Chapter 107: Sierra Smuggle
“Rings!” was all I could get out, activating mine as quickly as I could.
You have been made invisible.
For the next 15 minutes, you gain the following effects:
-You are affected by invisibility. You cannot be sensed visually by anyone.
-If you take damage, invisibility automatically ends.
Instantly, I disappeared from sight. I looked down and couldn’t see my hands, body, or clothes. Invisibility was interesting because, in addition to making your own person unable to be seen, it would also affect certain things you carried with you.
Nobody was quite sure how it decided, but, for example, while a shirt would be made invisible, a backpack wouldn’t. Gloves would, but a sword you held wouldn’t. And, obviously, the moment you removed any of these objects from your person, they’d instantly become visible.
Of course, I consciously understood what invisibility would mean. Nobody, not even I, would be able to see me. However, I didn’t realize just how disorienting something like that would be.
I’d let my hair grow out a bit recently – some of that due to the necessity of recent events – and so, at this point, it was always down at the sides of my head, framing my face. There were always strands falling down in front of my eyes every now and then, and any time I moved my eyes upward or to the sides I could always see it. But not anymore. I could still feel my hair there, it should have been there, but I couldn’t see it.
I also couldn’t see my nose between my eyes. Normally, I wasn’t even aware of my nose always present in my sight, but now I couldn’t get the pointed lack of it out of my thoughts. It just felt wrong. And, of course, worst of all – I could still see when I blinked, straight through my eyelids.
During the few seconds it took for me to adjust to these changes – and during the time it took to deal with the excruciating pain from the hole torn in my shoulder – I watched Erani and the Dryad disappear from sight, as well.
“C’mon, we need to move,” I silently messaged the Dryad. “Tell Erani too, follow me– or, wait. You can’t see me. Uh… Go over there, in the direction of that big tree. We need to stick together so we aren’t isolated when the effect wears off.”
I moved away, watching my footsteps and the footsteps of my two companions impact the ground so I could keep basic track of where we all were. It was very strange to look down and not see my own body below me, but I was beginning to get used to it.
The soldiers of the army, of course, had begun moving forward to attack us after that Archer woman – Asmo – spotted and shot me, but it didn’t seem like they knew we’d turned invisible yet. They were still moving toward our original position where we’d hidden at first, but we were now long gone from there. Hopefully they’d have trouble tracking us as we moved further.
I was, of course, using Regenerate to try and heal some of the damage I’d taken from Asmo’s shot as we moved, each activation of the Talent increasing my Health by 22 over the course of 10 seconds. It wore off after the first activation, and I used it a second time, eager to move out of the dangerous territory of being able to be killed by a single one of her arrows.
You have activated Regenerate. You will gain 22.1 Health over the next 10 seconds.
42.2 Stamina Cost. Your Stamina is 56.
I technically had enough Stamina for one more activation after this, but I still wanted to keep enough energy to actually move up this mountain, so I wasn’t sure if I’d use it. After I saw the full effect of this activation of Regenerate, my Health would be sitting at 233, so I was at least out of the immediate danger zone for now.
One thing I’d noticed as I Leveled up more and more was the effects of increasing my Stamina/Minute. Generally speaking, exerting the body a certain amount would always cost the same amount of Stamina. If a person weighed the same amount, carried the same gear, and moved over similar terrain over the course of multiple days, each time they moved over that same terrain, it’d cost them the same amount of Stamina.
So, if moving over that terrain cost the person, say, 2 Stamina every minute, it wouldn’t matter what Level they were. It’d always cost 2 Stamina every minute to move in that way. Obviously, increasing maximum Stamina would allow a person to move for a longer amount of time, but so would Stamina/Minute.
Most people thought of that number as just something that would help rest after exerting your body, but in truth, it was always regenerating Stamina, even while you were draining it. Currently, my Stamina/Minute was a bit over 1. Compared to the 0.36 all Unclassed people had, that meant, in the previous example with movement costing 2 Stamina every minute, I’d be able to travel for twice the amount of time they could – and that was before taking into account the fact that I’d also be starting out with a higher Stamina value than them, too.
Where this really started to get ridiculous was once Stamina/Minute overtook the amount of Stamina expended per minute. Hells, I’d already noticed at times that, when we were moving at a more leisurely pace and went some time without having to hike up hills or fight monsters, I’d check my Stamina, go thirty minutes of walking, and then check my Stamina again to see it was higher than I’d started at. What that meant was, during those moments of walking, I must have been using up less than 1 Stamina every minute, and therefore my Stamina/Minute was enough to cover it with some extra on top.
This was the reason why you’d often hear about duals between High-Level opponents taking hours, sometimes even days if they were strong enough. Mages had enough Mana and warriors enough Stamina to last them that long. Of course, Melee-Type Classes had Martial Arts which expended Stamina to use, and us Magic-Types had our Spells, so all of those excess resources would end up going to those sinks during a high-intensity conflict, but still. At a certain point, fights would work more like a siege than a battle, with each side trying to slowly chip away at the other’s resources while preserving their own.
So, while I was a bit worried about pushing my Stamina so low in the middle of being chased, it actually wasn’t as much of a death sentence as it may have been in the past.
However, there was one thing that still made me hesitant to use that third activation of Regenerate.
Expedite would increase my Dexterity temporarily, meaning I could suddenly move much, much faster. However, moving faster wasn’t free. Moving the body would still require just as much energy as before, Dexterity would just allow me to expend that energy at a much quicker rate. So, if I could move twice as fast, I’d have to use twice as much Stamina, too. And when being chased, that meant I’d want to hold on to as much Stamina in reserve as I could in case I ever needed that burst of speed.
We continued up the mountain, reaching the tree I’d pointed out to the Dryad before.
“Okay, now let’s keep moving up, between those big rocks,” I said. It was important to ensure we stuck together here, since it was so easy to lose track of everyone with our invisibility active. “If you can, try to mask your footprints by kicking behind you as you move. But don’t let it slow you down and get you left behind. I can’t see if you’re moving slower than us.”
“Will bad guys catch us?” the Dryad responded with a question. I could sense the fear in her mind as she sent the message. “Like you said before. Too many to kill. I… I am sorry for wanting fight.”
It was a moment that broke my heart, hearing her apologize like that. She was a child, forced into this awful survival situation. “No, no, I’m sure they won’t catch us. And if they do, we have each other. I’ll protect you, and you can protect me. We take care of each other, okay? I promise. And don’t apologize for wanting to fight. We have enemies, and you wanted to make them pay for hurting you. I want to make them pay, too. And we will, together. After we survive.”
As a response, she just sent a vague response of affirmation and commitment, a bit too complex to translate into a single sentence. But I could tell she trusted me, and that was all that mattered in the moment.
We squeezed between the rocks, the hard surface helping to ensure we left no tracks behind us as we continued up into the mountainside. At this point, the soldiers realized we were gone from our previous hiding place – I could easily keep track of what was going on with my vantage point. They were scouring the nearby area, looking around trees and rocks for us. Judging by the fact that they were looking – trying to see us – it seemed like they hadn’t yet picked up on the fact that we’d used invisibility.
I watched as Asmo walked up to the area they’d last seen us, inspecting it on her own. She held her hands behind her back, inspecting each overturned rock, disturbed leaf, and speck of dust perfectly.
Standing behind her was another woman I recognized – this one looked like she was a Berserker Class with a battleaxe in her hands. She was one of the soldiers from the royal guard with Asmo, but I didn’t remember if I’d ever heard her name. She didn’t seem as enthusiastic about finding and killing me as the Archer was – she was more standing on guard and trying to protect her own life than actively seeking me out – but if she was with them, she was obviously dangerous.
Asmo bent over and touched something on the ground. Probably a footprint, or some other track we’d left behind. I knew they’d find something eventually, but watching them suddenly start chasing along the same trail we’d just walked made me more than panicked.
I was still pretty low on Mana from our fight with the Infernals – I was currently at 173 – so I wanted to avoid casting Expedite for now. Using it on both me and Erani would sink me down below 100, which would essentially mean I’d be useless if a fight broke out. Sure, if we actually got to the point of fighting we’d probably be fucked anyway, but I wanted to save spending the last of my Mana on Expedite as a last-resort option, at the very least.
Besides, for now, we still slightly outpaced our pursuers. They had to spend their time tracking us and trying to figure out where we’d gone, so as time passed, little bits of additional distance were put between us.
A minute passed, and my Mana regenerated a bit more, up to 227. The soldiers picked up pace a bit more as they followed our tracks upward, seeming to understand the general direction of our movement.
Another minute passed, my Mana moving up another slight amount up to 281, and the soldiers picking up their pace yet more. As such a large force, I could tell it was difficult to actually get word out for everyone to get moving, but now that they were moving, and they knew where to move, they were like a force of nature. The same boulders we scurried over were demolished by specialized Magic-Types in the front, trees that would be in the way were chopped down at the base.
At this point, they’d gotten to the point of moving faster than us, slowly reducing that same distance we’d just put between us and them. And in front of that force moving toward us was that damned Archer, following our tracks. Even with our efforts to hide them, we were no match for an expert like her, it seemed.
It was clear I’d just have to use my limited Mana on Expedite. I wouldn’t be able to keep it active for long, but we needed to buy some time.
“Can you tell Erani to come close to me?” I asked the Dryad. We’d defaulted to using her as a method of passing silent messages since Archers were high in Dexterity and Dexterity enhanced hearing. “I’m going to use that Spell on both of us so we can move faster than the bad guys.”
“Okay.”
After a moment, I watched as a set of footprints in the ground walked over to me. To be honest, I’d completely lost track of which set was whose because of the invisibility, but it seemed like this was Erani. I reached out a hand, blindly feeling around until I touched her skin.
But just as I was about to cast Expedite on her, I heard a voice.
“Uh, you may not want to do that.” It was Index. It’d been silent for a bit now, probably understanding that any sudden noise from it would startle me and threaten causing a scene that’d make us easier to spot, so if it was talking now, it was probably important.
“What?” I whispered in as silent a tone as possible. Really, it was more just moving my lips than anything. Index didn’t need to hear me as much as I just needed to put the intention of speaking into my mind so that Index’s log could pick it up and it could read my words from there. “Why?”
“Uh… shoot. I can’t really say.” It sounded stumped and frustrated. “Just– you’re going to want that Mana soon.”
I glanced around, side to side. Were there enemies around? Was it warning me of an ambush? I relayed everything it said to the Dryad, asking her to pass the words on to Erani, too. I felt Erani’s hand leave mine as she presumably glanced around for something that might attack us soon, too.
I didn’t see anything, but obviously Index wanted to warn us about something. What was it?
“Ah! Finally, I can tell you something else,” it’s voice came through again. “You’re looking in the wrong direction.
I glanced down. Hellions? No, I didn’t feel them. So if it wasn’t down, then it must’ve been…
“Oh no,” I muttered, not quite caring that I might be heard from someone. There were much bigger thoughts on my mind.
I glanced upward toward a figure that flew above us, blotting out the sun. Massive, covered in scales, and definitely not a Drake.
It roared. A Dragon’s roar. That deep bellowing scream echoed out as Astintash hurtled toward the ground in front of us, diving straight down toward the mountainside. It got closer and closer, until–
It crashed straight into the army’s forces, creating a massive shockwave and completely destroying the surrounding terrain. I was flung to the ground, as were Erani and the Dryad, I suspected. The trees around us split and splintered from the impact, and even some of the boulders closer to the impact cracked as the earth shook below us.
I groggily lifted my head and looked over to the Dragon which was now standing in the middle of the decimated army, corpses littering the ground around the crater that’d formed around its feet.
“You dare?!” Astintash boomed, spewing flames from its nostrils as it snapped its head around at the surrounding soldiers. “You dare muster this pathetic army to try and attack my home?!”
It stomped its feet once again and whipped its tail into a few stragglers behind it, then opened its mouth and billowed out a cone of flame, incinerating everyone in front of it, and turned around to spew them across the entire battlefield.
Even with us being quite a number of paces away, I could feel the heat from where we were.
Thankfully, as we weren’t Astintash’s main targets, I wasn't damaged. A message from the Dryad and whisper from Erani confirmed they were safe, too. The people in the army, however… Anyone who hadn’t already been crushed underneath Astintash’s feet was burnt to a crisp, the only survivors people who were either far enough away to begin with, or people high enough in Level to have escaped or tanked the damage.
Still, the Dragon wasn’t immortal. From the back of the army, I could see siege weapons being loaded and readied to fire. Astintash had caught them off-guard and destroyed a healthy portion of the forces, but it’d also made itself completely vulnerable in the process. This wasn’t one of its fly-by hit-and-runs like it did against the wall. It’d dropped itself in the middle of enemy forces in an effort to kill them all or die trying.
A ballista shot impacted its side, and when it turned to look at the shooter, it was hit in the side of the face by a glowing-white arrow – one that was no doubt shot by that damned Archer, Asmo. I hadn’t technically seen it, but I had no doubt she had some sort of movement ability to get out of that sort of trouble. Archers were notorious for being able to slip out of a Melee-Type Classer’s range in almost any situation.
Astintash stomped and scraped at the army, killing anyone who dared draw near, but the people were also fighting for their lives, chipping slowly away at the Dragon’s tanky body.
I felt Erani’s hand grab my shoulder. “They’re distracted, let’s go!”
“No, no,” I responded, trying to think through my injuries. “We’re still making ourselves vulnerable if we climb. Asmo’s alive, and if she decides to abandon the soldiers and keep searching for us, she’ll almost certainly be able to track us down. We were absolutely fucked before, but Astintash is providing us a chance to win here, whether it knows it or not. If we leave Astintash here, it’s possible the army could kill it. They brought resources, siege weapons, things specifically made to kill Dragons. They knew it might attack them and came prepared. It could beat them, but if they kill it, that’s our entire method of getting past the wall, gone. We’re back to square zero.”
“Then what the fuck do we do?!” Erani slightly raised her voice. I could tell she was panicking, and tried to stay calm, myself.
“We wanted to negotiate with it before, right? Well, it’s right in front of us, and needs our help. Why not get that negotiation done right now?”
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