Chapter

Thirty-Five

On the way to the spinewolf den, Brin couldn’t stop his brain from thinking. Was doing all this playing right into the [Weaver’s] hands? If it was, so what? If Tawna wanted him to do something that he also wanted to do, would it make sense to not do it just to spite her? That would be giving her too much power. The best decision would be to live his life as if she didn’t exist, not to rearrange his life based on every little thing she did.

She’d given him a choice, and he’d chosen to do what he wanted. What she wanted was irrelevant. Although, he couldn’t help but wonder if he’d screwed himself by going after the weaker monsters first. What if trying to do both meant he wouldn’t get the information she’d promised? Well, if that was the case, so be it. This was already an extremely lucrative day.

The clouds continued to darken as he walked, and a chill wind began to blow, but the rain stayed constrained to a few drops here and there.

Around noon, he knew that if he went any further, then he would be near where he thought the den should be. Before that, he should take a break. The fight with the spiderlings had taken a lot out of him. He needed to approach whatever this was at his absolute best.

He found a patch of soft grass, asked Marksi to keep watch, and then lay down and closed his eyes. Back in his old life, he’d been the king of the fifteen-minute nap. He wasn’t sure if that talent had transferred. With all the preteen manic energy he’d been living with, he’d never needed it. But it was worth a try now.

He lay on the ground, but couldn’t sleep. His neck and hand hurt too much. Well, even if he couldn’t sleep, a rest would still help.

He woke up and it was dark. Panicking, he thought he’d slept through the night, but it wasn’t actually that dark. The clouds had gotten a little bit darker and the wind was blowing harder, but he doubted he’d been asleep for more than an hour.

The pain in his neck and hand had diminished to a dull ache, but for some reason all his other muscles had started to ache more. Oh well, this was as good as he was going to feel. Best to get started.

He continued north towards the spinewolf den. The trees thinned out, but the water became more and more muddy, until pools of stagnant water started to cut off his path and he had to wander through them like a maze.

He copied Lurilan’s trick of cutting a tree branch to use to test that the ground in front of him was solid. He didn’t fear illusions, but sometimes grass that looked normal was actually floating on top of the water.

Slowly, he made his way through the swampy forest. He might have gotten lost, but Marksi had no problem swimming over the top of the water, so Brin could send him ahead and use him as a goalpost.

Finally, Brin saw a trail. A game trail, probably. Whatever animals lived in this forest would know the best way to get through on solid ground.

He followed the trail, astonished at how easy walking was when you didn’t have to fear every step.

Soon he found a small hill rising out of the swampy surroundings. There was an old dead tree he recognized; it had been drawn on the map. Underneath it on the other side, there would be the mouth of a cave. The perfect home for whatever evil thing happened to be passing through the area.

The area around the hill was wet and treacherous. Without his stick to test the ground, he would have sunk into the mud a dozen times over.

He approached cautiously, straining his ears to pick up any sounds. Yeah, something was definitely in there. He wasn’t sure exactly what it was that made him think so, just a strong sense of danger and… wrongness from that direction. This had to be what [Monster Sense] felt like. He’d need to remember this feeling.

He backed away and thought about his plan of attack.

Without knowing what it was, he couldn’t really think up a strategy, but the fact that it sought out this hill as a place to hang out meant that it probably couldn’t live in water. Maybe he could use the swampy terrain to his advantage?

He couldn’t swim very effectively while wearing full leather armor and carrying a backpack and weapons, but that didn’t mean there was nothing he could do. He saw a tree covered in vines, some of them hanging down all the way to the water, and that gave him an idea.

He pulled out the rope with a grappling hook and had Marksi carry it up to a high branch on a tree overlooking a pond. By getting a running start, he should be able to jump, catch the rope in midair, and swing around to dry ground. Anything following him would either plunge into the water or have to stop and go around. His biggest saving grace in the fight against the spiderlings had been the fact that he was faster than them. That meant that he had been able to disengage and then fight them on his own terms.

He tested it, running along the ground and leaping into the air to grab the rope. He was gratified to feel the strength in his arm as he easily held his body’s weight with one arm. The first swing didn’t go quite as he planned, and he had to swing back and forth a couple times to get to dry ground again. The second attempt went perfectly. He swung on the rope, around the tree, to land on solid ground on the other side.

He only found that tree and one other that would work for this, but that also meant he only had to cut his rope once.

After that, he spent some time going over every inch of ground in the surrounding area, figuring out what was dry and what was wet. If he was going to be running around here, it would help to know what was safe to stand on. It would be just his luck to die because he stepped on the wrong spot and plunged down to his neck in mud, presenting his head nice and convenient for some monster to come and bite it off.

The entire time he jumped and flinched at every sound, thinking that it was the monster coming out of its den, but the monster stayed put while he got the lay of the land.

Finally, he decided it was time. He was as ready as he’d ever be. He did one last mental inventory. He had the smoke bomb that would shoot sparks and heat—good for fooling undead. He had one wand with a potent flame spell, two fake wands, and a lighter. All that, he kept in the various pockets on the armor, where he could get to them quickly if he needed it.

He had the potions of turn undead, which he left in a backpack a little distance away. He also had his two swords. The sword of speed was still a bit slippery from the pool of spider goo he’d found it in. He pulled out his sword of strength. Perris hadn’t really given it a name, but Brin was calling it the glass cannon sword, because it would break after one or two uses, and because of the enchanted glass core that gave it its power.

In video games, he’d always been the person to die with all his best items unused and a backpack full of health potions. In real life, though, he was going to jump straight into his strongest attack and hopefully end things before they even started.

If that didn’t work, he’d use the fire wand, and if that failed, he’d use his sword of speed to run away. He already had the Monster Hunter achievement; this was just the victory lap. If things got too hairy, he’d leave.

He approached the hill, using every bit of stealth to walk as silently as he could. Sure, the monster probably knew he was out here, but he’d rather not let it know he was approaching it now. It was probably too much to hope that he’d be able to sneak up and stab it while it was sleeping, but that would obviously be preferable to a straight-up fight.

He saw motion, and froze. Something rose behind the hill, a line of red and yellow spikes. They were on the back of a large green head: a giant lizard. It had the protruding eyes of a chameleon, but spines along its back like an iguana.

Monsters roar in movies. The first time you see a monster in any movie, tv show, or video game, it always roars. The giant lizard didn’t roar. It barely even looked interested. It simply climbed over the crest of the hill, approaching in no great hurry.

It was bigger than any lizards they had on Earth. Bigger than Komodo dragons, it was more like some dinosaur he didn’t have a name for, especially with the way that its tail curled up and around, with a dagger-length stinger on the end. Its legs were much longer than he’d expected, keeping it high off the ground. Maybe the size of a horse, if a horse was a lizard with the tail of a scorpion.

It walked casually, moving faster than it looked because of its size. What would it look like if it actually wanted to move fast?

It stopped only ten feet away and stared at him for a long moment. He started backing up, towards the tree with the rope.

All at once, the giant lizard charged, jaws open, scrabbling towards him across the mud. It moved unnaturally fast and was upon him before his brain even registered what was happening. He dodged the stabbing stinger tail on instinct and swung his glass cannon sword towards its head but felt only air. He dodged its bite, but then it spun and the side of the tail clubbed him across the chest.

He flew backwards, further than he expected because he skipped across the water once before splashing in. He flailed against the water to stay on the surface, and realized that he was right below his rope, so he grabbed it. His wet fingers slipped in his panic, but he tried again, got a hold, and started climbing up. It was difficult with his sword still in his hand; somehow he hadn’t dropped it, so he put the hilt in his teeth and climbed with both hands.

All his strength went into getting a strong enough grip on the wet rope to hold his body weight. Actually moving up was taking forever.

He couldn’t breathe. The armor had miraculously stopped the stinger from running him through, but he still felt like he’d been kicked in the chest by a bull.

The giant lizard was hesitating at the side of the shore. Could it not swim, or was it afraid of the water? Was there something in here that was even worse? The panic that thought brought him nearly made him lose his hold. He took a deep breath and kept climbing.

He noticed the giant lizard had a heavy wound in its side; he’d thought he’d missed with the sword, but apparently it had cut through the monster’s flesh so easily he hadn’t even felt resistance.

The glass cannon sword had cut and it hadn’t shattered. Lucky. Perris said it would work for one or two blows, and apparently he was getting two. He needed to make the next one count.

He tried to focus on climbing, but he was still holding his breath, and his vision was starting to go dark. He forced his lungs to move and he managed to suck in air, but his chest screamed in pain.

He slipped, falling two feet down the rope before barely managing to catch it again.

The giant lizard liked what it saw. It slid into the water and swam towards him. He was only a few feet above the water; the stinger would hit him easily.

Unless something changed, his only chance would be to jump from the rope and stab the monster on the way down. The monster would be ready, of course. He didn’t like his chances.

How dumb had he been when he had gone over the terrain, picturing a long, drawn-out battle where he’d have lots of time to maneuver? One way or another, this would be over in seconds.

Marksi appeared on the surface of the water, a flash of camouflaged motion that he only barely noticed. The snake must not have watched enough movies either, because he didn’t roar or screech either. He slipped up to the giant lizard, wiggled around an arm that tried to swat him away, and bit the lizard’s protruding eye.

The monster let out a high-pitched screech, and the water erupted into splashing chaos. Brin couldn’t tell if the lizard had caught Marksi, but he knew that it was angry, in pain, and most importantly, not thinking about him.

He took the sword from out of his mouth and let go of the rope.

He brought the sword down in a solid overhand slash, and this time he was watching so he saw the full effect of the glass cannon sword.

It parted the water like Moses. It split the flesh of the monster like a knife through butter. No, like a knife through fog. He cut the neck just above the shoulder, and if he’d aimed better he was certain he’d have taken the head clean off. He wouldn’t get another chance; the sword shattered as it exited the wound, the pieces falling into the water.

It was definitely a mortal blow. Which was why he was surprised when the monster’s mouth clamped down on his leg and started twisting him around in the water.

His throat filled with water, and he forced himself not to cough as his body churned in circles through the whitewater. And then, slowly, it stopped.

Alert!

You have defeated:

Facaldagart [12]

Due to level disparity extra experience will be rewarded.

Alert!

Your System is currently locked. Experience confiscated.

He was right; he’d mortally wounded it, but its death throes had nearly killed him in return.

The mouth holding him let go, and he swam to the surface again. The leather armor was more buoyant than he’d have thought, which is why he survived at all, but it was all he could do to strain his way upwards and take gasping, coughing breaths.

Somehow, he made it to the shore and pulled himself up, just happy to be alive. Marksi was already there, slithering in agitated circles. When Brin pulled himself up, he switched from fear for Brin to extreme pride in his role in the fight.

Once Brin was sure he wasn’t going to pass out or hack up his lungs, he spared some energy to lift one weary hand and give Marksi some scritches.

More notifications arrived.

Alert!

Due to extreme levels of experience confiscation, your experience will temporarily be transferred to attributes.

You have 3 free attributes. Please assign them within the next 13 hours or they will expire.

Alert!

Due to your actions, you have lost a measure of System protection. You will now give experience to your slayer upon your death.

Congratulations!

You have upgraded an achievement.

Warbound (Epic)

Your thirst for violence cannot be quenched.

+10% Vitality upgraded to +20% Vitality

+10% Will upgraded to +20% Will

That was awesome. At the same time… he couldn’t help but feel like it was a bit anticlimactic. It was a nice but expected increase to his achievement. It wasn’t the earth-shattering, mind-blowing advancement that Tawna had promised. Had she just been screwing with him, in the hopes that he’d die?

At the same time, it wasn’t as dangerous as she’d said either. True, he could’ve died, but with his magic sword, it was closer to the coin-flip Perris had talked about. Not the [Weaver’s] “most likely you will die.”

That meant that either the [Weaver] was totally full of crap and Perris was the only one who was actually straight with him, which totally checked out, or it meant that… the danger wasn’t over.

That thought had him sitting up straight despite his exhaustion. This was a monster den. He shouldn’t expect to be safe here.

He stood up, groaning at the pain in his middle. He loosened the armor to poke around a little and he didn’t think anything was broken, just very bruised. He’d have to walk it off, as he didn’t want to stick around here.

He did another quick inventory. His wands weren’t broken, the lighter still lit, and the sword of speed was still in its sheath. The other sword was broken and lost; he hadn’t even held onto the hilt.

Surprisingly, his armor was completely whole. It was scratched, but none of the monster’s attacks had cut through. Just how good was this armor, Perris?

He fetched his backpack, ready to leave before something else came to the spinewolf den, but Marksi refused to leave the spot. He kept moving around, looking agitated and pointing at the water where the corpse of the giant lizard, the Facaldagart apparently, was still floating on the surface of the water. Strange, that it could float. The thing was definitely heavy.

“Well, if you want it, you’re going to need to fetch the grappling hook for me,” said Brin.

Marksi quickly climbed the tree and loosened the grappling hook, then climbed back down with the rope in his mouth.

Brin threw it out to the monster, where it hooked against the tough scaly hide. He pulled it to shore. Actually getting it on land was difficult. He couldn’t get good leverage, and the ground was slippery. He ended up using the grappling hook again by stabbing it in deep and then using the rope to pull it up.

Marksi found the hole in the monster’s side and started biting it, trying to dig itself in deeper.

“Marksi, I don’t really know how to dress a kill, and I don’t think we could explain where we got the monster parts if we brought it to town. I think we’d better leave it here.”

The little snake wouldn’t give up, so Brin sighed and used his sword to deepen the hole Marksi was trying to dig into. He didn’t know what he was looking for, so he stabbed deep inside in several different directions. The smell was intense. He knew corpses smelled bad when they rotted, but nothing could have prepared him for the strong, stinging smell of an animal’s insides.

Marksi disappeared inside the monster. He re-emerged, slimy with blood and viscera, holding something in his mouth. It was red and glossy. It looked like a rock. A gastrolith, maybe? It could also be a Mana stone. He’d heard that adventurers collected them from monsters and that Chamylla used them for enchanting, but he’d never seen one before. Before he could get a better look, Marksi swallowed it.

“No, Marksi! We don’t know what that is!”

It was too late. Snakes could regurgitate, but it was dangerous; he’d only make Marksi do it if he was sure the thing he’d eaten would kill him. He’d ask Hogg about the stone before he made him do it.

For now, Marksi curled around in a pile and immediately fell asleep. Right there, in full view of a spinewolf den. Exasperated, Brin picked him up and put him in the backpack.

Then he took off. He ran from the area at a steady, maintainable pace. He was exhausted, but the worst was behind him and now he just wanted to get home. There was nothing to conserve his energy for.

No other monsters found him as he ran. He didn’t hear or see anything out of the ordinary. He didn’t even see any animals, and the birds were silent. The rain started to come down steadily, a light drizzle. Not enough to make it cold, especially not to him in his leather armor, but it was enough that the ground became slippery, so he slowed down to a walk.

The walk almost felt worse because now that he wasn’t expending so much effort, he could start to think about how tired he was, and about how much his bruised chest hurt.

To get himself to stop thinking about that, he thought about Tawna instead, which wasn’t any better.

Danger, rewards, and information. She’d promised him those three things, but hadn’t really delivered. Was it because he’d gone to the thick brush first? Would something different have happened if he’d gone to the spinewolf den right away? He couldn’t imagine what. He’d have fought the same monster, then come home after, walking this same exact direction. The timing would have been different.

As nice as it would be to have more achievements, he’d accomplished a lot today. More than he’d even expected when he set out. He actually hoped that he’d missed whatever it was Tawna wanted him to find.

The other option would be that he was doing exactly what she wanted him to do. That she would guess that if she gave him two choices, he’d be greedy and pick both. After all, if she had really wanted him to go to the spinewolf den right away, she could have just not told him about the thick brush.

The sky grew a bit darker. The rain came down harder, a proper shower now, and the wind picked up.

His mood began to darken, too. He felt strange, like a thread connected to his heart was pulling, guiding him forward. Not to where he wanted to go, but to where fate intended him to go.

Could people other than [Weavers] feel fate? Could they feel it when they did exactly what a [Weaver] manipulated them into doing, and walked the exact path she wanted them to walk? If so, that’s what he was feeling now. The terrible shackles of fate. He could take them off, if only he was certain they were really there.

He could turn aside. He could go a different direction, take a longer path home. But he wouldn’t, because he wasn’t sure if that was wise or simply superstitious. Mostly, because he wanted to see it, whatever fate had in store. He knew he wouldn’t turn aside. And so did she.

Even so, even with the sharp tugs of fate pulling him along, and with all his dark thoughts and terrible expectations, it still took him by surprise. Even after all of that, Brin was still surprised when he found him.

A manlike figure, wearing tight and ugly black clothing, sitting on the ground. A crude spear in his lap, also black. Skin, a terrible gray.

Absurdly, he didn’t set off Monster Sense. Not a monster. A person? That was highly debatable.

The figure had his back turned, and Brin thought he might not have noticed he was there. Maybe he could still get away. The figure turned, slowly. He looked Brin in the eye.

In his eyes, Brin saw death.