Chapter 55

  [Skill: Master of Nightmares reached level 1.]

  The message on my NeuroHUD was the only stationary thing in my field of vision as I found myself experiencing a jumbled flow of vivid, unintelligible sound and imagery. If nothing else, the skill was conveying to me clearly that the disorienting nonsense I had found myself in the middle of, was Lanny’s dream. I had no idea whether she was having a drug-fueled fever dream all by herself, or the single level of my Master of Nightmares skill was just not enough to capture and interpret the ongoings in her dreamscape and present them to me in a manner that made sense. Either way, the experience was almost identical to the type of glitch that could sometimes occur in NeuroHUD aided training simulators. I had experienced one of those glitches once, during SAC training; the software had decided to take a coffee and adrenalin break and upon returning it had fed the training scenario environments to my NeuroHUD — and therefore into my mind — at a times-twelve speed. I had thrown up at that time. More than once. Not my finest moment.

  This time, however, while my mind was being assaulted with a chaotic dream I couldn’t make any sense of, I was fully aware of my actual, physical surroundings as well as of myself — talk about a new type of double-vision: one psychic, one physical. For a moment, I thought about disengaging and calling off the skill, but I had already violated her privacy by stepping into her dreaming subconscious, and it was a perfect opportunity to try a few things with my new skills. I really hoped Lanny would be her cheerful, optimistic self in the morning after having her dream invaded.

  [Skill: Dreamscape Architect reached level 1.]

  The notification arrived as I called on the skill, willing it to alter the dreamscape, trying to slow down the slew of imagery I was seeing. It had worked somewhat; after a couple of seconds, I was able to make out some details, such as ice and fire-demons, carts and … minotaurs. I increased the mental effort I was putting into my skills, experimenting with them, and bit by bit the scenes cleared, and after a few minutes her dream was approaching a minimum degree of coherence. Was she dreaming about a fight she had participated in? Or was she perhaps fleeing from minotaurs? It sure looked like it. Except … minotaurs were smaller and couldn’t fly. And ice-demons weren’t green. I supposed a certain amount of nonsensical strangeness was allowed in dreams — it made me wonder if my days in Hell had been a long, lucid dream, for my experiences here had been stranger than any dream I’d ever had.

  Lanny was starting to toss and turn on her leather sheet on the ground, and I could hear a few squeaking sounds coming from her, and I was becoming rather disoriented again, which led me to believe I was overstaying my psychic welcome in her subconscious. I called off both skills. As if I had flipped a switch, her dreamscape vanished, and it was strange and almost depressing to be sitting on the edge of a bed in a dark and quiet room again, after her messy, frenzied dream. She began to calm, her breathing slowed, and she stopped twitching. I supposed the skill’s description wasn’t lying when it said using it might turn my victim’s dreams into nightmares. In any case, I had got the first levels for both Master of Nightmares and Dreamscape Architect, but as much as I would have liked to spend some time pondering how and in what situations I could possibly employ them and how to level them efficiently, it had to wait. If my experiences so far were anything to go by, tomorrow was going to be the start of another relentless and exhausting march through the Wilds and then another battle at another city. Rest was what I needed more than anything else right now, so I went back to sleep.

  ***

  For the first time in a long time, I’d had a dream of my own. I couldn’t remember what it was, and I wasn’t even sure if it really had been my dream or some leftover psychic scraps from using my skills earlier. Either way, my sleep hadn’t been as good as the night before, but I felt rested enough to face another day in Hell.

  I clambered off the bed. Lanny was gone already, probably making breakfast, which I didn’t mind at all — she had single handedly made me appreciate monster meat, and that was an achievement that deserved a medal. I wondered if medals or commendations were a thing in a demon army. I’d have to ask Reinos later. When I noticed the large washbasin and a thick, folded, fabric sheet next to it — which must have been what passed for a towel around here — I made up my mind that my attendant was going to get a medal whether it was common practice or not. I wasted no time washing and drying myself, getting dressed then getting back into my SAC, and just in time. As the couplers and synthfibers locked into place, Lanny walked into the room with a platter of meat and mushrooms. Burning Darkness yelled some obscenities at her as she pushed him over to the other end of the table so she could put my breakfast down — unfortunately I was the only one who could hear the sword’s lamentations. I had to start seriously thinking about what her medal should look like, and how the design should convey her heroic act of defying the renowned and sometimes very annoying Hellfire Blade. But for now, it was breakfast time, and I could already smell that the seasoning was different than yesterday — whatever hellspawn, godforsaken ingredients she had used — and I was looking forward to it. It didn’t seem like Grashon and the others were going to join me, so I sat down at the table and began eating under Lanny’s watchful eyes; she clearly enjoyed that I was enjoying the food she’d made.

  ‘Lanny, how did you sleep last night?’ I asked her halfway through the meal.

  ‘Well enough, Lord,’ she replied, and I couldn’t tell by her tone whether she meant it or not.

  ‘Anything unusual? Like strange dreams or something?’ I prodded.

  ‘Oh, how did you know?’ she asked, coming around and sitting down on the chair next to me.

  ‘Just a guess. I had some dreams myself, and I don’t usually dream,’ I answered.

  ‘How strange,’ she mused, looking at the ceiling. ‘You were also in my dream, Lord.’

  ‘Oh? What was the dream? What did I do there?’ I inquired, making sure I didn’t sound like someone who had been the cause of said dreams.

  ‘Just a dream about fleeing from Third Ringers, making our way to Garoshek and most of us dying on the way. My caravan, I mean. I was with a caravan. We traded. Spices and mushrooms, you know. Damned fire-demons can’t tell the difference between good food and a piece of rock, and even if they could, they’re more interested in anything else than knowing where to find the good stuff. Not until they get a taste for the good stuff.’

  ‘The “good stuff” huh?’ I raised my eyebrows at her.

  ‘Yeah. Good stuff.’ She nodded.

  Hm. Good stuff? Coming from someone else … it sounded a little obnoxious. Did I sound obnoxious saying “good stuff” to others? Well, even if I did, I couldn’t and wasn’t going to change old habits — they were good stuff. I also got the impression that Lanny was far from being heartbroken or suffering from PTSD after witnessing and surviving the slaughter of her caravan by minotaurs. Then again, Flamey hadn’t been particularly affected by the fact that I had killed her biological father; if anything, she had been happy about it. Ah, demons.

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  ‘Right. So, you said I was in your dream? What was I doing there?’ I asked, hoping to gain some insights into how my skills worked and what they had done last night.

  ‘Not much, my Lord,’ she said, shaking her head and shrugging. ‘Just watching, I think. I’m not even sure if I saw you, but I felt it. It was a dream. It doesn’t matter.’

  Just watching? That … sounded about right — that’s exactly what I had been doing. And just as I had been able to see Zeneth in my dreams, she could sense my presence in hers too. Interesting. It also seemed that both my dream back then, and Lanny’s dream last night, had been made of memories. I couldn’t yet tell with certainty if that was due to the skill’s influence or not — sometimes dreams were just random garbage, much like what unofficial NeuroHUD screensaver plugins would treat you to if you dared install one. But I gave it a good chance that my skills had something to do with dredging up memories during dreaming. These psychic skills had potential in terms of information gathering, spying, interrogating and such, I supposed I just had to level them to the point they would work like they worked for Zeneth.

  ‘Yeah, it doesn’t matter,’ I said, and I refocused my efforts on the meat and mushrooms that not only tasted different than yesterday’s meal, but better. Lanny had talents to share, I had medals to give, and Reinos was probably waiting for me already, so I got on with my breakfast.

  ***

  Team Catapult had made insane progress with the project while I had been mucking about in Lanny’s dream. These crafter demons, despite their lower levels, had been working hard and fast and likely without any breaks. The place that had been a field hospital yesterday, was now a giant, open air workshop, in which a hundred crafters worked, argued and scurried about between stacks of wood, piles of metal bits and pieces, huge jars, coiled bundles of ropes and monster corpses. Even at first glance I could tell everything and everyone they could possibly need for the catapult project were here. Lanny looked bored — probably because there was no cooking involved — but she did nod in approval upon observing the section dedicated to extracting and mixing … uh … animal fat and innards to produce flameslime. It seemed the soldiers had hunted hundreds of the beasts during the night; the scene was gruesome, smelly, and judging by the look on his face, Reinos was almost as impressed as I was. And I was impressed indeed.

  ‘Shall we have a closer look?’ I suggested to my general.

  He nodded, and we trudged over to inspect the various ongoings, leaving Lanny and my squad to stay and stand guard, or to have a break, or to do whatever they wanted to do for the time being. They had realised by now that no-one in the city was foolish enough to attack the lord and the general — the two highest level individuals — so this time Grash and the gang didn’t argue and stayed behind.

  It was once we walked past the stockpiled materials that I realised how much progress the crafters had really made: in a clearing amongst the heaps of wood, metal and animal carcasses, dozens upon dozens of demons stood around their makeshift workbenches, cutting, hammering, chiseling and assembling recognisable parts of a catapult. Several catapults, actually. At some of the workstations the frames, wheels and the arms for at least four of the siege weapons were being made. At another, a dozen demons were twisting unidentifiable fibres into ropes, handing them over to a team of crafters who used a monstrous wood and metal contraption to twist them around poles to create a torsion spring. On other tables and on the ground, dead animals were being sawn to pieces, fat and blood extracted and collected, then mixed with other ingredients to produce flameslime. By the look of it, they were maybe a day away from working prototypes.

  ‘Excellent progress,’ I commented, nodding approvingly. ‘Have any of them slept at all?’

  ‘I don’t believe they have.’ Reinos grinned. ‘Rare to see crafters this enthusiastic about something. I imagine even if using the catapults won’t provide any EXP, building them must be helping their crafting skills along.’

  That made sense: while the EXP you got by killing something or someone could be used to increase your own level or to buy stuff, the levelling of a skill was a different, unrelated story, as if it was running on different software, so to speak. Skills didn’t need EXP. They needed a small, initial talent, then practice and repetition, and your skills would grow and develop, making you more and more proficient in whatever the skill was related to, be it fighting or crafting.

  ‘Yeah.’ I agreed. ‘Can you get the team representatives together for a few minutes?’

  ‘Yes, my Lord,’ Reinos said, then kept quiet, no doubt talking to one of his captains through his version of the RMS.

  A minute later Krasharak burst forth from between the numerous workbenches, followed by the four crafters whose faces I remembered well, unlike their names which I had forgotten. Shame on the forgetful demon lord.

  ‘Oh, my man!’ Burning Darkness, who had been uncharacteristically silent all morning, spoke into my mind, almost sighing. ‘The flameslime guy is Tarak-Denat, the smith is called Droghor-Gazak, the wood guy is Lagharok and the one with the ropes is Arghadon.’

  ‘I think I have asked you this before, but can you read my mind, actually?’ I asked, whispering, only a little bit irritated.

  ‘No, but I could tell by how you were looking at them that you had no clue what their names were,’ he said. ‘I don’t blame you, just so you know. Yesterday was a long time ago, and maybe you need some more time with demon names.’

  ‘Well, thanks,’ I whispered as the delegation arrived to stand in front of us.

  ‘My Lord! General!’ Krasharak greeted us with a bow of his head, the four crafters mimicking him.

  Reinos and I nodded back to him.

  ‘So, how are my catapults coming along?’ I asked the group.

  The group pushed Lagharok forward to speak for them immediately and without mercy. The fire-demon stumbled forward then straightened himself before us and cleared his throat.

  ‘Khm. Yes. We’ll have one ready to throw the first jug of flameslime tomorrow.’ He gave us his short and concise report.

  ‘I assume you wouldn’t have started making them without refining the design to the point you were all happy and confident about it, right?’ I inquired.

  ‘Of course not, my Lord!’ Lagharok protested the idea without hesitation. ‘We changed and improved a number of things. It will work.’

  ‘Good. Where is the improved design work? I want to see it.’

  The four crafters and one former city overseer turned and pointed at the exact same section of the city wall where I had done the initial work yesterday. It was a few dozen metres from where we stood, and I just shook my head, suppressing a few swearwords looking to escape my mouth.

  ‘Alright,’ I said in the end. ‘Unfortunately, I can’t take the wall with me, so I want one of you, or all of you, to make a precise and exact copy of all plans and designs you’re using for the catapult, including tools and contraptions that had to be built for specific purposes like the rope springs. Use wooden boards, leather sheets, or something similar. Just make sure the designs are legible, as your fellow crafters in Orroth will be using them to build more of these things.’

  ‘You’re … leaving? For Orroth?’ the woodworker asked.

  ‘As soon as I have the designs.’ I nodded.

  ‘Give us an hour,’ he said, and the crafters scurried away to fulfil my request, and I turned to Reinos.

  ‘If any changes or adjustments need to be made after testing the prototype … uhm … the first catapult, make sure the crafters document it.’

  ‘Of course, my Lord.’ The general nodded.

  ‘Zeneth, you around?’ I called out for the Fifth Ringer.

  ‘I am.’ The deep, resonating voice of the hive mind demon came from right behind us.

  Reinos and I flinched in unison, then spun around, and the guy was standing there as if he had always been there — a dark, menacing figure of absolute blackness in my eyes, a scrawny ice-demon in everyone else’s.

  ‘Huh. Good. So, if you look at the design and any modifications, will your colleague in Orroth be able to convey it to the crafters there?’ I asked, hoping that whatever he saw the rest of his cohorts could see as well, being in the same hive mind and all.

  ‘Yes,’ he replied with his usual curtness.

  ‘Excellent.’

  ‘Have you decided whether or not we’ll be abandoning Garoshek, my Lord?’ Reinos asked.

  ‘I have. Have you?’

  ‘I have as well. I think it will be wise to take everyone and leave the city empty,’ he said.

  ‘I agree.’ I nodded. ‘As you heard, as soon as I have those designs, I am leaving with my team. Both the army and the city residents are under your care and command, general. I know you will handle it well, and I will see you in Orroth.’

  ‘Thank you, my Lord,’ he said, grinning at me. ‘Let’s make the Fourth Ring great again!’

  I wondered where he’d got that phrase from — it was catchy.