Earlier, I’d peered through the open door of the first level to get a quick view of what was going on in there and to gauge the height of the interior ceiling. Even in the dark, I could see them. The inactive Swordsmen guards. They stood in silent formation, hundreds of them, reminding me of the Chinese terracotta army. They didn’t have dots over them in my map at all. I didn’t know if that was a good thing or not.
Their metallic bodies swirled with a yellow aura, all of it leading to a point in the ceiling. There would be a soul crystal up there somewhere. Mordecai said that at night, the guards were in “stasis” mode, and that they were invulnerable. I’d entertained the quick notion of locking them in their warehouse and just blowing them all to hell, including the lich, over and over again until they died, which would result in an obscene amount of experience. But it looked as if that wasn’t going to happen. Not tonight.
And I couldn’t just roll a bomb into the lich’s chambers, either. He appeared to be the last bad guy standing, so I needed to get the bad guy soliloquy out of him before we killed him. That way we could win the quest.
We had determined that there was no mute spell in the area, or any other protections that we could see. That didn’t mean there wasn’t a nasty surprise waiting for us, but at least we’d be able to rely on magic.
I placed the tenth and final stick of goblin dynamite on the exterior, exposed joist, using the sticky detonator charge to attach it to the structure. Each stick of hobgoblin pus allowed for up to ten simultaneous detonations with one button press. I was going to use all ten tonight if we had to. I hoped we didn’t.
Below, half the village stood on the street, watching. They held torches and scythes and other items of medieval weaponry. I hadn’t summoned them, but Fitz the tavernkeeper had raised the alarm after he overheard Mordecai and Katia discussing the idea of a lich in town. Even though it was the equivalent of 3:30 AM, he’d rushed out, shouting that the “night patrol” needed to defend the city. Since half the town was already wide-awake with the collapse of the municipal building, it didn’t take long for a crowd to form.
Before we knew it, we had a group of NPCs gathering around the warehouse. They ranged from orcs to humans to elves to dozens of other, more obscure races. But no skyfowl or the smaller chickadees. It was as if they didn’t care about the plight of the city, as long as the damage remained on the ground. Across the street, smoke still rose from the collapsed debris of the mall and municipal building. The night smelled of dust and fire.
After all of our preparations, we now only had about forty minutes left before the armor suits would reanimate. The tops of distant buildings already glowed with the first signs of the faux sunrise. We had to move quickly.
“That’s the last of them,” I said, stepping my way to the ground. One of the rungs broke off, and I cursed. I spent a quick minute fixing it. I pulled the handmade ladder into my pack. I’d hastily built the thing with crap from my inventory. It was a rickety, slipshod combination of lengths of wood and metal weight bars that would give an OSHA inspector a coronary. It had taken me almost an hour to construct. If we survived past tonight, I was going to build another one of these, but one that was built properly.
“You ready?” I asked.
“No,” Donut said. “I don’t like this plan, Carl.”
Mongo was in his carrier. He’d proven that we couldn’t trust him to stay still when things started to get out of control, and we definitely needed to control the narrative here. And Donut needed to focus.
We were relying on Mordecai’s advice to keep ourselves alive.
“Liches come in all shapes and sizes and power levels. You never know what they’re going to be,” he’d said earlier this evening. “But they all have one thing in common, each and every one of them.”
“What’s that?” I asked.
He looked up at the ceiling wryly. “They’re just like Odette. They never, ever shut the hell up. They are narcissists to a fault. And they are cowards. Now that they have grasped a handful of life, they will do whatever they can not to let it go again. That’s why they always have minions. They always have elaborate, grandiose plans. That’s why I think you should just blow the building and take a chance at losing the quest.”
This was earlier, when we still thought that Featherfall was the lich and that his lair was in that building. But since then, Mordecai had changed his mind. He seemed to think that because we’d killed most of Remex’s support system, he would be vulnerable. It was now worth the risk to approach him. Mordecai also said that it made sense that he’d hide above the warehouse of the swordsmen. A magical crystal was used to “recharge” the swordsmen each night, and anyone searching the town using magical means wouldn’t see him there.
Mordecai: Here’s another wrinkle. This is obviously another boss. And since that one earlier was a Neighborhood Boss, I’d bet my left nipple this one is a Borough Boss. So even if he’s been weakened, you need to come to the fight prepared.
So we made the decision. We were going to confront the lich while he was weak. He already knew we were coming. It was likely he’d been watching this whole time. So we would slowly and deliberately ring the exterior of the building with explosives, enough to turn the whole structure into dust.
My original plan was to have Donut stay outside while I went in solo. She absolutely refused.
“You promised me that I wouldn’t die alone,” she said. “You can’t keep that promise if you die before me. We do this together.”
I relented, but it required a change to the plans.
Katia now stood in the crowd. Her face was much better, much more natural. She still looked like a burn victim who fell face-first out of the ugly tree, but I wouldn’t question she was a human now. I summoned her over.
“Here,” I said. “Hold onto this for me.” I handed her a pencil-like detonator.
“Whoa, whoa,” she said, backing up, refusing to take it. “Don’t give that to me.”
“Keep it in your inventory,” I said, shoving it into her hand. “If we die, or if I say so, press the button. No questions. Just do it.”
“Why don’t you hold onto it?” she asked, looking at it like I’d just handed her a live snake. “Carl, the description says it might click on its own.”
“Put it in your inventory. It’ll be fine,” I said.
It disappeared into her pack.
“Why me?” she asked again. She looked ill.
“We don’t know if this guy has some sort of mind control. It’s a lich thing. We need someone outside the sphere of influence to hold onto the boom switch just in case.”
“So, what’s your angle here?” she asked. “Mutually assured destruction?”
“That’s right,” I said. “All we want is information. All he wants is to live. It’s a gamble, sure. But it’s not like we’re not constantly on the precipice of death anyway.”
She shook her head. “Hekla warned me that you were crazy.”
“Just be sure to be about a block away before you press it. There’s enough dynamite in there to blow your weird snow boots back to Iceland.” I raised my voice and called to the crowd. “You are all still in the blast zone. You’ll want to back up. A lot.”
We stepped into the warehouse as the crowd started to scatter. I gave the Swordsmen a nervous glance as we quickly moved to the small trap door cut into the corner of the room. I pulled my ladder and began to ascend. Donut remained on my shoulder, trembling.
“It’s moving. But it’s going to the back corner of the room, like it’s running away,” Donut said.
“Don’t kill us,” I called as I came into the room. “You kill us, you’ll die too!”
I took a deep inhalation of breath as I examined the monster quivering in the far corner.
Carclass="underline" Not a lich, Mordecai. Not a fucking lich!