“I see that the assassin
Cloud poisoned that one time has elected to team up with the elves we kicked
out of the forest that other time to interrupt my invasion of Argopolis in an
attempt to destroy me!” Blex rambled excitedly as he stared into his crystal
ball. “But fear not! I knew this might happen and have prepared a contingency
plan. Ted, you will take our reserve forces and lead them against the elves!
Cloud and Sir Beesalot, you will join him on his mission! Once you guys join
the battle it won’t be long until our reinforcements arrive, allowing us to
crush those meddling elves!” the beholder crime lord eagerly detailed.
“I look forward to showing those tree huggers the wrath
of my oozes and fungi,” Ted, the dragonborn, stated in a deep and disdainful
baritone.
“Those fools should have left well enough alone after we
kicked them from our forest,” Beesalot explained, his words emphasized by a
threatening, angry buzz.
Cloud shifted nervously in her seat, obviously not eager
to face her old foe.
--------------------
King Merith and Althaea stood atop the city wall,
watching as the elves climbed up the siege ladders and charged down the stone stairs
into the streets. Merith wondered how Ferrum had discovered their plot, because
as soon as the elves entered the city, they were greeted by a contingent of
thieves and constructs. As the leader of the refugees continued to watch, the
forces of Imperium Cleptarum were joined by several ochre jellies and black
puddings, corrosive oozes that, when cut, split into multiple smaller oozes
instead of being injured. And while the elven warriors were dealing with that,
they were being shot at by arquebus-wielding, trained bears.
“We need to get down there and help!” Althaea angrily
exclaimed.
“Yes, we do,” Merith conceded.
The two elves ran down to the streets and into the fray,
carving a path of destruction through the enemy army with their whirling
blades. Just as the elves seemed to be making headway with their leaders’ help,
swarms of giant bees and dozens of swarmforged poured over an adjacent wall to
the one the elves had climbed over. With the help of the bees, Blex’s forces
quickly regained the upper hand.
“This is not going well,” Althaea paused. “‘Your Majesty’,”
she finished, saltily reminding Merith of his responsibilities. “Do something!”
“I am well aware. At this point I am starting to believe
that Jeff’s plan was a fool’s errand, and I think our only hope is to find
whoever is leading this section of the enemy army and eliminate them!”
“Looking for me?” questioned a deep and contemptuous
voice.
The two elves spun around to see who had spoken. Before
them stood Ted the Ooze Whisperer. The dragonborn’s grey leather armor seemed
bright in contrast to his black scales. His head was draconic, yet also
reminiscent of a skull, with a pair of segmented horns protruding from his
temples and immediately curving downward, then forward like tusks. His
snakelike yellow eyes scrutinized his opponents as he drew a faintly-glowing,
silvery sickle. Ted was flanked by a pair of eye guards with double-bladed
scimitars at the ready. With a dismissive wave of his hand, the dragonborn sent
his guards into battle.
“Distract the guards. I will take care of the boss,”
Merith whispered to Althaea.
The elven royal guard charged forward, sidestepping the
first eye guard’s slice, and kicking the construct backwards. The second eye guard
lunged forward arcing its blade down at Althaea. The elf nimbly blocked the
strike and engaged the construct in a contest of strength.
Merith bolted past the distracted guards and straight
toward Ted. As the king of the elves neared him, the dragonborn focused his
concentration and was surrounded by an aura of poisonous spores, waves of which
blasted into Merith every few seconds. Holding his breath, the elf twirled his
blade through the air, slicing it at his foe several times in quick succession.
The druid deftly deflected the strikes with his sickle, each strike from the
elf’s enchanted blade leaving a thin layer of frost on Ted’s weapon. With a
quick incantation, the dragonborn fired a blade of ice from his off hand.
Merith leaped out of the way, only to be struck with several tiny shards of icy
shrapnel.
Althaea overpowered the construct, shoving it backward
before slashing both blades across its legs. The impact of the strikes was lessened
by the eye guard’s built-in energy shielding, but nonetheless left large
gashes. Before the elf could follow up on her attacks, she was struck in the back
by an electrically charged cut from the second guard’s double-bladed scimitar, which
tore a large hole in the back of her leather armor and shocked her with
electricity. Althaea twirled around, desperately attacking and blocking from
both sides. She was receiving minor cuts left and right while only managing to
slowly whittle down the constructs’ energy shields.
As Merith was about to take another swing, Ted quickly
cast a spell, which greatly boosted the height of his jumps, then leapt to the
roof of a nearby building. No longer able to reach his foe, the elf slung his
double-bladed scimitar across his back and drew a dagger. He hurled the weapon
at the dragonborn while simultaneously speaking an incantation under his
breath. As the ranger’s missile spun end over end through the air, a hail of
thorns appeared around it. Ted easily dodged the knife, but was struck with
numerous thorns, only a few of which penetrated his leather armor. He let out
an angry draconic roar before spewing a torrent of acid breath from his jaws.
Merith ducked under the corrosive blast, but was struck in the shoulder by a
stray glob of searing acid.
Once her foes’ energy packs were finally exhausted,
Althaea leapt into the air, performing a spinning kick to both of their faces.
As the two eye guards lay prone on the ground, the elven royal guard ran to
help her king. Before Althaea could reach Merith, a suit of gleaming platemail
drifted gently down to the ground in front of her, its descent slowed by the combined
might of its inhabiting bee swarm.
“We have been looking forward to this,” Sir Beesalot
hissed as he drew his greatsword from his back.
--------------------
Cloud stood atop a roof, away from the melee happening in
other parts of the city. Across from her stood Jeff, still bent on vengeance.
“Finally, we meet again! This time, only one of us is
leaving…. and it certainly won’t be you!” the halfling exclaimed in a cheerful,
yet deadly, tone as he began twirling his chained dagger.
Cloud stoically gritted her teeth and drew her twin
blades. The tabaxi dodged to the side of her foe’s first long, sweeping slice,
blocked the second with a magical barrier, and charged toward the halfling with
a burst of speed. Just as Cloud reached him, Jeff lobbed a small gray sphere at
the ground, engulfing them both in a cloud of smoke. The tabaxi rogue suddenly
felt a terrible pain in her back as she was stabbed with a throwing knife, and
before she could turn to face her attacker, she was kicked off the roof. She
landed face down on top of a wooden crate in a back ally, with the knife still
stuck in her back.
Once
the smoke had cleared, Jeff swung his chained dagger down at his opponent, but
the attack missed as Cloud was now blurry and indistinct. Before the assassin
could swing again, Cloud sheathed her swords and began throwing a barrage of
daggers from within her cloak. Jeff dodged several of the projectiles, but took
one to the shoulder and had his sides grazed by two others. He turned and ran
from the edge of the roof, depriving the tabaxi of a clear shot. Cloud used her
feline claws to easily scale the side of the building. As she clambered back
onto the roof, the tabaxi barely ducked under a thrown roofing tile.
“Poisoning
you was nothing personal! I just needed the reward money!” Cloud fearfully
shouted at Jeff.
“I
know. Likewise, it won’t be personal when I slit your throat!” The halfling
shouted back, before bursting into maniacal laughter.
--------------------
Merith
placed a hand on his injured shoulder, and with a short string of magic words,
his acid burns were healed. Ted lifted one hand into the air and chanted a
druidic incantation. After a moment, a large vine grew from the ground behind
the elven king, cracking apart a small section of the cobblestone road in the
process. Merith reached for his double-bladed scimitar, but he was too late.
Before his hand could reach the weapon, the vine lashed out and wrapped itself
tightly around the elf, immobilizing him. As the elf struggled to free himself
from the vine, the dragonborn leapt down to the ground and placed his hand upon
the cobbles in front of Merith. After another short chant, the cobblestone
around where the elf was standing seemingly turned to liquid clay. Directing
the stone with a few precise waves of his hands, Ted enveloped Merith from the
neck down in a cocoon of liquid stone, which resolidified in moments.
Althaea managed to parry Sir Beesalot’s first few swings
before striking her scimitar down on his shoulder. The knight shifted to the
side and let her blade glance off his enchanted armor. He charged forward,
putting his full weight into a powerful shoulder slam. Reeling from the blow,
Althaea barely blocked a downward slice from her foe’s greatsword using the
handle of her weapon. The two combatants stood in place with Beesalot pressing
his sword against the hilt of the elven royal guard’s weapon with all his might.
As Althaea struggled against the swarmforged knight, numerous bees flew from
within the armor’s visor. The swarm of bees clumped together, forming the shape
of a fist.
The bee fist flew forward, slamming into Althaea’s face
with the force of many, many bees, inflicting a multitude of stings in the
process. The bees turned around and flew back into the armor. With his elven
adversary distracted by the pain, Sir Beesalot twisted his blade and flung the
weapon from her grasp. Before Althaea could react, the knight slammed the hilt
of his sword into her stomach. The elf, exhausted, disarmed, and in pain, was
caught completely off guard as the duo of eye guards came up behind her. Each
guard grabbed hold of one of Althaea’s arms with both hands, and together the
two guards forced the elf into a kneeling position and held her in place.
“Well, that’s over with,” Ted affirmed with sigh of
boredom. “If either of you try to escape, I’ll melt your faces with my acid
breath,” the dragonborn threatened. “OK Beesalot, go make the announcement.”
Sir Beesalot floated into the air above the nearby
buildings and the battle, propelled by the wings of an entire hive of bees. “Attention
elves! We have captured both of your pathetic leaders!” the swarmforged boomed.
“Now cease this fighting and submit yourselves to the rulership of Imperium
Cleptarum or your foolish ‘King’ and his ‘royal’ guard will be executed via
acid breath! Make your choice now!” he commanded, underscoring his words with a
threatening buzz.
--------------------
Jeff swung his chained blade through the air. Cloud leapt
over the blade and grasped the chain with both hands. She pulled on the chain
and, after a few seconds, managed to pull it from the halfling’s grasp and
fling the weapon off the roof. Cloud drew her twin shortswords and sprinted
toward Jeff. As she neared her foe, the tabaxi swung both of her blades in an X
shape down at his neck. Jeff ducked under the attack and yanked the dagger from
his shoulder. The halfling assassin plunged the knife into Cloud’s stomach
before twisting it and then cutting it out through her side. Jeff kicked his
foe to the ground and turned to walk away.
After
a few steps, the halfling paused to tend to a sudden stinging sensation in the
side of his neck. “Got em!” Smitty exclaimed in self-satisfaction. “You’re
welcome, Cloud!” he gloated as he put away his blow gun.
No
answer.
The
only sound was that of Jeff’s lifeless body sliding down the roof tiles.
“Cloud?”
--------------------
Ted
the Ooze Whisperer and Sir Beesalot watched with satisfaction as the elves
threw down their weapons and surrendered.
“What
are you going to do with us?” Merith demanded, the tremor in his voice
betraying him.
“That
will be up to the boss after the battle is over. And don’t expect it to be
fun,” Ted explained in a mocking tone.
Go to Chapter 8 ⏩
