RSK Chapter 6

Heyo! Hope the weekend is going good for everyone! 

Alessa POV~~~~~

A wave of energy physically knocked me over while I was talking to Gobluke. I looked up to see a massive complex magic construct floating above Oberon. He was chanting quietly to himself, as more mana flooded into the magic. Pinpoints of light started to form above the circle much like when he had used Magic Missile earlier. They began to elongate until they were more like spears or lances. 

“Storm of Blades!” Oberon shouted, over two hundred spears made of mana started to fly towards the hole that was the entrance of the hive. 

I ran up to him as I wanted to get a better look. I was still frightened to death of him but I figured if he wanted to kill me he would have done it by now. I stood next to him as the ground ripplied from the large amount of spears forcing their way through the entrance, and I assumed the tunnels that followed. 

Maybe ten minutes later, the ground trembled suddenly. I glanced at Oberon but only saw him smiling, so I figured it was still within his safety margins, god I hope he has safety margins. The trembling grew worse as something approached the surface. With an explosion of sand and stone, the ground near the entrance blasted out in all directions as a truly massive form emerged from the ground. 

A giant ant, obviously the Queen, dragged itself from the ground. At least a hundred of the mana spears were embedded deep into her body, as blood leaked from what looked like every spot on her body. She roared when she saw us, but tried as she might couldn’t muster the strength to charge us. The muscles in her limbs were cut to literal ribbens. I looked at Oberon to see what he was going to do, to my horror he looked back at me. 

“Go finish her,” Oberon said without any emotion. The light that made his eyes glowed a bit darker. 

“What?! No! I wouldn’t even be able to get near her!” I shouted in horror. 

“Go, and grow stronger. Or die in this desert…” 

I wasn’t sure what my expression looked like at that moment, but it was probably good I wasn’t able to see myself. I suddenly felt a pat on my back and looked to see Gobluke and the other goblin standing behind me. He gave me a thumbs up and handed me his spear. 

“Go! You scaredy girl, but we change that,” he encouraged me… I think. 

I took the spear, it was crude but I knew the materials it was made out of would have fetched a high price in any guild hall. I steeled myself as I gripped the spear then started walking towards the giant ant Queen. She was still struggling but the more she did the worse the blood loss. The Queen had to be nearly six meters tall, but due to her injuries she was currently slumped against the ground. 

I heard a clicking sound that grew more irritated once I was only a few meters from her. Grinding my teeth, I pulled my arm back then thrust as hard as I could into the Queen’s head. While the material was able to cut the Queen’s charpice with ease, my own strength was lacking only making the spear sink in a few centimeters. The new pain caused the Queen to thrash for a moment as I held on to the spear for dear life. She quickly ran out of energy and collapsed back to the ground, the impact causing my arm to jar. 

“Are you really going to force her to suffer so much pain? I didn’t know you were so sadistic,” Oberon called over to me. 

“Scaredy girl, killing is mercy,” Gobluke added. 

“Hmm, as the common-challenged goblin stated, to kill her now would actually be a mercy,” Oberon said with a nod as he patted Gobluke on the head. 

I looked back at the Queen, who was breathing roughly. Truly it would be a mercy to end this now miserable creature’s life, to end her pain. With new determination, I yanked the spear free and quickly jumped back in case she gained another burst of energy from the move. The Queen shuddered but otherwise stayed prone. 

I angled the spear level with her head, then putting all the strength I had in my body, I charged her. This time, when I struck the Queen I aimed for her head. The spear sank nearly half a meter into the person sized head, the Queen made a clicking cry one final time before she body lost all strength and completely collapsed to the ground. Blood sprayed from the wound and coated me, I was eternally grateful that the blood wasn’t acidic, as some insects were. 

Vaguely, I heard some clapping from behind me. Oberon was clapping in a slow and measured way while Gobluke was clapping like a maniac. I couldn’t help but compare them to a parent and a younger sibling. While this experience was horrifying, I felt a bit more confident. I decided to check my status as I hadn’t in a while. 

Name: Alessa Darkfeather

Age: 14

Race: Human

Level: 21

[Basic Sneak: Adept] [Basic Magic: Novice] 

Sin: [Pride: 5%]  [Greed: 15%] [Lust: 10%] [Envy:45%] [Gluttony:13%] [Wrath:30%] [Sloth: 6%]

Curses: Ancestral Curse

Boons:

One of the downfalls of being human was that we were capable of all the sins. Where as the other races have their sins that they were much more susceptible to, they were able to basically ignore the callings of the other sins. It was a mystery that has confused mages for many centuries, because as many people will say, everyone is capable of doing all the sins. I was only barely an adult so I didn’t really worry about it. I had my lot in life. 

“I think that’s about enough for today,” Oberon said pulling me from my thoughts. I looked up and saw that the sky was indeed starting to dim. 

“Yes!” I said with a bit too much enthusiasm. 

The way back was a bit too quiet, but with the death of the ant Queen, I really had no desire to talk to anyone. As soon as we got back to the castle, I asked Vaunn to lead me to the nearest working bath, which there was one thankfully. 

Oberon POV~~~~~

I watched Alessa walk away. The girl was covered in blood from the ant Queen, but what do you expect when you stab a giant creature like that. I needed to be hard on her or she won’t survive. I just hoped I don’t break her myself first. I shook my head then turned towards the group of skeletons that stood at attention next to the castle entrance. 

“Go hunt the monsters in the area. Stay together, and help each other out,” I paused as I tried to think up anything else that should be included, “If you find anything interesting, let me know in the morning.”

They saluted then turned as one back towards the exit. I watched, hoping I wasn’t making a big mistake. With them taken care of I made my way back to the Fortress core room. It had been a couple days since it was exposed to the mana in the air and should have absorbed quite a bit. Even more so given that the Fortress barely had any drain on the core. 

Zriq met me on my way to the room. The now handsome fairy seemed to be bouncing of the walls with the amount of energy he was projecting. He had been hard at work and managed to clean a large section of the castle. It seemed that the cleaner the place became the happier he was, must be a fairy thing. 

“Welcome back Master! How was the hunt?” Zriq asked.

“Anti-climatic? Disappointing?” I said with a bony smile. 

“How so?” 

“The monsters were apparently relatively strong according to the guild, but when I fought them they were… pushovers,” I explained.

Zriq didn’t reply for a long moment, “Master, I think I know the problem.”

“Oh, explain.”

“As I’ve told you there has been two World Shifts since you… went to sleep. The shift has tried to accommodate to your… overwhelming power, but even then it can’t contain you completely within its rules. Level 1 for you might be more like level 99 or even 150 for others, not to mention your… body,” Zriq answered. 

“Interesting… I will need to study this more in the future,” I said tapping my chin. 

“Aye,” Zriq agreed. 

We made it to the Fortress’s core room a few minutes later. The core was now glowing a strong red meaning that it had absorbed a decent amount of mana. I rested my hand on the surface to bring up the interface. A few more options were available now. 

[Island mode:Unavailable]

[Repair walls: 698,765 Mana, Materials Required/ 1,756,301 Mana No Materials] 

[Repair Castle: 784,658 Mana, Materials Required/ 1,987,465 Mana No Materials]

…

The list continued on for quite a bit. Unfortunately, most of the list was greyed out or required a tremendous amount of materials to create or repair. As soon, mana could be used in the place of materials but there was a high cost most of the time. Mages actually learned Equivalent Exchange from the cores. With this core being legendary grade, it had a near 1 to 1 conversion rate to simplify it a great deal. 

As I looked over the options, I noticed some things that were not on there last time, even if my memories were spoty when it came to magic related topics they were bright and very clear. I wasn’t sure if it was due to my nature or the world shift as there were quite a few things related to Undead creatures on the list. I spotted one that only required a few thousand mana to create. 

[Crypt of Echoes: Will draw wandering souls and spirits into its proximity. The Spirits will then hunt the Enemies of the city, as designated by the owner. A random chance for a physical Undead to be created from the kills of the spirits. Spirits can evolve. Cost: 2500 Mana, Empty Building]

Considering I had plenty of empty buildings in the city I felt it was a good investment. While I wasn’t sure I would gain EXP from this, it seemed like a good security watch, and while the spirits wouldn’t be able to bring the materials back, I would be able to send people or undead out to gather them. The corpses could even bait more monsters to the area, only to become more fuel for the city. 

I clicked on the option and the map of the city appeared. I couldn’t select anything that had something in it, but just about everything else was fair game. Thinking long term I selected a lone building that was sitting on the very edge of the territory shown. Another magic screen appeared and showed the building as if I was looking at it. 

A swirl of mana surrounded the building then was sucked inside. The walls became bleached white much like bones that have been left to nature for too long. A wail sounded from the entrance that if I had blood might have made it run cold. It was reminisce of a woman, some most likely a banshee. Sure enough, a moment later the ghostly outline of a woman emerged from the ceiling of the building. She looked like she wore a tattered dress with blood stains that had turned white from time. 

I watched until she flew off into the distance. With the sound of the banshee gone I could hear something shaking, I turned to see Zriq’s legs were shaking. He saw me looking and quickly pulled himself together. 

“Just something I’ll have to get used to, Master.”

I moved my hand up in front of him, “Better get used to it soon, because it will only get worse,” I said with a sinister grin.