BXBX NOVEL Chapter 89: Something’s Off
His mouth was opened in a scream that was drowned out by the sounds of the crackling violent energy still visible around him and wracking through him.
"Argh!"
The thing was, even as Henry endured the pain and let out his yell, he breathed a mental sigh of relief that he could survive this.
Forced to his knees, Henry bowed his head as the energy finally started to fizzle out of him. Leaving behind only the occasional spasm due to residual dark energy like the aftereffects of an electrocution.
[You have lost 80 Hit Points]
[Hit Points: 10/100]
"So powerful," Henry mumbled knowing he had only his increased Hit Points to thank for surviving the attack.
A Warlock's spell primarily scales on Intelligence and with a 70 in Intelligence, an 80 damage was likely all the Warlock could manage with a single tendril attack. In a sense, he had truly given it his all.
Henry had done the same.
When he fired, he made sure it was a shot his target would not survive and now that he had finally managed to stop the energy causing him to spasm, he looked up and saw the Warlock with a hand over his heart.
"You—" the Warlock said but that single word caused the blood that had pooled inside his body to spew out in a massive gush but even then, the look in his eyes wasn't just of pain. It was anger too.
He had so many questions and all of them were about how Henry could have survived his attack after getting so clearly hit by it. And How Henry could look like he was now barely suffering the spell's aftereffects?
'How? How? How?' The Warlock kept asking over and over in his head because he couldn't even properly compose his questions in his head.
*Thud*
His knees hit the ground soon enough and with a final hateful look at his killer, he fell forward, face first and his blood pooled around him in a massive irregular red circle.
[Kill-Reward: 150 Exp]
[You have gained Skill Exp]
[You have defeated a Warlock for the first time]
[You have received a Bonus of 200 Exp]
As Henry swiped the notifications aside, he pulled a Healing potion from his Inventory and raised it to his lips only to pause when he heard the clopping of hooves from behind.
He already knew who it was but he arched his neck around to look at Nyx who was trotting over with her head low.
"Hey," he called to her with a smile.
Nyx let out a snort and scratched the ground with one of her hooves,
"-I- I hit the ground wrong.-" she said and looked sheepish that her head had hit the ground so hard that she had gotten stunned and was essentially out of the fight and unable to provide him with any aid.
"It's fine," Henry said with his eyes on a tab that was now floating above the horse's head;
[Hit Points: 40/50]
The Wind barrier that had sent Nyx and Angus's horse flying many meters away along with the head slam against the ground had cost Nyx 10 Hit Points but it was a level of damage she could still shrug off.
It was then, looking at the tab above her head, that Henry realized he had never once given Nyx a Healing Potion to drink and had no idea how it would affect her.
'I suppose it can't kill her,' he thought with a shrug before pulling out one of the last few bottles of the 20 Hit Points recovering Healing Potions he still had and he held it out to Nyx.
"Here," he said.
Nyx sniffed the cork curiously before grabbing it between her teeth to pull it off to sniff the contents of the bottle.
"-This is that thing you drink, isn't it?-" She asked.
"It is," Henry said.
Nyx let out a breath before grabbing the bottle between her teeth. She raised her head so the bottle turned upside down and the potion flowed down her throat and gave her a feeling of immediate rejuvenation.
[Nyx has recovered 10 Hit Points]
[Nyx's Hit Points: 50/50]
"-That's good-" Nyx said with delight, "-I like it!-"
"I'm just glad it didn't kill you," Henry said and watched as Nyx's eyes widened,
"-It could have killed me?-" she asked.
"A joke," Henry said with a chuckle, "Relax."
He raised the improved Healing Potion he had bought from Elminster to his lips and finally drank it.
[You have recovered 60 Hit Points]
[Hit Points: 70/100]
As the feeling of healing rejuvenation spread through him, Henry finally glanced over to see what Angus was up to.
His brows furrowed in confusion when he saw Angus' hands on the heads of the two Warlocks as he passed a strange purple energy into their bodies and they just submissively took it.
Henry stepped closer and called out,
"Angus?"
Angus looked to the side at Henry, his purple eyes glowing more brightly than Henry had ever seen them glow,
"Hey, Henry," he said and looked over at the body of the third Warlock surrounded by a pool of blood,
"I knew you could defeat him. I wish you didn't leave him so dead, though."
"I didn't really have a choice," Henry said.
"There's always a choice, Henry," Angus said gently,
"But I don't fault you. You had no way of knowing what I was planning. Hell, even I didn't know until a few minutes ago."
"Angus, what are you doing?" Henry asked with his attention barely on Angus' words and more on the kneeling Warlocks.
Angus simply smiled and continued his Subjugating process with Henry as a spectator.
When Angus went after the Vinculum, he had done it to be free of his bond to his creator but as he allowed himself to delve into the item's 'sense of self' he understood that it was capable of even more than that.
The eyes of the two Warlocks became a dull purple as Angus finally took his hands off their heads and took a step back to observe his handiwork.
Almost at the exact same time, a loud voice came from within the Manor,
"Oi! How useless can you fuckers be?"
Henry raised his head and looked through the open doors the Warlocks had walked out of just minutes before. Behind those doors was a massive Hall that diverged into many different paths and corridors that led deeper into Manor but the bulk of those paths were all blocked by the angles of the door and multiple different walls.
Anyway, within that hall now stood a man who had his hands in his pockets as he shook his head at the two Kneeling Warlocks.
He saw them as weakened and subdued by the enemy and simply found that shameful.
The man chuckled,
"After today, if you dare claim to hold more importance to my Lord, I swear by the gods, I will smite you."
'A Vyker,' Henry thought. He didn't even need <Insight> to know. He could just tell.
Others had arrived now but Henry's attention was on the first and he watched as the man took a hand out of his pocket and held it out in front of him before conjuring a fireball above his palm.
A second later, as the energy within the fireball flared and burned even hotter, the Vyker took a pitching stance, leaned way back, and then tossed the fireball at an incredibly blurring speed.
The target was Angus and since he just stood in place without any attempt to defend himself, the fireball would have surely hit. But then, a shield, illuminated by a strange purple energy, shimmered into appearance and absorbed the fireball attack with no more than a ripple across its surface.
The kneeling Warlocks stood slowly to their feet and turned around to face the one who had tossed a fireball at their Master.
The Vyker took a step back and his smile drooped off his face as he realized something was off and as his mind worked to figure out what it was…
… The subjugated Warlocks attacked.