The Waiting Room

I walked into a room, had time to notice it had the same subterranean appearance as the Tower that I first woke up in, but nicer and more upholstered, and that there was a door set in the opposite wall.

Then I was hit from the blind-spot made by opening the door so hard that I came to sliding down the floor ten feet from where I had been standing. The invisible armor was shockingly good at reducing the damage. By which I mean that I was simply stunned and in a lot of pain as I writhed on the floor and screamed out in shock and pain, instead of dead. I didn't even waste time figuring out what had attacked me before I forced myself to my hands and knees just to leap as far away from the direction that the attack had come from, stumbling to my feet with my somewhat increased, but still rather clumsy, agility.

Only then did I chance a look to what had attacked me and found that I was in the rather large room with a hulking orc warrior of some description. He was looking somewhat confused, which I assumed was because he was wielding a giant two-handed sword, which he had hit me with with all his force, and I was not bisected. Maybe five seconds had passed since I entered the room. He had long black hair, massive jaw and fine, shining plate armor.

"Any chance we can talk?" I said. "You will give me your Journal," he said. "Not how it works," I said. "Then I will take it off your corpse, liar!" he shouted and rushed at me.

I had had time to stand up in the brief exchange, but with less than twenty feet between us I barely had two seconds to react. I activated my staff, expending the final casting of my invisible barrier spell, but the angle was awkward and I couldn't seal myself in a safe corner, only block off one path of approach. He ran into it, sword held in a high guard, broke his nose and a tusk, and fell back over. I felt only an uncomfortable jolt from the transferred energy. With human-like strength, even a good strike with leverage from the sword would likely not-

He stood back up again and grinned through bloody teeth, and raised his sword in a middle guard to the side of his face. The sword came alive with magic.

"What rank is this, abjurer? Wait, don't answer, let's test it out," he said.

But I wasn't really listening. I was still alive, and, while I had no mana left to speak of, I still had some hitpoints and figured I'd be better off using them trying to kill him than using them by being skewered on a magical greatsword. So I called out "Fus!" and my spellbook flew up from my robes and opened up in front of me to the greasefire spell and I cast it. I immediately threw up blood and the orc started screaming. Not dead though. The fucking Journal was useless, what was the point of being able to check my health and mana if I couldn't do it during combat. Well, whatever, I wasn't dead yet, and so I used this distraction to run around the corner of my invisible wall and as far away from the screaming orc as I could.

"You're really making me uncomfortable," I said.

The orc had dropped on the ground and manage to swat off most of the fire, as he rose and said.

"That's the fucking point of combat!" "Yeah, but with the whole raging evil angry barbarian thing. Feels sort of like you're playing into a stereotype," I said. "I am a godsdamned blademaster, not a barbarian, hero. And I will take you down," he said.

So I guess it was me who was being insensitive, but, to be fair, he was a large, muscle-bound man rushing at me with a big weapon and screaming. I was further away this time, but holy fuck had the fire not slowed him down at all. And I was out. Fully spent. I felt tearing and sloshing in my guts, and I knew that couldn't be good. I was out of mana, and out of stored spells in my magical items. I mean, I guess all but one. And I really didn't have anything left to lose.

So I fumbled for the rod I'd taken from the squid guy and activated it, casting the water-ball spell in the path of the oncoming blademaster.

Huh.

That was a lot bigger than I remembered. The waterball was easily large enough to envelop the orc with room to spare, and as it appeared out of nowhere, he was suddenly stuck and breathing in water. I saw a look of fear on his burned face, but only for a second before he started swimming, and from then it was clear that he was making progress. I just ran. But there was nowhere to go, and so I simply got as far away from him as possible.

After he was out of the water, it was just a matter of time. I ran, dodged, leaped and was proud to last about twenty seconds before he had his hands around my throat and pushed me to the floor with an embarrassing ease. He stepped on my chest, my armor keeping his sole an inch away from my ribcage and I looked up in terror as he positioned his sword point down and began pushing through the armor. It sparked with blue and white magic, bright as a welding torch, but he was clearly making progress. I knew I was dead. I had been in many life-and-death situations over the last two days, but here I could simply do nothing but wait for him to skewer me. I was steeling myself to die of casting from hitpoints, hoping to take him down with me, when I heard the door open and a familiar woman's voice call out: "Oh my god, Alex?"

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It bought me a moment of distraction, and while I couldn't do much with it, I rolled out of the way. I heard an incantation and a split second later the blast of superheated air so hot that I could smell my beard melting, before it went away as soon as it had started. I finished my roll and looked up to see exactly who I had expected.

Anna had clearly been through some shit. She stood there, face covered in dirt and ash, her black hair in an uncharacteristic bun. She was wielding two wands, one in either hand, and seemed to have found a more normal robe than my aloha fever dream, though it looked pretty scraggly. It was made of linen or something, dark gray in a way that looked more like faded black than intentional, and ripped to ribbons up to about her knees. I pushed myself up and waved at her, said 'hi,'. When she rushed over to me and dropped on the floor next to me to hug me, I remained very stoic and masculine. When she started crying, however, I cried with her. We took a moment. And then we both took a deep breath and sat leaned against the wall.

"You're hurt. I don't have potions or anything, but…" she said. I checked my journal to find that I was down to four hitpoints. "The only hitpoint that matters is the last one, right?" I said. "In, like, Wyverns and Wizards, dude," Anna said. "Hurts a bit, I'll survive if we find a potion or a place for me to hide. My-" I stopped speaking when I realized what we should actually be talking about. Shit, I really, really didn't want to be the one to bring up the topic.

We knew all the names of all the survivors of the Tower so far. Everyone left had shown up on the blackboard. None of our other friends were on it. If they had come here with her, they were dead. I needed to know.

"The others. Have you- have you seen any of them?" I said. "No. I was in the bathroom, and then suddenly I was in a classroom with a countdown. I was so fucking scared, but- god, it's a lot. A lot has happened," she said. "Thank god. I haven't seen anyone else from our game group either. We can at least hope it means they didn't come here with us. Or they ended up in a different sector," I said. "Apparently our sector had really high survival rates on average. Which I can't even begin to explain," Anna said. "I can. A lot of people got organized in a guild. We have this really badass lady leading us and a bunch of strong people to help out. I'm so sorry we couldn't find you," I said. "Fuck. How many people?" Anna said. "Around fifty. It was just you and four others outside the Guild that survived. But it's alright, we can join up now," I said.

She looked at me with concern.

"Uh, Alex, do you trust them?" Anna said. "Fuck. What was it like for you?" I said. Anna wasn't really a suspicious person, not the way I remembered her. That she was jumpy at the idea of other people in groups didn't bide well. "Later. We can share war stories when we get out of this fucking place," she said. "So, wizard buddies?" I said, attempting to change the subject, when the door opened once more.

"Alex, help!" Kristen shouted.

I looked back at the door and saw darkness and bones encroaching behind her, as the Xiangs and Elijah were running towards the exit. There were no discernible shapes behind them, just a wave of bone and shadow.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck," I said.

I checked the journal. I had regained two mana points in the little break that I'd had. For a second rank spell, I'd end up having to cast three from my hit points if my math was correct, but that would mean that whatever damage went through, so long as it was more than nothing would bring me to zero. Well, what the hell, there was a chance that that avalanche of bones didn't do any damage, wasn't there?

I began the incantation for the invisible wall, when Anna pushed me aside and incanted an arcane spell that I wasn't familiar with. The path behind the three fleeing figures erupted into a wall of fire. The darkness parted and the popping of bones sounded like a scream.

Mr. Xiang rushed through, pulling Mrs. Xiang with him. And the darkness snuffed out the flame and rushed forward. "Look out!" I shouted at Elijah, only steps away from the exit, and he pulled up his strange glowing shield. He was just close enough to the door that the shield blocked off all the darkness, as it extended a few feet above and behind him, though it retained the shape of a cup. The darkness and bone was pressing against it, ready to swallow the boy whole.

"Calmly now, just a few more steps back," I said. "I- I can't, the shield, I can't move while it's active," I said. "Alright, Elijah, get ready to drop it and jump back. Jump as hard as you can," I said. "He won't make it. Alex, it's definitely too fast," Anna said. "He will make it," I said. "Alex, all you're doing here is making it your fault when he doesn't make it," Anna said. "I- I think she's right. It's really fast and I'm- I don't know if I can-," Elijah said. "Well do you have better ideas?" I said, "Anyone?" "Thank you Alex, Mr. and Mrs. Xiang. I go now to the Lord. The shield will run out soon," Elijah said. His voice was shaking. His legs were shaking. He was crying.

Mr. Xiang took a deep, calm breath. He inhaled deeply, smiled and exhaled.

"I have loved you always, and will love you forever, my darling wife," he said. "No. No, I am putting my foot down, you do not do this," Mrs. Xiang said. "It is not so bad. I have always wanted to be a hero. The boy has his whole life ahead of him, and I have had the most beautiful life possible because I was with you for it," he said. "So don't leave me. I can't do this alone," Mrs. Xiang said. "I am so happy that you care so much for me. Thinking of you always," he said. "Wait, no, there has to be something. I'll think of something, just a second," I said.

And Mr. Xiang used his ability to switch places with Elijah. Darkness took him. I slammed the door shut before anything could get through.

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