Company Unknown 4, page 24
“My focus is getting pretty good, right, Instructor Doud?” The half-orc took a step back so he could turn his head without losing an eyeball in the process.
There was no response from the hulking body he focused on, but to my chagrin, the chest was still rising in breath. At least my sergeant showed similar signs. Only two others from our force appeared alive, though one wasn’t in my line of sight.
Before I could check the general condition of their side, P. P.’s movement drew me back. All muscles in my body screamed as they tried and failed to spring into motion. Whatever he had been using on my arm was now in full force on my entire body.
“You see, all the abilities in my rare skill are pretty strong. Tossing dozens of soldiers around like rag dolls is easy.” He lazily waved his hand and everyone in that direction flew into the wall. “Yet getting only a particular thing under its power without affecting everything else nearby is pretty hard. But I like a challenge, and Dad challenged me to bring you in alive . . . or he hinted at it, anyway.”
If this instructor of his had taught him villainous monologuing, I owed him a fruit basket or something nice—or I would have, if I hadn’t planned on killing him after I finished off his student. Maybe a funeral wreath? Definitely a nice one with lots of lilies and roses. Were those in season? Did they even have them here?
P. P. stopped in front of me and pulled up my chin to meet his gaze. “What do you think he wants to do with you?”
“Mmpfh,” I cleverly responded.
“Oh yeah, the mouth. I always forget that part.” He snapped his gauntleted fingers, and my jaw began to move.
“If it’s butt stuff, you might as well kill me now.”
P. P.’s mouth dropped in horror. “Dad only likes women . . . I think. I do not get to see him very often anymore, but when I did, it was all females.”
As difficult as it was for me, I held back the insulting things that immediately came to mind about him, his father, his family, his youth, their home, orcs in general, the Fahrkini, and so many other things that might set him off. While enraging him would result in the loss of control he needed to keep my limbs neutralized, having my entire body turned to jelly would not be an improvement. Like him, I needed to focus my “ability” for a specific purpose. Being an attention-starved son myself, I knew where to go and peppered him with questions about the topic no one else cared about: him.
With the greatest willpower I’d ever mustered, I managed to keep awake during his droning, though I almost missed the end of several topics in time to throw out another question. What really saved me was a brilliant trick I thought up: replacing every mention of his name with my own.
Suddenly, I couldn’t get enough and hung on every word. That resulted in the opposite problem, but it also forced my attention back down to find what I was looking for. His grip on my left hand had loosened. With my arm still too tightly held, there was only one option available.
I timed the spell perfectly, holding it for when he reached the end of the story about how he’d killed his first monster without help. His widened eyes of excitement at the story’s conclusion absorbed the dazzling light of Purity in its entirety. My body dropped free before the half-orc’s scream even formed on his mouth.
The sole part of the plan that didn’t go well was that while clawing for his eyes, he inadvertently knocked his visor down. That didn’t stop me from going straight for his face anyway. By my estimation, the damage was great, but it still wasn’t nearly enough. Though blunt weapons did do more damage against plate and other hard armors, his was exceptional. But hey, it would probably sell for a lot once I finished him off—if I finished him off. “Don’t get ahead of yourself,” as Mom liked to say.
My Purity was a bit too successful. Not only was I free of P. P.’s ability, so was everyone else. While I kept up the pressure to make sure P. P. couldn’t regain his wits enough to reapply his ability, I caught snippets of the fight between the others and Instructor Doud. It was a close struggle, but I was sure they would eventually fall to him—and, indeed, my sergeant was inches from such a death when one of the soldiers caught Doud from behind. The huge Fahrkini fought valiantly, but eventually fell to their combined might. The victory came at a cost, though. In my excited shaking of fist as Doud fell, I gave P. P. a second of reprieve, and that was all it took for him to unleash his ability again.
His haste to get the ability off might not have occurred in time to save his tutor, but it was enough to slam all four of my allies down hard. It was also enough to re-freeze my limbs. I did not wait this time to check my hand. A few finger wiggles later, another Purity slammed into his face.
The lowered visor protected him from much of the blinding light this time, but those few seconds were barely enough. My hammer bashed the visor in. Instead of immediately following it up with an identical strike, I dropped the hammer to free a second hand.
P. P. assumed I was strangling him and made choking noises, but that wasn’t what I was doing. The helmet twisted easily. I could have probably yanked it off, which would have made any future blows a lot more damaging.
My plan was probably the better one anyway. I guessed correctly that the half-orc needed to see his target to use it. Twisting his helmet halfway around made that impossible. Though it took three minutes of constant bashing and slashing, I and my now mobile allies were able to finish him off.
Exhaustion washed over me as the fight finally ended. Every instinct said not to sit down, but my body rebelled. A short rest while I checked the gains in the status menu. There wasn’t time for much else. His armor was too dented to remove in a reasonable amount of time, and I had no doubt more enemies would arrive soon.
The experience was significant, but it would be a while until I leveled. I really needed a pick-me-up about now, yet the world is always an unforgiving place.
The new ability I’d opened up on my hammer was the opposite of what I was hoping to see, but not because it wasn’t good. It was another in a long line of things I desperately wanted. Fighting off the desire to buy each one had reached nearly impossible levels. This one was the hardest of all. It had a version of Flight in it, though from what P. P. had shown it was more of a slow, somewhat wobbly ascent. Was that only due to being confined in a room, or maybe a choice so he could hover over us lesser beings like a god?
P. P. would never be able to give me that answer, barring a change in my stance on creepy, creepy necromancy. The ability description did give a clue, however. And since my mind was currently and likely would continue to be my weakest stat, I could at least fight off the desire to buy this skill for a while.
Telekinesis (7 points) – Lift or constrict beings or objects with your will. If target attempts to work in opposition to your power, chance to resist is made using their brawn against your mind stat. Weight of objects allowed to lift is also based on your mind. Weight limit is higher for simple commands (such as, knockdown everything in an area) than for more complex ones (such as, knockdown one person in a group, bend just a right index finger).
Fortunately—relatively speaking—a deep laugh echoed from the doorway in front of us to distract me from any further internal thoughts about buying any of the abilities on my weapon. There were more important things to worry about now, like who was that, how bad did he want to kill me, and did he have any food?
As if he could read my mind, the voice answered all those at once. Given who the voice belonged to and what his countless children had shown, I had to hope he was only really good at guessing and couldn’t actually see my thoughts. Just in case, I put a picture of a troll doing unspeakable things to him in my mind.
“Prince Mer, welcome to my abode. I am sorry my accommodations so far have not been to your liking, but if you will come inside, I am sure I can make the adjustments you require,” the voice said. “Your father had similar difficulties, but I found the perfect manacles to make him happy. See?”
An almost bestial scream rattled the area.
“Won’t you come in and have some cake?”
I didn’t know what that “cake” was, but I was sure I’d shove it down Murder’s throat. That the scream might or might not have belonged to my dad didn’t matter. I owed two worlds an end to Murder’s creation of people with terrible names. There would be no more P. P.s, Dongleberries, Vageenas, or Peckerpockers (I’m guessing). There would only be Mers.
DEFINITELY NOT FATHER’S DAY
Murder McSnuggle did not keep his terribleness to just one field. He adapted it to all.
The throne room in front of us consisted of so many clichés at once that the sensory overload nearly knocked me off my feet. If I thought the muscular orc could read, I would have sworn he’d parsed through hundreds of fantasy novels from Earth and copied the most common elements from all the orc chieftains contained within to create the look of his room.
We had a throne entirely of bones. Helmet carved out of a skull and then coated in gold (probably melted down from the teeth of defeated enemies). Mounted and stuffed heads of fearsome beasts on the walls. Cartoonishly overwrought artwork depicting him defeating those beasts and everything else under the sun. (Everyone could plainly see his real bulge was only modest. And that if he’d had long, flowing hair, it was now gone for decades.) Not to mention the six-foot-tall battle-axe to compensate for that bulge.
Guards nearly as beefy were positioned in a nice row to each side of that throne. Their numerous scars were easy to see on their shirtless torsos. I was fairly sure all the scars had been created by their king and not gained in battle. Whoever their wax guy was, he deserved a raise. At least I could tell what was blowing their hair back like they were in a romance novel: Dimensional Shift picked up the outline of a small fan in a dark crevice behind us.
Murder’s free hand petted a massive gray wolf with an impossible number of sharpened teeth. It would have seemed threatening if the beast didn’t look like it would have a heart attack after a few wobbling steps. Even an amateur supervillain like me knew you needed to give your killer psycho pets regular exercise and a healthy diet. And if you’re going to have alluring women at your side, you really need a fulltime makeup artist and hair stylist on staff. Regular bathing helps a lot too.
The chained prisoner to the left was really the only thing I could give him credit for. The Gaelkini was almost as big as Murder, though it took a little imagination to compare them, huddled as the prisoner was. Whoever did the chest waxing of the guards probably should have done the opposite to the Gaelkini’s massive horns. Even if someone turned off the lights, I would probably still be able to see their reflection. If this prisoner was my father, he showed no recognition—but then again, his eyes were not in focus. He was either highly drugged or so weakened from whatever they’d done to him that he was barely there.
The excitement upon seeing him that registered on my companions’ faces confirmed that the prisoner at least looked like my father. Still, it would fit all too well with the surroundings for that to be an illusion or shapeshifter. The Murder on the throne not being the real deal wouldn’t surprise me either.
The huge orc stopped petting his dire wolf to point at me. “So, you’ve taken out my sub-boss—”
“Son,” I said. “Whom you neglected so terribly, he was a pushover. Or maybe it just runs in the family.”
Murder’s smile grew, revealing his perfect teeth. “Perhaps it runs in yours as well.” He motioned to one of his guards, who gave the prisoner a good kick.
“Doesn’t matter. I had a good mom—at the training-me part, not so much on the mom part.”
Murder’s hand went back to petting his wolf. “Something I tried as well early on. A pity Vulvana had other ideas that forced me to abandon that experiment.”
“You mean she was stronger than you, so you ran away to somewhere she couldn’t get you,” I said.
His guards stiffened at that, proving they were alive and not mindless puppets.
The bigger orc shifted his weight forward like he was going to rise but stopped at the last minute to resume his carefree pose. “Hardly. We had a difference of opinions and decided to take a break.”
“For nearly fifteen years?”
“It was a bit heated.”
“Well, I guess she must have finally gotten over it.” I gave a signal to my soldiers, but they had already moved to the periphery of the room. “She tried to use me to create a portal to this world. Doubt it was for a sightseeing tour.”
“You led her here?”
Murder’s eyes widened. It was easy to predict that would hit a nerve. Unfortunately, I hit too big of one. His entire body glowed red as he crushed the armrest on his throne. Already thick, his muscles bulged to double their size. His face contorted into an odd mixture of pain and joy. He now hefted the battle-axe that had looked too heavy for both his hands like it was made of paper-mâché. It was definitely enchanted, but still. This was not looking good.
Or was it? “Always play into your strengths, but not too much”—and he already had way too much of the stuff. Time to exploit that for all it was worth.
The screams coming from either side of Murder weren’t the least bit surprising; his trophy harem was already scrambling away in fear. That the six oiled-up guards were right behind them did raise an eyebrow, but I’d already discounted them as show warriors anyway. They were just saving us some time.
My own allies had proven they were made of sterner stuff, but I almost wished they weren’t. The effort of giving orders and keeping an eye on them so we wouldn’t run into each other was probably not worth any help they could give, but I also knew they wouldn’t listen if I just asked them to go away. They were warriors to their core, and they would not abandon a comrade in danger. Fortunately, they were not members of my squad and were used to operating without guidance. I had to hope their instincts were as good as mine.
Much as I love pre-fight banter, it was clear Murder wasn’t going to give me that time. The unbridled anger in his face said he wasn’t listening anyway. Though this took all the fun out of the fight, it did make my job easier. My plan would have been comically simple were I able to use Swap or even Dimensional Shift, but at least I knew they wouldn’t work ahead of time.
What affected Murder was obviously not the normal Rage skill, and he soon proved it wasn’t; this ability increased his speed and brawn considerably more. As such, I did not even bother to try to roll or dodge away from his charge. Instead, I backed out of the entranceway.
Before going through the transformation, Murder’s broad shoulders would have barely fit through the opening, but now he was almost twice too big. What he did have, however, was power and desire. It didn’t seem to matter that the sides of the door were carved of the same thick natural stone as the castle and the room. They might as well have been made of plywood. The sole thing that saved me was an instinctual summoning of a Phantasmal Clone. Though he hadn’t been aiming at the real me, the orc’s thick right arm still caught me in the side on its way through my copy.
Nauseated and disoriented, I felt my survival instincts kick in and landed off-balance and halfhearted blows with my buckler and hammer. Unfortunately, this Super-Rage was like its lesser counterpart: neither Shield Bash nor Knockback had any effect. He was so far gone, he didn’t notice I’d hit him at all.
Overcome with the craze his ability imparted, Murder only realized after a while that he’d obliterated his phantom target on impact, and that other targets could be found by just turning slightly to the left. I used that time to recover my sense and ready a Purity.
The spell landed perfectly on his face as he turned in my direction; my effort to move away from the impending freight train was less successful. Flying off did at least place me beyond his blind thrashing. The landing still hurt. Any thoughts of repeating this until the end of his Super-Rage evaporated. By just clipping me twice, he’d nearly bottomed out my health, and my mana had already been below half before the fight started.
“Please tell me someone has something that can stop him or at least slow him down?” I called in the direction I guessed the others were.
There wasn’t time to look anywhere but ahead. Murder’s vision seemed to be returning. I hastily hit myself with a Restore before beginning another Purity.
“We have nothing to give but our lives,” one of them said. “Something we will gladly do if you can bring our people peace, Prince Mer.”
“Would not it be better if we could get peace and not die?” one of the others asked.
The retort caught in his throat as the smashing of metal came from that direction—I think, anyway. It all became a bit jumbled as I slammed into another wall. Thank the gods Rage obliterated common sense and reason. Despite the noise of my impact and the fact that his forearm connecting with my shoulder gave away my location, Murder was unable to guess where I was with his eyes again blinded.
My uncontrolled landing had left my head lolling in the direction of my allies. It was a good thing, as I’d have no time to look their way otherwise. Unfortunately, they seemed right in saying they could do nothing but sacrifice their lives as a distraction. The cheesy decorations scattered throughout the room were no better. The throne was the only thing that appeared sturdy enough to do some damage, but if Murder could obliterate thick stone without pause, the bones of the chair would last even less. If I could have survived a while, I might have just kept leading him through the building, hoping the impact of the walls would finish him off—but even if it had been full, my mana was not enough.
Right as Murder shook off his latest bout of blindness, I caught one last object I’d overlooked in my initial scan. I’d dismissed my barely breathing father as useless on account of his condition, but the chain to keep him restrained before he got so weak had to be strong. Both his muscled body and the stories I’d been told said he was quite formidable. The thing subduing him had to be as well, right?
