‘Uh-oh.’
A half-dozen floating, conjured swords stopped spinning in mid-air to point squarely at me, then shot in my direction. I surprised myself by jumping to the floor while the swords flew overhead, opening my usual portals not between me and the swords but between Val and the ones flying towards her. The weapons shot through the portal and out at a wall, in which they became buried—but seconds later, they began trying to yank themselves back out again.
Somewhere between six and ten conjured weapons shot towards each member of the Slayers. I’d avoided the first wave, and I’d saved Val from the same, but the other three were having more trouble. Lore desperately swung his wide blade to parry the attacks of the floating weapons, and Corminar cowered behind the quartermaster’s desk, frantically kicking the swords away as they approached. Only Arzak, of all of us, seemed to have a more viable long-term strategy.
The orc parried some of the conjured weapons away with her old sword, but she also used the enchanted sword that I’d given her to suck—for lack of a better word—the floating blades into it. From the looks of it, she could only capture the magicks of one weapon at a time, but with every conjured weapon that she sucked in, her new sword glowed brighter. Even though it was a slow process, she was whittling down the enemy’s attack, and every little helped.
The swords that had flown over my head turned in mid-air and swerved back towards me, and this time I again dove to the floor, but also opened a pair of portals to “catch” the attacks. The portal caught the conjured weapons in mid-attack and sent them soaring towards the last three Goldmarch soldiers—the conjurer included. While the weapons pierced two of the soldiers, sending them stumbling backwards into the wall and pinning them there, the swords passed straight through the woman that had conjured them.
‘Perhaps an ounce of assistance could be provided?’ Corminar called out, his voice shaking, his legs frantically kicking the swords away.
The swords I’d just portalled turned around again, half pointing to me, and half splintering off towards Val. There wasn’t much time to help them both, so I opened a portal below Val’s feet without asking first—if she had a problem with that, then she’d have to bring it up later—and threw her into the corner behind where Arzak and Lore were successfully parrying or absorbing any attacks.
Next, I fixed my attention back to Corminar, dropping myself through a portal of my own just in time to avoid the conjured swords flying towards me. I dropped at Corminar’s side and immediately grabbed two of the conjured weapons from the air—by the hilt, naturally, not the blade, though I’d once made that mistake in the past. I brought them down as I crouched, and buried them deeply in the wooden floor.
Corminar, recognising what I was doing, took advantage of me slowing the attack. Instead of kicking the next sword away, he rolled out of its way at the last minute, hopped nimbly to his feet, and buried it in the floorboards in much the same way as I had just done.
Before long, this area of the room was clear besides the last sword, which Corminar and I were wrestling towards the wall. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see the conjuror with her arm stretched toward us, willing the magick sword away from the wall.
Corminar released his grip on the floating sword to pull out his bow once more, and he shot an arrow towards the enemy. She whipped another sword away from Lore to block the arrow, but in doing so she broke her concentration, and I was able to bury the sword in the wall.
I thought, for a moment, that we were on our way to victory. What a fool I was.
The conjuror roared, frustrated, and with the flick of her wrist she dematerialised the weapons that were buried in the wall or floor, and created new ones at her side to replace them. That was interesting, then; she had a limit as to how many swords she could conjure. And from the look of Arzak’s sword, glowing brighter than ever, the conjuror wasn’t able to unsummon those that she’d captured. If we could keep Arzak protected, doing her thing, then it was only a matter of time until this fight was won.
Unfortunately, the conjuror had just had the same realisation.
All the remaining conjured weapons—a good twenty-five or so, though I didn’t exactly have the time for a thorough count—ceased their attacks on Lore, Val, Corminar and I, and all reposition to point at Arzak instead.
‘Err…’ the orc mumbled, eyes wide. ‘Need help!’
Lore, standing closest to Arzak, rushed in the way of the soaring blades, knocking as many from the air as he could. Arzak, for her part, did her best to parry and absorb the rest, but it was clear that they were getting slowly overcome.
‘Styk!’ Val shouted to me, but I was already on it.
I reached to open another portal to shield my friends from the conjured weapons, but an idea struck me midway through. Instead of opening one of my usual Local Portals, I tried something else. I tried a Pocket World.
The floating swords, with no real minds of their own, did little to avoid the portal, and they shot straight into my pocket dimension, removing them from play. I felt through the magical connection with my ability that I was already eating well into my storage capacity—conjured weapons used up a lot of space, it seemed.
The conjuror’s eyes widened as she saw her magicks disappear into the portal, and she tried first to pull them back out again. But I was quicker than her, and I snapped the portal shut once more before the first sword tip could come through and wedge it open.
With so few swords left—only six or so, compared to the original number, which had been four times that—it crossed my mind again that the fight might now be turning. For a second time in the past five minutes, I was wrong. I really had to stop assuming things like that.
The conjuror, sensing that she wasn’t going to be able to pin down—or kill—all five of us with so few weapons, changed up her tactic. All but one of the remaining conjured swords shot back towards the woman who’d magicked them, twisting at the last moment before hitting her to instead begin spinning around her, like some strange magical tornado. The last conjured weapon hovered in front of her, pointing at Lore, who happened to be closest. The sword hovered there as though daring Lore to attack, to find out what would happen if he did.
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Lore took the dare.
The barbarian charged forward, swinging his heavy blade to knock the single floating sword out of the way, and then he swung it again at the conjuror. His blade met spinning weapons, moving fast enough that he and the Bane Sword bounced away again—but not before he took a good few deep scratches in the process.
‘Styk!’ Val shouted. ‘Get her out of there!’
I nodded, then pressed my right hand forward to open a portal beneath the conjuror’s feet. But just like had happened a few times before when facing down an adept magic user, the conjuror was ready for this. One of the swords in the tornado tore off from its path and shot down below the woman’s feet, stopping her from falling through. So these swords could touch her when she wanted them to.
I gritted my teeth together as closed this futile portal. ‘Gonna need to try something else!’
Arzak, with her imbued blade, charged forward next, swinging her weapon into the tornado. But again, the storm of blades was moving fast enough that she only bounced off, unable to touch metal to spell for long enough to absorb the remaining swords.
‘Reinforcements required!’ the conjuror shouted. ‘Reinforcements required!’
Val’s gaze flicked to me; she knew as well as I did that we needed to end this fight before someone actually heard us.
Corminar released an arrow over my shoulder, but again it was unable to get passed the spinning weapons. It was seemingly impenetrable.
But there was still one thing left that I could try.
I made a show of roaring—and attracting the enemy’s attention—as I pressed my right hand forward once more, looking as though I meant to open another portal beneath the woman’s feet.
The conjuror immediately pulled one of the swords from her tornado, whizzing it towards the spot under her feet where my portal was about to be.
Or would have been, if I’d actually intended to open one there.
Instead, I opened a portal between the ground and the shifting blade. And I created its partner in front of the conjuror’s chest.
The blade shot through, and because the woman had wanted to be able to stand on it, it was solid to her. She yelped as it pierced her chest. Her eyes bulged, and she let her conjured weapons fade as she instead shifted to yellow-white Healing magick.
But Lore, Arzak and Corminar weren’t going to let her get out of this so easily. They seized the advantage of the break in the enemy’s defence, letting her have sword and arrow and in plentiful supply. This time, the fight really did turn in our favour.
As the woman dropped to the floor, I let the notifications that had piled up come through.
4x Goldmarch Soldiers defeated!
Goldmarch Bladebinder defeated!
Worldbending — +4,320xp
Worldbending increased to level 42!
Base Points gained — +2 INT, +2 Free Points (INT/WIS/CHA)
Knifework — +4,250xp
Knifework increased to level 36!
Base Points Gained — +1 DEX, +1 STR, +2 Free Points (VIT/DEX/STR)
Stealth — +3,900xp
Stealth increased to level 18!
Stealth increased to level 19!
Base Points gained — +2 DEX, +2 WIS, +4 Free Points (DEX/WIS)
Nice, I thought, up I go some more. And then I returned my attention to the task at hand: killing a Player.
"Styk"
Level 16 Bladespinner
Base Stats:
Vitality — 42
Intelligence — 151
Dexterity — 96
Strength — 71
Wisdom — 57
Charisma — 33
Skills:
Worldbending — Level 41
Knifework — Level 36
Stealth — Level 19
Needlework — Level 12
Identification — Level 11
Abilities:
Stab III — Put your weight behind your wielded blade and force the tip through tougher hides and armour. Damage scales on [STR], increased by an additional 50%.
Execution II — Attack a target while undetected for +200% damage.
Closed Reach — Bend reality to narrow the gap between blade and target by up to 8 inches. Uses mana.
Mana-Fuelled — Passive. Optionally, use mana in place of stamina to activate Knifework abilities.
Knifestorm — Lash out at all surrounding enemies in a tornado of blades, using either one or two daggers. All enemies with arm’s reach receive physical damage worth weapon’s base damage and additional damage scaling on [STR].
Local Portal II — Create a portal to another location within current range of sight or within a ten yard radius. Uses mana/second.
Portal Slice — Passive. Portals can now be spawned within non-sentient objects. Doing so slices through all objects that are not reinforced by magic.
Tamed Portals — Passive. Increased efficiency of portal magicks means that your portal glow is reduced by 50%, making them less likely to be detected by enemies.
Ash Husk — Convert your flesh to ash, strengthening it against flame for ten minutes. Gain 50% resistance to fire attacks.
Shrill Perimeter — Create a perimeter wall of 20 foot radius, invisible to all but those adept in magicks. If an enemy crosses this perimeter, this spell releases the shriek of a banshee.
Warped Shield — Passive. If an enemy strikes you with a low-level melee weapon, Warp Shield automatically activates to open a portal that deflects this attack. You must not have any portals currently active. Uses mana on activation.
Pocket Worlds — Open and access pocket dimensions. Storage capacity of summoned pocket worlds scales with [INT] of creator.
Stealth Attack II — Passive. 80% boost to damage when unnoticed by enemy.
In Plain Sight — When activated, you have a heightened abilitiy to hide in plain sight, and are able to spot opportunities to break from combat at a higher rate. Scales on [WIS].
Stitch — Create a basic stitch in common fabrics. Ability scales on [CHA].
Cloth Armour — Craft a cloth armour of higher quality, dependent on materials, time and skill level.
Active Effects:
Legacy of Sisyphus:
XP gain increased by +900%