[Beastborne: Tower of Blight] (Book 6) Chapter 10

“I was content to leave you alone!” Hal growled, balling his fists. “All you had to do was stay away from my home.”

He had only known such anger once. When Val’s Khaeros had nearly killed Besal. Now he felt that old hatred well up in his chest like molten bile.

I’m going to finish this once and for all.

Noth put her arms around him. “No, Hal. Don’t.”

He took one more step, dragging Noth with him before he realized what he was doing. Dark veins were beginning to creep up his neck and across the sides of his face.

Noth tried to hold him back. “Hal. Don’t let it bait you.”

The Shadesblight was thicker than ever, creating a miasma so dense that he could hardly see the tower anymore. Things wriggled and shifted like a horror from beyond the stars in the shadows despite the bright day.

It wanted him to rush in and challenge it.

Taking a deep, shaky breath, Hal tried to calm himself. Once Noth could feel the tension bleeding out of his muscles, she relaxed her grip.

“Call the Council,” Hal said through clenched teeth. “I don’t care what anybody else is doing. This is our top priority.”

Noth looked up at him. “You’re not going to do anything… rash?”

“No.”

“Okay, Hal.” Noth squeezed him in a hug that did nothing to comfort him. Then she disappeared.

Literally.

One moment she was there, the next she was halfway across the settlement, walking out of a different shadow. It was a sign of how seriously she took his request that she was shadow traveling.

Vorax, now in his cloak form, swept through the grounds and fastened himself to Hal’s back.

“Thanks,” Hal told his familiar. “You can sense it too, huh?”

“Shashsaah,” Vorax replied, a maw of countless teeth opening up near Hal’s shoulder to speak.

“I know.”

“Sashashaa.”

“It is my fault,” Hal argued. “I let this thing in. I took the tower. I could have left it behind. I could have avoided resting in that large empty cavern, but I was so damn tired.”

Vorax grumbled.

“Yes, but I should have seen this coming. If the Abyss wasn’t there, then that would make sense for the Shadesblight to move in. I should have noticed that the rot and corruption around the ruins wasn’t the Abyss. It was the Shadesblight.”

Hal shook his head. So many ifs. If he had walked instead of flown in, he would have seen the corruption for what it was. If he had simply left instead of resting for the night. If he hadn’t taken the tower at all…

However, Vorax brought up a good point: if Hal had slept out in the open, perhaps he would have been infected. That would have been so much worse, Hal could not even imagine how bad that could have been.

With the Manatree’s blessing he didn’t see how that was possible, but then again, he didn’t think the Shadesblight could corrupt an inanimate object such as a building either. Clearly, he did not understand the Shadesblight as well as he thought.

In record time, the Council arrived, and many more besides.

Hal made it clear nobody was to go near the tower. Before the words were out of his mouth, the dwarves began to erect a small barrier all around the 500-foot-wide tower base.

It was longer than a football field, and it was perched right inside his home.

“And Komachi thought the icy snow was bad,” the pobul groused from Elora’s shoulder. The Wildsmaster was studying the darkness surrounding the tower with a critical eye. “Gets frozen too fast. Not good for sliding on muh belly.”

Mira put a hand on Hal’s shoulder. “We’ll fix this. Together,” she promised him.

It was a sign of how bad things were when the elf didn’t make light of the situation.

Durvin whistled in awe of the thing. “Durned thing’s massive!”

“You can say that again,” Angram said. He, and many others, looked to Hal. “What’re we going to do about it?”

Hal turned to his friends and allies.

He had more than enough time to think about what they should do about it. He could have gone to the dragons for help, but he didn’t think they would be able to do anything about it.

There was only one way to solve this.

“It’s a Tower,” Hal said, emphasizing the capital letter just like the capital D in Dungeon. “We climb it and kill anything in our way.”

More than one pair of eyes lit up at the prospect of going into the Tower to fight it from the inside. Several dwarves made a warding gesture with their hands and backed away, but just as many stepped forward, eager to answer the call.

He noticed Val, the only other Beastborne in the settlement, trudging through the snow towards him and his group. Tristal was accompanying her, who looked far more concerned.

Hamrin was among those who stepped back, though Hal couldn’t blame him. He couldn’t fight his way out of a wet paper bag, and Hal wouldn’t dare to risk him. Doing so would have devastating consequences for Brightsong’s food supply.

“I’m going to take a party inside to see what we’re up against,” Hal told the gathered people. “Nobody else is to get within a hundred feet of this thing, got it? I don’t think the Manatree can keep it contained forever.”

“What about those that venture inside?” Ashera asked, stepping closer. As a Royal Guard, she considered the safety of others her priority. Her shaggy oppa, Kow, was stretched out across her shoulders like a warm scarf. “Will the Manatree’s blessing protect us against the Shadesblight?”

“I don’t know,” Hal admitted. “I should be able to bolster the blessing, which is why I will personally be accompanying any group that enters.”

Mira pulled out her lance and used it to lean against. “If it’s like the other Towers on Aldim, it’ll need to be cleared floor-by-floor until we reach the top. Some floors will have bosses, others just puzzles or mazes. I expect, despite its size, that it’s still considerably bigger on the inside.”

“That seems a safe bet,” Hal agreed.

“Then we’ll need a rotating roster of people who are going to go inside with you,” she continued, “and a list of support personnel who will be administering to the wounded and weary who come out.”

A mittened hand went up. “Buffrix will go!”

Hal shook his head. Not only because Buffrix was nearly half his Level, but because he would be needed outside. While it seemed like a good idea on the surface to bring a healer into the Tower, it was far too dangerous to risk Buffrix’s life.

Worse yet, Hal suspected strongly that this Tower didn’t work like the others. It wouldn’t simply spit them out if they failed. The Shadesblight would find a way to consume them.

The next person to speak up was not who he expected.

“Komachi will go,” the pobul said, hefting a barrel of [Fizzy Komachi Bomb Brew].

“No,” Hal said, shaking his head. “You and Buffrix will be needed out here. We have precious few people who can buff or heal as it is.”

“Komachi’s Brewmaster Class is more versatile than ya think. And I boost Elora’s Wildmaster too.” Komachi grumbled. She gave Hal a rude gesture with all four paws, then slipped into Elora’s coat.

“What about me?” Elora asked, crossing her arms. By the determined look on her face, Hal didn’t think it was wise to turn the half-elf away.

“Anybody who wishes to come is welcome, so long as they are of sufficient Level,” Hal announced to the gathering. “To begin with, however, I’ll be taking only a few people in. I have zero idea of what to find within, so the first group will be those I’ve personally hand-picked. Once the threat level has been assessed, we’ll see.”

Bardan lifted his wide belt and re-situated the jewel-encrusted thing. “Aye, and any o’ ye who be lookin’ fer to go are to talk to me! I’ll get yer name down and we can do this all orderly like, ye ken!”

People began to queue up behind the boisterous dwarf while Hal drew a few of his closest friends in.

Despite everything… it almost felt good to be doing something as a group again. The Dungeon below Brightsong was the last time he had gone in a group to do much of anything.

There was always some greater threat that demanded his time. And while this was one of them, he also felt a little excited about the prospect.

His anger had time to cool into an iron core of determination. Once he was done with this Tower, he was going to find every place the Shadesblight called home and root it out.

It had made a grave error in attacking his home. He would see the damage returned a hundredfold.

“The Shadesblight will regret messing with us again,” Mira said, and spat in the Tower’s general direction. She made a rude gesture too, which only inspired a few of Noth’s slimes to mimic her.

“Oh, that ain’t right. That just ain’t right,” one of the dwarves said, seeing a hand formed out of a slime’s general forehead region.

Tristal managed to wriggle her way to Hal’s group. “I would like to volunteer to help Buffrix,” she told him. “I don’t think you need to keep Komachi on the sidelines if she wants to go. Besides, as I understand it, she is Elora’s familiar. Without her, I do not think Elora’s Class will function as it should.”

Komachi cleared her throat at being called Elora’s familiar.

Elora put a dainty hand on Komachi’s face. “Shush, you.”

Hal looked at Tristal curiously. “I almost expected you to want to go inside.”

The Founder shook her head and waved her hands frantically. “I said I would help you, Hal. Not die for you. No offense, but if I’m killed, I won’t be coming back. Oh, don’t look at me like that! I’m not going to actually die, but there is no way Rinbast will have left that same hole in his defenses open. He’s likely already monitoring it, hoping I try to use it again.”

“Do you have any healing abilities?” Hal asked.

“Not directly,” Tristal admitted. “However, I can enhance and empower people to perform beyond their means. I am more effective outside than inside, not only because my magic is less… confrontational than yours, but because we’ll both risk less. I’d rather stay by your side and help you than to be brought back from the dead a continent away.”

“Komachi is more useful than Founder lady?” the pobul said from within Elora’s jacket. “Nice.”

Tristal glanced sharply in Elora’s general direction.

“Shh,” Ashera told Komachi. “Be nice.”

Komachi flattened her little bear ears, then perked up immediately when Ashera petted her sleek head.

“That’s fair enough,” Hal said. “Then go with Buffrix and work on a method for dealing with people who are likely going to be worn out and potentially severely wounded. We need to make sure anybody coming out is going to be taken care of immediately.”

Tristal nodded and gave a slight bow. “I’ll see it done. Does that mean I can offer orders to the builders?”

Hal nodded.

Some of the dwarves grumbled, but when Tristal marked a few of the most experienced ones out with a dainty finger, they didn’t argue.

Leaving with her small retinue, Tristal began giving orders on what she needed built.

Hal turned back to the matter at hand. “With my Leadership, I can take in a party of 6 people. Not including myself, that gives us 5 members to choose from. Before we start, is there anybody who does not wish to go?”

Nobody said anything.

“Thought so,” Hal said. This was going to be harder than he had hoped.