by Andur
“Try to dismember them or they will get up again immediately!” Tanja's voice echoes through the tunnel.
Great! I redirect the flow of my mana to empower my muscles and tear the jaw of the monster apart. That done, I start to twist it's head off like the guard did seconds ago.
“Arrgh!” A scream from Nicosar echoes through the hall but I have problems of my own. Another three of the things are before me. I don't have a clue if they are new ones or if they are injured ones that healed up already.
They jump simultaneously and I grab all three of them out of the air simultaneously. It should be an easy task, but it feels like a huge effort.
Activating my mana sight, I realize that those things feed off the mana around them. Every ounce of mana I use to hold them in place just adds to their food. They themselves are gleaming brightly in all possibly shades of mana.
I grab my staff tighter and instruct the runes on it to rearrange. The staff doesn't use it's mana offensive now. Instead it will use it's passive function of the mana crystal and absorb mana.
Swinging it in a wide arc, I behead all three demons, which are still immobilized by my telekinesis.
Letting go of them, they drop to the ground. I eye the dead bodies suspiciously but it doesn't look like they regenerate.
The absorb function of my staff robbed them of their mana. “Switch your weapons to mana absorption instead of using it offensively! We are just feeding them the energy to repair themselves!”
Then I get jumped by a new pack of demons and the fight continues.
A few moments later there are no demons left and I look around to check on our state. One injured guard, an injured Nicosar and an almost dead guard is the price we had to pay in order to learn a lesson against the demons.
I kneel down beside the guard who got jumped by multiple enemies earlier. The things had time to find some weak points in his armour and bit and stabbed into them. I try to cast healing magic on him but it doesn't work.
The wounds inflicted by those things seem to directly affect the soul. “Doesn't look good for me eh?” The guard tries to smile but spurts out blood instead.
“You don't have to worry. We won't leave your soul in a place like this.” I concentrate and anchor his soul to his body.
Then I wave to the other injured guard. “Take him back to the Nomad and report the current situation. They can only use the weapons which have nothing to do with mana. Just pure physics! Everything else just feeds those things!”
The guard nods and grabs the heavily injured one to teleport away.
Then I take a look at Nicosar who is curiously eyeing the evil looking cut on his left thigh. One of the demons managed to break through the armour. Luckily it seems to be just a flesh wound. The demon didn't get deep enough.
“It isn't healing?” Nicosar stabs a finger into the wound like not believing it really exists.
“No way! The immortal geezer got damage by a critter!” Tanja smirks at him.
I purse my lips at the sight. “I suggest you are more careful with those things. They injure not only the physical world with their claws. You need to go back too?”
Nicosar shakes his head. “It just looks nasty. The armour did it's job, it's just a surface wound. It just surprised me because it hurt so much. I never felt pain like that before.”
“Then we go on and conquer this stupid tunnel. Now that we know how to keep them down it will be easier.” Celes walks forward and we follow her.
This time we advance more carefully. Getting jumped by such a large group of demons wasn't funny even though they were individually weak. There were about five or six of them for everyone of us.
And they don't have the good manners to wait for you to finish the fight with the first demon. They just came at us like a pack of rabid dogs. Or would starving be a more fitting term?
After another curve of the tunnel, we arrive in a big open cavern. There are dozens of demons and in the middle of it is a shiny spinning sphere.
Multiple elves, dryads and other mortals are held in stone prisons at the walls of the cavern. An elven male is lying twitching under the sphere while spikes and claws break through his skin and he slowly turns into one of the demons.
Probably we heard his screams earlier when we had to decide for a direction.
“By the gods! -Nicosar
“That's a second Sphere of Sight!?” Tanja exclaims flabbergasted.
I ready my staff with a grim resolve and walk forward while I ready my spells. “They connect to the Calamity through the sphere to create those monsters in order to gather souls!”
As we enter the cavern, the demons start to rush us and Celes jumps into a group of them. Waving her open palm two monsters are blown apart by the shockwave.
I don't waste time and throw my staff at the new Sphere like a spear. It impacts and the Sphere is blown apart into thousands of shards.
For a second the demons waver like they just lost something important. At a gesture the staff returns to my hand and the remaining demons continue their charge.
Another wild melee fight evolves. But this time we already know how to keep our enemies down.
Celes jumps into the centre of the action and I support her with assisting magic. Then I realize that Tanja is in a tight situation with multiple demons surrounding her.
At a gesture of my hand a blue arc of lightning lashes out at three of the demons. I know that this wont kill them but it will paralyse them long enough for Tanja to solve the situation.
Another demon jumps at me but gets cleanly cut in half by the guard with the two handed sword. I nod at him while I concentrate to clean the area with a wind cutting spell.
This time the fight isn't as tight as before. The demons may have superior numbers but now they don't get up like stand up dolls any more.
The fight concludes with a cavern of minced demons and a few mortals staring at us with big eyes.
There are about twenty prisoners left. Though the cells throughout the cavern should give enough space for hundreds of people.
“Thank you so much for saving us lord.” An elven male bows to us.
“What happened here.” -Celes
“I did my everyday work, when I suddenly found myself in that cell. And then this nightmare started. People were turned into monsters by that sphere and left the cavern. From time to time the monsters would bring new prisoners. At some point no new prisoners were brought and our numbers started to dwindle.” An almost naked dryad gives us her story.
“Probably they couldn't bring in fresh material when we started our bombardment, my lord.” One of the guards gives his assessment of the situation.
I kneel down beside one of the dead demons, but I feel nothing from it. It's like earlier just an empty shell. Probably they really are just agents for the Calamity to gather souls.
“Fair maiden! Could I hear the names of our saviours.” The elven male from earlier turns his attention to Celes with a sweet voice. She almost bursts out into laughter.
Fair maiden.... I guess it's normal for mortals to mistake us. Celes stopped her ageing process somewhere at twenty five. Nicosar preferred to keep his geezer appearance even as a god.
The elven male gets disgusted looks by the female prisoners.
“Don't even try. You aren't even worth the dirt on my shoes little mortal.” Celes waves at the guy.
“Only the high god Evenguar would call an elf a mortal. From which race are you guys by the way. I have never heard of people with horns before.” The dryad raises her voice again.
“We are gods like Evenguar. He begged us for help in order to save this puny world.” One of our guards lets his tongue loose again and the prisoners eyes go round.
“Let's get going, I don't want to camp down here over night.” Tanja urges the group towards the entrance we came through.
On our way to the surface the mortals keep pestering Celes with their gazes. Even the female prisoners join the fray.
Half
way to the surface Celes can't keep calm any more and snaps at the mortals. “What's up with you!? Never seen a woman before!?”
One of the women blushes and apologizes to Celes. “We are sorry. But you are all so different from what we always imagined about gods. And you look so beautiful!”
“Yes! I would actually like to go out with you! You are the finest woman I have ever seen.” One of the male prisoners joins the fray.”
….
*Blleeergh*
After three seconds of watching the guy, Celes turned towards a wall and barfed at the floor.
All prisoners watch her stunned.
“What? Never seen a pregnant woman before?” After her retching had stopped, she threw another shocking comment at the mortals.
Just that it wasn't only shocking for the mortals.
I jump at her side. “What are you saying honey!? Why didn't you tell me? And why do you go down here in that state?”
“Shut up and carry me, husband. I only found out recently and being pregnant isn't a sickness, where you have to refrain from moving and stay inside!” Celes snaps at me.
I know better than to object to her and take her piggyback.
“Pregnant?" One of the disillusioned prisoners breaks their silence.
"A God?"
"Husband?….”
“Sush! Idiots! Where do you think little gods come from! Did you think they just pop into existence! Stupid mortals!” Celes starts a tirade at them.
Actually they really do just pop into existence. It's just recently that gods are born like that. But I don't care to explain that to the shocked prisoners.
Evenguar will have quite some explaining to do after this. Based on how complex his religion is.
I carry my wife with watery eyes towards the surface.
81 - Saving a world?
We are back on board of the Nomad and I watch the tactical display in unconcealed dismay. The demons which got created until now are still on a rampage.
“Our weapons don't work. Even by using completely non-magic projectiles, the demons don't get killed. It only takes them longer to regenerate.” A technician informs me of the situation. “The only thing that worked so far was to slay them with a mana-crystal weapon in mana absorption mode.”
I nod at the explanation and think about the situation.
“Going down and fighting them hand to hand will cause us quite a few causalities for sure.” Nicosar points out one of our options.
“Destroying the planet would just set them adrift. But at least they wouldn't be able to continue to feed on mortals.” Celes mumbles to herself
I think back to the moment when I looked at these ghastly things with my mana sight. They looked similar to a soul. An artificial soul. What's the reason for their existence. I have to get a look at one of these things up close. I just saw the newly made ones, which hadn't fed yet. I need to see one of those things while feeding.
What actually happens to the soul?
The prisoners told us that from time to time a group of demons would return to the cavern and pray to the sphere. Were they bringing back the souls they caught? It's a creepy thought but were they acting as gatherers?
A shiver runs down my spine when I think back to my own experience with the sphere.
I open the command menu for the plasma weapons of the nomad and lock everyone else out of the system. Then I restrict the settings to my command chair.
“Your majesty?” The weapons officer turns around to me with an inquiring but polite voice. I just locked him out of his console.
“It's just an experiment and I don't want anyone to know the magic for this.” -Me
After ensuring that I am the only one with access to the plasma weapons, I call up the magical casting devices, which are used to create the containment field for the plasma.
The plasma weapons are a combination of magic and science. A stream of superheated plasma is caught by a magical barrier and then ejected with movement magic.
In principle the casting devices of the cannons could cast any other spell too. I tune down the amount of plasma, which frees one of the casting devices for another purpose.
Then I change the magical system within the device to interact with the plasma. The wonderful blue orb of runes which displays the magical system turns into a red one with sickening swirling interactions on its surface.
“Give me a target which is beyond saving and has a high concentration of demons.” I give the command and a technician zooms the screen on a city. There isn't much to see on that scale, but there are many red dots and a few blue ones. The red dots obviously represent demons and the blue....
Being sentimental won't change the situation.
I input the coordinates and press the button to fire the cannon. A swirling maelstrom of red energy is sent down towards the surface. It's a doomsday magic without a name. I never bothered to give it one and I only use it if I really want someone dead.
It acts like a shredder on all levels of existence. Even souls are hacked to so many small pieces that it would take an eternity for them to heal on their own.
Everything happens in silence, as the maelstrom hits the surface and the screen blackens out for a second.
After it comes back and shows a wasted city with a crater in the centre, the technician gives his assessment.
“No demons...... no anything. The place is dead like the surface of a moon.... your majesty.”
“Give me the coordinates for other high concentrations of demons.” I urge the Technician to continue.
Over the next twenty five minutes I fired the plasma cannons on thirty four different targets.
Nobody said a word during the entire time. Everyone was aware that I was wiping out quite a few innocent mortals together with the demons. But their souls may heal after an eternity, to them it wouldn't make much difference if they reincarnated after a hundred years or a few thousand..... or so I told myself.
At least they would reincarnate, compared to those who were thrown into the sphere.
After the last big concentration of demons was wiped out, I gave orders for our warriors to go down and take care of the rest.
Then I deleted my changes to the plasma cannons and made sure that they couldn't be restored. I don't feel comfortable with trusting anyone else with this spell. It crushes mortals and gods alike. There isn't much difference.
I left for my private quarters afterwards. In my room, I take out a bottle of wine and fill a glass with the content. It's not like I am mourning for the innocents, who were caught up in the crossfire. I am a pragmatic person. What has to be done, has to be done. My own people are my first priority, I would be doing a bad job as a king otherwise.
It just leaves a bad aftertaste if I think about the future. I may have to do it again. And what will the other powers do if they learn what we are capable of.
Do they realize that this weapon would have made no difference between a planet populated by gods and a world of mortals? I hope not.
The door opens and Celes enters the room. “I said good bye to Evenguar. He thanked us for saving his world.”
I arch an eyebrow. “I wonder if he will still be of the same opinion, when he becomes aware of the damage and the casualties.”