‘You went back to Alenna without me?’ Lore asked.

We—the six of us; three Slayers, three Trio members—were sat in the tavern once more, having some breakfast, and Lore and Carle were eating more than the rest of us combined. If I wasn’t mistaken, there was a little friendly rivalry going on around who could eat more. Maybe they had some things in common after all.

I shrugged. ‘We couldn’t sleep.’

‘We?’

Raelas waved to signal that she was the other half of “we”, and Lore frowned to show that he wasn’t a fan of that at all.

‘A date?’ the barbarian asked.

‘Yes,’ Raelas said, at the same time that I said, ‘No.’

Carle and Ama looked to one another, vaguely amused expressions on their faces. I got the impression then that I wasn’t the first person Raelas had pursued aggressively in this way.

‘Look,’ I said, ‘the point is: there’s something else we can do to help her. She needs information. Experimenting on those touched by the malae is all well and good, but there’s other related research out there that’s already been done. She just needs to read it.’

Lore’s eyes lingered on Raelas for a moment. ‘OK, so where do we get this research for her then?’

I mumbled the answer under my breath.

‘What’s that?’ Ama asked.

I sighed. ‘From a library of the Estat Order.’

‘...Ah,’ Lore replied; he’d been there the last time we’d had to deal with this lot.

‘They are the librarians with the excessive late returns policy, yes?’ Corminar asked. ‘Those with whom you two have tussled before?’

‘They’re the ones who kill you for late returns, yeah,’ I replied. ‘I… don’t think we ever got to the bottom of why they do that, did they?’

Lore shrugged. ‘Maybe they’re just a bit weird.’

‘“Just a bit weird” is putting sugar in your stew. Killing people for forgetting to return books is just a little bit passed that, don’t you think?’

Carle raised an eyebrow. ‘A peculiar returns policy indeed. And they still get patronage?’

‘I wonder if this policy isn’t intended to discourage such a thing,’ the ranger replied.

Ama leaned forward, cutting through the rest of the conversation and steering us back to the most important aspect of the matter at hand. ‘And this job… it pays?’

‘Yes, Raelas was quick to establish that.’

The tiefling nodded enthusiastically.

‘Is that all that matters to you?’ Lore asked, with more irritation in the typically gentle man’s voice than I was used to. ‘Saving people isn’t its own reward?’

‘No reason we can’t have two rewards!’

* * *

It was supposed to be a quick day trip. We’d leave Coldharbour in the morning, straight after our surprisingly tasty breakfast, and we’d head southwest to Fallenstone. We’d visit the ruins of the ancient city—in which a small town was beginning to form around the water well—and we’d track down the library. We’d go in, request the book in question, pray that this particular library was staffed by more reasonable people, and we’d head back again in time for dinner.

That was the plan, anyway, but I had doubts about one part in particular: that these particular members of the Estat Order would be more reasonable than the last. They didn’t have a good track record.

You’ll be unsurprised to learn that it was Raelas who walked at my side as we travelled.

‘You really won’t tell me a little about your past?’ she asked.

‘What’s there to tell? I stabbed some people, got stabbed a few times, and drank a lot of beer.’

Raelas raised her eyebrows as we climbed up the latest sand dune along the traveller’s road. ‘We both know there’s more to you than that. You’ve killed Players, tried to stop an invasion—’

‘Failed to stop an invasion,’ I corrected her, then glanced around to make sure Corminar wasn’t in earshot; he wouldn’t like the reminder.

‘—and you’ve done all this without going past level nineteen. And don’t think I haven’t noticed that strange relic you fiddle with in your pocket.’

I whipped my hand away from the Sisyphus Artifact, then tried to act casual about it. I could maybe trust the Trio with some details about our Player killing, but I wasn’t in any hurry to reveal the truth about the artifact—or the Player blood required to use it. It was time to change the subject. ‘Well, I don’t exactly hear you volunteering anything about your own past.’

‘You haven’t asked!’

‘Consider this me asking.’

Raelas smiled. ‘So you’re interested after all?’

I sighed; this woman could make something out of anything.

‘So, Carle, Ama and I, we’ve known each other forever. As far back as I can remember, at least. We grew up together on the streets of Oalem—no parents, no money, no prospects. Called ourselves the Trio since we were small. Had to steal food, find shelter where we could…’ Raelas glanced over at me. ‘And I’m guessing that’s all pretty familiar to you, too?’

I shrugged.

‘See? Lots in common. Don’t suppose this Val had to go through what we—’

At a glare from me, Raelas stopped mid-sentence.

‘OK, OK. Sorry. Just thought it had to be said, is all. Anyway, one day some rich merchant comes to town. An elf, from the Dawnwood. She’s visiting the local lords, and they all throw some huge feast in the palace gardens. We’re not allowed in—nobody is—but we can see enough to know that there’s too much food. It’s going to waste. We’re hungry—starving, maybe—and that food isn’t going to get eaten. So, when the feast is winding down, we sneak in, and we try to reduce food waste.

‘It’s the merchant that caught us. She alerted the guards, and they catch me. I tell them we were just hungry, that we just thought nobody would mind. But they keep going on about how it’s theft, like it’s against the law so it must be morally wrong, too. No… what’s the word?’

Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.

‘Nuance?’ I suggested.

‘Not the word I was looking for, but it works. Nuance. Yeah. So they arrest me, and they want me to pay a fine to let me go. Carle and Ama don’t have the money, obviously, and eventually the jailhouse gets too full any they let me go anyway. When I found the others, do you know what we swore?’

‘That you’d try to feed the poor?’ I asked. ‘Make sure nobody ever goes hungry again?’

Raelas laughed. ‘No. We swore that we would get filthy, filthy rich. At any cost. We swore we’d never go hungry again.’

* * *

When we finally arrived in Fallenstone, the midday sun high in the sky above us and making me desperate not for beer, but for water, Lore grabbed me and Corminar by the arm. Though Ama watched with pursed lips and an unabashed raised eyebrow, none of the Trio tried to eavesdrop on whatever was going on here. From the familiar look on Lore’s face, I had some idea.

‘Another vision?’ I asked.

He nodded glumly. ‘I was speaking with the Player we’re after. Yusef. I was asking him about… about prophecy. About these visions. Like he was an expert.’

‘A vision about visions? Very cool.’

But Lore didn’t seem to find this funny. ‘What if… what if we shouldn’t be here? These visions, they’re supposed to get us where Niamh wanted us, right? For that Council’s plan to get done?’

‘Are you saying we shouldn’t kill a Player involved in a transcontinental malae trade?’ I asked.

At this, he hesitated. ‘...No. Course not. I just… I dunno. Feels like we’re…’

‘Damned if we do, and damned if we don’t, as you humans say,’ Corminar finished for him.

Lore nodded, sadness in his eyes.

I clasped the big guy around the shoulder. ‘Alright,’ I said. ‘I hear you. We’ll think on it, yeah? Maybe there’s a way to kill Yusef without helping the Council. And if there is, we’ll find it.’

Again, the barbarian nodded, but didn’t seem reassured by this. Whatever he was seeing due to his own active effect, it felt very real to him. More real than I could imagine.

We returned to the others and fixed our attention on the library—which, as it turned out, hadn’t been all that hard to find in a town of maybe fifty buildings.

‘Alright,’ I said. ‘We know the plan. Corminar, Lore, Ama and Carle, you’re going in the front entrance. You’ll ask for the book and hopefully the librarians will hand it over. And if they don’t…’

‘We’re sneaking in the back anyway while they’re distracted,’ Raelas said.

Raelas and I hurried around to the rear of the building while the rest of the team approached the front door. I picked a spot that felt like it would have nobody inside to spot us entering, but of course that was guesswork, as I could see nothing. At least with my Tamed Portals passive, the portals wouldn’t glow brightly; if we were quick enough, Raelas and I might be able to sneak inside even if there were people about.

‘Ready?’ I asked.

Raelas stepped in close. ‘Ready.’

I opened a portal below our feet, and the other worldbender and I fell through. The moment we were out through the other end of the portal, inside the library, I cut off the spell and crouched towards the floor. Nobody immediately started crying out, which was a pretty good sign as far as breaking and entering went, and the only talking I could hear was on the other side of the building. Keeping still, I could hear that it was Corminar asking politely for the book in question.

Even better, I had picked a spot where there was nobody around. And there was nobody around because Raelas and I were surrounded by tall bookcases, full of—no points for guessing—books.

‘Any ideas how we find the one we want?’ Raelas asked, echoing my own internal monologue; my plan hadn’t accounted for there being literally thousands of books here.

I cast my eyes over the spines. ‘Looks like it’s alphabetical by title.’

‘Must have taken them a while.’

‘Yeah, maybe we need to introduce these librarians to a hobby.’

We moved down the aisle towards where the book in question should have logically been, and had to come to a sudden stop when an older tiefling man in a long robe glided by. I hadn’t heard his footsteps at all—they were really serious about being quiet in libraries, huh?—but fortunately he seemed too absorbed in the book he held to notice us. Raelas and I remained deathly still as he passed through the junction ahead of us, not daring to move.

He drifted away, and I breathed a controlled sigh of relief.

‘Alright, good,’ I said, turning to Raelas. ‘Now, let’s—’

But the other worldbender had idly drifted her fingertips along the spines of the books. And neither of us had known that the shelves would be protected.

A layer of blue light rippled where Raelas had touched the books, and for half a second I thought we’d got away with it.

But then the siren blared.

Stealth — +1,650xp

Stealth increased to level 25!

Base Points gained — +1 DEX, +1 WIS, +2 Free Points (DEX/WIS)

Ability selection unlocked

Select an ability from the list below…

…

The notifications were a sure sign that we’d now been spotted, and though I was excited to finally have another Stealth ability selection, it was going to have to wait.

Shouting erupted at the other side of the library, and the old librarian whipped around to face the source of the noise—us.

Once again, we had to do battle with the Estat Order.

"Styk"

Level 19 Bladespinner

Base Stats:

Vitality — 50

Intelligence — 204

Dexterity — 122

Strength — 77

Wisdom — 74

Charisma — 49

Skills:

Worldbending — Level 55

Knifework — Level 40

Stealth — Level 25

Identification — Level 18

Needlework — Level 18

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 III — Attack a target while undetected for +300% 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].

Enhanced Portals — Create a portal to another location within current range of sight or within a thirty yard radius. Support up to two pairs of portals at once. Uses mana to open portals only.

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.

Silence III — Create a bubble of 20 yard radius in which sound is eradicated. Uses mana to cast, zero mana to maintain. You may only have one bubble active at any one time.

Saved Portals II — Select a location to “save” for future portals. Until your save point is moved, you may always open a portal here, even if it is beyond your current Local Portal range. Mana is used only upon opening the portal.

Stealth Attack III — Passive. 200% 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].

Improved Cloth Armour — Craft a cloth armour of significantly higher quality, dependent on materials, time and skill level.

Active Effects:

Legacy of Sisyphus:

XP gain increased by +1,400%