Chapter 156: The Welcome Party

The Fae have a very short list of seven names that they won’t make deals with. Each and every Climber on that list has caused their people untold suffering and has been shunned for life and beyond.

William Oh’s name is on that list…seven times.

-          Jason Salazar

Will poured the whisky out so that the tiny person didn’t drown or die from poisoning, uncorking the bottle, but leaving the undead hand just outside the bottle, ensuring it couldn’t run away.

Then they came to an arrangement: Every time Will asked a question, the fae would answer him, or Will would chip away a bit of the bottle’s neck with his hatchet, opening making the entrance just a bit easier for the hand to try and stuff itself in.

Each chip risked shattering the entire neck off and allowing the hand to press its way in and kill the fae. Will was using his terrain control abilities to prevent that outcome but the creature didn’t need to know that.

It only took three chips off the neck before the little creature stopped trying to trick him into a deal or speak in vague half-truths.

Strangely enough, the entire time they were making this arrangement, Will’s undead hand never lost focus on the fae, even when other things were closer, or easier to reach.

It seemed as though whatever magic had been woven out of the thick Miasma around them, it had bound the fae and the hand together. The fae really did own the hand, in the eyes of the Floor.

It just wasn’t working out well for him.

In the lulls of conversation, when the fae wasn’t screaming, the caravan was quiet, and the road wasn’t particularly bumpy, Will thought he could feel a faint connection between the hand and the fae. A gossamer cobweb similar to what he felt when he tried to yank relics off of people.

Similar, but not the same.

This felt…more natural than the connection between a Climber and Relic, somehow.

The two were bound together by the terms of the creature’s ‘deal’, and the hand would never stop hunting it until those gossamer threads were unravelled.

Will wondered if he could sever a ‘deal’ with Phantom Hand the way he could the connection to a relic. The same way he could counterspell by scattering magic before it had a chance to fully form.

It was possible.

But…there were still a lot of variables. Other fae might create stronger threads, and if those threads were on Will, they might self-protect, rendering him incapable of considering the act of cutting them.

Something that nagged at the back of Will’s mind, though, was whether it was the fae who created the sensation of the miasma in the Floor tightening around him when he offered his hand...or if the fae had simply taken advantage of something that was created by the Floor itself. The environment.

Will’s fingers twitched as a thought occurred.

…The terrain?

He took the Amulet of the Homefield Advantage out of storage and looked at it.

If the force that seemed to enforce verbal agreements on this Floor was part of the terrain, could the effect be copied? Could the corrupted Miasma of the 8th Floor be copied?

Better yet, could the amulet create a sphere without their influence by overwriting the nearby terrain?

Will carefully inspected the glass vial with a cube of clear blue ice inside, taken from the 2nd Floor.

If that is the case, I definitely underpaid for this trinket.

…And if it’s not the case, how can I change that?

It was critical that Will test it, especially because it could be an excellent way to bypass his hand getting infected every time he went through the 8th Floor.

Will would rather sleep on a bed of solid ice for over a week. It didn’t even feel cold, because of Aspect.

But how to test it?

Will’s first instinct was to get some of their caramel candy, and offer it to the surrounding fae in exchange for…whatever, while the Amulet was creating the 2nd Floor ice terrain around him.

If the Floor forced him to follow through and give them candy, that was fine, but it was more of a headache if his ploy succeeded and he was able to avoid the enforcement of a deal.

Reason being: Now the fae knew he could do it, and it lost the majority of its element of surprise.

The obvious solution was to drag the captured fae off into the wilderness, ensure that they were alone, perform the test, and if it worked, kill it where no one else could see, preserving the secret for use with more important fae.

That felt…icky.

The fae were monsters, for sure, whose basest desire was to bedevil Climbers.  But they spoke. They looked like people.

Will had killed a lot of people thus far. All of them out of necessity in the heat of the moment. To save his life.

Will didn’t want to cross the ‘killing people in cold blood for a slight advantage’ river yet. Even if rationally, it was the same thing. Slight advantages saved lives. It just felt icky.

An easier way to test it without any witnesses would be on the 8th floor. See if the bubble of terrain protected his hand. Or Abyss, bring a bit of livestock up on the way through and kill a rat or chicken or something on the 8th Floor. See if it turned.

This isn’t the first time I’m coming through this Floor either. I’ll just play it safe and not fiddle around with the amulet too much this time through. I can test this somewhere else and return to the idea later.

Will donned the necklace and slipped it under his shirt, then went back to prying information out of his ‘guest’.

The stronghold to their south was indeed under the control of Lord Bakton, and actually boasted a sizeable population. Not as big as Akul, but pretty big. It was an excellent place for trade and industry to bloom, also a great place to buy and sell because crime and fraud were nonexistent, which kept prices low.

Visitors couldn’t commit crime if they wanted to because in order to enter the city you had to verbally agree to not cause trouble while they were within the walls.

And it was magically binding.

Further south was the ‘climber’ Key Site, where Climbers typically would go and clear a fledgling boss monster, securing their Door up or down.

To the east of the stronghold was a river bisecting a sea of farms, and to the west was the ‘grinding’ area, a forest filled with monsters driven there by the fae, where most Climbers liked to gain the levels they sorely needed.

The detail about the fae driving monsters there was not common knowledge. Most Climbers just thought that was where the monsters were. The Fae Lords liked to keep all the Climbers in one place, rather than wandering around their forests willy-nilly.

The caravan needed to hit the grinding area, for sure. The 8th Floor was…not great for XP, and most Climbers arrived three to five levels behind where they should’ve been. The fact that Will was only two levels behind was quite good. he still needed to get seven levels before they left.

On the subject of the Fae Lords, Will’s guest had plenty to spill.

The Key sites to the North, Northeast, and West of the arrival area were the domain of the three Fae Lords, each of whom had grown so powerful that the ‘raid boss’ term failed to do them justice.

Not only were they incredibly powerful on their own, but they each had the service of a ‘court’ of powerful fae, each strong enough to be a raid boss in their own right.

To the northeast, Mordaine, a lord with a castle decorated with the bones of his victims. Will’s captured ‘guest’ went to great lengths to point out that despite the rumor, the walls were merely decorated with bones, and it was a myth that the entire thing was made of bones, simply because nobody could see the original wall through all the bones.

Mordaine was probably the safest of the three. Anyone who put up a warning sign that big, obviously cared about what people thought. Theater kid, Will thought, resolving to visit.

Will didn’t say that out loud, because his ‘guest’ was on a roll.

To the north was Onacona, a mysterious Lord who simply vanished people who approached. Nobody actually knew what their castle looked like, or if they even had one. The most information they had was that some survivors reported their Party members vanishing in a flurry of pale feathers after passing an imaginary line.

The stories were from those who simply turned around at the sight of their Party members vanishing. People who chased after them disappeared too, never to be seen or heard from again.

Pass. Will thought.

To the West was Kincaid, who especially enjoyed play-acting as human royalty, with all of his court having fancy titles, getting together to have extravagant parties, and occasionally go out in force and hunt humans for sport as though they were game birds.

More was known about Kincaid than most, because of how often he liked to get out of his castle and interact with the ‘plebs’, and the fact that even though he occasionally hunted them, Climbers were welcome to visit his castle. About 80% of those Climbers managed to return, and often with treasure and fantastical stories.

Which encouraged more people to visit and possibly die.

When Will worked through the logic, he almost broke into a chuckle. Hundreds of climbers were lost to Kincaid every year, but Onacona only killed about a dozen because 100% fatality was an excellent deterrent. And nobody visited who’d visited Mordaine had ever died. They’d all been scared away in some way or another.

Kaincaid killed far more people than the other two, and yet…Climbers were less afraid of him, simply because they probably wouldn’t die.

Will shook his head in disbelief at people’s inability to read deeper into a situation. Kincaid OBVIOUSLY wanted a steady supply of people to kill, Onacona wanted to be left alone, and Mordaine was a pacifist.

Kincaid often sent his knights out on those ‘hunts’ with little tokens of his power that bolstered them and gave them access to Kincaid’s Abilities even though they-

“Say that again.” Will said, snapping to attention and pulling himself out of his thoughts.

The fae trapped in the glass bottle stammered for a moment before re-starting his explanation of the Fae Lord halfway through.

“For the leader of these hunts, Kincaid will manifest a portion of his power into a badge of office. This badge enhances the bearer’s physical prowess, and allows the bearer to use some of Kincaid’s Abilities. More importantly it marks them as the leader of that particular Hunt.”

“When they return, Kincaid will reabsorb the badge. It’s rumored that some of his real strength goes into the badge, because of the way he seems to recover when he takes them back.”

Will didn’t show his interest on his face, but internally he was jumping up and down and shouting from the rooftops.

THAT’S IT!

He’d been keeping his eyes open for something to give the Wraith Vessel upgrade for Phantom Hand the ability to manifest Relics.

There was a good chance a Sacrifice from this murderous Fae Lord was exactly what he needed.

Would it be a good idea to rush in there and demand a pound of flesh so that he could check the Sacrifice?

Probably not.

Like the amulet, he needed to keep this realization under wraps until he was in a position to get what he wanted.

Getting to level 45 would be a good first step, Will thought. He briefly considered getting above level 50, but decided against it. Class advancement might bake the current suite of abilities in place and prevent him from changing Phantom Hand, or simply alter it so that the upgrade no longer applied the same way.

Or perhaps he’d be missing out on a potent upgrade if he waited until afterwards to apply the Sacrifice to Phantom Hand.

It would be best if he got a chunk of Kincaid and tested it before Class Advancement. It’s be nice if the Fae Lord were willing to sell, but Will doubted it. given his behavior it would probably be for the best if he dies. It’d save a hundred Climbers a year.

As always, nothing says I gotta march in a face him right this minute. At the end of this floor, I should be level 45. If I keep my head down and don’t reveal my intentions, I can get everyone up to the 10th Floor and fight him on my way back down with just my Party. No collateral damage.

No…that’s not quite right. If I die on the way back down, the team on the 10th Floor is basically stranded, and will slowly get picked off. You’re still gambling with their lives.

Will weighed the choices and made a decision: He would still make the attempt on the way back down. Will would be much more powerful than he was now, and he was already incredibly powerful by the standards of these Floors.

Maybe it would be enough to kill a prince among raid bosses.

And if he pulled it off, that would propel him even further up The Tower.

As he was sinking into his own thoughts, Will’s ears picked up a distant thunderous noise, rapidly approaching. The hoofbeats of dozens if not hundreds of horses. A couple minutes away, according to Will’s sensitive ears.

“Matter of fact, my Fae senses are telling me that a Hunt approaches.” Will’s guest said, seemingly trying to act mysterious as he glanced toward the source of the sound. “You do have a very large, juicy caravan compared to most. It makes sense Kincaid would want to try and take some prey. Let me go and I will ask for leniency on your behalf.”

“…Don’t go anywhere,” Will said, brushing aside the deal wafting towards him, pulling his axe out of his belt loop as he stood, facing the source of the sound. Still a long way off, but soon the other Climbers would hear them coming.

Now…Who should I make the Fae afraid of, if not me? Will wanted to remain underestimated, or at least mysterious until he made his way back down and picked a fight with their Lord.

Will’s gaze drifted to Loth.

“Hey Loth! How’re your bugs doing?” Will asked.

“Oh, they like this Floor,” Loth said, giving him a wicked grin.

“Excellent. I have an idea you can help with.”

“Everybody gather up!” Will shouted.