Chapter 87 - Nightsong

  “Err, Mason? I think you should probably put that down.” She said slowly, as if not to spook a cornered animal.

  “Huh, why? This thing is awesome! It’s so light it’s like I’m not holding anything!” He replied unconcerned.

  Instead of explaining, she just read the note out loud. “Here lies The Nightsong, thought to belong to the g-o-d of Darkness. It is cursed to kill all who wield it but the few worthy of its power.“

  As she finished reading, she heard the clanging of metal hitting stone; she looked up worried but saw that Mason, having heard her warning, had panicked and dropped the sword on the ground.

  Item - Nightsong (Divine)

  In the time of the god’s rule, The goddess of darkness weirded a magnificent blade infused with her power. In a fight against the god of death and the god of trickery, the blade was shattered. The blade before you is Nightsong, the largest and most intact part of that blade; an amount of the goddess’ power remains. Being a divine weapon, only those with the protection of a god can wield it safely.

  “You know it is so very annoying when you zone out and stare off into the distance like that? What’s going on? Are you dying or what?” she asked frustrated.

  Mason, looking embarrassed, replied, “No, I’m not dying, thank you very much. The bit about being worthy isn’t exactly true, I think I’m okay,” He bent to retrieve the sword.

  “What are you doing? Don’t pick it back up, you idiot!” she yelled at him, her words echoing in the empty cave.

  “It’s fine!” he snapped back. “My identify, says that the sword belonged to the g-o-d of darkness. Or at least it was part of her sword. I think my… connection to chaos protects me from the sword’s power.”

  “Oh. Well okay. Does it, like, do anything?”

  “Errm, I don’t really know, maybe we should get out of here and test it out later.

  “Sounds like a good plan to me”

  He went through the motions of placing the sword in his inventory, instinctively letting go of it as he expected it to disappear, but the sword once again just clanged to the ground.

  Mayry, who had been heading the ladder, whipped around and glared at him, “Again? Mason.”

  Glaring back, he explained, “This time, it is not my fault! My inventory isn’t working!” He picked up a loose rock and tried adding it to his inventory. It worked. “Huh, that’s weird. It’s just the sword that’s resisting.” Shrugging, he pulled out a spare sheathe from his inventory and attached it to his hip and slid the sword into it. “Okay, lets go.”

  ***

  This place had yielded some valuable loot, but still, they both could not wait to get out of there. Mason noticed that Mayry was stuck very close to his side as they walked through the hallways; he put his arm over her shoulder and squeezed her as they walked.

  “I’m telling you, I do not want to go back in there.” A woman’s voice shouted as they approached the door. “Not again. We barely made it out the first time. Who knows if we’d even come out if we went in again.”

  The voices were familiar, when a man’s voice shouted back, both Mayry and Mason realised that it must be the two Others from earlier. It seemed like so long ago but it was only a few hours.

  The two of them looked at each other and, through facial expressions alone, communicated that they were both pretty tired and would rather not get into another fight so soon.

  “What else are we going to do? We need something t give us an edge, and that thing might very well be in there!” The Rhott shouted.

  “You go in then! I’ll be waiting right here for you when… if you come back.” Shazi shouted back at him.

  Mason whispered to Mayry, “Damn, they bicker more than we do. Follow my lead. I think we can probably do this peacefully, but be ready just in case it goes wrong.”

  At Mayry’s nod, Mason pushed the door open; as he did, he let his mana build around him, making his glow. He deepened his voice as much as he could and shouted to the two stunner Others, “So you two came back? I did not think you would be so unwise.” To Mason’s joy, the two of them shared a look and fell to their knees and began to grovel.

  “Please, elder, attacking you was stupid, and we beg for your forgiveness and mercy.”

  “Hah, I’m no Elder, though compared to you two, I might as well be.”

  The two Others immediately relaxed slightly. “Well, if you aren’t an Elder, who the hells are you?” Rhott asked.

  Thinking quickly, Mason replied, “My name is Aiden, and this is my companion, Gael. No need to introduce yourselves, Rhott and Shazi; your reputation, or rather lack thereof, precedes you.”

  Shazi looked insulted, whereas Mason wasn’t entirely sure that Rhott had understood the insult.

  Shazi whispered something in his ear, and he, too, took on a more standoffish stance. “Hey! We’re not weak! You just took me by surprise, is all!!”

  Mason smirked and asked, “Is that so? Would you like to try again now that you won’t be so… surprised?”

  They both hesitated; Mason took that time to use Identify on them both.

  Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  Chaos System User - Rhott - Level 25

  Chaos System User - Shazia - Level 23

  Just as he had thought, they were both significantly weaker than he was. He noted it odd that there was no extra information on either of them but shrugged it off; he couldn’t remember whether or not he’d ever used Identify on an Other before.

  Rhott and Shazi glanced before Shazi took a step forward, hands up in a mollifying gesture: “Hold on now. We don’t need to be enemies. You are obviously very strong, and Rhott has already apologised for attacking earlier. Why don’t we just sit down and talk it out?”

  Mason wasn’t keen on making friends with Others, but Shazi at least seemed nice enough, and they no doubt had plenty of information he could use. Having them give it to him voluntarily would be a whole lot easier than forcing it out of them. He glanced at Mayry, who gave a slight shrug and then nodded to the two Others. “Okay, but just so we’re on the same page, if either of you try anything, there won’t be any more talking.” Damn, trying to be scary was kinda fun.

  It was getting pretty late, so Mayry used her elemental abilities to create a bonfire; the fact that it also displayed her power to their guests was just a plus. The four of them sat around the fire, and for a few minutes, there was an uneasy silence, none of them wanting to start the conversation. Eventually, Shazi broke and asked, “Did you find anything in the shack? How did you deal with the mental effects? How did you get so powerful?” She instantly looked embarrassed and slightly scared at her outburst, but in hopes that they would return the favour, he answered. “We found a few things, nothing to really brag about. I have a mental resistance ability, and I quickly faced a lot of powerful monsters, and luck sort of dragged me through.” He saw Shazia nod and avoid looking at him, “Now if you don’t mind me askin-“

  Before he finished his sentence Rhott spoke over him, staring at Mayry, “You said your name was Gael? You’re that Elders daughter, ain’t ya? Yeah! I’ve heard of you! Your father sent you through to prove his line was the best!” He added in a mutter, “doesn’t prove much if he sent a bodyguard with you…”

  Mason glanced at Mayry, worried she wouldn’t be able to act convincingly, but before he knew what was happening, she had her hand around Rhott’s throat. In her best Gael impersonation, she whispered in his ear, “If I were you, I wouldn’t talk about things you don’t know anything about.” She dropped him, and he fell to the ground and stood up in anger.

  Mason raised his eyebrows at him, and he immediately sat back down. “As I was saying, If you don’t mind me asking, how did the two of you get here? And why are you in this area?”

  Shazi answered; she was apparently quite chatty once she got started. “Our elder told us there was a cache hidden around here. We were in this area anyway because of the mission that got sent around. We were hoping that the cache had some sort of powerful weapon or something to help us get to level 50 and get home.”

  Interesting. He knew he needed to get to level 50 to use the gate, but it was nice to have confirmation. He asked, “And once you get to level 50, what do you plan to do?”

  She hesitated, then answered slowly as if she thought it was a trick, “Go back to the gate?”

  Mayry spoke before he could ask more about the gate. “What is this mission you mentioned? We’ve not heard of anything like that.”

  She bowed her head as she spoke, obviously terrified of Mayry, “I don’t know. Perhaps you two are too strong; the elders may have thought the task beneath you…”

  “Ah, so it isn’t anything important?”

  “No, not at all. The same old thing, really: two high-ranking members of the faction of Ganehfrel have disappeared; they were last seen in a town near here, so naturally, we and a bunch of others are being sent to find out what happened and burn the place to the ground. We wouldn’t bother, but the money they’re offering is pretty good.”

  Both Mason and Mayry looked horrified; he had almost started to like the odd pair. Mayry asked coldly, “What was the name of the town?”

  Rhott answered, “I don’t really remember. It was something like Tinderwood or Emberl-”

  Mayry stood suddenly, cutting him off, “Sparksford, was the name of the town Sparksford?”

  “Yeah, that’s the one.”

  Before anyone had the chance to react, Mayry’s fist made contact with Rhott’s face and knocked him off his seat.

  Shazia stood up quickly, a bow and quiver of arrows appearing in her hands. It took a second for her to nock an arrow, and in that time, Mason was standing right beside her, Nightsong held to her throat.

  “What’s happening?! Why did you attack us?!” She asked fearfully.

  As Rhott was getting to his feet, Mason answered, “That isn’t important. What is important is we’re going to ask you some questions, and you are going to answer them, or you are both going to die.”

  Rhott, who was eyeing Mayry angrily, nodded and raised both of his hands.

  “How many are going to be attacking Sparksford? When was the attack supposed to be happening? How did you get given the task.”

  Shazia was struggling to form words with the sword at her throat, so Rhott, whose face had turned red with anger, answered. “Including us, five are supposed to be part of the attack. The attack is supposed to be happening either today or tomorrow. And-” Before he finished, Mason saw Shazia be immediately replaced with Rhott. He was taller than she was, and so the sword cut his chest instead of his throat. Where the blade cut, whispers of shadows were left behind. Rhott raised his palm, and a blast of concentrated wind shot out and blew Mason back a couple of feet.

  Shazia had recovered from being suddenly teleported and was now trying her best to fight Mayry; she was keeping her distance, firing glowing arrows at her while also having to dodge fireballs and ice spikes.

  The engaged Mayry was growing bigger and more demonic second by second, which in turn was causing Shazia to act more erratic as she got more afraid.

  Mason teleported behind Rhott and swung his sword, but the big guy was faster than he had expected and managed to duck under the sword and evade the blow but tripped on a line of Mana that Mason had tactically moved around the man’s feet. He hit the dirt and started struggling to untangle his feet, but every time he touched Mason’s mana, he was burned. More coils wrapped around his upper body, and eventually, he stopped trying to escape.

  Mason turned his attention to the two women who were still exchanging projectile attacks. Shazia was pretty severely burned, but Mayry, in turn, had a few arrows sticking out of her; one had even managed to pierce through her armour. Mason appeared next to her and used his Mental Manipulation ability to instil her with terror. She sank to her knees and curled into a ball.

  “I had her; I didn’t need your help.” The demonic Mayry called. She closed her eyes, audibly took a deep breath, and added, “Thank you.” She started the transformation to become more human-looking.

  They looked over at the two Others; Mason asked, “What do we do with them?”

  Mayry, frantic with worry, replied, “I really don’t know, but we really need to get to Sparksford as soon as we possibly can.”

  Trying to sound as calming as he could, Mason said, “I think we probably have a little bit of time. If we teleport most of the way, it shouldn’t take us too long to get there. Do we just kill them? I’m not super comfortable murdering them in cold blood, but....”

  Mason looked over to Rhott just in time to see him staring directly at him with a bloody grin. Too late, Mason saw something in his fist; right before he crushed it, he said, “May the gods be with you.” He vanished into a puff of smoke. Moments later, Shazia did the same.

  Bewildered at what had just happened, he looked back at Mayry and asked, “Did he just…?”

  “Yeah.” She muttered, looking terrified.

  “And that means…” He trailed off, hoping he was wrong.

  “Yeah, we’re pretty fucked.” She replied, looking more worried about getting to Sparksford than she was about what was about to happen.

  Mason slapped his hand to his head and, in a moment of thoughtlessness, growled, “God fucking dammit.”

  Mayry froze. Her head slowly turned in his direction. Wide-eyed and furious, she shouted, “MASON WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK!”

  Just now, realising his grave error, all he could think to say was, “Oh, for fucks sake.”