Sell you a Bridge chapter 103

Hell October 3rd 2010 8:00 PM EDT

Finding  the Warlord turned out to be as easy as expected, having the quest to  guide us was...interesting, but convenient. We hadn't really gotten any  quests like this, most of the ones in diablo were given by NPCs and  aside from that shitty Satyr we hadn't really met any that didn't try to  kill us immediately. But despite how weird it felt I couldn't deny how  nice it was to have an easy path to follow, even if it was annoying and  time consuming to cut our way through all the monsters to actually get  there.

The actual fight though, I  was less sanguine about (pun intended). People who hadn't gotten into  diablo very deeply might not remember the Warlord of Blood, he was kind  of a throwaway mini boss, but I'd been doing research for the dungeon  for more than a month, I knew every possible monster and bit of lore we  could run into. Despite his ridiculous name the Warlord was not a person  to fuck around with. In fact, he was probably going to be one of the  scariest things we'd fought up to this point.

The  Warlord of Blood was one of those stereotypical apex warrior types like  Achilles, a total beast of a man who took combat to an art form.  However the Warlord took that art form to eleven. The guy was known for  fighting alongside hell in the Sin War, where he literally mass murdered  actual angels back when he was still a human just with pure skill, and  that was before he lost his humanity through the act of slaughter and  ascended to some kind of proto murder god. The Warlord was one of the  most combat capable beings we would find down here.

If  it was just me I wouldn't actually be worried about getting killed down  here. The Warlord was to the sword was Mozart was to music, a sword  which was cursed as a motherfucker and thirsted for human blood. He was  also immune to magic, fire, and lightning, which nixed both Artemis and  Zee for direct combat. Artemis had brought out a physical bow she kept  as backup and a series of very brutal enchanted arrows, while my  girlfriend was itching to try out her new golem spell on the armor  plated bastard.

Reggie  was a bit less use in this fight, though he'd come up with some nasty  acid orbs he was itching to try out on the Warlord, he'd special ordered  the stuff from Acid Master, who was an old friend of Jim's, and was  excited about the utility since the rubber balls he used would let him  bank shots with them and he was getting pretty good at that. Kit was  rocking AP rounds, tungsten tipped. She'd been trying to source some  depleted prometheum bullets from a few arms dealers she knew but  apparently they were insanely hard to find pretty much anywhere unless  you had a stable source.

I  was sitting at about six hundred fifty points going into this fight,  after a few days of income mixed with some decent expenditure, but it  should be enough for this fight, especially considering the Warlord was  magic proof, so I'd mostly be using my points for mobility. Well,  partially anyway, I did have another idea, one that would probably cost  hundreds of points but would be a huge game changer if it worked. As we  approached the quest marker we slowed down, to do a bit of a huddle. I  looked around at the others. "Ok so we all know the plan?"

Artemis  nodded. "You hold the boss off while we take care of the Steel Lords  guarding him as fast as we can, then we gang up on him and kick the shit  out of him." That was an incredibly simplistic description of our plan,  but to be fair we were a well oiled machine after all this time  together down here. Plus I would be dealing with the main threat so they  had less to remember. I'd had enough experience fighting Blood that  combined with my insane speed and reflexes, not to mention my  teleportation, I should be able to hold the bastard off while the others  took care of him.

Zee  stepped up, looking nervous. "You seem genuinely worried about this  fight, you don't usually spook so easily." She was right, I was a bit on  edge considering the backstory, but there was no reason to worry her, I  could take it or not, either way being afraid wouldn't change a thing.  She sighed at my stoic expression. "But fine, if you want to play the  big strong he man I won't poke holes. I will however, do this." She  stepped forward and pushed up my mask to pull me into a blueberry  cheesecake flavored kiss. I felt a hot flash of energy run over me and  she stepped back smugly. "Reflection spell, picked it up from a scroll I  found. Should bounce back some of the damage and keep you safe."

I  laughed and leaned back in, pulling her into a longer, slower kiss.  "Thanks baby, that should help. Of course this beast of an armor set we  found definitely isn't going to hurt either." I looked down at my gear  with a grin. Though the Godly Plate of the Whale and other plate armors  were powerful, they were also fucking heavy. My current armor was loads  better. The Armor of Gloom. The stuff was some kind of insane leather  that was damn near impenetrable. It had shit for magic resist but my  ring of the mystics took care of that with only the low c0st of making  me slightly more flammable and shock prone.

Point  was my armor was light as shit and soaked up a ton of damage, physical  especially, which paired well with both my build and this cool new spell  from my lady. I grinned her as I pulled back, excited to test myself  against a powerful enemy, and with a shared nod between us and the  others we all headed into the room where the boss waited, my team spread  out to deal with the Steel Lords and I stepped forward to engage the  Warlord. As I approached I expected him to attack immediately, but he  just stood there, waiting hands folded on the pommel of his sword. The  point was driven an inch or two into the stone by its weight, showing  the black blade's sharpness.

I  drew my own sword, but he didn't react to the motion, simply staring at  me, waiting. Finally, after a minute or two of stillness, he spoke. "An  impressive blade boy, but your grip speaks of inexperience. I suggest  you return from whence you've come. You can hold your head up high for  making it this far, but if you attempt another step to pass me I'll have  to strike it from your shoulders." I'd expected arrogance, sneering or  derision, but I got none of those. All the ringing bass that echoed from  his horned helm contained was cold certainty.

There  was no pity, no mercy, no weakness or feeling of any kind. He was  stating cold mechanical fact. This wasn't a threat, it was math, me plus  him equaled death, sure as the sky was blue and the grass was green. It  was no more personal than multiplication tables. That honestly scared  me more than rage or hate. He had done this so many times, had seen so  many warriors that combat had become a formula he could just fill in.  Plug in the variables and spill blood. I swallowed hard, but I knew this  was necessary, I had to beat him, had to get to the bottom, so I  charged.

I  activated my shadow port, appearing behind him instantly with my blade  flashing. Every ounce of strength, speed, and all of my absurd reflexes  channeled into a blow that used every ounce of leverage and fluidity my  doom fist afforded me and every bit of flexibility and bodily control  possessed by a master ninja. I didn't throw this attack I PERFORMED it,  like a ballet or an opera. It was the sum total of all the martial skill  I'd learned from all my perks and my training with blood and my combat  down here in the dungeon. It was a perfect attack.

Which  I'm pretty sure is the only reason the almost invisbly fast parry that  leapt from the bastards blind spot somehow failed to open my throat  completely instead of just drawing a thin line of searing pain across my  neck. I ported back again , expecting him to follow, but he just stood,  relaxed, resting his sword back on his armored shoulder. He gave me a  nod of respect. "An admirable attempt. Few are they who walk away from  such a blow. I expected to take your head as promised." He straightened  from his relaxed posture. "I suppose you've earned a swift death."

Before  I could even process that he was on me. I felt like I was being  attacked by a steel hurricane. His blade moved like lightning, nearly  too fast to see and striking with enough force to split the sky itself.  His sword was so nimble is almost seemed like it was bending and curling  around my defenses, his absurd speed and skill managing to create and  optical illusion of a shining black wind whipping through the gaps in my  defenses trying to take me apart. I'd like to say I held my own, that I  defended myself with flashing steel and my amazing reflexes and my  magic speed enhancing sword.

That  however, would be a lie. I didn't fight the Warlord, I SURVIVED him.  Barely that if I'm being honest. Without my enhanced vitality, my  demonic flesh, my armor, or the reflection magic I would have died there  on that stone floor. As it was my body was being shredded. I used my  shadow form, my teleporting, my flight, and just about every trick or  skill I had. I hurled shuriken, I walked up walls, all just to buy  myself the extra minute or so that was feeling like eternity. Finally  the Warlord shifted slightly, he blade sweeping back and intercepting an  acid orb, and I knew the battle was joined.

My  team had come through, and bullets banged off his armor while he  intercepted every orb of acid and sidestepped neatly around arrows and  dropped anvils, somehow weaving through an entire symphony of death like  he was taking a lazy walk through the park. Despite that though, the  pressure on me lessened immensely. I made sure to memorize all of it, to  keep those skills and movements in my brain locked up behind my perfect  recall so I could maybe learn to do this myself, but finally I saw what  I needed, a single split second chance.

It  couldn't even be called an opening. He didn't reveal a weakness so much  as all my friends forced him to counter nearly simultaneously and he  only had two hands. I was sure he could avoid any blow I could make. I  only had one sword. Which is when I used my new technique, a fusion of  two of my others I'd been working on for a few days. I focused and  opened a Hole in front of me. Not a big one maybe the size of a half  dollar. It cost a big chunk of points, a cost which increased as I  opened about ten others around him in every blind spot I could find.

I  merged the power of hole with my shadow porting and twisted my  abilities to their limit to create a new skill, a new ability unique to  me, it drained my points down to a hundred, but I knew it was worth it.  Once I had it set up I drove my sword forward, a perfect assassins lunge  with every ounce of my talent and skill behind it, a blow that  surpassed even my earlier attack because there was no fancy maneuver or  technique, just perfectly leveraging my skills to do my fastest most  brutal stab. I was about ten feet away from him and he clearly didn't  think he could be bothered with my attack. I drove the blade forward  with every bit of force and leverage I could manage, sliding a picture  perfect stabbing lunge right through that half dollar sized circle as I  did.

He seemed to sense something,  to have noticed the attack once it entered his field of perception, and I  realized he had noticed me after all, but he dismissed it as just  another attack to block. Sadly for him, though he did block the blow at  his throat, he failed to account for the ten identical blades warping  through space to strike every one of his blindspots. He avoided some,  but more than five perfect blows pierced through him like he was a  pincushion. I stumbled back with a grin as he fell to a knee but  adjusted and strode forward to meet him again. He was wounded, now all  that was left was to mop up what was left.