Necromancer

A Royal Road Fan Fiction

By: Halosty

Chapter 27

Angelo and the rest of the adventuring party were still exploring the Moaning Mines. They had gained enough experience that they would probably be able to move on to an area with better monsters soon. They had decided to do one last run of the dungeon, hopefully to defeat the boss. The boss was apparently relatively weak, although he had many possible annoying abilities. Fortunately, according to the information they had found, he seemed to only use one of them chosen randomly. The group had gotten quite a bit better at fighting the ghosts, but Angelo would be happy once they were done in this dungeon.

Their current expedition into the dungeon was turning out to be very troubling. Not that they were having difficulties with monsters or traps, but actually the opposite. Although they had noticed a slight reduction in traps and ghosts in the recent days, today they found none at all. All they saw were empty tunnels filled with old mining equipment. There were no signs to indicate why the dungeon had changed, and now appeared abandoned.

Still, it was fine with the group as long as they could get to the boss without expending any of their mana or other abilities. It was possible a big raiding group had just come through, in which case the boss was probably already dead, but they wanted to check anyway. Without any combats to hinder their progress, it didn’t take too long to find the boss, especially since they had already been near the chamber in their previous exploration.

In the middle of the chamber floated The Forsaken Foreman. The group wondered which of the mini-bosses’ abilities he would use this time. All of them were really hoping for the dark arrows, since those would be fairly easy to dodge.

Everyone was disappointed when the ground shook and zombies came out. Angelo would have to deal with them while Maratis and Abaddon would attack the boss at range. Ruby had some skill in melee combat, but her time was better spent increasing the effectiveness the party… or decreasing that of the enemy. Unfortunately, the second was only really effective when the enemy wasn’t mindless zombies.

The zombies weren’t the worst option, however, as Maratis applied a holy blessing to Angelo’s sword, which caused them to be easily destroyed. Angelo relished finally being able to hit something with substance again. Much easier to attack, dodge, and block.

The battle seemed to be going well- even Abaddon’s mana was holding up, until The Forsaken Foreman pointed his hand at him. Abaddon wasn’t prepared to dodge the Dark Arrow.

“Two abilities? That’s now how it’s supposed to go!” Abaddon complained. Maratis quickly healed him up, but the party would have to be more cautious.

Angelo was still doing a good job of battering down the zombies, and was killing them fast enough there were usually only two or three animated at a time. The addition of the Dark Arrows didn’t set the party back too much.

No, what really did it was when Maratis was suddenly slashed from behind. Maratis had been properly paying attention to the firing of Dark Arrows- none of them would touch the priest. All of the zombies were properly being taken care of by Angelo, so that wasn’t it either.

“All three of the abilities? What’s going on here?”

The party was becoming very worried. Maratis was having to spend quite a bit more mana on healing and defensive spells. Still, the party had the boss under half health.

Then The Forsaken Foreman glowed red. The effect of this wasn’t immediately obvious, but when Abaddon’s next spell hit the ghost, Abaddon flinched.

“It’s… dealing damage when I hit it? This is crazy!”

Fortunately the red glow went away shortly, but the party was at a clear disadvantage.

Then the strange things started happening.

Out of nowhere, a bolt of blackness shot at The Forsaken Foreman. It was suddenly wrapped in black chains of unknown purpose. The party worried that this new ability might protect the boss, but it didn’t seem to make any difference in how much damage it took.

Then, instead of rejoining the battle when they were reanimated, some of the zombies started wandering off, out of the room. It wasn’t too long before there were no more zombies to deal with. This allowed Angelo to move up to the boss, and surprisingly hit it.

The accuracy of the Dark Arrow spells started varying wildly. The hand of the boss started to jerk wildly just before it attacked.

The attacks from behind were still a problem, but the boss’ health was quickly being whittled down. Occasionally the party had to stop because of the red glow, but this allowed them to focus on defense for a time.

Eventually, though, the boss was defeated. Everyone in the party cheered, and they headed in to collect loot. After that, they planned to rest.

The first bolt of fire struck Maratis, who was completely unprepared for any more attacks, and not very healthy to begin with. He died quickly.

Ruby saw Abaddon cast the spell, and moved in to attack him. She managed to dodge one attack, but she was tired and low on health. The second and third firebolts took her down.

Angelo saw what was going on and also charged Abaddon. Some of his attacks were even blocked, but Abaddon was pretty much uninjured after he had been healed and protected. He also, apparently, had much more mana than he had been letting on. Angelo aimed a stab right at the murderer’s mark on his forehead. It was avoided, at least enough for him to survive.

Angelo didn’t have enough health left after fighting up front in the battle, and was soon killed as well.

Abaddon smiled, and went to go collect his loot. Then, he felt a weird itch on his back, but for some reason he couldn’t move his arms to scratch it.

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Quietus wandered around in the tunnels. After facing the group of ten ghosts, no more had shown up. Maybe the dungeon had run out of ghosts? He was pretty sure their respawn rate should have been high enough that he should be finding at least some.

As he walked along, he disarmed the few remaining traps he found. Might as well get some experience on the way to find the fourth named ghost.

Then, he heard the sounds of combat down a tunnel he had yet to explore. He went towards it, interested to see who else was in the Moaning Mines. He peeked around a corner as the sounds were very close by, and saw his cousin, as well as the other in the adventuring party.

He wasn’t particularly surprised at this. He knew she was adventuring in this dungeon too.

Quietus spent time watching the group fight, especially the bard. He was hoping she would start dancing. It definitely wasn’t because he wanted to watch her swaying in her skimpy stylish outfit. He just wanted to see what abilities she had. Obviously.

Quietus then looked at the boss they were fighting. It appeared to be using all of the abilities that he had recently gained. Then, it used a new one. Quietus wondered what the red aura did.

It looked like the party was in pretty dire straits. Quietus figured he could do something to help, and summoned a spectral hand. He then positioned it around behind The Forsaken Foreman. He managed to hit with his first use of Soul Bind. Quietus pumped his fist in silent victory.

That would help the group, and since none of them were soul binding it anyway, he might as well get his quest complete out of the bargain. They looked like they needed some more help though.

Quietus began animating the fallen zombies before the boss could. He then took them around the corner, out of sight, and canceled the spell. They collapsed, and Quietus discovered that he got back a small portion of the mana he had used. He kept the last three around though, just in case.

The next thing Quietus did was summon a spectral hand again, but just for an instant, when The Forsaken Foreman was about to release the Dark Arrow spell. This threw the arrows off course. He tried to do the same for its own spectral hand attacks, but it put more force behind the movements in those, he didn’t just have to bump it off course a little bit at the base like he did with the Dark Arrows. Quietus gave up on the second course of action.

Eventually, the group managed to win the fight. A bunch of message windows popped up for Quietus, but for some reason he kept watching the other party. It definitely wasn’t because he wanted to see Ruby bend over and pick up loot.

Then, Quietus saw Abaddon fireball Maratis. He quickly pulled out a poison he had prepared. Not that he particularly cared about Maratis, but he somewhat knew what was coming next.

When Ruby was killed, Quietus was tempted to just scream and rush at Abaddon, but he knew that probably wouldn’t be a good idea. He did, however, continue his steady and stealthy movement forward. He was again tempted to charge when Angelo fell, but it was an even worse time to do so.

Then, once he had gotten right behind Abaddon, he used snakebite. He had been planning to use backstab, but his choice of poison had given him a different idea. Instead of aiming for an instant kill, he instead stabbed the spine, just below the back of the head. Not even a real stab, but just a prick.

Critical Hit!

Because of the precision of the strike and the use of snakebite, the effect of the critical hit has increased the potency of the poison.

Abaddon has been paralyzed! Effect is more potent on the weakened opponent. Paralyzation will last for 3 minutes.

It seemed to work well, as the nerve paralysis poison took effect almost instantly. Quietus walked around in front of Abaddon.

“You know, it’s wrong to kill my friends.”

“They weren’t my friends,” said Abaddon. “What’s the problem with killing random people I met?”

“I didn’t say it was wrong to kill your friends. Just mine. I was in a really good mood just earlier, and now you’ve ruined it.”

“Are you just going to talking until I get unparalyzed? I wouldn’t mind that.”

“No, I was just waiting for my other friends to arrive.”

At this point, two of Quietus’ zombies grabbed Abaddon’s limp arms, and held them out to the side. The other one covered Abaddon’s eyes.

“I’ve never really used this spell on another player. I don’t really want to hear you screaming though… Zombie 3, cover his mouth.”

Both players learned something in the following exchange. Quietus learned that he could use spectral hand and dark hand with either- or both hands. Abaddon learned that virtual pain was pretty much exactly the same as real pain. Just before Abaddon died, Quietus, for no particular reason, used Soul Bind on him.

You have slain Abaddon!

Fame +50 for killing a murderer.

Because Abaddon is Soul Bound, his body will not respawn as normal. Instead, he will come back to life wherever his body is.

Minimum time until login: 24 hours (96 hours game time).

Sadism Rises by 1 point! (+1 SAD)

Quietus stopped to think. This was the first time he had killed someone, so he had complicated emotions to deal with. Well, the first time he had killed someone that he didn’t have a quest for. Except for that one other person. So… the first time he had killed someone he didn’t have a quest for and who had a murderer’s mark. It had been kind of fun. It probably helped that Abaddon was currently Quietus’ least favorite person. After this time of introspection, Quietus looked at his other message windows.

The Forsaken Foreman has been bound!

You have learned:

Pain Mirror

Creates a barrier around the caster. The barrier reflects a small percentage of damage taken. Damage reflected increases with proficiency and mana used to activate.

Duration increases with mana used to activate.

Mana cost: Varies.

Quietus could see how this ability would be useful. It would still be better to not get hit though.

Quest Completed!

Dark Magic

Return to Alva for your reward.

Quietus would have been very disappointed if that didn’t count towards his quest. Although, it was not like he actually did any damage to The Forsaken Foreman.

Quest Completed!

Cleanse the Mines!

The Moaning Mines have been a constant source of trouble to the people of Twinsburg Heights. Even the church couldn’t exorcise the ghosts permanently, and whenever they were slain they would return even more quickly.

Thanks to your efforts, however, the ghosts can never return again.

The village will be very happy to hear that they can once again use their mines after a generation!

Go to the town hall in Twinsburg Heights to collect a reward!

Ah yes, his other quest completed too. Actually… Quietus didn’t remember getting any quest like that. It had just shown up as completed right then. Well, he wouldn’t turn down a reward.

Quietus then made note of what the members of the party had dropped. Then, he picked up what they had dropped. The bodies were turning grey and fading away, soon they would transport to the church of Freya to be revived. Quietus then took everything he could from Abaddon, but he didn’t get anything but a robe and some coins. Quietus figured he could sell the robe in town.

The loot from the boss wasn’t particularly interesting, at least not without being identified, but Quietus found a bracelet and a sword. Then he noticed something very strange. Floating in the air was a transparent ring. Quietus reached out for it, but his hand passed through it.

That just wouldn’t do. Quietus used soul bind on it. Although it didn’t gain and chains, it looked more solid and dropped to the ground. Quietus picked it up. He’d definitely get that identified in the city. For that matter, he should get his dagger identified too.

Quietus was just about to leave, when he remembered one last thing. He didn’t have a bag big enough, but since the dungeon appeared to be empty, he wouldn’t have to worry about getting attacked. He tossed Abaddon over his shoulder. One death wasn’t going to be good enough.

End Chapter 27

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