Needless to say once the merchant was finishing emptying his stomach upon the ground, Alexander was summarily dismissed from duties. This was hardly a surprise, an underling usurping command to summarily deal with a threat wasn't something the merchant could tolerate, add on top of that, said underling puking in his face? Alexander at this point wasn't all there, the rest after the large casting had dealt with some of the more serious issues but relying on his magic so soon after waking up was essentially not only scraping the bottom of an empty barrel, but carving into that bottom just to make sure. Alexander could feel two sets of arms hoisting him from the ground before his consciousness fled once more.
The time in darkness was rather short he felt though, as his brain rebooted itself and reminded him that his body was running on pain and fumes it also noticed he didn't awake on the badlands ground with Laytalya looking over him, rather the jostle of a wagon in motion told him he was still with the caravan. Cracking his eyes open carefully he glanced to the side to see Melissa and Laytalya sat beside a low table. Winston and Watson sat opposite the women with Winston looking rather bloated, even through the haze Alexander could see the large warrior guzzling a canteen.
Alexander groaned and tried to sit up startling the quartet, before either Melissa or Laytalya could speak Watson was beside him a firm hand gripping his shoulder. The younger fighters face was filled with urgency that cut through even Alexander's hazy mind, "Wha? What's... wrong?"
Watson shook Alexander lightly a low growl on his lips, "Its my brother! You have to undo whatever hex you put on him! Hurry! He's fit to burst if he continues sucking down water like this!"
Alexander looked curiously at Watson before craning his neck to look to Winston puzzled. "Removed my spell. Didn't put any hex on him."
Watson snarled, "You're lying, why would he have this unquenchable thirst if not for a hex! Melissa has been healing him since the fight but his thirst just grows, you have to have done something else!"
Alexander blinked, glancing from brothers to Melissa, "You're saying you've been casting healing spells on him all this while?"
Melissa nodded briskly, "None of my prayers to heal or cure slacked the thirst, even my remove curse psalms did naught but make him wish to drown himself."
Alexander sighed and lightly smacked Watsons hand away, weak as he was the young fighter had not expected it and had let go. "Stop healing him. It's YOUR spells making him thirsty."
Melissa snorted crossing her arms, "Healing spells don't cause such side effects!"
Alexander coughed laying back down lifting a hand to massage between his eyes, "Give it a day, no more healing spells. The thirst will most likely dissipate then. If not I'll fix him, but it will be more troublesome. This is a situation where more magic is the problem, his body needs to flush it out." He'd discovered it early in his old life as a bully boy and scoundrel, the Path of Priests didn't just wave their hands and gods cured all things. Supposed divinity in fact incited the body to heal itself. It was why there were limits to clerical healing, getting ripped in half couldn't be healed, regenerating your lower half just took too much to regenerate, the body would kill itself trying.
This is what he suspected here. If Melissa had been casting healing spells on Winston's already healthy body, rather than having no effect it could be said Winston's natural regenative ability was trying to cannibalize his body. The thirst was his body trying to take in fluids to replace what was being destroyed by his own immune system. Alexander had learned the secret behind "divine" healing in his childhood. These clerics merely urged the body to heal itself faster than normal. For young Alexander it had been a broken arm, being a macho minded kinda guy he refused to be put to sleep for the procedure.
He learned the hard way this was not to make the healing easier for the cleric, it was to spare the target the pain.
Five. Long. Hours.
That's the time the healing spell had taken to fix his broken arm. Every moment of bone twisting back into proper alignment, of flesh, muscle and blood reforming around the injury was his entertainment for that handful of hours. By the time it was all over he had been tempted to just slice the limb off at the shoulder but had been too afraid the lingering spell would try to regrow his entire arm! If Tress was the same way, it wasn't that Melissa's spells fizzled and did nothing, instead they were eating his body alive trying to correct genetic flaws since there was no physical wound. The thirst was his body trying to compensate for the magic trying to rewrite the flaws in his DNA.
This, of course, assumed the laws of divine magic were the same here. If Tress was different from his homeland then in a day he'd use his [Rot] spell to give the excess divine energy something to heal. For now as he rested he could hear Watson hurrying back to Winston while another approached. The cot creaked a bit as another sat beside him and fidgety slowly. Alexander rolled his eyes behind his closed eye lids. "Yes Melissa?"
Melissa sighed fidgeting all the more. She wanted to thank him for his efforts with the bandit, apologize for her behavior and scream at him for his continued disrespect. The war of which she should lead off with had her anxiously swaying back and forth emotionally. Exhaling slowly she spoke softly, "I wish to offer my thanks that you did not forsake me and the others as easily as the merchant would have. It was well within the challenge rules that you could have ordered me to that vile man's arms and do so with a smile for losing."
Alexander cracked open an eye to regard the priestess, the woman was not nearly attractive as Laytalya, though they shared the typical Tress dark skin, where his companion was a little top heavy the priestess was very much pear shaped. Were they back on earth she'd definitely be the text book definition of thicc. That was not to say she was ugly mind you, just she was more an ass man's dream than one such as himself who admired the curvature of the chest. Sighing he struggled to sit up, "My conflict with you had no true hatred. I just despise being talked down to, beating you at your own challenge was merely a way to get you to reign in that sour demeanor. To assuage your other worry, while I demanded equal rights in the challenge, it was not to humiliate and put an end to you. Your friends informed me of a potential business venture and I'd rather go into it as equals."
Dropping back down he waved weakly, "Now please priestess, some rest for the wicked if you would, I am not really in good sorts for an involved discussion." While he had no intention of slipping back into the bliss of oblivion he did need to focus on reclaiming his energy. It always seemed to return faster when he was relaxed and focused, so a prolonged talk would only serve to keep him feeling wasted. If not only to return to a mire whole and full state there was still the matter of the bandits. Seeing as he was still in the caravan if they did retaliate he was sure that bastard in charge would be all too willing to serve the killer of the raid leader up as a peace offering and next time it wouldn't be as easy to handle with a single casting.
Thankfully Melissa seemed to get the hint and left him to the rest he needed, neither Laytalya nor Winston jumped up to take the vacant bedside vigil seat either so perhaps the priestess was also running interference. Regardless he let his focus center, drawing in the energy he needed to replenish his tired, aching body. For the first time he let his mind study himself feeling a familiar screen appear inside his eye lids...
===================
Name: Alexander Caven ; Alex Maybell
Title: Dungeon Lord Alexander, The Demon Caven
Path: Death
Physical: 5 Charm: 4
Mental: 8 Luck: 6
Mystical: 9 Talent: 5
Level: 5 Advancement: 5%
Path Abilities: Deaths Gaze (Basic), Reaper Tenacity (Basic), Death Magic (Initiate)
Spells: [Rot] - 90%, [Create Slime] - 5%, [Create Skeletal Horror] - 0%, [Eyes of Translation] - 10%, [Death Bolt] - 40%, [Blood Lance] - 70%, [Bone Cage] - 10%, [Create Infectious Undead] - 50%, [Create Skeletal Warriors] - 80%, [Create Lesser Undead] - 100%, [Feign Death] - 20%, [Mimcry] - 30%
Dungeon Abilities: Rallying Call (Basic), Leadership (Novice), Dungeon Recall (Basic)
Equipment: Fine Adventurer Gear, Light Leather Glove, 13 silver whorls, 210 copper marks.
In Treasury
500 Golden Rulers
190 Silver Knights
Patent of Nobility (House Caven)
Genealogy of House Caven
500 copper marks
200 silver whorls
3 sets of Tier two gear
1 set of Tier one gear
In Transit
100 Teir One Skeleton Warriors
100 Teir Two Zombie Warriors
Allies: Jansea (Intermeadiate Succubus) - 60
Shank (Imperical Hell Pig) - 50
Thersea (Novice Hero) - Dead*
Laytalya (Slave Warrior) - 30
Melissa (Slave Cleric) - 5
===================
Frowning to himself Alexander focused on his rather lackluster stats. It had been awhile since he'd last perused his sheet but he could well see his physical stat had dropped by a point while the mystical nature if his being had absorbed a point. Beneath his glove he felt the numbness of the undead appendage, did this mean he could go all out five more times before his physique became truly undead? No only his arm up past his elbow had changed, even if he drained his energy another twenty times, at this rate he'd barely have changed half his body right?
Still it was a disturbing notion to think on, just what would happen if his whole body became undead? Would he die and be a mindless monster or would he just cease being human? Sighing inwardly he scanned the rest of the sheet, to no surprise Melissa had been enslaved but her loyalty was near non existent. The mass of undead he raised were still in transit so they'd not been discovered yet. He wondered just how long his good luck would hold. Considering his current situation, Death was due a twist of fate at any point now, or at least, needed to pop in and give some sagely advice or something. In all honesty it had been a decent stretch of time since last his tormentor had made himself apparent.
Wait.
Alexander felt like punching himself just then. He was missing that pale faced asshole? He almost gave a scream of frustration before focusing on replenishing his energy again. If nothing else this chance to focus had enlightened him on one truth: Better he stay unconscious until he recovered, this meditation crap just lead to his mind thinking up weird shit! Damn, was he so bored to miss Death when the bastard seemingly took a vacation from being a snide voice by his ear? He needed to get back on his feet right now.
As if listening to his thoughts the carriage suddenly lurched to a stop. Alexander could hear the merchant screaming at the guards, his voice was more angry than scared so it could be guessed it wasn't a raid party. Something else had apparently happened. Melissa was of a similar notion and even as Alexander opened his eyes he saw Watson and Laytalya both heading out to investigate. Glancing to Melissa and Winston both shrugged, in the caravan train the passenger wagons were further back so whatever had pissed off the lead merchant was unseeable from there.
In a few minutes Watson came running back out of breath, "Priestess, its gone."
Melissa had a puzzled expression looking as Watson collected himself, "Just what is gone?"
Watson swallowed lowering his canteen and shook his head, "The border waystation. It's been razed to the ground. All the soldiers and travellers we found were staked out for the crows and vultures. We found no fires so its safe to say it was attacked days ago."
Alexander sighed looking at the roof of the carriage. So even before the bandit bunch were sent packing their group had likely attacked the border site. While it wasn't the final destination, it was the last place to stock up on supplies before the badlands gave way to desert. Apparently whoever had taken the area was a believer in scorched earth tactics for as Watson continued it was revealed that at least the initial few wells they had tested had been fouled, there were more of course, but it was looking like they could not replenish their water here. The nearest oasis was two to three days travel off course but whoever had raided the border camp was likely waiting there to exploit those that needed water...