Viridian Gate Online: Books 1 - 3 (Cataclysm, Crimson Alliance, The Jade Lord)

by James Hunter

  “Get ready to fight!” I hollered at Abby as I ran one hand over Devil’s scaly neck. “We need to distract those things.”

  “Ready whenever you are!” she yelled back, her voice fierce and proud.

  THIRTY-THREE: Dogfight

  Devil’s powerful wings pumped frantically as we drove toward the first wave of Gargoyles. At a distance, I hadn’t really appreciated their size, but up close I realized how massive they were. Each was easily the size of a male lion and built along the same lines: slick, streamlined bodies, broad chests, and hulking limbs rippling with stone muscle. Instead of feline faces, however, each had the head of a gigantic eagle—complete with sharp amber eyes and a cruel tearing beak—which perfectly matched the powerful, feathered wings protruding from their backs.

  These things were closer to stone Griffins than Gargoyles—not that it really changed anything. At the end of the day, one giant, flying stone monster wasn’t all that different from another giant, flying stone monster.

  A group of the Griffins shot directly toward the spider-riders scuttling tirelessly up the face of the wall, but another group, four strong, veered toward us, obviously trying to intercept us before we could interfere. Abby leaned out to the right, her left arm slung around my waist for support, and started lobbing fireball after fireball at the incoming creatures. The guardians scrambled, a few breaking left and right, another diving low, while one lurched up, narrowly avoiding a direct blast to the face.

  I pulled us left, then dropped us into a dive, swooping low while angling toward the wall and our exposed spider-riders. Those guys needed cover fire, and we were the only ones that could provide it.

  The Griffins were quick and agile in the air, however, and before we could get far, a pair were dropping down on us from above, razor-sharp talons outstretched, eager to tear us to pieces. I jerked Devil right and almost lost my lunch as we flipped into a tight barrel roll—the world temporarily inverting—before leveling out as the diving Griffins swept through the air we’d occupied a moment before. One threat avoided. Unfortunately, another guardian was waiting for us, dead ahead, its beaked maw stretched wide as an angry white light built in its mouth.

  Before we could swerve, the creature spewed out a column of fire as bright and blinding as the sun.

  Devil, driven by some underlying sense of self-preservation, reacted before I could even think: a column of shadow flame burst from his jaws. The two streams of power—one eye-searing white, the other raven-wing black—collided like a head-on car crash. A massive explosion of swirling light and a thunderclap rocked the air, followed in short order by a tremendous shock wave, which mushroomed out from the impact site. The backlash from the detonation ripped one of the Griffin’s wings off—pieces of debris and hunks of stone spun free as the creature plummeted.

  Unfortunately, we were falling too, twirling toward the ground at breakneck speeds while wind furiously slapped against us. Unlike the Griffin, Devil appeared to be uninjured, but that shock wave had been nasty. The Drake fought against our chaotic descent, stretching out his neck and wings, desperately fighting to stop our out-of-control death spiral. Abby had both arms clenched tightly around my chest and I could feel her mouth moving against my back as she whispered silent prayers. We could sure use a little divine help, because Rowanheath was rushing toward us at an ungodly rate.

  In my head, I watched a grisly scene of us splattering against the side of a building over and over again. I couldn’t help but envision all of my bones breaking and my guts bursting upon impact. This was going to suck so bad. I pressed my eyes shut, not wanting to watch my death for a second time, while my stomach did backflips and summersaults. But then, against all hope, we began to level out as Devil frantically beat his wings, bringing us out of the deadly fall. I reluctantly cracked my eyes and watched as we skimmed over Rowanheath’s rooftops, only a few feet away from utter disaster.

  My heart was pounding in my chest like a jackhammer—I felt like I might still die from fear. But a few quick flaps brought us up to a more comfortable height, and my panic finally started to recede as we raced toward the spider-riders once more.

  “Holy shit,” Abby called out to me. “Let’s try not to do that again, okay?”

  I flashed her a thumbs-up, my hand still jittering from the rush of adrenaline. “I’ll do my best,” I hollered back.

  There were no longer any Griffins pursuing us—presumably, they’d left us for dead—which was good news, but they were now focusing all their attention on our spider-riders. Amara and Otto had almost crested the wall, but the Griffins were giving them nine kinds of hell in the process. They harried our riders with tearing claws or blasted them from the steep stone face with burning-white sunfire. I watched, appalled and horrified, as one of the Griffins ripped a burly, heavily bearded Dwarf from the back of a gray Sword-Slayer and callously hurled him into the air.

  The poor traveler tumbled eighty feet at least, and disappeared into the cityscape below. I didn’t see him land, but he was dead without a question.

  Still, our riders weren’t going quietly—those with bows or ranged magic attacks unleashed defensive cover fire as the spiders continued their upward crawl.

  Conventional arrows often bounced off stony hides, but I saw more than a few explosions of the acid-tipped arrows Amara and Baymor had used when fighting the Darkshard Keep Golems. The acid was highly effective, not only because it dealt a lot of damage, but because a single, well-placed shot could take out a wing and cripple the creature’s ability to fly. Magic also flashed toward the Griffins—balls of golden flame, spears of glacier ice, even a few blasts that looked suspiciously like Umbra Bolts. Michael, the fourteen-year-old Danish kid, who also happened to be a Shadowmancer, was riding with them, so it was certainly possible.

  I tore my eyes away from the scene as a pair of Griffins darted toward us, shrieking out their rage before both unleashed brilliant sunfire beams.

  We banked hard right, avoiding one column of fiery death, but the other slashed toward us like a chainsaw. With a grimace, I threw out one hand, palm up, and conjured Dark Shield, summoning my defensive barrier. The dome of flickering purple energy burst to life in front of Devil’s outstretched snout; the incoming sunfire beam smashed into the shield like a hammer, and bled through in an instant. Devil’s life bar began to dwindle, dropping by a fifth, then a full quarter before the Griffin’s flame-lance finally guttered and died.

  I lowered the shield and pulled us to the right as Abby unleashed a devastating barrage of fireballs from behind me. Each orb of flame was only the size of a ping-pong ball, but there were easily a hundred of them. And they moved fast. A hundred comets streaked toward the guardian like a flock of attacking sparrows, each one taking a tiny bite out of the stone monstrosity. It was death by a thousand paper cuts. The guardian faltered under the onslaught, its wings wobbling and shaking, and then it was crashing toward the earth like a meteor, its wings pockmarked with holes.

  The second Griffin dove at us, talons outstretched—we rolled left, and as we did, I fished my warhammer from my belt. We leveled out a second later and I swung my hammer as the creature flew past us, unleashing Savage Blow. I caught the eagle-faced monster square in the beak; stone shattered and exploded outward in a hail of shrapnel. I didn’t know if my attack was good enough to put it down for keeps, but it would certainly take a while to recover from a shot like that. Quickly, I stowed the hammer and urged Devil on toward the wall.

  I was relieved to see the first wave of spider-riders, maybe ten or so, had made it to the top and dismounted from their unorthodox mounts. They’d formed up into a tight box, and were firing into the crowd of swooping monstrosities, covering the riders still working their way up. I was a little surprised to see the spiderkin were also actively taking part in the battle—and, more importantly, they were crazy effective. Strings of gauzy webbing whipped through the air like party streamers, snaring winged enemies in mid-flight; once they caught something, the arachnoids wo
uld drag down their struggling prey with incredible strength.

  One-on-one, the spiders wouldn’t have been a match for the guardians, but they worked together in teams of twos and threes: one deploying silken thread, the others lashing out with deadly fangs and frightening speed to devastating effect.

  Meanwhile, Otto and another Risi man—a big beefy fellow with an equally beefy battle-axe—were holding the line against any encroaching Griffins that somehow managed to break free from the spider-webbing. The pair of them fought like a living whirlwind of flesh and steel, hacking at stone limbs, bashing in hooked beaks, obliterating outstretched wings. As we got closer, I couldn’t help but grin: the other Risi was Forge, the former Marine from Texas, and he was wielding the axe I’d scored from the Thieves’ Guild quest. The spider-riders had been recruited from an all-volunteer force—another likely suicide mission—and I was suddenly very glad he’d decided to stick around.

  The guy was a beast.

  I lost track of the battle as the world around me spun yet again—Devil taking evasive action. We barrel-rolled past a diving Griffin looking to knock us from the air, before finally touching down on a massive stone courtyard in front of the Keep’s main entrance. Somehow, almost impossibly, we’d made it. Against all the odds, we’d made it. And not just me and Abby. True, we’d lost a few riders, but more of the spiderkin were pouring over the top of the wall every second, shedding their riders before leaping into the fray. I couldn’t hold back a surge of hope and fierce pride: we might actually win this thing.

  Abby and I slipped from Devil’s back.

  After all those twists, turns, dives, and barrel rolls, I was glad to have my feet firmly planted on the earth again. Even though I was no longer riding Devil, that sense of him remained in my head, lingering in the back of my skull. We were connected. Attack, I sent, envisioning the Drake flying overhead, taking pop-shots at the Griffins still thick in the air like flies on a muggy summer day. Devil turned and stared at me, his purple eyes narrowing into fierce slits. They will bleed—the words flashed through my mind, barely more than a mental whisper, but very real. Then, the Drake dipped his serpentine head, a barely-there grin gracing his lips, and launched himself into the air.

  I stared after the Drake, momentarily dumbstruck as he waded into the battle, lashing out with his talons and tail, before roasting an inattentive Griffin with a flood of purple flame. There was definitely more to Devil than strictly met the eye.

  I put my minion from mind—Devil would just have to take care of himself.

  I turned my attention to our fighters, now battling their way, inch by inch and foot by foot, toward the Keep’s main entryway. A Griffin, badly wounded and missing one wing, touched down not five feet away from me—dragged down by the webbing from one of the sleek Poison Darters. The Griffin threw its head back, squealing as it thrashed against the spider silk, but I moved before it could break free. I pulled my hammer out and darted in, laying into the guardian’s temple, triggering Black Caress as I did so.

  Inky power flashed out as warmth and life trickled up through the shaft of my weapon and into my body. The hit knocked off a quarter of the creature’s HP, but before I could deliver the killing blow, Forge was by my side, decapitating the creature with his hulking axe. He paused and glanced up at me, a half-mad grin stitched across his face. “Told you I’d have your back,” he said, wiping the sweat from his brow with the back of one hand. “And thanks for the gift”—he held up the axe—“I’m putting it to good use.”

  Then, before I could respond, he lumbered away, charging another downed Griffin with an inarticulate battle cry.

  For the next five minutes or so, we lost ourselves to the battle, chopping enemies down in what felt like an endless grind as the rest of our spider-riders scuttled over the top of the wall. Devil soared overhead, providing us with aerial support. Amara danced and twirled through the enemy ranks, lashing out with arrows, lobbing deadly grenades, and hurling conjured spears with deadly efficiency. Abby fought behind a wall of Wode tanks, spewing fire like a living volcano. We’d cleared most of the courtyard when a huge shadow flashed overhead, followed by an eagle’s screeching cry, loud enough to shake the ground and send me reeling.

  I looked up, jaw hanging open, as a Griffin three times larger than the rest soared into view and slammed into Devil like a freight train. This creature wasn’t crude, animated stone. No, it was the real deal. A mythical beast of flesh and blood with golden lion’s fur—gleaming in the silver moonlight—and brown eagle wings. Stranger, this Griffin was completely decked out with silver armor. It had a crested helm, protecting its streamlined head and face, and a gleaming chest plate inlaid with blue gems. Swatches of ring-mail were draped along its sides and flanks.

  The newcomer’s huge talons ripped through Devil’s scaly hide with scornful ease, spilling out spools of ropy intestine and purple blood. Its hooked beak darted in while Devil struggled, ripping out the Drake’s throat in one vicious stroke. My minion sputtered and faltered, gore raining down as he fought to maintain altitude—a fruitless battle. I watched, shocked, as Devil’s HP plummeted to zero and the creature exploded in a shower of black debris and inky soot.

  <<<>>>

  Devil has perished in battle! Your Void Terror has lost all current EXP and cannot be summoned for (8) hours.

  <<<>>>

  White-hot anger surged through me—that asshole had just killed my pet. My minion. My amazing killing machine. That thing was going to pay, dammit.

  The Griffin banked hard right and dropped toward us, which is when I noticed there was a man riding on its back.

  He was tall and broad-shouldered with deeply tanned skin, a swath of ebony hair, and rugged good looks. He wore immaculate silver plate armor, tooled in gold and covered with glowing opalescent runes. A massive tower shield clung to his back, poking up over his head. He carried an ornate, jewel-studded sword in one gauntleted hand, and bore the reins for his mythical-beast mount in the other. The guy looked every inch of what a Paladin—or in this case Templar—should look like.

  He was noble, regal, heroic. He was the kind of man other men idolized and followed.

  In my gut, I knew I’d finally come face-to-face with Aleixo Carrera, former Colombian Drug Lord, current High Commander of the Imperial Inquisitors, and the Faction Leader of the Knights of Holy Light. This was the guy who’d sworn to torture me for eternity. This was the guy who’d pledged to murder everyone I cared about and raze Yunnam to the ground. This was the guy that just murdered Devil. This guy was going to pay.

  THIRTY-FOUR: Boss Battle

  Carrera’s Griffin touched down in the courtyard, a huge downdraft kicking up little dust devils and piles of debris. The Griffin calmly folded its sleek wings back, laying them flat against its body as Carrera swung one leg over and dismounted with a practiced, efficient ease. His easy manner told me this certainly wasn’t the first time Carrera had mounted up. He absently patted the Griffin’s feathered flank, crooning at it softly, before dismissing the thing with a faint flick of his wrist. The creature obeyed, wheeling around, then launched itself from the wall, taking wing as it glided toward the outer defenses.

  No doubt going down to try and put our cannons out of commission.

  Despite being significantly outnumbered, Carrera swaggered forward like a prideful peacock, coming to a halt about ten feet out, his feet planted wide—cocky, arrogant—his over-sized sword leaning against one of his silver pauldrons. He regarded me through squinted eyes, his brow furrowed in displeasure, a half-sneer curling up the lips on one side of his mouth. “So, we finally meet face-to-face, you miserable puta. Me cago en la madre que te parió!” I wasn’t exactly fluent in Spanish, but growing up in San Diego and working as an EMT had taught me enough to know he’d literally just told me, I shit on the mother who gave birth to you.

  Obviously, this guy was classy to the bone.

  “I’ve been looking forward to this encounter since I first discovered your theft,”
Carrera continued, his voice coldly professional. “People, they don’t steal from me—not if they want to live, pendejo, because I always get even. Always. And now, here you are. You’ve saved me the trouble of hunting you down in those miserable swamps. You’ve delivered yourself to me on a silver platter.”

  “Abby, Otto, Amara,” I commanded calmly, positioning myself squarely in Carrera’s path. “Get to the Command Center and hold it. Don’t worry about me, I can handle this. Everyone else”—I cast a quick look around—“you make sure they get there, bar the door, then fight off anyone who comes close. That includes you, Spiderkin.”

  A round of hairy, dry-rustling legs acknowledged me in reply.

  Abby shot me a worried look, her lips pressed into a thin line, but then she nodded. “Love you, Jack,” she called out before bolting for the Keep’s entry, trailing a line of warriors and spiderkin behind her. Otto offered me an approving nod as he hustled past.

  “Yes,” Carrera called out as they fled, “run along, la furcia. I’ll deal with this piece of trash, then I will come for you. For all of you.”

  A handful of warriors—a leather-clad Archer, a Dwarven Smith leaning on a beefy hammer near as tall as he was, and Forge with his gleaming battle-axe—loitered behind. They spread out behind me in a horseshoe, creating a loose barricade, barring the entryway. “I said go”—I glowered at each of the faction members—“I can handle this.”

  “With all due respect,” Forge said, his grip straining around the haft of his weapon, “I think we’ll stay. The three of us”—he swept a hand toward the others—“are all former military, and we don’t leave a man behind. Period. Especially not our leaders. Like I told you before—I’ve got your back. And so do these knuckleheads. Not to mention, if anyone ever needed an ass-beatin’, it’s that shitbird right there.” He offered Carrera a hard, feral smile, which seemed to promise pain and violence.