A Tyrant, Sort Of

To Aylin’s delight, Lady Sable didn’t forbid her from aiding in the prison break. She’d half expected it, seeing how reticent her mistress was from sending her into potentially lethal situations. That she’d been let into the tier two dungeon had also been a surprise. It was a shame Lady Sable didn’t have a real diplomat; Aylin would much rather be her warrior than her eyes, mouth, and ears.

The city of Bragghaven came into sight. It was smaller than Skatikk, being only a larger city of the Nightshade Tribe and not its capital, but it was still many times grander than Aylin’s clan.

It was odd how quickly her standards were adjusting, though. Her first glimpses of Gadenrock and Skatikk had stolen her breath. Now, she barely thought twice of them. She even found them underwhelming, comparing them to the grand cities found in other lands—not that she’d even ever seen one, but she’d heard stories of the human and orc capitals, or the sprawling forest-cities of the elves, or the gargantuan underground chambers of the dwarves. The Wither Witch had alluded to Aylin’s people being primitive, and Aylin knew in an objective sense, they very much were.

This mission shouldn’t be deadly. They were dropping in, unannounced, into a city wholly unprepared for three of Skatikk’s strongest classed—plus a dragon, a golem, and Aylin, who, while the smallest by far of the mentioned pieces, was still a classed warrior: she’d handle four to five regular soldiers with ease. Or, maybe. She was still rather untested in that regard.

But with this being a direct mission of Sable’s, Aylin would have her first skill bolstering her stats, making her even stronger than usual. They hadn’t fully explored that ability’s capabilities, but it seemed to scale on a confluence of factors. The more important Sable’s task, the stronger the boosts became.

Gritzn’s powers with divination were endlessly helpful. Using the severed limb—which they had gruesomely carried along—she was able to pinpoint exactly where the four prisoners were being held.

Arriving to the city proper, Lady Sable activated her [Horrifying Aura], and like usual, Aylin’s mind went white. The effect didn’t discriminate between ally or enemy; it doused every living creature nearby with distilled terror. Even with all of Aylin’s experience tolerating the overpowering fear, she struggled to keep her composure. Especially because it was getting stronger. Lady Sable’s recent level-ups had amplified the potency of the effect.

Aylin couldn’t see the exact reactions of the other goblins in Lady Sable’s grasp, but she could see them stiffen. Likely, they weren’t as weak to the ability as Aylin, thanks to their level and stats, but neither did they have the experience in tolerating it. But they’d been warned, so they hardly lost control to the burst of panic.

An ear-splitting roar burst through the air, punctuating their arrival into the city. Lady Sable descended onto the prison with shocking speed, the red-clay and wooden buildings of Bragghaven rushing up to meet them.

They’d discussed their plan of attack in advance. Not that there was much of a plan. Gritzn could divine the general location of where the missing party had been taken, but not the exact layout and cells of the prison. So, the plan was to improvise.

While their unexpected arrival bought them some safety, the mission wasn’t wholly safe. Quil’s team, while not as strong as Banr, Vex, and Rukni, were no push-overs, hence why Lady Sable deigned to save them at all. And they’d been defeated. Thus, a powerful group of classed existed somewhere in the city of Bragghaven, and that they would respond to their arrival in time to contest them was more than possible. Not guaranteed, with the unexpectedness of their invasion, but within the realm of possibility.

Aylin’s heart slammed as the prison structure came closer and closer. This wasn’t her first mission, or first combat, under Lady Sable’s orders, but truthfully, it was the first real one. Of the sort she’d actually expect, being a dragon’s minion. Not diplomacy or dungeoneering, but fighting through an enemy city to fulfill some greater purpose of her mistress.

Lady Sable arrived and none too gently discarded her cargo. Only Gritzn remained in the dragon’s grip—the divination mage simply wasn’t much use in combat, and had exhausted her mana pool discerning what she already had. She would stay with Sable.

Aylin scrambled to orient herself. She’d been in a fair amount of combat in her life, and some of it even against actual opponents during minor raids against other clans, but this was on a different level. Not only was she vastly underleveled compared to her teammates, but this wasn’t remotely a ‘typical combat’. The team of five—the three veterans, Granite, and her—had been dropped off at the front entrance of the prison, and everybody everywhere was in a frenzy. That included her teammates. The moment Banr’s feet had touched the ground, he was rushing forward. Four armored guards were unconscious before Aylin had even finished finding her footing.

The only reason Aylin had really been sent down here was to, like usual, be Lady Sable’s eyes and ears. She wanted status updates. If she needed to, she’d tear the building open to come help—but that had obviously not been the initial plan, because collapsing the building on top of the prisoner’s heads would be counter productive. Aylin could tell Lady Sable’s bulk was irritating her more as the days passed. She wanted her half-dragon form so she could solve these problems herself.

A heavy hand patted her back to spur her into motion. “You’re with me,” Vex said. “The golem too.” Without waiting for a reply, he was rushing in after Banr. As planned before, they’d be splitting into two parties to cover ground more efficiently. Time was of the essence. They wanted to find their captured allies before Bragghaven had time to mount a real defense.

Aylin was disoriented, but she could at least follow orders. Her legs carried her forward by instinct. Granite ambled along next to her, matching three of her strides with one long, slow step of his own. His hammer swayed to his side almost lazily. He seemed, as always, dispassionate to the whole event. Aylin knew it said nothing about his combat abilities. The oafish pile of rocks was almost unfairly devastating with those thick hands of his—much less his new hammer.

Unconscious bodies piled up at a nearly comical rate as they pushed into the prison proper. Vex’s and the others doing, of course, not hers. The various prison guards were laid out in lumps, out cold, before Aylin could fully recognize what was going on. Not dead—or at least not intentionally so. Classed didn’t kill regular folk, not if they could help it, and to level fifteens like Vex, Banr, and Rukni, they could certainly help it. That was a simple rule of war. Other classed, of course, were fair game regardless of their level. And ‘rules of war’ had a tendency to break down in heated combat, but at least here and now, they adhered to the code.

An iron gate led deeper into the prison, out of the entrance area, and it was ripped open, hinges bent and the whole assembly leaning sideways. Banr had torn the gate open without more than a grunt. He wouldn’t be able to treat the classed holding cells with the same disregard, but for the majority of the prison? Mundane materials couldn’t hold up against high-level strength-based classes. As demonstrated.

Their groups split left and right, entering the main prison hallways. There were less guards, though still some. Vex had arrows sprouting from arms and legs before she could even fully clear the room, then a knife-handle to the skull had them slumping down. Aylin felt briefly silly at her earlier thinking that she’d be able to contribute. Once again, she was present only to feed information back to Sable. Which she did so as a matter of instinct, by this point, narrating the events mentally even in the crazed frenzy of the prison invasion.

They scoured the prison. A stairway down led them into the earth, where they expected the reinforced cells for holding classed would be. Indeed, the second layer of the prison was smaller but far sturdier. It took some prying and grunts for Vex’s dagger to cut through the locks and give them further access. The guards were no more powerful, though. The city of Bragghaven could hardly afford to have strong classed doing something as simple as guarding prisoners. Especially because this sort of prison break, so quickly after Quil’s disappearance, was simply absurd. Nobody could expect a dragon flying an invading party of classed in.

Vex looted a pair of keys off an unconscious goblin lump, then continued forward. Likely, the reinforced cells wouldn’t be susceptible to even his enhanced strength. They needed the keys.

Running through hallways and opening cell doors—which were thick slabs of magically reinforced stone, rather than the iron bars up above—they quickly found the first of their targets. The prison hardly had an abundance of classed prisoners.

The sight awaiting them wasn’t pretty. They had, it seemed, stumbled upon the goblin whose severed arm had helped Gritzn divine the missing party’s fate.

“Zef,” Vex said. “Hells, man. You’ve had better days.”

Zef had already been standing and alert before Vex had found the key to let them into his cell. He stared, baffled, at Vex, Aylin, and Granite. Obviously, the rock elemental took the majority of his attention. Not because Granite was the most dangerous, but because it made zero sense for him to be here. A golem helping break him out of prison?

“Don’t stand there and gawk,” Vex said, already knelt down and grinding away at the thick chains with his dagger. While a normal weapon couldn’t break through the reinforced metal, Vex had a class—and surely a high-level magical weapon—helping him along. Still, it wasn’t an instant effort, and he grunted as he pried the chain apart. “You know where the rest are? Quil and them?”

“Vex,” Zef finally stuttered out, finding his words. “What? How are you here?”

“A dragon flew us,” Vex replied—and Zef stared blankly in return. Breaking his manacle, Vex spurred the goblin with a missing arm forward. He shook himself out of his shock.

“Quil,” Zef said, putting aside the ‘dragon’ comment. “No, I don’t know where they are. Obviously. Stuck in here, remember?”

“Figured,” Vex said. “Worth asking. Well, you’re joining the effort to find them. You good to walk?”

“Down an arm,” he said dryly, waggling a bandaged stump, then wincing. “Not a leg. But fighting? Not so much.”

“That’s fine. In and out is the goal. We’re on a time limit.” They rushed out into the hallway. “Who was it, anyway?”

Aylin didn’t understand Vex’s question right away, but Zef apparently did. “It was Yuv and her team,” he said. “They caught us in the middle of a fight against one of the dungeon’s stronger encounters. Worst timing possible.” His face darkened. “They got Ripple.”

Ripple being the casualty of the encounter, Aylin could infer. Vex winced and didn’t reply.

Already at the next cell, with Vex fumbling around with keys—at a supernatural speed, which was a weird sight—Vex replied, “Those two are the dragon’s minions, by the way. Her eyes and ears, I guess. Don’t let them get hurt, or we’re probably dead.”

“Dragon,” Zef said. “What the hells are you talking about, Vex?” He paused, then said, “Wait. That sound from earlier? The roar?”

“Our benevolent patron,” Vex confirmed. “She’s our escape plan too. But explain later. No time now.” The next cell’s lock clinked open, Vex finding the proper key, and he hurried forward.

Aylin assumed Zef hadn’t felt Sable’s [Horrifying Aura] on her arrival, then, since he seemed mostly bewildered by the possibility of a dragon. Did Lady Sable’s skill require eyesight, or otherwise some sort of awareness that Sable was there? It had quite an enormous range, but apparently didn’t work on everything within it.

Inside the next room prisoner’s room was Quil—whose first introduction was a hurtling pipe, aimed directly at Vex’s skull.