JP Koenig
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Chapter 3 - The Rescue (part 1)
🕑 Added 2025-03-17 01:47:43 +0000 UTC“He had a quiet dignity, unfailingly polite but I swear there was mischief in his eyes.”
-Jarl Arnulf Swifthand
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Taliesin plummeted from a distance of about five feet off the ground, piercing through the veil back into reality as he did so. He could see the ripples of aether shudder away from him in a riot of Chaos and broken affinities. If he hadn’t landed on his side, bare-assed and already shivering from the cold morning air, he’d have been concerned about how obvious his entrance was to this realm. That sort of disturbance could only draw attention.
A forest surrounded Taliesin, with tall, old-growth pine and fir trees that he couldn’t reach his arms around. A dusting of snow was on the ground, which he noticed most acutely with his bare buttocks, but otherwise he couldn’t see any animals around. That made sense, as Taliesin was on a road of some sort, wide enough to see regular travel. That would scare off any wild game that might inhabit the woods nearby.
Then Taliesin heard the soft scuff of metal against leather, and the whinny of a horse. His heart hammered in surprise as he turned around. A carriage was stopped on the road, surrounded by bandits and down to a single lone defender in plate armor and a horned helmet. No one was fighting. They were all staring at him.
Sometimes Taliesin hated being right.
The ground was littered with the dead and the dying. Most of them were defenders, but at least as many brigands were lying dead as were still standing. What sort of rogues would fight so desperately? Taliesin had always understood the criminal sort to be rather cowardly. They should have fled at the first sign of stiff resistance.
“Well, not that anyone asked my opinion on the matter, but I particularly hate bandits and brigands,” Taliesin said, standing with as much dignity as a naked man could muster. He brushed the snow and tiny bits of detritus from his backside, then casually pointed at one of the armed attackers. “{Lightning Strike}.”
Taliesin accidentally cast the spell in the same manner he always had, and immediately winced. It took an inordinate amount of power, and he could see the dozens of inefficiencies in his casting. Worse, his aether pool was far smaller than he was accustomed to and he had no alternative power source.
The bandit fell with a hole in his shoulder. He twitched on the ground as the electricity worked its way through his system, burning him from the inside out. Taliesin doubted he would rise again. The armored figure standing before the door to the carriage did not waste the distraction. A sudden strike of the sword pierced the throat of another assailant, before swinging at another foe.
“Hmm,” Taliesin mumbled to himself. “Let’s try that again. [Lightning Strike].”
This time he cast it correctly, using the neatly woven spellform he’d worked out while in the void. The spell was far less costly this time, and burned through two brigands at once.
“Kill the magus! Kill the magus!” came a cry from one of the attackers. Taliesin frowned. That’s not helpful.
“[Phantom Armor]” he cast, but not before an arrow sliced across his left arm and buried into the ground behind him. “Ow! Son of a…”
Taliesin ignored the injury as his spell enveloped him in a translucent layer of hard light in the shape of armor. Then he winced, not because of the pain, but because his power reserves had dipped terribly. Taliesin was barely into the fight, and nearly useless already. All his knowledge and years of experience, trumped by a lack of preparation and bad timing. He resolved to fix that as swiftly as possible. A man with a sword charged at him. If I live, he corrected himself.
“[Shock Touch]” he intoned. With a practiced sidestep, Taliesin dodged the incoming blow and touched the back of the bandit’s head. He was delighted that his agility had returned along with his youth. The man dropped like a marionette that had its strings cut. Taliesin picked up the bandit’s sword and awkwardly stabbed him in the neck before the stun wore off. He succeeded in striking something important, based on the gush of blood, but the blade slipped from Taliesin’s hand as he did so. He left it where it fell, unwilling to risk his own fingers on an unsuitable tool.
Taliesin’s attacks had divided the brigands’ attention, which helped the armored warrior get an upper hand. A surprisingly pleasant alto voice rang out. <Smite>!”
The flavor of the magic that burst out felt strange to Taliesin, but he had no time to puzzle it out. A bolt of energy rang down from the heavens, blasting another brigand and shocking the ones nearby. Taliesin saw the aether-wrapped bolt of divine power and shook his head in disbelief. He’d never wielded that much power, even with the Orb of Eternity. Such was the might of gods, yet he’d had the nerve to defy the ones that even gods feared. Taliesin was struck by his own audacity, and more than a little pleased with himself.
There were only three bandits left. One of them wielded a crossbow and stood back from the fray, while the last two were engaged in a desperate bid to stay alive now that the tables had turned.
Taliesin turned to look at the one with the crossbow. For a moment, they locked eyes. The man turned to flee. “[Lightning Strike].”
The fleeing brigand fell with a hole in his chest. Taliesin was nearly out of power.
The defending paladin struck the head from the shoulders of the leftmost bandit, leaving only one. This one suddenly glowed with a corrupted red aura. “<Stoneskin>!”
In a flash of power, the man’s skin took a mottled gray color and noticeably thickened. He shoved the knight back and whirled around, his eyes crazy with panic and unbound energy. The knight smashed into the side of the carriage and lost her balance, leaving her off guard and vulnerable. Fortunately for her the brigand bounded from the carriage, determined to flee. Unfortunately for Taliesin, the man fled straight for him.
“Watch out! The fool overboosted his Forging!” shouted the paladin.
“[Lightning Strike]” said Taliesin. The bolt of electricity leapt forward and struck the man with no effect. Instead, the electricity skittered across the brigand’s body and down into the ground. “Shit.”
Now the bandit was nearly upon him, sword raised overhead to strike Taliesin down on his way by. The man’s speed and mania meant that Taliesin had little chance to dodge. In desperation, he cast the only spellform he had the energy left to cast.
“[Minor Portal].”
A gaping hole opened up in the road just where the bandit was about to step. With a cry of surprise, the man fell into the hole and vanished.
With a breath of relief, Taliesin walked gingerly around the portal in the road. He crossed his hands before him, acutely aware that his Phantom Armor did nothing at all for his dignity.
“Pardon me,” he said politely to the astonished paladin. “May I trouble you for a cloak?”
The woman bent over and unclasped a cloak from one of the dead bandits and tossed it to him. Gratefully, he whipped it around his shoulders and re-clasped it. The baggy cloak covered him sufficiently for the moment. Then behind him, a wild scream could be heard in the distance. It grew louder and louder. The knight readied her sword against the new threat, but Taliesin moved over to the brigands, holding his feet against theirs to compare sizes.
“Surprisingly good quality clothing for knaves,” he commented as he found a pair of stout boots that would fit. He tugged them off as the final brigand plummeted from the sky and vanished into the portal in the road once more. The scream cut off in an instant, only to start again in the distance above them.
The knight continued to stare at him in shock for a moment. “Is he going to keep falling forever?”
“Oh, certainly not.” Taliesin looked up from where he was stamping on the boots. “Are you aware that golden eagles often hunt turtles? It’s an odd fact, because the turtle just has to hide in its shell to avoid the bird’s claws. Do you have a guess as to how the eagle solves this problem?” He gave the paladin a vicious grin. “You need not worry. The spell will end on its own soon.”
The screams grew louder and the bandit fell through the road once again.
The knight shook her head at the madness of the moment before crying out. “The wounded!” She turned to the carriage. “Milady, the brigands are defeated. Can Gunther help attend to the injured?”
“We shall come assist,” came a voice from inside. “Who are you talking to? And what is that gods-awful screaming?”
“Ah… we’ve had some assistance from an… unexpected quarter,” said the paladin as the carriage door opened. A middle-aged woman wearing men’s tunic and trousers and a thick fur-lined cloak stepped from the vehicle. Taliesin kept wandering the defeated brigands, looking for clothes. Unfortunately, most of the clothes were bloodied, dirty and torn from the battle.
“Is…. is he naked?!” sputtered the woman. Just then the brigand fell from the sky and went through the portal once more. At once she nodded in understanding. “He must be an archmage.”
“I’m starting to suspect so, yes,” said the paladin. She was already kneeling next to an injured defender. “This one is still alive, milady.”
“Gunther! Come assist us, please,” commanded the Lady as she ran over to help, heedless of the mud staining her cloak. She pressed down tightly on a wound.
A young man, thin of frame and appearing to have a weak constitution clambered down from the carriage. His clothes were sturdy and his cloak was white. He rushed over to the Lady and knelt down, his arm already glowing white from the elbow down. “<Heal>.”
“Milord, if there is any magical assistance you can render to aid my allies, I would be most grateful,” said the paladin.
Taliesin looked up, and realized his energies were restoring far swifter than he’d expected. Did this world have more ambient aether than his last one? He felt a fool for worrying about clothes when some of the defenders might still be saved. He had spent too much time in his own head while in that Void.
He had a scant few minor healing skills that might stabilize injuries, at least until he ran out of aether again. Taliesin might help one or two, at least. “I can certainly try, but I am low on aether. Point me towards those that can be stabilized while you focus on the worst injuries.”
Behind them, the portal suddenly winked out. The brigand slammed into the road at a fearful speed. His blood splattered across a wide area and the knight winced. Taliesin ignored the newly dead bandit and instead set to work assisting where he could.
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I have to play the algorithm game with RoyalRoad, so this chapter had to be split in half. This half had an odd break-point that's a smidge short, but the next chapter is longer to make up for it.
-- JP Koenig
