Wrack and Ruin Read online

  Max snorted as Dylan gave Smitty the stink-eye. “Might be worth it to try.”

  “You’re both just jealous.” Dylan shot them the finger. “My moves are epic!”

  “That’s not what that bartender in Austin called them. What was the phrase she used?” Smitty scratched his chin, pretending to try to remember.

  “Peacock with its tail on fire?” Max offered, smiling at both his corporals.

  “No, no. That’s close but…” Smitty tapped the side of his head. “I know! She said you danced like a penguin with oversized testicles, and its feet tied together!”

  Dylan laughed despite himself. “Yeah, that was it. I’m really gonna miss that girl. She was totally into me.”

  They were all silent for a moment, thoughts of their deaths on Earth and those they’d left behind sobering the mood.

  At least until Red appeared on Dylan’s shoulder, and asked “What’s a penguin?”

  Chuckling, the three Battleborne got back to business, searching the cavern with heads on a swivel as they advanced across, while Dylan quietly described a penguin to Red.

  They were nearing the center of the space when Nessa hissed at them, signaling for the group to stop. Every head turned toward her as she pointed at an innocent looking rock. One of many strewn across the cavern floor, this one was about the size of a beach ball, with an odd spiral pattern on its surface.

  Max and the others took a knee as Nessa moved back beside him. “That rock just moved. Not much, but it moved on its own.”

  Max took a closer look at the rock, but it didn’t move again. Picking up a smaller stone, he tossed it overhand, not putting any power behind it, just hitting the larger rock with enough force to sting whatever it was. They were all surprised when the stone hit its target and there was a metallic clang.

  “Ah, damn.” Dalia began looking around the room with a frown. “It be an iron slug. And we’re surrounded.”

  “Iron slug?” Max asked as he too surveyed the room. They’d walked past more than a dozen similar sized and shaped rocks on their way across the room already. When he turned back to the one in front of him, he saw slime begin to ooze out from the base of the rock, quickly followed by the fleshy body of a snail.

  “Nasty lil buggers. They feed on the minerals in the underground, and be especially partial to iron. Somethin’ in their bodies lets ‘em process the metal and use it to form the shells ye see here. Hard to break through, as they be several inches thick.”

  Already the slug he’d hit with the stone was moving in his direction, its head now extended out of the shell, and two eyes on the end of long stalks focused on him. He saw the creature was leaving a trail as it moved unexpectedly quickly toward him.

  Iron Slug

  Level 17

  Health: 2,900/2,900

  Smitty saw the same, and complained. “Whoah. Snails are supposed to be slow. This one’s movin like it’s late for dinner, and it thinks we’re the main course.”

  “And Max rang the dinner bell.” Nessa pointed in several directions toward other snails that were now all moving toward the group.

  “No booms, Max.” Dalia warned. “There’d be shrapnel everywhere. And ye might collapse the ceiling.”

  “Right.” Max agreed. He looked around, figuring they had about ten seconds before the nearest slug reached them. It was a lower level than him, but there were dozens of them approaching, and Dalia had already noted that they were hard to kill.

  He was trying to formulate a plan other than ‘run away’ when Dylan took matters into his own hands. He took two long steps forward and punted the nearest approaching slug. There was a much louder clang, and the snail, which should have flown halfway across the cavern, simply tilted to one side slightly. There was a slight slurping sound as part of its body was pulled out of its slime bed on the floor, then pulled back down. Dylan fell backward on his butt, reaching for his injured foot. “Damn, that hurt! Broke my toes! It was like kicking a train locomotive.” He let go of his foot and scrambled back to standing after Dalia healed the damage.

  “Don’t step in their slime trails.” the dwarfess warned. “They be acidic and sticky. Eat yer boots and make ya get stuck if yer unlucky.” She was about to warn them about the slugs’ attack when several of them reared back their heads then thrust them forward, emitting a short stream of viscous liquid. Everyone managed to dodge the first volley, and Max noted the stone floor begin to bubble and liquify where the streams landed. Dylan caught another incoming spit attack on his shield, and it too began to smoke, though the damage was much slower.

  Grabbing his halberd, Max thrust the spiked end at the same slug Dylan had kicked. The pointed end punched through the fleshy head of the monster, clanging as it slammed into the metal shell behind it. Using all the muscle in his arms, Max twisted and ripped the weapon free. There was a spray of slime, a couple drops of which began to burn his hands, and the creature’s head drooped to the ground. His troll regeneration began to battle against the acid eating his skin, the pain considerable.

  “They’re vulnerable to head shots.” Max called out. “But don’t let them spit on you! And let’s move toward the back wall. No good letting them surround us. Dylan, Dalia, shields! Let’s make a three-sided box and move through them. Smitty and Nessa, stay in between us.” He produced his own shield and formed up with Dylan, holding his at a ninety degree angle to the ogre’s. Behind him Dalia did the same. Smitty and Nessa got behind Dylan, and they all began to move toward the wall. Smitty had his epic Bow of Shootyness out and was doing his best to skewer snail heads as they moved. Max saw him hit one cleanly between its eye stalks, the arrowhead punching clean through the monster’s head. A moment later the shaft melted in half, corroded by the creature’s acidic blood.

  Max heard glass shattering behind them, and turned to see a broken vial on the stone floor in front of several of the pursuing slugs. Dalia called out, “They do no’ like salt. It’ll slow em down and eat at their flesh from below. I’ve only got one more vial on me.”

  “Save it for when we stop. We can spread it out wider, maybe slow them down enough to kill them all.” Max ordered. He was starting to form a plan involving one of the new spells he’d purchased from Josephine at her inscription shop. In the meantime, he needed to get them out of the center of the room alive.

  Wincing slightly at the cost, he produced a bottle of Firebelly’s from his ring and smashed the neck against the top of his shield before pouring its contents in a wide arc behind them. He produced a second bottle, and a third, throwing them high into the air so that they landed hard and shattered, spraying the liquid wide. He quickly cast Spark on the puddles, causing the high-proof liquid to catch fire. Several of the slugs began to emit high-pitched screams as they burned. Others stopped before entering the flames, then turned and began to move around them.

  Nessa screamed as a spit attack landed on her back, quickly eating through her leather armor. Some of the acid splashed onto Smitty as well, causing him to flinch and fire an arrow wildly off into the distance to crash against the stone wall. Dalia cast heals on both of them, but the acid continued to eat at their flesh even as the healing spell restored it. Smitty cursed, gritting his teeth against the pain as he drew another arrow and fired. All three of their shields were smoking from multiple spit strikes as they continued forward across the cavern. Dylan was using his axe to smash at a snail that stood directly in their way, but the weapon was just glancing off the metallic shell and doing no damage. Max equipped his halberd again and handed it to the ogre.

  “Use it to stab their heads, or lever it underneath and flip them. Once their bodies are off the floor, you should be able to punt them.”

  Grunting, Dylan took the weapon and went to work. Max watched as he slid the point along the stone floor, jamming it under the slug directly in front of him. He kept pushing, putting his ogre weight behind it, and the shaft eventually levered the creature up and over onto its side. As it spun slowly around to present its
back to Dylan, he kicked it to one side, sending it sliding on its metal shell until it crashed into another approaching slug with a clang of metal on metal.

  A quick inspection showed Max that the halberd’s dwarven steel was already beginning to smoke and pit slightly, as was the haft. “Let’s move! Gotta pick up the pace. Dylan, clear the road as best you can, we’ll move around the ones you can’t push away. Watch your feet!” he followed his own advice, stepping carefully over the slime trail he nearly missed seeing.

  A minute, and several painful hits later, they reached an opening at the back wall of the cavern. It was about ten feet wide, too wide for them to hold with just three shields. Desperate, Max put his plan into play. “Grab your canteens. Spread water over the ground in front of us!” He ordered the others, who quickly obliged, all but Smitty who was now growling in pain as he sent arrow after arrow downrange.

  Max slammed his shield down so that the bottom edge bit into the stone slightly. “Nessa, come hold this up. Just crouch behind it and keep it standing upright.” He motioned for the beastkin to take his spot. She was moving slowly, tears of pain rolling down her furred cheeks as she did what he ordered. Taking pity on her, he produced one of the good healing potions from his ring and handed it to her. “This might help.”

  Nodding gratefully, she quickly downed the potion with one hand as she crouched behind the shield and used her other hand to hold it upright.

  Standing next to Smitty, Max drew his own bow and proceeded to skewer as many of the slugs as he could with arrows. There were less than twenty of them still advancing on the group, and between he and Smitty they managed to kill three more before the first few crawled into the puddle of water from the canteens.

  “Everybody step back, make sure you’re out of the water!” he ordered, then held out his empty hand. Like Boom!, this spell he’d bought from Josephine was another that was created by a member of her family, and had a similarly amusing name. Max pointed toward the slugs already in the puddle and shouted “Zap!”

  A bolt of lightning shot out from his hand to strike the nearest slug. The creature froze in place as blue sparks shot across the surface of its shell, and its flesh began to smoke. A fraction of a second later, two more of the creatures who were within the conductive puddle froze as well. They didn’t take as much damage as the original target, but the shock had caused them to seize up and stop advancing.

  “Right on, boss!” Smitty shouted as he put an arrow into one of the stunned slugs. “Fire for effect!”

  Grinning at his corporal’s enthusiasm, and glad to have an effective weapon, Max did just that. He used Zap! again and again, quickly draining his mana as he hit each new slug that reached the puddle. The secondary damage transmitted through the water was building up on the other monsters, and they began to perish.

  Those still living managed just a few more spit attacks in between stunning lightning attacks, and Dalia began to run low on mana. “Hurry it up, Max, I be gettin’ low!” She grabbed a mana potion and gulped it down.

  “Same here!” Max’s mana was draining quickly. At level one, the spell ate sixty mana per cast. With a one thousand mana total pool, he was quickly running dry.

  Max was about to cast the spell again when the last of the slugs that hadn’t reached the puddle hit him with a lucky spit attack. The glob struck a glancing blow to his cheek before splashing past, but it left more than enough of the acid on his face and ear to make him scream. Forgetting the spell completely, he clapped his hand to his face, spreading the acid further and making his hand begin to burn as well. The pain very nearly made him lose consciousness, and his legs collapsed, causing him to land hard on his butt.

  Dalia cast a heal on him from behind her shield, but if anything it only increased the pain. Panting, Max closed his eyes and tried to focus. The acid was eating away at his teeth and gums, having already burned a wide hole in his cheek. He could taste the foul slime mixed with the coppery taste of his own blood for just as second before his tongue began to dissolve as well, ratcheting up the pain level a bit more.

  A strong arm gripped his bicep and began to lift him back to his feet. “C’mon, boss. You gotta hit em again. Don’t flake out on us now!” Dylan’s voice penetrated the pain.

  Opening his eyes, Max saw half a dozen of the slugs still living, recovered from his last stun and beginning to move forward again. Taking a deep breath, he cast the spell.

  “Thhhap!” his mostly eroded tongue would no longer make the z sound, but it seemed that the world’s system understood his intent well enough. The lead slug was hit by lightning, the others around it freezing as their muscles seized. Smitty continued to fire arrows, killing three more that Max saw before he made a huge mistake.

  Distracted by the pain… Max swallowed.

  The mixture of blood and acid burned its way down his throat, causing him to gag at first, then begin coughing up blood. He dropped his bow and gripped his neck with both hands, spreading some of the acid from his hand onto the skin of his neck, making things worse.

  “Stop it, boss!” Smitty slammed into him, knocking him onto his back as the orc grabbed both his wrists and began to pull. As strong as the muscular orc was, Max was stronger. He resisted at first, until Smitty’s yelling reached a lucid part of his mind. He relaxed and let Smitty pull his hands away, then pin Max’s arms to the ground under his knees.

  “They’re all dead, boss. Here, swallow this.” Smitty poured a health potion into Max’s mouth, nearly half of it dribbling out through the hole in his cheek before he forced himself to swallow again. The pain eased slightly, but it was also spreading through his chest and into his gut. With a quiet and ragged moan of pain, Max passed out.

  *****

  Out of mana again after healing Max and the others as much as she could, Dalia began passing out the best healing potions she had. All of them had acid burns that persisted in eating away at armor, flesh, and even bone in some places. Max lay unconscious, having taken the worst of the hits, and Dalia wasn’t sure how long he’d survive. Even his troll regeneration might not save him.

  Frantically searching her inventory, she looked for something that might neutralize the acid. She’d learned a good bit watching her father the alchemist, and knew of several ingredients that might help… if she was carrying any of them.

  “Yes!” She located a vial of powder from a dried mushroom called chalk cap that was a known neutralizer. Grabbing her mortar and pestle, she poured about a third of the powder from the vial into the bowl, then mixed in some of the high-grade healing potion before pouring the now thicker liquid into another vial. Handing the vial to Nessa, she said, “Here, pour this slowly down his throat! Make sure he swallows it all!”

  The moment the beastkin took the mixture from her, Dalia went back to work. She poured the rest of the powder into the bowl, then quickly added a few more ingredients and crushed them all together as rapidly as she could. When she was done, she had a bowl filled with a thick ointment that smelled like dirty socks and crotch rot. Dipping a finger into it, she ignored the smell and applied an experimental dab to a wound on her own arm. Instantly the acid began to bubble, but the pain lessened. She watched for maybe ten seconds as the ointment neutralized the acid and her flesh began to heal.

  Holding out the bowl, she said “Here, rub a bit o’ this wherever ye be burnt! Just a bit! This be all we have.” Ignoring her own wounds, she waited for the others to pull dabs of the ointment from the bowl, then crouched next to Max’s prone form. She gently applied some of the healing mixture to the edges of his cheek, making sure the acid stopped spreading before moving on. The mixture Nessa had poured down his throat had worked as well, the damage to Max’s tongue, throat, and presumably his innards, already beginning to heal.

  When she was sure he wasn’t dying, Dalia used the last bits of ointment on her own wounds, sighing with relief. With her mana partially recovered, she drained it again casting a single heal on each of them before collapsing, exhausted.
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  “That sucked. A lot.” Dylan plopped down next to her, examining the many burn marks on his shield. “This thing is pretty much useless now.” To illustrate his point, he lifted it up and peeked through a wide hole at Dalia, giving her a wink.

  “Aye, when we get back we’ll get ye some better gear.” The dwarfess promised, laying back after checking that there was no acid on the floor behind her.

  Off to one side, Smitty whistled quietly. “Damn, Nessa.” He looked at her exposed back and shook his head. The acid had burned away armor, fur, and flesh down to her rib bones on one side. The flesh had regrown, but the hair had not. “You should rest a while.” He motioned for her to sit as he crossed his legs and sat down himself. “Here, eat some of this.” Smitty pulled some leftover roasted spidorc meat from his inventory and handed it to her. “It’s uhh… spidorc meat. Sorry, that’s all I have. Tastes better than it sounds.” He shrugged apologetically.

  “Thank you, Smitty.” Nessa accepted the food and began to eat quietly. The orc grinned at her use of his name for the first time.

  The group rested, eating and drinking and doing their best to repair their damaged gear for half an hour or so before Max woke up. When he did, he bolted up to a sitting position and promptly coughed up massive quantities of blood.

  “Gah!” he spit a few times to clear his mouth, and started to wipe it with the back of his hand before remembering the acid and changing his mind. Instead he looked at his hands, seeing that they were fully healed and free of acid slime.

  “Let’s not do that again.” He looked at the others, who were nodding in agreement. “I mean, if we see these things, we run away. Period.”

  “Roger that, boss. Run from the heavy metal acid snail band. Right on. No argument here.”

  They gave Max a few minutes to eat and recharge as Smitty and Dylan went to loot the dead slugs. Dalia used some glass vials to collect some of their slime, then did the same with the pool of vomited blood that Max had produced. “Never know when flammable acid vomit might come in handy.” she explained as she tucked the vials into her inventory. Only a little creeped out, Max just nodded and took a bite of kabob.