Gravedigger Quest 2 - The Bloody Coin

[X] Hold the line until Melkorka is ready to move

—

While there was little doubt that no one wanted to stay here longer than absolutely needed, getting out of the Academy while carrying someone who couldn't move by herself if anything went wrong seemed like a bad idea. Lirra shuddered as she remembered carrying Chloe in a similar situation through the forest, the blood seeping from the mage all the way through Lirra's cape, the skin getting colder and colder as her grip on life faded…

"If- if we're fast enough, we could get away with Melkorka on her feet," Lirra said, trying to avoid those bad memories.

Lucilia walked to Melkorka and kneeled at her side, looking at the armour.

"I'll help get her suited, then. See what you can do to prepare if we're too slow."

Lirra nodded at Lucilia's instructions. As a Changeling she couldn't help her with that given the armour was made of steel, so she went back to the entrance to see what she had to work with. As it turned out, what she had was a lot of broken down golems, the doors from the nearby rooms and a lot of sharp implements, courtesy of Melkorka.

"So… how long does it take to put that armour on, actually?" Lirra asked Leirion, who was also on fortification duty.

Leirion just looked to the side with a nervous smile.

"Anyway, could you quickly go see if there's anything solid we could use in the nearby rooms?" she asked in turn instead.

Nodding, Lirra ran to search for materials, wondering if she hadn't, just maybe, slightly underestimated the complexity of putting on armour by a lot.

Unfortunately, Staves weren't as likely to have weapons or armour in their room as Swords were - Melkorka the smith, with her dozens of weapons, was an outlier and shouldn't be counted - but Lirra still managed to bring back a few metal items, held in a bedsheet to avoid burning herself, and deposited them at Leirion's feet. The mage had been shaping barricades around the door with the wood she'd already twisted to defend herself, but the repeated transformations, while aesthetically pleasing in a weird organic way, had left them brittle.

"Thank you, Lirra," said Leirion. "Now, what would help you fight against them? Holding them at the door kind of worked long enough for you to arrive in time, but…" She shuddered.

"Ah, well… It would be nice if I had enough room to move my spear, and if they couldn't swarm me."

Leirion nodded at that, thinking for a bit, then told Lirra to go back into the room.

"After this I'll be pretty much useless, but it should work," she said before taking a deep breath.

When Leirion opened her eyes they shone a bright pink, and soon a series of arcane sigils started floating around her. Strange lines went from them and crawled on the floor and walls, forming upon them a strange mystical web. Then, with visible effort, Leirion had her hands move in a series of precise positions, and the lines started shifting. And as their cage was transformed, so were the things beneath them. The ground started to cave, and the walls distorted. Pretty soon, the hallway outside the room was replaced by something akin to a moat, with a small platform - the untouched entrance - jutting out so one could defend from all directions against whatever tried to climb. Finally, and rather anticlimactically, some of the wood Lirra had brought turned into a long plank and fell on the ground next to Leirion, who soon did the same.

"There…" she gasped, taking heavy breaths. "We'll just… put the plank down to go over the hole once we're ready."

Lirra took a few hesitant steps on the platform. She did a small jump and winced as some dirt - or whatever the stone and wood had been turned into could be called - crumbled at the edge and fell down, bouncing between the various blades that jutted from the strangely organic moat's cliff until resting on the ground two meters down.

She twirled her spear, content that at least it didn't risk catching on a doorframe or anything.

It would have to do.

—

Soon enough, golems started to appear and Melkorka still wasn't suited up. Lirra could hear some bickering from inside as the bard struggled to help the Svartalf. It would have been nice if Leirion could help them, but sadly the mage was still recovering from her spell. She was half meditating, half comatose, sitting on the ground back against the entrance of the room, only able to lightly advise the two.

Lirra just had to trust the others to do their parts and do hers. As golems started literally pouring down the moat, she started stabbing those who got back up first as they tried climbing up. Given her position it wasn't that hard. It was much like shooting fishes in a barrel, if the fishes were piranhas and you were keenly aware of the leak in your boat but unable to do anything about it except increase your rate of fire.

Melkorka's runic spear was flying through the air, cutting through the horde with ease, but they were just coming and coming without cease. Pretty soon, Lirra could see stone hands grabbing the ledge and the baleful glow of the golems' single eye peering over. The fragile construction of the platform played in her favour as a few just fell back as it crumbled under their grip, and she stabbed those that held on. Unfortunately, it was only to see more had climbed over from the other side. She got rid of those, but the same repeated over and over.

Turn. Stab. Turn. Slash. Turn. Stab. Stab. Turn. Stab. Turn…

She was losing ground.

Stab. Turn. Stab.

She heard a scream from behind. Her spear flew instantly, piercing through the head of the golem that had grabbed Leirion's arm. The mage was sprawled on the ground, doing her best to crawl away as Lirra stepped back to the door. She pushed back a few golems, using the length of her haft to block a wide area. Her eyes widened in horror as one of them grabbed onto it as it fell down, dragging her along. Unable to get her footing back in time, she stumbled over the edge, but was able to step onto the head of a golem, then another and a third until she was back on solid ground… on the other side of the moat.

Lirra took an instant to assess the situation. Could she go back? Maybe. She might be grabbed on the way without the surprise of the first time. Would there be a point? The platform was lost. How could she save the three girls? Her grip on the spear tightened.

"Block the entrance with the plank!" she shouted, before flipping her grip.

She widened her stance, gauged the distance then threw her spear like a javelin. She didn't aim at a golem - there were too many, it wouldn't change anything - but at the platform. It was fragile, after all, and without a footing, the golems would be hard pressed to break down the defences and get in. If there wasn't a need to thin the horde in order to get out afterwards, it would probably have been best to do that from the start. Speaking of…

"Come out! Face me!" she taunted, pulling her shovel out. "You… you dumb, mean rocks!"

That probably needed some more work, but it still did the job as the horde turned to her, losing interest in those it couldn't reach in favour of the one it could. Lirra could likely outrun them - in a forest it wouldn't even have been a question - but in that particular situation it wasn't an option. If she lost them, they would come back here, so she had to be smart. Hit and run, close enough for them to pursue, but far enough for Lirra not to get overwhelmed.

And so she did just that. She struck down golems as they climbed up, then ran once she couldn't keep them down anymore. She did the same at the corner further down the hallway. Then to the next. And the next. Still, she was starting to tire down, and her ribs were hurting from a blow she received during her last retreat. As she was thinking of cutting and running - she was far enough from Melkorka's room now - she had the bad surprise of another group of golems coming from the next corner just as she was passing it.

She managed to parry the blow just in time, but she was pushed back and stumbled against the wall. By the time she recovered, she was surrounded. She stepped to the side, trying to lure the golems into moving in a circle with her so she'd have an opening but it didn't work. For all that their lack of sentience made them easy to trick, it seemed it also stopped them from being baited. As they slowly marched forward, a half circle growing smaller and smaller around Lirra, she glanced to the window on the wall. If she managed to jump far enough to reach the tree, it would break her fall, but with no running start and no time to actually open the window… She was pretty sure the golems wouldn't kill her if she was caught, but after the first test could she actually believe it?

The Academy wasn't above pointless slaughter. If she had to take a risk, then she might as well do something instead of just hoping for kindness from an institution that had shown to have none.

With a swipe of her shovel, she opened a path, took one step, two steps, and jumped. In a crash, she broke through the window, wincing in pain as sharp shards of glass tore through her cape and skin, and for an instant she was flying. Still, the ground came closer and closer fast. Too fast. She saw branches reaching to her, and soon leaves were filling her vision as she heard a series of cracks - the branches and not her bones, she hoped - then a final one as she hit the ground hard. Not as hard as it could have been, but still too fast for her leg who bent in a way a leg never should. The tree had done its best, but she just hadn't gotten enough speed before jumping.

In the distance, she could see the people that had been in the great hall running to the outer walls. So they'd made it. She smiled then tried to get back up, with her shovel as a crutch. She was slow and in pain, but she couldn't tarry. Already, one golem had fallen from the broken window, and while it didn't get back up, she didn't doubt that more would be pouring out of the gates soon with the noise they made.

She was proven right just a few steps later as she limped away. With no hope of running away now, she put her weight on her one good foot and readied for a last stand. With shovel and horn, root and branch and - she was desperate - even her teeth at some point, she put up as good a fight as the situation could hope for, but in the end she was overwhelmed. Her head rang as a fist connected, and her blurry vision could barely see the next one in time, but not soon enough to dodge it.

After that, merciful darkness took her before she could hurt much more.

—

Lirra wakes up in a cell…
[] … in the middle of chaos, as a rescue party is making its way here.
[] … under the cold gaze of Aida, her teacher, here to explain where she messed up.
[] … as the sun rises, hopefully soon to be followed by an explanation.