This Axe was Made for Chopping

There was a standstill as both Chamomile and the monsters stared each other down. Then the monsters surged forward and the battle began.

The monsters seemed to be in a race to see who could reach her first and with a quick readjustment of her grip, Chamomile swung her axe down on the lucky winner. Her axe cleaved cleanly through the monster and it fell to the ground a second later. Chamomile’s health bar was full and her axe was sharp, but she knew she would need a real strategy if she wanted to defeat the remaining nineteen monsters and not add her corpse to the pile. The first thing she decided to do was create an advantage.

Being trapped in a pitch black cave was a horrible disadvantage for Chamomile, especially considering the monsters seemed to have no trouble seeing in the low light. The last thing she needed was to get boxed in. She needed to act now so she started slowly backing up before the first wave of monsters could slip behind and corner her.

Chamomile’s eyes never left the monsters and she deftly picked off any that got too close. Finally she could see the cavern walls around her lightening. She continued her push until she had emerged from the sand dune and the monsters flooded out after her.

Now that they were in the bright afternoon sun, the monsters squinted as they tried to adjust. Chamomile, who had been in the dark cavern for a significantly shorter amount of time, cleared the spots from her vision in a matter of seconds. Unfortunately, the monsters were quick to follow as they got their bearing and readied their next attack.

While the monsters idled, Chamomile took the time to study her opponents. She could now see that they were some kind of fish human hybrid. They looked like women except for their many grotesque deformities: sharp claws, a mouth full of fangs, gills, and tough-looking scales. In addition to that their skin was a sickly gray color that Chamomile realized was probably to help camouflage underwater. In front of her stood sixteen sirens.

Chamomile wasn’t particularly well-versed on sirens. They were rare and usually stayed in the ocean; since Chamomile tended to remain on land, she’d never encountered one before. They were reported to be incredibly difficult to kill but thanks to her recently sharpened battle axe and all the buffs she’d imbued it with, she’d been able to take them down with one hit each. Even still, she tried to recall any weaknesses she’d read about them. Eventually Chamomile decided to deal with the sirens the way she dealt with all monsters: swinging her axe like there was no tomorrow.

Chamomile’s axe was two-handed and the weight meant it would be harder to dodge attacks; even if she could one-hit a siren, they also packed enough damage to seriously wound Chamomile after a single swipe of their claws. But her axe also had two heads which allowed Chamomile to attack in both directions. If she could pick off one siren at a time, she’d be finished in no time.

Without warning, Chamomile lunged to the closest siren and decapitated it before the others could react. She sprinted to the other end of the pack and killed a siren there before relocating again and continuing the process. The method consumed a lot more stamina than if she just attacked every siren near her at once, but it also stopped the sirens from picking up on any patterns and made it much harder for them to corner her.

Only ten sirens remained when they began their tactical retreat; one sprinted towards the ornate doors and the others quickly followed in the hopes that Chamomile would leave them alone. Unfortunately for them, they were running into the place Chamomile needed to go and she knew they wouldn’t let her take water from the well while they still breathed.

The fight had only taken place a few paces from the entrance to the cavern. The sirens quickly disappeared inside it and without thinking, Chamomile chased after them. As she entered the cavern, her vision cut out and she realized this might not have been such a good idea. The sound of sirens fleeing was still loud through her headphones, so Chamomile took a risk and removed her hands from the fighting keys to turn up her computer’s brightness all the way. Even then, she could only barely see the outlines of the sirens.

The cavern was a much tighter space than the beach, and Chamomile had to make sure she stayed in the center of the pathway to allow a full swing of her axe. After forcing her character into a full sprint, she caught up to the nearest siren and took it down with a quick swipe.

Chamomile worked fast and felled each siren before it had a chance to scream out; the rest of the sirens didn’t realize she was upon them until it was too late. Finally only one remained.

Axe raised, Chamomile prepared to strike. What she couldn’t see was the siren turning around and slashing blindly with its claw. The siren sliced through Chamomile and her screen lit up briefly to show she’d been hit.

“No no no no no,” Chamomile chanted as she watched her health bar drain almost completely after the single hit. One more and she would be dead. But now that the siren was in range, she had a window of opportunity. Not letting the injury distract her, Chamomile swiped her axe and struck true, cleaving the siren in two.

Her screen flashed an ominous red to warn her about her low health, but Chamomile took a moment to lean back in her chair and breathe deeply. A close fight to the death was always satisfying, but it could get pretty stressful by the end.

Once she had calmed down, Chamomile drank a health potion from her inventory, summoned a light orb, and quickly looted the bodies—picking up mostly fish, to her displeasure. After everything had been taken care of, Chamomile finally pressed on and found a second door hidden much deeper inside the cavern. Pushing it open, she entered a chamber full of vegetation. In the center of the room sat the well.

Chamomile closed the door, headed to the well, and saw a bucket sitting on the ground next to it. After checking that the rope it was attached to was sturdy, she threw the bucket in the well and hauled it back up. She dunked the waterskin in the bucket, waited a full minute for it to fill up, and then placed it back in her inventory. Her quest was almost complete.

But Chamomile hadn’t come all this way to not drink some of the water herself, so she summoned a cup and filled it partially. Not sure what to expect, she drank the water.

For a minute nothing happened. Chamomile thought a text box would appear on screen or that she’d receive an achievement at the very least. But nope. Nothing.

Chamomile was about to put her cup away and head back to Caspia when she felt a shock through her mouse. She jerked her hand away, afraid her computer was short-circuiting. She tried to move farther in case the computer was about to catch fire or something equally dangerous when she was assaulted with a barrage of memories. They flooded over her, all of them centered around one man: Asterion. He was the best player in WanderQuest, not her. Everyone loved Asterion. He was famous! How could she have forgotten someone like that?

Chamomile was ready to enter a spiral as she tried to figure out how she’d gotten the world’s most specific form of amnesia when she heard a noise through her headphones. She looked back at her computer screen and watched as the chamber door swung open.