John doesn't want to talk.

This man, or perhaps his unseen posse that made the "Smugglers" plural, had threatened Tricia just to get to him... and, depending on what that shrinking collar was meant to do, had every intention to kill him or worse. John wouldn't waste his breath trying to talk his way out of it... and any urge to do so left as he imagined the texted photo of the girl. John's first urge was to try his serpent's lunge, but this was neither a shrub nor some elven warrior. What was this man, who posed as a normal doctor in the real world, whose body writhed with unseen, inhuman things? Even now his clothes wrinkled and pulsed with something just beneath the surface, and John suppressed a chill at imagining what it could be. The glowing field he briefly spotted was invisible now. Checking the man's stats again, John noticed a "Shielded" status effect had been added. Would it stop his attack? Would this Artificer counterattack with something far worse? Depending on what he's got under that coat, I should probably avoid touching him anyways...

"You've got a scaaaaary look there, boy," the man named Rurik taunted. His accent was American, but not local; somewhere up north, perhaps as far north as Wisconsin or beyond, from somewhere in Canada. "You look like you want to take a swing at the good doctor. Do you think I'd even feel it if you did?"

He wants me to attack. But why? John decided to experiment. "Your name is Rurik Talon, and you work for the Zenith Smugglers." The twisted doctor's eyes widened, and John took the moment of surprise to call his crossbow into his hand and fire a bolt, praying it would hit. Awkward as his grip on the weapon was, the bolt managed to whistle through the air and strike the target, only to strike the invisible barrier. But unlike his crappy manashield, this one didn't let the bolt so much as touch the flap of the man's coat: in a bright flash, the entire projectile shone with blue light before falling to the floor, smoking the whole way down. John followed it down with a grimace: the iron of the bolt had been blackened by burns where it was not still glowing, while the wood of the stem fell apart in a row of glowing cinders and soot. The bastard's health remained unaffected; his mana, however, had ticked down by 15, equivalent to the damage promised by the crossbow.

Copycat successful.

"You hold that weapon like a child," Talon chuckled, noting how it vanished, "but at least you use it like a mage." He snapped his fingers, and for a moment the thinly-veiling barrier was apparent between them. A flash of sparks and lightning arced from the point between, jumping to visibly course through the nearby frames and furniture, anywhere within five feet that it found metal. The spark didn't seem hot enough to burn this time... more importantly, John noted that even this impotent light show cost the man five more points of mp. "Normally the dumb ones just run up and get cooked, but I guess you don't get as fat on mana as you without learning a thing or two."

"It shields you from attacks... and electrocutes whatever tries to touch you." John kept glancing between Talon and the ruined bolt. "Plus you're releasing enough voltage to burn wood into ash... but if you could do it at a distance, I'm guessing you'd have done it by now."

"You're more useful alive than dead; mana factories can't do anything with a corpse of a mage, even if we reanimated you." The question was plain on John's face, but Talon cut off any chance at it. "Don't worry, you'll know exactly what a mana factory is in a few days. So what will it be, hmm? You ready to call it quits? I mean, if you're testing me with a medieval peasant's weapon, I can't imagine you've got alot of tricks left that won't involve trying to touch me." He spread his arms wide as if to hug John. The room was small enough that it felt like a potent threat. "C'mon then: I've still got a spare. I've always got a spare. Let me put the collar on ya quiet-like, and I won't cook you to a crisp... just medium-rare for making me waste one, heh heh heh."

"We don't need to do this."

"I don't see how you're giving me much choi-"

The tunnel opened up above and below the mage, nearly six feet wide and almost taking a bed and the door screen with him. John watched the man fall for one, two, three... and then only three loops. Mechanical tentacles of gold sprouted through his lab coat, shooting into the walls that flanked both of them, and bungee-cording their overweight wielder with a groan of metal from either. Using this motion, Talon lunged forward, reaching for John with an extended hand, and nearly catching him before the boy blinked over his own, closing portal trap. Talon cackled with his back turned as he landed on solid ground. "Great," John sighed in a shaking voice, "a Doc Oc knock-off." He glanced at the walls as the tentacles pulled out of them, noting how a monstrous spike at the end of each left vicious gashes in the drywall. Gashes... but no burn marks. John's eyes narrowed at the walls.

"I don't know what a dawk-awk is, boy, but you better start taking me seriously." The tentacles coiled near their host as he turned, and a twist of a knob on his belt saw his girth defy gravity, floating just inches off of the floor without the aid of his new appendages. "Actually, you know what? You just keep playing. The factory just needs you alive; healthy is optional."

The tentacles slithered towards the tile floor and split away from the man as his body continued to feed their segmented, armored lengths. Each one ducked under nearby beds or behind furniture, making them difficult to track. John had an idea, but he needed to be sure it wouldn't get him killed... and he needed a clean shot at one of them to be sure of it. Spotting a pen from the doctor's table, he tried to guess where the tentacles would come... saw one slither behind the table... spotted the other rounding a nearby machine cart-

There!

He moved the pen with his mind, end over end, striking the exposed length of tentacle... only for it to bounce off harmlessly. The pen clattered below a bed before rolling to the narrow length of open ground between John and Rurik, the latter looking at it with a smirk. "Telekinesis too? I'd have been impressed in primary school... but was that it?"

"I'm still working out the kinks." John turned off his displacement, and gave a worried glance down at himself as he appeared where he truly was before the enemy.

Talon grinned. "Illusions, too! Looks like it's on the fritz, though... lot of that going on with you, huh? That's what's wrong with you kids: always playing around, never specializing in anything useful... always forgetting to keep up your guard." The calm of his voice ill-fit the explosion of movement that followed. A tray of medicines flew into the air and the doctor's table flipped on opposite sides of John as the tentacles made their attacks, each rocketing towards him with a bared, glittering stiletto, each one made from enchanted steel as thick as a railroad spike. With one seeking to spear his stomach, and the other to stab through his left arm, John inhaled as he acted surprised... and exhaled as each blade dove a mere inch into his flesh before stopping.

-30mp
-45hp
Your static field deals 30 electric damage to Rurik Talon!

-30mp
-45hp
Your static field deals 30 electric damage to Rurik Talon!

He winced as the sparks nearly blinded him, but glanced at Talon past the light show of the mechanical tentacles frying nearby, watching as the coursing electricity traveled up the mechanical arms and into the boastful mage's body. The smile melted as he jerked about, his flesh ravaged as fingertips burned and hair began to smoke.

Copied skill: Artificer's static field lvl3, 5mp reserve
Artificer's static field: boostable by up to ten levels of artificer upgrades. Surrounds you in a shield of electricity that electrocutes enemies and ranged projectiles. Prevents up to 10 damage per attack per level a rate of 1 mp per 1 damage. Deals 10 electric damage to offending creatures/objects per skill level. Charges all items in one's possessions, preventing feedback.

John was burning through his mana faster than he liked... but he didn't need much to smash empowered serpent's fangs into the limp, damaged tentacles , all while their owner twitched and drooled while floating limply from his belt.

Rurik Talon
Level 14 Artificer
241/301hp
281/401mp
Status Effects: Shielded (???), Blood Oil (46 rounds), Stunned (4 rounds)

Running up to the fallen left tentacle, he used blasted piercing blows into its hull, collapsing the plate and rendering the long, armed half of it immobile. As the pen toss had proven, the field didn't extend to his extendable attachments, and so John was eager to strike it once more, finally shattering the joint and dismembering the hideous weapon. The final blow on the second tentacle was struck just as Talon regained his senses and, with a twist of a second knob of his belt, dove for John, barely missing his grip before the boy managed to blink back across the room. John was running low, but he felt a bit safer, for now.

Talon stood up, jolting when he felt the dead weight of his ruined weapons. "Fucking Hell..."

"I told you: we don't need to do this. I don't want anything to do with whoever you guys are, anyways; I'm perfectly happy just sticking to my business, and staying out of yours-"

The remnants of the tentacles suddenly fell from the doctor's body... and pouring from the wounds in his clothes, from his collar, from his pant legs and dropping out from his lab coat sleeves, came the skittering noise of dozens, then hundreds, of tiny bronze bugs.

Steam Scarab Swarm
Level 10
932/932hp (2hp per unit)
Status Effects: Swarm, Remote-Controlled

"Kid... I can't believe I almost sold you to a mana factory. There's no way you knew an Artificer secret like that before... so did you learn it just by seeing it once? I took damn near a year getting it down!" John didn't reply, instead struggling to deal with the spreading carpet of scarabs that expanded into the room. The beds, thankfully empty in this barrier, began to sink as the tiny machines grinded them down, tearing the materials, be they stainless steel or cloth, into dust that began to swirl like a foreboding sandstorm just over the floor. "I didn't think doppelgängers could have children... no, no, you can't be part-doppel... but maybe a lineage? They wouldn't have missed that... come on kid, don't keep me in suspense! Wait... do you even know how you got that ability?" Perhaps out of restraint by their master alone, the Swarm kept to Talon's side of the dreadfully small space... but the swirling hurricane of debris smoke slowly sent tendrils down to John's feet, and soon he wouldn't be able to tell when they neared on the ground. There were enough to cover the ceilings, walls and floor of Talon's side; one way or the other, John feared, they could easily catch John unawares and probably process him the way they did the lifeless furniture. The static field wouldn't last long enough to stop them all, if Talon's confidence was any evidence. Eyeing the corners of the room, John contemplated one last trick to avoid a gruesome ****, doing his best to meditate under the duress of the enemy's taunts.