Authors Note: writing these disclaimers is extremely boring so I'm going to say this one counts for the whole fic, I do not own Runescape nor am I profiting from writing this. I'm not ever sure if I own my own character on Runescape.
Author's Note 2: This fic is receiving a long overdue tidy up of it's earlier chapters as the quality of the early chapters was quite poor. Please be aware this is a work in progress and it may be some time until all the chapters are up to standard.
Zanik was late, which was very strange for the young cave goblin whom I counted amongst my closest friends. We'd arranged to meet in the Tzarr city, have an attempt at both the fight pits and the fight caves. So far neither of us had won or made it to Jad. Still I wasn't too worried chances, were that had Oldak persuaded her to help in some new insane experiment.
I started mining some of the local gold deposits, keeping a watchful eye on the spot Zanik would teleport to. A half hour later I was getting worried, So deciding to kill a Tzarr-Ket before leaving I headed to the bank and got out a dragon dagger which I'd had laced with one of the more fast acting venoms as well as my usual mismatching armour. Once you start getting the really good armour, only the true entrepreneurs could afford a fell matching set, which is why I was forced to settle for a pair of dragon boots, a pair of dragon platelegs I'd got on the cheap the last time the Grand Exchange's prices went into freefall, a bog-standard dragon med helm, an equally bog-standard rune shield and the ever reliable rune platebody.
Advancing towards a Tzharr-ket, I activated one of my protection prayers before I attacked, which was fortunate as it was the only thing which prevented me being cut in half. I felt that strange ghost impact that occurred when a protection prayer did it's job. Turning quickly, a difficult task in armour, and dagger in hand, I caught the next blow on my shield as I took in the identity of my attacker. A HAM assassin, dressed in full rune, with the HAM crest painted on the chestplate, and wielding a dragon longsword. Which wasn't too unusual, the gear was reasonably affordable and I'd been forced to kill at least one assassin a month since the first time I stopped Sigmund but since his death about two months ago I hadn't seen even one.
What was surprising was that he had snuck up on me soundlessly and he seemed to know how to fight – the average HAM member didn't know which end of the sword was which.
I raised my shield to block another blow, it jarred my arm. HAM must have bankrupted itself training this guy. I countered, making two swift cuts in his direction, one of which he blocked with contumptuous ease, the second he ducked under, dropped into a low spin as he swept my ankle, for some reason the attack cleaved straight through my protection prayers. My armour stopped me getting burned as I had the heated crust of rock which seperated us from the lava below. Rolling aside as he stabbed down, I got to my feet, as his own sword was embedded in the thick rock crust. I went on the attack, forcing him to leave his sword or die. As he backed away he drew a throwing knife from his belt, which I caught on my shield with relative ease. He backed away further until he reached the wall.
I was on him in an instant, grabbing him by the front of his dragonleather tunic and lifting him off the ground with my dagger to his throat.
I decided to question him before I killed him, it probably said a lot about myself, the HAM organisation, or possibly both, that I would get more than a small amount of satisfaction by killing him.
"How did you find me?" It seemed the most obvious question.
For some reason, despite his perilous position, he burst into a fit of laughter, a smug grin plastered across his face..
"Well. If you're going to label a teleport orb..." he didn't finish the sentence, he didn't need to.
Rage boiling within my veins and fears icy grip suddenly clenched around my heart, I held him over one of the pools of lava.
"Tell me everything!"
"Well lets see... where to start?" The assassin said, taking great pleasure in his recount. "We've been tracking her movements for a while now, seeing as your's are too erratic to track." He paused causing me to lower him slightly, one of his boots began too blacken and burn. "I cornered her in wizards tower, and... asked her a few questions." He grinned maliciously though it was soon replaced with a pained scream as I lowered his feet into the magma, lifting him out again as his boots caught fire. A quick water rush put out his boots.
It seemed how dire his situation really was was finally sinking in as he was now all too eager to tell me, without the sarcasm and malice this time. "She refused to answer despite prompting." I could only imagine what torture they had used. "she still refused to answer so eventually we just gave up and killed her, I rummaged through her stuff, found the orb then came to finish you off."
As explanations went it was rather lacking, particularly as whenever adventurers were killed one of the gods usually took it upon themselves to intervene, of course Ol' Grim refuses to tell us which god is 'sponsoring' any particular one of us.
So the question was: What was to be gained from such an attack? The only answer was far too ridiculous to even consider.
So dropping the would be assassin in the lava, and ignoring his dying screams, I went to the bank and grabbed my explorers ring teleporting just south of Falador.
