sorry I went to a festival yesterday and ended up getting a hotel room. just polished this chapter this morning. after mowing the grass, I will be editing Town Builder for a few hours and then writing another Soldier Seraphim chapter tonight.

Chapter 587: It Smells Kind Of Fishy In Here

I welcomed the chaos my attack caused the elven king. I had repositioned the fish and glowstones in my dimensional space in case I needed this surprise, but added the sacks of apples to the dump as I knew this was a last attempt to surprise the king and break his defenses. The sacks hadn’t been tied shut, and apples spilled everywhere, but more importantly, the Caelorian king’s aether shield was expended, and he was distracted. I disrupted his haste spell form for the umpteenth time in this fight as I closed.

The glow stones were unable to overcome the magical darkness of the room, but Maveith had made them roughly spherical, and now they created hazardous footing, with slippery, meaty fish fillets and large apples mixed in. The deluge should have given me the advantage, but instead of moving, the king gathered himself, keeping his feet planted to meet my charge. I used an air shield to step over the mess and brought the two spiderbane blades to bear.

He met my attack with a timed downward slash. I crossed my blades and caught the descending shaft. The king lunged with a slide-step, pushing his spear through the crossed blades to strike my body. The shaft sliding on the edge of the runic blades sounded like chalk on a chalkboard. I was prepared, diverting the spear away from me with both swords. As he pushed through my guard, I was hoping to cut his hand with both spiderbane blades, but he didn’t flinch, and when my blades met his gauntlets, they failed to find flesh, sliding off. It wasn’t fair, given how easily he destroyed my spider-silk gloves with Heartseeker.

At least I was inside his guard, and I finally had the advantage of leverage and moved both blades off Heartseeker towards his exposed face. He spun away from the blades, again bringing Heartseeker against my armor, the rings near my belly were savaged before I escaped his range, cursing my luck. I would have cursed the dungeon, but I didn’t want to risk it interfering.

I was forced to retreat, but missed an opportunity as the king slipped on a fillet and lost his balance. If I had pressed, I might have gotten a strike. The king smoothly went into a backward roll and came to his feet again. I paused as I noticed a bloody line on his cheek—but which blade had cut him? I had paid the aether tax on the strike, but didn’t realize I had scored a hit.

The king realized it too. He slowly touched the wound, and I figured it had been magebane. Since he hadn’t activated his haste spell form again, I guessed his aether was going wild. I had spent time in the past poisoning myself with magebane, and I could activate my spell forms under the influence of this poison, but it was very difficult. Casting a true spell was impossible. By his consternation, the elven king clearly had not done any such practice.

The chaotic field of stones, fish, and apples separated us, and I took the time to drink an aether restorative. “A remarkable achievement to cut me,” Ninleyn said finally. “This tactic,” he indicated the debris, “was unexpected and actually brilliant.”

I really didn’t want to banter as I knew he was only stalling for time to recover. Maybe he was trying to reset his aether shield, too. I know how slippery the aether was to control under the magebane poison, and he had to be frustrated even if he wasn’t showing it.

I needed to end this quickly before he figured out how to push the volatile aether into his spell form. I laughed aloud, trying to set him at ease. “Well, it is not too often someone calls me smart. So we shall call it my victory then?” I asked. The king remained impassive. “Very well, we continue the dance,” I said, rushing in.

Using multiple air shields, I pressed a bit recklessly into the king. He was clearly off-balance, losing access to whatever spell forms he had been using in the fight beyond haste. My elven chain took more damage, and he even severed some links, creating finger-sized gaps in the mail. If he could get the tip of Heartseeker into the compromised area, I would be finished, as the black tip would shred my organs.

My options were to teleport away or take a chance. We had a back-and-forth clash, but this time, things the advantage tilted in my favor as I no longer had to constantly break his haste spell form. When the opportunity arose, I stepped into one of his spear thrusts, letting the spear glance across my ribs. Then I dropped magebane and grabbed the shaft, pinning the spear tightly under my arm. The king pulled hard on the spear, planning to drag the tip through my armpit.

I grinned as I felt the shaft jerk and tightened my grip. He did the work of pulling me toward him and the boneblight blade targeted his exposed neck. With no other option, my opponent released the spear and rolled away, but without his haste spell form and my thickened air spell form, he was not fast enough. Boneblight opened a cut on his chin, and I felt the blade take its toll of aether from me. It was a tax that I was more than happy to pay, as it should have just won me this fight.

The king knew it as well as Heartseeker rattled to the floor. It was supposed to be a slow-working poison, but when he spoke, his words were already slurred. “Twos littles cuts,” he said dejectedly. In terms of balance, I could understand his frustration.

“It is all I needed,” I replied with finality.

The king’s gray eyes looked at me, not with anger but respect. “Thiss wills nots bes the last times we fights, human.” That might have sounded like a threat if he wasn’t slurring his words. He looked at the black spear at my feet.

I bent down and picked it up cautiously. It felt heavier than mine, and maybe it was slightly longer. When I probed it with my aether, I didn’t sense a way to bond with it. The spear also felt uncomfortable in my grasp, almost like it would work against me.

The king’s eyes were focused on Heartseeker. “Spoils of victory,” I said as the elf’s jaw was starting to sag. There was a longing in his eyes as the spear vanished into my dimensional space. If the artifact was bonded to him in some way, I needed to bring it out after he was dead to break the bond. The king didn’t look upset, just resigned.

The king didn’t move to attack me, not that he had any other weapons. He moved his hand up to his jaw to hold it in place while he spoke. “Dos mes the mercys ofs killings mes.” He removed his winged helm and tossed it to the side. It clattered on the floor and was stopped in a pile of apples. His gauntlets were next, as he loosened the buckles, worked them off, and tossed them near his helm. His face looked as if it were slowly melting as his bone structure softened. His golden-blonde hair was matted with sweat. His appearance was grotesquely fascinating, like a majestic wax statue left in the heat. I picked up magebane and sent the boneblight blade to my space.

He started to undo the buckles on his cuirass but stopped when he struggled and looked at his fingers as if they had betrayed him. I could only imagine the feeling of having your body fail. I decided to take mercy on him. At the maximum possible distance, I tried to move his heart into my dimensional space. The king recoiled, stepping back like he had been kicked by a horse, and I felt the backlash as well. I stepped back a few paces and almost lost my balance on some glowstones. His resistance was likely due to having his own dimensional space.

While it was good to know I was right about his resistance, I still found it annoying and blamed the dungeon for setting him in my path. He was aware of what I tried to do and gave a lopsided smile. “I wills makes it easys for yous,” he said with a final taunt. He got on all fours and exposed the pale flesh of his neck by pulling his hair aside. I would have suspected a trap if it weren’t for the fact that his wrist was flexing unnaturally and it looked like he might collapse at any moment. “Strikes trues,” he said plaintively. “Ifs you sees mys queens, tells hers Is ams sorrys,” he struggled to say this.

“You will have to tell her yourself,” I said.

The once regal king tried to laugh, but ended up dropping to his elbows and it sounded like a wheeze. “Wes haves beens aparts sinces wes bondeds tos thes dungeons. Yours defeats woulds haves reuniteds uss,” he said in a whisper. I wasn’t sure if he was lying to seek sympathy, but this dungeon was a cruel master, keeping them apart for so long if it did.

When this fight started fifteen minutes ago, I was mostly certain I was going to be killed by this elf; now he looked pitiful and was begging me to kill him. Boneblight was a terrible weapon in more ways than one, robbing its victim of dignity. I approached and raised magebane. As it descended, the king looked up at me with gray-blue eyes. Those were not the eyes of a defeated man…they held the promise that there would be a next time. The cut was clean, freeing the head from the body. A clang of metal on the floor had me jump back. A circlet crown had appeared out of nowhere and was rolling between the apples and fish. It only took a second to realize this object had been in Ninleyn’s personal space.

Gathering the crown, I found it heavy with precious gemstones set in a pattern. My earth pulse resonated with it, telling me it had some type of magical function. It might not be useful in a fight, since he hadn’t been wearing it. I could puzzle over it later. I looked around for the chest and, not seeing anything, guessed it was farther into the passage. The collector was out, and I kicked the head closer to the body before beginning. The aether wisps were highlighted under my aether sight, but when the apex sphere formed, I couldn’t tell what it was with my aether sight as all essences appeared like small white beacons under it. I stuffed it into my belt pouch to look at later.

I picked up the mithril spear tip of Heartseeker, turning the sooty metal in my hand. That spear had served me well and saved me innumerable times. The enchantments had been clearly broken. I sighed as I stored the leaf-shaped metal in my space. I moved to the helm and gauntlets next, finding the helm too narrow for my head and the gloves much too small for my thick fingers. The king was a tall, lanky elf with an oval face and long fingers, and the armor was tailored specifically for him. I doubted his cuirass, elven chain, or any other part of the armor would fit me. I fingered the damage to my own elven chain armor, disappointedly. I gathered the sacks of apples, but left the ones that had spilled out. The fish was a total loss, and I only spent time gathering the glowstones that were close by. That done, I set my sights on the elven king.

I doubted even Ignis had the skill to resize the king’s runic full plate for me. It was a pity as it was a masterfully crafted suit and likely powerful. My version of Heartseeker hadn’t even scratched it. I still had the armor set I gathered before we entered the dungeon, and the wight that wore that was much closer to my size. I was still going to take the king’s regalia. I spent the next twenty minutes undressing the king and claiming everything—the armor, elven chain, and the fine clothes underclothes. I left the pale-skinned king naked, but set his head in its rightful place.  

As I walked further into the passage, I reconsidered the king’s armor. There was one way I might be able to wear it—I could imprint a nature spell form to alter my body. I sent out earth pulses and collected more mithril deposits as I moved. There was no point in getting the others since they couldn’t see in the darkness.

When I figured I had three times as much as Hephaestus needed, the passage opened into a large chamber. The massive arched chamber was polished stone, and I found I no longer needed my aether sight to see. A single, oversized, black marble throne was set in the center, with two black matching daises on either side. Each dais supported a basin of liquid, and there was a black cup on the lip of each. More importantly, there was a dark stone chest seated on the throne, confirming the room was cleared. I sheathed magebane and approached the throne…

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