Chapter Seven

  The world became a blur of colors, most of them green, as Miranda careened across the chamber and crashed into the wall on the far side.

  Pain lanced through her entire body, and her vision turned white as she slumped limply to the ground. Her life bar blinked urgently in the corner of her eye, with less than a sixth of her health left, but she couldn’t focus on it long enough to care. Nyr spun chaotically around her, there was a buzzing in her skull, and suddenly nothing sounded better than lying down for a very long nap. She couldn’t go to sleep now, though, could she? Hadn’t there been something she needed to—

  Derrick’s healing spell hit her, and she gasped in relief as the pain receded and lucidity came flooding back.

  “Jeremy!” she screamed, scrambling to her hooves, her head swinging frantically back and forth as she tried to get her bearings. Visantii was impossible to miss. The eighty foot long cobra had circled her body around the rest of Miranda’s party, walling them into a living arena. Her three heads darted in and out in an unpredictable pattern, with a deafening CRASH ringing out through the chamber every time her jaws snapped closed.

  Aaron was furiously swinging Troll Splitter, barely managing to keep all three heads at bay. His clothes were ripped where Visantii had already managed to bite him, but his health bar was almost completely full, and his buffs and bonuses were still active. Elise cowered behind him like a human shield, trying desperately to keep Makolo from dragging her out into the open so he could take on the snake goddess mano a mano.

  A bright yellow orb hung just a couple of feet below the ceiling, its warm and wholesome light fueling Derrick as he raced back and forth in a blur, firing off one barrage of spells and potions after another, almost seeming to be everywhere at once. Most of it went to Aaron, but whenever Visantii opened one of her mouths to strike, three or four shurikens would embed themselves in the soft pink flesh within.

  As a disciple of Onbarra, God of Sunlight and Restoration, Derrick was able to summon a miniature sun that boosted his powers in times of need. And as a Mandrake, his Photosynthesis skill made him able to absorb sunlight and use it to recharge his HP and MP, more than doubling the effectiveness of the spell. It didn’t make him invincible, and his damage output was still almost nonexistent, but it had gotten him out of situations that even Miranda wouldn’t have been able to escape.

  Visantii lunged, skirting around the massive axe and sinking her fangs into Aaron’s shoulder like a pair of swords. POISONED appeared over his head a second later, but the Neanderite barely seemed to notice since it quickly disappeared again. Instead, he used it as an opportunity to raise Troll Splitter and bring it down on Visantii’s neck. The blade bit deep, cutting through a fourth of the snake’s body.

  Visantii hissed and released him, retreating. The hit barely took a sliver off of her health bar, and even as they watched, green lightning danced across her sinuous form to heal her.

  But Miranda didn’t care about any of that right now. Where was…

  Her eyes landed on Jeremy, and her mouth fell open in horror. He was outside of the arena, his fists balled, throwing pathetic level zero punch after level zero punch at the colossal snake. They did so little damage that they didn’t even register on Visantii’s health bar, and the three headed serpent ignored him to focus on the Heroes she had trapped.

  “Ashes, ashes, ashes!” Miranda cursed, breaking into a sprint. How had he gotten here? Why was he here? And most importantly, how was she going to get him out alive?

  She reached Jeremy just as he aimed a spindly-legged kick at the divine snake. His foot bounced off of her scaly hide, but he didn’t seem the least bit perturbed.

  “Had enough?” he demanded, and punched her again. “This is the part where you fall down and—”

  “What the flame do you think you’re doing?” Miranda demanded, grabbing him by the back of his shirt and spinning him around so he went stumbling back toward the staircase. “Get out before you get yourself killed!”

  “Here to help!” Jeremy replied with all the confidence of a lion facing off against a hamster.

  “You hired him?” Derrick yelled from inside Visantii’s coils, his voice shrill with outrage. “That’s what you were doing instead of watching the camp?”

  Miranda looked from Jeremy to Derrick, wide eyed, and shook her head. “N- No! I just—”

  “WHY WOULD YOU HIRE A LEVEL ZERO NPC FOR A LEVEL FORTY BOSS FIGHT?”

  “I didn’t!” Miranda insisted. “I swear, all I did was…”

  Her memory flashed back to when she had met him, standing in the middle of the deserted street, a goliath rat lying dead at their feet.

  “Here’s some gold. It’s the least I can do after you saved me!”

  “Keep it. I don’t need your money, Jeremy. I need you!”

  “Oh, no…” she whispered, horrible realization dawning on her.

  As soon as Jeremy had tried to give her that gold, in his mind that gold had ceased to be his and became hers. It didn’t matter that Miranda had never taken it. She had saved him, and therefore it was her gold.

  The act of refusing a reward was completely beyond his understanding, so the fact that he still had the gold after she’d left meant that she must have given it to him. But he wasn’t at his store, and so he’d had nothing to sell. Nothing in Nyr was free, money least of all. That was one of the few rules that applied to both Heroes and NPCs. If Miranda had paid him, then he had to give her something in return.

  And so, lacking anything else, he had given her himself.

  JEREMY FAULKNER

  LEVEL 0 NPC PARTNER

  Miranda stared in disbelief at the character box. Jeremy, his expression as blank as ever, promptly raised his fists and went back to punching Visantii.

  “Stop that, you idiot!” Miranda snapped, grabbing him and shoving him away again. “Go away! Leave! Go ho—”

  “MIRANDA!”

  The Faun spun around just as two of Visantii’s heads struck at once. The center one went for Aaron’s head, and its fanged mouth clamped shut on Troll Splitter when he raised it to protect himself. While his weapon was occupied, the leftmost head lashed out from the side, distending its jaw until it was able to fit his entire torso inside its mouth. It bit down…

  WITHERING FANG

  Aaron roared in pain, but stubbornly kept his grip on Troll Splitter. if he’d let the axe go, Visantii would have undoubtedly thrown it out of reach. Derrick fired at the left head, but his shurikens plinked harmlessly off the goddess’ rock-hard scales.

  One by one, the buffs above Aaron’s head began to disappear, and his health plunged. Seeing this, Derrick cursed and began firing healing spells at him again. His life bar froze a little below the halfway mark. It jittered back and forth, not going further down, but also not going back up.

  “If you’re done arguing with your ex,” Derrick shouted, “your team could use some help here!”

  Growling in frustration, Miranda caught Jeremy around the neck with her left arm as he tried to run back into the fight, then hurled Eagle Feather toward the exit. “Silverwing!”

  The world around her turned silver, and then blinked back into existence. Standing on top of the stairs leading into the boss chamber, she pushed Jeremy down the hallway that would lead to the entrance.

  “Get out of here!” she said again, pointing down the tunnel. “I don’t need your help, so go home before you get hurt!”

  She spun without waiting to see if he obeyed, her cloak flaring behind her, and threw Eagle Feather back into the chamber.

  She reappeared in midair, upside down and with Visantii directly below her, one of her heads still stubbornly biting Aaron. The only buffs that were still active were Iron Flesh and Restoration, no doubt thanks to Derrick constantly resetting them. The level gap between Aaron and Visantii was too wide for either of them to keep this up long. If Derrick paused or ran out of MP, Aaron’s health bar would zero out in less than a second.

  She saw all of this in the time it took her to flip rightside up, and by then she knew exactly what she had to do. Landing on top of Visantii’s middle head—the one that was keeping Aaron from using Troll Splitter, she raised both daggers.

  “Weak Point!” she yelled, causing three glowing dots to appear on Visantii’s body.

  The closest one was on the side of her enormous center head. Leaping from her perch, Miranda drove Eagle Feather into the glowing spot as she fell. The blade met more resistance than she was used to, but she still managed to shove it past the scales and into the giant snake’s flesh.

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  Visantii opened her mouth and whipped her head around to hiss angrily at her even as her health went down. It was only a sliver, and it was nearly healed before Miranda even saw it, but it had gotten her attention.

  More importantly, it had freed Troll Splitter.

  “Triple Strike!” Aaron roared, his voice almost animalistic with rage. With the third head still sinking its fangs into his gut and chest, he raised his axe in both hands and brought it down so hard that Miranda could feel the gust of wind he created from twenty feet away. The blade slammed into Visantii’s neck, the scales parting as easily as cake.

  Meanwhile, Eagle Feather was lodged so deep in Visantii’s face that Miranda was able to hang from it. As Aaron did his thing, she quickly scanned the snake’s body, spotting the second glowing weak spot halfway down the goddess’ rightmost neck.

  Hoisting her legs up, Miranda planted her hooves against the side of Visantii’s skull and thrust off of it, pulling Eagle Feather free in the process. Her cape whipped behind her as she landed on top of Visantii’s right head. The raging goddess swung her head upwards to see what was happening, but all she managed to do was send Miranda on her way.

  The Faun surfed down Visantii’s back, her hooves practically gliding over the giant snake’s smooth scales. The glowing weak spot came rushing up to meet her, and at the last second, she plunged Midnight Frost into it.

  Visantii threw her right and middle heads back in pain as her life bar fell another small amount. She might have done the same with the leftmost head, but it was still clamped around Aaron’s torso. He raised Troll Splitter again, and brought it back down for the second strike. This time, it went almost halfway through Visantii’s neck.

  The center head turned around, its eyes locking onto Miranda as she slid to a stop halfway down the snake’s long back. She shivered. No matter how many gods she fought, being singled out by one of them was never a pleasant experience.

  It lunged for her, and she spun, flinging her cape up into its face.

  “Disorient!”

  The cobra froze half an inch away from her, stunned. With the level gap between them, the effect would only last a second or two, but that was all she needed.

  Leaping into the air, she landed once again on top of its head, then vaulted further down Visantii’s body. The last weak point was right in the crook between her center and right necks, and Miranda raised Eagle Feather as she descended toward—

  “I’ve got you now!”

  Miranda whirled around in midair, and nearly screamed in frustration when she saw Jeremy right where he had been before, his fists uselessly battering the giant snake.

  Only, this time, the goddess was looking directly at him.

  “Silverwing!” Miranda shouted, hurling Eagle Feather in that direction.

  She reappeared between Jeremy and the goddess just as Visantii struck. Given no other choice, Miranda swung Midnight Frost. The impact when it collided with Vistantii’s incoming fang should have been enough to knock the dagger out of her grip, but, in a stroke of luck that must have been divine intervention, the black blade began to glow. Another frigid wind blasted out of her, encasing the cobra’s head in a layer of solid ice.

  A fifth of Visantii’s health vanished, and she reared back, trying to shake the ice off of her like a cat with a sock stuck over its head.

  Back in the living arena, Aaron roared with fury as he delivered the last of Triple Strike’s three attacks. This time, Troll Splitter chopped straight through the remains of Visantii’s neck, crashing noisily against the stone floor as it came out the other end. The head immediately went limp, its fangs sliding gruesomely out of his body as it slumped to the floor. WITHERING FANG disappeared, only to be replaced by POISONED exactly one second later.

  The snake goddess’ health went down a full third—and this time, it didn’t regenerate.

  Miranda spun to confront Jeremy. “I told you to get out of here!”

  “I’m right here with you!” he said.

  “Yeah, that’s the problem!”

  Visantii’s neck was thrashing back and forth in its death throes, spraying bright green venom all across the chamber like a garden hose. Whatever it touched began to sizzle, sending clouds of acrid smoke billowing up to pool around the chamber’s ceiling.

  “Move!” Derrick shouted as a jet of it splashed into the arena, nearly hitting the party. Without waiting, he wrapped his arms around Elise and vaulted over Visantii’s tail, his scarf trailing behind him like a comet’s tail. Aaron was slower, awkwardly clambering over the snake’s massive blue body, but he too managed to escape without being hit by the spray.

  Jeremy tried to go around Miranda, his eyes still fixed on the snake. Miranda grabbed him, her face red. “Out! Leave! What do I have to do to make you go away?”

  Behind her, there was a titanic CRASH as Visantii slammed her middle head against the ceiling, shattering the ice and freeing it.

  “Miranda, leave him!” Derrick yelled.

  Miranda’s stomach turned over inside her. It was obvious how this was going to go. If she stayed here to babysit Jeremy, Visantii would kill her team. They had faced monsters like her multiple times, and while each encounter was different, there had always been one common factor: it had taken all three of them working together to win. Elise was a poor substitute—by no fault of her own—and every second Miranda spent trying to keep Jeremy out of danger was one second closer to them running out of time permanently.

  But if she went to help them, Visantii would crush Jeremy so easily she probably wouldn’t even notice it.

  Jeremy tried dodging around her again. “You don’t stand a chance against—”

  “I’m sorry, Jeremy,” she said, raising Eagle Feather. “Binding Blade!”

  She spun, and the glowing dagger passed through him. A white circle appeared around him, and he froze, suddenly becoming as still as a statue. With the level difference, he would be frozen for the next several minutes.

  “Just…Just stay out of the way,” she begged him. “Please!”

  With that, she spun and dashed back into the fray. Guilt clawed at her heart. This was all her fault. Granted, lots of things had been her fault in the years since she’d joined Derrick’s party, and the Mandrake had been more than happy to tell her about each and every one of them. This was different, though.

  This was dangerous.

  Derrick, Aaron, and Elise were sprinting across the chamber, trying to put as much distance between themselves and the pool of venom as possible. With both of her remaining heads free, Visantii hissed in rage and gave chase. Her neck stump had stopped spraying poison and was hanging limply beside the other two, but she was far from finished. She snapped at Aaron, who blocked the blow with Troll Splitter, and then circled around them, trapping the party in another living arena.

  “Silverwing!”

  Miranda reappeared up in the air, the dagger’s momentum causing her to keep flying upwards until her hat brushed the chamber’s ceiling. As gravity reclaimed her, and she came hurtling towards the monstrous serpent, her eyes sought out the last glowing weak point she had conjured. There it was, right in the crook between her middle and rightmost necks. She raised Eagle Feather as she fell, and—

  Visantii’s left head whipped around and lunged for her. Miranda had just enough time to spin in midair, keeping her from falling straight into the goddess’ open jaws. She couldn’t dodge it entirely, though, and bounced painfully off the snake’s nose. With her left side aching, she managed to twist around and land on her hooves next to her team members.

  “So glad you could join us,” Derrick said, his voice dripping with more venom than Visantii’s fangs. “Are you sure you don’t want to—”

  “Shut it, Derrick!” Miranda snapped. “Now isn’t the time!”

  “You are the last person who gets to talk about bad timing!”

  “Yell at Miranda later!” Aarson rumbled, stepping in between them. “Fight now!”

  Miranda gritted her teeth and raised her daggers as Visantii’’s two remaining heads poised themselves to strike. The goddess’ health still hadn’t gone back above the two thirds mark. The message was clear: take out the heads.

  “Aaron!” she exclaimed. “Hiroshima!”

  He understood immediately, and put his hand on her shoulder. Miranda hurled Eagle Feather straight up into the air.

  “Silverwing!” she shouted, and both of them vanished in a flash a split second before Visantii’s head darted out to bite at them. They reappeared about ten feet directly above Visantii, and Aaron released Miranda, hefting Troll Splitter above his head in both hands as he fell. Miranda threw the dagger a second time. “Silverwing!”

  I need a mana crystal, she thought as she reappeared, driving the blade into the snake’s weak spot.

  Visantii’s heads whipped around to glare at her. Miranda knew the goddess would heal the miniscule amount of damage within a few seconds, but it had succeeded in taking her attention off Aaron yet again.

  “Living Guillotine!” the Neanderite roared, slamming Troll Splitter into the snake’s leftmost neck.

  A sound filled the air that reminded Miranda of when her father had chopped meat for dinner on the rare occasions that he’d been home, and Visantii’s second head flopped lifelessly to the floor as well.

  “Miranda!” Derrick yelled.

  “Coming!” she yelled back. Putting her hoof on the space between Visantii’s necks, she vaulted down into the arena. Immediately, Derrick and Aaron put their hands on her, and Derrick’s other arm whipped out to grab Elise’s wrist. Then, making sure she didn’t break contact, Miranda spun around and threw Eagle Feather away.

  “Silverwing!” she shouted, narrowly avoiding the geyser of venom coming straight for them.

  The party reappeared at the edge of the chamber, and Miranda wasted no time in summoning a crystal from her inventory. It was just like the one she’d put in her trade box earlier, except this one was glowing with a vibrant blue light. Holding it up to her face, she breathed in, sucking all the light out of the crystal and replenishing her MP. Her spells were meant to be cast on the spur of the moment, and most of them only cost a point or two of MP, but when she used them back to back like this they drained her the way she had just drained that crystal.

  “One to go! Don’t get sloppy now,” Derrick said, summoning a ball of light and slapping it against Aaron’s arm. It exploded into glittering dust, renewing the Holy Edge buff without having to shoot it. “Miranda, do you still have…Miranda!”

  “I’m listening!” she lied, jerking her head away from Jeremy to look at him.

  “Do you still have that stick of dynamite you pickpocketed from that Underling last month?” he asked.

  “Yeah, why?” she paused, then her eyes widened in understanding.

  On the other side of the chamber, Visantii was still thrashing in pain, her new neck stump spewing acidic blood everywhere.

  Derrick turned to Elise. “This is going to be your time to shine. Get Makolo ready!”

  Elise opened her mouth like she was going to protest. She’d barely done anything for the entire fight except hide behind Aaron. Her skin was pale with terror, and Makolo’s chain was jingling as her hands shook. Miranda didn’t blame her one bit, but that didn’t change the fact that she wouldn’t get a share of the XP if she didn’t at least throw a punch before the fight ended.

  To her surprise, the Impwarden took a deep breath and nodded, her expression suddenly hard and determined.

  Derrick clapped her encouragingly on the shoulder. “Good! Miranda, Aaron, you know what to do. Elise, you wait until I give the word, and then blast that slur right in the mouth with everything you’ve got. Understand?”

  “I- In the mouth?” Elise echoed, her confidence instantly vanishing. “Makolo isn’t that accurate. I’ll need to get him right up close to her to do that!”

  “Then do it.”

  “Wha—”

  “Trust us!” Derrick reassured her. “Miranda will be there to warp you away before you have anything to worry about.”

  Elise looked at Miranda, and Miranda saw an almost childlike admiration glittering in the young woman’s eyes.

  “Okay,” she finally said.

  “Then go!”