“Level 21,” said Nessa as the triangular facet in the polyhedron yawned open wide. “Terror birds!”
Harald clenched the Dawnblade tightly as he stared at the portal. Small shapes appeared in its center, rapidly growing, hurtling outward, and then the first monster was spat out onto the cobblestones.
It was a huge bird, bipedal, its legs long and naked and scaled. Black feathered with red markings, it whipped around with wiry strength, its huge head rising to fix its beady black eyes on the closest raider. It flapped its vestigial wings, surged up to standing, and only then did Harald appreciate how big the monster was.
Easily some seven, eight feet tall, half of it those scaled legs ending in three hugely clawed toes, its neck thick to support the massive head, beak like a battle-ax, massively hooked at the tip, its feathers ruffed up in alarm, its tail feathers flared into a fan.
“Terror bird?” asked Kársek weakly. “That… that is a thing?”
The terror bird took four long strides and then leaped onto the team of raiders who were backing away rapidly. Copper ranked, they were fronted by an armored man with a tower shield, who raised his defense desperately as the bird crashed down on him squawking and trilling with hunger.
The weight of it bore the shield down, toes curving around its upper rim, and that huge head thwakked down, fast enough to blur, burying the point of its beak into the man’s neck. The armor was useless. Blood fountained as he fell screaming, his companions shouting in dismay, moving in to deploy their abilities, but it was too late.
Three more terror birds burst out the portal, two landing on their feet, one sliding out onto its side. They gazed around the plaza with hunger and avarice, shrilled their war cries, and exploded outwards.
Damn they were fast.
Faster than any man could ever hope to be. Fast as a galloping horse. Beaked heads pumping forward they ran together as a flock, the third rising belatedly to follow after.
Right toward Harald and his crew.
The Shadow Mastiff bayed as it ran out wide, and such was the power of the Level 27 monster that its warning howl caused the terror birds to flinch and swing out away from it—but they didn’t abandon their prey. Instead they leaned into the turn, coming around to hit their crew’s flank.
Harald knew what he had to do. Even as the others raised kite shields and prepared their Abilities, he pushed past Sam to move to the fore.
“Go!” he barked, and the Goldchops, heavy, lethal, eternally patient, leapt to obey.
They blurred out, head over haft, twin bolts of golden lighting. The terror birds saw them coming and squawked, ducking their heads and trying to dodge, but the Goldchops were Masterclass and simply swerved to follow.
Each buried itself in a terror bird’s chest with such power that the sternums and ribs exploded inward in a puff of feathers. The two birds tripped and fell, collapsing face first onto the cobblestones and rolling awkwardly, slain instantly.
The third, the belated follower, surged past its two dead comrades, uncaring, and leaped.
For a second Harald simply stared, eyes going wide as the terror bird soared into the sky, huge talons extended toward him, its screech the stuff of nightmares, and then he activated Dark Vigor and leaped aside.
He hit the cobblestones hard, rolled, came up smoothly to his feet, and saw Nessa unleash her Crescent Arc, the great flash of white energy hammering into the terror bird’s side and causing it to stumble.
Kársek detonated the cobblestones beneath its feet at the same time, so that it faltered, hopped on one foot, and then Vic let out a laughing cry and lunged forward, his rapier flashing as he stabbed the terror bird in the chest.
But still it fought on, its huge head swinging down, hooked beak looking to tear Vic’s arm off at the shoulder.
Only for the Shadow Mastiff to collide with it mid-spring, massive jaws clamping around the bird’s neck as it smashed into its wounded flank and punched it off its feet to bring it crashing to the ground.
“Fuck,” whispered Harald, rolling out his shoulder.
Chaos was engulfing the plaza.
Terror birds were coming through without end. Groups of three, four, five, they were spat out to land roughly on their feet or sprawl out, only to gather their wits and streak off, screeching and twittering like bolts of beaked lightning. Already a dozen were wrecking ruin upon those who stood against them, and more and more were coming through.
The Goldchops tore themselves free of the corpses and rose, dripping blood.
“I’m going to block the Portal,” shouted Harald. “Stay back!”
“What?” Sam was bewildered, horrified. “What does that even mean?”
Harald ran at the polyhedron. The Goldchops flew ahead of him, and never had he loved them more, the strength and speed they gave him, their sheer, absurd lethality.
The Shadow Mastiff loped alongside him, peeling away at the last moment to run down a terror bird that was sprinting by.
Harald opened his twin Thrones and poured his might into the Aching Depths. The area before the polyhedron grew dark and frigid, and the next trio of terror birds who fell out of the triangular portal squawked in dismay as they rose up within the boundaries of the abyss.
But Harald wasn’t moving to engage.
He was just getting close enough for the Goldchops to get to work.
They flew out wide only to curve back in and slice through two necks, spinning horizontally. Blood and feathers exploded as the terror birds collapsed, and then the third ran at him.
Harald raised the Dawnblade, its length slicked black with Abyssal Attunement. Dark Vigor gave him wings, and he laughed as the chicken from hell came racing at him, fleet footed and more than he could hope to handle alone.
The terror bird leaped, huge feet swinging forward to grapple him, and the Shield of Valor appeared midair before it, so that the bird slammed to a halt, letting out a whistling cry of confusion, and fell back to the cobblestones.
Sam was there, her Beacon of Hope filling Harald with such emotion and relief that his eyes prickled as he grinned at her.
Five terror birds leaped out of the portal to land before them, black and red feathers ruffled.
They cocked their heads and immediately rushed at Harald and Sam.
A wall tore itself out of the ground, rising some four feet abruptly, but the birds simply leaped over it with ease.
Screams came from all around them, the cries of the terror birds, the sounds of bedlam and chaos.
The Goldchops came flying back through, and two of the terror birds fell. The Shadow Mastiff ran in from behind, baying again, and that unholy, demonic howl caused the terror birds to flinch, two glancing back at its source, even as Vic stepped up alongside Harald, his Aura of Cruelty complimenting his Aura of the Aching Depths.
But these were Level 21 monsters.
They were not so easily dissuaded.
Two leaped as one barreled in toward them.
So fast. So hellishly fast.
Nessa let out a cry of effort as she unleashed an upward angled Crescent Arc. Vic somehow glided away, off to the side, his motion fluid as he slashed out at the running bird’s side, cutting open its wing.
Sam moved the Shield of Valor before the running bird, but it simply knocked it aside, pounding past, and then it was upon them. Sam raised her Thornguard, but the huge beak swung past it, over the edge, and into her cuirass with such force that she was slammed to the ground.
“Sam!” Harald hewed with the Dawnblade, two-handed, and struck the bird across the leg. The wound turned black immediately and he felt a pulse of power, but the scales were tough, and he failed at cutting the leg off completely.
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Nessa and Vic were fighting the other two terror birds, both of which suddenly died as the Goldchops plowed through them like a scythe through feathered pillows. Both Goldchops then converged on the terror bird that was about to attack Sam again, knocking it bodily off its feet and almost into Harald.
Who crouched beside Sam, eyes wide. The wound was terrible, a huge hole punched through the metal cuirass and just over her heart, everything dark and visceral red, blood welling up everywhere.
“Quick.” He dug out a scale and pressed it to her cheek. “Hurry!”
She grimaced, jaw clenched, and absorbed the Golden Dawn. Another, and the wound began to heal.
“Go,” she rasped. “I’m fine!”
Harald rose and saw terror birds pouring out of the portal now like water from a hose, no longer coming through in groups but a constant rush, one after another, some landing atop each other so that they squawked huffily and clacked their beaks at each other.
Another raiding team moved up to help, but it was impossible to stem the tide. The Goldchops crisscrossed again and again, dropping monsters with each pass, but the volume was too high.
Twenty of the terror birds pushed out, snapping their beaks and letting loose haunting hunting cries.
“Back!” shouted Nessa. “Fall back!”
Harald heaved Sam to her feet. Kársek was backing away, sweating profusely as he raised wall after wall in the monsters’ path, but there was clearly insufficient Earthblood here for the walls were three feet, some only two feet high.
The Shadow Mastiff leaped atop the back of a terror bird, sinking its talons into the feathers as it chomped, only for a second to spear it in the back with its huge beak and tear it off and onto the ground.
“No!” shouted Harald, directing the Goldchops to help, but it was too late. Four terror birds encircled the Mastiff and swung their beaks down again and again, and a moment later Harald sensed the defeated Hound returning to his Cosmos.
No time to think, to plan. The terror birds wouldn’t let up. They had no strategy, no hesitation. They just came at you, fast as the wind, and their legs and necks were long enough that reach was a problem, their beaks already swinging down at you even as you tried to strike back.
Vic moved alongside Harald, his rapier slashing out so rapidly that it formed a web of steel before them, a moving fence of wicked cuts that gave the closest terror birds pause. Nessa had been separated from their crew, birds rushing between them so that she fought her own retreating action, but it was clear she was struggling; her blade flashed again and again as she released Echoing Strikes and Crescent Arcs.
But all the while the Goldchops did their bloody work. Back and forth they flew, inexhaustible, bloody-minded, slaughtering the terror birds wherever they span. Harald directed them to Nessa’s aid, and they buried themselves in the huge birds that faced her, dropping two and then exploding out of their bodies like horrific babies to bury themselves in two more.
A terror bird was on him. Suddenly it was just there, rearing up, massive battle-axe beak slashing down with all the power of a guillotine. Harald ducked aside as he swung at the beak, but he was too slow; the beak tore down the outside of his arm, shredding leather and ripping open his deltoid and triceps.
He felt nothing.
Turning smoothly, he used his Strength of 15 to bring the abyssal Dawnblade right across the bird’s neck, shouting in fury as he wounded the bird.
It squawked and leaped back, thick red blood spraying across its feathers, then lunged in again only for Sam to intervene with the Thornguard. Massive green vines immediately burst out from the shield to snake around the bird, wrapping it tight and burying black thorns into its feathered form as it fell over.
More terror birds were coming through.
Their crew was actively retreating now. Terror birds were racing around the perimeter of the plaza, harrying those who’d remained behind, or taking off down side streets or into the avenues. A crowd of some fifty of them were pushing out from around the portal, and still more came.
Panic and horror gripped Harald’s heart.
He wasn’t strong enough to stop them.
He had no empowered attacks of his own. He could barely go toe-to-toe with one, much less stop such a massive flock.
Fury and frustration gripped him by the heart.
He’d not worked hard enough.
He’d not advanced fast enough.
He’d been insufficient.
Then huge footsteps sounded from behind, the ground shivering, and a giant club came swinging down from above to collide with a descending terror bird that was dropping onto them. The club hit the bird square in the chest with such force that blood and feathers blew out as the bird was whacked back into the sky, neck suddenly lolling limply as it crashed far back in the flock.
The scale-golem strode past Harald and entered the fray.
It simply waded into the inrushing flock like a farmer amongst chickens. Standing eight feet tall, it was just slightly taller than the terror birds, but so solid, so massive, so powerful that they appeared zephyrs of the wind compared to a mountain.
They pecked at him, harried him, slammed their beaks into his bronze side, but then the scale-golem swung his eight-foot long club and utterly destroyed three of them in one blow.
It was awe inspiring. Built to resemble stylized dwarven warriors in full armor, they were gifts from the Anvil Kings of Dumrûn, thirty of them bestowed a century ago, though only twenty-three remained. They all gleamed of bronze, all wore massive armor, and each wielded a different weapon.
But massive and unstoppable as the scale-golem was, it could stem the rushing terror birds no more than a single boulder could a flood. They simply parted around it and raced on.
Harald stayed close to Vic so that their auras could work in combination, Sam’s Beacon of Hope keeping his head in the game, his mind sharp, his resolve fierce. Together the three of them angled back to join up with Nessa whose left arm hung limp, her shoulder a bloody mass of ribbons.
“Behind,” barked Vic. “Heal yourself!”
Nessa didn’t bother complaining.
Harald brought the Goldchops in tighter, so that they simply swept back and forth before their crew along a path some ten yards wide. Anything that entered that murder zone was demolished, hewn apart, and it was only due to his Masterwork Artifact that they were still standing.
They fought a tense retreat, and still the terror birds came. How many had run out into the city proper? It was a disaster. Bells were pealing the alarm, but how quickly would the people of Flutic respond, how quickly would they get out of the streets?
Then the Dungeon Plaza convulsed.
A vast shockwave burst forward from an unseen source, causing cobblestones to leap forth from their sockets, the ground to buckle, and some fifty or sixty terror birds to collapse in upon themselves as if stepped upon by an invisible giant.
The violence was shocking, absolute, overwhelming.
One moment a third of the Plaza was awash with surging, squawking terror birds, the next it was a butcher’s floor of feathers and blood and broken bones.
“What the hell?” Harald turned, dazed, and saw the Hammerfell striding forward, eight feet tall in her steel plate armor, her crimson tabard blowing in the wind, her burgundy hair loose and framing her angelic face.
Harald had never felt such relief.
She wielded her absurdly massive blade in one hand. It was the size of a trestle table, its broad blade gleaming white as if drawn fresh from the forge.
And her aura.
By the Fallen Angel, her aura.
Harald felt goosebumps wash across his arms, felt his own Aching Depths whimper and collapse upon itself before the sheer might of the Hammerfell’s presence. His throat caught, his mind blanked, and she seemed to only loom more massive, not eight feet tall but eighteen.
The terror birds oriented on this new threat and came, shrieking and leaping, to their doom.
The Hammerfell swept her blade before her again, cleaving the air, and another shockwave rolled forth. Terror birds caught in its path simply burst apart, as if Kársek had detonated them from within.
“Excuse me,” said the Hammerfell, her voice soft but somehow carrying to where Harald and his crew stood, jaws agape. “Mind stepping aside?”
“Run,” whispered Nessa, grabbing hold of Sam by the arm and hauling on her. “Run!”
Their crew raced away from the portal, but Harald couldn’t help but turn even as he ran to watch the seventh most powerful raider in Flutic go to work.
The scale-golems were closing around the portal itself, insensate and uncaring of Lady Hammerfell’s assaults, but it was clear she was going to be the one to clear this threat.
Again and again she chose a quadrant of the square to pacify and swung her huge sword. A deluge of force burst forth to liquefy the terror birds. She settled into a wide legged stance and just swung again and again.
Hundreds of terror birds died.
None were able to even get close to her.
Their crew slowed and came to a stop. Other raiders were gathered around, watching in awe at what one of their best could do.
Even his Goldchops felt insignificant compared to that level of power. Harald dismissed them, and felt his strength and speed diminish.
But it only fed his feeling of insufficiency.
Instead, he just watched what someone with real power quelled the Shuddering by herself.
And by the Fallen Angel, Lady Hammerfell was awesome.
“You know,” said Vic, barely audible over the huge thrumming sound of the force waves. “I don’t think she’d have much trouble with the goblins we just fought, either.”
Sam snorted and shoved Vic’s shoulder.
“What could give her trouble?” asked Kársek, tone wondering. “This is true might we are seeing. Incredible.”
“She had to work hard against the Vortex Hydra on the 63rd,” said Harald. “But that’s barely halfway down into the dungeon.”
“Remember the statues on the 47th?” asked Sam softly. “How overwhelming they seemed?”
Harald tried to imagine Lady Hammerfell going up against one of those hollow statues with its flaming sword. Imagined her swinging her huge sword and demolishing it with one blow.
“Don’t forget she’s just using one Active,” said Nessa. “The one best suited to this situation. She’ll have a dozen others, along with her Passives.”
“And still she’s capped at the 63rd,” said Vic. “Makes you fear what might lurk on the 90th, does it not?”
“What’s the deepest anyone has ever reached?” asked Harald.
“You mean returned from?” Sam shook her head in wonder. “The Queencutter is said to have visited the 71st. One of the Anvil Kings is said to have lead a Doomforge Legion to the 80th, but…”
Kársek passed his hand over his blood-soaked beard. “King Brogar Ironheart, yes. We’re taught of his folly in nursery songs.”
“Folly?” asked Vic. “That sounds an apt description of a venture to the 80th.”
Kársek just stroked his beard, shaking his head dolefully as he did so.
“Look,” said Nessa. “The portal. It’s calming.”
Terror birds had ceased to fall from the triangular portal, which was slowly lightening and returning to normal. Even as they watched, the polyhedron shivered, jerked, and then resumed its regular spinning.
“Thank the angels,” sighed Vic. “It’s over. Time for a bath!”
“We need to hunt down the terror birds that got away,” said Sam.
Vic winced. “Do we though? Do we?”
“She’s right,” sighed Nessa. “Who knows how many got out?”
“Then what’s the point of giving taxes to the Flutic government for them to pay for a city guard,” complained Vic, “if they’re not going to, you know, guard us?”
“Oh wait!” exclaimed Sam happily. “I got a level!”
Lady Hammerfell stood watching the Dungeon Portal for a moment longer, than released her huge sword so that it simply disappeared, and turned to sweep her gaze over the plaza.
Her gaze fell upon their crew and alighted on Harald.
Who felt a jolt of emotion pass through him. He’d admired her before, but after this display of power? It felt an honor just to be regarded.
Lady Hammerfell smiled and inclined her head. Raiders, members of her crew, city guards, all were converging on her, no doubt seeking orders, reassurance, or just to be close to her magnificent form.
Mouth dry, still holding her gaze, Harald did the only thing that felt appropriate.
He bowed low.
When he rose, he saw that she’d broken away to jog toward the main avenue, warriors hurrying to keep up.
“Come on,” said Harald, resolve firming. “Sam’s right. We’re not done yet. Not while there are monsters loose in the city.”