Его не звали, но он приперся / They never called, yet he is here: Глава 13

Chapter 13

Camrad_RIP 09.07.22 в 09:24

Walking through the breadcrumbs of the hapless hunter's half-forgotten memories was strange and difficult. Not because of the severity of the route, but because of trying to reconcile what Glacio remembered of his adventures with the reality of the situation. Torrid and long, despite all my characteristics and titles. Well, someone had to do it anyway, right?

Camrad_RIP 09.07.22 в 09:32

I had walked or rather flew, the way to Whitewater almost entirely in shadow form. After that joyous - don't miss the quotation marks - the moment when being in the Shadow stopped taking energy and even started regenerating it, this was the fastest and most profitable way to travel. There were side effects, but they could be dealt with, and the Price of Humanity helped in that regard. By the time my ghost flew into the wooded vaults of the Nothern Woods, I felt a gut-wrenching chill and nothing else. The almost completely extinguished emotions, yes, aided by the cold claws of the contracts that clawed at my heart, provided a delightful bouquet of feelings.

Camrad_RIP 09.07.22 в 09:34

I had to get back to reality, settle under a nearby tree, and have a smoke break - it was a simple snack, plus a jug of cider I had smartly brought, which was like compote for me, that served as a good antidepressant, making me feel good about life and rise my mood again. The leftovers of my lunch had to be thrown directly into The Shadow, for to leave such evidence literally within walking distance of an enemy would have been a very short-sighted, if not foolish, decision.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:12

The way forward was a little slower, as I regularly interrupted my steps, exiting the real world and moving in the usual stealth mode. So far I hadn't encountered anyone or anything except a few deer and a couple of wolves, but I hadn't reached the necessary route, so there was nothing for me to look for, nothing to do.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:13

When I reached the rock from which the young hunter had fallen into the water, I walked simply and uncomplicated along the stream, trying to move as quickly as possible, but also as stealthily as possible. Even Glacio himself had no idea of the amount of time he'd spent clinging to the log and praying to the gods that he wouldn't get crushed at the next rapids, and his perception of time was rather confused.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:13

Judging from the fact that it took me almost a quarter of a day to get there, and given my speed, it took him a very long time to get there. And no, I didn't see the mysterious fortress, as you might expect. I began to encounter alarms and traps. More alarms, to be honest - typical magical nets and strings blocking the standard trails and passages between trees. Not too dense, but inconspicuous enough to catch even a professional.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:34

Sphere sensed these traps very vaguely, and so did my sense of danger - the structure was similar to what I'd already seen in some of the traps used in the ancient necropolis I'd climbed into at the beginning of my adventures. Back then I hadn't sensed it at all until I'd stepped in and almost died, but now it was different. It was either the traps were weaker, or I'd grown too much in skill, but I didn't even need my Gaze to notice the signal threads.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:36

I could feel the energy in them, which was reminiscent of nature, but with a bit of earth in it. It was like the warm roots of a plant that had been torn out of the ground - an unpleasant scale, especially to my shadow senses. I'd wager gold on the fact that some druid, in conjunction with someone else, had made them. The other one was supposed to make those alarms invisible in the premonition skills, but there's no sure. Maybe there was one person with two rare classes, not two. It doesn't matter.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:37

It was easy to get around obstacles - I flew around them in shadow form, slowly approaching my goal. I spotted the men sitting at the campsite and moving along the pre-built and equipped "tree paths" fairly quickly, despite their good stealth scores of all of them. And yes, Hans wasn't lying about the fact that these peppers know how to hold their positions, for they had indeed turned the forest into a three-dimensional maze of traps, tricky trails, natural (or seemingly so) obstacles, and rope roads running through the towering tree crowns. Here you do not have to storm, you have to really pour fire over the whole area to ensure that it is possible to expel the ambushed huntsmen.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:40

The death lane, lovingly created by the enemy, was not particularly wide. The first kilometer went to the detection zone, where there was nothing but alarms. Although a couple of routes for a quick evasion of possible saboteurs were found, but it was more of reassurance in case of a meeting with those who liked to hunt game in these places, not to unload expensive traps on them, simply and unpretentious to shoot from a distance. Then there were another two hundred meters of terrain, dotted with lie-ins and ambush positions, and the final boundary was the zone of death.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:41

That's where the real perversion was! Remotely activated magic traps, lots of physical traps, some druidic crap that made every bush turn into a disguised monster. You could really take down an entire army here, especially with the incompetent command of the attackers and the proper use of trump cards by the defenders. All these preparations subtly reminded me of the scanning psychic field over Whitewater - a sense of a conscientiously made and regularly updated billet, that no one believes that they will have to use. This is entire to my advantage, of course.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:43

The enemy's life force was measured in five fives - pun intended, however - of those same rangers, which is quite a lot, considering their levels, equipment, training, and the defenses they were wrapped up in. Naturally, I had to walk in circles around the defended area several times, trying to figure out all the huntsmen, which was only made more difficult by their camouflage, concealing artifacts, and the constant flicker of patrolling.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:44

I had to go right inside the death zone and use their "air paths. Because walking on the ground would have been problematic even for me - there really was nowhere to step. And even on those trails, there were alarms! They were of a different nature, selective, but no less cunning. Not signal strings, but rather full-fledged, barely discernible cobwebs, or even closed fields that would immediately raise an alarm if someone who wasn't wearing an amulet passed hit them. It might have been a problem if I didn't master the shadow step and could not fly while in shadow form. There was the thought of stealing someone's shadow by dragging the signal of the loser amulet onto myself, but that too was a dead end, unless I eliminated the donor itself - whatever the central control circuit was, it was advanced enough to spot two identical signatures and raise an alarm.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:48

Probably some cunning artifact, or even a contract spirit of unknown nature, but the efficiency was excellent. A couple of times I almost hit the signal strings with my ghostly form - not all spells were advanced enough to notice me when I was in another realm, but there were some. Mostly due to the extremely strong and subtle effects, these spells became too real, touching the upper limits of the other realms. You couldn't exactly call this kind of thing unnoticeable, but their purpose was solely to snare those who liked to pass through trouble by escaping from the real world.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:50

What was missing was individual preparations against each realm but that's a fantasy. At the same time fantastic paranoia and equally fabulous douchebaggery. Creating an individual comprehensive defense against travelers through every known plan, or at least through the most popular ones, is a job of titanic proportions. King Melareth's private chambers are hardly so protected, though I can't vouch for that, alas.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:52

What was much funnier was another detail, which I could not notice on the spot. Look, gentlemen, we have almost two kilometers of obstacle course, covering a certain territory, and in the center of this defense circle is an area that is barely a kilometer in diameter. Attention, connoisseurs, a question: where in this corner did a huge rock fit, in which a full-fledged fortress was hollowed out?

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:53

The observation that followed was torture - I could neither be seen nor caught unless I was distracted and fell into some trap through sheer inattention, which I carefully avoided. The rangers continued their seemingly chaotic movements, getting on my nerves and patrolling the territory entrusted to them. Three times the cursed evil castle remained undiscovered as if it weren't even here.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:53

Had Glacio caught a colorful hallucination provoked by danger, a huge amount of adrenaline in his blood, and hypothermia from being in cold water?

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:54

I found the wrong place, and somewhere near there is another protected area, where the fortress was located, and this hellish place was some kind of spare barn?

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:55

Is the fortress, in fact, much smaller than the size that Glacio imagined for the reason described in the very first assumption?

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:55

Or is the damn shithouse hidden so well that I do not notice it despite all my characteristics, skills, and titles?

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:56

I would have to find out for myself, for it would be foolish and useless to leave here with the least amount of information. I had originally intended this raid to be long and arduous. And I certainly did not expect all the problems to be solved in the blink of an eye. The times when I was confronted by all sorts of weaklings are over, and now I have to work against tough pros who compensate for the lack of personal power with teamwork, material support, and sheer numerical superiority.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:57

It was really hard to get into the deepest part of the guarded area, and the last dozen meters were literally a solid wall of scanning and protective magic, followed by... emptiness. The same kilometer of free space inside the protected circle was a typical forest, albeit rather overworked with rocks and driftwood. Even a couple of bonfires and traces from picnics were visible - probably jaegers were resting here. Absolutely quiet place, which is banal and there is nothing to protect, because there is nothing to be. And around it stands a barrier of such power that it cannot be broken by an army battalion.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:58

Suspicious.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:58

I'm going to take a closer look at the last lines of this protective perimeter, just in case. I wondered if there might be some clue to my silent clairvoyance, or if it might be of some other use. My out-of-existence hides my essence from other people's knowledge in passive mode, but I can't pick up anything with my third eye, either.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 18:59

I found them nearly half an hour later, my whole body pressed into the cold earth, where the last rays of the setting sun were falling. The things were there, nearly a dozen meters deep, so securely hidden beneath the earth, the stone, and the charms that even I couldn't see them at once, even with the Sphere.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:00

They were... poles.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:00

The stone pillars were about a meter in diameter and almost five meters long, going down vertically, as if they were lined up to the ruler, forming a perfectly shaped circle, inside which was an empty space. I felt uncomfortable in that place, shivering. It made me want to crawl back under the veil of enemy spells, instead of being here, right in the middle of some incomprehensible magical thing of unknown purpose.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:02

That's exactly what I did. I dove into The Shadow again, and then a little deeper, deeper than the signal spells would reach. The world, already dim and monochromatic, began to rapidly lose detail until only the outlines of the largest and most visible rocks remained of reality. All other material objects were replaced by the dense blackness and grayness of the Shadow, greedily stretching its paws toward me. Even though I was now a Shadow myself, this only took away some of the impacts of this place, leaving the broadest set of unpleasant sensations intact.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:03

I fall into reality in a small den set up as a short resting place for some patrolman. There are no alarms unless you count the one hanging in the passageway, so I can rest for thirty seconds before continuing my work. Still, my second step into deeper layers in the last hour was overkill, simply by not being used to this kind of exertion. A few training uses didn't do much to curb the new facet of my abilities - being in the Shadow, at its uppermost edge, is almost normal for me, then the depths are as difficult as they are scary.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:05

Okey.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:05

Let's continue our mission.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:05

I got it, not right away, but I got it! They might call me a Slowpoke, recognizing him as my totem animal, but in my defense, this was the first time I had encountered such a thing, and it was so well camouflaged. Or rather, not exactly disguised, though such an outcome was probably foreseen, too. It's just that in all the hullabaloo of alarms and active traps that were set in this place, I did not immediately notice such strange and qualitatively concealed elements.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:06

In fact, until they were activated, I couldn't tell them apart. Rather I didn't distinguish them from the dozens of similar magical formations that clogged my senses. At that moment in time, I was lying in another lie-down, trying to remember to keep track of the patrolmen so that they wouldn't step on me if anything happened. I almost jumped up and down when, about fifty yards to the left and below, new reinforcements began to appear.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:08

At first I thought I'd been spotted and would have to run away, but I quickly realized that that was not the case - it was just a new shift coming in. They came out of nowhere, bitches! They appeared out of a peculiar haze, a barely discernible movement of air, as if in heat, which formed a strange doorway into... to nowhere. The sphere showed this place, conducting in the brain the association with the sea of glass shards and blades, constantly changing shape and capable of cutting into pieces if you stick your hand there. And still the same sphere discerned the space beyond the gate... that was both here and not here at the same time. It was no more than twenty meters deep, but it did, giving me a headache from trying to understand what was happening and to integrate it into my picture of the world.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:09

While I was recovering from my surprise, the newcomers exchanged information with the old shift, exchanged a couple of jokes, and then the latter also dissolved in the same arch of a strange portal, disappearing from my perception, and I began to understand a little of what was going on.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:10

Observation one: the arch appeared directly over the Southern edge of the circle created from enchanted subterranean pillars.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:14

Observation two: the arch did not disappear completely, and now I could distinguish it normally, even if it was difficult to do so because of the constant background noise.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:15

Observation three: if I look closely and recall my sensations during the reconnaissance, I saw six or seven other similar places where the space itself seemed to ring with the sound of broken glass.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:15

The last observation: these fuckers turned out to be fucking cunning motherfuckers who didn't play around with all the little things, but instead simply shoved the entire rock, the fortress in it, and all the adjacent territories into a three-fucking-all space fold.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:16

And now I have to somehow get in there and figure out a way to get them out of there.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:18

Well, it's just awesome!

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:18

Trying to enter the portal archway deep into the fold without an identification key and without knowing what was waiting for me on the other side was pure suicide, especially in the face of the blind spots in my clairvoyance. I don't know what would be more dangerous - to be Kostik shredded into many pieces when the portal didn't work correctly (or correctly, as it should with trespassers), or to walk through it and be locked up with all the bastards there, and all the defenses?

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:20

Instead of making stupid decisions that I would later regret, I went outside the protected area. Then I went farther away and finally sat down for lunch because almost a day and a half without eating had not the most pleasant effect on my body. This time I did not leave any picnic and even tried not to produce any smell, but just ate some dry food and went to bed. I wouldn't say that I needed sleep, but it wouldn't hurt to send a message before my allies started an operation to rescue me.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:21

I was able to communicate without too much trouble, since it was nighttime, which made everyone sleepy. After a few minutes of effort, and then I created a shared dream for all of us, even Ygra. The latter was so excited about our company that she tried to have a session of friendly hugs and poking my face into her green boobs, which delayed the meeting for what seemed like an eternity and a half while we tried to make her understand the importance of the situation and make her realize that this was not the time for games. She understood us by about the second minute, though, not bothering to stop the merry game of tag-team. If it hadn't been my dream, I wouldn't have been able to stop her, but I just didn't want to. Let her nakedly troll the trio of my companions, especially those of them who thought I was an ogrefucker. Taria didn't mind, though, vindictively twisting and biting her nipples in retaliation for trying to smother her with boobs.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:23

Well yeah, I'm a kind of a troll.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:24

No, I'm not ashamed.

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:24

After all of us (including my projection) were nearly strangled three times each in the gorgeous cleavage of the green giantess, I did take control of the dream and called a meeting for the second round. The first question, spoken even before the meeting itself began, was posed by an affectionately smiling Losius:

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:24

"You could have stopped this circus right away, couldn't you, Tin?"

Camrad_RIP 10.07.22 в 19:25