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The Big Oof! Volume 1 Chapter 23: Stealing Power
🕑 Added 2023-01-13 03:00:04 +0000 UTC“Heh.” A huff of amusement escaped Elijah’s mouth as he flicked his hands to clear the gore off.
Bennet was cringing while he wiped off pieces of flesh that managed to land squarely on his face as he walked over next to his captain.
“The mere fact that something so stupid worked, pisses me off...” The engineer said with an annoyed look on his face.
Azeline however, stood there still stunned as her eyes danced around at what remained of the Vanir, unable to accept what just happened. All the horror stories about how malicious and mischievous those small things were towards mortals was put to rest within mere seconds. The woman couldn’t decide whether she was disappointed with the fact how anticlimactic that ended or surprised how powerful her companions' magical weapons were.
Usually the thing would freeze everyone in the same manner she was and then force them to play its sick games before sucking the soul out of them.
At least that's how it went in legends.
“I… I expected-” She eked out, resheathing her dagger. “More…”
But just as she said that, she noticed there wasn’t even a drop of blood and as a matter of fact the scattered pieces of flesh were slowly evaporating.
“The beings of the Fae courts are truly bizarre…” She said, watching the fiery vapor float into the air.
Looking up at the ceiling Azeline noticed that the looming clouds that completely covered the cavern ceiling had completely disappeared. All that remained was the odd sparklings lights that dotted the bedrock that seemingly provided this place the ambient light needed for them to see.
“Where in the heavens are we anyways?” She asked, looking at her companions. “This place is way too big to be anywhere near the cabin we entered from.”
The two men looked at her as if she was crazy before they both furrowed their brows after realizing she was completely correct.
They didn’t go THAT deep…
“I… I don’t know…” Bennett said, rubbing the scruff on his face.
“Was there even an incline on the tunnel we went down?” He looked towards Elijah.
However the man wasn’t there anymore.
Looking around the cavern, Bennetts eyes finally found the man as he started digging through several crates and sacks. It seemed during the intensity of the combat they just experienced, they had completely ignored all of the massive rows of what he assumed was cargo that was scattered all over the place.
“HEY GUYS LOOK! I FOUND GLOWY STUFF!” Elijah yelled out as he stood up, holding a small bulbous shaped bottle that had a faint, but vile yellow glow.
The look of understanding covered Azelines face when she saw what Elijah was waving around in his hand.
“So this was where Simol was storing everything!” Azeline yelled as she ran towards rows of boxes and sacks.
Azeline always wondered why this shit hole of a town at the ass end of nowhere was so important and now it was all starting to make sense. She knew that Simol was Kjadhar’s guy when it came to transportation and general smuggling, but she never quite understood why every route led here.
However, when she looked up, she saw that Elijah had uncorked one and was about to bring it up to nose for a sniff.
Smack
“Eli-jah, no!” Azeline scolded, knocking it out of his hands.
Elijah had a startled, but sour look on his face as he lifted his hand up to protect himself.
“But… But why!?” He whined, looking down to grab another one.
But as soon as his hands gripped around another bottle, he looked up to see a furious look on Azeline’s face as she scrambled up to where he was.
“AHH!! OKAY, OKAY!” He yelled dropping it as Azeline grabbed the cuff of his shirt with one hand and his wrist in the other.
“I. SAID. NO!” She chastised. “BAD!”
Bennett stood there staring at the two with an unsurprised and disgusted look on his face.
I swear to god, the idiot is a fucking cat trapped in a man’s body. He commented internally.
The engineer finally made his way over to the collection of cargo and opened one of the innumerable sacks that were scattered all around. Inside Bennet found that it was nearly full to the brim with weird violet colored dried herb that seemingly pulsated every other second with a faint purple glow.
“I’m assuming these are drugs.” He said, looking up at Azeline who was strictly monitoring Elijah.
The woman looked down at him briefly before snapping her head back to Elijah, not trusting he would try to meddle with something else.
“What’s a drug?” She asked, narrowing her eyes as she watched Elijah further poke around in a box.
…
“Addictive mind altering substances that have a negative impact on your mind and/or body.” Bennett corrected after coming to the conclusion she also wouldn’t know what a ‘narcotic’ was.”
“Ah, yes! Except these do a lot more than altering the mind.” Azeline replied as she slapped Elijah’s hand as he tried to pop open the cork on another bottle with a different colored liquid.
Elijah gave her a scornful look and slowly set the bottle down before he continued his investigation.
“These are able to give otherwise mundane individuals the ability to gather and use mana, albeit for a limited time.” Azeline said, slapping Elijah’s hand once more. “Can you stop touching things!?”
“Ahhh, I see.” Bennett started stroking his chin again as he walked around the stack of boxes so he was right under Elijah. “And I’m assuming there’s some severe side effects?”
The woman let out a sigh, hovering over this overly curious man was starting to become tedious and annoying. Her eyes wandered over to the pile of ropes just off to the side and wondered if it would be easier to just tie him to a stalagmite and call it a day.
“That’s correct, you become overly addicted to it and it usually ends with you going crazy or…” Azeline said while her eyes momentarily glazed over.
The memory of her first encounter with an individual who turned into abomination flooded her mind.
“You turn into that… ‘THING’ we just killed.” She said grimly.
This caused Elijah’s hand to immediately stop as his expression turned into one of horror as he looked up at Azeline.
“You understand now? Stop your foolishness.” The woman said with a smug grin on her face. “If you keep messing around, you’ll grow another arm or leg!”
“Hmmmmm? So that’s what you mortals have been putting in my prison.” A familiar voice called out just above Azeline.
The Vanir that should have been dead was sitting cross legged on top of Azeline’s head.
Everyone snapped their heads toward the source as its eyes once again flashed, causing Azeline to stiffen up and topple over. The little thing immediately blinked in front of Elijah the moment he stood up and grabbed ahold of his face with both hands in a wide hug.
“HOLY SHIT-AHHHHHH!” Elijah yelped as he flailed and fell backward off the stack of crates.
Directly on top of Bennett.
“OOF!” The engineer had all the wind knocked out of him after taking the full brunt of Elijah’s fall.
“AHAHAHAHA! SUCH POTENTIAL!” The Vanir cackled viciously as its eye started to glow brighter.
It then started to chant in some distorted, but song-like language while the area around both Bennett and Elijah started to emit the same Violet light as the Vanir’s eyes.
“You two will make such promising apostles!”
The two couldn’t help but be disoriented from the barrage of sensations that were overwhelming their minds. An odd whirring noise resounded within the strange little fairies blinding light that filled their immediate area along with a strangle pricking sensations on every inch of their body. It almost felt as if someone or something were taking millions of needles and injecting something into every nerve or every pore.
“AHAHAHAHAHA!” The Vainr cackled with a manic face
It came to a realization that whatever these mortals were they must have been insanely powerful as it poured more power into her soulmagic, causing it to glow brighter.
further
“AHAHAHahahaha…hah… wait…” A sound of concern left the Vanir’s mouth.
Looking around, the area around her was glowing brighter and brighter as more of her mana started to escape at an uncontrollable rate.
“Waitwaitwaitwaitwait!” The thing yelled, trying to stop whatever was happening, but unfortunately…
It was too late.
“Nononononononono, wait!” The vanir looked around at the mana flowing out.
Panic started to fill the small being as it felt nearly every ounce of mana leave its body and into both the ether and the two mortals that laid sprawled on the ground groaning. The price the Vanir was paying for the soul binding spell was something not any god was even capable of imagining.
Suddenly the spell faded as the Vanir immediately dropped out of the air and fell right on its face.
“OOF! Argh!” The thing yelled out in pain as it scrambled to its feet.
“Y-You!” It pointed its finger and jabbed Elijah’s face. “Give it back! Gimme back my power!”
Elijah groaned in pain as he felt something small poking its face while he sat up.
“What the fuck… just happened?” He moaned in pain as the fairy floated up with its wings and continued its ineffective abuse.
“Gimme it back, gimme it back, gimme it back, gimme it back!” It whined while its fist smacked against Elijah’s forehead.
Again, Elijah waved his hand in an attempt to smack the annoying thing away from him, fully expecting for it to vanish and show up the other side of his head. However, surprise spread across his face as his hand found purchase on a small body, sending it rocketing away from him towards the ground.
“OOF!” The Vanir cried out before slamming into the dirt.
He watched as the thing recoiled off the ground and was sent cartwheeling a full foot before coming to a full stop, face down. There the fairy thing laid stock still for almost a minute until it finally stirred and slowly got up with trembling arms.
“What the…” Bennett winced in pain as finally lifted himself off the ground.
Adjusting his eyes, he enabled his optical implant and became completely startled by what he saw. Not Elijah, but his own body was lit up like a Christmas tree, full of that same energy and every medical tracker in his body started screaming at him. The damned things were fully convinced he was chock full of so much radiation, he might as well have melted where he stood.
“You…” The Vanir said with tears in its eyes while it wobbled on its tiny legs “You thief!”
“Wuh?” Elijah responded in utter confusion.
The Vanir started to fly once more and beelined for Elijah’s head, this time being much more wary of the mortals' hands. Even though it lost its ability to blink around at will, it was still blindingly fast as the fair smacked against Elijah’s face and grabbed a hold of his hair.
“Thief! THIEF!!” I cried out as tiny tears fell down its face. “Why’d you take it all!!
“I only wanted to give you a little bit and you took it ALL!” the thing wailed as it pulled and yanked. “Gimme it baaaaaack!”
Elijah winced in pain as the belligerent fairy finally pulled out a strand of hair, causing him to reach up and grab the fucker.
“Can you STOP?” He demanded glaring at the small Gremlin as it pouted.
Now that Elijah got a better look, he could see whatever he was holding didn’t just sound like a female, it was female.
“Why wont my soul magic work on you!?” She demanded “When a goddess asks a question, you have to answer, okay!?”
Never in all his years had Elijah wanted to squeeze the life out of something so small until he ran into this insufferable little shit. It was beyond him how something so cute and small could be so god damn troublesome, annoying and most of all, persistent.
“You know I could break every bone in your body if I just squee- OW FUCK!” Elijah tried to threaten the tiny thing when it bit down on his hand.
He immediately let go, flinching away as the Vanir tried to fly closer for another bite, but Elijah recoiled his arm back and let loose a full powered punch.
“GWAK!” The Vanir yelped out as the blow sent her rocketing towards the ground.
With an audible crack, the poor fairy slammed into several jagged rocks causing her to break her neck and slump over. The vacant look of death was in her eyes as she stared lifelessly at her attacker, however Elijah wasn’t fooled as he shook his hand and waited for the damned thing to revive.
“This planet man…” He grumbled with a disgruntled look.
And as soon as he complained, the Vanir’s corpse started to disintegrate once again, leaving that same fiery glow. Soon her body collapsed in on itself and formed a tight whirling ball that was hovering over where she was slain.
Pop
Elijah flinched, because as soon as the supposed goddess regained her form, she was darting full speed at his face, chompers at the ready.
“GRRRR!” The Vanir growled as she bit down on Elijah's hand, once more.
“Ow! Ben! Ben, help!” Elijah desperately called out as he flailed in an attempt to swat the hellion away.
Bennett just sat there staring at the mind breaking scene in front of him with a mixture of disbelief and disgust while he watched his captain dance around. It felt like this was all some kind of weird and cruel joke some savant that was able to hack into their neural implants was playing. As a matter of fact, the engineer looked down at his hands and then started pinching himself all over at varying strengths to test the limits this supposed simulation held, however each time he was disappointed.
“Nah, this is some PCP shit.” He muttered to himself while Elijah ran from one side of the cavern to the other with the fairy following close behind him.
Standing up, Bennett left Elijah to his fate while he walked over to Azeline to check on her.
“You alive?” The engineer asked as the blonde woman rose up in a groggy manner.
“Ya… What happened?” she asked, rubbing her head.
A yelp of pain rang out causing the two to turn their head and see that Elijah was still running away and impotently flailing his arms while the Vanir chased him.
“You know what? Don’t tell me.” Azeline said, jumping off of the stack of crates.
“A wise choice.” Bennett responded, shaking his head.
Mainly because the man didn’t have anything even resembling a coherent answer for what was currently happening. Today has firmly cemented the saying ‘reality is stranger than fiction’ as an absolute truth, because this venture has been nothing but a non-stop rollercoaster of insanity.
“HAH! GOT YOU!” Elijah yelled out, grabbing ahold of the tiny winged demon with a rag he found wrapped around his hand.
The Vanir ignored the man as she continued to try and bite, but unfortunately her teeth weren’t long enough to fully penetrate the cloth.
“Let me go, you-! You thief!” She yelled while struggling. “I’m your patron, you should be obeying my every order!!”
“What does that even MEAN!?” Elijah retorted with a snarl on his face. “I don’t even feel whatever it is you did to me!”
Bennett and Azeline couldn’t help but look at each other with a concerned look while the strange bickering unfolded in front of them. The little menace did indeed do something strange to them, but Bennett didn’t feel any different than he normally did other than the headache that was forming. However, whenever he activated his optical implants, he could see that an intense amount of energy in the form of light was spilling out of his own and Elijah's body.
And he could see a small tether that connected the both of them to that little being…
“Look, I’ll let you go only if you’re able to be calm so we can talk like rational people.” Elijah said, hoping to give peace a chance. “Okay?”
Realizing she wasn’t going to get anywhere without her soul magic or any meaningful way to threaten this mortal, the Vanir tilted her head down as she looked up at Elijah while pouting.
“Okay fine…” She said with an upset voice.
Elijah looked at his companions with a worried face for a second before finally loosening his grip and letting the fairy like being hover in place and waited for her to attack again.
…
However, nothing happened as a heavy sigh of relief escaped his lips.
“Okay… Now, what exactly did you do- OW!” Elijah's first attempts at some kind of resolution failed.
The small little being had bit down on his hand once more.
“PEACE WAS NEVER AN OPTION!” She yelled, as she kept chomping.
