The stench of rotten corpses and death assaulted his nostrils as he took a deep breath. He wished he wasn’t used to the smell but he was. It had been sixteen days of nonstop battle but the Messengers kept pouring into the valley from the portal in the distance. Mountains of Messenger corpses dotted the landscape in a gory display. And scavengers were already picking them apart.

Rations were down and the Messengers knew this. Sacred artists didn’t eat much, but they still needed sustenance from time to time, and for many of the Sprouts trapped in this valley, that time had come. They were beginning to starve.

Jerome eyed the portal, a gigantic, roiling cloud with a void in its center, hovering in the air and facing the ground. It was over ten thousand feet in the air and thousands of Messengers materialized on the ground beneath it every five minutes or so. It was like the Messengers they killed were being reborn. Destroying the portal was impossible right now as the Messengers were guarding it with everything they could throw at them, which was their elite Messengers. For some reason, Judges were missing from the action.

He had a plan though, but he needed Charybdis to consume as much void beads and ascended essence as possible.

“Jerome, are you sure about this?” Selene’s voice reached him through his ring.

“Absolutely,” he replied. “There’s only one person who would understand that the message is coming from me. Even if others could read it, it’ll make no sense to them.”

“If you say so,” she replied as a gigantic boulder crashed into some Messengers killing them on impact. “We are wondering though. If we send this… what do I call it, a bird?”

“Call it its given name, Selene, the ‘Mobile Comms unit’, or comms for short. Come on, go ahead.”

He heard her grumble on the other side of the line as he shot down some more Messengers with his ‘rapid fire rifle’ as Sheela calls it, or RFs for short. Jerome smiled at the memory of her christening the one he had given to her — the Silent Death, a sniping rifle that could take out targets from over point six-six-two miles away. Everyone in his team was wielding one now, except for Nyx.

The dragoness already had an issue with wearing shoes, using a weapon was a no-no for her. She preferred her black flames — well, she used her computational ring from time to time.

“The comms is shaped in the form of a bird so it can take flight and avoid danger. Send it to Alvion with the encrypted message—”

“The encrypted message you wrote on a piece of Messenger skin.”

“There was no paper,” he pointed out. “That’s called improvising.”

“And I think it’s very creative of you,” Lang’s voice reached him from the comms. “However, it wouldn’t be expedient for us if we just send this…”

“Come on now, ‘comms’. It’s easy.”

“Comms… there,” Lang said uncomfortably. “It wouldn’t be expedient for us to send it away and not be able to reach you.”

“Has Sheela not delivered the second one?”

“There’s a second one?” Selene asked. “Why didn’t anyone tell me about it?”

“I just finished it this morning.” Jerome gunned down more Messengers. “She was tasked with delivering it to you.”

“Wait a moment, is this it? The ‘thing’ that’s shaped like a box?” Lang asked.

“That’s a strange looking box,” Selene said. “Is it also mobile?”

“No,” Jerome responded.

“And you’re sure the Messengers can’t listen in on what we say through these…” Lang said.

“Comms units,” Jerome said. He was getting a little frustrated with their back and forth. “Comms is short for communications, I’ve mentioned this a thousand times already.”

Lang sighed. “And each time I feel like I’m in a naming convention.”

“A naming convention, what’s that?”

“Of course, you wouldn’t know what a naming convention is,” Selene scoffed. “Just so you know, only eight-year-olds ask that question.”

“Sometimes, Jerome, I think you’re the smartest dumbest person I’ve ever had the opportunity, albeit the misfortune of meeting,” Lang said with another sigh.

“That hurt, both of you.”

“Deal with it,” Selene said. “We’re allowed to complain to our hearts content.”

“Now you sound like an old grandma who’s tired of her children.”

Selene sputtered at those words to which he chuckled, enjoying her momentary shock. But a beam of light rushed towards him the next moment, causing him to swerve mid flight. The Elite Messengers were finally joining the fight again.

“If I notice observational waves, I’ll notify you. Gotta go.” Jerome cut the flow of essence from his ring, cutting the call. He shot forward, intent on catching the Elite who shot at him off guard.

“Don’t, Jerome,” Nyx called out. “It’s a trap. They’re trying to lure you in.”

He stopped abruptly, pushing clouds away with the force of his speed. “That’s one heck of a trap. They shot that thing from over a mile away. Last I checked, only Judges can shoot that far.”

“That’s not a Judge,” Nyx said. “It’s a machine of sorts. I saw them wheel them out of their portal.”

She was quite a ways away from him, he couldn’t even see her with so many clouds and six thousand feet in the air. Yet she was looking out for him.

“Huh! No wonder the beam was as thick as a tree trunk. Wait, them?”

More golden beams tore through the sky toward him. Jerome swerved and began to climb higher but the beams rose in their angles to hit him. Charybdis materialized in his hand and with a thought, he sent it shooting towards the sources of the blast — not to destroy them but to consume as much ascended energy as possible.

“Jerome, why are you gaining altitude?” Nyx asked. “Be careful up there.”

He chuckled. “This is nothing. I can reach ten thousand feet if I want to.”

He stopped at seven thousand five hundred feet, looking down at the earth. “It sure is peaceful up here. No pollution whatsoever.”

But seeing the ‘machines’ Nyx talked about gave him pause. “Achilleia, those are—”

“Yes, Xerae, those are cannons. It wouldn’t be long before the church figures out how to make them smaller. And use your inside voice.”

Jerome cursed. This war just kept getting worse. It didn’t matter how much he threw at them, the Church just spun new technology out of thin air.

The cannons were shiny new things on large, heavy carriages. Their barrels were thick with wide bores that could contain a full grown man. But they were unlike the cannons from earth in their internal structure. With his x-ray vision, he was able to identify their structural engineering and function which would have been quite complex for the average Vorthean citizen, but not for him.

Achilleia, are you ready? He asked. This would be the first time he tried this with a physical weapon. He had no idea what might happen to his rifle after passing essence through it like this.

“Oh, I am, Xerae.” Achilleia said excitedly.

Hey, calm down now. I know it’s an awesome development. But I need you to take readings. I don’t want my rifle exploding in my face.

“‘Awesome’ doesn’t begin to describe it, Xerae. It’s an unintended function of residual intent left in your computational ring.”

Computational ring sounds like a mouthful. We should think of a shorter phrase or word.

“Well, have you tried ‘ring’?”

Hey now, no need to be so sarcastic. He chuckled.

“It’s resonance, Xerae. When essence flows through your ring, it generates a unique resonant frequency. This frequency harmonizes with the gems’ crystalline structure, amplifying the density of essence passing through it.”

I know how my computation ring works, Achilleia. I designed it, didn’t I? ‘Computation ring’ sounded better.

“And I taught you what a formation was in the first place, didn’t I? Let me have my fun, Xerae.”

Well, he couldn’t argue with that. Jerome took aim, and took a deep breath. “I embrace your strength, Mother.”

He had discovered that he didn’t need to recite his mantra to wield magic. But he did need to acknowledge Mother Nature, to exalt Her. It sounded like worship, but he’d take that over worshiping some false god who turned their followers into mindless puppets.

“As the essence enters your rifle,” Achilleia continued her monologue. “It couples with the kinetic energy of the projectile, creating a synergy, and transfers the amplified essence to the projectile…”

His ring glowed with a white light that seeped into his rifle. The futuristic looking slab of metal pulsed with energy and a large grid was projected in front of the rifle — a magical grid. Every cannon on the ground shooting at his flying spear was highlighted in the magical grid with glowing red circles.

“The magical grid you see in front of you is a spatial map to help identify threats and predict enemy evasive maneuvers. A function of residual intent left on your ring.”

“Evasive?” He scoffed. “Immobile weapons are only target practice, Achilleia.” Energy built up in his rifle.

“The combined energy creates a localized quantum flux, allowing the projectile to tap into the energetic potential of the denser essence…”

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Jerome chanted a quick cloning spell before taking the shot. With a loud boom, the bullet exited the barrel, white light trailing it. It split into a dozen bullets aiming for the cannons on the ground. The Messengers saw this, aimed their cannons at the incoming bullets, and fired. The bullets swerved, avoiding the golden beams of light shot at them.

“... increasing its velocity and impact force.”

A fusillade of magically empowered bullets struck. Within a second, they obliterated all twelve cannons. The Messengers operating the cannons were caught in the explosion and Charybdis returned back to him.

Huh. Did the cloned bullets look bigger than normal to you, Achilleia?

“They were three times the size of the original bullet, Xerae.”

“Huh, Jerome?” Ms. Tara’s voice reached him through his ring. “Was that you?”

“Yes.” He chuckled. “Something I discovered the day before. Although I’m not sure your rings can do the same thing — well, technically, they should.”

“Can I try?” She asked excitedly.

“Err, you may end up shattering your rifle,” he replied, looking around to see if he could sight her. He didn’t. But he could sense her. “Kinda renders the words ‘no harm in trying’ useless, don’t you think?”

“I’ll try anyway.”

“Make sure to protect yourself before you do,” he said but she had already cut the connection before he finished speaking.

“I’m trying it too!” Csala’s voice came through to him, all excited.

Jerome flew west toward them both. Ms. Tara was already blasting Messengers from four thousand feet in the air. Her hair was raised all around her, glowing with an otherworldly golden glow, the same as her rifle. The bullets shooting out of her rifle grew in size the moment they passed through the magical grid in front of the rifle. Like his, they evaded obstacles — boulders, mountains of corpses, large bolts from ballistic siege weapons — to strike their targets. But there was no cloning spell to multiply them.

“Incredible!” Jerome said in awe.

“I told you ‘awesome’ doesn’t begin to describe it, Xerae!”

The essence-imbued bullets are enchanted on contact with the magical grid, increasing their mass and density, as well as their proportions! This is just… incredible! He thought, smiling to himself. Oh! What I could create using this power!

So this is how computer hackers feel in my old world when they find out they can hack a program. But in my case I’m hacking the WORLD!... and its principles, I guess. What a privilege!

Csala dove low, glowing like a mini sun. She flew pretty close to the ground, her bullets leaving trails of golden light in the air as they found their targets. “Ah! Even if they absorb the essence, the bullets carve through their skulls, killing them on contact. Ah ah ah!” she screamed.

But how do they understand what’s going on with their weapons?

“I’m guiding them to see the world like you do, Xerae; in a mathematical and computational perspective.”

You’re teaching them to see the world as three vectors. Shweet. He chuckled. “I’ve never seen you this enthusiastic before, Csala.”

“Oooh, what about when we play under the sheets?”

Ms. Tara coughed. “We can all hear you both, you know?”

Csala laughed uproariously.

“Ahem.” Jerome felt his ears turn red. Hearing Ms. Tara’s ‘scolding’ after what Csala just said, he felt like he was a kid again, caught doing naughty things. “Achilleia, stop leaving all our channels open, will you?”

“Where’s the fun in that? Shoot, Xerae!”

He shook his head at that. He was wise enough to know that this was a fight he couldn’t win. He began peppering the Messengers with cloned bullets.

~~~

The City of Alva. The War Room.

Seven

“Reporting, Commander!” he saluted.

“Report,” the Commander’s voice rumbled mechanically.

“Our analysts have been able to identify the sources of the strange energy readings in the jungle, Commander. The readings are off the charts.”

Seven presented the documents to him and watched those eerie blue orbs scan them faster than the human eyes. The Commander groaned.

“These tell me too little.”

“Our observation devices were destroyed too quickly for us to get anything substantial, Commander.”

“What’s this one?” the Commander asked. “Am I looking at a reading from a cannon?”

Seven stifled his panic. “That’s… that’s the one that took out our cannons, Commander.”

“You mean this… is a person!?”

Seven felt the weight of his body increase tenfold. He went into full blown panic in an instant. Why does it have to be him who delivered bad news?

“According to the analysts, yes, Commander!” he said in alarm, knees trembling. “They are calling him the ‘Spawn of Madru’.”

“Hrmmgh,” the Commander groaned and the weight on his body lifted. “More like the ‘Demon of Vorthe’. And we’re sure he’s not a Pillar.”

“Affirmative, Commander. He’s Sprout.”

“Very well. I’ll requisition for more cannons — double the amount this time. Continue observing these threats for now.”

Seven saluted and marched out of the war room.

~~~

Boris

“I’m more concerned with the fact that we have a loose mouth among us,” his examiner, Viktor, said for the first time since they were sent here. “Two Judges died while heading toward the Sprouts, that wasn’t a coincidence.”

Boris snarled behind his mask. He didn’t need a supervisor. But the brass didn’t think so. He walked up to the sandtable asking, “You think we have a traitor amongst us? Here? I would know if one of these maggots even thinks to betray the Fatherland.”

“Not here,” the golden-haired star of Svol said, shaking his head with his eyes closed as he enjoyed the ministrations of his maidservants.

“Well…?” Boris asked, expecting an explanation. The bastard gave him none. Even with all that was going on, the golden boy was too calm. As if he held no stakes in their losses.

Viktor was responsible for reporting back to the brass about his failure or success. Boris knew he should be trying to please the cock but he couldn’t help but want to strangle him. Not that he could succeed even if he tried. Elite Judges were far more powerful than normal Judges. And even if he could, Victor was the golden boy of the capital city of Svol. Whatever abyss the brass would put him in would make the nether realm feel like home.

Boris looked away from the coterie of maidservants fussing over the golden boy’s hair and nails. He had other more important things to do than wait for answers from the over-pampered elite.

“If there’s a rat amongst us…” he muttered to himself as he scanned the sandscape that mimicked the southern region of Vorthe, “and he’s not here, then…” His eyes fell on the caravan that had just arrived at the battlefront.

“There…”

~~~

The City of Alvion. The Southern Region of Vorthe.

Rihal

“Remind me again why we didn’t come earlier to Alvion, Crystal?”

“Oh, because a lovestruck teenager wanted to find her lover at all cost, even at the risk of Alvion falling?”

“You don’t have to rub it in!” Ash was red in the face by the time Crystal finished talking. “And Jerome’s still out there, facing Light knows what.”

“Well, the Sage did say he can take care of himself, Ash.” Crystal’s voice was softer now. She sounded like she was trying to console rather than argue.

Rihal turned away from her to face the Messengers trying to gain purchase on the second ring. He was afraid his face would betray him at that moment. He couldn’t bring himself to say anything to her.

The walls of Alvion weren’t the tallest in the empire. But the eight towers around the third ring of the city had no equal in all of Vorthe. Alvion’s walls were built in concentric rings: the outer wall was the first ring which had now fallen. It had protected most of the inhabitants of the city until the southern gate was breached. The city had had to move them all into the second ring which originally housed merchants and goldsmiths. The third and innermost wall, where the towers were built, housed the nobles and elites of the city’s social hierarchy.

The original city was built from a single piece of gargantuan rock — a tremendous achievement in Vorthe — but its structure had evolved over the millenia. The earth-toned colors of the rings remained but the different structures inside the city had changed over time. With fancier buildings and brighter colors to give the walls a cleaner look, the city was looking more like Farryn now. The city’s gates were made from large interlocked stones as well. It had taken the Messengers days to breach it and even then, the southern gate had fixed itself and said Messengers were now locked inside the city with them. If they made it past the second ring, there was a surprise waiting for them. But Vorthe would rather they didn’t.

“There!” Ash shouted, pointing into the distance. “Aim for that section of the walls. If they breach it, our soldiers would be overwhelmed!”

Rihal gave the signal but exchanged a look with Crystal. A red beam of light shot over their heads, covering the distance to the location in an instant.

“How can you see that far?” he asked. “We are over three hundred feet in the air and most likely seven hundred feet away from the second ring. Yet you can still sight a person all the way from here?”

“Can’t you?” she asked, looking sincerely confused.

“We’re Spirit Realm artists, Ash, so we can. You’re not.” Crystal made a face at her.

“Well, I’ve always been able to see quite far.”

“Always?” Rihal asked, raising his hand again to communicate with Vorthe’s Watchers in hand signs.

“Well, not always. I started seeing farther when I became a sacred artist. The distance increased when I turned Blank.”

“That’s…” Rihal looked to his right, sensing someone.

“Message for the captain.” A member of the Nediti appeared out of thin air on one knee beside him.

“Rise,” Rihal commanded. “What’s the message?”

“Well, it’s… there’s a bird?” the boy — and he was a boy; a young Spirit Realm artist probably, which meant he was barely sixty — said as he rose from his kneeling position.

Rihal tilted his head questioningly at him. The boy pointed up at the sky at something circling them.

“It got my attention somehow—”

“And you lead it here?” Crystal asked, threateningly.

The boy took a step back in fear. “No, I was trying to bring it down but couldn’t. And it feels like it led me here.”

“It’s a metal bird,” Rihal said. “It’s shaped like a falcon from the looks of it.”

“That must mean it’s from Jerome!” Ash said.

“No, it might just as well have been sent by Alvric,” Crystal said. “Probably to kill whoever is in command.”

“I’m not in command though, so I guess I’m safe,” Rihal said. Ash punched him in the arm for that but gasped in pain — for all the good that did. He chuckled. “It’s descending.”

The metal falcon landed on the stone parapet in front of him and Rihal noticed the piece of parchment tied to its leg. He reached for it with his mental energy and ripped it off. Crystal caught it before it reached his hand, smirking at him. She opened it to read and squinted her eyes at the words.

“Hmmm. It’s encrypted. But I’m sure I can crack it…” Several moments passed in silence.

Rihal sighed. “If you can’t read it—”

“I’ve got it!” she shouted and began to laugh. She laughed and laughed that Ash had to hold her, to keep her from falling and embarrassing herself.

“Cute,” Rihal muttered. Crystal heard it and stuck her tongue out at him in a playful manner. “Will you read it?”

“Okay, here it is.” She cleared her throat but the mirth in her eyes remained. “‘Baby Walrus to Father Walrus—’”

“What!?” Rihal moved to snatch the parchment out of her hand but she danced away laughing hard again. Ash succeeded though, but only because Crystal let her.

Rihal collected the parchment and scanned its content for a moment. After breaking the encryption, he began reading. “‘Baby Walrus to Father Walrus, Situation Critical. Supplies Depleted. Rations Low, Morale Lower. Requesting Emergency Food and Crystal Stone Supply, Effective Immediately’.” He frowned at the next line. “‘Touch the head of the bird to contact Baby Walrus.’”

Rihal did as instructed and the cool metal underneath his finger glowed with a golden light in the area his finger covered, warming up the metal. Jerome’s voice filtered through the beak of the metal bird the next moment.

“Hey, Rihal.”