The Dark Lord Bert 2 by Chris Fox (bookstand for reading .TXT) 📕

gone to search for a “sky rock”. But that was quite all right. One of the advantages of being a sorceress was that she possessed a variety of situationally useful spells.

The Ghostly Trail spell would follow Bert, or more likely Boberton, provided they could pick that trail up once they left town. That would be the difficult part. She had no idea which direction he’d gone, as there were forests in all directions if you went far enough.

Kit adjusted her azure robes as she approached the throne room, paused outside to gather her courage, and then stepped in to see what madness White had gotten up to.

She knew the moment she spied him at the window that something terrible had happened. She knew before the screams, which echoed up faintly from the town below.

“What have you done?” Kit forced calm into her voice as she moved to stand next to White.

The dark elf wore a maniacal grin as he stared down at his handiwork in the town of Bobertown. Kit’s hand shot to her mouth, and she very nearly lost her lunch when she surveyed the grisly carnage.

Crushstuff was surrounded by two dozen spectral figures. As she watched, the ogre brought his axe down on a fleeing archer. The weapon split the unfortunate elf from head to groin, and she winced sympathetically.

The body parts fell to the ground, but several zombies shambled forward to gather the pieces and drop them into a cart. A ghostly spirit rose from the body of the fallen elf, and it turned hungry eyes on the living still fleeing from Crushstuff.

Yet it didn’t bother the ogre. Wait…she took a moment to really see the ogre. His greenish skin had faded to a sallow white-grey. The pallor of death.

“White…what did you do to Crushstuff?” She backed a step away from the window, and prepared to run.

“Nothing you need fear.” White waved a hand absently as he continued to observe his grisly work. “Crushstuff requested improvements, so I gave him the undead template. He’s immune to most normal damage types now, though he is vulnerable to silver.”

“Hi, Kit!” The ogre smiled up at the tower, a ghastly sight, then brought his axe down on a horse. An already dead horse.

“And, ah, what are you gathering body parts for?” Kit knew she should run. White could turn on her any moment, but she had to know.

“I’m turning this town into a necropolis.” White leaned on the window sill, and sighed dreamily down at the carnage. “It will be bone and misery as far as the eye can see, which will give my new kingdom the benefits of the Oppressive Dictator government type. In the basement I’m already working on a wight factory.”

At first Kit thought he meant cloning himself, a terrible thought, but then she realized he meant undead wights. The kind that haunted barrows in the fantasy novels she so enjoyed.

“How are you doing it all so, ah, quickly?” Another risky question. Kit edged toward the door, but White hadn’t noticed.

“Another class feature.” He finally glanced at her, and smiled in a way that almost made him resemble a real person, until he spoke again. “I expected to have to barter some of them away, but was able to keep them all. I have 156 more. And I will use them to turn this entire world into my plaything. I will conquer it all, and I will end the wretched silliness. I will make a World of Grimdark, but I shall fail to stick the landing in the final season. I will call my new world…Westerass.”

Kit noted that he’d turned back to the sill, so she crept to the door, and slipped into the hallway. White never noticed. Kit hurried back down the hallway to the door to her new quarters. She wrenched it open, grabbed her pack, and turned to leave.

“I’m ready.” Nutpuncher’s deep voice drew her attention downwards, and she found the monk standing there with his pack already cinched around his shoulders. “I stayed up all night watching. Was just waiting for you to get up. You’ve got a plan to stop this, right?”

“Not much of one,” she admitted. Kit closed the door, and began threading a path out of the tomb. “We’re going to need to find Bert. He’s still got the dark lord trope. We know he made it to a forest, but not which one. We need more information.”

Nutpuncher shoved his hair aside and peered up at her. “Let’s say we find him. What then? You don’t think we can stop White, do you? He’s probably immune to everything.”

Kit clenched a fist. “I don’t know, but we’re going to try. The worst that can happen is we fail, and the game ends. We proved we could stop White last time. I want to do it again. The way he plays isn’t right, and it isn’t fun.”

Nutpuncher offered a determined nod. “Okay, let’s go.”

13

Dirt Mittens

Bert had a serious problem. The forest was quickly running out of elves as they clawed at each other to reach the strange numbered rock.

Thanks to his trope, and the fact that he hadn’t returned to Paradise in some time, Bert had an idea. Well, a series of ideas really, enough to constitute a whole plan.

“Boberton!” Bert bellowed at the top of his lungs, and both furry heads swung in his direction. “Chase elves away from rock. Not let any come near!”

The dog’s tail wagged fiercely as both Lefty and Righty began barking at elves. Most ignored the dog, so Boberton began knocking them into the air with his broad heads. He barked and yapped and ran around in a wide spiral around the rock.

At first more elves tried to sneak past, but within a few minutes they’d learned that Boberton would not be deterred. He knocked a final elf so high into the air that the fellow landed atop the branches of one of their trees, and that put an end to the attempts.

That left