It was early afternoon and the three wood knights all stood on the road in front of the church. The soon to be battlefield had all been prepared and the standing torches were all lit.
Bean and Mae both looked on as E took the dried manure and molded it into balls the size of a fist. After some careful strikes of flint the first ball began to smolder. E tossed it to Bean.
" Alright bean toss them up and through those windows. Mae, run up and kick the front door open after three make it inside." He held up three fingers and pointed to the broken stained glass on the second floor of the church. "Just bust it open and run back. When you're back here I'll throw the rest in and back up to my position."
Bean lobbed the first smoking dung ball up and into the first window. Unfortunately it landed right inside the window frame and bounced back down. Mae looked at E with a bit of greif. He had added one more piece to the plan just as it began but rather than fight it Mae just planted her sword and got ready to charge. The next few balls that got thrown all made it inside. E then got up and rubbed his hands on the standing torch. There wasn't any time to fuss to much about the manure on his hands he just needed a good grip. They all stood there for a few moments to see if the smoke was working.
After five or so minutes the trio began to see smoke rising slowly from the broken windows. " Yes! Perfect okay Mae get ready when I say, run and kick it open and run back."
Mae rolled her eyes, then she knelt down in a sprinters stance. E and Bean began to share the smolder amongst their last few dung balls and held them at the ready. " Mae Now!"
Mae darted off in a full charge towards the doors. Bean winced as the heat in his hands began to overcome him but held on ready to throw. E stood there ready to lobby the last few balls they had left. Mae had built up a heavy footed charged and around the last few steps she had as she closed in on the door she lept up at kicked out both of her feet commando style at the door. At this moment every one became shocked. Mae's feet made contact with the door and as they did she was met with zero resistance as the door was made out of web! It looked whole heartedly like a door but Mae just slid into it as it made it up to her waist before she fell onto the threshold. She looked back at them " HELP!"
Bean tossed aside his dung balls and began to sprint towards the building. E stood there with his mouth agape breifly before coming to his senses. He dropped the dung balls and grabbed his bow and knocked an arrow, in his quick thinking he lit the tip of it just behind the arrow head on fire and released it into the doorway.
Combat Initiated
A notification pinged in front of E. At that moment he look at Beans back who was running towards Mae and Mae was crawling forward fighting the web kicking and screaming for help, she was moments away from tears. E realized time had slowed in this moment and as he looked on at his companions he couldn't help but feel foolish. The open doorway beyond her seemed to be extremely dark and webs were strewn everywhere. Standing just behind Mae loomed a large figure. Just then the slow pace of time sped back up and E look on in horror as a large spider the size of a cow stood behind Me who was almost free of the web.
" Fffooooooodd!" the large beast in the shadow stuttered out. At that moment two hands clasped the top two corners of the doorframe and into the light a dark haired top half of a man leaned out of the doorway over Mae. It moved slowly and E noticed it had an arrow in it's shoulder. It's a Dryer! E was horrified.
" Bean! FIGHT!" E yelled out to Bean as he had almost stopped in his tracks. Bean grabbed the javelin off his back and pressed on. Mae seemed to have fainted under the Dryder. E began to step forward and release arrows rapidly in his now approach to the building
Up close and Deadly activated - 2 MP
Up close and Deadly activated - 2 MP
E released 6 arrows in quick succession using the rest of his mana. He felt the strain hit him immediately afterwards.
Fft! Fft! Crack! Fft! Crack! Thunk!
Three of his arrows pelted the Dryder deep into it's chest, another went into the doorframe and the other two shot wildly into the upper threshold of the doorway breaking on it's stone. Bean was charging in. As the Dryder reeled momentarily, Bean jumped up a skewered it directly into it's stomach. Afterwards he climbed on top of it using the arrows E had shot into it and did the unthinkable.
" Arrggghhh!" the Beastly creature cried out and stumbled back into the church, the sound of wooden pews and fumbling continued on briefly before Bean was seen flying out of the doorway onto the ground quite a few feet backwards.
E had narrowly dodged a flying goblin and was quickly dragging Mae back from the building. " MAE! MAE wake up!" E was screaming at her as they backed up. E passed Bean who was standing up brushing himself off. He held a strange grim grin and dark blood could be seen on his chin.
Mae woke up as she was being drug, and stood up quickly, in a fit of anger she pushed herself up yanking her arms from E. She was just about to begin yelling but ran a few paces to her planted sword and brandished it. " You li.."
" I know! I fucked up okay! Afterwards! Get ready!" E interjected her before the squabble began. Bean grabbed two large stones and prepped himself. The three of them stood there ready for the insects to begin storming out. Their hearts all thumping madly in their chest. Bean burped and the coughed out a clump that hit the dirt.
" Definitely not the best thing I've ever eaten." Bean said as they all took quick glances at the mass on the ground.
" Is that a?" E grew squimish and green.
" Yup, got his eye, like sucking a snail hahaha!" Bean seemed proud of himself.
Mae looked on at the two of them briefly and recalled herself screaming for help. She felt a deep scar as this memory ingrained in her brain. " I almost died... I .."
She pushed the thought aside as a commotion began to stir withing the church more wooden scraping and furniture rubbing the ground sounds began to chime out. After a couple second it grew eerily quiet.
" Uraaaaagghghhhhhh" The dryders top half appeared at the doorway quickly shocking the trio. Everyone got a quick fright. E look on at the panting beast, Mae and Bean trembled.
As it stepped forward E's analysis skill began. As time slowed momentarily he couldn't help but notice the half of its face that wasn't marred by Bean showed anger fear and sadness in a deep scowl. One tear fell quickly from the Dryder, and then another from E.
Will save rolled - Success
6%...7%...
E pulled back his arrow and shot it out quickly in response as time began to catch up. Sshhk!
A quick thud and a collapse of the beast came Shortly afterwards as smoke flowed out of the doorway. The dryder lay there twitching briefly before it became still.
Mae and Bean stood there quaking. E wiped his hands in the light snow and then on his pants. " I guess that's that. Nothing else seems to be coming out. Mae let's just talk about this back at the inn, we still have to clear out the building to make sure. The quest said nothing about this, we can only assume there are more spiders or the like inside. Grab the torches."
Bean grabbed the torches and Mae in her gloom took one and they followed behind E. They approached the building again, this time quite carefully. Bean stepped forward and kicked snow on the Dryder. It didn't move so he grabbed it by the hair and drug it out of the building, E stood vigilant at the doorway with Mae. after dragging it out a bit Bean yanked his javelin out of it's stomach and followed up towards them.
" Mae don't burn the webbing, I care if things catch fire. We will do a quick sweep and a little digging we need to know why this dryder is here." E whispered back to them and took point. He began to step quietly and carefully with his arrow half strung.
The church was in dire disarray, broken glass, furniture and webs were strewn all about. The temperature in here was just a gentle warmth which still puzzled them. the smoke balls of dung had all gone out and it stunk to high heaven's, but there was more rot to it than anything else. With the torchlight and the fading sunlight peeking through the windows above the could see just well enough, E had the best vision here. They made their way around the open gathering room, every once in awhile the husk of a spider could be seen but they were all long dead and cracked or collapsed to the gentle prodding of the group.
They had finally made it to the front stage area where next to a large organ that filled the back wall a podium stood, and between the two a few rotting carcasses lie. Getting closer they discerned that they were actually skeletons with rotting flesh on their bones, they look to be the average adventurer party of four. The three of them all looked at each other and felt the pressure of what could have been them weigh on them heavily. After a few more minutes passed and quite a few more spider husks being prodded they made their way back outside.
They look down on the body of the dryder. The story here spoke for itself. Mae was the first to give her analysis of the situation. " I think it was starving. It even ate the spiders that were inside. I remember it saying food.. It must have been weak, you can even see it's bones and ribcage on the more human half. And the leg here, it's already been cleaved off and healed. The previous party must have hurt it badly but ended up losing to it. I'd say we had oppertune timing, but it doesn't make sense.."
E and Bean nodded in agreement but grew longing for her to finish. " What doesn't make sense?" Bean asked.
" Why was the quest on the board, did someone know the party who arrived before had failed?"
This time E chimed in. " No there were no clauses on this task, any amount of parties may have had a hand at it. The only thing I can add to what you came to the conclusion of is that it's likely this quest wasn't about the bugs, or the dryder. What really doesn't make sense is why they would task this at the lower tiers of D+. This is easily in the C's, had it not been frail we would have been felled as well. It has something to do with why the church is warm. Something is fishy here. And look at the dryder more carefully.. Do you see what it's wearing? A robe... a priests robe."
Bean and Mae got closer and flipped the dryder over. Bean rifled though the clothing to find anything that could lead to an answer, but found nothing. E stopped him.
" Bean, let it be. Mae start making a grave, we can search the church afterwards for clues or treasure but... just let this thing rest now." Mae nodded and ran towards an area that hadn't been used yet for graves and began digging with her sword. Bean stood up and looked at E with a shrug.
" E, what about the ones inside? We gonna bury them? They look well equipped I even saw a shi-" E cut him off.
" Not now. We will, but this place.. something isn't right here, I don't think we are done. I can feel it."
E had looked on at his class menu while they still hadn't entered the church. He had a notification pop up after killing the dryder. He hadn't taken the time to read it under his Seer's tab because he was alarmed at his first status page.
Combat initiated
Lastly he noticed something else that confirmed his suspicion.
level 0 - 187/100 - 187%
Level up not available in combat.
Something else was still here, they were still in combat. The question was, why hadn't it made a move? Where was it?