Bloodstained Blade-Chapter 196 - Stygian Labyrinth

The Ebon Blade had no idea how many days it had been since Geral had last slept, but after it spent several minutes preventing him from charging forward into the dark, the man eventually sat down. It took less than a minute then, before he was snoring softly, and out like a light.

The weapon ignored that, though, and instead focused on its first attempt to summon a ghost. It had plenty of souls, and it wasn’t hard to select one of the dead orcs that floated freely in its soul gem. Still, it focused with the utmost care, because the last thing it wanted to do was waste an important soul, or set one of the powerful demons it held free.

Still, it was a strange sensation, and altogether different from animating a zombie. Then, the weapon merely had to focus on the body, and the souls were drawn into it. Now, it was more like drawing the energy out into the air and then attaching it to a tether before it could escape to the world after.

-1 Monster Soul.

The ghost barely looked like an orc. Its body was amorphous and translucent, and only its red eyes and large fangs showed the monster it had once been. The blade didn’t summon the creature to study it, though; instead, with a thought, it sent the thing floating off into the dark, and as it did, it watched it go, first through its own eyes, and once it turned the corner through the ghost’s own eyes.

Zombies were crude warriors that had to be puppeted, and least broadly in groups, and death knights were faster and fiercer, which made them able to act more on their own. Ghosts were more autonomous and could travel much farther, maybe even ten times further, but they were little more than scouts.

Fortunately, right now, scouts were all it needed. After a minute, it figured out that the thing moved faster if it pushed it, but it seemed to tire and grow thin, becoming even more translucent, so the sword stopped, letting the thing drift slower rather than fade entirely. Instead, when the ghost reached a fork in the path, it sent it left, then summoned another one to go to the right.

The second ghost was a human soul, and it moved quite a bit faster, even if it was no more substantial than the first. Slowly but surely, they drifted farther apart, exploring the tunnels. As the ghosts encountered other forks, the blade created more of the insubstantial undead, but still, even after exploring several miles of passages in all directions, it found no promising leads. Some tunnels lead upward or downward. Some led to large caverns or ended unexpectedly in dead ends, but none of them revealed any of the accursed dwarves that had dug these places, or any new paths to freedom.

-3 Monster Souls.

-8 Human Souls.

After a dozen ghosts wandering the tunnels, the blade had to stop summoning more. It wasn’t that it couldn’t, but that it was getting lost in the different locations. Its minions ranged across miles in different directions now, but it was difficult to keep all of their locations in its mind.

As they drifted, they found enough signs of life to tell a story, but that story was that this was a very old mine that had long since been abandoned. It held nothing but cob webs, tapped out veins, and dust. The blade hoped it would goblins, at least, or some vermin. A goblin could show it the way to the surface. Even a rat might prove there was a way to the surface, even if the blade couldn’t read an animal’s mind.

Unfortunately, it didn’t find even that much. By the time Geral woke several hours later, the blade still had no plan. Unfortunately, by then the ghosts had all reached the end of their tether, so it let its wielder start walking through the endless darkness just so it could extend its ghostly feelers a little further.

Hours later, it finally found something promising. One of the ghosts found recent footprints, and a short time later, a lit lantern hanging from a peg. That was enough to take control over Geral and sprint toward the distant tunnel.

The way was circuitous, and it had to double back more than once, but it drew closer to its ghost like a compass needle, and soon arrived to study the place itself. What it found then made it take heart, but it was not the light or the footprints that offered real hope. It was the sounds of rivalry somewhere beyond.

Somewhere nearby, dwarves were drinking and enjoying themselves. That meant freedom, or at least a clue that would lead it there. It was practically home free.

The weapon tried to reabsorb the ghosts then, but those efforts were largely fruitless. Those that were distant were entirely out of reach, and only the one that its wielder could physically pass its blade through was recaptured, though even that wretched thing was thin and weakened by the way it had been used.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

+1 Weakened Soul.

As they moved to the end of the tunnel, they found a door. It was locked, but it did nothing to slow it down. Neither did the half dozen dwarves who were surprised by its appearance. Most only had enough time to stop laughing at whatever shared joke they were laughing at. Only two had time to put down their tankards, and only one had time to lift his axe. None of them offered meaningful resistance or shouted an alarm.

+704 Life Force.

+6 Dwarven Souls.

The blade immediately seized the brightest of the souls and demanded, Tell me where I am, and where the quickest way to the surface is.

What poured into its mind then was the overview of the city they were currently three levels beneath, Torgen-Murag, the Spire City. The blade had never heard of it, and neither had any of the other souls it had questioned on this trip, but it quickly became apparent why.

The city was built inside the nearest mountain, and rarely interacted with the outside world. As the recently dead soul told it everything, the blade ignored his encyclopedic information on the clans and the industries of the ancient place and focused instead on its layout. The lower city was layer after layer of old mines that had been converted into buildings and thoroughfares. Though they were tangled, the blade would be able to move through that part easily enough.

The upper city was more delicate and grandiose, but better guarded. It had any number of buildings that doubled as pillars holding up the mountain above them, but the blade didn’t care about those, only the exit.

Ahead, and then to the left, the blade told its wielder, guiding him through the cramped dwarven maze of the streets beyond. They saw other dwarves as they moved, but ignored them as long as they could. It was only when they reached the upper city that it clashed with real warriors for the first time.

The guards fell quickly enough, but one battle-hardened veteran managed to parry two death blows at the cost of his weapon and his arm before he perished. He even managed to make Geral bleed, though neither the Ebon Blade nor his wielder registered the blow as it ended the little man.

-22 Life Force.

+99 Life Force.

+2 Dwarven Souls.

The blade had enjoyed the battle, but it did not slow to savor it. Instead, it forced itself up and out, cutting through the walls of dwarven soldiers and past them into the streets beyond. There was a whole city down here. It could see that now. Normally, it might have stayed to slaughter the inhabitants to pay back Gordon-val, the dwarvish god that had sought to imprison it, but instead, it spared them and moved toward the giant bronze gate that towered over most of the buildings in the city.

+212 Life Force.

+8 Dwarven Souls.

As long as I am underground, I can still be buried, it told itself.

It didn’t have to force Geral to ignore them. He killed whoever crossed his path, but moved purposefully toward the exit while the alarm gongs read somewhere nearby.

By the time they reached the gate, an entire division of dwarven warriors had formed up. Each of them stood with gleaming platemail and perfectly polished halberds. It wanted nothing more than to fight them and see just how strong their armor was. Instead, with a single slash, Geral set them all ablaze with Hellfire and then used Bolt to move past them, embedding in their guard captain before he even realized he was in danger.

-75 Life Force.

+68 Life Force.

+4 Dwarven Souls.

“Steady!” he called out. “We must—” Those were his last words.

The blade had just enough time to appreciate the strange taste of dwarven steel before he split the dwarf's heart, and Geral split him in two. It was a waste to skip the warriors, but it longed for blue skies now and wanted more than anything to cleave through the door. It turned out to be more than three feet thick, but the heavy reinforced bronze was neither thick enough nor strong enough to stop it, and it sliced through the thing with three powerful Vorpal Strikes.

+7 Dwarven Souls.

While the dwarves burned behind it, and died bellowing in pain, it cut a huge, crude triangle in the door, and then Geral forced the loose part free. Revealing a cavern further beyond. That was a surprise to the guards standing on the far side, but even as its wielder began to dispatch those surprised dwarves, it focused on the cavern. It couldn’t see the outside world yet, but it could see its essence rippling across the stone fabric of the stone.

+4 Dwarven Souls.

After a brief battle where it got one last taste of thick, dwarven blood, in left warm bodies in its wake as they moved in that direction. What greeted it weren’t the blue skies it had been hoping for, but black ones. Still, that was enough. As Geral moved to close with the watchman at the entrance, it finally allowed itself to relax and enjoy the encounter. Despite everything that had happened, and everything that had almost happened, they were free.

+99 Life Force.

+1 Dwarven Soul.