>>6342584"Kill her!"
"Light her up!"
"<span class="mu-i">I'll tear your heart out and stomp on it, you <span class="mu-s">bitch!</span>"
Their words pass over you with as little effect as the bolts of force that crash into you. The Renner 45 is a perfectly serviceable side arm that has one particularly fatal flaw: its force projection mechanism is based on the ever reliable first order spell, Magic Missile. A mainstay of every mage worth their salt, due to its unerring precision and ability to apply 0.35 kilothaums of magical energy as pure force. Janeway's blasting rod even ups that to 0.45 kilothaums, enough to drop a goblinoid at 40 paces.
The flaw lies in the bolt's unstable frequency. It puts plenty of power down range, but another first order spell known by every mage worth their salt can easily disperse that force: the aptly named Shield. You need not even vocalize the aria to bring up the screen of force, and with a slight tweak to its frequency you can simply walk through the barrage as if their rods had not activated.
"You know, I usually don't dirty my own hands with this sort of thing," you say in the cold and distant voice of the Morrigan. Your fingers gentle pierce the guards of the horrifically slow orc and aasimar, brushing against their heart before their fists can swing at you. Both drop dead with a heart attack, the precise injection of death rotting their organs from within. "My cute skeletons would be more than enough to deal with the likes of you, but still... there's something satisfying about cleaning up a mess with your own hands, isn't there? Especially when that mess thought they could get away with threatening my friends..."
Your eyes shift to the twins. Where the tiefling woman stands there in shock and horror, they have taken hostages, "And the dearly beloved patrons of her cultured establishment."
"You're going to let us leave, and then you're going to skip town," the... you can't tell if it's the brother or sister speaking, really. If they had both black hair, they'd be identical to one another. "Saving one little whorehouse won't stop the revolution. It's already here, the pimps, the pornographers, and all the patrons propping up their debauchery will die, tonight. Take your whoremonger 'friend' and get the hell out of our undermount, for I promise you... after tonight, everyone in this city will be hunting you and your ilk, and there will be nowhere for you to hide."
You can't help it.
You've already woven a shield of Dragon's Blood about every patron in the establishment. There is no one they can harm. Not the handsome fellows at table three, or the chubby cuties at table four, or even the hopeless lesbians they currently have at the end of their blasting rods. For the next half and hour, the weapons they've been relying on are useless.
So there's no harm in laughing, right?
It's therapeutic.
All eyes turn to you, staring, wondering what happens next.
And then your laughter stops.</span>
