Puny God

by Andrew Beymer

  Talk about annoying. I was hoping he’d have some misguided sense of honor towards his men that had him staying behind long enough for me to catch him, but it turns out he was nothing if not practical.

  Also? The portal started to flicker and sputter as soon as they were through. Not good. Not good at all. If that thing was flickering and sputtering then there was a good chance I wouldn’t be able to follow them once it was gone.

  Not to mention the little problem of being trapped in a massive tree city inhabited by elves who were already wary of me because of the destruction I’d visited on them. Or the massive orc army teeming at the gates ready to really fuck shit up, and something told me they wouldn’t go easy on me if they found me.

  So I ran towards the portal. I didn’t know where it was going, but I did know that wherever the hell it was going had to be a hell of a lot better than where I was now.

  At least I prayed it would be a hell of a lot better than where I was now. Of course there was the little problem of the thing sputtering and guttering and dying out like there was no magic left in it.

  I cried out in frustration. I wasn’t going to let this happen, damn it. I threw myself at the portal, knowing that even as I landed I was only going to wind up on the other side of the thing in this clearing and not on the other side of where the portal led.

  Bright light filled me. Like the universe itself had opened to me and it was filling me. I felt that bright light going somewhere in the distance, but I didn’t care. Because I could seize some of that magic and I threw it at the portal before it closed entirely.

  Then I was through. On the ground in a similar clearing that definitely wasn’t inside any elf city. The elves that’d been running from me were there as well, laughing and smiling and generally looking like they were having a grand old time now that they’d gotten away from me.

  It took a moment for them to realize I was standing there staring at them. First one, then another. They elbowed one another until finally the officer, standing there smiling and laughing like he’d just pulled one over on me, turned and his eyes went wide as his mouth fell open.

  “Thought you could get rid of me that easily?” I growled.

  “Impossible!” he said.

  “Yeah, well I’m about to take impossible and shove it up your elf ass,” I said, stepping towards them.

  They glanced at one another. It was a glance that seemed to say they knew they were fucked. I was still glowing with the residual energy of whatever the fuck it was I’d done back there, and I was ready to use it on them.

  “Hand me the crystal now and we won’t have any problems,” I growled, holding a hand up. “If you don’t…”

  I trailed off and let them fill in the blanks. I’d read somewhere that it was a lot better to let someone fill in the blanks when you were threatening them. Whatever they could come up with in the depths of their terrified mind was usually way better than any actual threat the person doing the threatening could come up with.

  The glances lasted for a moment, then two of the elves ran at me as the others turned and ran into the forest.

  “Son of a bitch,” I said. “Why won’t you guys just give up!”

  Luckily I still felt that magic pulsing through me. Sure most of it seemed like it was going somewhere else. I wasn’t sure what the fuck was going on with that, but I was sure that I could take some of it and use it. So I seized some of that magic and used it as I landed a punch on the first and then the second elf coming at me.

  They flew through the air and slammed against trees, falling to the ground. I didn’t bother to see if they were dead or unconscious. If it was the former then they were the ones who’d attacked me and that was tough shit. If it was the latter then I didn’t have time to stop and check on them.

  No, I ran through the forest towards the gem. I could still see the bright glow through the forest, though I also got a sense there was something else out here. Something dark and malevolent that would love nothing more than to have that gem.

  I slapped branches and leaves out of the way and prayed that I wasn’t walking through the fantasy world equivalent of Poison Ivy. That was something that was almost never mentioned in books or movies, but this place was way more real than the books, though I figured a rash was the last of my worries right now.

  I was almost doubled over by the time I caught another glimpse of the gem in the distance. I needed speed to get to those fuckers, and I just didn’t have it.

  Clearly I was far from the cultivated lands around that city. The same as how the farther you got from civilization back on my world the more likely it was you were going to run into impassable wilderness.

  I was filled with a grim determination, and a glow surrounded me as I plunged through the forest. I was pretty sure that second wind came from the gem, or maybe the magic. Maybe it was the same thing.

  It was calling out to me and giving me what I needed to make sure I could save the day. It didn’t want to be captured by that darkness any more than I wanted to see it captured by that darkness.

  We’d both be fucked if that happened.

  “Come on you fuckers,” I growled.

  I glanced up to try and get some idea of how long I’d been running through the forest. I had some vague idea that I’d be able to tell how much time had passed from the positioning of the sun or something. At least that was always how it was described in fantasy novels.

  There were a few problems with that, of course. The first being that I was in the middle of a dark and forbidding forest with a canopy overhead that wasn’t the kind of stuff the sun could pierce through easily.

  The second problem was I wouldn’t know how to navigate using the sky even if my life depended on it. I had a vague idea that the sun rose in the east and set in the west, but even then it wasn’t true east or true west depending on the time of year. Which was more than most people probably knew, but not enough to navigate by.

  The third problem was that I was pretty sure the light was coming from a couple of directions. Which would indicate that there were a couple of heavenly bodies up there that providing light for this planet. I couldn’t tell since I couldn’t see out of the forest, but I’d put good money on it.

  This truly was an alien world I’d discovered, for all that I’d barely discovered more than one tiny city in the forest. Even if I knew how to navigate using the sky back on earth that would be no guarantee that I knew what the hell I was doing on this world.

  There was a fourth surprise, though. Up above there were walkways strung between the trees. They looked small, but that was a measure of the distance they were from the forest floor. It also looked like there was a hazy layer of something in between that almost obscured the walkways.

  Odd, that. I wondered if the creatures I was chasing were trying to get up to those networked treetop walkways so they could get away from me more easily. They were having to deal with the same crap here on the forest floor I was, after all.

  Well those fuckers weren’t going to get away that easily. I plunged into the forest one final time, heading in what I thought was the last direction where I’d seen the crystal, and finally I plunged through the foliage and found the assholes I’d been chasing in a clearing that surrounded one of the more massive trees I’d seen since coming to this forest, and that was saying something considering how big most of them were!

  Only it wasn’t the scene I was expecting. The elves turned and looked at me in surprise, but then they turned back to the creatures they’d been facing off against when I burst onto the scene. Massive orclike creatures that resembled the barkeep who’d slipped me that drink back in the tavern, or the creatures I’d seen attacking Leila in the darkness behind the club, stood in a circle around the elves carrying nasty dark weapons that glowed with a black haze.

  Son of a bitch.

  8

  Evening the Odds

  The orcs turned and looked at me quizzically. Like they weren’t sure what to do with some glowi
ng asshole appearing in their midst when they were getting ready to lay the smack down on these elves.

  One elbowed the other and muttered something in its language about a puny god showing up to try and take them on. I would’ve commended the thing for being on point with its reference game, if a little outdated, but I was more pissed off that it was making fun of me.

  Also? I was kinda surprised I could understand the fucker.

  “I’ll show you a puny god motherfucker,” I said.

  The orcs stared at me like they were trying to figure out whether or not I’d actually said what they thought I’d just said.

  Hell, I was trying to figure out if I’d actually said what I just said. It would seem they understood me, so there must’ve been some magical universal translator doing me a solid here.

  “That’s right fucker,” I said. “If you want to make fun of me then maybe you should see what you’re up against first!”

  I knew this was stupid. I knew those orcs could bend me in two, snap me in half, and corpse fuck the remains. They held nasty hooked black swords. Okay then. None of them had anything like that back in that alley.

  “What are you doing?” the elf officer hissed at me.

  “Trying to get my crystal back from you assholes, and now I’m trying to save my ass too I guess,” I said, stepping closer to the elves.

  One of the elf fuckers raised his spear at me. I grabbed the thing and pushed it to the side. For a surprise the thing actually sparked and then went dead, and I felt another little surge of magical power. The elf looked at the spear like he wasn’t sure what the hell to do.

  “Anyone else want to try me?” I asked.

  They all stared at me and then looked back to the orc creatures.

  “Enough of this! Zolz thought he was getting the spoils, but I’m going to take home the true prize today!”

  “Wait, so you’re Zolz?” I asked the orc who’d stepped forward.

  “Well, yes?” Zolz said.

  “Do you always talk about yourself in the third person like that?” I asked.

  Zolz cocked an eyebrow, and it was a strangely thoughtful look for such a giant brute. Then any thoughtful look disappeared as he raised his sword over his head and let out another bellow.

  “I’ll destroy you and take your Core puny god!”

  “Like hell you will!” I said, not liking the way that asshole was eyeing the crystal. My crystal, for all that the elves were still kinda sorta in possession of the thing.

  “And what are you going to do about it?” the orc asked, leering down at me and laughing.

  He was close enough that I got the full blast of his bad breath. Smelling that shit had me understanding why breath could be a weapon in some games. I waved a hand in front of my face. “Holy shit that’s ripe!”

  The orc frowned and looked at me in confusion. Meanwhile I was trying to get the attention of the elf officer. He glared at me, but fuck him if he thought I was going to let a little something like our sudden enmity over a little bit of damage I might’ve caused magically arriving in their world stop us from working together.

  Especially when there were a bunch of big smelly orc creatures standing there getting ready to fuck our shit up. That was the kind of thing that tended to introduce a lot of clarity and peacemaking impulses into an otherwise contentious situation.

  The enemy of my enemy and all that.

  “I mean honestly,” I said, returning my focus to the orc. “Would it fucking kill you to suck on a breath mint from time to time?”

  I cocked my head to the side. “I mean do they even have breath mints in your world? Or are you just stuck chewing on some twig whenever your breath gets so ripe that even the whores at the local brothels won’t touch you because your credit line isn’t big enough to cover what she’d charge to power through the stink?”

  That seemed to get through to some of the orc’s companions, at least. They started to chuckle and laugh, and believe you me that didn’t sit well with the head orc asshole. He threw his head to the sky and let out a bellowing roar that let everyone know just how unhappy he was with their laughter.

  Meanwhile the elf officer finally seemed to realize I was trying to get his attention. That or he’d been purposely ignoring me waving my hand behind me where this orc asshole couldn’t see. It was about fucking time, either way.

  “What?” he hissed.

  “You want to make it out of this alive?” I asked.

  “What are you talking about? Of course we’ll make it out of this alive!”

  His voice was all cocky and confident they were going to make it out of this alive and without my help, but there was something in his eyes that said he was worried.

  I’d seen enough assholes streaming games where they were getting their digital shit kicked in to know the look of someone who was bullshitting even as they could see their whole world crashing down around them.

  I also felt something else a little odd. It was like the sensation I’d felt when I was with that Rachel girl. It was the feeling that I could almost sense this asshole’s thoughts, and they weren’t pretty.

  Mostly they were filled with thoughts of what he’d like to do to me with those strange light spear things. It wasn’t pleasant to experience a realistic thought of someone wanting to rip you apart straight down the middle.

  More disturbing than that, though, were the terrified thoughts of orc creatures infused with some sort of dark magic ripping through them. I was filled with memories of other terror soaked battles where something very similar had happened. Battles where this officer went in cocky and confident he was going to win, sure he had the power of a champion at his back which meant there wasn’t a chance the elves could possibly lose, only to see the people he’d trained with, the men he loved in a totally military brotherly platonic way and not in a sort of military scenario you only tended to see when you accidentally clicked on the gay part of a porn site, ripped to pieces.

  Not pretty memories, those.

  “You need to listen,” I said. “Because those orc things are going to stop arguing here in a minute, and when they do they’re all fucked unless we do this.”

  “Why should I listen to you?” the elf asked, his voice a low hiss. “You’ll just disappoint us like the last one did.”

  I thought of Rachel and all the amazing things we’d done to each other. I thought about how a moment with her had been anything but disappointing, and I thought about how this elf didn’t give a flying fuck about any of that because me getting laid in some magical ephemeral space between worlds wasn’t going to kill these orc assholes.

  “The way I see it you’re going to die either way,” I said.

  “Is this supposed to be instilling me with confidence, human?” the elf asked. “Is this your grand plan? To point out that we’re all going to die?”

  I shrugged. “Honestly I don’t have much of a plan. I’ve sort of been making it up as I go along ever since I arrived, but I do figure the only chance you have to make it out of here is to give me the nice crystal you stole from me, no hard feelings, and maybe we kick some orc ass together.”

  The elf glared at me for a little longer than he probably should’ve considering we were on a deadly deadline here, and then glanced at his men. They were all staring at me with something that almost made me feel bad: hope.

  They actually legitimately thought my lame soon-to-be college dropout ass might be able to save them.

  And as I looked at the situation I realized that I just might be able to pull it off. After all, in a perverse way this was what I’d been training for. I’d been spending most of my time getting a degree in strategy. Sure it was strategy in a video game, but it was strategy that felt similar to what was going down here in a high fantasy scenario very similar to the kind of game I liked to play. It somehow felt right.

  “Come on,” I said. “What have you got to lose?”

  “Apparently my life no matter what I do,” the elf growled.

 
; “Well yeah,” I said. “Don’t get me wrong. I’ll be really sad if we all die here, but at least we can say we tried, right?”

  I looked at each of them in turn and grinned, but it didn’t look like any of them were buying what I was selling. I’d hoped to give them some sort of inspirational pep talk that had them all ready to kick some orc ass, but I guess I’d have to settle for them following my orders.

  And as I looked out at all of them I felt something new. As though I could sense their thoughts as well. It was a vague impression, but still. I had my troops at my disposal, and now it was time to figure out how the fuck we were going to do this.

  “I have a feeling I’m going to regret this,” the elf said.

  “Me too!” I said, still grinning as I held my hand out. “I’m Craig, by the way.”

  Again the elf eyed me, and again that seemed like the kind of thing we didn’t have time for considering there were orcs right there waiting to kill our asses, and finally he took my hand.

  “Eleric,” he said.

  “Nice to meet you, Eleric,” I said. “How about we kick some ass together?”

  I was more concerned with what was going on around us. My insult, and the resulting laughter, had set the orcs into an argument that allowed us to have that brief conversation, but it looked like they were finishing up. Where “finishing up” meant the big one in charge had removed the head of one of his subordinates.

  Brutal. I really didn’t want him to have a chance to do that to yours truly.

  The head orc bellowed and the rest backed down. He turned and looked at my new elf friend. Though it might be a bit too far to say that Eleric was my friend. Grudging ally would probably be closer to the truth, but it was better than the two of us trying to kill each other when there were ugly orc creatures wanting to do the same, at least.

  And that orc was bringing his sword up. He certainly had the reach to move through the crowd of elves surrounding us. His sword was coming down as my new elf ally pressed the gem into my hand, and light flared within it.