Chapter 004: Bland Taste

Mountain elves. Three. Fair skin, long brown hair, pointy ear. One female and two males. All of them wore tribal-looking light armours made of fur and pelts. Spears lied beside them. One was nailed to a tree with arrows. Causes of death for the other two wasn't as obvious.

Interesting.

Mountain elves in DFI's games were one of many elven subspecies. Lived in mountainous regions (obviously), and were pretty... warlike. Not the honourable barbarian types, more like I AM GOING TO RIP YOUR HEART OUT AND EAT IT THEN PISS ON YOUR HEARTLESS BODY type. There were also more civilized ones, but they weren't as common. Besides having pointy ears, they were biologically resistant to fear of heights, and had improved tendons, ligaments and joints, and sense of balance that made them quite dangerous opponents when fought in mountains.

Well, we WERE in the mountains. That there was a valley amidst them didn't change that. The question was - what were they doing here? And what killed them?

"I didn't know mountain elves are living around us." I spoke to Leria. She shook her head.

"Neither did I. Sure, there are a lot in the Dragonspine Mountains, but normally far south from here." She scratched her head. "That's strange."

"Yep. We should investigate. Any ideas about the cause of death? Beside the guy nailed to the tree." Natives - if I could call daemons that - didn't use arrows. This made the mystery interesting.

“Well, not natives." She said after checking one of the bodies. Guess they did call daemons “native” around this anomaly.. “Stabbed to death, but not by Stalkers. Either some daemon around here has upper limbs that look similar to spears... or they stabbed each other. Or by some other spearmen, but I doubt three mountain elves would die without taking the life of at least a single enemy".

True. Mountain elves scared the shit out of even orcs and goblins. A warband of mountain elves wouldn't stop from pillaging and murdering the shit out of a Beyond worshipping cult. Only a few species (or cultures, since DFI disliked monocultural species... and monospecies cultures) could match their ferocity and brutality.

"Might have been an ambush. Though there are no signs." Hmm. "Well, the bushes over there seem damaged by somebody running through it. We might as well try that." She nodded. Time to continue the investigation.

***

Despite the obvious risks involved we still helped ourselves to elven equipment. They didn't have that much, but there was jewellery and some money. We stole everything that didn't look like mountain elves made it - the last thing we wanted was them somehow discovering we stole something from the bodies of their warriors.

In fact, I'd prefer to avoid them discovering ANYTHING connected to us. I had... a few traumatic memories from the last DFI game.

We continued walking through the forest. Found more dead elves. Well, that was a stroll both profitable and enjoyable. Seeing all these dead mountain elves... whatever happened, this world became a better place considering the common activities of mountain elves.

The situation got only more interesting. What made mountain elves slaughter each other with such ferocity? They stuck together, enhancing their natural aggressiveness with a lot of xenophobia. They were divided into competing tribes, and their disputes could get nasty, but... all the bodies I checked had identical sets of tribal tattoos. This didn't make any sense.

We walked into a small clearing, following a trail of dead elves. We might have got careless once again, believing that elves cleared a path for us from local daemons.

The battle, once again, was a complete surprise. Locals seemed to love them.

Thankfully, the enemy was surprised by us suddenly popping up as well. Two Blackwood Stalkers and... the heck is this?!

Blackwood Hexcaster

Category: Dark/Thorns

Type: Daemon/Servile

Threat Grade: Iron IV

A daemon born from malevolent energies spilling from the being that sleeps beneath the Black Woods. They now haunt this forest, driven by the hatred it inherited, stalking those brave (or foolish) enough to enter the accursed forest.

Known spells and hexes:

???

Ah shit, a caster.

He looked like other blackwood daemons. Stickman made from gnarled branches. Unlike the rest, he had fingers - and what looked like a staff in his hands, made from the same material as he himself.

Together with two Stalkers, he was busy maltreating the bodies of two elves.

"Leria, that one is a caster!" I shouted... and then fired an Arcane Bolt at him. I might have rolled for initiative higher than him, but it was pretty much useless. My bolt splashed harmlessly on his magic shield. Two Stalkers weren't far behind me and leaped towards us. Leria answered with Aura jump and intercepted them before they skewed me.

If I couldn’t take the caster down fast, she would get butchered, dammit. No, no way in hell I can defeat an Iron-IV on third level by myself. Different approach.

I immobilized one of the Stalkers with the Tentacle and then fired Vulnerability Curse against the other one. According to description it was a curse that made him slower and weakened protection magic and armour. It didn't stack, and it cost me an outrageous amount of mana (almost one third of the whole) but this wasn't the time to be stingy.

The air got noticeably colder and there was a foul stench in the air. Yeah, welcome to Doom Magic; the DFI was inspired way too much by Lovecraft.

Hexcaster fired a stronger version of Life Tap at me, coming right through my magic shield. My heart skipped a bit. My vision darkened. I felt like I was about to faint for a split second, but I resisted it. I fired several consecutive Arcane Bolts. The blue bar above him was almost depleted when he casted another hex.

I forgot that if he was silent for so long... then he must have been busy preparing something nasty. The gnarled roots covering the ground suddenly exploded in front of me, with a tangle of thorny branches coming at me lightning fast.

My shield broke. I jumped back, but I still didn't avoid the attack completely.

This scratches will be painful later on... if I survive. The branches he changed returned to their normal form when the magic ran out. Fucking Thorns Magic, an evil twin of Nature Magic. At least he was still busy with me, which bought more time for Leria.

I recast Magic Shield on myself, then Tentacle on one of the Stalkers. The other one was losing badly against Leria. Unfortunately Hexcaster noticed it. He must have had some counter-debuff spell or hex, since the tentacle got unsummoned.

Dammit, I lost a lot of mana. 40% of it left at best. Two more Arcane Bolts at the weakened Stalker. He collapsed. The other Stalker leaped at Leria. Fuck it.

"VULNERABILITY CURSE!" 9% of mana left. It got even colder. Now I had to just survive and keep Hexcaster attention on me. He fired another Life Magic spell on me, and once again I almost collapsed. While I resisted, I still felt drained and exhausted. Escape wasn't an option anymore.

He fired the thorn spell again, but this time I'm prepared. Rather than shielding myself, I fall on the ground. The branches 'explode' above me.

Another Life Magic spell. I fell on my knees, panting.

Blackwood Hexcaster

Category: Dark/Thorns

Type: Daemon/Servile

Threat Grade: Iron IV

A daemon born from malevolent energies spilling from the unnamed being that sleeps beneath the Black Woods. He now haunts this forest, driven by the hatred it inherited, stalking those brave (or foolish) enough to enter the accursed forest.

Known spells and hexes:

Magic Shield

Life Drain

Blessing of Nyrathzm

Thorn Explosion

So it's Life Drain and Thorn Explosion. Blessing of Nyrathzm must be what he used to break my Tentacle hex. No idea who Nyrathzm is. Maybe the thing that was sleeping beneath the Woods?

He ignored me and turned toward Leria. Oh no, you don't.

I cast three Arcane Bolts in a short succession. My mana goes below 0.

NEW SKILL ACQUIRED

Overdrain

Rarity: Rare

You are capable of using more mana than you possess by draining your own body from the mana that is naturally there, at least when pushed into a corner. Warning: it isn't very healthy...

1

The amount of mana you can overdrain is increased by 5%!

Two seconds later I was on all fours and busy vomiting my last meal. Alright, that's one skill I will not use unless my life depends on it. Thankfully I got the Hexcaster’s attention back. He must have decided to finish me before he focuses on Leria. I expected another Thorn Explosion... but instead I got a hail of thorny, needlelike projectiles he conjured from thin air. Thorn Magic version of Arcane Bolt. Is he running out of mana?

My Magic Shield broke after sixth projectile. I knew what it meant for me... but I once again overdrained and recast the Shield. This time I didn't vomit. Instead blood rushed from my nose. My vision blackened and... reddened? Wait, am I bleeding from my eyes as well?!

I collapsed on the ground. I'd get oneshoted by another Life Drain... if Leria didn't finish her opponent and didn't leap at the Hexcaster.

Well. I guess I’ll take a nap...

My consciousness faded away.

***

When I woke up, I was lying on my back. I could see familiar tree branches above me.

So... I guess Leria won. I don't think the Hexcaster would have spared me.

My head felt like it was about to explode. I took a painkiller potion from the Equipment.

"L...eria." I said weakly. It was enough. A second later I saw Leria's beaten up face hanging above me.

I didn't have to explain. She saw the bottle lying by my hand and helped me drink it. I wasn't in the state to even raise my head. It would seriously explode if I did. The potion tasted... somehow. I think my taste buds (or brain) went haywire. There is no way leaves of a common bush tasted like... a weird combination of ketchup and strawberry ice cream.

Jesus, that's the worst hangover ever.

I drank the whole bottle... and after ten minutes it started working. I still felt like there was a large coal train running around my head, but it wasn't going so fast anymore.

I've risen. Or at least my upper half did. We were still at the clearing where we fought Hexcaster and his bodyguard. I could see his mangled body lying near the dead elves.

Leria helped me rest my back on the nearest tree.

"You scared me there a little." She spoke. Well, seems like she had a hard time. Lots of torn parts of clothing. This would make her look like a character from an ecchi anime if not for the wounds visible beneath. I conjured an antiseptic ointment from the equipment.

"Take this. Rub it into your wounds. It should disinfect them properly." She took it. "Great job with the caster."

The last thing I wanted was Leria getting her wounds infected. DFI loved making creative (and murderous) diseases almost as much as bestiary entries. Magic in aetherwarped areas could warp bacteria just as much (if not more) than normal animals.

"He was almost out of mana when you collapsed." She shook her head. "Good job keeping him off my back until I finished the other two. And for debuffing them." She smiled. "Yes, I noticed that. They were weaker than those I fought earlier." I nodded.

"Well, it's nice to be appreciated. What now?" She stopped rubbing for a while and looked at me questioningly. "Mystery of dead elves and all this. I think I need a break... but if we do that, we might never discover the truth." She seemed deep in thoughts for a while.

"I think we should proceed forward after you feel better." I looked up at her, surprised. "Think about it. What's the chance of us running into another Hexcaster?" She had a point. It was our third day in the forest and this was the first Hexcaster we encountered. And it would still be a rather easy win if not for his bodyguards. If he was alone, we would have overpowered him without this level of complications. Vulnerability Curse and then combined attacks until he drops dead. Leria smiled and pulled up an item. "Besides, I have a present for you. Consider this a little payback for letting me out of the cage.”

New Item!

Blackwood Staff

A staff looted from a Blackwood Hexcaster. Rather than being created by mortals as most staffs, it was materialized from aether together with the daemon that carried it.

Rarity: Common

Material: Blackwood

Quality: Average

Condition: 15/15

Enchantment: Black Magic Fortification

Special: Aetherforged

Black Magic hexes casted through this staff are 10% stronger AND cost 10% less mana to cast!

Spells and hexes casted through this staff are 10% stronger!

Sweeeet.

Having proficiency with daggers was understandable with my background... but that was a useless skill. Magic Shield could protect me from attacks coming from only one direction. Coming too close to the enemy was a suicide since I had no omnidirectional defense magic like Leria's Aura Armour. Making the dagger in any way useful would require learning Aura Manipulation... and extensive multi-classing in DFI's games was always painful.

"Nice, now I can feel like a genuine sorcerer." I chuckled. It hurt. I got up by using the staff as a crutch. "Alright, the best way to deal with injuries aside from mortal ones is to walk them off. Besides, the answer might be closer than we think."

***

To my honest surprise, the battle with Hexcaster must have been the boss battle of the quest. Maybe a few minutes later we reached a dead end, with almost ten elven bodies scattered around. Plus several dead Stalkers, Bolt Throwers and even another Hexcaster (though his staff was ruined).

We investigated, of course.

"Hmm..." Leria, my personal pathomorphologist, soon arrived to conclusion. "I think the elves battled each other. Then they were surprised by the daemons." They must have been really beaten down for daemons of this level to kill them. I guess the ferocity becomes a problem when both sides are ferocious. Her eyes darted towards an elf. "Hey, that one is still breathing!"

Oh, great. I come closer, thinking I can use my Dagger Proficiency for the first time... but then I see the elf Leria is leaning over.

"A Dragonbride?!" I gawked at her, too shocked to do something. To say that was unexpected would be an understatement of the year. Leria looked at me, surprised by the look on my face.

"A Dragonbride?" She asked.

"Ehm... mountain elf society is matriarchal. The Dragonbrides are their female-only caste of sorcerers and priestesses." ... at least that's how it was in the last game. "They use some magical ritual to bond with the dragons they worship. These glowing lines on her skin are a sign." I got out of my stupor and conjured medical supplies. I might have opposed everything that the Doomplace stands for... but considering what sort of people mountain elves were, I could be... persuaded to sell this one into slavery. And the girl we found had to be worth a lot.

First, she was a Dragonbride. Considering the fact they were protected with religious zealotry by already fierce mountain elves made them a unique... merchandise. Not to mention that there weren't too many of them.

Secondly... she was the most beautiful girl I ever saw. Seriously, DFI overdid it. Sleek and untarnished skin, almost golden hair and blue eyes (something unique for mountain elves)... she was less 'sensual' in her build than cute - her curves were rather scarce (although she was still feminine in general built) and must have been young, sixteen or eighteen.

She wore what I could describe as a white robe elves stole from some unfortunate priestess. They shortened it so it ended just above knees. Freedom of movement. Her legs were just as pretty as the rest of her.

Wow. Even the shining lines on her skin looked beautiful. Those on her face assembled into what looked like rose flowers on her cheeks. There should be a limit to how blessed you are with your physique!

Considering the look on Leria's face, she thought the same. Now, that's envy if I ever saw it.

The girl was badly hurt. There were no critical wounds, but she was beaten up, had lots of shallow wounds (and few deeper), and lost a lot of blood. I rubbed the anti-bleeding ointment on worst of her injuries and then bandaged it. This should stop her from losing even more blood.

There were alchemical potions that increased blood production; some could even force the organism to produce a lot in a short span of time, which helped greatly in cases of blood loss... but I had none of them. With how weak the ointments I used were, I should be glad she had no deeper wounds. Her survival was still uncertain.

Then I remembered that I could use Appraisal on people... I'm dense sometimes.

Vaera Vannylan

Gender: Shemale

Species: Mountain Elf

Level: 25 → 5

Class: Dragonbride

Active Effects: Devouring Curse

Known Spells and Techniques:

???

Well, that’s… WAIT A FUCKING SECOND.

Since when does DFI puts anything even REMOTELY resembling genders other than the male and female in their games?! Even in their last, most expansive game they steered clear of this particular field. Wasn't their founder a radical conservative that was several times flamed by the left worldwide by publically saying stuff like "there are only two genders... and lots of mental disorders"?!

Also... WAIT A FUCKING SECOND, she is he?! She has a penis instead of vagina?! WHAT. THE ACTUAL. FUCK.

"Em, Av? What is it?" I raised my eyes from the elf and looked at Leria. "You are making a strange face."

"Ugh, I might have discovered something terrible." She looked at me with a question mark written on her face. "Eh, I'll tell you about this. Eventually.” This Devouring Curse seemed to be the cause of the strange reading on his... her... its... level. Interesting. “For now, we should focus on carrying our captive back to base. Without causing more injuries or drawing attention from daemons. Since I can't really carry anything..." I was still using my staff as a crutch to help me walk. I paused... meaningly. She sighed and nodded.

***

It was surprising, but the return journey wasn't that bad. We encountered daemons only once, and it was just a single Stalker. We finished him according to plan - I kept him busy (with what remained of my mana) until Leria put down the elf. Then I kept standing in front of the Dragonbride with Magic Shield until the daemon was slain.

We carried him (I decided to use this pronoun for now) into the prison. Then we used what looked like an armbinder (looking more like something out of BDSM rather than a proper restraint) on him and put him in one of the cells. The fact he was still alive was a good sign. His breathing also seemed to improve.

Well, now we had to wait until he wakes up to get answers. In the meantime, I had to deal with alchemy...

“Where are you going?” Leria seemed slightly scared by the face I made after we properly secured our captive. I couldn’t blame her, it must have been a scary face.

“Alchemy.” I answered. I still had 2-3 hours.

***

I cut open my finger with a dagger. Then I keep ingesting the ingredients with intervals long enough that I can be sure that it was the last ingredient that worked. It is the most... primitive way of progressing your herbalism skill, that is GUARANTEED to kill you eventually and was a sensible option only when you had a guaranteed resurrection.

Five first herbs I took caused no noticeable reaction from my organism. The sixth one caused violent vomiting. Yeah, well, it's better than sudden kidney failure. I made another cut on my finger. It was a blind luck, but after I took the seventh herb, the bleeding grew stronger.

Herb to counter blood loss by accelerating your blood production - check. Unless you got critically hit or poisoned, the most common cause of death in melee combat was blood loss. This was a necessity to survive, especially for Leria.

First two mushrooms had a taste that made me feel like my tongue was on fire. Bleh, disgusting. Inedible, even if it had some alchemical usage. Third tasted better, but it made my head spin. I almost vomited again.

Jesus, that's some strong poison. I barely tasted it and I have problems with standing. It was possible that one of earlier herbs was poisonous and it caused reaction only now... In fact, many poisonous mushrooms and herbs had their first symptoms show up hours or even days after ingestion. Some were poisonous only when a lot of them were eaten for years. But DFI tended to give most poisons rather fast showing symptoms... so that they could be used in combat.

Last mushroom tasted... bland. There was no reaction. Hmph. I took a bigger bite. Five minutes later I felt faint. I fell on the ground, vomiting. I was sweating. I felt like I was burning. Shit. Another bite was a bad decision. I think I've found a rather nasty mushroom...

Then I died. Fucking ingredient tasting.

YOU DIED!

Cause of death was brain damage due to ingestion of poisonous mushrooms.

Creative, but also… bland, wasn’t it?

You can resurrect now… or take a break and logout.

Resurrect

Logout

DFI and their bad jokes on a death screen. Sigh.