A Grim Reminder - Part 1

"Adantia?! What the hell happened?!"

"You people really need to think up more original questions," Adantia growled. "Can't tell you how many times I've heard that one today…"

"It seems there was an incident. A direct confrontation with Xanthia Allaquetz and her second-in-command." Moira took the duty of filling John in upon herself, perhaps sensing the snark that was likely to follow without intervention. "We were in the middle of learning exactly what transpired."

"What transpired was that I got caught off-guard," Adantia huffed. "Prissy little bitch is stronger than your information said. And I expected that part. Not like a necromancer gets spotted on the front lines often enough to get a good read on her. I was ready for that part."

Some of the cockiness faded, and for a moment, Adantia's focus seemed to pierce through the blood loss and waves of pain. Her left hand clasped itself over the ruby-red, uneven edge of her torso, slamming down on the wounded flesh with enough **** to make John wince at the sight and sound of it.

"But she wasn't supposed to be that much stronger. And even then, I could have taken her and that annoying little Phantom of the Opera wannabe with her. But they came prepared. Ambushed me, killed the Fateweaver I was working with before I even knew they were there. And the only reason they could do that was because they brought something that they should never have had in the first place!"

"A weapon of some sort?"

"A friend." Adantia's lips trembled as she spat the word. Even her unseeing eyes seemed to grow distant as she continued, "One of the most powerful and most dangerous mages in Paix. They reanimated her, had her with them when they attacked me."

"You think they may have slipped past the guilds of the plains to ransack the bodies of your former inhabitants?" Moira's face paled slightly at the question, fearing the answer. Her gauntlets creaked, fists clenching as the possibility hung in the air.

"No. No way I'd have overlooked that. Or Rachel, she had that whole place warded to hell and back, and the only reason she never found me was because she avoided Paix like the plague after it was destroyed. And it wouldn't have mattered if they did. I gathered up the few things that were left of the people I used to call friends, or family. Weapons, keepsakes, bodies... even before I pulled myself together enough to pick through the rubble, what I found—what wasn't reduced to ash—was barely enough for a handful of proper burials, let alone necromancy at this level."

Adantia's features tightened, and the only thing that seemed to break her out of her growing rage was when her fingers finally tightened too much on the stump of her former arm, causing enough pain to make her grimace.

"Maybe if it were someone that could have survived, someone who escaped and died anywhere else. But that was Wren, and I'm positive that was her dagger, the original one. I may not have been as good at sensing back then, but I recognize all the enchantments on it. I made some of them myself," Adantia explained. "Someone stole that dagger off Wren's body. And the only person who could have done that was the one who murdered her."

The implications immediately reflected on those gathered in the room. Kim's sword hand, already resting on the pommel, tightened so harshly that John could hear the hilt's wrap creaking. Moira's posture tightened, while memories of impotence replayed themselves in John's mind. Etriyya made a gesture John didn't understand, and he heard a wisp of a prayer escape her lips.

"You think they're working together with one of the Deities? With Suula?" John voiced the question when the silence held longer than he could stand.

"It makes the most sense out of the clusterfuck of options here," Adantia said, voice trembling with fury. "After what happened to Paix, I can't even pretend to understand what's going on in Suula's mind, so I can't fully rule out her offering up the dagger as payment for something they did in the past. But Wren is one of the most dangerous assassins I knew back then. If they could call on her abilities this whole time, they could've wiped out most of the leaders of these disjointed mage circles a long time ago. No, I think this is recent. Either they reached out to Suula or she reached out to them."

"And either way, they're both clearly invested in this operation now," Moira clarified darkly.

"At the very least, they're invested in trying to kill me. Damn near worked, too," Adantia grumbled, a touch of wounded pride slipping past the walls of cold fury. "They won't get so lucky next time, though. Seeing Wren threw me off balance. I'll be ready when she shows up again."

"You're in no shape to fight," Moira cautioned, as if the fact weren't obvious. "Are you even safe now? It doesn't look like you're in your tent."

"Tent? What, you think I'd go back to those assholes?" Adantia scoffed, jerking her eyes upward briefly.

With the simple motion, the phone that Adantia was using twirled up and around, giving them a panoramic view of the area around her. As Moira had pointed out, it wasn't the same tent as their last call—it wasn't even a camp in any sense of the word, just a small clearing with a small coil of her cables curled up nearby, glistening faintly with crimson heat.

"They've barely been holding it together when they thought they had a chance on their own." Adantia sat up slightly, placing her remaining palm on the ground to steady herself. "I'm sure at least a few of them saw me as I broke out of the Barrier and got the hell out of there. If they lived to tell about it, their leaders are going to be panicking. I'm just a stranger to most of these idiots; if they realize how badly that bitch seems to want me, they're gonna start wondering if they can ransom me off to end the war. I need rest, and a damn good healer if I'm going to get back in the fight, but I need to be alive for that to matter."

"Our Order can send off a squadron of healers immediately," Moira insisted, armor clinking as she gave a ferocious nod. "I'll send my father. He will ensure they reach you safely, and-"

"Do you even know where I am?" Adantia asked loudly, interrupting Moira's enthusiastic vow. "Because I sure as hell don't. Kinda just ran off into the woods. I mean, I can figure it out, but cool your jets 'til then. And won't sending your biggest sword off to bumfuck forests to find me put a damper on your preparations? At the very least, if he doesn't make it back in a few days, it's gonna make your whole **** a hell of a lot easier to ambush."

"It is worth the risk," Moira insisted confidently. "You are the strongest mage in this entire conflict. If Xanthia or her forces find you out there, on the verge of bleeding out…"

"Cut the drama. I'm not bleeding out; healing magic isn't my specialty, but I'm not completely fucking hopeless." Adantia's voice was dry, almost back to some of its usual sarcastic bite, whether due to the change in topics or the fatigue taking the fire out of her. "Already regrew probably half of what that fucker bit off me."

"...Half?" John couldn't help himself from asking, staring at the void where her arm had been.

"Yeah. Fucking dragon thing they made was huge; must have used a few hundred corpses just for that. It took half a lung with it when it pulled away." Adantia switched to steadying herself with her cables, freeing her hand to rap its knuckles against her chest. Then she pulled the collar of her shirt slightly, showing off a line of dark red scarring that ran from a spot just beside her neck, all the way down beyond the revealed skin, presumably to somewhere on her lower torso. "Think the blast I shot down its maw might have fractured its core, though. So not a total loss."

"Lady's light, protect us…"

Moira's exclamation mirrored John's feelings perfectly. He'd gotten so used to his Gamer's Body ability that the idea of fighting without a limb now seemed almost unthinkable to him. The thought of somehow managing to fend off and escape four foes, each of which could've endangered or defeated John on their own, all while missing a limb and parts of her internal organs...

"You lost a solid chunk of your chest, and still managed to defend yourself?" The awe on Etriyya's face and held in her warbling tone matched what the rest of them were feeling, but she made no attempt to conceal it. "By the Lady, how?"

"I'm a tough bitch to kill," Adantia boasted, somehow managing to pull off confident and intimidating once more, even while sliding the collar of her shirt back into place to cover her wound. "And I got lucky. That overgrown lizard went for the other side, not sure I could have mended a torn-up heart before I kicked it for good. It was my own fault for getting so worked up. Won't happen next time."

"You seem quite assured of your ability to emerge victorious when next you meet these necromancers. Given the severity of your injuries, are you really so confident?" Kim's expression was a bit more reserved than the others’, as steely and as cutting as her blade.

"Oh, they're as good as dead the next time I see them. Believe me," Adantia swore in a low growl. "I'll figure out where I am once I'm sure nobody is following me from either side. If I haven't gotten myself halfway patched up by then, or if it hasn't been so long you've already left Springfield, I'll figure out a safe place for your healers to find me."

"Should we not consider a withdrawal?" Moira suggested. "Rather than trying to remain nearby for a swifter return, perhaps you should return to Springfield entirely. Healing a wound of that severity on a fighter of your caliber will take time, even with my father attending to you. And for all your bravado, there is no way for you to guarantee that another confrontation would not end similarly, even if we restore you entirely."

"I told you, they threw me off my game," Adantia growled. "I got cocky, I paid for it, it's not gonna happen again. Next time, they're mine, end of discussion. If you wanna send someone to help heal me up, I'm too shorthanded to turn it down. Otherwise, as far as I'm concerned, all this shit sucks, but it just confirms that the plan is working."

Moira seemed to have reached her limit of patience for the powerful mage. The respect and concern on her face gave way to an annoyance far more familiar to John as she spoke, "I cannot help but to feel that you're not taking this matter seriously enough. This is a war for our very futures, yet you're talking about a setback of this magnitude as if it were a mere trifle. Working? You consider being nearly eviscerated and hiding out in the bushes to be a sign that your plan is working?"

"It may not be working very well for your plan, but my plan was never about winning the war," Adantia said. Dismissive as the words were, what really chilled the blood in John's veins was the voracious, almost manic smile on Adantia's face as she drew in her cables, pulling the phone close enough to reach.

"The idiot behind you convinced me to come out and fight in this war. Not to be a hero, or to save your precious little order, either. I don't play to lose, but that's not why I'm here. I'm doing this because the best way to keep the few people I have left from getting hurt is to paint a huge fucking target on my back. To make sure if Suula comes for anyone, she comes for me first. Well... guess what, John? Looks like it worked. Cheers for the idea; Moira was right, you're great at this whole 'trying to get yourself killed' thing."

Adantia’s smirk was the last thing they saw before the line was cut, a toothy grin with every bit of the pent-up rage and malice he'd seen when she was at her worst, back in Paix. A stunned stillness hung in the air for a long while, the lot of them exchanging disbelieving looks.

"By the Lady, that one's doing just grand, eh?" Etriyya muttered, shaking her head one last time before donning her helmet again. "Nothing we can do for the lass until we hear back, though. May as well get on with it. At your leave, of course, Warden?"

"We can't simply return to training as if nothing has happened," Moira replied, one hand pressed so harshly into the bridge of her own nose that John worried she might break something. "The entire reason that we had faith in this insane idea was just defeated. Worse, now she's running around hiding in the middle of the countryside with a missing limb because she doesn't trust the mages she was fighting alongside!"

"All the more reason for us to ensure she has dependable allies in the near future." Kim's jaw was set, and there was a tension to her that wasn't present before, but she was nothing if not unyielding. "Let her handle her own matters as she wishes. We can do nothing for her until we hear further, regardless. The best thing for us to do now is to train so that we can tilt the scales back in our own favor when we arrive on the battlefield."

"Tilt the scales? You may not have been here to witness it, but she bested my father, Kim." Moira had never shown anything but respect and appreciation for her father, but the wildness in her eyes as she spoke showed the true extent of how highly she regarded him as a warrior. "And yet she just lost half her body mass trying to hold her own!"

"She was injured enough to kill most people, from the shock if nothing else. Yet she was able to escape the commander, her second-in-command, and according to her, one of the most lethal mages in all of Paix, undead or otherwise," John countered. "I'm not saying she's making good decisions, not by a long shot. But if anything, the fact that she could defend herself four-to-one or worse while missing an arm and most of a lung? When she's back to full strength-"

"If she survives that long," Moira hissed. "I knew that she had her own reasons for entering this war, but when she described wanting to make an impact, she left out the key details of it. Like the fact that she seems to have a deathwish!"

John wanted to protest that she'd have killed herself long ago if that's what she was after, but it wasn't convincing, even to himself. If that was her aim, it had to be public enough for the news to travel to Suula... and even then, John couldn't shut out the memories of Arista shouting at him, vowing to pursue him doggedly for the rest of his days until he killed her himself.

"Warden," Etriyya said quietly, clasping a fist over her breastplate, knuckles cradling the sigil of the Golden Rose, "the path has already been set. We can argue over its foolishness, but I believe it would be best to make use of this time and ready ourselves. None of us may know where it leads, but the more effort we put into these preparations now, the better our chances of bending that path toward a happy place."

"You... are correct." Moira had to **** the words out, but she eased back slightly, some of the fervor ebbing from her eyes as she straightened herself and adjusted the way she gripped her hammer. "I pray that your offer to join you in your new world still stands, John Newman."

"It does." John gave as sturdy of a nod as he could manage. He hadn't thought Moira would be shaken enough to think back on the promise, but he couldn't say he blamed her after seeing Adantia in that state.

"Now, let's make sure that it isn't necessary."

"Another group," Moira called out as the thundering of hooves heralded the arrival of nearly a dozen centaurs, all galloping toward them. Before John could consider whether a spell to strike the lot of them was worth the mana, they fanned out into a wide circle, peppering them with arrows while keeping a respectable distance that allowed them to pull back any time one of the group started a charge in their direction.

"Bloody fast, aren't they?" Ettriya growled in annoyance. Her shield caught another arrow from the centaurs encircling them as she tried to prepare one of her spells. The sharpened steel of the arrowhead was strong enough to scratch the enchanted metal, and the **** of the oversized bolt jolted her shield arm back enough to throw her cast off, the mana fizzling away.

"Frustratingly so," John agreed, his form flickering for a moment. "I'm even having a hard time keeping up with them, and I'm getting close to my maximum level. They must be Agility-focused."

"Less of the lingo, and a little more- ah!"

Etriyya cried out as another arrow struck her shield. This one shattered on contact, its arrowhead formed from what looked like some kind of obsidian. John wasn't sure exactly what about the arrow's strike had caused the cry of pain, but Etriyya dropped her sword to the grass below at the same moment she shrieked.

"Enough of this," John growled. He didn't have enough mana for a ranged battle with this many, but he could buy them more breathing room, and enough time to break out of the holding position they were stuck in. He shifted on one of his feet and the ground began to quake in a circle around them—A rough circle, but a circle nonetheless, one that was perfectly aligned with the distant perimeter the centaurs were forming. Flat grasslands became jagged, rocky peaks in an instant as a five-yard wide section of ground heaved itself into the air unevenly.

The peaks varied greatly in height, from around a dozen feet to a few stories tall. A few of the centaurs were able to veer off course in the few moments before the upheaval properly began, but half of the annoying archers were launched skyward. At their level, John knew firsthand that even a fall from terminal velocity was unlikely to do much more than annoy them, but the disturbance was enough to disrupt the never-ending barrage of arrows long enough for them to go on the offensive.

Kim was the first to react, covering half the distance toward the broken lines before John had even drawn his arm back. A centaur that had been launched skyward in one piece landed on the ground in four, the cuts of her blade so lightning-fast that the creature barely had time to grip its bowstring before it was slain, the arrow falling harmlessly away.

John's sword, flying through the air of its own accord, arrived to Kim's right a few moments later, piercing to the hilt the lower half of one of the centaurs as it tried to get its hooves back under it. A sickening ripping sound left the half-humanoid bleeding out on the ground, its knees buckling under its own weight. John's blade whirled clockwise around the newly formed barrier while Kim danced counter-clockwise, tracing a path around the circumference of it.

Meanwhile, John took up a position beside Etriyya, who was doing a less-than-stellar job of stifling her grunts of agony as she tried to lift her fallen weapon with a hand that seemed incapable of it. He stood over her with discs of solid wind in his hands, powerful winds that burst outward each time one of the recovering foes shot an arrow toward them. Most were stopped immediately, and the few that weren't were deflected harmlessly into the dirt when they met the compressed wind.

"Are you alright?" John asked as he protected the disarmed knight. "What happened?"

"I don't fuckin' know, but I can't grip my sword," Etriyya shouted. She sounded infuriated, but there was a distinct note of genuine fear that couldn't be fully buried.

The circle of centaurs was being cleared out thanks to John's levitating blade and Kim's precision strikes, but the few centaurs that had been stuck on the outside were beginning to leap over the peaks of John's earthen wall, their legs launching them so high he might've thought they were flying.

And like that, just as the volleys had begun to thin out, they were escalating again, and arrows bombarded them from every direction once more. Each of the arrowheads peppering them varied in material slightly, and the flashes of light that sometimes accompanied their impact made him wonder what sort of enchantments these creatures were using, but he didn't dare focus on the magic with his Observe when there were always more incoming.

John found a moment between the oncoming arrows to shift his gaze over to their life bars. Etriyya was doing poorly in terms of health, but to be honest, so were all of them. Despite their bravado, the shock of the day's events was clearly weighing on each of them, John most of all; they had taken a lot more damage than necessary in their first few dungeons, enough that Moira's healers had begun to tire and require rest. Now, five hours in, their health and mana were reaching their limits.

"Stay behind me. We've put down enough of these bastards already, this should be the last group." John noticed a centaur taking aim, and was just moving to intercept its shot when Etriyya got there first.

"No, I can still fight!" Standing once more, sword abandoned, she shifted her shield into position. She held both arms behind it in a rather awkward-looking stance, one that seemed extremely ineffective, and her movements were lagging worse than usual. The very first arrow to impact her shield shattered with a flash of blue light that nearly crumbled her fragile stance. The knight's deteriorating health was obvious, and Moira must have agreed, for she wasted no time in coming to Etriyya's aid.

"You're brave, Knight Etriyya, but you're wounded, and I don't have the mana to be both protector and mender," Moira warned. "The Lady's watchful eye be upon us!"

John didn't see any visible effect at first, until he noticed the subtle golden gleam in Moira's eyes. Whatever it had done, her reactions had never been quicker. She and John moved around the staggered Etriyya almost as a mirrored pair, intercepting each arrow that approached in a dance that almost looked rehearsed.

By the time the last of the centaurs fell, the hybrid creature cleaved at its seam by Kim's lethal blade, Moira was panting and glistening with the sheen of her efforts. While physically fine, the mental relief that came to John the first moment he looked around and didn't see an arrow soaring toward him couldn't have been more palpable.

"Ready yourselves!" Kim called out as she quickly returned to them, her eyes scanning the interior of the arena John had created.

"Quickly, before the final enemy spawns. What ails you, Knight Etriyya?"

"Not sure," Etriyya grunted. "Doesn't hurt that bad, but I can't move half my bloody fingers."

"The armor is hardly even scratched," Moira noted as she knelt next to her loyal knight. "Blood leaking from the seams, though…"

A quick series of movements and a hefty tug took Etriyya's gauntlet off, revealing a bloody mess underneath. There was so much crimson trailing along her arm that John didn't notice the tiny black fragments lodged in her skin until Moira gave a wave and swept the blood away with golden radiance.

"By the Lady," Moira exclaimed, her eyes wide and a perplexed look on her face. "Half a dozen, at least, and…"

Moira held the gauntlet she'd stripped away up against Etriyya's arm, eyeing the alignment of the plates against Etriyya's wounds. Each marker, each tiny penetration of Etriyya's flesh, was perfectly aligned with one of the joints, seams, and one had even managed to slip between Etriyya's gauntlet and vambrace. By the way her hand was awkwardly twitching as Moira tended to her, only half of her fingers moving, and those only clenching half as hard as they should, they'd struck true at the woman's poor tendons.

"Blasted arrows!" Etriyya swore, clutching at her right elbow with her left hand. She stared at the wounds with every bit as much disbelief as her leader. "These unbroken blighters are using something like obsidian on a few of their shafts. One must have shattered just right to slip in and do me good like that. Would've kept a full ward up if I knew I was that unlucky."

"Truly unlucky. The odds of so many fragments finding the perfect gaps in your defenses like that..." Kim's eyes narrowed as she stared at the wounded arm, a sour look etched on her features. "Truly a one in a million stroke of misfortune, Knight Etriyya."

"Well, if it weren't for bad luck..." Etriyya **** a chuckle that turned into a slight hiss when Moira began a healing incantation. The black shards extricated themselves in short order, the wounds rapidly closing, and the fresh streaks of blood disappearing the same as the old.

"Watch yourself more closely, and do not think yourself invincible because you hold a shield. Your armor lacks the blessings that the Lady's blessed shield has; faith is admirable, but not enough on its own," Moira lectured, though there was no heat to the words, and even the Warden did not seem to think them particularly pertinent. An almost absurd skepticism colored her look, and her eyes flickered to the Slayer with a yearning curiosity.

"We're having a rather bad time of it this go-around altogether," John noted, stepping forward as he heard the sounds of shuffling from behind the raised mounds of dirt. "We'll call it here—this will be the last dungeon for this shift. We'll pick up tomorrow, once everyone is rested."

The silence that followed his words only lasted a few seconds before it was interrupted by a clamorous burst, the thick walls of rock and dirt being partially blasted open as an eight-foot tall beast plowed directly through. The mini-boss that joined them in the clearing was no centaur, a fact that stole a slight chuckle from John when he saw what had arrived instead. The mini-boss stood on two bovine legs, held a greataxe in pale white hands, and lowered its horned head threateningly toward them when it began to move, emitting a crooning "moo" as it barreled forward.

"Huh. Different species, still a human half thrown on top of something with hooves. Is that a coincidence, or is that supposed to be some kind of a joke…? Kind of a dry sense of humor sometimes, you know that, Gaia?" Aware that he was in the presence of two Order warriors, John opted to keep the irreverent thought to himself... however, his remarkably rare moment of self-restraint was rendered moot when Moira noticed the chuckle and the accompanying grin.

"What is it you find so funny, John?"

"Ah... Moira, what do you think Gaia's sense of humor is like?"

Moira's expression still bore some of her befuddlement from earlier. John's words only deepened that confusion. Her mouth half-opened in what might have been a serious response, but something she saw in John's confident smirk made her think better of engaging with the comment.