Chapter 14: New Weapons
Zephynn caught up to Vinnia as a town came into view. Vinnia seemed to be watching the gate when he walked up behind her.
"So you came after all," said Vinnia in an unsurprised tone, "I knew you had it in you."
"Well… I guess it's just because the world seems to be against me," said Zephynn.
"No joke," said Vinnia, "With what you've been through this last week after five hundred years rotting in that temple of your mother's, I can understand how you feel." She turned around. "Utterly scared and alone," she finished. Zephynn nodded slowly and then she grabbed his wrist.
"Come on," said Vinnia, "We need to get in there. I've heard of this place and it's got one of the best forges in the world."
"Wait, do you even have money?" asked Zephynn, "And even if you did, do you have enough to buy… uh, real weapons?"
"No, I don't have money," said Vinnia, "Now come on. It's almost noon!" Zephynn slowly put two and two together as Vinnia pulled him towards the town and realized that they were about to become thieves.
"Oh boy…" he said to himself.
"Did you say something?" asked Vinnia, pausing to look back at him.
"No," said Zephynn, pulling his hand away from her, "And I can find my way on my own just fine, thank you very much." Vinnia rolled her eyes and made another gesture to follow her, which Zephynn did in reluctance.
Unlike Pallitia Town, the town they had entered seemed more like a military base than a town. There were houses that were quite run down and the streets seemed to be empty.
"Where is everyone?" asked Zephynn.
"I don't know," said Vinnia, "Who cares? Let's just make towards the forge, get some weapons, and get out of this dump." They saw smoke rising over one of the buildings nearby.
"That must be it," said Zephynn. The two of them snuck around the buildings, which made the place seem even more like a military base as they went deeper in. Some of them had tarps for ceilings and one of them actually revealed that some of the houses were tents, as there were flaps open everywhere.
They reached the forge with no trouble at all and walked in to find that there was nobody in there either.
"Okay, this is getting creepy," said Zephynn, "If this is a town, where is everyone?" Vinnia put her hands on her hips and tried to think.
"Maybe everyone evacuated," said Vinnia. Zephynn picked up a steel blade that was about four feet long from one of the tables. It appeared to be freshly made, and it also balanced perfectly in his hand.
"No, if everyone evacuated, there wouldn't be fresh weapons here would there?" Zephynn asked.
"Why does a town need to make weapons anyways?" asked Vinnia as she picked up a lance and lifted it up and down, "It almost doesn't feel right to call it a town!" Voices suddenly came from outside. Both demigods looked at each other and ducked under different tables.
"How about that lance you were making?" one asked.
"Yeah, you said it was going to be awesome," said another.
"Guys, just be patient," said a third voice, "I know I'm like, the best forger around here, but just wait until you see it in the training room and you'll know just how powerful it is.." Three burly looking men walked right into the forge. They all wore shirts with the sleeves cut off entirely and their pants were black from working in the forge for so long. Zephynn guessed that they were returning from lunch.
As the middle of the three, probably the one who had been bragging about his skills as a forger, walked up to the table that Vinnia had taken the lance off of, his face turned from stuck up to what-the-heck-where-did-my-lance-go.
"Did one of you two idiots take the lance I made?" he asked as he turned around to the others.
"No sir," said the one on the left in confusion, "We have no idea what happened to it. Isn't that right?" The one next to him shook his head in agreement.
"Yeah," he said, "We have no idea what happened."
"You two better not being lying to me," said the braggart with a mean looking face. As the three forgers were talking up there, Vinnia and Zephynn were communicating via whisper between the tables they were hiding under.
"What do we do now?" asked Zephynn in a hush. The sword was still in his hand.
"I don't know," Vinnia whispered in response, "Maybe we could distract them…"
"Did you hear something?" asked the mean forger. The other two shook their heads.
"Are you two hiding something from me?" he said angrily.
"No sir," said the first of the other two, "We aren't hiding anything." He took a step back, but the mean forger took two steps forward and grabbed him by the neck.
"Tell me what you're hiding!" he yelled. Vinnia took this opportunity to wrap his legs in a couple of vines and then jerk them so that he screamed and fell to the ground on his back, thus causing the other forger that he had been holding to fly over to the wall and hit his head, further knocking him unconscious. Vinnia quickly retracted the vines as the only forger left standing bent down to shake the mean forger. He was knocked out of the forge by a gust of scorching wind and hit the ground outside.
Vinnia and Zephynn rolled out from underneath their hiding spots and dashed out of the forge, but not before the mean forger could see them.
"Thieves!" he screamed, "Patrol! Get them!" Vinnia and Zephynn found themselves trapped in an alleyway created by the buildings around them. Soldiers approached them from both sides.
"Yeah, this isn't a town," said Vinnia, "It's definitely a military base."
"So what do we do now?" asked Zephynn in panic.
"Man up chicken boy," said Vinnia twirling the lance she had stolen in her hand, "It's time to fight!"
"Uh… are you sure about that?" asked Zephynn, his panic growing.
"Again, man up!" Vinnia yelled. They stood back to back, weapons at the ready as the soldiers came closer. Then, Vinnia shot forward at the first line of soldiers, leaving Zephynn to look back in shock as she impaled the first soldier coming at them from her direction.
Vinnia herself suddenly felt sick to her stomach. She pulled the lance away and jumped back, realizing what she had just done.
"Okay…" Vinnia said in sudden panic, "That was… odd."
"Now do you understand how I feel?" asked Zephynn, who was trembling as the soldiers came closer to them at a fast pace. Vinnia raised her hand in the air and vines shot out of the ground, lifting them above the soldiers and onto the rooftop above them.
"That was scary," said Zephynn sincerely when they found themselves out of harm's way, "Now do you see why I didn't want to fight?"
"You already asked that," said Vinnia, still pale from what she had done, "And yes, I most certainly do. This is not like killing monsters." She turned towards the exit of the encampment, which was quite a ways from where they were.
"I say we get out of here in stealth," said Vinnia.
"I agree," said Zephynn in response, "But that'll be quite hard to do." He pointed down to the street below them where soldiers were gathering in formation and facing the rooftop where they were taking refuge. Vinnia quickly regained her composure and took a breath in and out.
"Let's go," said Vinnia, trying to remain calm.
As they headed for where they had entered the military encampment, they tried to avoid combat as much as possible. Eventually, the buildings got to the point at which they were tents again, and the two demigods had to jump off and run for their lives. They encountered a few more legions of soldiers, which they swiftly avoided, and eventually, they reached the exit of the encampment unhassled.
"We're almost there," said Vinnia hopefully, "We just have to make a run for it."
"Even if we do, we're branded for life by these people," said Zephynn, "If they find us they're going to kill us."
"Stop being such a pessimist and let's go!" Vinnia said in annoyance, "I mean, I know that's true but…" Suddenly, an enormous creature with a single red eye on its forehead barreled into the camp from the woods holding an enormous, spiked, brown club with a metal handle. Slime dripped from everywhere on its body, and it seemed that it was sweating the stuff.
"What in heaven's name is that thing!?" Vinnia cried.
"I don't want to know…" Zephynn responded, shaking as he tried to hold his sword in a ready stance. The enormous Cyclops creature began smashing the buildings and tents of the camp almost immediately. Soldiers appeared instantly to try to immobilize it, but it knocked them all out of the way.
"We have to do something!" Vinnia cried.
"But we can't!" Zephynn argued, pulling her back, "They'll kill us on sight!"
"Would rather die at the hands of that ugly thing?" asked Vinnia, "Because it's going to come after us when it's done killing them." Zephynn waited too long to respond because both of them felt a hand on their shoulders. They looked up to see the mean forger smiling evilly down upon them.
"Hello kiddies," he said, clearly steamed at them for what they had done, "How about you come with me and give those weapons back?" Vinnia responded by summoning a vine and wrapping it around his neck, thus pulling him off of them and allowing for Vinnia to smash him in the stomach with the butt of the lance. He fell to the ground gasping for breath.
Vinnia withdrew the vine and smacked him over the head with the lance's hilt. He fell unconscious.
"What a nuisance," said Vinnia, "At least he gets knocked out easily. I wouldn't want to… you know."
"Yeah," said Zephynn, "I know alright. Do you still want to help them at the risk of being thrown in prison for the rest of our lives?"
"Yeah," said Vinnia, spinning her lance in her hand, "Would you leave a bunch of poor innocent souls in need?" Zephynn had no answer for her.
"I thought not," said Vinnia, "And besides, I think I owe them enough already. Let's go!" They both charged at the gargantuan monster and tried stabbing it in the legs, but their attacks simply bounced off and a swing from the club forced them to retreat.
"Okay," said Zephynn getting his sword ready again, "So we can't hurt it. Now what?"
"It has to have a weak point somewhere," said Vinnia.
"Its eye maybe?" asked Zephynn.
"No, that's too obvious, it's got to be somewhere else," said Vinnia, "After all, what idiot would create a monster with its eye as its weak point?"
"You're assuming it's been created by something?" asked Zephynn. The club swung down at them and they jumped the swing.
"Yep," said Vinnia, "Underworld monsters are. Why not these guys?" They dodged a few more swings of the monster's club before trying to stab it again. It didn't work. The monster's skin was harder than diamond.
"Hitting it in the skin isn't working," said Zephynn, anxiety catching up to him.
"Well what part of its outside isn't made of skin?" asked Vinnia in frustration, "We can't hit anything that's not skin on its body!"
"You're making no sense at all," said Zephynn.
"I know I am!" Vinnia yelled, "What can we hit that's not skin!?"
"Uh… its eye?" Zephynn suggested again. Vinnia observed monster again and they dodged another swing of its club. It was seven feet tall at least and as Zephynn had said, its eye was the only part of it that wasn't skin that could be hit from the outside.
"Fine, we'll go for the eye!" Vinnia exclaimed in annoyance, "But just how do you plan to reach that height?"
"Let me take a shot," a voice came from atop one of the buildings. Both demigods looked up and saw Pit standing on the roof of the closest building to them. The staff was in his hand, and his eyes, though blatantly lost in sadness, were also filled with some form of confidence. The enormous monster turned to him and got ready to swing the club, but Pit raised the staff into the shooting position and aimed directly at its eye.
When the club was ten feet from him, Pit fired. Rather than a normal charge shot, out came a beam of red light that buried itself in the monster's eye. The club fell onto the roof not five feet away from Pit and the monster held its face in pain. Slowly, the monster melted into the ground, and its remains were but a pile of slime that slowly soaked away leaving only a destroyed camp entrance to account for the battle's happening.