Chapter 242: Undead definition

Chapter 242: Undead definition

Mason obviously didn't trust the little half-dead goblin for a second. Still, the thing posed no obvious threat and he did trust in Blake's ridiculous luck to find just what he needed.

"Alright," he said with a sigh. "How can you help us kill the 'big bosses'?"

"This way, humans," the goblin grinned a nightmarish grin, then splashed back into the mist and acid.

"Wait," Mason called, not moving an inch. "How far is it? We don't like the floor or the mist."

"Not far, human," the goblin almost whined. "We leave acid. Mist thins. Not far, I promise. Yes, promise."

Mason frowned and glanced at Blake. "You know what...can you just...control its mind?"

The goblin blinked and looked between them like it didn't comprehend what it heard. Blake raised a brow as if shocked.

"And here I thought I wasn't to use my mind powers willy nilly. That to employ such drastic, offensive tactics was both terrifying and immoral. That the sacred, inviolable free will of living creatures was so precious, so..."

"Can you do it or not?"

Blake shrugged. "Nope. I tried right away. Apparently it’s not exactly...living. And the semi-dead require...a different kind of magic."

"The semi-dead," Mason repeated, feeling something cold crawl up his spine as he stared at the creature. "You mean undead. Like in the movies. Yeah I'm pretty sure I'm just going to kill it."

The goblin dropped to its knees again. "No! Not enemies. Must trust. Name is...name is Pil...no...Pliny! Engineer. Inventor. Much brain. Before...change. Many inventions. Rival of big masters. You see? Betrayed. Put in...machine. But survived..." the thing gestured at itself as if to say 'like this'. "Hate. Hate all of them." Its beady red eyes glowed. "Want revenge. Only revenge. Understand? Nothing left. Nothing."

"I know liars, and if he's one then he is very, very good," Blake said quietly. "I say we trust him, at least for awhile."

"You only think you know liars. You trust everyone because you think it’ll all work out," Mason said with a sigh. "But fine," he said a little louder. "Lead us on...Pliny. We'll follow. For now."CHeCk for new stories on no/v/el/bin(.)c0m

The goblin nodded or bowed again and again, then turned and led them into the mist.

* * *

It hadn't lied about the distance, at least. Less than a minute of trying to pick their way around the acidic pools, the floor got drier and the mists receded. The hall narrowed into a corridor, then expanded again into a circular room filled with what looked like old furniture, broken down devices, and all manner of nameless garbage.

"Dumping ground, see?" said their guide. "Fools think waste. But I know better. So many parts. So many inventions."

He banished his shorter Claw and started picking up random pieces of trash, infusing one with an exploding Trap before aiming at the zombie-gunners.

It blew apart like he'd tossed a claymore. Bits of flesh and metal fell like the nastiest rain in the world, and Mason slashed down a few corpses before falling back and throwing another.

It was all going swimmingly. Until a piece of garbage bit Mason's foot.

He stopped and growled, slashing and cutting apart what appeared to be a head and shoulders with one arm. Somehow the creature had crawled close enough, though its rotten teeth didn't do much more than break a little skin.

Mason kicked the remaining half across the damn cavern, then spun and used both Claws to slash anything even remotely movement-capable as he cleared the room.

Apex Predator flared a warning, asking Mason if he wished to change his affinity or to try and resist the ‘potentially lethal effect’ on his own. It was rather strange since usually it just changed him without a second thought. But he was fighting and didn’t have time to read a bunch of text, so he agreed to change his affinity.

And practically collapsed.

[Congratulations! You have discovered a hidden player affinity: Undead.]

[Title gained: Doing it my way. Gain a non-standard affinity. +2 to a random statistic.]

Mason wasn’t sure what the definition of ‘undead’ was, but he definitely felt like he was dying. Some cold hand had reached into his chest, gripped his heart, and squeezed. He didn’t remember feeling particularly different when Apex Predator shifted him to ‘elemental’ affinity or anything else. So he didn’t have a clue what was happening.

Transformation was ticking away, dealing with the bite and some kind of poisonous rot that seemed to be trying to work its way up his leg. Meanwhile, there were still zombies trying to kill him.

But there weren’t many left, and these weren’t strapped with goblin explosive devices. Fighting through the heart palpitations, Mason (and Blake's constructs) more or less made the remaining undead just plain dead with a few minutes work.

Streak looked pretty happy to sit it out, apparently not even interested in chewing any of the bones. Annie had buried her face into Becky's chest, which was inappropriately eye catching. The cowgirl just stroked the other girl's hair and gave Mason a glare like she knew what he was thinking.

Which was sort of true, but also not really, since he still mostly felt like he was having a heart attack. Apex Predator finally flared again and the awfulness stopped as quick as it came.

Mason growled and stared at the goblin.

"Didn't know! Forgiveness!" The wretched little engineer dropped at Mason's feet with his arms raised. "Not its purpose. Terrible mistake. Changes nothing. Let Pliny help. Please?"

Mason fought the urge to slash the thing’s head from its shoulders and sighed, putting away his Claws. Blake was right—the genuine surprise he'd seen at the attack, and the general misery of the creature was enough to make him believe it wasn't lying.

“I'm beginning to see why they tried to kill you, Pliny. But I believe you.” Then, to the others as well: “Wait here. I'm going back for Calypsa. Then we go kill these 'big bosses'. Understand?"

"Oh yes," the goblin looked at him with something uncomfortably close to adoration. "Understand. Will help. Will help very much. Till death. I promise, human. I promise."