Court of Thorns: A LitRPG Story Read online

  Mana Shield didn’t stop his wounds from hurting, but he’d learned to deal with the pain. He gritted his teeth and hacked at the horned Climber’s neck until its head came off. By then, the party had wiped out the rest of the monsters. The damage was done, however. Everyone was visible and dozens of hostile monsters had seen the fight. All their internal disputes were forgotten once intruders were spotted; two more Chaos Climber bands and half a dozen Titans started to converge on the group from multiple directions.

  “Run!” Hawke ordered, placing a virtual arrow in the direction they needed to go: their destination was a moss-covered hill with a cavern opening. They dropped a few spells on the ground to slow down pursuit and rushed toward the cavern.

  Before they had made it very far, a giant monster came out of said cavern:

  Gullinbursti the Mad (Chaos-tainted Great Beast)

  Level 20 Elite Boss

  Health 16,000 Mana 8,000 Endurance 10,000

  Golden fur was still visible in patches along its massive body, but those and its name tag were the only signs that the stumbling thing moving towards them had once been the Labyrinth’s legendary boar. There was a single tusk protruding out of its front end, but it was long, twisted like a corkscrew, and covered with thorns. Dozens of eyes covered a third of the wormlike central mass, which was propelled by a couple of dozen running legs, kind of like a centipede except these legs were furry and hoofed. Ten or more limbs from a variety of different animals were unevenly spread over its fifty-foot length.

  The thing that had once been Gullinbursti came out, blocking the way to the cavern and trapping the party between multiple groups of monsters. They had to get past the boss or they would be overwhelmed.

  “Keep going,” Hawke told them. “Blaze and I will distract the big monster.”

  Blaze grew to full size and Hawke leaped on his back. They took to the air and flew straight for the furry worm-boar headed for the party. To their credit, everyone in the group kept moving forward, trusting their leader. Time to earn that trust.

  He and Blaze used their breath attacks and welcomed the Chaos beast with twin torrents of psychic fire. Hawke went for broke and burned off over a thousand Mana to deliver enough damage to insta-kill every previous boss he’d encountered. He even managed to improve his Breath Weapon skill to 5 as he lined up the blast: it went over Blaze’s head and hit a large concentration of eyes right next to the monster’s deformed tusk. Gullinbursti staggered in agony, its Health down by one third by the double attacks. As they flew past the giant critter, Hawke and Blaze delivered simultaneous Shadow Leech spells, disrupting the monster’s spellcasting abilities for three seconds. Bosses usually could use spells; Hawke had no intention of discovering which ones this thing had.

  Blaze said as he circled back.

  Saturnyx added.

  On the ground below, the boss reared up, its remaining eyes focused on its flying tormentors. Not too far away, the rest of the group ran past it. Hawke caught a brief struggle among the party members; Zippo was being dragged away. The idiot had probably tried to hit the giant monster. Hawke set that aside for the moment. There were plenty of bigger things to worry about.

  The chamber’s ceiling was about two hundred feet near the center but it narrowed down to half of that on the northern section where the boss’ cave was. There wasn’t much room to maneuver, and the ground below was filling up with enemies as the pursuing bands began to arrive. Gullinbursti reared up and seemed to explode: dozens of thorns the size of spears flew toward Blaze and Hawke. As if that volley had been a signal to fire, all the monsters in range opened up with their ranged attacks: thorny spears, globs of some flaming substance from the Climbers, beams of pure Chaos from the Titans, and several spells from lieutenant types. Most attacks missed their nimble targets, but not all. Blaze’s defensive auras were overwhelmed; Hawke’s followed suit a moment later.

  They both muscled through the pain and healed themselves before doing a low firing pass over the assembled beasts. They used their basic flame attacks to save in Mana but kept up a continuous stream of Mind-Fire that killed the weaker critters and hurt everything else. The enemy spells were mostly mental debuffs meant to drive their targets insane, but Ethereal Dragons like Blaze were highly resistant to that sort of thing and Hawke’s Tranquil Mind kept his brain in one piece. For the time being, at least. But a quick look at the combat log told Hawke they would get shot down in thirty to forty seconds, and only if more reinforcements didn’t arrive.

  We’re in, Tava told Hawke telepathically.

  On my way, Hawke replied as Blaze flew toward the cave entrance. The giant boss and its minions came trampling after them.

  Blaze added.

  The ‘mages’ in question were Aristobulus, Gosto, and Grognard, who were prepping several Earth and Nature spells to block the cavern once Hawke was through. They could get there in a few seconds, no problem. Blaze tucked his wings into a narrow, streamlined shape and figuratively put the pedal to the metal. The monsters and the jungle went by in a blur as they surged toward the cave.

  They darted in, chased by a few more spiteful spells and missiles, and the party sealed the cave. An Avalanche from Aristobulus caused the upper portion of the cave to collapse, filling the entrance with earth and loose stones. Gosto added Thorn Thicket, magically creating a network of plants that bound the dirt into a hedge wall. Grognard finished it off with Stone Wall, sealing the whole thing behind three inches of solid rock. The monsters would break it all down eventually, but not quickly.

  Getting back the same way was probably impossible, but hopefully they wouldn’t have to.

  “Well, we made it,” Hawke said as he dismounted and Blaze shrunk back to large dog size.

  “Not really,” Amelia said. “We haven’t made it past the Gatekeeper.”

  Interlude: The Thorns Strike

  “You are not enjoying yourself, dearie,” Leara told Desmond.

  “I thought we were working.”

  “We are. Panadel and I are gathering information. You are watching our backs. But you should at least pretend to have a good time. Dour warriors are not fashionable.”

  Desmond pasted a fake grin on his face, still looking around for possible threats. They were attending a party. Not a common shindig in the Golden Hall but a smaller gathering. The ballroom was ten stories up, located in one of the middle levels of the Chancery of Mithril. It was an exclusive event; only Fae nobles and other notable entities were invited. And their servants, bodyguards, and slaves, of course. Of which Desmond was all three.

  The ballroom reserved – or perhaps created – for the occasion was covered with gold-lined green marble slates that provided a soft illumination of their own, just enough to fill the space with a greenish gloom that made Desmond think of being underwater. Some of the guests had their own light sources in every color possible and a few impossible ones, adding to the bizarre ambiance. At least the freaks had agreed to have a single kind of music for the event, even if the music wasn’t anything Desmond would have chosen. His tastes ran more toward Ren Faire sort of stuff, back when his tastes counted for anything. What they were playing used a lot of brass instruments and reminded him of something a high school band might play, if they were all high on acid.

  The crowd – about a hundred VIPs and three or four times as many underlings – were clustered in groups matching their Courts of factions. The Wild Fae were off in one corner: Satyrs, Tree Folk, and Woodling guards stayed close to their Faun, Kitsune, and Wood Elf leaders. That bunch looked uncomfortable and out of place; Desmond figured they had only accepted the invite to show that they weren’t afraid of the others. The Seelie Court members, on the other hand, were clearly happy to be there. Their delegation was the largest there. Tiny Sprites darted back and forth around Silver Fae who looked like nine-foot-tall super-Elves. A seven-tailed Kitsune was having an animated c
onversation with a golden-skinned Aosh Sidhe who looked like a living statue. Starborn, the Seelie Ambassador, floated over the congregation; she was one of the Rikkarr Sidhe, a Royal-Class Fae whose humanoid outline was filled with blinding light. Shifting geometrical figures surrounded Starborn, also glowing brightly, and smaller dots of light made her look like she’d brought along her own constellation as a fashion accessory.

  On the opposite side of the ballroom were the Unseelie. They seemed to like the green lights, because they weren’t using any magic or Glamour to change them. Maybe they were afraid to attract too much attention. Crystal City’s Unseelie community was relatively small and low-powered after a few unfortunate incidents a few centuries back led to the expulsion of most of its leaders. Most of the attendees were Dark Elves with jet-black hair but otherwise identical to their Seelie counterparts. The Unseelie Ambassador was a Hunt Leader, who wore an antlered hood that hid most of his or her features. Leara and Panadel had been members of the Unseelie Court for most of their lives, but they were no longer welcome there. Desmond’s bosses had yet to approach them at the party.

  Finally, the Gray Court consisted of a handful of unaligned Sidhe, led by a Fae Godmother, who looked like a pointy-eared chubby woman in a silk dress and an elaborate beehive hairdo that added over a foot to her relatively small form; her dragonfly-like translucent wings fluttered as she stuffed her face, eating from a bowl of candied cherries like they were going out of style. There was nothing cute or cuddly about Fae Godmothers, something that had somehow disappointed Desmond when he learned the truth. The real ‘fairy godmothers’ didn’t do favors for free, and their blessings usually cost far more than they were worth. They were powerful spellcasters and Glamour weavers, so few people messed with them.

  Besides the Fae, there were a few prominent guests. A city delegation was there; it didn’t include any of the Council of Four who ruled Crystal City, but two members of the Assembly were representing the settlement: an Earthen Dwarf and a Hydro Woman. The two Demi-Elemental Assemblypersons were a bizarre combination of flesh and mystical matter. There was even a Dragon in attendance, Delmarr the Jovial; he was in humanoid form to avoid taking up too much room, but everyone gave him a wide berth. And some Elemental Nobles were there as well, tracking dirt or water on the marble floor or leaving a trail of flames as they walked, depending on their particular species.

  Desmond found the whole thing boring and annoying. He’d been dutifully following his bosses as they mingled with the crowd. Since their arrival about two hours ago, they had spent a good thirty minutes with members of the Seelie delegation, twice as much with the Fae Godmother, and were currently talking to the Assemblyperson Sooreen, the Hydro Woman, who looked almost human except for her deep blue skin and the icicles that grew out of her head instead of hair. Her presence also lowered the temperature in a ten foot radius by a good twenty degrees.

  “I will make your concerns known to the Magistrate,” Sooreen was saying. “There have been some troublesome Mana fluctuations in the city over the past few weeks, and their point of origin has eluded our investigators. Perhaps they are related to your Fae criminals.”

  “They are not just Fae, Your Purity,” Panadel said in a diplomatic tone. “They recruit members from all races of the Realms, including Undead.”

  The Assemblyperson snorted, sending a fine spray of water that got onto Desmond’s face. Elementals were messy like that.

  “I will assure you,” she told Panadel. “That no Undead is allowed to exist within the boundaries of our fair city. We have the finest protections against such abominations.”

  Panadel began to respond, but that was when the attack began.

  Desmond first noticed a lull in the conversation, noticeable even through the loud music. He followed the lack of sound and realized that the dozen or so members of the Unseelie crowd were moving purposely forward while the Hunt Leader stood in the rear, hands upraised. Before anyone could react or sound an alarm, one of the Dark Elves casually grabbed a serving girl and drained her of all life in under a second; she didn’t have a chance to scream before her shriveled corpse collapsed, but a nearby reveler did.

  “Revenants!” Desmond’s shout was drowned out by dozens of screams of terror.

  The Hunt Leader pulled his hood back, revealing the bloodless face of Huntmaster Laryn. A bit too on-the-nose, Desmond thought as he called forth Spell-Cleaver and activated several magic tattoos and engravings. He didn’t pause to wonder how the Undead had been able to invade a Sidhe safe haven. All his attention was focused on the two alleged Dark Elves pushing their way towards his bosses. Everybody they touched was killed instantly unless they were very high-level or protected by heavy-duty spells or Glamour. Even worse, the desiccated bodies of the victims were beginning to stir. To rise again. He only spared a glance at the twitching forms before turning to the two Revenants. Now that the charade was over, they weren’t bothering to conceal their identity:

  Innaree (Exalted Elf, Undead)

  Level 39 Revenant

  Health 5,240 Mana 4,720 Endurance n/a

  Alathan the Sorrowful (Bane Sidhe, Undead)

  Level ?? Revenant

  Health 6,258 Mana 3,780 Endurance n/a

  “Keep those things away from me!” Assemblyperson Sooreen screeched.

  Her bodyguards were a pair of level 35 Iron Elementals shaped like ambulatory suits of plate armor. They stepped forward, blocking the two Undead and striking them with mauls that had grown out of their hands. Desmond took the opportunity and moved off to one side, trying to flank Innaree, who was merely fifteen levels higher than he was. In the fraction of a second it took him to move, the Revenants were struck several times, to little effect. Even worse, whatever Undead effect they transmitted by touch traveled up the Elementals’ weapons, which were an extension of themselves. The bodyguards reeled back, their levels reduced by several notches; rust spread through their bodies and they began to fall apart.

  Desmond activated a new tattoo – Augment – that raised his Attributes and combat skills by fifty percent and wished, not for the first time, that Leara or Panadel could create a party and raise his effective level. Unfortunately, Fae didn’t form parties. They were too afraid that their secrets might slip up through the required connections. The tattoo would help with the level discrepancy but it would leave him exhausted and weak after three minutes.

  Screw them, he thought as he chopped into the weakest of the two Revenants, using every ability he could pile onto the savage blow. And by ‘them’ he meant both the Undead and his bosses.

  It felt as if he had hit a stone wall. The Undead didn’t even stagger under the massive impact, although its Health did drop by over twelve hundred points. The thing once known as Innaree reached for him with a clawed hand, but Desmond slapped it away with the sword’s guard and used a twisting enveloping move to catch the monster’s arm and slice it open with his blade. The flame runes on Spell-Cleaver ignited the Undead from the inside out. Another thousand Health were burned away; only three thousand to go.

  The deafening music had been replaced with the equally loud ‘din of battle,’ something Desmond had sung about at Ren Faire events without having a damn clue what he was talking about. The sounds of metal on metal or flesh, impossibly loud cries of agony or terror, the sizzle, roar, and thunder of spells, they all combined into something that hit you with almost physical force even when you were busy fighting for your life. He added to the noise by screaming obscenities at the monster trying to grab him while he kept slashing it to pieces.

  Three fingers fell to the dance floor, followed a moment later by the Revenant’s right hand, neatly severed at the wrist. Before Desmond could savor the small victory, the monster shouted something in High Fae; a tendril of congealed blood erupted from the stump of its arm and lashed at Desmond. The Undead’s blood tentacle tried to drain him – and bounced off the newest magical shield Leara had carved into his skin. His bosses had been preparing for a rematch with the l
evel-draining monsters. Their countermeasure worked, at least this once.

  The living dead usually didn’t show surprise or any emotion, but the way the Revenant paused told Desmond that the monster hadn’t expected the blood tendril trick to fail. He took advantage of its hesitation and drove his sword right through Innaree’s neck. Desmond twisted the blade with all his inhuman strength, using it like a lever to separate the Revenant’s vertebrae until its head came off. He’d done it; he’d killed the damn thing.

  Desmond checked his timer app; he still had the better part of two minutes left before the Augment tattoo crashed and left him weak as a kitten. The second Revenant who’d gone after his bosses was nothing but a smoldering pile of ash. One of the Iron Elemental bodyguards had turned into another Undead – something that should have been impossible – but Panadel or Leara had sent it back to hell with some spell that turned it into a molten puddle on the ground. For the moment, Desmond was free to look around the ballroom turned battlefield.

  There were bodies everywhere, and many of them were beginning to come to life, or rather un-life. In the thirty or forty seconds Desmond had spent fighting one of the Revenants, the rest of the monsters had killed over hundred people. Most of those had been servants and flunkies, but a good third were VIPs. From the looks of it, the Gray Court delegation had been wiped out; Desmond couldn’t see the Fae Godmother anywhere. Dead or fled, he didn’t know. Surprise and the Undead powers of the Revenants had taken a hideous toll on the gathering. The element of surprise was gone, however, and the Fae were dealing with the killers in the midst in the Fae way: elegant brutality.