Chapter One Hundred and Ninety-Eight - Everybuny was Draugr Fighting

It didn’t take much to learn how to fight the draugr. Not that it was easy.

I stepped out of the path of the undead before me, then dipped down and pointed the point of my spade up and at the draugr’s chest. When I sprung up, it was while extending my arms as hard and fast as I could to stab the undead in the sternum.

My warspade dug into the monster’s old leather armour, then hit the dried bone beneath with a dull thump. The draugr stumbled back, but that wasn’t enough to take it out.

Raising its arm, the monster brought an axe up above its head and started to swing it down.

I eeped and reached up, catching its forearm before it could chop my head open.

The draugr and I stared at each other as the moment held, his axe hovering a foot over my head and my spade still poking into his chest.

He growled and started to push down.

The monster was way stronger than I was. I had the advantage of speed and agility, the draugr had strength and undead endurance on their side. It usually ended in my favour, but only by a thin margin.

I fired some Cleaning magic into the undead’s arm, the rotting flesh therecrumbling like dry sand, and the axe dropping from fingers that went loose.

Thinking quick, I swiped the axe out of the air, flipped it around, and buried it in the undead’s neck.

Its head went flying, and soon my warspade loosened as the monster it was stabbed into turned to so much dust. Dust that swirled and spun and flew off to the front of the room where the buns were fighting.

I glanced that way, just in time to see the dust sink onto the draugr lord and heal some of his wounds.

The buns were doing alright. Buster had one of the four guardian draugr pinned down, and Carrot and Peter were switching between their own opponents and the boss. Momma, meanwhile, was beating the stuffings out of a draugr in heavy plate. They would have won a long time ago, if it wasn’t for all the dust moving from the undead to their leaders and basically keeping them healed up.

“Broc!”

I spun around and refocused. Amaryllis had been the one to call out, but she seemed fine, with a draugr hanging from marionette strings before her and keeping another busy while she sniped at it with bursts of crackling magic. She pointed off to the side, and I found myself wincing.

Awen was having some trouble. The monster she was fighting was taller and stronger than her, and she kept stumbling back and out of the way of the heaving swings of its two-headed axe.

I bounced over, and when the draugr raised his weapon for another swing, I jabbed my spade into its armpit as hard as I could.

The undead’s arm drooped, axe clattering to the ground.

Awen got her feet under her properly, then rushed forwards with a squeaking and not very intimidating yell. Her hammer came crashing down onto the draugr’s head,cracking bone, tearing sinew, and blasting apart the monster's dust cloud.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

Awen panted, then spat to the side. “I’m fine,” she said, sounding very tough. “...Awa.” Maybe not very tough.

I pat her on the back, then surveyed the room again. The draugr kept coming, but unlike the zombies from a couple of floors back, they took some time to drag themselves out of their caskets, and so we only had to face them one at a time.

Bastion was doing a big portion of the work. He darted across half the room, wings beating and humming as he struck out at the undead with fencer-like lunges and pokes that didn’t leave them with any time to react.

“More,” Awen said. She pointed out to a pair of the undead coming our way.

“Alright,” I said. “I’ll distract them, can you take one out then?”

She nodded and I rushed ahead.

The first draugr had a pair of little axes, the one behind him had a short spear with a rusty point. I decided to focus the nearest with the axes first.

My attempt to bonk him with the flat of my spade was met with a parry, and the draugr stepped up, its other axe swinging horizontally through the air right for me.

I stepped back, then feigned swinging as hard and fast as I could.

The undead raised both axes and caught the haft of my spade with the wooden handles of his axes. Not that it was hard, I wasn’t actually swinging to injure.

The moment my spade rattled I let go of it and ran up to the draugr. With a little hop, I placed a foot on his knee, then jumped up and used its shoulder as a stepping stool.

One foot raised, I concentrated a bunch of Cleaning magic into my heel and brought it crashing down onto the draugr’s head. The undead was wearing a coppery cap atop his skull, and that took some of the damage from my attack, but most of it washed into its head in the form of Cleaning magic, and I saw the light dimming in its eyes as it began to crumble.

Unfortunately, that left me falling down without a way to maneuver out of the path of the second draugr’s spear thrust.

I began to move to kick the spear away when a trio of clacks sounded out and the draugr sprouted some feathery bolts. One pinned its arm to its chest, swinging the spear to the side and out from under me.

I landed in a crouch, then reached up and grabbed one of the bolts jutting out of the monster’s chest. A burst of Cleaning magic fired through the bolt dug into the undead’s core and soon it was turning into so much dust.

Awen moved over to me while winding the crank on the side of her crossbow. “Are you okay?” she asked.

I nodded, and since I was already crouching, picked up the bolts laying on the ground. One had snapped, but the others looked alright.

Taking a moment just to breathe, I inspected the room again. Something niggled at me. Most of the dungeons we’d been in needed you to fight, but there was almost always a solution outside of that.

My attention caught on one of the decrepit old banners, one that I hadn’t noticed because it hung over the entranceway. It would have been above us when we entered the room.

“Ashes to Ashes.
Dust to Dust.”

What did that mean? It was a simple enough rhyme, and I was pretty sure I’d heard it before, but why was it here? I looked down and shifted my feet when I saw another draugr stumbling towards us.

“Almost loaded!” Awen said.

I nodded. “Got it,” I said.

Amaryllis had finished off her last opponent, and was bent over with talons on knees, gasping for air.

“Amaryllis, group up with Awen, take a break,” I called out.

“No breaks for me?” Bastion questioned as he casually swiped a draugr’s head off.

“Do you need it?” I asked.

He laughed. “No! I’m actually enjoying myself quite a bit. This is good practice.”

I left him to it. It was rare to see that much emotion on Bastion’s face. He was in his element, I supposed.

“Broc, are you going to take care of that one?” Awen asked. She was pointing ahead.

The draugr had more armour than the rest of those I’d fought, but instead of a spear or axe, it carried a long staff topped with a fist-sized gem, bit of gnarled wood folded around it to hold it in place.

“Hey there,” I said as I picked up my warspade and held it out before me.

The draugr’s response was to wave an arm before it. I felt the wind in the room shift a bit, and the flames in some of the sconces nearby fluttered towards the draugr. A ball of something crystal-y formed before him.

Ice?

I didn’t have time to wonder as it shot out towards me.

I ducked to the side and swung my spade to hit it, but missed entirely.

The spike curved a little, and I flinched as it sliced across my bicep. “Ah!”

“Broc!” Awen said. She raised her crossbow and pulled the trigger, then racked a bolt back to fire again. Three twangs sent a trio of arrows at the draugr.

It responded by summoning a wall of twisting snowflakes before it that sent Awen’s bolts flying off to the sides to clatter against the walls behind it.

Pushing a bit of Cleaning magic to my wound, I set my feet and narrowed my eyes. That monster was tougher. I doubted Cleaning balls would hit it, and fireballs were right out. Which left a more physical approach to things.

I charged straight at the undead mage.

It didn’t have the muscles left in its face to look surprised, but I imagined that it wasn’t expecting me to jump through his icy barrier with a burst of Cleaning magic to negate the worst of the icy specks darting around.

My spade came around with a great big arc, but the draugr, despite his heavier armour, was nimble enough to duck back.

I shook myself, flecks of ice dropping from my clothes and head. It was only a bit chilly. I could take it. The draugr snapped his staff down to hit me, but I brought my spade up and caught it mid-haft. “Hah!” I said.

The undead brought the staff up, just a bit, then smacked it down on my knuckles.

“Hah!” I cried out. That stung!

I hopped back and jumped on the spot while cradling my hand. It wasn’t broken or anything, but it hurt worse than the cut to my arm did.

The draugr, looking rather pleased with himself, raised a hand in my direction.

“Oh no, you don’t!” I said.

I tackled the undead in the chest, and we both went tumbling back to crash on the ground. The problem, I realized almost right away, was that he was still stronger than me, and that in a fight that mostly involved grappling, I was at something of a disadvantage.

We rolled a bit, bursts of Cleaning magic shooting out into the undead while he groaned and growled and tried to claw at me. We had moved closer to that strange half-pipe that had carried flames to each lantern.

I got one hand free, reached into the trough, and grabbed a handful of ash to fling into the undead’s face.

I was expecting it to go blind for a bit. I wasn’t expecting its head to melt.

“Huh?” I said as I crashed down, no longer held up by the undead as its body collapsed.

I... hadn’t really worked to kill it, but I noticed Mister Menu’s notification pinging me about it anyway. I pushed that to the side for the moment as I stood up.

Had I done enough damage, or was it something else?

The ash?

The body hadn’t sent a tendril of dust over to the undead the buns were fighting either.

I grabbed a handful of ash from the nearest sconce. Some was still really hot, but I ignored that as I looked for another undead. It wasn’t hard to find one walking towards Amaryllis and Awen. It already had a pair of bolts stuck in it.

Getting up, I ran up behind the monster and flung my fistful of ash at it. Where it touched the undead’s skin, the flesh and bone sort of sizzled and melted away.

“I figured it out!” I cheered.

Well, ‘figured it out’ was a big way to say I accidentally stumbled on a solution, but it was close enough.

***