Apocalypse: Generic System by Macronomicon (shoe dog free ebook TXT) 📕

to wonder if the display gave Jessica second thoughts about deflecting the bronze spear sailing through the air toward the ginger necromancer.

Jessica whipped a hand out, something metal leaving her hand in a blur. A clang! sounded through the chamber right before the bronze-tipped bone spear clipped Ron’s leg and lodged itself in the stone beside him.

“Shit!” All of the necromancer’s swagger evaporated in an instant as he dropped to the ground, clapping his hand over the oozing cut in his leg.

The Death Knight placed itself between Ron and the figures in the distance.

The light was dim that far out, and all Jeb could make out was shifting movement and a glint of something shiny.

Oh shit!

Bronze spears started raining down on them like hail, and Jeb couched down small and made the ‘shield’ gesture with his arm, shoulder and head tucked in.

The shield popped a dome shape in front of him, and he crouched behind it, spears ricocheting off wildly.

When the hail passed, Jeb scanned the group to see if anyone was hurt.

Amanda and Brett weathered the attack behind their shields, and Jess managed to dodge all of the incoming projectiles.

Ron’s Death Knight was plucking spears out of its body with nonchalance, while Ron tried to stop the bleeding in his leg behind it.

“Amanda, get Ron!” Jeb shouted. The heavily armed healer lunged over to Ron, a spark of white light leaping out between them. Ron shivered for an instant as the flesh of his leg knitted.

“Ron, stop them from doing that again!” Jeb shouted as Jessica took shots at the enemy, seemingly choosing her targets with ease.

She must be able to see them.

“How far away are they?” Jeb asked as the zombies converged on the distant hill.

“About a hundred fifty feet,” Jessica said, sending an arrow hurtling toward the enemy cloaked in shadow.

Jeb pulled out the fireball wand and twisted the collar on the barrel until it rested just shy of the one-sixty mark.

“Fire in the hole!” Jeb warned, squeezing the trigger. Click.

BOOM!

“That made them think twice.” Jess said. “They’re pulling back – hold on a second – she whipped her bow up and shot something dark streaking through the air.

Jess’s eyes widened. Whatever she saw, she didn’t like it.

“Put a shield up!” she shouted, grabbing Jeb’s shoulder. “Cover us!”

Jeb didn’t question it.

He siphoned Myst out and made a dome of telekinetic force over the five of them.

Spatters of some kind of hot brownish liquid began raining down over them, sizzling as it boiled against the hardened air.

Nearby, a perforated leather bag struck the ground, oozing more bubbling goop.

Some kind of boiling oil attack? Jeb thought, peering at the bag. Boiling candied sugar could fuck up your day, if that’s what it was.

“They’re taking off,” Jess said, peering into the darkness.

“Let’s move back toward the entrance,” Jeb said, lifting the dome upward in one big section so they could duck out from under it without spilling any of the gunk on themselves. “I don’t like unexpected things.”

“Ugh, this shit smells,” Ron said, scowling as he ducked out of the shield, trying his best to avoid getting any of the cooling goop on him.

“Hold on,” Jessica said, cocking her head to the side. “I hear something coming.”

“What?”

“I don’t know, but it sounds like a lot of…” Jessica pointed into the distance, toward the dark roof of the cavern, where dots of light were beginning to show, like stars winking into life. A few at first, then more and more dots of light came to life on the ceiling, spreading outwards by the thousands as they detached from the ceiling in a cloud.

A swarm. The boiling goop was bait. That’s why it smells.

Jeb didn’t know which was worse: That the creatures that had ambushed them were clearly sapient and knew how to pick their battles, or that they now had to deal with a swarm of what he could only assume was less than friendly.

“Back to the entrance, double time! Watch your footing!” Jeb said, motioning for them to get moving toward the entrance.

Jeb set the range on his wand to two hundred feet and the explosion tore a chunk out of the swarm, but many more took their place as his companions rushed past him.

Unfortunately, these creatures were much faster than even a superhuman sprinter, closing the distance between them in a matter of seconds.

They were like…evil firefly bats with molten tummies. I’m not a biologist.

The vast majority of the swarm creatures collected around the area they’d just vacated, gnashing their mandibles against the rock with the goopy green stuff on it.

A few of them, though, they split off from the swarm and investigated the fleshy treats hustling away from them.

Jeb felt a pinch on the back of his neck for a heart-stopping instant before the creature and everything nearby was flung away from him.

In the empty moment following that, Jeb wove a shark cage of telekinetic force around him, with openings about an inch wide. No more biting the back of my neck.

The creatures were about the size of a football, and while they battered futilely against his cage, the rest of the party members had an up close and personal experience with the flying rats.

Jess was bleeding from dozens of small scratches across her body as she dragged Ron backward through the chamber. There was a black steel helmet covering her head, with a drape of interlocking plates partly down the back of her neck.

Ron was covering his head with his arms, while his death knight ineffectively swatted the swarming creatures out of the air in ones and twos.

Amanda and Brett were the least affected by the swarm, as they were decked out in the most complete sets of armor.

Brett