Ellake
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Chapter 132 - Desperate Measures
🕑 Added 2024-09-12 20:00:06 +0000 UTCNate awoke slowly, his head ringing as his mind tried to process his surroundings. He attempted to look around and regretted it immediately, pain lancing through his jaw. It had been enough to see he wasn’t alone. Carefully and slowly he tried to focus on his body, assessing the damage. It was far less extensive than he had expected. A broken jaw was the worst of it, which he’d jostled raising his head. Beyond that though, he was down to his underwear and tied to a chair.
Reaching inside himself for the Familiar Contract he found that Frick hadn’t reformed yet. The little spirit’s banishings usually only lasted an hour or so which told him that it hadn’t been long since he was taken. Very slowly he rotated his head to look around the room he was in and the people he was sharing it with. Whoever they were, they hadn’t bothered to blindfold him. Seeing his condition he acknowledged that they didn’t really have a reason to. It looked like they had chained him to a chair and had stashed him in some room with a couple of windows looking out over a warehouse floor. That was a guess, but an educated one, given all the crates and barrels stacked throughout the place outside the window.
“Let me in there!” came a familiar voice from outside of the room. Nate was still groggy but he was sure he had heard that man's voice before. Was he just remembering the sound of the ones who had attacked him or was it someone else?
“Not until she arrives. Her orders,” was the response. That voice was deeper and as his head cleared he was sure that was the one who had hit him.
“Do you know who I am?” hissed the first speaker and Nate finally put a name to the voice. Fabien fucking Lussier.
“I dun give a fuck, m’lord. She’s paying. Now cool ya heels till she arrives,” responded the mercenary, followed by an angry growl and the sound of feet stomping away from the door.
Well, shit, he thought. Apparently there were consequences to opposing the nobility. At least if his current situation was anything to go by. But what was it that the other guy had said? ‘Not until she arrives’? Who was ‘she’? With his mind cleared he started to try and reach for his mana and found that while his mana remained, he still couldn’t project it beyond his skin. Worse, the bindings were far enough away that he couldn’t affect them with True Teleportation. He had a pretty good idea about what was going on. It was no accident that he wasn’t alone. Attempting to flex his mana he started pushing back against whatever was excluding his mana. Between his Magic Power and Magic Control he tried to forcibly construct a rune in front of him.
The response was immediate as two of the three staring at him grit their teeth. Active mana exclusion or suppression as a Skill. That was an interesting path to take.
“He’s awake,” called the only one of the three not gritting her teeth, but even her voice sounded a little strained.
The door opened, enough for the other voice to call in.
“Everythin’ alrigh’?” asked the man waiting outside.
“Thought you said he was some level forty or so from the Guild?” ground out the only man in the room besides Nate. “He’s pushing back against three of us! This is insane! I’ve had less difficulty wrangling a level sixty Mage!”
“Jus’ keep ‘im under control. She’ll be ‘ere soon,” grunted the man outside of Nate’s makeshift cell, before shutting the door.
Nate smirked at the three left in the room with him even as he continued to press against them with his mana. Eventually he’d run out of mana, or they would break. While he kept the pressure up he had a moment to tally up his situation. He had a broken jaw, had his robe and ring taken, was chained to a chair in some warehouse and couldn’t use his mana to get himself out of this situation. In short, he was fucked. He just hoped someone would find him before Fabien was let into the room to kill him, as he was sure that was what the noble intended.
His mind wandered back to the attack and how he could have done better. It had been nothing like his fight against the demons in the Fourth Hell and he wanted to think about why. The answer was obvious quickly. Mana exclusion. In the Fourth Hell, none of the demons had interfered with his ability to use mana, or processed mana he supposed. Given the lack of ambient mana it made sense that they wouldn’t have developed such Skills. Maybe they had a variant for demonic energy? Who knew? But that was what had tipped this fight against him. If he’d had his completed Barrier Bracer he likely could have used that to defend himself.
The mana exclusion had prevented mana from being released into the area, but it didn’t stop him from drawing on his Mana Reserve. It wouldn’t have stopped him from drawing on the mana within the bracer. That would’ve turned it into a war between the mana in the bracer and whoever was opposing the presence of mana. He was confident he could’ve won that. At least confident enough that he could’ve put up more of a fight. Maybe it would’ve been fine if his Magic Power was higher as well. That had been the issue against Null. The problem still lay in that much of his Magic Power was linked to being able to create a runic array. With his Magic Power at almost a hundred and fifty he was no slouch in that department, but his Empowered Runic Artistry bumped that by another hundred. That gave him an idea going forward, assuming he survived this.
He had nothing better to do and no way to escape so he kept going over the idea. They were unable to affect the mana inside him or so close to his skin. In fact, he had yet to meet someone who could affect the mana inside of himself. It wasn’t to say it was impossible, but it was an order of magnitude more difficult to forcibly make changes to someone else. He knew this from trying to teleport Kiri. Her own mana naturally resisted. Now, Kiri’s Magic Power was absolutely garbage, so in his tests he had been able to move her, but the cost had been obscene. He didn’t know if that had anything to do with affinities or if something else was the cause. Especially since, from what he had seen, mental Skills had been unaffected by that challenge.
Based on his experiments with Kiri he suspected that mental-type Skills, like her Command the Soul or the Enchantress back in Helmfirth’s Suggestion and Command used mana to influence soul energy. Soul energy apparently did not carry the same resistances. That wasn’t to say it was cheap or easy. Kiri had complained extensively about how expensive the Skill was. Thinking back to the fight, the mental attacker had even yelled that he was running out of mana.
Going back to his original line of thinking, he knew that any type of mana suppression, be it via nullification or exclusion, when used on a person's actual body, was almost always doomed to fail. So, if he couldn’t project his runes beyond his body, perhaps he should make his body the house for some of his runes. Not all of them. He had to consider the limitations of his biological body and more specifically, his physical Stats. But perhaps he could do something like creating a barrier runic array on his bones. The question was, was the effort worth it?
He didn’t think he could use Conceptual Material on himself. It wasn’t the first time he’d considered the Skills application to biological matter, but there was an issue of molecular structure alterations. Living things had their molecules structured in very specific ways. Changes to that could stop things from working, and a breakdown in a biological pathway could spell death. Worse, he had no method for reversing what he did with Conceptual Material. Perhaps he was just reaching for straws when what he needed was more of his runecrafted equipment. That brought him back to his initial thought, that if his Legendary Barrier Bracer had been ready, then he wouldn’t be almost naked tied to a chair in some dingy warehouse.
Approaching footsteps brought an end to his musings. Unless he missed his guess, there were two people approaching. A moment later the door swung open and three people entered his makeshift cell.
The first was the man who had broken his jaw. The one he was assuming was the leader of this mob of miscreants. The second was Fabien Lussier, red hair and eyes that burned with anger and hatred as they stared at each other for a moment. The third gave him a mild surprise, as Caroline Lambert, the Enchanter from the Nobles District entered, purple hair hidden beneath a black coif.
Ever since the issues began at the Royal University he had been wondering who was behind them. Mind you, there had only been the two issues. But burning out his room then getting him kicked out of Enchanting seemed risky and he had wondered who would bother making the effort for some random Adventurer. He’d honestly wondered if perhaps it was the Unseen, or just some noble who hated the Adventurer’s Guild. Did the Enchanter just want revenge for their interaction? That seemed unlikely to him. Then it clicked for him. She didn’t want revenge. She wanted knowledge. She wanted Sigils. What was it she had asked him back then? He wracked his mind, ignoring the pain in his jaw as he thought back on their interaction. ‘Is that the only Master quality Sigil you know?’ That was it. Her question back then. She had suspected he had other Master quality Sigils in his repertoire and she wanted them. Greed. Why did it always come back to that? Apparently people could give the demons of the Fourth Hell a run for their money on that front.
Staring back at the three sets of eyes watching him he waited patiently. He had a pretty good idea of what was coming next. It was Caroline who finally broke the silence.
“Hello again, Nate. I wasn’t happy with how our last interaction ended so I have made sure that this time the difference between our positions is far more clear.”
She paused to hold up his ring, “I am both impressed and disappointed with what I found in here. A few incredibly powerful mana gems. Some mana imbued gold and a few other metals though nothing above Rare quality that I could tell. A ridiculous amount of painting supplies. And these.”
As she finished she pulled one of his Skill Enhancement Orbs, his Puzzle Box and the Legendary Skill Orb for The Time Between and finally a closed book out of the storage ring. He wanted to laugh at her but all he managed was a chuckle before the pain in his jaw made him stop. She might have found a bit more if they had struck before he entered the Den. But he’d already made his manerium delivery. Frick had his other two projects back in his room at the University, though with his Familiar banished those were now just lying around his room. The runes protecting the room should be enough to keep them protected though. Finally, the low number of mana gems was because they were either back in his room for Frick to use, or recharging in his little mana syphoning facility. Still, there was more than enough in front of him to cause some serious problems.
“I am very disappointed that you don’t carry your Sigil tome around with you, as this certainly isn’t it,” she lamented, shaking the book left to him by Arikanvil about how to find his home universe. “Is it some form of advanced mathematics? It doesn’t matter. It’s Sigils that I want and it’s Sigils that you’re going to give me. Where do you keep your Sigil tome?” she demanded.
“I’ll get the answer out of him,” Fabien said, sneering at Nate.
“You’ll have your turn. But not until I get my answers,” replied Caroline with a clipped tone before looking at Nate expectantly.
His jaw made it painful to talk, but he figured silence would just get him tortured even sooner. Better to buy some time. “W’as a Sijil tom’?”
Caroline frowned in displeasure and he prepared himself for the pain of being slapped. Instead of slapping him she grabbed his jaw in her hands and roughly tilted his head upwards. The pain was excruciating and he would have screamed if it wasn’t for the liquid being poured into his mouth. He started to choke when she pinched his nose, forcing him to swallow the dirt-tasting concoction. As it slid down his throat he felt a numbness spread through his body starting at his face.
“There. Now maybe you’ll be able to speak properly. Now repeat what you just said,” she demanded.
She wasn’t lying. The numbness was making him a little foggy but the pain was mostly gone. Testing his jaw he could feel a slight click when he moved it but it didn’t send a bolt of agony racing through his head.
“I said, what’s a Sigil tome?”
He had a pretty good idea. But fuck giving her an answer. If they were going to get some answers out of him, they really would have to torture him. Anything to buy time for some sort of rescue or for the three who were suppressing the mana in the area to run out of juice. He survived a Dungeon at level one. He survived a System Challenge and the Fourth Hell. He’d survive some greedy two-bit Enchanter and her goons.
“It’s going to be like that is it?” Caroline asked, her voice dripping with acid as Fabien and the mercenary stared at him, Fabien’s eyes eager and the mercenaries hard.
“What about these then? What Skills do these Orbs offer?” she asked, holding out both the Skill Orb and a Skill Enhancement Orb.
He couldn’t help himself as a laugh burst out of him. Both were Legendary and she couldn’t identify them. He knew his laugh was a bit hysterical, but he couldn’t stop himself. Between the ridiculousness of the situation, the fear of looming torture and the alchemical concoction shoved down his throat he wasn’t in the best mental space. Coupled with seeing how incompetent his captors were, he just couldn’t help but laugh in their faces. A thought in the back of his mind said that if he told them, they might kill each other for the Orbs. Fabien definitely seemed like he’d be willing to kill for such a treasure. But that would be such a waste of his hard-earned rewards. He’d keep that idea in his back-pocket for now.
Caroline moved on to his Puzzle Box, holding it up in front of him, “What Sigil is this and what’s inside of the box?”
“Don’t know,” he muttered truthfully, still trying to get his laughter under control.
“Fine. I guess we do this the hard way,” Caroline responded, distaste clear on her face before she turned to the mercenary. “Bring me a table and a chair.”
Turning to Fabien, she gave him a nod, “Nothing lethal and stay away from his hands and face. I need him to be able to answer questions and draw.”
“My pleasure, madam,” answered Fabien with an eager smile as he drew a small rod out of his pocket. The blackened wood was only about ten centimetres long and tipped with a red gem. Nate didn’t need his sphere of awareness to tell what it was at a glance. Some form of wand. He was proven correct a moment later as an angry red flame lit at the end of the wand. Academically he was pleased to see his thoughts on mana exclusion and enchanted or runecrafted items had been correct. Taking a deep breath he prepared for the pain.
The table and chair hadn’t been brought in, nor had Caroline asked Nate any more questions, but that didn’t stop Fabien from leaning forward and beginning to burn Nate’s chest. He had hoped, for the barest of moments, that the alchemical concoction would prevent the pain. The flames licked his skin and put that hope to rest as he began screaming.Looking up he locked eyes with his torturer and saw only pleasure reflected in them.
*************
Lothar looked at his boss as the man walked past holding a chair and small table.
“This is a bad idea, boss,” he whispered softly, not wanting their employer to hear.
“What is it now, Lothar?” grunted Darren.
“Boss, that woman couldn’t tell up from down with the kids gear. Not the fucking robe. Not the Orbs. Not even the fucking Sigil on that box and she’s a fucking Epic Enchanter! By the Gods, Boss, I reckon we’ve put our fucking foot in it on this one. People with that kind gear at his age…they got friends in high places!”
Darren grunted his agreement and after a moment nodded, “Alrigh’. After we get paid we’ll hoof it outta Etrua. Use a go-between fer any future deliveries to tha Capital. Ya happy?”
Lothar was not happy. He was far from happy. Nodding to Darren he watched his boss leave while considering whether he should just make a run for it right now. He had a real bad feeling about this.
Comments
Dajiinn
This chapter just ruined the story for me. Sorry man, good luck.
C Smith
So uh nate is an idiot. Doesnt really seem to think that he f-ed up from his thoughts. Sure he does think ya if i had my leganday barrier bracer this wouldnt of happed. But he never Thinks to him self humm, i shouldnt have gone out alone until that thing was finiahed....And he then calls the people who captured him incompetent. If there incompetent how much of an idiot is he. Idk makes nate just look bad. Also it was pretty obvious it was the enchantress lady and the bumb noble.
