Unbound

Evie caught a Paladin in the throat with two throwing daggers, severing their spine and dropping them instantly. The second and third Paladin died messier, but just as silently when Harn's burning axes met their crimson armor.

They didn’t stand a chance.

You Have Killed A Paladin Of The Pathless (x3)!

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"All clear," Evie said.

"All clear," Harn echoed. "Lady Verona?"

She raised a fist. "Companies, forward."

Dragoons and conscripts marched at her order, proceeding through the narrow tunnels in careful lines, melee weapons drawn and eyes open. The tunnels were once well maintained, but seemed to have begun flooding in places during the past few months. They trudged through shallow pools and across slick stone, never impeded so much as inconvenienced.

The tunnels were labyrinthine as well as narrow, with enough twists and turns to keep Evie confused for glasses. Verona and Patrim knew the way, at least, which meant the trip was taking far less time than it could have; each fork in the road was navigated instantly, the older Daynes marching onward without hesitation. Their aim, they said, was the upper levels of the Citadel. Too low and they’d hit the barracks which housed only the Drakengard—the duke’s personal guard—and too far out and they’d hit one of the thirteen towers, where the Dragoons resided. Both were off limits for their team.

Instead, they were aiming for the heart of the palatial structure, where the finest rooms meant for visiting dignitaries had been commandeered by Paladins and Priests. That had been confirmed more than once during their reconnaissance.

"Why were those Paladins down here?” Evie asked as they walked. Her chains were stowed due to being utterly impractical to use in the tunnels. She toyed with her bandolier of blades instead. “I thought this was a secret way in?"

Patrim nodded, his mouth set in a grim line. "Not as secret as I hoped. It is clear they are aware of the tunnels, but judging by how few redcloaks we’ve encountered, I do not believe they know their full extent. However, we must assume that any exit we take will have someone guarding it.”

“Hm, suppose that’s alright. Saves me the trouble of huntin’ them down, at least.”

The older man looked at Evie appraisingly. “A girl after my own heart.”

"Look sharp," Harn said. "This is it."

They’d ascended a set of wide stairs, the risers carved with swooping lines and starbursts, until it opened up onto a triangular landing large enough to hold more than twice their considerable numbers. A door was set there, carved to look like a set of huge, upsettingly detailed stone hands. They were clasped together and shut without gaps between the fingers, and Verona approached its structure.

“Be ready, all of you. Lord Nevarre's Skill still holds strong, but subtlety will not avail us forever. We know what is beyond this gate," she said, addressing everyone.

"The enemy," Patrim growled.

"Yes. All who face us will do so at the behest of the Pathless. End them with brutal efficiency."

"I like the way this lady talks," Evie said.

"We come out swingin'," Harn agreed. "Fast and hard. Got it?"

The Dragoons behind him nodded along, several that Evie recognized from the forge. All of them felt eager and angry. There'd be no issues convincing them to go all out. Evie gripped her chains.

Verona released a pulse of Mana, activating the sigaldry and it was as if the hands had come alive. The fingers unclasped and pulled away into the walls, revealing a marble chamber...and five startled Priests.

Harn took one in the knees, just as Evie ran past him, chains punching through a startled skull before whipping after the others.

All of them were dead before their initial shouts stopped echoing.

Harn walked to the bedchamber's lone door and peered out. "Two more in the hall," he muttered. "How long til Felix drops Abyssal Skein for everyone?"

"He promised us a full hour," Patrim said.

"So another half glass." Evie slung her chains back across her shoulders, unperturbed by the blood that oozed down her arcanite armor. "Let's make use of it."

Spears met sword and shield, allowing the Paladins a few more seconds of life, but no more. Phantom, illusory speartips surprised them time and again, allowing for a second true Spear to find its home in the gaps of their crimson armor. Vess pulled her Spears free, four Paladins dead at once, and witnessed her Dragoons wreaking near-silent havoc on the patrol they’d found.

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Her team’s stealth was gone, unable to be recast due to Felix's absence, but they more than made up for it through training and the deceptive nature of their footwork. The Dragoons were agile hunters, and in the inner halls of the Citadel, the Paladins and Priests were easy prey.

Another Paladin died, head torn off by an ice-block hammer. "It's clear. They're all dead," Beef said, though he looked a bit pale.

Vess put her hand on his shoulder. "Are you alright?"

"Oh, y-yeah. I just," he swallowed. "I just don't remember the Paladins being so weak."

"Weak?" Archie asked through heaving breaths. "I can barely keep up."

"Rise to Adept then, Mr. Ross," Hallow intoned from Beef's chest. "You will find things far better this side of it."

"Yeah yeah."

"At any rate, the challenge will change from here on out," Vess said, addressing them as well as the Dragoons at the back. She thrust her glaive toward the mithril-chased door at the end of the ornate hall. "All our foes are likely to be fellow Dragoons. They are our enemies until we can remove their Oaths…but if we are to take back our Territory, then we need their aid. We are only to disable them, not kill them. Is that understood?"

The Dragoons all saluted, their faces hard and weapons ready. Beef did some sort of strange gesture with his flattened hand against his forehead, and Archie...well, Archie just shrugged.

“Seems stupid to keep the enemies alive, even if they might help later. We should just cut our way to the top, and worry about the rest later.”

“No,” Vess told him, her voice hard. “If you kill someone Archie, I do not care what Felix needs you for: I will carve the price out of your flesh.”

The thief threw up his hands. “Jesus! Fine. You don’t gotta be mean about it.”

Beef shoved him with a hip, jostling the Delven’s entire body. "We're just playing on hard mode, Arch! Nut up, casul!"

Archie straightened his padded leather jacket. "Do you know the difference between a bull and a steer, kid?"

"No?"

Archie unsheathed his daggers. "You want to?"

"Archie. Door," Vess commanded. Their banter was amusing at times, but now it was a burr at the back of her attention.

Archie muttered a few more things but he walked up to the door and phased his hands right through the lock and back out. "Unlocked. Two Dragoons sitting at a table, playing dice. The bigger one's cheating."

"You saw that through the door?" a younger Dragoon asked.

Archie grinned. "I'm just good, man."

Vess held up a hand. "Squad one. Breach."

A Dragoon kicked open the door, and a squad of ten flowed into the room. There was the brief sound of struggling, a howl of wind and the clash of metal, but it was followed by silence.

“All clear, my Lady!”

Vess entered the chamber first, Beef and Yinarion behind her, and found a semi-circular room that clearly acted as some sort of common area. Rugs, tables, chairs, even a bar counter and bookshelves decorated the space, though all of it was in disarray. The swirl of wind Mana still roiled through the air, and the tang of discharged Skills was sharp in her nose. The two Dragoons Archie had sensed were on the floor, bound, gagged, and unconscious.

That same young Dragoon walked over and picked up a set of dice. He hefted them in his hand. "Huh. They're weighted." He looked at Archie. "You were right."

"Damn straight." The thief grinned a moment before it froze on his face. "We've got company coming, though. Central door, at least five."

"I got 'em, this time," Beef said, as he lowered his stance. Hammer in hand, he waited twenty strides from the door. "Arch, tell me when they're close."

"Not yet," he said, eyes closed. "Not yet."

Vess frowned. "Beef, what are you—"

"Now!"

"Ruinous Rampage!" the Minotaur bellowed, and quite simply vanished. He reappeared as a calamitous comet, bashing through the door and its frame before barreling into half a dozen Dragoons.

They were thrown, their bodies limp like a child's doll as they crashed into walls and the nearby staircase. None of them stood back up. Panic gripping her heart, Vess activated Analyze.

All alive. She closed her eyes, then frowned. A twisting melody caught the edge of her Affinity, and she looked at the bodies again. There was an…aura around them, hazy at the edges except where it interacted with their chests, and where it drifted off into the distance. Their Oaths? Are you seeing this Yin?

I am not, but I can hear the strangeness to their cores. Their Oath lies heavy on them.

Beef, ignorant of her worries, lifted his head, his horns gleaming with blackened-green Mana and his snout stretched into a brilliant grin. "Done!"

Yintarion laughed, pleased. "I like this boy."

Her soldiers pounced on the downed Dragoons and bound them as well. They might not remain unconscious for long, but the bindings would keep them mostly immobilized even if they used their Skills. Felix had made them himself out of his improved Fiendstone, and the opalescent material was more than strong enough to hold anyone below Master Tier. She'd tested that herself.

"You're dad's at the top of this place, right?" Beef asked, interrupting her thoughts.

Vess looked up, wishing she could see through the floors of stone and metal between them. "He is."

"Do the stairs go all the way up? Can't we just bum rush all the way there?"

"We would be left trapped at the top of the tower, with enemies filling every floor beneath us."

"So? Then we'll just beat them on the way down. And if we can't, we just jump off."

"They're thousands of strides above the ground," one Dragoon protested. "I apologize for interrupting, but...you may survive, Lord Beef, but we would not."

"Oh. Right."

"I can carry some, but certainly not all of you," Yintarion added. "And to exit this tower in such a way would certainly gain the Hierei's attention, and that would be deadly. We must instead walk the harder path, and hope that the Autarch is swift at meting out justice."

“In the interim, we must rise to our own challenges,” Vess said. She gestured up the steps. “Scouts. Advance.”

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