BT - Book 1 - Chapter 82

“We’re going to have to move on to the Cavern of Rust,” Micah watched as Trevor plucked a dove from the air with his spear.

Nearby, one of the white birds shrieked, pulsing a burst of sonic energy at Drekt.  The big man stumbled, a trickle of blood trailing from his ears.

Micah began casting Heal, finishing the spell directed at the disoriented fighter just after one of Sarah’s arrows knocked the bird from the sky.  Nearby, Telivern held a large tortoise at bay.

The two creatures rammed into each other, Telivern glowing slightly as its wings flapped slowly, matching the tortoise stride for stride despite it standing almost twice Micah’s height.  Ravi swooped at it from above, ignoring the dove nests covering the creature’s mostly flat back in order to rake her claws along the back of the tortoise’s neck.

The monster opened its mouth, unleashing another flock of the damnable birds from inside the tender white-pink flesh of its beak.  Already their whistling chirps were beginning to reach the crescendo that would let them unleash another volley of sonic attacks.

“Is now really the time for this Micah?”  Trevor asked, swiping his spear through the air to create an arc of green light that sped toward the birds, turning two of them into nothing more than puffs of feathers.

“I just don’t think that the current dungeons and monster hunts can challenge us any more,” Micah responded, planting the butt of his spear into the ground as he cast air knife five times in succession with his left hand.

One dove managed to dodge long enough for Sarah to bring it down with another arrow.  Meanwhile the tortoise tried to rotate its head to snap at Ravi, only to open up its neck to a jab from Telivern’s razor sharp antlers.

“Oooh,” Jo interjected, dropping from the sky behind the tortoise, jamming her short blades into one of its legs.  “You have something in mind that’s more exciting than this?  Count me in!”

The tortoise, having had enough, pulled its head and limbs inside its shell, allowing itself to slam to the dirt.  Telivern pranced back to safety while Jo leapt backward.

“Drekt,” Micah called out as he approached the creature from the left.  “Let’s see if you can crack that thing’s shell.  I’ll use Sonic Orb and see if I can drive out of hiding in the meantime.”

He jogged forward, spear held in the crook of his armpit as a crackling sphere of energy, humming slightly, appeared between his hands.  Just as he pushed the translucent ball of magical power into the side of the tortoise, causing its entire shell to vibrate, Drekt brought down his heavy cleaver with a bellow, cracking its armor slightly.

The shell rocked back and forth, but Micah ignored it, pushing deeper with the sphere of energy, counting on the spell’s high pitched whine to bypass the creature’s heavy armor even as Drekt pounded away at its other side.

Cautiously, Trevor approached the hole its head was withdrawn into and stabbed deep, his spear wreathed in green energy.  After nothing happened he did it again, thrusting the spear haft even further down the opening.

This time, he stumbled backward, falling onto his rear and back as the monster spit out another flock of recently spawned doves.

Micah didn’t even look up, he could feel the shell heating under his hands as the vibrations from the Sonic Orb slowly turned the giant reptile’s flesh and organs into mush.  A loud cracking noise filled the afternoon air as Drekt’s cleaver finally shattered its armor.

Ravi swooped down from the sky, devouring one of the pigeons before it could even begin to charge its sonic attack, swerving to avoid Sarah’s arrows as the precise shots began to methodically clear the air around Trevor.

A follow up swing from Drekt covered him in a fountain of shell bits and gore.  Micah smiled as the entire tortoise shook beneath his hands, its head popping out right in front of Trevor only for his brother to plant the butt of his spear and let the creature impale its head on the spear.

It shuddered, the head of the spear poking out of the top of its head before the creature’s neck slumped and the light in its eyes faded.

“Are you really sure we’re ready for more challenge than that,” Sarah asked sourly, waving at the dead tortoise as she walked up to the rest of the party.  “It felt plenty difficult to me.”

“Ankros be praised,” Drekt replied contentedly, a giant grin on his face despite his entire body being covered in the still steaming innards of the monster.  “That was a battle worthy of legend.  A level and a point of attunement.  I for one am perfectly happy with the current level of difficulty.”

“Oh we were fine,” Micah circled its immobile bulk, taking in the small prairie and mountain pond that had formed the center of the creature’s domain.  “None of you suffered more than superficial wounds the entire battle.  It just took us some time to work through its shell.  You weren’t in any real danger.”

“But we would be in the Caverns of Rust,” Sarah crossed her arms, staring him down sternly.  “I’ve heard about that place.  It can be conquered by a team of level forties with moderate difficulty and no losses, but the last I checked, none of us are anywhere near level forty.”

“Well you should see what Micah has on tap then,” Jo grinned, wiping off her blades with a clump of grass.  “I bet it could solo the boss in the Caverns of Rust.  There’s nothing for us to worry about Sarah.  Plus, it’ll be a ton of fun!”

“Oh?”  Sarah’s arms remained crossed as she raised a single eyebrow.  “And what pray tell is this great secret that only my sister seems to know about?”

“Go on and tell her about the abomination,” Drekt chuckled, cutting through Micah’s indecision.  “She might as well learn about it now rather than later.”

Micah put his index finger and thumb in his mouth, letting out a piercing whistle.  Sarah glared at him as he waited, someone sheepishly, for the Luoca to arrive.

“Hey Micah,” Trevor wandered over to him, limping slightly.  “I was wondering if you could do me a favor.”

He cocked his head at his brother, straining his ears for the sound of the Luoca’s wingbeats.

“Drekt and I were looking for a place to have a retreat of our own away from Basil’s Cove,” the man blushed deeply, “you know, for training away from everyone else.  We were thinking of building a log cabin, sort of like you have in the grove.  This place is really nice and its secluded enough that we wouldn’t have to worry about anyone interrupting us-”

“Training,” Sarah snorted.  “I’m sure everyone is looking to steal your secrets there.  Anyway, I’ve always wondered which one of you two is the ‘spearman’ and which-”

“Can you quit being such a bitch?” Jo rolled her eyes.  “Seriously Sarah.  Everyone has been nothing but nice to us, outfitting us with new equipment and helping us gain more experience in the last couple months than we’ve earned in a decade, and all you can do is snipe at people and make crude jokes.”

“Jo,” Sarah’s expression softened.  “I don’t understand how you can trust them so easily.  They recruit us to their little gang with an obviously made up story, and try to lure us into joining them with gifts and promises.  We don’t even know what the three of them really want.”

Thankfully, Micah’s ears caught the buzzing flap of the Luoca’s wings as it descended upon the prairie, human head snarling and snapping at all of them as it landed.  Other than the single missing leg on its left side, the daemon was completely healed and exuding an aura that instantly crushed the budding drama between the sisters.

“This,” Micah indicated the large slavering daemon, “is luoca and the eighth member of our team.  Without buffs it is roughly the equivalent of a level sixty blessed, but with them it should be able to kill anyone in Basil’s Cove.  I say ‘should’ because Jo and I ran into some complications when we were raiding Baron Hurden’s estate.”

“I told you not to go on that mission Jo,” Sarah’s usual sour expression returned.  “There are just too many blessed in and about the estate.  There’s no way you could sneak into his library without getting caught and tortured.  I’m just glad you gave up and escaped before things got too out of hand.”

Micah cocked a head at Jo, raising an eyebrow as he asked an unspoken question.

“Sooooo,” Jo began, scratching the back of her neck sheepishly, “when I said we escaped from the Baron’s villa before anything too bad happened I might have left some small things out.”

“Like what,” Sarah spat, glaring at her bashful sister.

“Like the fact that we made it into the secure library and Micah was able to copy down a couple of rare and high tier spells,” Jo began, speaking slowly as if to draw the sentence out.

“Well,” the other woman relaxed slightly.  “That’s good I suppose.  Usually when you act like this it’s right before revealing some sort of major fuck up.  I was afraid you were going to mention that you ‘forgot to bring up’ that the two of you got caught and made some sort of high power and implacable enemy.”

Micah started coughing uncontrollably, doing his best to hide a sudden chuckle as Jo, looked away from her sister, staring at the pond like it was the most interesting thing in the world.

Trevor scurried over toward Drekt, eager to be busy away from the unfolding situation.  Even Telivern, Micah’s longtime friend, betrayed him by meandering toward the other two teammates.  Only Ravi landed next to Micah, leaning her large furry bulk into him and purring deeply.

“Jo,” Sarah continued, a warning tone in her voice.  “I’m not an idiot.  You’re acting like you did when you stole mother’s candied plums and tried to blame me.  What happened.”

“You basically guessed it,” Micah interjected, coming to the woman’s rescue.  “We got what we needed and as we were about to leave, we were ambushed by the Baron’s hired ritualist.  I’m not exactly sure what level she was, but it’s at least ten or twenty above anything I feel comfortable fighting.  I ended up calling in the Luoca and escaping.”

Sarah looked at the daemon as it fanned its insect wings, distaste written all over her face as she noticed the grass around its legs wilting and dying at a visible rate.

“How did your monstrosity fair?”  She shivered slightly as the daemon’s human head leered at her.  “That thing is wrong on a fundamental level by the way.  I mean, I don’t know how, but every fiber of my being wants to reject its very existence.”

“Hey,” Jo interjected.  “I think its cute!  Plus. it’s just trying its best.”

“Errr,” Micah shrugged.  “It didn’t lose, but it certainly didn’t win.  As best as I can understand, she’s still alive and the Luoca came back pretty heavily injured.  I don’t know if it was just her or an entire group of people, but I would prefer not to find out.”

“By the Sixteen,” Sarah shook her head looking back and forth between Micah and Jo.  “I cannot let either of you out of my sight.”

“Anyway,” Micah sighed.  “I think there might be something to Trevor’s idea of building another base further out.  I get the impression that she’s looking for me, and I’d prefer to make myself scarce rather than deal with someone of her resources.”

“Micah,” Drekt called out from the other side of the tortoise.  “Is that why you wanted to move on to the Cavern of Rust?  To avoid this woman?”

“More or less,” he shrugged.  “Right now we’re following the rules and leaving records of the dungeons we raid.  An unfortunate necessity for most dungeons.  That said, the Cavern of Rust doesn’t have a waiting list the way the lesser dungeons do.  Once we get the hang of things, we could level up there in peace without having to worry about Baron Hurden keeping tabs on us.”

“Plus,” Micah’s face morphed into a sour expression, “at this rate, we might need to accelerate things.  The extra levels from raiding a high powered dungeon will probably come in handy sooner than we’d like.”