timewalk

  AliandraAli took the st step off the stone bridge, alighting oime-wray fgstones of the tral ring. To the north, she could see the jagged edge where about a quarter of the ring was simply missing, a great empty swathe of darkness where once had been a thriving district, ripped away by an a catastrophe to presumably fall shattered to the ground far below.

  “This is so incredible,” said, breathlessly.

  “It looks so different,” Ali answered. She had just been down here – only several weeks ago, her mind insisted, btantly ign the intervening millennia she had not personally experienced – and the jarring shift to darkness, ruins, and uh unnerved her in a way that made her question her very existence, or purpose. Surely this is all a dream, her mind insisted. It ’t be real.

  “I wish I could have seen it intact,” said. “Before whatever it was that blew up half of the rings.”

  “It was beautiful,” Ali whispered.

  “What’s the pn?” Malika asked, tapping her right foot impatiently.

  “That building first,” said, pointing.

  Ali reized the building just ahead as the remains of a research b she had visited not a week before the camity, delivering books from the library. Now, half of it y crushed by an unexpined disaster, covered by a dense yer of the dungeon’s bohe building crawled with undead; dozens of skeletons and zombies creeping around with movements that no one could ever mistake for the living. Skitterers and other tiny white bone creatures scattered out of their way, hiding in buildings or uhe giant, pitch-bck mushrooms, only to return as they passed to resume their strange, unknown purposes.

  “ I put the runic circle here?” Ali asked, pointing to a spot in the ter of the cleared area had led them to – a tiny beachhead of safety amid the surrounding sea of undead monsters and ruins.

  “That'll work,” replied. It was a rather unremarkable spot, distinguished from the rest of the granite fgstones underfoot by beiively free of bone.

  She got to work, finding her Runic Script for her Cure Poison spell ing much quicker with so much practice. From here on out, it would be a lot harder to use her magic circles, she was inscribing these simply as a backup – a failsafe if their incursion into the sed ring failed. The buildings were set so close together, that in all likelihood they would be fag a running battle that would take them to the major street or clearing before they would be able to take a break. They expected it to be much like their first experieh the inner ring, where monsters kept joining the battle in an unending stream, but this time, they would do it with purpose and a clear pn. Ali uood the reasoning, the strategy was required simply due to the density and number of monsters, but she could still feel her heartbeat beginning to grow louder, quicker within her chest as she readied her minions.

  She finished up hastily, “I’m done.”

  “Ok, I’ll chase that zombie bat off the roof, and then after that, you guys go in,” said, speaking to Mato and Malika. “Ali and I will meet you on the roof.” Their strategy was necessarily simple because they didn’t know the distribution of mohey faced, nor the exact yout of the building. She and would remain outside ying down c fire – a strategy Ali had just learned about – while Mato and Malika would poke the hor’s by charging through the front door and finding a way to the roof, if possible, attempting to draw all the undead along with them.

  “Ok, sounds good,” Malika said. She and had spent ages hashing out a hundred tingencies in case their pn didn’t work.

  “Let’s go,” Mato said, his words ending in a rough growl as his magic ed his body into his favorite form.

  Light magic swirled around ’s hands, imbuing his bow and the nocked arrow with a strikingly beautiful formation of shining mana before the delicate of light shot out across the clearing, ao strike the zombie bat wheeling just above the building. It screeched as the deceptively powerful magic dragged it over the side to crash down oone several stories below.

  Mato was on it in an instant, and the battle was joined.

  “Attack,” Ali anded her minions, trying desperately to ighe flurry of noise and activity that they had just provoked from within the ruined walls, and the putrid stench of zombie flesh being shredded by bear cws.

  The bined firepower of her friends and all her minions finished off the zombie bat just as the first skeletons burst out, charging from the shadowy doorway.

  Re-killed? Ali tried to ignore her distrag thoughts, promptio crify what it meant to ‘kill’ an undead creature that was already dead. I have work to do. Mato had already crashed through the emerging skeletons and was rushing toward the doorway with Malika beside him, r his Taunt.

  “Go with them,” she said, speaking Goblin to her Storm Shamans. In close quarters, few of her other minions would be effective, but the shamans would be ideal to help Malika and Mato when they ran into heavier resistance.

  “Yes, master,” they said in chorus, rushing into the building behind Malika. Immediately, brilliant fshes of lightning magic could be seen lighting up the dark windows and doorways. She heard a feminine scream and a sharp cttering of bones as Malika must have almost exploded a skeleton.

  As the others disappeared ihe building, Ali summohe rgest barrier she could muster, cramming and as many of her Kobolds onto it as she could before levitating the ehing into the air, h level with the sed-story windows. It took a surprising amount of her willpower to lift the barrier with the weight of all her minions, but she gritted her teeth and pushed ahead.

  As Ali levitated up the side of the building, a movement in the darkhrough the windows ohird floor caught her eye. Judging by the lightning and soul magic she could see through the stone building, Malika and her shamans had just made it to the sed floor, so whatever was in there wasn’t friendly.

  “Fireballs through that window,” Ali told her mages, getting a couple of chirps and wicked smiles in response. She raised the barrier higher while their summoned fmes intensified. With a swoosh and sizzle, the indiary spells unched from her improvised floating artillery ptform shot through the dark window, illuminating the interior briefly before the detonations ripped through the shambling shapes within, knog ks of loose stone and shattered bone from the walls to ctter down into the street below. Fire sprayed out of the windows, tossing debris and even a couple of bzing bodies with it, and as the glow died down, Ali noted with satisfa that nothing moved within.

  Using her barrier as aor, she willed it to take their grht to the top. Ali stepped out onto the ft roof and began arranging her minions as they disembarked so that they would have the best shot at the open trapdoor and stairwell that led down into the bowels of the ruins below. sed the air briefly for any aerial danger while Ali tracked their friends’ progress deep within the a Dwarven stonework by the steady flickers and fshes of mana visible through the solid granite walls thanks to Are Insight. The building began to tremble and shake as the crashing of bat and the muffled cracks of lightning grew progressively louder.

  With an abrupt cresdo of noise, Mato burst out from the stairwell and onto the roof, trampling several luckless skeletoh his paws, immediately followed by Malika and a horde of monsters. Ali identified them at once.

  Warrior – Skeleton – level 24Mage – Skeleton – level 31 (Fire)Warrior – Zombie Kobold – level 28Rogue – Kobold – level 25…Mage – Skeleton – level 32 (Ice)Mage – Kobold – level 33 (Death)

  Some of the undead skeletons and mages must have once been Elves or Humans, judging by size. Most were mismatched bone armor and wielding ons of bone, but there were a sizeable number of Eimuuran steel pieces in evidence, obvious by their distinctive reddish-bck gleam. Several Kobold zombies emerged, bringing with them the overp stench of rot ah. But interspersed among the dead were several live Kobolds – a haphazard group of dungeon-spawn that seemed to have no rhyme or reason to their makeup.

  Every creature focused on killing Mato as he wheeled about to face them, thundering his challenge again. Briefly Ali’s nape crawled. That was one impressive k of bear. And he’s my friend, remember?

  “Fireballs,” Ali anded, without further hesitation. There were probably around thirty monsters; trying to pick them off o a time was simply not an option. She crouched behind her golden barrier, focused entirely on direg her minions, summoning lightning totems in the ter of the pack, healing Mato with her Acolytes, and dropping sequential Fireballs on top of the undead.

  “They’re not dying,” noted, after a few moments of unleashing his arrows into the magical onsught.

  “What?” Ali gasped. The ter of the rooftop had turned into a chaotic explosion of magic, filled with so many different types of mana and attacks that Ali was struggling to keep track of what was even going on. But, to her dismay, the expected death of all the monsters failed to materialize. Even after the fifth fireball, she had only mao down two of the living Kobues – none of the undead had even faltered.

  She focused ily, ign the flickers of lightning, the detonations of fire, Malika’s soul magic, Mato’s nature mana, ’s shining arrows, and even the holy magic of her Acolytes. What is left? There were several unusual formations of ice magi a couple of skeletal mages. And then she saw it. A potent formation of dark bck mana densed into an ripped ialons of a bck-robed Kobold, that seemed to suergy and life away from any living monsters in the viity. The talons opened, releasing the orb, and it flew into the ter of the fgration and exploded, a cussion of death magic that she had not noticed amid the tinuous Fireballs.

  Is it healing them? Is that a kind of reversal of Nature-based healing? No, more like the opposite of holy… With a chilliainty, Ali k was true. The explosion of death mana was being absorbed, taken up by the skeletons and zombies as they scrambled to their feet with renewed vigor.

  “! The Kobold Death Mage at the back is healing them!” Ali yelled. She redirected all her archers and her own Are Bolts in a desperate attempt to kill the mage. Beside her, fred with the brilliant indesce of his Righteous Fury sending his arrows screaming across the rooftop into the small Kobold healing the undead from its hiding spot by the stairwell. In a matter of seds, the Death Mage dropped to the ground, a smoking pincushion, and suddenly, like marioes with severed strings, the undead began to colpse to the deafening explosions of fire and lightning.

  Better. Ali stopped her enthusiastic Fire Mages, redireg her minions to mop up the stragglers. A few of the skeletal mages had been outside the range and were missed by the fireballs. But the trated firepower of all her minions made short work of them.

  Ali mopped her forehead with the back of her hand. “Done?”

  “Hardly. We aggroed the building over,” announced, his voice calm, but still veying the urgency of the situation. “Ining.”

  Sure enough, the building was crawling with activity, skeletons, zombies, and Kobolds already spilling out of the windows and doorways, drawn by the sound of their bat. And here, finally, Ali fully uood the genius of and Malika’s pn. Most of her minions were ranged – mages and archers. Quickly, she lihem up beside at the edge of the rooftop, yelling, “If it moves, shoot it!”

  Both Mato and snhed at her high-pitched tone.

  “Whatever works,” Malika grinned.

  Blushing, Ali formed her barrier elevator for Malika, Mato, and her shamans, and lowered them down to the ground to face the ining horde while she rushed to destruything she could y her hands on in preparation for the sed wave.

  Mato

  Mato charged off the barrier before it even touched down, tearing across the street and smashing into the undead monsters spewing forth from the doorway, r a challeo reduce their strength and ehey all focused on him instead of running rampant and causing chaos. Rearing up onto his hind legs, he Swiped left and right to clear himself a space to fight in.

  There were a few rger skeletons among the masses – raised remnants of Humans or Elves, and even a few stocky shapes that may once have been Dwarves. All of them wore pieces of boe armor or the dark Dwarven Eimuuran steel, just like his own. His Swipe crashed through everything, crushing bone and crumpling armor, empowered with his Bestial bat and the energy imparted by his spent life force. The raking attacks were perfectly suited for striking multiple closely bunched monsters simultaneously. He was getting used to the tearing pain whenever he used his ability, and it hardly bothered him anymore. Much more important was judging how much he could spend without putting himself at undue risk. While his Brutal Restoratioored a substantial amount of health, it trickled ihirty seds, and a lot could happen in a battle in the short span of a few moments.

  He blocked several particurly dangerous strikes from sshing bone swords, opting to let his armor and bear hide take the brunt of the other attacks. The burning surge of healing through his body told him Malika had arrived, and he could press forward. Without her by his side, his attack would have failed in minutes, a meaningless death in a dungeon deep underground.

  “Let’s go,” Malika said, pung an undead Kobold so hard ihroat, its spine snapped with a sharp report. “I’ll follow you.”

  He shifted sideways, pulling the pack of skeletons with him, pg himself beside the gossamer glowing that catapulted upward, snagging a bat out of the sky and dragging the struggling creature to the ground with a crash that spliwo skeletons from the force of the impact. saw that? Nice! Mato roared, shing out with an empowered Swipe that tore through the lightly armored bat hide as if it were paper. The blood that sprayed across his fad the skeletons he was fighting surprised him for a moment – it had been a while sine of these had been alive instead of the more on, putrid rotting zombies.

  Mato sehe ining fireball before he evehe heat. As his Survival Instinct leveled, he was beginning to gain more and more subtlety with his perception – and telling the differeween a fireball and a sword without being able to see it was a remarkable advahe detonatio bones and rotting flesh flying before Malika seized the ce to top him up with a quick heal.

  The of light expired, and the bat frantically uself into the air to get away, despite its grave injuries. Mato ig, tent for the moment that he had enough moo eh, and charged through the doorway and into the darkened room within the ruined building, dragging the remnants of the monsters along with him through the hail of fire and arrows. His enhanced senses adjusted quickly, pig out the roaming forms of several zombies and skeletons that still wandered within.

  Suddenly, a magical wall of bone sprouted out of the floor with a creaking ch that set his teeth on edge. He charged, relying on his mass and momentum to crash through a se of the bone wall, sending dust and shards flying and the Kobold mage on the far stairs scurrying upward and out of sight.

  Click.

  Shit! Traps! His Survival Instinct warned him of the attack, but it was already too te. Multiple darts smmed into his fnk, several of them boung off his heavy armor, but a couple were pced perfectly to deliver their poison.

  You have been afflicted with Poison.+3 Poison damage per sed.Poison – Duration: 10 minutes. t: 1

  Immediately, three squat Dwarveons emerged from the swirling dust and darkness, wearing pte armor and wielding shields and swords of that same reddish-bck steel. He swiped crosswise hitting all three of them with a powerful blow, feeling the stabbing pain as his attack ripped through their armor. A toualika’s healing and the long slow pulse of his restoration magic began terag the damage of the poison as he shifted sideways, pulling his enemies further into the room.

  His job was not to kill them all, merely to collect them and rush to the top of the building again. But as he reached the stairs, Survival Instinct screamed at him, and he desperately tried to guess which dire to block. He lucked out, blog one of the twue ambushers, but the sed stabbed from the shadows, burying its darkly glinting dagger deep between his ribs. The burst of pain was so extreme he stumbled, crashing into the wall. Fuck, Ambush! He roared a challenge, realiziedly that he should have dohat to reduce the rogue’s strength at the first sign of danger.

  Live and learhought, notig Malika had collected the skeletal and Kobold mages from the ers and rinting toward him, dodging bolts of magic. “Sed flo!” she yelled. “Heal ining!”

  Mato charged up the stairs with Malika close behind, only to run face-first into a wall of bohat sprang up out of nowhere. A rge barrel tipped into the stairwell from above, p copious quantities of toxic green liquid over his head and shoulders – a liquid that looked suspiciously like wyvern spit. Stinks like it too.

  Your Poison has increased to 2.

  A distaonation sounded from somewhere far above, rog the foundations of the walls and triggering a pained screech from beyond the stairs. Mato swiped at the wall of bone, spending the health to tear it to shreds with his cws while Malika’s magic topped him up once again.

  With their eill hot on their heels, he and Malika raced up the stairs into a broad open sed level, lit by the still-flickering gobs of fme – remnants of one of Ali’s fireballs. Corpses y everywhere, burnt past reition. Whether they had been undead or not, Mato didn’t much care; instead, he charged the still-moving figures in the far er.

  His Swipe tore into the boudded leather armor the warriors were wearing, much softer targets than the usual pte armor, but the longswords set his danger sense off, tearing great slices through even his dense hide.

  Another bone wall appeared between him and the mages huddled in the er, and he heard a thump and a muffled curse from Malika.

  “Fug wall,” she grumbled. “I ’t see shit.”

  He was just debating how he could corral the monsters chasing him, the new ones, and still hit the wall, when Malika backed up two steps, then raced up the sheer bone barrier a over the top.

  “I’ll bring the mages,” she said, freeing Mato t the monsters he had already secured off to the stairwell again while stealing a little of the damage she incurred to himself to give her an edge.

  Mato took to the stairs again, charging upward after verifying by the sound of her breathing that Malika was just behind him. The two of them emerged onto the roof with a veritable horde of Kobolds and skeletht on their heels. Ali and were already firing at skeletal wyverns overhead, so he simply rounded up all the monsters, trying to create the tightest pack he could. would appreciate it; he did like to be effit.

  “Ali, we’re ready,” Malika called out.

  The first fireball struck, detonating almost on top of Mato. The fme seared his flesh, burning his fur up in a fsh of sulfurous stench that bur his lungs. The holy magic of an Acolyte and Malika’s simultaneous searing surge healed him to full in an instant. My health is getting whipsh! Mato thought. This strategy worked, but he didn’t have to like it.

  In the sed between the fireball and the blinding fshes of lightning, ’s shining dragged a skeletal wyvern down into the crush. Blinded by fme, Mato Swiped to his left fnk, guided entirely by Survival Instind memory, cws shredding through bone and scales as the wyvern crashed to the ground.

  Your Poison has increased to 3.

  One of the most annoying things about the skeletal wyverns – apart from the flying – was the fact that mere proximity was enough to be afflicted with their poison magic. This time, though, the wyvern did not escape. The stant barrage of lightning and fireballs destroyed everything that wasn’t getting stantly healed.

  “Ining, building,” announced, and within a few moments, Mato was being lowered to the ground to repeat the entire exercise once more.

  timewalk