Alin didn’t like Brittney’s light wings spell for the sole reason that they were under her control.
It had nothing to do with his trust level, which was as high as it could be because his dad wouldn’t have included her or Michael if they were in any way a threat.
“Careful! It’s building up mana!” Brittney gestured, hands moving like a dancer.
Michael’s yellow light wings carried him to her left, while Alin’s took him to her right.
Arrows rained down on the mole mother and her wriggling young.
Despite being newly born, judging from the disgusting afterbirths scattered all over the chamber floor, they moved quite well as they scurried toward the floating trio.
Alin squeezed short, controlled bursts from his AK.
Loud, but bearable in the large chamber.
He certainly wouldn’t have used it in the tunnels.
Those were for the gray and its ability to drain life.
Small sips, he thought… then shuddered at the mental image as he pulled from the mole monsters on the ground and those hiding in the earth and stone.
Pale pink flesh became splattered with red as bullets and arrows struck home.
“Incoming!”
Yellow light shimmered in front of Brittney.
Just in time as the air around the star-shaped tip of the mole mother’s snout rippled.
A cone of distortion shot up to engulf Brittney.
Her magic shield vibrated as her mouth worked silently.
“Sonic attack!” Michael called out.
The rest of the team arrived out of the large hole in the ceiling.
Ellis caught them with a platform of earth and stone.
Galen shouted orders.
Guns out, frags out.
The mole monsters squealed.
Loud noises not of their own making must’ve hurt sensitive ears and maybe even those fine, vibration sensing whiskers on their snouts.
Gob tossed grenades, then switched to his assault rifle with the usual blank look.
Steph was wide-eyed and a bit wild with his shooting.
Cold mist swept out from Galen’s outstretched hand.
“Mages start freezing!”
Frost began to coat the mole monsters.
The mother broke off from her attack on Brittney to aim the vibration wave at the Mist Spekters on the earthen platform hanging from the ceiling.
“They’re coming!” Ellis warned.
Mole monsters in the walls and ceilings began to emerge as the stone mage struggled to play whack-a-mole, trying to seal the holes shut before they could emerge.
Alin hesitated.
Everyone had to contributed to earn rewards.
It would’ve been too easy for them had he just drained all the monsters to near death.
Thus, he waited and watched, only draining those that looked close to striking deadly blows.
“I have to let you guys down!” Brittney cried out. “It took a lot out of me to block its attack.”
“Don’t worry!” Michael shot an arrow that turned into a rain, turning the mole monsters emerging out of a 10 meter radius into pink and red pincushions.
Alin drained the life out of the ones that survived.
“Drop me,” he nodded to Brittney.
He emptied his magazine and dropped the AK in favor of his longsword.
Steel, not Threnium, with a freezing enchantment.
A baby mole monster the size of a large dog lunged.
He cleaved it in twain.
More charged.
He cut a horizontal arc in front of him, activating the enchantment with a thought.
High level enchanters like Heddy didn’t need to rely on spoken trigger words. He just had to say the word in his head.
Galen’s cold mist turned into a spiked, crystalline barrier that the mole monsters impaled themselves on.
Alin shuffled forward, shattering the ice with a single blow.
He suppressed a grimace.
That wasn’t how he had been taught to treat his swords.
Oh well, he had several back ups for a reason.
Even Heddy couldn’t enchant basic metal to last forever.
The enchantments took their toll with every activation.
He cut mole monsters with precise downward strikes.
Low level superhuman strength was more then enough combined with sharp steel to sever vertebrae with economical swings.
Ears burst suddenly.
The mole mother loomed.
He leapt back, dodging giant claws that gouged deep into stone.
The boss monster swept upward.
Stone chunks pelted him.
Blue light flashed as his magic shield charms activated automatically.
He pulled from her causing her to stumble.
A glance to the ceiling.
The battle up there looked well in hand.
Pink mole monsters dripped red rain from where Ellis and Dat had trapped them in the earth and stone while the others had shot them with bullets and spells.
Elsewhere, Michael continued to fill mole monsters with arrows, while Brittney did the same with spells of yellow light.
“Focus fire on the boss!” Galen bellowed. “Get clear, Alin!”
Didn’t have to tell him twice.
One super leap carried him over 10 meters away.
That wasn’t enough for his comfort so he sprinted away as everyone else turned the mole mother into a pink and red smear across the chamber floor.
The cool temperature meant that the frost-covered mole monster corpses thawed slowly.
“Heal checks. Alin, start mapping our way out.” Galen’s gaze unfocused as he interacted with the spires’ interface.
The plan had been set last night.
Turn the spawn zone back into an encounter challenge.
Don’t attempt to gain ownership by taking on the true boss monster.
They had accomplished their goal and it hadn’t taken more than 2 hours.
Galen blinked. “Grab your personal rewards, but make it quick. Bag the team ones. We’ll deal with them back in the city.”
The return trip up the tunnels was a lot quicker.
Mole monsters barely slowed them down.
Picking up random and sometimes hidden items took longer.
It was the standard fare for a spires-generated encounter challenge.
Precious metals in the form of small bits of raw ore or an eclectic mix of coins from many worlds judging by the markings.
Raw gems and crystals or ones pre-enchanted with a magical element.
Gear, like weapons and armor, of varying quality from a mix of world, just like the coins.
Nothing stood out in particular upon quick appraisal.
Some of the enchanted items might be useful as replacements for the Mist Spekters lacking better gear. Plus, it’d help sell the cover story.
Murderhobo companies tended to wield and wear a motley assortment of gear as they continuously upgraded through their hauls.
They returned to a staging area that was awash in activity like a hive of wasps knocked out of a tree.
Gun smoke filled the air.
Bodies littered the ground.
People shouted to cease shooting as bullets and spells crisscrossed the landscape.
Aimee cursed.
They were still a long distance away from their temporary camp, which was shrouded by dark smoke.
“They look alright, but it looks like they got attacked,” she said. “Everyone else is shooting at everyone else.”
“Do you have eyes on the soldiers?” Galen said.
“Hard to see with their camo and, I think, a few Skills, but they’re hunkered down behind their little hill. Not shooting at anyone.”
“Decoys. Michael first. Then Brittney. Then you, Alin. Bubble of silence, please?”
The spell cut the noise immediately.
Michael stepped out to loose an arrow over the battlefield before quickly jumping back.
Even he didn’t want to experience the screamer arrow.
Brittney went next, sticking a hand out to cast a bright, strobing orb of yellow light over all their heads.
Alin was ready.
The gray had swept out to encompass the combatants.
He drained them into unconsciousness in seconds.
Most of the Level 40 and above that could have resisted had gone down into the caverns or on the above ground trails.
All that had remained were those groups too weak to claim a spot with the exception of the old American soldiers pretending to be an independent mercenary company.
Those he left alone.
If all had gone to plan, they’d think that the arrow and the light were responsible for knocking out the fighting.
“They’re all out.”
“Time?” Galen said.
“Minutes.”
“Let’s hurry to camp.”
Chrome’s golem waved as they approached.
Its armor plating was covered in scorch marks and liberally dented.
The trucks were in no better condition.
One was a burning hulk that Chrome had evidently dragged a short distance away to keep it from setting the other vehicles on fire.
The ambient heat burned away Alana’s mist cloud as fast as she could cast it.
Red dripped down her face creating a ghastly mask.
Bodies littered the ground.
Alin held his breath as he blanketed the entire area with the gray.
Relief released.
No Mist Spekters lay dead.
“No critical injuries.”
“Threats are down! Heals on! We’ll cover defense!” Galen barked. “What happened?”
Alana wiped at her eyes.
Head cuts bled freely, often times making them look worse than they were, but one couldn’t ever take head wounds for granted. It was hard to tell if it was just a cut or blunt impact that damaged the brain.
Her eyes didn’t look dilated, so that was a good sign.
Alin probed with the gray, getting a sense of how badly everyone was hurt.
Kat was somewhere to the rear of the camp.
Her heart pumped, but she was on her feet and moving around well.
Brittney placed a heal on Alana in passing as the repentant mage made her way into the interior of the temporary camp.
“Thanks.” Alana took a deep breath. “We were attacked. Alpha Dogs, Pen Is Mightier, Swords For Days, Crimson Garden, a few other idiotic murderhobo groups that I didn’t catch. Basically, half the trash that didn’t snag a spot took their shot at us. The other half either tried to keep their heads down or hit whoever else was closest. Sorry, captain, this is going to be a mess.”
“Don’t be. We didn’t do anything to make them attack.” Galen eyed the devastation.
Alin had seen worse on many other occasions.
However, he couldn’t argue that the devastation was utter for those dead on the dirt.
He couldn’t help but think about if they had families or people they cared about out there relying on the hauls from their various adventures and delves.
His dad would take care of it.
The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
That knowledge made it easier.
“What did the soldiers do?” Galen’s gaze fell on the small hill and the observant men and women watching them through the mist and smoke.
Alin had made his fog visible to obscure the camp’s visibility from the outside and to further sell the Mist Spekters name.
“If you’re asking if they instigated this whole thing?” Alana sighed. “Then I have no idea. What I can say is that they didn’t join the fighting.”
He exchanged a glance with Galen.
They hadn’t seen it coming.
His dad had scanned the people in Carlsbad about a week and a half ago and hadn’t picked up any sort of clandestine threat, which meant the murderhobo attack had been a recently planned thing, maybe even that day.
It wasn’t like his dad could shadow them every step of their journey. He was a busy man with nightmarish horrors around the world to deal with on a nearly daily basis.
As it was the attack was fairly typical murderhobo behavior.
“Even if the Americans had nothing to do with it, they’ll use it,” he said. “They’ll look to recruit survivors and use it to push Carlsbad to reunification.”
“The latter doesn’t concern us, but we could use the former,” Galen said. “If there were secret dealings then we need to get our hands on said survivors before they do. Proof that the old Americans are using independent mercs to hit other independent mercs will hurt their rep with the roaming murderhobo community.”
“I don’t know that it would matter. Those kinds of people only care about two things,” Alana said. “Wealth and power. They’ll go with whatever gets them levels as quickly as possible. I’m more concerned with the fact that they might have decided we’re already a threat. Enough to want to take us out.”
“Either way, it works for the plan,” Galen said.
----------------------------------------
A dingy bar.
Loud music.
The clacking of pool balls against each other.
Laughter.
Anger.
Then laughter again.
Beer and liquor flowed freely.
It had been a few weeks since that blow up out at the caverns.
The top groups, with the exception of the ex-soldiers, that were sketchy in as much as they didn’t carry themselves well enough to sell the ‘ex’ part or rather, they carried themselves too much like professionals, had missed out.
When they had emerged all that was left were charred pockmarks in the dirt, smoke in the air and the stench of battle.
Turned out some of the hungriest teams tried to take a bite out of the new kids on the block with what looked like better gear for being so new.
That golem alone had everyone licking their chops.
Stupid though.
A quick appraisal would have told them that the machine didn’t come without the pilot.
As for the robot horse?
Tempting, but again, one had to be realistic about the risks.
A normal horse with rider Skills was dangerous enough.
The robot one apparently had sharp teeth, hooves that shot out like power hammers, guns, missiles and laser-fucking-eyes.
Cutthroat Dan sipped her beer.
“Idiots,” she muttered.
The Mist Spekters had taken off almost immediately.
Still, they did bring the bodies back to the city.
Didn’t have to do that.
She probably would’ve left them for the monsters out in the desert.
Would’ve served them right for randomly attacking a group that looked like it could take care of itself.
She had bought the bar’s services for the rest of the month.
Her crew deserved the break.
Let the rest of the desert rats complain.
Cheap price too.
Especially with their haul from the spawn zone.
Lost a few men and women, sucked for the families, but she had already sent their shares over the spires.
It’d keep them alright for a few years.
After that, well, hopefully the crew kept growing and raking in the loot.
The benefits package for next of kin needed maintaining and she didn’t like to think about it, but it’d be the first thing to go if they ever ran into hard times.
Sorta made the government’s offer almost palatable to her rather freedom-loving palate.
Once again, she considered the offer from that guy out west somewhere.
Very generous.
However, a gilded cage was still a cage.
Too many rules.
Her kind of adventurer… no, murderhobo— a smile crossed her face— she remembered a younger Danielle, playing games on her computer. She always did two playthroughs. The first was so she could just go around explore the digital world, while killing everything and everyone she came across.
The name was apt.
Even if the older Danielle out in the real world hadn’t quite gone to those depths.
Sure, she had opened up plenty of second smiles on men, women and monsters, but she could hold her head high and say that most of them deserved it one way or another.
“You sure about that?”
Her eyes widened.
A man sat across from her at the small, round, bar table.
“The beer, I mean,” he pointed. “It’s getting warm. American swill is meant to be downed fast, while it’s still cold. Need to dull the tastes, you know?”
“The fuck are you?” her hand shot to the double-edge dagger in her underarm sheath.
Eyes darted around the bar.
None of her crew— they were just carrying on.
Drinking contests.
Pool.
Dancing.
Terrible singing.
Even worse flirting.
None of them were paying any attention to the random man seated across from her.
“I’m a person with information that I believe people should know. So, please relax. I promise I mean you no harm at this moment.”
To her surprise, she did.
The voice in her head seemed to be telling her that the guy was telling the truth.
She took a moment to assess him.
Short.
Brown skin, black hair.
Young-ish.
Maybe?
Face looked as old as 30 and as young as 20.
Eyes suggested that they had seen a lot more than that.
Attractive enough.
Had that thick, wrestler neck that high school Danielle had liked.
Cutthroat Dan wouldn’t have kicked him out of bed on the rare occasions she felt like indulging.
“I’m not interested in anything that’ll cost me.”
“But, you’ve picked up quite a haul from what I’ve heard? Enough to last a year of doing nothing. Two if you’re frugal. As much as five if you decided to live like an ascetic.”
“I don’t risk my life to deprive myself of the good stuff. It’s already too short as it is.”
“Not for you.”
She snorted. “Luck. Plenty of less lucky people at my back. Dragging me down.” She scowled.
That had been too honest.
It wasn’t like her.
“You some kind of therapist?”
“No,” he laughed. “At least not by choice.”
“Whatever, man. You got something to say, then say it, but I’m not paying. You want a beer, you buy it yourself.”
“Oh? I thought drinks are on you.”
“You aren’t one of my crew, so you pay.”
“Well, I’d imagine what I have is worth at least a beer.”
“I’ll be the judge of that.”
The man slowly reached into his pants pocket.
“I know, bit of ancient technology, but you should have the means to access them.”
She gave him a flat look.
A USB drive and a Micro SD.
He slid them to her side of the table.
“Pictures and recordings. Edited a bit to protect trade secrets, but I’m sure there are tech savvy people in this city that you can go to for verification that none of it is fake.”
“Of what?”
She snatched the items and stuffed them in her pocket before he could change his mind about the free part.
The slow rattlesnake missed the desert mouse as the local saying went.
“Of what the American government is up to underneath Salt Lake City… was up to. Don’t worry about your home. They’re not doing anything underneath you at the moment, but I’d keep an eye and ear on those Redstone guys.”
“So, they’re working for the old gov? Like, directly? Or on a contract?”
“They’re technically separated from the Combined Armed Forces working on a PMC contract just to get around truth spells and Skills if it ever comes up, but don’t be mistaken, everything they do is to forward the agenda of the old gov. Particularly, Rightful Destiny.”
“Assholes,” she muttered. “They have anything to do with the dumbasses taking a shot at the Mist Spekters?”
“Encouraging words were provided, but that soldier is long gone.”
She narrowed her eyes. “As in… gone gone?”
“No idea where. Used a demigod portal.” He shrugged.
Shit was fucked!
This guy was talking about scary high level stuff with the same energy that Robert talked about what his stupid little rat dog got around to.
“What do you want?”
“Nothing. Beyond you taking a look at what’s in those.” He eyed her breast pocket. “And to think about future possibilities based on it.”
“That’s it?”
“Yeah.” He stood slowly, like she was a skittish cat looking for any reason to bolt. “Oh, one more thing. You’re not the only one getting those. Riggs is next. Followed by a few others. Then the city council’s office.”
“They open this late?”
“Emergency meeting concerning Redstone and the revocation of their permission to operate out of here.”
She raised a brow at that.
The city militia was emphatically not up to Redstone’s standard.
That was a pounding waiting to happen and not the fun kind.
“You trying to get us roped into that mess?”
“Not at all. There will be no violence. Redstone will leave, willingly or not.”
The man walked out the door.
He had to go through the front of the packed bar to do it.
She watched him all the way.
Reminded her of the video on her old laptop she had saved for a reason she had forgotten long ago.
One where a shark swam through a thick school of fish that moved out of its way as if it had a terror field around it.
Those things were legit.
Terror fields.
She had fought monsters with them.
It was unnerving to have your limbs moving on their own despite how much willpower one thought they had.
Luck.
Only reason she was still around to remember those times.
Unlike so many others.
The man vanished out the door.
She glanced at the glass case on the wall.
Ancient memorabilia.
Signed photos of random famous people, probably.
Old footballs.
A pair of boxing gloves.
And one reflection of a sun-worn woman’s face with more gray in her hair than the original brown.
She reached for her glass in disgust.
Gnarled fingers from a long life of violence.
Scars crisscrossing wrinkled hands.
Veins and sinews stood out.
Every bit of softness she might’ve had once had been wrung out. Dried by the harsh desert sun.
She looked over her shoulder.
A bad habit in the introspective times.
Hands gripping her shoulders, her hair.
Pleading eyes.
Angry eyes.
Ghosts of the unlucky.
Weighing her down like always.
She whistled.
The music stopped a few moments later as her crew looked to her with varying levels of alacrity depending on how many sheets to the wind they were.
“Got a place for a private conversation?” she eyed the bar owner.
The old man’s eyes widened.
She sighed. “Not with you. I don’t have any complaints. It’s for me and my command staff.”
“My office alright?”
“That’ll do just fine.” She stood and strode over to place a gold coin in the old man’s hand. It was one of the weird ones from another world she just happened to get. Pretty rare unless one was running some of the higher level challenges and zones. The mid to low level ones usually gave out Earth stuff.
The old man shrugged and bit the coin.
Satisfied, he handed her a key.
“All the way down the hall to your right.”
“Thanks.”
Her command staff followed her with varying levels of sobriety.
“If you can’t see straight-ish, then head back to the party. You’re useless otherwise. We’ll fill you in tomorrow.”
Part of her chastised herself about jumping when a rando told her to.
However, something in the stranger’s eyes had said that she’d regret being slow on this.
Slow snakes didn’t eat and she wasn’t ready to crawl out into the desert to die.
----------------------------------------
Washington, D.C. Spring 2055
President T.K. George sat in his office.
Not the oval one, but one down the hall.
It was just him and the general in charge of the southwest theater of operations.
General Martha Jonson.
Surprisingly young and more surprisingly woman.
Which was great!
A sign of the times.
He had run on a platform that catered more to the youth rather than the old dinosaurs.
The general looked to be in her 40’s, age not level.
Hard to level that sort of class when victorious battles and what not were hard to come by.
So, she wasn’t that much older than him.
It felt good to sit across from a peer.
A good change to what it usually was.
The Joint Chiefs must be fuming to know that he was taking the meeting directly with General Jonson.
“Ah… I just want to be clear that none of this is going over anyone’s heads?” he clarified. The old guard tended to be touchy about attacks on their authority, perceived or legitimate.
“No, Mr. President. My superior wanted me to express his… concerns… about the unorthodox nature of this, but it all fits proper protocol.”
Of course it did.
He didn’t get his allies in the House and Senate to pass those changes for the hell of it.
“Good. So, convince me on the necessity of your plans, general.”
“Houston is ours.”
Which was crucial to get oil production and refinement back up to where it needed to be. Granted their needs weren’t pressing at the moment considering the fact that their military vehicles spent most of their time in hiding from random destruction from above. However, they had to plan for the future when said randoms were no longer an issue.
“We have half of Dallas and should have it all by the end of the year. San Antonio is a mix of lawless elements and rampant spawn zones. Austin— is a threat to the operation to retake San Antonio.”
“They’ve been steadfast in proclaiming neutrality and haven’t acted otherwise.”
“That is irrelevant, sir, respectfully. Rightful Destiny can’t make exceptions.”
“Sure, but there’s no reason to rush things when the passage of time could take us to the ends we desire.”
“I’m sure you’re aware of Austin’s ties to the Golden Eagles mercenary company and further ties to our enemies in California.”
“Yes, yes. We did declare war.”
Honestly, had there not been an 8-foot-tall demigod standing over his shoulder, that whole war thing probably would’ve gone differently.
Then again, without said demigod those superpowered people would’ve rolled his military right over like a hollowed out log.
“Rightful Destiny gives you the legal authority to act with immediate effect,” General Jonson said.
He wondered if the demigod had been in her ear.
Probably.
The Eidolon of Salla… almost certainly was.
That one represented one of the gods of war.
Generals were right up that wheelhouse.
“The operational plans?”
She reached into her briefcase and placed a thick stack on his desk.
“I’ll read it with my advisers, but give me a quick overview, like I’m a kid.”
“We use monsters, the rabbits and our allies. Whatever is left of Austin will have no choice but to come back to where they belong.”
“Or go west.”
“Regardless, the city will be empty for us to reclaim. The largest potential threat will be gone. Texas will be under our full control.”
“Does it strike you as odd that our otherworldly allies no longer seem to care about pushing our enemies?
“Sir?”
“It’s just that the eidolons used to be so circumspect with the actions they encouraged or discouraged. Ever since the demigod arrived… well, do you think some of these operations are a bit too… provocative?”
“We’re at war, Mr. President. No action in pursuit of victory can be taken as such. They are an existential threat to our way of life. When you’re facing something like that you have to fight with everything you have at your disposal. No matter how distasteful you might find it.”
He regarded the general.
The positive feeling toward her faded away at the fire in her eyes.
A true believer.
Always dangerous.
Useful, but dangerous.
“You are dismissed general.”
“Thank you, sir.”
She stood and saluted.
He stared at the plan for a few minutes before reluctantly picking it up and heading to his more oval office.
To no surprise an unexpected guest waited for him.
The Eidolon of Sunor stood like a million dollar statue in front of his desk.
He bowed at the waist.
“Honored eidolon.”
“The plan will proceed. You have 6 hours to review it and send out official orders.”
“Ah…” he sat down.
She didn’t need to say more.
He did what she said or he’d lose a bit more of his perceived authority over the country.
The people of Austin had until the summer to enjoy a relatively conflict free existence.