Book 8: The War For Noobtown, Chapter 1

Chapter 1 - Jim Goes Down to Jersey, Looking for a Soul to Steal

“I expected this to be a bit more of a challenge,” I stated nonchalantly, stepping through the portal to Jersey.  Well, we were more like Jersey-adjacent.  I wasn’t quite sure where we were in the topology of Ordinal, but the whole place smelled terrible.  It looked even worse.

“At least he named it appropriately,” I offered, wrinkling my nose.

“You only learned Scent as a skill.  I was born with it,” grumbled Badgelor, crinkling his face.  “This place smells worse every time.”

If you excluded the columns of fire and brimstone and the lake of molten lava, this place looked like a dump.  Ruins were piled high everywhere.  An archeologist would have a field day here, assuming they weren’t eaten by monsters.

“I wish Filly was here,” said Shart, Filly’s hat materializing in his hands. Badgelor grunted, and looked at me imploringly.

“Maybe he’s closer than you think,” I said gesturing towards Badgelor.

Shart excitedly looked over and frowned, “That’s just the stupid badger.”

“Feck you too,” said Badgelor.

“Well, that didn’t work,” I said. “Focus people.”

We weren’t there to see the sights, though.  We had come to Jersey to find Jarra’s soul.  I didn’t yet know what we’d do when we found it, but I knew that I had to recover it.  Otherwise, she would be lost forever.

“What’s that?” I asked, pointing at what appeared to be an industrial scale meat grinder.  Occasional blasts of dark smoke from the top gave this wasteland its “forever lost in hell” vibe.

“Soul Cleanser,” said Shart.  He was riding inside my mind, peering out through my eyes as though they were windows.  I didn’t understand why he’d done that, but, given his last interaction with demons, I suspected he was hiding from something.  Or someone.

What would worry an elder demon?

“We don’t have time for this detour, Dum Dum,” stated Shart.

“I don’t think we have an alternative to this detour,” I replied, stepping down onto the hard, dusty ground. It crunched slightly under my feet.  I experimentally cast a Portal nearby.  The magical hole seemed to open normally.

“We can’t be doing this just to save your girlfriend.  She’s already dead,” Shart said bluntly.

“You can’t be sure of that,” I replied gruffly.  “Besides, there are other reasons.”

“What could those other reasons possibly be?” asked the demon.

“If you recall, none of the Treasures of Rule, or any other weapon I’ve yet encountered, can actually hurt Charles,” I explained, pushing aside a large piece of rebar from a destroyed building.  “I’m hoping something down here will do the job.”

“That’s actually not completely dumb,” said Shart, shaking his head.  “What happened to you?”

“It's a day that ends in ‘y’.  I’m thinking about killing Charles,” I replied.

“I’m so proud of him,” stated Badgelor.

“I guess,” grumbled Shart.

“Puma check,” yelled Badgelor, placing his paw on my shoulder.

“I know,” I replied, walking straight toward the hidden shape.  It would have appeared invisible to most, but not me. I could see it through my Mastered Perception skill.  The absence of something was being highlighted in my vision.

I’d like to have been better equipped here.  My Lion armor had been ruined in the fight with Grebthar.  I’d also lost my sword, though I did have the hilt of Excalibur with me, for all the good that would do.  I was effectively walking around in my traveling clothes in the most dangerous area of Ordinal.

Fortunately, I could kill and skin pretty much anything at this point, and invisible armor sounded interesting.

We kept walking forward until I finally got to the range where I assumed whatever it was would have to attack, or move.  I hoped it didn’t slink away, I wouldn’t get the armor.  The entire question was academic as I put my foot down the ‘nothing’ suddenly surged forward striking with a clawed appendage fully capable of tearing a normal man’s arm off.

I was a Monk, and a Weapon’s Master.  That allowed me to use all my weapon perks on all of my weapons, and that included my arms.

· Powerful Block:  You have blocked the succubus, Tabitha’s, claw strike.  You have executed a Powerful blow.  Tabitha is knocked off balance.  You take 27 points of Damage.

I hissed, jerking my arm back.  A pool of acidic poison was busy melting through my flesh.  It had bypassed most of my resistances, and my poisoner perk wasn’t active meaning that what little I could do didn’t help.

“I think I can fix that,” said Shart and he started working on my character sheet.

Tabitha had fared little better.  I had blocked her hard enough to send her flying backwards.  She landed hard, smashing into a ruined wall.  The invisibility effect began to warble and the succubus’ form became apparent.

“That is the most hideous thing I’ve ever seen,” I exclaimed.  Tabitha looked like a praying mantis had exploded out of a human body.  Half of her face made up the top of the creature’s head.  Her breasts were leaking the poison acid, and her arms had split into multiple appendages with a mantis-like blade for cutting and pincers.

“Woohoo,” yelled Shart.  “Check out the claws and pincers on that one.”

“I thought succub’ were supposed to be attractive,” I yelled as she started squirting acid at me, machine gun style.

“It is succubi," said Shart.  "On the surface they appear with attractive feminine characteristics, part of it is an illusion effect that you can see right through if you tried. Down here, they don’t bother with the disguise.”

“They all look like this,” I said, flipping over another strike as she moved towards me in a series of claw swipes.  I had every defensive technique known to Ordinal, allowing me to use my Mana or Stamina to avoid strikes.  She was not handling the variety well, and I could sense her starting to get frustrated at her constant failure to hit me.

Then came the scream as Badgelor found her partner.  Tabitha’s head swung around far more than it should have and she found Ultimate Badgelor ripping the guts out of another thin and curvy demon, this one had blades where his knees and arms should have been, as well as a large horn protruding from his…

“You know I hate the fact that there are male succubus’ on Ordinal, right,” I said as I closed with Tabitha, slamming my fist into her hardened carapace with enough force to crack it even as my leg simultaneously struck at her knee, shattering it.

“You act like demons have genders at all, which is stupid even for you, dum dum,” said Shart.  “We are demons, we have about as many biological similarities to humans as you do to trees.”

Tabitha attempted to bite me, but my hands grabbed her by either side of her mandible filled mouth.  The very human tongue in the middle of that garbage disposal was enough to give me nightmares.  I activated Powerful Lift and twisted her head around sharply.

When that didn’t work because her head fully rotated, I jammed a foot into her shoulder and pulled, finally yanking her head free in a shower of gore.

“So all they do is go to the surface to serve mortals, or eat them?  Sounds kind of depressing actually.” I said.  Badgelor seemed to have things well in hand so I examined Tabitha’s corpse.

· Salvage opportunity:  You can salvage the corpse of the demon Tabitha to recover 12 units of Demonic Chitten.  The Chitten possesses the following enchantment, Invisibility.  Mana must be expended to maintain the enchantment.

Thankfully I didn’t really have to skin her.  I activated my Salvage skill and all of Tabitha’s various parts collapsed into several piles.  Her organs were processed down to biological cubes, which I left.  Her claws and other ‘weapons’ materialized and I glanced at a few.  The claws could be used to make a sword, were I interested in such a thing.

· Salvage Skill: Rank up!  You are now Master at the Salvage skill.  Please select a perk.

“That’s what I’m talking about.  Open wide,” I said to Shart, grabbing the parts.

“Go feck yourself,” replied Shart.  “Demons can’t eat demons.”

“I meant to put her into your storage,” I said.

“There isn’t a difference,” Shart replied.  His vast dimensional storage was where I tended to keep pretty much everything.  I had my own, but it was tiny and I tended to only fill it up with the essentials.

Badgelor waddled over, “You finished yammering yet?”

“Not quite,” I said, examining my knuckles, “This is therapeutic and all, but I really need a weapon.”

“You do have Tony’s Anvil,” said Shart as I pulled an odd bone out of my fist.  “You should make an enchanted weapon.”

“One capable of smashing the Amulet of the Dark Overlord” I said after a moment.

“Yup, save the Crystal for Badgelor,” said Shart.  “Besides, the Amulet is going to be hard enough.”

“Could I drain the amulet, heck, could I drain the crystal?” I asked.

“The crystal absolutely not, it is Divine Tier, you are not,” said Shart as if that explained everything… which it sadly did.  My Mystical Lore skill helpfully told me that as a non-divine tier body, my puny mind would snap if I even tried it.

I was preparing to ask about the amulet when a memory of Jersey flashed through my mind and Charles was standing next to me.  He looked proud and confident, with a much younger Badgelor riding on his shoulder.  Then it was gone and I put the idea of draining an intelligent thing out of my mind.   One was enough.

“So just smash the amulet,” I said.

“That’s still going to be tricky,” said Shart.  “The amulet is ‘only’ an artifact tier piece of equipment, meaning that it is next to impossible to destroy.  You are really going to have to Jim something up to manage that.”

“Where there’s a will, there’s a way,” said Badgelor.

“I suppose,” I said standing up and surveying the wreckage.  My last encounter with Charles was weighing on me, he seemed crazy.  That wasn’t it though, it was something else.  I noticed Badgelor looking at me so I changed the subject.  “I figured this would be harder.”

Badgelor looked at Shart and then back to me, “Jim, I love your attitude but seriously, you have to stop this.”

“Dum Dum, those were the scouts.”

I squinted toward a large tower in the distance.  Dozens of demons, including one that was the size of a house, ran at us.

“Oh.”