Chapter 21

Mace and I had never really spoken much about his own experience in the portals. I’d recently given him some wicked armour, and a few goodies that he was currently holding for me. Maybe they’d help him. I’d seen him do some pretty fancy ‘spy stuff’ but besides flashing his weapons on occasion, I’d not seen him use them.

Yet.

The Blue Graveyard was everything I was told, and the creepy vibe it give off was real. I shook it off (mostly) noticing that Mace and ‘the boys’ seemed unaffected. We practiced a few different formations (all standard ones) then opened the big rusted gate and stepped in.

A few skeletons wearing ragged armour and rotten clothing turned their heads and started moving our way.

“They’re faster than Zombies,” I observed aloud. “and they are carrying weapons, well at least some of them are.”

“They’re supposed to be a little weaker though, but yeah; I’m told they’re also faster.” our helpful Rogue supplied as Mace and I moved to engage the first one.

“Mine,” I called out and dropped my axe head to the left, tangling his cutlass up in my blade tips. I threw out a simple snap kick to see if he’d fall apart. He didn’t, but he did stagger backwards a bit, dropping his sword. I brought the axe up for a neck slash, and the thing took another staggering step sideways this time while its head hung awkwardly off to the side. A second blow caught both its neck and shoulder. A third blow was needed to drop it.

For a first try at fighting something with its own weapon, I figured I did ok. I’d practiced against other Weapons, but was always a bit worried how I’d do against an opponent who was really ready to kill me with a sword. The decisive kill had me all ramped up.

I turned to see Mace drop one with a single blow, his mace smashing aside his opponents shield and crushing its rib cage and spine. All of the air in my inflated ego went ‘pop’ at seeing that.

“This fucking curse blows Donky dick ... I now need three strikes to knock one down and you go through ‘em like a buzzsaw.” I moaned

“If you put your axe away, does my ‘buff’ dissipate?” He replied while kicking apart the bones at his feet, looking for shiny treasures.

“On second thought, let’s not try it just yet, these guys might have an issue without it.” He pointed out the Rogue smashing the limbs off of one opponent, while the FireMage tee’d up his opponent like a semi-pro ball player, its head flying in our direction. Both Weapons had grins almost as big as the skeletons did.

“Fore!” Called out our happy Spearman as he duplicated the Mage’s move and ANOTHER skull came whistling towards us. I batted it away with the side of my Axe.

“You’re fucking WELCOME!” I hollered out while looking with dismay at the edge of my axe, as though I’d maybe see the effects of the curse.

I got laughter in return, the other guys obviously noticing that they had a boost in their weapons effectiveness against the skeletons.

I was probably the fastest of us, so when these things started pulling themselves out of the soil I nearly always got in a strike before they got their torsos above ground. Still, it never took me less than two strikes to wreck one and one time it took four. Having the Fire Mage step in to help me was a particularly bad moment. It was like having my mom hold my hand and help me across the street; or your girlfriend hold a guy at the bar from the back so you could gut-punch him.

Five of us ‘Hunters’ was about right for the first level. (It was apparently Mark II, they’d been in only once before) We could handle the mobs fairly well since none of them were any larger than 5 and despite my whining about my suck-ass curse, I only received two hits from the skeletons in the next hour and a half. Both strikes were already slowed by running off my axe, and my forearm pads took up the rest of the impact. Nothing but bruises. I’d taken harder slashes in hockey. That curse worked both ways.

The Boss came out in the final mob. We were fighting off five of the regular ones, when out of a big square stone house in the middle of the yard strides this 6-foot tall one with armour, a proper kite shield, and a falchion.

Mace smashed my (current) opponent from the back, breaking it apart since his was already down. (Damnit! I had it!) and we backed away from the advancing boss in a line.

“Mage!” Called out someone to my left. A moment later a small ball of fire hit the big rack of bones in the shoulder, blackening it but doing nothing else I could see.

“Spear!” The same voice shouted and a moment later a thrown spear awkwardly struck the torso of the advancing Boss, maybe damaging it a bit.

“Ok, anyone think they can take it on their own?” Came the voice, a little quieter this time as the spear dissipated. (Presumably back into the inventory of its owner)

“I can take him.” Mace said without any hint of arrogance. I figured he probably could, but figured it might be a lot closer fight than he did, judging by the confident tone he used.

“Albio, you keep that curse active, and stay nearby. I don’t want to loose that buff and de-buff right now” he said.

“I’ll be in range, also: take this...” I passed him a charm I’d picked off the ‘surprise’ corpse at the morgue. It was a bracelet, a simple pink snap bracelet like something a kid would wear. It looked really worn, like it was about to break at any moment but it still worked. Mace put it on without asking. I could see his surprised look.

“What the fuck man!” He asked, annoyed. “You couldn’t have passed this to me earlier?”

I knew what he was thinking. The writing on the bracelet itself read ‘Pink Power’ in cracked and faded letters but once you stored it in inventory you could read its description: ‘Holy Right Arm: +15% attack, +15% defence when facing undead or evil opponents. Restrictions: Cannot be equipped by non-aligned individuals.’

I couldn’t put it on, I’d slap my wrist with it, and it would just bounce off. I let it bend into a circle and tried to slip my hand in ... it snapped flat and fell off like it was mocking me.

Mace moved to engage with even more confidence now, and the poor Boss was in an uphill battle with a dull weapon and a few buffs working against him. I circled to the back of the skeleton, hoping to create an opening while ensuring that the two of them were covered by my curse.

The two big guys rushed together with a ‘Clang’. Both of them had gone for a shield bash, followed up with a low strike. They both pulled their strike early and moved to block instead.