Chương 40: The Emissary Shard of the Ill-Starred Knight

>>We'd better get a move on. Look what the slime is doing. The slime was doing its weird spasming again, but it split in half this time instead of squirting out a little clone. One half stayed at the portal, and the other half stood itself up into a peak and then flopped sideways. It did it again and separated itself from the main body of the slime. >>I guess that answers a number of questions about slime physiology. >>Not to sound like an extra in a B-movie, but IT'S COMING RIGHT FOR US!!!! >>Slowly…

The slime continued to lurch its way around the inner wall of the sphere while George took a good grip on the handle next to the tunnel's opening and braced his legs against the wall. He stretched his arm toward Webb's floating body and cast draw at Webb's feet. Webb spun around like a compass needle and began moving toward George. >>Grab him, George! >>Easy does it. >>Don't let him bounce! George reached for him but could already tell he was coming in too fast. >>Hold on to the handle!

When George stretched his hand out to grab Webb, Nod's eight long spider fingers stretched out, too; five from the tips of George's fingers and three like claws from the back of his hand. Their fingers wrapped around Webb's leg and held onto him after his body bounced off the mouth of the tunnel. >>There you go, George. Now, bring him in. George pulled Webb's leg into the tunnel, and the other followed. George let go of his leg to take a grip on Webb's belt.

When George released Webb's leg, Nod's extended fingers disappeared into George's hand. George guided Webb's body between his legs into the tunnel, keeping the slime around his head away from his body as carefully as he could in zero gravity. The half of the slime that had gone mobile had progressed one-quarter of the way around the room by standing up and flopping itself against the wall like a giant inchworm.

One of the bits of floating slime passed near George's face at the mouth of the tunnel, and George blew a puff of air at it, sending it spinning back toward the middle of the room. >>OK. Torch that slime off his head, and I'll seal the door. George held out his finger, and Nod's finger extended out and ignited.

As soon as the bright tip of the brazing talon came near the slime, it tried to pull away from the heat, but Nod took control of George's arm and quickly stabbed the brazing talon into the slime in five or six places. The slime quivered and began pulling away from Webb's head. The places Nod had punctured the slime had instantly gone from bright green to dull grey. It started to wiggle and squirm away from George until all the slime had collected on the top of Webb's head.

It bunched up and pushed itself off the top of Webb's head and away from George. Nod gave it one final poke with the hot tip of his talon and sent it floating back into the room. >>There. See? Easy. >>Now, let's get to looting. >>Help me get this tunnel sealed first. >>Yes, but hurry up. We have about 22 minutes left in this round. >>Nod. I hate to say this, but will you do the hand thing again? >>That metal ball looks a lot heavier than I am, and I don't want to fly out toward it in the middle of all that slime.

>>No problem. Always happy to… >>… lend a hand. Nod's long, black fingers grew again from George's hand, reaching for the handle on the wall and wrapping around it. George cast draw on the large ball and nothing happened, except his body swung out into the room. He tucked his legs close to his chest to avoid the floating slime and tried again. His body strained toward the metal ball, but Nod's grip held. He tried to draw it again, but nothing happened. >>Feel the force flowing through you… >>It isn't moving.

It is too big. >>Much fear I sense in you. >>This is why you fail. >>And by that, I mean: HURRY UP! >>I do not want you to appear half-naked back in the voting round because you were swapping clothes with a dead dude and got distracted. Plus, there is no telling what happens to this guy's body when the round ends. I don't want to lose this loot! George cast bind between the smooth silver ball and the mouth of the tunnel as well as draw.

At first, nothing happened, but as he did it several more times, the ball began to float in his direction. The closer the ball got, the more his crafting skills seemed to have an effect. When it was fifteen feet away, it picked up speed and momentum. George pulled himself back into the tunnel, and he had a moment of doubt that he had misjudged the size of the ball. If it was smaller than the tunnel, he had just made it into a bullet and was floating in the barrel of a very large gun. >>Coming in hot!

The metal ball slammed against the mouth of the tunnel. It was only slightly larger than the tunnel and seemed wedged tightly in. All the same, he cast bind on it a few more times just for good measure. >>I love it when a plan comes together. >>Now… I think we have some necro-thievery to get up to. George gently pushed Webb's body back to the other side of the tunnel and out into the room so he would have some room to work. He tried not to look at the man's half-digested face.

However, the rest of his body seemed untouched by the slime. As he pushed the body down the tunnel, Nod Identified pieces of Webb's gear. <Voidmetal Sabatons Slot: Feet Set Item: 1/7> <Voidmetal Greaves Slot: Legs Set Item: 2/7> <Voidmetal Cuirass Slot: Chest Set Item: 3/7> <Voidmetal Pauldrons Slot: Shoulders Set Item: 4/7> <Voidmetal Bracers Slot: Arms Set Item: 5/7> <Voidmetal Gloves Slot: Hands, Neuronetic Socket—Right hand Set Item: 6/7> Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road.

Support the author by reading it there. >>George! It's a set. We hit the jackpot. >>Set items have mega bonuses when you have the whole set. When they reached the previous room, George wedged his toes into one of the handholds and brought Webb's momentum to a standstill. >>Should we say a few words? >>Do you mean like a funeral? >>Webb never did us any harm. He was just caught up in all this like we all are. >>Sure. I'll try my hand at a poetic benediction. >>You just get to stripping him. >>Dear Webb.

We didn't know you, but you sure have some sweet gear. You probably weren't on our team and might have tried to kill us even if you were. So… I guess we call this just deserts. Sorry about the slime… that's no way to go. Thanks for paying it forward with some loot. >>We'd pour some whiskey out for you if we had any, but we used it all to burn the last guy we killed. >>Amen. George started to take Webb's armor off.

The pieces came off surprisingly easily; they were clasped around Webb's body with strong magnets released at a touch. In a minute, all the pieces of the weird, black armor were floating lazily around the room. >>I want it all, George. Leave him his undies, but the rest is ours. >>15: 57 left in the hunting round. >>Here goes nothing. George braced his legs against the tunnel walls and stripped off his shirt, ripping it a bit to get it over his helmet. Then he let it go and shimmied out of his bright sweatpants.

His movements sent him spinning in circles and bumping into pieces of floating armor. He used draw to get back to the mouth of the tunnel and then reached out for Webb's body and pulled it over to him. Getting Webb's tactical trousers and shirt off Webb's body was much harder than getting the armor off. Webb's body wouldn't cooperate, and though George had learned how to land in zero-G without slamming into things, this was more like weightless wrestling with an inert dummy.

George was spinning around and bumping into things inside of a minute. >>This is so damn awkward. >>I wish I had a nodling in here to see how you look right now. >>I love that you took your clothes off BEFORE getting Webb's clothes off. >>You were just like, "I'm George and I'm here to party! LET'S DO THIS!" He was sweating by the time he had the trousers off of Webb's body and onto his own. He tightened the belt around his waist, slipped his arms into Webb's black shirt jacket, and zipped it up.

>>Now the armor, Tony Stark. George cast draw on the two black shoes that Identify had called sabatons. They had no laces and seemed as hard as metal, but when he slipped his feet inside, they smoothly resized themselves to fit George's feet. >>Do you know anything about voidmetal, Nod? >>Uh. It's black? It looks cool? Who cares? Hurry up! Next, the greaves went onto his legs. All he had to do was hold them against his shins, and the straps moved on their own and clasped behind his leg.

The same thing happened with the chest plate, the arm bracers, the two shoulder pauldrons, and the gloves. >>I cannot tell you how excited I am about the improvement in your look right now. >>This is going to be serious street cred. >>I have upgraded your personal motto from "Hi, I'm new here. Please don't kill me" to "Fake it 'till you make it." >>And I do not hand out these upgrades lightly. No, sir. >>Where is the seventh piece? >>It says the set is seven items, so where is the number seven? >>Um.

Floating somewhere? >>Wait. It's not the undies, is it? >>Is it? >>Identify, show me the seventh piece of armor. A white line shot out from George to Webb's right hand. George reached out and grabbed Webb's body and pulled it closer to himself, gripping Webb's forearm and holding his hand up to his mask. An iridescent white stone shone in the center of Webb's palm. George looked at the black glove on his right hand and saw a matching hole in the palm of the glove. >>That must be what socketed means.

>>In for a penny, in for a pound, pal. Identify kicked in and provided a description of the strange jewel. <Emissary Shard of the Ill-Starred Knight Slot: Right hand Set Item: 7/7> >>GEORGE. >>I must have that. >>Give it to us, precious… >>How do we get it out of his— But George didn't need to finish the sentence. As soon as the hand wearing the socketed glove came close to the gem, Webb's hand shot out and slapped itself against George's hand like the dead man was giving George a high five.

George instinctively tried to pull his hand away, but the two hands were stuck together. The movement jerked Webb's body and sent them both spinning around the room again. Ability Notification! Threat Level 3 Knickknack Savant - Level 5 Pain began to build in George's palm. He braced his feet against Webb's shoulder and tried to get leverage to pull his hand free. Suddenly, George felt a strange wriggling in his hand, and hot, lancing pain shot into his palm. He screamed, and his movements became more frantic.

Ability Notification! Threat Level 4 Knickknack Savant - Level 8 George felt the effect of the Knickknack Savant sweep over him again as a more composed, rational corner of his mind kicked into gear, but there was nothing George could think to do except pull his hand away. His hand felt like something was digging into his palm. Blood started to seep out from between his hand and Webb's and spray out in globules that floated around the room in slow motion. >>George. Get your hand away! >>Something is happening!

Ability Notification! Threat Level 5 Knickknack Savant - Level 13 Time Dilation Maximum: x 200%"No shit!" George said. Time slowed, but it did nothing to diminish the pain. George pulled harder, and his hand came apart from Webb's, but it was still joined by ropy, fibrous strands that looked like a weird combination of blood vessels and circuitry.

George could move his own body at normal speed—which he supposed would actually appear much faster than normal speed to an observer—but the droplets of blood still floated around the room with graceful, agonizing slowness. The white gem was still in Webb's hand, but the fleshy cables would not let go of George's hand. Suddenly, they flexed, and George's hand pushed back together against Webb's.

"Gah, it hurts!" George said. >>Hang in there! Trying to shut it down.

"Nod!" George shouted.

"I can feel it pushing into my hand!" Ability Notification! Threat Level 6 Knickknack Savant - Level 21 Time Dilation Maximum: x 400% As George said that, gobbets of red flesh and blood were squeezed out through the tight space between their palms to float around them in a slow-moving crimson nimbus. >>BADBADBAD. >>Cut it off!

"My hand?" George shouted. >>Shitshitshit.

"Nod! What is going on?" >>Wait a minuttttttttteeee…. >>Howmuchwoodcouldawoodchuckchuckifawoodchuckcouldchuck wood?!?!?!?!?! AAHHHH >>┌(๑╭╮๑) ┘ 彡┻━┻ | >> [⨶. ⨶] Nod's spider fingers punched out through the joints in the gloves and impaled Webb's body in eight places before just as suddenly retracting back into George's hand. {System Error} //Kelsior array corrupted// +Var PRIMEARRAY {}{}{}{}{} GRRRSSSSS? IF(emissary candidate%><! FaLSE?? &&MOA Isprime I++){YAARRR {Else} IsTRue = emissary nexus. {System Error} {System Error} {System Error} {System Shutdown} The connection with Webb's hand suddenly ended, and George kicked his body away. Ability Notification! Threat Level 1 Knickknack Savant - Level 1 Time returned to its normal speed with a rush. Thick, sticky blood welled from the new hole in Webb's hand. George's arm was coated in blood. He raised his right hand to his helmet, and sure enough, the gleaming white gem had nestled itself into the socket of the glove. The hand felt like it had been shoved into a blender, but he could still flex his fingers like normal. >>Nod, what happened? But Nod did not respond. >>Nod? >>Nod! Nod! George checked the round timer and saw eight minutes left in the round. He pushed off the wall and floated away from the cloud of gore but only managed to get more on him in the process. His shoulder bounced gently against the far wall, and he grabbed a railing with his left hand. He used draw to bring his old blue sweatpants to his hand. He used them to wipe off his visor and then sent them floating out into the room again. Webb's body was still cartwheeling around and bouncing off things. He held his right hand to his body and pulled himself toward a tunnel with his left hand. The timer said there were six minutes left in the round." Nod," George said." Are you there?" If Nod didn't come back, he wasn't sure what he would do, but he knew he didn't want to be in this bloody room anymore. He pulled himself into a tunnel and floated slowly down it. He thought this was the same tunnel he'd used to enter this room, but he didn't recognize the room beyond it. It was full of stairways crossing the room from crazy angles. He brought his momentum to a standstill and mentally clicked the store interface. Purchased: Clean self — 1 gold (48 remaining) The visor on his helmet was suddenly clean. The blood disappeared from his armor and hand." Ok," George said." First things first. Talk it out. Something went wrong and Nod is not responding. He might come back. He might not. That means I lost the connection to the nodlings." George checked his click counter and saw that it continued to rise. He held up his hand, and the black lines of Nod's intraskeleton remained beneath his skin." The voting round is about to begin," George said aloud." I'm going to show up in Webb's armor like I killed him instead of just poaching the armor off his dead body. So, I'll just sit quietly like last time and not vote for anyone. I'll take the next hunting round as it comes." Ability Orb Activated (June Dolora) Die Another Day—Extend the length of the hunting round by one hour. Time Remaining: 01: 03: 59"Dammit, Nod. Where the hell did you go?" George said.