When Lore and I arrived at the house where Tokas and Lambkin were staying, we found that the introductions were well and truly complete. Lambkin, Corminar and Raelas stood standing over a map of the city, Tokas and Carle were reading books on the Divination skill tree, and Ama was…

‘Where’s Ama?’ Lore asked.

‘In the other room, with the kids,’ Raelas replied.

‘...Traumatising them?’ I asked.

The tiefling blinked at me. ‘Playing with them. She likes children.’

‘I didn’t think that woman liked anything.’

Lore and I shuffled over to the table, and the sketched map of the city thereon. ‘What we thinking?’

‘Unlike in Sunalor, we do not have the forces to make use of the city walls,’ Corminar said, apparently having put his “Lieutenant Cladenor” hat back on for the first time since the fall of his homeland. He was thinking like a leader, at least. ‘The defensive nature of this city—though nothing like that of the Dawnwood capital—is useless to us without a great number of allies. Instead, we search for an area to which we might lure the Player. One where we might spring a trap.’

I nodded. ‘Alright. Where are you thinking?’

‘We don’t know,’ Lambkin answered.

‘Less alright.’

‘We are open to suggestions, Styk.’

I studied the map further. There was the main square, outside Coldharbour’s house of government, with the high staircase overlooking the rest of the plaza, and where I had my Saved Portal ability set to. But would high ground help us here? Otherwise, there were the markets—we could potentially use the chaos of the hubbub to our advantage, but then… maybe Yusef was used to that environment? And then there were the rooftops, a potential arena away from the locals and collateral damage. Here, maybe Raelas and I could use our portals to the team’s advantage, shifting us around from rooftop to rooftop and keeping ourselves out of harm’s way.

I couldn’t answer, and the reason was simple: we just didn’t know enough about our enemy. We didn’t know how strong he was, we didn’t know what abilities he had. All we really knew was that he could foretell the future in some way, though even that we didn’t know the limitations of.

‘I don’t know either,’ I finally admitted. ‘With what little we know about Yusef, how can we know what plan would work best? If I had to choose now, then maybe the rooftops? Raelas and I could use portals to move us all around, while we limit the movement of the enemy. But for all we know, the Player can jump thirty feet in the air.’

‘I’m game if you are,’ Raelas said.

Corminar nodded. ‘We will pencil in the rooftops of the southwestern district until such a time as we have a better plan.’

‘Perhaps we need to take a step back, here?’ Lambkin asked.

Lore took a step back from the table. ‘I don’t see how this helps.’

‘Not… not literally. I mean, maybe we’re approaching this the wrong way. Styk is right; what really do we know about this Yusef? We know he is strong, that he has earned the loyalty of the Cult of Ascendancy, that he has some affinity for Divination, but how might we overcome such power, regardless of location?’

Lore’s eyes lit up. ‘We turn his strength against him.’

Raelas looked up at him with recognition in her eyes; she too knew her Armadan history.

I nodded. ‘Yes. But how? The Cult of Ascendancy have so many people by now that surely we can’t hope to get close to him. We’d need either to separate him, or…’ I trailed off as an idea came to me.

‘You got something, handsome?’ someone—no points for guessing—asked.

‘Yusef’s strength is in the number of cultists. But the weakness is that he can’t possibly know them all. What if we found some of their robes? We blended in? We could get close to the enemy without him even knowing we were there.’ It was my thieving past coming in handy again; surely nobody else on the team would have thought of this. Well, Val might have done, but she wasn’t here.

‘You’re saying we assassinate him?’ Raelas asked.

‘But he’s a Player,’ Tokas piped up from across the room. ‘He will be too strong. How can we deliver so much damage so quickly?’

‘We’d need to strike all at once, yeah,’ I said. ‘Our strongest attacks. Maybe some new weapons, and poisons. I don’t know all your classes, so I leave that up to you to figure out your strongest attacks. But for me—’

‘Oh,’ Lambkin said.

‘Oh?’ the elven ranger asked.

‘Yes, oh. I just thought of something.’

We waited for a moment for him to continue, before I prompted, ‘Are you gonna tell us, or…?’

‘The malae trader group. The one that Tokas and I were infiltrating? They were armed to the teeth. I don’t know who was proving such powerful weaponry, but—’

‘The Player,’ Corminar and I said at once, before the elf continued, ‘He would want those trading in the malae to be able to protect themselves. He would know the value in protecting his trading organisation.’

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Lambkin nodded. ‘The point is: they had weapons. Weapons that we can use. Weapons we might turn against the Player, in the spirit of turning his strength into weakness.’

‘We should head back to the markets,’ Tokas said. ‘We should retrieve the weapons before—’

But Lambkin shook his head. ‘The guards will have already seized the cache. They will be selling the weapons on for some “under the table” coin. A guard salary isn’t sufficient; trust me, I know.’

‘So we gotta steal the weapons from the guards?’ Lore asked. ‘If Val was here, she’d love that. Loves a heist.’

‘Alright,’ I said, returning us to the task at hand. As we’d been discussing, Ama had returned from the other room and was standing in the doorway. ‘Disguises and weapons. What else? We need more than this if we’re definitely gonna win this one. We’ve gotta have enough of an advantage that we can kill the Player even if he can see us coming with his magicks.’

Tokas threw her book to the sofa and joined us at the table. ‘You’ve got to remember, Lambkin and I weren’t here just to kill him. We were here to expose him, to turn others against him and his kind. This should still play a part in our strategy; the more allies we have…’

‘The better chance we have,’ I finished for her. A couple of weeks ago I really wouldn’t have expected to be planning a slaying at Tokas’s side, but here we were. The enemy of your enemy really was your ally, after all. Once this was over, though… Well, it was hard to put my memories of the devastation of Plainside behind me. If Tokas was after redemption, then that was going to be a long, long journey.

I nodded. ‘OK, good. We have a plan. Let’s—’

Lambkin raised his hand, and at that moment I realised all eyes were on me. Somehow, I had fallen into the role of the team’s leader; everyone else looked to me for confirmation. ‘...Yeah? You don’t need to raise your hand, you know. You can just speak.

‘I didn’t want to interrupt.’

‘Lambkin, pretty much all we do on this team is interrupt each other.’

‘It’s a bit rude, though.’

I shrugged. ‘No argument there. You got something else?’

‘It’s what Toke just said,’ he replied. Toke? Were they on a nickname basis now? I hadn’t realised they’d grown so close. ‘About having more allies.’ He looked over to Raelas and Carle, who were standing to my right. ‘I hope you don’t mind me saying, but you three of mercenaries, right?’

‘Why would we mind you saying that?’ Raelas asked, not realising that Lambkin was honourable enough to think “mercenary” was a dirty word.

‘You’re here for the money,’ Lambkin said. ‘Whatever Styk and the team are offering you.’

We really needed to figure out where the payment we’d promised to the Trio was going to come from.

‘And that’s fine. We can use all the allies we can get. But why not reach out for more? Over the past two months, Tokas and I have seen no end of mercenaries travelling through Coldharbour. We should use them in this fight.’

‘Ooh, time for some networking,’ Raelas said excitedly. ‘It is nice to meet others in the business.’

‘And who’s gonna pay them?’ I asked. ‘Because I don’t have any money.’ I hesitated, feeling Ama’s eyes on me. ‘...Besides what we’re gonna pay the Trio, obviously.’

‘I have been syphoning money from the traders since I joined. I thought stealing from them would be the honourable thing to do, though I have not spent a penny of it. Who could justify spending money earned from malae trading?’

Lore nodded thoughtfully.

‘I will pay for aid out of this pot. Mercenaries, yes, but enchanters too. Anyone who might give us an advantage.’

‘You’re right,’ I said, realising this was a departure from how the Slayers usually worked. ‘We shouldn’t just keep this to ourselves. Everything we can get, we should use. Lambkin, you lead us to the guardhouse. We’ll steal the weapons from there. Afterwards, you begin recruitment while the rest of us steal Ascendancy robes and being to sow dissent amongst the cultists. Everyone on board with that?’

There was a murmur of agreement, before people began to grab their jackets and weapons. Only Lore stood still, raising his hand, having picked up Lambkin’s bad habit.

‘Yeah?’ I asked.

‘What if the Player gets here before we’re done?’

‘We better hope he doesn’t. And we better hurry.’

"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].

Gentle Step — Passive. Your footsteps are dampened on even the hardest of surfaces. Reduce noise of movement by 80%.

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%