Die Trying - Chapter 63 (Patreon)

Wade felt like he was dive bombing behind a pet cat about to knock grandmother's ashes off the shelf. That kind of disaster.

Eri tilted his skull, fingers still absently sifting through the glittering mithril sand, puffs of clear blue power leaking off the bones, getting sucked into the sand like there was a vacuum within. Wade got to him the next instant, slapping the sand out of the hand.

"Oi! It's killing you!" Wade said, finishing the job and brushing off any last bits of mithril he could spot. Eri's skull rotated to stare at Wade, somehow conveying confusion despite having no facial features whatsoever. "You're not flesh and blood anymore Eri, and mithril absorbs mana!"

The skull tilted, the jaw clicked twice.

"Yeah that would have been fine, back when you were human." He held the skeleton's hands up, rapidly tapping the bones. "Where's the mana used now Eri?"

Eri looked at his hands, then back at Wade, then at the sand, as if just now connecting these obvious dots. The jaw clicked once firmly.

"No shit oops." Wade sighed, brushing off the mithril flakes. "You survived Lapushka, finally stepped out of the Nathir playground out into the open world of whatever the fuck we're stuck in now. If you get done in by shiny dust after all this, I'd be pissed. I think you'd be pissed off too."

Eri's jaw clicked in indignation but Wade just rolled his eyes at that.

Maybe the first thing Wade should buy from Play's storefront was a necromancer's book. Perhaps an ancient and highly regarded book of secrets.

Something like 'The care and feeding of your first skeletal minion.'

More interesting to note was that mana was no longer being leeched from the skeleton's feet, even though Eri stood on top of the wet sand. The area of effect on mithril was still very small, just like the mithril anchor ring he'd used on earth. Mana had to be almost touching mithril to be sucked in. The bones were thick, so while the outside layer would have the mana sucked out, there might still be some inside keeping Eri powered. His health bar wasn't being drained anymore at least.

Could be that there was a limit at which point he'd no longer get hurt by a mithril sandstorm here.

The jaw clicked a few times and Wade waved a hand off. "Yeah, I'm hoping you might have a flare of some kind. We need to signal some people far off." He pointed toward the cliff edge. "Maybe a spell to amplify your voice? Or anything really."

The skeleton gave him a flat stare for a second. Then started pretending to talk. Before freezing up, two hands holding the skull as if surprised nothing had come out. He acted incredibly confused, almost terrified, before half stumbling around the area, one hand clutched at his throat, other hand reaching out to the sky. As if dying. He even did a whole twirl around. Only thing missing was a deep bow.

Illy clapped excitedly, while Selena looked thoroughly unamused.

This dramatic asshat. "All right, fine! Dumb question, my bad." Wade rolled his eyes, "And about that flare?"

Eri's empty eye sockets somehow managed to convey the most profound "are you fucking kidding me" expression Wade had ever seen.

"This time it's a reasonable question!" Wade deflected, then wagged an accusing finger at the menace. "And second, I don't want to hear it from a guy who almost killed himself snort magic sand not even a minute ago."

Eri's jaw clacked three times in rapid succession, then tapped the non-existent nose on his skull.

"Same thing!" Wade said. "Now, got any flares or big boom explosions? Anything?"

The skull rolled around on his shoulders, in the most exaggerated roll of eyes Wade had ever seen.

How was his first skeletal minion so goddamn sassy? Is this something all the other necromancers had to deal with?

The skeleton then mimed hiding, crouching low to the ground, before drawing a finger across where his throat would be if he had one.

"So... that's a no?" The language boon wasn't translating whatever this charades movements were.

Eri's jaw opened and closed several times, before he theatrically pantomimed someone sneaking, then being spotted, then being violently dismembered.

Ah. That's what he meant.

"Okay, advertising your location wasn't exactly a good strat for slaves on the run." Wade muttered. "So no flares?"

The skeleton gave a thumbs up, stared a little bit at the tip of the bony thumb, then flicked off a grain of mithril still stuck in one of the cracks. Like a hiker would flick away a bug or flea crawling around. Probably felt the same to the skeleton.

But as Wade talked, he realized there was one last option: "Hold on, you can't be infected with blackrot, can you?" He turned to the others. What he found was Selena, and Leon looking down the cliffside, where Illy had already started testing some routes out. Leon remained away from the cliff, contemplating options.

The other two turned his way and he went over his next scheme.

Selena's ears waggled a negative. "He would indeed be immune, as there is no living material on a skeleton to infest. I doubt the monsters under the sea would ignore him completely. He would not be completely safe, only safe from infection."

"I think he could probably play dead though." Wade said, turning to look at the undead skeleton. "Probably."

Eri stared back, internally laughing.

"And then, when I pop back on Earth, he's brought with me if it works like it does for you. So if we fuck up, and he goes under the sea, all he has to do is lie down somewhere and wait till I yank him to earth."

"What's the suggestion here?" Illy asked, lifting herself back up from her mini scouting expedition.

"Just trying to find other ways to get someone down that cliff." Wade said. "Eri can use his featherfall spell, and he's not squishy like we are. Getting hurt is a lot harder for him. He's basically perfect for climbing down stuff like this."

"The expendable mook you mean?" Illy asked, hand on her hip.

Eri gave her a thumbs up. It was rapidly turning into his favorite earth hand-sign.

"Main point is that if he falls through the mithril sea, then wherever he ends up, he can't be infected and just chill down there playing dead. After the round up, we'll go back to earth, he'll come with me, and when I respawn here again, we can try a second time for free."

Illy shook her head. "Can't risk the skeleton Wade. He's the only nutjob among us who knows how the ancient magical mcguffin tablet works."

"The people in the city aren't in that much danger." Wade shrugged. "It's not that bad."

He quickly raised his hands in defense as Illy stared him down with murder in her eyes. "All right, I will clarify. I mean, it sucks to respawn, but it's not a permanent death situation."

The glare intensified.

"Look, if I were there with them, I'd be fine with that. I had this recurring nightmare of being in a car crash for a good few months before it finally stopped. Meanwhile each time we've woken up in that city, it's been well rested and somewhat in control. Worse case, I'd learn how to die fast. Best case, I sit inside a nice house hidden away and have all the time in the world to destress. Maybe learn to meditate. Could even be a spiritual retreat… A free spiritual retreat each night."

Wade stopped, his head actually going into gear. "Actually come to think of it, if I can bring stuff from earth and then bring it back to earth, I could bring a work laptop here." He could already think of dozens of personal projects he could be working on that required time he didn't normally have. Could even try video editing again.

Just a small issue of possible horrible death by golem or eaten alive by animals if they stumbled on his hiding spot, but everything in life had pro's and con's.

Besides, getting painfully eaten alive by predators could be handled: So long as he tossed his laptop far away from his body before getting mauled, high chances it would be ignored until he returned the next day to pick it up. Nothing of value would be lost!

His brain ruminated on it for a moment, before he remembered he already had three or four new ways to make more money right this moment, and all of which were better in every metric.

He'd never need to touch a laptop computer for work ever again.

The idea was making him giddy, completely sidetracked from the current problem.

"Quit yer tweaking. This isn't what I was getting at." Illy sighed, "I mean what if yer minion here doesn't spring back like Selena does and stays dead as a doornail? Then we're properly screwed. The people might not be in as much bother as we first thought, but without that tablet, they've no hope of gettin' out this city unless they take down a Lapushka themselves. And I'd bet me last quid they wouldn't get half as lucky as we did."

"There is another issue with your plan," Selena said from the back. "If his bones are a construct of mana, passing through the mithril sea would bleed him dry. It would be fatal for him."

"Oh." Wade frowned. "Shit. That's a point. Maybe we could insulate him from that?"

The answer was no, they could not. Not with the equipment they had on hand here. And the winds here were unpredictable, constantly blowing in different directions with strange intensities. If Eri were to use the featherfall spell to help him scale downwards, he'd also be at the mercy of the wind.

One bad heavy blow right in the middle of a jump could send him far off, where only the mithril sea waited. So in the end, Eri was not the right argonaut to send off into the void here.

Illy hummed, looking down the cliff. "Maybe we can start a landslide or something? Get their attention. If we can dislodge a few heavy rocks down there, could get things rolling." She looked around, then pointed at Leon's hammer. "And we got the right tools to do that."

Wade nodded. The right tools for the job. Tools. Leon's giant hammer. Eri's very flat metal greatsword. He facepalmed. Duh.

"How about we get Leon's hammer and ring Eri's sword with it?" Wade suggested. "Probably would make a massive amount of noise, right?"

There was a slight silence in the clearing as the group processed. Then Illy laughed, "Ah shite, answer was staring us in the face this whole fecking time. Good spot."

Leon and Eri took care of that, while Illy, Wade and Selena started throwing down rocks to start some kind of visual rockslide, putting multiple plans all together. Anything to get vision up front.

It worked.

And fortunately quickly, because after ten ringing hammer blows into the greatsword, Wade was pretty sure he'd start taking hit points on his health points just through his ears.

The demons started looking at each other, then looking around for where the distant banging sounds were coming from. Until they squinted and followed the rocks falling down up to their source: A group of mortals frantically waving their arms.

The larger of the pair, possibly some kind of of more typical goat-looking demon stared upwards, and then started pointing animatly at the crew, before turning to his imp companion, yanking the little guy up to line up with his pointing index.

The tiny imp looked to have now spotted the group with that extra help.

From there on came a game of distant charades, of which Market's Language buff did the extreme lifting.

WHAT ARE YOU PEOPLE DOING UP THERE?

Trying to get down, thank you.

YOU DON'T SAY. DO YOU HAVE YOUR OWN BOAT SOMEWHERE HERE?

Nope. We're kinda screwed really. Would appreciate some help?

WAVE SANK YOUR BOAT HUH? REALLY NEED TO LEARN HOW TO TIE THOSE THINGS DOWN PROPERLY NEXT TIME. DON'T GO SAILING IF YOU DON'T HAVE THE BASICS DOWN, COME ON GUYS, YOU SHOULD KNOW BETTER.

That last part was more the body language between the larger one and the little imp. Wade rolled his eyes.

Can you help us, or at least stay there while we get down?

SURE, BUT UHHHH, GOOD LUCK. LOOKS PRETTY STEEP. DON'T FALL.

Thanks! Give us a moment, we need to handle something real quick and we'll be good to climb down.

TAKE YOUR TIME MAN. PLENTY HERE TO KEEP US BUSY. ALSO, DO YOU HAVE GRASS? WE ARE RUNNING LOW.

"A mild narcotic, rolled into a leaf and then smoked." Selena said, feeling like she had to explain to the others. "If I am interpreting that number sign correctly."

"You are because Market's blessing is telling us all the same thing." Wade said.

She puffed her feathers up, realizing how that language buff did whisper a light amount of context to unfamiliar things to everyone here.

Well, the pair of demons down there might not be the sharpest tools in the shed, but they did seem very honest (For actual demons) and happy to help, which was all Wade was looking for.

There was a buzz in his pockets. He slowly pulled it out and checked the screen, knowing what he'd find.

Zinny says you should have a gift prepped fyi, it's very faux pa to get a favor for free among demon society. ┐(￣∀￣)┌

"Who is Zinny?" Leon asked as he looked over Wade's shoulder, curious to see what the NEETess was up to.

Wade opened his mouth and nothing came out. Ah. Right. "He's Play's Butler. That's about all I can say."

"Of fecking course that princess has a butler." Illy rolled her eyes, turning to Eri for the next part of the plan. "How'd she con someone into doing that for her anyhow? Where's she getting the money to pay for that kind of service."

"Also can't say." Wade shrugged, opened his mouth and nothing came out again. "… can't even say why I can't say. Wow that's paranoid as heck."

Zinny says he's flattered you think so. (b ᵔ▽ᵔ)b

Illy narrowed her eyes. "Don't tell me your god is a fecking e-girl streamer."

"Nope." Wade said. "… at least I don't think she is."

"How she afford PC and stuff?" Leon asked. "You describe her room filled with collection. Sounds expensive."

"Wade. If your god is selling fecking bathwater to pay for her shite, I'll lose my faith in humanity faster than talking to the French."

Zinny also says your backpack's a good gift. A good backpack like that would be real handy down there. Or a flashlight.

Wade squirmed in his boots, immediately more alert, running high level mental mathematics. "…I could, maybe, possibly, part with the flashlight." He eventually ground out, hating the idea of giving up anything. "But the backpack's being used for just about everything short of moral support. It stays with me." He looked behind him. The small cheap little dollar store discount had survived years now, with little fuzzy bits of frayed fabric all over as it's battle scars. It stared back at him, loyal as ever, even in the middle of hell itself. Wade could almost shed a tear. "Nevermind, it does moral support too."

He unzipped it, and yanked out his notebook and pens, going for the second part of this whole plan while he considered if there was anything else he could offer the demons. Like a rock or something from inside the Nathir city. A golem part maybe?

For now, they had better handle the wardkey, so he called out to Eri the moment his pen and paper were ready for notes.

The Nathir warkey tablet turned out pretty easy to use. All one had to do was press anything that has mana into a groove, and it'll naturally be sucked into the tablet, activating it. Only a light amount of mana was needed. The mechanics of the thing wasn't the key itself, any less than the circuits of a computer are. It's the data and permissions within that are important, and this tablet had exactly that. Some kind of semi-magical computer, only modular and built for one task.

Wade couldn't quite tell where on the technology scale the Nathir were. The golems were outright sci-fi. But the housing and tools he'd seen being used down here were so low-tech that even earth did better. Why pickaxes and sledgehammers when there were literal golems moving around? Or was it like assembly lines in a low income country, where machines could be built, but labor was just cheaper and easier?

As for the wardkey, they figured a quick way for people to still use it even without a single understanding of mana: Break a skeleton bone somewhere down in the sewers, and then press it into a specific sections of the tablet. The bone needed to be close enough for the mana within it to be leeched into the whole thing, starting it up. Wade wrote down everything: detailed instructions on how to use the wardkey and to leave it behind for the next group to get out.

The crew returned and placed the letter right at the entrance of the sewer, neatly held in the hands of one of the ruined, rusting golems, where the ambient water wouldn't damage it.

Before they left the sewers again, Wade grabbed a few junk pieces off the golems, anything that looked valuable, and decided he was going to see if any of it could be used to trade instead of his flashlight.

It was his flashlight after all. Wade was very possessive of his territory.

Illy walked next to him, as they passed the rusted golem parade to return out of the sewer. There was a grin on her face Wade instantly distrusted. "Ye do know any golem bits here are probably worth a small fortune back on earth, right?" She gave him three pats on the back, that grin deepening.

…

Maybe the flashlight would make for an adequate bribe. Sacrifices must be made after all.

Also, Wade decided a few more bits of Nathir junk could technically fit into the backpack. Why not? He was in the area. Extra would just take a few more seconds to collect.

Then truth slammed into his mind like a spear. Wade felt illumination dawn upon his small puny mind, bringing the truth he'd been blind to: This wasn't just any sewer. It was the Cave of Wonders. Minus one animated sand-lion entrance and a genie lamp on a pedestal at the other end - but everything else was accurate. He was surrounded by glimmering gold and jewels on all sides, sitting in stagnant water, waiting for him.

Leon mimed spraying Illy with a water bottle. "Bad devushka, no making the American manic."

Said American was already crouching by the nearest golem, stripping even more parts off.

If Wade got the others to physically shove the zippers close to each other, he could zip up to maximum capacity. And then stuff the side pockets. His pant pockets were free too, just his phone taking up space. Where else could he hold onto things?

"Leon, grab the little loot chipmunk before he gets too carried away and contract tetanus. At this rate, next thing he'll do is start shoving sharp shite into his knickers."

Illy was correct: Wade could carry more if he stuffed some of these parts in his underwear. Some of this stuff wasn't sharp. So long as he kept the sharp ends out of the way.

"Wait-wait-wait!" He tried to gather up the items before Leon reached him, frantically increasing his speed, desperately looking for more places to shove things down before the giant could yank him out of this sitting pile of riches. "I'm still debating what to swap ou-"

Leon caught and yoinked him up like a misbehaving cat, before it could knock something expensive off the shelf.

Like an urn of ashes.