons and supplies she could use to save the guard, so she prioritized visiting them first.
Instead of taking the main road as before, Samantha ran up and around the sand dune to minimize the amount of travel she’d have to do through town. She had considered waiting until nightfall to engage in these more risky rescue operations, but she’d already been here for around six or seven hours and the sun had not shifted its position in the sky at all. Again, she chalked this up to an oddity of the rift and just assumed that night would never fall over the oasis. Once she’d circled around to a point that was closest to her target, she activated [Translucence] and moved in. Following a similar process to before, Silas kept overwatch from high above and directed her safely to her destination.
She needed to resort to a bit of creative [Telekinesis] to get inside the shop due to the door being locked, but was able to pull off the maneuver quickly enough that no scorpis stumbled across her. After using spectral form to unlock the front door from the inside, she returned to her body, entered the building, and locked it behind her. All the windows were boarded up, so she canceled [Translucence] to conserve qi and began looking through the available wares more closely. There was a floor hatch leading into the basement not far away, but she wanted to gather some supplies before making contact with the hiding couple. While the owners being constructs took almost all of the guilt out of ‘looting’ the shop, it still would be incredibly awkward to do it while they were watching.
She moved to the weapons section first and a strange item caught her eye. Next to an extremely sharp and dangerous looking dagger was a longsword made of some unknown gray material. The dull, matte surface looked out of place, and the entire weapon–from blade, to guard, to pommel–was made from it as if it were cast in a mold rather than forged. There was a small plaque embedded into the blade near the hilt which reminded her of the identification cards used on the first floor to give more information about products. So, going off of her hunch, she touched the plaque and trickled some qi into it.
Basic Longsword (Resource - Weapon)
Value: 5
The quest prompt did say resources would be clearly marked.
Now that she was aware of what resources generally looked like, the shop as a whole became much less appealing in terms of available supplies. Every section had at least a few non-resource items, but it was safe to say a vast majority were marked as resources. To her chagrin, even the sealed boxes labeled ‘Food’ and ‘Potions’ weren’t spared.
Unlike the sword, these items were made from a tan, wood-like substance. She held up a wheel shaped block resting on top of the box’s contents and fed some qi into the small plaque attached to it.
Cheese Wheel (Resource - Food)
Value: 1
She did the same to a flat, rectangular object.
Bacon (Resource - Food)
Value: 1
Huh.
“Silas, this might take longer than I thought. Are you able to find a safe place to rest nearby? The cooldown for your ability shouldn’t be too long yet.”
“I’ll be okay! Just let me know when you’re ready to go.”
While she had initially planned to quickly grab a few essentials for now, the fact that most of the items weren’t usable hindered her significantly. She needed to comb through everything in the store in order to find the select few items that weren’t resources, then pick out the ones that were actually helpful to take with her. In the end she collected a mundane leather backpack, a long-handled warhammer with a blunt metal head on one side and a sharp spike on the other, the sharp dagger she’d seen earlier and a sheath for it, and an enchanted canteen. Unlike the one she’d brought up from the first floor, this canteen drew in water from the surrounding air to fill itself with cool, drinkable water throughout the day. It held about 32oz in total and was full.
She took a long, satisfying drink to slake her thirst, but saved a third of the contents to give to Silas later. That done, she finally moved to the basement entrance and gave it three firm, rhythmic knocks.
“W-who’s there?” a man’s voice shakily asked.
“My name is Samantha Cray. I’m here to help you to safety.” she explained.
“Thank the gods!” a woman said. Samantha could hear her rapidly climbing some stairs to open the basement hatch.
“Wait! Not so fast–I can’t keep up.” the man complained. The woman’s steps paused, and Samantha could hear the uneven gait of a limp. When the hatch finally opened, the couple climbed out and greeted her.
“Oh! You’re with the army, aren’t you?” the woman said with obvious relief, shaking Samantha’s hand profusely.
“Of course she is! Look at her uniform. They don’t give those out to just anyone.” the man said teasingly to his wife.
Samantha raised an eyebrow and looked down at herself. Her clothes were in tatters from her run-in with the rift guardian, and not at all like a uniform should be. She was barely maintaining her decency with all of the holes in the cloth. She didn’t get the impression that they were making fun of her though, which begged the question of if they were seeing the world differently than she was.
“We tried to evacuate with everyone else–we really did–but my husband couldn’t move quickly enough so they had to leave us behind. They said they’d be sending someone back to clear out the city, but I wasn’t sure if we’d last until you arrived. I’m so glad you’re here.” the woman explained earnestly.
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“Is your husband injured? If so, I can heal him.”
“It’s a deformity I was born with. It can’t be healed by arts–I’ve already tried.” the husband answered, gesturing to a bowed leg. Catching sight of the freshly pillaged items on Samantha’s person when he looked back to her, he clucked his tongue, “I see you’ve already helped yourself to some of our wares.”
“I apologize for any inconvenience it causes you, but I need these to save you and the other survivors.”
“There are others here?” the man asked, his mild irritation shifting to concern.
“I saved a young girl named Trista earlier, and I’m headed to help a wounded guardsman next.”
“In that case, please, take more!” the woman insisted. “I can see you’ve only acquisitioned the basics for yourself. Are you sure that old warhammer is fine when we have some enchanted weapons just over here?” she gestured to a weapons rack nearby which held nothing but the disappointing gray quest resources.
Just to make sure she wasn’t missing out on anything, Samantha fed a bit of qi into the information plaque on one of the items.
Enchanted Glaive (Resource - Weapon)
Value: 20
First the uniform comment, and now this? I don’t know if bringing attention to our difference in perception will upset them, so I’ll just play along.
“This hammer will be fine, thank you. If you have any food or spare clothes that would be great, though. I did see a box of food over there, but I’m afraid I can’t eat any of it.”
“You are too kind, leaving the best food and items for when we rebuild.” The woman’s eyes were positively brimming with appreciation as she spoke, “I think I may have some old rations stashed away somewhere. You also look to be about my size so I can give you some of my clothes. But, are you sure that’s all you want?”
The man plucked up a resource from the box and raised it to his open mouth. Interestingly, the resource dissolved into motes of blue light as he bit down on it, and he let out a contented sigh, “You are missing out on the finest delicacies of our little slice of paradise. Truly delicious.”
She didn’t know if the offered rations were actually edible, but it couldn’t hurt. “Just rations and clothes, and then I’ll get you both out of here.”
The woman quickly gathered what Samantha requested and returned. She was glad to find these rations were legitimate food and packed them away for later. The clothes were a bit loose, but fit better than she expected they would. She kept the remnants of her stealth armor over top of the new clothes for the added defense, but knew that she’d need to actively look for a replacement soon.
The couple were adamant that she take along some ‘supplies’ for other survivors, which Samantha happily agreed to do. Seeing the husband consume one of the ‘food’ resources had given her an idea on how to potentially keep the remaining survivors alive for a bit longer, if necessary. She also grabbed a writing instrument and some paper.
“So, which of you shall I take first?”
The couple looked appalled, “First?”
“I can’t carry both of you at once, and the spirit beasts outside are too fast for a mortal to outrun.” she clarified.
Almost comically in-sync, both shook their heads.
“Together, or not at all.” the woman stated firmly.
Samantha sighed. Nothing could ever be easy.
“Now listen here young lass, I’m sure it’s hard for you to understand a love like ours, but you’ll find out some day! This fine woman is my other half, and I’d rather us die together than escape alone.”
The woman nodded enthusiastically in agreement.
“Silas, we’re getting ready to leave soon. How’re things looking out there?” she sent mentally.
“Same as before. Without [Translucence] you’ll be seen right away.”
Samantha rubbed at her face tiredly, “These people won’t leave unless I can take both of them. Do you think you could try and distract the scorpis? Get a bunch of them to chase you like they were chasing me and Trista?”
“Hmmm… if I use [Swift] it should work. How long do you need?”
“No, on second thought… the two minutes you can use [Swift] probably won’t be enough. Besides, the risk to you just for some potential bonus rewards isn’t worth it. I have another idea that might work, though. What do you think about playing a game of keep-away…?”
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Silas gave her the signal and Samantha threw the shop door open. Quickly rounding the corner and approaching the unsuspecting scorpis worker from behind, she crushed its stinging tail and body with a single downward swing of the warhammer. As expected, the head began madly clacking and chittering.
Perfect.
Placing her foot on its torso, she grabbed hold of the fist-sized head and pulled it free from its body. Then, she tossed it high into the air and held it in place for a second with [Telekinesis] as Silas swooped down from above and grabbed hold of it with his talon-like claws. She ducked back into the shop and closed the door, then shared senses with Silas so she could look through his eyes and evaluate their strategy’s effectiveness.
She watched as he flew low to the ground and circled their location a couple of times to make sure anything nearby would be drawn to him. Then, using the chattering head as a lure, he led the gathered mob of nearby scorpis away from the shop. Once he was a fair distance away and most of the spirit beasts in the area had left to pursue him, she stopped sharing senses with Silas, picked up the shopkeeper, and led the way out of the city.
“Hurry, this way! It’s not far.” Samantha encouraged the older woman.
The woman was clearly doing her utmost to run, and Samantha could admit she was keeping a decent pace for a mortal, but it still felt like they were crawling through the streets. In the time it was taking them to move a block Samantha could have already been halfway up the dune.
As they neared the edge of the town and broke free of the building lines they ran into the first sign of trouble. A larger scorpis–which she presumed was a soldier–emerged from behind a building they had passed not long ago. It immediately began chittering and whipping its tail around with agitation.
She quickly set the man down, put herself between them and the spirit beast, and dropped her pack into the sand, “Keep running up and over the dune! I’ll cover you.”
They heeded her instructions and kept running as she rushed back to confront the scorpis. As she neared striking range, its tail twitched oddly and a sharp spike shot out towards the fleeing couple. She immediately activated her sphere of dominion to speed up her perception and focused her intent upon the projectile. The spike was currently on a direct collision course with the center of the woman’s back, but Samantha grabbed hold of it with [Telekinesis] to start pushing it off course. Fighting against the momentum of the flying object was more difficult than she expected. 5 qi barely budged it and 10 qi still moved it much too slowly. Increasing her qi investment higher and higher, the spike finally passed the point of no return and skimmed past the woman so closely that it snagged her clothing before it impacted the sand beside her in a puff of dirt.
With her concentration fully focused on the spike, the scorpis was taking advantage of her inattention. It launched an 'X' shaped slash attack with both bladed arms which cut into her side as she turned her body into a twirling dodge. Afraid that it would launch another projectile at the helpless mortals, she thrust the head of the warhammer into the meat of its segmented tail and pinned it to the ground. She then unsheathed the dagger attached to her thigh and swiped it across a tail joint, smoothly severing it with almost no resistance.
The scorpis started to thrash, but a solid thrust kick to its side saw it stumbling sideways and falling over. Losing its tail seemed to be inhibiting its balance, because it struggled to right itself. Capitalizing on the sign of weakness, Samantha brought the hammer down upon its back to crush its body, then its head to silence it.
In the time that it had taken her to engage the scorpis and kill it, the mortals had only made it a short distance up the dune and struggled to make progress against the shifting sand. Seeing more scorpis begin to come their way in the distance, she sprinted back to the couple and grabbed her pack on the way. Running between and slightly ahead of them she called out, “Grab hold of my pack and don’t let go!”
Once both of them had a firm grip on her bag, she activated [Swift] for traction and pulled them up the dune as quickly as she thought they could handle without losing their grip or injuring themselves trying to hold on.
“W-wait! Something’s wrong.” the woman said, her voice sounding shaky. “My arm…”
She let go of Samantha’s pack and clutched at the spot where the scorpis spike had passed by her. There was now a small, red stain around where the clothing had been ripped. She suddenly turned pale before her eyes rolled back into her head and she started tumbling down the sand dune like a rag doll.
“NO!” her husband cried out as he let go of Samantha’s pack and started chasing her back down the dune.
Samantha could see two more scorpis soldiers emerging from the building line, and she inwardly cursed. By all accounts it seemed the spike was poisoned and Samantha hadn’t managed to divert the attack far enough away. There was no way the woman would survive poison from a Rank 5 spirit beast–something that could take out even Bronze tier cultivators.
With a heavy heart she made the call to abandon her in favor of saving her husband, who still had a fair chance at escape. She reached out before he could get too far away and threw him over her shoulder, then fully committed to fleeing with speed befitting a cultivator. The man screamed in anguish as the scorpis closed in on his wife’s body and began dragging her away. Samantha expected her to dissolve into blue motes at any moment… but that moment never came. The woman’s body remained until the scorpis had pulled her out of sight.
The entire time Samantha carried the man towards the rift exit he kicked her, screamed, punched her, and even tried to bite her. He cursed her as he struggled, but all attempts to free himself or hurt her were completely ineffectual. She barely felt any of it. Her Resilience was simply too high for his attacks to make a notable impact. With a sort of dark humor, she imagined this must be similar to what parents felt when restraining a small child throwing a tantrum.
When she finally set him down, he tried to run past her and back to the dune multiple times. Each time she thwarted his efforts it increased her doubts about if these people were truly constructs or not. The woman hadn’t dissipated when she died, and this husband's grief seemed much too visceral to be anything but sincere.
Perhaps Trista had been real, and just teleported away? Or maybe she was a construct but these people were real. But if they’re real, why did they see her wearing different clothes and why were they able to consume the resources that were unusable to her?
When he finally gave up and collapsed to the ground in a weeping heap, she realized that she, too, was crying.
Does it matter if they’re real or not when my failure to save them hurts just as badly?
Her entire body shook and her throat tightened at the heart wrenching sight. She couldn't help but blame herself.
When Silas made his way back over to them and landed beside her–now without the scorpis head–he rubbed against her to try and comfort her.
“It’s okay! They’re not real, remember? You did your best.”
“I… I don’t know what to think anymore.” she admitted.
The man paused his weeping to throw a handful of sand at her. “MURDERER!” the man screamed, his gaze accusing and filled with hatred, “I could have saved her if you let me go! You killed her! If I just went to her–”
A heavy sob escaped Samantha and she turned away, ashamed.
“I’m sorry.”
He barked out a crazed laugh, “Sorry? SORRY? You think that will ever be enough? I pray this death haunts you until the end of your days. I pray the ghost of my wife keeps you up at night, and that I soon will join her in bringing you unending misery. Now, you’re going to let me walk back there and be with my wife. We go everywhere together... or not at all.”
He walked past, bumping roughly against her as he did. For a moment, she genuinely considered letting him leave. However, she had to be sure of something first.
“Hang onto me Silas.”
Grabbing the man around the waist, she lifted him kicking and screaming and began walking towards the rift exit. Silas jumped onto her back, digging his claws into her clothes to avoid being hit by flailing limbs. If this was some sort of crude teleport, her holding onto him should prevent it from activating. If it was a higher tier teleport like ascending floors, holding onto him should also teleport her and Silas to wherever he was going. So, if he dissolved into motes of light but she and Silas remained here, he had to be a construct. He had to be… right?
Stepping as close to the rift exit as she dared, she waited to see what would happen. After a few seconds, the man’s form started to lose color and he began to dissolve just as Trista had. He cursed her the entire time he was fading away, with his final words being ‘I hope you suffer’.
Quest progress updated!
Hostiles Remaining: 148/150
Survivors Rescued (Optional): 2
She fell to her knees and punched a fist into the sand with an angry scream.
Whoever made this quest was a monster.