I heaved myself over the side of the balcony, leaping behind the enemy orc, then jumped once more to put my drawn blade in reach of Lev’s neck. It worked, for a moment.
Distracted by Val, the orc hadn’t noticed me get so close to him, and only really started paying attention to me once I had metal pressed to his flesh. Unfortunately, Lev reacted to this in a way that nobody before had reacted: he grabbed my knife arm, crouched, and wrenched me over the top of him.
I flew through the air and crashed into Val, who—judging by the noises she made as a result—was not impressed. As we pulled ourselves up off the floor, Lev growling at us, Val turned to me.
‘Is that all you do? Put knives to people’s necks?’
‘And claim to be scary,’ I added.
‘Yes, put knives to people’s necks and claim to be scary,’ Val clarified. ‘Is that all you do?’
‘I’m working on it, aren’t I?’
Lev took a step forward; the fight was back on.
Val focused once more, beginning again her winding roots, but still the orc was too strong, able to break free of them before they could grow firm. While it slowed him down, it was only a matter of time before we were in arm’s reach. I could only thank the gods that he didn’t bring his battleaxe on dates—then we’d be in real trouble.
‘Val?’ I asked, starting to step backwards. ‘You got any idea what—’
‘You think you can occupy him for a minute? By yourself?’
I blinked. ‘What? No! I’m level 5, Val, and he’s level—’
Val answered by bolting for the balcony door, disappearing through it.
Both Lev and I looked to the door, and then back to one another.
‘...Hi?’ I tried.
‘You die now,’ came the response.
I nodded. ‘Right,’ I said, and then I, too, ran for the door.
I crashed through the wooden door, not bothering to twist the knob before I pushed it, causing it to crack from its frame before slamming into the wall beside it. Inside, I found myself in a bar area, complete with cocktail trolley, kitchen island, and a substantial collection of bottles.
A bar for the rooftop balcony? Fancy.
I charged onward, hearing the orc’s heavy footsteps coming up rapidly behind me, and as I passed the cocktail trolley, I pushed it into Lev’s way. From the sounds of the crash I heard a second after, he hadn’t had too much problem brushing it out of the way.
So I tried next grabbing a couple of glass bottles from the counter as I charged past them, spinning on the spot to lob one, then the other, towards Lev’s head. I stayed facing him just long enough to see that he easily deflected the first lobbed bottle, but—not expecting a second—the other one caught him in the face. It smashed, and a couple of large chunks were buried in his skin.
But it wasn’t enough to stop him, only enough to make him hunt me more aggressively. I ploughed on, towards the rear of the building, and spotted a stairwell. I leaped down it in one stride. ‘Ow! My ankles!’ I said aloud, then immediately regretted saying this aloud.
I pulled myself up to my feet, doing my best to ignore the self-inflicted fall damage, and charged down the short landing I found myself in, for the next set of stairs. On my way, I grabbed a couple of picture frames from the wall—one of an elderly woman, maybe the owners grandmother, and another of a man with the words “Rest In Peace” engraved at the bottom.
I threw them both at Lev.
Honestly, these pictures frames—even with the glass panes—did about as much good as the bottles. Maybe less. There was a reason you threw bottles in bar fights, and not picture frames, I supposed. Something to do with the aerodynamics.
Reaching the next stairwell, very conscious that Lev had grown closer still, I hopped down it, this time taking the stairs three at a time, and doing no damage to my ankles. As I ploughed down them, I thought desperately about my—admittedly rather limited—skill list. Surely there was something, even at this low level, which could get me an advantage if used creatively? If not, then Val and I were going to have a big problem when it came to facing down the Player. If indeed I lived to get that far.
Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
At the bottom of the staircase, now on the ground floor, I swung around the corner and—
Walked straight into the homeowner. Lev’s date, now standing tall and confident, glared down at me.
‘You’re back, huh?’ I asked. ‘What’s changed?’
As Lev stormed down the stairs behind me, the date grabbed me by the throat and pressed me against the wall. I wrenched at his hand, trying to free myself, my legs dangling below me.
‘You die now,’ the orc said again. Lev stepped closer, grabbing me by my knife arm, and nodding for his date to release me; he wanted to deal with me all by himself, it seemed.
‘I’d really rather not!’ I tried.
‘No choice.’ Lev blinked at me. ‘Level five? You are this old and level five?’ His eyes widened. ‘You are level five and think can defeat me?’
The orc’s date ambled around behind him, and… I noticed something. The date was smirking. So quick a change in demeanour was it, and now he was smirking?
‘Look, it wasn’t my idea, alright?’ I said. ‘The sorcerer I was with, it was her idea.’
‘You think steal from me?’
‘No!’
The orc snarled. ‘So just kill me then?’
‘No!’ I said again. ‘I mean…’
‘So what want from me?’
I nodded to the orc’s firm grasp around the wrist of my knife hand. ‘Maybe you can let me go, and then we’ll talk about this?’
‘No.’
‘At least loosen your grip? That hurts a little.’
‘No,’ the orc said again. ‘Tell me. What want from me?’
The smirking date stretched his neck by tilting his head side to side, and then seemed to warm up his arms by rolling his shoulders and flexing his digits. Was this man about to kill me himself? Or…
And then I remembered something that Val had told me a few days back. Something that she’d tried not to make a big deal of, and in doing so had made a very big deal of it indeed. She wasn’t a human, or at least, wasn’t all human.
She was part changeling.
The “date”’s skin rippled as it changed, his body shrinking both in height and breadth. The rippling form was mirage-like; hard to look at, because whatever you thought was there, wasn’t. Or at least, it wasn’t for very long.
Sensing that something was wrong, Lev craned his head over his shoulder to follow my line of sight. In that moment, Val launched herself into a punch—not something I’d seen her do before. Her clenched fist caught Lev squarely in the temple, with enough force behind it that it would have knocked out any lower levelled person.
It was just a shame that Lev wasn’t low in level.
While the blow didn’t knock him out, it did stagger him, and his grasp on my wrist loosened. I took advantage of the distraction to push against him, forcing the tip of my knife towards his throat. I made it close—oh so close—before the orc realised what I was doing.
‘No you don’t,’ he said.
‘Yes I do,’ I corrected him, activating my Closed Reach ability.
The world bent, and the tip of my knife closed on his throat. I even overshot it a little, piercing the orc’s flesh and causing a small trickle of blood to begin flowing down his neck. Val’s vines—slow to form in an interior setting—wrapped themselves around the orc’s legs, holding him firmly, and finally…
Lev raised his hands in surrender.
Level 27 Barbarian defeated!
Knifework — +2,500xp
Knifework increased to level 11!
Knifework increased to level 12!
Base Points gained — +2 DEX, +2 STR, +4 Free Points (VIT/DEX/STR)
Stealth — +100xp
Worldbending — +200xp
Worldbending increased to level 1!
Base Points gained — +2 INT, +2 Free Points (INT/WIS/CHA)
Ability unlocked — Local Portal
‘Knives on throats,’ I said to the orc in front of me. ‘It always works.’
"Styk"
Level 5 Novice Bladespinner
Base Stats:
Vitality — 4
Intelligence — 9
Dexterity — 12
Strength — 25
Wisdom — 9
Charisma — 0
Skills:
Knifework — Level 12
Identification — Level 5
Worldbending — Level 1
Stealth — Level 1
Abilities:
Slice — Slice the enemy for physical damage worth weapon’s base damage and additional damage scaling on [STR].
Stab — Put your weight behind your wielded blade and force the tip through tougher hides and armour. Damage scales on [STR].
Closed Reach — Bend reality to narrow the gap between blade and target by up to 8 inches. Uses mana.
Local Portal — ???
Basic Stealth Attack — Passive. 10% boost to damage when unnoticed by enemy.
Basic Identification — Discover basic attributes for a particular object or person. Ability scales with [WIS] + [INT].
Active Effects:
Legacy of Sisyphus:
XP gain increased by +400%