Val shook the borrowed face away, her skin rippling back into the visage that we all knew.

‘Was nobody going to mention she had changeling powers?’ Lambkin asked—a question that we all ignored.

We were still hidden down one of the winding alleys of Zelas, though a different one to where Val and I had had our talk. More and more we’d noticed lingering eyes upon us, owned by members of the cult, and so we’d decided to keep to the shadows. Only Val, who could change her face at will, was perhaps safe from spies, and so we’d sent her out to scout.

‘Well?’ I asked. ‘Any news?’

‘They’re looking for us,’ Val said. ‘All of them. A lot of the cultists don’t have more than vague physical descriptions to go on, but they’re still looking. It’s a wonder we’ve lasted this long, even.’

‘Though, I imagine it is only a matter of time before the hordes descend upon us,’ Corminar said, echoing what we were all thinking.

‘Then we move fast, steal back the artifact, and—’

‘There’s more,’ Val said, and at this her face grew glum. More glum than was typical of late, at least. We were all silent, none of us asking the obvious question, none of us quite wanting to know what Val was hesitant to say. But, of course, she had to say it. ‘There are prophecies spreading through the ranks.’

‘Well, we know those are all lies, now, don’t we?’ I said.

But Val’s expression didn’t change. ‘From what I’ve heard, they’re not just coming from Yusef. They’re coming from Lore, too. The Player is squeezing him for his curse, using it to reinforce his own supposed Divination skills. And I’m thinking, if Lore is involved…’

‘Then maybe they’re true,’ I finished for her.

Val nodded.

Down the end of the alleyway, the hubbub of the crowd grew louder. We all looked around the street, lit with flickering lanterns, anticipating trouble. But none came; the cultists weren’t upon us just yet.

‘What were they? These prophecies?’ Lambkin asked.

Val shrugged. ‘Most of them aren’t relevant to us. Most of them just seemed to be positioned to prove that Yusef could tell the future—tomorrow’s weather, the Zelas lottery numbers, that kind of thing.’

‘Then he’s worried we’ve figured it out. And he’s worried we’re telling his followers.’

‘Perhaps this why he steal artifact too,’ Arzak suggested. ‘Want make sure they not listen to you.’

‘Maybe,’ I agreed, then turned back to Val. ‘You said… most of them? What about the ones that are relevant?’

The witch’s eyes darted to Arzak, then back to me. ‘Just one, really. Sounds like it came from Lore himself. It says…’ She gulped. ‘It says someone is going to die. One of us. And from the sounds of it, it’s going to be…’ Val again looked to Arzak, this time holding her gaze on her.

‘Hm,’ the orc said.

‘Yeah.’

Arzak stood for a moment, digesting this information, and then looked to Tokas. ‘This change nothing,’ she said. ‘But Tokas stay away from me.’

‘That prophecy was a lie,’ Val reminded our orcish friend. ‘Yusef was just playing on your fears. We don’t know that Tokas—’

‘And I not want find out,’ Arzak interrupted. ‘Maybe Yusef kill me, yes. Maybe cultist do. Or maybe it is woman who betray us before.’

Tokas took a small step backwards, positioning herself behind Lambkin. This was all coming to a head, and I’d promised myself I’d do something about it before it snowballed out of control. But here we were again with more important things to worry about—namely, getting my artifact back.

‘The artifact,’ I reminded Val, cutting off the glaring competition between Lambkin and Arzak. ‘Did you learn where it is?’

The witch nodded. ‘Yeah, I did. But you’re not gonna like it.’

* * *

‘You’re right, I don’t like it,’ I said.

The lot of us stood in the centre of the city, on the rooftop of a tall, stone, residential complex, away from the eyes of Yusef’s spies. And we looked up at where the Sisyphus Artifact was stored—in a tower. A particularly tall tower. Probably the third tallest tower in the city, though it was hard to tell from this severe, neck-twinging, angle.

It was built from brick that matched the colour of the surrounding deserts, stacked high and held together with the gentle blue glow of sorcery—how else could they build so high? Windows and the odd balcony marked every storey, but even with this aid, I couldn’t get an accurate count of how many there were. Maybe thirty. On these balconies, and around the base of the tower, we saw guards standing at attention, allowing access to the tower only to those dressed in familiar pale orange robes. The cult had already taken the building.

‘I don’t suppose there is any chance they are storing the artifact on the ground floor?’ Corminar asked.

‘It’s in the Chamber of Elders,’ Val replied.

‘And where is that?’

‘Top floor.’

Corminar nodded. ‘Lovely.’

Val gritted her teeth, though this wasn’t a reaction to Corminar’s sarcasm; I think we were all on the page on that front. ‘The way I see it, there are two ways in to the Tower of Elders. We could fight our way past the guards and up every single floor—there’s thirty-two, I counted—and hope that we survive to take on the Elders who are protecting the artifact.’

‘I vote other way,’ Arzak said.

‘The other option is we use Styk and Raelas’s portals to climb the outside.’

‘I vote first way,’ Arzak corrected herself.

‘How accurate can you be at this distance?’ Corminar asked me. ‘Could you open a portal that places us at the top balcony?’

‘Not from this range. I’d need to be closer. We’ll have to do it bit by bit.’

‘I was afraid that you would say that.’

‘OK,’ Val said. ‘We’ll wait until after dark, and—’

If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

I shook my head. ‘No. It could be too late by then, they could have moved it. We go now.’

‘But they’ll see us.’

‘And we’ll be thirty-two storeys above the ground. By the time anyone reaches us, we’ll have the artifact and be portalling out way back down again. We don’t have to kill anyone in there, we just have to steal the artifact.’ It was just like the good old days.

I opened a portal in front of us, its partner on top of a building adjacent to the base of the tower, and I gestured towards it. ‘After you,’ I said to Arzak, who was closest.

‘I not happy about this,’ she said, but she stepped through nonetheless.

After the rest of the team pressed through, I followed. And then the climbing began.

* * *

‘Is high!’ Arzak said, having to raise her voice over the wind. It was funny; from down below, it had seemed like a perfectly still day, but now we were ten storeys up… not so much.

Most of our number were crowded on a balcony below, holding the door closed against an oblivious local who thought the lock was stuck. Arzak, Corminar and I, however, were clinging to the bottom of a window ledge and about to make our next move.

‘By my calculations, we’ll need to be at least three times this high,’ the elf said.

‘This not reassuring!’

I raised my arm, pointing it up at the next target balcony—about seven more storeys up—opening a muted portal in front of it. On my first attempt, I opened it too far away, but on my second, it was close enough that we would make the leap. With a little momentum, at least. But I’d thought of that, and I’d opened the other half of the pair of portals below us.

‘...Why portal down there?’ Arzak asked.

‘You need to let go,’ I told her.

The orcs eyes widened. ‘No force on Alterra make me let go.’

Corminar sighed, then looked at me with an expressed silent question. You sure about this?

I nodded, and the elf released his grip on the exterior of the tower, falling through the portal and appearing in the air above us. He grabbed the edge of the next balcony nimbly.

‘See?’ I told Arzak.

‘Hm,’ she replied, then after a large sigh, she finally released. Arzak tumbled towards the portal, caught the side of it against her broad shoulders, and then tumbled past it.

‘Arzak!’ I cried, but another portal appeared below her, dropping her back where she’d been a moment before. This time, she hit the mark, and with the added momentum she came out flying into the stone side of the tower. I looked down to Raelas. ‘Thank you,’ I said.

‘No problem,’ the tiefling replied. It was nice to see her coming out of her shell a little bit more, after what she’d been through. I still couldn’t agree with what she’d done—malae trading was a dangerous game—but with the benefit of distance, I was starting to see how she’d been driven to it. Had I forgiven her? No, not yet, but maybe it would come. I was forgiving people all over the place these days. If that wasn’t heroic, then I didn’t know what was.

I leaped through the portal next, appearing on the balcony above, then ushered Corminar and Arzak to the ledges of a nearby window to make space for the rest of them.

‘Why you volunteer me for this bit?’ the orc asked.

‘You’re strong, Corminar’s nimble, and I have portals,’ I replied. ‘It had to be us three.’

‘Corminar and Styk not afraid of heights,’ Arzak mumbled. ‘Arzak is!’

‘Do you always talk in the third person when you’re scared?’

‘Sometimes.’

Still, she got out the way just in time for Val to come barreling through. Lambkin came through after her, and the witch caught and stabilised him. If I thought she wouldn’t do the same for Tokas and Raelas—what with what had passed between them—I was wrong.

‘All good?’ I asked her, clinging onto a protruding piece of stone for dear life.

‘Yep,’ Val replied. ‘You?’

‘I’m all good.’

‘I preferred Raelas’s flirting,’ Corminar piped up. ‘This is dreadful.’ This comment didn’t help at all.

We proceeded in much the same way, up until the penultimate balcony where the wind had grown stronger and, more importantly, Arzak’s complaining had become too great to bear. We traded her out for Raelas, who also had portals at her disposal. As the balcony wasn’t quite big enough for Arzak, Val, Lambkin and Tokas to stand there at the same time, Arzak resorted to holding Lambkin in the air to my space.

‘I have never felt so degraded,’ the ex-captain said—something that nobody paid any attention to.

Finally, we were up on the top balcony, outside the Chamber of the Elders. At least, provided that Val’s information was correct. I couldn’t tell if anyone had spotted us, as the distance to the ground and the loud, billowing winds made it impossible to tell, but it was worth us moving quickly. The last thing we wanted was a hundred cultists coming to the Elders’ aid.

As the last of our number hopped up onto the balcony, I slowly pried the door open. Inside, the chamber consisted of a large stone table surrounded by wide, high-backed chairs, each of them facing the door. I don’t know if I’d been expecting the Sisyphus Artifact to be hidden away, necessarily, but what I hadn’t been expecting was for it to be displayed on a pedestal in the middle of the table.

I stepped into the room, and then realised I’d missed something.

Sat on each of the large chairs was an old tiefling, their legs crossed, their slim bodies obscured by the backs of the seats. One of them poked their head around to look at me.

I raised a hand in a pretty ambitious wave of greeting. ‘...Hi?’ I said.

"Styk"

Level 20 Bladespinner

Base Stats:

Vitality — 52

Intelligence — 227

Dexterity — 137

Strength — 82

Wisdom — 76

Charisma — 50

Skills:

Worldbending — Level 61

Knifework — Level 45

Stealth — Level 26

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].

Throw III — Throw blades at great speed towards your enemy. Deal considerable damage to armourless area, with addition damage scaling with [DEX] and [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.

Portal Relay II - Up to ten small-scale portals can now be positioned stationary to an entity, and used to communicate sound. In addition, your standard portals may be used to communicate sound.

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%