Archimedes
“Careful, guys. We’re coming up on the area soon. It’s just a bit farther west of us,” Archimedes told the group. Following the quest directions led them to a rundown residential neighborhood an hour away at a brisk run. It seemed like one out of three houses in the neighborhood had already been boarded up and abandoned even before the apocalypse.
“Are we going double warden and selecting each other as wards?” Chedderfield asked. “We can get some of that sweet, sweet double negative 25% damage taken for both of us, and I can rock my sexy new shield if we do that.”
“I was going to be an Automator actually until this bad boy runs out of bullets,” Archimedes admitted, patting his turret. “Then I was going to switch to a fighter or manager. I still want to get all the perk points, but—”
“Ignore the perk points, you can farm those later. You should stick to Chedderfield’s plan,” Nguyen suggested with an annoyed tone. “We don’t know how tough this fight is going to be, but there was way too much damage protection in that warden tree to not run it in a close, hard-pressed fight. There are also no penalties to being a warden.”
“Welp, there you go,” Chedderfield laughed. “The lady boss has spoken. If you get to demand we run out of the base on a moment’s notice to save people when we could be lounging around drinking soda, we get to pick your class for the close-up fight.”
“A warden it is then,” Archimedes reluctantly agreed. He was a little disappointed that he wasn’t going to get the chance to level up his Automator class any further, but he still designated Chedderfield as his “ward.”
You’ve selected a ward. You will take 25% less damage when within 10 feet of your designated ward. You will take 25% more damage when farther than 10 feet away from your designated ward.
Manuel Chedderfield has selected you as his Ward. It is recommended that you stay within 10 feet of Manuel Chedderfield.
After adding each other as wards, Archimedes and Chedderfield joined the rest of the group as they continued their journey. As they came to the housing block indicated by the quest, Archimedes could hear the sounds of battle: screams of pain, shouts, and the steady thumping of moving feet. As they crested the hill, he saw a chaotic fight between monsters and men ahead. The people inside a church two blocks down the street were doing their best to hold onto their sanctuary, a four-story-tall building made of solid brick with a roof painted green. The structure had tall, spiraling peaks that gleamed and cast multicolor light in all directions as the sun refracted off the large stained-glass windows, creating a translucent shield that held off the monsters. The houses on the block to the north and south of the church had been flattened, and the debris had been cleared, leaving concrete basements visible to mark where the homes once were. They were clear indicators of how the hell-cursed had come rolling through, destroying and molding the terrain to fit their army’s movements.
A hundred feet above the battlefield, two large jellyfish floated in the sky, hanging in the air like bombing blimps as they floated toward the church, their long tendrils occupied though as they snapped and swung at dozens of featherless bat-like creatures with long talons that were attacking them. The flying monsters wove in and out of reach of the tendrils as they continued to swarm the monsters. On the ground, hundreds of the hell-cursed spawn marched across an abandoned green space, a small park really, in the center of the block. Among them were large mastiff-sized hellhounds, muscular brutes, and a living bone catapult that moved on skeletal legs that made it look like a horridly twisted scorpion as it launched zombies that it grabbed off the ground as it walked.
Leading them all was an eight-foot-tall creature with a thin frame, bulbous head, and pale skin. Despite its size, it was the most human-feeling hell-cursed creature Archimedes had come across as it wore what looked like a tailored black suit, wielded a long black cane like an orchestra leader’s baton, and directed the brutes and the zombies to attack the humans at the church and gather in the center of the park, where a giant hole had been dug.
“Sure you don’t want to be a purgator?” Archimedes asked Chedderfield as they paused at the top of the hill overlooking the battle. For a moment, he hoped his friend would change his mind so he could go back to his original plan of focusing on automated damage. He had this aching desire to figure out just how to utilize his Auto-Cast skill and a vague plan to link it to his Flame Breath skill to further boost it.
Chedderfield shook his head. “I can’t depend on always fighting hell-cursed, and I think this is a good combo to test out. With this many brutes and hellhounds, I think it's better to try to tank this.”
“You just want to play with all your new warden skills, don’t you?” Lucy laughed. “Stop making excuses. You already had Nguyen strong arm the pick.”
Chedderfield gave a wide, guilty grin as an answer. Archimedes shook his head, not able to muster up anything to say to his friend when he himself had had a similar desire to play with all the shiny class skills he’d gotten.
“Well, since we’re here, why don’t you all get on one of those roofs and—” Archimedes said.
“Get on one of those roofs? This isn’t that cafe from last time. They’re house roofs, and they’re way too steep. I’ll spend more time trying not to fall off than I will actually shooting anything,” Danielle objected.
“Yeah, nah, those things are sharp angles for a reason. They’re designed to get things the hell off them,” Nguyen remarked. “We’re not posting up on them.”
Chedderfield shrugged. “Our two snipers just vetoed that plan, so that’s that, I guess.”
“What’s the game plan then? Where are we stashing the featherweights?” Emma asked.
“Featherweights?” Danielle shook her head. “My left boob is bigger than you.”
Nguyen rolled her eyes at the side conversation and turned back to the others. “If we’re engaging from a fortified position, then we need to manage how many of the hell-cursed are coming down this street, or we need to find a different place to fight.”
“Why don’t we create our positions?” Chedderfield asked. “Don’t you guys remember how we fought at the mall? There were walls and barriers to funnel the undead, and we rained hell down at them from the second floor.”
“But we don’t have that setup,” Lucy said with a shake of her head.
Chedderfield raised a hand, and it started to glow. “So we make it. I have the Stiff Defense skill. You guys just need to donate any bone cards you have so that I can start making stuff.”
“I think it’s better than trying to fire down from the roofs. What are you thinking? Walls that funnel the hell-cursed?” Archimedes asked.
Chedderfield nodded. “If we have enough material, sure. But I think I should focus on making something for our snipers to fire from. A nice, flat platform on top of the hill for our snipers and the turrets.”
“What’s to stop the hell-cursed from getting to the platform?” Emma asked.
“Us,” Nguyen said, gesturing towards Archimedes, Chedderfield, Lucy, and herself. “It’s the same plan that we talked about. The four of us cover the front and sides to protect the ranged fighters.
There were nods all around as their plan came together, and Archimedes watched Chedderfield collect spare bone cards from everyone. They were only bronze level, but Archimedes didn’t think it mattered. As Chedderfield began building his platform, Archimedes turned and watched the hoard of hell-cursed fight against the people at the church. He hoped the humans could hold out for the few minutes it would take to set up. But as he watched, the bone catapult launched a brute through the air, and it crashed into the church’s barrier. The barrier flashed as the brute hit it, and the creature grabbed with its hands for any place to find purchase, but the monster slid off and shook its head as it joined the rest of the hell-cursed pounding away at the flickering barrier that stood between them and their enemy.
“Guys, I don’t think they can hold out much longer,” Archimedes said as he turned back to his group and saw Chedderfield standing on a ten-foot-tall white wall that stretched out to cover the asphalt street.
“Don’t need to. I think we’re good to go,” Chedderfield said from atop the platform.
“How’d you make it that fast? Dicky never made anything that quickly.”
“Uh, I sort of cheated,” Chedderfield admitted as he stomped on the wall.
Archimedes heard a dull echo and realized that the wall was hollow. He walked around it and saw that it was about five feet thick too, enough for the shooters to take a prone position but not much more.
“We didn’t have enough bone cards to make a solid wall, so I used what I had to make walls and internal supports. It won’t stop a charging enemy, but it’s strong enough to support the turrets and a few people up there.”
“Then the girls need to get up there, and I need to summon my turret quickly. Those people down there can’t fight on their own,” Archimedes said.
Danielle and Emma climbed up with Chedderfield’s help, and Archimedes grabbed Nguyen before leaping up there in a single bound, knelt, and activated his turret skill. A glowing circle appeared, and he started to feed it the materials it would need to build his turret. He turned his head and saw that Emma’s turret was already up and glowing, it not having to be rebuilt from scratch and only resummoned.
As the turret finished constructing, Archimedes fed it more metal for it to use as ammunition and watched Nguyen’s eyes and hands glow white as she muttered strange words.
He heard Lucy shout from below, “It’s down! That barrier thing around the church is down!” just as Nguyen shouted, “I curse you with the Pox on Death!”
The glow faded from Nguyen and she wiped beads of perspiration from her brow but nodded at Archimedes reassuringly as she equipped her laser rifle. Though concerned for his friend, Archimedes had other more pressing concerns and he turned to see that the shimmering barrier around the church had shattered and the hell-cursed army was rushing the brick building and its defenders. People fired bows and magical rays of energy from the second-story windows, and there were maybe a dozen people defending the front door with spears and swords. But without help, it would only take minutes for them to be overrun.
“Now! Start to fire now!” Archimedes shouted as he fed the last bit of scavenged metal he’d brought to his turret.
He leapt down from the platform, and, looking back, he saw thumb-thick lasers fire from Danielle and Nguyen’s laser rifles. A moment later, he heard the boom of his turret as it found its first target to fire upon. Chedderfield joined him a moment later, his unique black macuahuitl in one hand and a bone round shield on the other arm.
“You ready for this, hermano?” Chedderfield asked. “No flying off to save anyone or kill the boss. You gotta stay here for us to use this dual ward thing.”
“Yeah, yeah. I know. I’m not a child. I know how to stay still,” Archimedes said as he rolled his shoulders and brought out his spear from his inventory.
“So you’re gonna be a good boy? You gonna stay? Good boy!” Lucy joked as she took a position to Archimedes' left.
The three of them laughed at the joke, but Archimedes’ eyes watched the fight down the hill from them as the laser fire and large caliber rounds from his turret harassed the hell-cursed army below. A turret shot cut through four zombies, and well-aimed laser shots burned through the head of a brute, dropping it. Yet, it seemed like none of the monsters in the army really noticed the group, and they could have stood there all day taking shots, whittling down the army, except that the leader saw what was happening. The eight-foot-tall figure saw his brutes dropping and traced the path of destruction.
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Archimedes saw the moment it raised its black cane in the air and shouted something unintelligible to him over the din of battle. But the army responded. Slowly at first, the zombies at the back of the group attacking the church turned and charged where their leader pointed. Then, every single member of the hell-cursed army turned, and Archimedes knew they had a problem.
He was expecting a large wave to come at them, but he wasn’t expecting the wave to include the entire army. The fastest of the undead army, the hellhounds, sped ahead of the others and raced up the hill they sat upon. Archimedes heard the whirl of a turret spinning up and the staccato firing of Emma’s turret as the monsters came into range. The big guns sprayed a burst of bullets that tore through the monsters before they made it a few feet up the incline.
More of the hell-cursed army followed the zombies charging with an abandon that only the undead could achieve. Even as the monsters were shredded by the combined turret and laser fire, Archimedes knew that there were just too many for the weapons to overcome. Raising his spear, he prepared to intercept the first hellhound that had made it past the turrets and sniper fire when, all of a sudden, the light in front of him shifted like it was a pool of water that had been rippled by a skipping stone, and a large, waist-high cat with a fleshless skull appeared out of nowhere, inches ahead of him.
“What the fu—” he began as he raised his spear to block the pouncing hellcat, parrying the entire skull with a twist of the spear haft, only for the creature’s widespread forelegs and three-inch claws to tear at the orange material of his fireman’s jacket as it was sent sprawling to the side.
“Fuck those guys,” Chedderfield replied as if he had seen them already. “And be careful. Those hounds breathe fire.”
Archimedes nodded. “Thanks for the heads up.”
No sooner had the warning come than another incoming skinless, horned mastiff opened up its mouth to vomit out a spray of fire at the pair just before it got obliterated by a powerful laser beam.
Archimedes dropped to a knee, covering his head with his jacket arms, the long side of the coat covering his legs just as the blast of fire washed over him. As he stood up unscathed by the blast, he once again thanked his lucky stars that he’d upgraded his fireman’s jacket to protect him from fire damage—so it was a terrible surprise when he felt a burning itch under the jacket that intensified to the point the skin across his shoulders and left arm felt like it was being roasted. Looking to his right, he saw that, while he had been able to block all of the flames thanks to his upgraded jacket, Chedderfield hadn’t. His friend had managed to use his shield and deflect a spray of flames aimed directly at him but had been caught by the fire that had bounced off Archimedes’s thick fireman’s jacket and sprayed across Chedderfield’s shoulder and left arm, the flames scorching the unarmored parts of his flesh, causing Archimedes to feel the pain damage being transferred by his Guardian Angel skill.
Archimedes gritted his teeth. He ignored the searing pain as one of the hellhounds opened its mouth to breathe fire on them again. He rushed forward, away from the position he was supposed to defend as he charged up his weapon and thrust at the beast with his spear. The sharp speartip skidded off the monster's lower canines and impaled the creature. The spear’s charge detonated inside the monster’s head, and the entire skull of the mastiff exploded into an array of shattered bones and bits spraying out in all directions.
You have exceeded the maximum distance allowed from your Ward. You will take 25% increased damage. The [Guardian Angel] passive will not function again until you are once more 10 feet or less from your selected Ward.
“Get the fuck back here. This debuff hurts,” Chedderfield snapped from behind him.
As Archimedes turned, he saw Chedderfield using the bottom of his shield to bash in the skull of a hellcat that had bitten his leg. The shield glowed orange briefly before it came down for the third time, and the creature finally let go, blood pouring from the top of its head. It stumbled backward and was dispatched by a quick chop of Chedderfield's weapon, which decapitated the monster, sending its head flying away in one direction and its body in another.
“Roger, roger,” Archimedes replied quickly as he leapt back to his post near Chedderfield. Even as his feet hit the ground, his spear was swinging, knocking back another hellcat that had tried to attack his friend’s legs. As he returned within the ten-foot radius of his ward, he saw the in-range notifications and listened to his turret firing to life again. But he couldn’t help but feel like there was a gigantic metal chain holding him in place.
“The zombie pets were just an opening wave,” he heard Nguyen calling down as her laser neutralized the last of the mutts that had been the vanguard of the incoming army. “You got hulks ahead, and we can’t take out those crystal ones,” she warned as she leapt off of the platform and replaced her rifle with a spear.
Archimedes wondered why the turrets weren’t shooting the brutes, but then he saw the answer: both Emma’s turret and his were doing their best to neutralize one of the two remaining jellyfish, which was sucking up zombies into its floating body despite not having the cannon attachment visible on top.
“Brutes are already here! Where’s that Ring of Purity, brat?! Chedderfield didn’t lend it to you for nothing!” Lucy called out from Archimedes’ and Chedderfield’s left a moment before Emma jumped down from the platform. Archimedes turned in time to see the teen place her glowing hands on the asphalt, and a white flaming circle expanded out from her for about ten feet. The flames passed over him without issue, but he watched the guts from the hellcat he had impaled moments ago burn from the fires of the purifying flame.
The rumbling sound of marching made Archimedes turn in time to see a packed mob of zombies begin their run up the hill. Continuous fire from the turrets tore the first of the hell-cursed to shreds, Archimedes’ high-powered gun often cutting through two or more creatures with a single shot. But the monsters were so densely packed that those behind the first row simply ran over the fallen to reach Archimedes and the melee defenders.
Standing within the flaming circle of purity, his best friend to his right and his girlfriend to his left, Archimedes poised his spear to strike out at the creatures charging them. The moment the first zombie crossed the flaming line, it ignited from the base of its feet, and white flames rapidly traveled up the zombie’s body in less than a second. The monster stumbled a few steps, its flaming arms grabbing for Archimedes before its legs collapsed, and it fell, leaving only the still-burning husk and a floating bronze card behind.
Even as the zombies fell to the turrets, lasers, and purifying flame, Archimedes’ spear struck out, spitting hell-cursed heads, slicing limbs, and pushing frenzied monsters away from his companions or pulling them into the burning flames of the ring of purity. Yet, the press of the hell-cursed mob was such that he was forced back first one step and then another as he killed the monsters trying to kill him. Eventually, he found his back touching something and found Chedderfield kicking a resilient group of zombies away on his right. Nguyen was only a few feet farther to the right, aiding Chedderfield by killing the monsters that tried to flank the man. A yelp made him turn left, and he saw a black cone of energy erupt from Lucy’s outstretched hand, stunning four zombies. His spear took one, and her sword took the heads of two more before the flaming ring claimed the last.
There was a mighty roar as one of the hulks finally reached the front of the pressing army, its skin erupting in flame as it crossed the threshold of the purifying flame. Archimedes couldn’t help but smile as he bellowed back his own challenging shout. Using the flame of the Ring of Purity as a marker for the distance he could go before he’d be out of his ward’s range, Archimedes activated Leap Rush and hurtled into the air toward the massive hulk.
Archimedes came down with a powerful spear thrust, the tip of his weapon nearly impaling the brute through the skull. Only a sudden shift to the right by the creature kept it alive, though the weapon pierced it through its shoulder and burst from its left armpit. A living creature would have been stunned from the shock of such a wound, but the undead brute swatted Archimedes off its back. The blade and haft of the spear ripped away flesh and muscle as he held his grip on the weapon and was sent sprawling backward. He managed to land with a roll and came back to his feet, bruised but not broken, though he heard a grunt of pain from Chedderfield to his right.
As the hulk came at Archimedes like the flaming monstrosity he was, Archimedes dodged the initial double-fisted slam attack easily, stepping to the side. He then planted his heel into the ground and used the middle of his spear shaft to push the crystal brute off balance and toward Chedderfield. Chedderfield capitalized on the momentum as the shield on his left arm disappeared, and he swung his macuahuitl in an upward swipe with two hands, like he was a tennis player reaching for a low ball with a backhand. His vibrating blade cut cleanly through the legs of the crystal hulk, which tried to take a step toward Chedderfield but only raised a stump of a leg before crashing to the ground. Archimedes was there with a follow-up attack in a flash, stabbing the creature right through the chest and into its heart as he finished off the burning undead monster, a silver card appearing above its unmoving corpse.
Three crystal brutes pushed their way through the burning mob that was being held off by the turrets, Lucy, and Nguyen. As Archimedes looked up at their nine-foot-tall, rock-hard forms, he couldn’t help but lament his choices a little. “Kinda wish I had gone with Fire Breath over Leap Rush,” he commented as he took a deep breath and prepared for the next skirmish.
“That’s why you got me,” Lucy said proudly as she activated No Brainer on the three incoming crystal hulks the moment they entered the Ring of Purity. She lunged into the air, every bit of her weight, momentum, and strength putting its force behind a single sword thrust. Her blade pierced through the crystal hulk’s weak, unprotected ocular cavity and ripped its brains out as she pulled her weapon back. Then, contracting her body, she tucked her feet in, and after planting them on the dead creature’s chest, she pushed off in a graceful back flip before landing on the ground and readying her weapon to go again.
Archimedes had always thought Lucy was beautiful, but nothing was more beautiful than watching Lucy perform a perfect, clean, quick, acrobatic murder of a monster type that had, at one point, made Archimedes struggle just to stay alive.
“What? If you’ve got the stats, why not use them for flashier kills?” she said as she turned and met Archimedes' shocked expression.
“Damn, I love you,” Archimedes said to Lucy.
“Aww, thanks, bro. I love you too,” Chedderfield replied jokingly before rushing forward, his shield glowing orange, and smashing into one of the remaining two hulks, reminding Archimedes too late that he should be killing his own brute. Lucy had already begun to square off against the remaining one inside the Ring of Purity, but then Archimedes noticed a large glowing-orange ball in the distance being formed and shaped inside of the undead catapult as it walked closer and closer to their location.
What the hell? he thought as he stared, trying to figure out what was about to be launched. Then, he realized it wasn’t a single monster. The eight-foot-tall creature with the black cane had curled up with two crystal hulks on each side of it, forming a single gigantic ball that was about to be hurled right at them.
Lucy, who had just finished killing a crystal hulk, turned to catch a glimpse of Archimedes as he charged his Leap Rush skill, “What are you— No! Don’t you fucking—”
Archimedes smiled guiltily, then unequipped his spear. He saw the catapult fire and tracked the monster ball as it reached its peak and started its descent. He could see where it would land and used Leap Rush, firing into the air as fast as his legs could propel him.
Half a second later, Archimedes intercepted the large ball of monsters.
You have exceeded the maximum distance allowed from your Ward. You will take 25% increased damage. The [Guardian Angel] passive will not function again until you are once more 10 feet or less from your selected Ward.
He could feel something snap and heard an audible crack. His whole body lit up with pain as he took the force of the monster projectile.
Archimedes was successful though. Instead of striking the raised platform with Nguyen, Danielle, and Emma, he and the glob of flesh he felt like he’d been melded into from force alone struck asphalt, chunks of rock piercing through the thick fireman’s coat into his flesh. The four of them bounced several more times across the street until finally coming to a stop when they smashed into the brick wall of a house. The ball broke apart, and Archimedes and the three monsters were sent flying apart in all directions.
Archimedes lay face down on someone’s lawn, his breath coming in gasps as he tried to push himself up, but his body just wouldn’t respond, pain shooting through his chest, arms, and shoulders. With a pained groan, he was able to roll over and sit up and saw the three monsters that had been launched already getting to their feet. The crystal brutes had cracks running through their stone bodies and the black-suited monster cradled one arm to its chest.
Archimedes was getting ready to charge Leap Rush to get back toward Chedderfield when he saw the eight-foot monstrosity that had been in the middle of the two hulks hold up his baton, creating a large red dome around them. As Archimedes shot to his feet and tried to trigger Leap Rush, rather than building up energy in his legs and shooting off toward the others instantly—toward safety where he could recover, catch his breath, and get his health back after being hit by what felt like a truck—his legs felt drained instead.
Panicking, he took a bite of food from his pocket, trying to heal up a little as he checked his health in his status window.
Name: Archimedes
Lvl: 7
Hit Points: 17 [210]
Stats: Modified [Base]
Strength: 19 [13]
Constitution: 21 [18]
Agility: 13 [10]
Mind: 15 [13]
Charisma: 12 [10]
Active Buffs:
Athletic: +1 Strength, Constitution
Normal Stature [151-220lbs]: +1 Strength.
Flesh of My Flesh: +4 Str, +3 Agl, +1 Con, +2 Cha, +1 Mind
Undead Delight: +1 health/10 second
Active Debuffs:
Broken Ribs: Decreased breathing by 30%
Fractured Left Arm Ulna: Decreased attack speed by 15%
Torn Right Arm Deltoid: Decreased attack speed by 40%
Archimedes almost choked on the Hulk meat he was chewing on when he saw that he only had seventeen hit points left. No Wonder I feel like everything is broken. He quickly switched from the Warden to the Healer class and activated his class skill Healer’s Touch. His fingers glowed yellow and he touched his chest. The yellow glow suffused his upper body and Archimedes felt a sense of relief throughout his body and found it easier to breathe.
Name: Archimedes
Lvl: 7
Hit Points: 71 [210]
Still in pain but able to move again, Archimedes dismissed his status page, got to his feet and weighed his options. He tried to use Leap Rush again but the red dome that surrounded everything in forty feet flashed and his skill did not activate. So maybe the red field only prevents movement abilities, he reasoned as he re-equipped his spear, swapped out Leap Rush for Fire Breath, and prepared for the fight. The menacing hell-cursed monster raised his baton again as a yellow field engulfed the two nearby crystal brutes, their wounds from the impact healing right before his eyes. They slowly stood up, now looking as if they had never been hurt at all.
“Well . . . fuck,” Archimedes said, pulling another large chunk of conscriptor meat out of his fireman’s jacket and chowing down on it.