Bending the Rules Pt. 03: Battle Test

Apologies for pronoun mishaps. It's all fun and games until somebody loses an I.

8722 words. Reading previous entries is recommended, but hopefully not necessary. Not based on any particular game franchise or storyline.

Glossary terms:

Soulsmith (n): A priest with the capability to transmute EXP into learned spells for adventurers.

*****

Nuru got up bright and early the next morning. There was a bit of time before he met up with Dayo, so he went out to investigate the other things he'd heard.

"Why, hello Nuru!"

"Good morning, Hasina."

"I've got caterers working on the banquet for an out of town guest. There's simply no privacy to be had if you were thinking..."

"Oh, no, but I'm flattered you'd consider it."

"Then what brings you by today?" Hasina's face dimpled a bit as she smiled.

"Well, a little bird told me that you have a music box you want repaired."

"Your little bird is suspiciously well-informed. Does it have a name?"

"I call it 'friend-of-a-friend.' I don't know its true name."

"Well, be that as it may. I'll tell you, my husband has been promising me for months that he'll send it out to a craftsman and get it repaired. It was a gift from my sister when we were young, may she rest in peace. Made it to Level 38 before a dire manticore killed her whole party."

"I'm so sorry to hear that."

"Me too, but she died doing what she loved, and that's the most important thing. But you're not a craftsman, Nuru, why do you think you can fix it?"

"Well, I am a bard. I have Musical Knowledge, and an unusually high DEX score. I figure I can at least take a look."

"Alright. Just be careful, I don't want it too badly damaged if I have to get a specialist. It'll cost extra then."

"Yes, of course."

She led him into the study, and took the music box down from a shelf.

"There are some basic tools in the drawer next to you; my lout of a husband thought he'd take a crack at himself, but he hasn't anything like the right skills. I'm just thankful he didn't break anything. I'll leave you to it, let me know if you need anything."

"Thank you, Hasina. I will."

It proved to be quite a challenge. The music box had sat neglected for some time, begun to rust, and the pins holding it together had become brittle. The magical speed crystal was a good quality, and was in good shape, fortunately, as was the note plate. He managed to scrape away most of the rust to reveal a metallic shine, and cleared dust that had congealed around some sticky grease in the teeth and prevented the notes from coming out properly. Hours later, he got it all put back together and put the speed crystal into the slot.

Hasina came back from the other room at the sound of it.

"Oh my gosh! Nuru, you've done it!"

"Well, I'm afraid I have nothing to polish it with, and I don't think the pins will stand up to another disassembly, but yes, it's working."

"Oh, thank you so much! This means so much to me. How much do you want for that?"

"Oh, twenty currency would cover it."

"Hmm. That's more than I might pay for the craftsman. But transporting it to him would not be free and... come to think of it, this way I get to tell my husband - great mayor mind you, just a lousy husband - that I did it myself and put a dig to his conscience. Plus, I get to increase his estimation of my skills. It's a deal!"

"Thank you kindly."

"No, Nuru, thank you. You've made me a happy woman twice this week. You come on by anytime."

"Why, I think I shall. Good day!"

*****

The day had advanced more than he knew, and it was almost time to go exploring. He carefully threaded his way through the streets - much busier than he remembered on the day of the tournament - and tried to avoid getting too close to anyone that looked high level, in case they had Sense Demon. A few suspicious glances told him that he wasn't entirely successful, but he wasn't pursued, and thanked his LCK.

"I've come for that ring," he told the shopkeeper.

"Hm? Oh, yes. I almost threw it out anyway, I figured you weren't going to be coming. You didn't seem like you were really here to shop at all."

"Geez. Should have made a formal agreement, I guess, but I figured it was such a small item..."

"Never you mind, I figured a Blue Sun elf aught to act in accordance with higher principles, so I kept it even so. Here you are."

"Thank you. Here's your twenty."

"Come again soon!"

"Not likely," Nuru muttered on his way out. He sprinted out of the area as much as his stamina allowed, went out to the cabin at a more measured pace, and invoked his IOU.

"Nuru, what happened?" Dayo said.

"What do you mean?"

"Your MP. It's zero."

"Oh, that. Yeah I'm giving up MP for spring."

"Dammit, Nuru, this is serious. You're crippled, I can't babysit you out there, and the danger is real. We're out there picking through corpses much higher level than you, and the things that killed them might still be around."

"Oh, don't worry about that. Jaheem!"

The lyena bounded out of the trees towards them.

"Fuck. Nuru, get behind me!" Dayo yelled, materializing a wicked-looking metal-studded staff in a puff of smoke.

"No, no. He's with me."

"He... what? This is not your demon. Old Jaheem's just waiting for some foolish adventurer to let his guard down, and eat them, so I hear. Better safe than sorry."

"He owes me a favor."

"HE owes YOU a-"

"Yes. Believe it or not. Feeling better, my friend?"

Greeowf.

[Much.]

"Excellent. Dayo here is a friend also. Watch out for both of us, will you?"

Berk.

[Yes.]

"But especially me. I'm young and feeble, and a liability to everyone."

The old lyena howled with an unsettling laugh that made Dayo shiver.

"All right, all right. I take it back," Dayo grumbled. "You know what you're about to be doing is basically impossible at your level, right?"

"So I've heard."

"Do you actually understand him? How's that even possible for a Level Two? You're nowhere near the level required to handle the EXP cost for Greater Beast Language. Birds are simple enough, but lyenas..."

"A power I'm borrowing. From a demon."

"...I see."

/We need to talk about that, by the way/

"Yes, yes. Not now," Nuru said to his shoulder, the habitual way he addressed the succubus he had a pact with. He only knew her as Adana.

"Something the matter?" Dayo said.

"Not at all. Just one more thing I need to attend to."

"Right. So, one of my favorite places is this Goblin Warren where the queen's lieutenant sits. I'm not supposed to spoil the location of the queen, but I figure the lieutenant is the first one you run into, so that should be OK. Sometimes a high level adventurer tackles it solo trying to farm for amethysts, because it's actually an old amethyst mine the dwarves dug several Expansions ago. The queen likes her 'pretties,' so she sends the lieutenant to oversee a small mining operation there and, well, sometimes a solo adventurer gets cocky or forgets his HP potions. Bit tragic, but that's what happens when you get careless - or greedy. Sometimes the lieutenant doesn't even mind me there and they don't attack, and rather like me cleaning the bodies out, but other times, not so much. I know how to handle myself. I'll try to watch out for you, but no promises, you understand. Form a party?"

Dayo offered him a temporary pact, a travel and mutual assistance agreement, good for twelve hours or until either of them died. Profit sharing, EXP sharing, provision for notifying next of kin in the case of death. Standard as can be. Both of them signed, and off they went.

"So I'm dying to know, if you pardon the expression," Nuru said, laughing at himself as they jogged, "how is it that you level up as a necromancer?"

"Same as anybody else. Questing and killing."

"You can't take EXP of the fallen?"

"No. I'm a subclass you call a valkyrie. I can gather the spirit of a dead person, and I can bring their soul back to the altar of my goddess for its release, but the power I gain does not go into EXP or MP. It's a separate mechanic. I'm forbidden to go into too much detail with outsiders, I'm afraid."

"Oh. Well, alright," Nuru said, disappointed.

"But I can give you a basic overview, since it's a common thread among most of the Factions. As I'm sure you know, the High Archon of each Faction is empowered by one or more of the gods to bestow a certain gift, as are, to a lesser degree, the other archons. This gift works as a spell, and may use both MP and a unique mechanic to perform their rituals or Faction skills. Well, among the Low Factions, that mechanic is some form of soul power, gathered from dark ritual or dead bodies. Or from the 'pre-deceased' in the case of Cursed Ones, their way of saying a living being."

"Like vampires?"

"Among others, yes."

"So... what is our quest today?"

"Heh. I guess I can't very well quest with you and not share the objective. I'm gathering spirit power."

Dayo held up what looked like the shell of a lantern, with runes cut out of the metal shutters.

"How much of it?"

"As much as we can. I have a... quota you could say, but that's really just a daily goal I've set for myself in order to complete my quest within a few weeks."

"Think we could finish it today?"

"I doubt it. I've probably got a full week ahead before I have enough, conservatively."

"And liberally?"

"Well, assuming we do something totally crazy and reckless, I might finish it today. But I'm not willing to risk that until I know how we work together - if we do. You are a man, after all."

"I'll try not to let that get in the way," Nuru said drily.

"You jest, but I've had some bad experiences with co-ed parties. You're lucky I'm considering it at all."

"I appreciate that," Nuru said. "Shall we? Daylight's burning."

"Oof, you're telling me."

Dayo said, pulled the silver hat down to cover their face.

"Don't tell me you're a vampire," Nuru said.

"No, just - minor side effect of my Faction Alignment. Low Faction mostly don't spend much time in the sun, even if they're not of the Cursed variety."

"Mesi's got a good tan going."

"Mesi rocks that smokey look, absolutely. But she's unaligned; we met before she picked a Faction, and then she decided she didn't want to adventure anymore. Took an arrow to the knee, or so she says. She class-shifted into dancer and spends all her free time dancing in the woods. For whose glory... you'd have to ask her yourself."

"An arrow to the knee? And she dances? There's got to be more to that story."

"Hmm. I'm curious now, I'll have to ask her about that."

"I noticed she's got no tan lines. I do know what that means."

"The nudity taboo never did sit well with her. I think that opened her sheltered mind and why she didn't run screaming when she found out my profession. She thinks there's a bit of a conflict of interest between my roles as a fighter who kills during quests, and a valkyrie who gathers spirits of the dead. But so far we've made it work."

"So you get EXP *and* you get your... special mechanic when you kill."

"That's right. I don't go in for those big adventure quests these days though; partly because Mesi doesn't like it, and partly because it's just... it wears on your soul. You go rampaging all over the place, and you get to be a bit jaded to it. I don't want someone taking *my* life like it's nothing."

"Totally with you there."

"We're here. Ready?"

"Sure. Jaheem, have a look around will you? Don't attack, just find out what's around."

Growf!

[On it!]

"Run the direction away from us if they start following! Unless you... need... help..." Dayo trailed off as the lyena disappeared.

"He'll be fine. He's got some tricks."

"Not worried about him, to be honest."

"Ah, right. Not really your friend. OK, so..."

A sudden scream broke the passive conversation and drew their attention towards a cave entrance. A goblin chased after the lyena waving a short sword and a spiked shield. It swung wide once, twice, thrice, and then sat down hard as a heavy blow struck below the shoulder of the sword arm. It sat, stunned, then picked itself up and took more measured strikes which also fell short. Jaheem continued harrassing the gobling for a short time, then turned and ran away. The goblin screamed and warbled in its own language, looking around carefully, saw them standing, and stopped, staring. When they made no move, he turned and walked back inside.

"Occupied, obviously," Nuru said.

"Right. That'll make this tougher, but maybe more productive."

"How so?"

"Well, if some adventurers came through, they wouldn't leave survivors. They've have to kill all the goblins, who won't leave their stronghold undefended. If the goblins aren't dead, maybe they didn't make it, and certainly didn't drag their dead with them."

"Oh, of course. So there might be a few bodies there, but it'll be difficult to get to."

"Let's see if anyone else comes through."

Jaheem trotted silently up enough that they both almost missed him.

"Oh hey, so that answers that. Do you know how many there are?"

Grrrowf. Snort.

[Many. Blood.]

Jaheem's ears pricked up, and he stared in the direction of the cave entrance.

Whine.

[Many coming.]

"Uh oh. Maybe we better go," Nuru said.

"Why? What's-" Dayo got out, before a group of armored goblins burst out and ran their direction. "There's too many! Run away!"

Jaheem War Charged right down the middle, bowling a few over and taking the attention of all the rest.

"Wait. Let's see what happens," Nuru said. "I won't leave him here alone."

After a moment, half of them clustered together under direction of the biggest; the others turned back to face Nuru and Dayo, breaking into a dash.

"They're fast. We wouldn't have gotten far," Dayo said, grimacing. "Well, you wouldn't have. Better to face them here while you have your breath."

Dayo stepped forward, taking an aggressive stance. Two of them charged after Nuru, breaking to go around, but Dayo turned her staff horizontal at the last moment and caught both of them. They were strong and pulled the valkyrie along with them, but they slowed down as Dayo's boots dragged in the dirt. They turned towards this more immediate foe, and one of them promptly got hit in the face with an arcane blast, staggering him. The other took a swing and only managed to catch the staff planted in the dirt, bouncing back and throwing it off balance. The third globlin hurled some small object that trailed an ugly smoke. The second goblin covered its eyes and ducked, but Dayo didn't see it and was hurled to the ground as the object exploded violently. The second goblin ran over towards her to finish the valkyrie off, but found that the staff had grown a scythe blade that whistled menacingly as it cleft the air in its direction. It dodged to the side, but its momentum halted. The third goblin took aim with a small crossbow at Nuru, and found itself set upon by lyena from behind that bellowed and growled and chomped at it menacingly with jaws bigger than its head.

[Can I kill them now?]

The three goblins that had been chasing Jaheem mustered and came at him again, and he dodged away.

"Soften them up, we'll finish them!" Dayo called out.

Jaheem knocked one into another, then chomped onto the wrist of a third, wreaking horrible injury on the muscle under its armor. It screamed in pain, but passed its blade to the other hand.

Nuru stood, watching and waiting, unsure what to do, but unwilling to leap in against the stronger foes.

Dayo threw down some kind of rune, and waited. The goblin blasted earlier shook its head and came straight in, only to lose its footing in the arcane circle and fall into a puddle of magic-induced mud. As it climbed back up in quickly-solidifying ground, it took a blow from the staff Dayo swung like a bat, dealing a critical hit and killing it. The second turned back to Nuru and charged, but then stopped when it found he was no longer there, having run some feet away. It turned and charged him again, waving its weapon dramatically, only to meet empty air again. It looked around and saw him, took an arcane blast on its shield which absorbed the blow, then came on again.

Nuru was quickly running out of stamina. He reached for the only thing he had with him - low-level scrolls.

Dayo went after a few distracted goblins with a one-two punch; first the staff knocked aside the shield, then an arcane blast swept them off their feet. Finally, the staff battered their helm in and laid them down permanently.

The goblin running after Nuru was undeterred by his sudden aloneness and kept on. He got a snowball to the face, and stopped in mid step. He shook the snow away, looked one way, and the other. It felt a blow from behind and turned around, finding Nuru shaking the remains of Fire Hand away. It jolted into action, but stopped again and sniffed. Something wasn't right. And then it noticed the flames leaping up from its own back where Fire Hand had been planted right between the metal shoulder guards on its unprotected spine.

The goblin shrieked, started running back towards the cave, and then stumbled as the pain swept past the adrenaline. It got up, dropping its shield and weapon, and ran again only to panic, stopping to tear off its armor and helmet. This, however, did not stop the flames which engulfed it. It fell and rolled, but in vain; the flames had stuck to its flesh and roared back up the moment the burning skin met the air. After a few moments more, it collapsed in a crackling heap.

Dayo laid down the last of the other goblins in time to see the burning goblin thrashing and smoking.

Jaheem trotted up casually, as if just out for a morning stroll.

"Nuru, do me a favor," Dayo said slowly, eying the roasted fiend as it expired.

"What's that?"

"Forget I ever said anything about kicking your ass."

Nuru grinned. "I just assumed it was rhetorical."

"I appreciate you saying so."

"What level are you, anyway?"

" 'Never ask a girl her level'," Dayo quoted.

"I'm lucky you're not a girl, then, aren't I?"

Dayo burst out laughing.

"Well played! I'm Level Twenty."

"And these goblins, they're..."

"You can't read them? Oh, I guess not if your Lore and Basic Knowledge aren't high enough. They're Level Eight, maybe a few Level Nines."

"I'm really in over my head, aren't I?"

"Didn't I say so? You're lucky Jaheem's Level Thirty-Five."

"Holy crap. How did you get bested by a Rising Sun champion?"

Grunts and funny sounds.

[A beast does not have the luxury of enchanted equipment, nor did I get the buffs of a hundred allies cheering me on.]

"All this time, Gram's been full of shit," Dayo mused. "That butcher's been the one that's been telling everyone that Jaheem would eat their children, but at the same time refusing to post a bounty. You wouldn't do it, would you?"

The big feliform shook his head, making a retching face.

[You ever tried to eat human?]

Dayo cackled. "I don't need translation to know what that means!"

"So, now what?" Nuru said.

"Now I harvest these spirits. Check your EXP, and loot the bodies for anything useful. I'll let you have first dibs."

Nuru looked inward.

"Woah! I'm maxed out!"

"Wow. As high a level as Jaheem is, I'm surprised... oh, but he can't officially party with us, can he?"

"He said he could not give me any EXP with his kills."

"That would be a no, then. Plus you did the final blow on one of these idiots, so you got extra for that. I forgot how quick your EXP fills up at that level."

"I better go spend it, then. How long will it take you to do your special mechanic?"

"I've got to have those conversations, even with goblins. And I'll scout around for any adventurer bodies that are about. I'll be good for awhile if you want to run back to town and grab your level."