NOVEL SIMPLE Chapter 25.3 Breach and Clear
Their footsteps echoed through the empty streets.
The sun had long since dipped beyond the ocean before the party even left their home. While any city of comparable size to Shatak had more than a semblance of a nightlife, most of that was relegated towards the various bars and clubs that were clustered on the western end of the city near the ports. The commercial district, on the other hand, was practically empty.
The four hunters opted to head to where Sade was being held on foot. Sure, there was the risk of them tiring themselves out, but due to nearly a year of daily endurance training, it was considered negligible. It wouldn’t be long until they reached their destination. That was… unless someone wasn’t lagging behind.
“How… Much further?” Ariwyn gasped between heavy breaths.
“Just three more streets left to cross, vamos!” Daniela hissed, waving for the group to keep moving.
“Just -hah- give me a moment.” The high elf panted.
“We don’t have time fer this.” Tyr muttered so low it sounded like a growl.
Lilie looked at the other pale woman with an exasperated expression. “I thought you said you had physical training?”
“I did!” The high elf whined. “I would have you know that strength is one of my highest physical stats.”
“And that is?” LIlie asked.
“Eleven.” Ariwyn declared proudly.
Rick arched a brow. “And your endurance?”
“Oh, uh… that is… um, nine.” She replied somewhat sheepishly.
Everyone else groaned. They all knew that those stats were quite impressive for a regular mage, but when compared to the sheer absurdity Sade brought to the table, it fell far short of their inflated expectations. Time was of the essence, and they couldn’t afford to keep stopping.
“That settles it then.” Rick padded over to the taller blond and crouched down in front of her. “Hop on.” He said while gesturing towards his back.
“I-uh… wha?”
Rick’s eye twitched in annoyance. “Either I carry you or we leave you behind. So hurry up and decide!”
He could see Ariwyn’s face flush with embarrassment, but thankfully she wrapped her arms over his shoulders without any further complaint. Standing back up, he noticed that his passenger was considerably lighter than he estimated. Knowing better than to actually comment on a woman’s weight, he simply filed that detail away in the back of his mind and started jogging after the rest of his team.
Twenty minutes later they arrived in front of a small store. Rick wasn’t exactly sure what the shop actually sold, but if it was a front to hide the Rivenmoor family’s dirty little secrets, then he supposed it really didn’t matter. He carefully removed his new elven backpack and stepped closer to the door.
“This the place?”
“Definitely.” Daniela whispered softly. “This door alone has at least five separate wards to stop people from getting inside.”
“Can you bypass them?” He asked.
The thief gave a quiet little snort. “Of course I can! I’m not a novata out on her first heist.”
Rick gave a chuckle of his own and backed off to let her do her thing. He didn’t have to wait long. Within just a couple minutes, the dwarf stood back up to her diminutive height and swung the door silently open with a huge grin on her face.
“Having fun?” Rick teased.
“Si. Haven't had a challenge like that since I swapped out Tyr’s underclothes with something smaller.”
“Wait, that was you?!” The amazonian woman hissed.
Daniela’s face became several shades paler. “Oh hey, would you look at that, timetoheadinandrescueSadebye!” Before anyone could even parse out the individual words of that last sentence, she was already inside and combing the room for any traps or hidden passages.
Within a few seconds they heard her call back out from within the depths of the store. “Found it!”
Shrugging his shoulders, Rick led everyone inside. They found their thief in a back room standing proudly next to a tunnel big enough for everyone but Tyr to walk inside without ducking their head.
“That was quick.” Lilie mused.
The petite woman waved her hand dismissively. “Meh, it wasn’t that hard. Us blue bloods tend to be adverse to crawling, and have a strange obsession with secret passages hidden behind paintings and the like for some reason. So all I had to do was find something big enough to cover a hole like this.” She said while tapping the secret passageway. Rick craned his neck to the side and saw that the door to the hallway was a floor to ceiling mirror.
“Everyone ready?” He called out, staring into the gloom of the narrow passageway.
Everyone, including Ariwyn, all gave quick grunts of affirmation. So with their standard formation of Daniela and Lilie in the front, Rick and Tyr in the rear, they creeped as quietly as they could down the dark tunnel.
The path sloped downward, slowly bringing the party deeper and deeper below the city. None of them felt it was wise to cast a spell to light their way since it would more than likely warn anyone standing guard that they were coming. So instead they all held one hand on the shoulder of the person in front of them. Daniela, who was acting as point woman, had a skill that let her see in the dark, so the party trusted in her ability to guide them all as safely as possible.
Unfortunately, all their caution meant little once they stepped into the first room.
Torches along the wall all lit up simultaneously, momentarily blinding the five of them. Before Rick could blink away the spots from his eyes, he heard Tyr scream in warning.
“Take cover!”
Acting on pure instinct honed from countless hours of training, Rick grabbed Ariwyn around the waist and dove to the side. The second his feet left the ground, a loud crash followed by a thunderous boom erupted from the spot where he was previously standing.
“Damn, I thought I could at least get one of you with that.” A calm voice said from just ahead of their position.
Rick looked up and saw a slender elven man step out from around a corner on the other side of the room. He had sandy brown hair, pale skin, and the most infuriating smirk Rick had ever seen plastered on his handsome face. He pulled a broadsword out from what looked to be an overly large sack at his hip that had probably a dozen different handles all poking out of its top.
“Well well, looks like we have a few rats coming in to chew on our ankles. As if the one we’re holding wasn’t bad enough!” The man spat.
“I take it yer the unlucky bastard who left all that blood behind back at the arena?” Tyr shot back with her own cocky smirk.
The man’s expression grew dark, and bright sparks of electricity coursed all around his body. “So you know that bitch who practically castrated me?!” He screamed in anger. The sparks writhed around the blade in his hand like a nest of snakes as his magic surged through the metal. “We weren't allowed to touch that whore until the boss was ready, but I’ve got no such orders to spare you lot. Let’s see how you enjoy having my blades carving up your insides!”
The moment he finished his slightly unhinged monologue, a bolt of lighting shot out from his shoulder and collided with something flying towards his face. He blinked rapidly in confusion before turning around to see one of Tyr’s heavy artillery arrows embedded into the wall right behind him.
Tyr clicked her tongue in annoyance and lowered her bow. “Damn, I thought I could get ya with that.”
Hearing his own words thrown back at him in such a mocking way sent the elven man’s blood pressure into critical levels. He let out a primal roar of rage and hurled the sword in his hand at the pregnant woman like it was a tomahawk. Tyr barely had time to dive to the side as the moment the weapon left his hand, there was a deafening boom and a small bolt of lightning tore through the air to impact the ground next to her.
Sticking out of the ground where the bolt struck, was the simple broadsword the man had thrown, the metal of the blade still faintly glowing, the air around it making a faint sizzling noise from the extreme heat.
Like that was the starting pistol of an olympic event, everyone in the room burst into motion at once. Rick and Lilie both dashed towards the man in an attempt to close the distance and prevent him from throwing out more bolts of electricity. Tyr strafed the back wall of the room and provided covering fire with a steady stream of regular arrows, while the thunder mage drew two more swords out of his sack and was rapidly deflecting the missiles she sent his way.
Rick couldn’t spare a glance to see what their newest member of the group was doing. Since no overwhelming multicolored bolts of magic were flying through the air, he hoped she was merely repositioning so she wouldn’t hit her allies by accident. He desperately hoped that this wasn’t the noble woman’s first true taste of battle and had frozen up in shock. This fight was far too dangerous for him or anyone else to play babysitter and he barely had the ability to keep himself safe, let alone a pampered princess.
Right when he and Lilie closed the gap, the elf swung both his swords wildly at them. The second the weapons crashed against Lilie’s shield and the haft of Rick’s spear, the air in front of them exploded, sending both of them skidding backward.
“Oh ho! You lot are tougher than you look.” The man sneered. “Guess I should take this seriously.”
He raised up both weapons and chucked them at the group. Just like before, the moment they left his hands the swords morphed into bolts of lighting in an eerily similar manner to Sade’s ‘lightning spear’ spell. Tyr had to stop shooting and roll to the side once more as the magical projectile slammed into the wall where her torso used to be.
The other lightning bolt tore its way towards Lilie. Rather than jumping out of the way, the shaytoni hunkered down as if she was planning on tanking the hit. At the last possible moment, her shield swung out and collided with the bolt with a bone shaking crash as metal met magic. For a single heartbeat, it looked like the lightning would overpower her defense, but within the next moment the attack bounced away from her shield and slammed into the ceiling instead.
Did she just parry a fucking lightning bolt?! Rick thought as he stared at his insane teammate in wonder.
“Impressive! But I highly doubt you could do that again.” The man said mockingly. Floating around him in a corona of steel and electricity were several more swords from his sack, each of their tips pointed forward as if they were ready to be launched at the party at any time.
“This is the end of our little game. It’s been fun, but once you are all dead, I can finally skin that dark skinned bitch alive.” He let out a predatory smile. “Don’t feel too bad about losing, it's the natural way of things. Everyone knows it’s suicide to go up against a high elf.”
Without warning, several pointy metal tips erupted out of his biceps and thighs. Immediately all the floating weapons clattered to the ground followed closely by the man himself. He looked on in horror as a pair of toned, yet slender, arms reached out from behind his slumped form and coiled around his neck in a chokehold. The voice of his assailant wormed its way into his ear in a low purr.
“And don’t you know that only an idiota takes his eyes off the rogue?”
