EliminateIII: Nightsoil is teleported from inside the caster over a distance of 70ft over the course of 1 minute.
It wasn’t fancy, it wasn’t flashy, but you couldn’t beat waste management. Sanitation, comfort, and cleanliness all in one. I didn’t know how the others were surviving.
I didn’t want to know.
I was the in the goblin room, giving myself privacy while I practised magic. I would have done it for the other’s sake as well, but their opinions seemed to have changed.
Conan was off counting paces, trying to properly map the rooms he’d explored the week before. He was hoping to find any inconsistencies in places we’d visited, whether that be secret rooms or just corridors and chambers we’d overlooked. Once he had the general layout down here figured out he even had plans to measure the stairs and try to line up the north-south axis based on my markings on the floor above.
Originally, we’d considered continuing exploring together, but Brace had pointed out that if we hit a trap while together, or lost another week, her party would be out both their explorers. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to be included in her party, but the point was a good one. As such, Conan had instead pointed me through the one door in the goblin room I hadn’t been, then set about mapping the dungeon.
He’d also warned me to stick in that general direction, as every other path he’d taken had led to creatures, traps, or unpickably locked doors.
Armed with knowledge, and the confidence that he’d not been horrible skewered by some trap walking the same corridor, I made good time out of the goblin room right up to the second door. At which point I discovered the room with the pit in the centre, just as he’d described, and the crowd of nine people, which he’d somehow failed to mention.
“Halt fey creature!”
I was getting tired of that sentiment. At least they weren’t calling me a demon or attacking me on sight.
“Where did you come from?” I demanded, I didn’t bother correcting them on the fey thing. It might be the only thing keeping them from attacking me.
Their apparent leader, an exceptionally cute and unbelievably-short woman gestured with her axe to the wooden platform suspended above the pit. It was as if the goddess of the dwarves and a cherub had had a beardless baby.
“We took the elevator.”
“Do you serve the warlocks?”
She puffed herself up indignantly, looking up at me with fire in her eyes, “We are knights of the emperor! I am one of his personal advisors! Who are you and why are you here?”
I glanced around at the others. Strangely, they were all women. Perhaps the emperor had a type? Three of them weren’t even wearing armour. One of the women had a strange looping scar on her neck, too jagged at the edges to be part of a ritual, yet order enough to not be caused by natural means. She’d fought warlocks before, yet wore robes instead of armour.
Magicians.
None carried spellbooks in their hands, so they weren’t magi. Nonetheless I’d have to be wary. I didn’t know what they were capable of.
“I am Oswic, Magi of the Sacred Order, Wise Man of Blackbridge, The Starcaller of Dawn, Master of Twilight, Voice of the Storm, Speaker on the Wind, Five Time Hoopstone Champion of Ravenhold, and I am here searching for a man known as Eric. We were both captured by the warlocks, so you’ll pardon my caution.”
The cherub woman took a step back. Magi, when not freshly escaped from a prison cell without the book of spells they’d built up over a lifetime, were exceptionally dangerous.
“We have no quarrel with you Magi, nor however, can we allow you to pass. Your kind are too dangerous. Leave the way you came lest we be forced to defend ourselves.”
It was a flash in my mind. One not from the dark altar nor the Mushroom-King. A dark impulse. Invisible swords slashing. Nine women dead at my feet. My path unimpeded. They were putting myself and Eric at risk. It would be just. Show them what their lack of trust deserved.
I fled the room without another word.
It was one of the dangers of magic. Impulses could turn to actions as quick as thought. Even a sword took time to draw from the sheath. Time in which sense could be regained. Time in which others could flee. There was a reason Magi trained mind, body, and spirit.
I found Conan in the giant chamber with the magic pool.
“The room with the pit is blocked. Nine women; mages and warriors.”
Conan frowned, “Where did they come from? Did they climb up from the pit itself?”
“So they claimed. There was a lift suspended over the hole. Something I’d be very keen to investigate, but they prevented my passage with threat of violence. Is there other routes you deem safe to explore?”
Conan consulted his unfinished map, and his previous notes of passage.
“Three creatures wait calmly through the door there,” he pointed at one of the two exits closest the pool, “Humanoid. They might be reasoned with or defeated with your talents. Beyond that door,” he pointed at the other of the two exits, “is a portcullis leading to a strange room full of candles and fire. But I swore I heard whispering, and saw small creatures dancing in the shadows. The candles didn’t cast light properly either, and moved around when I wasn’t looking. I didn’t dare investigate.
“And finally,” he pointed to the door opposite the room with the three creatures, “if you continue that way ‘til you find a hallway, then follow the hallway left for a few hundred feet, you’ll come across a trapped door I couldn’t bypass. The hallway is also trapped, so I’d be careful down there.”
The hallway of traps was the least appealing of the three options. Foes I could reason with or fight, and I was good at reason and fighting. Traps, either they killed me or I got lucky. My luck had held so far, but it could only last so long.
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The flames and candles sounded like sprites of some kind. Sprites, much like elves, loved making deals and bets, but also like elves, they could be temperamental and had a cruel streak of humour. The room of three humanoid creatures then.
I pushed open the door cautiously with my foot, spellbook and sword at the ready. Behind me, Conan held aloft his own sword, and a torch to grant us light.
The room was large, square. About the size of the goblin room. The left side was dropped away to a sloping pit filled with spikes. If I was careful I could probably pick my way through them.
Between me and the pit were three people, mostly naked, crouched facing away. They turned to face me at the sound of the door. For a second I felt a thrill of fear. They were missing their heads. I’d heard there were some warlocks practiced in sorcery, but I’d not thought they’d stooped so low as to bind corpses.
The fear faded an instant later, replaced with a sense of revulsion and curiosity. They had heads on their torsos! They were two men and one woman, mostly naked save for basic loincloths about their waists. Instead of bellybuttons, they had mouths. Instead of abdominal, they had noses, and instead of nipples they had eyes.
The woman’s eyes in particular were distracting, nearly thrice as large as a normal person’s, and staring in two different directions.
“Rivers rise,” Conan breathed, “They were in shadow before.”
A mouth twice as wide as my own split the middle man’s torso in two, I half expected to see his spine, “No passage.”
I could clearly see four doors from where I was standing, not including the one I was in, “We mean no harm, just wish to explor-”
“No PASSAGE!” he wasn’t any louder than a normal man, despite the size of his mouth. I guess he still had human sized lungs stored somewhere in there. Maybe even in the same space. But they’d need a space to keep their brain as well, or everything would overheat. Perhaps a shorter intestine?
Regardless, loud as a normal man was still pretty loud. I flinched back at the sudden change in tone.
Conan put the hand holding his sword on my shoulder. He called past me, “You’re brave, but three naked people, without weapons no less, are no match for two armed and armoured men.”
“Heaven’s punishment is for us to deliver,” the other headless man spoke this time. He had a beard of sorts, which lay over his loincloth as if it were a scarf.
“A bargain then?” I asked, “Gold coins for passage? Ribbons? Gloves?”
The three torso twisted back and forth. The woman’s eyes swayed from side to side with the motion which was distracting in a way I couldn’t quite describe. Shaking their heads, I realized. I tore my gaze from her eyes to stare instead at the middle distance just beyond the centre man’s armpit.
Time for a bit of bluffing then.
I took a step forward, “I will pass now.”
I put the emphasis on the ‘I’ in hopes that Conan would understand to stay back. He did, moving back to stand in the doorway.
The three creatures moved into my path, eyes bouncing with each step, some more than others.
“We are the punishment of heaven,” repeated the one on the left. I wasn’t about to let a straight line like that go to waste.
“No,” I replied, “I am.”
Marshlight
Eyes that large, especially the woman’s, would be far more sensitive to light. Especially if it appeared suddenly right next to them. As such I made sure one of my lights was placed directly by one of the woman’s eyes. I only needed one to waver to start the avalanche.
The other light I placed by the man on the left, more or less chosen at random, but with the slight hope that if the sudden flash led them to retreating the middle man would feel all alone.
Both flinched back from the lights before them, shrinking back and away from me. My lights followed them, dancing angrily before them, darting in then skirting away just before impact.
“I am Oswic of Blackbridge, Magi of the Sacred Order, The Starcaller of Dawn, Master of Twilight, Voice of the Storm, Speaker on the Wind, Five Time Hoopstone Champion of Ravenhold, and you will never again bar my passage.”
The three looked up at me warily. I wondered if having their eyes so low made them feel shorter than they actually were.
“We are-” the woman began.
“Move.” I gestured an arm at her.
PushII
I aimed for her hair and her mouth, points of vulnerability seeing as the spell only could manage 80 lbs at a time. One of her pendulous eyes might have been more effective, but I was worried the force would cause it to rupture. Mouth and hair was enough. She stumbled into the right wall, back pinned against it by her mouth.
The other two remained where they were. Brave creatures, whatever they were.
I raised my hand again, “Next time, you might go into the spikes,” the lights swirled, “My patience wanes.”
I couldn’t follow on the threat even if I had the spells. I could kill the beetles and frogs in cold blood if I had to, perhaps even the goblins or orcneas, but these creatures were too human.
They took a step closer.
I was losing a spell today, wasn’t I?
Will-o’-Wisp
Two more lights joined the others, forming a wavering spinning barrier between us. The creatures didn’t slow.
Fine.
Magic Swords
I should have led with them.
An invisible sword appeared beside each man, flat of the blade nestled in their armpits. Then the swords jerked to the side, pushing them towards the wall the woman was pinned against.
Some injury was impossible to avoid, especially give that they couldn’t see my swords, but if it served to let me pass I’d deem it acceptable. Thankfully the spell I’d recorded claimed “Two invisible blades dance and strike”. Pushing them like this wouldn’t have been possible if I’d only recorded the striking. The dancing was responsible for a good deal of the injury as it was. Straight lines were impossible.
I left them pinned to the wall as I made my way across to the only other exit in the room not shrouded by spikes. It could have been an intimidating scene for the headless men to remember if the door hadn’t been stuck fast.
I tugged in vain, trying to conceal my exertions, but the door only rocked in its frame. Sloppy construction all the way down.
I took a dozen steps back and shoulder charged the door, smashing an Oswic shaped hole through the centre. The remaining pieces of the door rattled as they slid free of the framed and rolled along their oiled track-
Oh.
It had been a sliding door.
I’d have preferred not to look back at the headless men, but I wanted my swords back.
“Raise your arms if you want to keep them!” I called to the three. Despite their exaggerated expressions I couldn’t make out any ridicule on their faces. Perhaps being able to smash through doors with ease made up for the fact that I couldn't figure out how to open them.
They all obeyed my orders, even the woman who I hadn’t cut. I withdrew my swords and ended the spell on her simultaneously. My lights flew to my side as I gave Conan a salute with my corporeal sword.
“Fair well!”
He raised his torch in response.
“To you as well Oswic! Til we meet again!”