Life Reset: Salvation (Life Reset - Neo Book 6) Page 4

  But first I had to have a conversation with my army’s strategist.

  Walking into Goblin’s Gorge’s cathedral, I connected the open portal to Storg’s with a flick of my mind. I noted, with a smile, that Kuzai was still scrubbing the same spot on the floor he’d been working on yesterday. Then I stepped through the portal and disappeared in a flash of magic.

  3 - From Beneath

  I exited the portal inside Storg’s Dark Temple. Goblin adepts, some of the army’s healers, were performing devotions. They turned and bowed deeply at me, murmuring ‘Shadow Lord’ as I passed them by.

  I left the temple and emerged onto a bustling street. The town’s original population, now part of my clan, was walking side by side with hob soldiers and hulking Ogres. The city itself had metamorphosed; the buildings seemed to loom menacingly over the pedestrians, sinister symbols embedded in their walls. Dark shadows hugged the edifices even though I had not purchased the Eternal Night blessing for most of my conquered vassals.

  I could see all the way to the town walls. They were already repaired. Hob soldiers were crawling all over them, making them even higher and stronger.

  I approved of the extra effort. Storg was our northernmost outpost, the closest to Everance. Any army sent to attack us would have to go through here first.

  “Chief!” I heard someone shout ecstatically.

  I turned and spotted Malkyr. My large friend’s frame was easily visible through the passing pedestrians.

  “About time you got back here; things were kinda dull. No one’s tried to kill me repeatedly for like a week.”

  “That’s not exactly a bad thing,” a woman’s voice said, and a moment later I spotted Hoshisu, Malkyr’s sister. Several other familiar faces came behind her.

  “Good to see you guys,” I greeted them. “What have you been up to?”

  “Smithing mostly,” Malkyr said. “Keeping busy trying to come up with new armor designs. I only came to Storg—”

  “He’s not interested in your downtime activities,” his sister reprimanded him. She looked at me and offered a thin smile. “We’ve all been training and preparing for the attack on Everance. Some of us are concentrating our efforts on research in the science facility. I heard Aly’s made great progress with her cyber-telepathy project.”

  “Cyber telepathy?” I chuckled. “That’s a cool name for it. Have you seen Sullivan around by any chance?”

  “He should be right over,” said a pale-faced player I remembered liberating from Whitebanner’s prison. For some reason, he didn’t meet my eyes when he talked.

  I tilted my head at him. “Have we met before?”

  The player, Jaelon, hesitated. “N— … yes.” He swallowed hard. “My friend Nesteph and I were part of the raid force the Manapulators sent to Goblin’s Gorge … I’m really sorry!” he added hurriedly. “We had no idea you were a player; we were led to believe it was just another monster raid, a test to join the guild.”

  I smiled at him. “Ancient history. We’re all on the same side now.”

  He seemed relieved, and his eyes met mine for the first time. He smiled back hesitantly. “Thanks for rescuing us, and sorry again.”

  A player carrying a stack of papers hurried toward us from the far side of the street. A tall, purple-caped goblin followed behind him.

  “Oren!” Sullivan said with relief. “Thank god you’re here.”

  “You sure about that?” I asked. “You do remember which god we’re supposed to be worshiping, right?”

  “Poor choice of words, but it’s a good thing you’re here.”

  “That normally means trouble. What’s up?”

  The army strategist looked at the other players with a raised eyebrow. “No one told him?”

  “I tried,” Malkyr protested and pointed at his sister. “She wouldn’t let me.”

  “What’s going on?” I asked. I didn’t like being out of the loop.

  A terrified shriek pierced the air, and we all spun toward the sound.

  A bleeding woman ran into the main street from a side alley, crying and yelling hysterically. Before anyone could do anything to help her, a blur of movement followed her, then two, scythelike blades erupted from the woman’s chest. She managed one final shriek before she was hoisted into the air, then the blades tore sideways, dissecting her into chunks.

  A blood-drenched creature that looked like a giant, white praying mantis screeched at the successful kill, ignoring the screams of the terrified civilians.

  “That happened,” Sullivan deadpanned.

  I recognized the creature. It was a bonetis, a sort of giant praying mantis whose exoskeleton was made of bone rather than chitin. I’d seen them before in Akzar’s arena, where they were pitted against Bonecruncher, The Champion, as a warm-up act. The specimen before me looked like fodder though.

  The thing’s body seemed to be composed solely of white, scythelike blades. It skittered on all six limbs as it charged into the crowd, looking for another victim. I instinctively froze it, but before I could order my dagger to fly over and sacrifice it, a dozen hob soldiers charged and took it apart with their enchanted blades.

  “What’s going on?” I demanded, turning back to the players. “Why are they running around my city? Where do they come from? Why doesn’t the army stop them from hurting civilians?”

  The purple-caped goblin took a step forward and bowed his head apologetically. “My fault, Chief. Savol not able to cover all town to protect everyone.”

  “It’s not your fault, General,” Sullivan said and turned to me. “Those things come from underground, probably through the sewers, and come out into the open randomly. This has been going on for several days. Apparently, the town had this pest problem long before we got here. Back then, the mage guild put magic barriers in key underground tunnels, blocking most of the paths into the city.”

  “Bonetises were supposed to be a player quest,” Malkyr added. “You know, whenever the population grows large enough to slip through the gaps, recruit some adventurers to cull them.”

  “Unfortunately,” Sullivan continued, “since we killed most of the guild’s high-level mages when we took over, there’s not enough of them left to maintain the barriers, and the bonetises started pouring out in droves. From everywhere.”

  “Like out of toilets,” Malkyr said and shuddered. “Thank god we players don’t need to shi—”

  “They’re a problem,” his sister cut him off smoothly. “They’re not especially high-level, 20 at most, but by the time our soldiers intercept them, they do a lot of damage.”

  Sullivan sighed. “We’ve already sustained several civilian fatalities. The bonetises that escape take the body parts with them, presumably as food.”

  “Why haven’t you sent in the army to clean them up?” I asked.

  “Two reasons,” he said. “One, at such close-quarters fighting in the underground tunnels, our soldiers could be overwhelmed. Most of them are still below level 20, so it takes two or three of them to bring a single bonetis down reliably.”

  “Why not send the champions then?” I asked. “Bonecruncher and Broncar can easily handle the problem. I’ve personally seen the Ettin eat a bonetis as if it was an extra-crispy cereal.”

  Sullivan sighed again. “Those two belong to Akzar’s militia, remember? They returned to their city along with the remainder of their forces, and I’d much rather have Akzar recover their numbers than mobilize them to deal with our crisis. But that’s not the issue, which brings me to the second reason we haven’t sent anyone in after them: We can’t find the entrance to their tunnels.”

  I blinked at him. “Excuse me?”

  “The bony critters invade the sewers from somewhere deeper,” Kyth, the half-gnome, half-goblin player said with a grim smile. “And we can’t seem to find it. We need to trace their route when they return with their spoils, but we can’t exactly follow them through the underground tunnels they come up from.”

  “What about the golems? Their
beads should be able to pass through anything the bonetises can.”

  Sullivan scoffed. “Apart from the fact that their cores are too big to pass through, the two won’t play ball.”

  Vic chuckled in my mind.

  “Swarm doesn’t understand the concept of tracking; all he wants to do is kill,” Sullivan said, exasperated. “And Aidanriel won’t go down into the sewers; says he refuses to sully his shining balls.”

  Malkyr winced. “Yeah, he keeps repeating that.”

  Vic remarked.

  “So how do I come in?” I asked. “I can’t – and won’t – squeeze through toilet pipes.”

  “But your shadow clone can, right?” Sullivan smirked at me. “You could slip in through the cracks and locate where those things are coming from. Then you—”

  I sighed. “Then you want me to clear up their nest, right?”

  “Wrong,” Sullivan said. “Those bonetises are a great XP source. Almost all of the players are eager to go after them. I’d much rather they, and maybe some select individual troops, go down there and grind.”

  “Sorry buddy,” Malkyr said to me with a grin. “You’ll just breeze through the whole thing and steal all our XP.”

  I hesitated. “How long is it going to take? Everance has to take precedence.” I debated with myself about revealing the fact that I only had two months remaining in NEO. I wanted the players to realize the urgency and push on, but I didn’t want to demoralize them. Without me to hold the clan together, their future didn’t look good.

  Sullivan seemed a little puzzled by my question. “Shouldn’t take too long. Besides, we can’t do anything against Everance until we have enough forces to march on them. In a week or two, all the vassal settlements will fully restore their militia, bringing the number of soldiers we can mobilize to about 7,000. Even then, we’ll still need to come up with another thousand warriors of our own before even making the first step toward the capital.”

  “I remember,” I said, deciding against mentioning my time limitation. “I’m working on it.”

  “Well,” the strategist continued, “while you work on that, others can deal with the bonetis threat.”

  I surrendered. “Alright, so how should I do this?”

  Kyth grimaced. “I’m afraid the only way to track them back is to let one of the critters run away with its kill.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “I’m not letting them kill one of my clan if I can help it.”

  “They strike fast and disappear faster,” Sullivan said. “So when you find one, it likely won’t be a problem.”

  “I see,” I said darkly. “I better get on it, then.”

  I concentrated briefly, pouring mana into my shadow. Some of the gathered players who hadn’t seen my clone in the past gasped and took a step back. I waved them goodbye with a shadow limb then rushed away, melting into the shadows, and started zooming through the town.

  “Okay,” I said to Sullivan through my physical body. “I’m on that. Now, regarding the—”

  “Wait, you can control both bodies at once?” The strategist looked at me in awe.

  I shrugged. “It took a little effort, at first …”

  Vic snorted in my mind.

  “… but I got it under control,” I finished. “I get a sort of game-assist to run both bodies at once. It can get a little disorienting if I’m in two different combat situations at once, but it’s still manageable.”

  “Man, that’s OP,” Malkyr said.

  I scanned the city through my clone eyes, having already circled the walls. There were no signs of bonetis attacks that I could see. I turned back to Sullivan. “Anyway, I’d still like an update on the state of our forces.”

  “Sure,” he said, still taken aback. “The main objective right now is to consolidate our hold over the territory we conquered. We keep a thousand soldiers here at Storg at all times in case of a surprise attack. I’ve assigned another 500 to patrol the land between the settlements. With the towns’ militias nearly depleted, we’ve seen a rise in banditry and animal attacks. If we don’t keep it at manageable levels, farmers and other craftsmen won’t be able to go out and work.

  “As for the rest, we keep rotating them back to Goblin’s Gorge. At any given time, there are around 350 soldiers back at the valley – mostly training. Especially the spellcasters, following your request to let them train in the new Warlock Tower.”

  “Ah, right.” I had requested the army casters be stationed there as much as possible. The tower could only hold 50 individuals, and they got a substantial boost to their magical skill training speed.

  “So, Chief,” Sullivan said, “do you have anything for us to do while we wait for you to build up our forces?”

  Back in my shadow clone, I decided to climb the town hall since it was a central building that overlooked most of the town.

  I pursed my lips. “Not at the moment. I need to go over our clan’s economic strategy with the new Minister of Trade. After that, I might need some troops to protect our trade routes.”

  Sullivan shrugged. “Sure, just—”

  “Hold on, I think I got something.” Back in my clone, I noticed a disturbance in the city. I flashed through the shadows at the speed of darkness and came upon a gruesome sight.

  Two bonetises had cornered a couple of civilians with a young boy. The two adults were reduced to minced meat in the few seconds it took me to get to the scene, and one of the monsters was already charging at the boy. In a fit of rage, I drowned the creature’s fragile mind with dark mana, infecting it with my will. The bonetis halted mid-charge, then its body crumbled into a tangle of flailing, sharp limbs that repeatedly hacked and stabbed itself.

  The kid ran away screaming while the bonetis kept dismembering itself. The other monster picked up a pile of chopped flesh with its forescythes and rushed into a storm drain, leaving a bloody trail behind.

  I delayed for a moment to make sure the bonetis I dominated was dead, then rushed into the drain after the monster, finding myself inside Storg’s sewers.

  The place was a mess, with thick slime covering the walls and a putrid, chunky stream running through the bottom. Thankfully, as a mere shadow, my sense of smell was greatly muted, but I could still sense the rancid air around me. The bonetis scuttled down the sewer, oblivious to my presence.

  Back in my physical body, I had to tighten my fist to keep myself from lashing out at the murderous critter. “I found one,” I said in my physical form. “Following him through the sewers.”

  I continued drifting after the fleeing bonetis. It reached an unremarkable spot and suddenly disappeared underneath the knee-high sewage.

  I summoned a single drilling arrow and blasted a chunk off the wall, marking the location, then dove into the opaque liquid after the creature. Almost immediately, I found a makeshift tunnel at the bottom of the sewer and followed it. It led sideways before bending upward then I found myself stepping out of the pool of sewage and into an underground cavern.

  “Got it,” I said, looking at the players around me. “There’s a tunnel below the sewers, three streets west of here. It leads to an underground cave. I’ve marked the wall next to it; you shouldn’t have a problem finding it.”

  “Ugh.” Malkyr wrinkled his nose. “Maybe we should rethink not sending the NPCs after it?”

  “Don’t worry, kid.” Kyth patted his knees. “I think I have a way to let us through with minimum, eh … sewage leaks.”

  “Oren can probably teleport us one by one, right?” Malkyr looked at me hopefully.

  I shook my head. “Sorry, buddy. Nihilator’s zone of influence doesn’t extend that far below. You’re on your own.”

  “Crap,” Malkyr muttered.

  “And then some.” I cracked a smile at him. “Well, if we’re all done here …”

  “Yeah, we’ll form hunting parties right awa
y,” Sullivan said. “Are you going back to the valley?”

  “That’s the plan.”

  “Then you might want to invite the Mob Squad to join us.”

  “You’ve got it,” I said. “Send me a message if you need anything else.”

  “Will do.”

  I nodded at the other players then teleported away.

  ***

  “Alright.” Sullivan turned to the other players. “So who wants to go down there first?”

  Malkyr sighed. “I guess I’ll go. I just need to grab my sewage gear.”

  “You’ve got gear specifically designed for sewage diving?” Hoshisu raised an eyebrow at her brother.

  “Yeah, also known as my old, disposable leather armor,” he said grumpily.

  “I’ll join too,” Kyth said. “And I’ll message Aly and Nero; I’m sure they’ll want in as well.”

  “Go get ready,” Sullivan said. “Savol, better bring in a squad of our strongest soldiers to secure that entrance. The tight quarters won’t allow us to deploy a large force down there.”

  “Savol will do this,” the goblin general agreed.

  ***

  I emerged from the portal in Goblin’s Gorge’s cathedral and took a moment to inhale the familiar information tendrils around me. I smiled. The Mob Squad was still dining at the inn, despite being way past morning.

  Another short-range teleport brought me to the inn’s front door. I stepped inside.

  The large building was hosting a couple of dozen soldiers that looked like they had just finished a shift, along with some of the clan’s players. The Mob Squad was occupying a central table, consuming – according to the many empty dishes – their fifth breakfast. Lirian was sitting with them.

  “Here’s the chief!” Riley, the other dark priest of Nihilator, cheered, waving a wedge of meat pie at me.

  “Hey, guys.” I approached the four players and looked questioningly at my daughter.