Amazon Apocalypse 4: Chapter 66

“On what world is kidnapping part of a lawyer’s job?” Sakura asked, eyebrows raised.

“I told you, Themyscira!” Myrina bounced giddily on her heels.

Her kidnapping victim let out a few muffled groans.

I glanced down at Myrina’s captive, the Patriarch of the Darkbinding family. For once, things had suddenly gotten a lot simpler, instead of how things usually went. At the end of the day, this was the guy causing trouble for us. Now, we had him in our clutches.

I placed a hand on Sakura's shoulders. "Don't question it. Just be grateful."

"Yep!" Myrina grinned fro ear to ear.

“He’s really just an upper C-Grade?” I asked, skeptically. I examined Myrina's prisoner again just to be sure.

Patriarch Darkbinding (Level 192)

“I thought the patriarch of a major family would have been stronger,” Sakura gave the tied-up Patriarch a nudge with her shoe.

“Merchant families are always wimpy.” Myrina waved off our concerns. “Besides, the Darkbinding family is a local force. It’s not an interplanetary one like the Samhain Clan. These guys might be on par with my clan within this pocket realm, but they wouldn’t be qualified to be mentioned in the same breath outside of it.”

Since Myrina had already kidnapped the guy, I realized we might as well go along with it. Even if we just held him captive for a bit, his clan would be in such disarray they wouldn’t be able to organize any further actions against Doomblade’s Armory. In a week or two, Sakura could solidify our position in the local enchanted armor market, and with a few more tournament wins, we’d be financially unsinkable.

I figured we were pretty much done with him, so we strapped him into a chair in Sakura’s office for an extended stay. Much to my surprise, the moment we had the gag off, he began frantically speaking.

“Unhand me, you brutes! This isn’t how upstanding merchants conduct underhanded schemes! And right before dinner, of all things? Are you trying to starve me? Is this what torture is like?” Patriarch Darkbinding said with frantic indignation.

He was roughly twice as round as Mister Mutton, who was already as rotund as his name implied. In short, despite his fears, Patriarch Darkbinding was in no danger of starving.

“We’re not going to torture you. Just leave you here a bit. I’ll unstrap you when we’re going to leave. Consider this a vacation. You can relax, maybe work out a bit. I’ll even put you on a proper diet to get you in fighting shape!” Myrina offered. I was surprised at the gentleness in her tone, though there was a feral gleam in her eyes.

Patriarch Darkbinding went immediately pale, cheeks quivering with terror.

“A... d-diet? System forbid it! Curse you, you mad woman! You’re in league with my physician, aren’t you?” Patriarch Darkbinding looked genuinely terrified at the prospect as he struggled against his bonds.

Myrina let out a villainous cackle, back to her usual self. Clearly, she’d known Patriarch Darkbinding’s weakness right from the start.

“That’s right. Don’t worry, I saw you had quite the collection of delicacies in your office. Don’t worry, I already finished your dinner so it wouldn’t go to waste. It was delicious.” Myrina rubbed her belly, then reached for a decorative golden bag of holding at her waist. “And guess what I found in your office? Somebody left a bag full of sweets tucked away in the corner. You didn’t want anybody to know about these, huh?”

From the bag, she drew a truly spectacular-smelling cookie, comparable to the stuff that Bridget baked from time to time. It had my mouth watering just smelling it. But Patriarch Darkbinding looked positively panicked.

“Wait, wait! I’ll talk. I’ll tell you what I did to your sponsored team, that archer, the Minotaur, and the mage! Then you’ll leave my stash alone, right?” Patriarch Darkbinding pleaded.

“What about Dannar, Agatha, and Ivanar?” I asked.

It took Myrina eating a bit more of his food in front of him to get all the answers out of Patriarch Darkbinding, but eventually, we pieced together what happened. The protests outside our front door had been his first plan. When that fell apart, he planned to rally his merchant partners and get them to choke us out. At the same time, he planned to make us lose in the tournament by getting rid of our teammates. He hoped that by eliminating us before the singles brackets, he wouldn’t get to show off what our armor could really do.

It was a good plan on paper, and executed by someone a bit more capable, it might have actually worked. But Patriarch Darkbinding was a soft merchant, and while he was capable of all manner of cutthroat contracts and hostile corporate takeovers, minor physical inconveniences were enough for him to throw up his hands in defeat, to say nothing of genuine threats to his life. The moment Sakura had mentioned violence he became a gibbering mess, which was probably why Myrina had tormented him with the idea of a diet instead.

Cutting a lengthy explanation short, Patriarch Darkbinding had forged a fake letter from Dannar’s mother telling him that she was dying and that the only thing that would save her was an herb from a nearby forest protected by B-Grades. Agatha received a forged message that her lodge urgently needed her and that she was to be recalled from Mucaria with all haste. Meanwhile, Ivanar was being held up by two extremely friendly Minotaur ladies.

They were very dirty and underhanded tricks. Sakura immediately took measures to contact each of them. I doubted such measures would be of much help, though. By now, our team mates would already taken the bait and would be impossible to reach until they discovered the deception.

Dannar would be out in the woods for days searching for a special herb that was nearly impossible to find. Agatha would be caught outside of Mucaria’s time dilation and lose days for as little as a short trip. The only one I could hope to have back in time for tomorrow’s match was Ivanar, though I doubted he’d show up even when he realized he’d been deceived.

So it seemed we’d have to face a full team on our own. Thankfully, Myrina took the news in stride. When we closed the door to Sakura’s office containing our very hungry prisoner, Myrina turned to me and smiled.

“You and me are plenty! When have we ever needed anything else?”

***

“The odds will still be heavily against you, despite your prior performance. It’s just going to be you two against a team of five,” Sakura said.

“Bet heavily on us and win big,” I replied confidently.

Sakura nodded, and like that, our plan was settled. With Patriarch Darkbinding safely in our custody, Doomblade’s Armory was significantly improved.

But no merchant would ever claim to have too much money, and if we could give Sakura another big win, she’d be able to experiment with expanding our reach through additional marketing, employees, or whatever else she was thinking of.

We parted ways at the gates, and Myrina and I entered through the competitor’s doors. Unlike prior days, we were quickly waved to the center of the arena.

The announcer’s voice from the other day boomed loudly over the entire arena, which was more packed than I’d seen until this point. Even a few of the private booths high overhead were lit.

“Attention one and all! The final day of the team matches is here. Everyone you see before you have qualified for the esteemed main event, where they’ll be fighting alongside the invitational guests, each of whom is a young protégé from across Mucaria and its associated worlds! The great families already have their favorites to win, but will a dark horse rise from the common folk to challenge them? If so, they’re somewhere among the challengers you see before you!”

Beneath my Doomblade helmet, I smiled. Little did these people know there wasn’t one dark horse here. There were two.

After spending a while explaining the rules for our competitors and what these last team matches meant, we were sent back to our benches to prepare for our final team matches. While less prestigious than winning the singles tournament, the team matches would still have winners and a grand prize for every member of the victorious team.

By now, all those that were left were impressive people, despite not being qualified to skip the open brackets and receive an invitation directly to the singles tournaments. None of the teams had anyone I’d consider dead weight.

“Next up, Team Feisty Redhead!” the announcer called again. “But oh no, it looks like Team Feisty Redhead has encountered some issues recently. They’re down three team members? Just watch those betting numbers turn against them. They were favored to win, but now not so much. Take a look at the current odds. Looks like they just sunk down to three to one. Sure, we saw Feisty Redhead take down the better part of a team last time, but was she strong or were those guys just weak? Seems like we’ll find out today!”

We were up against a full team of five adventurers, each looking like a hardened veteran. Their armor was of fine make, comparable to the enchanted armor I’d given Cyra. They’d clearly served this team of five through many battles, because each piece was dented, scraped, and bore many marks of repair.

“And up against them, Team Warhawk! We saw them crush their competition through every earlier match, and if any are taking home the team match grand prize, it’s them!” The announcer introduced our opponents. Meanwhile, I examined them.

Team Warhawk Bulwark (Level 194)

Team Warhawk Fighter (Level 187)

Team Warhawk Fire Wizard (Level 192)

Team Warhawk Blessed Cleric (Level 185)

Team Warhawk Shadowblade Assassin (Level 188)

The entire enemy team was composed of late C-Grades, and not weak ones either from the way the announcer talked them up. The odds were against us. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Sakura placing her bet when the odds against us were at their worst.

“Begin!” the referee said, and our enemies wasted no time in rushing us.

The Bulwark, more commonly known to me as the tank, rushed forward toward Myrina. Behind him, the Fighter followed close behind. I would have thought they’d go for me, but perhaps, thanks to her recent flashy displays, they considered her the larger threat. Maybe they were right, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t going to try to prove them wrong.

From what I’d seen of the matches so far, the big and sturdy fighter held the line while the faster fighters took out vulnerable healers or ranged damage dealers. But Myrina was no flight-footed assassin who’d die the moment she was pressed by two fighters. I could trust her to hold her own.

With Myrina doing my job, I needed to do hers. I lowered my shoulder and rushed forward toward the cleric and fire wizard. The Shadowblade Assassin had vanished shortly after the match began, and she’d no doubt strike at Myrina or me the moment she found a weakness. I’d have to trust in our armor to make sure she’d find none.

The cleric jumped in front of the wizard. He was a stocky dwarf, compared to the slender elven wizard behind him. He probably thought he had the mass to brace against my charge. Dwarves were practically impossible to knock over with their low center of gravity under normal circumstances, and this one was enveloped in a golden light that I sensed would make him even harder to knock over than normal.

I smashed into him with the full momentum of my armor. The dwarf might have held his grand if he had better footing. Despite the immense force I shoved him back with, he strained and groaned and just barely held on. But I pushed him forward, and his feet churned the sand beneath him as I shoved him aside.

“Fireball!” shouted the elven wizard. It was the same spell Dramonar loved so much, and because of that familiarity, the fire enchanted plates on my armor were perfectly suited to dealing with it. The fireball washed over me harmlessly, much to the wizard’s horror.

I grabbed her by the neck, looked at her a moment, then threw her across the arena. I probably could have taken her out of the fight then and there, but not without risking lethal damage. Besides, no amount of fire magic was going to hurt me so long as I was wearing this armor.

Instead, I focused on the dwarven cleric. He swung for my knees with a mace enveloped in golden light. His aim was good, too. On normal armor, he would have bent the joint to uselessness with that swing. No doubt he’d taken out many armored fighters with that trick. But I’d foreseen enemies targeting such a weakness when building this suit. Kinetic energy enchantments activated and shifted his aim just enough to force the mace to glance off the thickened metal plates of the kneecap instead of where he’d been aiming.

He cursed, and I reached over my shoulder to draw my sword. The massive hunk of magical steel unclipped from my back as I deactivated the electromagnet holding it in place. In one swift motion, I brought the sword down on the dwarf cleric’s shoulder, just inches from his head.

That blow would have taken him out of the fight, but the assassin finally saw fit to reveal herself. She charged me from behind. Knife extended forward as she targeted me where I’d be least likely to sense her. Or at least, where I’d be least likely to sense her if I didn’t have a rearview camera built into my helmet’s visor.

I shifted my weight slightly just in case the dagger was better at piercing armor than I expected. Instead of hitting delicate joints, the dagger skidded across enchanted abdominal plates. I brought my sword around, slapping the dwarf aside with the flat as I spun and smacked the assassin with the same motion.

The dwarf stayed where he was, but the much smaller assassin was sent flying in the opposite direction from the elf wizard. Then, it was just me against the dwarf cleric. He was pretty tough for someone who was clearly the team’s healer, but he wasn’t as tough as me in my Doomblade power armor.

I bent low to grab him by the neck, shrugging off a mace to the shoulder. Dwarven throats were much harder to grab than elven ones, so I couldn’t pick him up and toss him around like I had the wizard. Instead, I ended up grabbing his beard, poking it out from beneath his helmet, and giving it a tug.

“Goblin tits, ye miscreant! Unhand me beard!” the dwarf shouted in a barely discernible accent.

I ignored his protests, hoisted him by the beard, and tossed him in the air. Then I two-handed my sword with the kinetic repulsion runes facing forward. Like a batter hitting a baseball, I gave the dwarf a good smack. His armor crumpled, and he flew across the arena, where he broke through the magical barrier shielding the audience and flew into one of the private booths up above, effectively taking him out of the match.

All I was left with were the assassin and the wizard. The assassin was fast and good at hiding, so I’d save her for last. The wizard was easier to chase down. She conjured a whip made of fire and flung it at me, which was her last mistake. I grabbed the end of the flame whip and was surprised to find real mass behind it. Sensing something solid, I heaved on the whip and sent the wizard flying in my direction.

She soared toward me, and I grabbed my sword in both hands before repeating my batting feat a moment later by sending the elf flying. The wizard didn’t make it quite as far, since I sensed she was a bit more delicate than the dwarf. She landed sprawled in a heap outside the ring and right where the healers were standing waiting for the match to end.

Then, it was just me and the assassin. I eyed every shadow for a flicker of motion, but she hesitated to show herself. Now that I’d taken out both her allies, she realized she was outmatched on her own. Her only hope was her two companions would finish off Myrina and help her.

But it was not to be. A thunderous clang rang through the arena like the chiming of a massive bell. I looked and saw it was Myrina slamming the helmets of the enemy team’s bulwark and warrior together repeatedly. Both powerfully built men wriggled helplessly as she held them in either arm and bashed them against one another.

After that, the match was essentially over. It was a game of hide and seek with Myrina and me chasing the same target. She and I ran around the arena, stomping on shadows and slashing at sand as the assassin looked for an opportunity that would never come. If I were working with my magic, I’d have a dozen ways to find her. Maybe some I could implement unnoticed as Doomblade, but I wanted to be true to the spirit of my false identity, so I played the brutish warrior helpless against the assassin’s concealment magic. I’d need to make a tool for this sort of thing. Maybe I could build some night-vision goggles into my helmet.

Eventually, the assassin took a risk and targeted Myrina’s back. But the opening was a false one, and the moment the assassin left the shadows, Myrina twisted on her heel and drove her armored boot directly into the assassin’s chest, shattering ribs and knocking her out of the arena in a single blow.

“And the winner in this two-on-one match is team Feisty Redhead!” The announcer declared. “Down three team members or not, it looks like this dynamic duo is unstoppable! No one can beat them in the team brackets, but only time will tell if they can keep up with the prodigies of the singles tournament.”


<Note>
Not sure if this will make it into the story, but Patriarch Darkbinding buys his secret snacks (that his wife and physician don't know about) from the bakery Bridget works at. He was one of Bridget's biggest tippers.