Slave Pits of the Tyrannical God (Path of Transcendence Book 2)

by Brian McGoldrick

  Just like when a player revived after fighting their way back from the Land of the Dead, Sandor's corpse turns into grey smoke, and he appears next to The Nameless. With his armor destroyed, he is all but naked. However, all of his wounds are gone, without even leaving a scar.

  “I'm going to get you, you ugly bastard! I'm going to keep you alive and screaming for months, for years!”

  I smile, while giving Sandor the middle finger. “Now, I can torture you as many times as I want.”

  “Brand, serve me! I will forgive you, and let you have this one, if you do.”

  Sandor's eyes go wide with terror, and his jaw falls open.

  “Go fuck yourself.”

  The Nameless frowns. Even though he does not show any visible signs, I am certain that I can feel a boiling rage inside of him.

  “I am curious, why do the DokkAlfar tolerate your presence, when you are the servant of Dvergar god?” The tone is pensive, as though he is considering an academic question.

  The facilitator is staring at me, but he keeps face a complete mask that does not reveal what thoughts might be inside his head. Most of the audience is staring in stunned silence, but there are still scattered pockets of conversation. Whether their subject is myself, The Nameless, my connections to the Dvergar, or something else, I am certain that many of those conversations will lead to difficulties.

  “You're one petty ass fuck for someone who calls himself a god.”

  “Woden!” Thrall appears out of thin air. His expression is nothing short of thunderous anger and unmitigated hate.

  Woden? Is that The Nameless' real identity?

  “Thrall. So, this is where you have been hiding? That means you must be the mysterious Smith. I am surprised you dare to remain in the Labyrinth, but then you never lacked for rashness.”

  “Take your new dog and leave Gor'achen. As a projecting spirit, you have no chance against me.”

  The Nameless, maybe should I call him Woden, smiles. “Alva and Graham. You are both of Earth. Swear your lives and souls to me, and I will take you with me.”

  Alva is in the same box as last, standing next to Aluras'bektsh'tar, who has brought her to orgasm multiple times since I started fighting. Till now, she had not even looked up to see what was happening in the arena, but she raises her head slowly. A fearful hope lights her eyes.

  “If you dare to speak, I will give you to the bull orcs for a week.” Aluras'bektsh'tar's tone of voice is cold and merciless.

  “Be silent DokkAlfar cunt! Your adherence to a practice as idiotic as female love is a pathetic joke in the eyes of nature and the gods. The imbeciles like you espousing homosexuality will doom your Empire, if you are allowed to continue propagating their inane ideologies.”

  The scorn in The Nameless' voice seems to put Aluras'bektsh'tar on the level of pond scum or worse in his eyes. Despite the anger in her own eyes, she does not say another word.

  “Make your choice woman. Swear yourself to me or remain the plaything of the homosexual.”

  Alva lick her lips. “I swear.”

  Both Alva and Graham appear next to The Nameless, and a moment later, Yoh and Galadria appear, in collars as well. Yoh is naked and filthy, his body covered with scars, mostly whip scars. He must have been in the general slave pens. Galadria is is naked as well, while not as badly scarred as Yoh, she has her share of scars from being whipped. Besides the scars, her lower abdomen has so many stretch marks that she must have kicked out at least a dozen kids. It looks like she was in the breeding pens. Both of them have a haunted look and a general aura of being broken.

  Yoh looks around, and his eyes widen, as they settle on me.

  “Mark McGuinness?”

  The Nameless smirks at Thrall. A shimmering silver circle appears under the humans, and they sink through it.

  “Your time will come soon. After I deal with Yggr, The Labyrinth will be mine. If you do not grovel at my feet, I will destroy you.” The Nameless' translucent projection disappears with his words.

  Thrall stares at the facilitator. “These games are over. Blood Rose Stable wins. Without the Ogre, there are no five gladiators that could overcome Brand.”

  Fear plain to see in his eyes, the facilitator bows to Thrall “Victory goes to Blood Rose Stable! Full points!”

  Thrall looks at me. “You spent too much time toying with the Ogre. You are lucky you did not die while you were playing games. When you return to the stable, come to my forge.”

  After Thrall disappears, I start walking back to the ready room.

  I know what The Nameless' purpose is, but how does he plan to accomplish it? Boran said that the Labyrinth is actually a dimensional battle fortress. So is there a control center that The Nameless can use to take it over?

  I have been idling here too long now. Sandor, Yoh, and Galadria have to be the people Thrall said I would want to talk to. Now, they will know I am alive and coming for them. I really fucked up.

  Looking around, the arena has lost its lustre for me. I was letting myself get distracted with learning from Thrall, and the adulation of the crowds seduced me. It was such a powerful drug, all it took was one time and I was hooked. It was something that I never experienced. I had my head up my ass, because it felt good to be cheered instead of reviled. This is not reality. It is no different from a movie. I am scarred ugly freak. That is all that people ever see. They never look past the surface, but if they could see past the surface, my mind and soul would probably terrify most people.

  I suppose I am no different from normal people. I know I judge on appearances. The only women that attract me are good looking, but I do not trust them. The better looking a guy is, the more I dislike and distrust him on sight. In the end, I do not think I care what lies under the surface any longer. It must be the way humans are hardwired to think.

  Buoyed by my Power, my laughter fills the arena. It is a mad cackling, but I cannot control myself. The crowd stares down at me, with incomprehension clearly written on their faces. Fuck them.

  I have to find out what Thrall has to say. After that, I will decide what to do next.

  Power, Pain, and Prices

  *** Gor'achen Citadel - Battleground of the Damned ***

  Return: Day 251

  Thrall is staring into his forge, with his arms crossed over his chest. The scar that matches where the figure was being stabbed in the carving is clearly visible. It is obviously an old wound from being stabbed by a sword or spear.

  “The five that Woden took were all Possessed. Three of them are three of the people you were looking for. They were the ones I said you would find here. It seems you were slow to act, but I think the end result would have been the same no matter what your course of actions had been.”

  “After The Nameless' proclamation when he brought Earth into the Battleground, how could you not know that The Nameless was Woden?”

  Thrall sighs, giving the impression that aeons and mountains are weighing him down. “I thought The Nameless and Woden might be one and the same, but the proclamation was made through a spell. Until I came into contact with that spirit projection, I had no way of knowing if that was actually Woden, or another portraying an image similar to Woden, as a means to cause confusion. The internal politics of the Three Divine Tribes are labyrinthine. Jotun, Aesir and Vanir are all joined together into a single nation with the Jotun at the top, but the constant struggling and maneuvering for position and prestige never ends. One day the Jotun will be knocked down and another tribe will rise to the top.

  “Woden and Yggr are twin brothers. They deposed Tyr who ruled over the Aesir for tens of thousands of years, but could not kill him. When Tyr returned with Vanir allies backing him, the war between their forces escalated, and Yggr drew in his Jotun allies. Somehow, Yggr became ruler of the Jotun. He and Woden used the combined might of the Jotun and their faction of the Aesir to crush the rest of the Aesir and subjugate the Vanir. In the end Midgard, the original home of the Three Divine Tribes was destroyed in the w
ar.

  “After millennia of wandering, the Three Divine Tribes found Taereun and settled there. Many of the non-Transcendent humans tribes worshiped them as gods, and soon, they thought of themselves as gods. They came into conflict with Umbral Dragons, and it was the beginning of the Jotun-Dragon War. In the aftermath, the Umbral Dragons were destroyed or scattered, Yggr, as the Jotun Emperor ruled over the Three Divine Tribe, many of the DokkAlfar began to worship the Jotun instead of the Dragons, and Woden had disappeared.

  “Woden was driven out by Yggr, during the Jotun-Dragon War. He disappeared, and it was only about twenty or thirty thousand years ago that The Nameless appeared. The Three Divine Tribes have been aware of him, but I never heard of any significant action being taken against him. They probably never knew where to find him, so they did not waste resources on him. Until he took near complete control over the Battleground a few hundred years ago, he was more or less not worth their time.”

  “You seem to be well acquainted with these Three Divine Tribes, you but speak of them, as though you are not a part of them.”

  Thrall lets out a single bark of vicious laughter. “I am a half-blood Aesir. My mother's race was barely able to be called human. I was born near the end of their wandering. Let alone an Aesir, most of the Jotun Empire does not even consider me to be more than a half animal, but because of my father's power and prestige and my own accomplishments, they now leave me alone and do not interfere with my plans, as long I do not involved myself with the Three Divine Tribes.”

  Thrall turns to stare at me. “I do not know why Woden is so interested in you, but if anyone other mortal told him fuck himself like you did, he would kill that mortal on the spot. Have no illusions, for that insult if nothing else, Woden is certainly your enemy, but he seems to need something from you. I cannot think of any other reason for him not destroying you, before I had a chance to intervene.

  “I contacted Boran, but he has no idea why Woden would be interested in you either. Now that he knows who The Nameless is, Boran will begin to act. He will not let Woden interfere with his plans. Events that have been trapped in a stasis will soon start to move again.

  “Come.” Thrall leads me into his training hall. After reaching the middle of the hall, he stops and turns to me.

  Abruptly, the hall disappears. We are standing in the middle of a space looking down at the Earth. No, it is not the Earth that I know. The continental coast lines are almost an exact match, but there are differences. In places there is damage that appears to be result of massive impact or explosions on the scale of nuclear weapons. The planet spins beneath us, and our view zooms in on the southern tip of South America. A huge structure on the scale of a mountain, but with a regular outline, rises up from the waters of the Drake Passage.

  “This is the outside Labyrinth of Yggr, on Taereun.”

  Shock numbs my mind. Taereun is Earth? From the things said by both Boran and The Nameless, Woden, I should think of him as Woden, there Universes of the Earth and Taereun exist in separate multiverses. So, why do they have the same geography?

  “That looks like Earth.” My words are barely above a whisper.

  Thrall shrugs. “I have seen several worlds with this same geography. According to the Dvergar, all these worlds are what they call Gaean Worlds. They claim that the first world in the first universe ever created by Life looked like this, and it is infinitely repeated throughout the myriad realms of the metaverse, because it is the original. I do not know if their words are true or false, but I have never found the Dvergar to be liars.”

  Gaean Worlds? Earth? Taereun? I do not know what the meaning of this is, but I feel that there has to be more than meets the eye. Earth scientists have had theories of infinite universes branching off based on divergent events, but I always thought that those were mostly just bullshit. Could there be some truth to them?

  “The Labyrinth of Yggr is the abode of the Jotun Lords, the home of the Three Divine Tribes. It is a virtually indestructible shell that contains this dimension and tens of thousands more. Soon, Woden and Yggr will be going to war for control of it. Boran and other Dvergar will become involved, and events will move forward.”

  While I have been more than pleased to soak up what Thrall was willing to teach me, I have never been able to understand his altruism. “What do you get out of this?”

  Thrall smiles bitterly. “There is someone important to me that is trapped within the structures and strictures of the Three Divine Tribes' culture. I hope to set her free, but I lack the Power to challenge the Jotun Lords and Yggr.”

  “So, which side are you on in this war?”

  “I allied myself with Boran and the Dvergar Transcendents a long time ago. They do not generally care what other races do, as long as they do not endanger the structure of the multiverse in general and Taereun's universe in particular. Woden and the Three Divine Tribes will at the very least suffer a great deal of damage by provoking the Dvergar, and I will look for my chance in the chaos.”

  “What do you expect from me? I not a Transcendent.”

  Thrall laughs, but this time there is no bitterness. “Do what you want. My real interest in you is that you master my Shadow Fist and find a disciple of your own. Shadow Fist was my father's creation and passed on to me alone. He never taught my two brothers the art, and that is the core of their hatred for me.

  “I tried to find an heir for the art, but none could ever completely master it. Only, one who is accepted by the Od can even attempt to learn Shadow Fist. That limits the number of possible successors, and of the ones I have trained, none have mastered it. You are closer than any before you. Shadow Fist is still not complete. My father created it. I continued to evolve it. Maybe, you will be the one to complete it.”

  Thrall is Transcendent, an immortal. The art given him by his father and someone important to him that is trapped by a culture that reject him seem to be the center of his world. It seems to be too simple, but Transcendents are probably motivated by the basic desires they had before the became Transcendents. Besides, I get the impression that he is just a little Transcendent in a big ocean.

  “It is time for your next lesson. Psi falls into two broad categories, psychics and kinetics. Pyschics target mind and soul. Kinetics target body and can sometimes be used to influence mind. This illusion is generated by psi, kinetic psi. Your spatial awareness is another manifestation of kinetic psi. Force based attacks are yet another manifestation of kinetics, and you have an extremely strong affinity for anything related to brute force.” Thrall has a wry smile as he pauses, making it unclear if the last was a compliment, an insult, or both.

  “You should be able to expand your abilities with kinetics on your own. I do not have much talent in that area outside of illusions. My strengths lie in psychics, especially telepathy, mental assaults, and mental probes. I am going to attack you in a variety of ways, so that you can directly experience psychic abilities. Your shields are strong enough that you will not suffer any real injury.”

  Fuuuuuck. And he says that I have an affinity for brute force. It is not like I have the Power to stop him. If I had the Power, this would not be necessary.

  *I am beginning.*

  The way he projects the idea into my mind is different than normal. I never realized it, but he is always using some kind of trick or technique to conceal exactly how he uses his psychic abilities. I guess you could call it the wavelength he uses is obvious this time, and I think I can see or maybe feel how he is doing it. I might be able to duplicate it with practice.

  My knees buckle under me, and I cannot make a sound. I am barely aware of my surroundings. I do not know what Thrall hit me with, but it put me down with a single hit.

  *That might not have been the best result.*

  Thrall's telepathic projection brings me back to awareness, but it is still an effort to focus. I sit on the floor, rubbing my head with both hands.

  “What the fuck was that?” My words are slurred, like I am drunk.
<
br />   *A reminder of the difference between between being Transcendent and not even having begun to Coalesce. It has been a very long time since I last tried to show someone how to use psi. That was nothing but a blast of raw psi, but I underestimated how powerful it was.*

  “It was plenty powerful. My head feel … feels like it was punched by a stone golem.”

  *It is extremely difficult to make a blast like that weak enough to not injure you, but it is something you need to experience. You can think of it as a basic psychic punch.*

  After sitting on my ass for a few minutes, I force myself back to my feet. “Okay, I'm ready.”

  *This will be a lighter attack.*

  I cannot see the attack, but I can feel it. It feels almost like a blast water from a high pressure nozzle. Even though the distance between Thrall and myself is short, the Trinity energy starts to spread out as soon it is released. The best way to describe that attack is a slightly focused blast of raw Power. In a way, it is similar to some of the ki burst attacks that I sometimes use, crude and not very effective outside of point blank ranges.

  *Did you see it clearly?*

  “I think so, but I'm not sure I can duplicated it. I don't have enough psi strength at the moment.”

  *I did not expect you to be able to use the attack now. Your spatial awareness will not strengthen your psi very much. With your natural affinity for force, you can probably develop a psi based force blast. Using that as much as possible will strengthen your psi until you can use this attack.*

  By the time Thrall is done showing me literally dozens of psi attacks and techniques, I feel like my mind has been used as a target dummy for an entire army. On top of that, I am almost overloaded from trying to remember how all of the various techniques differed. None of them used actual patterns, but most of them used the Trinity energies in odd ways. It will be quite some time, before I can begin to make use of this repertoire.

  The strange thing about Thrall's actions is that it seems like he is making an attempt to expose me to as much knowledge as possible, whether or not I can remember it all. I feel like he is preparing in advance for his absence.