“ ‘Urry up with it already, would ya?”

  “Look, do you want me to trigger the traps for you all or not? Because me personally, I’d much prefer to not be the one doing the guessing and checking in this mess!”

  Of all the places that this artifact could have ended up in, the ruins of London’s old subway ranked as potentially one of the worst locations on the list. Fog obfuscated practically every surface more than a stone’s throw away from him. Opaque, rolling clouds of the stuff seeped in from station entrances and ventilation shafts alike. The haze sought the lowest point it could reach, which over time had led to the entire underground being choked with thick mist.

  He had no idea how the Subway Wizards could live like this. Every breath he took felt strained and muggy from the moisture. Like he was drinking air, rather than breathing it. Add to that fact that the entire tube system had been infamous for trapping heat inside for years now, and it felt like being trapped in the worlds darkest, ugliest sauna. Or maybe Louisiana, if the ranting of old pub customers could be trusted.

  Plus, it didn’t help that he was being forced to push his way through a deluge of mage-crafted Domain traps using nothing but the bodies of his one available clone.

  Granted, he was overstating the strain he was undergoing personally while doing this. As strange as it was, unlike any other Domain magic he’d seen in his time alive, his own had seemingly no initial stamina cost attached.

  Not to say that summoning a copy was free, far from it. He just had other ways of paying for it.

  Namely the narrow boundaries of what he could actually use his magic for. On paper, he was strictly limited to making duplicates and nothing else. Every other tool in his Exotic Domain’s disposal was triggered by things happening to him, rather than his own will like what might be true for a normal caster.

  Take, for example, the visions of his copies in their death throes. A copy had to both die and do so where he couldn’t see it for him to get one. The same qualifier was also given to any other clone currently active, creating a complicated web of triggers over the group that he still wasn’t sure he’d mapped out fully in his head.

  Though, speaking of watching me die… add that to the list of hidden costs. There’s no way this is going to be psychologically healthy for me long term, vision or not.

  Silently, he offered an apology to the two surviving clones who definitely were grappling with the mental backlash right now. As a small consolation, the frequency of them might keep them in the loop on his general level of progress down in the tunnels.

  He’d need their help once the mission was finished.

  Another body was summoned for the grinder. About five paces ahead of him, a thin beam of light flashed at about ankle height of the copy, killing the clone in an instant as the floor opened up beneath its feet.

  The pit itself was only about as deep as he was tall, but it didn’t stay a pit for long. The rearranged earth and stone slammed together as soon as he touched down, the impact causing his ears to ring as a thin river of blood appeared along the seam in the clay. Pressed up from below.

  It did little to appease his already sour mood.

  “Any of you want to volunteer for my job? No? Not a single one of you?”

  “Pipe down, kid,” one of the heavily equipped grunts rumbled. “Yer on the clock yerself, remember?”

  “Yeah. Yeah, I am!”

  His little lie to Guillaume had percolated down to the rest of the delving crew, meaning he had to keep his story straight for now. Simple enough, but he wasn’t about to stop ranting there.

  “So why don’t you tell me just whose bloody idea it was to take a stroll through the single most varied and creative source of assisted suicide the whole of this foggy hellscape has to offer?! Everyone knows by now how every last one of these tunnels is trapped at least a hundred times over!”

  To emphasize his point, he summoned yet another copy about three meters ahead of the group, and a little to the left. The instant he materialized, a thin beam of light flashed, and the two halves of it hit the floor before the clone could even process he’d died. Henry pointed a finger over his shoulder, a look of resigned frustration on his face.

  A point which his opposition very conveniently ignored, instead brandishing his gun closer in his direction.

  “Yer awfully whiny today, ain’t’cha? How’s about I-”

  The gangster he’d been addressing looked about ready to give a piece of his own mind, but the Harpy raised a hand dismissively before he could open his mouth. It stepped forward, interjecting itself into the conversation.

  “Peace,” the Harpy interposed calmly. “Allow me to elaborate. That path leads to…hmm. How should I put this? Contested territory.” It shook its head, its overly dramatic green ponytail swaying like a pendulum behind it as it expressed its dissatisfaction with its own explanation.

  “The artifact we’re looking for is currently in the hands of the Morlocks-”

  “-Subway Wizards,” Henry interjected.

  “Do not interrupt, please. The Morlocks-”

  “Subway. Wizards.”

  As long as he drew breath, he refused to use that cheesy title for the little paranoid schizophrenic cretins. Helpful though they might be, provided they trusted you.

  Something that tended to flip more frequently than the weather, with little rhyme or reason.

  The Harpy decided to diplomatically ignore his outburst, but gave him a pointed look in return. Impressive, considering it had a one-eyed gasmask for a face.

  “…As I said… the artifact is in their possession. Far away from the tunnels that they dedicate to corralling monsters with, like the one the wolves usually approach us from. But more importantly…”

  A deep exhale rattled around the interior of its rebreather, sounding weary with a hint of frustration.

  “…Whatever it is, they considered the artifact strong enough to go on the offensive for the first time since the arrival of the Shroud.”

  Henry’s eyes widened in shock. Now that was a troubling development.

  Notorious isolationists who relied on layer after layer of magical defenses well beyond the point of insanity? Defenses that were only possible due to monopolizing the largest majority of surviving mages in Hallow London? Abandoning them even momentarily to attempt a land grab of their own?

  It just didn’t add up. They just didn’t have the numbers for such a move. Either they had well and truly lost it for real this time… or whatever artifact they’d gotten their hands on must be an absolute powerhouse.

  A powerhouse that the Gentleman’s Club now had its eyes dead set on.

  Henry swallowed. “You don’t have any idea what this artifact is either, do you?”

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  One of the thugs closest to him gave him a hard check on the shoulder with the butt of his rifle.

  “Shut up n’ git ta clearin’.”

  Evidently, they were still fully intent on keeping him in the dark. He sighed. This was going to be a long trip, he could already tell.

  Well, sooner I get there, the sooner I find out, I guess.

  “Fine.” Another clone was brought forth as he massaged his temple with one hand. He wasn’t sure if it was the humid conditions or the choking scent of his blood in the tunnel, but something down here was beginning to give him a migraine.

  With a rough shove from the burly henchman, the copy stumbled several paces past the point where the last one died. Unable to right himself in time, he fell to the crumbling brickwork floor unceremoniously.

  He curled up into a ball on the floor where he landed, expecting the worst.

  Nothing happened.

  The copy, not expecting this result, opened one eye with a hint of surprise. He looked down at his body, patting himself down in shock as he realized he was still all in one piece.

  “Huh! Look at that!” The clone rose to one knee, ecstatic about the positive turn of events. “I’m alive!”

  He stood straight, throwing his hands up in excitement.

  A thin beam of light flashed in the air as his fingers brushed through a space just to the side of his head. Before the duplicate could react, a geyser of pressurized acid burst down from the ceiling.

  The spray hit him at an angle. The aftermath was not pretty, especially since it failed to actually kill the copy outright.

  “Jesus Christ!” One of the thugs broke their usually stoic composure at the fresh dose of nightmare fuel. Fumbling at his hip, he pulled out a snubnose revolver and loosed a round into the wounded clone’s head.

  Engravings on the side of the weapon glowed faintly for a brief moment, before an accelerated projectile tore through the dense fog and completed the mercy kill. A thin cone of displaced air hung around for a brief moment as Henry’s ears rang from the loud report of the gun in the close confines of the subway.

  That son of a-

  He’d recognize that handiwork anywhere. The world went silent for several seconds as the gun discharged, and his copy was at last put out of his misery.

  “Hey, what are you doing with that?!” Henry pointed to his old possession after the tinnitus began to subside. “That’s mine!”

  “Not anymore, it ain’t.” The thug casually observed the craftsmanship that went in to his custom piece. “Where’d you get such a flashy piece of kit, anyways? Tiny guns like these would normally ‘ave bobbies crawling up yer arse ta get it, yeah?”

  “I found it in a burnt out evidence locker and had it refurbished, okay? Can I have it back now?”

  “Ye really weren’t listening, were ya? Finders keepers. Now buzz off and get back to work.”

  Henry’s migraine pulsed angrily as his eye twitched. Had it not been for the other four expedition members shifting their weight aggressively in anticipation of a fight, he might have done something stupid and just attacked the guy then and there.

  It was his stuff, damn it. He’d already lost enough of it trying to break through to the spider's nest Big Ben.

  Reluctantly, he let the issue drop, albeit not without a bit of grumbling.

  “If you get yourself killed down here, I’m taking it back…”

  With little else left to do, he returned to clearing the way forward. It was a grisly endeavor that would continue for the next several hours, mostly in silence aside from the brief moments of sacrifice.

  It almost gained a sort of rhythmic feel to it, after a time. Two steps forward, one step back. Pretty close to a pattern, but never quite the same on any two given occasions.

  Why did the Subway Wizards feel the need to push the boundaries of Domain enchantments to expand their already impressive repertoire of ways to kill intruders? No idea. But apparently they’d taken to it like they did everything else that mattered to them – with an almost fervent zeal.

  He’d been watching closely, and he hadn’t noticed a true repeat just yet. Which was concerning, to say the least.

  That wasn’t to say it didn’t get monotonous. It absolutely did. He tried to find other things to occupy his mind with out of sheer boredom, but everything blended into the same green-gray of the fog.

  The only light down here came from their own persons. The crystal on his chest, while it did glow softly, wasn’t really an effective light source. It was more like a lava lamp that occasionally flashed brighter. Though, to be honest, he was glad that was the case. Any other way and the light might have made it difficult for him to sleep at night.

  Well, more difficult, anyway. Sleeping positions were a bit of a hassle, and even after that…

  Don’t finish that thought.

  There was a reason he drank so much coffee nowadays.

  He held a disposable light talisman in front of him like a lantern, illuminating his way forward as they slowly navigated the wreckage of the London Underground.

  Occasionally, they’d find a trap already triggered by something or another. Typically, it was the corpse of a pure-form vampire they stumbled across, usually alone but occasionally in small groups of about a half dozen like themselves. On rare occasions, they found the corpse of some poor scrapper as well, which were much more fortuitous to find for them. Not only were they typically loaded with untouched gear, they were generally much more effective at disarming traps before they got unlucky.

  I appreciate the effort, stranger…

  Eventually, they were forced to halt when they reached a spot in the tunnel where there was still a train on the rails. Mostly. Somewhere further ahead, past the opaque mist cloud in front of them, there must have been something that derailed it. From where they stood right now, the last train car was wedged in such a way that it blocked nearly the entire passage horizontally.

  One of the accompanying thugs whistled, impressed at the sight of the wreckage. A conversation struck up between the four thugs, with an air of familiarity that implied they worked together frequently in the past.

  “Whatcha think did a number like that, Gordie?”

  “…”

  “What, still doing the strong silent act, despite everything? ...Nah, I'm just messin' wit' ya. I’d reckon maybe the werewolves might’ve done it.”

  “Oh, come on, you always bet werewolves.”, piped up a third.

  “What, it’s a safe bet!”

  “If it was them, they’d leave a car-sized hole torn through the entire thing. Not exactly seeing one here.”

  “Oh, blimey, yeah, yer right! Remember that time we saw those vamps trying to go toe to toe with that lone wolf near the river?”

  “Is that the one that knocked over the whole lot like they were bowling pins before falling in to the drink itself?”

  “Yeah, that one! I bet he would’ve been beefy enough to do something like this even if he was just sittin’ on the tracks as it moved! Oh, uh, hey kid, check the train for traps for us, will ya?”

  Another copy. Another bright flash, This time, he just dropped to the floor bonelessly, dead in an instant. Must’ve started running out of ideas.

  He double checked with a follow-up. To his credit, the duplicate actually got pretty close to the train itself before the next trap was triggered.

  Though why they felt the need to use magic to drop a flashbang grenade on their heads, he had no idea.

  “LOOK OUT!” Henry shouted at the top of his lungs, turning his head away and covering his eyes. With a pop, light flooded the surrounding area, reflecting off the fog for the barest of instants and illuminating the entire tunnel brightly enough for him to see what the insides of his eyelids looked like.

  From the sound of curses being spewed, a few of the others had been slow to react.

  And one of them was staggering around as he rubbed his burned retinas.

  “Oh, fer feck’s sake,” one of the gunmen grumbled. Blissfully unaware of the tripping hazard directly at his feet. Henry shouted to him, trying fruitlessly to get him to stop moving.

  “Wait, stop! don’t-!”

  He was just a hair too slow to keep him from the point of no return. The thug tripped on the corpse of his duplicate, a face of panic slowly enveloping the burly man’s expression as the ground rushed up to meet him.

  The coarse fabric of the back of his jacket just barely brushed past Henry’s fingers when he lunged to pull him back from the brink.

  It wasn’t enough. Just beyond his reach, he careened into the smooth concrete besides the railway. A thin beam of light flashed as the man landed face-first.

  The floor’s surface rippled, and his head sunk nearly all the way into the concrete before it resolidified. His eyes, nose, mouth and even ears were completely submerged, and his hands which he had used in an attempt to break his fall were ensnared just as solidly.

  Muffled screams came from within as he thrashed. The concrete began to shift to an inky black, turning from a coarse, granite-like texture to something between basalt and coal tar that rapidly flowed to encase him fully.

  The Harpy was the first to react. Blitzing past the rest of them who were too stunned to move, a deep buzzing rumble intensified as it rapidly closed the distance.

  From beneath the tattered cloak it wore loosely around itself extended a third, mechanical arm. Looping over the Harpy’s shoulder, it terminated with a heavy, vice-like clamp and bore an extra joint. Like one of those industrial lifter arms found in factories, but slimmed down to tuck in between its pair of already giant mechanical wings and the body of the person they were attached to.

  At first, it tried to break him out of the rapidly forming stone cocoon. It did manage to pulverize some of the surrounding rock face, but the damage was repaired as quickly as it was dealt. Then the stone began seeing the Harpy as a target and tried to encase the lifter arm as well.

  After that point, it cut its losses and pulled itself free. The only mercy it provided was using the clamp to crush the thugs exposed neck, severing his head from his body. He died instantly, before the asphyxiation could do him in in a much more painful fashion.

  The Harpy backpedaled quickly to escape the range of the rapidly reforming stone. When the body was finally fully encased, the whole mass sunk below the floor, and the concrete returned to an unblemished state.

  Like he’d never been there to begin with.

  Once it had confirmed it was out of any danger, the Harpy whirled around to face the rest of them. Its single ocular lens glowered at each survivor balefully.

  “We continue with caution,” it commanded. “No more careless mistakes.”

  The one holding on to Henry’s revolver gulped audibly.