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1176. Sorceress' Trap
🕑 Added 2024-09-22 15:00:27 +0000 UTCWhen only a part of the scouts returned, they knew the Dungeon Worm Nest was a pure disaster, but none of them dared to mention it. The young princess had a terrible temper. They were just simple soldiers and didn't dare to rouse her ire with careless words.
After orders were given that they would stay for the night they simply carried on with the already established duties, after all, they had already stayed here for a couple of days. He tried to make himself look busy, but someone called out to him.
“Hey, Jimmy! Stop trying to dodge guard duty and start patrolling,” his superior barked at him. He had hoped not to, but at this point, he wouldn't be able to avoid punishment if he slacked off. Hiding his big sigh, he saluted his superior and turned to patrol the surrounding woods.
This pine forest was nothing special, initially. However, they had heard stories about Gamma before coming here. It wasn't Arget Nore that drove the natives from this place, but Zarkists. He got goosebumps just thinking of Zarkists. A single scratch could turn you into a beast devotee of an evil god. Somehow the natives managed to defeat them, but the guys kept joking that there were still some random infected in this region.
A rustling in the bushes alarmed his heightened senses. He was really on edge. After all the horror stories they heard of Urth, nobody could blame him. Carefully, he followed the rustling and found- A zombie deer crawling on the floor!
Relief washed over him. It was just an undead. It was probably just a deer that got hunted on the land of death and turned by the power of the land. There was nothing to fear about that! With practiced movement, he stabbed at it with his spear.
Just before the spear could pierce its head, its neck jerked to the side. Missing the head, the spear lodged deep into the neck and shoulders of the undead animal. The zombie suddenly cried tragically and spewed a fountain of rotten blood at him.
Disgusted he stumbled back, pulling the spear with him. he tried to block the fountain, but he was drenched in black blood. It had even sprayed through the gaps in his visor and hit his face. He imagined the metallic, rotten taste on his tongue and almost puked in his helmet.
“Disgusting bastard!” with a swing of the spear he beheaded the deer. “Shit, I will have to ask someone to use high-tier cleaning magic when I get back to camp...”
....
“God dammit, not again!” Natina cried out.
They had set out earlier in the morning of the next day after they realized the worm's nest was just a trap. A fruitless endeavor without any gains and too many losses overall. It was still heavy on her mind by the time the army boarded the undead and flew to the skies.
Three hours later they came across another mountain with holes. Another nest of dungeon worms? No. The SAME hole-riddled mountain. Her failure was haunting her, taunting her, like a painful pimple that just wouldn't go away. They even found their previous campsite here.
“Your Highness, it didn't work,” the mysterious swordsman who had paid a visit to the lich of Gamma, approached her. This was already the second time they had returned to this mountain. They had realized that they wandered into some kind of entrapment magic after the first time and tried a couple of common methods to counteract it, but they had arrived back at the mountain again.
Calling it the curse of her expedition earlier was almost like a prophecy at this point. As if to punish them further, during every loop, they came across a vast assortment of starved flying creatures, attacking the airborne army in a feeding frenzy.
Had those also been trapped in this enchantment? Fatigue started building up quickly among the living soldiers. The monsters were not that strong, but their numbers were large. They would have to rest soon, but at least her swarm of doom was growing thanks to this.
“You don't say!” she almost barked back at the man stating the obvious, but managed to control her mouth, moments before disaster. This man was a legend, sent by the imperial family to support and protect her. Probably also to monitor and judge her. Either way, she was someone she shouldn't offend, yet.
They tried several other methods to escape, but they found the entrapment in this place was powerful, yet subtle. This was the ingenious part. although the effects were almost non-existence, not even the legend beside her could escape the minuscule nudging that had them fly in circles for over half a day.
“You are right, I fear we will have to use that,” she said instead, hinting at one of the hidden artifacts they brought along.
“Hm, it's a pain to use it so early. We will have to find a different way to crack Iego, but I believe you are right,” the legendary warrior agreed with her.
The artifact in question was an orb that could negate all magic in a radius of two kilometers for a certain amount of time. The orb was called the barrier breaker and was one of the most powerful siege weapons an empire could possess.
Of course, this power came at a price. It had a 30-day cooldown and did not differentiate between allies and enemies. Once used, nobody would be able to cast magic within the affected area. Mages, spells, most skills, magic artifacts, and everything that relied on magic or enchantments became temporarily useless.
They had tried everything else they could think of because they didn't want to waste this precious resource, but it seemed like they had no choice. Whoever set this up was either a legend or extremely skilled in large-scale entrapment formations. Probably both.
It was hard to believe Minas Mar would be able to set up something like this. They didn't speak it out loud, but maybe Chrona had not kept their word. The enemy empire definitely had one or two characters the warrior could think of, that could pull off this kind of magic. According to their information, there was nobody in Minas Mar capable of this.
“Before we do that, what if we try to leave by foot?” the adjutant suddenly entered the conversation.
“We were always attacked by beasts in the air, but the camp was relatively calm. Maybe the beasts and the entrapment are a warning not to take shortcuts?” he explained his idea.
“But this isn't a dungeon. Why would they build in a way out, instead of trapping us indefinitely?” Natina asked confused by the adjutant's thought process.
“No, no, he may have a point. Such powerful magic that can even affect legends usually comes with a catch. Legends depend a lot on their narrative, putting a clever way that allows a trap to be overcome, could allow a legend to lower the cost of the spell or enchantment,” the swordsmen explained stoically.
Natina listened to his talk but didn't really get it. “Well, if you agree to this, it won't hurt to try it,” she said with a shrug. If it didn't work, she had two scapegoats to push the blame onto. As such, they made the decision to walk away from the mountain.
After a break, the army set off riding an army of undead beasts. Their speed took a dip as they now had to traverse the land, but miraculously they did not arrive back at the mountain. They rode eight hours straight and finally saw new landmarks. Hopeful whispers could be heard among the soldiers.
“I think this actually worked...” Natina mumbled.
At this point, they had been going for almost 20 hours without rest. The night was falling quickly, so they decided to set up camp instead of riding through the night. The camp was set up, with everyone looking forward to tomorrow when they could finally get back to their journey.
