Chương 32: Chapter 109: Cat and Mouse

"It's the oddest thing." The tracker said, sniffing the wind. Caddock raised a brow and waited.

"Every once in a while I'll get a whiff of a campfire, but it's hard to nail down a direction. Like There's no origin. It's diluted, miles away, but there's no directionality to it." After days of searching they hadn't found the Deceiver's landing point, nor had they caught sight of him. Like he disappeared off the face of the Earth. Most fliers couldn't fly any longer than their Ability held, it was a rare Class that allowed long range aerial hauling of three people and their gear.

The prophet was recorded as stating that William Oh could fly, but there was no evidence it was anything more than short range bursts. And with two others in tow… What about the kobold? Caddock found the church's dossier on the kobold to be infuriatingly sparse, as though it were nothing more than a mascot for William Oh's Party, and therefore unworthy of note. The damned thing wouldn't be in the Party anymore, let alone running it, let alone alive, were it not an aberration worthy of note.

Perhaps it was providing the means of flight… somehow. Damn those monks. Still. They must be stopping somewhere to camp… The old paladin craned his neck and looked up, studying the stars above.

"Pull the fliers back in, I've got a new job for them." In a matter of hours, Caddock was standing atop one of the enormous mirrors the gods had placed at the beginning of the Coil to keep humans warm, nudging a little campfire with the toe of his boot.

"It seems as though they're flying from star to star," he mused to himself, before glancing up at Hiro, who was studying the stone ceiling with apprehension.

"Have our fliers search the stars back towards the village. Have our logistics crew begin packing for a run."

"Back towards the village?" Hiro asked, looking back down at him.

"Can't we just use the village as their origin?"

"Maybe. I'd like to discover their first two campsites, made while they still naively believe we will not find them. Those first two campsites are most likely to be the straightest line towards their final destination." In a matter of hours, Caddock was leaning over a map, frowning as he traced a faint line of charcoal across his expensive map, using the blade of his sword as a straightedge. Is this Deceiver insane? Caddock mused as he traced their projected course through the shaded forest north of Bone mountain.

Under their very noses. Caddock was inclined to believe this was their true objective. His quarry was inexperienced, had never been hunted before: They had no experience with this kind of tracking. The route northeast wasn't an attractive distractor by any means. It was too dangerous to be fake. They should've headed south. Despite not knowing his end-goal, this route gave Caddock a bold, winner-take-all impression that screamed 'teenage boy assured of his invincibility.'

Which fit what he knew about this particular Deceiver. They're travelling at night, sleeping during the day. I can take advantage of that. Sleep is overrated, anyway. Now that Caddock knew which way they were going and roughly how fast, he could estimate their current location to a few square miles, even get ahead of them and stage an ambush. The problem was, how to deal with this information?

Caddock was only going to get one surprise attack on his quarry, - at best – and certain tactics that he might like to use, such as softening up the entire area with a Nuker from a safe distance, were unacceptable due to the Prophet hostage. First, send messengers to the rest of the army to halt the spread and instead tighten the net, draw it inwards, so even if I miss, he's still caught.

Next, I need a crew of fast movers who can also camouflage well enough to avoid being spotted by our opponent's commanding visual field. Ranger Archetypes. The Dossier on William Oh suggested that his Acuity was his strongest stat at over a hundred, base, not including his kit. He was going to be difficult to sneak up on. But that's not saying it can't be done. William Oh"We can't stay here." Loth said, peering through a spyglass above the crest of the hill.

"Why's that?" Will asked.

"We made a mistake. The graneshian army is changing direction, heading straight towards us." Will frowned, thinking about it for a moment.

"The campfires?"

"Probably. I'm ashamed to admit I was complacent." Loth said.

"How long do we have?" Will asked.

"Less than three days. We should leave as soon as we finish eating and aim for the northern tip of the circle. It likely hasn't received word of us yet, and they wouldn't send their best."

"Oh no, we won't get to continue to freeze in this damned forest." Jason muttered, huddled up in his sheepskins.

"What a tragedy." During the day, the forest north of Bone mountain was brisk, but at night, it plunged to below freezing temperatures, forcing them to hunker down and see to Jason's survival. Will was surprised to note that freezing temperatures felt nearly the same as a brisk day. He could logically tell there was a difference when he paid attention, but it was a vague thought in the back of his mind. Even loth, who had been particularly weak to cold, was unaffected by these temperatures.

"North is even worse." Will said.

"Oh. Shit." Jason muttered before his expression changed.

"Actually…One minute." He raised a hand and began trundling towards the latrine. Will glanced over as one of his ghost butlers arrived beside him.

"Let me se what you've got for me this time," Will said.

"I stole this from a crafter who paid their life's savings to acquire this for their son." Noob said, offering him a package of waxed paper.

"It is a Cursed Armor from the Fourteenth Floor."

"You don't need to tell me who you had to hurt to get these, just pay them back if I can afford it." Will said, taking the package and opening up the Sourdough Entry. Active: 1 Charge. The user may gain the full effect of a Consumable Relic only using 80% of the relic. The remaining 20% may be reserved to ferment a new Consumable Relic if provided powdered Relic dust, time, and additional Charges. Scales with Focus.

Damaged (but not destroyed) permanent Relics can now be targeted with a charge of Sourdough, which will cause them to passively absorb Relic Dust to gradually repair themselves for one month. Speed scales with Focus The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. And what would Cursed Armor do to the Ability? Will thought, checking the changes the Sacrifice would make. Gives items a mind of their own and limited mobility.

May cause them to act in a manner that benefits the User, although consumables may be less eager to be consumed.

"Nope." Will said, handing it back.

"A Corsoth, from the ninth Floor." Noob said, offering him the next package. Corsoths were notorious for yanking Climber's souls out of their bodies and shoving them in little dolls, or whatever they had on hand. Definitely a strong interaction between miasma and the physical world. Allows damaged Relics to absorb miasma from living enemies. In rare occurrences, the Relic may absorb new effects. Oooh. That's the closest we've gotten so far.

Noob had been bringing him possible sacrifices for nearly a week now, and nothing had given him the 'new effects' so far. The relic still had to be damaged, but it was still progress.

"let's hold onto that one, but I'm not a fan of 'rare occurrences'," Will said, handing it back.

"A Meldmonger, from the Fifteenth Floor." Noob said, handing him a watertight tub filled with a wobbly jelly of some kind. Let's see… For an additional 5 Charge, Relics absorb affixes from the Relic dust they are submerged in, with a tendency to average rather than add. Scales towards addition with Resistance. Can only be performed once per Relic. Average rather than add? Will thought.

In simplified terms, The way Will was reading it, if he had a relic with 8 Resistance and 0 acuity, and he bathed it in Relic dust from items that only gave 20 Acuity, the relic would become a 4 resistance, 10 Acuity item. With high Resistance, the finished product might shift to 6 resistance, 15 Acuity, or more. That's why it can only be performed once. If I could get close to 100% addition rather than averaging, and do it multiple times, that would be… a little too much for The System to handle.

The System did not like infinite scaling. Even Frederick Wyrd's infinite damage loop only worked because sooner or later one person exploded long before the power would tear a hole in reality. Still, this gave him exactly what he'd envisioned, the ability to nudge the stat distribution and Abilities of an item the way that he wanted to.

"Holy…this is it." Will mused, jiggling the container.

"This is the one I want."

"Excellent." Noob said with a nod. Will offered the Sacrifice up to The Tower. Warning! This Sacrifice will complete this Secondary Ability. No further upgrades will be allowed. Do you wish to continue? Will paused and gave it some thought. The Corsoth Sacrifice didn't mention a limit to the number of times it could trigger, although it was a 'rare occurrence,' whatever that meant.

It was theoretically possible that Will could design a perfect weapon by hunting a specific monster over and over again, stacking tiny chips of upgrades from random chance until he wound up with something amazing… But on the other hand, it would only work for weapons, and it's largely out of my control, the exact design. Will could imagine himself trying to enhance the dimensional Assassin's amulet by smacking monsters with it, hoping for an upgrade that only happened every half-million kills.

No, I'll take this one. It was a bit sad that Will wasn't going to get upgrades to Sourdough that gave it the ability to duplicate or enhance consumables, or speed it's effects up to the point where he could make a huge profit like he'd originally thought. But… originally I was thinking a bit too small. The ability to custom-tailor an item to his build and then slot it into one of the fingers of Phantom Hand was… outrageously good, and far outweighed an infinite money glitch. Money was…

fine, but after seeing Lords in action, Will had realized it was only a small portion of their power. They had something no one else could touch. And that was what Will needed. Will raised the Sacrifice and mentally confirmed his intention to offer it to The Tower. The Sacrifice disappeared in a flash of blinding light. As the light reached its peak, flooding his vision, Will heard the creaking sound of a taught string shifting against lacquered wood. A bow.

Will threw himself backwards as an arrow blazing with energy shot past him, curving mid-flight to follow him and drawing a line of blood across his face. I thought Loth trapped this place to the Abyss, Will thought, tumbling backwards and using Phantom Hand to yank himself sideways, making his path erratic. Will switched his equipped Relic from the Wand of the Undead Retainer to Stormfists. Stormfists +10 kinesthetics +10 Resistance +10 strength +31% movement and attack speed.

Each blow struck has a 42% chance to add a low amount of lightning damage. May paralyze. The world slowed down as Will sped up.

"Loth, wha-" Will glanced over and Spotted Loth with an arrow through her temple, eyes wide and staring. She's wearing Cuirass of the Cruel Tyrant, Will thought, flinging himself up into a tree and snagging a branch with his hand while sending Phantom Hand towards his Party member as dozens more arrows aimed to follow the sneak attack and turn his lieutenant into a pincushion. Phantom hand grabbed Loth by the breastplate and yanked her forward.

The arrow fell out of her head, seemingly burnt away by acid, leaving behind a steaming wound that was rapidly closing. Will spotted a handful of dead Armor beetles crumbling to ash as they fell out of her robe.

"Wha!" Loth snapped awake as she flew through the sky.

"Ambush!" Will said as he sprinted through the treetops, the finger-thin branches bearing him with the same strength as bedrock.

"They were already here!" Loth said, yellow-green eyes wide, mind leaping three questions ahead.

"How the-""Nobody could've gotten inside the perimeter without me noticing. They were already in the forest waiting for the perfect opportunity!" Shit, Will thought, Jason was further away from us, and I was blinded by the Sacrifice. It really was the perfect moment to attack.

"I'm good!" Loth cried, signalling for Will to let go of her with Phantom Hand. Loth snagged a tree, digging in her black claws into the thin birch tree, causing the entire thing to rock violently in place as she held her other hand up and snarled. A series of explosions flooded the surrounding forest as her traps went off, bathing the forest in smoke and shrapnel, hopefully shaking up their aggressors, and- Jason! Will thought, bouncing off a tree and heading for the last place he'd seen him.

Will whipped past the latrine and there was no sign of his friend. Instead, there was a man wearing dull, unpolished heavy armor studded with wicked-looking spikes. Shit, Will thought, screeching to a halt on a tree-branch.

"I want you to know-" Will didn't bother to listen to the rest, instead lobbing an iron cannonball at the offending Graneshian soldier. The cannonball exploded like a snowball against a barn roof, leaving a fist-sized chunk of rapidly cooling iron fused to the man's breastplate. Like a snowball, the paladin idly wiped it off.

"That your friend is going to be fine," He finished, drawing his sword.

"You on the other hand-" Screw this, Will thought, grabbing himself with the Phantom Hand and yanking himself backwards. Not at full speed, not right away. Will wasn't suicidal. Soldiers seemed to burst out of the ground below him, unable to catch him due to his height above the ground. Two ahead of him leapt up to cut off his retreat, waiting with arms splayed on either side of a larger evergreen.

Will shot a hole through the center of the tree and followed along behind it, tucking his arms and legs in tight, receiving some minor scratches, but punching through the wood and outside the encirclement.

"Will!" Loth shouted, prompting Will to throw out a hand and catch Loth mid-flight.

"Hold on tight," Will said, putting the palm of Phantom Hand on the small of his back and gradually increasing the speed, until the wind and branches began tearing at his clothes like a mad beast, emerging into the sky and leaving the Graneshian soldiers behind in a matter of seconds. BOOM! An explosion reminiscent of Mason's Conflagration detonated just behind him, the shockwave thrumming through his chest. The Nuker had missed the timing by a fraction of a second. Faster.

Will increased the pressure, praying his concentration lasted. A second explosion came behind him. Closer, but still harmless. Will wrapped his hand around the back of Loth's head and grabbed his ankle with Phantom Hand, yanking himself down and backwards, aiming to dodge the third explosion before the Nuker got a feel for their speed. Will snapped downward, transferring most of his forward momentum into downward speed, heading straight for the earth. Another explosion sounded beyond Will.

Will grabbed branches with his hands and feet as he hit the canopy with meteoric speed, transferring stability into the thin branches to slow himself down before he hit the ground. Even prepared, the snap and sudden stop nearly broke his neck.

"You okay?" Will gasped. Loth coughed.

"Bone Mountain," She said, pointing up at the fortress looming above them. the military arm of Granesh they'd been hiding in the shadow of.

"That's where they'll be taking him." Will nodded, changed directions and began propelling them into the very heart of enemy territory. Back at the clearing, Caddock watched Will disappear with an appreciative whistle.

"Damn. He's fast." The old paladin said. How the Abyss am I supposed to catch up to that? That boy's gonna be a Lord if we don't kill him soon.

"Sir, should we pursue him?" one of the rangers asked, approaching him.

"I haven't eaten, drank, slept or shat in a week, so no, we're going to leave that to the harriers, let them wear him down while we get some rest, now if you'll take the Patient Stalking ability off and excuse me…"

"Sir." The ranger pointed up at the mountain, where they had sent the Prophet to be protected inside the fortress. There was an explosion on the side of the mountain along the road leading up to the Bone Mountain fortress.

"Shit." Caddock began sprinting. In retrospect, sending the Prophet to the fortress was the best choice, which also made it the most predictable. If William oh had done anything other than immediately bum-rushing the fortress, the prophet would be safely inside its walls before the Deceiver realized where he went. Caddock grinned. This is actually kind of fun.