Stealthcaster Read online

  He caught movement in the corner of his eye and shifted somewhat, looking to the right, just over Praklegh’s left shoulder. There was a shape there, a gray and blue blur, tumbling like a spinning ball, and as his vision cleared, he could see that it was Woody. Knees tucked tight to his chest, his back bent around, he flipped tightly through the air, spinning with great speed. Praklegh saw the direction of his gaze and started to turn, but too late. Woody’s curved back struck her hard in the left shoulder, knocking her off her feet, her fingers springing apart, the red energy dissipating immediately as she flew backwards, striking the ground with a painful, twisting sideways roll.

  Solomon scrambled to his feet as Praklegh continued rolling, coming up on all fours, her yellow eyes narrowed among the ridged scales of her sloped forehead. Sol’s fingers pulled out some of the healing herbs from his pouch and shoved them into his mouth, quickly chewing even as he darted left, narrowly avoiding a whirling crackle of red-hot magical energy. He looked at Woody and Woody looked at him, smiling and nodding beneath his form-fitting blue helmet, then they both turned toward the sorceress and prepared to press their attack.

  Chapter 40 - Turning Tide

  * * *

  If anything the arrival of the Harefolk, Troglodytes and fae made the Sharak-Ku clan leader all the more dangerous. Fralesh pressed her attack against Megyn, violently ripping her leg free of the arrow that had pinned it hard to the ground. She stumbled slightly, hesitant to put pressure in the injury and Megyn moved in, swinging her short sword in a tight arc. Fralesh met it, even while off balance and knocked it aside, then used her momentum to lurch right and thump Megyn with her shoulder, knocking her back a step.

  For a moment, the ranger considered calling her wolf for help, but she glanced right and saw Tyson in the midst of a group of a half dozen Sharak-Ku, ripping, snapping and growling, doing some serious damage to the snakeman warriors. She couldn’t distract him with her troubles— not now.

  Spinning with the force of Fralesh’s strike, she swung her sword back again, taking aim for the neck, but Fralesh wasn’t fooled, planting her foot and coming back around herself, blades meeting with a sparking, shattering clang. Again and again they each pressed and blocked, a combination of offense, evasion, and defense keeping the conflict too close for comfort.

  Megyn realized that if Fralesh didn’t have an injured leg, the skirmish would have likely been over long ago, but as it was, the clan leader moved a bit more slowly than she normally would and was more protective of her weak side, which was given Megyn just enough leeway to actually be competitive.

  But with each passing moment, Fralesh seemed to be getting stronger and less hampered by her injury, almost as if she was slowly healing over time. Desperation kicked in and she lunged, going for a killing strike, clasping both hands around the handle of her sword and swinging for the fences. Fralesh almost laughed as she dodged the attempt then moved in, slamming her sword down on hilt of Megyn’s sword, just above her fingers, smashing it from her grasp and knocking it to the ground, the force of her blow sending Megyn to her knees as well.

  “That was just the mistake I was waiting for, little girl!” she cackled and pointed the dagger at her while lifting the sword and preparing to send the blade clean through the ranger’s exposed neck. The sword swung down, whistling through the air, then met a second sword with a shattering clang of metal on metal.

  Fralesh growled, looking to her left, and saw Esmelda there, the Amazon warrior, arrived just in time, extending her arm, her battle axe blade deflecting the sword strike at the last moment.

  Megyn looked up in relief, scrambling and wrapping her fingers around the hilt of her fallen sword. Esmelda pulled the axe back as Fralesh pressed the attack, lunging at her and slamming the sword against the axe as the Amazon barely pulled it in front of her in time. Following up with the dagger, the Sharak-Ku darted and thrust, the blade slipping under Esmelda’s block and ripping at her Ankheg armor, striking with a sparking slash. Although the blade didn’t fully dig into Esmelda’s skin, she winced in pain and faltered, allowing Fralesh to press the attack, obviously now completely over her injured leg. Megyn jumped to her feet and rushed her from behind, but the clan leader saw it coming and spun, knocking her attack aside, pausing the girl long enough for her to whirl back around and kick her hard in the chest, driving her back. Esmelda’s axe swung down hard and fast, but Fralesh stepped back just enough for the blade to whip past her and drive hard into the rocks at her feet. With the Amazon off balance, the Sharak-Ku female lunged, using her foot to pin the axe against the ground, then swung the dagger around, ripping a wet, red tear through Esmelda’s right cheek. Megyn didn’t hesitate, charging forward, attacking with her own sword and she got in a solid strike, crashing the blade hard against the other fighter’s armor under her armpit. The armor dented and caved in slightly, Fralesh grunting in moderate pain. A slice of HP skidded off her health meter and Megyn could help but smile at the thought that maybe she wasn’t entirely invincible after all.

  Not being invincible and being beatable were two totally different things, however. Fralesh swung hard, striking Megyn with her forearm, lifting her off her feet and sending her skidding back-first along the hard ground. Esmelda swung her axe, but it whipped just over Fralesh’s head as she swung back with the dagger, narrowly missing her target.

  Megyn looked up from where she lay. Not too far away, she could see Solomon and Woody charging in toward Praklegh, the sorceress, while Ella and Locratia stood shoulder-to-shoulder, letting fly with their magic spells. She’d seen the Harefolk, Troglodytes and fae come streaking from the northern perimeter and saw the Sharak-Ku line beginning to break around her. Things seemed to be shifting. Shifting slowly, but still shifting. As she watched Solomon jumped over the sorceresses head while Woody moved in, slashing with his sword. The rabbit was inhumanly fast (appropriate since he wasn’t actually human) and managed a few solid strikes before the sorceress fired a concussive strike and knocked him to the ground. She turned on Solomon as he ran at her, but he slipped under her crimson lighting strike.

  She was pretty sure he’d triggered Scamper, the Harefolk skill that increased his dexterity and agility, because he just suddenly got faster, dodging another magic blast.

  “Head down!” screamed Esmelda and Megyn drove down by reflex, barely dodging what could have been a lethal sword strike. She veered left, heading back to Fralesh, but the Sharak-Ku was moving even more quickly than before. She struck with her sword, slamming the blade from Megyn’s grip, sparking a white-hot stab of pain in her hand and up through her forearm. Esmelda lifted the axe and prepared to swing, but Fralesh had drawn her in perfectly, moving to intercept an ramming the dagger hard and deep underneath the lower ridge of the Amazon’s Ankheg armor plate. Esmelda’s eyes widened as the curved dagger drove in deep, all the way to the hilt, a thick jet of red blood shooting out from underneath the bronze colored armor. Fralesh sneered and ripped the dagger free, then prepared one final strike with her sword.

  “No!” Megyn shouted, running at her. Her sword was gone, her quiver empty of arrows, so all she could do was desperately try some sort of hand-to-hand combat, The Sharak-Ku swung the sword, but Megyn barely dodged it, throwing a kick and striking the snake woman in the left side, doing little to no damage at all.

  “You come after me unarmed?” Fralesh demanded, glaring at her. “Are you that foolish?”

  “I won’t let you kill her!” Megyn screamed, clenching her fists, putting herself between Fralesh and Esmelda.

  “It won’t be your choice!” Fralesh shouted and lurched forward to strike.

  “Megyn!” the voice was shrill and clear, a vocal flare that caught her attention immediately. She looked toward Solomon, who was still using Scamper to hop over an attack by Praklegh, flip in the air and land on the other side in a low, graceful crouch.

  “Catch!” he said, obviously spotting her predicament. He swung his arm forward, letting fly with his throwing axe and Megy
n shot left, barely avoiding a sword strike. Fralesh recovered quickly, turning, curling her arm, preparing another final blow, and Megyn extended her hand, the pummel of the throwing axe slapping hard into her palm, feeling cool and natural.

  In a flash, she activating Weak Point, looking at the approaching warrior, her level 2 Amazon Warrior Skill Tree ability swiftly analyzing the balance, direction, and tactics of the approaching warrior. In a manner of less than a second, a single point of attack was determined and she moved forward, sliding beside the thrusting sword. swinging Solomon’s axe around in a quick semi-circle.

  The blade collided with the isolated weakness, a gap between the torso armor and the rugged scales of her jawline, biting into the soft tissue of her neck hitting with the perfect angle to strike and strike deep.

  CRITICAL HIT!

  Hit points flew from Fralesh’s health bar, whipping away in a flurry of red-colored numbers until her final health number was revealed, less than twenty percent of what her total had been. She gagged and coughed, her rigid muscles seeming to shrivel and shrink right in front of her, dropping onto all fours, hesitating for the briefest moment. Esmelda lurched onward, barely staying on her feet, but she had her axe raised and she brought it down, using every ounce of her strength to slam it hard into the base of the clan leader’s neck.

  Whatever was left of her HP exploded away in a red flash and Fralesh couldn’t even get out a shout of pain before she fell to the ground, motionless.

  Red light exploded at the periphery of Megyn’s vision and she turned to see Solomon taking the full brunt of a crimson lightning storm, courtesy of Praklegh who had taken advantage of his momentary distraction to catch him full on with a magic assault. The air crackled and skin sizzled as Sol stumbled forward to his knees, bending low and catching himself with the palms of his hand, his arms tensed.

  “Release him!” another voice came and Megyn looked behind her, seeing Ella leaping into action, her hands swarming in a churning green energy. She let it fly, the Acid Arrow whipping into a twisting spear of light, striking Praklegh hard in the chest and splashing over her with smoke and sizzle, flaying layers of skin from her body, boiling off the liquid and melting metal armor to her scaly flesh beneath.

  Praklegh screamed a loud, ear-splitting howl in both pain and anger, but recovered herself enough to launch a violent counter attack, spinning red lightning tumbling through the air. Ella threw up Shimmering Sphere, forming a protective bubble of energy just in front of her, but the powerful lighting struck it, shattered it and punched through it, catching Ella in its wake and throwing her down.

  Locratia appeared just behind the falling form of the rookie magic user, and she hurled a swift fireball at the Sharak-Ku, who tried shifting out of the way, but caught the burning ball of hot magic in the torso. Hit points dropped by the dozen, but she set her feet and struck back, funneling half of her remaining mana into a horizontal tornado, a nature-defying sideways funnel cloud that swarmed and spun, slamming into Locratia with the concussive force of a hurtling car.

  But she’d clearly forgotten about Woody.

  The Harefolk took the opportunity and darted forward, and Praklegh heard him coming, but too little too late. By the time she whirled and fired a magic bolt, it had soared over his left shoulder and left her vulnerable to a sword thrust, the blade striking her already depleted armor and negated health, slamming through what remained of her protection and bursting through her back with a wet, red splash.

  Everything froze there for a moment, the Sharak-Ku sorceress twisted in pain, Woody’s sword impaling her, holding her semi-upright as the sounds of sights of war continued to rage all around them. Woody ripped the sword free, the last remnants of her health slicked away and she slumped to the rocky ground, dead.

  “You children will regret that!” screamed Graybard, charging at them with his spear cocked and ready to fire.

  “Megyn!” Solomon called, and she read his mind, throwing the axe back to him. Even as the axe arced in the air toward him, he summoned his magic, drained his MP and consumed all of the extraneous noise around him, which swirled into a pocket of strange silence. He caught the axe, Graybard threw the spear, and Solomon unleashed Axe Throw, hurting the weapon forward. The force of his throw carried him off balance and he stumbled ahead, barely ducking under the whipping spear, which cut the air about a foot above him. The lightly glowing axe struck Graybard full on, then immediately dispersed the Sonic Shockwave magic harnessed in the amplification crystal. There was a dull WHAM and a muffled crack, followed by the telltale Critical Hit prompt and the Sharak-Ku Master of Arms went down like a bag of dead rats.

  His hit points had been cleaved in half and even as he slowly started to pull himself upright, Tyson stalked him from behind, walking toward him, claws clicking on the stone, clearly audible among the relative silence of their pocket of battle.

  “I will strike at you with my dying breath,” Graybard growled, fingers reaching for his secondary weapon, a sword slipped into a shield at his hip. The wolf growled low and angry and the Master of Arms turned around slowly, already knowing what was in store. Tyson leaped, he scrambled back, but not fast enough and in a silver/white fury the beast took him down.

  Solomon retrieved his axe as Tyson finished off his prey, looking throughout the battlefield. The Sharak-Ku resistance had been broken, the vast and strong army shattered and broken into smaller, frantic pieces, decimated by the combined forces of the Harefolk, Troglodytes, and fae. Battle still raged, but it was battle in name only, at this point mostly a clean up crew, with several Sharak-Ku breaking off and running into the trees, desperate to escape with their lives, not all of them having the fierce willing to die resistance of Graybard, apparently.

  “He did it,” whispered Ella, coming up next to Solomon. Not far away, Megyn had moved to Esmelda, who lay on the ground, clutching at her wounds.

  Solomon looked at her.

  “Who did what?”

  “Woody,” she replied. “As we were leaving Thorathon, I spoke with him. Told him of the Troglodytes, and he told me of the fae you all helped. We talked about how it might take the combined forces of all within Gallowind to stop the Sharak-Ku. He said he’d see what he could do.”

  Solomon let his eyes linger across the rock strewn field around them, thinking for a moment about all the corpses and all of the potential loot that was sitting there for the taking. He licked his lips purely by instinct, but swept his tongue quickly back in his mouth as he approached Woody.

  “Thank you,” he said, placing a hand on his Harefolk friend’s shoulder.

  “For all you have sacrificed,” Woody replied, putting his own paw on his friend’s arm, “I felt an obligation to do my part.”

  “You did your part and did it well. You may have just won this war for good.”

  “Let us all hope,” Woody replied. “We could use a measure of peace.” His eyes wandered to the wreckage around them, corpses splayed, weapons and armor scattered. “And I’m going to loot the heck out of some of those bodies.”

  Chapter 41 - The Spoils of War

  * * *

  A low fog had settled over the rock-filled meadow separating Gallowind Wood with the Devil’s Mouth Caverns. Solomon was grateful for it. It was low enough and thin enough that it did not block the view of every corpse strewn along the grass and rock ground, but it made it at least a bit more palatable. He hadn’t bothered to even try and count the dead and wounded, instead walking through in a haze, gripped with a vicious fist of survivor’s guilt, wondering what he could have done to prevent this.

  To prevent any of it.

  Yes, they had ‘won’. The Sharak-Ku had been broken and decimated, the scant survivors running to the hills as the Harefolk, Troglodytes, Amazon and fae drove deep into the belly of the snake army.

  But with war, even the winners were losers, as he counted just as many Amazon corpses on the ground as he did Sharak-Ku, all of them intermingled with the other races as well. Arrows,
swords, burns from magical spells of countless description, you name it, it was a cause of death. Solomon tried to think back to any previous games he played and whether or not such obvious carnage was a result of the larger scale battles, but he could not. This was truly a first. Just another example of the immersive environment of Shyft 2.0 and not for the first time he wondered just how much immersion was truly too much. He thought back to Lionel, smiling confidently as he used the Clasp of the Redeemer to save his own life mere seconds before being beheaded. He thought of Soracia, her throat torn open by the swift tug of an enchanted blade. Esmelda doubling over as the same blade was rammed hard into her guts, just underneath her layered Ankheg armor.

  Memories of his own death and respawn came, too, as they always did, that puncture of barbed tail ramming into his chest, the world swirling into darkness, honestly not sure if he’d even wake up on the other side of it.

  And now this. Now he was walking ankle-deep in a bloodbath, an all out war of brutality that had left scores of dead and dying in its wake. Was this a game he even wanted to play?

  If he didn’t, was there any way out?

  Approaching the base of the caverns, he looked and saw Ella crouched over the prone form of Fralesh, the Sharak-Ku clan leader. She stood and pulled out the familiar curved blade with the snake sculpted pummel and tested its balance in her hand.

  “This thing has some power,” she whispered, looking at Sol as he approached. Opening her Cloak of Containment, she slipped it into one of the enchanted pouches and the dagger blinked away in a small puff of white light. “These Sharak-Ku have quite a few decent weapons and armor,” she said. “I think I might appropriate some of Praklegh’s gear. Some pretty impressive magical enhancements.”