Two of the golems peeled toward them.
Harry’s stomach tightened. He shifted that way at once.
The other four adjusted, grinding after him. In seconds all six were moving together again, a single wall of stone closing in.
Cedric’s voice cut through the party link.
- Cedric: Sir Harold, there’s too many. We should retreat and hold the path.
Harry glanced back at the narrow pass behind them. Tight. Defensible. But the cliff would be a problem.
- Harry: Alright. Get back.
They retreated to the narrow pass. Harry and Cedric took the front. Stan and Jo behind them, shoulder to shoulder. Harry held Stonefang, Jo and Stan leveled spears. Cedric traded his spear for Underwyck’s Maul.
The golems stopped.
For a long moment they stood motionless.
Then, as one, they retreated back to the far side and spread into a straight line.
Cedric watched them, jaw tight. “If we want to get past, we are going to have to fight out there.”
Harry kept his eyes on the line of golems. “If I go out, can you hold here?”
Jo shifted her stance, pointing with her spear. “That’s too many to fight at once.”
Harry flicked his gaze to his meters.
V: 54 | TM: 51%
He rolled his shoulders. “I should be able to keep my speed up enough to stay out of reach. I think we just have to get past them to that building to finish this level.”
Stan scratched at his chin. “Can we run past?”
Cedric and Harry exchanged a look.
Cedric drew his lips into a hard line. “Dangerous. If we do not make it across and get surrounded we would be finished.”
“And we don’t know if we’d really be safe even if we did get across,” Jo added.
Harry bounced lightly on the balls of his feet. “Hold here. Let me see if I can take a few out.”
Jo’s voice came low and steady. “Be careful, Harry.”
Cedric reached out and squeeze Harry’s shoulder. “If you need help, use chat. We may not hear you otherwise.”
Harry nodded.
- Harry: Good idea. Alright. Here I go.
He stepped out of the pass and onto the open stone.
The golems started to advance but Harry went wide hugging the mountain. When they were close he rushed in, lunged for a cut and retreated.
Harry never stopped moving. Sprint in. Cut. Sprint out.
Stonefang flashed at hips and knees, shoulders and elbows. Anywhere the blocks met and the seams showed. He never stayed close longer than a heartbeat.
System helped. Suggesting points and angles of attack and making sure he didn’t get so focused on doing damage he forgot to avoid being trapped.
He pushed speed and strength to thirty percent whenever the cooldown cleared. No vitae. During the dead seconds he circled wide, boots scraping grit, keeping distance until he could boost again.
The golems did not hurry. They did not tire.
They ground after him in slow tightening arcs, stone feet thudding.
They angled their movements, stepping together, trying to herd him toward the cliff or trap him against the mountain. He broke their lines before they could close him off, cutting across their front or dodging behind them. A few times having to dive out of the way to avoid being hit.
Whenever one drifted toward the narrow pass held by the others, Harry darted in behind them. A hard slash behind the knee. A deep gouge into a hip. Enough damage to turn it back toward him.
Wind curled up from the drop, kicking up the dust, and tugging at his cloak. The ground was coated in fine grit and loose pebbles. They rolled under his boots when he pivoted, threatening to steal his footing if he planted too hard.
Every time he slipped inside their reach he felt the vibration of their steps through the soles of his boots and the rush of displaced air as a stone fist swept past him.
He'd been at it long enough that it felt like an hour, though it could not have been more than minutes, when he saw Cedric coming out from the path, Underwyck's Maul rising.
Harry’s gaze snapped across the golems. Every one of them faced him. Broad backs to Cedric.
He stepped closer to hold their attention.
Cedric brought the maul down in a full overhead attack.
The hammer came down on the head of the golem nearest to him. Stone split. The head burst apart and dropped in heavy chunks. The body pitched forward and crashed to the ground.
The two closest to it began to turn.
Cedric was already moving, boots pounding as he retreated toward the pass.
Harry darted in on the opening. Stonefang carved into a shoulder he had already weakened. The blade bit deep. The arm tore loose and fell away in a spill of dust and broken granite.
He had to dance aside as the now headless golem half rose and almost caught him by the leg.
He moved back and took a moment to see how he was doing. Two were missing arms. One was missing a leg and dragging itself across the stone on its hands. The others all showed damage. Limping, joints split and cracked, stone hanging by narrow bridges. Dust coated the ground in a pale layer that swirled underfoot.
Jo’s voice cut sharp through the chat link.
- Jo: Harry! We need some help!
He snapped his head around. A seventh golem had come up the path behind them.
Jo and Stan had already pivoted. Spears planted against its chest. The creature leaned into them. Their boots scraped and skipped across the stone as it drove them backward.
- Harry: I’m coming.
Cedric stepped out from the pass and onto the landing, clearing space for them to fall back.
Every golem on the platform shifted at once. Stone bodies grinding as they turned toward that side. The heavy thud of their steps vibrated through the ground.
Harry checked his meters on the move.
V: 53 | TM: 52%
Dammit, dammit, dammit.
He spent two vitae on speed. Two on strength.
Sixty percent and no cooldown.
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He sprinted across, cutting between the golems. Stone hands lunged for him as he passed. One clipped his shoulder. He staggered, caught himself, kept going, and skidded to a stop, almost colliding with Cedric.
- Cedric: I have this one.
Harry spun back around. Five golems advanced on him, nearly shoulder to shoulder. Behind them, the one missing a leg dragged itself forward on its hands. He moved towards them to give Cedric space and turned to watch over his shoulder.
- Harry: You sure you got it?
- Cedric: I’m sure.
Jo and Stan were still braced against the new golem, spears grinding against granite as they gave ground.
- Cedric: Move.
Stan and Jo scrambled backward onto the landing.
Cedric planted his feet, rotated from the hips, and brought the maul around in a low, brutal arc.
The hammer struck the golem’s side.
Stone exploded outward.
The creature shifted hard to the right. It staggered a step.
And went over the edge.
The sound of it striking ledges on the way down faded quickly.
:: System: Harry. Please turn around.
Harry looked forward.
The five golems were almost on top of him. He backed up, almost to the path, but stayed on the landing. Afraid that if he left it, the golems would turn on the others.
Cedric, Jo, and Stan moved left along the mountain wall, opening a path for Harry to follow.
He darted toward that side.
The golem on that flank shot a hand out and caught his shoulder. Stone fingers gripped onto his chainmail and locked. His momentum stopped dead.
He slashed Stonefang across the wrist. The blade bit deep. Granite parting under the edge.
Before the grip loosened, the headless golem seized his dagger arm above the elbow.
Crushing.
Two more pressed in behind the ones holding him.
Harry hardened his free hand and smashed it down on the arm clamped to his shoulder.
Boots scraped on grit as they shoved forward. Forcing him back step by step. He tasted dust and stone at the back of his throat.
To his left he saw Stan and Jo charging in, spears leveled.
Over a granite shoulder he caught sight of Cedric coming fast.
He had circled behind them.
Underwyck's Maul drawn back over one shoulder, jaw set, elbows cocked. Blue eyes hard and bright.
The golem gripping his shoulder stepped left.
Into nothing.
Off the cliff.
Harry was wrenched sideways. Hundreds of pounds of stone pulled at his shoulder. His boots slid. He dropped low, left hand snapping out to seize the forearm clamped around his dagger arm, locking on.
He bent double, half over the edge, tried to pull himself back.
One of the other golems walked straight into him. It was missing an arm. The other wrapped around his chest and drove forward.
Another step.
He tipped.
The ground was there. And then it wasn't. His stomach lurched as the sky swung overhead.
The golem at his chest and the one gripping his dagger arm went with him.
- Jo: Harry!
The last thing he saw before the edge slipped out of sight was Cedric’s hammer coming down on one of the two golems still standing.
Stone and sky wheeled past in broken flashes.
About fifteen feet down they struck a narrow ledge. The impact knocked the golems loose and ripped Stonefang from his grip. He snatched for it and missed as it spun away into open air.
In a tangle of limbs and granite they fell, scraping and tumbling down the cliff face
A distant part of his mind caught party chat flaring alive, three voices overlapping, calling his name. The rest of him was focused on not dying.
Harry waited for a moment when he wasn’t bouncing off the side of the mountain and pulled a venomstalker fang from inventory. He drove it into his neck and crushed the sac.
Heat flooded him at once as his health began to tick upward.
H: 110 .. 111 .. 112 .. | V: 49 | TM: 55%
Hopefully it’d be enough.
He had no sense of how far he’d fallen. Fifty feet below, a wide ledge rushed up.
He hardened his skin. Fingers turned into claws. He twisted toward the cliff face and drove his hands at the stone.
Sparks flew as his claws skipped across the granite. Pain tore up his arms as he barely slowed.
The golems fell away, leading the way down.
The pain when he hit was beyond anything he had ever known. Worse than the bell tower. He couldn’t move. Didn’t want to move.
He tried to check his meters.
Everything went dark.
Harry’s eyes snapped open.
The first thing he was aware of was hunger. Raw. Immediate. Clawing up his throat.
He tried to sit up.
Pain detonated through him. Every nerve lit at once.
He forced himself to turn his head.
He lay on a shelf of rock. The smashed bodies of the golems were scattered around him.
System, how long was I out?
:: System: Nineteen seconds. I used a portion of vitae to heal you.
He had to concentrate to focus on his meters.
H: 25 | V: 30 | TM: 73%
- Harry: Cedric. What’s happening?
Silence.
- Harry: Anyone?
:: System: When you lost consciousness you dropped out of the party.
Dammit.
He shifted his focus to Blood Sense.
Three threads above him on the platform.
Alive. Moving. Stan and Jo close together. Cedric nearby.
With his right arm he tried to pull a venom sac from inventory. His arm answered with a fresh wave of pain.
He used his left hand instead, took the fang from inventory, drove it into his neck, and crushed the sac.
Heat flooded him.
He felt bone grind and slide back into place. Skin pulled tight. Muscle stitched itself together under his ribs.
He watched his health crawl upward.
Don’t move, Harry. Wait.
Moving too soon could tear it all open again.
Twenty agonizing seconds crawled by.
H: 45 | V: 30 | TM: 73%
He rolled onto one knee. Forced himself upright.
Stonefang!
He turned in a tight circle.
Nothing.
Broken granite. Dust.
No time.
He moved to the cliff face and looked up.
The platform loomed above. Broken ledges, narrow cracks, uneven seams.
He used wardrobe to strip off his boots and stockings and transformed his hands and feet.
He pulled one of the last five venom glands from inventory and used it.
He burned vitae to boost speed and strength. Sixty percent. No cooldown.
H: 46 .. 47 .. | V: 26 | TM: 76%
Hunger roared through him.
He shoved it down.
He started to climb.
Claws bit into cracks and seams. Toes found narrow holds. He moved fast, hauling himself up the face of the cliff.
Halfway, one of the Life Threads above him streaked across the landing.
Stan.
It hit the mountain wall and went still.
The thread was still there. He was alive.
A heartbeat later another thread shot to the right.
Jo.
She stopped at the edge of the cliff. From her thread he knew she was hurt. A moment later she began to move. Slowly. In the direction of Stan.
Cedric was still moving. Fast. Circling in the center of the landing.
Harry climbed.
Thirty feet to go.
Twenty.
Cedric’s thread flickered and collapsed.
As he watched, it flared with strength, but faded and went dim.
Harry clawed upward, muscles screaming. He reached the edge, hooked a hand over stone, and hauled himself onto the landing.
Where Stan and Jo had been, a golem lay shattered across the rock. Fragments of granite scattered wide.
The one missing a leg was nowhere in sight.
Stan lay crumpled against the mountain wall. One leg twisted at an unnatural angle. Jo was hunched over him, her head resting against his chest.
A dark trail of blood marked the path she had taken across the stone.
Their threads were weak but steady.
Cedric knelt near the center of the landing. Unmoving. Head hanging forward. Shoulders slumped.
Underwyck’s Maul rested at his side, still locked in one fist. In front of him lay the broken remains of another golem. His thread was thin. Barely there. And fading.
“Jo. I’m here.”
Her head snapped up. Eyes wide.
Harry turned and staggered toward Cedric.
***
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