5.

  Sounds of fighting were distant and echoed across the building. Metal on metal and the cries of the dying as Naomi raced around the upper levels of the den. Santi pulled and tugged using [Air Current] to bring him the sounds of the fight. It didn’t take the Apostate long to work her way through the building, by his count there were only four quick skirmishes before Naomi started on her way back.

  Keeping his eyes locked on the abyss in front of him and waited to see if any more of the dark dwarves would come streaming up to face them. After his attack there didn’t seem to be any desire to try forcing the stairs. Santi was patient, only tapping his foot, as he kept his senses stretched around him.

  “All done. Only four of them scattered about. Highest was only thirty-two. I think we can clear the den easily enough,” Naomi said as she walked up to him. A bit of gore dripped off her blade as she peered over his shoulder to look into the depths. Santi straightened as he was so close to the woman with her blade drawn.

  She didn’t ram the sword through his back and for that he was only slightly surprised. She was nowhere near the level of homicidal as Duncan was.

  "Stay behind me,” Naomi said, she gently pushed him to the side and started down the stairs. Santi gave her a few steps before following after, giving her plenty of room to swing her sword. The tight confines would make it more difficult to swing, but Santi had faith that the woman had plenty enough experience that it wouldn’t hinder her.

  The darkness pressed in on them, but Santi’s perception was high enough that he could make out the rough outlines of everything around him. Between that and [Air Current] he had nearly complete coverage of everything around him. When the stairs shifted and became a slide, he felt the movement of the stairs before it happened.

  “Trap!’ Santi yelled as he sprang upward. The morph blade became a hook, sliding into the roof of the stairwell and he held himself up with ease. Naomi wasn’t as lucky. Her feet went out from under her and her head bounced off the metal of the slide with a tremendous thunk before she disappeared out of the range of his magical senses.

  “Oh, well that’s not good,” Santi said to himself as the Apostate disappeared. He hung there for a moment, debating about what to do. There was only one real answer and he had to sight as he thought of it. The hook dissolved back into its regular form and he fell and landed lightly on the slide. Bent knees kept him from sprawling as he immediately began to slide down.

  Air whistled past his face as he picked up speed. [Air Current] was quickly reworked out of its normal sphere and into a long cone in front of him. The slide was going to end shortly, Naomi’s form not there, and he hit the bottom of the stairs and bounced lightly as he looked about.

  He was glad to be short, the ceiling was hardly six feet tall, and the width of the halls could be spanned if he stretched his hands out. It had only been moments since Naomi had landed but she was already whisked away, the muffled sounds of struggle coming from down the single hall.

  Santi used [Windstep] and blasted down the hall, casting over and over as he was forced to change direction rapidly in the hard ninety degree turns. The sounds of metal hitting flesh came toward him and a pained cry, a human cry. Santi sped up till he was nearly flying and he came out of the hallways and into a square room.

  Naomi was in the middle of a cluster of dwarves, thrashing about as three of them tried to hold her down. A truncheon rose and fell with the precision of a pneumatic hammer, each blow rang like metal hitting metal. [Windblade] swept along at neck height, blood spewing free as heads rolled. Two of the dwarves managed to turn, one falling to the ground and the other raising a shield. The shield was torn in pieces, but broke the impetus of the magic, letting the dwarf survive.

  Naomi was fast as she rose, climbing over the top of the dwarf who ducked and wrapping a strong forearm around its neck. The dwarf cried out, strangled and stifled, hand outstretched as she tightened her grip. Santi lunged across the distance between him and the last dwarf, extending the morph blade into a lance.

  The monster swung an axe at the lance, but the morph cut apart the axe like nothing and pierced through the dwarf’s head. It went stiff for a moment before its knees buckled and the lance pulled free as the dwarf hit the ground. Santi looked over to the scrum going on just in time to hear bones break as Naomi twisted her shoulders violently.

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  “Thanks for that. Got a bit cocky and this is what it gets me,” Naomi said as she got to her feet and reached over for her sword. A decapitated dwarf had been holding the long blade as the captors had dragged Naomi away. She swung in once or twice, rolling her wrist while she ignored the blood streaming down from her busted mouth and cut above her eyes.

  Santi eyed the minor injuries and thought of how his own body would have responded to the beating she had been receiving. He didn’t think he could have withstood the beating she’d been enduring without significantly more damage, even with all the stats and boosts his equipment gave him.

  “Happens to the best of us. You still good to keep going?” Santi asked.

  “I’ve taken worse tumbles getting out of bed. Let’s clear the den, we got a lot more of these if we want to beat Alan and the others.” Naomi gave a smile that was hard to see in the dark and then bounded down the hall the quartet of dwarves had been trying to take her.

  Santi hung behind her, allowing the more durable Apostate to stumble through everything. Traps were sprung, spikes, pitfalls, and blades that slashed around at waist height. Naomi took them in stride, her blade and strength stopping and breaking the swinging blade, she leapt over the pitfalls and spikes and continued forward like a one woman wrecking crew.

  Santi followed in her wake of destruction as no more of the dark dwarves came out toward them. He could hear them further down in the complex, metal on metal and the guttural sounds of their language. The System didn’t translate their language, they were monsters not sentient.

  “I’ll go in and start the fight, protect my back,” Naomi ordered as she entered the room all the noise had been coming from. Santi grunted in acknowledgement and then they were entering the heart of the den.

  A line of mid-thirty level dwarves were waiting for them, but Santi was looking behind them. Five dwarves stood together on an elevated platform. Two of them were in heavy armor with mauls clutched in their hands. A third was dressed in soft robes and was holding tight to a metal wand which was pointed at them. The fourth was already slinking off to the side, trying to break away from Santi’s viewpoint. The fifth was the largest and was covered in ornate armor with jewels wrapped around his helm.

  Dark Dwarf Royal Guardsmen lvl. 46

  Dark Dwarf Royal Guardsmen lvl. 48

  Dark Dwarf Stone Mage lvl. 47

  Dark Dwarf Shadow Stepper lvl. 48

  Dark Dwarf Chief lvl. 50

  [Windblade] shot past the line of low-rank guards and caught the shadow stepper as he tried to escape. The dwarf vanished from view, popping back into existence only a foot away from Santi. Daggers were coming toward his kidney as Santi spun with all the speed he had, blocking the triangular dagger with a flick of his wrist. The dagger went by him and Santi stepped forward and punched the dwarf with his off hand.

  Cartilage shattered and the dwarf’s head snapped back and Santi slashed upward. The dwarf’s step backward caused him to dissipate, flowing back into the shadows and appearing in a far corner of the room.

  “Assassin is in the back corner!” Santi gave the call out even as Naomi slammed into the line of guards. Her sword took on a red hue that glowed in the dark, giving faint illumination as her sword swept through the dwarven guards. Metal melted as the sword slid through the guards, sending three to the ground before the others got out of the way. One of the royal guardsmen leapt forward, maul howling toward Naomi as she was forced to step back.

  Santi cast [Air Shield] in front of Naomi and stopped the spear of stone that the enemy mage had thrown at her. Santi retaliated with a series of [Windblade]s as he worked his way around the end of the line and leapt into the knot of elites. He slashed and hacked, tearing into the remaining royal guard as the mage attempted to throw more stone bolts at Santi.

  Santi stepped to the side, letting the stone fly by his head, and extended the morph blade into a long needle that punched through the mage’s throat. Blood bubbled out of the small hole as the mage lost control of its magic, stone falling away into sand as it grabbed at its neck.

  [Air Shield] detonated in an explosion as the royal guard’s maul punched straight through and headed toward Santi’s ribs. Santi jumped back and let the maul scream at him as the morph weapon retracted into a long dagger. The maul pulled at his clothes but he didn’t blink as he rammed the knife into the guard’s eye.

  The chief had charged Naomi, who was a hailstorm of steel and skills. Most of the lower level guards were dead already, but the royal guard, assassin, and chief were hemming her in. Santi twisted the knife and the royal guard died, falling to the ground as Santi sent a single [Windblade] to finish off the mage.

  Naomi was on the defensive but holding her ground. Santi jumped toward the royal guard and stabbed it through the back. The guard stiffened as the sword ruptured through the royal guard’s chest and Naomi took advantage of the chaos to spin and stab the assassin through the gut.

  Santi used an [Air Shield] to block the chieftain’s blow that should have brained Naomi as she twisted her sword back and forth through the assassin. The two regressors turned on the chieftain and the battle ended in moments as the chief fell under their blows.

  “Not a great job of keeping them off my back,” Naomi said after she caught her breath.