“That sure is a lot of water,” Scorch said as we stood at the edge of a cliff overlooking the northern sea. Icy blue water spread out in all directions beneath an overcast sky that threatened to infect the sea with its monochrome dreariness.
“It sure is,” I said.
There wasn’t really anything else to say. It objectively was a lot of water. It was pretty, though. Not pretty in the way of those tropical vacation photos people used to post on Instawhatever. It was beautiful in the way that probably inspired those ancient poems about widowed wives of sailors lost at sea. Standing there and looking down at the waves crashing against the craggy cliffs, I could imagine entire mythos being borne in a place like this. But we couldn’t stay forever. So, I scratched Scorch on the top of the head for a moment, tried to capture the image of this place in my mind’s eye and then started walking again.
We decided to follow the cliff’s edge for a while longer, though, as the northern shore would lead us back to the old foot trail we had followed on our way up here. At some point, we entered a patch of fog that extended off the cliffside and out over the ocean. It was not lost on me in that moment that I was literally walking among the clouds. I’d always seen fog as low-lying clouds anyway, but it never felt so literal as now. I imagined someone standing at the bottom of the cliffs watching as I seemingly walked in and out of the fluffy cloudstuff.
The feeling lasted for a moment or two before I started to question why I was in such a poetic mood, all of a sudden. Was it the discussion with Orabi? Was it as simple as being in awe of the scenery around us? I had no idea, but I felt an incipient urge to text Jasmine a love note so that the mood wasn’t wasted. I thought better of it, though. She’d probably enjoy it but I wasn’t sure I could handle the teasing. It was probably just the altitude getting to me, anyway.
We made it to the entrance of the footpath when I stopped suddenly. Scorch hissed from her perch inside my duster. Simultaneously, a red dot appeared on my minimap. I pulled up Environmental Mapping and scanned the area. There was only one being in the entire area and it was hiding maybe 50 yards into the forest behind one of the giant pines. Worse, the red indicator revealed that the mystery guest had violent intentions toward us – or, at the very least, feelings of hostility. I pulled my dagger and waited, saying nothing. If this creature wanted a fight, it was going to need to come to me and fight me on my terms. I wasn’t falling for any ambushes…Juniper and Shrek would never let me live that down. If this waylayer could wait, so could I.
It didn’t take long before they took the hint, however. Their aura emerged from the forest before they did. It was the strongest aura I had felt since the night I met Jasmine, and it only grew stronger as the person stepped out of the shadows and onto the trail. It was a tall, sublimely well-muscled orc and when I could make out their features, I could see that it was an objectively gorgeous male with long, red hair. I didn’t need Threat Assessment to know exactly who was approaching. Jasmine’s description of him was more than enough. Brakk Furyborn.
“So,” he said, with a deep and velvety voice, “you are the human.”
“I’m A human,” I said. “I wouldn’t say the human. I’m sure there are others with more claim to that title than me.”
“No other has infested Jasmine Irontusk with whatever mind sickness you’ve beset upon her.”
I could feel his aura pushing me back toward the cliff’s edge. I resisted. When he couldn’t manage that, I could feel the pressure of his aura change direction, attempting to press me to my knees. It was a pale imitation of Jasmine’s aura without even a fraction of the power. Still, it was strong, and he was used to overpowering people with it so I put up a show of resisting before dropping to my knees. If he wanted to think I was completely helpless, I would happily allow him to believe that. He smiled as my knees touched the ground.
“I do give you credit for one thing. I have folded men in half who were twice your level with my aura. Yet you resist it, even now.”
“Just stubborn, I guess,” I said with a grimace. I hoped I was a better actor than I felt like, in that moment.
“Audaciousness I would generally find admirable. In this case, however,” he said, stood before me, “I find it to be less so.” He put his foot on my chest and knocked me over backward. He pressed me down into the ground so hard that I made an indentation several inches deep in the soil. My breath whooshed out as his massive foot nearly caved in my lungs. I groaned.
“What’s that, human? Did you say something?” He bent down so that our faces were inches apart.
“You’ll have to speak up, I’m afraid I didn’t hear you.” He pressed even harder into my chest with his foot and I felt something crack.
“No? Nothing to say? What a pity. I suppose that means there’s nothing left to discuss,” he said, unsheathing a brutal looking short sword and raising it above his head.
“Goodbye, Rockland Azariah Hall.”
He pulled back slightly and started to swing downward, looking undoubtedly to split me down the middle. As the blade began to fall, however, time slowed to a near standstill. I felt the ground beneath me begin to give way as the cliffside crumbled. Slippery Bastard had engaged and my Deep Roads Duster had delivered the counterstrike opportunity it had promised. Not knowing how long the time dilation would last, I slashed at Brakk’s face with the Blade of Seredh. A bright blue stream of light followed in the slow-motion swipe of my dagger. I watched as it sliced a diagonal gash across the orc’s face, from the right cheek bone, across the bridge of his nose, and up to the middle of his forehead above his left eye. The wound opened slowly, grotesquely for a moment and beads of blood formed along its interior.
Then, time caught back up to us. Brakk yelled in surprise and fell backward just in time to watch as the ground beneath me fell away, taking me along with it. I fell backward through the air for some seconds before I was able to adjust my body enough to grab hold of a passing ledge. Even with my enhanced strength, I doubt I would have been able to catch myself and break my own momentum if it weren’t for my Burrow Grips. I held desperately to the cliffside with my left hand, placing my dagger back into inventory and feeling around my chest for the stoat.
“Scorch! Scorch, are you ok?”
I was afraid Brakk had stomped on her and perhaps even killed her while he was pressing me into the ground, but she soon popped her head up out of my duster from behind the built-in copperplate chest armor.
“Is he gone?” she asked.
I craned my neck to look up the side of the cliff. I couldn’t see anything except the clouds. I used Environmental Mapping, but it was basically blank. There was no sign of him anywhere.
Brakk was livid. He had the little bastard dead to rights and then somehow, HE had been the one on the receiving end of an impossibly sharp blade. Worse, he had no idea how the human had managed it. One moment he was about to deliver the killing blow and the next, his prey had lashed out and escaped all within the span of less than a second or two. He was absolutely, ragingly indignant over it. The sheer, brazen audacity of a low-level human to not die when he should was more than mere boldness. It was insubordination. It was outright subversion of the natural order…and that was an affront for which Brakk was unable to abide.
His rage was distracted momentarily as something warm dripped from his forehead and into his left eye. He shut his eye tight and rubbed at it with one hand. When he pulled it away, there was blood smeared over his palm. He gingerly touched his face and found the wound that was left behind like the mocking laughter of a mortal enemy. The gash was wide and covered a significant portion of his face. HIS face. The face that was the pride of the entire Furyborn clan. His fury in that moment was complete. He roared his frustrations at the sky and spun back toward the forest. With a single swing of his sword, he felled six of the giant skyscraper-sized trees. They fell and toppled off the side of the cliff. He swung again, his anger completely unassuaged by such paltry destruction. Several more trees creaked and fell victim to his frenzy.
Rockland Hall had made a nemesis of a mere enemy. The zealotry already living within Brakk Furyborn had been fed a mighty meal – defeat, and enduring disgrace. Everyone who looked upon Brakk from this day forward would see Rocky’s handiwork and wonder who had been foolhardy enough to leave the mighty Brakk in such a state. They would suspect a powerhouse, of course. Perhaps they would think it Jasmine herself. Brakk’s honor would not allow him to lie about his defeat. That would be heaping dishonor upon disgrace, and he knew that was a coward’s end. And so, he would tell them, when they asked who had done this: “A dead man.”
I clung tight to the side of the cliff, pressing myself against it as close as I could. For some reason, it had started raining 1500 foot tall trees and there I was, caught out with no umbrella. The tree showers lasted for less than a minute, thankfully, and I once again looked skyward to see if Brakk had decided to follow me down. I waited a full five minutes before deciding he had either left me for dead or was too busy playing lumberjack. With Environmental Mapping pulled back up, I focused on the cliffside to try to plan out an escape route using the Master Cartographer trait.
At first, I was looking for a way to climb down, but it was a long way to the bottom and there was nothing down there except sharp rocks and crashing waves as far as I could tell. I definitely wasn’t going upward, since it was entirely possible Brakk was just loitering around up there waiting to murder me. So, I started to look for horizontal options. We could go back westward, in the direction of the Nephil Ruins. But, on the off chance that Brakk could follow us, I didn’t want to risk him finding out about the Nephil and their technology. That seemed like a bad mix. So, through the trusty old process of elimination – I looked eastward. I strained my eyes against the face of the cliff and small foot and handholds began to light up, here and there.
I grabbed hold of the first and started to carefully make my way eastward, keeping EM active as I went. After about 15 minutes of steady progress, I felt like I was really getting the hang of this horizontal climbing thing. But then I noticed something unexpected. In the distance, several miles beyond any of the marked handholds, there was a new marker on my map. I strained, trying to see what my ability was marking for me, but the fog was too thick and the distance too great.
“Halt!”
Startled, I nearly let go of the cliffside to raise my hands. I quickly regained my senses, however, and scrambled to regain my grip. I glanced upward to where the voice had originated and saw two large creatures flying toward us. They were now clearly marked on my minimap with yellow indicators…a type I’d never seen before. I assumed that since red was an enemy and green was friendly, that yellow meant that these creatures were on guard and could go either way depending on how I reacted. I took a steadying breath.
“Hey there! Um…lovely day, isn’t it?”
“Stay where you are!” the second avian fellow called as they approached. “You are under arrest for trespassing on her majesty’s domain!”
“Well…shit.”