Chapter Forty-Three – The Copper Coop
Where do the chickens come from? Turtle man down! Too early for bacon. Playing dodge vomit. The Copper Key. The four bells.
Sal stood at the entrance of the dragon’s lair, only it was the strangest dragon he’d ever seen. It had a beak and stubby little wings and had a very chicken-like appearance, despite it being scaly like a classic dragon. Around its neck hung a large copper key, the prize of the Tower floor, which would unlock the doors that would lead up to the silver level.
As for it being a lair, it had the size for it. However, instead of being a gloomy cave, it was a brightly lit place with bright metal walls, catching every bit of light. The ceiling arched overhead, far bigger than it should’ve been. That’s where the dragon was, on a platform hanging from the ceiling with huge, man-sized links of bronze chains. Underneath the chicken dragon, there were rows of cages on either side of a central aisle.
Sal was in a very strange kind of chicken coop, which he could confirm was an actual chicken coop, since he’d recently visited such a place for impromptu dance lessons. The cage doors were all thrown open, and they were surprisingly nice, polished wood, fitted with copper hinges, well-crafted thanks to the magic governing the place. Bright lanterns shined on top of the cages, one for every cage.
In front of the cages were treasure chests, covered in feathers and filth, with shovels leaning against them.
On the floor were a variety of monster chickens, about the size of large dogs, covered in copper armor. Their natural sharp claws were augmented with copper blades, and their beaks were extra sharp thanks to metal helmets that covered their faces. There were a dozen demonically armored chickens, about to attack the new Astounders, who were hiding behind huge copper-stained bins, stained with chicken droppings.
It was a smelly place to take refuge, but they had little choice. Behind them were huge copper doors, sealed shut, without doorknobs or keyholes. They reminded Sal of the doors that he’d managed to access because he’d had the copper coin.
They’d already killed a whole batch of the chicken monsters, and there were armored corpses everywhere, some hacked to death with swords, others burned with magical flame. Ronnel, the Primo archer, must’ve survived the entire level because many of the dead chickens had arrows in their craws. Yes, there was his body, half-melted in a pool of cooling liquid copper.
One section of the cages was smoldering, the wood seconds from catching. Was the room about to be reset? That generally wasn’t the case, or so he thought, not until the next party was a room or two away. Or maybe he was wrong about that. Maybe the entire dungeon reset itself every four hours, but he didn’t think so.
Sal shouted out across the room. “Kaixo, I have arrived! What can I do to aid you?”
“Did you bring bacon?” she called out.
“I have indeed!”
Sal regretted his shouting. The room was too bright for his Umbra Cloak to work. There was no melting into the shadows, and he realized he had a problem.
The dozen or so chickens had turned to see who had shown up to save the day. They all squawked, as did the dragon above.
Sparky joined in, croaking and making panicked shrieking noises. He seemed to be trying to get the monsters’ attention.
It wasn’t going to work because Sal was out in the open and the rest of the party had taken refuge behind the stained and stinking copper bins.
Sal didn’t pause but leapt into the closest cage and slammed it close. There was a locking mechanism on the outside, and he quickly reached through the bars and slammed it shut. The chickens came at the cage, trying to lift the latch with their metal-enhanced beaks.
Sal managed to brandish the Fear Blade. “Verily, chicken fiends, you must flee before my fearsome weapon.”
The chickens did scream in fear, and ran away, but a second later, the dragon itself came flying down on tiny flapping wings. It slammed onto the ground and let out a squawking roar.
Sal stared into the craw of the chicken dragon. Molten copper dripped down the thing’s beak, and in the back of its throat, more copper was bubbling up. So that’s where the copper puddles came from! This thing spat molten copper, or was it more like regurgitating copper? Or was Sal overthinking things? In the end, he simply didn’t want to be covered in molten metal vomit, and yet, the thing was about to unload the contents of its stomach onto him.
The Fear Blade didn’t work on the chicken dragon, obviously, and for Sal, there was nowhere to run.
A message flashed before his eyes.
<<<>>>
Wow! Talk About Being a Good Guy! Karmic Gauge increased by 25%. You are literally risking your life for your friends, knowing full well you can’t harm even a single cog in a lady copper golem with that magic sword of yours.
Current Karmic Gauge: 26% (Orange and Getting Oranger!)
<<<>>>
At least he wouldn’t die with his Gauge in the red. He thought he would probably get more points if he survived his molten copper bath. Maybe.
Sparky then flew right into the huge dragon’s eyes, scratching, biting, and breathing fire.
That little dragon saved Sal’s life without a doubt.
Kaixo appeared in a blur of motion thanks to the Speed Boots on her feet. She had the cage door open, and she was pulling him out, and then they were rolling across the floor.
The rest of the party had come storming out of hiding. They ran into the middle of the armored chickens.
Theovanni ran out with most of his body covered by that ridiculously large shield. Chickens fluttered to try and scratch his eyes out. The shield glowed white, giving him a shell of magic. With such a powerful shield, he probably didn’t even need the plate mail. Chickens bounced off the force field around him, the kid had his sword out, and he was slashing through chickens, left and right.
The big Torta warrior and his two-handed mace, he was crushing chickens in their armor, turning them into tinned chicken, something that Sal had eaten during a few of the longer campaigns. Sal was surprised to see how effective the hardened leather hauberk and bamboo armor was.
Boomboom was also smashing armored chickens with his painted war hammer, which struck with a magical explosion every time it hit. It almost sounded like popcorn as it snapped, crackled, and popped through the armored demon birds. Chickens tried to rip through his magical chainmail, but the links held.
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But they still had that dragon to take care of. The beast had leapt off the floor, fluttering its feathery wings to return to the platform above. It then screamed as copper eggs came tumbling off the platform, striking the stone, and cracking open.
It took a minute for Sal to realize the dragon was laying those eggs.
Newly hatched chicken monsters burst out, shrieking. The metal eggs liquefied, covering the new chickens in their armor. So the armor was their old eggshells. Now that was a rather clever way of conserving resources.
The dragon spat molten copper at them, and Sal’s Youngin Reflexes kicked in. He pulled Kaixo to her feet and they ran to the cages on the other side of the room.
A chicken tried to attack them. Sparky dove into the monster and both went rolling across the floor.
Sal found himself shocked. He was in the middle of a battle for his very life, and he found his heart pounding. Breathing was hard, and yet, at the same time, he loved how he felt. It was the song of adrenaline! He couldn’t hurt the dragon, but so far, he’d only been rewarded for coming to help his friends.
He wasn’t sure of the rules, but he was only sure of one thing. He grabbed Kaixo by the arm. “I have come bearing the Skycrack Wand and a willingness to aid you.”
She rolled her eyes. “Always with the fancy words. Did you bring any Pork Power?”
Sal opened his bag to see the bacon wrapped in a napkin at the very top. “Verily, I have brought a strip of the Bacon Buff, but it hasn’t been twenty-four hours, and I do not have a Gimm timepiece. How will we know when you can eat more to get the benefits?”
Kaixo then flung up a hand, triggering the Shield Ring. Above her appeared a dome of pink light. molten copper ran down the side of the rivulets to sizzle on the ground.
The Yaniri sorceress was sweating heavily. “Give me the bacon and the wand and keep the dragon busy. Try and stop it from laying any more eggs. I’ll give Boom the bacon, and I’ll use the wand. We’ll get a warning message when the four o’clock climbers come in.”
Sal wasn’t sure what that meant, but he did know that Kaixo wouldn’t be able to eat more of the bacon. Boomboom, however, was a likely candidate for his magical food.
A second later, Kaixo had both the wand and the Pork Power, and they were running away from the dragon.
This wasn’t the first time he’d had to fight against such a fearsome monster. There had been this mountain leviathan he’d faced, but he’d had any number of spells back then. Still, if his job was to keep the thing busy, he could do that.
And he could help out the other members of the New Astounders. He ran through the armored chickens, waving the Fear Blade around. The chickens squawked, flapped their wings, and fled.
He turned just in time to face the dragon, and that huge beak, which came snapping at him. Left, right, left right, ducking dodging, and Sal was using every bit of his magically enhanced reflexes, though some of it was his old combat training from his time as a Dark Lord.
He then went running back through the chickens with the dragon chicken chasing after him. Each of the other members of the New Astounders went to pounding on the dragon chicken, though it struck back, flinging the Torta, Testu Hemez, back against the cages.
The dragon then turned and sprayed the poor turtle guy with molten copper.
Testu managed to dodge some, but not all of the terrible attacks. The pain soon overwhelmed the turtle man, and thankfully, he fell unconscious.
Theo sped over and hacked into the dragon. The kid made sure that he had the dragon’s complete attention, and he did. The chicken beast tried to eat the dragonrider, starting with the shield. It was a bad place to start. The shield was spitting white energy, but it was keeping the kid safe.
Kaixo raced over to Boomboom, holding out the bacon. “Eat this! And heal Torta! Otherwise we’re all dead!”
The priest grinned. “Bad time to be eating anything. And what’s bacon?”
“Pork!” Kaixo yelled.
Theo’s shield magic vanished, and then the dragon started testing out that plate mail even as the kid hacked at the dragon.
Kaixo raised the Skycrack wand. She shouted, “Crack it!” Thunder exploded in the room, and lightning went forking out from the wand, missing the dragon completely. The electricity hit the cages, sparking off the doors, and scorching the wind. At least nothing caught fire.
Sal remembered that Shivaun’s mage wasn’t very good using the wand, and he’d wondered about that. Now he realized that it would take some practice getting it right.
It was a poor time to realize such a thing.
Theovanni was about to be ripped apart by the thing.
Kaixo saw the same thing. She stowed the wand and used the Mercury Boots. She sped forward and suddenly a length of chain appeared in her hands. It was a chain whip with a dagger at the end, pointed and razor sharp. She flung the chain whip dagger first and it smacked into the chicken dragon’s head. It snapped its head around to see who had dared to hurt it.
Sal didn’t pause. He sped forward, thinking that maybe they didn’t have to kill the chicken dragon. The point of the entire level was to retrieve the copper key around the beast’s neck.
Sal had the Fear Blade out, and that kept the chickens from him. He raced forward and instead of attacking the dragon, he shoved the blade against the ribbon holding the key to the dragon’s neck.
A flick of his sword cut through the ribbon. The key fell to the floor, clanging like a large bell.
Kaixo sped forward and picked it up. It was a huge key, the size of her arm, and Sal wasn’t sure what he thought would happen, but nothing seemed to change.
The armored chickens fluttered back in, and Theovanni batted several out of the sky while Sparky attacked another one. That poor mini dragon was scratched and bleeding, but still the brave little guy fought on.
Torta was back on his feet, thanks to Boomboom and the slice of bacon.
And it was only because the turtle warrior was there that Sal wasn’t bit in half. Yes, the former Dark Lord had freed the key, but he was right next to the beast.
Torta smacked the dragon’s side, as did Boomboom.
The dragon smacked Torta away, and then opened his beak to breathe a torrent of molten copper death right at the priest. His magical chainmail wasn’t going to save him.
Sal ran as fast as he could and threw himself into the healer.
Both wound up on the floor with the dragon towering over them. There was no way they were going to stop that thing. They’d hardly scratched it, and Kaixo tried the wand again, and this time, managed to send lightning into the platform. She was useless with that wand.
Yes, they had the key, but there didn’t seem to be a place to use it.
The Dark Lord stared up into the dragon’s beak coming down at him even as the message filled his vision.
<<<>>>
Wow! Karmic Gauge increased by 50%. You put yourself in harm’s way to save that guy! Impressive!
Current Karmic Gauge: 76% (A Very Righteous Blue!)
<<<>>>
Unseen bells clanged, so loudly, that one of the sections of cages crashed to the floor.
The chicken dragon turned its head, seemingly confused.
The armored chickens retreated to their cages, totally giving up on the fight.
The bells clanged again, and that sent the dragon flying up onto its platform, where it hid its head under its wing.
Theovanni stood, gasping for beath, with Sparky on his shoulder. “What’s going on, Mr. Fang?”
Sal had no idea, but Betty did. He’d been in Sal’s pocket the entire time. “If you have the key, and if the four o’clock climbers are here, it seems that we might’ve beaten this level!”
Torta came staggering over, and would’ve fallen, if he hadn’t used his big mace as a cane. Boomboom limped over as well. He was going to need to dole out a whole new round of heal spells.
The bells clanged a third, then a fourth time. The chimes of happy music followed, a full orchestra, playing too loudly for them to talk and hear each other.
The armored chickens vanished in a flash of light, their armor clattering to the floor. The chicken dragon also disappeared, though it left behind the molten copper in its belly. It splashed down from the platform onto the floor.
Sal and the rest of the New Astounders sped away to avoid the torrent.
The sealed doors on the other side of the bins full of chicken droppings opened, and Gail Questor came out, all six feet of gaunt sorceress, with a somewhat disinterested look on her face. “Oh, look, there are survivors. That is somewhat surprising. You were the New Astounders?”
Kaixo came up with her chain whip dagger in her hands. “We are the New Astounders you mean,” she said defiantly.
Gail nodded and consulted her clipboard. “So there are four survivors. You have the one corpse.” She motioned to Ronnel’s body. “Do you want me to take it, or do you want us to get rid of it?”
Kaixo contemplated the body for a second, and then shrugged. “All of Ronnel’s family had already left Allbreath quite a while ago. I don’t think the Primogeny care all that much about having the actual body at the funeral. We’ll do a tasteful memorial service. We’re fine with that.”
Sal realized that she’d counted him as one of the members, and hadn’t considered Amira Torrey in the hallway of traps.
Gail made some marks on her clipboard. “Very well. You have fifteen minutes to loot the room, and then we’ll reset it. It will take a while for the four o’clockers to get here. Then I’ll escort you out. Congratulations on getting the Copper Key. It is an impressive accomplishment, given how many have tried and failed.”
She kept the door open but meandered out, flipping pages on her clipboard, like she was taking inventory at a general store in Caya Idle and not managing the world’s most incredible tower.