Jacob, Deacon, and Ralph turned a corner leading directly to the guild. Jacob noticed that Ralph was still injured and sent party invites to both members. It wasn’t long there after that both Jacob and Ralph were healed back to full health. Jacob wondered why Deacon didn’t just invite people to a party, he was always waiting for others to do it. This is something he would speak to him about later. Once they were a block away, they could hear fighting in the streets. Jacob ran over a carpet strewn across the road shortly followed by Ralph, but Deacon dropped to a knee once he made it onto the carpet.

“Something is wrong.” Deacon yelled.

“What is it? We have to hurry.” Jacob said sniffing around his immediate area. It was a familiar female scent. Just then transparent red light started emanating from the carpet in a ritual circle around Deacon. Jacob jumped into action reaching for the edges of the carpet when a woman appeared next to him blowing powder in his face then kicking him in the side of the head. Jacob went down hard and didn’t get up.

“It’s Amanda!” cried Deacon. Ralph shouldering Amanda aside before she could stab Deacon with whatever was in her hand. Deacon didn’t get a good look at her under her hood, but it looked like she was crying. There was an ominous red glow from her right hand now. He would have to worry about that later. Pain shot through his body as he could see his soul energy visibly decreasing at a rapid pace.

“Deacon, you need to escape. Fight through the pain. If you lose all our soul energy, things will only get worse.” Came the voice of Zageracks.

“I can’t…move.” Deacon thought struggling against whatever power was keeping him in place.

“Just clear your mind and think. We are at fifty percent now. Not a lot of time left.” Zageracks said.

Deacon didn’t know what to do. If he’d had a hint of the trap, he could have dodged the carpet. This was definitely an Elder Ruby trap, and he was zero for two in this contest. She always managed to get him somehow. This wasn’t helping. If it is Ruby, then there are others involved and she isn’t here. That explains Amanda, but she isn’t powering this ritual. If it wasn’t for his short time with Verus he wouldn’t even know it was a ritual. That means there is someone nearby channeling it. Deacon franticly looked around in a direction opposite Amanda’s appearance. If she was playing the distraction, then…there! In a window on the second floor of the building across the street he could see a faint outline in the same red light of the ritual. Too far for him to reach though. He’ll have to get Ralph’s attention.

“Ralph, second floor, building on my left, leave me here!” Deacon yelled.

“What about Amanda?” Ralph said dodging another stab from her.

“She’s weak just like Elder Ruby. I can take care of her no problem.” Deacon said cracking a smile at the cursed woman.

“You piece of trash. I will end you!” Screeched Amanda as she threw the knife in her hand at Deacon.

Deacon could barely breathe at this point. The knife sunk deep in his left shoulder. Amanda must be equipped with enchanted weapons just in case. As Deacons health dropped by ten percent, he could see the party was disbanded when Jacob fell unconscious. This was not ideal considering Amanda wouldn’t hold back against an immobile Deacon. Ralph was no where to be seen and someone wanted her dagger back. Amanda stepped onto the carpet completely unencumbered by the ritual. With a grin she started to slowly wiggle the daggers handle inside Deacon stripping away another five percent.

“Poor Child of Ruin. You’re going to destroy this city just like you did mine. You’ve already caused this woman to lose her mind and you can be defeated by a simple exorcism. What a mighty champion you are.” Amanda said with Elder Ruby’s voice.

“Ruby, I’ve missed you. How are things? Still a piece of shit I see.” Deacon replied through gritted teeth.

“That mouth of yours will get you in trouble young man. You should be more respectful to your betters.” She said as Amanda’s foot smashed down on top of his head forcing him to the ground. Now at eye level with the carpet he could see a frayed end, the power charging the exorcism must be damaging it. He focused on the thread and used his new ability of Polterheist to tug at the carpet thread. He needed to keep her talking, hopefully he could unravel enough of it to break the circle.

“You’re right. I haven’t treated you with the respect you deserve. Which is none. I respect my own feces more than you.” Deacon said almost immediately regretting it as the foot came down this time on the dagger ripping it out of his shoulder and causing another fifteen percent damage to his health bar.

“If you’re going to pull a unicorn out of your ass you need to hurry. We are down to twenty percent soul energy.” Spoke Zageracks.

The dagger was now lying on the carpet as the thread he was pulling on started to pool on the ground he realized this wasn’t going to work. Amanda was repeatedly kicking in various places. Deacon decided to give up on the carpet itself and tried to grab the dagger with Polterheist. It worked. As Amanda lifted her leg for another blow, Deacon dragged the sharp ruby dagger through the carpet cutting it in half and breaking the ritual circle. The light immediately died around him and consuming five souls he football tackled Amanda straight into a nearby wall with Spectral Dash. He heard a loud crack as they collided. Her leg was bent the wrong way and she was knocked the fuck out. Turning at the sound of breaking glass, Deacon found what looked like a Ruby cultist on the ground. It had a dark red robe on with a choker. That choker had a ruby gem embedded in it. Deacon looked up to see Ralph all cut up hanging from the window. Deacon yelled for him to hang on and wrapped Amanda up with the remains of the rug they used to trap him. He then ran over to just under Ralph.

“Drop down. I’ll catch you.” Deacon said.

“No way. Get something for me to land on. I can’t climb my hands are all cut up.” Ralph replied.

“Don’t be a baby. I’ll catch you and cradle you in my arms. Also, invite me to your party.” Deacon shot back. Ralph let go and Deacon failed to catch him correctly due to his shredded left shoulder. They fell in a pile of limbs and body parts, but no harm was done. Ralph immediately added him to a party. They both released a sigh of relief as their wounds began to heal.

“I would have given you a potion earlier, but Jacob took what little I had when we were in the cafeteria. I wonder how those dungeon guys are doing.” Deacon said still sprawled in the dirt.

“Let’s go. Where is Amanda?” Ralph asked.

“I had to bust her up pretty bad, but I tied her up in that rug over here.” Deacon said.

“How did you get free? I just now stopped the guy from chanting. There were two others up there I had to take down.” Ralph said.

“Managed to break the circle giving me back control.” Deacon said obscuring the details.

“Good work. At least we only have to go a city block carrying these two.” Ralph said as he rushed to pick up Amanda.

“Right, the giant Canidae is all mine.” Deacon said getting under one of Jacob’s arms and hoisting him up. He was heavy.

Once they returned to the guild, they found a flurry of activity. Ralph locked Amanda in a room but not before setting her broken leg. She wouldn’t be running off anytime soon. He noticed her right hand was all bruised with red tracks running up the arm. He wanted to run her over to the temple right away, but she needed to wait. When they were close enough to the guild, some healers managed to rouse Jacob with a detoxification spell. At that point he began barking orders. They turned the courtyard into an emergency hospital. He then created information squads made up of scouts to inform people fighting in the streets what was happening and how to defeat the Sanguine Vessels. Once that was done, he began organizing fighting units each with a healer to start rescuing people trapped by the fighting. There was a large storage warehouse at the keep he would direct all noncombatants too if they couldn’t get to the temple of Astrael.

Attribute

Score

Intelligence

16

Strength

35

Speed

37

Agility

18

Wisdom

15

Luck

300

Deacon finally had five minutes to think. That’s when he remembered the new attribute point he had yet to use. Looking at his scores he decided to put it in wisdom. That’s probably his best bet for increasing his aura range. Old Pai’s range was huge. So he surmised it must be a combination of his training and wisdom score which seems to be important for faith-based classes.

With that done he headed to the Alchemy lab where he found Anry churning out potions. Lilian was nowhere in sight. There were stacks and stacks of vials filled with red fluid. He could see the sweat dripping down Anry’s back and figured he should announce himself. He seemed to be in the zone.

“Anry, I’m back. Are you ok?” Deacon asked. Anry nearly fell off his stool at the greeting.

“Deacon, I didn’t hear you come in. I’ve got forty potions ready to go. Lilian ran to help the southeast quarter for some reason. I figured It’d be better if someone was making more potions. I now have a new spell called Water Purification. It makes the potions double strength. I thought if I could make a lot of them, we could sell them for a higher price and maybe get more guild points.” Anry said obvious exhaustion on his face.

“Let me guess, the spell doesn’t cost anything?” Deacon asked.

“How did you know? It’s like a miracle.” Anry said.

“You didn’t read the Kingdom Notification, did you?” Deacon asked.

“No was it important?” Anry asked.

“Fuck you, Fates.” Deacon said under his breath.