Michael Head

Got sick. It sucked. Still alive.

Sorry I was out of it for a little while everyone.  I got covid while I was at DragonCon, and it laid me out hard.  I was in and out of the hospital for a bit, since my lungs don't work the greatest.  They only have about eighty percent capacity on a good day, and things that a normal person could shrug off really knock me out for a bit.  I'm still not back to one hundred percent yet, and dealing with low energy levels and brain fog, but at least the weight loss is appreciated.  I was at 240 lbs in January of this year, and after the pneumonia over the summer and covid over the past few weeks, I'm down to 200 lbs.  Don't get me wrong, I work out some, but not a ton considering the large amount of titanium, pins, rods, and screws holding my body together.  And I swear I can feel the shrapnel grinding in my body every time I pick up something more than twenty pounds, so lifting weights is low-weight/high-rep for me.  I go in tomorrow to see my VA doctor for them to run a bunch of tests to see if there is something else going on, and to try and see if there is anything they can do about my brain fog and energy levels.  Even getting out of bed and taking a shower wears me out, and I have to take a break for a few minutes to catch my breath.  For someone who is in relatively good shape under forty years old, that isn't natural or good.

Otherwise, things are rolling along nicely.  I had a bunch of good meetings while I was at DragonCon.  I talked with Michael Chatfield (Ten Realms author) about some exciting ideas for the future, a Kickstarter representative who is super nice and has great ideas, Podium audio bought me entirely too many drinks, Daniel Schinhofen stole my bill at a restaurant, Shadow Alley snuck me into the vendor hall so James Hunter could yell at me in public (we're friends, don't worry), Brian Nordon, Lars Machmuller, and Kevin Sinclair took turns trying to kidnap me because "I'm *actually* funny in person" (Kev and Brian are freaking huge humans, and it's a good thing I'm feisty), and Matt Dinniman gave me an insane number of things because he likes my books.  He didn't say he actually read them, but he definitely said he liked the covers, so that's something.  (Seriously though, he's always fun to hang out with, and he rocks at karaoke.)  If anyone gets the chance to come to DragonCon next year, I highly recommend it.  All the LitRPG/Cultivation authors hang out at the Westin bar between panels, and we will talk and hang out with literally anyone who comes up and talks with us.  It's a lot of fun, minus the whole getting sick thing.  There's also going to be a special event just for authors next year that doesn't require a DragonCon pass, where readers can meet tons of us all at once in one location and get free books, autographs, swag, and hear speeches if you want.  I just signed a bunch of books this time, and told bad jokes to the few people who made the mistake of standing close to me for too long near the open bar. 

As for more concrete information, I also had meetings with both Legion and Mountaindale about my future contracts with them.  Legion is open for literally anything, and will take whatever I am willing to push their direction.  I'm certainly excited about that, and the potential is great.  Mountaindale is definitely more discerning with what they are willing to accept, and a lot of our discussion centered around the future of Threads.  I'm definitely good for books five and six in the series, so that's great news.  They aren't as excited about the side series, so that will probably be going through Legion once I get the time to polish it to acceptable levels.  Once Mountaindale can gauge the sales numbers for books five and six on Threads, we will be able to see if they are willing to take another contract for books seven through nine.  I genuinely think they will, since that will close out the first story arc for Jim and friends, and they want the complete story under one roof.  After that, I'll have to present each story idea to them as an independent entity for approval, which is entirely fair.  The bottom line is, I have two great options going forward for whatever story I want to write without having to self-publish.  That's something I could certainly always do, but I just don't know if I want to wrestle the headache that marketing presents itself to be, especially when there are already companies that exist who have it mastered. 

Now that I've vomited my thoughts on this overly long update, I'm going to get back to work.  Jury is due to Tantor audio very soon, and I'm so far behind it's ridiculous.  I'll get it done with some sleepless nights and insane amounts of coffee, so it's time to embrace the suck and get it done.  After I see the doctor and hope I don't get tossed in the hospital again, of course.

Anyway, thank you all for being awesome and supporting me like you do.  I love your face.

Michael.

Wandering Warrior: Jury - Chapter 7

Chapter 7

It didn’t take long for the ghouls to ready themselves.  They were smart enough to wait and cluster together to rush the gate until the last possible moment, only giving me a few seconds to react.  Unfortunately for them, a few seconds was all I needed.

The wood used to make the palisade was all fresh-cut timber from the forest.  Not only was it still green, but it seemed to rain at least once a day on this planet, making it even harder for wood to become properly seasoned.  There was a lot of moisture still in the logs that made up the gate.  So, I decided to use them to show the ghouls how devastating a guy with a basic understanding of physics could ruin their day.

I had a spell I used that could gradually increase the temperature of an object until I cut off the flow of energy.  It was how I melted the silver to make the bullets for my wrist gun.  I held out my right hand, palm facing downwards, and brought my ring finger down to my thumb, making sure to keep the other fingers perfectly straight, and said the activation word.  “Heat.”  Instead of a gradual influx of mana like normal, I pushed enough of the crackling energy that flowed through me into the spell that the strain on my body made me drop to one knee.

As the water inside the wood went from liquid to steam, the logs let out an ominous groan.  None of the ghouls paid it any attention, rushing forward in a tight cluster.  Air began to warp around the logs in a haze, the high temperatures causing even the rain that came close to the wooden barricade to boil off.  I knew the rapid expansion would be too much for the logs to handle, and they would soon explode.

With my left hand, I held up my palm vertically in front of me with my fingers spread wide, visualizing an invisible wall of hardened air that would help direct the blast outward.  I didn’t vocalize anything for the spell, not wanting to divide my mana too evenly.  The air shimmered in sympathy with the waves of heat coming off the logs, adding to the intensity of my first spell.

As the first ghouls reached the gate, I activated one of my seldom-used titles.  It had harsh restrictions, but I felt as though the moment called for it.

Title: Send Them into Orbit

-Explosions are often overkill.  That’s exactly what this situation needs.  More overkill!  Blast those enemies straight to the moon.

Skill Imparted: Any explosion caused by the title holder is 50% more powerful.  Secondary explosions will not carry this bonus.  Can only be used during the waning phase of the moon or moons, depending on the world.  Useable once per thirty day period.  Warning - Be wary of friendly fire, as explosions do not know friend from foe.

I had gained the title back on world nine, shortly after gaining my Mage class.  A spider, one big enough that you could put it in the ‘nuke it from space’ category, walked across my face while I was sleeping in the jungle.  I might have overreacted a bit, and the resulting title had been my reward.

The title was finicky enough that I honestly forgot about it most of the time.  I had a ridiculous amount of titles, after all, and the majority of them were completely useless in my day-to-day life.  Most seemed to be made to make fun of me, like the one called ‘Donkey Kick’ that I could use to kick a donkey incredibly hard, but only after it had kicked me first.  I had gotten it after a donkey had kicked me into a ditch while on an escort mission on world four.  All it did was poke fun at me in the moment, which fit the mold for most of my titles.  But, for once, this one could come in handy.

I felt the title’s effects settle over me, and the first of the ghouls crested the pointed spikes of the gate.  As it saw me, our eyes met, and it smiled a fang-filled grin meant to cause fear.  I smiled back, and shoved one last burst of mana into my Heat spell, pushing the wood of the gate over the brink.

The sound of the explosion was underwhelming, considering the size of the fireball and flaming spears of splintered wood that blasted into the group of undead like the world’s largest shotgun blast.  That isn’t saying it wasn’t loud, just that it wasn’t as loud as I thought it should have been.  There was no doubt about the effectiveness of the last-second plan.  It was even more destructive than I expected.  Considering what I was looking at, I double-checked to see if there was a freaking mushroom cloud forming above the hole where the gate used to be.

“Wow.”  I took a moment to catch my breath before getting to my feet.  Our palisade wall sagged inward along both sides for several yards, the ground holding the spikes wrenched upward in a rough-edged crater.  A shockwave had torn the earth apart for well over two hundred yards.  The destruction reached deep into the forest in a cone of wood shrapnel, flattened trees, and spots of burning brush where the superheated steam was hot enough to ignite the more flammable organic materials.  “I need to use that title more often.”

Apparently, my system agreed with me.

Title Upgraded: Send Them into Orbit II

-Your penchant for overkill astounds!  If you keep this up, blowing your enemies into space might become an actual goal you can achieve!

Skill Imparted: Primary explosions are 50% → 55% more powerful.  Secondary explosions now carry a 5% chance to also carry the same bonus as the primary explosion.  This chance applies to each secondary explosion individually, not cumulatively.  Can now be used during the waning phase of the moon, as well as days of the full moon and new moon.  Useable twice per thirty day period.  Explosions are still dangerous to both friends and enemies.

Warning - Your continued destruction of the pristine sections of forest has changed your status from ‘gained their attention’ to ‘angered’ for one of the gods of this world!  They have dispatched Icons of Wrath for your immediate execution.  Leaving their area of influence as soon as possible is strongly advised.

Damn.  Well, that’s definitely not good.  The title upgrade was definitely a nice bonus–especially having the extra activation and days to use it–but having a local god after me was a checkmark in the bad column.  It wasn’t the first time it had happened to me, of course.  I’d done it a good six or seven times before, and each time it had meant fighting the avatar or champion of the local god or gods that didn’t like me.

When you go around flipping the power structure of entire continents, you tended to piss off everybody.  This was probably a speed record for me, though.  I usually didn’t have a local god or two trying to kill me until I had been on a planet for at least six months or so.  Given the clues in the messages, I’d have to say it was some kind of forest or nature god that was mad at me.  It was definitely time to spend some time behind the walls of a city, while the forest deity got distracted by squirrel politics or something and forgot about me in a couple of weeks.

“James!  They’re still coming!”  Cross was making his way down to join me closer to the gate, so he was in the perfect position to see the ghouls that had survived the gate explosion sneaking their way toward the gap in our defenses.

The others were still at the top, prepping our crossbows and covering Jess, who was waving her hands around and working on some kind of spell.  I was glad to see they were planning a proper division of forces and supporting fields of fire without me having to provide any input.  Our little team was developing nicely.

A loud crunch from a ghoul tossing aside some debris made me take a few shuffling steps over to where I could get a better view over the twisted remains of the walls.  I was surprised to see so much movement through the steam and smoke the rain hadn’t managed to knock down.

“How are these things still kicking?”  I pulled off my hat and wiped the sweat and rain off my forehead before settling it back on my head.  My body and soul ached from the strain of the past few minutes, but I wasn’t going to let it stop me.  Letting someone else handle the magic might be a good idea though.  “Doesn’t matter.  I’ll hold the gap, and you can provide support.  There shouldn’t be enough left to overwhelm me anymore.”

“Don’t speak too soon.”  Cross joined me on my boulder as we watched ten surviving ghouls struggle through the steaming mud and rain.  “You can’t take on all of them by yourself.  You’re good, but not that good.”

I gave him a grin for an answer.  I honestly didn’t know if I could take all ten ghouls by myself.  Probably not, especially in this environment.  It was too open, and they would be able to surround me before I could whittle down their numbers.  Friendly fire would become a problem then, and the others wouldn’t be able to help.  If our walls hadn’t been messed up so much, it might have been worth a shot.  After I had a few minutes to recharge some mana for healing, of course.

We both watched as the group of undead got close enough for us to make out details through the haze and fog.  The ghoul leading their survivors through the disaster zone was the same one I had shot, with the distinctive bone ridge spike on his head.  It walked with a noticeable limp, and I felt a little thrill of victory knowing that my corrosive crossbow bolts did hurt them.  They were just incredibly tough, and anything short of a kill shot wouldn’t put them down.  As they got close, it opened its maw of a mouth and hissed for a moment before speaking actual words.

“Hssssss…  Man-meat out of tricks.  We fight.  You die.  We eat.  Lady will give us more magic rocks.”  The ghoul’s voice seemed almost up-beat and excited, if a gravel pit that had the ability to speak could sound excited.

“You feel like telling me more about this lady you mentioned?”  I knew there were some witches further north that were causing problems, but the ghoul made it seem like there was a singular person he was talking about, not a coven.  “Like, maybe a name?”

It was never that easy.  All I got in reply was a snarl, and the leading ghoul charged.  Cross and I leapt forward to meet them, both of us leaving one another some room to maneuver.  I was a bit stronger, so my jump put me closer to the undead.  As I unclipped my mace from my belt and activated my shield bracelet with a flicker of mana, two crossbow bolts slammed into the ghouls on the edges of their line.  It forced them to tighten up their group, giving them less room to swing their meaty bone-covered fists at me.

The leader ghoul fell back at the last moment, letting two of the biggest remaining bone knights take his place at the front.  Lucky me, I guess.  I used my forward momentum to help me swing my mace upward like it was a golf club, and the ghoul on the right was a golf ball sitting on a tee.  The bladed head of my mace caught the undead creature full-force in the solar plexus, shattering his bone armor and sending the oversized bone knight flipping back into the monsters behind.  I didn’t kill the robust creature, but it definitely wasn’t getting up right away.

Cross caught up to me, wielding the spear I had let him use until he could find a replacement.  The paper-thin blade darted at the weak points in the ghouls bone armor, piercing ankles and knees with the precision of an expert.  He managed to tie up three of the smaller undead in the blink of an eye, their movements getting slower and slower as the damage built up against them.

I ducked as another volley of crossbow bolts flashed overhead.  Leedy and Murphy were still targeting the ghouls trying to work their way around to our sides, cracking bone armor with the heavy impacts.  It didn’t stop them, but it certainly slowed them down.

The ghoul I hadn’t smashed threw a haymaker of a punch at my face, and by reflex I tried to knock its fist up and away with my forearm, trusting my shield bracelet to handle the attack.  That was a mistake.  Even with both the bracelet active and my Vigor stat sitting somewhere in the sixties, the spikes on its knuckles tore through the shield like tissue paper and ripped into my arm.  A shock of cold sunk all the way through my bone, stealing my breath in surprise.  The pain tried to rob me of my concentration, and I silently berated myself for thinking I could fight ten of these things by myself.  These ghouls were on magic steroids.

Some kind of power or ability made their armor much more dangerous to the living than any regular bone spikes should be capable of.  My guess would be the dark core it carried inside its chest was better than the ones I had seen before.  The ache from the cold magic it carried that flashed into my arm when it connected numbed the wound and made using my hand sluggish, but I held my mace in my right hand anyway.  My natural healing fought against it, keeping it from spreading further as I could feel the wound slowly–and painfully–trying to close.

While fighting against the shock of the ghoul’s new ability, it managed to knee me in the ribs on the same side.  The crunch of bone sent another wave of pain through me, but this time there was no debilitating cold to go with it.  I definitely wasn’t doing as well as I should have been, but these were the survivors.  The best of the ghoul forces.  There were a bunch more left to kill, and this one had already torn up my arm and cracked my ribs.

Still, I guess it was better than getting punched in the head.  As the ghoul wound up for a second haymaker, I torqued my shoulder muscles hard and brought the head of my mace across and downward onto its undefended hip and pelvis, crushing the whole monster onto its knees.  It wasn’t the only thing here that packed a wallop.  I kicked away the disabled monster and looked up for the one with the spike on its head.  Instead, I faced a fresh group of bone knights.

It was no surprise to me that the ghoul leader still held back.  There was more animal cunning in its rotting brain than any of the others, and it wanted us as worn down as possible before it risked its own life.  I wanted to include him in the festivities sooner–leaving people out of parties is impolite, after all–but the remaining ghouls tried to dogpile me.

There was no way for Cross to help me, since he wasn’t done finishing off the three he was still picking apart.  I danced back from the ones trying to surround me, my mace flicking out and making them pay for their eagerness when they got too close.

Jess finally showed herself, turning the ground under our feet into a muddy soup.  The heavy ghouls sank in to the mud past their knees, while Cross and I only ended up a little past our ankles.  Both Cross and I jumped high and back, giving her the chance to turn the ground into solid stone, sealing the ghouls in place.

Since they’d certainly smash their way free quickly, the two of us capitalized on the moment.  Both of us went all out, our movements a blur.  My mace crushed the skulls of two ghouls before they put up any kind of defense to stop me, and Cross finished off the three he had been wearing down.  The rest of them managed to break free of the stone around their legs, and regrouped just inside the crater where our gate used to be.

Now, the only ghouls left were the two big ones I had badly wounded, two speedy-looking ones that had a few crossbow bolts sticking out of their cracked armor, and the leader.  We squared off against each other, gauging our odds of success.

Cross had taken a few wounds during his fight, and he was bleeding a red and black sludge from a cut on his ribs and another from his leg.  It was concerning to see the lich’s corruption had tainted his blood so thickly, but there was nothing I could do about it right now.

I had the torn-up forearm leaking blood, and I was breathing heavier than normal, straining against the tightness from my cracked ribs.  Most of my fatigue came from the strain of my earlier spell-casting, and now it was catching up with me.  The strain on my body and soul after such a long day had me closer to my limits than I had been since the fight with the lich.  Despite that, I was silently pushing myself to heal my injuries, but the cold taint in my forearm fought against me.  It was a steady drain that wasn’t letting my mana levels recover, and our enemies weren’t going to be kind enough to wait a few minutes.

The ghoul leader motioned the four others toward Cross, while giving me a snaggle-toothed grin.  “You eat tainted one.  I eat this one.”

“I can assure you, I’m more than a mouthful, bub.”  I tried taking a deep breath, but my ribs stopped me.  “You can ask your mom all about it if you want.”  Everyone stared at me in confusion.  Even Cross.  I guess ‘your mom’ jokes didn’t always translate well on this world.  “Whatever.  I’m funny.  You can ask your mom about that too.”

Understanding that I was at least poking fun at them, the ghouls snarled in anger before charging.  Another pair of crossbow bolts cracked into the speedy ones going for Cross, and he steadily backed away from the four monsters trying to kill him.  That was all the attention I had to spare for his fight, because my own fight went wild with a quickness.

The leader of the ghouls held its position for a reason.  The ground cracked beneath its feet as the bone knight surged forward, black and green energy crackling like lightning along its joints.  I barely managed to knock away the sweeping kick it aimed at my midsection, my left arm buckling under the pressure as I took two quick steps backward.  It was much heavier than it looked, the bone armor covering it denser than steel.

As we parted, the ghoul only managed a few more steps before it tumbled to the ground in a thunder of splayed limbs and spraying mud.  The earlier soft tissue damage from my acid crossbow bolt must have burned through something important in its hip, affecting its mobility.

I’m not one to pass up such a kind gift when someone offers one to me, so I darted forward with my mace held high over my head, ready to end the ghoul before it could get back on its feet.  Trying to end our fight quickly, I aimed at its head.  That’s how I found out the bone spike that made it stand out from the others was more than just a decoration.

Somehow, as my blessed starmetal mace was about to crush the vulnerable ghoul’s skull, it twisted its head and neck so my weapon was deflected up and along the bone and shunted off to the side.  I struck the wet ground next to the bone knight hard enough that it buried the mace halfway up the handle in the mud.  It was immediately stuck, and I was forced to let it go as I rolled away from a spike-covered elbow aimed at my midsection.  The ghoul was back on his feet in the blink of an eye, and he made sure to put himself between me and my mace.

“Damn!”  I cursed both myself, and my bad luck.  A rumble of thunder seemed to agree with my outburst.  My ninjatō sword hissed against its sheath as I drew it out slowly.  “I guess today just isn’t my day.  Want to call it for now and try this again tomorrow, preferably when I’ve had some time to recharge my mana a little more?”

“Hungry now.  No waiting.”  The ghoul’s wicked smile showed how confident it was feeling, despite the earlier tumble.  It held up both fists, and smashed them together.  Despite them being coated in bone, it still sounded like two plates of steel ringing against one another.  “Lady send us to find you.  Now, I eat you, and Lady make me most strong and fast bone ghoul ever.”

“Wait.  If she only sent you out to find us, are you sure she wanted you to eat us?”  I was only mildly curious about the answer.  What I really needed was the ghoul to keep talking.  Every second we weren’t fighting was a second I gained ground on the cold in my arm.  I almost had it beat, and once I did, my natural regeneration would let me roast this guy.  “What if she wanted you to find us because she wants to talk to us?”

Confused at the new idea, the ghoul froze for a good three seconds.  That’s a long time to stay completely still, and both Leedy and Murphy were happy to have such a helpful target.  Two crossbow bolts bounced off of the monster’s chest, his armor too thick for them to penetrate.  The kinetic force still transferred, and it knocked the ghoul back half a step.

Once again, I closed the distance between us, this time aiming for the tiny gaps in its armor.  My sword ate every kind of magic it came in contact with, which made it a potent weapon against magical creatures, mages, and basically anything controlled or animated by mana.  It was not, however, some fantastic longsword, greatsword, or claymore, that can hack off limbs with a single mighty blow.  That meant I was forced to try and kill this thing by chipping away at it bit by bit, without letting it hit me.

So, that’s exactly what I did.  It wouldn’t have been possible if Leedy and Murphy hadn’t helped me by plinking away at the ghoul leader, causing the occasional distraction.  There was also the fact that it didn’t have a fully functioning hip, so I kept forcing the ghoul to follow me in a big circle, dancing in and out of its reach as I gave it the death by a thousand cuts.  Each time the ninjatō found a gap in its armor, it stole a bit of the black and green lightning mana that made the undead so powerful.

I lost track of time, slipping into the dance of blades taught to me by the elves on world eight.  Dodging the attacks of the ghoul became a natural part of the dance, the two of us falling into a pattern I could follow with my instincts alone.  It was as pure a representation of battle that I had ever experienced, the two of us precariously balanced.  I slowly started gaining an edge as my sword stole more and more power, and both the ghoul and I could sense the fight was coming to an end.  I was going to win.

While I never matched the grace and speed of the elves when I had been at level fifty-five, now I couldn’t help but wonder what the blademasters would say if they could see me after breaking past the limits of level one hundred.  Probably some snide comments about my footwork, immediately followed by a lot of sniffing and sour looks as if there was something that smelled bad in their immediate vicinity.  Elves could be jerks like that.  At least they made delicious cookies.

The flow of our fight slowed, and I capitalized on a brief lull to recover my mace.  After regaining the armor-crushing weapon, I swapped my sword to my left hand–which had healed enough to use again–and held the mace in my right.  It allowed me to smash the armor protecting the ghoul’s joints, slowing it down even faster.  Eventually, the bone knight dropped to its knees, drained and defeated.

As I sheathed my sword and finished healing with a burst of recovered mana, my ribs and arm finally made whole again.  I walked up to the ghoul, pushing enough mana into the starmetal mace to be able to power a Smite spell.  The bone knight watched me come closer, leaking undead fluids from nearly every inch of its body.

“Is there any chance you feel like talking about that ‘Lady’ person you mentioned earlier?”  While I knew the odds weren’t great, I couldn’t help but try.  “I’m willing to listen if you are.”

“Closer.”  It rasped at me, leaning forward in the mud.  I carefully approached, fully aware it could still take a swipe at me.  When I stopped a few feet away, it motioned with a curled finger.  “Come. Closseerrr…”

“Yeah.  I’ve seen this movie.  It never ends well for the good guy.  No thanks.”  I started backing away, and I felt the mana start to swell in the ghoul’s chest.  “Ah, shit.  You’re about to blow yourself up, aren’t you?”

The ghoul started to chuckle, and I turned to run.

I only made it a few steps before an explosion of death and malignant mana detonated behind me.

Wandering Warrior: Jury - Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Calling our fallback point a castle was using some pretty strong words where they didn’t belong.  When someone said the word ‘castle,’ it most definitely didn’t describe what I was seeing when I looked at our fortifications.  Stacked boulders with extra parts would be a much better way to describe what we were working with.

“Murphy, get the little barrels of burning oil placed in the trench.  Leedy, help Jess get the horses in the corral.  James will get the gate in position.”  Cross was shouting orders to the others, his blackened arm pointing where he wanted people to go.  “I’ll get the crossbows loaded and ready, and we’ll all meet at the top when we’re done.”

“Sounds good!”  Leedy dashed for the square fence of roughly cut logs behind our stack of boulders, knowing that it would be a pain for Jess to get the makeshift gate open by herself.

Considering it was basically just a few trees cut in half lengthwise that had been tied together with old ropes and brittle vines, it took some finesse to not have it fall apart when you lifted the stupid thing to swing it to the side.

That pretty much described our entire setup.  What had initially been a clearing filled with boulders and a few encroaching trees, had been transformed by Jess and Cross into an improvised base during an extended training session.  We had decided to make it the place where we stored our bigger items, and continued to add to it as the days went by.  Now, we had a lumpy mess that was certainly defensible, but rough was putting it nicely.

I made it through the steep dry moat before I walked over to the palisade of stone spikes and pointed logs that lined the perimeter of the site.  The dry moat wasn’t completely dry, since it had about a foot of dirty water in the bottom thanks to the rain, but the slick mud would only make it harder for an attacker to climb out of it.  I found the open section where we had left a gap, and lifted three pointed logs that had been lashed together to fashion a gate.

Dropping them into the narrow hole where they were supposed to fit was easy enough.  They were a good two feet shorter than the rest of the wall of spikes though, and weren’t nearly as steady, since the hole was loose around the logs.  I kicked in some gravel and dirt to try and fill in the gap, and it made it sturdy enough that I didn’t feel like wasting mana on a spell to fix it.  I had a feeling I was going to need every bit of magic in just a few minutes.

A spike of earth mana spun me around, and I saw Jess had dropped the section of moat where the horses had come across.  She raised a few more stone spikes to finish out the palisade so the corral was closed off.  Now, the ghouls best option was to come through the sections that had wood instead of stone.  Which is exactly where we would be, and not the horses, or all our stuff.

“Uh, a little help?”  Murphy waved at me from the other side of the wall.  “I’d like to be on the inside when the monsters get here.”

I guess I should have waited for him before dropping the gate in place.

“My bad, Murph.  Hold on.”  I jumped to the top of the gate and leaned over, reaching down for him.  His armor lit up, providing him with the physical boost necessary to make the six-foot leap so I could pull him over the eight-foot section of wall.  We both hopped down, and started making our way up the stacked boulders to where Leedy and Cross were already waiting for us.  “How many barrels were you able to set up?”

“We’ve got four along the edges, and two right in front of the gate.”  Murphy brushed back his sopping wet dark hair, the faint curls definitely longer than the regulations the Wardens had ever allowed him.  His rugged good looks, dark stubble, sharp jawline, and muscular frame could land him on the cover of any romance novel in my home world.  It was almost enough to make a guy jealous, if I had a little less self confidence.  At least I was taller.  “They are going to get a nasty surprise when they try to go through the front door.”

“Let’s hope they decide to go that way.”  I looked back at the possible approaches, noticing several places they might choose besides the gate.  “We’ve got a lot of ground to cover if they don’t.”

Once we got to the top, Cross handed each of us a loaded crossbow.  They were weapons we had recovered from the destroyed platoon of White Wardens that had tried to kill us while we were fighting the lich and his undead army.  It might have ended poorly for them and their commander–some jerk named Gibson or something–but it had been great for us to get all the new gear and equipment.

“It won’t be long now.”  Cross passed out a small quiver of the special bolts I had prepared to go with the crossbows as Jess finally joined us.  There was a nervous energy buzzing in the air, so he did his best to soothe everyone’s nerves.  “Everything’s as well prepared as it can be.  I’ll handle setting off the barrels.  You focus on hitting them with the crossbows.  If they make it through, we make our stand here.  As much as we like them, the horses aren’t as important as our lives.  They probably won’t bother with them until they’ve killed us, anyway.  Stay focused, and we’ll stay alive.”

Everyone gave him a sharp nod, with Leedy even throwing in a salute.  I guess old habits die hard.  It made me happy to see Cross taking charge of the situation, because it meant I didn’t have to do it.  I knew it also made Leedy feel more comfortable, since the former corporal preferred getting orders from his captain.  And, one day, I wouldn’t be here anymore.  They needed to get used to someone else telling them what to do.

As we settled in to wait, I noticed Cross was unconsciously flexing his darkened hand, the lich-curse drinking in the light around it.  Wherever the blight spread, it caused him to feel a tingling numbness that I knew was hard for him to ignore.  The curse was weird to see, almost like the eye didn’t want to focus on it.  Veins of throbbing black streaks went from the middle of his forearm to his elbow, much thicker than they had been when I had restored his hand and tried to isolate the curse to one spot.  It seemed like the more he used magic, the further the curse spread.  No matter what I did to try and stop it, all I could manage was a series of roadblocks to slow it down.  If we didn’t find a cure or counter-curse before it made it to his heart or brain, things weren’t looking good for the home team.  I didn’t know what would happen to him, but I was sure it wouldn’t be very pleasant.

“I think they’re here.”  Jess had the eyes of a cat shifter, so it made sense she was the first person to see the ghouls making their way to the edge of our perimeter.  “They’re spread out too far apart for any of my bigger spells yet.”

She sounded glum, but I figured she’d be okay.  Jess shouldered her own crossbow, the tip of the special bolt gleaming in the fading light that managed to make it through the clouds.

To make sure Cross had passed out the right set of bolts, I cast my Identify spell on it.

Item: Crossbow Bolt (Enhanced)

Type: Organic Corrosive Compound

Grade: 4/5

Description: A simple steel and wood crossbow bolt that has been treated with an alchemical mixture, making it brittle and prone to shattering. After striking a hard surface, the wooden portion will splinter, releasing the powdered acid hidden within.  Any organic tissue will suffer immediate damage, dissolving most cellular membranes in seconds.  Effects vary based on environment.

Yep, that’s definitely the ones he was supposed to pass out.  I had two other kinds made, but they wouldn’t work nearly as well on the ghouls.  Their heavy bone armor might be able to stand up to the corrosive powder, but all it needed to do was make it between a few gaps and they would start falling apart.  Of course, we wouldn’t be able to use them after the initial wave without risking getting some on ourselves.  The acid would burn itself out quickly, so we would be okay as long as we played it smart.

“Aim for the big ones.  They’re usually slower, and won’t be able to dodge.”  Cross was preaching to the choir, but I knew he was just talking to steady nerves.  “Pick your targets early.  Start from the edges and work your way inside.  Don’t forget to lead them a little.  Center-mass is all we need, don’t get fancy.  Fire and reload as fast as you can.  Once they get halfway to the moat, stop shooting.  We’ll wait for a few seconds to see how they handle James’s little surprise.”

There wasn’t time for anyone to acknowledge his orders, because that’s when they rushed us.  It was outright unfair how something that big and nasty could move so fast over open ground.  We all fired as quickly as we lined up our shots, the steady twang of the steel cords and crossbow arms finding a drumbeat-like rhythm that ran counter to the hunting howls of the bone-armored ghouls.  Somehow, most of our shots managed to hit their moving targets, but they were shrugging off the hits as if the bolts were little more than the rain.

While the storms had died down in intensity, there was still an occasional flash of lightning that lit up the skies.  When one flashed overhead as I was reloading my third bolt, it made the charging line of ghouls look like twisted knights in demonic plate armor, their jagged faces warped beyond recognition of anything that could have ever been alive.  It made both the Paladin and Judge inside me burn with anger, and I could feel the lightning inside my mana generator thrash in sympathetic rage.

I tracked my third target, a ghoul with an unusually oversized head spike, and fired as it leapt over a tree stump.  The bolt caught it in the hip, and it stumbled for only a moment before running for the moat.  All of the ghouls were still running for the moat.

“Hold!  They’re getting too close.  We’ll melt our faces off if we keep shooting.”  Cross leaned closer to me, trying to keep his voice low.  “Are you sure those bolts are going to do something to them?”

“Yeah, I’m sure.”  I finally had a solid count of the ghouls, now that they were in the open.  We were facing exactly thirty-five of them.  Even seven-to-one odds.  There was no way in hell we could kill all of them without casualties.  If the acid didn’t work, some of my people were certainly going to die.  “Just give it a minute to kick in.”

The ghouls stayed spread along our front, either smart enough to know we would use an area spell on them if they did bunch up, or because they all wanted to be the first in line to eat our faces.  Probably a combination of both.  After all, I bet my face was delicious.

At some unspoken signal, they rushed the moat as one.  Cross waved his cursed hand, activating the runes on the barrels.  It would take a good five or six seconds for them to heat up enough to explode, which was enough time for the ghouls to find out climbing out of the moat was much harder than jumping in.  A few of the smaller and more nimble ghouls jumped straight over the moat, and immediately started climbing the palisade walls.

They managed to get about halfway up when the barrels went off.

I had to cover my eyes from the light of the sudden explosion, blinking away a few spots before I could see the damage.  For the ghouls that had been close to the barrels, it was impressive.  They were burning like candle wicks, unable to climb out of the moat as the flames cooked them inside their armor.  The ones farther away were only knocked down, and unless any oil managed to splash on them, they went right back to climbing out of the trench.  Of the thirty-five that had entered the moat, only twenty-six would be leaving.  Better, but still not survivable for everyone.  And my acid bolts still hadn’t done anything.

The few ghouls that had been climbing the palisade had been knocked off the wall, but all of them were right back where they were moments before.  Their claws had no problem finding handholds in the wooden sections of our wall.  Things weren’t looking good.

Jess knelt down, placing one hand on the ground and pointing the other toward the palisade.  The runes in her armor lit up, and the mana around us thrummed in response.  I was happy to see all the hours of practice we had put in starting to show dividends.  She didn’t even vocalize a spell as sharp stone thorns suddenly began to grow from the stone sections of our wall.  The ghouls trying to climb were immediately tangled up, and left large chunks of themselves behind as they jumped down.

“Nice job!”  Murphy, who was bound and determined to one day marry Jess, scooped her up before she could fall over.  “You’re amazing!”

“She just exhausted herself before the battle is even halfway done.  It was a great spell, but she should have stopped at the halfway mark.”  I shook my head, walking over to gauge how drained she was.  I slapped her awake, not being gentle about it.  “Hey!  Wake up, crazy!”

“Huh?”  Jess opened her eyes, rubbing at her cheeks.  “What’s going on?  Did we win?”

“No.  You passed out for about two seconds.  Now you’re a liability that Murphy is going to have to guard with his life, instead of helping us fight.”  I knew I wasn’t being very nice, but I also wasn’t wrong.  This was the kind of rookie mistake that got mages killed all the time, and it usually wasn’t just the mage that ended up dead.  What had upset me the most was that we had talked about this exact thing in the past.  “Stay awake and concentrate on getting as much mana back as you can.  And we’re most definitely going to have another discussion about tactics for mages once all of this is over.”

Jess gave me an unsteady thumbs up as Murphy helped her get into a comfortable position to meditate.  Murphy didn’t look happy with me either, but Leedy seemed to agree with me for once.  He probably wasn’t happy that he would be fighting without his normal backup, since Murphy usually watched his back.

As I moved back to the edge to see what the ghouls were doing to get over the wall, Cross leaned closer to speak privately with me.

“You know she only got excited.  This is her first time defending a position like this.”  Cross glanced back to where Murphy was helping Jess sit up straight.  “I’ve seen similar occurrences from young warriors time and time again.”

“I know.”  I watched as a ghoul tried to leap over the wall and impaled itself, wrenching itself free and falling back over the wall after leaving behind a chunk of its calf armor and lower leg.  “But after this–if we survive–she’s not going to do it again.  It was a fantastic spell, and bought us some extra time, but it would have been just as good at half its size.  She’ll be one of the most dangerous mages on this planet when I’m done training her, but only if she doesn’t kill herself first.”

“All I’m saying is, don’t be too hard on her.”  Cross motioned to another ghoul that was defeated by her wall of stone thorns.  “You don’t want to stamp out ingenuity like that.”

“Fair enough.”  I sighed, trying to think over what our next step needed to be.  Whatever it was, it looked like my acid bolts had been a complete failure.  Finally, the undead decided to make their move.  “Get ready everyone, they’re moving.”

The ghouls had decided to stop trying to jump over, and were now moving toward the one spot on our wall where there weren't any thorns covering it.  The front gate.

“Wait for them to get closer, and we can try to crush them with something nasty.”  Cross was leaning forward, anxious to attack.  “Do you want to use fire?”

“I don’t want you to do anything.”  I looked rather pointedly at his cursed hand.  “My acid bolts failed, so let me make up for it.”

Cross looked like he wanted to argue, but he knew as well as I did that his life was on a timer.  Every time he used mana, Cross was burning through what little time he had left.  He let out a long breath and gave me a nod.  “Fine.  You handle it.”

I hopped down to the next row of boulders, wanting to get closer to the main gate.  This time, I didn’t want any mistakes.  No more shrugging off my attacks.

When they clustered up to break through, I was going to drop the hammer on these bastards.

Wandering Warrior: Jury - Chapter 5

Chapter 5

The screams of the tortured captives made it impossible for Gleason to concentrate on the designs in front of him.  He knew it was necessary for their cooperation, but his underlings weren’t nearly as effective as he was at getting what he wanted from people.  They just didn’t have the same passion for the art that he did.

Being a White Warden had opened the door, but recent events had changed him from someone who liked his work–forcing the truth from people, no matter how recalcitrant they might be–to a man who loved what he did.  Hurting others had been a necessity for Gleason to perform his mission as leader of the White.  Now, it was still a necessity, but he no longer bothered with the song and dance of pretending to find an excuse.

Gleason used pain as a way to make other people do as he wished, and as a way to make himself feel good.  The screams were far too distracting for him to finish with the plans for the recently captured blacksmith.  Gleason would rather torture the man and his family for a few more days, just to make sure the final product came out as perfect as the man could make it.  If he was properly motivated, it might even be possible to get a masterwork out of the man.

He swept the drawings for the new armor into a neat pile and put them into one of the waterproof pouches stacked on the shelves that currently served as his filing system.  It was necessary, since the dampness of the sewers would ruin parchment and paper in only a few days.  The plans he’d already put in motion were outlined in the numerous documents he had in other locations, but here were the ones still to be finalized.  There were plenty of ways Gleason could move forward, and he knew most of them would hinge upon the actions of those who weren’t even in the city yet.  He double-checked the seals on the pouches, making sure nothing would be ruined while he left for the surface.

For Gleason, finding the old abandoned sewer maintenance station under the Merchant Guild District was another sign of the Trinity’s favor.  It had everything he needed, all in one place.  A small barracks, kitchen facilities, enchanting tables, forges, blacksmithing workshops, alchemy stations, offices, and even a small temple dedicated to the Trinity.  The pervasive smell and toxic fumes had probably been what forced the maintenance crews to the surface ages ago, but such trivial matters didn’t bother him anymore.

Ever since the lich had cursed him, and then the vampire had bit him, he wasn’t affected by the same things as a normal person.  He held up his hand in the dim candlelight, studying the black veins that throbbed under his skin.  Once, a few candles wouldn’t have been enough light for him to see such fine details.  Now his eyes could see no matter how dark it was.  He only needed light to see colors.

At first, he had thought himself abandoned by his gods.  Cursed by the undead, defeated by some monster calling himself a judge, and doomed to die a horrible death.  After his trials, his awakening, he understood the truth.  Gleason had undergone a transformation.  A series of trials had remade him, shaped him into a tool the Trinity could use to cleanse the filth from the world.  The Trinity had made sure he didn’t turn into an undead, as that would mean he was no longer fit to serve them.  Instead, they had made him something more.  Something new.

“Sir!”

Gleason turned, surprised to see one of his men had been brave enough to disturb him.  The eleven followers he still had were once thirteen.  Two had been turned into lessons for the others, so they would know not to make the same mistakes.  He cleared his throat and motioned for his underling to get on with it.  “I take it this is important?”

“Sir, I know you don’t like it when we come in here, but you told us to tell you immediately if any of the prisoners escaped.”

Instead of reacting, Gleason studied the man.  The formerly white robes and pristine armor of the White Warden were now gray and dingy, scuffed in several places and going to rust in others.  A few blood splatters stained the uniform, layered in both old brown and new red colors that created a mosaic of his deeds that Gleason could appreciate.  He decided then and there he would rename them.  They were no longer White Wardens.  These were his Blood Wardens, and they would do his work as the Trinity intended.  He would have an announcement and ceremony to inform them of their new designation and ranks tomorrow, after all of this excitement was dealt with.

“What would you like us to do, sir?”

“Who escaped?  And who was on guard when it happened?”  Gleason grabbed the thick metal bar he had been using as a weapon off the table before limping swiftly out of the room, ignoring the stiffness in his limbs that persisted even after all the healing he had been through.  The broken limbs given to him by that damned judge seemed cursed, forever causing problems.  “It wasn’t you, was it?”

“N-no!  I mean, no, Commander.  No one was on guard.  It was in the section of tunnels we had secured last week.  There wasn’t supposed to be any way for them to get out.”  The Warden waved a gauntleted hand toward the east, closest to the region where both the slums and the river encroached on their section of the sewers.  “From what we could tell, it looks like they found a secret passage, or maybe a hidden door.  It leads to an area we’ve never explored, close to the docks.”

“And who is this ‘they’ you mentioned?  A crafter?”  Gleason could afford a crafter or two escaping, as long as they weren’t too highly placed in their guilds.  If one of the politicians escaped…

“Yes sir, it was a carpenter.  One of the shipwrights in the Sailor’s Guild.  The man you…”  The Warden trailed off, swallowing hard, not wanting to meet Gleason’s eyes.

“The man I what?  Spit it out.”  Gleason was getting tired of the man’s timid nature.  He had half a mind to try and see if some time on the rack would burn it out of him.

“Last week.  The prisoner you maimed.  When you got angry after he spit on you, so you cut out his eyes and tongue.  It’s him and his sons who are missing.  We thought he was going to die, but…”  The Warden slowed down as they approached the section of sewer tunnels where they had thought there was no escape for those housed inside, pulling free a ring of keys from his belt.  “It’s just above the water line, near the flooded sections.”

“Show me.”  Gleason pushed through the heavy metal doors that served as their prison entrance for those broken enough that they no longer required a watchful eye.  All the people on the other side of the doors huddled in the dark around the few candles he allowed them to keep lit, clustered as tightly as they could get on the narrow walkways on either side of the filth flowing through the middle.  Threatening to take the light away was the easiest form of control he had at his disposal, especially when it came to mass punishment.  “Move.”

His order meant everyone on his side of the sewers had to jump into the disgusting muck running through the arched tunnel, but none of them hesitated.  Their skinny forms and shrunken cheeks cast jagged shadows on the ancient stones, somehow making their muted whimpers and quiet splashes more macabre than pitiful.

“I’ll get the lantern, sir.  Give me a moment to find the matches, and–”

“Stop talking.”  Gleason held out a clawed hand and furrowed his brows, concentrating for a brief moment before dark orange flames erupted from his palm.  His magic had transformed even more than he had, and its power was far beyond what he could have managed in the past.  He looked over at the prisoners before motioning his Warden to lead the way.  “We’re going to check on this supposed ‘escaped’ prisoner.  If any of you try to leave while we’re gone, I’ll burn off the bottoms of all of you and your families feet, so you aren’t tempted to try and run a second time.”

It wasn’t normal fire that he conjured, but something from a different place.  It was laced with veins of black, that seemed to swallow the light the orange flames tried to emit.  More concerning, it gave off an oily smoke that settled in the lowest places, such as the cracks between stones, and the slowly flowing sewage that cut through the tunnel.  Anyone who looked too closely would swear sometimes there were faces that briefly formed in the smoke, screaming in agony before disappearing like they had been pulled back from wherever they had escaped.

“We don’t have to travel far, Commander.  The flooded sections are closer to the river, so we need to go this way.”  The Warden led Gleason through a series of tunnels that were even in worse disrepair than the rest of the sewers.  This section was either older, or had seen heavier use due to its proximity to the river.  Or, given the extra moisture, it hadn’t weathered the passage of time nearly as well as the rest of the system.

They came to a stop just before the tunnels started to angle downward, and to go one more step would mean they would be up to their ankles in filth.  Gleason could see a hole running along the edge of the channel, butting against the opposite walkway.  His vision allowed him to see details that those who had inspected before him had most likely missed in the poor lighting.

“It isn’t some kind of hidden doorway, or secret tunnel.  That’s part of an overflow relief system.  From the clarity of water coming in, I would bet your life that it runs straight to the river.  Two starving young boys and a blind man?  They’ve certainly drowned themselves trying to escape.”  Gleason thought for a moment, trying to remember any large drain pipes that exited along the city wall near the docks.  He couldn’t think of any that were made from the old stone found in the ancient sewers.  “Send some men to try and find their bodies.  If they haven’t been eaten, they’re probably caught under the docks somewhere.  Toss them where the undead or goblins will find them.  We won’t hear any questions after that.”

“Yes, Commander.  What about the mission to pick up the new alchemist and his family?  The guilds have all increased their security, and their new number four now has a guard detail at his house.”  The Warden hurried to keep up with Gleason, who had already turned to go back to the entrance.  “Do you want us to take the risk?”

“Hmm…”  Gleason paused, causing the Warden following behind to almost stumble into the disgusting causeway beside them.  “No.  Instead, send them an invitation to dinner at a nice restaurant.  Make sure it’s from someone they won’t want to offend, and the location is far enough away they’ll want to hire a carriage.  That carriage will be ours.  Bring them here, and begin the integration process immediately.”

“What if they have their own carriage?”  The Warden winced when he saw the look on Gleason’s face.

“Then you make sure they don’t have a carriage driver available.  Do I need to explain everything to you?”  The flames in his hand jumped higher, but somehow there was less light than before.  “Or does the number four alchemist’s carriage driver also have a guard detail to protect him?”

“I–I’m sure we can arrange something, Commander.”  The Warden swallowed heavily, stepping back from the thick black smoke that seemed to reach for his boots.  “There shouldn’t be any problems.”

“Good.”  The fire returned to normal, and Gleason returned to his steady march toward the exit.  “Now, I’ve got a few more designs to go over with the shield master, and a completely new idea I want the leatherworker to review for a different kind of whip.  One I think the enchanters are going to really lose some sleep over.”  He looked over his shoulder at the underling trailing behind him.  “So this time, I really don’t want to be disturbed.”

“Y-yes sir, of course sir.  I’ll make sure everything is taken care of.”  The trails of smoke grasping at his boots were more than enough warning for the Warden.  Most of all, he would make sure the next time something happened, it was someone else that drew the short straw and had to visit their Commander.

The two quickly left the prison section, locking the doors behind them.  Quiet whispers burst forth as the light from Gleason’s dangerous flames slowly disappeared.  No one took a candle and ventured to inspect where they had come from.  The carpenter and his boys had tried to get more people to leave with them, but none had been willing to take the risk.  They understood what the carpenter hadn’t.  Sometimes, there were powers you didn’t challenge.  It was best to let those with the ability to stand against such things to do so, while those who were mere mortals stood to the side.

Even though the heavy slabs of steel had remained open while Gleason had been deeper in the prison, not one person had tried to escape.

[I hope that ending lands like I want.  It's meant to be a play on the saying "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."  These people are standing to the side, waiting for others to step in and save them.  Yes, they are starving and malnourished, but there are literally dozens of them, and only two bad guys.  If they had jumped them and tried to drown them in the sewer, they might have actually won.  But, history has proven time and time again that most people will not take that step, or risk themselves, choosing slow starvation and no chance at freedom over a blaze of glory with only a tiny chance at life and freedom.  I'm touching on those points here, like I do throughout the series with other things like morality, choices, viewpoints on justice, etc.]

Wandering Warrior: Jury - Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Warning the camp was my first priority, but I needed to do it without getting shredded or isolated from the others.  Linking up with them and fighting a running retreat toward our fallback location was the best choice, especially since I had no idea how many ghouls were running around.  Running straight into camp would only spring the trap on myself, and ruin any chances of making it to my friends.  Especially if I ran into a group of the ghouls with cores.

This planet’s ghouls weren’t like regular ghouls, and somehow they had been getting worse over the past few weeks.  Their skin grew a kind of natural bone armor covered in deadly spikes–sometimes with nasty barbed spikes over the knuckles, knees, and elbows–protecting joints and vital areas.  Instead of being wiry and uncoordinated cowards, they were beefy, over-muscled undead knights in plate armor of bone covered in deadly weapons.

When I had fought the lich, there were only a few of them to deal with, and they seemed…dumber.  The ones we had been seeing recently had been in larger numbers, with a certain kind of animal cunning that made them more dangerous than a pack of wolves.

They also frequently carried inside them something called an ‘artificial monster core’ that my system told me was used as a way to control them.  What made the ones with a core a genuine threat was the boost in intelligence to near-human levels.  I’d even heard them speak, and they went far beyond animal cunning when it came to tactics.  The cores were made from a solid hunk of death mana that made my skin crawl when I touched one, and I still hadn’t figured out how it could be used to control an undead monster, or more importantly, where they were being made.

No matter where these ghouls were coming from, it made warning my friends they were coming that much harder.  They would zero in on me in seconds, and make it almost impossible for me to join my group.

A flash of lightning overhead lit up the forest in harsh lines of bright light and deep shadow.  The boom of thunder that followed shook rainwater from the trees, adding to the deluge drenching the forest floor.  Already, footing was getting precarious.  The leaves and needles covering the dirt had created a skim of mud and detritus that was almost as bad as an icy sidewalk outside a gas station too cheap to use enough salt to get the job done.

In the distance, I heard horses neighing, upset by either the storm or smell of nearby undead.  Given the heavy rain, it was probably the storm, which is exactly what the others would think as well.  Time to change that.

My grenades and wrist gun would work as a warning, but that knife cut both ways.  The ghouls would know exactly what direction to run to catch me.  Same thing with a flashy spell, or just straight-up shouting.  That left me with something that would cause everyone to be more alert, but not give a specific direction from where it came from.  I took some inspiration from Tew, the Green Warden, and decided on trying to cause a localized earthquake.

Dropping to one knee, I placed both hands flat on the muddy ground.  I dug my fingers in as deep as they would go, creating furrows that quickly filled with water.  The mana inside me thrummed along with my heartbeat, circulating throughout my body.  There was no way I could power an earthquake large enough to affect the area I needed by myself, so I had to tap into the energy of the world to help me.

Not something I was used to doing often, but I could do it.  As with everything, there were risks.  World sixteen had been extremely low on mana, so I had learned to tap into the local environment for a boost.  Not often, since magic had been illegal there, but I had helped change those laws before I had left.  Hopefully, they had stopped burning ‘witches’ at the stake every time somebody sneezed wrong.

Focusing on my hands, I pushed the need to connect with the earth beneath me into the wet soil.  I felt the world slow down around me as a connection snapped into place between my own energy and the energy around me.  There was no longer any worry about Soul Burn, no concern for ghouls, or quests, or anything beyond the epic calm that settled over me.  The earth and stone beneath me had been here for eons, and it would continue to be here for eons more, no matter the struggles of the beings that walked above it.

No.  I refused to lose myself in the perspective of the inorganic.  That was always the risk in something like this.  Reaching out to something greater than yourself meant you opened up your mind to other viewpoints, other ways of seeing the universe.  It would be too easy to fall into that sense of peacefulness, and lose yourself forever.

Instead, I held on to my own mind, and started shifting the tiny flows of mana through the forest beneath me.  They were virgin streams, never twisted to another purpose beyond what nature formed on its own.  I was thankful, because the strain was already making me shake like I was lifting a refrigerator over my head, only made worse by the ache of the Soul Burn that throbbed around the mana generator that pulsed behind my belly button.

Luckily, it didn’t take long for my spell to take shape, and the power started to build.  I made the spellform fragile enough that it would break on its own when the shaking of the earth grew strong enough, and pulled away before the tremors were barely noticeable.  It would build into something everyone would notice soon enough.

As I stood, there was another flash of lightning, turning the forest around me into a world of light and shadow.  I used the rumble of thunder to sprint along where I thought the line of ambushers were closing in, trying to find the edge of their line.  When I ran full-out, I could move faster than a horse could gallop.  Considering the trees and storm, I wasn’t quite going that speed, but I was pushing it, zipping around like a roadrunner on speed, raindrops stinging my eyes.  The slick footing and heavy rain actually helped make it easier for me to stay unnoticed, until I ran smack into the back of a ghoul I didn’t see crouched behind the rootball of a half-fallen tree.

It was hard to tell which of us was more surprised, but it was most definitely me who ended up on the worse end of the collision.  I had been clipped by the ghoul’s heavy elbow spike somehow, and its barbed end had torn free a chunk of my triceps as we separated.  Which hurt like a motherfucking bitch. [On the fence about this sentence.  It’s an honest reaction, but not necessary for the story. Cursing is one of those things that can either help with character impact, or hurt with reader immersion, depending on your audience. I’m open to feedback.]

The impact was about as violent as a car crash, and both of us had gone flipping into the trees and underbrush with heavy and hard contacts that hurt even my high vigor stats.  The ghoul’s shocked face and wide eyes were downright hilarious as I saw it tumble away in a spray of black blood and shattered bone armor.  A thick tree was helpful enough to stop my uncontrolled flight when I hit it with my legs, and I fell to the ground in a heap.  I laid still for a moment, trying to gauge how injured I was, and thanking my lucky stars that the grenade on my belt and the ones in my pack hadn’t gone off.  I had been too cocky, and I was paying for it with a messed up left arm and a left shin bone that was bruised badly enough, it might have been better if it had just broken instead of taking the massive soft tissue damage.

Before I could sit up with a groan, the earth had already started to shake.  There wasn’t time to feel sorry for myself, and there most especially wasn’t time to sit around meditating and healing.  I unclipped the healing and stone skin potion on my belt, noticing the vial was cracked along the neck.

I snapped it loose and poured the whole thing down my throat, slamming what would have been the equivalent of about five shots of burning alcohol all at once.  It hit my gut like a bomb, shaking my stomach harder than the earth was beginning to move.

Pushing aside my discomfort, I used the tree that had stopped my impromptu arial excursion to help me get back on my feet.  The burning sensation was spreading out from my stomach, moving quickly up my chest and down my hips.  I could feel my strength already beginning to increase, and aches and pains started to fade into nothing more than memories as it finished working down my limbs.  I flexed my injured arm, amazed at the results.  The missing piece of muscle and skin was knitting itself whole as I watched.  There wasn’t even a scar left when it finished repairing the damage, and the bruised shin I had worried about felt better than ever.

Making more of these potions just moved up on my to-do list, because I felt amazing.  There was bound to be a downside when it wore off, but I couldn’t imagine it being anything that would make me want to pass on the upside.

The ghoul I had run into wasn’t up and shouting about our little incident, so I took off again, still trying to circle around the edge of their group.  By now, the earthquake spell was picking up momentum, and I had to be more careful about my footing.  There was an obvious slow-down in my reactions caused by the stone skin potion, but the increased strength balanced it out enough I didn’t have a problem adjusting.

A loud crack announced the end of a tree’s life, the increasing earthquake making the whole forest sway.  It fell with a crash somewhere closer to the campsite, accompanied by more thunder and lightning.  I could hear shouting from what had to be Cross, and the horses losing their shit at the earthquake.  All of them would know the shaking wasn’t natural, and they were under attack.  I could most definitely check the box about warning them that something bad was coming.

Ghouls started hooting and howling, giving away their presence to the camp, along with a rough estimation of their numbers.  There were a lot of them.  Like, a concerningly large amount.  I might have been cocky about my speed, but I had made the right decision not to try and rush straight through their lines.  It would have been very bad.

Their hunting noises also told me I was on the edge of their line, with only a few more yards to go before I could finally circle around and make it cleanly back to camp.  I used a thick tree limb to help me turn a hard corner just past the final cluster of ghouls holding the end of their line.

Not wanting to waste the opportunity, I unclipped the grenade on my belt and pulled the pin before side-arming it at the six or seven enemies I could see trying to stay on their feet while the earthquake kept them unsteady.  I poured on the speed, not wanting to get caught in the blast radius.  The rain would cut down on the smoke–not that it would affect the undead much anyway–but shrapnel didn’t discriminate.  It was an equal opportunity ass-kicker.

The explosion pushed me in the back, shoving me forward between two trees.  I managed to stay on my feet, despite spalling slapping against the back of my calves and thighs.  There was no way to tell if it was actual hot metal and bone fragments, or pieces of rock and dirt kicked up by the explosion.  It didn’t matter, because the stone skin potion pushed out whatever it was before I cleared the forest edge and made it into the campsite.

It was as if I walked into a wall of water, the rain slapping me in the face with a vengeance.  Mother nature on this planet was a real bitch.  Blinking my eyes clear, I saw I was almost too late.  Not too late to save them, of course.  The team I was building was turning into an efficient little force, and I needed to remember that.  I was almost too late to be able to link up with them before they left the area for our fallback point.  They were already leading our train of overloaded horses on the narrow trail out, with two people bringing up the rear as a trail guard.  I was genuinely impressed that they had managed to pack up so much of our stuff on such short notice, but then I remembered that I had sent Jess earlier to tell them to load up because we were moving.  This time, we had blind luck on our side.

“James!  Where have you been?”  Leedy, one of the former Blue Wardens I had somehow ended up with, was the first to notice me.  “It doesn’t matter, you better hurry up!  A bunch of ghouls are about to attack!”

I scrubbed at my face with my hands, fighting back the sigh of frustration that wanted to escape.  A sharp quake made us all stagger, only made worse by the muddy conditions of the clearing.

“Let’s go.  We can catch up when we’re clear.  There’s too many of them to fight under these conditions.”  Cross, the other guard in the rear–and my apprentice Judge–was in full captain mode.  He liked giving orders, and sometimes, he was even good at it.  “I can hold them here while you gain some distance.”

And then sometimes, he said some stupid shit like that.

“How about you shut up and we all run?  That earthquake spell I put in place is going to get a lot worse before it gets better.  The only reason those ghouls haven’t charged us right now is they are trying to figure out what’s happening before they commit to the attack.”  I jogged forward at the pair of them, making shooing motions with my hands.  “Come on, we don’t have much time.  Once they realize it’s not an actively controlled spell, they’re going to rush us.”

“This is you?”  Cross turned to follow me as another hard rumble caused him to nearly trip and fall.  “How?  I thought you were still on the mend.”

“Not important.  Run now, talk later.”  Leedy was in the rear, considering he was the slowest of the three of us.  His armor was glowing, meaning he had already activated the runes used to enhance his speed and strength.  It would tire him out quickly, but the man had enough grit to push past the inevitable exhaustion he was going to soon get hit with.  “They’re going to be right behind us.”

“He’s right.”  I slowed down a bit to let Leedy catch up.  “I’ll have to show you how to do what I did sometime, but we’ve got bigger concerns at the moment.  If we can make it to the stronghold in time, I think we can hold them off.  If they get the chance to surround us…”

I didn’t need to finish the sentence.  They had heard how many ghouls were behind us, and it wasn’t good.  Even with my stats, Jess being a fledgling mage, Cross developing well as a Judge, and Leedy and Murphy in their Warden armor, we would be hard-pressed to make it through in one piece.  It was important to remember the enemy always got a vote, and none of us were invincible.

A bolt of lightning struck a tree nearby, adding to the chaos.  Leedy sprinted even harder, eager to catch up with the horses.  Behind us, the earthquake spell was reaching its crescendo, and the ground started to split apart in great rents that cut through the forest.  We had made it past the epicenter, so we only caught the edges of the attack, but the ghouls bore the brunt of the assault.  Their hoots and howls that normally meant they were on the hunt took on a more desperate tone.

There was a final mighty rumble as the spell formation shook itself apart, and miniature canyons yawned open, creating small mudslides as trees and huge amounts of earth fell into the gaps.  We had all fallen to the ground, unable to stay on our feet during the heavy shaking.  Each of us looked back to watch the end of the spell, and it was downright apocalyptic for the section of forest caught in the strongest area of the earthquake.  Anything caught in the morass was crushed into a pulp while the ground settled back to stillness.

A screen popped into my vision, telling me how effective my spell had been.

New Title Earned: Crack Kills

-Your unique use of earth spells has managed to crush more than 50% of the enemies arrayed against you.  Destroying a pristine section of the forest in the process has gained the attention of one of the gods.  Lucky you!

Skill Imparted: Large-scale earth magic uses 3% less mana per minute.  An additional 2% will be applied if the earth magic being used is outside of combat, including construction, training, and enchanting.

Well, a useful title for once.  The attention from a god probably wasn’t good, but I was beyond caring at this point.  Either way, it was time to get out of here.

“Come on guys, we need to go.  There’s still a lot of ghouls who are going to want revenge, and we need to get ready for them.”  I brushed myself off after I stood, only managing to smear the mud into a more even layer over my clothing and armor.  I hoped the rain would clean it off a bit before the storm blew away.

Both Cross and Leedy were looking back at the destruction, so we all saw as the mud-covered forms of ghouls rose from the earth like angry murder mushrooms.  Now that huge swaths of trees were gone, we could get a better idea of how many there were coming for us.

Even after killing more than half, we were still going to be pushed hard.  I stopped counting at twenty, and grabbed my two compatriots, shoving them to get them started.

“Go.  We’ve got to get to the castle.  These things aren’t going to kill themselves.”

To whoever is stealing my content, you're an asshole

Somebody on here is illegally stealing and posting my content on a website that I didn't give them permission to post on, and they are risking an Amazon bot finding it and closing my account. If that happens, I can't be an author anymore, and no one wins. So please, knock it off, before we are all screwed. And for the love of all things good and holy, take the picture with my daughter on it down from the porn-filled pirate site. Seriously. You're a fucking dick-hole, and hold absolutely no rights to my intellectual property. Thief. If you don't at a MINIMUM remove the picture of my daughter, I'm going to report you and your website for promoting child pornography to the FBI. That's going to get their attention a lot faster than piracy. Now, fuck you, and I hope to meet you in person one day so we can discuss your actions.
Love,
Michael

Wandering Warrior: Jury - Chapter 3

Chapter 3

“I’m not alone out here.  I have a group of friends I can’t abandon just because you want a shortcut through the forest.”  I pulled myself free, surprising her with my own strength.  “What I can do is tell you how to get through the forest quickly.  Does that work?”

“That’s…that’s fine, yes.  Thank you.”  She showed a bit of her younger age, the indecision of the moment making her waiver from her earlier firm stance.  “Can you draw us a map?”

“Sure, but you won’t need it.”  I crouched down, tugging on her sleeve to pull her with me.  I drew some lines in the dirt, and placed a few rocks as placemarkers.  “This is the trail we’re on now.  In a few miles, you’ll run into a trail with an old shack at the intersection.  Take that trail past the shack until you see a burnt-out stone building that used to be a dairy farm.  The city is just north of it.  All you have to do is follow the cobblestone road from there.”

“We’re that close?”  She looked the map over, trying to gauge distances.  “Why can’t we just cut straight north through the forest at the intersection?”

“Because you have carts, and the trees are too dense.  Not to mention all the Paul’s running around in that section.  They’re a kind of one-legged creature that sneaks up on you and kicks you when you’re not looking.  You don’t want to stir up fae who are that devious if you don’t need to.”  I tapped the rock that symbolized the city.  “Besides, you want to approach on a road.  That’s where the gates are.  If you come in through some other way, you’ll just have to circle around until you find an entrance.  Which, if I’m not mistaken, is this exact gate I’m telling you to take.”

“Oh, right.”  She looked back at the rest of her group.  “Only Tew and I could jump the walls.  I have to think of the others.”  She stood, brushing off the imaginary dirt from her knees.  “Thank you again, stranger.  I hope to see you again, preferably under better circumstances.”

“Sure.  Maybe I could buy you dinner sometime.”  I flashed her a grin that had made actual queens blush.  She didn’t even notice, already walking back to her group.  “Or not, I guess.”

Her shouts made them hurry their pace, and they were quickly marching past.  I stood to the side, watching the platoon of Wardens march along.  Every one of them wore enchanted armor and carried rune-covered weapons.  They would be a welcome addition once Greendown was under siege.  The two Green Wardens brought up the rear, and I gave a little wave to them as they went by.

“You.”

I swear, the ground actually rumbled when the second Green Warden, the one I hadn’t met yet, stopped to speak to me.  It was impossible to see what he looked like under the hood, but he was taller, broader, and I got the impression this one was much older.  I would also bet he had the experience to go along with the strength he wielded.

“Name.”  The rumbling growl coming from under the cowl was strong enough to shake my chest.  There was more than a little mana used in whatever he was doing.

“What?”  I almost took a step back, but I didn’t let the clear attempt at intimidation push me.  “It’s hard to understand you over the fluttering in my chest, big guy.”

“Give.  Me.  Your.  Name.”  The Green Warden shifted under his cloak, exposing his hand gripping the hilt of a thick-bladed dagger hanging from his belt.  It had a green gem cap that flickered with an angry light.

I kinda wanted to steal it.

“Tew, leave the man alone.  He helped us.”  The Green Warden who reminded me of Sinthia tugged on his elbow, but she might as well have been trying to move an oak tree.  “We wouldn’t even know about the upcoming siege if it wasn’t for him.”

Apparently, being helpful didn’t count for much in the big guy’s book.  He gently stiff-armed his fellow Green Warden, pushing her away without moving from where he stood in front of me.

“Name.”

“Well, since you asked so nicely…”  I thought furiously, knowing what would happen if I told him my real name.  Violence and blood would just be the start.

Now that I had stood next to both of the Green Wardens, I had a better gauge of where their power levels were at.  If I wasn’t suffering from Soul Burn, I wouldn’t even hesitate to take both of them on at once.  Stat-wise, I put the woman somewhere in the high thirties of my system for strength, flexibility, and vigor, while Tew’s presence felt like the middle forties.  They were certainly the strongest humans I had met on this world, but I bet I could beat them like a drum in a purely physical contest.  Humans were usually much easier than monsters in a straight-up fight, especially on unprepared ground.

The thing holding me back was that it wouldn’t be a straight-up fight.  From where they sat magically, I should be able to crush them.  Should didn’t mean could.  Both of them felt like they were in the low thirties for their mind stat, but it was impossible to gauge what their gear and weapons could do to boost them.

I also didn’t know what kind of spells they might know, or what their expertise was in.  It would really suck to have something crazy and exotic like an illusion spell or something trip me up.  And, just because they seemed to be weaker in their magic, didn’t mean they weren’t suppressing their own abilities.  Kinda like I was doing right now, to keep them from knowing how strong I was.

Since I took too long to answer, Tew got fed up with me and growled in anger, drawing his oversized dagger.  Holding up my hands, I activated my Paladin class and cast one of only four spells it gave me when I gained it.  “Be at ease.  Blessing.”

The flare of pure white light that pulsed over Tew made him pause, and he slowly sheathed his blade.  My magic slowly faded from the world, making it seem washed-out and gray.  It’s why I hated using that spell.  I’d feel…off, for at least the next day or two, and the only tangible benefits were going to be felt by Tew.  He’d be a little faster, stronger, and tougher for a few days, and sleep like a baby tonight.  Lucky jerk.

“You are a Paladin.”  Tew’s hidden features seemed pleased, and his voice didn’t try to shake the trees free from the ground anymore.

I didn’t know how I knew he was suddenly in a better mood, but I just knew it was true.  Maybe the voice was a clue.  The gem in his dagger dimmed as the tension between us ratcheted down, and I could literally feel my palms itch at the urge to snatch that thing.  It was a very nice dagger.

Tew nodded and held out his hand for me to shake it.  Now that he wasn’t enhancing his voice with mana, he sounded more like someone from my original world who had smoked two packs a day for the last twenty years or so, and less like a natural disaster with a voice.  “Should have said so.  Or wear your accouterments, like a normal Paladin.”

“Well, you guys aren’t exactly the best at communicating.  You like to jump straight to the fighting before I can even get a word out.”  I motioned at Tew’s dagger with my free hand as we clasped wrists, making my point.  His crushing grip was unsurprisingly stronger than the other Warden’s, and I squeezed back just hard enough to keep him from injuring me.

“Hmm…”  He turned away from me once he let go, looking back at his compatriot.  I still hadn’t seen his face under the hood, but I had the feeling he didn’t want to admit how close to the mark I had hit.  “Oriana, come.  This siege will be good training for you.  To become our new tenth, you must have many leadership challenges. ”  Tew looked over his shoulder at me, letting me catch sight of a close-trimmed beard that had gone completely gray.  “I’ll see you in the city.  A Paladin is meant to fight against undead.”

It wasn’t a question.  I simply gave him a smile, which he probably took as agreement.  The two Green Wardens gave each other a look I couldn’t see under their hoods before they turned to leave.  I let out a slow breath as they walked away without saying anything more, and did my best not to slump in relief.  Next time, I should listen to the native of the planet and just run away.

I watched the pair hurry to catch up to their departing platoon of Wardens, and caught the woman, Oriana, glancing back at me.  She gave me a little wave before they disappeared around the gradual curve of the trail, and I raised a hand in return.  That’s right, still got it, baby.

After they were out of sight, I started walking in a completely different direction than where our camp was located.  I didn’t know if they would leave someone behind to watch me or not, but I wasn’t going to take any chances by leading them right to us.

While I was walking, I replayed the encounter with the Wardens in my head, trying to suss out any nuggets of information I might have missed.  The detached feeling created by my Paladin spell actually helped for once, removing any emotion that might have colored events.

The obvious exchange between Tew and Oriana about her being in training felt like the most important bit I had heard.  Well, that, and the whole plan to hunt me down and kill me.  I had no doubt the orders came from their Oracle book, same as they had the last two times.  Somebody had a real murder hard-on for me, and I was more than ready to return the favor.

As soon as I found out who they were, of course.

If Oriana was only a Green Warden in training, that meant Tew better represented their normal baseline for power.  Considering there were only supposed to be ten Green Wardens, and Tew’s age was getting up there–a guess based entirely on the brief glimpse I caught of his beard–I thought Tew wanted to retire.  Oriana was going to be his replacement, and he had to get her up to snuff before he could hang up the hood.  I didn’t know what to do with the information, but it was never a bad thing to know more about your opponents.

There was no question they were my enemies, especially since they were the power that propped up the guilds that kept average people as little more than serfs.  Until I could convince them to change their ways–or crush them under my heel and force what remained to see things my way–I’d remain at odds with everyone in a Warden’s uniform.  Didn’t mean I hated them, though.  Well, maybe some of them, but it definitely wasn't a blanket hate.

After a few miles of wandering around in the middle of the forest for a bit, I was sure I didn’t have someone following me.  There were insect noises and little forest creatures running around all over the place, so I felt okay letting my guard down a bit as I swung back around toward camp.  They were the best indicator for predators and unnatural things like the undead.  When they went quiet and still, it meant something nasty was around.

While I walked through the underbrush, I thought over the plans I had been putting together over the past few weeks.  There had been a lot of gold and treasure we collected after killing the lich, and my very first step when we got to the city needed to be upgrading my wardrobe and armor.  If I was going to be rubbing elbows with the rich and influential, I needed to look like I belonged in the room.

It was an annoying lesson I hadn’t wanted to learn, but a particularly spiteful mentor who taught me my Soldier class from world three was very good at completely ignoring what I did and didn’t want to do.  Eyide had been the craziest woman I had ever been in a romantic relationship with, and I had learned a lot of lessons from her.

She once tied me up–naked–in bed, thinking something exciting was going to happen.  Well, something exciting did happen.  Once I was secure, she opened the bedroom door and let in four men with clubs to beat me to death.  Eyide had considered it a training exercise.  I had thought of it as attempted murder.  Our relationship didn’t last much longer after that.

Maybe two or three weeks longer.  Her crazy was only matched by her hotness and flexibility, but my stats had only been level fifteen or so at the time.  I wasn’t strong enough to handle that kind of combination, so I snuck out in the middle of the night while she slept.  The rest of my time on world three I had to watch my back, looking for the knife between my shoulder blades I was sure she was planning to put there.  That was one world-hopping portal I was happy to see when it showed up.

Finally, I could smell the makeshift smokehouse Leedy and Murphy had set up to make some jerky.  It had the distinct aroma of burnt pine sap and too many herbs, which seemed to be the norm for this world.  They liked a thick crust of whatever-the-hell on their meat, while I preferred mine a little more plain.  No sense disrespecting the animal like that, but to each their own I suppose.  I couldn’t complain too much, especially since I wasn’t the one making it.

We had set up against the edge of a tiny spring in a particularly thick section of forest, making it much harder to find our camp.  Unless you had a nose, of course.  Then all you had to do was follow the smell.  Which was why I had tried to say we didn’t need a smokehouse.  It was an argument I had lost almost immediately, especially since we did need some way to preserve meat when one of us killed something bigger than a rabbit.

Another point the others had made was that we moved often enough that the odds of someone finding us were really no different than random chance.  I brought up the fact that random chance had a bad habit of stabbing me in the face, but they just laughed at me.  For some reason, I don’t think they understood how serious I was when I said it.

The wind had picked up as I got closer to camp, and the few distant clouds in a mostly blue sky had quickly turned into heavy thunderheads that looked ready to let loose as they grew closer and the shadows got darker.  One of the worst things about this planet was the weather.  It was always changing, and somehow that change tended toward bad.  It had even snowed in the middle of the night with no warning a few weeks ago.  Snow, when it had been hot enough earlier during the day to make me miss air conditioning.

It didn’t match any weather patterns I knew about, but I wasn’t a freaking weatherman, and each world certainly had their quirks.  At least it wasn’t world eleven, where they had only one hour of daylight every twenty-four hour period, and it was covered by living nightmares constantly on the hunt for human flesh.  Or even worse, world fourteen, where they had perfect weather all the time, except everyone was absolutely bug-nuts crazy and went around dancing and singing everywhere they went.  They hadn’t even been good at singing, either.  Their church snapped up anyone with talent when they were young, and spirited them away to various monasteries and convents to ‘protect’ them from all the mindflayers running loose.  It was like being stuck on a planet filled with ‘Got Talent’ tone-deaf rejects.  I still woke up in cold sweats from that one.

Really, I had bad dreams from both of them, but the first one was expected.  The second one was something completely new.  PTSDD, or Post-Traumatic Singing-and-Dancing Disorder.  If I ever got back home and found a shrink that didn’t immediately lock me in an insane asylum and melt down the key for scrap, they would be able to discover a whole new field of study.  I’m sure they’d appreciate it, even though I didn’t.

I shook my head, imagining what that conversation would sound like.  There wasn’t a situation where I ended up outside of a padded room, no matter how free-thinking the doctor.  Talking about my experiences to other people from my world would never work.

A branch snapped to my right, and I shifted up against a tree, clearing my mind and focusing on the here and now.  That stupid Paladin spell had made my mind wander all over the place, otherwise I would have noticed the complete lack of sounds coming from small animals and insects much sooner.

I strained my ears, enhancing my senses and focusing on my surroundings.  There was no way I had been followed–at least a ninety-nine percent chance I hadn’t been–meaning the odds were heavily in favor of me stumbling across somebody already here.  From what I was hearing, I had walked up on a group that was slowly creeping up on the camp.  There was no way to know if it was Wardens, bandits, dinosaurs, wendigo, chupacabra, or undead, but the most likely enemy had to be undead.  Intelligent undead, because they knew to be quiet.  The worst kind.

Another twig snapped to my left, and I slowly turned my head to try and see through the thick underbrush.  A spur of bone scraped against a tree as a monstrously overgrown ghoul took a graceful step into the open before disappearing again out of sight.  It wasn’t fair that something so ugly could move so smoothly, or so quietly.  Three more cut through the same gap while I watched, each of them looking more deadly than the last.  The one in the back even turned around and checked their tail, like a proper rear guard.

Yep.  Intelligent undead, and they were headed straight for camp.  This was bad.

Thunder rumbled overhead, and the skies opened up, dumping buckets of rain in the blink of an eye.  I was soaked before I could pull up the hood of my waterproofed cloak.

It could be worse.  Nobody was singing.

Wandering Warrior: Jury - Chapter 2

Chapter 2

I didn’t have a solid gauge for how powerful a Green Warden might be, and I wanted to meet one in person.  According to how Jess was acting, they were no pushovers.  But, I wasn’t exactly a pushover myself, either.  I had long ago maxed out the system granted to me when I was sucked through a portal and forced to become a world-hopping patsy for a bunch of mystery gods who never deigned it necessary to speak to me directly.

Since then, I had found a way to increase my personal power past the limits of the system.  By absorbing the mana found at places of power, I boosted my stats over what should have been possible for a human.  It had also created some kind of mana generator inside my body, an orb of energy that rested behind my belly button like a ball of barely contained liquid lightning that empowered my body and magic.  While I still wasn’t sure what it was, exactly, I wasn’t afraid to use every tool at my disposal to give me an advantage.  Before jumping into a possible fight with an unknown enemy, I checked my status to see how far my healing had come along.

Name: James Holden (Earth v7.2)

Title: Chief Justice/Arbiter/Justicar/Executioner/etc…

Level: 100/MAX

Rank: 2/10

Age: 27 (Physical) 47 (Actual)

Class: Warrior/Soldier/Knight/Paladin/Mage (5/5)

Profession: Healer/Alchemist/Blacksmith/Runesmith/Judge (5/5)

Status:

[Currently suffering from the effects of Soul Strain]

Strength- 65 [59]

Flexibility- 65 [64]

Vigor- 65 [61]

Mind- 65 [57]

Mission:

Mythical Quest: Deliver Justice - World Count 20/???

Legendary Quest: Return Home - Requirements not met

Epic Quest: Find out why - Requirements not met

Rare Quest: Track down Silver Star - Ongoing

Unique Upgrade Quest: Find ten places of power - 2/10

Soul Strain- Grade 1/5 - An injury to the connection between the body and soul.  Can cause a myriad of issues, including but not limited to the temporary reduction of status points, nausea, headaches, hallucinations, reduced magical control, and bouts of rage.  Recommended cures include extended periods of rest, items or potions intended to cure or assist strengthening of the soul, or absorbing places of power attuned to life or soul energy.

My quests hadn’t changed, but my stats had gotten closer to their max level, meaning I was getting better all the time.  Right after I had woken up from the fight with the lich, everything had been in the mid-forties.  The incremental daily increases back to where I should be was a good sign.

The total sum of knowledge I had about items and potions meant to strengthen the soul couldn’t fill a thimble, and I had even less information about ‘attuned’ places of power.  That meant rest had been my only option over the past few weeks of recovery.  I had already improved from grade three all the way to grade one on my soul strain, so I was feeling pretty good about dealing with these guys.

“James, quit standing there like a lump on a log!  We’ve got to go!”  Jess grabbed my arm and tried to pull me away.  “They’re going to notice you any second!”

“I’m just going to talk to them.  There’s no reason for them to fight a random stranger they find in the woods.”  I shook her off and waved her back.  “Go get the horses and find the others.  Let them know what’s happening, and pack up everything.  No matter what happens, we’re going to have to move sites before we bed down for the night.  These people are already too close to our camp for comfort.”

“You don’t understand, they won’t–”

“Go, Jess.  This isn’t the time to argue.”

She opened her mouth one last time to argue, but finally gave up when she saw the look of determination on my face.  Jess disappeared into the underbrush, her steps as silent as a hunting cat.

I took a moment to prepare my shield bracelet, making sure it was ready to go at a moment’s notice.  It would block a few projectiles, or one big spell.  In a fight, that could make all the difference.

I also pulled out two of the items I had been working on over the past few weeks from my pack and hooked them on my weapons belt, next to my mace and sword.  Each of them were things I had been able to create from the leftovers of the battle with the lich and his undead army, using both my alchemist and blacksmith professions while exploring the rules of chemistry and physics specific to this world.  The results had been…mixed.  Worse that I was capable of, but better than a poke in the eye.  Especially given the lack of proper tools, work stations, and limited ingredients.  I cast my Identify spell on the first item to make sure it still registered as a functioning device, and hadn’t been damaged in my ruck.

Item: Grenade

Type: Choking Smoke/Bone Shrapnel

Grade: 3/5

Description: An alchemical mixture of ash, herbs, and gunpowder in a skeletal bone and metal frame that explodes upon significant impact.  Purity level is moderate.  Smoke causes temporary blindness and irritates lung tissue.  Effects are variable based on environment and resistances of target.  Area of effect is two paces for shrapnel, five paces for smoke under ideal conditions.

There were only four of those, considering my limited supply of gunpowder.  I still needed to save enough for my three-barreled wrist cannon, and the grenades weren’t as important to me as my ‘trump card’ that had saved my life time and time again.  I looked at the other creation and cast Identify once again.

Item: Potion (Blend)

Type: Healing/Stone Skin

Grade: 7/10

Description: An alchemical mixture of herbs and minerals that greatly speeds healing over a short period of time.  Purity level is high.  If the entire potion is taken at once, the effect ‘Stone Skin’ will activate.  Vigor will increase by 35%.  Strength will increase by 15%.  Flexibility will reduce by 20%.  Status changes will revert to normal levels based on activity levels.  More than one potion used in a thirty minute period will result in adverse side effects.

While the time limit on ‘Stone Skin’ was a bit vague, I figured it was metabolism-based.  It would wear off faster if I was running around a bunch.  I was also going to make sure I didn’t ignore the warning about taking more than one potion every thirty minutes.  After all, none of my healing abilities could cure an erection lasting longer than four hours, and who knows what kind of things might happen.  It definitely wasn’t worth the risk.

“And what do we have here?”  A woman dressed in the uniform of a Blue Warden stepped out from behind a large tree to my right, near where Jess had been training.  “A lost villager in need of help, or a bandit in need of a lesson?”

I didn’t react to her popping out of nowhere beyond turning to face her.  Since I didn’t sense her before she appeared, it meant she either used magic to hop there, or she was an incredible scout.  My bet was on some kind of magic tied into her armor, similar to the speed enhancements Leedy had on his Blue Warden armor.

“Hello.”  I raised a hand in greeting, making sure to keep my other hand relaxed and resting on the hilt of my sword.  My spear-staff was currently on loan to Cross until he could find a quality weapon for himself, leaving me with only my magic-eating ninjatō sword, star-metal mace, wrist gun, and the grenade.  Oh, and my folding pocket knife, shield bracelet, and the potion.  I guess I was still okay if they wanted to throw down.

“That’s all you have to say for yourself?  Hello?  After all that magic you were tossing around–without displaying a guild sign–you didn't even try to hide or run away.  My, you are an interesting one.”  The woman took a step back into the shadow of the tree and disappeared, using whatever magic had allowed her to sneak up on me.

I paid closer attention this time, and there was a definite glow around the armor covering her calves before she disappeared.  This was looking like a more diverse and well-prepared group compared to what I had seen from the Wardens in the past, marking their group as some kind of elites.

Just to be safe, I activated my shield bracelet.  The low hum and faint bubble of clear energy quickly faded away as it settled into place, conforming to my shape like a second skin.  If that skin floated about an inch from my body, anyway.

There was a commotion back at the larger group as the scout reappeared near them, and I heard some shouting.  A few barked orders had them spread out, some going off the trail in an obvious flanking maneuver to either side.  I thought I could see two members of their party stay toward the back, both wearing green cloaks that would hide their features even if they were close enough for me to get a good look at them.

“Well, you’ve stepped in it now, stranger.”  The woman scout came out from the shadow of a much smaller tree to my left this time, two long daggers drawn and ready in her hands.  “You match the description of a certain someone we’ve been ordered to find.  It would go much easier if you would drop your weapons and surrender yourself for questioning.  No need for you to feel any extra pain, beyond what the White Wardens are going to do to you.”

“You have got to be kidding me.”  I took a moment to rub at my temples, feeling a headache coming on.  “All I said was one word to you, and now I’m to be tortured and possibly executed because I might be someone you’re looking for?”  I waved my arms around.  “Look at where we are right now.  In the middle of nowhere, and you just assume I’m your target based on a general description and the fact that magic was cast nearby?  Well, lady, I wasn’t even the one who was casting the magic.  Your assumptions are wrong, which could lead to the death of innocent people.”

The fact that they might actually be after me in the first place didn’t matter.  It was the principle of how she came to her conclusion that I was upset with.  They were more heavy-handed than a sumo wrestler filling his plate at an all-you-can-eat buffet line.  I mean, seriously.  These Wardens were absolutely out of control.

“That doesn’t matter.  You don’t get to decide–”

“No, you don’t get to decide who to torture and who to kill based on half-assed information.  You are no better than a group of bandits.  A bunch of murderers wearing fancy armor.”  I felt the mantle of Judge settle over me, straining to be released.  My voice deepened, changed by forces older and more powerful than those controlled by mankind.  “You are guilty, and I judge you as unworthy of your position and station.”

“Uhm, what’s happening?”  The scout took a step back, stumbling over an exposed tree root.  “What in all the hells below are you?”

While we had been talking, most of their group had managed to encircle me.  I counted at least twenty that I could see, which was far too many for me to take on all at once safely.  What was supposed to be a simple conversation to gauge the power of a Green Warden had quickly turned into a mess.

So be it.  If these people wanted to throw down, then that’s what I’d do.  A quick shot from my wrist gun would surprise them, taking the scout out of the fight and giving me a chance to throw my grenade at the largest concentration of Wardens standing on the road.  Then, I’d break free of their circle and use my mace to crush the legs or skulls of anyone in my way.  If they tried to follow me, I could–

“Wait.”  The voice cut through the mounting tension like a knife, causing the Wardens to take a step back and the knotted tension in my shoulders to relax a fraction.  “There’s no need to jump straight to violence.  Not when the forest is filled with enough undead to make me wonder if the end times are near.”

The speaker stepped out from behind the scout, using her shadow to travel from wherever they had been hiding.  It was a Green Warden.  As they dropped their hood, I saw it was a woman, younger than I expected, with a slight build, and blonde hair that fell in crumpled waves that framed her face.  She reminded me of someone important I had left behind, and for a single aching heartbeat, I was somewhere else.

“You’re always so ready to do violence.”  Sinthia shook her head, the breeze coming in off the ocean providing fresh air from the coppery stink of blood and burnt smell of ash as it blew strands of her hair across her stormy green eyes.  “Will you ever take a moment to just try and talk your way out of things?  This was supposed to be a peaceful negotiation.”

“These people were never going to stand with us.  And in a fight like this one, you’re either with us, or you’re against us.”  I wiped the tip of my spear clean on a nearby curtain, ripping it down in frustration.  The heavy material felt expensive, which only made me even more angry.  The open window showed hints of an oncoming storm, one that would help cover our tracks as we made our escape from the city center.  “It isn’t like this so-called council cared about the people anyway.  Just look around us!  There’s enough wealth in this one room to feed everyone in the slums for a week!  Maybe two weeks!  Instead, they were happy to sit up here, getting rich and fat, while their own people suffer, and the lich runs free to do as it wants unopposed.  Stealing children off the streets while they watch!  No, Sinthia.  This time, violence was the answer.”

“One day, James, I hope you grow to see there are more than just two options.  More than right and wrong, black and white.  And I hope even more to be by your side when it happens.”  Sinthia bent to grab the key to the treasury from the neck of the dead councilman seated to the right of the council leader, the man I had roasted to death with a lance of flame hot enough that it melted the golden armrests of his chair.  “Come, we have to hurry.  The enchanted equipment should be in the vault, and we need to get it out before the guards find what you have done.”

I blinked, coming back to myself.  We had been trying to gather support for an assault against a disgustingly powerful lich on my last world, making deals with every local and regional power in existence.  Most of them had gone poorly.

At least the armor we had found had helped lead us to the true hiding place of the phylactery that made the lich immortal, ultimately allowing me to kill it and free the children held captive by the insane undead.

The pain of seeing Sinthia again–even under those bloody circumstances–was as strong as a physical stab to the chest.  I could still feel the part of me that I had left behind when I was forced to abandon her, throbbing as if it was an open wound.  The mantle of Judge seemed to stutter, shifting uncomfortably on my shoulders before dropping away.  I looked back up at the woman that had reminded me of her, noticing her eyes were blue, not green.  No need to get lost in the past.  She was not Sinthia, and this was not the same world.

“Are you okay?”  The Green Warden took a tentative step forward, holding up her hand questioningly.  “You looked to have suffered an extreme injury just now.”

“I’m fine, thank you.  You reminded me of…someone I knew once.”  I straightened my back, rolled my shoulders, and shoved down my emotions into the pit of my stomach where they belonged.  “Now, where were we?”

“My subordinates were sent to apprehend you, before you revealed the fact that it was not you who was casting the large works of magic here earlier.”  The Green Warden held out her hand, motioning to the torn earth where Jess had practiced.  “Do you know who was doing magic?  Before you say anything, I encourage you to answer truthfully.  We will know if you are lying.”

“Wardens.  Right.”  I looked around, noticing that they were an almost even split of White and Blue Wardens, both of which might have the ability to see if I was telling the truth.  “Yes, I know who was casting here.  She’s long gone by now, and I won’t give you any more information about her beyond the fact she’s out of your reach.  And once again, in case you wanted to make sure I wasn’t lying, it wasn’t me casting spells in that clearing.”

Her eyes flickered to someone standing behind me, getting confirmation from someone else that I was being honest.  It meant she either didn’t have the ability, or wasn’t using it herself right now.

“Hmm.  You’re telling the truth.  Tell me this, stranger.  Why didn’t you run when you saw us coming?”  The Green Warden took a step closer, putting her just out of range of my sword if I were to draw and swing it.  She obviously didn’t understand what the cannon on my wrist could do to her if I lifted my arm about four inches.  “Most people unaffiliated with the guilds would run at the sight of a group of Wardens approaching them.”

“I was doing nothing wrong.  Currently, my only intentions for being in the woods are to kill monsters and undead, as well as rearm, rest, and recuperate before going to Greendown.  Why should I run from you?”  I hooked my thumbs in my belt, relaxing my posture.  I was also aiming my wrist gun at the Green Warden’s stomach.  “You can ask your people, that’s nothing but the truth.”

Her eyes looked over my shoulder again, and she flicked her hands to either side.  “Enough of this.  We’re taking too much time accosting this man for no reason.  Gather up the gear and carts.  This task force is back on the move in five minutes.”

The Wardens started to disperse, moving quickly back the way they had come.  The other Green Warden hadn’t moved from their place, holding position with the few carts they had apparently been pulling by hand.

“Since you seem to be a local, do you have any news of the area?  Is there some reason why so many undead infest this region, stranger?”  The Green Warden pulled her hood back up to hide her features once again, as if the few stray beams of sunlight that made their way through the thick canopy hurt her fair skin.

“You haven’t heard?  Greendown is nearly surrounded.”  I was genuinely surprised by her question.  “They’ll be under siege by the undead and the armies of the witches within a few weeks if things keep going like they have been.  Orcs, goblins, trolls, all kinds of monsters have banded together to crush the city.  As it stands, they’ll be lucky to last more than a month without reinforcements from the south.  Isn’t that why you’re here?  To help save the city?”  I was hoping that was why they were here, and not because of little-ol’-me, like that scout had hinted at.

“No, we had no idea.  We were sent after a single man, one who might even be behind this uprising.  In fact, given who our orders are from, I now have no doubt.  It’s imperative we reach the city before the siege falls in place.”

The Green Warden’s hand flashed out, grabbing me by the forearm hard enough I felt my bones shift under my muscles.  At least that answered one question.  Green Wardens were strong.

“I hate to impose on you after the way we met, but time is of the essence.  You must take our task force through this forest to the city as quickly as possible.  We must speak with Commandant Beck at the Hunter’s Guild, and then use whatever information he can give us to track down our target.  Finding and killing James Holden is all that matters now.”

Sometimes, I think the gods thought my life was all one big joke.

Wandering Warrior: Jury - Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Pain was the best teacher I had ever known.  Not because it taught me what I should do, but because it showed me exactly what not to do.  Like, say, try to teach a barmaid lycanthrope shifter some magic spells with the potential to wipe out entire buildings.

“Okay, nice try, but this time you should be sure to aim the cone of destruction away from us.  Sound good?”  I coughed, waving away the cloying dust in the air.  The ever-present headache and pain in my chest that had stuck with me for the last month reminded me that I still wasn’t back to my peak, and my body certainly didn’t appreciate the heavy impact of rocks and dirt clods that had hit me after the explosion.  “It would go a long way toward keeping us in one piece.”

“Sorry about that, James.  It got away from me right at the end.”  Jess, the cat-eyed apprentice that I never asked for, did her best to shake out the dirt from her hair.  She avoided looking at me as she surveyed the destruction of the forest clearing around us.  “I’ll try it again with a focusing rod, like you said I should.”

Her training over the last few weeks had been steadily working toward these bigger spells, and I had been dreading it for exactly this reason.  Jess had a natural affinity with earth magic, which was like throwing gasoline on a bonfire.  Explosive.

“First, we need to move again.  Destruction like this is bound to draw attention, and we don’t know who’s still looking for us.”  I picked up my gear and tied it to the back of my new horse.  It had once belonged to the White Wardens and was trained not to run when things started to go boom, making it a great choice for a mount.  “Once we reposition to the west, you can try Earthen Eruption a few more times before we have to return to camp.”

Jess gave me a thumbs up as she packed up her own gear.  Her horse was another of the White Warden’s horses we had gathered up after they had been wiped out by the undead forces of the lich I had barely managed to kill a month ago.  I had nearly been killed myself in the battle, and even with my advanced healing and spells the recovery had been slow.

The damage I had suffered during the fight hadn’t been physical.  Well, it had definitely been physical, but it wasn’t just physical.  I didn’t have a quantifiable way to describe how I had been injured.

When I had battled the undead monster, it had gone in a way all twenty years of my experience fighting across twenty worlds hadn’t prepared me for.  The lich had wrested control of my body away from me after I had absorbed a fountain of energy from a place of power it had already claimed for itself.  That allowed it to use my body like a puppet, even without actually possessing my mind in the traditional sense.  I had fought tooth and nail to regain control of myself, and eventually found a way to break free.  The wounds from that confrontation still hadn’t closed properly.  My body was perfectly fine, of course.

Somehow, the lich had damaged my soul.

“How much longer until you think we can risk going into the city?”

Jess broke me from my inner thoughts, forcing them back into the present.  I answered with a shrug of my shoulders, not willing to voice a reply.  We had hashed over the same arguments as a group dozens of times, and always came back to the same answer.

Not yet.

Avoiding Greendown and all its hazards was the best choice for now, even if it meant I might fail my gods-given quests by running out of time before I was yanked off of this planet and sent to a different one.  Completely against my will, of course.  Like the gods always did things, year after year.

Being stuck in my twenty-seven year old body over the past two decades had made it hard to keep the sense of urgency necessary to accomplish the tasks I knew were expected of me.  It felt like I was an old man trapped in a young body.  I guess that’s kind of what I was, but I also knew if I ever wanted to make it back to my own world, I couldn’t hold back for too long.  We would have to go to Greendown sometime soon.  Just not today.

“All I’m saying is, I think I’m ready.  Even the Button Guild would have to think twice before coming after me now.”  Jess held up a hand as we led our horses side by side down the dirt track, making a fist with only her pinky extended.  “Stone Spears!”

Faint light glowed under the edges of her bracers and pauldrons for a brief moment before a good twenty pointed rods of black rock erupted from the ground in two neat rows along either side of the trail.  The runes I had carved into the underside of her armor plates were meant to focus and enhance the spells cast through them, which made Jess even more deadly to our enemies.  When she remembered to use them, of course.

“See?  That didn’t tire me out at all, and I placed them all perfectly, with no mistakes.”  Jess looked over at me with a smug grin on her face, obviously proud at how far she had come.

“That isn’t the point, Jess.  And I don’t think the assassins of the Button Guild are the kind of people who would confront you face-to-face anyway.”  I snapped my fingers, and her stone spears sank beneath the surface of the trail like they had never been there.

None of my armor pieces lit up like hers had, but I did have my own copies of the runes just in case I needed a little extra juice.  I had practiced with them a few times, and the results had been as dramatic as I had hoped.  The only downside was the materials the runes were carved in.  My armor was mostly hardened leather with wooden reinforcement, so using the runes too often would burn them out quickly.  Which was why I didn’t use them all willy-nilly.

“I know how the Button Guild works.  They make a chimney fall on you, some bad wine gets served only at your table, or a runaway freight wagon runs you over in a freak accident.  Supposedly, you never even see them before you die.  You end up in the cemetery, and weeks later the rumors start to spread that it wasn’t really an accident at all.”  Jess guided her horse around a stump in the trail, looking at her feet to avoid tripping over old tree roots.  “Between the five of us, I think we can keep anything like that from happening.”

“Look, I’m tired of sleeping on the ground, same as everybody else.  That doesn’t mean we should rush the process here.  Your training is going well, but that hasn’t been the case for everyone else.”  I held back the sigh that tried to escape at the thought of what I had been going through with Cross over the past few weeks.  “There are still plenty of…issues we need to work out before I trust everyone can handle themselves in a crowd if we get separated.”

Jess didn’t have an easy answer for that one.  She knew as well as I did that the three former Wardens in our group would definitely have a harder time in Greendown than the two of us would, despite the probability of hired assassins trying to kill us.

During the battle with both a member of the White Wardens–from what I had seen, they were basically this world’s version of the Spanish Inquisition–and the evil undead lich who had nearly killed me, I had redeemed Captain Cross from a disgraced member of the Blue Wardens to a fellow member of my own order.  I had made him a Judge.

Now, there were two of us on the entire planet, and sometimes I felt like it was one too many.  Most of the problems I was having came from the differences in culture between Cross and myself.  Passing on the skills of a Judge wasn’t all that hard.  The knowledge and wisdom of how and when to use them was a completely different issue.

“Does this work?”  Jess had led us to another clearing, this one much smaller.  From the small pile of weathered lumber left on the far side, one made for a purpose long-forgotten by the people who had clear-cut it years ago.  “We’ve been walking for quite a while.  I’m sure we’ve made enough distance between the other clearing and this one.”

I took a moment to look around and gave her a thumbs up.  “Looks good to me.  Try using the large focusing rod this time, and then you can move down to the more specific ones after you get the hang of keeping the spell under control.”

She moved off, taking the premade tools I had prepared to help with her training weeks ago.  I should have started with them in the beginning, but the mad rush of my first arrival on this planet hadn’t been very conducive to proper preparation.  Especially when I hadn’t even wanted an apprentice mage in the first place.  Now, I had both an apprentice mage, and an apprentice Judge to deal with.

At least I didn’t have to worry about what Jess would do when I left.  She was going to be a powerful earth mage, sure, but I had no doubt there were plenty of even more powerful mages running around somewhere if she got too far out of hand.  Cross, on the other hand…that was like I was leaving behind a kind of legacy, and I couldn’t afford to mess it up.

He was raised to believe the guilds on this planet were doing good things for the people, and they only needed slight adjustments to be put right back on the top of the proverbial food chain.  From what I had seen, they needed to be burned to the ground and then salt the earth.  Twice.

And that wasn’t even mentioning his views on some stupid book called The Oracle, which was supposed to be a direct line to the gods.  I was about ninety percent sure it had been hijacked by somebody decidedly not this planet's gods, if it ever had actually been a holy relic of some kind in the first place.  If I wasn’t around to argue with the finer points of right and wrong with him, he might end up taking orders from some dusty tome like some medieval form of text messaging straight from the desk of the bad guys.  Hence the importance of instilling a strict moral code that at least pointed in the same general direction of my own.

A powerful explosion rocked the forest clearing, nearly knocking off my straw hat.  I looked up to see a rather sheepish grin on Jess’s face.

“Sorry!”  She lifted up the baseball-bat sized focusing rod of carved wood and banded iron I had fashioned from a broken axle we had salvaged from an old freight wagon at the cheese factory south of Greendown.  The runes running up and down its length were meant to help control and focus the mana of a large spell, kind of like training wheels for a new mage.  “I already know what I did wrong.  Too much push into the end of the spell, and not enough emphasis on the targeting portion.”

“Look, you’ve already made enough noise to alert half the forest.  Just hurry up and get it right.  There’s no point in repositioning a third time.”  I shook the hilt of my sword in its sheath, making sure it was loose enough to draw in case I needed to pull it out quickly.  “It’s only a matter of time before we have some kind of uninvited guests.  I’d rather face them now, then lead them back to camp.”

“R-right.”  Jess gave me a shaky nod as her hands tightened around the focusing rod.  Talk of real enemies had her jittery, but I knew from experience that she’d shake them if things popped off.  By now, she was a veteran of several battles, and even I couldn’t call her a rookie anymore.  “I’ll get it this time.  No more mistakes.”

I positioned myself to better see both directions up and down the trail while she got back to work.  The rapid series of booms behind me seemed much more controlled, and I only had to brush off the occasional clump of dirt that came raining down from the sky.  It’s amazing how real danger can provide improved performance.

She kept at it for another hour, only taking a single five minute break to get a drink of water and allow her mana to recover a bit.  The drastic improvement in her ability to recover from spell casting was the biggest change I had seen in Jess over the last month.  It wasn’t nearly as pronounced if she was using non-earthen spells, but since that was our sole focus, I had no doubt she could keep it up for at least another hour or two.

But, that wasn’t going to happen.

After the fight with the lich, our little band of misfits had scrounged what we could from the remains of the battle, and traveled farther east, circling the edge of the forest surrounding Greendown.  It was the least inhabited section of forest even before the undead uprising due to the lack of natural resources, and now it was absolutely empty.

We had stayed on the move, avoiding the few major hordes of undead moving through the area, and taking down any smaller groups we thought wouldn’t be missed by the undead leadership we knew were still out there somewhere.

There had even been a few Warden patrols, but they made more noise than the undead.  It made for a miserable month of camping in the ever-present damp and almost daily rainstorms.  Keeping out of sight while we recovered had been necessary, though.  Necessity always seemed to make things more bearable.  And, we still ran into enough groups of enemies that keeping our skills sharp wasn’t a problem.

“Jess, I’ve got movement to the north.”  I didn’t exactly shout, but I wasn’t trying to keep my voice down, either.  There was no question whoever was coming had already heard all the noise we had been making.  “Grab the horses and swing to the west.  You can hit their left flank while I hold them at the front.  Make sure none of them escape, whoever they are.”

“You got it, James.  No one gets away.”  She gave me a sharp nod as she led the horses away, all signs of her earlier jitters evaporated in the afternoon sun.

I noticed a bit of tiredness to her steps that hadn’t been there before.  Maybe I should have stopped training sooner, especially with the expected confrontation coming.

No.  Jess would have to fight when she was tired far more often than when she was well-rested and fully recharged.  This was far better training for her in the long run.

Pushing aside my thoughts, I stepped out of the bushes and into plain view of the group approaching on the path.  I still didn’t know if it was wild animals, monsters, undead, or people, but it didn’t really change how this would ultimately go down.  Whoever it was, we would fight, and I would win.  There was no room for any other thought process.

Until Jess came running right past me, ducking low to stay out of sight.  I had no idea where our horses had gone, but her frantic waving caused me to let out a long sigh of frustration.

“What is it, Jess?  Why are you hiding?”  I motioned behind her, clearly peeved at the lack of horses.  “And where are our things?”

“Forget all of that!  We have to run, right now, or we’re going to die.”  The whites of her eyes were visible all the way around her irises, and I started to realize just how freaked out she really was.

“Calm down.  Tell me what’s going on.”  I leaned back to look up the path, my view still partially blocked by all the foliage and shadows cast by the trees.  If I couldn’t clearly see them, then they couldn’t clearly see me, either.  “You should know by now there isn’t much in this forest that I can’t handle.  What is it?  More dinosaurs?  Wendigo?  Some of those one-legged fae creatures that like to sneak up behind people and kick them in the butt called Paul?”

“No.  It’s much worse.  Green Wardens.  There’s two of them, and they have lots of friends.  A full platoon of Blue and White Wardens.”

“Well…shit.”

Wandering Warrior: Jury - Prologue 2

Prologue 2

Chilly mountain air from the north blew through the trees, causing the trio of witches to shiver.  The presence of the supernaturally beautiful vampire in their midst didn’t help curb their discomfort, and the dense power coming from her magical staff cowed all but their most rebellious thoughts.

“You still don’t have the goblins in position?  What’s taking so long?”  The vampire princess stalked across the clearing, causing the shadows cast by the bonfire to jump across the forest clearing in a macabre dance.  “Do you need me to do it for you?”

“No, great lady.”  The oldest of the witches, a hunched crone, shuffled forward into the light.  “The orcs had to be convinced to stop eating them.  Now that they are willing to allow the greenskins to muster on the surface, we should be ready for the next phase of the attack by sunset.”

“Sunset!”  The vampire stabbed her staff into the dirt, causing a flare of power to erupt from the gem set in its top.  “What’s the point of having forces that can fight during both the day and night, if you only attack when the sun goes down?”  She paused, cocking her head to the side, as if she were trying to hear something whispered from far away.  The undead princess took an unnecessary deep breath and let it out slowly, calming her sharp temper.  “Fine.  One more day won’t matter in the long run.  The important part is keeping the pressure on the city’s defenders, both day and night.  Stage the forest and cave dwellers for daytime raids, and my ghouls and vampires will continue to push them during the night.”

“We’ll make it so, great one.”  The old crone pulled a clay tablet from within her heavy robes, her gnarled fingers showing a surprising level of dexterity as she gave it a twirl.  “Once we have them behind the city walls, we’ll crack their fragile shell like a rotten goose egg!”  Her deranged cackle ended in a phlegm-filled cough, forcing the crone to spit into the fire.  The orange flames sputtered and danced green for a moment before returning to their normal hue.  “Drats.  Now I’m hungry for scrambled eggs.”

The vampire winced at the disgusting display, turning toward the edge of the clearing that led to the largest concentration of her own forces.  “I’ll leave you to it.  Make sure your monsters are ready the following sunrise.  No mistakes or delays this time, or I’ll be forced to punish you.  Again.”

Now it was the witches turn to wince, their eyes flashing to the fourth member of their coven.  She was still staked to the ground where the vampire had left her, the whimpers of pain long ago ending.

“If she survives the change, send her to me.  I’m interested to see what kind of abilities a vampire witch might have.”  With that, the undead princess left, her heavy presence lifting off the coven like a wet blanket shrugged from their hunched shoulders.

The youngest of the witches, a woman who had yet to see gray in her long black hair, was the first to speak once they were sure the vampire was gone.  “Now what should we do?  There’s only three of us left!  Without a full coven, the moment the vampire returns to the mountains, we won’t even have the power to keep the orcs in line.  They’ll turn on us, and eat us, or worse, we’ll–”

“Enough, Danika.”  The old crone slashed her hand through the air, tucking away the clay tablet in the same motion.  “We were forced into this by circumstance, not by choice.  We’ll make the best of it, as we always do.”

“But–”

“Trust us, Danika.”  The third witch, who was closer in age to the leader of the coven, with pure white hair and a slightly hunched back, patted the younger woman on the small of her back.  “This isn’t the first time we’ve been in a tight spot.  There’s plenty of time to make plans for what comes after, whether we win or lose against the Wardens.”

“Orcs are the least of our concern.  Either they get wiped out trying to take the city, or they are distracted enough when we win that sneaking away will be child’s play.”  The oldest of the three was struck by another coughing fit, hacking her phlegm into the fire once again before continuing.  “Our true enemy is the undead.  The princess already let slip that she wants the power a vampire witch under her thrall might provide.  We can’t let that happen.”

To accentuate her point, she pulled a small pouch off of her belt and sprinkled some of its contents onto the body of their fourth member.  The powder hissed and bubbled when it made contact with the open wounds covering the corpse.  After a few moments, the body trembled and thrashed against the ropes holding it.  As suddenly as the movements started, they stopped, and the body stayed still.

“What did you do?”  Danika approached the body of her coven sister cautiously, afraid of what might happen next.  “Is she…a vampire now?”

“No.  She’s passed on to her next life.  I released her from the bonds of the undead.”  The old crone hunched down a little lower, sadness haunting her features.  “I had hoped to never see another sister pass before me, but the fates deem my wishes to be nothing but wasted words on the winds.”

“So, if the undead are our true enemy here, what should we do next?  Try to help the Wardens?  Try to make a deal with the guilds?”  Danika wrung her hands in worry, her thoughts on the idea plain for her coven mates to see.

“The Wardens and guilds are just as much our enemies as the undead.”  The old crone shuffled her way over to a chest near the edge of the clearing, where the majority of her personal supplies were kept.  “We’ll continue with the plan, and try to sack the city.  It’s what we do afterward that matters.  Now, come help me.  We need to prepare.”

The two coven sisters nodded in agreement before hurrying to her side.  They didn’t know how much time there was before the vampire princess returned, and every second could make all the difference.

***************

“You called for me, milord?”  The princess made her way through the trees, using the light from her staff to illuminate her way.  “Is there something wrong with the demon gate?”

“No.”  The voice of the Destitute came through the pendant on her necklace, as strong and powerful as if he were standing next to her.  “I wanted an update.  Have you found out anything about the interloper who killed the lich?”

“The witches are barely competent, but I have hopes that they will be enough to take the city.  Once the population has been converted, I’ll march them to the mountains immediately, and the new numbers should be enough to provide the push we need to close the gate.”  The princess took another deep breath and let it out slowly, a habit she maintained from a time when breathing was necessary for her to live.  “As for the interloper, there’s been no sign.  I’ve had my forces looking everywhere south of the city where we last knew they were, but all they found were some old campsites and faint traces of someone using magic.”

“Hmmm…”  The Destitute’s displeasure was palpable, even through the speaking device.  “Make your attack on the city.  We need those extra units if we’re going to have a chance.  Don’t forget to arm and armor them as best you can while you’re in the city, even if it takes a little longer.”

“Of course.  I know the value of properly prepared troops, milord.”  The princess finally made her way through the trees to the road where the majority of her forces were staged for the evening’s attack.  “If there’s nothing else, I have a city to take.”

“Yes, there is something else.”  An invisible force pushed down on the princess, forcing her knees to buckle under the pressure.  “You will find out who the interloper is, and inform me immediately once you do.  There can be no mistakes this time, Princess Starnight.  I have a feeling once you make your assault on the city, the interloper will make themselves known.  I should know about it right afterward.  Don’t forget our ultimate mission.  We’re trying to save the world.”

“Yes, milord.  I understand.”  The pressure disappeared, and she made it back to her feet.  “I hate that name.  Princess Starnight.”  The vampire dusted off her clothes as she made her way over to the ghouls that would be leading the push against the Wardens.  “If I could find the bard that stuck me with that name, I’d feed him his own entrails for an eternity.”  Pushing aside her anger, the princess focused on the forces arrayed in front of her.  “Enough delays!  Forward, and kill them all!  We’ve a planet to save, and no time to spare!”

The horde of undead roared in response, rushing out of sight in the darkness like a wave.  Off to kill everything living in their wake.  It made the princess smile.

Wandering Warrior: Jury - Prologue 1

Prologue 1

The city of Greendown was old, but it had been built upon ancient ruins from a civilization that had been even older, and far more advanced.  The integration of the aging sewer system left by those who had come before had cut down on outbreaks of disease, and helped Greendown flourish, even after its borders stretched beyond the bounds of the ancient ruins.  Only the people living in the slums closest to the outer walls had to deal with the smell of raw sewage in the streets, making the more central regions of the city more sought-after.

Naturally, the center of the city is where the vast majority of the guild halls were located, along with a few governmental buildings dedicated toward running the city.  In the exact center, in the place of prominence, there wasn’t a palace or keep for a king.  Instead, it was the guild hall for the Hunter’s Guild, which served as the headquarters for the Western Wardens.  This late at night, it was almost abandoned, except the few people still working to prepare for what was coming from the mountains and forests to the north.

“Commandant, there’s still been no word about the missing people from the guilds, or your nephew and Captain Cross.”  The aging figure hunched over his desk looked up to see his scarred secretary standing in his doorway.  Commandant Beck held in the sigh that tried to escape, not wanting his loyal servant to see him feeling the strain he was under.  Years ago, the secretary had been badly injured when he refused to stop running back into a burning building, determined to save every person inside that hadn’t been consumed by the flames.  He had saved nearly a dozen, most of them children.  It had been a heroic feat worthy of songs and stories told by bards up and down the banks of the Mighty Reka for generations.  As is the way of things, he quietly retired from his position in the Black Wardens and offered his current position, where he worked to help Commandant Beck keep the region from descending into chaos.  After not receiving a reply, the secretary cleared his throat and moved on to the next issue.  “Lieutenant Lucente is here to speak with you, as you requested.”

“Send her in.”  Commandant Beck stood, leaning backward to stretch his lower back.  “We don’t have much time left to finalize our plans.”  The light drizzle outside made his bones ache, and he could feel every place he had been injured over his long career.  Most especially where a goblin spear had caught him in the back when he was a much different man, still filled with the fire and zeal of youth.

While old age was catching up to him, Beck knew he could still hold his own on the battlefield.  His frame still held enough muscle to carry the burden of heavy armor, and carrying a shield and lance was still something he practiced with the men when time allowed.  Morning practice with his longsword kept him in good enough shape that he didn’t fear any of the younger men in a duel yet, especially since they hadn’t learned the tricks that experience had brought.  Not to mention the few magic spells he knew that could tip the scales in a real fight.  Being replaced by a younger man was still a few years away, which bode well for the city.  Beck had yet to find a replacement for himself he felt could handle both the responsibility of securing the region, and the balancing act in the political arena.  His nephew and Captain Cross had been the two most likely to succeed him, but Cross was from the Blue branch instead of the White–making him politically unprepared–and Gleason had proven himself to be… problematic.

He shook off his internal concerns about his personal situation and walked over to the place on his wall where he had removed some paintings of his forebearers.  There, he had hung a map of the surrounding area, with Greendown in the center.  It didn’t show all the details he would have liked, but it was enough for the purposes of planning the defense of the city against what was coming.

Beck wished the map’s colorful lines and hand-drawn details held the answers to the questions plaguing his mind, like where all the craftsmen kept disappearing.  It was never the best who went missing, like the guild leaders and their vice heads, but the fourth or fifth in line.  The ones not quite good enough to warrant top security details.  Enchanters, blacksmiths, armorers, bladesmiths, leatherworkers, alchemists, all had disappeared into the night without a trace, sometimes with their entire families in tow.  The uproar it had caused somehow landed on his shoulders, and the people wanted answers.  So did he.  Many of those men and women were his friends, people he had known for years.  His investigators could only determine that it wasn’t the witches’ type of magic that had taken them.  Something else was loose in the city, and he didn’t have the manpower to hunt it down at the moment.

“You wanted to see me, sir?”  Beck turned around to see the highest-ranking Blue Warden left in his command, at least until Captain Cross could be found.  Lieutenant Lucente hadn’t bothered saluting.  The two were familiar enough that she knew he didn’t care about such frivolities in private.  Beck knew she was the illegitimate child of some noble from somewhere far to the east, which gave her the raven-haired and tan-skinned features that stood out this far north.  Many men would have found her beautiful before the battle with a wendigo had caused her to lose an eye, and given her two long scars across the left side of her face.  Now, most men found her black eyepatch intimidating, and kept their distance.  Her uniform was stained with blood, and a dirty bandage was wrapped around her left calf, giving her a slight limp.  She was dripping mud onto the floor, and smelled like she hadn’t seen what a bar of soap even looked like in at least a week.  Commandant Beck was quietly impressed.

“Yes, Lieutenant.”  He motioned to the map on the wall.  “I know you just came back from the field.  Show me where the largest concentrations of undead were located, and where you think the witches are going to make the next push.”

Located at the juncture of two major roads, and along the banks of a mountain-fed stream deep enough that most boats could make the voyage from the Mighty Reka, Greendown was a strategic location for ore, lumber, furs, and food production.  It was also home to a major branch of the Alchemist Guild, and the thick forests and mountainous regions were rife with ingredients important to their craft.  Unfortunately, those same forests and mountains were home to many of the worst kinds of monsters, beasts, and unsavory characters that could find a home nowhere else in the world.  Which is why they were now dealing with an undead uprising and monster horde lead by a witch coven, hellbent on taking the city for their own unknown, but certainly nefarious, purposes.

The Lieutenant pulled a dagger from her belt and used the tip to be as precise as possible.  “Sir, the largest concentrations of undead are here, here, and here.  We managed to push them back, for now, and my men hold the intersections that run roughly along this line.”  Unsurprisingly, the points coincided with major routes to the north.  Undead tended to travel along the path of least resistance, congregating in hordes on trails and roadways until they ran into something that interested them.  They all expected orcs, ogres, and goblins to make an appearance at some point, but they hadn’t materialized in any great numbers yet.  “But, sir, that isn’t the only thing.”  She paused, digging into a pocket to pull out a small scroll.  As she unrolled it, a small black stone fell out.  Drawn on the parchment, Beck saw the rough drawing of a ghoul, but one unlike any he had seen before.  “There’s something new.  It’s not just vampires occasionally leading the undead when the sun goes down.  During daylight, there’s these new kinds of smart ghouls, who are tougher, faster, and stronger than they should be.”  She passed over the black stone.  “Inside of them, we found this.”

“Interesting.”  Beck held up the stone to the light of his lanterns, noticing the glittering swirls that seemed to come alive as he touched it.  The feeling of foreboding coming from the pebble was disconcerting, and he sat it on his desk before wiping his hand on his shirt.  “How much has this affected the battlefield?”

“Honestly, sir?”  Lucente sighed, seeming to age a few years before Beck's eyes.  “Even with twice the number of Wardens, we wouldn’t be able to hold for more than a week.  Their numbers are growing too fast.  I don’t know where all of these undead are coming from, but the witches must be gathering every undead there is in the entire mountain range.  On top of that, with the ghouls handling the daytime, and the vampires at night, it makes the zombie numbers even more effective than normal.  We don’t have a chance to rest our best fighters, and it’s only a matter of time until they start to fall to exhaustion.  Once the witches muster their additional forces, most especially the orcs we’ve seen in the past, it’s going to turn on us quickly.”

“Is it really that bad?  We have a pair of Green Wardens on their way from the south.  Once they get here, things should get much easier.”  Beck was pleased to see the Lieutenant perk up at the news.  The Green Wardens were the strongest of their forces.  A single Green was practically a platoon by themselves.  “Can you hold out until they make it upstream?”

She pointed to a second line on the map, where another road intersected with the northern trails.  It was the last row of intersections before the actual city, where their supply stations were currently set up for their field operations.  “We are probably going to need to pull back in the next day or two, if we want to keep our defenses intact.  Then it’s just going to be a fight to hold those positions long enough to pull as many supplies as we can into the city before the siege starts.  If they can get here soon, we can hold this line.  If they take their time, or the witches start casting curses and using big spells, we’ll have no choice but to hide behind the walls.”

Beck took a long look at the map, thinking over his options.  He knew the Green Wardens were on their way because of a mission from The Oracle, and not because of the undead, but once they arrived there was no doubt those battle maniacs would jump at the chance to fight.  Whoever James Holden was, he would die quickly and allow the Green Wardens the opportunity to save the city.  He would also get answers as to the whereabouts of his nephew, and Captain Cross, whatever their fates might be.  “I’ll give the order to start pulling in supplies.  You do what you need to do, Lieutenant.  Hold the line for as long as you can, and I’m sure our city will come out the other side of this fiasco unscathed.”

She gave him a sharp nod of agreement before saluting and turning to leave.  Both of them knew they were in for a long slog of a fight, but with the Green Wardens on their way, the weight didn’t seem to push on their shoulders quite as heavy.

Tycoon May: Chapter 43

Chapter 43

The next two days were a struggle in patience for Grant.  For once, both Sarge and Grant were wrong.  There were no huge monsters to fight, and no hidden assassins to battle.  Instead, traveling along the road was incredibly boring.  On the upside, it allowed him to heal, and get his armor and equipment put back together.

Another bonus was the chance for their group to make plans based on what they found in the next city.  If everything went perfectly, Grant was going to go straight to the nearest contribution point center and turn in his Metallica, while Sam and Aria sold off the wagons and their loads as quickly as possible.  Then, during Grant’s process of getting his badge leveled up to Tier Three and Four, the others were going to gather as many people as they could to assist with the assault on Forteresse Mere, which was two cities away from here.  If everything didn’t go perfectly, they would do as best as they could, and meet up at the next city, and push on to Forteresse Mere with what they had, hoping that Chug had enough forces to make up the difference.

<It’s too bad no one can tell you how long it’s going to take to get your badges back from House Thursday.  I don’t understand why it isn’t instantaneous, like it was from Tier One to Tier Two.>

“You heard what Sam said, Sarge.”  Grant was back on his customary place in the rear of the convoy, riding on the pile of goods as he watched their trail.  “They always have some kind of celebration to commemorate the achievement.  We just have to get through it, and then it will be time to go after Tycoon May.”

<Celebrating making it to a made-up tier by people only in power because they lied about what kind of food is safe to eat.  That’s a new level of ridiculousness that hurts me in places I didn’t know I could feel pain.  I can’t wait for you to overthrow this place.>

Grant felt his wagon start to slow, so he turned around and saw they were finally within sight of the city.  On first glance, it looked like all the others he had visited up to this point.  But, when they traveled for a few more minutes and the city didn’t seem to get any closer, Grant started to realize the scale he was seeing seemed completely different from the other cities he had been to so far.

<This one is at least five times the size of the last one we were at.  And look, the inner walls have an extra layer here.  This place must have enough Tier Three and Four citizens to warrant a whole additional layer of city.>

“Well, that will make it easier to blend in, right?”  Grant tried to stand up to get a better view, but the rough roads made the struggle seem like it wasn’t worth the strain.  “There must be a lot of people who come through here, for the roads to be this bad.”

<Look at the fields around the outer walls.  There aren’t nearly enough to feed everyone inside.  This looks as if it's another garden and greenhouse city, which means they have to be subsidized by the cities around them for the bulk of their grains.  They probably focus on fruits, vegetables, herbs, and spices, which isn’t going to keep their bellies full, even if it does taste good.  So yes, their roads most definitely see a lot of traffic.  Without it, the city would starve.>

“I wonder why there aren’t more cities focused on grains?  Sure, farming outside the walls would be hard, and the one with the fields inside the walls meant there weren’t a lot of people, but it’s still better than starving to death.”  Grant squinted against the glare of the sun glinting off of all the glass in the greenhouses spread throughout the city.  “It just doesn’t make any sense.”

<Sure it does.  I bet grains don’t earn as much in contribution points, so they focus on the crops that will earn them the most as a citizen.  That’s all there is to it.  Most people’s priorities aren’t on survival, especially this close to the capital.  It’s on promotion, and wealth.>

“That seems to be a recurring theme throughout this District.”  Grant couldn’t help but feel frustrated about everything he’d seen since leaving the farm in District January.  “I guess you could say that’s something we’ve seen over and over again for months now.”

<Don’t be surprised if you keep seeing it.  That’s just human nature, Grant.  You could call it greed, or ambition.  Some might even call it hope for a better future.  In any case, the two of us judging these people harshly isn’t going to solve the problem.>

“Right.  Well, I guess there’s no time like the present to get things started.”  Pushing aside his thoughts, Grant hopped down off his wagon and started jogging toward the front.  He gave Sam and the others a wave as he ran past, but didn’t stop to speak with them.  They had already made their plans, and there was nothing left to say.  Either things would work like they wanted and everyone would meet in the next city, or Grant would see them in Forteresse Mere at the end of the road in a desperate last run.

Entering the city only took waving his badge at the busy guards, and Grant pushed his way through the heavy foot traffic in search of a contribution point center.  He noticed a tension in the city that had become common since word had started to spread about monster meat being edible.  It felt like a cauldron ready to boil over at any moment.  Even the work crew of ‘Vassals’ being forced to head out the gate to gather manure that Grant passed eyed their guards with a kind of hostility that hadn’t been present before.

<The whole District must be like this.  It’s on the tipping point.  Things must have been close to the edge for a long time for the people at the bottom Tiers, and your revelation might be the push they need.  All you have to worry about is timing it so you are the one to challenge Tycoon May, and not some other Wielder or powerful cultivator looking to make a name for themselves.>

“It’s never that easy, Sarge.”  Grant weaved his way through a group waiting to buy some kind of grilled vegetables on skewers that made his stomach groan in protest.  “There’s always going to be something that keeps us from a painless victory.”

Sarge stayed silent, which Grant took as quiet agreement.  Finally, Grant spotted a contribution window near a smaller building in the colors of House Wednesday.  It wasn’t a House Monday building, but it wasn’t House Thursday, either.  Good enough for his purposes.

“How may I help you today, sir?”  The woman behind the window was wearing the armor of a monster hunter, like all House Wednesday members were.  “Do you have contribution points to turn in?”

Grant shifted the ridiculously heavy belt pouch on his waist and dropped it on the corner of the granite counter, where it immediately snapped off and fell to the ground.  “Oh, sorry about that.  I have a lot of ore to turn in.  And I do mean a lot of ore.”

She looked at Grant with wide eyes before turning around and waving for someone out of sight.  “We can certainly help you update your contribution points, but large amounts require the signature of more than one certifying official.  Please wait here while I get my supervisor.”

A heavy frown creased Grant’s features as the House Wednesday representative rushed off.  Nowhere else had used two people, meaning Grant had probably been ripped off by the other Houses.  Deep down, he wasn’t even surprised.  Maybe this time, he wouldn’t have to bribe anyone to get credit for what he had earned.

Tycoon May: Chapter 42

Chapter 42

<Wake up!>

Grant groaned, trying to rub his aching head.  He couldn’t remember why he hurt so bad, but it probably had something to do with the choking dust, smoke, and flames all around him.

<If you don’t get up, right now, you’re going to die.>

Sarge’s no-nonsense tone was like a bucket of cold water dumped on his head.  The last ten minutes came rushing back, and Grant struggled back to his feet, despite the piece of twisted metal sticking out of the side of his leg.

<This whole thing is about to come down.  If you don’t move, you’re going to get buried.>

“Do you think the wagons made it through?”  Grant winced as he ripped out the metal and started climbing for the spot of light above his head.  “Or were they caught in what happened?”

<We won’t know until we get outside.  The reaction was too explosive for me to sense anything else going on around us.  Now move faster, before it’s too late.>

A rumble from the loose stone around him made Grant freeze, then redouble his efforts to escape the basement.  There was no other way out besides climbing the rubble left by the floors above, and the few twisted and warped sections of portcullis that had somehow made it inside.  In fact, that’s probably what saved Grant’s life.  He managed to find a piece of portcullis intact enough to use as a makeshift ladder, and made it out of the collapsing gatehouse with less than a minute to spare.

It started to crumble under its own weight, pulled down on top of the body of the Wielder that had nearly killed Grant before he even knew what happened.  He tried taking another step, but his leg finally gave out.  Collapsing onto his knees, Grant clutched his injured leg and watched the gate house create a tomb of worked stone for the terrifying warrior that he barely escaped.

“He’s alive!”  The voice was barely audible over the sound of the stone edifice collapsing, which was drowned out by the even louder sounds of the magic wards strengthening the walls snapping and sparking with booms of thunder as they shattered under the unforgiving force of gravity.  “Somebody help me, he’s hurt!”

Suddenly, Sam was there, helping Grant to his feet.  “Come on, Grant.  We need to go.  They’ll be after us with everything they have after something this big.  Our only chance is to make it to the next city and sell the wagons to the other merchant trains before they can catch us.  Then we’ll be able to scatter and disappear.”

“Right.”  Grant had heard Sam, but his words hadn’t sunk in yet.  He was still processing what had happened.   “Sell the wagons.”

“What happened in there?”  Sam guided him toward the waiting group of wagons, where several other injured were already sitting on top of wagons.  They watched with wide eyes as Grant approached, the backdrop of the collapsing gatehouse providing them with plenty of reasons why they should be concerned he was joining them.  “We barely made it out before everything started going crazy.”

“Everything went smoothly for you guys?”  Grant looked around for Aria, Evander, and the Wrecking sisters, but didn’t see any of them.  “Where is everyone else?”

“They pushed on, to clear the way.  We’ll catch up to them soon.”  Sam helped Grant onto the seat of the front wagon and climbed up next to him before passing over a roll of bandages.  “Patch up that leg.  I’m sorry we don’t have any potions left.”

“It’s fine.”  Grant started winding it around the wound, but he noticed his Regeneration skill had already started to slow the bleeding.  “So, are you going to tell me how it went for you guys?”

Sam flicked the reins and got the wagon train moving before answering.  It gave Grant enough time to take a drink from a water skin and clear his head a little more.  “Things went without much of a problem.  Evander and I hit the men watching the wagons with most everyone else, and Aria went after the men hiding inside the building with the Wrecking sisters.  They were so surprised, we had won before anyone knew what happened.”

“Glad to hear it.”  Grant grunted in pain as they hit a pothole in the road, causing his leg to shift.  “How did so many people get injured if things were so easy?”

“We jumped on the wagons and had them halfway through the gate before the guards could do anything.  That’s when the first explosion happened.”  Sam glanced at Grant’s burnt and scorched armor.  “Pieces of the guard house started falling on us, breaking bones and causing a panic.  We rushed through before the second and third explosions really messed things up, but it was still pretty rough going for a bit.  The animals didn’t appreciate the loud noises, so getting them back under control took a bit.  That’s when you walked out.”  Sam made sure to steer around the potholes to avoid more discomfort for Grant.  “Now will you tell me what happened?”

Wincing once again, this time at the thought of his own unfounded bravado, Grant looked back over his shoulder at the city slowly growing smaller behind them.

“I overestimated myself, and drastically underestimated what a full-fledged Wielder in District May can really do.”  Grant cleared his throat and turned back around in his seat.  “After I made it to the gatehouse door, I expected to rush in, overpower a bunch of guards, and hold the building while the wagons made it out of the city.”

<It was only a matter of time until you found someone capable, Grant.  Don’t blame yourself for what happened.  It went as well as could be expected.>

Grant ignored Sarge, and instead took a deep breath and let it out slowly.  “Instead of a bunch of guards, there were only three.  A Wielder and two of his Vassals.  May Twentieth, to be specific.”

Now it was Sam’s turn to wince.  A fight with a Wielder was vastly different from a fight with a Vassal, especially if they were focused on combat.  Instead of interrupting, Sam stayed quiet and waited for Grant to finish on his own time.

“Their weapons were swords, very similar to mine, but bigger.  Probably meant to be used when fighting from the saddle.  I think they are called Odachi, while mine is an Uchigatana.”  Grant tapped February Twenty-Nine.  “It’s probably what saved my life.  I might have been able to beat one of the Vassals, but all three of them combined?  I should’ve been no match for them.  Fighting in the gatehouse was tight, and having a shorter weapon meant I didn’t get hung up on anything while we fought.”

“It doesn’t matter who should have won, Grant.  You walked away, and that’s all that matters.”  Sam lifted a hand to put it on Grant’s shoulder, but thought better of it.  “Don’t let it eat at you.”

“Don’t worry, there’s far worse things to haunt my dreams.”  Grant sat up straighter, refusing to let his thoughts crush him.  “Anyway, when I came through the door, we fought.  Nobody even said a word.  It was…eerie.  I was doing my best just to stay alive, so I started using the skills and spells I have.  One of my spells, called Thundering Step, uses lightning.  There was something about it that interacted with their weapons’ ability, and it caused an explosion.”

“Three enemies, and three explosions.  I guess that explains what happened.”  Sam popped the reins, eeking out a bit more speed from the pack animals.  “I’m just glad you managed to make it out okay.”

Grant didn’t reply, and Sam allowed them to fall into silence.  It had been a fast but furious fight, and the Vassal weapons exploding had been quite the shock.  Grant couldn’t help but wonder what would have happened if the Wielder’s weapon had exploded as well, instead of just creating the massive final shockwave that ended up being the final nail in the gatehouse’s proverbial coffin.

<It’s almost impossible for a Wielded Weapon to break, but almost isn’t never.  If the Wielded Weapon had exploded, a good portion of the city would’ve disappeared.  They contain too much power for anything but another weapon to survive.  It might even crack the boundaries of reality, and that’s not something we want to do.>

“Look!”  Sam unknowingly interrupted Grant’s conversation with Sarge, pointing to something along the horizon.  “That has to be Evander.  Nothing else looks as big and dumb from a distance.”

Grant couldn’t help but laugh at Sam’s joke.  Somehow, he was right.  The silhouette was unmistakably Evander, and the jaunty attitude was somehow visible all the way from here.  He definitely looked like mental cultivation wasn’t his primary focus.

“It looks like he’s waving us forward.  They didn’t find anything waiting for us.”  Sam flicked the reins again, trying to get the wagon train to speed up even more.  “Thank the stars above, I think we’re in the clear.”

Grant couldn’t help but grimace at Sam’s comment.  “You didn’t have to say it out loud like that.  Now, something bad is definitely going to happen.”

“What?”  Sam shook his head.  “Don’t be so superstitious.  We’re going to be fine.  All we need to do is make it to the next city, and everything will be smooth sailing from there on out.”

<Oh yeah, he definitely wants you to have to fight some crazy huge monsters.  No other explanation at this point.>

Grant couldn’t help but agree with Sarge this time.

Tycoon May: Chapter 41

Chapter 41

Running past the cells where the rest of the members of the convoy were being held made Grant feel bad for leaving them, but he knew Sam and Evander would handle things quickly enough.  Finding them an exit close to their wagons was the best help he could provide at the moment.

<Don’t forget, you are going to have to fight your way out of the gate once you get control of the wagons, not to mention taking care of the crossbows hiding in the windows overlooking the street.>  Grant tried not to sigh at the thought of everything he still had to do.  <Remember when you walked through the front gate, and said you weren’t going to get in any trouble?  Yeah, that was a good time.>

The cells ended at an intersection with another tunnel, and Grant could quickly tell that this section wasn’t under the wall any more.  To one side, it smelled like the sewer.  On the other, it quickly corkscrewed downward out of sight, most likely to some form of cistern or storage area.  Even though he really didn’t want to do it, Grant knew his best option was the smelly passage.

A stinking trail of sludge trickled down the center of the path, most likely as runoff from the latrines on the wall.  Considering the need for fertilizer, Grant knew the city sewer most likely led near the fields.  There was a metal grate blocking the tunnel section that led to the wall, but a few blows from his pickaxe took care of the problem.

<See if you can circle back around near where the wagons are being held.  Popping up under the feet of the people waiting to ambush you would be some seriously poetic justice.>

Grant certainly wasn’t going to argue with that idea.  It took a few detours through some particularly nasty tunnels, but he eventually managed to find an exit in the alley opposite the one he had watched the Wrecking sisters get captured.  Best of all, it was right next to the building where the crossbows were hiding in the windows.

“Okay, now that I’ve found our escape route, it’s time to go bring everyone else.”  The walk back to the others went quickly, and Grant was happy to see Sam and Evander had gotten everyone out.  They had even managed to track down their gear, and were almost done strapping on armor and weapons.

“Grant!  Thank the Regents you’re back.”  Adria rushed forward to greet him, but stopped short of giving him a hug.  “I take it you found our way out, and we aren’t going to like it.”

“There’s a sewer exit right next to the wagons.  From what I could see, they are still waiting for more people to show up, so everything is still staged and ready to go.”  While it might have felt like half a day had passed since Grant discovered his friends had been kidnapped, it probably hadn’t even been more than an hour since he jumped across the roof.  “While you guys go out and handle the guards, I’ll go into the building next door and take care of the House Saturday people waiting with crossbows.  We can charge through the gate and make it out of the city before they even know what hit them.”

“No.”  Adria slashed her hand diagonally through the air, as if to physically cut apart his plan.  “It’s not a bad plan, but it only takes one guard to drop the portcullis and cut our group in half.  We need to secure the guardhouse at the same time, or this will never work.”

Grant frowned, thinking over who could manage something like that.  “The problem will be catching up after the wagons pass through.  We’ll be moving fast, and they’ll have to run after them.”

Adria frowned, thinking for a moment.  “I’ll do it.  I can’t ask anyone else to take that risk, especially with Evander hurt.  He’ll need your help on the ground anyway.”

Thinking of all the stairs he was going to have to climb, Grant swore he felt a twinge in his calf muscles.  “No, I should take the gate, and you should take the building with the crossbows.  Evander and the others can handle the guards.”

“You’re the only one who knows the way out.  That won’t work.”  Adria looked back at the others.  “Besides, if you’re captured, who will go after Tycoon May?”

“I’m not going to get captured.”  Grant pulled free his sword and activated Thundering Step, allowing lightning to play along the length of his sword.  “Unless they have a couple of Wielders hiding up there, I should be fine.  I’ll draw you a map of the way out, and we can give each other twenty minutes to get in position.”

“He’s right, Adria.”  Sam stepped out of the crowd, already holding a scrap of parchment and a stick of charcoal so Grant could draw them the way out.  “You may not like it, but Grant’s proven himself to be the best option for something like this.”

Even though she said it through gritted teeth, Adria finally agreed.  “Fine.  Let’s stop arguing about it, and get it done.  There’s a Lord of the Month who needs to answer for his crimes.”

Drawing the map only took a few minutes with Sarge’s help, and Grant watched as the group disappeared off into the darkness.  Now, it was time for him to go back up to the top of the wall, get over to the gatehouse without causing an alarm, take control of it from an unknown number of guards, and hold it long enough for his friends to escape.  A pretty average day for him, all things considered.

As he made his way back to the tower, Grant paused at the House Saturday Vassal he had killed.  The uniform the man was wearing had been soaked in blood, but considering the black color it wouldn’t be noticeable unless someone was up close.  Shrugging, Grant stripped the outer robes from the Vassal and slipped them on over his armor.  Hopefully, they would be enough to get him close to the gatehouse without drawing attention.  The robes smelled awful, were too tight and restrictive, made him feel sick to his stomach, and worst of all, looked absolutely terrible.

<Seriously though, I have to agree with you on this one.  How do you manage to make black look bad?  House Saturday could really use a new tailor, and an updated fashion sense.  I mean, come on.  Pick a struggle.>

Climbing the rubble pile back to the floor he collapsed was easy, considering the table that had broken his fall also worked as a ramp.  It was a miracle that no one had noticed their jailbreak by this point, or noticed the commotion he had caused during all the fighting.  When he finally reached the top of the tower, the most difficult part he faced was opening the door he had broken the key inside of, but a few uses of his Apprentice Repair spell had it fixed.

“Here goes.”  Acting like he belonged on top of the wall, Grant walked toward the guard house, slightly hunched so the few people he passed couldn’t see his face.  Thankfully, they either ignored him or got out of his way as he approached.  Everything went smoothly, right up until the end.  There was a single man in front of the guard house wall entrance, but it wasn’t a regular guard.  It was another member of House Saturday.

“Eh?  What are you doing up here?  Aren’t you supposed to be watching the prisoners?”  The House Saturday assassin held up a hand to stop Grant, and leaned forward to look under his hood.  “Did something happen?  Were you—”

Grant’s sword hilt clipped him under the chin as he unsheathed it straight upward, nearly knocking the man off the edge of the wall as he completed the motion.  He grabbed the flailing Vassal by the wrist, pulled him back from the edge, and stabbed him through the armpit where there was no armor to protect him.  His Uchigatana sliced through both lungs and his heart, killing the man in seconds.  Grant allowed him to fall off his blade to the ground and flicked the blood free, listening to hear if anyone inside had heard the scuffle.

<I’m pretty sure you’re in the clear.  No one wants to pay too close attention to the scary assassins, especially if they’re fighting among themselves.>

“Huh.  Good point.”  Grant propped the House Saturday assassin up against the corner where the outer wall met the gatehouse.  He immediately slumped down, obviously dead.  From a distance, it might look like the Vassal was crouched to tie his boots or something.  Better than him lying face-down on the stone.  Not that it mattered much, but it could buy a few minutes if a guard farther down the wall looked this direction.  “It’ll have to do.”

Grant took a deep breath, preparing himself to go through the door.  Considering it was twice the size of the last tower, he had a feeling it wouldn’t be as easy as last time.  Especially since he had to hold it once he took control.  That was fine.  He was unstoppable.  Shaking his arms and legs, he got ready.  It was time to take the gate.

Tycoon May: Chapter 40

Chapter 40

Grant’s fall was broken by a very sturdy table.  He bounced off of it, and somehow managed to roll his way under it before he could be crushed by the rest of the stones falling down around him.  The other guards and two House Saturday assassins that had been waiting for him weren’t so lucky.

<I can’t believe that worked.  You just crushed eight Vassals, and leveled up to thirty-eight.  Maybe there is some kind of dumb luck involved at this point.>

“I thought… you said… it’s Karma.”  Grant’s back and ribs were in agony from the fall, and he was having trouble catching his breath.  He managed to crawl out from under the table as his Regeneration skill kicked in, grunting in pain as he felt his ribs shifting in his chest.

<Yeah, that’s certainly what it really is, but it’s still crazy how that worked out.  Not that it was all good for you, of course.>  As the dust started to settle, Grant saw what Sarge was talking about.  The rubble from the upper floor had blocked the doorway leading to the exit, meaning the only way out was to go all the way back up the tower, cross the wall to another tower, and fight their way to the ground.  <Unless there’s a way out through one of the other doors.  You never know what could be underground.>

Grant couldn’t hold back the shudder that ran up his spine.  He remembered the rat hordes in District March that could strip a person down to bone in little more than the blink of an eye.  Going underground there was a death sentence.

Shaking off the memory, Grant pushed aside the few stones blocking the doorway that led deeper into the wall.  There was only a single lantern in the distance to light the way, so despite the hurry he was in, once again Grant took his time to make sure there weren’t any traps left behind by overly cautious assassins.  It was a wise decision.

More than anything, it was instinct that kept the poisoned needles that came out of the walls and floor from stabbing through the bottom of his foot.  There might have been an almost inaudible snick as they shot into place, but somehow he just knew to freeze in place.  Grant carefully took a careful step back and saw the gleam of light reflect off the purple-tinted tip of the double row of needles that stretched the full length of the floor and walls.  A few well-placed swings of his sword knocked them flat, making them less of a danger.

Another trap would have dropped a skull-crushing boulder on his head if he hadn’t noticed the thin layer of dust coating the trio of floor tiles in the center of the downward-angled pathway.  Grant triggered the device from a distance with a chunk of his precious Metallica, happy to sacrifice the ore in exchange for a clear path of retreat.

There was a third trap plate right before the doorway next to the lantern where Grant suspected the people from the convoy were being held, but he didn’t trigger it.  Instead, he used the tip of his pickaxe to pry up the edge of the plate and turn it sideways, so if anyone stepped on it the trap couldn’t go off.  He wasn’t willing to risk setting this one off, just in case the device did something to the people on the other side of the door.

There were no windows, key holes, or door knobs to try, and the door was flush with the wall, meaning there was no way to open the door.  So, Grant did the only thing he could think of at the moment.  He knocked.

<I can’t believe you just did that.  There’s absolutely no way that’s going to work.>  Sarge highlighted the floor along the base of the door in Grant’s vision.  <Use your pickaxe again, and dig out a spot where you can grab the door to pull it open.  Once you get enough space to…>  Sarge trailed off as the sound of someone undoing heavy bolts and chains from the other side of the door came through the thick wood.  <Un-freaking-believable.  How much bad Karma does Tycoon May have?>  Not one to look a gifted horse in the mouth, Grant knocked again.

“Hold on, hold on.  It takes a bit to get all of these undone!”  The voice from the other side was easily recognizable as the House Saturday assassin that had gotten away from Grant at the Gracken cave.  “Let me guess, you have more of these chumps tied up and ready for questioning?”

As the door was flung open, Grant punched the other man in the face hard enough that teeth went flying.  The House Saturday Vassal stumbled back, trying to grab for something at their waistband.  <He’s going to recognize you, and report back that you’re still alive.  Kill him now.>

Feeling a little bad about how many people he’d killed already, Grant unsheathed his sword in a flash, using Iaijutsu to slice the killer across the neck.  The man’s body crumpled to the ground, dead before he knew what happened.  “I better be careful.  I don’t want to turn into a Murderhobo.”

<Oh, don’t worry about that.  You would have to kill way more before that could happen.>

Checking over the body, Grant quickly recovered a thick ring of keys.  He made his way deeper into the room and discovered it was lined with more thick wooden doors.  These thankfully had a tiny window cutout he could look through, and the first one revealed a very beaten and bloody Evander.  He was sharing a cell with Sam, who was doing his best to clean his wounds with a scrap of torn clothing.

“Sam!  Evander!  It’s good to see you two.”  Both of them jumped at Grant’s shout, and even the injured Evander managed to limp his way over to the doorway.

“Grant, is that you?”  Sam was trying to squint through the narrow opening, but some trick of the light made it impossible for him to see who was on the other side.  “Did they capture you too?”

“Capture him?  Ha!  I bet Grant’s here to break us free all on his own.  Aren’t you?”  Evander’s praise made Grant blush, but he quickly pushed down his embarrassment and focused back on the situation.

“Yes, I’m here to break you free.  Once I get you out, I’ll give you the keys so you can get everyone else.  While you’re doing that, I’m going to scout for a way back to the surface.”  Grant didn’t bother listening to their replies, instead staying focused on finding the right key.  There were dozens of them on the ring, and no two were the same.

After what felt like a gratuitous amount of time, Grant finally got the two men free.  “I never thought I’d be so happy to see a face as ugly as yours.”  Evander grabbed Grant in a big hug, quickly letting him go when Sam tugged at his sleeve.  “I know, I know.  We’ve got work to do.  Hurry, we’ll have everyone else out of here in no time.”

“Yes, what he said.”  Sam grabbed Grant’s shoulder and gave it a light squeeze.  “Thank you, Grant.  I don’t know what would have happened to us if you hadn't been here.  I didn’t want to believe that Tycoon May and his mother would stoop so low as to kidnap and torture their own citizens, but I guess I should have known better.”  Tears fought to escape the corners of his eyes, and Sam wiped at them with a dirty sleeve.  “After all, ‘we’re a sacrifice he’s willing to make.’  Once we get out of here, we’ll need to make sure everyone else knows about this part of his activities, too.”

“Right.”  Grant didn’t know what to say to their emotional outbursts, so he simply passed over the keys to Sam.  “I’ll be back as soon as I can.  If you don’t hear from me soon, just go back the way you came down, and try going over the wall.  That’s the only way right now.”

“Got it.  But don’t expect we’ll leave here without you.  Especially not after this.”  Sam waved him toward the darkness at the back of the dungeon area.  “Please, hurry.”

Nodding, Grant turned and headed for the unexplored area.  If there was a way back to the surface, it was up to him to find it.  Otherwise, they were in for an even longer day of fighting.

Tycoon May: Chapter 39

Chapter 39

Somehow, no one had noticed Grant’s scramble over the wall.  Even the ridiculous impact of him hitting the wall hadn’t brought the few men pacing the crenelations running.  The voices coming from the other side of the door of the tower meant all that was about to change.

<If you move fast, you can clear the tower before they know what hit them.  Don’t hesitate, and move with a purpose.>  Grant put away his pickaxe and leaned against the door, ready to throw himself through the opening.  He listened carefully to try and get some idea of how many guards were on the other side, but the thick stone dampened the noise too much for him to hear anything but faint murmurs.  <I think I hear three people talking, but even I can’t be completely sure.  Be careful.>

Taking a deep breath, Grant slammed against the door with his shoulder and bounced off with a grunt of pain.  “Pull, don’t push.  I literally just checked that.”  Ignoring Sarge laughing at him, Grant yanked the door open and stepped into the room.  There were four guards inside, not three, and all of them had been given a moment of warning when he messed up his entrance.  Two of them charged, swinging cudgels studded with heavy spikes, while the other pair tried running down the stairs, deeper into the tower.

Rolling under the two clubs, Grant came up swinging for the legs of the two runners.  He managed to clip one on the heel, sending him sprawling into the other.  They both went tumbling down the stairs out of sight, where shouts from below warned Grant there would be more guards coming his way soon.

A hard impact to his left shoulder spun him partially around, but by some miracle his armor didn’t allow the spikes from the cudgel to pierce his skin.  It did dent inward at a bad angle, cutting down on his flexibility, and making it impossible to raise his left arm any higher than chest level.  It was a good thing he didn’t need two hands to use his skills.

“Peach Flower Petal Flurry!”  The level two skill left afterimages in the air as his sword moved, cutting down the two guards before they could mount a proper defense in the tight quarters of the tower.  Given the situation, he didn’t hold back.  He couldn’t have them coming up behind him while he was trying to rescue his friends, or running for help from House Saturday assassins.  The guards died quickly, and he wiped his sword clean before sheathing it.  Grant idly noted the increase in his cultivation, meaning the pair had been Vassals.

<You also got credit for the two that went tumbling down the stairs.  They didn’t die, though.  They were just knocked unconscious during the fall.>

“Any idea what the weapon ability is?  I didn’t get a message about it.”  Grant pulled the door closed, and used the keys from one of the dead guards to lock the door before breaking it off inside.  He used another key to do the same to the other side.  It might buy him some time if the guards along the top of the wall tried coming at him.

<Honestly, it’s an insidious kind of power.  It has a weak ability to disable armor.  That’s why you are struggling to lift your arm right now.  If enough of those guys were to beat on you long enough, you’d be trapped in your own equipment.>

“That’s… actually kind of scary.”  Grant imagined being in a suit of armor similar to Tycoon May’s set, and then getting stuck inside until someone was willing to let him out.  “It could cause some serious problems.”

<Not really.  Don’t get hit by them, and you won’t have any issues.>  Grant did his best not to roll his eyes.  Easy for the sword spirit to say.  He wasn’t the one fighting inside the tight confines of a tower against superior numbers.  <Time’s up.  They’re coming up the stairs.>

Grant spun and did a quick sidestep to put himself behind the first guard to come charging up the stairs.  Instead of drawing his sword, he reached out and grabbed them by the collar, easily yanking them back off their feet.  They made a loud ‘urp’ sound before tumbling out of sight.  More shouting and clanking of metal meant it was as good a time as any for him to go charging below.

<He either wasn’t a Vassal, or wasn’t knocked unconscious, because you didn’t get credit for taking him out.  Although, I do approve of the ingenuity.>  Keeping his hand on the hilt of his sword, Grant started his descent.

As he carefully rounded the stairs, Grant came face-to-face with another pair of guards, this time wielding shields and spears.  They were ready for him, and he barely had enough time to use Iaijutsu to draw his sword and combine it with Hemlock’s Bane to parry their stabbing thrusts aside.  Still, the successful move gave him a boost to his next attack, and he capitalized on it by using Begonia Chop, directly attacking the shield of the larger of the two men blocking his path.

The extra ten percent from each skill combined, causing the simple metal and wood of the upraised shield to explode.  Both guards shouted in a mixture of pain and surprise as the fragments hit them, flinching back as Grant stepped forward into the gap they created.

Six more swings of his sword, and the guards were left bleeding on the floor.  Behind them, Grant saw the three people he had sent tumbling down the stairs laid out against the wall.  All of them were alive, but they were still knocked out.

<That’s two more Vassals defeated.  Keep it up!>  Not trying to let it get to his head, Grant took his time going down the next flight of stairs.  If he was in charge, he would have set up a trap or two by now.  Thankfully, nothing of the sort came to be, and he made it to the next floor unopposed.  In fact, it was completely abandoned, and the door was locked.  The very thick, iron-bound door, with no key in sight, was locked from the other side.  <Well, that’s not good.>

“No, it’s not.”  Grant quickly looked around, trying to find another way down.  If he had gauged the distances correctly, the ground floor, where he had seen his friends taken, was right below.  He was close to his goal, but they had stopped him.

There were no windows beyond a narrow arrow slit, so going outside wasn’t an option.  Hacking his way through the door wouldn’t work either, especially if he wanted to get through quickly.  Frustrated, he kicked at the wall, even though he knew it would hurt.

<You know that won’t work.  They reinforce the walls as much as they can against monster attacks.>

Sitting down on the floor, Grant fought against the feelings of defeat that tried to wash over him.  “I figured House Thursday did something, otherwise those really big monsters would just knock over the city walls like they were children’s toys.”

<It’s a lengthy and expensive process, but it’s a cost they know they have to pay.  The price of doing business, I think it’s called.>

“Wait.”  Grant quickly stood up, thinking over what he knew about House Thursday, and more specifically what he knew about Tycoon May.  He looked above him, seeing how the ceilings were supported by beams of wood that bisected the room.  “If it’s expensive to reinforce the walls, how much do you want to bet they don’t spend anything extra on the floors…”

Not waiting for Sarge to reply, Grant pulled free his pickaxe once more.  It gleamed brightly in the light cast by the lanterns inside the tower, and even though it was a simple hunk of hardened steel seated on a shaft of wood, at that moment, to Grant it seemed to be the most beautiful piece of shaped metal he owned.

<I’m going to make you pay for thinking that.>

Deciding to ignore the sword spirit for the moment, Grant started digging at the floor of the tower like it held the largest chunk of Metallica the world had ever seen.  Chips of stone flew free, pinging off the walls as dust quickly choked the tower.  In only a few short minutes, Grant felt the floor beneath him shift dangerously.  He redoubled his efforts, doing his best to focus his blows in a straight line down the center of the room.

His only warning it was going to collapse was a loud crack, and the half of the room he stood on gave way, crumbling apart as it collapsed.

Tycoon May: Chapter 38

Chapter 38

As Grant drew closer, he was tempted to shout for Sam, Adria, or even Evander.  Something about the abandoned wagons told him it would be a bad idea.  The draft animals stood there placidly in their harness, waiting for a command from drivers who were nowhere in sight.  Without making it obvious, Grant tried to take a closer look, but he noticed several people in plain clothes that stood stiffly, like they had armor on under their regular clothes, carefully watching for anyone approaching the wagons.

Instead of walking up to the convoy, Grant crossed the street and turned down a wide alley lined with vendors still setting up for the day.  He leaned against a rain gutter, doing his best to conceal his face as he took his time to eat the loaf of bread he had taken from the inn.  It quickly became obvious that something had happened to the rest of the people on his wagon train, and whoever had captured or killed them was waiting for more members of the group to show up.

<My bet is they were captured.  You can’t question a corpse.  Plus, there’s no blood or signs of a struggle.>  Grant tapped his sword hilt in silent agreement, carefully checking over the street without trying to make it obvious that was exactly what he was doing.  <Look up, at the windows across the street.  Does that seem familiar?>  Sarge highlighted a pair of windows that had been propped open, and the occasional glint of metal from inside gave away the crossbows pointed at the wagons.  <It’s either the same crew that attacked Chug, or one that uses similar tactics.  My bet is on House Saturday showing their ugly faces again.>

“Well, if it is House Saturday, that gives us an edge.  They still think I’m dead.”  Grant carefully thought about what his next steps should be.  He could always just walk out the gate and head to the next city on his own.  If they were still alive, Sam, Adria, and the others would be released as soon as he defeated Tycoon May.  It was the safest option for everyone involved, beyond the added difficulties it would mean for him to get to the next city.  He didn’t even know where they were being kept, or even if they were still in this area.  Taking the time to follow one of the people watching the wagons could take all day, which would slow him down even more.  If he took that kind of delay, it could mean he wasn’t there when Chug and his men—

A commotion near the wagons caught his attention.  “Where is everybody?  Hello?  Oh, who are you?  Wait, don’t touch me!”  The Wrecking sisters came out of nowhere, breaking his train of thought, and instantly creating a scene.  One of the guards hiding in plain clothes had tried to grab them as they got close, and it immediately turned into a brawl.  Grant went to join them, when Sarge’s voice stopped him.

<No.  Look.  It’s already too late.>  Grant wanted to protest, but Sarge was right.  The streets were filled with warriors, all of them piling onto the sisters.  They didn’t stand a chance, even if he did join them, and that wasn’t even mentioning the hidden crossbows that had yet to join in the fighting.  It would most certainly turn into a running retreat if he attacked, and there was no way he could guarantee that they might escape with him.  Bystanders weren’t happy about what was happening, but no one was brave enough to step in and stop what was happening.  The sisters fought on, even though it was a losing battle.  <When they’re captured, follow them, and see where they take them.  I bet we’ll find the others.>

Instantly liking the idea, Grant quickly made his way deeper into the alley until he was out of sight of the main street.  He climbed up the side of a building to the roof, and used his new vantage point to get a better view of where they might be taking the sisters.  They fought for another few minutes, but were eventually worn down by sheer numbers.  The fighters they had wounded, along with an escort that tied the sisters' hands behind their backs, started marching as a group along the inner border of the wall.

Annoyingly—yet thankfully—it wasn’t far.  Grant watched as they were forced into a guard tower only a few blocks down from the gate, and they disappeared out of sight the moment the heavy wooden door slammed closed.

<Well, it looks to me like House Saturday and the city guards know about one another.  That makes them all fair game.>  Grant grunted in agreement, already thinking about how he might get inside.  The main gate had most of the guards, and the wagons still held most of House Saturday’s attention.  There wasn’t going to be a better time for him to try and break his people free, but breaking down the door to the tower would make enough noise that the guards and ambushers would hear it and come to investigate.  <You can get in through the upper floors of the tower.  All you need to do get on top of the wall without them noticing.>

“And all I need to do is jump the gap, or climb a wall without being seen.”  Grant gauged the distance in annoyance, knowing the distance between the rooftop and the tower was too big for him to jump.  It was at least another story and a half higher than the roof he was on, not to mention a street away.  He wasn’t quite strong enough.  The occasional guard walking up and down the length of the wall wasn’t too much of a concern, but they would certainly spot him in the time it would take for him to reach the top.  “How am I supposed to pull this off?  I don’t want to wait all day until nightfall.”

<Well, there is one ability you have that might help.  You just have to hope it’s enough to get you to the top.>

“You mean Adjusted Air Friction.”  Grant took a moment to pull up the skill description.

Adjusted Air Friction: Adjust the amount of friction you have with the air around you.  Run with reduced wind resistance, or slow yourself to a crawl.  Cannot be used without the wielded weapon in hand.  Ability scales with Armor Cultivation levels. Caution: May cause a discharge of lightning.

“I don’t know if I can pull it off without using Thundering Step to help, and the lightning show from that would certainly bring down all kinds of attention.”  Grant knew that he could create enough condensed friction on the bottom of his foot that it could hold his weight for a split second, allowing him to jump off of it, but he had never tried it without using Thundering Step at the same time.  The speed boost it provided made the time he put his weight on the spot of air miniscule, but replicating it without the lightning spell would be nearly impossible.

<You don’t know if you don’t try.  Besides, if the worst comes to pass, you can always run away and free them all when you’re in charge.>

“That’s… actually a good point.”  Grant knew that captivity for them wouldn’t be a good thing, and he promised to make it as short a stay in prison as possible if that’s what came to pass.  He pushed aside the thoughts of failure, focusing on what would happen if he did everything right.  If he didn’t make a mistake, then his people were free today.  He liked that option much better.  Envisioning what he needed to do, Grant took a few practice jumps to the rooftops on either side of him.  It was much easier considering they were at the same height, but something was better than nothing.  “Okay, here I go.”

Backing all the way up to give him a running start, Grant sprinted for all he was worth, using Adjusted Air Friction to cut down on any wind resistance.  As he leapt off the edge of the roof, he used Iaijutsu to unsheathe his sword, combining the skill with Oleander Thrust to give him a ten percent boost to his speed.  At the apex of his leap, Grant focused all of his willpower on forcing Adjusted Air Friction into the smallest, most dense spot possible under his leading foot.  He pushed off with all his strength, shouting in victory as the tiny disk of hardened air held just long enough for him to extend his leap.

It still wasn’t enough.

Grant’s shout of victory turned into a groan of pain as he slammed into the wall hard enough to shake dust free.  His vision went double as he started to peel away, falling backward toward the street below.

<Use me!  Use your pick!  Don’t give up!>  Sarge’s shout cut through the haze of the minor concussion Grant was suffering from, and he somehow managed to stab his Uchigatana into the mortar between two stones.  It started slipping almost immediately, the weapon poorly suited to holding his weight in a situation like he had found himself.  Somehow, he managed to pull free his pickaxe, and stabbed its point into the wall above his head.  It held, and he let out a sigh of relief.  <Hurry.  That’s going to catch the attention of someone.  And next time, we should probably take off the incredibly heavy pouch weighing you down before you jump across a really large gap.>

Grant looked at his belt where his pouch of riches hung and sighed, mentally kicking himself before looking back up at the top of the wall.  He had been close, despite accidentally handicapping himself.  A few quick swings of his pick and he was on top of the wall, crouched next to the door of the tower.  The unlocked door.

It was time to save his friends.

Tycoon May: Chapter 37

Chapter 37

“You know, it’s a real stroke of luck that I came across Chug like that, just as I needed him.”  Grant was sitting in his room inside the inn, using his Apprentice Repair spell to fix all of the dents and dings his armor and gear had collected.  “It’s almost like the fates want me to win.”

<I don’t think this is about you specifically, Grant.  This is Karma coming back on Tycoon May.  You can’t do wrong by your people all the time, everywhere you go, without eventually facing consequences.  My guess is, there are a lot of people like Chug out there right now, just waiting for the opportunity to get even with him.>

“So, you’re telling me if you treat people poorly for a long time, eventually it will catch up with you?”  Grant watched carefully as a tear in his pack slowly closed until it looked almost brand new.  “I guess it’s a good thing I showed up when I did.  Otherwise, someone else might have set up the attack on him.”

<Oh, it doesn’t happen on its own, Grant.  There has to be a spark to start the fires of retribution.  You’re that spark, the same one that has passed through Spring, and now into the middle of Summer.  It’s time to burn down the rot of what’s in place now, and make room for something new.  Hopefully, something better.>

“Yeah, I definitely want to do better.”  Grant took out a dent in his breastplate as he thought long and hard about how exactly he would go about being a better leader.  “If I do become the Calendar King, what do you think my first rule should be?”

<Picking competent people to help you lead.>  Sarge’s reply was instant, and the abruptness caught Grant off guard.  <Like we’ve talked about before, surrounding yourself with people determined to see you succeed is vital to your future.  Finding them is the hard part.>

“Well, I think I’ve found a few good ones already.”  Grant thought back over the men and women he had come across over the past five months, knowing each of them had changed him in their own way.  “I’ll do my best to be a hero of the people.”

<Don’t try to be a hero, Grant.  Be a leader.  Sometimes, that means doing what is necessary, not what is wanted.>

“I’m not sure what you mean by that, Sarge, but if I’m their hero, then I’m sure I’ll be doing what is necessary.  So, that’s a win-win situation!”  Happy with himself, Grant focused on quickly finishing up what he was doing.  The training with Chug had been good exercise, and he was feeling rejuvenated for the coming day.  He decided to take the time to check his stats, since it had been a while since he had looked them over.

Name: Grant Monday (Options: Grant Monday, Earl Spring, Lord April)

Rank: Earl Spring (Lord of The Month for January, February, March, and April)

Class: Foundation Cultivator

Cultivation Achievement Level: 37

Inherent Abilities: Swirling Seasons Cultivation

Health: 1093/1093

Mana: 44/44

Mana Regeneration: 5.5 per second

Physical Damage: 173

Critical Damage: 260

Magic Damage: 175

The most recent changes hadn’t been huge, but his mana regeneration was getting to the point where he wouldn’t have to worry about running out during a fight as long as he was smart about it.  At least, as his spell list stood now.  If he added more to his repertoire, it might be a bit different.

Grant knew his lower armor level was still the biggest thing holding him back at the moment.  It was barely better than paper at this point, but he didn’t have a better option.

<Enough daydreaming.  Get your gear around, and try to meditate.  It isn’t just your armor holding you back.  Your mental cultivation level is going to be your next chokepoint if you don’t start working on it.>

“Got it, Sarge.”  Grant did as he was told, quickly using the washbasin in his room to clean up as best as he could before getting dressed and packing his things.  Getting comfortable in the tiny room provided by the inn was difficult, but it was far better than the skull of a dead animal surrounded by a field of giant ants.  As he focused inward, Grant could feel himself slipping into a trance-like state.

The world fell away, and Grant meditated.  His Regeneration ability seemed to like it when his mind was calm, and he could feel even the sore muscles in his back slowly start to unknot.  As his mind cleared, so did his thoughts.  It wasn’t long before the shift in his brain brought with it a clarity he hadn’t felt in a long time.

He was about to go and fight someone from House Thursday as a member of House Monday.  A completely defensive-focused enemy, with powers that will certainly negate most of the damage he could do.  It was going to take a lot more time and energy to defeat him than Dokeshi March, the last person he had to fight to take their power fragment, since Junfa April had given her piece to him freely.

Plans about what he could do were formed and discarded by the dozen.  There weren’t many things he knew about the environment where he would be fighting, which made it harder to decide anything permanent.

<Grant, it’s time.>  As he opened his eyes, he realized it was already morning.  His meditation had made time pass by quickly.  <They are probably staging to leave at the gate already.>

“Why didn’t you warn me sooner?”  Grant scrambled to get the last few items ready so he could leave.  “I wanted time to eat breakfast!”

<You need to do a better job of being aware of the outside world while you meditate.  The split second it would take me to warn you of an enemy could be the difference between life and death.  Eating a cold meal on the road is a mild lesson in comparison to how harsh it could have been.>

He didn’t exactly like it, but Grant knew the sword spirit was right.  It wasn’t a good idea to lose himself completely inside his own head like that.  That didn’t stop him from grumbling quietly under his breath as he stomped his way down the stairs to the bottom floor of the inn.

When he got there, he was expecting to see the normal sights and sounds of a common room in an inn.  Loud, boisterous men and women sitting at tables filled to bursting with people, stuffing their faces with food and drink.  Instead, what he found was something closer to a bunch of people at a funeral.

<More like a bunch of soldiers preparing themselves for war.>  As Grant looked at the grimaces on the faces around him, he couldn’t help but agree.  Everyone was… sad.  Maybe a few were angry, but most of them seemed outright defeated.  <They know something big is on the horizon.  At the very least, they’ve heard about House Thursday suppressing information about monster meat, and they’re starting to piece together what that truly means for their society.  No one likes change, and big changes are coming.>

“Well, I guess I better get to work then.  Drawing things out will only make it harder on them.”  Grant headed for the door, grabbing a small loaf of bread someone had abandoned off of a table as he left.  The few whispers and hushed conversations he overheard on his way out were all about Tycoon May, and whether or not they should believe the rumors about monster meat being edible or not.  From the fear in their voices, Grant suspected they already knew the truth.

Outside, things seemed a little more lively than they had in the inn.  Businesses were opening up, carts were rumbling up and down the cobblestone streets, and Tier One and Tier Two badge holders hustled toward their daily jobs as the sun poked over the horizon.  At this early hour, Grant didn’t see a single Tier Three badge holder.

Threading his way through the city streets to the gate didn’t take long, and Grant eventually caught sight of the wagons staged off to the side of the roadway, loaded and ready to leave.  Except, there wasn’t a single person with the wagons.  Something was wrong.  Everyone was missing.

Tycoon May: Chapter 36

Chapter 36

“I still can’t believe you know Doug.”  Chug took another drink of water before he dumped the rest of his cup over his head.  The two of them were watching the last rays of sunset disappear over the horizon on a rooftop garden across the street from the inn Grant would be staying at for the night.  After sparring for a gratuitous amount of time, the two of them were drenched in sweat.  Both Chug and Grant were nearly evenly matched, as long as Grant didn’t use any of his spells that enhanced his speed.  Even then, that only gave him enough of an edge to gain an advantage if he caught Chug off guard.  Practicing for the Dao of the Uchigatana was important, and Chug was a great sparring partner to bring out his best, despite not being a Wielder.  It had been a great reminder for Grant that sometimes even a Vassal could be dangerous, if he wasn’t careful.  “I haven’t spoken to my brother in years—I didn’t even know if he was still alive—and then you show up and tell me you just saw him.”

“Well, I didn’t just see him.  It’s been a little while since he and I talked near the border with District April.”  Grant rolled his sore wrist, where Chug had walloped him when he had been a tick too slow.  “He was the first nice person I met when I got to District May.”

“Still, what are the odds?  My brother and I split ways shortly after getting promoted to Vassal together, and I’ve been trying to find out if he’s okay for years.”  Chug wiped away the water dripping into his eyes.  “The threads of fate tie us all in knots, don’t they?”

“You have no idea.”  Grant idly tapped the hilt of his Uchigatana, the weapon that had changed his life forever.  “Anyway, now that you know me better, do you feel like telling me what that ambush was all about?”

“The more I’ve thought about it, the more it all felt like one big setup.”  Chug leaned forward, crossing his arms as he put his weight on the edge of the wall running around the perimeter of the rooftop.  “I think those guards were encouraged to come after me, just so those other guys could get a shot at me.”

“And who were those other guys?”  While Grant suspected House Saturday assassins, he couldn’t be sure.  After all, he had fought a clown knight in full plate armor once.  Anything was possible.  “Why would they want to kill you?”

“You probably aren’t going to believe me.”  Chug looked over at Grant to gauge his reaction as he spoke.  “Tycoon May doesn’t care about the citizens of his District.  He only cares about money, his mother, and himself, in that order.  I worked as one of his guards, and I saw what they are really like.  When I realized what kind of people they are, I tried to leave.  They’ve been after me ever since, to make sure I don’t tell anyone the truth.”

Grant couldn’t help it.  He burst out laughing, clutching at his ribs.  Chug straightened up, looking offended, and turned to storm off.  “Oh, oh Chug!”  Another fit of laughter hit, but Grant managed to grab the Vassal before he could leave.  “No, you don’t understand.  I’ve been tracking Tycoon May for weeks, trying to fight him and take his power because of that exact reason.”

“What?”  Chug pulled himself free, with a distrustful look on his face.  “It’s not nice to make fun of people, Grant.”

“I’m being serious.”  Grant pulled out a piece of jerky, breaking it in half.  “It’s even worse than you think.”  He handed half to Chug, and took a bite of the piece he kept for himself.  Chug watched him with wide eyes as he chewed it up and swallowed.  “They have lied to everyone about monster meat being poisonous, so House Thursday can control food distribution.  If you control the food, you control the people.”

“That’s… that’s crazy!”  Chug looked at the meat in his hand, sniffing it before taking a tentative bite.  “But, after what I’ve seen them do, I believe it.”

“I have an idea.”  Grant motioned with his thumb to the inn across the street.  “Why don’t you join my group and I?  It’s not a big group, but we’re all competent and strong.  We’re headed to Forteresse Mere as soon as we can get access to Tier Four badges.  Once we get in, Tycoon May is going to have to answer for what he’s done.”

Chug took another bite, slowly chewing his food as he thought.  “No.”  Before Grant could argue, Chug held up a finger to stop him.  “Listen, I worked at Forteresse Mere.  It’s going to take more than a Tier Four badge to get you into the keep.  You can get into the city easily enough, but the castle is the best House Thursday has to offer.  It doesn’t matter how strong your group is, they aren’t getting in.”

“Oh, really?”  It was hard for Grant to take Chug seriously, considering what he had been through already.  The Vassal was certainly underestimating his abilities.  A simple castle wasn’t going to stop him.  “I think I can get into a stupid building.”

Chug held up a hand and started counting things off on his fingers.  “Well, to get past the first wall, you’ll need to counter the moat, spell formations, the trained monsters, the two companies of guards, lower the drawbridge, disable the poison fountains, unlock the gate, raise the portcullis, close the murderholes, disarm the automatic ballistae, cross the lava pits, and then answer the three riddles correctly to open the gate that gives you access to the courtyard in front of the second wall.  That’s when things get hard.”

Grant swallowed, appreciating the fact that maybe it wasn’t Chug who was underestimating the situation. “Okay, I’m starting to see your point.  What do you suggest?  I’m open to recommendations.”

“In the morning, I’m going to start recruiting.  I’m not the only former guard on the run from Tycoon May and his mom.”  Chug popped the last bit of jerky into his mouth, chewing it slowly.  “And with what you just showed me, I think I’ll be able to convince a lot of people to help.  Once we have a big group who knows the defenses, we can punch straight through and get you to Tycoon May in no time.”

“How long do you think this will take?”  Grant knew he was running short on time.  He couldn’t afford to wait for weeks on end while Chug recruited an army.  “I’ve got to move fast.”

“Don’t you worry.  Messengers can handle most people.  I’ll just need to visit the more stubborn ones in person.  We’ll meet you at Forteresse Mere in less than ten days, as long as everything goes to plan.”  Chug held out a hand for Grant to shake.  “You just make sure to get a Tier Four badge by then, otherwise we won’t be able to get into the city.”

“Oh, that’s the easy part.”  Grant patted the ridiculously heavy pouch hanging from his belt.  “I’ll have that in no time.”

Tycoon May: Chapter 35

Chapter 35

The city was much like the first one Grant had visited in District May.  It was mostly buildings of glass and stone, intended to function as greenhouses.  Instead of fruits and vegetables, this city seemed focused on herbs, spices, and various kinds of lettuce.  Lots and lots of lettuce.

<Grant, I think I’ve never seen so much kale in all my life.  The people in District February would have a brain aneurysm if they saw this place.>  He could only silently agree, weaving his way through the streets in search of a place to stay for the night.  <I bet there’s an inn near the gates on the opposite side of the city.  You should start heading that way.>

Not having a better idea, Grant started going that way.  It was quickly obvious that the difference in cities closer to the capital were how strict they were at keeping the Tiers of people separate.  Beyond the major street that ran through the city center, he didn’t see a single Tier Two badge holder mingling with Tier Ones, and the single Tier Three badge holder he saw parted the masses like they had an invisible battering ram in front of them.

“This place is weird.”  Grant stopped to look over a spice vendor's wares, but really just to people watch.  “Why is everyone so divided from one another over something so silly?  I mean, don’t get me wrong.  I definitely need to get a Tier Four badge, but that doesn’t mean I understand why some cheap piece of metal you wear determines the kind of person you are instead of your actions.”

His sword spirit stayed silent while he poked around, and the merchant quickly lost interest when Grant didn’t engage in speaking with him.  He was about to continue his journey in search of an inn when he heard what was clearly a muffled shout and the familiar sound of metal clashing against wood and armor.

Grant hurried down the nearby side street, which emptied out into a cul-de-sac surrounded by loading bays of greenhouses.  In the center stood a lone figure wielding a staff, surrounded by four men wearing the uniform of the guards.  A fifth guard was already on his back, holding his bloodied nose.

“Don’t make this harder on yourself!  You’re already in enough trouble as it is.  Come quietly, and it will go better for you.”  The guards were all holding single-edged short swords that looked like oversized meat cleavers.  “There’s no way out.”

“Wait, is that Doug?”  Grant moved closer, double-checking to see if he was crazy or not.  “No, but it sure does look like him.”

The man that looked like Doug stayed silent, staying in a low stance with his staff held in both hands.  The standoff ended when one of the guards standing behind not-Doug charged him, swinging his sword at the back of his head.  Not-Doug neatly dodged, sweeping his staff low to take out the guard at the shins.  While that guard face planted onto the stones, the other three rushed forward at the same time.

Not-Doug was a blur, dancing between the swordsmen without effort.  He made the remaining guards look silly, forcing them to trip over themselves and each other as he used his staff to deflect their swords where he wanted.

<That’s a guy you need to train with.  He knows his business, and business is good.>  One of the guards was forced to suck in his stomach to dodge a thrust from one of his fellow guards, which put him in line for a punishing uppercut from the end of not-Doug’s staff.  He was knocked out instantly, snoring as he hit the ground.  <Business is really, really good.>

Grant watched as the last two guards were quickly dismantled.  The last guard tried to run at the end, but that just meant he was knocked unconscious more tired than the others.  Not-Doug threw his staff like a spear, hitting the guard at the base of the skull and dropping the man before he could make it past Grant.  He hadn’t killed anyone, and somehow still managed to beat them all without seeming to break a sweat.  Even Grant would have been hard-pressed to repeat such an impressive feat.

The man—now without a weapon—eyed Grant warily, not sure what he was doing there, or who’s side he was on.  While his back was turned, a window behind not-Doug cracked open and Grant saw a glint of light shine off a crossbow bolt pointed at the man.  “Look out!”

Without his staff, Grant knew the man was defenseless.  He activated Thundering Step back-to-back, sprinting with everything he had to give, trying to get between the man and the would-be assassin.  Grant heard the thunk of the bolt being loosed over the pounding of his heart in his ears, and he knew he would be too late.  In a last-ditch effort to save the man’s life, Grant used Iaijutsu combined with Oleander Thrust to give him another ten percent boost to his speed.

Not-Doug had taken Grant’s actions as an attack, and had crouched low with both hands in a ready position to face him.  That meant the bolt would hit him in the back of the head instead of his back, only making things worse.  His eyes widened in surprise when the tip of Grant’s sword bypassed him completely, aiming over his shoulder where the bolt deflected off the blade and narrowly missed hitting him in the face.

“Run!”  Grant shouted at the man, as three more windows were thrown open along the edges of the courtyard.  More crossbows poked out, their owners hidden in the shade of the recessed rooms.  “I can’t protect both of us for long.”

The two of them managed a hasty retreat, and Grant was forced to slash two more bolts out of the air as they left the ambush.  One of the crossbows was poorly aimed, and bounced off of the ground before embedding itself in the unconscious form of one of the guards.

<Whoever that guy is just got fired.>  Sarge laughed to himself as Grant kept a close watch to make sure none of the others had reloaded yet.  When the guard sat up screaming as the bolt in his leg started sizzling, Sarge stopped laughing.  <Those bolts are poisoned.  I’m not sure the guys with crossbows are with the guards.  Most cities frown on their policing forces using things like that.>

Once the man reached his thrown staff, he turned back around to face the courtyard, barely in time to block another bolt.  The heavy bolt ricocheted off to the side, where it was deflected into a rain barrel.  Another quickly followed, aimed at Grant’s midsection as he ran to catch up with the other man.  He easily dodged aside, causing the bolt to go skipping off into the alley.

“While I appreciate the help, I don’t know you.  This isn’t your fight.”  The staff-wielder didn’t look at Grant as he spoke, instead staying focused on the crossbowmen still hiding in the windows.  “If you leave now, I don’t think they’ll follow you.”

<The real question is, who are the people trying to kill him?  Normally, it’s you people are after.  Whatever you do, don’t lose this guy.  For now, at least.>

“My name is Grant.  I was just passing by when I heard the fight.”  The distinct clicking sound of crossbows reloading came from the windows, causing the pair to back up a few more steps.  “I came to see what was going on, and then I saw you lay those guards out.”

“We had a disagreement about whether or not I should be included on a manure run.”  The man quickly knocked aside two more bolts like it was nothing, while Grant deflected one.  A fourth missed them completely, shooting far over their heads.  They finally rounded the corner of the alley, disappearing out of sight from the ambushers.  “The guards thought since I’m a Vassal, I should go, but I disagreed with them.  I’m here for a different reason, and don’t have time for their petty games.  You saw the rest.”

Once the two of them put some distance between themselves and the battle, they started to relax.  Grant realized the man wasn’t going to explain what his reason for being in the city was, so he decided to ask him if they could spar.  “If you don’t mind, I’d like to do some training with you.  It’s hard to find someone with your skills to practice against.”

“Sure, I don’t mind.  It’s the least I can do after you knocked aside that arrow meant for me.  I know a place we can go, where I can show you some pointers.  It would be a good idea to lay low anyway, especially if those people with the crossbows are who I think they are.”  The man stuck out his hand.  “The name’s Chug.  It’s good to meet you.”

Grant lifted an eyebrow in surprise.  “Chug?  Huh.  Is there any chance you know a guy named Doug?”

Wandering Warrior: Judge - Epilogue 2

Epilogue 2

The windows that overlooked the snow capped mountains had long-since been repaired, but the signs of the explosion that had rocked the room were still apparent.  Scorched stone, blackened walls, and missing tapestries made the cold chamber feel even more unwelcoming than it had before.

“Milord, there’s still no word.”  The messenger knelt near the entrance, afraid to enter without permission.  The three figures standing around the table in the center of the room were all unnaturally still, contemplating whatever was displayed on the piles of maps and wooden figures spread across its surface.  “Would you like me to convey another set of orders?”

The attention of the vampire dressed as a noble fell on the messenger like a physical weight, pushing the much younger vampire into the stone floor and causing a trickle of blood to leak from its eyes.

“Nothing, you say?  Not even from the elders stationed nearby?”  The Destitute stepped away from the table and walked over to the mantle over the fireplace.  He picked up a small bottle, tapping it with a finger before holding it up to his eyes.  “Hmm…”

“Don’t tell me, the lich is dead?”  The woman stood up straight, grabbing a steel staff capped with a clear diamond the size of a fist off the table.  “I can’t believe the snake finally bit off more than it could swallow.”

The shortest of the three leaned away from the woman, afraid of being included in any backlash the Destitute might visit upon her.  “Milord, what would you have us do?  If this new enemy has the power to kill one of the lich’s strength, we can’t face it alone.  Perhaps we should–”

“Oh, quit sniveling.  I thought the Duergar were supposed to be a tough race, but you’re nothing but a coward.”  The woman sniffed in disdain, turning her back.  “I don’t know if I should even trust you to fix my ship.”

“Coward?”  The gray dwarf clenched his heavy fists, anger causing them to tremble.  “Say it again, and I’ll pull my support so fast your pointy fangs won’t know what happened!  Let’s see how far you get without me, or my engineers.”

The diamond on top of the woman’s staff started to glow with a faint silvery light, and she bared her fangs at the Duergar.  “If you think you can just walk away after everything I’ve done–”

“I think that’s quite enough.”  The Destitute didn’t raise his voice, but it wasn’t necessary.  The weight his words carried were enough to silence the bickering between the two, and caused the messenger to cough up blood.  The noble vampire went to place the bottle back on the mantle before thinking better of it, and tossed it into the flames.  It immediately started melting, spitting sparks over the ever-burning logs in the fireplace.  “The lich failed.  That doesn’t mean our new opponent is strong, just that the lich failed.  We need more information before we jump to conclusions.”  He turned to the gray dwarf.  “Production will need to increase by a quarter.  I’ll send the extras south, to bolster the witches.  The rest will continue to fight the demons, as normal.”

“And you want me to have the coven kill the interloper, right?”  The woman reached into a pouch, pulling out a locket and walking toward the door.

“No, Princess.”  She stopped and looked back at the Destitute.  He smiled, showing an elongated fang.  “Tell them to learn everything they can, and then report back to you.  We’ll plan our next steps from there.”  The woman gave him a sharp nod and swept out of the room.  He turned back to the fire, thinking over what orders to give to his remaining forces in the south.  In the flames, he saw something interesting.

Bending over, he plucked free the melted glass remains of the bottle he had used to mimic the phylactery of the lich.  Instead of boiling away into nothing, there remained a tiny glass figurine.  An upraised fist, in the same shape the Wardens used.  The Destitute turned to look at the messenger that still waited near the stairs.

“Get parchment and ink.  I don’t want you to forget anything.  I’ve many commands, and there’s no room for mistakes.”  He turned back to watch the flames as they danced across the logs that never burned.  “After all, we’re trying to save the world.”

Wandering Warrior: Judge - Epilogue 1

Epilogue 1

Everything had been going perfectly.  Gleason had left the village behind, and his scouts had brought him to where they had lost the trail for James Holden just in time for a beacon to light up the evening skies in the far distance.  It was as if the Trinity was lighting the way for him.  He could feel their gaze settle upon him, urging him upon his divine quest.  Gleason and his men had nearly killed their chargers in their rush to catch their prey.

Gleason had used his Long Eye spell to spot his quarry sneaking around the roof of an old building, and had immediately ordered his men to don full armor and go in after them.  That was when things had started to turn for the worse.  When the gaze of the Trinity had fallen from his shoulders.

While he knew that the undead weren’t normally a threat to the Wardens–and most especially the men under his command, who he had personally trained–they had been confronted by a new type he had never seen before.

At first, he had waited outside the old building while his men dutifully followed orders and attempted to clear the building themselves.  After all, if their commander had to do all the work himself, what good were they?  A runner had come to tell him of the fierce fighting inside, and of the mounting casualties they were being dealt.

Gleason ordered all of his men but one to join in the fight, leaving his newest Warden to guard the horses.  He did what any good commander would do, and followed behind, bringing up the rear so he could better organize his men as they fought.

Instead, he watched as his men were ripped to pieces by foes that should have been killed by the wounds his men inflicted.  An undead that could still fight with a spear through its head was unlike any undead he had ever heard of, with the exception of those very few ancient vampires that lived in the far north, or across the seas in the southern deserts.

He was forced to join in the battle, dirtying himself with the ichor of the undead monsters within minutes of entering the building.  Gleason was so incensed by the audacity of the unclean filth that dared touch him, he cut a path almost by himself straight to the strongest source of magic he could feel in the whole building.

That was when he had seen him.  Him.  James Holden, the man who called himself a Judge.  A monster, condemned to die by the gods themselves, claiming to be something more than a pig wallowing in filth.  He was covered in it, stinking of the undead, like he had been down in the basement with them for days.

Gleason had always known himself as one of the best fighters in the Hunters Guild.  Out of the hundreds of Wardens he had sparred with in recent times, only the Green Wardens could defeat him soundly.  He knew his worth, and it was far more than most men could ever aspire to reach.  Then, he fought James Holden.

It was like fighting a Green Warden, but without any of the pride or honor they exuded.  He knew then, that Holden was a monster in truth.  Gleason had given his all, and was found wanting.  In fact, he knew that Holden had beaten him without much effort.  The lazy confidence the man showed was evidence enough of that, not even breathing hard during their fight.

Then, to make matters worse, instead of being given a clean death upon his failure, Gleason had been pulled underground, where a slavering monster had dragged him through what had felt like miles of tight tunnels until he was brought before this creature, a wizened old vampire that felt heavy with mana.  Gleason knew it was a powerful undead, at least at the level of an elder vampire.

“What have we here?”  The raspy voice sounded like the monster hadn’t spoken out loud in a long time.  It reached out, flipped open the visor of Gleason’s helm, and sliced a ragged, dirty fingernail across Gleason’s cheek.  The vampire licked the blood that dribbled free, taking a few moments to taste it as if it were a fine brandy, picking through the subtleties and secrets it carried.  “I think the master would like you.  I think he would like you very much.”

Behind Gleason, the tentacled creature that had brought him here made a burbling sound, and produced a charred skull that had very pronounced canines.  The elder vampire snapped his fingers, and the tentacled creature gently handed it over.  As Gleason watched, the vampire focused on the skull, and a faint green glow seemed to come from the empty eye sockets.  A disembodied voice seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere at once, fading in and out to Gleason’s ears.

…keep it… different vessel, without holy magic… injured badly.  Tell the Destitute that I… not what we thought… need to hurry, before it’s too late… demons can’t hold him forever…

“Yes, milord.  I’ll do as you say.”  The vampire turned to face Gleason, and smiled wide enough to show yellowed fangs in all their unholy glory.  “Today is your lucky day, young Warden.  You get to become a part of something important.  Something bigger than yourself.  All you need to do is… survive.”

Gleason’s mouth was so dry, he had to try twice before he could speak.  “S-survive?  What do I need to survive?”  He felt a faint flicker of hope in his chest.  Perhaps the Trinity didn’t leave him completely forsaken.  “You aren’t going to kill me?”

The vampire moved faster than Gleason could hope to avoid, grabbing his helm and twisting his head to the side.  He pulled it up enough to expose a gap between his breastplate and gorget, baring a strip of flesh around his neck.  Gleason tried to struggle, but the vampire’s grip was like a vice.

It held up the skull like a dagger before plunging the twin canines into his neck, and Gleason felt like two icicles had been stuck into his flesh.  Coldness flooded his body, numbing his broken limbs as his chest slowed its breathing.  He managed to look down enough to see that thick black veins were writhing beneath his skin.  Gleason could feel them stretching to cover his body, living snakes twisting through his organs, invading his brain.  Then, the skull exploded.

“No!”  The elder vampire jerked back from the flash of green fire, pieces of its own hand blown off in the sudden violence.  The cold invading Gleason was interrupted by the green flames getting sucked into the twin holes in his neck, before it flashed orange and was gone.  “What did he do?  What does this mean?”

Gleason, now forgotten on the floor, was dealing with problems of his own.  The black veins and green fire that had invaded his badly injured body caused a catastrophic grand mal seizure.  His body contorted so hard that he fractured more bones, knocking free his helm and exposing his sweaty head and face as he foamed at the mouth.  The black veins had sunken out of sight, leaving him looking as normal as a man in his position could be expected to appear.

Staring down at the broken man, the elder vampire scoffed.  “So many grand plans, gone to waste.  The outworlder must have managed to destroy the lich after all.”  He looked at his damaged hand, and the barely breathing Warden.  “No sense letting good blood go to waste.  Especially since I need to heal myself before I can report to the Destitute all the failures of the lich.”

Grabbing Gleason by the back of the neck like he was a stray kitten, the vampire lifted him up to his mouth and bit him, drinking deeply from the Warden.  He intended to drain him completely, not wanting to chance a newly risen vampire in a few days time that he would need to babysit.  They were little more than beasts, thinking only of their thirst, and with the knowledge of magic already in his mind, the former Warden would have been a nightmare for the elder vampire to deal with.

As it took a second drink, Gleason’s eyes snapped open.  His body moved by instinct, trying to grapple the elder vampire to break free of its grasp.  The many broken bones he suffered from made him weak, and the elder vampire fought him off easily.  Not wanting to draw things out, it took a third drink from Gleason, enough that the man should have passed out from blood loss by now.  Instead, black veins erupted to the surface of his skin, giving him enough strength to pull free of the vampire’s grasp.

“Curious.  The lich’s gift should have died when it did.”  The vampire stood, intending to finish the job the old fashioned way as he pulled a dagger from his belt.  “No matter.  I’ll make this quick.”

Even with the boost provided by the black veins, Gleason could do nothing to save himself.  He watched silently as the vampire approached, holding up its weapon as it prepared to kill him.  For Gleason, it wasn’t even the first time he had faced a similar scene that day.  In his final moments, he cursed James Holden for beating him, he cursed the Wardens for sending him on a fool’s errand, and most of all he cursed the Trinity for forsaking him in his hour of need.

Before the knife could strike home, the elder vampire stopped, grabbing at its abdomen.  “What?”  He looked at Gleason, clear confusion on his face.  “What did you do to me?”

A realization struck Gleason as his lips cracked and bled in a crimson smile.  It made sense now.  All this–he wasn’t forsaken by the Trinity.  He was being tested.  Tested for greatness.  Laughing maniacally, he croaked out a familiar sentence.  “All you need to do, vampire… is survive.”

As Gleason watched, a familiar black vein crawled up the vampire’s neck.  The already wrinkled appearance of the vampire seemed to worsen, and more black veins spread across his visible skin.  The powerful undead monster was brought low, doubling over in pain as it whined like an animal caught in a trap.  That only lasted a few more seconds, before the vampire dropped to the floor, completely still.  Its body rapidly shrank, turning into little more than a shrunken skeleton.

From its back erupted a mass of black ropey tentacles that flung itself at Gleason.  He could do nothing except close his eyes and await a similar fate as the tar-like mess slammed against his breastplate.  Gleason held his breath, waiting to die.

When nothing happened, he looked down to see nothing was there.  The black veins were gone, leaving nothing beyond a clean spot on his armor.  A few heartbeats later, Gleason knew it had somehow gotten inside him anyway.  He was suddenly flushed with a cold so intense it burned, turning his breath into a mist as he exhaled.

Gleason expected the end to finally come, but once again, it didn’t.  The burning cold seemed to rejuvenate him.  Heal him.  Restore him.  Gleason finally sat up, fully whole and hale, more energized than he had felt in years.

“I… I’m alive.”  Gleason patted himself down, confirming he was truly okay.  Staring down at his body, he could only come to one logical conclusion.  “I truly am destined for more.  The Trinity have not forsaken me.  They have blessed me.”  He felt his neck where he had been bitten by the vampire.  Gleason knew from all the literature and from past hunts he should be feeling feverish already, and that the change into an undead monster was inevitable.  Somehow, that didn’t bother him right now.  He didn’t feel feverish, and even if he did change–which he might not–he knew deep down that he wouldn’t be like a regular blood sucker.  Gleason had been chosen for more.

He reviewed his memories over what the vampire had said.  Apparently, the skull it had used to poison him was supposed to impart some kind of gift from a lich.  When it had exploded, the vampire had assumed that the lich had been killed, but Gleason knew different.  The Trinity had changed the unclean gift from an undead monster into a blessing from his deity.  That meant his mission from the Oracle was so important, it warranted direct interference from the gods themselves.  Gleason dropped to his knees in supplication, raising his hands above his head.

“You have chosen me to be your agent on this mortal plane.  I will not fail you.  Corruption will be cleansed, torn out by the root.  I will raise your praises with my voice, and fulfill your orders with my hands.”  Gleason stood, not noticing the black veins tinted with green and orange flames as they flickered across his body.  “This I swear.”

In his heart, Gleason was most happy that the only real order he had ever received was to kill James Holden.  After what he had learned from that dirty shifter mayor, it made what he was going to do to Greendown all the sweeter.

Wandering Warrior: Judge - Chapter 41

Chapter 41

As I got back to the others, it was clear they were all exhausted.  We had been fighting for well over twenty minutes, maybe more.  That kind of exertion would make anyone feel like they were about to fall over dead.

“Did you finish it?”  Cross was the only one still steady on his feet, but the line of darkness on his wrist had grown jagged in the short time I was gone.  “Is he dead?”

I looked back to where Gleason had disappeared into a hole in the ground.  There was no way I was going down there right now to confirm the kill.  “I didn’t see him die, but I would bet my spear you're using that he isn’t coming back after the undead are done with him.”  Not that it mattered much anyway.  He had been pretty easy to beat.  “If by some miracle he lives through this shit and wants to fight me again, I’ll just kick his ass all over again.”

Jess gave me an exhausted thumbs up.  “Great.  Why don’t you get over here and give us a hand?”  The blood of the undead made it look like someone had splashed her with black paint in a poor attempt to recreate a Pollock painting.  “I could use a break.”

I had to jump over a pile of bodies to get to them.  Our group had been putting in some work.  “I know you guys really want to finish off what’s in here, but what do you think about getting out of here?”

“What about the lich?”  Leedy had to brace himself against the wall to stand upright, but he didn’t have an ounce of quit in him.  “There’s no way we can let something like that run wild.  It’s too big of a threat.”

“Oh, I’ve got a surprise for that thing.”  I sheathed my sword and hefted my mace.  “It doesn’t know how screwed it is.”

Cross stepped forward.  “Do you need us to do anything?  Maybe I can hurt it now that I hold some of its power.”

“No.  What I need you to do is hold a perimeter around me while I handle him.  Then, we’ll need to move fast.  My spell will allow us to follow his soul back to his phylactery, but the trail only stays visible for a short time.”  I pointed to the stairs, where the other White Wardens were still getting their asses kicked.  “There’s no telling how far away it is, so I might have to leave you behind for a while.  If we do get split up after we plow through those guys, find a place nearby to recover and I’ll find you.”

Everyone agreed, so we readied ourselves for a fight to get back over to the lich.  I only had enough mana for the first part of what I needed to do, meaning I would have to take the time to recharge when I got to the lich’s phylactery.  If it had extensive wards or guards, I might be in trouble.  I was betting on the thing going for stealth over a good defense.  Its brief time in my head gave me a few hints at its personality, and it felt more like the kind of thing that prided itself on outsmarting its enemies by being sneaky, and gloating about hiding things in plain sight.  Considering how things had gone in the basement, I couldn’t be sure of anything.  One could always hope, anyway.

You still don’t seem to understand your position, future vessel.  Nothing you can do to me can cause permanent damage.  It was still struggling against its bonds, and I could feel the stone prison weakening as we got closer.  Destroy this body, and I will find a hundred more.  Eventually, you will give in.  Surrender yourself to me now, and save us both the time and trouble.

When we got to the lich, the fire burning in its eyes had died down to mere embers compared to the scorching flames I had seen before.  The others formed up around me, keeping close so they could help one another as needed.  I waved my hand over the center of the stone prison, allowing the mana there to pull away and expose the lich’s bony chest.  I held up my mace and took a deep breath, gathering my power.  I looked down at the lich and smiled.

“There’s something you should know about me, Sparky.  Something you definitely didn’t account for.”  The starmetal mace lit up a vibrant blue that clashed with the eldritch green light from its eyes.  “I’m also a Paladin.”  The embers of its eyes flashed, but it was too late to do anything.  It had been too sure of its power over me, and its safety with its phylactery somewhere else, and it knew it.  “Smite.”

I swung the mace down hard enough to shatter the skeleton like it was made of glass.  Pieces of bone flew everywhere, and I watched as the skull bounced out of sight, the embers flickering out as it rolled away.  I made sure to keep mana from the Paladin spell flowing into my mace as the lich was forced out of the vampire’s remains so I could still see the form of the lich as it coalesced in front of me.

The Smite spell was one of four I had received when I gained the Paladin Class, and it could banish or destroy all sorts of evil spirits, demons, devils, and so on.  It had varying effects based on how strong they were.  For something like a lich, it didn’t matter how powerful or ancient it was.  The undead creature would be forced back into its phylactery for at least a short period of time to recover, which gave me a chance to kill it for good.

As I watched, the sickly green mist that was the lich swirled around the basement before shooting up the hole I had cut through the roof.  Its essence left a trail that I could see like a streamer of neon in the dark of the basement.  “This way!”

I ran for the opening, clearing out space for us with brute force provided by a second wind.  The adrenaline rush of tracking down and killing the lich had banished the exhaustion that had been creeping up on me, making it possible for the others to keep up without getting bogged down.  It also helped that the majority of the undead seemed to lose interest in us as we ran deeper into the basement.  They were more focused on the noisier and flashier White Wardens, who were still getting mangled over by the stairs.

Cross and I helped Leedy and Murphy up to the next floor, where they immediately started fighting more undead.  Cross jumped up to help them while I planted a knee so Jess could use it as a springboard and leap up herself.

After I jumped up, I saw the mess that Gleason and his men had made.  They had walked straight into the ambush we’d avoided earlier, consisting mostly of super ghouls and a few elder vampires.  Torn bodies were strewn everywhere, and I was shocked to see how many undead they had killed up here.  Jess was standing next to me, looking as sick as I felt.  “If we had come through one of those doors, it… we might not have made it.”

“No kidding.”  I pulled her away from the hole, toward the wide open doors on the opposite side of the building.  We only had to fight a single ghoul as we left the building.  It had been trying to catch the horses staked outside by the White Wardens.  Their lone guard left behind to protect them had been killed by the ghoul, and the undead had been wearing ruts in the grass as it ran in circles after the chargers that hadn’t managed to pull their staked-down ropes out of the ground.  “You gather up our gear and pick the best horses.  I’ll follow the trail and send up a signal if I need you.”

I didn’t wait for them to agree.  Instead, I took off running.  The trail led out into the forest behind the cheese factory, weaving between treetops like a single strand of the northern lights.  It was fading fast, mostly because my own mana was running dangerously low.  Concentrating on my breathing, I tried to bring in as much ambient mana as I could as I sprinted through the trees.

Somehow, the lich realized I was onto it.  There was nothing it could do about refusing to return to its phylactery, but it could make sure that it threw in as many zigs and zags as possible before getting sucked back into its home like a third-rate genie getting pulled into a dusty-ass lamp.  I was forced to juke my way through five or six briar and thorn patches before I changed up the dynamics of the situation.

Instead of running around and wearing myself out, I found the tallest tree in the area and quickly climbed it.  I quickly realized the damned lich had been running me in circles around a small clearing in the forest.  While the lich had the capability to delay its return, creating extra work for me as it did, the limitation was that the direction of travel had to always be a little bit closer toward its phylactery.  It was too dark to see details, but I thought I could see a few boulders or possibly a stone hut in the center of the clearing.  That had to be the place.  I decided to take a chance and beat the lich there.

Jumping from one tree to the next, I made quick time over to the location.  As I got closer, it was obvious my hopes of the lich leaving his phylactery undefended were misplaced.  What I had seen from the tree was a ring of stones similar to a miniaturized stonehenge that had been carved with wards meant to keep everything–and I do mean everything–out.  Not even grass was growing inside the ring.  In the middle was a tiny stone hut no bigger than an outhouse.

Over my head, I saw the energy signature of the lich finally catch up.  It shot straight into the outhouse, causing the single visible window to glow an angry green.  The irony of the lich’s phylactery hiding inside a shitter wasn’t lost on me, but now wasn’t the time for laughter.  I tried to push my way into the clearing, but it was like going up against an invisible brick wall.

Nothing happened as I tried to shove my way through the barrier with raw strength, marshaling all of my considerable physical stats.  I strained–veins stuck out in stark relief against my arms and chest as I pushed against the barrier.  I let out an explosive breath as I stopped trying to brute force my way in and changed tactics.

“Magic barrier, huh?  Well, I got something special meant for things just like this.  Annoying shield-thing, I’d like to introduce you to ancient elven engineering.”

I drew my sword and slashed horizontally in one smooth motion.  The ninjato smashed against the barrier in a ripple of explosive light and sound.  The energy of the blow created a backlash on my body, knocking me backward and nearly taking me off my feet.  The barrier pulsed once in response but didn’t diminish in any noticeable way.  This wasn’t working fast enough.  By the time the mana-leaching properties of my sword brought down the shield, I’d be too late, and the lich would’ve escaped.  I couldn’t let this bastard get away, but I was quickly running out of options.

A cold knot tightened in my stomach as I faced the possibility of failure, the knowledge that all of the sacrifices of our party and the many victims–the generations of undead we had seen in that basement–could be wiped away in front of this last obstacle.  I was just so damned tired.  Physically, yes, but in a much deeper sense that had been growing year by year, as I faced world after world without any reason, direction, or answers.  Oh, I had answers alright.  I’d learned more than I’d ever thought possible in these twenty years, but I had none of the answers that really mattered.  Who did this to me?  Why?  What was the purpose of it all?  Would I ever get my fucking life back?  Would I ever get to taste root beer again?  Was it my destiny to be a tool of the uncaring forces of the universe that had upended my entire existence?  It would be so easy to toss in the towel.  Say fuck it, and just go fishing or something.

Just then, a subtle sensation broke through the fog of despair and self-pity.  One I had been experiencing ever since I drew closer to the house, only I had never stopped to truly examine it.  It was a feeling I had only experienced once before, when the vampires had sent their velociraptor attack dogs against us.  I finally made the connection.  Whatever was powering this thing had some serious mojo, much more than a single lich should be able to gather on its own.  In fact, it hadn’t done it on its own.  I slid my sword smoothly back into its scabbard and stepped closer to the barrier, one hand reaching for its polished surface.  Only this time, I reached into the barrier.  A message popped into my vision.

Quest Update!

Unique Upgrade Quest: Find ten places of power - 2/10

-Absorb the power built up at the location to increase your level.

It was clear to me that the lich had somehow converted or parasitized the collected magic of this place of power’s energy well.  I sucked in a deep breath as I considered the danger of what I was about to do.  Books had been written about the folly of drawing in magic that had been tainted by the sentient will of another.  Even after twenty years, there was so much out there about magic that I didn’t know it could fill libraries–literally–and this was certainly a subject I wish I had studied more.  I also knew it didn’t matter.

I was going to do it anyway.

Putting both hands against the barrier and closing my eyes, I envisioned the wall as a white mist.  I immediately thought of the energy blocking me like a battery that I could drain, making it easier to start pulling it into my body.

At first, it didn’t want to budge.  Pulling free the first few wisps of power was like dragging heavy chains with my hands taped shut.  When I finally got the first one to flow inside my body, it got a lot easier.  In fact, it got too easy.  Energy started to flood my body, and I was suddenly drinking from a fire hose.

You think you can steal my power?  The hubris of those who think themselves strong is truly staggering.  Your dirty tricks won’t save you now.  I wanted you as a vessel, but after injuring me, I think I will have to use a different option.  Let me show you what happens when true strength shows itself.

The lich somehow had control of the wards even from within its phylactery, and I was locked in place by the mana pouring into me.  My only defense was to keep it from pooling inside my body and burning me up like a wooden pitcher trying to hold lava.  Instead of trying to escape, I pushed my mind against the river of energy to try and force it to move.  It felt impossible.  The rush of power felt like a solid bar of metal burning its way deeper inside my body.  For the briefest of moments I felt a flash of doubt, before I crushed it mercilessly.  This pissface lich and his stupid boobytrap weren’t going to kill me.  I doubled down on my focus, and shoved with all I had.

Blood sprayed from my nose as something inside my head gave way, but the energy finally swirled into motion.  It lazily curled around my body, burning me on the inside, until it hit the mana generator in my center.  The mana was pulled violently toward it, creating a whirlpool that felt like my organs were getting dragged into a black hole.  Zero stars, do not recommend.

As more power poured into me, it scoured my body from the inside out.  I was being scrubbed with dense flames, every part cleansed in a fire of agony.  All of the energy that formed the dome of protection was moving toward me now, and I was forced to focus all of my attention inward.  The mana compressed as it was pulled deeper, making me feel like an overstretched water balloon about to burst.  Keeping myself from popping was both a physical and metaphysical struggle, centered around the whirlpool of my mana generator.

Finally, the generator couldn’t hold anymore.  It had condensed down from liquid fire into a solid ball of marble laced with lightning that suddenly burst outward in a flash of thunder.  I heaved uncontrollably, and foul black sludge poured from my mouth out of nowhere.

While I was trying to puke up the barrel of rancid crude oil I didn’t remember eating, the generator reformed.  It looked almost exactly the same as it had before being turned into a solid rock, except now its interior walls were crystalline in nature.  Almost like a blue geode, but filled with dense gaseous mana that was lit with the occasional streak of silent lightning.  A less dense version of that same mana now filled the rest of my body, making me feel like an overtightened spring about to shoot loose and bounce around all over the place.

A series of dings accompanied a screen that popped in my vision, telling me I had accomplished another step of the quest.

Name: James Holden (Earth v7.2)

Title: Chief Justice/Arbiter/Justicar/Executioner/etc…

Level: 100/MAX

Rank: 2/10

Age: 27 (Physical) 47 (Actual)

Class: Warrior/Soldier/Knight/Paladin/Mage (5/5)

Profession: Healer/Alchemist/Blacksmith/Runesmith/Judge (5/5)

Status:

Strength- 65

Flexibility- 65

Vigor- 65

Mind- 65

Mission:

Mythical Quest: Deliver Justice - World Count 20/???

Legendary Quest: Return Home - Requirements not met

Epic Quest: Find out why - Requirements not met

Rare Quest: Track down Silver Star - Ongoing

Unique Upgrade Quest: Find ten places of power - 2/10

My stats had all grown by ten points this time, along with my version and rank increasing by one.  It should have been a moment to celebrate, except for the projectile vomiting, of course.  Jumping for joy and crushing the soul-home of the undead magic user would have been the logical next step, if I had been able to move.  Once I was done involuntarily heaving, I realized I was frozen in place, still stuck as if I was reaching out to touch the invisible dome that I had already absorbed.  I tried to drop my arms, take a step, cast a spell, do anything other than stand there and breathe, but I couldn’t.  It seemed only my involuntary bodily functions were working.  Something had paralyzed me.

I’m surprised you survived such an influx of power.  The lich’s smug voice was more annoying than fear-inducing, but I could feel as I broke out in a cold sweat when my arms dropped to my side and I took a single step toward the hut on top of the hill without telling my body to do so.  As surprising as you are, you still don’t understand many things.  Such as what happens when you take power that is not your own, and fail to claim proper ownership of it.  I took another step, almost falling forward onto my face.  This isn’t the usual way I take control of a body, but I suppose it’s better than nothing.

Thinking furiously, I did everything I could to stop myself from haltingly making my way up the hill.  I tried throwing myself backward, but there was no response.  All I accomplished was giving myself a terrible headache.  The power humming inside my body was controlling me like I was a puppet, and no matter what I did, the lich didn’t even seem to notice.  It had said that I hadn’t claimed ownership of the power, but that wasn’t a real answer.  Not that I could do anything about it now anyway.  Even the mana generator inside me refused to react when I tried to manipulate it.

I had known what I was getting myself into when I absorbed the mana from the shield.  However, knowing the danger and experiencing the reality of it were two completely different things.  I tried to calm my racing thoughts and work through the problem.  Tried, and failed.  Panic was a flame in my chest as one attempt after another met with zero success.  I was totally fucked.  I knew it, and based on how the lich somehow managed to move my limbs with a smug sense of superiority, the lich knew it too.

Well, what should I do with you now?  My body came to a stop in front of the hut, and my hand reached out to drag open the heavy stone door that held it closed.  First, since you have wounded me, you shall help find a new home for my phylactery and guard it until I have healed.  I will think upon your future while repairing the damage to my soul.  That Paladin magic makes you unsuitable as a permanent vessel for me, but perhaps I can force you to take the step into immortality.  You don’t have to be willing to participate in the Ceremony of Endless Night.  He was talking about turning me into a lich.  That would be bad.

When the door opened, I saw a small, ornate wooden table covered with runes.  Around the edges were various pouches filled with uncut gems, thick gold and platinum coins, and what had to be different kinds of colorful swirling monster cores in more than just the undead variety.  All in all, it was an absolute fortune that rivaled the treasuries of some city-states I had visited.

In the center of all that wealth and power was what I could only describe as a glass spray bottle.  The old-fashioned kind with a squeeze ball my great-grandma kept around that used to hold perfume.  The type that smelled like baby powder, before it had dried up sometime around the end of prohibition.  Inside the perfume bottle, swirling green energy from the lich marked the out-of-place item as the phylactery.  Somehow, despite the hold on me from the undead creature, I managed to snort in amusement.

What?  You find something funny, mortal? Has your own impending doom caused your composure to shatter like your frail mind?

The lich relaxed control of my voice, and I took a moment to spit out the foul taste in my mouth before answering, noting with relief that the lich needed me to communicate verbally. While it had control over my body, it couldn’t read my mind.  It was a small edge, but this bastard had me dead to rights.  “No, it isn’t that.  I was just wondering what cheap-ass antique dimestore dumpster you found that thing in.  The last lich I killed had a really badass dagger crafted from the fang of an ancient viper and the skulls of his enemies or something respectable like that.  But you?  Nope.  You go with a perfume bottle.  I mean, seriously.  Did you say to yourself, ‘self, baby powder and wrinkly old ladies are what really get me going, so let’s tie our soul to something that represents both of those things at the same time!’  Or was there some other process that made you decide on such a shitty home for all of eternity?”

As it turns out, the lich didn’t appreciate my sense of humor.  They probably had no idea what I was talking about.  I’m sure that the bottle was used on this world for something other than perfume, but they were very sensitive about it, regardless.

The lich ripped free my sword from its scabbard and stabbed me through the leg.  Impressively, it avoided hitting anything important, like a major artery or bone.  It still hurt like hell.  The next time I let you speak, it would be good for you to remember that I can cut out your tongue anytime I feel the need.  Now, time grows short.  I’m sure your friends will be along soon, and I want to be in a secure location before they do.  Without my agreement, the lich used my body to start stuffing his pouches of wealth into a black leather pack covered with protection and camouflaging runes that had been left under the table.  The runes on the table sparked and sent jolts of electricity through my body as items were removed, but the lich was happy to let me suffer through the pain instead of taking the time to deactivate them.

My new Vigor stat of sixty-five meant my body could take the abuse.  The real problem was the sword sticking out of my left thigh.  The regenerative effects of Vigor tried to close the wound immediately, but the lich decided to leave the sword where it was, continually cutting and healing as I moved.  Preoccupied as it was by the wealth of items on the table, the lich didn’t notice the blade on my ninjato glowing subtly as my blood dripped onto the floor.  My magic eating sword.

Without letting on that the stolen mana inside me was diminishing, I tried to wiggle my toes.  My big toe moved up and down twice, but only on the side where the sword was.  Since the mana inside me was stagnant instead of flowing freely, the ninjato was affecting my left side faster than my right.  My left hand was holding the bag, so I tried moving my fingers.  They twitched, causing the lich to pause.  It thankfully brushed off the involuntary movement and went back to what it was doing.

After a few minutes of carefully packing the leather pack and sealing it up tight, the lich went to reach for the phylactery.  It was time for me to make my move.  Somehow, I knew that if I touched it, the lich’s chances of winning the battle for control of my body would swing in its favor.  Holding its center of power was a bad idea, especially when I was still filled with mana it somehow had control over.  The runes protecting the perfume bottle were more stout, so it took the time to disarm them as it slowly held out my hand.

Almost done.  I have a secondary location nearby, and once we use the blood of a sacrifice to contact the Des–

It was reaching with the right hand, so I used the bag in my left to swing at the spray bottle.  The lich was so caught off guard that it didn’t even try to stop me.  I smacked the phylactery off the table, where it clattered off the floor and bounced out of sight.  I knew that the crystal or glass it was made out of was supernaturally reinforced by the lich’s soul, so the fall wouldn’t hurt it.  The runes reacting to the phylactery getting disturbed sure as hell did, though.  Hurt, I mean.  Well, it hurt me at least.

My body was blown out of the tiny building by the explosion.  All things considered, the explosion was pretty small compared to what it could have been if the lich hadn’t already been deactivating them.  I landed a few yards away, rolling on the ground and shouting in pain as my sword was ripped from my leg, tearing open a huge wound that sprayed blood high into the air.  Today was not a good day.  Really, it was going in my top twenty of days that sucked the worst.  Maybe top ten.

You think to defy me!  Entire kingdoms have bowed to my greatness.  For centuries, I was worshiped as a god!  I’ve had enough of you, and your ridiculousness.  My right hand clumsily flopped around before finding where the hilt of my mace was clipped to my belt.  The lich repeatedly punched me in the huevos while trying to pull the weapon free.  Definitely moving into the top ten category.  You’ll die by your own hand!

The carabiner-style clip was confusing for the lich, which only bought me a brief moment to think of a way to keep me from splattering my own brains across the barren hilltop.  The blessed starmetal mace was the most lethal of all my weapons, and I didn’t want to get into a pointless tug-of-war that only risked my own life.  All it would take was one slip and I was dead, and at no point in that confrontation was the lich in any danger.

When the bad guy takes a hostage, you shoot the hostage.

Aiming my left hand at my right forearm, I fired the leftmost barrel of my wrist gun.  Amazingly, I didn’t lose the hand.  My new stats had toughened my body enough that I managed to only suffer a shattered radius and ulna, and lose a hefty chunk of meat in the process.  Still, at such close range, it was a miracle it wasn’t blown off completely.  By doing it to myself, I thought the shock of getting shot would be lessened.  I was wrong.

What an interesting spell.  I’ll have to explore that later.  I groaned as I tried to pull myself back up the hill while still laying on my back.  It was awkward, and lacked any good leverage.  I also couldn’t heal myself, otherwise I would have to just shoot myself again.  Slipping in my own blood, I didn’t stop.  I kept inching my way back up the hill.

You’re determined, I’ll give you that. You know, I was rather intrigued by that slapping spell you cast on my avatar in the basement.  What do you think of my version?  The lich raised my injured arm and started slapping it across my face.  It couldn’t kill me with force, so it seemed like the lich would do it with indignity, instead.  Indignity or not, it certainly didn’t feel like getting hugged by a basket of kittens.  Quit hitting yourself, quit hitting yourself.

“There is no James, only Zuul…”  The lich didn’t get my joke, because it was an uncultured savage living in a world severely lacking in a proper entertainment industry.  “I’m going to kill you like the bitch you are, lich.”  The hut finally came into sight, and I found a fresh burst of energy.  Getting to my feet was impossible, so I started crawling for the open doorway.  I still couldn’t move my right side properly, but with my body using up the remaining mana inside me to heal all the damage, the lich was losing control.  “You’re gonna be super dead.  D-E-D dead, motherfucker.”  It’s possible the blood loss was affecting me.

I finally got within arms reach of where the phylactery was lying on the ground, and managed to unclip my mace from my belt with my left hand.  Instead of Smite, I prepared myself to cast the Paladin spell Cleanse.  Since the lich was already suffering the effects of the former, the latter should finish it off.  As the spell started to take shape, it fizzled out and I felt a stabbing pain in my head, renewing my bloody nose.

You don’t have the control necessary to cast another one of those Paladin spells with my claimed mana still flowing through you.  I’ll tear you apart from the inside the moment you try to cast another ‘holy’ spell like that.

“Damn.”  I lifted the heavy mace and slammed it down on the spray bottle with a dull thud.  Neither the mace nor the phylactery seemed to have suffered any damage from my weakened blow.

Ha!  You’re nothing.  You’re too weak to break something that has been reinforced by my soul, even after you injured me.  It’s a good thing I found a better vessel.  I would have found you disappointing.

“So, you’re saying a physical blow could still break it.  It doesn’t need to be magical.”  I carefully clipped my mace back on my belt and scooted back a few feet, using the hut to shield most of my body from the phylactery.  “I’m just not hitting your lame-ass perfume bottle hard enough.”  Taking a brief moment to select a title I barely used, I activated it.

Title: Executioner

-End the lives of the guilty, so their presence can no longer sway the world.

Skill Imparted: Your next attack is 25% stronger.  An additional 25% will be applied if the target is restrained.  Can only be used on those who are deemed guilty.  Useable once per day.

The power of the Executioner hummed through me.  “You aren’t exactly the Necronomicon, but let me show you my Boomstick, asshole.”

Wait, no, I–

I lifted my wrist gun and fired first the middle barrel, then the top one, lining up both shots so they would hit at nearly the exact same spot, one barely above the other.  I did it so fast that the two shots sounded more like one.  The first round hit lower, causing microfractures to spread across the glowing green crystal and popping the bottle up in the air for a split second before the next round shattered it into oblivion.  The resulting explosion was far larger than the little hut could contain, and it sent me on another trip down the hill, where I was stopped violently by my lower back cracking across one of the boundary stones.

I barely hung onto consciousness as pieces of burning hut and dirt rained down around me.  I looked up just in time to see a familiar leather bag–a very heavy bag–descending straight for my face.  “Son of a–”

The fucker did make it into the top ten after all.  I closed my eyes, resigned to taking the hit.

A good nap was probably what I needed anyway.

Wandering Warrior: Judge - Chapter 40

Chapter 40

The aura device didn’t seem to bother the Warden as he came down the stairs.  He was forced to deal with the undead trying to swarm him just as much as we were, but his whip sliced through them like they weren’t even there.  It had to be powerfully enchanted, on top of him pushing a hefty amount of mana into it.

“James, I think that’s the guy I told you about!”  Leedy shouted back over his shoulder at me while he fought against a vampire that was using a femur like a club.  “He’s probably the one who hurt the mayor and his family!”

“What’s he talking about?”  Cross moved so quickly that his sword was a blur to everyone but me, clearing some space so we could talk for a few uninterrupted moments.  His job was made harder because his weapon was starting to warp from all the action we were seeing, probably made worse from clanging off the hardened bones of the lich earlier.  “Who hurt what mayor?”

I cast another row of earthen spikes a little farther out on our rear to reduce the pressure on the others while I answered.  “A type of magic informed me that the werebear family we met was injured because of me, so Leedy and I made an educated guess that it was some guy named Greasy.”

“You mean Gleason.  Commander Gleason, the man in charge of the Greendown Division of the White Wardens.”  Cross squinted at the armored man slowly making his way over to us in a storm of violence.  “That certainly could be him.  It… sounds like something he would do, and he does prefer using a whip.”

“Well, you know what I’m going to do to him if he really was the one.  Are you going to be okay with that?  Or are you going to try and stop me?”  We were interrupted when I had to deal with another zombie thrown by a vampire who had been hiding behind a pile of rubble.  Using a bit of mana around the blunt end of my spear, I whacked it away like a gruesome version of baseball.  The vampire wasn’t expecting the line drive to come right back at him, and the pair of undead went down in a tangle of limbs.  “That’s at least a double.”

Cross brushed off the baseball commentary and looked at me seriously.  “James, I…”  He looked down at his stump of a hand for a moment, ignoring the battle around him.  When his eyes met mine again, they were harder than stone.  “I don’t know if I will ever forgive you for taking my hand, but I understand now why you did it.  You brought me low, and showed me the rotten foundations I stood upon.  For that, I thank you.”  He glanced back over to the whip-wielding Warden who was now more than halfway across the basement to us.  “And to answer your question, no.  I won’t help you to fight the Wardens, but I won’t stand in your way.  Especially Commander Gleason.  In fact, I’ll make an exception for that one.  He’s everything that’s wrong with them, all rolled into one person.”

A section of the floor suddenly dropped, cutting off the direct path Gleason had to where we were standing.  The ground shook as a meaty arm flopped onto the ground, and the mother of all super ghouls poked its head out of the hole in the ground.  “Well, shit.  I better go handle that.  Think you can stop mister fifty-shades of gray reject over there while I handle goliath?”

The man never even batted an eye at the movie reference.  That alone sold me that he was well on his way toward developing a sense of humor.  Hallelujah.  Either that, or he was just getting used to me.  Cross simply gave me a sharp nod and started fighting his way over to where he would intercept Gleason as he circled the new pit in the ground.  I sprinted forward toward the giant ghoul, dodging a heavy punch that turned the zombies that were too slow to get out of the way into hamburger meat.  The monster was too big to get out of the pit, but that didn’t make it any less of a danger.  If anything, it made killing the stupid thing even harder.  I would normally hamstring something this big, then take it apart piece by piece.  Since that wasn’t an option, I had to play whack-a-mole with me filling in for the mole.  Every time I dodged a swing, I took a chunk out of the monster’s arm.  It had those annoyingly sharp bone spurs covering up most of its exposed flesh, making the task even more difficult.

Eventually, the ghoul made a mistake.  It raised a hand to crush me, and one of its bone spurs got caught in the ceiling.  The delay cost it an arm.

“Ass whoopins’ for sale!  Only costs an arm and a leg!”  I cackled in glee as I cast an overpowered wind blade and followed up right behind it, using my spear blade to slide into the elbow joint and remove the limb with a pop.  It made with the angry roars of pain, and I danced out of reach while it flailed around.

I glanced over to check on how Cross was doing, eagerly looking forward to the epic showdown.  The culmination of my redemptive efforts.  The proverbial straw that would break the camel’s back of corruption.  The crescendo of my labor to reach one lone Warden for the betterment of humanity.  The snowflake that would unleash the avalanche of change in this world.  I could even hear the orchestral sound track in my head as Vader confronted the Emperor.  Grinning in anticipation, my eyes landed on the two embattled foes.  The grin slid from my face and into the same confused head tilt of a dog watching its owners doing the horizontal mambo.

They were just… yelling at each other?  What is this shit? A domestic dispute?  Did daddy slap mommy at the dinner table?  Get your shit together guys, and make with the stabbing!  I rolled my eyes in exasperation as I dodged another reckless swing from the ghoul, its brain not computing that it was missing a good four feet of the distorted appendage.

“You were always a disgrace to the Wardens, Cross.  But I can’t believe you would deny the Oracle!”  Gleason halfheartedly snapped his whip at Cross, who dodged it easily.  “I’m going to enjoy showing you what it means to betray your oaths!”

“I’m the disgrace?  You’re barely human!”  Cross tried to dart forward, slashing at Gleason’s leading leg with his sword.  His boosted speed surprised Gleason, but the White Warden’s armor easily deflected the hit.  Cross danced back as the whip cracked through the space where he had stood.  “I’ve heard all about the things you’ve done to people.  The lengths you’ll go just so you can hurt someone.”

“That’s because they deserve it!”  Gleason’s whip cracked out, and this time Cross couldn’t dodge in time.  It cracked across his left forearm, scoring a line of searing pain just short of where he was missing his hand.  “I’m the only one willing to go far enough to dig out the corruption you allow to rot!”

Whatever happened next was between the two of them, because I had to deal with a one-armed giant ghoul that figured out it could pick up its own severed limb and use it like a club.  The good news was the wild swings were easier to dodge, and cleared out any interference from the other undead crowding the basement.  The bad news was it got a lot harder to do any damage to the stupid thing.

I had to use another wind blade to cut the back of the ghoul’s wrist as its arm swung past, cutting deep enough that the momentum caused the joint to give way.  It tore its own hand off, sending the heavy arm it had been using as a club into a cluster of zombies near the stairs.  The ghoul watched the lost limb disappear with a forlorn look on its face, so I used the opportunity to throw my spear through its eye into its brain.  I must have hit something important, because it went limp.  That might sound stupid at first, the spear went through its friggin’ brain after all, but the last super ghoul I’d fought had still stepped up to the plate with half its head missing.  Apparently this one wasn’t in the same caliber.  It must have used all of its ‘super-ness’ on getting big instead of tough.  I was also not prepared for it to die that fast, so I didn’t manage to dodge out of the way when it collapsed forward onto me.

“Umph!”  My breath exploded out of me as the heavy corpse squished me to the floor.  I was stuck under its chest and shoulder, with only my right leg and arm sticking out like a squashed bug.  I immediately tried wiggling myself free, but my armor was caught somewhere on one of the ghoul’s bone spurs.

Of course, that’s when a zombie noticed me and tried to take a chunk out of me, the opportunistic bastards.  The undead creature tried to drop down and bite my face off, so I punched it in the chest.  Even without good leverage, the dry and desiccated animated corpse was dusted.  I looked past the crumbling body and saw Cross wasn’t doing so well against Gleason.  It was looking like it wasn’t going to be a clean breakup.  Damn I hated the clingy types.  I hoped Cross learned his lesson well, you never put your metaphorical religious dick into crazy.

The much better armored White Warden was like a bull, charging at Cross and waiting to see where he dodged before cracking his whip at him.  Cross was bleeding from multiple wounds, mostly across his arms and legs.  The black veins throbbing under his skin leaked a dark sludge that was streaked with his blood.  Cross occasionally got a few hits in, but he was overmatched.  His poor Captain’s Sword was getting wrecked against the enchanted armor protecting Gleason, making it even harder for him to inflict any damage.

Knowing that there were going to be more frisky undead trying to get a piece of me, I doubled down on trying to wiggle myself free.  The awkward position I was in made it way harder than it should have been, so I started to carefully raise earthen spikes under the ghoul, being careful not to stab myself or shift more of its weight onto me.  Just as I was about to get free, I heard Cross shouting.  “No!  James, look out!”

That bitch Gleason had realized that I was the home-wrecker and I was now trapped ass-up in the dryer, and was about to big dick my general vicinity.  I wasn’t about to go out like that.  I pushed harder at the dead weight with both my strength and magic, a thrill of fear and premonition shooting down my spine.  He yanked a medallion of some kind off of his neck, forcing a simply gratuitous amount of mana into the thing, if the sudden influx of energy I felt was any indicator, and lobbed it underhand at me.  Commander Assbutt just stole a page out of my playbook.  The White Warden had just overloaded a high-quality rune device, and it was going to explode.  It seemed to tumble through the air in slow motion, gathering in power as it flew over the hole in the floor.

The moment drew itself out into a sharp, silver-edged thread, as though pulled by fate itself.  Even the trajectory was perfect, the mana straining the failsafes of the rune sequences, more than sufficient for its grim purpose.  My bulging arms were bars of forged titanium as they strained against the weight pinning me.  But it was the weight of the moment that truly held me in thrall.  I shoved mana into the earthen spike spell, pushing the ghoul off of me and slicing a deep cut across my left hip as the bone spur that had caught on my belt was yanked free.  I’d already known the bitter truth from the time the medallion left Gleason’s fingertips, however.  It wouldn’t be enough.

My mind spun with calculations and angles, the vast weight of personal experience working each possibility in the potential of that one moment–and in the end, came up wanting.  A grim determination settled on me even as my focus never diverted from the four and a half rotations the medallion had made in its flight.  I was going to have to–

The broken, bent, and chipped blade of a Captain entered my narrowed vision like a mandate from the heavens, striking the artifact as if to deny the very gods themselves.  Cross’ bloodied and battered body had made a decisive lunge, his movement so fast that he was blurred, even to my superhuman senses.  Unbowed, he struck at Gleason’s surprise attack while a steely resolve furrowed his creased brow, even as he over extended himself, dropping any pretense of defense.

Stunned, I couldn’t do anything but watch as Cross slapped the medallion away in mid-air with his sword, scoring the already strained runes and causing the artifact to explode.  The blast sent him tumbling head over heels, bouncing off of the torso of the ghoul I had finally forced to the side.  I heard the crunch of bone and tearing muscle as he ricocheted away, and came to a sliding stop a few feet away.  Like a morbid bank-shot on the world's worst pool table, the body of the ghoul was forced closer to the sunken pit it had crawled from by the collision, pitching grotesquely as it slowly dropped back into the hole in the ground, disappearing from sight.  I limped over to Cross and grabbed him before we could be swarmed by more undead, dragging him back to where Jess and the others were waiting.  Gleason was immediately forced to fight off a fresh wave of zombies, led by a regular-sized super ghoul that forced him back for the moment.

“Are you two okay?  That was crazy!”  Jess ran over to help me pull him into cover.  “What was that explosion?”

I checked over the unconscious man, seeing that he was in rough shape.  The impact with the ghoul had definitely broken some ribs, and the whip injuries looked pretty bad.  Somehow, he was still holding on to his sword.  I was genuinely impressed.  “That was Cross, making a choice.  Even with my shield bracelet, there’s no guarantees I’d have come out the other side of that explosion in one piece.  Last time, he dove in front of a spear for me, knowing that the big bad guy had been defeated.  He understood me, even then.  Knowing he would be healed.  This time, he didn’t know how this fight would end.”  My voice began to shift in tone, the patterns of speech becoming something more, something old and resonant with power.  “He chose a Path, even though he knew not the way, he found it nonetheless.”  I looked carefully at Cross, and made my decision.  I might regret giving up so much mana all at once in the midst of battle, but I could make it up with a few minutes of uninterrupted focus with my mana generator.

The mantle of my Judge Profession settled heavily on my shoulders, and I grabbed Cross by his empty wrist.  His eyes snapped open, the sudden pain shocking him awake.  “You were judged for violating your conscience.  You chose an easy evil, a wrong action, insteading of making a hard, good, and right decision.  Hiding behind an organization you were a part of to give yourself the ability to justify murder.”  Cross tried to pull away from me, but I didn’t let go.  “The purpose of your punishment was so you could see the error of your ways.  And while there are many methods to fake true repentance, I believe you truly have seen the error of your actions.”

Cross stopped struggling, and didn’t try to pull away as I bit my inner cheek and spit the blood on his stump.  He coughed, trying to clear his abused lungs.  “How do you know I’m not faking it?  That I’m not pretending to have changed?”

“Because, Cross.  You’ve seen both sides of the coin now.  You have judged people in the past, been judged yourself in turn, and didn’t let it break you.”  I drew a circle across the top of his stump with my palm, smearing my blood and spit.  Water and life.  “Then, you did something that showed what is hiding inside yourself.  When you described Gleason, you said ‘he’s everything that’s wrong with them.’  Meaning, you don’t count yourself among ‘them’ anymore.  You went and fought him, giving it your all.  Then, when you were given a choice, you picked the wellbeing of another over yourself.  I don’t know about you, but it doesn’t sound like you belong with the Wardens anymore.  And it just so happens I know an organization that’s very low on members that you can join.”  I waited a moment while he processed what I told him as I readied the ritual.

My eyes were lodestones that gripped and held his, even as the magic took me–the words ancient and not wholly my own.  “Alexander Cross, former Captain of the Western Wardens, the Judged and Redeemed, the Crippled, Lich-Touched, and now, the Worthy.”  I had never even known his first name, the knowledge was suddenly there, provided by the magic of the ceremony.  The mantle of Judge throbbed with power, the swirling ambient mana of the region ebbing as it coalesced around the two of us.  Magic gathered into a primal Working, outside my control.  It was a function of the Old Ways–a magic so fundamental and primordial that its roots ran into the very core of each world I had been sent to.  It was a power so old and deep that the scraps of information I had gained on ancient tablets and sources tucked in dusty corners of elven libraries had hinted that it came from the same place as the gods themselves.  That power–no, that Power–now gathered around Cross in a shroud, and called to him as it had called to me all those years ago.  There weren’t words, but it was a contract and a commandment all the same.  It was a Covenant wrought in the very foundations of existence itself.

I held up my right hand.  “Do you so swear to uphold the tenets of righteousness and justice?  Do you swear to defend the weak and the oppressed, to show grace and mercy towards the innocent?  Do you swear to Judge their oppressors and the unrighteous, and to take up the heavy burdens of responsibility?  Alexander Cross, do you accept the Office of Judge, and all of the inherent authorities, requirements, and privileges therein?”

His eyes widened when he realized what I was offering.  A chance to become a Judge.  The words came to him, the same way they did me.  From elsewhere, and everywhere.  “I make this blood oath of my own free will.  I swear to be a defender of the weak, a guardian to those unable to defend themselves.  I swear to be a warrior for good, a bulwark against those who wish darkness upon the innocent.  I swear to punish the unjust, fairly and without bias.  I swear to balance the scales.  I swear to be a Judge.”  He gave me an almost imperceptible nod right before the mana I had called–but didn’t fully control–rushed into him, flooding his body with healing energy.  Time seemed to slow as I undid what I had before, changing it so his hand could regrow.

The majority of the gathered mana funneled into Cross and broke into uncountable threads that wove their way through his body in a way I couldn’t hope to understand.  The Old Ways were making a Judge.  I focused my attention on what I could control.  His healing.

At first, everything was fine.  His broken bones and various wounds acted normally.  I tried to heal the rest of him while I was working, but the black veins didn’t want to cooperate.  There was immediate resistance from the necromancer’s energy, and I found it impossible to push it out of his body.  As his hand regrew, the dark magic left the rest of his body and funneled into the regrowing flesh.  No matter what I did, I couldn’t force the foreign power from him.  Instead of spending more time duking it out with the black energy, I formed a shell of energy to block it from reentering the rest of Cross’s body, and ensured his own mana would keep it powered.

Figuring out a more permanent cure would have to wait.  As I released him, the still moment that had been created burst like a soap bubble, and I pulled him to his feet as we both had to immediately defend ourselves.  The brief lull was over, and the two of us fought furiously for several seconds before we could speak again.

“What did you do?”  Cross held out his new hand.  It was a solid dull black, as if it drank in any light that touched it.  A perfectly straight line divided normal healthy tissue from the black flesh right below the bend of his wrist.  “It feels cold.”

“I don’t know what happened.  The lich’s power wouldn’t leave, but I managed to lock it all away into your new hand.  Can you use it?”  I watched as he tossed his mangled sword back and forth from one hand to the other, without fumbling it.  “I’ll take that as a yes.”

“There’s no sensation.  It’s numb, but I can still move it.”  Cross rushed forward to kill three more enemies that got into his range.  I noticed his speed wasn’t what it was a few moments ago, but it was still more than normal.  When he came back, he was shaking his new hand.  “It’s going to take some getting used to.”

“Can you cast magic again?”  I saw the realization hit him that his magic might be available to him once more.  He just shrugged.  “Well, try it out.”

“I don’t have my gauntlets.”  Cross saw the look on my face and his mouth closed with a click of teeth, immediately giving up on getting his old gear back.  He flicked his wrist, casting what I recognized as his slapping spell.  The nearest zombie that was trying to make its way between earthen spikes got folded like a paper airplane, dropping to the ground with a crunch.  We both looked at each other with pikachu-surprised face.  “Yes, I can do magic again.”

“I’d say so.  Looks like someone got an upgrade.”  I looked carefully at Cross’s hand, and noticed that the pristine line separating the dark and light skin wasn’t quite as defined.  Him using magic must have disrupted the power keeping it separated from the rest of his body.  “Although, you might want to hold off on too many spells until we understand for sure what’s going on with you.”

Cross immediately saw what I was talking about and quickly agreed.  We then had to fight off another group of zombies and one more vampire.  I looked back and saw that Leedy and the others were looking tired, but they were still in the fight.  After healing Cross, my energy levels were barely below a quarter, right at the threshold of where I wanted to be to handle the lich.

The undead I could see still numbered in the high hundreds, but the piles of corpses were making it more difficult to tell.  In that regard, the lich was actually helping us.  His eldritch power would occasionally flash out, devouring the defeated to empower those still able to fight.  If he hadn’t been doing that, we might not have been able to move just from the sheer weight of bodies.

The White Warden was dealing with that exact issue at the moment.  He was bogged down less than fifty yards away, but couldn’t get any closer due to how crowded it was around him.  His whip was certainly effective at taking down the undead.  That didn’t make it a bulldozer capable of pushing stuff out of the way.  If I was going to fight Gleason myself, I would have to go to him.

“Cross, take this.”  I handed him my spear.  His sword was barely better than a strip of dull metal by this point.  “Try not to break it.”  He gave me a nod and I turned to the others.  “Hey, I’m going to block off your side.  You three come help Cross hold this side while I fight the other guy.”

A quick spell later and we were all bunched up on the only open side of a cube.  Everyone was amazed at Cross’s new hand, but there wasn’t time to explain much.  Jess grabbed me by the arm before I could leave the relative safety of our little fort.  “James, be careful.  The White Wardens have a reputation of being tough for a reason.  You saw what he did to Cross.”

“I’ll be fine.  You just hold the line.”  I pulled free of her grip.  “This won’t take long.”  I planted my foot against an earthen spike and drew both my ninjato and mace.  The familiar weight of the weapons felt comforting, and mana unconsciously danced along the mace before sparking over to the ninjato where it was absorbed.

I used the earthen spike as a springboard to launch myself toward Gleason, bowling over the undead in my way.  My shield bracelet almost immediately overloaded, shattering at the multitude of impacts.  The gap I had made closed up behind me, but I was already within striking distance of Gleason.  It took him a moment to comprehend what had just happened, which gave me enough time to hit him with an uppercut from my mace.  It caught him in the breastplate, flipping the Warden onto his back with a heavy thud.  His breath exploded out of him, and he struggled to get back to his feet.  “Commander Gleason, I presume?  You and I have a few things to discuss.”

That was the exact moment the flickering aura finally gave out completely.  The undead rushed me with a vengeance, and I was forced to defend myself with my full concentration.  Just because I was super strong and fast didn’t mean I couldn’t be overwhelmed by huge numbers.  The strongest human ever was still only an even match for an average vampire.  While I had broken the shackles of the strongest human, I still had limits.  The prolonged fighting was beginning to wear on even my enhanced strength and endurance.

I lost sight of Gleason for a moment, until the Warden erupted from the crowd with a flurry of sweeping whip swings.  He managed to catch me across the back of my left arm with the tip of his whip on a backswing I underestimated, and I almost dropped my sword from the sudden shock of pain.  His weapon packed a real punch.

“Mired in the filth of the plague of undead?  It’s no wonder why the Oracle wants you dead.”  Gleason cast a spell that was enhanced by his armor, and his speed doubled.  He blurred forward, but his long whip was hindered by the surging undead.  My shorter weapons didn’t have that problem, so I stabbed at his leading leg with my ninjato as my mace blocked his swinging arm.  Surprisingly, the magic-eating sword didn’t penetrate right away.  “Just as the disgraced Captain Cross learned, you are no match for the ancestral armor of the Gleason Family.  It has been improved for generations, and–”  The tip of the sword finally ate through whatever was blocking it, and the strength of my arm allowed it to puncture straight into his leg.

“I’m going to make you pay for what you did to those werebears, asshole.”  I twisted the sword before ripping it free, tearing an even bigger hole in his armor.  He staggered back, where a super ghoul was waiting to grab him.  It tried to bite through his neck armor, but Gleason’s family actually had done a good job at reinforcing it.  I killed a vampire and some zombies that tried to grab me as well, just in time for Gleason to break free of the ghoul and kill it with his whip.  I set myself, flinging gore off of my weapons.  With a growl, the two of us rushed at one another, and light flashed in the darkness as his whip cracked.

Trying to trap Gleason, I held my sword out from my body to make it an easy target.  He took the bait, his whip snapping out and wrapping around it as he tried to yank it from my grip.  Lightning danced along the edge of the blade where it met the whip, and he quickly pulled it free before his weapon was destroyed.  He was an idiot, anyway.  Anytime you’re in plate armor, you should be more concerned with blunt weapons.  Like, say, a mace.

I could tell Gleason had been trained to use a shield, because he reflexively lifted his arm to block my mace.  He wasn’t using a shield, so my hit crunched into his elbow hard enough to move his whole body sideways about six inches.  The sudden pain and whiplash stunned him, so I hit him again, this time aiming for his thigh.  I really put some mustard on it, and I heard his femur snap as his armor buckled against my full strength.  The runes seemed to be more for magical and piercing attacks than blunt damage, so I took full advantage.

He dropped to the ground with a scream of agony.  To give the guy some credit, he managed to whip me across the face in his fall.  It caught me right under the chin and followed my jaw line all the way to my ear.  The cut burned like it was on fire, but my Vigor stat was already fighting against it.  A twisted and malignant magic infected the cut, making the pain spike excruciatingly.  It was a disgusting use of magic that could only belong to a sadist.  I swiped a finger across the wound, concentrating as I cast a quick spell that cut off sensation around the wound, undercutting the magic at its foundation and not giving the spell any handhold to execute its dark work.  His whip being imbued with this spell in particular reaffirmed Gleason’s position as a bug that needed stepping on.  It also made me want to rip his head off with my bare hands as I imagined its use on the mayor and his family.  A healing spell later would make sure I didn’t have a scar.

I had to kill some more undead that had closed in before I could do anything else, but when there was another brief lull I stood over the top of Gleason and met his eyes through the gap in his helm.  “I would normally go through a long spiel about how I’m a Judge, and it’s my job to punish those who do wrong.”  My mace rose and fell, crushing the femur of his other leg.  His scream of pain was cut off when I slapped him with the flat of my sword blade.  “Considering the situation, I don’t think all of that is necessary.  I’ll just skip to the end, where I sentence you to death for being an absolute piece of shit.”  Two more quick blows and both of his forearms were shattered.  “I should leave you like this and let the undead finish you off, but I don’t have the time to make sure they do it right.”  I stood up and readied my mace to crush his skull, which was more merciful than the little rat deserved.

“No!”  Gleason flailed around, trying to stop me.  “It can’t end like this!  I was meant for more!”

“You were meant to be a protector, fuckstick.  Instead, you became a nightmare to the people you were supposed to protect.  Try to do better in your next life.”  I raised my mace over my head, but before I could swing it down the floor under him gave way.  Meaty tentacles from some undead abomination reached up from the sub basement, forcing me to scramble back so I didn’t join him.  His screams disappeared as he was dragged away into the darkness below.  “Okay, I guess that works too.”  I gave a shrug and my mantle faded into the background.

More cracks were forming, showing the places where the sub basement had been dug out by the undead.  Over by the stairs, I saw a group of White Wardens fighting.  They weren’t making much progress, and seemed to have a denser mix of vampires than my group did at the rear of the basement.  It was definitely time for us to get out of there.  This was no place for the living.

Wandering Warrior: Judge - Prologue

Prologue

Magical flames crackled in the fireplace, casting harsh unnatural blue light across the room.  They lacked any heat, but that made no difference to the inhabitants of the chamber.  Arched windows overlooked beautiful snow capped mountains, where no human had stepped foot in living memory.  The altitude made it impossible to survive for long, the air too thin to support life.  Unnatural creatures that called the barren mountaintops home would have cut short any expeditions foolish enough to try.

Four figures huddled over a table covered in maps.  They were unnaturally still, despite the chill.  A living person would shiver uncontrollably if they were subjected to such extremes, but the four had long since left such trappings behind long ago.

“Sir, the battle at the second entrance resulted in a cave-in.  We don’t have a way to get through in time.”  The speaker was the shortest of the four, but he was as broad as any two of the others combined.  A thick, pale finger shifted a wooden flag on the map several inches.  “If our team repositions to the third entrance, there’s still a chance.  It’s a longer route, but we know the way is clear.”

The lone woman of the group picked up the pair of wooden flags in the center of the map the group was focused on.  Her long silver hair reflected the blue firelight, giving her an ephemeral appearance that carried more weight than her slight stature would suggest.  “It seems to me there’s no point in throwing more troops at a lost cause.  We overplayed our hand, and the demons took advantage.”  Setting them to the side, she pointed at a map that had been shoved off to the side.  It showed a large city surrounded by smaller villages, with population numbers scrawled in the margins.  “We can replace our losses in a few weeks, and try again.”

It isn’t that easy.  The third speaker was almost skeletal, barely more than skin and bones, wearing a worn, moth-eaten robe.  Instead of an actual voice, its words entered the minds of those around it like an insidious whisper straight from a nightmare.  Their eyes glowed with a green eldritch fire that scorched the sunken sockets of its skull.  Handing them pitchforks and wood axes won’t be enough.  He motioned to the short figure.  Even the Duergar can’t produce weapons and armor at the type of speeds you’re asking for, and opening a portal to their world already costs more than you’re willing to pay.  You’re talking about throwing away our best-equipped units like it’s nothing, and I for one won’t–

Off to the side of the room, a rune-encrusted marble orb carved to mimic a globe on a wooden stand started to grow warm, giving off wisps of steam in the chilly air.  The fourth figure, who had yet to speak, snapped his head around the moment he noticed the change.  All conversation cut off, and the man slowly walked over to observe the device.

“What’s happening?  Are the demons making another incursion?”  The woman took a tentative step backward, putting the skeletal figure between herself and the magical artifact.

“No.  This is something different.”  The man concentrated, holding out a hand and nearly touching the surface of the globe.  “It feels like a portal is being opened somewhere on our continent, but not like anything I’ve encountered before.  Perhaps a new faction making themselves known.”  His voice was deep and resonant, which matched his classic noble features and proper attire.  While he watched, a portion of land started to glow.  The heat was causing the runes on the globe to deform, and the man hissed in annoyance, displaying elongated canines.  “Someone is interfering with the location spell.  The runes can’t lock on to where it’s opening.”  His frustration caused his composure to slip, and the force he contained within himself made the other three in the room shift in discomfort.  He held up a hand, quickly forming a series of symbols that left lines of vibrant red light in the cold air.  “We’ll see if they know what they stand against.”

As the vampire’s spell finished, it drifted toward the globe.  The moment it touched, a catastrophic reaction resulted in an explosion that obliterated the orb, blowing out the windows in the room and allowing the arctic air to blast through the chamber, throwing the whole area into disarray and extinguishing the magical fire.

“Milord!”  The shortest of the four ambled forward, afraid that the man had been destroyed in the spell backlash.  As the smoke cleared, and the winds scoured clean the room, the noble was still standing.  A faint red shield surrounded him, shooting out sparks that scorched the stone floor, as if they were a direct reflection of his anger.  “You-you’re okay?”

“I guess they knew what they were doing, wouldn’t you say?  Using a fixed runespell in place of a willpowered conjuration was foolish.”  The woman’s smirk was laced with equal parts humor and scorn.  Her elegant features were revealed to be cruel by her twisted smile.  She displayed a set of elongated canines almost as fierce as the noble’s.  “What are you going to do for an encore?  Perhaps destroy our stronghold below?  Collapse the cavern holding my ship?”  She tapped her lips with a perfect finger.  “I know.  You could challenge the dragon to single combat again, since that worked so well last time.  I’m sure the demon hordes would love to cheer the two of you on.”

The noble snapped his fingers, dismissing the shield.  His displeasure at the woman’s sharp words were ignored as he focused on the more pressing issue.  “This is direct interference from the other side.  We have to answer this incursion immediately.  A new set of interests can’t be allowed to intrude at such a… delicate time.”  He pointed at the skeletal figure.  “The spatial distortion is located nearest to your territory, and you will enforce my will.”

What would you have me do?  The skeletal figure took a few steps to separate himself from the other two.  He had been singled out, and didn’t want to squander the opportunity this represented.

The noble looked at the table where his maps had been before the wind had blown them away, and waved his hand.  An exact carving of the lands far to the south quickly took shape in the expensive wood, and the two stepped close to look over it.  “I wasn’t able to pinpoint the exact location, but the portal must’ve opened somewhere near here.  Flood the region in undead.  Twist the living to our purpose, if you see fit.  Force whoever this is into the open.  And when you do, end their interference however you prefer.”  The skeletal figure turned to leave, but was stopped by the heavy hand of the vampire on its bony shoulder.  “As I said, however you see fit.  But they will meet their end.  Or you will.”

It will be as you say, Destitute.  The green fires left the eyes of the skeletal figure, and flew out of the open window as the now inanimate body collapsed into dust.  The noble figure, known as the Destitute, turned back to the other two still in the room with him.  There were more immediate issues that needed to be resolved.

Wandering Warrior: Judge - Chapter 7 (Revised)

Chapter 7

“Commander Gleason, I think he’s fallen unconscious again.”  The man wearing the uniform of the White Wardens, the investigative division dedicated to rooting out criminals violating the laws set forth by the guilds no matter where they might hide, dropped the mundane leather whip he was holding and glared at the man who had spoken to him.

“Do I need to explain everything to you?  Have the healers look him over.  I want answers, and he’s not allowed to die before I have them.”  Gleason waved his hand in irritation at the sergeant who was assisting him for the day.  “No, don’t untie him, idiot!  Bring the healer here.  I want him alive, not given relief.”

Chastised, the Warden rushed off, leaving the bleeding man tied to the post where he had been for the past several hours.  Gleason was relentless when he suspected a man of wrongdoing, and wouldn’t stop until he found the truth he was looking for.  The prisoner should feel lucky, despite his reluctance to confess.  At least he wasn’t using his enchanted weapons.  The training yard he was using at the moment near the front gate made it more difficult to interrogate prisoners, but his usual location was under renovations after the last… incident that occurred.  His temper had gotten the best of him, leading to a few walls needing repairs.

“Making more friends, I see.”  Gleason looked up to see the only Warden in the city who might have the slightest chance at matching him in power besides the Commandant.  The man was on horseback, wearing the uniform of a Blue Warden, with the armor and rank of a captain.  “Don’t you tire of beating on innocent civilians and ordering around underlings, Gleason?  You should join me outside the city on a hunt some time.  It might do you good to fight a real monster or two for once.”

“Innocent?”  Gleason snorted in derision.  “This man is a member of a conspiracy dedicated to undercutting the Potters Guild.  Does the starving families of hundreds of potters seem so trivial to you, Captain Cross?”

“I’m not trying to do your job, Commander.  All I’m saying is that getting out of the city would broaden your horizons about the threats we face.”  The Blue Warden shrugged and turned to leave.  “It’s your choice, of course.  Anyway, I’ll leave you to your work.  The Commandant has me on a special mission, so I best be off.”

Gleason’s brow furrowed.  “A special mission?  Why would the Commandant select you over me for something like that?”  After all, Gleason knew he was the better choice.  He could perform more powerful magic, and had won far more duels in both the Hunters Guild and Warden tournaments.

“I’m not supposed to talk about it.”  Captain Cross put a gentle heel to his horse, sending it walking slowly toward the nearby gate.  “This isn’t exactly a secure area to speak of such things.”

Not one to give up so easily, Gleason kept pace with the Blue Warden’s horse.  “Look around.  No one is foolish enough to listen in on one of my private conversations.  They wouldn’t dare.”  Of course, a quick glance proved him right.  Not a single person was close enough to eavesdrop.  “You might as well tell me.  I’ll find out anyway.”

Captain Cross winced, thinking of the things the Commander might do to uncover a secret he wanted to learn.  “Fine.  I was requested specifically by the Oracle.  There’s a new threat that has cropped up, and I was chosen to put it down, no matter the cost.  I’ve had word from some of my men that have pointed me in the right direction, and now I’m going to take care of it.”

Gleason stumbled, almost tripping over his own feet.  “The Oracle requested you, over me?”  The Blue Warden nodded his head in acknowledgement, and Gleason could feel his heartbeat in his ears.  “I suppose I should wish you well.  Trinity’s blessings make your path easy.”

“Thanks.”  Captain Cross raised a hand in farewell, spurring his horse onward.  “I’ll tell you how it goes when I return.”

“You do that!”  Gleason waved, the smile on his face not reaching his eyes.  Once the Blue Warden was out of sight, he turned back to the yard where his prisoner was still tied up.  The healer had finished applying some salves, and was standing off to the side where his sergeant was waiting.

As Gleason approached, the sergeant stepped forward to speak with him.  “Commander, the healer said–”

Brushing past the Warden, Gleason picked up the blood-encrusted whip off the ground.  As he unfurled it, words of Captain Cross ran through his head, causing rage to bubble up in his chest.  Why would the Oracle not choose him, the strongest of the White Wardens?  Why wouldn’t the Commandant want his best on a mission to put down a threat that warranted the attention of the Trinity?  Had he not proven himself, time and time again?  Was there more he needed to do?  What more did the gods demand?  Did he need to–

“Commander!”  Gleason looked over to see his sergeant had grabbed his arm, stopping him from swinging.  When had he started whipping the prisoner again?  “Commander, I-I think he’s dead.  You can stop now.”

The courtyard was covered in blood and gore.  Streaks of it ran across his white robes, staining its pristine appearance.  Both the sergeant and healer looked at Gleason with fear in their eyes.  His prisoner was barely recognizable as human.  He looked like he had been shredded in an animal attack.  Taking a deep breath, Gleason let go of the whip and freed himself from the sergeant’s grasp.

“Clean this up.  I need to change.”  As Gleason left the courtyard, he stopped and glanced back at the sergeant.  “On second thought, toss the body to the side, but leave it in plain sight.  Then, bring in the next one.  His brother, I think.  I still need to know who else is in their group.”

Gleason wouldn’t let such a minor setback stop him from completing his mission, especially now that he knew he still had to prove his fidelity to the Trinity, and prove himself he would.  One evil criminal’s pound of flesh at a time.

May 2023 Update (Read this first!)

Hi everyone! Well, Wandering Warrior: Judge is done.  It had to go through some major developmental editing, which is what I have been doing these past few weeks. Introducing the 'big bad guy' as the lich in the last third of the book was too long of a wait, so it was necessary to change some things by doing a prologue.  I also had a bit of an epiphany.  While Wandering Warrior is a GameLit story, it isn't a normal progression fantasy.  James doesn't really have a true progression arc, or a redemption arc.  He does have a maturation story arc, which usually fits the mold of a different genre like mystery or the occasional high fantasy.  The character who *does* get a progression arc is Cross.  That means I needed to change up their interactions a bit, and introduce Gleason and Cross earlier as well.  I ended up adding a new Chapter 7, so it will look like you are missing a chapter but you really aren't, the rest just got bumped one.  The final version will have a few interactions between James and Cross being less harsh, and more of a mentor/student vibe in the later parts of the book.  Because, ultimately, that's what this series is.  It's the first person perspective of the mentor for the judges that are created on each of the worlds James leaves behind.  I'll be dropping all of the new chapters as well as the ending here in just a bit.  Like I said, the chapter numbers will be a little wonky, but it should all make sense if you read this first.

After some very extensive research by myself and several others, there are exactly zero other books like it in the genre at the moment, (first person perspective on a mentor character), so I'm taking a big risk with this story.  But, for a fever dream that turned into something that I came to really love, I'm very happy with it.  I really hope you all do too.  It's either going to make big waves, or flop hardcore.  That's why I agreed to sign this series with Legion Publishing and do the audio through Tantor, so I can get a larger advance up front and let them absorb the risk.  I won't see the same level of profit on the back end if I had done it another way, but considering my current situation the sure bet is the way I need to go.  With my wife's current health concerns, paying off my house as quickly as possible is the smart choice, even if I lose money over the next ten years.  That level of stability will really help with her stress levels, and the lower I can keep them the better.  (That might be oversharing a bit, but in case you couldn't tell I'm a pretty open person.)  It also means I now have a hard deadline for when Jury and Executioner are due for Wandering Warrior, since Tantor is giving me the money up front.  That means my priorities have to be with James, Jess, Murphy, Leedy, and Cross for the next several months.  They don't mess around, and I need to get them done with plenty of time to spare.

Anyway, I hope all of you have a fantastic rest of the month, and be sure to let me know what you think about the end of Judge!

Michael.

Wandering Warrior: Judge - Chapter 38

Chapter 38

We only had a moment’s warning that more undead were coming, when a rain of pebbles dropped from the hole we had just fallen through.  The first thing that came through was a zombie that was little more than a skeleton, and the fall caused it to shatter into pieces.  Jess backed away from the new avenue of attack, cornering herself in the back of the room.  Murphy followed, killing the next creature that fell through the hole by lopping its head off before it could even fully stand.  It had either been a young vampire or a fresh zombie, but in this case it didn’t matter much.

“Should I do it?”  Jess had the plank of wood held behind her, out of sight of the lich.  “There aren’t as many as we thought there were going to be.”

“Wait until the right moment.  You’ll know it when you see it.”  I gave her a thumbs up for encouragement, and twisted my yari spear, snapping free the blade.  “It’s time to make this bastard pay.”  A vampire came flying out of the darkness at me, so I used a flick of my wrist to help boost its jump straight into the burning pit of flames.  A certain Johnny Cash song popped in my head, and I chuckled as I focused back on my main target.

Somehow, Cross had managed to get in front of the lich before I could, his sword at the high ready.  His stump was held out to his side, helping to balance him like a professional fencer.  “You were in my head, creature.  I demand payment for this injustice.”  I had to give the one-armed bandit some credit.  He certainly still had both huevos.

Yes, I suppose I should have left you better off than when I arrived.  It’s poor form for a visitor to leave a mess, even if it was for a short while.  The lich waved a bony hand, and a bolt of pure darkness shot out of his fingers.  Cross managed to mostly dodge it, catching a glancing blow on his breastplate.  His sword slashed downward, clanging off the lich’s forearm bones as if they were made of steel.  The possessed skeleton grabbed Cross by the groin, picking him straight up off the ground and throwing him over his shoulder where he bounced across the ground twice before going still.  Never mind about the both huevos thing I guess.  A follow-up bolt of darkness from the lich caught him in the back, and Cross jerked in pain.

While they were fighting, the rest of us hadn’t been idle.  Leedy had been killing everything that tried dropping through the hole, while Jess and Murphy were fighting off the lone burning flesh amalgamation that had made it out of the pit.  I was closing in on the lich while beating off the occasional vampire that showed itself, and by beating off I meant violently dismembering.

“Hey, Sparky, why don’t you pick on someone your own size?”  I cast a bolt of lightning empowered by my mana generator, and it seemed to have an effect.  A pair of ribs got blown off, and it looked like the fires in the lich’s eyes weren’t burning quite as bright.  “Glad I could get your attention.  You know, I’ve got a nine volt battery I think you would really get along with.  Maybe you just need to meet someone to bring out the best in you.”

I think I’ve changed my mind about the pleasant dreamscape.  Instead, I will be removing your fingernails for eternity.

The lich grabbed for my throat, trying to subdue me.  I had to admit, he was fast.  But I was faster.  I dodged the grasping hand, and stomp kicked his knee the wrong direction.  If it had been a living person, that would have ended the fight rather quickly.  Instead, it only made the lich stumble back into a pile of rubble.

“You know, Sparky, things would go a lot easier if I knew where your phylactery was hiding.”  I cast an earth spell, holding out my pinky in a sweeping motion and forcing the stone to enclose around him like a cage.  It struggled for a moment, but it was quickly obvious there was no escape with me standing in front of it.  “I would make things go way quicker for you.  Even with your threats, I promise, it won’t even hurt very much.”

I didn’t want to do this, vessel.  Your unwillingness to understand your position has forced my hand.  Just know, the results of this day rest on your head.  The green fires of its eyes flashed, and what we had thought were solid walls fell away, revealing undead packed together so tightly that they had shown up on my delving spell as solid material.  An enemy force that numbered in the hundreds now counted in the thousands.  I was looking at generations of people the lich had dug up and enslaved for his army, and it pissed me off.

“Jess, now!”  My warning shout was unnecessary, since Jess and Murphy had been backed up against two of the walls that had just come down.  They were already neck deep in angry undead, and only Murphy’s furious fighting and Jess managing to cast earthen wall spells had kept them alive long enough for her to place the piece of wood on a flat section of the floor.

When the spell activated, the difference between wood and fabric was immediately noticeable.  Instead of a dense fog focused on the immediate area, a gray haze covered the entire underground space, blanketing it in a light coating of heavy oppression.  Even the lich seemed cowed, trying to double over in his stone cage.

“Now’s our chance!”  Leedy was the first to capitalize on the opportunity, rapidly maximizing his time available by removing the heads of everything within reach of his sword.  “Kill them all while you can!”

Everyone exploded into action, taking out as many undead as they could.  It was obvious to me almost immediately that it was no use.  Even with thirty minutes, we wouldn’t be able to kill the lich’s army of undead with conventional means.  We were going to have to retreat and do it some other way.  The distraction did give me a chance to check on Cross, who had miraculously been left alone after getting manhandled by the lich.

A quick inspection showed me his body had been infected by the necrotic energy the lich had used.  Considering we were still in the middle of a battle, I couldn’t completely empty my mana in an attempt to heal him.  Instead, I focused on just getting him back in the fight.  A quick pulse of healing energy with a circle on his forehead was enough to make his eyes flutter open.

“You back in it?”  I saw his eyes focus on my face, and Cross grimaced in pain before giving me a sharp nod.  “Good, because we need you.”

“Help me up.”  I pulled him back to his feet and Cross wobbled a bit before standing firm.  “I’m good.”  He definitely wasn’t, as I could see the veins of necrotic energy pulsing under his skin.

“Okay man, you go for it!”  I put his sword in his hand and slapped him on his back, sending him stumbling toward a horde of zombies.  He turned the stumble into a charge, and was quickly chopping off heads and limbs like a pro.  I’m sure he’d be fine.

Your struggles are pointless.  It’s only a matter of time until you and your friends are overwhelmed.  If you give yourself to me now, I will allow your friends the opportunity to join my army as something more than just the fodder that you see before you now.

“I have an idea.  How about you shut your bitch-ass up?”  I channeled my mana and worked a slab of kinetic energy into a certain slapping spell I’d seen Cross perform once before, and that I had practiced once or twice in my free time.  The nearly translucent form of a hand manifested as the spell bitch slapped the lich across the face hard enough to knock his bottom jaw loose.  It was every bit as satisfying as I hoped it would be.  The lich’s jaw dangled free by a strip of flesh, swinging back and forth like a macabre metronome.  “Too bad that won’t actually keep you quiet.”

There is nothing you can do against me.  None of your magic can do me permanent harm, and since I am not a fool, my phylactery isn’t anywhere nearby.  Even if you defeat me here, for an immortal it is but a temporary setback.  It is only a matter of time until you–

An explosion rang out from up above, stunning us both.  We looked at one another carefully, gauging if the other was responsible.  “That wasn’t either of us, was it?”  The lich shook its head, and I jumped to my feet, casting a spell to reinforce the stone prison trapping the skeleton.  Its struggles intensified now that there were party crashers, but my mana was still too densely layered in the stone for it to break free.  While it fought to get loose, the lich must have ordered a sizable portion of its forces to go up and battle whatever had come to visit, because the back ranks of the horde disappeared into the darkness.

There was another explosion, and a scream from up above told me it was at least a human in persuasion that was invading, and from the sounds of it, there were a lot more than just one.  Leedy and Cross were already closing in on the wooden plank where Jess and Murphy were fighting, so I moved to join them.

It was as good a place as any to make our stand.  Either the new person or persons would get killed and we would end up facing the rest of the undead, the undead would get wiped out and we would make some new friends, or the undead would be unalived for good and we would fight some new and exciting enemies.  Either way, we were in for a long evening.  The basement walls getting ripped out made the entire structure unstable, and any overly destructive spells would certainly bring the building down on our heads.  We would need to wear them down slowly, as long as our stamina could hold out.  No matter what happened, I still had to make sure my mana stayed above a quarter of my total reserves.  I still had a date with Sparky, and there was no way I was taking a rain check.

“Focus on the bloodsuckers!”  Jess cast her version of stone dart, taking a vampire through the eye.  “They’re still weak from the aura!”

Now that I could focus on the fodder, I realized how many vampires there actually were.  Under the influence of the aura, they weren’t moving around much better than the zombies.  There were a couple of elder vampires herding groups of their brethren forward onto our blades, so I targeted them first.  A couple of surprise flame darts didn’t finish them off, but it certainly distracted them from helping.

The four men stood back-to-back, with Jess standing in the middle.  She cast her stone darts over our shoulders as fast as she could, keeping anything from flanking us.  Our weapons worked with practiced efficiency, and I cut down undead by the dozens.  The blade of my spear was a blur as it cut through anything that dared walk in front of me.

I was just starting to feel like we were making progress, and everyone else seemed to notice that the density of enemies was easing off, when the aura helping to slow down the undead flickered.  The only thing the lich could move was its head, and it swiveled its broken skull to look at me.

It’s almost time.  You won’t believe the things we can accomplish together.  If you would only acquiesce to the inevitable, you would see that this isn’t such a bad thing for you.

“Right back at you, bub.”  I cast another fireball at the center of the basement for emphasis, providing us with more light and taking out another wave of reinforcements before they could close in.

As if to answer, another fireball, this one more red than my blue, flew down the stairs on the opposite side of the basement.  It splashed over the stone steps like water, washing away the undead like they were sandcastles built too close to the waterline.  It was the closest thing to napalm I had seen since world five, where I had gained my Alchemist Profession and had actually seen some used to clear out Creeping Reaper Vines.

“Commander, down here!”  The first person down the stairs was a Warden dressed in a similar style to what I had first seen Cross, Leedy, and Murphy wearing, but he was in all white instead of blue.  He had the unfortunate luck to run into the aura our artificial core was producing, and immediately dropped to his knees before tumbling down the stairs into the fire.  Oops.

Cross immediately turned to shut off the device, but I held out the butt of my spear to block him.  “Not yet.  We’ve still got a few minutes left.  Kill as many as you can while it still lasts.”

He was furious with me, but gave me a quick nod before getting back into the fight.  There hadn’t been time to tell him about the werebear family, or perhaps seeing another member of his Guild die reminded him that he was supposed to kill me.  Either way, he wasn’t opposed to killing more undead.

The rest of us redoubled our efforts, doing our best to thin out the undead as much as possible while we still held the advantage.

Considering the situation, I started letting loose a little more with my spells.  I tried to keep them small, using things like wind blades to extend the attacks with my spear, and earthen spikes to shape the battlefield to our advantage for when the aura finally dropped.

When it started flickering, the fight quickly got more dangerous.  It was hard to predict the jerking attacks of the faster zombies, and the vampires were smart enough to start using the brief moments of unrestricted movement to actually throw zombies at us.

“Get closer!”  I quickly erected two walls to either side of us, only leaving two directions to defend.  With both Murphy and I using polearms, the thrown enemies weren’t as much of a problem.  The spikes I had placed earlier made it harder for them to flat out rush us, so Cross stood with me to cover the front while Leedy and Jess joined Murphy in the back.  “If it gets too rough, let me know and I’ll close up this side too.  We’ll be trapped, but we can focus all our strength on one side.”

“Don’t worry about us, you just handle yourselves!”  Murphy’s halberd chopped into a particularly juicy zombie, slamming it off to the side where Leedy could finish it off.  “We’ve got this.”

I looked over at Cross, who was somehow moving even faster than when we had started.  “How are you feeling?”  The black veins that covered his body throbbed with his heartbeat, strong and steady despite the situation.  “You don’t look so good.”

“I… I feel better than good.”  Cross took two quick steps forward and cut a vampire’s head off with a flawless rising draw cut.  He was so fast, the undead creature couldn’t even attempt a dodge even with the flickering death aura.  A single jump backward and he was in position next to me again.  “See?”

“Yeah, I definitely see.”  I reached out a hand to try and diagnose him but a shout from the stairs stopped me cold.

“James Holden!”  A man wearing plate armor covered by an immaculate white robe was standing there looking straight at me.  At least, I thought he was looking at me.  It was dark, and he was wearing a helm, but I was pretty sure.  He cracked a whip that exploded the head of another vampire that tried to charge him up the stairs, and somehow still managed to remain spotless.  “I’ve been ordered by the gods to come and kill you.”

“You’re going to have to go back up top and check in with reception to get a number.”  I gestured at the undead.  “There’s a line, and these guys were here first.”

The lich poked his head up again, looking between the two of us.  Oh my.  Things just got interesting…

Wandering Warrior: Judge - Chapter 37

Chapter 37

We made it to the cheese factory well before dark, but the heavy clouds made it seem otherwise.  It couldn’t have been much past four in the afternoon, yet everyone except Jess and I were nearly stumbling around in the dark.  She had stayed back with Murphy and Cross while Leedy and I had moved up to check the front of the long stone building.

“I don’t like this.”  Leedy was crouched next to me in the tall grass next to the hut that had once served as the guard house to the facility.  “I know the sun is hiding behind those clouds, but it won’t matter much to the vampires.”

“Don’t bet on it.”  I looked to the west, where I knew the sun had to be.  “Maybe a younger vampire can run around, but an elder vampire is sensitive to even the slightest ultraviolet radiation.  They aren’t going to get fried by a full moon or anything, but direct rays, even through heavy clouds, will cook them up like a bucket straight out of a Kentucky Fried drive through.”

Leedy looked at the side of my head, probably trying to see if my brains were leaking out of my ears or not.  “I swear, half of what you say is pure nonsense.”

“You’re not wrong.”  I shucked my pack and leaned it up against the building, making sure it was out of sight.  We had both already seen that the only entrance on the front side of the building was blocked off by an overturned wagon, meaning we needed to find an alternate way inside.  “Tell everyone else to drop their stuff off here, and I’ll swing around the south side while you all swing north.  We meet on the back side and plan our entry from there.”

He gave me a thumbs up and the two of us split apart.  I stayed low, keeping below the top of the grass.  I had almost completely maximized my perception, making it easy to see where I was going.  It was also easy to smell the scent of old blood and rotten meat, mingled with rotten milk.  Time to dial back the ol’ sense of smell a bit, before I went nose blind to the funk.  Not that it would have been a bad thing, but I didn’t want to rob myself of an early warning system if I didn't have to.  What I wasn’t getting a lot of was noise.  Either the stone walls were incredibly thick, there wasn’t anything inside, or they knew we were here.  Given the smell and my luck, it was definitely the last option.

I had to wait a good five minutes for the others to catch up with me on the opposite side.  It had given me enough time to spot three likely places we could enter, which made all of them bad choices.  A large empty window frame, a set of double doors warped open by age and neglect, and a smaller door on the western side that looked to still be in working condition.  The five of us grouped up behind a pile of rusted out milk containers less than fifty feet from the largest entrance at the rear.  I laid out what I had seen, and we quickly agreed on one thing.

“It’s definitely a trap.”  Murphy peeked through the containers at the double doors before ducking back down.  “There’s no way that’s not a trap.  They want us to go in there.”

Cross pointed the way they had come.  “We saw another window on the side that’s been boarded up.  We could go in there.”  He looked at the open window near the double doors.  “Not that it’s a better option.”

“Why don’t we just throw spells at them until they have to come outside and face us?  We could use bigger spells, coordinate attacks, and keep from getting overwhelmed or cornered.  Wouldn’t that be easier?”  Jess looked around at us, obviously confused as to why we hadn’t already just said so.  “Am I missing something?”

“It’s as good a plan as any, Jess.  There’s only one problem.”  I held out my hand in an upside down ‘V’ and prepared the delving spell that I had used on the well back in the quarantined village.  One cast, and I could already tell that there was an extensive underground area.  “There’s a big basement, and I think they’ve expanded it.  They can just retreat down there and wait for us to run out of spells.”

“You’re assuming they’re smart enough to do that.”  Leedy tapped his nose at me.  “Not every enemy makes good decisions.”

“But to hope for their stupidity is to plan for failure.”  Cross pointed at me.  “We all know the best plan is for you to send in a big spell and set off whatever ambush is prepared for us.  The rest of us can fight what comes out.  After that, we go in and clean up what’s left.”

I shook my head.  “I don’t think a full-frontal attack on a lich is the best option.  Well, it is, but we need to be more surgical.  It would be better to create our own entrance by punching a hole through the ceiling all the way to the basement, and take on the strongest enemy while we’re at our best.  The vampires won’t be able to run while the sun is out, so after the lich is gone we focus on them.  Zombies, ghouls, and whatever else can get mopped up after we’re done with the greater undead.”

“And how, exactly, do we survive being inside the basement long enough to kill the lich without getting ripped apart by the rest of them?”  Surprisingly, Cross didn’t sound combative.  He sounded genuinely curious.  “Because that would be quite the trick.”

“Remember when it was just you and me, and I tried out that strip of fabric that messed up all those undead?”  He nodded, and I held up the artificial monster core.  “I think I can do it again, but better this time.”

Once Cross was in on the plan, the others quickly agreed.  Instead of fabric, I used a strip of wood this time.  It only took me a few minutes to carve out the runes with my pocket knife, and I had to prick the finger of everyone present to include their blood in the creation of the device.  The majority of the blood was mine to ensure it would be strong, but using theirs would ensure they would be excluded from the aura when it activated.  Seating the lumpy piece of hardened mana in the hole I cut for it was a chore, since it wasn’t a perfect circle.  I had to wedge a few slivers of wood in the gaps so it wouldn’t fall out, and I knew it wouldn’t hold up if someone bumped it too hard.  It would have to do.

“Is it ready to go?”  Jess had been looking over my shoulder while I worked, literally breathing down my neck.  “It doesn’t look like much.”

“Yep, it’s ready.”  I passed it off to her.  She took it with wide eyes, almost dropping it.  “When things kick off, I’m going to be too busy to watch over that thing.  It’s up to you to guard it.”  I pointed to the section of the rune sequence that activated the pull on the core.  “Just push a bit of mana in here, and set it on the ground.  Once it goes off, we’ll have a good five to ten minutes before it burns out.”

“There’s a big difference between five and ten minutes, James.”  Leedy didn’t seem amused at such an unspecific time frame.  “In a fight, that’s a huge difference.”

Looking back at him, I shrugged.  “Well, considering I’ve used one of these once, with a piece of fabric, it’s the best guess I can make.  What I can say for sure is, anything strong enough to withstand the aura it creates is going to do their best to destroy that thing.  So, protecting it needs to be a priority.”

“I’ll help Jess.”  Murphy had his halberd ready to go, with a short sword on his hip.  His breastplate and helm were polished, and the runes on both thrummed with unused power.  He was certainly ready.  “They won’t get through the both of us.”

“We’re wasting daylight.  Come on.”  Cross led us to the side of the building with the boarded up window, where we took turns helping each other onto the roof.  It was made of slate, giving it a stone look like the rest of the building, and flat enough that we didn’t have a problem finding footing.

For once, I didn’t have a memory to remind me of something.  Assaulting an undead stronghold through the roof with only four people to back me up?  Definitely a first.  I cast my delving spell again, picking the place that seemed to be most central to the underground area.  It was actually near the front door of the building, which would have been the last place we would have been able to easily access had we gone through the rear entrance.

“Is everyone ready?”  I looked around, getting confirmation from each of them.  We had checked and rechecked our gear so many times it was pointless to do it again.  “Okay.  The first spell is going to clear the way, the second is going to make room for us, and the third is going to let us drop down without getting hurt.  The moment we confirm the lich is nearby, or we start to get overrun, Jess activates the core.  Her and Murphy guard it, while the rest of us kill as many of them as we can.”  I held out my hand, forming a fist.  Lightning danced around it as I forced mana into the spell that built across my knuckles.  “Here we go!”

My punch slammed into the roof, shattering tile downward in a funnel of destruction.  The spell I had used was a variation of earthen spike, but I hadn’t properly formed it into something solid.  By leaving it more ‘free,’ it allowed the energy to explode downward in a cylinder shape that took what materials were available instead of creating any from mana.  Basically, it was a homemade tunneling spell that dropped a tube of stone pulled from the building into the basement.

Screams from undead throats echoed out from below, and I answered them with a swarm of fireballs.  Instead of one big spell like in the clearing, I cast a series of smaller ones to reduce the strain on my mana reserves.  A wave of heat rushed out of the hole, so I twisted my wrist, causing a small vortex to form.  Flames leapt upward, carrying with them the smell of dust and roasted meat.  Rotten roasted meat.

“How are we supposed to go down there?!”  Leedy was missing part of his eyebrows after trying to look down the hole, and I wasn’t sure if the redness on his face was from the heat or if he was mad at the surprise makeover.  “We’ll be cooked alive!”

“I’ll admit, maybe fire wasn’t the best choice.”  I moved over to the other corner of the roof.  The underground section here wasn’t as deep, but it was still wide open enough to give us room to fight unobstructed.  “What can I say?  I’m not perfect.”  I punched downward again, casting another makeshift cylinder digging spell.  Air rushed in, feeding the flames before black smoke came pouring out.  I cast a series of wind blades to clear it enough to see, and I deemed it clear enough to risk it.  “Come on, before they realize what we’re doing!”

As everyone jumped, I used the vortex spell to slow our fall enough that we could reach the bottom without breaking our legs.  It was still a hard fall, and the uneven ground caused by the chunks of stone covering the ground from my spell meant it was easy to twist an ankle.  Murphy let out a curse as he came down, and I rushed over to help him to his feet before he could ask.

“That wasn’t fun.”  Murphy grunted in pain as my healing spell straightened out his leg.  It had been a complete dislocation, meaning it was going to be extra sore for a long time.  It was one of those injuries that stuck with you no matter how much healing energy you dumped into the body.  My eyes asked him the obvious question in the flickering light of the fires caused by my spells.  “I’m good, I can walk.  Just don’t ask me to run anytime soon.”

The room we had landed in had probably once been meant to store wheels of cheese, but the wooden racks had long since gone to rot.  The dividing walls had been smashed to rubble, turning the entire basement into one large open area with the occasional section left standing to hold up the building above.  I could see the dug out section of the basement where my first breeching attempt had gone off, flames still leaping high enough that the floors above were burning.  Suddenly, I was glad we hadn’t landed there.  It had been their refuse pit, and the source for the raw materials the lich necromancer needed to make his undead abominations.  As we watched, several amalgamations of bone and flesh tried to climb free of the pit as the magical fire ate away at their substance.

A high-pitched scream meant to freeze a man’s brain into slush hit us with a physical force, causing the runes on everyone’s helms to light up.  My shield bracelet glowed red, telling me it was repelling an active magical assault.  A charred skeleton came clacking into view, its blackened fangs somehow more prominent than any vampire I had ever seen before.  Its eyes glowed with green eldritch flames, scorching the skull’s sockets as they rolled wildly in the dark.  When it finally spoke, it did so straight into our minds, despite our protections.

How nice of you to present yourself to me, my new vessel.  You have no idea how much trouble it would have caused if I had been forced to chase you halfway across the known world.  As a reward, I’ll have to do something nice for you.  Perhaps a pleasant dreamscape for your soul to reside in, while I take control of your body?  Hmm?  Would that be nice?

Jess glanced over at me before looking back at the vampire skeleton.  “I guess we found the lich.”

Wandering Warrior: Judge - Chapter 36

Chapter 36

Gleason slapped the bear shifter again, dropping the burly mayor to his knees.  “I’m tired of your excuses, lycan.  I’m tired of these little, worthless villages, and their worthless little people.  I’m tired of chasing this worthless man around this stupid forest, and I’m quickly running out of the capability to care about collateral damage.  Now, tell me everything you know, or you will find out what happens when I reach the end of my patience.”  The morning sunlight was like daggers in his eyes, and it made him more irritable than normal.  Even seeing a full platoon of thirty White Wardens in their immaculate uniforms did little to make him feel better.  He motioned for his man holding the mayor’s daughter to provide a demonstration, and he punched the girl in the kidneys hard enough to make her gasp in pain.

“Enough!”  The mayor’s wife struggled against the shackles she was held in, trying to break free from another of Gleason’s men.  “He’s told you everything he knows!”

“Silence!”  The man holding the mayor’s wife’s chains jerked them hard enough that she fell awkwardly onto her back, the shackles causing her to cry out in pain as they dug into her flesh.  “You will only speak when spoken to.”

Murmurs from the crowd surrounding the spectacle were quickly turning hostile, but Gleason had no concerns.  His pristine white uniform told them everything they needed to know.  You might be able to argue with a Blue Warden, or even fight with a member of the Black.  But no one ever stepped out of line around the branch that specialized in investigations and executions.

“Why don’t we start from the beginning.”  Gleason didn’t phrase it as a question.  He snapped his fingers, and one of his men ran over with a camp chair so he could have a seat.  “Tell me what happened, from the moment this stranger walked into town, to the moment he left.”

As the lycan spewed forth more lies, Gleason thought back to how close he must have been to meeting his target on the trail the first day he had set forth from Greendown.  If it hadn’t been for those foolish bandits creating a second path through the forest, he could have ended his mission before going through all this trouble.  Considering how easily the bandits had been defeated by Holden and his few followers, all the testimonies of their former ‘captives’ were hardly believable.  A bare handful of people–even if he believed that one of them was Captain Cross–wouldn’t have been able to take down an organized group of any proper size.

It was far more likely this village had been working in concert with a small band of miscreants, and the undead were a fabrication used to scare those not in on their plans.  Gleason didn’t think the entire village was bad, after all.  But when they let a dirty shifter lead them, they were barely better than the dregs of society.  That was why he was back here, in this flyspeck on the map, trying to learn more about his target.

His men had already tracked his target back along the trail to a village stricken by some kind of plague, and lost them shortly after.  Even Gleason’s Long Eye spell couldn’t follow them through the dense forest.  It was too much ground to cover, and he had no place from which to start his search even if he had the mana to spare.  Since there was no way they would have risked the sickness in the last place they were spotted, that left this village as his best chance of finding out where James Holden was going next.

“...and then, they left.  None of them spoke of going anywhere else, besides heading to Greendown, like I said before.”  The mayor wiped at the trickle of blood running down the corner of his mouth.  “That’s all I can tell you.”

“And you expect me to believe that.  Do you think I'm a fool, mayor?  If what you said was true, they would have reached the city days ago.  I’ve certainly received no word of them, and I would be the first to know.”  Gleason stood, pulling out his boot knife.  “I think, perhaps, you’ve misunderstood the situation you’re in.  Maybe you just aren’t hearing me.”  He reached out, viper-quick, pulling the mayor’s ear out from his head before slashing it off in one stroke.  “Perhaps this will help you listen.”  Gleason moved to cover up the motion with his body so the crowd couldn’t see it at first, waiting to see how effective it would be before revealing his actions.

The bear shifter only gave a short grunt of pain, barely reacting to losing a portion of his flesh.  It disappointed Gleason to see the lycan was so resilient, but he couldn’t help but feel the flash of excitement at what it meant.  To find the man’s limits, he would have to try something else.  He stepped back and tossed the ear aside as he unlimbered the whip coiled on his belt.

“No!”  The daughter, upon seeing what Gleason had done, managed to pull free of the White Warden holding her.  While the mayor and his wife were in shackles meant to control shifters, they didn’t have enough sets to be able to have any to use on the girl.  They were expensive after all, and Gleason wasn’t in the habit of taking shifters prisoner.  The girl immediately started to change, heavy claws growing from her fingertips as her face elongated into a snout and thick fur sprouted from her body.  Surprisingly, she still managed to speak during her transformation.  “Leave him alone, you monster!”

The shifter girl, now a three hundred pound grizzly bear, slapped another of Gleason’s men away as he tried to rush toward her.  Blood flew as the shifter’s claws slashed his man’s chest, staining his white clothing red.  Smiling, Gleason flicked his wrist in an almost lazy fashion, cracking his whip across the mayor’s chest and upper arms, flaying his skin to the bone.  This time, the stoic man couldn’t hold back the scream that erupted from his throat.  The magic embedded in the leather, silver, and steel braids made any wounds burn like they had been doused in salt and acid, compounding the agony the man was feeling.

“Come, little bear.”  Gleason’s ice-chip eyes seemed to burn with excitement, and sparks danced from his free hand.  “Let me show you what happens when you defy a White Warden.”

She charged him, rumbling forward on all fours.  The onlookers gaped at the spectacle, taken aback by the sudden turn of events.  They knew–they all knew–the moment the girl had struck a Warden, that her life was forfeit.  Gleason’s favorite part of his job was being an executioner.  Even though he hated being outside the city, it did have its perks.  Like getting to decide how to execute criminals.  Inside the city, he had to bow to his uncle’s orders.  Here, he was the highest authority.  Gleason could make much better examples of criminals, so things like this in the future didn’t need to happen.  He was more than happy to sacrifice the shifter girl so that others would make better choices in their lives.  It would give some meaning to her worthless life, and that made it an even better reason for him to enforce the law.

He let her get close enough to think she had a chance, then leapt over her, scoring her back with his whip.  Gleason was impressed that the girl didn’t immediately collapse, and instead spun around, ready to charge him once again.  To encourage her, he cracked his whip at her father, neatly splitting the knuckles of the hand clenching his chest.

The bear reared up on two legs, letting loose a chest-shaking roar before charging at Gleason once again.  This time, he used his free hand to cast a spell that caused a fist of air to punch the shifter hard enough to stop her dead in her tracks.  He slashed his arm back and forth, leaving two thick lines of bleeding flesh across the bear’s chest and stomach.  This time, it was too much for the young lycan to take, and she dropped to the ground, trying to back away.  Gleason whipped her again, this time catching her across the snout.  The bear whimpered in pain, and tried to turn and run.  His whip caught her around the trailing foot, nearly severing it as he jerked backward hard enough to pull the heavy shifter off her feet.  She whimpered once, before falling unconscious, the pain too much for her to take.  Her naked form slowly started changing back into that of a human, and Gleason rolled his wrist, ready to whip her again.

“Stop!  Please!”  The shifter woman, still on her back, tried to get to her feet.  The White Warden standing over her put his boot on her abdomen, holding her in place.  “Have mercy, she’s just a child!”

“I’ll-I’ll tell you anything!  Just leave my daughter alone!”  The mayor had sprouted hair along his cheeks and arms, but the magic in the shackles kept him from doing more.  That he could even push through enough of the magic to do what he had was impressive, and showed how powerful of a shifter the mayor was.  “I know things!  Important things!”

Gleason let loose a sigh.  He had been hoping the mayor would have been able to provide at least a little more of a break from his boredom.  His whip, as if it had a mind of its own, uncurled from the girl’s ankle and rolled back up.  He made sure not to dismiss the spell that inflicted pain on the wounds, though.  There would be no escape from the agony for these unclean things.  If left unattended, it would fade naturally after a few weeks time.  Some were driven insane by it, but those that made it through came out changed for the better.  Just another perk of Gleason’s position, helping to improve the little people beyond what they could ever achieve on their own.  His eyes swept over the mob of witnesses, who all flinched back after his display of power.  It was good they knew their place, now that he had reminded them of it.

“You are not in a position to bargain with me, mayor.”  Gleason flicked off a bit of fur-encrusted flesh from the end of his whip as he approached.  “You are going to tell me everything you know.  And I do mean, everything.  At the end of our conversation, I’m going to finish punishing your daughter for assaulting a White Warden.”  His wife wailed in distress, but was cut off by a thump from his man.  “The severity of her punishment will be measured against the quality and quantity of the information you have provided me.  Now, I would encourage you to hold nothing back, as her survival surely depends upon it.”

This time, as the mayor started talking, Gleason paid close attention.  Their discussion went on well past lunch, and finally, as early afternoon started to pass, the mayor ran out of things to talk about.  His rasping and dry voice trailed off, and he looked up at the leader of the White Wardens with nothing but fear in his eyes.

“Good.  You have done well, mayor.  I think you might have even told me enough to save your daughter’s life.”  Gleason motioned to his men, who had fashioned a pair of posts while he had been interrogating the mayor.  “She still needs to be held up as an example to anyone who learns of this, but she can do so by telling the story herself.”

As his men strung her up, he ignored the pleading of the mayor and his wife.  Gleason had already explained to them what was going to happen, and felt no remorse for their unlawful ways.  Knowingly consorting with people that were actively planning to weaken the guilds was always going to end up with them paying the price in blood, and he was here to collect.

The girl’s shifter nature had allowed her to heal some of the damage over the last few hours, which only allowed him to push the limit even farther.  Gleason’s control of his whip was precise enough that he never cut too deep, only flaying open the girl’s skin in careful layers over her back and abdomen.  He made sure to take one eye, and scar her face evenly on both sides.  At some point, one of his men cut out the mother’s tongue.  She had probably said something to deserve it.  The mayor had dropped to his knees, tears running clean streaks through his dirty cheeks.  He was a defeated man, without a spark of defiance left.  No one else in the village would meet Gleason’s eye, all of them only looking at their feet.

“There.  Now, the letter of the law has been followed and enforced.  Beyond punishing the mayor himself, of course.  Since his wife and daughter are crippled, I choose to leave him whole, so they won’t starve to death out here on the frontier.  I can certainly show mercy.”  Gleason looked around at his men for approval, and they all murmured their agreement.  He then pointed at the heavy emblem hanging from the mayor’s neck.  “Oh, and he isn’t the mayor anymore.  No lawbreaking lycan should be in charge of a frontier village in need of strong, proper leadership.  Choose someone from yourselves to take his place, or I will do it for you.”

A haughty older teen, just shy of his twenties, broke from the group and took the pendant from the man, shoving the old mayor in the dirt before putting it on his own neck.  “I’ll take it, Mister Warden.”

“Fine.  I’m sure you will be an upstanding example.”  The new mayor turned to leave, but Gleason cleared his throat to stop him.  “Give them a day to gather their things, and then run them out of town.  If anyone stands against you… burn their house to ashes.”  The young mayor seemed happy to get Gleason’s orders, as any small town leader should.  The crowd quickly dispersed, leaving the platoon of Wardens to their own devices.  A few villagers collected up the bleeding wife and daughter, while the former mayor followed them numbly.  “Let’s go.  Perhaps taking a look at the farmhouses around Greendown will reveal the location of our wayward targets.”

As Gleason and his men prepared their horses, he thought over the past few days.  He had learned much from this excursion.  There was a growing rot all throughout the city, and it was his job to dig it out, one he was looking forward to doing.

After, of course, he killed James Holden.