B01DCAV4W2 (S) (17 page)

Richter was also able to catch occasional glimpses of both the Assassin and Warrior.  He was displeased to see that both of Terrod’s captors were well armed and armored.  They must have hidden a cache of equipment outside of the mists.  As they fled the village, it would have been a simple matter to stop and gear up.  It was going to make taking them out more difficult, but Richter wasn’t deterred.  There was work to be done. 

The two groups traveled together, though only half of them knew it.  With every step forward, the need for revenge grew stronger in Richter until it outshone even his goal of saving Terrod.  His fingers tingled in anticipation.  He imagined wrapping his hands around her throat, slowly tightening, her eyes bulging until a vessel broke and flooded one white globe with blood…

The okami stopped walking.  The lack of movement shook Richter from his dark musings.  The wolf had recognized the waking of another predator, one that happened to be riding on its back.  It instinctually wanted to protect itself from a new potential threat, but was confused because it had also been charged with protecting this human. 

Richter recognized the tenseness of the okami and forced himself to calm down.  It was like forcing a thundercloud through a strainer, but he finally controlled his fury.  The wolf began walking again.  Richter knew he couldn’t control himself while continuing to spy on his quarry.  They were close enough that he could assume that the three would continue straight into his kill box.  He moved forward and prepared for the fight to come.

Richter situated himself on the cliff above the traps.  He sent Futen back to follow the group invisibly.  The remnant would come warn him when they were close.  Richter removed his weapons from his Bag, pleased to see they still maintained their poisoned status.  Alma alighted upon his shoulders.  Richter took three Potions of Clarity out of his Bag.  He drank one and fed another to Alma.  Then he looked at the okami. 

“I’m not sure how much you understand,” he said softly, “or if you intend to help me, but I’m going to kill the people who took my friend.  Whatever you decide to do, thank you for getting me here.  I would like to offer this as a thank you.  It will increase any experience you gain.  Will you take it?”

The wolf looked at him.  Its lupine expression was as inscrutable as a sphinx, but when he was done talking it nudged his hand with his head.  Taking this as a good sign, he then realized that giving the wolf the potion could be difficult.  None of the leaves on the nearby trees were large enough to serve as an impromptu bowl and he didn’t have any utensils in his Bag.  Ultimately he just steeled himself and formed his hand into a cup and poured the precious liquid into it.  Praying the okami was smart enough to understand, he moved his upturned palm towards the forest hunter.  When the wolf lapped the potion up, Richter exhaled in relief.  The wolf’s tongue was rough like wet sandpaper.  Not unpleasant, but he still quickly took his hand away from the predator’s mouth, relieved the process was done.  After that he cast the buffs that he could and then settled in to wait.

Before long, Richter heard Futen’s seemingly disembodied voice saying that the group was close.  When the group came into his field of vision, he gave a grim grin.  Their time of reckoning had come.  He nocked an arrow to his bow, but didn’t draw it. The three walked forward.  Orvin led his party with Terrod a few steps behind and Natosca bringing up the rear.  The Warrior frowned at seeing the narrowing of the path up ahead, further complicated by the fallen tree, but didn’t pause overly long.  After a quick look left at the choppy river water and right at the jumbled forest terrain, he kept walking forward.  Reaching the site of the sticky trap, he looked over and under the log.  Richter held his breath for a moment, willing the man to go under and trigger the trap.  Even his heart felt like it paused mid-beat.

With a relaxing exhale, he watched the Warrior push the vine with the trip wire.  A host of sticky threads shot out to ensnare all three!  Richter immediately began imbuing his arrow.  Killing his enemies should be like shooting fish in a barrel! 

Richter was wrong. 

As soon as the trap was triggered, Orvin roared in anger.  He tried to reach for his sword to cut himself free, but the web like material effectively cocooned him.  Terrod looked up and about with a detached surprise.  Both men were incapacitated. Natosca on the other hand, showed exceptional agility by flipping backwards into a series of handsprings.  Her quick reflexes saved her from the trap.  No matter how crazy she might be, she definitely had skills.  Richter still didn’t understand how her level had appeared so low when he initially analyzed her.  He quickly did so again and was shocked by what he found.

Name: Sonirae. Half-Wood Elf, Half-Human. Level 33.  Health 450.  Mana 290.  Stamina 370.  Racial blends are erratic in their disposition.  They can end up with some or none of any of their parent races characteristics.  Profession: Rogue.  Specialization: Assassin. 

What the hell, Richter thought.  When Natosca… Sonirae, Richter corrected himself, had said she was an Assassin he hadn’t known it was a formal title.  He hadn’t even known it WAS possible to specialize in a profession!  Richter didn’t even want to think about what abilities or skills the woman might have access to.  He had to take her out quickly.

The Assassin’s acrobatic maneuvers may have saved her from the trap, but the last flip brought her perilously close to the edge.  In the split second Richter had left before Sonirae righted herself, he loosed his arrow.  His stealth dropped as he did, but it no longer mattered.  The short distance between Richter’s bow and his target didn’t allow her anytime to dodge.  The arrow struck her squarely in the side.  The result brought a true smile to his face. 

The arrow he had chosen was one of the Heavy Cobalt Arrows from the armory.  The loss of accuracy was not much of a problem at a range of only a dozen yards or so.  The glowing arrow struck the Assassin’s armor with a small boom.  Even more, the ‘Heavy’ quality of the arrow worked just as Richter had hoped and she was knocked off of her feet.  The momentum took her right off of the edge and out of sight. 

The attack elicited another roar from the Warrior and a cheer from Terrod.  Richter pointed at the man, “Alma, drain him!  Futen, find the woman and let me know if she is getting close.” 

His familiar swooped onto Orvin.  There was a rumble in the ground suddenly, but there was little noticeable effect other than to cause a faint ripple in the ground that soon faded, so Richter put it out of his head.  The fighter’s level was too high to be stunned, but that didn’t mean the man could simply weather his familiar’s attack.  He started screaming as soon as Alma clamped onto his head.  The physical response of Alma’s
Brain Drain
seemed to vary, but Richter was happy to see that the pain that was caused stayed uniform.  Richter drank in the man’s screams and enjoyed watching Orvin’s futile struggles. 

Richter knelt and grabbed the edge of the cliff he was on.  He turned around and quickly eased himself over the lip.  A short drop down, and then he was on the same level as the two bound men.  A soft thud heralded the arrival of the okami behind him.  He turned and ran to where Terrod was caught. 

“Hey buddy,” Richter said.  “You look like crap.”

“Good to see you too,” the man said in a pained voice.  “If I knew you were coming, I would have gotten pretty for you.”

“Well I’ll let it go this time.  Besides,” Richter said with a vicious smile as he listened to the Warrior’s screams, “they are playing our song.  Let’s get you out of here.”

Richter cast
Slow Heal
on his Companion and then took stock of the situation.  He was standing on the boundary of the sticky material.   He didn’t want to become trapped as well.  Orvin was caught right in the epicenter of the trap, ten feet away.  Terrod was only four feet away, but the ground was still covered in adhesive webs.  He drew the short sword from his Bag and tried to cut one of the strands.  It immediately got stuck.  He was able to pull it free after several tries, but it was clear that cutting wasn’t going to be an option.  That’s when he heard the tearing noise.

The Warrior hadn’t been idle since being trapped.  As soon as his attacker had sicked his pet on him, he started trying to free himself.  First, he used the enchantment in his boots.  His hope was that the shockwave would cause the tree he was attached to shift and maybe free him.  Unfortunately, the webbing that bound him also effectively tied the tree in place to both the ground and the cliff wall.

He groaned in frustration.  The trap was too strong for him to escape, but he had invested in a helpful Talent since becoming a Warrior.  Orvin activated
Power Up I. 
At a cost of one hundred stamina, he was able to double his Strength for a short period.  The problem was it took a full minute to activate the Talent.

The screams that were filling the air hadn’t just been because of the pain from the dragonling’s attack.  It was in frustration and rage that he still wasn’t strong enough even with his Talent.  His failure to break through meant that what he saw as a flying rat could keep attacking him with impunity!  Orvin had always known he would die in battle, but he couldn’t stand the injustice of being slaughtered like a trussed sheep!  So, cursing the time it would take, he had to use the next level of the Talent,
Power Up II. 
It required a two-minute startup time, and cost of two hundred stamina, but his Strength increased by 300%. 

Orvin could only watch his hooded attacker slip down from the cliff above and start talking to the prisoner.  When the man pulled back the hood of his cloak, he was shocked to see the face of the man they had been sent to assassinate.  It was such a surprise that he almost lost the concentration needed to maintain his Talent.  Richter was supposed to be dead!  That babbling bitch had said she had killed him.  Orvin swore that if he got out of this situation alive, he would choke the woman to death!

The pain he was experiencing was enormous, but another Talent he had invested in let him tolerate it.  Unlike
Power Up
,
Iron Will
was a passive Talent.  In Orvin’s opinion, it was a vital investment for any fighter.  It made him more resilient to pain, but more importantly increased his resistance to enchantment type spells.  He had invested in it to level three. 

While Orvin waited for the startup time of
Power Up
II
to elapse, he glared at the Lord of the Mist Village and imagined the horrors he would inflict on the man once he was free.  Finally, the two minutes was up.  Strength surged through his entire body!  His veins pumped molten steel, and feeling like one of the Engineer’s mechanical constructs, he ripped his arm free of the binding.  Now it was time to deal with this accursed flying rat!

Richter looked over at hearing the Warrior’s bonds snap.   The man’s right arm came free.  With the literal speed of thought, he projected, *
Alma, fly away!*

The dragonling either ignored him or was so drunk on the feast of memories and personality she was partaking in that his command didn’t register.  The Warrior was still able to wrap his hand around her neck and started squeezing with all of his increased Strength.  Alma finally broke off her attack.  She squawked as Orvin did massive damage to her little body.  If not for the almost rope-like, sinuous nature of her neck, the fighter would have ended her life by snapping it.  As it was, the dragonling wouldn’t last more than a few more seconds before expiring.

Richter wasn’t going to just let his familiar to be killed, however.  He drew an arrow as fast as his high Dexterity allowed and fired
.
The arrow streaked across the ten feet faster than even Richter could track and struck true.  It impacted the forearm that was holding Alma.  It looked like the man was wearing medium or heavy armor.  It didn’t matter though.  The purpose of the shot was not to penetrate the man’s armor.  Richter had grabbed a Heavy Arrow. 

Orvin’s arm whipped back from the blunt damage arrow.  It didn’t knock the Warrior down braced as he was by sticky threads, but his grip did involuntarily release, allowing Alma to escape.  She flew away and golden light suffused her body as she cast
Slow Heal. 
A quick check of her status showed that the Orvin’s crushing grip had removed more than one hundred health.  Richter hadn’t seen Alma access her Life Magic since he unlocked the Power, but he felt relieved that his familiar would survive.

Orvin stared at the dragonling flying out of reach and then locked eyes with her master in fury.  He started ripping the sticky threads off.  Richter had no idea how the man was strong enough to tear the high tensile material, but it didn’t matter.  At the speed he was going, he’d be free in less than a minute! 

Richter Analyzed the Warrior.  The minutes that Alma had been draining him had taken a definite toll.  She had removed hundreds of health points.  The man’s mana was completely depleted and his stamina was less than one hundred.  He was clearly still a threat though.  Richter took aim again, planning to finish the mercenary off, but then he heard a deadpan voice.

“The woman is returning, my Lord.  She has climbed out of the river and is making her way back towards you from the west.  She will be here soon.”

Richter cursed under his breath.  All he needed was another few minutes and he would have been able to both kill this man and free Terrod!  Now that he had seen his Companion though, he knew that saving the barkeep was the priority.  Richter shoved his arrow back into his quiver.  Extending his hand, he cast
Flame
.  Where cutting the white threads had failed, the flames eagerly ate the web like material.  The flames quickly moved over the white bonds leaving only ash behind.  Terrod suffered a few minor burns where the trap had been touching his skin, but it only amounted to a small loss of health.  

Terrod fell, his legs cramping from being immobile in a strange position.  Richter helped him back to his feet.  There was no time for a brotherly reunion though.  The flames didn’t stop at just freeing Terrod.  They continued over the entire trap, the fire eating its way toward the Warrior.