Phantasmal Party Read online

  "Do it," Ingrid said firmly. "Whatever it does, it has to be better than having my soul enslaved to this creep of a Hermetic."

  Ed opened his status and chose to rank up his Summoner class, and the information on his new class appeared in front of him.

  Phantasmal Spinner

  Tier 1

  Level 1

  0/3000

  'The phantasmal spinner is a summoner who has learned to bind living humans into his conjured phantasms, giving them power in exchange for their service.

  Phantasmal Shard – Distill one of your phantasms into a Shard, which can then be Sliced into any human target, turning them into a Living Phantasm. Limit of 1 Living Phantasm per level

  "I'll give you the hobgoblin," Ed said even as he was activating his new ability, causing his hobgoblin to turn into a ball of blue light before reforming into the largest Shard he'd ever seen. "If this really merges your abilities with the phantasm, the hob is the best match for you."

  "Let's do this," Ingrid said, weakened once again by the poison. "I don't have much time left."

  Ed took the large green Shard, and brought it closer to Ingrid, who took hold of its lower part and aimed it at the middle of her chest. Ed pushed the Shard in, and it slid into her, leaving a pale green pentagon between her breasts.

  As soon as the Shard was fully Sliced, Ed started channeling his mana into healing Ingrid. The healing ability of a summoner was a rarely used ability, since it only healed one health per mana point, giving it the worst ratio of all known healing abilities. Its only advantages were that it had unlimited range, and was instant to use. The ability quickly drained away all of Ed's mana, and he drank the party's last mana potion in order to keep healing Ingrid. By the time the potion's mana boost ran off, the poison affecting Ingrid had worn off, and while she wasn't up to full strength, she was at least out of immediate danger.

  Ingrid slowly stood up. She was visibly taller than she was before, and her shoulders broad enough that the stitches on her leather armor threatened to tear. She brought up one of her hands, looking at her pale green skin, her other hand going to her now large, pointed ears and from them to the small white tusks jutting from her lower lip. "This is going to take a while to get used to."

  Lucy sprang up and hugged her lover, tears still streaking her cheeks, and Ingrid grabbed Ed and pulled him into the hug, and the three stood there together for long minutes, relieved to all be alive.

  Ingrid Bjørnson

  Race

  Hobgoblin

  Class

  Shieldmaiden

  Lancer

  Shards

  4/2 (6)

  Strength

  10

  Dexterity

  7

  Wisdom

  6

  Constitution

  11

  Agility

  8

  Intelligence

  7

  HP

  5/51

  Mana

  20

  HP regen

  1.7/hour

  Mana regen

  0.7/hour

  Aura Breach (tier 2): essence gains reduced to 25%, mana regeneration reduced to 10%

  Shard

  Level

  Essence

  Living Phantasm

  NA

  Sealed

  Goblin

  5

  Sealed

  Hobgoblin

  1

  0/5000

  Shieldbearer

  Endurance

  5

  3

  Sealed

  320/3000

  Shieldmaiden

  2

  2400/9000

  Spearman

  Sharpness

  5

  2

  Sealed

  1450/2000

  Lancer

  1

  1160/3000

  Shield Bash

  5

  Sealed

  Provoke

  5

  Sealed

  Retaliate

  2

  540/2000

  Armored Combat

  5

  Sealed

  "We need to decide what we're going to do," Ed said a few minutes later. "That necromancer has to know that the three of us escaped by now."

  "Without James to serve as a beacon, he won't be able to find us inside the Labyrinth," Lucy added, "and with the dead pitcher plant here, we should be safe for a while, at least."

  "We should probably stay here until I can gain enough mana to heal Ing."

  "We should go to my grandfather," Ingrid told them. "I hate to run back to the family, but with Hermes after us we're going to need help."

  "We can't tell them," Ed argued. "The spinner class is even worse than I expected. If I'm reading it correctly, I can Slice the phantasmal Shards into someone even against their will."

  "Nasty," Lucy winced. "But does it really matter? It doesn't look like Ing has changed much, other than those cute tusks."

  "That's a good question. Give me an order, Ed."

  "Stand on one foot!"

  Ingrid just stood there, looking a bit confused, then suddenly yelped, and raised one of her feet to the air. "Brrr. Feels a little like having to cough. I can hold it back for a bit, but the itch just gets worse until I do it."

  "Can you put your foot down?" Lucy asked.

  Ingrid slowly brought her foot down, but stopped just a little bit before it touched the ground. "Feeling that itch again. I might be able to stand normally, but it'll be really uncomfortable."

  "You can stand normally," Ed told her, and she breathed a sigh of relief.

  "I have to agree," Lucy said. "There's no way we can let this get public."

  "We still need help though. Even if Hermes does leave us alone, I've got a tier two breach, and all of my open Shards are tier one now, so closing them just by fighting is going to take months, and until I close at least one I effectively have no mana regeneration."

  "Tier two breach? How did that happen?"

  "I had open Shieldmaiden and Retaliate Shards, the hobgoblin had Hobgoblin and Lancer, now I have all four, so tier two breach."

  "Waaaiiiit a minute. You got all of the hobgoblin's Shards? You have two different classes now?"

  "Yeah, she got all them all."

  "It shouldn't even be possible to Slice two Classshards!" Lucy turned to Ed, grabbed his shirt from under his armor, and looked straight into his eyes. "Ed, sweety, as soon as you hit level two of your new class, I'm getting the kobold!"

  "Err, what?"

  "As soon as you can have another living phantasm, I'm getting the kobold. I might be willing to wait long enough to make sure I don't get a breach, but not a minute more."

  "Lucy, are you sure? This isn't something we can reverse, as far as I can tell. And it means that…"

  "I know that!" Lucy interrupted. "And I'm perfectly OK with it. Having two Classshards is worth it."

  She let go of him, and went over to hug Ingrid. "Besides, we already told you we were a package deal."

  ◆◆◆

  It took three hours before Ed had enough mana to fully heal Ingrid, and they waited an extra hour for Ed to summon his so far unused fox-kin phantasm. It was completely useless in a fight, since it didn't have even close to enough mana to cast its one spell, but it would be enough to trigger traps and ambushes, and might gain at least a little essence for its Raceshard.

  "Whatever happened to the goblin's weapon and armor?" Lucy asked suddenly.

  "I haven't the faintest idea," Ed answered her.

  Ingrid, however, took some time to look over her new Shards while they waited. "I think I know. That weird living phantasm Shard has an ability called 'Phantasmal Arms'. Give me a second to see how to activate it."

  Ingrid concentrated for a few seconds, and suddenly a wave of silver and blue light started to flow from the Shard imbedded in her chest, quickly covering her from head to toe, and extending from her right hand and left arm
until she looked like a human-shaped lava lamp holding a spear and shield made of light. The whole process took about ten seconds, after which the light vanished, leaving Ingrid wearing a full set of plate armor, and holding a long, wicked looking spear in one hand, a large shield hanging from her other arm.

  Ed whistled in appreciation, and Lucy clapped her hands at the display as Ingrid started to stretch and jump around, striking at the air with her spear. "This is amazing. The armor is practically weightless, and I could wave this shield around for days without getting tired."

  She kept moving for a few more minutes, getting used to her new fighting expertise and armor, then turned towards her lovers. "We should get going."

  "We should head towards the entrance," Ed decided. "We're down our healer, and we're not in a condition to take out the boss, not to mention the amount of enemies we'll face on the way."

  "I agree. We should also decide now where we're going after we leave the Labyrinth. I still say we should go to my grandfather. I've heard him say before that some knowledge is too dangerous to reveal, so I'm sure he'll understand if we want to keep our secret."

  "I'm with Ing," Lucy added. "At the very least, we can't go back to the Pug. Kevin will tell that creep where we stayed."

  "The Arctology it is," Ed decided. "Fox-kin in front. Ing, can you take second place? I'll bring the rear after Luce and the kobold."

  "I appreciate you asking and not telling," Ingrid smiled at Ed, "but we don't have time for that in a delve. I'll take orders over confusion."

  "I'll take orders out of a delve too," Lucy winked, and Ed felt his face warming as the reduced party set out to escape the Labyrinth.

  Chapter 9:

  The Arctology

  Ingrid’s spear flashed forward, barely slowing as it pierced through a lizardman’s scales and ribs and straight into its heart. The monster died instantly, and the return blow from its mate clanged off of her new armor harmlessly. At her left side, Ed was taking a lot longer to finish off his enemy, even with the aid of his kobold’s Icebolts. Lucy, meanwhile, was busy maintaining a Chromatic Storm on the three lizardmen hunters deeper into the swamp. Ingrid finished her second enemy as quickly as she did her first, and turned to see Ed’s enemy drop after being hit by a triad of Icebolts. A second later, Lucy let her spell peter out, revealing the three now dead hunters.

  “Having trouble keeping up Ed?” Ingrid taunted.

  “Of course not,” Ed answered her jokingly. “I’m obviously in the lead, since my minions and I killed three, and Lucy killed two.”

  “Ooooh,” Lucy joined in. “Shots fired!”

  Before Ingrid could answer, her gaze fell on the Phantasmal Worker carrying James’s body, and her jovial mood evaporated. “Let’s keep going. We need to get out of this swamp so we can get James’s body purified.”

  The party settled back into their marching order, and set off. It took them an extra half hour to reach their entrance point, and at the sight of a door standing lonely and unsupported in the middle of a solid island in the swamp, the party broke into a run, eager to get to safety.

  “I doubt Hermes would dare to try anything in the bazaar,” Ingrid said as the party gathered before the door, “the joint patrols would put a quick stop to anything they’d try. But we should get to the Arctology quickly.

  The three moved through the door and back into the stairway. The bazaar was strangely subdued as they set down the stairs, the normally lively crowds eagerly entering the stairway or triumphantly returning to the bazaar silent and furtive, the merchant’s booths empty and lifeless for hundreds of meters away. The reason for the tense mood was immediately obvious. Ten heavily armed and armored warriors surrounding a large, imposing high elven woman waited at the foot of the stairway. Her age was impossible to gauge, as was typical of elven derived races, and she was wearing a pristine white lab coat over a navy blue business suit, and her anxious gaze locked onto Lucy as soon as she passed through the door.

  As the party started to moved down the four flights of steps to the floor of the bazaar, easily navigating the now familiar shifts in orientation and gravity, the woman and her entourage advanced to the base of their final flight of stairs, waiting for them to arrive. As she stepped on the final flight of stairs, Ingrid removed her helmet, and the woman’s gaze snapped on her and she visibly relaxed.

  “Really, Ingrid,” she said in a cultured, refined voice. “I was worried when your friend’s stream was interrupted after the battle with that pitcher plant, but it looks like you were just trying to become a brute without me interrupting you.”

  “I am so not in the mood for this, Mother,” Ingrid said angrily. “And this is really not the right place for the conversation we actually need to have.”

  The rest of the party left the stairway by then, and the squad of Bjørnson armsman let them through and formed a large circle, facing outward to search for any approaching threat. By then, Ingrid’s mother could see James’s body held by Ed’s worker, and her voice became brisk and businesslike. “Let’s take this home then.”

  ◆◆◆

  Ed sat in a plain looking meeting room in the Arctology. Ingrid’s mother lead them swiftly through the mazelike corridors of the Bjørnson family home, and into a private elevator that only opened to an aura scan and took them up an unknown number of floors. Ingrid, who passed through her room on the way and was now dressed in well-worn and comfortable jeans and t-shirt was sitting to his left and Lucy to his right. Ingrid’s mother sat across from her, next to an old gnome wearing a crumpled corduroy suit.

  James’s body was waiting on a stretcher near the wall, waiting for a high tier healer to cleanse it from the necromancer’s influence.

  “Why don’t you do the introductions, dear?” The old gnome looked pointedly at Ed, who was still wearing his Bjørnson armband, and then at Ingrid.

  “Mother, Grandad, I’d like you to meet Eduard Fergusson. Ed, this is my mother, Cathrine, and my grandfather, Daved.”

  “It’s an honor to meet you, sir and ma’am.”

  “Daved will do, young man.” The old gnome, who was the head of one of the Five Families, offered Ed his hand, his shake firm but not crushing.

  “Now why don’t you tell us what conversation we really need to have,” Cathrine started coldly. “You can start with why you had to so urgently and secretly make this man part of our House.”

  “If you’ve been following James’s streams, you know Ed has some unique Shards,” Ingrid started. “I made him promise to keep the nature of the Shards secret so I can stay in reise for a while longer before bringing it in as my new information.”

  “The problem is,” Ed took up the tale, “that this just turned into something I don’t think anyone should know about.”

  “That is simply not acceptable,” Ingrid’s mother stated. “I have been fielding calls from every major and minor family, guild and club over the past few days. Everyone wants to know if Bjørnson can make summons viable and how. And while I have no issue with telling the outsiders that this is proprietary information, your uncle Mathias is foaming at the mouth thinking you’re withholding information that could be of use for his ‘pets’. So you are going to tell your grandfather and me everything, armsman.”

  “Lay off him, Mother. This is the kind of ability that lets you turn anyone into a slave, and those are bad enough when it’s a tier six necromancer or succubus ability, but at tier one, everyone can use it. This isn’t something you or I want out.”

  “Which just makes it even more important that you don’t keep it to yourself. If you have this Shard, then so can anyone else. The Family needs to know about it so we know to protect ourselves.”

  “If you know about it, then so does Mathias. And then Olav. And if Olav knows, then the whole damn world knows. This stays with the three of us.”

  “I tried doing this logically, but you’ve always been a challenge, Ingrid.” Ingrid’s mother turned her eyes on Ed. “Eduard Fergusson, as an armsman of Hous
e Bjørnson, I am formally ordering you to tell me about your Shards.”

  “I can’t, ma’am. This is too volatile.”

  “You will tell me everything, or I will pronounce you in breach of House rules. As a disgraced armsman, nobody will party with you and no guild will accept you. This is your last chance.”

  “Excuse me, Dr. Bjørnson,” Lucy spoke for the first time since seeing Ingrid’s mother on the bazaar floor. “Ed never actually agreed to join your House. Ingrid basically shanghaied him into it, and any truthsayer will confirm that he can’t be in breach if he never accepted the rules. And you know how UNLOA feels about the Five Families exceeding authority.”

  Ingrid’s mother’s face has been growing stormier and stormier the more Lucy talked, and she looked about ready to explode when her father stood up and placed his hand on her shoulder.

  “That’s enough, Cathy. If Ingrid feels that strongly about her secret, I tend to trust her judgement.” And turning to Ed, he added. “Please forgive my daughter. High elves tend to believe in their own rightness far too much sometimes. I do wonder on occasion if Christine wasn’t right about the Raceshards corrupting us. But enough of that. I will agree to let you keep your secret, but knowledge has a way of spreading. I will insist that if your Shards become more common, you will inform the family of every detail about them.”

  “I can accept that, sir.”

  “Good. Now tell us what happened in your delve today.”

  It only took a bout fifteen minutes to tell the entire story, and then ten more for the two elder Bjørnsons to grill the party for every detail they possibly noticed about the Hermes members who ambushed them.

  “I think we can safely say that Hermes was behind blocking James’s stream,” Old Man Bjørnson said after he was satisfied that he couldn’t get any more details out of the three. “It would have been extremely easy for Kevin to carry a device that would fry the electronics in his headgear. That design uses crystals that drop starting from floor twenty, and every tier three magitech tinker can build them.”