Chapter 48: Grand…ish Strategy

“Oh yeah? Well, William Oh invented the chain of command, which he then used to strangle a  supposedly ‘immortal’ cyclops who could only be wounded by metaphor. Top that.

-          Mack Daniels, level 30 Climber

“Hold on a second,” Roger said, cocking his head to the side for a moment before he turned and dove into the murky water just beside them.

A moment later, the oversized Rustic Brawler emerged from the water, struggling with an eel larger than a man. It looked…pissed.

“Dragon Eel!” Roger shouted over the thrashing of water. Will detected a shift in the creature’s throat an instant before Roger yanked it’s head to the side.

A torrent of acid erupted from its mouth and sailed off into the distance, landing among the weeds of the swamp, which immediately began to smoke.

“These things make some of the best leather Relics this side of the seventh floor! Most of your Party are lightweights so it’s worth seeing what this guy drops.”

Crack!

Roger snapped the monster’s neck and threw it up on the dry path, climbing out of the waist-deep water, idly brushing off leeches.

Miasma began to flicker and unravel, rising from the corpse of the monster in a way that almost looked like smoke, if the smoke had been alive.

The corpse’s finely scaled leather mummified before evaporating, leaving nothing but bones in a matter of seconds.

Inside the dragon eel’s  torso were dark brown, nearly black leather leggings. Only on very close inspection was one able to see the tiny scales of the eel embedded in the leather, lending it extra strength.

Ranger’s Eelskin Leggings

+4 Resistance

+10% movement speed.

+15% Ranger Archetype Ability Potency

Will liked the ranger archetype ability potency, but his current leggings gave much stronger stat bonuses.

“I’ll take it,” June said, raising her hand.

“How do we find Dragon Eels?” Will asked.

“Sometimes you can catch their fins sticking out of the water. They look kind of like a branch leaning sideways out of the water, but there’s always a piece of scum or something obscuring where the fin extends down into the water. They also have a very faint hissing sound when they breathe through their gills. I’ll point it out next time I hear one.”

Roger guided them through the swamp for a solid three days, until Mason hit half Charge, then they followed the shortest possible route back to Way Station.

It took longer than they’d expected, between the Ring of Arcane Endurance and Mason’s natural regeneration. Most encounters ended with one application of Mason’s conflagration, which was paid for by the Ring of Arcane Endurance.

Those that didn’t end in a single explosion usually involved Will and June picking off stragglers while Reggie stood there looking tough.

It was only when everything went wrong at once and needed a hasty correction to prevent death or injury, that Mason unleashed more than a single explosion.

They quickly learned to hate swamp vampires, as the intelligent worms that animated the corpses of dead adventurers retained a bit of the host corpse’s intelligence, and would arrange simple ambushes that aimed to cut party members off from the group, or drown them in enemies, so they couldn’t protect their weakest members from the sheer numbers.

Or both at the same time.

The most egregious example of this was when a tentacle monster plant emerged, splitting a narrow dry path in two, separating Mason and June from Will and Reggie temporarily.

By the time Will and Reggie got around to the other side again (about five seconds) the Nuker and Scout were already fending off half a dozen swamp Vamps with more emerging from the murky water every moment.

One of the vamps even managed to land a hit on Mason’s arm before he got off any explosions, which gave Reggie a circle-shaped scrape in the same spot.

Paying someone else to take the damage for you. Will had mixed feelings about Tanks. They were useful, and they reduced the aggregate amount of damage taken by the party, unless they were abused.

But the people who signed up for it were buying in to the Climbing game with their body…and mind. Decoys like Travis just died, but if a Tank didn’t die, they usually retired with crippling wounds. Often mental ones.

Resistance didn’t help resist psychic damage.

When Will and Reggie joined the fight, they scattered the vamps to the wind and turned to kill the tentacle monster that was trying to draw them into a gaping maw in the swamp lined with teeth.

With the proper application of arrows and explosions, the creature’s tendrils went limp, and they looted it’s corpse.

One of the vamps dropped a ring with inward facing barbs that granted lifesteal, which went in the emergency pile, since nobody wanted to wear it, but it might prove useful in an emergency.

Ring of the bloodsucker

+2 resistance

+2% lifesteal

The tentacle plant dropped a bow seemingly made of gnarled vines tightly woven together.

Bow of Entangling Vines

+3 Acuity

Projectiles fired from this bow cause vines to erupt from the ground and restrain their target. Scales with Acuity.

June switched out her current nonmagical bow for the new Relic, since any bonus was better than none, and the effect wasn’t half bad.

“Draw’s a little high, but that’s good. I’ll get stronger,” June mused as she tested the bow.

They made it back to the Inn at the end of the third day, and Will checked in on the rest of his Party.

Loth, Alicia and Travis looked about ready to chew their way out of the room that Steve had locked them in, which was good.

The next morning, the seven of them got together and Will made introductions.

“Alright, everybody, introductions,” Will said, gesturing to each person as he explained how they were going to operate. “I’m William Oh, the Party Leader. This is Loth, She’s my second in command. June Ferrier will be squad leader, Mason is her second, and the rest of you guys are under them.”

“’Kay,” Reggie said with a shrug while Travis sputtered.

“You’re going to put a kobold and a commoner in command of Alicia Zodiac!?” he said, his face red with what Will could only assume was second-hand indignant outrage. Alicia Zodiac didn’t really show any response.

“I like Loth,” Alicia said, with her trademark expressionlessness.

“I mean, if miss Zodiac feels that’s the best choice of action-“

Will met Travis’s gaze, and widened his eyes.

“It’s fine.” Travis hastily course corrected his ass-kissing.

“I have to say, it’s an honor to meet you, miss Zodiac” Mason said, offering his hand to the blonde archer.

“…You have very slender bones. Are you a boy?” She asked, her voice barely audible.

“…right.” Mason said, withdrawing his hand while June and Reggie chuckled.

“He’s a boy, I had to change his clothes when-“ Reggie began.

“We don’t have to go into it!” Mason interrupted.

“He passed out and pissed himself,” Reggie whispered.

“I see.” Alicia said, nodding.

“You say that like there weren’t extenuating circumstances! I was literally crushed under a boulder!” Mason cried, rounding on his Tank.

“Anyway!” Will interrupted them before Mason could get any more red in the face. “Introduce yourself and your Abilities and what we can generally expect from you in combat.”

“My name is Mason Lanover, I’m a Nuker, and my Ability, Conflagration, allows me to deal a large amount of damage in a very small amount of time. I’m good at clearing encounters that turned out to be harder than expected, softening up overlarge groups, or ending fights before they drain the resources of the rest of my Party.”

“Are you trying to steal my job?” Alicia asked quietly, her eyes glowing blue flames.

Mason backed away from her and stammered.

“Alicia, you’re just going to have to learn to share the Nuker role. You’re better at detection and long-range ambushes, he’s better at mowing them down during the thick of a fight. There’s a lot of overlap, but it’s not a bad thing.” Loth said.

“…Father said if a Party brings on someone with the same role, they’re going to replace you…” Alicia said, looking at the ground.

“Has it occurred to you that your father may not always be right?” Will asked, going out on a limb so Loth didn’t have to burn any bridges…or mix any metaphors.

Alicia glanced up at him, her glowing blue eyes widening minutely. “…no?”

“Two Nukers is better than one. We’ll be able to venture out for a long time before either of you run out of Charge. Now shake Mason’s hand and tell him you look forward to working together.” Loth said.

“…Okay.”

Alicia marched toward Mason, who stood stock still. She jutted out a hand, still looking at the ground.

“…forward to working…” She whispered, her hand trembling.

“Ah, likewise, Miss Zodiac” Mason said.

“..Licia,” she whispered.

“Likewise, Alicia,” Mason said, relaxing and giving her hand a firm shake.

Once they were done, Reggie picked up the introductions, followed by Travis, June, and finally Loth and Will.

“Now before we head out, Mason should at least put on some clothes.” Will said, shaking his head in exaggerated disgust.

“He’s not wearing clothes!?” Alicia demanded, drawing the confused gazes of Mason, Reggie and June.

Loth pinched him.

“Ow. Sorry, I couldn’t help it.” Will said, rubbing his arm.

“…I’m being razzed,” Alicia whispered, staring at the ground, her face red. “…Just like Father said would happen…”

“Alright, we’re all together, what’s the plan, boss?” June asked, looking at Will.

Loth tugged on Will’s shirt prompting him to bend his ear closer to her.

“The way the chain of command works is you give a vague direction of what you want to get done, and June and I decide the specifics.” Loth whispered in his ear.

Will nodded and stood up straight.

“I want our party to get some practice working together now that Roger isn’t babysitting us. I also want to make it a productive outing for Ranger gear for our three Ranger subclasses,” Will said, pointing at himself, Alicia and June, hopefully displaying more authority than he felt.

This whole thing felt odd.

“Alright, let’s massacre dragon eels, vine pits, tangleweed and muck-drowners. They have the best ranger drops. The southwest side of the Way Station has the easiest land to navigate and a low population of swamp vamps, making encounters safer and more predictable. Let’s start there and work our way outwards. I’d also like to get Travis an extra pair of Swamp Stompers because his maneuverability in the swamps simply isn’t high enough to take full advantage of the Boots of outflanking.” Loth said, glancing at June, nonverbally passing the torch to her.

“When did you learn all that?” Will whispered to his second in command.

“Steve’s dossier.”

“I knew there was something I was forgetting,” Will muttered, snapping his fingers.

“You couldn’t have read his handwriting anyway.” Loth whispered back.

“Alicia, you can see through water?” June asked, picking up the planning where Loth left off.

“I can see through everything.” Alicia whispered in an eerie tone, causing Reggie to reflexively put his hands in front of himself.

“Alicia and I are going to run point, Alicia will point out anything with bones before it gets a chance to ambush us.” June said.

Vampires have bones. Will thought approvingly. With Alicia around those pesky ambushes would be countered every time.

“We’ll focus on using Alicia’s ability to see through water to grind Dragon Eels until we get some more Swamp Stompers, then we can use our Master Decoy as bait, leading enemies straight into the hammer and anvil that is Mason and Reggie, which should increase our hunting speed greatly.”

“Reggie, grab our pack from the inn. There should be enough supplies in there for a weeklong trip. Alicia, how many arrows do you have?

Alicia whispered an answer.

“That’s not going to last a week.”

“My carry weight is pretty good,” Will offered.

June added that to the calculation without missing a beat.

“Will gets another pack, so we can add a bit of…and if I….” June began muttering to herself for a few moments before handing out orders that sent everyone scrambling to prepare their gear for a long outing.

Will tried not to look impatient as the process of preparing the Party to leave took nearly half an hour when it felt like it should’ve been a simple matter of putting a backpack on and heading out.

He understood logically that more moving parts to a Party meant more things that had to line up for the Party to move. He understood that, but it burned his very soul when Travis had to stop for a bathroom break, and Alicia needed a cobbler to waterproof her boots better to avoid foot-rot, and Reggie had a metal joint in his armor that had begun rusting in the damp air, causing an audible squeaking, which he had to take apart, polish, and then oil.

But, just like Loth had said, a good leader lines up every possible advantage to make success as easy for their team as possible. Will didn’t want Alicia getting foot-rot, or Reggie’s joints locking up with rust at an inopportune time.

Oddly enough, Mason was the try-hard that seemed to have everything organized and ready to go at all times. It made sense given the slender young man’s discipline and Climber training that seemed to have been drilled into him from youth, but it didn’t quite fit Will’s Young Master mental image.

He must’ve been born to young money Climbers who passed on some of their serious attitude.

Also, he didn’t carry much actual gear, given his stature and role.

That helped.

 Finally, after what felt like an interminable amount of time, they set out to the southwest, where the patches of dry land were somewhat larger, and interconnected.

Will must be a good leader, because honestly, it was too easy.