Broken System Ch. 61-62 (Patreon)

Ch. 61 - Just Act Natural

No matter how much he worried, and no matter how many times he woke during the night to make sure the guards were still vigilant, nothing happened. No alarms sounded, and no lightning raids were launched. Indeed, the only thing that they should have worried about only came into view after climbing a long, shallow hill just after mid-morning.

They’d expected to arrive at Plantation 131 by noon, so everyone had thought they’d have more time to prepare. As it turned out, though, the geography made it so they would be seen a long way off, and they hadn’t thought about that. So, by the time they could see the the walled farm that was their next target, their opponents could almost certainly see them as well.

The part of the previous day that hadn’t been devoted to worrying about centaur attacks had been devoted to making plans for the battle to come, at least. That said, most of those hadn’t been particularly promising. In the end, they decided to tell pretty much the truth. One of them would pretend to be the Rhulvinarian in charge, and the rest would be their entourage.

They’d claim to be refugees from a major beastman attack on Plantation 124. Then, when all of the mage lords had arrived to hear the details, they’d take them out in one clean decapitation strike. It sounded fine on paper, of course, but there would be about a million things that could go wrong with that plan.

Benjamin had voted for Emma to play that role, both for her haughtiness and so that he could focus on trying to hack into all the slaves simultaneously with data leak. He’d adjusted his spell so that it would sniff for port access prior to making any attempts to exfiltrate data. If that modification worked, he could have access to everyone before the first blow was struck, and the mages would be none the wiser, but he hadn’t tested it yet.

Everyone agreed on the plan, at least in the broad strokes. It was only Emma who didn’t want to play her part, arguing they hadn’t even seen a female Rhulvinarian sorceress. “For all you know, there might be no such thing, and even if there is, I have no idea how one of those bitches is supposed to act!”

‘Just pretend you’re in charge and better than everyone, like always,’ Raja quipped, earning a lethal gaze from her while he and Benjamin laughed at just how true that little pop-up had been. Even Matt smirked, though he quickly suppressed it.

Benjamin grudgingly admitted that she had a point. The Summoner Lords had perpetrated every other form of evil that he could think of, so it certainly wouldn’t surprise him to find out that they kept women barefoot and pregnant or whatever the magical equivalent was.

Still, as she’d refused to do it, it had fallen to him to sit upon the horse at the front of the group and wear some of the Rhulvian finery that they’d sacked as he ran through the lists in his head and tried to remember what he was forgetting. Raja couldn’t do the job, which was a shame because he would have made a great effete nobleman, and Matt, well, neither of them trusted him to keep his cool if things got weird.

Benjamin had been the one reading through their correspondence. He was the one who knew how their magic and systems worked. So, he was the one who had to pretend to be in charge, even if standing at the front like that made him more likely to die if things went wrong.

He could find no fault with his plans, though. He was dressed the part, and though he really didn’t know how to ride a horse, he didn’t think he was embarrassing himself by sitting there and letting it walk forward mostly on its own. He’d even added the darkness to the eyes to his party, though they were purely cosmetic. He didn’t really have an easy way to do that with everyone else, so they’d all agreed to keep their eyes downcast for now.

About the only tell he could think of, looking over his character sheet, was that he was still kind of ugly for a mage, even with the items he was wearing granting him some bonuses in those respects. He doubted that his social stats would do him any favors when it came to lying, either. Honestly, he wasn’t even sure how a magical egomaniac was supposed to act; he was just planning to be an asshole the whole time and see how far that got them. It seemed to work with rich people on Earth, after all.

NAME: Benjamin Newsome

RACE: Human

CLASS: Mage(Blood Mage)

LVL: 5

EXP: 8,114/10,000

BPs: 3

Mind

INTELLECT

13

WILL

11

MANIPULATE

4 (5)

Body

AGILITY

6

STRENGTH

11

APPEARANCE

5 (8)

Soul

ANIMA

7

SPIRIT

12

CHARM

6

RESOLVE:  55/55

HEALTH: 55/55

MANA: 15/15

STATUS EFFECTS:

Soul Scar (major): -5 to all actions,-50% mana, No natural recovery of health or mana.

SKILLS

Knowledge (academics): 35

Craft (programming): 50

Knowledge (internet): 25

Magic (Runic): 70

Dodge: 25

Team Work: 30

Diplomacy 45

Leadership: 10

Awareness: 35

Resist (Social): 25

Survival: 20

Athletics: 15

Craft (primitive): 10

ABILITIES

Obstinate: +20% resistance to social attacks and charm magics

Blood Mage: Reduce Mana by half. Mana may be freely refilled at the cost of one health per mana. Immunity to life drain effects.

Optimized Mage: All spells cost 1 less mana

Elemental Attunement: +10% effect to all elemental spells

EQUIPMENT:

Main Hand: Delicate Ivory Wand

+25% spell range

Body: Dragon Scale shirt

An elegant shirt with unexpected defense. +2 APP, +8 Armor, -5% damage

Neck: Gold chains

+1 APP

Left Hand: Ring of Braided Bands

Defend against a single fatal blow.

Right Hand:Band of Scintillating Stones

+1 MAN, glows in the presence of treachery or poison.

Accessory: Heart of the Wild

+1 health regen/hr, +1 to all actions.

INVENTORY:

None

Benjamin had picked the various items of jewelry from the bag of such things that they’d taken. Emma had picked through them, chosen the few with any martial applications, but he’d chosen his accouterments simply for what looked the most ostentatious.

Perhaps that was a mistake, and he should have tried to stack as much manipulation as possible, but it was probably too late for that now. All he could do was hold his head high as he road through it with his gleaming breastplate and hope that things went even a little bit like how they’d discussed them.

When they came through the gate like they owned the place, the men at work nearby chopping wood and threshing grain barely looked up at them. Benjamin paused a moment for effect and then dismounted his horse, looking around. He’d expected to be greeted by one or more mages. He had a whole speech in his head, but there was no one around.

“You there,” Benjamin said, taking the quickest of glances at the nearest worker’s status screen. “Barnabus. Where are the Lords of this outpost? It is urgent that I speak to them.”

The man paused with his armload of firewood and regarded Benjamin silently for several long seconds. For a moment, Benjamin worried that the other man had seen through his disguise or that men held in thrall by a different mage lord might not be required to answer anyone they thought of as a mage because of missing certificates or something similar.

Instead, he finally answered. “Lord Darton is away in Arden with the intruder, Mage Samel should be in the fields, and Lord Keirer is… indisposed of just now.”

As he spoke about Lord Keirer, some loud moaning came from the closest stone building, acting as the perfect exclamation point. With so many slaves available to do everything that needed to be done, he was not surprised that dalliances could last half the day.

Sadly, it made the whole thing more complicated, though, because the two dangerous mages were in different places, which meant that they’d have to find some way to bring them together or kill one without the other noticing. And, of course, the other one could be back at any time and…

As Benjamin’s mind was whirling and the man he’d been addressing continued on about his business, he heard someone approaching from behind. “What’s all this then? We weren’t expecting any shipments until at least next month.”

Benjamin turned to find a young man in a wide-brimmed hat studying Matt while his friend stood there with a thousand-yard stare carved into his face. Benjamin was impressed. Matt was certainly doing a better job of pretending to be a brainwashed slave than he would have.

“This is no shipment, you imbecile!” Matt yelled. “Plantation 124 has been attacked and plundered!”

“Well, then I’d hate to be the one that had to report that,” the other man said with an unmistakable smirk. “And you are…?”

“You may address me as Lord Grevin, Mage Samel,” Benjamin answered, trying not to trip over the unfamiliar name.

The other man grimaced but said nothing as Benjamin tried to highlight the class differences between the two of them. “Well, at least you rescued most of your cattle,” Mage Samel shrugged. “These things happen. Surely, the punishments from the High Lords won’t be too terrible when that is taken into account.”

Benjamin shook his head. “This is the wrong attitude. We need to assemble a war council and a plan of attack and purge the animals that did this before they think to do it again!”

“Very droll,” the mage said with a smile, “but as much as this misfortune impacts you, I do not wish to make it my misfortune by interrupting my lord while he is… relaxing.”

“If you shall not, then I will do exactly that!” Benjamin said as he walked to the door.

“I don’t think—” Mage Samel said before going suddenly silent.

Benjamin looked behind him and saw that Matt had taken advantage of the man’s distraction and cleanly snapped his neck before the mage even knew that he was in danger. Part of Benjamin wanted to admonish his friend for that when there was still more to learn, but the other part of him wanted to congratulate Matt instead.

He looked around quickly but saw that no one seemed to have noticed, and the sounds of sex continued on the second story unabated. “Emma, do you think you can kill that mage up there before he sees you as a threat?” he asked.

Her only response was to smile and walk past him.

“Thirty seconds,” he hissed, “Then I’m putting everyone to sleep like before.”

She said nothing and continued inside as he began to count slowly down in his head and carefully listened for any signs of panic or combat.

There was nothing, though, and as he cast data leak, gathered passwords, and began his scripts, those workers that were visible from the yard where they stood simply passed out mid-task and collapsed to the ground.

“All right, everyone, form up,” Matt barked as soon as it started to work.

There was no point in pretending this was a stealth operation from this point on, and everyone leaped from the wagons, drawing the weapons that had been resting by their feet and spreading out to form a large ring, fortifying their position.

Even with his wand, the range on this probably wasn’t enough to affect everyone, and he’d have to cast it again on those in the fields, but for now, they braced for whatever was going to happen next.

Ch. 62 - Close Call

The next few minutes that followed were a lot like the last time they’d done this. Well, except for Emma opening the window above them, stripped to the waist, and showing off the severed head of the man she’d killed. She was splattered with blood and had a crazed look in her eyes as the freedmen they fought beside cheers.

Matt did not join them, though. Instead, he marched angrily inside the house. Benjamin followed just to make sure things wouldn’t get out of hand, but when he saw the blood-soaked bed and heard the few relevant facts, he quickly left again; this was clearly a lover’s quarrel, and he had no desire to be a third wheel rolling through this carnage.

“It was the only way to make sure the little degenerate didn’t suspect danger until the last moment!” he heard her yell as he walked back down the stairs.

He supposed that in a deranged sort of way that made sense, though he was fairly sure that the Emma that had dumped him once upon a time never would have stripped to gain a tactical advantage in murder. Given that Matt had done something similarly surprising and awful only a couple minutes before kinda made it hard for him to judge her, of course, Benjamin decided.

This was just what happened when you took out most of what a person was to make room for talent and skills related to murder. Even as he approached the familiar faces of Carlos and Jeong and began to lay out a plan for how they would secure the grounds and start gathering supplies, he couldn’t shake the knowledge that almost every person in the group had a soul that was filled with killing and death.

“I don’t want another party like last time,” he told them, much to everyone’s disappointment. “We can save that for the trail. With as little trouble as we’ve had so far, I’d much rather be out there than in here in case the missing Lord comes back.”

“After a break for lunch, though, right?” Jeong said, eyeing the carcasses of several recently slaughtered pigs.

“Getting something going for everyone to eat is a great idea,” Benjamin agreed. “Everyone is going to need a couple hours to process what just happened to them. You know that better than anyone. I’m just saying that once that’s happened, we’re gone.”

Everyone agreed with that. So, still listening to the sounds of Matt and Emma arguing, he walked away with Carlos and several other men with weapons so that they could rewire the beacon embedded in the plaza to buy a little time.

Just as they got there, and before they could start tearing up the stones, a line of green fire erupted from the center of the plaza, leaping almost thirty feet into the air before it widened to a bonfire and eventually a rift in space.

Benjamin saw half a dozen people walking through, along with the briefest glimpse of a city on the other side. Then his eyes met the dark-robed mage who was leading them.

“Lord Darton, I presume,” Benjamin said in a shaky voice, trying to keep the act going and take control of the situation. “I am Lord Grevin, and it is my sad duty to inform you that—”

The gambit failed, and the other mage’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. He raised his arm and shouted an unfamiliar command and a swarm of brightly colored crystalline songbirds sprang into existence, flying toward him and then the men that he’d brought with him as they sang an eerie melody. Benjamin only barely had time to cast level three arcane armor as they reached him.

The resulting explosions as each small bird erupted into light and razor-edged shrapnel reduced most of the men that were standing next to Benjamin to bloody smears, and even the magical barrier that he’d erected around himself wasn’t enough to spare him. Instead, he watched time freeze as hundreds of razor-sharp shards of shrapnel pressed against the thin red barrier that separated him from death.

Time hung there for only a moment, but it was enough to watch the fragments borrow into the glowing barrier until it faded entirely. Then things sped back up, and he landed hard on the ground, where he’d been knocked sprawling by the force of the blast. At first, he thought the blast had only been enough to knock him down, but as he lay there coughing up blood and feeling the numbness spreading to his limbs, he could feel that it had been worse than that.

The mage advanced on him, looking contemptuously from Benjamin to his men near the gate and back again. “I know Lord Grevin, and you, sir, are not him,” the mage smiled. “I shall enjoy tearing your mind and body to pieces as soon as we put down this little rebellion of yours. I—”

Benjamin was bleeding and shell-shocked, but he wasn’t dead. While the villain started to monologue, he cast data leak again, grabbing all of the authentication details he needed from the gloating mage’s honor guard.

As powerful as the man seemed, Benjamin was surprised that it worked. When the data populated, though, he didn’t free them or put them all to sleep as he mostly used the power. This time, he silently sent a single command to all of their displays.

‘Kill Lord Darton.’

The result was instantaneous. Even as he turned to cast some new horror at Benjamin’s burgeoning army, three of his own honor guards ran him through with their shiny bronze swords. He didn’t suspect that what had happened was possible until he was already dying. The mage lord had just enough time to turn around and give his best Julias Caesar impression before he fell down on the stones into a pool of his own blood. The wide-eyed look of disbelief at how quickly the tables had turned would stay etched on the proud man’s face permanently.

Benjamin smiled at that, even as he felt himself starting to lose consciousness. He looked at his stats and saw he was down to three hit points. That was bad enough, but the debuff showed just how dire his situation was.

Lacerated: 5 bleeding damage/minute.

He tried to do the math in his head to see just how many seconds that Matt had to save him, but everything was too fuzzy for that. Instead, he looked up at the clear blue sky as everything slowly faded to black.

. . .

When Benjamin awoke later, everything hurt. At first, he thought it was dark out, but he only realized after his vision slowly cleared that he’d been moved indoors somewhere.

“Matt?” he rasped through a dry throat. That single word was enough to provoke a coughing fit, though, and he quickly regretted it.

“Here, drink this,” an older woman said, offering him some water.

After a couple attempts, he managed to get some down. He recognized the woman. She was a woman with some healing magic from the first plantation they’d rescued, but he didn’t remember her name until he looked up, though he didn’t remember her name until he looked at her sheet.

“Thank you, Dolara,” he wheezed. “Is Matt okay? Was there another attack?”

“He’s fine,” she reassured him. “He’s just out there getting everyone ready to move like you wanted. Other than the men that were standing next to you when the portal opened, everyone was fine.”

“How many people died?” he asked.

“Seven,” she said, “but it wasn’t your fault.”

Surprisingly, Benjamin knew that. He didn’t even feel guilty. It was his mistake technically, but how could he have known that his disguise would be breached so easily? What worried him more than anything was the idea that he might have done something else to give himself away, though he wasn’t sure what it could be.

At least this time, none of my friends died, he thought to himself, trying to console himself over Carlos’s messy end. He’d just barely gotten to know the guy, and one swarm of gemstone songbirds later, they’d need a shovel to put him in a casket.

Replaying the whole thing in his mind, Benjamin decided the only thing he could have done differently was to improve his disguise. He would try to do just that, eventually, but he couldn’t do much while he still lay here feeling like death. He’d been studying the way magic items were wired on and off, and he thought he might be able to create one that would hold a lesser illusion if he had enough time to work.

Eventually, Raja came by and gave him sparse updates. He let him know that they’d subdued a handful of people in fields that Benjamin would need to deprogram once he was feeling up to it and that they’d looted everything worth taking and would be rolling out soon.

‘89 more recruits here,’ Raja told him. ‘That brings us to almost 170. Practically a real army.’

“Pretty awesome,” Benjamin smiled, trying to be enthusiastic. “But what the hell are we going to do with it?”

Raja gave him a wry smile and nodded silently, forcing Benjamin to smile too. “That’s right,” he agreed. “Whatever we want.”

Raja’s smile brightened at this, and he patted his exhausted friend on the shoulder, then went to go find the rest of their friends, leaving Benjamin to lay there. When did we cross the line from freedom fighters to warlords, he wondered, but there were no easy answers there.

By the time Matt and Emma had returned, he’d sat up, and with the help of Dolora, he’d gotten dressed in some ill-fitting clothes. It was only when he saw how badly the outfit he’d been wearing was damaged.

The whole thing was basically shredded from the collar to the knees. Even the magical armor woven into the shirt hadn’t been enough to deflect all of the projectiles. It really put it into perspective.

“I thought you might not make it for a bit there,” Matt said with a serious expression as he helped Benjamin to his feet.

“Nah, man,” Benjamin smiled, trying to lighten the mood. “I was sure you’d save me. It was only 5 damage a minute.”

“Five damage a minute that just wouldn’t stop,” Matt said with a shake of your head as he walked outside. “Something about the shrapnel. You just bleeding and bleeding until we removed it. Practically surgery out on the plaza there.”

“You see there?” he pointed. “That spot? That’s you.”

Benjamin’s cavalier attitude was gone when he saw the leftover carnage from earlier. There were two areas stained with blood. One, where the men with him had been blown apart, and another, a dozen feet away. The second one was apparently where they’d tried to patch him up, and it was a much bigger, fresher stain.

Benjamin wondered how he’d bled more than seven dead men for a moment, but then, deciding he didn’t really want an answer to that question, he turned away and started walking with his friends toward the wagons.

The longer he thought about it, though, the thing that was really odd, he decided, was that the ring he’d been wearing hadn’t been triggered. It was a single-use item, and it was supposed to save his life from something like this, but it had done nothing even when he’d been bleeding out. What was that even supposed to mean as far as he was concerned? How should he take that?

.

He decided he’d find an upgrade as soon as he got around to it. A point or two of strength would serve him a hell of a lot better than a ring that didn’t work.