Chapter 46: To Dance With Devils

Sammy had no words for what she saw, so she once more sent imagery to Carlisle and her other Followers, emphasizing the marchioness in the cage. As their shock and alarm fired back and information was spread, she finally sent, “Move quickly, begin any buffs — she doesn’t have long — it’s some kind of sacrifice! Be as quiet as possible, so we can preserve surprise!”

Carlisle had the group running ahead, still with more tunnel ahead of them before the wide cavern opening. Sammy was peripherally aware of Estara casting a few buffs — one on Bob, Mekias, and the other front spearman. It was a lesser protective effect, halving the effect of one injury.

She performed it seemingly without prayer… thanks to Samantha’s Illusion domain she could pretend to cast magic spells instead, tricking and pretending being a form of prayer to her goddess. So she whispered fake incantations and made nonsense hand signs. Any wizard would be puzzled at the gibberish, but then they might expect that of the mysterious ‘Witch’ class, which Sammy wasn’t even sure existed.

The scene down from the lip was a rapidly eroding stalemate. The shield was weakening. To Merril’s eyes, the frogmen behind it were simply preparing for their final stand, brandishing weapons with grim expressions.

Their shaman was there in the middle, his frog face and forearms showing a coloring of bright orange, blue, and black like some tropical poison species. He was bloodied and haggard-looking, but deep, resounding croak sounds and growls indicated spells, buffs he was layering over his allies, waving around two ornate sickles in both hands, sometimes chinking them together to make chime-like sounds, all part of his non-runic spellcraft.

Observation was interrupted by a hyena demon coming down from the curving path to the right. From this angle, Merril had no visual cover.

Sammy instantly activated her Illusion ability-use through the relic, cloaking Merril into the background like he was part of the surrounding rock, almost at the same time eyes were on him. The beast stopped dead, staring right where Merril had been and cocking its head in puzzlement. It knew something had been there, but then it wasn’t.

It slowly moved closer, beginning to sniff the air, and then the ground, as Merril, with great equalling slowness for the sake of silence, adjusted to a crouch, his bladed rapier in hand already.

He’s not someone that can just behead this fucking thing in one go — fighting is going to be extensive and noisy. I can create sounds to drown out something, but I can’t stop them. And he still might not even win…

Sammy reached with her ability to the farthest it extended behind the creature, then made an echoing, directional noise like scuffling frogman feet she’d so recently become acquainted with. She fashioned it in such a way the exact location was indistinct and ‘thrown’ further away, hoping it would work.

The demon-thing spun around with a snarl, then bounded back up the curving path, convinced there was an escapee straggler somewhere above, perhaps its very duty to take down.

“This spot isn’t safe alone, Merril — head down quickly! The group is close. I can save my other use on Dax’s relic if I center my Illusion cover on you. Get in the relative middle.”

Merril was already moving, though, swiftly yet light-footed and avoiding noise. This was his particular skill set, ultimately. “Understood.”

The feline scout did not have to wait long before the group came up. Sammy sent to her Followers, “Everyone needs to know they will be cloaked from sight by an illusion, like makeshift invisibility. It won’t fool them forever, so move quickly while doubt and confusion persists. We use our element of surprise to ambush the firecasters first. Then we make our play for the cage to free the marchioness… and retreat to tighter quarters.”

Carlisle sent agreement, then “Quickly, speak ‘Trouble’ and ‘Reinforce’ through the mirror to Sir Talbion in the camp!”

Sammy did so, almost in the back of her mind, finding the old soldier sitting on a rock, smoking a pipe, with the mirror right in his hand. He murmured, “Got it,” around his pipe after the two words spoken from the mirror in a mimic of Carlisle’s voice, then stood up and began shouting orders.

Too far out to help them, I think… but who knows.

Sounds of resumed battle filtered to the group as Merril rejoined them — they pressed onward down the rocky sloping path, cavern formations of various shapes all around them. The view of the scene Merril had looked down on was blocked by a wall to the right, but they soon approached the wide passageway that gave access.

Two other paths were evident, one continuing forward into a tunnel sloping down, and a wider cavern to their immediate left, where possibly there were additional routes. Somewhere in that direction was the loot, Sammy realized.

A hyena demon burst up from the path ahead, crossing right in front of them all before they spilled into the great cavern to the right. But it did not so much as glance at them underneath the disguise of the background behind them… it just jogged the same way they were going ahead of them…

After a collective release of held breath, the party moved after it, keeping themselves in as much silence as possible. Fortunately there was plenty of noise already as cover.

The first thing noticeable was that the portal had winked out — that was a good sign, maybe, as no more demon-things would pour out of it.

Meanwhile, the frogman group led by the shaman was pushing ‘forward’ along a wall into vicious combat with imps and hyena demons. His shield of force had seemingly been condensed into the normal size of a shield, which he directed with one sickle while attacking with the other, wreathed in some ghostly energy that licked out with each swing, cleaving through flesh easily.

Their push gained casualty after casualty, though, as they were surrounded on three sides and not all were as capable as the shaman and the few elites around him. Furthermore, bolts of fire arced over the backs of imps into their midst, skewering and scorching them on direct hits, or ruining their shields in an eruption.

Sammy couldn’t focus hard on this matter, all of her mind honed on crafting a background cloak around them as they moved swiftly toward the mages, who still — for a little while longer — had their backs to the party in their facing of the shaman’s group.

Halfway there, some hyena demons craned their head over, their ears twitching, their eyes passing over the party with puzzled-like reactions. Suspicion, but nothing concrete…

“You worthless idiots!” Sir Thadeus called as he was stalking toward the fray by the frogmen, his flaming greatsword gripped in readiness. The imps quickly made way for him, eyeing the sword with fear. “Watch how it's done!”

Charging forward, Thadeus’s blade flashed at the shaman and was intercepted by the shield… but it burst like a shower of sparks, banished by overpowering force and magic, and the sword carried through to cut right through the shaman’s hand, who gave a piteous cry as he reeled backward.

Horrid though the sight was, it served as further distraction for the party’s approach. The imp firecasters had their eyes glued to the spectacle, right as Bob, Theron, Carlisle, and the rest were right on them.

One imp across the way finally cried out as he was crossing from one end to the other, exclaiming in surprise with his eyes near the back of the party, at what must’ve been some imperfection or distortion in the air. But it was largely too late.

Sammy quickly unleashed her REX buffs in the last few moments before engagement, giving every one of her followers the same solid boost to combat performance and a wound negation — The Blessing of Holy Wrath. She could construct more defensive or slightly more offensive ones, but the balance was too desirable for the situation.

Ranged fire fell on the casters, blind-siding them, right before they were charged by the front-liners. An arrow in the neck of one, a knife and a dart in the chest of another — spears and blades fell upon two more before they even turned, and so half of them were already down or disabled.

The rest dodged and evaded in confusion from their fallen foes, but their eyes could at least see shapes and distortions, it had to be imagined, as the illusion was ‘disbelieved’ and Sammy otherwise had trouble keeping up with blocking out the sudden swift moves of combat.

One — the furthest out — ran off toward the imp pack immediately, eyes casting back and crying out warnings. The other imp that had cried out initially shouted some support.

Sammy fashioned a front-facing illusion directed between the scene and the fighters, of fallen and falling rocks from above having crushed the firecasters rather than there being combat, complete with rock-dropping sounds. This sowed confusion and fear in the imps when they glanced where the firecaster was pointing… then glanced up, wondering if a cave-in was occurring and getting paranoid. Hesitating.

The fled firecaster’s eyes were wide as he did a double take, shaking his head and yelling in his otherworldly language, pointing and gesturing vehemently, hopping up and down…

Meanwhile, the other firecasters darted around in confused disarray and flung bolts of fire wildly as the party closed in on them. One firebolt hit Theron’s shield, exploding, cracking it in half, and catching it on fire — he stepped aside briefly to get it off his arm. This was simultaneous with that fiery imp being impaled right through the back by Bob, who was soon ripping it out of the fallen body with the aid of a boot.

Finley took a direct hit from a firebolt right in his chest while fighting, which dropped him backward onto his rear… but thankfully the wound negation saved him. He touched a hand to a bare chest, a hole made in his armor.

Carlisle took care of another with a quick dash forward and the slash of a sharp spear, slicing open a firecaster’s throat and causing it to spin away and flop to the cavern floor, spraying out blackish-red blood.

The one other imp had a hand back, prepping a throw while dashing away, when Estara gestured with her staff and a flash of bright light exploded in his face, stunning him and sending him stumbling away with a grimace… right into Dax’s vicinity, who ran him through and sliced his throat in quick succession with saber-and-dagger.

While this went on, the shaman fell to the quick work of Thadeus and his dreadful sword, slashing gouges in his chest and then lopping off half of his head right at the mouth. The frogmen gave terrible cries of rage and continued to fight, now without the firecasters raining down on them, but the sword wielder was bad enough, making very quick work of them.

Carlisle spun his spear up above him in an arc, some signal all recognized to gather around him, as they moved toward the cage and the marchioness, who was watching everything transpire helplessly through the wooden bars of her cage.

The gesticulating firecaster seemed to have gained an audience and flung one bolt of fire their way, which was dodged easily, being a blind shot. What wasn’t blind was the arrow that flew from a scout, catching the imp in the gut — nor was the second from Mekias that pierced his skull, dropping him.

The observing imps certainly took notice of that, Sammy unable to hide the occurrence with the distance between them. In any case, she couldn’t maintain the rock illusion anyway, with the center of her effect on Merril moving.

Despite doing her damnedest to make the landscape look like the landscape instead of her rushing party, the assembled imps were catching on, pointing at distortions, yelling, pointing at dead bodies, and hesitantly moving toward the blurring they saw. Some barked commands and then the hyena demons charged.

One was near Merril and another soldier, and they dodged out of the way, the creature more or less snapping at air and barreling entirely past, entirely befuddled…

Two more came streaking across the floor, yelping furiously — a soldier dodged one only to get clipped by another, the force of the charge taking his feet out from under him and sending him down with a hard drop. The demon adjusted quickly, practically grappling with the man as it spun around, clawed, and snapped.

Briefly, Sammy tried a localized blinding effect at the creature’s eyes, but it was too late — as it jerked, it did so with its mouth already around the soldier’s leg, and it didn’t let go, just ripped and bit down hard with the sound of snapping bone. The soldier cried out.

Two close-range arrows and a thrown knife impaling into the beast made it finally let go and scream, reeling away and biting at the things embedded. Meanwhile, the group collectively hesitated because of their sudden wounded-

“Swarm that entire blurred mass, fools!” Sir Thadeus called, pointing his sword their way with a scowl and a flash of red, fiery energy in his eyes. “Illusions at work. Attack any imperfection you see! And guard the cage!”

Shit, shit, shit!

Halfway to the cage, foes swarming in on them, and a wounded man grimacing on the floor with a ruined leg, the party’s powerful illusory advantage seemed to have worn significantly thinner.

Samantha knew a storm of violence was about to pour out and men were going to die in that place where she led them, potentially those precious to her. Potentially Dax and Merril. Potentially Estara…

Potentially all of them.

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