“I feel like a peeping tom,” Nolien said.
“It’s not safe for them to be alone,” Basilard said. “If Lunas is anything like his father, he won’t tolerate the defeat Annala handed him.”
At that very moment, Lunas sat in the castle’s cafeteria. Like the audience chamber, it had been specially fitted for the occasion. There were staples and delicacies from every visiting country and banners drawn up to represent them on the walls. The delegates enjoyed themselves and the company of allies in the hospitality of their host.
Sacred Fire burned above them. Its flame was warm and gentle, and awed the delegates while they ate the food prepared by its torch’s staff. While her guests spoke of it and Annala’s proposal, Kasile sent a subtle and satisfied smirk in the direction of Lunas.
The prince shrugged and tapped a button on his scry. It sent a pre-written message to the crew of his airship. At his command, they activated the Order Obelisk installed within the ship and established an Order Domination Field. It was a small one, just big enough to cover the ship itself. Anything bigger would violate international statute regulating the use of Ordercraft on the unwilling. It was enough to empower Nulso. It boosted his formidable ability enough to perform the next step in the prince’s plan.
In the courtyard, the sky bent and twisted. Eric and Annala broke their embrace to stare at the anomaly. Eldritch light spread out over the castle and tore open a hole in the air. An obelisk dropped from it and dug into the ground. Arrays of light up on its surface, illuminating ordercraft runes. A tidal wave of dominance rolled through the area up to the curtain wall.
It washed over Eric and Annala, provoking a deep sense of hatred and disgust. It washed over Nolien and Tiza, compelling them to kowtow, and over Basilard, who clutched BloodDrinker. It washed over Kasile and she altered Fairtheora while fighting down panic. It washed over Fairtheora himself and did absolutely nothing but tell him its location. It washed over the Royal Ordercrafter Team and warped their sense of reality. It washed over Lunas, who whispered, “This castle will soon be mine.”
A thick grey-silver cloud arose from his clothing and gathered over his head. The bodyguards bared their weapons and it selectively drained them of all mana. They fainted on the spot. Then it elevated over Kasile’s divine fire and projected a voice inside their heads.
Mortal Flesh, greetings from the Highest Authority. This has been sent with a message for the girl who dares to call herself a divine queen.
Kasile struggled to stay in control of her emotions and project serenity, but it was a losing battle. This was an enforcer; a fragment of Order himself. As a divine being, it ranked two orders above her ancestor, a full nature deity. She stained her petticoats with her fear.
“You are neither divine nor a queen. Your spirit is weak, flesh runs in your veins, and your so-called ‘divinity’ is merely genetics. Your queenly composure is a façade and you are easily swayed by crisis. You rule through fear and manipulation instead of charisma and the rule of law. The only proof of your royal claim is your so-called Sacred Fire and yet, as proven by Zettai Centurion, that can be faked. You are a fake and therefore have no authority here.”
Kasile stood up and did her best to be calm. Judging from the looks and whispers, her best wasn’t good enough. She reached for the part of herself that connected to her divine ancestor and declared, “I am queen by virtue….” She cleared her throat, took a cleansing breath, and tried again. Nothing. Her divinity was gone! “You’re doing this! Just like you do to elves!”
“This is a creation of Law. Its nature is to suppress Chaos and false power. If your self-proclaimed divine magic fails you in the presence of this, then it is not legitimate.”
She pointed her finger at Lunas and shouted, “Call off your attack dog!”
Lunas shrugged. “Order is this thing’s master. I can no more control it than you can.”
“Fine!”
She reached into the bow behind her back and pulled out a sheath. Out of the sheath, she pulled out a dagger. It was nothing more than a cold iron blade with a wooden handle. Yet despite the lack of ornamentation and simple construction, the enforcer hesitated.
“That’s right! This is a chiem; a dagger infused with chaotic power! Get out of my castle or I will destroy you!”
“Ignorant child.”
Ignoring the dagger completely, it reached inside of her. It bypassed her gown with its runes and her skin with its heritage for the most sacred part of her being. Fear unlike anything she ever felt gripped her mind. A frigid hand grabbed her soul. She threw the dagger at the enforcer, but it dodged it effortlessly. She grew pale and cold as the hand pulled her essence from her body. All the delegates were horrified, save Lunas.
“Now this castle is mine,” he whispered. “Send the rest.”
Portals opened all over the castle: the kitchens, library, clerical offices, castle town, and more. From within walked bestial four-legged monsters, screeching winged monsters, and disciplined humanoids alike. All of them wore the same style of ordercraft armor. They moved quickly to corral locals, block doorways, patrol the skies, and otherwise control the area.
The royal guard wasted no time gaping in astonishment and immediately counterattacked. It was only then that they noticed the Order Domination Field. It empowered the invaders via their armor and weakened the defenders, oppressing them with intense gravity while draining their personal mana and cutting them off from the new mana coming in. As a result, they quickly tired. In one gallery, a single guard remained both alive and conscious.
“Fire burn it!” she shouted while parrying a pike. “What the Abyss is going on?”
She head-butted the soldier to break the parry and then brought her sword down in a swipe that bit into her opponent’s neck. In response, her opponent wrenched her helmet off, exposing her to the full effect of the Order Obelisk. She fell to her knees at once and her opponent raised their pike to kill her. Another pike, shimmering with golden light, killed it instead.
A woman with long, golden-brown hair and pointed ears floated over its corpse. Her eyes were red as blood and glowing with battle light. Her skin was a contrasting pale white, like someone who stayed inside all day knitting. She was garbed in feminine armor from neck to toe. The phrases “Ye Guilty” and “Ye Innocent” were inscribed on it. Sewing needles and thread rested in pouches at her waist alongside pouches containing nooses and poison. Around her neck was a knitted scarf. The pike that felled the Latrot soldier was her middle finger.
“Belldandy!” the royal soldier cried.
“That’s me.” Every hair on her head became a spear and impaled every hostile in the room at once. “I’m not the only one either. We’re having a family reunion.”
In every wing of the castle, tricksters emerged from their hiding places. There was Krank, the god of matchmaking and marriage counseling, disguised as a statue. Minerva, the goddess of brain surgeons, flew out of a painting. Sophie, the goddess of bookworms, quietly came to life inside the castle library. Virtu, the god of manly men, burst out of a can of hair spray. Larry Dante, the god of idiots, was in the kitchen cooking bacon (incidentally, he had no idea what was going on). Together with other siblings, they slayed monsters, smote anti-mage soldiers, and redirected portals. Then they reached the end of their worlds.
Belldandy was stuck in the gallery with the soldier she saved. Every one of its doors and windows led back into the room. The same was true for her siblings. Lunas was prepared for their arrival and programed instructions into the Order Obelisk to counter them. It split the castle into separate dimensions. From the minute he arrived weeks ago, Lunas marked their boundaries. When the Order Domination Field came up, it partitioned the tricksters into their own pocket of space. The only exception was the greatest trickster of all: Tasio.
He pretended to be a snowbank in the castle courtyard, figuring it to be the most likely place to drop an obelisk. Thus, he was ideally situated to turn himself into a cannonball and shatter it. He
launched his attack, but a giant golf club appeared in his path. It shouted, “Fore” and smacked him into the Order Domination Field’s ceiling. He stopped himself before touching it and was back in an instant.
The golf club transformed into a middle-aged human man. His ears were long and pointed like Tasio’s, but his hair was black. If Tasio’s glow was the sun, then his own was the void of space. Between his reading glasses, breastplate, running shorts, tap shoes, and various other add-ons and equipment, he looked like the sum total of a middle school’s extracurricular clubs.
“Well, if it isn’t the self-proclaimed ‘Patron of Humanity,’” Tasio drawled. “What are you up to this time, Alphfy?”
“Aphelion!” the other trickster insisted. “I will not allow you to destroy this obelisk. The humans do not need your help to do that, nor do they need elven help for curing mana mutation. Chaos and Order will fall away and the reigns of history will transfer to Hand of Man!”
Tasio glowered. “Alphfy, don’t make me spank you like I did in the Conversion War.”
Aphelion blushed. “That only happened once! I’ve been training while you were goofing off! I’ll win this time!”
As the two tricksters argued in the sky, humans were indeed on the move to counter the obelisk’s theat. In their custom made barracks on the castle grounds, the Royal Ordercraft Security and Compliance team scrambled to deactivate it.
The power of the Order Domination Field thrummed in their minds and in their souls. It altered their perception of reality, both physical and theoretical. It whispered, “Order’s will be done” in their ears in a continuous loop. Kimberly saw her soldiers wavering and called a halt. Grabbing her badge, she held it up above her head and declared,
“One cannot serve two masters! For they would love one and despise the other! We swore loyalty to Her Majesty Queen Kasile before we were given this power and then again afterward. She put you under my authority. I am your immediate superior. Obey me.”
Taylor Jones shook her head. Then she grabbed her badge and held it above her head. “Fire’s will be done!”
Jasmine St. John shook her head. Then she grabbed her badge and threw it to the ground. “Greater Order is coming! The world will be pacified!”
The two of them punched each other and caught each other’s punch in their other hand. This led to a mercy match with both their physical and spiritual power.
Thuy Kwan raised and lowered her arm, neither able to bear it proudly nor throw it away.
Daniela Cranston fell to her knees, clutching her head and saying nothing.
Kimberly Johnson grimaced. “It’s a good thing Fairtheora insisted we drill for times like this. Where is he anyway?”
In a hallway leading to the castle courtyard, Fairtheora the Lawkeeper, Royal Sentinel of Roalt, lumbered through the Order Domination Field. It could not affect his mind or spirit because of his orc immunity to ordercraft. For the same reason, it was more hostile to him than either humans or elves. Order never forgot a transgression.
“Order! I will do my duty, for queen and country! You cannot stop me!”
A cloud of magical dust poofed in front of him. The presence he felt inside it stopped him; it stopped him cold. It slowly dispersed to reveal a fairy. She had pink hair to her waist, and it rested in four tails over an immaculate silver-grey robe. Her skin was pale and her eyes blank. The Eye of Order was tattooed on her forehead.
“Dannaigh ….What have they done to you?”
“Failure,” she droned. “Failure knight serving a failure queen. You will be punished.”
On the castle balcony, a closed pocket of space appeared. It manifested as a sphere of solidified existence flashing into place. Tiza and Nolien didn’t notice and it happened too quickly for Basilard to react. Someone shouted, “By the power of Order: Divide and Conquer!” and three portals appeared beneath their feet.
Inside the sphere, the couple had a clear view of the Order Obelisk. Annala pulled her Death Killer bow from her sash, unfolded it, and took aim. A magic circle generated underneath her as she chanted holy verses. Just before she fired, a voice spoke in her mind.
Apostate!
Her concentration broke and her power faded. She shook her head and altered the bow’s algorithms to factor out scriptural chaos power and focus on genetic instead. In other words, her inherited Seed of Chaos instead of her personal pious soul. When it was ready, she fired.
Nothing obstructed her shot. It sailed through a veil of existence, several monsters, and the Obelisk’s own barrier to penetrate the Obelisk itself. Then it exploded. Chaotic energy pulled from Annala’s seed traveled up and down the structure but did not damage it. The only evidence of Annala’s attack was a tiny hole and scorch marks.
“I shall require a bigger arrow.”
What you truly need is greater faith!
Suddenly, she contorted and fell to her knees. The Order Obelisk retaliated against her attack by focusing on her. Its presence filled her; cold, parasitic, and oppressive. She had accomplished nothing but to convince it that she was a threat.
“Tasio, Tasio, Tasio!” Eric shouted.
The Trickster didn’t appear.
“Abyss take you, Tasio! You’re never around when you’re needed!”
Light gathered at the Obelisk’s peak. It was drawing mana from the surrounding environment, rendering it colorless in the process. When its charge completed, it fired at the paralyzed elf. Eric scooped Annala up in his arms and jumped over the railing. He landed on the same balcony and the Obelisk’s beam swerved to blast him in the back.
Incredibly, his clothing remained intact, but it was the only thing to do so. The beam vaporized his skin, ruptured his organs, smashed his bones, and even damaged his spirit. If not for his Seed of Chaos, Razor Spirit, and monstrous survival instinct, he would have been dead before he registered that he’d been hit. Instead, he lay on the floor, helpless, in hideous pain, and wondering what happened.
A portal appeared over him and Nulso dropped out. He was dressed as he always was, but his suit had shifted. It was no longer clothing but an exoskeleton. The suit and belt were now as much a part of him as his arms and neck. The ponytail wrapped so tightly around the latter it was a wonder that he could still breathe. His skin was as white as a corpse and pulled as tight as possible over his bones. It glowed dimly with eldritch light. Everything about him was a sharp contrast to the world around him, as if he were separate from reality.
Seeing Eric defenseless, he raised his heel to crush the boy’s skull. Without his brain, Eric would never recover despite his other advantages. Then two hands reached out of Eric’s pocket and flipped the bird at Nulso. The ordercrafter put his heel down peacefully. He betrayed none of the frustration he felt because Order’s power was suppressing it.
“Clever trickster. If this...I mean...if I had the power and authority, then I would eat both of your souls, but this will have to do.”
He crossed his hands over Eric’s body and generated a sphere of Orderly power around it. Two hands reached into the body and identified both Eric’s soul and the wormholes Rojo Genki was using to inhabit Eric’s clothing. He listed his spell’s requirements like one submitting a formal work request. Finally, he executed the spell with the words,
“By the power of Order: Banishment!”
The box of eldritch light shrank around Eric until it was skintight and altered itself until it took the shape of an “X.” Finally, a portal appeared beneath him and he fell away.
Annala watched it happen. With the Obelisk’s power focused on her, there was little else she could do. Her rage and chaotic verses couldn’t overcome its divine spiritual presence. Nulso stood over her and leered.
“Hello, my Golden Hair. Today, you will be mine.”
Then he noticed the choker at her neck. He did not frown because the Order Obelisk refused to allow it. No emotion was allowed on his face. Instead, he felt only a mild annoyance.
“I see. That boy has already claimed
you for his own.”
Annala glared up at him. “I belong to no one, and even if I did, I’d call Eric ‘master’ long before you!”
He held the Subjugation Collar in his left hand. “I have time to change that.”
Meanwhile, a portal opened outside the castle and dumped Eric on the far end of the drawbridge. The activist groups were still present and watched him crash.
His body was a mess. His soul was bruised. His mind was working on basic instincts until it restored higher functions. By the monstrous will of the grendel, he forced his body to heal as quickly as possible.
A troll approached him with a club in one of his two wolf arms. He roared at the threat and struggled to his feet. They collapsed underneath him.
Gruffle snickered. “I’m going to enjoy this.”
Inside the Royal Mage’s tower, a portal opened and dropped Basilard. He landed on his feet, ready to counter anything that attacked him. Seeing nothing, he dashed for the exit, but a blaze of intense fire blocked the doorway. It vanished before Basilard could douse it and revealed something else; someone else.
It was a tall man with orange hair. He wore a mage robe with ordercraft symbols just like Dannaigh. A staff with red and purple jewels at each end was gripped in his right hand.
“We meet again, Mr. Bladi.”
“Sequitor…What are you doing here?”
“A new line of business.”
He chucked lightning. Basilard deflected it but only with great effort. Ice blocks formed around his feet in the meantime. He struggled to free them and Sequitor cast a fourth spell. Three spheres of energy appeared around Basilard in the form of a triangle. They formed three lances made of three elements.
“Fire shall incinerate the impure.”
The fire lance struck Basilard, but his barrier held it back. Its heat seeped through and caused him to sweat. Then the lances of water launched.
“Water shall cleanse the repentant.”
The water lance soared like a missile, through Basilard’s barrier, and then through Basilard himself. The lightning lance followed on its heels and struck the advantage of the opening created by the first two. The veteran mage was simultaneously frozen, burned, and electrocuted. He slumped forward.
Mana Mutation Menace (Journey to Chaos Book 3) Page 24