The Sword and the Bone Ch. 01

Chapter 1: Discovery

Within the confines of an extensive dungeon, two companions found themselves at a passageway leading into some kind of study. They glanced through the doorway to see a two headed monster occupying the room. At the sight of the beast, the two stepped back and hid next to the doorway, hoping the monster did not take notice. Sidled up to the wall, Mae, a lean built woman with short brown hair, placed her hand on the hilt of her sheathed broadsword and glanced back at the monster through the doorway, attempting to gauge if it noticed them. After a moment, she looks towards her companion and asks "I don't think it saw us, but the bastard looks strong. Any idea on how we're gonna take him down?"

"Uhhm hang on let me find something." Replies Rebecca, a smaller black haired scholarly-looking young lady, as she flips through the research book she kept at hand, glasses sliding down her small nose slightly.

"Two headed... ogre like body... aha! Here we go, looks like it's an ettin" She mumbled inaudibly to herself as she speedily read through the entries hoping to gain an edge on the monster before they made an assault. As she finished the passage she let out a weary sigh and groaned "real helpful, book... thanks." rolling her eyes while she shut the book and stored it away in her satchel.

"Nothing useful, Becca?" queried the warrior. "Just basic information on habitats and eating patterns. So we're going to have to improvise." replied Rebecca, as she pulled out her spellbook and prepared an incantation.

The monster lumbered around the room, seemingly unaware of the duo as they prepared their plan to fell it. Rebecca began to lay out the plan, "Alright Mae, this is gonna be a bit tricky, I'm going to need you to distract the beast so I can try to get a clear shot on it to freeze it in place, but once that is done, you should be able to just beat it down."

"Right, got it!" quickly replied Mae, charging ahead.

"Now, once I get this spell charged you go out there and... Mae?" said Rebecca, just realizing that her friend had already left her side.

"Hey Ugly!" Called out Mae towards the ettin, "You lookin for a fight!? Well, come and get me!" she taunted as she began to run towards the beast, sword drawn and held slightly vertically against her leather chestplate for stability.

The ettin was quick to take notice, it's two sets of eyes darted towards the warrior and it met her charge brandishing a crudely fashioned giant stone axe with both hands. It responded to the garish warrior's taunts with surprisingly clear speech for a beast of it's stature. "Hey!" shouted the left head as it brought the axe down to block Mae's charge "Yous callin us ugly!?". "I thinks she is!" responded it's twin "Well itsa good ting we haven't eaten yet 'cause you're lookin reeaaal tasty!" commented the left head "Yea! It's lunch time!" affirmed the right.

Stopped in her tracks by the massive weapon slamming down in front of her. Mae took a moment to properly size up her opponent while he monologues. The monster towered over her, at least 5 feet taller and significantly wider. Mae hesitated for a moment, a flash of fear of the strength this monster may pose though it's sheer size alone overtook her. She stepped back, but managed to stay courageous. Hardening her expression, she quickly maneuvered away from the axe and managed to position herself near the ettin's flank. Before it had time to react, Mae swung at the back of it's oversized legs. The sword sliced into the monster's tough skin with a fair bit of resistance, but left a bleeding wound deep enough to make the monster reel at the impact. The two headed beast yelled out in pain in response and began to limp slightly as it attempted to turn and face Mae.

In this moment of vulnerability, Mae called out towards Rebecca, "Now's your chance! Go for it!", but as she turned her head to see the magic fly off to inhibit the beast, Mae was instead met with the sight of her mage companion still preparing the spell! "I THOUGHT YOU SAID YOU'D FREEZE IT WHEN I DISTRACTED IT!" yelled Mae as she prepared herself to dodge the lumbering yet destructive swings of the ettin's weapon. "I TOLD YOU THAT I NEED TIME TO POWER UP THE SPELLS, ESPECIALLY WHEN IT'S A LARGER TARGET!" barked back Rebecca, trying to keep her focus on empowering her frost magic."WELL HOW LONG!?!" Mae cried out in a panic, narrowly blocking an axe swing with her sword, which gave her a precious second to move herself away from the axe's deadly head. But before the spellcaster could respond, the two headed monster turned one of it's heads and saw the nervous looking mage empowering her spell and said "Ay Berg! Der's anudder one!"

"Yea! Les gedder Gerg!" responded the second as it began turning itself towards the doorway to charge at Rebecca.

"Oh no you don't!" asserted Mae, keeping up with the monster to the best of her ability. Unable to get in front of the monster to cut off it's assault, Mae changed her plan. Thinking quickly, or perhaps hardly thinking at all, the nimble warrior made a running jump onto the creature's back. Clinging to the old and worn rags it used as clothes, the warrior grab hold of her blade and plunged it into the exposed back of the monster! The ettin howled in pain and stopped dead in its tracks, much to the relief of the timid mage not more than five feet away from it.

The monster dropped it's weapon by its feet and started to reach around it's back to grab at the garish fighter on it's back. With a relieved sigh, Rebecca took this time to put some much needed distance between herself and the beast while Mae continued to distract it. Mae grabbed hold of the sword lodged into the monster's back and avoided the flurry of limbs attempting to claw at her by quickly climbing further up the monster's back. Once she reached the monster's upper back, she raised her sword once again to stab at its shoulder blade. And once more the beast cried out in pain, but with a quick movement of it's massive hands, it managed to grab onto Mae by her battle garb, pulling and tearing at her leather cuirass, leaving parts of her midriff and chest exposed before finally managing to remove her from it's topside.

Mae fell to the floor with an audible thud, her upper body exposed to the world around her, however she was too determined to slay the two headed monster to even notice. Winded, Mae collected herself and her sword which fortunately fell nearby and attempted to impede the monster once more. "Rebecca just needs a bit longer... she needs to help me stop this thing" she thought to herself, driving herself forward despite the pain from being thrown. Before Mae could even catch up to the ettin, however, a bright flash of white light erupted from the far side of the room and the next thing Mae knew was that the Ettin's lower body had been encased in ice!

Rebecca let out a self satisfied half smile before looking up and calling out to Mae "Now's our chance, let's kill this thing before he breaks out!".

"How much time do we have?" replied the exposed warrior, looking for a weak point to strike at.

"I dunno" admitted the mage as she prepares faster magics to assist her friend, "A minute maybe, less if he can force his way out, so we gotta act fast, go for the heads if you can!".

It took a moment for the two heads to realize what had happened, but as soon as it did, it began to use it's fists to smash it's way through the ice, it's shoulder and back wounds bleeding further with every swing.

Summoning up the rest of her energy, Mae once more made a jump onto the monster's backside and began climbing towards it's heads. As she climbed, Rebecca conjured a barrage of smaller motes of fire to swarm the ettin, with each flame leaving an impact on its skin, burning the flesh to a charred black and further distracting the monster from it's attempt at escaping. The climb upwards was uneasy, the ettin determinedly tried to shake off the adventurer despite being burned alive.

Due in part to Rebecca's efforts to distract it, along with the ettin being held stationary, Mae was able to reach the top of the monster's back to take a clear shot at the monster's necks, it made one final effort to shake her off before Mae took her sword and plunged it into the neck of the right-most head! Simultaneously, a flaming spear launched itself towards the left-most head, engulfing it in flames and burning it to a crisp. The ettin let out a pained groan as life escaped from its body, the corpse collapsed onto the ground, still being held upwards somewhat by the ice encasing it's legs.

As it fell, Mae removed her sword from the bloodied remains and jumped to the ground with a triumphant stride to regroup with Rebecca. The two victorious adventurers took in the aftermath of their combined efforts. "A bit closer than I'd like," declared Mae " but you did come in on the clutch, Becca. So, Thanks."

Rebecca responded with an annoyed and patronizing tone "You're right to think that was close! I told you before that you need to wait for me to be ready before you go charging into a fight!"

Mae let out a weary sigh and with a tone of genuine remorse said "I know, I know, I keep rushing in before we get everything set up, that's my bad. You didn't get hurt because of it though, did you?".

The anger quickly faded from the mages face and she returned to her usual timid demeanor "Oh... uhhh yeah I'm fine... and well, you did do what I asked in the end anyways, so uhm thanks for distracting Mr. Big 'n Ugly for me." She said with a slightly nervous laugh and cute smile. "How about you though? You look like you got thrown pretty hard. Do you need a potion maybe?"

Mae took a moment to stretch out her back as she answered, "Ahh yeah, a bit painful... but nothing too bad I think. I should be fine, maybe a bit sore for a few days. Anyways, I gotta say Becca, nice job freezing the bastard! That ice is cold enough that I'm still feeling it from over here!"

"Well, uhh that might be because of ahhh...." responded Rebecca blushing as she points towards the warrior's exposed breasts, too polite to directly state the issue. Mae looked down for a second while stretching, realizing that she had been brazenly shaking her naked chest around for over a minute now.

Mae's face went beat red as she quickly attempted to cover herself up while stammering out an embarrassed apology "OH GODS I DIDN'T KNOW WHAT I WAS DOING I'M SO SORRY!".

Rebecca turned a similar shade of red and tried to cover her face as she turned away and digged around in her satchel for something. With an almost fearful tone she replied "D-don't worry about it! It's... fine haha it's no big deal, hang on I-i have a cloak you can use to cover up!! Here!" A nervous expression rested on her face as she tossed a worn out cloak towards the bare breasted warrior. Careful to keep her chest covered she catched the cloak with one hand and placed it atop her now torn leather armor. She took a few breaths and tried to regain her composure.

"Ahh thanks, Rebecca" said Mae with a less than confident tone, "And sorry for uhm... shaking my tits around like that..."

"No, no it's fine..." countered Rebecca, still blushing "I hardly even noticed until you brought up the ice. And besides, they're just your boobs, it's not like it's a big deal, we both have them.... And they looked good too" Whispered the shy spellcaster under her breath as she looked away again to hide her flushed cheeks.

"What was that last part again?" questioned Mae

"Nothing! Nothing." Rebecca barked back nervously.

A silence fell over the room lasting for several long moments until it was broken by Mae "Aaaanyways, you wanna see if this monster was guarding anything cool?" she asked excitedly, returning to her usual cheery demeanor.

"Oh, uh yeah! You check it's body to see if he was carrying anything worth note, I want to see if this study has anything interesting!" responded the mage with a similar tone of excitement in her voice.

About 20 minutes passed, after not finding too much of note on the Ettin's remains, Mae sat on the floor attempting to fashion the torn bits of her leather cuirass into a usable piece of armor, while Rebecca perused the bookshelves on the far side of the room, removing a select few books and placing them onto the table nearby. After gathering three books, the girl placed herself down by the table and started flipping through the pages. Needing more materials to tie together the pieces of her armor, Mae walked over to the Ettin's carcass and removed a strip of its clothing to use as her own. As she began to walk back to her spot, she looked over at her friend, nose deep into one of the books and pondered aloud "You're not seriously going to read through all of those right now, are you? How long do you plan on us being here?".

Rebecca looked up from the small nest of books she made for herself and responded "Oh, no I'm just skimming the passages looking for anything especially useful, it will take me a few nights to read through all of these!".

"Ohhh okay" replied the clearly somewhat bored warrior.

Some more time passed and Mae had finished repairing her armor, though not as sturdy as it once was and was now waiting impatiently for her partner to finish her books. This dreariness did not last long however, as the mage soon began making a fuss "Hang on a second... I've seen this map before!" Rebecca exclaimed before diving into her satchel of books and supplies. A moment later, she pulled out a casing holding several maps and began comparing them. "Oh, perfect!" shouted the scholar, clearly ecstatic.

"What is it Becca?" queried Mae as she walked over to her table, adjusting her newly repaired chest armor.

Pointing to a map in the book Rebecca explained excitedly "You see this line they have marked here, this entry states that whoever made this part of the dungeon had a treasure stash hidden not too far from this room!"

"That's... Amazing! We should hurry and go grab it!" responded Mae with a joyous look in her eyes.

"Yeah! Let's go!" exclaimed Rebecca as she hastily packed away the books and ran with her companion towards the treasure room with a spring in her step.

After running through the corridors towards their promised treasures, the two near their destination, slowing their pace as to not get themselves lost within this winding maze of a dungeon. Rebecca carefully searched the right most wall, looking for the hidden entrance to the hidden treasure room. She mumbled to herself "The book says to look for a false wall and proceed down the hallway from there..." clearly unaware of what to look for, Mae began pondering about the treasure, asking if the book mentions anything about it.

"Nothing on what it is exactly, but it did say that whatever they stored there, they wanted to keep it safe, as it was a one-of-a-kind type of thing! Whatever it is, it's bound to be a treasure trove's worth of knowledge, and failing that, something we can sell for a ton of gold!" responded Rebecca, turning away from the wall to address Mae. She signaled for Mae to follow her actions to assist in their search. They press against the walls of the corridor for what felt like ages in search of the secret passage, but to no avail. Losing faith in their expedition, Mae let out an exasperated sigh and began questioning the validity of the map, Rebecca had also begun losing her patience, but continued searching with a frustrated fervor.

Having essentially given up, Mae rested her back against a corridor wall and said "We've looked for, what an hour now? We've checked every part of this stupid ass wall, it's not here Becca! We should try another hallway instead."

But with eerily perfect timing, a section of the wall Rebecca was pushing on finally gave way to the hidden passage they were searching for. A smug smirk painted Rebecca's youthful looking face and she looked towards Mae and silently mouthed "Told ya so" and stuck her tongue out at her to tease before motioning for her to follow as she proceeded into the hallway. Mae rolls her eyes slightly before following after her.

The hallway stretched on endlessly, every twist and turn changing their direction wildly until it started to become unclear what direction they were even traveling. Yet, they pushed onwards towards the promise of unknown treasure, until finally it gave way unto a large open corridor. The two intrepid adventurers look around with awe as they enter the room, and as if responding to their curious wonder, the room magically illuminated itself, torches and braziers igniting along the walls and floors, giving the room a bright orange hue.

As the flames light themselves down the line of the room, the two noticed that while the room is impressive, it also seemed to lack their sought after treasure. "AW DAMN IT" Yells out Mae frustratedly "Where the hell is our treasure!?".

Equally confused, Rebecca looked around the room, trying to find signs of something, anything to show for their efforts in finding this remote and hidden room. No such luck, until the clever mage took notice of the fact that the lights in the room had been arranged in such a way as to seemingly guide them forward. Bringing the raging warrior back to her senses, Rebecca urged her to follow her once more as they walked down this large and open room. As they approached the far end of the room, the final set of torches illuminated themselves, revealing a magnificent sight!

A lone pedestal, surrounded by both small piles of gold and treasures and by three metal statues. The statues stood guard lifelessly, guarding over the small treasure hoard and another lone object. Placed atop of the small pedestal, stood a pristeen, beautiful looking sword right in the center. The ornate looking blade immediately caught Mae's eye and she began to move herself towards it before a firm hand was placed on her shoulder by Rebecca. "Wait, wait wait wait!" She urged, "Don't you see how this is set up, it's clearly a trap! Once you remove any of the gold or that sword over there, those statue's swords are gonna come down and cleave your head off or something!"

"You're... probably right, Becca, thanks for stopping me.... But we didn't come all this way just to leave empty handed, did we?" asked Mae, sounding disappointed.

"No, of course not, we're gonna grab all this treasure, but we are going to have to do it safely." chimed Rebecca, as she flipped through her spell book to prepare some magic to help them through. "Okay, here it is, alright, Mae, I'm going to cast a barrier spell on you, if the trap works how I think it works, this should protect you from the sudden heavy blows these things could be dishing out, but only for a short time, so you'll need to be fast."

"Oh alright, thanks... but wait, why did you use this before when we fought that ettin?" Remarked Mae

"Well I was going to cast it on you, but someone just had to run in before I was ready, so I just used frost to immobilize it instead" Retorted Rebecca with a slight glare.

"Ahhg, alright fine, you got me there," Mae conceded " just cast the spell so I can grab the stuff and we can get out of here!"

Rebecca simply nodded as she read the incantation for the spell, taking the time to channel her magical power into the spell, ensuring it will be able to withstand the heaviest of impacts. And with a flick of the hand, the spell was complete, leaving Mae coated in an emerald green shell.

"There, that should protect you from some heavy weapon attacks, just be quick, I can only keep it going for about 30 seconds, a minute at most." Rebecca informed, her free hand on her temple to help her keep focus.

"Right, I'll be quick then" responded Mae getting an empty bag ready to nab the gold strewn about the floor. She quickly moved over toward the pedestals, the large metal statues standing over it imposingly. The shielded warrior quickly bagged all of the loose coins, quickly filling the bag with their new pile of wealth. Once all of the coins were lifted, Mae looked up towards the statues, still standing motionless. "Seems... safe for now... How much longer can you hold the spell, Becca?"