V2Ch27-Safe Haven

“A strange story,” James said after Jeremiah Rotter finished speaking.

“But I assure you, it’s completely tr—”

“I believe you.” James cut him off. “It sounds like the Dead Marsh is quite dangerous.”

Anansi had already told him as much, so that wasn’t staggering news. Hearing more details about the threat didn’t change the nature of the mission.

“Yet you still intend to go there?” Rotter asked in disbelief. “Also, where did you get that name from? It sounds appropriate, but I didn’t realize these places had names.”

James smiled grimly. “I have my sources,” he replied vaguely. “And I can be quite dangerous myself.” He tilted his head at the sand where the bodies of the coyotes had been until he used Mass Pillage on them.

“I-I see,” Rotter said. “Of course, sir. Far be it from me to question someone so powerful.” He smiled weakly.

I don’t love brown nosers, James thought. Especially not ones who are so blatant about it. Things I’ll have to get used to.

“What will you and your group do?” he asked aloud.

“Oh, that—hm.” Rotter’s eyes noticeably darted to the unconscious Damien Rousseau before they shifted back to James.

Oh, I see. That’s their real leader. Of course. James’s observation thus far had been that power was the only law in the System-operated world. It was only natural that the highest level member of the group would be in charge—especially when he was a ferocious creature!

“What happened to him anyway?” James asked, pointing his thumb at Rousseau.

“Oh, um. Well, he tangled with a creature in that marsh that might have been just a little beyond his abilities.”

James raised an eyebrow. Rousseau was a fierce werewolf last time I saw him. A little scary even to me. What could’ve injured him so badly that he’d have trouble fighting off a few coyotes?

“Are you going to give me the details, or do I have to beg?” James asked.

“Ah, I wasn’t there,” Rotter admitted. “But there were huge bite marks all over him when he came back, and he’d reverted back to human form. He’s a werewolf, you see.”

“Interesting.”

Huge bite marks doesn’t sound like an undead injury. I can’t help wondering if Damien would have turned into a zombie or something if he did have bites from them. But it reminded him of the time when he’d seen Damien fighting one of the forest wolves. Maybe they were cohabitating with the undead in the Dead Marsh now. Or fighting for that territory.

If they’re working together now, those are awfully strange bedfellows…

“Well, I’m going back toward the Dead Marsh, to kill everything inside it. Let’s finish this Orientation with humans at the top of the food chain, where we belong!” James said. “You can keep trekking through the desert and try your luck with the other creatures that live here, or you can follow me.”

“I, ah, I don’t know—we left there because it was so dangerous—”

“Then try your luck in the desert if you want. I would stay and guard you, but there’s another group of people I already promised to protect. They’re either in the Dead Marsh or very near it.” James smiled broadly, and for a moment he must have resembled a crocodile. “I can tell you that if you’re worried about your physical safety, the safest place to be in this Orientation is right behind me, wherever I’m standing.”

“Y-yes, that makes sense.” Rotter looked back at his teammates. Recovering from injuries, dressed in torn clothing, or both, they seemed a motley bunch at present. “Will you wait—” He began, but stopped at the look on James’s face.

I’ve already waited too damn long! James thought. The faces of his companions ran through his mind: Alan, Mitzi, Sierra, Ramon, Camila, the other Rodriguezes—and yes, even Cliff. He owed them something, if only because he felt he’d promised them something. He also wondered what had happened to the escapees. He had nothing but admiration for those who had used the window he’d made to escape, especially since it happened despite his plan failing.

He was about to rise and tell Rotter that his group would have to take care of themselves, when he heard another voice that gave him pause.

“Of course we’ll follow you. We owe you our lives. We’ll provide whatever support we can.” Damien Rousseau’s voice came out almost as a growl, but James suspected that was just how he sounded all the time. Possibly a side effect of becoming a werewolf. The tone of gratitude sounded sincere to him, and James currently wore the Ring of Truth, so he felt confident in his reading.

“I’m very glad to hear it, Damien,” he said. “Nice to meet you, by the way.” He walked a few feet and extended his hand to where Damien still lay on the sand nearby. The werewolf shook, but his grip felt weak to James.

He still needs time to fully recover, he thought.

“Pleasure’s really all mine,” Damien said in his quiet growling voice. “I really thought I was going to wake up in some kind of wild fantasy afterlife there.”

“Well, I’m glad you don’t have to face that,” James said with a smile.

“Forget about me for a minute, though. What do you need from us? How can we help you?”

“Well, I have to return to the forest as quickly as I can,” James said, feeling a little bad now. “I was hoping to get some backup here, but I can see you guys need some time to recover from that attack. Do you feel able to defend the group adequately if I run ahead?”

Damien dropped his head. “Sorry, man. I think we’re a burden right now. I think we’re a capable group. I know I gathered a balanced team around me.” He pronounced these words in a tone of pride. “But in this open desert, we’re at a disadvantage until we’re fully recovered. We retreated to this plateau so we couldn’t be surrounded, but that wasn’t enough.”

“Hm. So it’s a terrain problem in your judgment?” James asked. That was something he could deal with.

Damien simply nodded.

Basic Elemental Magic: Earth! James began chanting.

After around ten minutes of chanting, while Damien and the others looked on in quiet anticipation, James unleashed his magic.

Three thick walls of condensed sandstone rose from the ground on all sides of the group. At James’s further command, bits of sandstone near the tops of the walls fell away in a pattern, forming crenellations. Still wielding earth Mana, James pulled part of the plateau down to form a thin outcropping that would shield them from the sun. It didn’t make contact with all of the walls, so there was a thin gap to let sunshine through. And, lastly, James made a human-sized gap between one wall and the plateau.

The walls should hold against anything short of high explosives, and the roof should be adequate as long as no flying enemies attack, he judged. They should be able to leave through that gap, but any predators would have to find that opening to attack, and if they wanted to enter, they would have to do it in a single file line. Adequate defense.

He snuck a peek at the group’s reactions. He could barely see them, because he hadn’t left many openings in the roof. But there were still people whose mouths hung open as they stared at James or the fortress he’d thrown up. Others looked like the surprise had passed for them, but they continued to look around with appreciative expressions. And Damien Rousseau was staring at James with the biggest grin he’d ever seen.

“Everyone feel secure?” James asked with a wink.

People began talking over each other about how much safer they were now.

“Alright, recover at your leisure, and come meet me in the forest or the marsh when you can. I’ll visit you in your dreams and let you know where I am.”

James leapt straight up and punched a human-sized hole in the ceiling. There, now they have a little skylight. Probably wasn’t enough light before. He landed on the roof and noted with a bit of relief that it was strong enough to hold his weight. He realized belatedly that he hadn’t known it would.

That could’ve been bad.

“What was that he said about dreams?!” Someone asked from below.

James didn’t wait to hear and ran across the stone fortress’s roof. Then he jumped down onto the sand and kept running, a chant already working its way through his lips. He’d realized what he needed to reach the forest more quickly. Basic Elemental Magic: Gravity.

He had all the Stat points he needed in Agility. He just needed to decrease his weight, and he would be able to clear ground more quickly than even his Skin Balloons, which he ordered to follow above him as quickly as they could.

Once James was lighter, he found that each stride carried him several yards forward. As he grew accustomed to his new, insanely light weight, he ran as fast as he’d imagined.

One hour later, the sun had almost set.

James arrived at the edge of the Dead Marsh and stopped running.

The change in terrain was immediately obvious. The ground began changing from dry sand to moist soil that supported far more vegetation. It was almost as abrupt as a line in the earth, which made James wonder if something like this would ever happen in nature, or if it was just the System skewing reality in its preferred ways. A few yards ahead, the tree line began to reassert itself. Most prominently—and this was why he stopped running—James could see a mist emanating from the marshy ground.

That feels ominous and unnatural, James decided without much thought. He wasn’t sure when exactly he’d gained the ability to sense it, but he felt the presence of hostile Mana inside that mist. Some life form was controlling it. He judged that entering the mist might provoke an immediate ambush.

And it stank of rot. Something mildewy in it, perhaps. James was no expert in swamps, but having spent much of his life in Florida, he had a healthy wariness of standing waters. Common wisdom in the Sunshine State was that any body of freshwater was likely to contain alligators.

He suspected worse predators than those lurked in these waters.

The Dead Marsh. The name almost ran a shudder through his body. But he consciously evoked Self-Control, and the normally involuntary reaction stopped immediately. Now was no time to lose his head. He tried to decide what to do. Where to go first.

I wonder where the Rodriguezes have gotten to. Are they in there? Still outside of it? Captured by Rostov and his thugs?

He just didn’t have the answers he needed to make a confident decision.

“What are you going to do?” Hester asked, breaking her long silence.

I almost forgot you were there, he thought.

“Kind of missed your voice,” he said. “Thank you for warning me about those humans in trouble before, by the way. I’d appreciate you doing the same in future. As for what I’m going to do, I need to figure out my strategy for taking the cultists and the Ruler of the Dead Marsh out. Still deciding the order I should fight them in. And where exactly my group is likely to be. More pressing at the moment, I’m not sure what’s up with that mist. It gives me the creeps.”

“Do you think you can destroy it?” she asked.

“I was considering an attempt.”

It seemed a little rash to try a frontal assault on something that was obviously infused with enemy Mana, but he doubted the mist itself was a form of attack that could reach him while he was outside the confines of the Dead Marsh.

Well, as long as I still have a little daylight, he thought. Responding to his silent command, the Skin Balloons dropped their altitude to pick him up.

They raised him back up to a height where he could get a little more sunlight. James began charging a final Solar Ray for the day. He would see if he could blast that mist away and penetrate into the Dead Marsh.

He spent longer than he had before, gathering power around himself. This time, there was no time pressure, after all. No coyotes about to rip people’s throats out if he didn’t intervene. And he was conscious that he was collecting energy much less efficiently, with the sun setting already. Might as well do the best job he could.

When the sun had almost completely melted into the horizon, and he could hardly feel himself gathering any power from it anymore, James gave up and unleashed the attack, shooting it straight into the heart of the mist.

The results were disappointing.

The mist faded where the Solar Ray struck, but it only penetrated for a certain distance. Some trees and shrubbery were destroyed, and James could see he was turning small amounts of the swamp water into steam.

But even before the beam had fully discharged its energy, the mist reasserted itself. James felt the ray being pushed back, as if the foreign Mana was overpowering the beam he’d fired. Perhaps that was exactly what was happening.

He quickly ran out of power and ordered the Skin Balloons to set him down slightly further back from the Dead Marsh.

He decided not to enter the territory within the mist for now.

I have a bad feeling I’d be setting off the final boss fight a little too early. Need to figure out what the situation is with the Rodriguezes and the cultists before I decide what to do.

“Aw, man,” Hester said quietly.

“Are you as disappointed as I am?” James asked wryly. The little spider was growing on him.

“Yes! That attack wiped out all those coyotes. Whatever’s in there must be really strong. I’m starting to worry.”

James sat down cross-legged.

“Well, don’t worry too much,” he said. “I’m going away for a bit. Hopefully I’ll solve some problems while I’m gone.”

Dreamwalk.