Chapter Eighty-Seven -Trouble in Parad-ice!
Chapter Eighty-Seven -Trouble in Parad-ice! The moment the rope was in my hand I had to move. First I pulled myself back towards the centre of the golem’s back, then I looped the rope around one of the thick joints of the golem’s rear legs and tied a quick and very crude knot. I yanked the knot tight just as the rope went taut.Having the very fast platform I was sitting on come to a complete, and rather jarring, stop wasn’t the most fun.I was thrown off with a yelp only to crash on the icey floor and slide a dozen meters on my side. ”Ouch,” I said.I panted while staring up at the domed ceiling for a moment. Then the loud booming crash of golems running into each other had me craning my neck up to see what was going on.Three of the golems had tangled together and were sliding across the floor on a direct path for me.I ‘eeped’ and rolled onto my front, feet kicking out for purchase as I tried to get up.They were almost on me when my foot caught and I launched myself into the air and out of the golem’s path.This time my landing was a little better as I hopped onto the stone disk in the centre of the room and took a moment to stare at the carnage Awen and I had caused. Three of the golems had crashed together and were wriggling about, trying desperately to untangle their now-bent and battered limbs. A fourth had veered so badly off course that it was now embedded into the far wall, though it was still alive, judging by the twitches. Two of the golems remained intact, circling around the middle at a dizzying speed. I tried to think of a way to take them out, but nothing came to mind. Then I shrugged. I didn’t have any weapons on me except for a camp knife-my shovel was somewhere in the pile up off to the side-which meant that I only had myself to use.I ran along the middle of the disk, then jumped, timing it so that I landed atop the golem closest to the middle. The moment I was on it I slid one leg over its centre and rode it as if it was the strangest horse ever. Throwing my weight from one side to the other didn’t do much, and I didn’t think my magic could do anything to really hurt the golem. I could try filling it with fire, but my fire was always a little anemic and I didn’t think I could get it hot enough to ruin its mechanisms. “Broccoli!” Awen screamed.I looked up in time to see her spinning around on the ice, then she flung something up and high into the air. My eyes widened as I recognized her hammer.“Got it!” I screamed as I jumped up and caught the weapon out of the air. The extra weight made my landing back on the golem’s back a little precarious, but I managed to keep my feet. And then I had the perfect tool to fix my golem problem.“Hah!” I screamed as I brought Awen’s hammer down on the crossbow atop the golem’s back. It went ‘sproing’ and a few bits flew off in a most satisfactory way. The next blow hit one of the golem’s legs, bending it and throwing the golem to the side for a moment before it shifted its weight to the other legs. That gave me an idea.I searched around until I spotted the golem pile up way off on the other side of the rink. We were approaching it fast though.I whacked at the next leg on the golem’s side until it too tore off. We began to veer towards the pile, but the clever golem shifted its feet to change directions.“Oh no,” I said as I whacked its head as hard as I could.The golem went haywire.I jumped off its back and landed in a slippery crouch just before the golem ran into its buddies at full speed.Congratulations! You iced two (2) Brass Ice Slipper Golem, level 7!Just two? I looked over and counted. There was only one golem left moving, the rest were all in various states of... crashiness. Still, they were twitching and moving, so I supposed that they counted as alive.My attention snapped back around to the final golem. The bot shifted, planting all of its skates down at an angle so that it slid sideways and threw off a huge spray of ice. Then it clicked and clacked around, walking on the ice instead of skating in interminable circles as it had been.“That’s different,” I said as I weighed the hammer in my hand.The golem shifted, first becoming wider, then unfolding so that parts of its body slid into others. It reminded me of those toy cars that turned into neat robots, only this thing was turning from a neat robot into something else.I learned what when, with a final shift of its legs, the golem unfolded into a large brass scorpion, its huge tail tipped by three crossbows that were pointing right at me.“Oh shoot,” I said.The room went white. I felt the air warming up and my hair rising.When I blinked back the green tinge that covered my vision it was to find that the scorpion golem was sitting in a puddle of foot-deep water, parts of its brass frame still glowing white-red and other bits looked like they had fused together.The cords tied to its crossbows were on fire, and sparks were bursting out from the side of its head. It was, in short, dead.“Hah! I’m not useless!” Amaryllis cheered.Then her feet slipped out from under her and she crashed to the ice again.I lowered Awen’s hammer and looked about. “Well, I guess that’s it for this one.”Skating over to Awen, I handed her back her hammer with a big goofy grin. “Thanks, that was good thinking.” “Awa, th-thanks!” She said.You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.“You should go finish off the rest of the golems, I think a few of them are still alive and I don’t know if you’ll get any experience if I kill them off myself.”“Th-that’s generous.”I snorted and shook my head. “We’re in this together, it’s just normal, yeah?”“R-right!” Awen said.She fumbled her way over to the golem pile off to the far end of the room, her gait a little slow and uncertain, and she almost fell once or twice, but she was getting the hang of it.I skated over to Amaryllis, stopping with a twist of my ankles just next to the harpy. “Do you want some tips?” I asked.Amaryllis looked up to me, crossed her wings over her chest, and pouted. “I don’t need help,” she said.“Of course not,” I said. She glared.I smiled.She glared harder. I pushed back, and-while cheating a little with some cleaning magic-started to skate around her with my hands behind my back. I even did a bit of a twirl.“I hate you,” she said. “And you are one clumsy duckling.”She shifted onto her tummy, pushed off the ice, and was halfway to standing when her arms shot out to either side and she planted into the ice.I bit my lip so hard I was almost bleeding. “Do you need help... mallard-y?” I said. Then a giggle escaped.“There’s no ice where I’m from,” Amaryllis said.“Don’t you live on a mountain?” I wondered.“We have fire mages,” she said.“Ah,” I said. “So your entire species has... trouble with ice?” I asked as I crouched down before her.She turned her head around and pinned me with a glare. “If I could stand up right now, I would slap you for that.”Giggling, I moved over to her side and helped her first to her knees, then onto her feet. “Wrap an arm around my neck,” I said.“Don’t tempt me,” she said, but still did as I asked and placed a wing over my shoulders. She almost slipped, but I managed to keep us standing.“Okay, so, first, don’t raise your feet off the ground. You move with your hips and with your knees. You need to squat a little.” I instructed. “I don’t actually want to learn how to skate,” she said.“Aww, but think how awesome you’ll look when you show up all of your harpy friends?” I asked. Amaryllis was silent for a bit. “So I need to keep my centre of balance lower?” she asked. We eventually made it to the disk in the centre of the room where Awen was waiting for us. She had a smile all ready and on full display when we arrived. “I figured out the door,” she said.“Neat!” I replied. “Amaryllis is only a few hours away from figuring out how to skate.” We had only almost-fallen three times.We stepped onto the platform, Amaryllis with a sigh of relief, and we all kind of just relaxed for a moment. I stretched a little, then told the girls that I would be back before I skated back to the entrance and got my backpack (and Orange).“Awa, I found your spade, and one of the golems dropped something,” Awen said as she removed her own backpack and pulled something out of it.An enchanted compound crossbow of rare quality, new. I grabbed the bow and turned it this way and that. There was a trigger beneath it, and an all-metal stock meant to be pressed against the shoulder. The forward section of the device had a pair of arms that folded back and swept along the sides of the bow. The mechanism to reload it looked a bit like a large crank built into one side, with plenty of little gears and pulleys. “Nice,” I said. “What does it do?” I handed it back to Awen who took it gingerly as if it was a baby rather than a weapon.Awen flipped it over and tapped the underside. “There are two compartments here. This one is for placing bolts that you can reload with the same crank that pulls back the string.” She pointed to an opening on the other side. “This one stores even more bolts, but it’s not connected to the rest. Ah, and there’s more string too. It’s enchanted for durability and there’s an enchantment that increases the draw weight that activates once it’s primed.”“Cool,” I said. “Well, have fun with it.”“Awa? Are you sure?” She asked. “It might be worth a lot.”I shrugged. “Then it’ll be worth a lot to you. I’m not the crossbow-y sort. And Amaryllis, ah, doesn't have fingers.”“I’m certain I could operate it given some practice,” Amaryllis said.“Th-then do you want it?” Awen asked. She was hugging the bow in a way that suggested she really didn’t want to give it away.“Awen, when I want something dead from far away, I’ll call down thunder and lightning on it. I don’t need a toy to do it. Keep it. It suits your specialty.”“Awa, thank you!” Awen said. Her smile made it all worth it. “Okay! Now we need to skate to the other end,” I said.“Oh please no.”“I could carry you?” I asked Amaryllis. “I could fry you,” she returned.We did eventually make it to the other side, and with minimal spills at that. The door was wide open, welcoming us onto the same sort of glass bridge we had been using all day. “Oof, that was a rough one,” I said.“It was,” Amaryllis agreed. “Let’s get this over with.”Crossing was easy as pie now that we were used to it, and the next door was just as simple as the ones before it.The room it opened onto was huge, with glass pillars rising a dozen meters into the air, and yet they only reached a quarter way up to the ceiling above. There was enough room under the glowing ceiling to fit a small village. And in the middle of it, sat a dragon.
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Chapter Eighty-Eight — Wyvern
Chapter Eighty-Eight — Wyvern I had been looking forward to the day where I would get to meet a dragon since... about the time I discovered what dragons were, really.Big, magical fire-breathing creatures that were at once majestic and terrifying. There was so much lore and mysticism around them. I had spent countless hours imagining what it would be like to talk to a dragon, to ask them about their life story, to make friends with something that no one would ever dare bully, and that I could ride across the skies on.They were the stuff of legends, both good and bad.The dragon on the fifth floor of the Path of Broken Reflections wasn’t a creature of flesh and blood as I had imagined, but it was beautiful nonetheless.Five meters long-I guessed-from snout to tail, wings that had to be longer than its entire length, all made with delicate curves. It had a pair of horns wrapped around its head that ended in jaggedy points, and its teeth were as long as my hand.Its size alone was impressive, but this dragon was more than just big, it was like a mosaic of stained glass. I could see the ceiling on the dragon’s other side, warped and shifted by the glass that made up its body. Delicate filigree of spun glass circled out across its wings. It turned its head our way, pupils like golden mirrors locking onto us.It didn’t move though, probably because we had yet to enter the room proper.“Whoa,” I said. “So pretty.”“No,” Amaryllis said. “You can’t walk up to it and ask to be its friend.”“I’m sure it’s nice,” I said.She sighed. “It’s draconic. Their idea of being nice is eating you later instead of eating you now. Besides, if it eats you, Awen and I will have to face it alone. You wouldn’t want that, would you?”“Awa, I don’t want anyone eating Broccoli,” Awen said.“You’re not trying to guilt trip me into not trying to talk to the pretty glass dragon, right?”“I would never,” Amaryllis deadpanned. “Who am I to stand between you and an opportunity to be chewed up by a wyvern.”“Wyvern?” I asked.She gestured to the dragon. “No forelimbs, the wings are at its sides, not its back. That’s a wyvern. They’re the more... animalistic cousins of dragons. Not nearly as dangerous, but still a threat.”I scrunched up my face, but gave up with a nod. “Fine. I guess. No talking to the pretty wyvern.”“It’s a dungeon creature, and the boss at that. There’s no way you’ll be able to negotiate your way past it,” Amaryllis said. “Which means that we’ll have to fight and kill it. Which I’m not sure we’ll be able to do.”I looked from her to the dragon, then fired off an Insight at it.The Stained Wyvern of Mirrored Paths, Boss, level ??.“Oh, that’s not very good,” I said. “Can you see its level, Amaryllis?”The harpy shook her head. “No. But I can guess. Judging by the level of the dungeon it has to be between levels eleven and thirteen. Basically, you can expect it to have a second class waiting in the wings, probably far below ten, but still there.”“Ah,” I said. “That’s not good.”There were a few problems with trying to fight a dragon... or a wyvern. First, it was a giant predator bigger than a minivan and we were just three very small girls that would all neatly fit into its tummy once we’d been chewed a little.Second, it had wings, and could presumably fly.Third, it was a few levels above us. I couldn't say how much stronger I was now compared to when I arrived in this world. Or rather, I couldn’t say how much of an impact levelling up on its own had. Skills, on the other hand, were huge boosts to both my power and abilities. I bet that the Wyvern would have a whole bunch of really good skills.I winced. “I say we try. But we also prepare to run out of here if we need to.”Amaryllis tapped her talons against her wing, then nodded. “I agree. We’ll try a few things, then if those fail to work we leave and try something else.”“Awa, I’ll go where you do,” Awen said. “I, I can help from afar now, too.” She raised her crossbow. It only had a few bolts, but they might help.“You’re both able to fight at range, so maybe we focus on that?” I asked.“It can fly. That will neatly negate any advantages we get from our range,” Amaryllis said. “And as much confidence as I have in Awen, she is very new to that toy of hers. Hitting a moving target will be a challenge, and I doubt a couple of bolts will be enough to hurt that thing.”“We’ll try anyway,” I said. “Are we all ready?”Amaryllis sighed, then did a few quick stretches. “I suppose so.”“I’ll try my best!” Awen said.Grinning, I stepped into the arena with my friends at my back.The wyvern shifted on its huge haunches, its chest puffed up, and it let out an ear-piercing shriek.You have heard the screech of a fearsome creature! Your soul is shaken.I tripped, almost falling before I caught myself. Black spots flickered in the corners of my vision and I was worried I might faint for just a moment before it all receded. I looked up, saw that the wyvern was still in place, then turned to check on my friends.Amaryllis' wings were trembling, but she wore a fierce and downright mean scowl as she glared up at the Wyvern.Awen... didn’t look so good. She was on her knees, eyes wide, and her entire body was shaking just a little bit. “Awen!” I called.She gasped and snapped her attention around to me.Our eyes met, mine trying to be reassuring, hers filled with unshed tears. “You’ll be okay,” I said. “It’s just a scary monster. You’re better than it is.”The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.“Awa,” she said. She seemed at a loss for words, but still climbed back to her feet and hugged her crossbow close. “Right.”A huge ‘whap’ sound had me looking up in time to see the wyvern jumping off and taking to the air. It was truly majestic to see it wheel around above us, that is, until I remembered that we had to bring it down.The arena’s many pillars ranged in size from a meter wide to about twice as much, and each one was nearly three Broccolis tall. That means that the wyvern couldn’t just scoop down and snatch us off the ground, but it also limited our visibility a bit.“I’m going to try and draw it closer,” I said. “You guys try to knock it out of the sky.”“Got it,” Amaryllis said. Awen nodded behind her.I bunched up my legs, then kicked off to land atop one of the larger glass pillars. It took me a moment, searching the wide ceilinged arena, to spot the wyvern spinning past above. It’s brilliant glassy body flashed past walls made of shaped mirrors and warped glass, sending prismatic rainbows against every surface that it flew past.“Now, how am I going to get you down here?” I wondered. All I had was my spade-my backpack and Awen’s having been left by the entrance-and that wasn’t exactly handy for grabbing a wyvern’s attention.Maybe magic? Cleaning magic wouldn’t do much to a wyvern, I didn’t think, but it might be enough to grab its attention. I didn’t have anything to lose except a few points of mana.Shrugging, I aimed a hand up towards the wyvern, pinched my tongue to help with my aim, and fired off a tiny but fast ball of cleaning magic.I missed by about fifty meters.Cleaning magic was not hit-scan. I hadn’t accounted for the amount of lead time it would take to hit even a target as big as the wyvern.My second shot missed, and so did my third. Its circular path wasn’t perfectly circular as it avoided spikes and crenellations in the ceiling. I had to either aim a whole lot better or...Scrunching up my nose, I started to fire more and more cleaning balls, each one making my mana tick down by a point or two, but I was filling the air with glowing balls of mana. I hoped that the wyvern wasn’t into bullet hell games.A few of my spells hit with a series of dull plops, like dropping a pebble into a bathtub.The wyvern spun around in the air, golden eyes locking onto me.“Get ready!” I called out.I saw the girls moving over to stand next to a pillar, Amaryllis with her hands sparking and Awen with her crossbow raised.Wind battered around me as the wyvern came screaming down towards the pillar where I stood talons-first like a bird of prey. I stood my ground for just a little bit longer, coiled and ready to jump.Then lightning rammed into the wyvern’s side.I jumped, moving towards another pillar that I bounced off of on a path towards the far end of the room.The wyvern wheeled upwards with huge beats of its wings. There was a faintly darkened spot on its side, but little else to show that it had been hit.“Darn,” I said. Then the wyvern flipped around and came roaring down towards the girls. “Double darn!”The wyvern’s chest began to glow and it pulled its head back in a way that I was certain was very bad news. Then it opened its mouth wide and a cloud of sparkling dust poured out of it and splashed out towards the girls.Lightning filled the air between them, Amaryllis doing her best to stop the deluge, but while it pushed some of the particles back, plenty still landed around the girls.I took off at a hopping spring, bouncing from pillar to pillar while the wyvern flapped its wings and regained some altitude.The dust it had spat was glass. Fine particles of loose glass, like sand that choked the air. I began to fire my cleaning magic in little bursts as I jumped down into the cloud.Finding the girls was easy. They had huddled together under Awen’s long jacket, using it as a barrier of sorts. Seeing them coughing up blood and wheezing was a lot harder. “Are you okay?” I asked rather stupidly as I moved to their side. They were both covered in multicoloured, sparkling dust. A fresh burst of cleaning magic took care of some of that, but I was starting to run low on mana already.Amaryllis tried to say something, but just choked and wheezed instead. She tapped her bandoleer.I caught on and reached over to yank a pair of potions from her chest. Popping the cork off of one, I pressed it to her lips, then I did the same for Awen with the second potion.It took a few fretful seconds, but my friends were soon breathing easier. “That was disgusting,” Amaryllis said.“Awa,” Awen agreed.“Good thinking with the coat,” Amaryllis said. She shook her wings and a few strands of glass tinkled out. “That was... unfortunate.”“I-I think I hit it with a bolt,” Awen said.I tried a smile, then looked up as a shadow flitted past. “That didn’t quite work as planned,” I said.“We noticed.”“Right. One more thing, then we leave and regroup, okay?” I said. “Are you both up for it?”“I won’t let one little setback hold me down,” Amaryllis said as she stood taller and shifted her wings.“Awa, I, I can try!”Grinning, I told the girls the bare bones of my plan, then I jumped onto the top of the nearest pillar. “Alright, buster, it’s time to... get...”My voice trailed off as I stared around and at the three wyverns flying just over the pillars all around us.“Oh, shoot,” I said.
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