Beyond?

by Andur

  Suddenly everyone moves at once as the enemies disperse, taking targets of opportunity. One of them is coming right at us and I step in front of Stella while reaching into my pocket. There I search for the remote control for my drone. The man points his finger at me and I feel myself being lifted up into the air. Before he can use the full force of his telekinesis I anchor myself with fortification magic in my position. His ability tears at my body, but all he achieves is moving me a few centimetres.

  With his attention on me he totally ignored Stella, who jumped him like a fury. She makes a somersault in the air and brings her left leg down on him, crushing his hastily raised arms. His fate is sealed once she manages to grab his forward leg. The poor guy turns into a club and Stella jumps at the one who went for Adala, glowing strengthening runes all over her skin and swinging her victim without care for his well being.

  I decide to intercept Mr. Bandages, who approached the Great Shaman. Surprised, Bandages stops when I position myself between him and the Shaman. A flick of my wrist sends a series of arcane missiles at him, but the spells simply evaporate in front of him.

  He spreads his hands to mock me. “You are still defying me? Don't you understand that your magic doesn't work? Didn't you realize that I am way more powerful than during our first encounter?”

  So he is the same person after all. “I wouldn't be so high and mighty. Looks like you didn't get away unharmed. At least I know that a nuke into your face hurts you!”

  His expression turns sour. “So the spell is called nuke? I admit that it surprised me. Such a powerful spell deserves a better name, I'll steal it for my master.” He points his open palm at me and I cast a barrier of the fourth order. The Great Shaman is safe since he is well protected behind me while everything around us gets shredded.

  I grin. “So your ability is restricted to the physical world. I already feared that you have something like an ultimate protection spell.”

  He snorts. “My protection was granted by the Master himself. Nothing can penetrate it, it is the ultimate defence. You were right to fear me!”

  Somehow I can't believe that. “I wonder if it's really so impenetrable... tell me... why can I see you if your spell blocks everything?”

  He turns flabbergasted. “What?”

  I pull the remote control for my drone from my pocket and rule the regulator to the maximum. It's a highly effective communication laser. Probably I should have written a warning onto it. Don't point this at people's eyes or unprotected skin. As I do now.

  Mr. Bandages screams as the ray of light sears directly into his eyes. The bandage starts smouldering and I smell burned flesh. Then he falls to the ground and starts crying like a little child. I switch the laser off and walk over to him, kicking him in the guts with all my might.

  Somehow my shoe sinks into his flesh and he starts bleeding from his belly. “This is a more serious case of radiation sickness than I thought. I am amazed that you managed to survive the nuke.”

  He spurts blood. “The Master will punish you for this! Our army will overrun Dwem and then Nict is next on the list. Your weird spells won't change anything!”

  I reach down and grab his forehead, trying to read his mind. But before I can do so he shudders and lies still, he is dead. I wipe my hand and shoe on his tunic and get up to find the rest of the southerners defeated. They were heavily outnumbered after all.

  Stella is still busily beating one of them, does she have personal issues with them, or is it just letting off steam?

  The Great Shaman gets to his feet. “Such a shame! To be caught off guard by such a simple spell. Well, at least they showed us their true face.”

  I nod, but somehow I am not happy with the outcome. “They were a little too sure of their victory if you ask me.”

  57. ~New threats.~

  “And a blinding light pierced the Sky. The power which was given by the Emperor to the third general stopped armies and eradicated cities. The general who commanded the Light committed the greatest atrocities of all while the Empire was forged. It was lucky for the rebellion that he was the first to fall.”

  -The forbidden Chronicle.

  Dwem, Capital

  Azir

  The Great Shaman reaches into his pocket and pulls out his coin, then he flicks it to me and I catch it just in time. He grins and shakes his totem at me. “Take that as a little thank you for helping me out. It's no ordinary coin, so take good care of it.”

  I turn the coin between my fingers. No matter how I look at it, it's just a badly made golden coin. The shape isn't exactly round, more like an oval and the markings on both sides have almost faded into nothingness. On one side is something which could be a building, while the other shows the outlines of a person without distinct features. The surface is smooth from many years of touching it. At least it seems to be old. “Are you sure? It seemed like you are attached to this item.”

  The Great Shaman shrugs his shoulders and pulls another coin from his pocket. “Don't worry, I have more of them.” He flips the new coin and catches it. “Coins have power. Don't underestimate them, just because you don't understand it.” The crazy dwarf walks away to talk with one of his subordinates. I store the coin away to take a look at it later.

  The muffled whimpering of one of the southerners draws my attention, it's Stella's victim. After his face turned into a swollen mess Stella turned to other means of inflicting pain. She is sitting on top of him while holding one of his hands. Everyone else keeps a respectful distance from her and the target of the violence. “How many troops do you have?”

  He shakes his head and a second later Stella snaps his pinky. The guy starts wriggling, but Stella twists his hand to force him down.

  “You are related to the Black Magicians! Aren't you? Who ordered the assassination attempt?” Once again the guy refuses to answer and his index finger receives two new joints.

  Ah, so she suspected them to be related to the attack on her. I thought she hadn't figured it out yet. My report back then made it seem like I killed most of the guys directly responsible. I walk over to Stella and place a hand on her shoulder. “Dear? Can I have him? This interrogation method isn't civilised at all.”

  She looks up to me. “I am not done!”

  I point at him. “But he is.”

  After a moment of indecision Stella moves away from the southerner, but not without stomping onto his shin, breaking it. He does an admirable job in not giving in to the pain.

  I kneel down beside the guy and smile at him. “Do you know who I am?”

  He nods. “You are the mind magician.”

  “If you don't resist your mind may stay intact. I am only offering this because I feel generous.” And because I don't want to tire myself needlessly.

  His expression turns crazy. “The Master himself entrusted us with our task. There is no way that I would betray his cause!”

  “So you are under the influence of enslavement magic too?” That's not good. It means that he'll fight to the last. I'll have a headache after this. “This will hurt you more than me.” I place my hand on his forehead and invade his mind. He greets me with an attack of raw emotions and if I hadn't steadied myself, I would've been swept away.

  I imagine needles attacking his defences, but he locks up and turns inwards in an attempt to block me. Without caring I claw at his mental defences until they crumble. He was in a bad state to begin with, but his mind still doesn't give up and tries to slip my grasp.

  If he keeps that up he'll die before I get anything out of him. Not having any other choice I start attacking with my raw will and tear memories from his mind piece by piece. Memories and images flash by while he is trying to regain control, but it further slips from his grasp with each passing moment. He doesn't yield and fights until finally something vital inside him breaks. His mind shatters like glass and robs me of the possibility to get any more information.

  I blink to focus my eyes. His twitching body is on his knees and his mouth is open in a
soundless scream. The eyes are turned upwards to the point of showing only the white in them. Slowly the twitching stops and he breathes out one final time like sighing, relieved. Then he lies still.

  He fought his last fight without reason, like an animal. I clean my hand on his tunic and stand up, rubbing my temples.

  I feel a strange pulling sensation in my head and something seems to throb directly behind my eyes. “This'll turn into a nasty headache!”

  “So if hurting someone isn't civilised, then what is that supposed to be?” Stella points at the corpse to my feet.

  Adala has a sick expression on her face and Padma is a little pale. Eliot walks closer to take a look at the southerner. “Dude! No matter how often I see it, I'll never get used to this! Nict's mind magic is freaky!”

  I attempt to step away from the corpse, but realize in time that the Great Shaman showed up at my side. He shakes his totem at the corpse. “So did you gain anything from frying the brain of one of our only prisoners without consultation?”

  Ah, well. Sorry for not asking. “You wouldn't have gotten anything out of him. He was under the influence of enslavement magic and it was a strong one at that. At least I got some information from him. It's the first time that I got my hands on someone who was a little deeper involved in this.”

  The Great Shaman turns impatient. “Don't beat about the bush and get to the point. What are we dealing with?”

  I point at the corpse to my feet. “This guy was the minion of Mr. Bandages over there. They were part of a secret underground network which is working all over the world. Their orders come from someone whom they call the Master. He taught them magic and bound them with enslavement spells to his will. It seems like Mr. Bandages was very high in the Master's esteem until he lost the network in Nict. The master punished them with a small scale operation as ambassadors in Dwem. They had no other purpose than to keep up the appearances.”

  I gather my thoughts. “This network of theirs seems to be huge. He has memories of far away places, at least one of them seems to be Quinn.”

  The Great Shaman scratches himself with his totem. “They aren't from the southern nations?”

  I continue rubbing my temple while I am trying to sort the information I got. “They aren't. The southern nations are just a pawn, like the barbarians. He wasn't involved in any other operations. Ah, that's right. I saw a map of the northern border. I got a good glimpse on their troop deployment, but that's not our main concern. They intend to break your defence by using a new weapon. They called it the Light of the Emperor, seemed like an-.”

  The Great Shaman screams. “Repeat that!”

  I wince, loud sounds aren't nice to my brain right now. “Their secret weapon is called the Light of the Emperor.”

  The Great Shaman runs out of the room. “Call general Greywinter! Gather all remaining forces and get them to the border!”

  I look at Stella, but she is as clueless as me. Then I let my gaze wander over the other people in the room until Padma finally seems to know something.

  She makes a helpless gesture. “The Light of the Emperor is one of the great artefacts with which the Emperor forged his empire. He had seven of them, one for each of his generals and one for himself. The Light is said to be the most dangerous one, though to my knowledge all of his artefacts were lost or destroyed during the rebellion.”

  I tilt my head and try to remember what I saw. “Could it possibly look like a big helmet with wings?”

  Padma shakes her head. “No, there are some illustrations of the artefacts in our museum. Unfortunately the Light of the Emperor is always only shown as a pillar of light, parting the clouds and creating a wasteland. The other's are better documented.”

  Adala looks at the ground and crosses her arms in front of her chest. “There is always a figure with a winged helmet in those illustrations, pointing at the light.”

  A pillar of light parting the clouds? And a helmet? How could a helmet do something like that? I wish the guy's memories weren't so fragmented. It would be much easier to make sense out of them.

  Stella steps closer to Padma. “Your historical records seem to be better than ours, could I take a look at them? There is almost nothing of that time in our libraries.”

  Padma shrugs her shoulders. “Those aren't restricted information. They are freely accessible in our museum, though there isn't much more than you have in your library in Nict. I was always interested in history, so I compared them with each other. There are some slight differences in how the story goes, but the outline is the same. The only obvious differences are in how everything was perceived, like how the emperor was a conqueror to us and a great ruler to you.”

  I grumble. “That's all good and fine, but how can it be that his legacy suddenly shows up and bites us in the ass. I can imagine quite a few lights which are able to part the clouds and none of them bode well for your army.”

  In that moment the Great Shaman returns with general Greywinter, who is carrying a huge screen. I feel instantly reminded of my old world. The general is followed by two soldiers with a table and they set everything up in the middle of the room.

  The Great Shaman flicks his hand at the screen and it turns on, showing a map of the northern border. “Can you show us their troop deployment? We need to find out where they have the Light and steal it from them. If they manage to activate it we will lose everything!”

  58. ~The Light.~

  “And may he, who collects all the Great Artefacts, open the Emperor's vault and see the source of his might with his own eyes. May he shudder in fear and cry in despair, because only then will he realize that all his power can't stand up to the Master of All.”

  -The forbidden Chronicle.

  Dwem, Capital

  Azir

  I watch the Great Shaman and general Greywinter brooding over the map with the enemy troop deployment. After a long and detailed discussion they finally stopped pestering me with questions. It has been three hours since we dealt with the southern delegation and this whole situation is becoming a mess. No matter what we do, the enemy keeps pulling aces from his deck. Well, they have obviously been planning this since a few hundred years ago and their goal seems to be nothing less than world dominance.

  This Master figure behind them must have some huge issues with himself and the world to show so much determination to this little project of his. To be honest, if it wouldn't affect me I wouldn't care about what they are doing at all. But that's not the case, so I am currently trying to find a solution.

  Ivy is micromanaging our two drones, trying to find this helmet of theirs. I turned the drone which was headed towards the southern nations around a while ago, since I figured that we might need more of them. I face Ivy and whisper. “How is the situation.”

  She keeps concentrating on her task. “The first drone is already above their main army, but so far I had no luck in finding the helmet. The second drone just crossed the border to Nict, it'll take some time for it to arrive.”

  The drones are fast, but it still takes time for them to travel such vast distances. Having them fly at maximum speed also depletes their energy reserves faster than they can regenerate them. Still, having two drones on-site is better than one.

  Dwem's northern border is a line of bunkers and long range artillery positions. Their army is quite modern in terms of this world's technology. They are even using rifles, though they are only one shot models. But they pack a punch and can penetrate any armour the barbarians mustered so far. In addition they are using grenades and sabres for close quarters combat.

  Most of their defence is concentrated on the central mountain pass to the north, which allows access to Dwem. The barbarians' efforts so far concentrated on conquering the pass, so most of their troops are deployed there. The Shaman and Greywinter think that they'll use their super weapon to take out the defences at that pass, which would practically end the war.

  Dwem's whole army and strategy are built on entrenching themselves in a f
ortified position and to wait for the enemy.

  The so called barbarians on the other hand are from a country further north. They aren't really barbarians, but the Dwemer are calling them so. I guess it makes killing them easier. If you use degrading phrases to describe your enemies it dehumanises them and lessens the moral burden. I won't judge them for it.

  The barbarians are still mostly sticking to swords and bows, though they are recently beginning to use muskets, explosives and new spells. These new weapons were surely not created by them, but given by yet another party.

  Another point which speaks for them is numbers. The only reason that the Dwemer are able to hold them off is their artillery. Any attack by the barbarians is doomed to end in a bloodbath, shredded to pieces by the Dwemer's ability to attack over long ranges.

  But lets assume that the barbarians have a weapon which can take out those artillery positions. The Dwemer's army would be overrun in a single offensive.

  That's why the Shaman and the General are planning to make a sally with all their troops as soon as they spot the helmet with their scopes. That's a desperate plan in my opinion. Regarding the scopes, of course the Dwemer have a way to observe the enemy troops over long ranges via magic. Otherwise their nice artillery wouldn't be half as effective. They even turned the throne room of the Great Shaman into a big video room to give the Shaman a good view on what's going on while the general and his subordinates keep him informed.

  I am not as optimistic as them. They are hoping that it takes a while to activate the Light of the Emperor, so that they have time to retrieve it. I must admit that the helmet sounds like an interesting artefact and that I want it for myself. It's a waste to give such a mighty artefact to someone who doesn't even understand it... most likely. I am not saying that the Dwemer are unqualified idiots, they are more qualified in terms of technological knowledge than most.