Holy War

by Sugralinov Daniel

  Storm, level 564 Storm Dragon.

  Crash, level 565 Diamond Worm.

  Crusher, level 30 Fierce Wolf Montosaurus, level gog Ancient Reptile.

  Spotted Mechostrich.

  Hidden status: E-class Threat with potential A.

  Hidden status: Initial of the Sleeping Gods.

  Money: 176,213,838 gold, 42 silver, 54 copper coins.

  Marks of the Valorous: 10.

  It was a shame I hadn’t managed to find Supreme Grand Master Oyama. His lessons would have come in very useful, but I didn’t have time to find his village in southern Latteria. And it wasn’t a given that the teacher would agree to take me on right away…

  My thoughts broke off at the sound of the horns and drumroll of Nergal’s army, but then the Sleeping God interrupted them.

  “Do not be angry at those fooled by the parasite and usurper that calls himself a god! They come here for loot and glory, but they will find only disappointment!”

  Tiamat’s Inspiration

  You feel no anger or pain. You do not fear death. You know no fear.

  All the defenders were as if wrapped in a gentle divine embrace, and when the colossal figure of Nergal rose up into the sky behind his army of light, all I did was smile and look for his health bar.

  Chapter 20: The Battle for Tiamat’s Temple

  WHILE I SOARED above the temple to assess the battlefield, time seemed to slow. The enemy’s army was like an endless billowing sea, with our troops a grain of sand in the path of a tsunami.

  Nergal wasn’t the only one to come and support his followers. His ancient rival had joined him, the god of darkness Marduk the Sombre, whose avatar towered above the clans of the Empire as they advanced from the south. Stark against the piercing blue sky, the shadowy figure of the god of darkness looked like an inkblot—nothing human about it, just two holes instead of eyes and divine arms spread above his troops like storm clouds.

  Nergal wasn’t particularly anthropomorphic either—a vague shining silhouette filling half the sky, a burning sun in place of its head. The beacon of light seemed to be approaching the planet. It grew to three times its size, and now wisps of light could be seen around it, creating the impression of moving hair. The light of the Radiant burned the eyes even through closed eyelids.

  Neither god made an attempt to take on a form friendlier or more familiar to sentients. I had no idea what the gods’ presence meant; would they take part in the fight? Could they be defeated?

  Tiamat took on the form of a giant ethereal two-headed dragon, shrouding the temple with her body. One head turned to Nergal. The other—to Marduk. The Sleeping God didn’t move, but I somehow knew that she was resisting an invisible pressure from the New Gods, above whose avatars were no names and no health indicators. I waited for Behemoth to join Tiamat, but I couldn’t feel his presence.

  The forces of the Commonwealth advanced from the north. The Empire’s troops approached confidently from the south. From east and west came smaller bands of neutrals. They approached in no hurry, at a steady march.

  In the enemy’s vanguard, I could clearly see perfectly triangular legions of troops in identical armor. So that’s who the Alliance of Preventers was waiting for!

  I carefully examined the NPC army approaching from the north. The soldiers of King Bastian the First marched under a standard of blue and gold. Dwarven battle groups followed human cohorts, and behind them stood elvish archers and self-propelled gnomish battle tanks all along the front line. The less numerous races of the Commonwealth were scattered here and there among them; fearsome lophers and titans pulled catapults, miniature fairies fluttered and buffed their allies with magic dust. A cavalry of human knights covered the flanks, reinforced by hobbit sling-shooters mounted on centaurs armed with long spears. None of them were over level three hundred and fifty.

  Behind marched all manner of mismatched player raids. There wasn’t much order in their ranks; second-tier clans rubbed shoulders with two or three thousand casuals lucky enough to reach the heart of the desert. In any case, both they and the royal legions were cannon fodder to go ahead of the Alliance of Preventers.

  The disciplined formation of Modus, the Azure Dragons, Excommunicado, Mizaki and the Children of Kratos was hiding behind the backs of ordinary players and NPC soldiers, but its many battle standards gave it away. Crag wandered somewhere among those preventers, disguised.

  Thousands and thousands of fanciful battle pets mingled with the sentients. I saw spectral tigers and chimeric scorpions, war boars and fire deer, three-headed hydras and steel golems.

  The entire mass shouted, screamed, clanked with armor, growled, cluttered, screeched and roared, eager to crush the scant defenders at the temple of the Sleeping Gods.

  Three priests of Nergal formed the final line of troops on the northern front. They were surrounded by seven crystalline structures that bent the light in strange ways.

  Aspect of Light, level 6yg Reflection of Nergal

  “You see those too, Scyth?” Crawler’s voice squawked from the comm amulet. “The Aspects of Light. The last time they appeared was during the Swarm War. How big are they? Around two hundred feet tall?”

  “A little less. Strange—they have no health bars. Can they be killed?”

  “No,” Yemi answered, connected to our network. “And they’re always a hundred levels above the highest-level player in Dis.”

  “Is that legal?” Infect asked.

  “Its part of the game mechanics,” Yemi answered. “Nergal and Marduk can’t directly involve themselves in the affairs of mortals, but they don’t want to stand aside either. So they thought up that trick. The god’s reflections are made from the highest-level ability of the high priests. It costs a year’s supply of Faith. Marduk is a little weaker than Nergal, so his priest could only summon six Colossi ofDai’kness.

  I turned to the south and saw what he was talking about. The Colossi of Darkness were the same level as the Aspects of Light, but there was one less of them. Black cones standing sixty yards tall, they swallowed up the light, swimming through the air above Marduk’s priests. The servants of the dark god rode mammoths with giant blackened tusks.

  The clans of the Alliance stationed themselves nearby; the Travelers, Zuldozer and Warsong. I couldn’t see the Widowmakers among them. Next came a long procession of more casual players, with the vanguard full of Emperor Kragosh’s legions of the dominant dark races: ores, trolls, ogres and minotaurs. The standard-bearer uruk-hai from the planes stood out on their giant wolves, each a head taller than any ore. Black and red strips of cloth fluttered above them. Emperor Kragosh’s army howled and roared.

  “The Colossi and the Aspects will disincarnate if we kill the high priests,” Yemi continued. “But nobody has ever done that before. We don’t have a chance!”

  “Why are you here if you think we’re going to lose, mage?” Bomber asked.

  “There’s no honor in the strong defeating the w^eak, heh-heh.

  There’s no shame in losing this battle, even if it’ll hurt. Anyway, Scyth is full of surprises, so…”

  “Yemi just doesn’t wanna lose his castle,” Crawler interrupted.

  The mage laughed. Something in his crowing laughter reminded me of a new ability that I hadn’t factored into my strategy for the coming battle. The Path of Sacrifice! I thought for a moment, did some calculations in my head, shouted into my comm amulet: “Yemi, get your ass to the temple right now, and bring Babangida, Francesca and your best healers!”

  “How many healers do you need?”

  “Even^ single one you have! Crawler, Bomb, Infect, bring Patrick, Gyula, Irita and the guardians back to the temple! Now!”

  My heart, once again alive, tiled to beat its way out of my chest. The enemy approached Tiamat’s flourishing oasis. Once the players reached the hospitable zone, I had no doubt they’d saddle up their firing mounts.

  There were mere minutes left to carry out my plan—the circle around the temple was tightening
, and an endless stream of attackers was about to descend on the scant rows of defenders.

  My allies took up defensive positions on three dunes, covering the approach to the temple. The cultists of Morena and the troggs from Stone Rib took up positions on the northmost dune. I sent the Montosaurus, Sharkon and Storm to help. Iggv and Crusher stayed with me and waited in the temple.

  On the crest of the southwestern dune, the mercenaries from the Goblin League and the motley crowd of Arena gladiators dug in. Those boys wouldn’t be easy to shift—they were near the top of the leaderboard in levels, and their battle skills were so honed that each could take out a dozen Empire soldiers at once.

  The third dune in the east wasn’t as large as the other two, and Yoruba’s soldiers occupied its peak. They were fewer than the troggs and cultists, but when they died, they could come right back into the fray after reviving at the clan graveyard and passing through a portal that would still be active for forty minutes. If it got tough, they’d retreat to me at the temple, where I’d cast Spirit Shackles.

  My thinking was that we had no chance at all against an army with twenty times our number. But I could balance the scales by knocking out the siege legions of Bastion and Kragosh, and maybe some of the players. Sleeping Vindication didn’t work the same as Plague Fury, which dealt the same high damage to everyone within its area of effect. Vindication hit with full force only against the closest targets. It lost roughly one percent of damage every twenty yards—that is, with my current level of Perception.

  The important thing was to be the first to take damage so that Sleeping Justice activated. Alongside Aid of the Sleepers, it gave me hope that I wouldn’t even need healers. Anyone killed by Sleeping Vindication would restore my health by forty percent, and that seemed to be my main cheat—considering the health supply I was counting on. The damage that my group took might return to the attackers with Reflection, but I hadn’t yet had the opportunity to test that.

  I dropped sharply, flew through Tiamat’s incorporeal avatar and approached the troggs. Movarak stood nearby with his priest Sithanak and a powerful female trogg, his spouse Ukavana. They discussed something. I heard Dekotra the troll and Ranakotz the half-ore shouting orders somewhere in the distance. A few of Morena’s cultists had lit a fire on bones and drawn some strange geometric figures around it in the sand. Green grass began to push up through them.

  I hailed them, hovered before the trogg leader. Movarak turned to me.

  “Chosen one of the Sleepers? Has something happened?”

  “Changes to the plan.” I waited for Dekotra and Ranakotz to come up, spoke to them all. “I can redirect the wounds of sentients in my group to myself.” As priests of the Sleeping Gods, you possess the greatest strength, and that means you’ll be able to deal more damage to enemies when you’re invulnerable. I need you to agree to join my group.”

  Still not understanding how NPCs saw the interface, I invited the priests of the Sleeping Gods into my raid group. A few seconds later, their portraits were added to the raid.

  “One of you must go ahead and let the enemies attack you,” I said. “This is really important! Then the Sleeping Gods will quadruple my power.”

  “I will do this in the name of the Inexorable One and the Sleeping Gods,” Ranakotz roared.

  Kicking up sand and clanking his armor, the half-ore ran down the slope of the dune to meet the Commonwealth army.

  Gritting my teeth, I still sent the Montosaurus, Storm and Sharkon after him in guard mode, just in case. The moment the half-ore took damage, my battle pets would punish the attackers harshly, allowing him to retreat to his own.

  Taking off again, I saw Yemi and his healers moving toward the temple: shamans, priests, druids. Crawler, Bomber and Infect galloped along a little further away on their mechostriches. Gyula was up on a horse, and Irita was on her huge translucent wolf. The guardians, Flaygray, Nega, Ripta and Anf, ran behind them, keeping pace. Patrick flew above them all his gryphon bought in Nivelle.

  Once I reached the Broken Axe ores, I repeated what I d said to the troggs and cultists, invited clan chief Sarronos and his priest Kromterokk into my group, then shot off like a bullet to the temple. Everyone I’d called was already gathered there.

  Wasting no time, I invited everyone to the raid and spoke fast.

  “Alright, my raid group is for those with the highest endurance. That’s guards and priests. I have the ability to take all the damage done to the raid. So I need all your healers, Yemi. Use whoever you need to fill the ranks to a hundred, but make them the strongest. While I’m alive, the raid will be invulnerable. Got the idea?”

  Everyone nodded, but Yemi frowned.

  “What about damage? Sure, we’ll thin out their ranks, but…”

  “Leave that to me, mage. The more damage the raid takes, the better. I have to go. Healers, stay with me. The rest—gather more people and…”

  I suddenly felt a sharp pain in my thigh. My health bar didn’t move thanks to Equanimity activating. Ranakotz’s portrait blinked red—it seemed the half-ore had taken an arrow to the leg. Sleeping Justice reacted right away: I got a fourfold increase to my stats and vindication, and my health, not counting the points gained by Path of Sacrifice, exceeded thirty million. The trumpet roar of the ancient reptile sounded off in the distance, alongside peals of thunder from my dragon.

  “I don’t really know what’s going on, boss…” Nega drawled, but I raised a hand, interrupting the succubus…

  And so as not to waste the resource coming in from Aid of the Sleepers, I fired off Sleeping Vindication. Strange. The bar didn’t restore. Had nobodv died?

  “As I was saying, boss,” the succubus continued undeterred. “I don’t really know what’s going on, but I get that we’re invulnerable while you’re alive. Let’s get to work, boys!”

  The priests of the Sleeping Gods and the guardians ran out of the temple to return to their previous positions. I carried Infect onto the roof, then returned to find Yoruba’s healers with Keron leading them, a thickset troll shaman who looked a lot like Ranakotz. Drums beat and horns sounded in the distance. I heard shouts in some unfamiliar language, repeating over and over, as if there was a football match on in some distant stadium and the crowd was chanting.

  “Lok’Tar ogar! Lok’Tar ogar! Lok’Tar ogar!”

  “Those are the ores of the Broken Axe,” one of the healers explained.

  “What does it mean, what they’re chanting?”

  ‘Victory or death!”

  I sat down in the center of the temple, closed my eyes, concentrated. There was at least five hundred yards between me and the positions occupied by the defenders. The closer the enemy came, the harder Vindication would hit…

  “Holy shit, Keron!” one of the healers broke the silence. “Scyth has over three hundred million health! Have you ever seen anything like it? We got our work cut out for us!”

  “Shut your mouth,” Keron said without rancor. “Just get ready to work like never before. If Scyth goes down, we all go down…”

  Lowering his voice, he started explaining the healing rotation to his team, telling them who would heal me and when so as to conserve the group’s mana. Keron was an expressive man, and ‘dickhead’ was probably the least offensive word he used to address his clanmates. Aggressive guitar riffs drowned out the healer’s voice; our enemies approached, and Infect strummed out his attacking repertoire.

  The battle for Tiamat’s temple had begun.

  Almost at the same time, the portraits of all the raid group members started desperately flashing red. The damage redirected to me, but I had no fear for myself. Casting a glance at my pet icons and seeing they were all yellow, I called them back. They’d quickly recover out of combat.

  Over the next twelve seconds, I released three full Sleeping Vindication explosions in a row—the resource recovered almost instantly. But then a bug came up that I doubted the developers could have foreseen: the damage against me started to loop! The raid was st
ill taking damage, and the twenty Yoruba healers were already sweating just trying to slow down my falling health, let alone keep me fully healed.

  It was a disaster. I didn’t have a calculator to hand to work out the numbers, but roughly speaking: Sleeping Invulnerability absorbed forty percent of incoming damage. The rest got split among the group, was intercepted again by Sacrifice and returned to me. Then the absorption from Invulnerability kicked in again, and so on until all the damage was fully absorbed. All the features of Resilience factored into those calculations somewhere, but a panicked shout from Crawler interrupted my mathematical exercises. His voice crackled from the comm amulet across the temple: “Scyth! This is useless! We’re retreating. We can’t hurt them!”

  “Why not?”

  “Hold back your explosions, boss,” Nega’s voice came through. “There’s something not right here!”

  I started to get similar messages from everyone, but Crawler was the first to figure it out.

  “They have NergaVs Inspiration] Thirty-six seconds of full invulnerability left!”

  “Annageddonsl” Infect shouted. “Scyth, get out of there, you can’t withstand that even with full…”

  “Everyone back to the temple!” Crawler commanded, interrupting the bard. “The temple will survive. That’s why nobody uses Armageddon to take castles—the damage penalties against structures are severe.”

  I ordered the healers not to move, then ran outside and took off into the air. I needed to figure out wiiat was going on.

  Nine meteorites were descending toward the temple at once from the north and south sides of the slope, leaving trails of smoke behind them. Around thirty more seconds left until they landed.

  The attackers were frozen in place. A multitude of players hovered in the air on flying mounts; some were casting destructive scrolls and waiting for the consequences.

  Our mercenaries and gladiators, with Maglubiyefs Umbrellas deployed above them, rushed down to clash with the attackers before the meteorites landed.