NOVEL NEXT 76: The Fox of Mass Distraction
Nessy's body twitched in Adelle's arm and then Candace shuddered, one eye losing its tint as the husky's own sky-blues snapped open.
"That was fun!" Nessy licked Adelle and then slid out of the cheetah's arms.
Candace murmured something and leapt over the railing, somehow slowly gliding through the air until she landed on my shoulders.
"Aleeeeec, carry me," she ordered, sitting down.
"Um, okay," I said as she wrapped her legs around my neck. She seemed practically weightless. "Isn't it hard to unbind physical things?" I asked her. "How did you just make yourself weightless?"
"It works by conceptual understanding," she explained. "I understand myself well enough to modify my conceptual state easily. For example, if I wanted to unbind the weight of that tharr dragon," she pointed at an emerald critter sitting on a rooftop like a fluffy cat. "It would be much more difficult because I don't know this dragon personally at all. The more I scan something with Astral Sight, the better I become at using my skill on it."
"I see," I said. "Could you bind your skill to me? Make me into a Binder?"
"Nu. You're really hard to scan," Candace said. "Your soul doesn't have an end to it."
"What about reducing my weight in general?"
"Same issue," she shrugged, wiggling on my shoulders, feet swinging on my chest. "Your body is hard to scan. You've got an infinite number of potential cells behind every cell. Binding or charming you is a pain in the ass."
"Could you bind my skill to yourself then?"
"Only conceptually," she replied. "Which means I'd be conceptually liminal-ish for a few minutes, but not physically immortal like you. Hrmmmm. This gives me a juicy idea."
"Which is?"
"Oh you'll see," she purred, kneading my head.
. . .
For lunch, we headed to a tourist-filled sushi cafe called "The Drowned Tower." The place featured floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking Lake Eerie, its interior filled with salvaged items from Old Denver. Battered street signs, fragments of marble counters, a rusted bank vault door repurposed as decor, etc. All of the repurposed decor was slightly warped by heat, chewed up and covered in colorful barnacles.
Lunch passed in a blur feeding each other delicious sushi and general conversation. Candace kept stealing food from everyone's plates while maintaining eye contact as if challenging us to stop her. Kristi complained about her dress whenever someone looked at her, yet preened whenever she caught me staring. Adelle focused on the food, occasionally grunting in agreement or disagreement to whatever was being discussed. Nessy was being a cute doggo, swatting me with her tail and spending every moment pawing, licking or sniffing me.
Afterwards, we headed to "Pocket Dimensions," a shop specializing in extradimensional storage solutions. The proprietor, a portly red panda with spectacles perched on his snout, guided us through rows of bags, backpacks, and pouches.
"For a delving pack, I recommend our Delver's Delight 2020 series," he said, pulling down matching black bags with silver buckles. "Triple-reinforced dimensional celesteel rings, water-resistant, spell-resistant, and they come with anti-theft runes."
Candace paid for the extradimensional bags for everyone.
"Dragon's Hoard Armory" occupied a converted church, its stained glass windows depicting dragons in various heroic poses. Inside, a multitude of armor and weapons lined the walls from swords, to axes to magitek guns, and stranger implements I couldn't identify.
A grizzled wolf pradavarian approached us, his gray fur streaked with white. "Delvers, eh? What're you hunting?"
"Highway Sixty-Nine," Candace replied.
The wolf's expression slid from professional interest to barely concealed concern. "The Infinite Highway? You're either brave or have a death wish."
"Bit of both," Candace laughed. "Do you have something that can cut concepts apart?"
"We do carry concept-damaging weapons," the wolf said. "But nothing that would permanently slice ideas or Astral beasts. If you really want to beat that highway… you'd need a legendary weapon like the Sword of Everglade."
"Which we can find where?" I asked.
"The Sword of Everglade was lost in 1988 in the depths of Denver," the salesman said. "Delver Knight Everglade Ishtitch attempted to shear the heart of Denver after it rose from atomic hellfire, but was himself slain by the Lawyers. His two-dimensional, idea-killing sword that could literally cut anything vanished underwater along with his entire pack. Denver was engulfed by lake Eerie in a week after their demise, its depths now impossible to scout as it is populated by the Colossus Dreadmaw's children that constantly nip at the foundations of the dungeon."
"How did the Layers even bring someone down who could cut anything?" I asked. "How do they attack?"
The salesman leaned against a glass case containing celesteel daggers. "Lawyers don't attack directly. They sue you."
"So, like, did they take Everglade to court?"
"Exactly," he nodded grimly. "One minute you're delving, the next you're served papers. The summons itself is a trap. Touch the paperwork, and you're bound to appear to the nearest court controlled by the dungeon. Miss your court date, and judgment is rendered against you by default."
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
"Which does what?" I asked.
"They foreclose on your existence," the salesman said flatly. "They own you, take your body, your soul, everything. Once someone is owned, they become new Lawyers."
"So did Everglade become a lawyer?" I wondered.
"Yes. Back then Denver was at its full power. He and his team were basically flooded with Lawyers from all sides and served lawsuit after lawsuit as he sliced them and nearest buildings to shreds," the wolf said.
"The lawsuits bind themselves to ya like Astral shackles," Candace added. "They create a conceptual weight of sorts on your soul. This weight creates binding loops which tear the body from the soul, trying to drag it to separate courts in different locations."
"Everglade was able to bring down about seventy skyscrapers before he fell," the wolf nodded.
"The lawsuits accumulated and his soul tore into a hundred pieces, departing from his body," Candace said. "In 1988 Denver was still a new thing and the Lawyers were good at hiding what they were in the Astral. Nobody had personal Astral anti-lawsuit shields back then."
"Yep. We offer tourists a variety of Conceptual shields nowadays," the wolf agreed, pointing to a wall of small colorful shields, bracelets and necklaces. "These block you from being bound in the Astral by Denver."
I walked to the wall to look at the shields. Many of them appeared to be woven from dragonscales, others had etchings of dragons in them.
"The dragonscale ones work really well within twenty clicks of Cascade then they slowly begin to decay," the salesman explained. "The others are imbued with Astral dragons that nip the lawsuits off you. They will work anywhere on the continent as long as you insert crystal mana into the fuel container. The mana gauge here lets you know when you need to add more crystals to the artifact." He pointed out.
We spent another hour selecting weapons and shields. Kristi chose a massive celesteel hammer with rune-etched edges with art of dragons that could damage conceptual bindings and dragonscale-packed, shape-adjusting bullets for her grandfather's Decimator. Nessy got herself a microphone with dragon-etched shoulder pad speakers that would amplify her musical ability to disrupt concepts. Adelle selected heavy-duty gauntlets with dragon flames and teeth etched into them. Candace got herself a harpoon gun that extended the range of her Binding powers to whatever the wire-connected arrow struck.
For me, Candace acquired a concept-damaging celesteel knife and a handgun with dragonscale bullets.
"I can't believe we spent twenty thousand on weapons," Nessy said, glancing at the casual way Candace had handed over her card.
"Totes worth tho. Being broke is for poor people." Candace replied.
"That makes no sense," Kristi muttered, tugging at her revealing dress.
"Stop fidgeting," Candace rolled her eyes at Kristi. "Nobody's looking at you."
"Everyone's looking at me," Kristi hissed back.
"Nu-huh. They're looking at me," Candace corrected, striking a pose. "I'm mega-fabulous."
"You're mega-annoying is what you are," Kristi huffed.
"You're just salty 'cus you lost to a fab-fox." Candace grinned. "Try harder next time!"
Kristi opened her mouth to retort, but her phone buzzed. She glanced at the screen and frowned. Candace flitted around the raptor and also glanced at her screen.
"Yo dad sounds mad," she said.
"Yeah, no shit," the raptor girl tried to grab the fox, but failed to do so.
"You should tell him you're out with your awesome pack, wearing almost nothing," Candace suggested from Kristi's other side.
"Damn it, how do you keep escaping me?" Kristi snapped, her claws nearly catching the elusive fox.
"I'm getting better at reading your swings in the Astral," Candace explained. "You're very fast but you're also too predictable, too obvious.
"Candace, leave Kristi be," I said.
"Why? I'm not bullying her." The fox bobbed. "I'm helping her learn through playful nipping! She gotta learn to stop telegraphing her moves. Anyone with a Foresight skill can basically smack her around way too easily."
The raptor sighed, seemingly not arguing with the fox.
Nessy trotted beside them, blue sundress fluttering in the wind. "C'mon, Kristi! Let's go flying! The storm's rolling in, it's the perfect time for urbexing! We've got a few hours to kill before dinner with my fam."
Kristi glanced at me.
"Don't worry," Nessy said. "We got plenty of lawsuit shields and we won't go in too deep. Also, I very much doubt that an Astral lawsuit would be able to stick to Alec's liminal soul."
"Ye," Candace added. "You need to let out some steam before you explode. Punching Denver is a good time. I got us beer!"
"Woo!" Addie fist pumped. "Alcohol n' breaking shit."
"Fine." The raptor girl gave into the combined encouraging assault of the trio.
. . .
The Nemesis took off from the Cascade pier, its shields humming in front of my face, keeping me from swallowing dragon-bugs. Bigger dragons chittering in annoyance scattered out of our way as Kristi punched the Glider towards Denver, her body pressed against me from behind. Her chest felt warm and soft against my back as she was still stubbornly wearing the diamond dust dress. Neither of the girls put on any armor, wearing dragon scale bracelets, as the Lawyers of Denver didn't use physical attacks.
We soared over the black sand beach, then out across the choppy waters of Lake Eerie. The ruins of Denver loomed ahead, getting bigger with each passing minute.
"Which one?" Kristi called over her shoulder.
"That one! Land at the top!" Nessy pointed to a relatively intact skyscraper closer to shore. Its top forty floors rose above the water, windows shattered, every wall crack and exposed beam covered in barnacle growths and dragon nests.
Kristi banked the Nemesis glider around and above the building, blessing me with a lovely view of our delving destination. The skyscraper's crown and a section of the top floor had collapsed inward, creating a massive cerulean pool catching the sky's reflection. A thick ring of sand had accumulated over decades of storms, winds, and nesting dragons around the pool.
Over the decades, nature had reclaimed the skyscraper's roof. Lush birch trees sprouted from the sandy rim. Flowers bloomed in patches of vivid purple, scarlet, and yellow.
Dozens of dragons perched along the building's edge or fluttered around the miniature ecosystem. Tiny ones no bigger than hummingbirds and bees darted between flowers, while cat-sized specimens lounged on branches. A cluster of larger dragons, each roughly the size of a dog, dove into or bathed in the rooftop lake, sending ripples across its crystal surface, emerging with little goldfish in their claws and mouths.
Through the lake's clear waters, I spotted the remnants of office spaces, desks, and filing cabinets now serving as underwater shelves for aquatic plants and flocks of goldfish.
Kristi brought the glider down on a flat section of the rooftop sandbar. As I disembarked, the sand crunched pleasantly under my feet.
"Damn," I let out. "I can see why this place is a tourist trap."
"Yeppers. The dragons grind at the building, reducing its dungeon-y nature," Candace commented, climbing out of the bag. "S' their little paradise, a fuck-you to Denver and everything 'dat it stands for."