The Merchant of Tiqpa: The Bathrobe Knight's Sequel Read online

  “Well, now we’re just missing two opinions.” Locke looked at the boulder under which Bianca and Katherine had been crushed.

  “I have their phone numbers. I can ask them as soon as I get a chance to log,” Sampson offered.

  “Sounds good,” Tubal said. “Alright, guys, we got a new mission! Let’s get it done! Sampson, why don’t you log real quick and bring them up to speed. Reginald, Sparky, Shy--let’s go check out the next boss. I’d prefer that Bianca and Katherine both be here for this fight, but I’ll settle for getting it done now. If we wait for them to get back, there’s a good chance that they might end up arriving at the same time as the Holy Alliance. Even worse, they might meet up with them out on the beach or something on the way here. I’d hate for them to have to die again so soon just because we’re waiting on them.”

  Eliza had remained silent throughout the majority of the conversation, but Locke was certain that she had been aware of the entire exchange. She may not have been hanging on every word passed between them, but nothing was lost on her either. Oddly enough, she wore a somewhat distant expression. He would have expected her to be as intimidatingly poker-faced now as she had been earlier, but she seemed to have lost a bit of her facade and now looked more like she was somewhere else at the same time as her gaze flickered back and forth between them. Locke hadn’t noticed when it had happened, but she had sheathed both of her swords and was now using both of her free hands to stroke her long ponytail, which she had pulled over her shoulder. Finally, she seemed to focus herself, and her eyes lost their far-off look. “Let’s just get going,” she said quietly.

  “That’s what we’re going to do,” Tubal snapped back. “But we still have to figure out how to beat this boss. We don’t even know what it is. For all we know, it could have a trap so that, when we enter the room, poison or something comes out. Patience can be a virtue sometimes.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” she answered. “I’ll take care of it.”

  “Fine, go ahead.” Tubal crossed his arms and watched Eliza walk toward the boss room, the rest of the group quickly following after her.

  Locke followed along with Reginald behind Eliza, but he still felt a little uneasy about the whole venture. There was something off about Tubal’s dialogue, the group’s reaction and even Eliza’s demeanor. He hadn’t known any of them for more than a day, but he knew that something wasn’t right. She can’t just be moving on and letting this slide, can she? He stared at her back, watching her sway from side to side as she walked, and he couldn’t help but wonder what must be going through her head.

  The boss room they entered was unique to say the least. He had heard about humor-built rooms before, but never anything like this. It was definitely one of a kind in all his gaming experience. There, in the center of the room, was a giant octopus. In and of itself, that wasn’t so unusual. It definitely wasn’t a far stretch of the imagination to skip from ‘underwater dungeon’ to ‘dolphins’ to ‘octopus.’ What set it apart, however, was the spiky green mohawk jutting up from its head that shot up at least two feet above his rather large and bulbous body. As if that wasn’t enough, the octo-boss was standing behind a sushi bar, chopping away at dolphins. The group had walked in just at the right time to witness the Mohawktopus pick up a dolphin, one that appeared to still be alive, and hack off its head before proceeding to turn it into sushi. In front of the busy chef was an array of plates bearing already-prepared sushi rolls, replete with wasabi and ginger on the sides of each dish.

  “Customer or ingredient?” the Mohawktopus asked in a voice that was one ‘eh’ away from being the most Canadian stereotype Locke had ever heard, not even looking up from his work.

  Eliza pulled out her swords and picked up her pace, walking even further ahead of the group toward the chef. Locke wasn’t surprised at all to see that she was serious about having a go at the boss alone.

  The Mohawktopus put down his sushi-making utensils and picked up four large sushi knives. “Ingredient,” it confirmed. “It’ll be over quick.” The giant slimed, more than jumped, over the table. Each one of the suction cups on its tentacles slowly extended and contracted as its arms flopped forward like some odd cross between a snake, a centipede and a large vat of gelatin, all the while managing to keep its four knife-wielding tentacles high in the air.

  “Yes, it will be,” Eliza replied, dashing forward at the beast.

  The Mohawktopus attacked with all four of its weapons at once, using the remaining four tentacles to pull itself toward Eliza with an unexpected burst of speed. Eliza nimbly dodged two of them as she used her swords to deflect the other two. She went straight for the kill, stabbing directly at the Mohawktopus as soon as she had successfully parried the attacks, but the knives that she had dodged were already back to block her attack.

  Eliza tried to position herself so that she could launch another attack, but she wasn’t able to get balanced correctly while she was clinking blades with the swashbuckling cephalopod’s sushi knives at the same time. The beast had stopped moving when the fight had properly begun, and the tentacles that it had previously used to pull itself across the floor were now free to swing at Eliza’s legs and lower torso. She jumped back as the beast made a couple swipes at her feet in rapid succession, quickly dodging the attacks. As soon as she had created a bit of space for herself, she re-established her footing and darted in again.

  This encounter basically went exactly like the previous one had: It began with a series of blows and ended with Eliza backing off as soon as the tentacles that were supporting the Mohawktopus swung out at her, their suction cups coming within inches of grasping Eliza.

  Crud, this isn’t going to go anywhere, and if she misses one jump back, she’s dead, Locke surmised after Eliza repeated the maneuver in a third exchange. Unless . . . “Tubal! When Eliza jumps back, stick some arrows into it. Reginald, can you give her a shield?”

  “Yeah, I guess,” Tubal answered, reluctantly drawing his bow. His face showed that he still wasn’t sure about helping her, but despite his hesitation, he had his arrows notched and ready when Eliza backed up. Reginald was quick to lay out the yellow shield on Eliza as soon as she was clear of the enemy.

  “Eliza, don’t worry about parrying his next attack!” Locke barked out another order as he tossed two Fragility Poisons at the Mohawktopus. He hated being the glue for the team, and really wished he could slide back into just making potions and poisons and helping when needed. At the moment, however, the animosity between them was still almost palpable, even if they had agreed to work with each other.

  Eliza ran in, ignoring Locke’s advice. She threw up her swords in time parry the next attack, but the two knives just bounced harmlessly off the yellow shield Reginald had given her. She was clearly thrown off of her game for a split second by the unexpected assistance, and when the next two blows came, she wasn’t able to dodge one of the knives as she tried to bounce back, almost taking a shallow cut right into her side.

  The Mohawktopus spun around in an expert fashion and used his four sushi knives to block the arrows that Tubal had shot off. For all the good he did, Tubal may as well have not even fired a single shot.

  Without missing a beat, Locke threw three health potions at Eliza. She dodged one of them, but the other two hit her and slowly healed her.

  “What the . . .?” She glanced at the small flesh wound on her torso as it stitched itself back together. “What did you do?”

  “It’s called teamwork, and if you don’t get used to it now, we’re never going to win against a well-organized force in the future,” Locke replied, rushing over to her side. He made sure that he was still out of reach of any tentacles, and he positioned himself so that if he threw any more potions, he wouldn’t have to worry about catching any of his own teammates in the crossfire.

  “Just listen to what I’m telling you. You need to hold off on rushing the boss until Reginald gets another shield up. When that happens, you need to ignore his attacks, let them bounc
e off the shield, and go right through the middle. If we do this right, you should be able to penetrate his defense,” Locke explained.

  “And, Sparky” --Locke turned to the Dragon-Wing who was silently watching the scene from Tubal’s side--“can you flank the Mohawktopus? Try to distract it?”

  “Mmm . . .” was her only reply, but she circled around the slimy sushi chef and lifted her shield up. Locke was kind of sad to not hear her typical, overly-dramatic role-playing lines. He had been hoping that she would spout out something to do with honor, duty or the like, and he was disappointed when she didn’t. It’s like I’m trying to organize a drinking game at a wake for someone who died of alcohol poisoning.

  “Alright, Sparky, go in first. Eliza, follow up right after Sparky makes contact. Tubal, focus on aiming for the tentacles on the ground so that he doesn’t sweep their feet. Keep him moving. Reginald, keep a shield up on Eliza if you can,” Locke called out, issuing another string of orders and putting the fight together.

  Sparky charged in first, moving her shield like lightning as she blocked the sudden flurry of knife attacks directed at her. The Mohawktopus whipped around and snaked out one of its tentacles as if it were going to try and snatch her up with its big, meaty appendage. Fortunately, Tubal was quick to take advantage of the opportunity and shot out five flaming arrows that stuck into the massive, wriggling arm before it could gain enough height to come down and grasp ahold of the Dragon-Wing knight.

  Eliza shot Locke a glance that could have withered a steel nail, but still followed the directions and charged in. For an instant, Locke could have sworn that she closed her eyes as she seemed to struggle to resist the urge to block the incoming attack. The octopus’s attacks bounced off Reginald’s fresh shield, and its other two limbs were too busy with Sparky to stop Eliza as she dug her blades right between the creature’s eyes, spilling out a purplish-blue blood. Just as quickly as her swords pierced into the creature, Eliza and Sparky both jumped back, giving Locke the room he needed to throw out four Fragility Poisons. He tried to time his throw so that the bottles shattered against the creature as soon as his teammates were out of range, and he was rewarded by the Mohawktopus letting out a massive, ear-piercing shriek.

  The wound that they had managed to open on the giant cephalopod didn’t last long. Much like the one that it had inflicted on Eliza, the blood stopped oozing out, and the wound closed itself up as if a magically-invisible surgeon was working away to patch it up. Even worse, the four tentacles that had been pulling it to and fro across the floor each reached into a pocket of some sort inside the octopus and pulled out four additional sushi knives identical to the ones it was already holding. Locke watched on in dismay as it propped itself up on one tentacle and started spinning.

  As if the self-healing and breakdance moves weren’t a brazen enough denial of physics, the spinning began to propel the Mohawktopus in the air, causing it to completely lift off the ground and float like a helicopter. The eight knives it held acted like deadly edges at the end of the octopus’s twenty-foot-long tentacles, and they whirled around at a dizzying speed.

  “Any bright ideas for this one, Shy?” Reginald asked. He was already at work casting another shield in front of Eliza to make up for the one that had already been destroyed, and Locke was happy to see that he didn’t need too much goading to keep up with the fight.

  Locke stared at the gelatinous gyrocopter of death and quickly ran through his options. I could keep throwing an endless amount of money at it, kill it with potions as we kite it around, but that wouldn’t get us any closer to working as a team. He took a deep breath as he watched Sparky slowly lead the octocopter of doom away from the rest of the group, never getting close enough to elicit concern from anyone watching.

  What would happen if she actually slammed into it? Locke watched Sparky's shield as she continued her retreat out of range of the monster. There’s no saying if it would rip her up or if she’d bounce off it, but . . . Hmm. . . We’re not going to get anywhere waiting. “Sparky, circle around to Eliza. Reginald, switch your shield from Eliza to Sparky. Tubal, save your arrows and position yourself behind Sparky. This boss is supposed to be easy, right? That’s what Sampson said, yeah?”

  “Yeah, or at least that’s what the forums said,” Tubal answered.

  “Great, then let’s have some faith and try this out.” I can’t help the fact that there’s no real way for me to directly assist in the battle, but I’m confident that this plan will work. Well, I hope it does at least. He momentarily faltered before shaking off the doubt. No, if the boss is supposed to be an easy and farmable one, this can’t be that difficult. It only took two people to make it through its four arms earlier, so it shouldn’t need too many more now. It’s clearly a boss that needs a little bit of teamwork, but shouldn’t require that much effort. This can’t fail. He did his best to reassure himself as Sparky rounded over to Eliza, and Reginald’s shield encompassed Sparky.

  “Okay, Sparky, push forward. Slam into the blades--don’t dodge them--and angle your shield slightly upward. If I’m right, it should push our helicoptopus into the air, leaving its underbelly wide open,” Locke called out, explaining his strategy.

  “Won’t that cut Sparky up?” Tubal asked as he readied an arrow.

  “You guys will just have to have a little faith in me. There is no way they would list this boss as easy if no melees could approach him,” Locke reasoned.

  “That may be asking a bit much, given recent events,” Tubal shot back, giving the slightest hint of a grin to let Locke know he wasn’t being too serious.

  “Glory is always served hand in hand with risk,” Sparky declared with her usual theatrical bravado, quickly drowning out Tubal’s skeptical remark.

  Well, at least one person still trusts me. I think.

  “Hey, if you got a better idea, boss, we’ll be all ears,” Reginald offered.

  Tubal didn’t say anything in response. He merely shrugged and readied his bow. “Let’s see if it works. There’s no harm in a death, right?” His newly-chipper attitude vanished under Eliza’s searing gaze at his last remark. “I mean, let’s just give this a go.”

  “Great then. Sparky, lead off, and remember that your objective is to slam the thing backward so that Eliza and Tubal can get underneath those blades and finish it off.” It probably wasn’t necessary, but Locke went over the game plan once more. He wasn’t going to give anyone the wiggle room they needed to make any excuses later for why they didn’t do their job.

  Sparky nodded and shouted, “For honor!” as she ran, hiding behind her shield as she slammed into the spinning whirlwind of a sushi chef. As soon as the two collided, its blades tilted downward rather than upward as Locke had wanted. The arms clipped the ground, and the creature went spinning away like a car taking off in a drag race. The boss raced across the chamber in an erratic fashion and slammed right into the wall of the cavern. It splattered across the side of the chamber so quickly and with such force that it reminded Locke of a Wiley Coyote attempting to speed through a tunnel painted on the side of a wall.

  Eliza, who was practically mid-lunge when the boss splatted onto the wall, and Tubal, who had his bow fully drawn, both just stood there in silent surprise, awkwardly frozen in their action poses like a pair of figurines. No one even knew what to say as they stared at the fresh piece of wall art.

  “That can’t be his final form, can it?” Reginald blurted out, shattering the quiet.

  Chapter 7

  Did . . . Did that just happen? Even Locke had a hard time processing how quickly the fight ended. He had been expecting it to be ‘easy,’ but not over faster than a romance scene in primetime television.

  “You don’t think he squished our precious loot, do you?” Reginald asked, voicing a question that never would have even popped into Locke’s head.

  “I have a feeling it wasn’t on him,” Tubal said, pointing to a chest that was materializing in the middle of the room even as he spoke.

&nbs
p; “I don’t think there was any glory in that one,” Sparky said as she looked at her shield. “I was but a boot, crushing an ant that indignantly tried to climb to heights it couldn’t reach.”

  “Nonsense,” Locke answered as he came up on her side. “You didn’t know it would be that simple until after you rammed it. It could have killed you, and isn’t that where your ‘glory’ comes from? Risk, as you put it, protecting others?”

  “Hmmm . . .” Sparky seemed to think for a minute and then replied smugly, “Indeed. You are a scholar of great value to see that there was honor in this mercy killing.”

  “That’s the spirit!” Locke smiled a stupid-huge grin. He wasn’t just excited because Sparky was back in decent spirits; he was happy because his plan had worked. After all, he hadn’t been the one fighting. As far as his abilities went, he was about as useful as a wet paper sack in a knife fight. Instead, he was hyped up because he had found a way to be useful even without fully engaging in the fight. Sure, he had lobbed out a few potions, but he never even had to draw his sad, little sword. He was the one who had pulled the group together and set them to action. He was the one that had bound them together in single purpose, unified them with a plan and gotten them to execute it. When the teamwork he had orchestrated worked, albeit not in the method he had envisioned, a wave of relief washed over him, followed by a genuine sense of success that he had only ever experienced before when closing a big sale.