Black Flame in the Barren Steppe: Epic LitRPG (Realm of Arkon, Book 8)

by G. Akella

  Kan knew where I was going. "There's no point to waking the duke. By the time you get through and explain the situation to everyone along the way, it’ll be morning. So we need to head to the temple. I don’t know to stop the morts, but we can decide that when we get there. Creatures from the Underside should, logically, be vulnerable to Light magic, which means they’ll receive a nice warm welcome at the temple. Perhaps Myrt himself will pay a visit."

  "All right, that's what we'll do," I ordered, smacking the table. “We move to the temple and proceed based on what we find there.”

  "Don't forget to yell ‘Fire!' along the way," Bonbon added.

  We all looked at him. "What? Why?" Raena voiced.

  "Do you really think anyone will stick their noses out otherwise?" the bald man asked, turning towards the girl. “But getting them out of their homes will give them a fighting chance.”

  "I really hope we'll just end up milling around the temple like idiots until morning." Masyanya said quietly, sighed, and followed after everyone.

  It happened as we were leaving the inn courtyard. Far ahead, near the East Gate, we heard a deafening roar and felt the ground quake underneath us. Windows and doors rattled in place, and we heard screams from the next street over.

  "Vaessa! Masyanya! Summon the pets!" I barked, shifting into combat form. “We'll cut past the market. Buffs on, here we go!”

  The next blast came from somewhere near the port. The ground shook under us yet again, and the darkness of night gave way to a bright crimson flare in the west. A second mort had come to Venern. In a strange way, I felt relieved. Beasts were attacking the city! Was this the sign I wanted? I didn't know how accurate the vision Kert and I had seen was, but my oath to Sata still bound me. But where could her phylactery be? There was a Temple of Sata in the city, so it could be there. But Venern was no castle, despite its citadel, and there were two beasts attacking, not one. Also, I didn't see any red towers, so the time to fulfill my oath hadn't come just yet.

  A squad of armored soldiers ran past us, towards the gate. Bright magic lights flared up atop of the guard towers. The doorman charged out of the inn behind us, hands on his head as he gazed in awe at the sky glowing red over the port.

  "Come on, let's go!"

  I checked to make sure everyone was buffed, and clapped a pensive Bonbon on the shoulder. Holding my sheath, I ran after the soldiers around the next bend in the road.

  We reached the turn, then the wide street running past the city park that led to the market. The temple was much closer to the East Gate then it was to here, and I doubted the mort would bother taking the streets. But why were the Fallen Ones assaulting the city from multiple directions? Was I missing something?

  Some drunk man at the crossing stammered and watched us fly by, and ahead we heard the clashing of iron, screams of terror, and a low hollow growl. The townsfolk began to pour out onto the street, terrified at the roar. Alarm bells began ringing in the citadel, and then in several different places in the city, and the clamor rippled through the streets of the awakening Venern.

  "Get your children and run for the North Gate if you want to live!" Bonbon cried from behind me, over and over again, to the citizens peeking out of their homes. “Death is coming from the East. Run from the port!”

  The people parted as we rushed by, watching us in shock and shouting something we couldn't parse. We reached the park quickly, and as I passed the final house, I threw up my hand and ordered the rest to stop. The park was like a scene from a low-budget horror film. From beneath the trees, several dozen soldiers and civilians moseyed towards us, swaying strangely as they walked. The bars above their heads were red, but their names, levels, and HP were all hidden. Their faces were distorted, and their eyes glowed with a demonic yellow light.

  "Wow! I've never even heard of anything like this before!" Donut yelled in my ear, over the ringing of the alarm bell. “Some kind of zombies, but I’m not sure they qualify as undead."

  I looked around the park again and saw a soldier trying to skewer someone with an invisible spear. Only by peering more closely could I discern a clot of black before him—an amoeba-like shape with two small yellow eyes. It was about seven feet in diameter and sported short tentacles. But there was no HP bar over the creature. It wasn't hidden, like the bars of the soldiers marching towards us. The bar was missing entirely!

  "The hell is going on with that thing's HP bar?" Donut gasped into the channel after following my gaze. “That can’t be. It’s not possible.”

  The amoeba ignored the spear poking at it and rushed the soldier, wrapped him with its tentacles, and easily tackled him to the ground. The HP bar of the level 230 guard drained in an instant, and dozens of yellow lights coursed through the body of the creature on top of him. After a few moments, the amoeba broke away and lost interest in the corpse. It hung in the air then, barely moving its tentacles. The corpse, however, moved more than it was supposed to. Rising from the ground, it picked up a spear and shambled towards us.

  These are the transformed, dar," Raena remarked, nodding at the zombies. "I never knew where they came from. Now I do. I don't know what that beast is, or how we can defeat it, but there’s nothing we can do to help these people now.”

  "That is a particle of the essence of a Fallen One. Some higher beings are capable of creating them by the thousands." Vaessa, as usual, was in the know. “Ordinary weapons are worthless against them. And I'm not sure about magic.” She looked at me, awaiting my orders.

  A piece of a god... I looked at the abomination. Do the Ancients also have some kind of transformed among them? Vaessa said there might be thousands of these creatures here. How could we hope to take a mort if we couldn't kill one of these little guys?

  "Take them all out and we'll break through to the market!" I commanded as I unsheathed Ruination. “I’ll try this bastard on for size right now. Here we go!”

  Jump! The zombie lunged forward with the spear with remarkable deftness, but I had time to get my shield up. One half-step forward and to the right. My blade entered the spearman's chest, and the impact of the blow knocked him to the ground. Three of the transformed threw themselves at me, but my friends were already in action. Two fell slain by Ice Shower, and Kan Charged into the third. I finished off the supine spearman and stabbed immediately at the inky stain that appeared in front of me. I had time to notice that its eyes were triangular.

  Everything around seemed to freeze. An intolerable squeal coursed through my brain as the amoeba froze in the air, then disintegrated into shreds of black fog which Ruination promptly sucked up. Fatality, bitch!

  "The hell was that?" Donut swore. “Took out ten percent HP in an instant, and its range is insane!”

  The tone of the roar shifted into something like the squeal of a pig blown up to the size of a mammoth. Perhaps the mort had felt the death of the amoeba. But the thing had died like any ordinary mob. We could take them, especially since we wielded epic weapons in our hands, not "ordinary steel."

  "Come on, quick!" Kan turned and pointed beyond the trees, where we could see the fence surrounding the market. “There's a battle raging over there. I hear them shouting commands!”

  George charged past me, spreading his wings wide and rocking as he went. The dragon skull-smashed a zombie running toward me, then slowed his pace to seek out his next victim. The zombie had no loot to speak of, same as the slain spearman. Not that we cared for loot at the moment. Seeing nothing else of interest in the area, I ran towards the market, with Vaessa lagging behind me. I had no idea how the knight-commander could discern orders being shouted in the incomprehensible roar up ahead, compounded by the ringing of the bell and the terrible screams, but I had no reason to distrust him.

  We cleared out the park as we continued. Reece and Raena would blast the mobs running at us from a distance, the dragons would clean up any survivors, leaving the melee fighters with very little to do. Once at the fence, Kan cut through another amoeba, reached the corner, and threw
up his hand in a warning.

  "Another perplexing scene," he announced in the channel, “but you'd better pick up the pace.”

  Half a minute later, we were all watching. A few dozen stump-like things were moving slowly along the small square between the city market and the temple. They looked similar to the walking tree stumps from children's films, only these were like crosses between trees and octopuses. Coal-black in color, without an HP bar and without anything resembling a head. The creatures rocked their gnarled limbs slowly back and forth, like living splotches of gloom when illuminated by the bright light of street lanterns.

  Ten level 250 crossbowmen stood at the square exit, blocking off the road leading to the temple. Behind them stood twenty spearmen from the city guard in tight formation, ready to charge the monsters after the crossbows let loose. A woman sobbed on the edge of the road, covering her face with her hands. Even a healthy fighter risked a heart attack at the terrifying sight, let alone the common folk.

  Half a second later, the knight-commander waved his arm, and a dozen crossbow bolts hit the advancing monsters. The volley did no serious damage—the bolts simply vanished into the blackness, and the creatures quickened their pace. At the sight of this, the soldiers quietly bagged their crossbows, drew their swords, and parted to flank the spearmen on both sides. The mobs were about fifty yards away from them, so we had to move quickly.

  "Are those particles of the Fallen One, too?" I asked Vaessa, gesturing at the stumps. “Or are they something else?”

  "You really think I know the answer to that, dar?" the demoness replied in surprise. “I only learned of morts a month ago. But come on, let's see how tough they are.”

  She nudged me aside, took one pace forward, and thrust out her father's dagger. The dragons stopped next to their mistress, then Lola arched her neck and let out a stream of flame at the freaks. Dragon flame, as it turned out, was stronger than the darkness, tearing the mobs apart like a gust of wind ripping through a lowland fog. The lone surviving stump turned toward us, but two Ice Spears swiftly finished it off. The roar ahead of us went quiet for a moment, and we heard the soldiers cheer from across the square.

  "Remind me to cancel my plans to ask Lola to cook my dinner meat for me," Bonbon complained into the channel. “Also, so much for the loot...”

  "What would they have anyway?" Donut shouted over the noise, clapping Bonbon on the shoulder. “We kill the mort, you'll get as much loot as you can carry.”

  "Only thing I want right now is a bite," said the bald man, pulling a half-eaten roll from his bag.

  Masyanya shrugged. "Doesn't surprise me. Fine, then—we kill the mort, and we’ll take the loot. You get the body. You know, to eat."

  "Poor Donut," Bonbon rolled his eyes and was about to add something, but I was over the nonsense.

  "Enough chatter, come on! You can talk on the way!"

  Kan nodded at the guards. "We should ask them some questions."

  "Not a bad idea." We circled around George, who was blocking the way, and made a beeline for the commander of the city guard. He was waiting for us.

  The man was a centurion of about twenty-five, maybe thirty. Clad in full mithril armor, he stood just in front of his troops, holding a blue-feathered helmet in his hand. He was the spitting image of the ideal human in this city—a neatly trimmed mustache, short whiskers—but held a boyish look of delight in his eyes despite the horror show the city had become. He had likely never seen demons or dragons before in his life, and to him they were like the superheroes of comic books had been to me back on Earth. I would have been astounded to meet the real Iron Man or Hulk on the street, after all. Of course, as a fourteen-year-old teenage boy, I would have looked right past the Hulk to check out Scarlett Johansson's character.

  "Thank you, earls," the centurion said loudly, keeping his enthusiasm under control. “Your help was just in time. I'm Carlin an Grasse, the captain of the guard here in Venern. Whom do I have the honor of meeting?"

  I nodded and put above my head the title of the Hero of Vaedarr, and quickly introduced my companions. It was a waste of time, I thought, but I owed it to them, and though the soldiers had made no signs of aggression against us, they were still blocking off the road. Only this officer could tell them to let us pass. Still, three demons with titles as heroes of the Erantian capital seemed to conflict with his usual picture of the world, so I asked him a question to free him from his latest round of rumination.

  "What's going on in the Temple of Myrt, captain?"

  I had difficulty communicating in combat form—even in our channel, my voice resembled a threatening grumble more than words—but that actually seemed to help. At the slightest sign of aggression, a coward shrinks, but a warrior steps up to the challenge. And Captain Carlin an Grasse was a warrior.

  "I... I don't know, earl." He shook his head. “When this all began, Countess Abigail an Ghejt took three hundred soldiers to the fork in the road in front of the temple to block the citadel from the east. I was ordered to take the half-century on duty to the second outpost, right off the main road. But on the way, we were attacked by creatures like these ones.” He nodded at the center of the square and turned to the crowd gathered behind the soldiers. His eyes grew dim, and he continued, shouting over the alarms and the roar coming from the temple. “We destroyed them, losing almost twenty troops. Then, as we mopped up the corpses which came back to life, Sergeant Gybe came running from the outpost to tell us that everyone there was dead, and that some kind of massive black creature was moving towards the Temple of Myrt."

  Right. The attack had started less than fifteen minutes ago, and panic in the city was just beginning to flare up. Confused townsfolk were flooding from side streets into the square, armed with whatever happened to be nearby. Many held children in their arms, and all held fear on their faces. Even the dragons standing off to the side did not scare them as much as that roar. Something had to be done for these people—the morts would kill them all, women and children alike. I raised my hand, called for their attention, and magically boosted my voice.

  "Residents of Venern! Your city is under attack by two beasts summoned by the Twice Cursed God! Take your children and flee to the North Gate. The beasts will be gone by morning! Tell everyone you meet along the way to follow you."

  I looked at the quiet crowd, then decided to help any who were confused. I pointed north.

  "That way! Now go, you damned fools!"

  That last bit was probably overdoing it, but it worked. The crowd shuddered and left the square. The spearmen stepped aside to let the commoners by, so the road to the temple was now open.

  "How do you know they'll be gone by morning, earl?" the captain asked, doubt growing on his face.

  "These are morts, the Fallen Gods of the Dark Ocean," I explained as quickly as I could. “We have dealt with them before, and they cannot endure sunlight. You and your people should organize the evacuation of the city. Nothing but death awaits you at the temple, and I doubt the duke would appreciate such a pointless sacrifice.”

  "Then why are you going to the temple?"

  "We have what we need to hurt the beast. Farewell, earl—we're in a hurry!" I clapped him on the shoulder and followed the others down the road leading to the temple.

  I was lying to the captain, of course. We didn't have anything we were sure could "hurt the beast," and I knew perfectly well that I was leading my people to the slaughter. They also knew it. At the start of our conversation back at the inn, I had emphasized that none of them needed to come with me, even though I believed all of them would. I was not about to argue either way. Everyone had their own war to win here, their own game to play. Silence of the Great Darkness wouldn't work on a mort, and it was possible that the eight of us could do little more than scratch it. My trump card, Ahriman’s scroll, was something I didn’t want to use. And wouldn’t use, since it wouldn’t help us. The paladins, monks, and garrison soldiers would be useless in this situation. The entire army of the Daar
Duchy was powerless against a level 710 monster, let alone a pair of them attacking at once. All that aside, I wasn't being a blind idiot, at least not entirely. For me, the luck my comrades so often hoped for had a name: the System. I didn't know how it would happen, but I believed that it would. Otherwise, this whole battle with Vill was nothing but an exercise in unfair and foolish futility. Of course, if I was wrong, I would die, and no one could forbid me from doing that. I didn’t give a damn that my death would be final, for I would die victorious in the eyes of those who counted on me.

  A hundred yards from our goal, we slowed our pace to a walk—better to conserve our vigor before entering any battle. The left side of the road was lined with three-story mansions belonging to the local nobility. Their tall, intricate fences blocked our view, but it was clear that the mort was already inside the temple complex. The roar was unimaginably stentorian. Based on the other sounds, I realized the creature was systematically destroying buildings, and I hoped the bronze statue of Myrt would not be so easy to topple. A cold, evil whisper stabbed at my mind with every step, on top of the roar, the crackling, and the sounds of falling stones. The whisper was a dozen voices babbling incoherently, trying to pull the mind into an abyss of insanity. Only the sounds of the alarm bells cut through and defeated the attempt. Corpses lay ahead on the road, fifteen or so city guards. Their weapons were nowhere to be seen. Most likely these were the outpost guards the captain had mentioned. But there would be time to mourn and bury them later. Along with many others.

  "Son of a bitch! It's like we walked into a crypt and they pumped all the air out!" Donut swore, distracting me from my less-than-pleasant thoughts. The rogue shook his head and turned to his girlfriend. “How are you holding up?”

  "Much better than you, apparently," Masyanya grumbled nervously into the channel. “You yourself said a few points for mental resistance wouldn't hurt. It’s no picnic, but it’s tolerable.”

  "I wonder if those bells can help with a hangover," Bonbon interjected. “If so, maybe the powers that be will sell me some.”