Chapter 104: Book 2: Chapter 8 (Part 2 of 2)

A couple of volleys of arrows, bolts, knives, hatchets and even a magic missile or two pelted the four clansmen who had been tormenting their captive. All of them were hit by multiple projectiles, a small measure of vengeance for the man they had been persecuting.

With our projectiles unleashed my force abandoned our concealed position and sprinted the thirty-odd metres from the trees to the entrance of the school.

Apart from boarding up many of the ground floor windows, the Jenson clan hadn’t made any defensive improvements to the building, and I rather doubted they were responsible for those small measures either.

The closest of the guards, another dogman, had been the focus of most of the first volley of attacks and had been slain outright by the deluge. The other three being a bit further back were then targeted more evenly by the combined second volley and hadn’t perished yet.

“Invaders! Invaders!” they shouted at the top of their lungs.

Two of them quickly ducked their heads down after screaming their warning and scrambled towards the small children’s play area to take cover from our missile fire. The only orc of the three survivors, who I subconsciously pinged as an actual Jenson, had the smarts to run for the school entrance, despite it being further away, rather than for the nearest cover.

The two others twigged too late that we were no longer targeting them from range, and we charged through the play park that helpfully was not enclosed. The two remaining guards hampered by their earlier injuries were overrun and despatched with sword and axe blows.

Seconds later, we were in front of the glass double doors that led into the school reception area. The doors had been closed and I could see a couple of slaves as they finished wrapping a chain around the door handles and padlocking it. The slaves stepped back hurriedly and took cover behind a desk as my group ground to a halt in front of the now-closed front doors.

The orc from outside, Clay, was being helped to his feet by two other orcs, Clancy and Pip, also both Jenson’s. The three of them had shit-eating grins on their faces.

“You made a big mistake, pretty boy,” Clancy, the largest of the three, sneered at me. “You think ‘cause you got a few guys at yer back yer a big man. Momma’s gonna teach you the error of your thinking. You ain’t shit. She’s gonna fuck you up good. Kill your boys, maybe put a collar on that pretty neck of yours, put you on your knees where you belong and put you to work.”

All three of them let out loud honks of laughter at that.

I couldn’t help pulling an ick face at the thought of what they were implying. No matter, they were about to be disabused of their misplaced confidence. It was obvious that they were under the mistaken impression that the force field that protected the school would work against us as well as it did against the monsters.

Not so, one of the four prison complexes in Ionia was the Michigan Reformatory which housed a number of inmates under the age of eighteen. Two of the new crew members, Richie Clarke and Pete Harris, were a few weeks shy of turning eighteen.

Had they not already been available we’d have had to pick up Jackson from Ionia before proceeding.

I’d sent Pete with LT’s group to open any doors for them.

Richie was standing just behind me, and I motioned for him to go forward. “Put your hands on the door hinge,” I whispered as he walked past.

Richie approached the doors nervously. As he did, I let my own grin grow wide. “Danny!” I shouted at the top of my lungs. “Do us a favour and open the doors for us.”

Danny, being an ogre, had been trailing behind the main group watching our rear for threats. He was too big to hide well, hence why he was assigned the rear-guard role. Now that stealth was unnecessary, he could take centre stage.

“With pleasure, captain,” he called out and started to jog towards us from the treeline where he had been lurking.

My team parted like the red sea at Moses’ command to give the big guy an open avenue and he lumbered past at a frightening speed. The ogre was nine feet tall and had to weigh close to six hundred pounds. He was heavy, but that weight was all muscle, which included his legs. He wasn’t particularly agile but when given a bit of a run-up, he turned into a flesh juggernaut.

Danny collided with the double doors, dead centre, shoulder first. The thick plexiglass cracked and then shattered. To be fair to the padlocked chains they held firm. The frame of the doorway, on the other hand, not so much, and the entire front edifice tore loose and barely hung on.

Danny backed up a few steps and with a mighty bellow, the ogre slammed his shoulders into the askew frame tearing it from the wall completely and he ploughed into the mezzanine of the school.

All this was possible provided Richie was touching the door, thereby disabling the protection field, which would not activate. A bit of a glaring security flaw but the school protection fields were only meant to keep monsters out, not people. I could have carved us a way through the glass without Danny’s assistance, but an ogre battering ram made a quicker and more distinctive statement.

The shock and awe were enough that the three Jenson’s barely reacted before we were upon them and cut them down.

With the immediate threat dealt with I raced behind the reception desk and grabbed one of the timid slaves by the scruff of his neck.

“Where are the kids and where is Gertie?” I barked at him gruffly.

He couldn’t look me in the eye, but I didn’t have time to play nice. Not that I felt like doing that anyway.

“The kids are in the assembly hall,” the terrified man muttered and pointed down one of the corridors. “Ma Jenson has converted the teacher’s lounge into her living quarters, she is usually in there.”

The man shuddered as he told me about Gertie. I took a closer look at him. He was about my age and good looking in a soft almost feminine manner. His femininity was accentuated by mascara, which was running down his cheeks, and lipstick.

A quick glance at the other young man showed he wore similar makeup. I think we had discovered the Jenson clan’s temporary answer to the lack of young women.

And yet, they seemed more afraid or disgusted at the thought of Gertie than they seemed to be at what her boys must have been using them for.

I didn’t have the spare time to delve deeper into the why and issued my orders. Danny would take two squads and head to the assembly hall. He would secure that area and the children. Meanwhile, me, Ana, and the third squad would hit the teacher’s lounge in the opposite direction. I sent the two slaves scampering to the back of the building to open the doors for LT if they hadn’t been already.

We rushed down the darkened corridors. The usually bright and cheerful frescoes and adornments you would normally see in an elementary school had either been torn down or defaced by the Jenson’s. As we advanced, two armed men were coming in the opposite direction to investigate the ruckus at the entrance, not fully understanding an invasion was underway.

They took one panicked look at my group and fled into an adjoining classroom. Undoubtedly, they intended to escape through the windows and out into the car park. It was a shame for them that the windows were boarded up. I sent Charlie and half my squad to kill or subdue them and then catch up with us.

Seconds later, we turned the corner which led to the teacher’s lounge.

The Jenson’s made it easy to confirm this was indeed the right place by posting a pair of axe-wielding orc guards outside the door. These two were full-blood clan members, Alex and Mikey Jenson.

Unlike the previous pair we’d crossed paths with moments ago, these two weren’t cowards. They were aware something was up; they might have even sent the other two to go find out what exactly was happening. And upon seeing us, launched themselves in our direction screeching war cries from their spittle-flinging green lips.

Both orcs were level ten Barbarians, which made them the strongest Jenson clan members we’d encountered to date. The pair came barrelling into us with little regard or care for their safety.

I didn’t have much practical Darkwyrld understanding of the barbarian class, but it didn’t look to be too far from the RPG trope of them descending into a berserk fury. Battling until either they or their opponents were dead.

Their heedless disregard for our attacks made this a trickier affair than previous combats. After all, none of my people were truly experienced melee fighters. As such, even though I got several sword strokes in the barbarians didn’t back away or try to fend me off and ploughed into the heart of our seven-person group swinging their axes with wild abandon as they did.

This forced me to turn and attack the orc’s backs as the two of them violently assaulted my low-level crewmembers. Meanwhile, Ana wrapped her whip around the ankle of one of them and wove her way through the frenetic fight laying hands on our people who had been hit and replenished their Hit Points with the ones she drained from our enemies.

The fight was short but took longer than a seven on two had any right to be. None of my crew were slain, but most had fewer than half their Hit Points left, and a few were even red lining into their health reserves despite Anastasia’s best efforts.

Fortunately, the other half of the squad caught up with us and they’d had far less trouble with the other two who had surrendered when they had been cornered in the classroom.

Not wishing to delay, I lined up in front of the door to the teacher’s lounge.

Somebody had scrawled Gertie’s Grotto on the red door in black marker. I could hear some muffled groans coming from inside, but they were indistinct. There was enough for me to tell that whomever they originated from was being quite loud, but you couldn’t hear much on this side of the door even with my enhanced hearing.

I grinned with vicious delight.

The lounge must have had some kind of soundproofing installed to counter the noise produced by several dozen elementary-aged kids screeching and squawking in the corridors and the play area. If we couldn’t hear much coming from the inside, then those inside were likely just as ignorant of what had been happening outside the room.

I lifted my leg high, ready to kick the door by the lock and bust our way in.

Anastasia darted forward before I could finish my very manly and impressive display.

She ducked under my raised leg, grabbed hold of the door handle and depressed it. The door was unlocked, and she pushed it open firmly. The bottom of the door dragged over the carpet with a soft rustle. The door dragging along the thick carpet brought it to a stop at a seventy-degree angle and prevented it from banging into the wall and announcing our presence.

Anastasia pirouetted out of the way and mouthed “You’re welcome,” at me and winked.

Any thoughts of clipping the cheeky minx’s ear abruptly fled as I got an eyeful of the scene within.

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Most of the furniture in the room had been shoved to the far side to make room for a king-sized bed. Gertie held court from the centre of the bed’s mattress, and she had been the source of the muffled groaning we had heard before the door had been opened.

There was no longer any impediment in that regard which was a damn shame as I couldn’t unhear or unsee what was before me.

Gertie was a large obese orc woman who was buck naked in all her sickly-green skinned glory. Patches of her skin seemed to be infected with something nasty and there were red-rimmed sores around her mouth.

She had three collared young men on their knees on the bed with her. One between her legs and the other two were under her arms, with Gertie gripping the backs of their hair and directing them while she squealed with wretched delight.

The three unfortunate men were being ‘put to work’ if I recalled Clancy Jenson’s threat from a few minutes earlier accurately. And we had an answer for why the two slaves from the foyer shuddered with revulsion at the mere thought of Gertie’s whereabouts.

Her eyes were closed as she screamed aloud. “Good boys! That’s it. Keep licking, keep Momma happy and there’ll be special treats tonight.”

The men continued pleasuring her. Although, if the heaving movements of their chests and pinched expressions on their faces were any indication, not by choice or any mutually shared enjoyment.

 

Gertie Jenson (Orc Matron)

Clan Siphoner (P) (3/14*)

Character Aptitude: High

Loot Value: High

Threat: Moderate

XP Value: 5,740

Current Affiliation: Clan Jenson (Leader)

Fertile Receptivity: 0/202

 

Gertie’s details were slightly different from any others I’d seen before and Quixbix intuited my consternation and was happy to supply some further information as I sprang into action while Gertie was distracted with her reluctant paramours.

<She has a siphoner class. Those are pretty rare and can be highly useful if used correctly. I think it goes without saying that Gertie has been abusing the power. The siphon forms a symbiotic link with those in their sphere of influence and when they level up can absorb some of their stat increases.

<The siphon is then supposed to redistribute those stats to others within the same network. The purpose is to horse trade between people to concentrate their development in the areas most useful or needful to them. However, if you pump too many siphoned stats into a person without offloading any in return or hoard them for yourself the class essentially becomes parasitic, not symbiotic, and there can be dire consequences.

<In Gertie’s case, her obesity and the suppurating sores tell me she likely hasn’t returned many of the advancements she has absorbed. The longer she holds onto the stats the worse her ailments will become until they become permanent features and it starts to spread to those in her network. Three is her true level, but she has the equivalent of eleven extra levels worth of stats that she has harvested from her clan.>

Quixbix’s lesson was interesting but didn’t really change my plans. Killing this monstrosity remained top of my to do list. That she was unarmoured and unaware that cold death stalked her only made it easier.

I leapt up onto the bed in the midst of her grunting orgasm. Her crusty eyes flashed open at the sudden shift of weight on the bed, but all she saw was the points of my ice blades as they slammed home on either side of her filth-caked nose. The blades slid home, through her occipital cavities and into her brain.

The good luck ended there. I’d wrongfully assumed that my double strike into her grey matter would be the finishing touch of the fight.

It wasn’t. She was hurt and hurt badly, but her health was not fully extinguished.

Fucking magic assisted health!

Gertie reacted immediately and thrashed on the bed as she bellowed in both rage and pain. One of her flailing arms slapped into my chest and the strength of the blow caught me by surprise.

I was propelled across the room like a rag doll and slammed into a grey metal filing cabinet that bent inwards from the force of the collision.

The slave who had been nearest to me had been clubbed by Gertie’s arm fat as she swiped at me and he rolled off the bed, dazed and struggled to retain consciousness. He was the lucky one, Gertie had been aiming for me with her thrashing limb and it had been a glancing blow to his head that poleaxed him.

The same could not be said for the other two male slaves on the bed.

The chap who had been knelt between her legs had his neck snapped between her thighs. The second slave kneeling on her other side looked up at the worst possible moment and received a sharp elbow to his nose that caved in his face and skull. He flopped back off the bed onto the floor, lifeless.

“Scum! Fucking…ssscum! I’ll…I’ll…k-k-kill you. Where’s muh boys?” Gertie roared almost incomprehensibly as she tried to manoeuvre herself off the bed.

Despite what Quixbix had said, in the heat of the moment I’d neglected to consider just how much Strength and Constitution points Gertie may have harvested to give her the equivalent of eleven additional levels. Well, it was obviously enough Con to survive the direct health damage of two blades to the brain.

The Darkwyrlds at work again.

Of course, usually, the stats you gained from a new level were a bit more evenly spread, preventing such beastly might in the earlier levels.

The silver lining, she must have neglected to take any extra dexterity as she waddled about on the bed trying to get to her feet while screaming barely intelligible invective abuse.

Gertie looked and sounded like she was in the midst of a stroke. My double strike may not have killed her outright, but not even magic can make it so that you suffer no ill effects from serious brain trauma.

Gertie managed to roll herself onto her knees, but the hilts of my ice scimitars connected with the mattress in the process leaving her howling in pain.

Just as I was shaking off the cobwebs, my crew started to make their way into the lounge warily. Seeing me be flung across the room must have rattled them somewhat and I couldn’t blame them for their hesitancy.

As I got my feet back under me and prepared to bark some fresh orders Gertie seized the hilts of my swords and with a pained screech yanked them from her head and in one smooth motion hurled my blades towards the door where my people were coming through.

Even without her eyes, it was difficult to miss.

I reacted quickly and dissolved the blades, but not swiftly enough. Both Anastasia and Charlie the Acheronian scammer were struck by my weapons. The scimitar’s dissolution kicked in before they could penetrate more than an inch and the terrifying force of Gertie’s enraged throw was mitigated but both stumbled back and fell to the ground with an oof.

“Spread out and use ranged weapons,” I yelled.

Following my own command, I cronjured short ice throwing knives and chucked them at the disgusting orc woman.

Scarlet blood poured from her gaping eye holes and spattered her cheeks and the soiled sheets of the bed. Gertie was breathing heavily and grunted something incoherently as she finally slipped off the bed on my side. I didn’t know if it was the blades to the brain or if she was naturally this foolish, but she didn’t summon whatever armour she must have had in her inventory to help keep her alive.

As Gertie got off the bed, she stood on the back of the sole living slave who had been hunched in the foetal position on the ground. Instinctively, he rolled away at the sudden weight on his hip, and sightlessly Gertie stumbled and fell to the carpeted floor.

It was all over after that.

Anastasia’s whip encircled her throat and my men seeing an opportunity advanced on the prone orc to attack her exposed head.

Soon she lay still on the ground, bleeding from dozens of wounds. Anastasia helped heal up Charlie who hadn’t taken any further part in the battle while the rest of the squad extricated the poor sap Gertie had fallen upon.

The battle for Muir was over.

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