Nightmare Realm Summoner

“Slow down,” Hazel hissed, holding a hand up. “Are all of you like this? Or did Nobody just send the other psychopath to deal with this?”

“Can I decline to comment?” Wess asked. “And I don’t think I’m a psychopath, thank you very much. Psychopaths don’t feel emotion or something along those lines, yeah? That couldn’t be farther from what I am. I don’t know what you Outworlders were up to before the System popped up and said hi, but I can promise it was a lot more enjoyable than what I was up to. I’m having a hell of a time with this shit.”

Hazel pressed her fingers to the bridge of her nose. A distant explosion rolled through the ruins around them, sending dust raining down from the ceiling and shaking the ground beneath their feet.

Several people cried out from the boss room, and Brandon’s voice cut through the din as he barked out orders. The Outworlders had things down to a well-oiled machine. But that really wasn’t much surprise to Wess.

Even though it had only been for a very short time, he had been in the Ancestry with Crimson. They were competent warriors. And that might have been an understatement. Crimson knew how to handle dungeon monsters incredibly well.

It was people that they fell short in. The corners of Wess’ lips twitched. He was starting to lose count of the times that Crimson had gotten completely humiliated by completely ignoring every aspect of a fight other than the monster itself.

I guess that’s why Crimson isn’t the top ranked family, eh?

“Glad to see you’re serious,” Hazel grumbled. “You are confident you can do this, right? Because we’re all dead if you screw up.”

“Relax, miss,” Wess said with a sigh. “Do you think I’d throw my life away for no reason? I’m here because I’m good at shooting things. And Glint is here because he’s good at, er, killing things. Painfully.”

“Eloquent,” Hazel said. She sent one more glance at Glint, then grimaced and nodded over her shoulder toward the boss room’s entrance behind them. “Okay. The boss isn’t too close to death yet. It should be at least an hour if not longer. Moving too quickly will ruin everything. We can’t let Brandon get a chance to notice something is up.”

“You sure he won’t notice the fact that you’re missing?”

Hazel shook her head. “My position is rear guard. This is where I’m supposed to be.”

Wess stared at her for a moment. Then he snorted. Crimson was even more terrible at people-skills than he’d thought. Brandon had somehow managed to choose the one person planning his downfall as his rear guard.

At this point, he’s practically asking to get killed. I suppose I’ll just have to oblige him.

“Wow,” Wess said. “That is… unfortunate.”

“Fortune has nothing to do with it,” Hazel replied. “I’ve positioned myself very carefully for this. Everything is arranged for… so long as you hold up your end of things.”

“You arranged a bunch of shit and then left the most important part of the plan to a random bloke that you met for a few minutes at best in an Ancestry?”

“Your sarcasm is wasted. If there’s one thing that can be universally relied upon, it is greed,” Hazel said. “You can’t try to tell me that Mirrorwane isn’t interested in the rewards they can get from this. Getting nearly all the loot from a—”

“Hold on, there,” Wess said, raising a hand. He tilted his head to the side. “Nearly?”

“Nearly,” Hazel repeated. “There’s some I’ll need. Crimson doesn’t go around doing dungeons for no reason. You’ll get the majority of the rewards here. I just need one small thing. Don’t get…”

“Greedy?” Wess arched an eyebrow.

“Don’t start,” Hazel said. “The item is entirely useless to Mirrorwane.”

“Mm,” Wess said.

“Don’t do that.”

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“Do what?”

Hazel pressed her lips together. “That noise. Don’t make it.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Wess said. “But it sounds like the kind of thing we’ll have to figure out when the time comes, won’t we? Bigger things on our plates than some small, unimportant item. Of course, if it is important, then we might have to do a little bargaining. I can’t go back to Mirrorwane and tell everyone I got fleeced, can I?”

“Don’t push your luck,” Hazel said through a clenched jaw. She glanced over her shoulder as another rumble shook the earth, then looked back to Wess. “Just fill your part of the deal and you’ll be compensated with so much that you won’t even be able to bring it back to your city.”

“Mm,” Wess said.

Hazel’s eyes narrowed. Another rumble shook the earth.

“Let’s suspend this discussion for the time being,” Hazel said. “I need to give you an update of exactly what we’re up against. This isn’t just any boss, and we need to ensure we’re on the same page if we want everything to go our way.”

“Probably wise,” Wess allowed. “Go on, then. What’s the plan?”

“The boss is a Great Earthen Elemental,” Hazel said. “That’s why this dungeon is taking so long. They’re huge and impossibly tough. You can probably make the mental connections. Slow, durable, all the things you’re guessing are probably correct.”

“Tough enough that the fight is taking hours?” Wess asked. “I was wondering about that. Is this thing made out of diamonds or some shit?”

“Yes,” Hazel replied. “Functionally. It’s basically impenetrable by all but the most powerful attacks we’ve got.”

“Soul Weapons?”

“Won’t work,” Hazel said with a shake of her head. “Those are most effective against beings with a larger presence in a non-physical domain.”

Wess stared at her.

Hazel sighed. “Ghosts and such.”

“Ah. That makes it clearer. So you’ve just got to chip away at the big bugger for a while. Sure. That does seem like it means it’ll be a bit tough to land the final blow on. It might end up surviving a surprise attack.”

“Yes,” Hazel said. “That’s the point. Though, realistically, I don’t care that much if we land the final blow on the monster. It’s Brandon that needs to die.”

“But I care,” Wess said. “That’s a lot of power and potential Title Fragments that I could be losing. So I appreciate the warning. What’s the toughest attack you lot have got right now? I need to try and estimate where I stand.”

Hazel paused. She clearly wasn’t too eager to share what Crimson’s best abilities were. But, after a few moments, she let out a small huff.

“It’s Brandon. He’s got an ability that lets him charge an arrow with magical energy. It can drill into an enemy and then explode when it hits their core.”

“About how much damage would you say it can do?”

“I’ve seen it kill the final monster in an Adept Rank dungeon in a single shot. The only drawback is he can’t move while he’s readying the ability, and it takes quite a while if he wants to get it up to its full strength.”

Wess nodded slowly. “How long?”

“Roughly a minute.”

“And how many times can he use it?”

“Once. It takes a ton of magical energy. But if it doesn’t go off, he won’t waste the energy. It’ll go back into him unless he shoots the arrow.”

“Noted. Can he store it up?”

“Not right now,” Hazel replied. “But if he manages to get much stronger, then he will. He’ll be able to move while charging the ability as well. It’s what got him where he is now. It’s still repressed by the System, but…”

“Yeah.” Wess scratched his chin. “That’s definitely a problem. And I take it that, if he manages to land the killing blow on this monster, there’s a good chance he’ll manage to get strong enough to get his grubby little hands back on that ability?”

“It’s possible.” Hazel nodded. “And that means our chances of winning the fight will drop to almost zero. He has more people than we do, and his supporters are easily as strong as mine.”

“Noted,” Wess said. “Well, I’ve got no plans of letting anyone other than me land that final blow. Anything else in particular I should be aware of?”

Hazel shook her head. “Not beyond all the normal things one should be aware of. Just keep in mind you’re only going to have a moment to act. Brandon is too experienced to be caught off guard for long.”

“I’d expect as much,” Wess said. He tapped a finger against his gun. “And how long can your people hold off his? If his warriors are better than yours, I’d imagine you’ll need my help finishing them off as well.”

“We should be able to kill some with the element of surprise. It doesn’t matter how strong you are if you get stabbed in the back. But yes, a little backup would be appreciated,” Hazel confirmed. “As long as you can take Brandon out and keep him from landing the final blow on the boss, then there won’t be any major problems.”

“Right on. All I have to do is land a perfect killing blow on the boss then deal with Brandon while you somehow win a fight with 2:1 odds stacked against you. That should be simple enough.”

“Really?” Hazel asked.

“No,” Wess replied. He grinned. “But it’ll definitely be one hell of a shitshow. Realistically speaking, as long as I manage to steal the kill from Brandon, we should have a pretty decent chance of coming out ahead, right?”

Hazel inclined her head. “Yes. That’s the most important part. Don’t try to go for Brandon first. His senses are too good. He’ll probably manage to react and you’ll waste our surprise attack. The best shot we have is to kill the boss and take him out as fast as possible afterward in the chaos that follows. Can you and Nobody’s monster do that?”

Wess glanced at Glint. Then he looked back to Hazel.

“I suppose we’ll find out.”