Chapter 15 Jinx
“Hand over the adventurers, the wagons, and any weapons you have on you! Do that and we’ll let you all walk to town!” A large man with a commanding voice bellowed out over the parked wagon train. “You have until the count of ten!”
“Because that is all the higher you can count, yes, we know.” A living silhouette purred as its cloak seemed to billow perpendicular to the direction of the wind. He had appeared within a blink evenly spaced between the wagon train and the thieves. It was a simple mugging, nothing less, the only part that was more was the fact that there were nineteen muggers.
“What are you?” One of the many men arrayed against the caravan spoke aloud. It was not the leader but a smaller and more lanky man that was missing a few of his teeth.
“I am the Lord of all that is Dark.” The standing shadow purred. Steam was wafting off of him as he seemed to be cooking off in the direct sunlight. “I was resting. Using this caravan to take me from my home to my neighbor. You have disturbed me.”
“You don’t scare me.” The large man in the middle declared.
One of the women behind him tripped as she tried to back away. “He should.” A deep feminine voice warned him as a knight in full plate sauntered out in front of the caravan holding a pure black parasole. “He likes examples.”
“Futility, ignorance, incompetents, arrogance, weakness, haplessness, and finally, an example of what not to do when a demigod stands before you.” Isaac purred.
“It’s just an illusionist and a warrior, kill them and we can move on.” The large man declared and raised his sword that was at least as tall as Isaac.
He had barely taken a step when the female knight’s voice rang out: “Open gate to torment and fury.” She spoke the words calmly but with her chest so her voice carried out across the invaders and the caravan alike. With a gesture an endless torrent of flames made a wall nearly a dozen feet high and twice as long from her left side the entire way to the end of the caravan. “Now bow.” She ordered them.
“Kelsy! What level is that bitch?!” The lanky man screamed at the fallen woman a few feet from him.
“I-I-I-I don’t know! All I’m seeing is my own level?!” The woman yelled back.
“Wait, ‘s those platinum tags?” One of the other bandits questioned as he noticed Lenna’s double platinum tags that were dangling from her neck for all to see. “Oh we are so fucked.” He swore. “Scatter!”
“Huh, bandits with self preservation.” Isaac commented. “Shamesh,” He spoke and stepped to the side. As he did so, a figure of bones dressed in elegant butler’s attire stepped away in the opposite direction and bowed towards him. “Do not let any escape, but we need at least one of them alive.”
“As you command, my Lord.” Shamesh spoke and rose back to his full height. “Should I keep the mess to a minimum?”
“Yes.” Isaac confirmed.
“Understood, my Lord.” Shamesh replied. By that point many of the bandits were barely visible in their retreat. Even the largest among them had immediately bolted. There were only two remaining. The woman that had fallen and another that seemed to be frozen in place. The stationary bandit had realized that everyone was faster than him and that if he ran he would be the first one to be captured. He most likely expected to be able to escape at a later time and was simply accepting his capture as a temporary endeavor. “You may Die.” Shamesh spoke towards the bandit the farthest away. “You may Die as well.” He continued before the first one had even hit the ground. “Die.” He ordered the next one as the first one’s lifeless body hit the ground. “Die. Die. Die.” By the time he had thinned out nearly a third of the fleeing bandits, the rest had taken cover behind trees, as if that could save them.
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“What the fuck, Richard!” One of the surviving bandits. “I thought you said it was an easy caravan to hit!”
“It looked like it!” One of them yelled back. “How was I supposed to know they were being protected by a demo-” His voice was cut off as Isaac appeared with his hand already through the man’s throat. A moment later, black dust and ash drifted away on the slight breeze as the man’s equipment crumpled to the ground.
“I told you. I am a demigod. I am no demon. Though, if one wants to try, and take my title, as the Lord of all that is Dark, they are more than welcome to try.” Isaac purred, his true form was almost completely revealed. Death flames were pouring off of him and his dragonscale armor only served to add ripples to the dripping fire.
“Richard!” One of the bandits called out. Another bandit shot a bolt from a crossbow directly at Isaac’s head. It passed through a fading silhouette as he materialized in front of the person that had shot it at him.
“Anyone who stops resisting, will not be killed by me.” Darkness spoke calmly but loud enough for all of them to hear. As he did so, he grabbed the crossbowman by the face and watched as the top half of the man turned to dust with the simple gesture.
“Then what will you do with us?!” A bandit demanded.
“Make you walk to Sapphirestone, then you can be their problem.” Isaac replied calmly.
“They’ll just kill us!” The bandit yelled back. “We didn’t do anything to you! Just let us go!”
“Is that what you have been doing, mortal?” Darkness questioned and slowly turned his gaze to face the man cowering behind a tree from Shamesh.
“Yes?” The man replied with seemingly little faith in his own answer.
Isaac appeared in front of him. “Stupidity will not save you.” Isaac explained calmly in his deep and gravely ‘Lord of Darkness’ voice.
The man swallowed hard. “B-b-but I’m not resisting.” He pleaded.
“Walk back to the caravan, drop your weapons at Hellfire’s feet. All of them.” Darkness instructed the man. “You have twelve seconds. Eleven.”
The man panicked and dove at Isaac with a brandished skinning knife. The knife glanced off of Isaac’s dragonscales without even leaving a mark. The man’s momentum took him directly into Isaac’s chest, face and shoulder first, and he melted away on contact. A pair of legs toppled to the ground at Isaac’s feet. One of their thighs hit Isaac’s boot as it landed and disintegrated the entire way down to the ankle as death refused to be easily sated.
Darkness sighed. “For the rest of you, ten, nine,” He continued his countdown. A few of them ran back towards the caravan while trying their best to strip themselves of their weapons. The rest decided it was time to make a run for it.
“Die. Die. Die.” Shamesh spoke from where Isaac had left him. With how weak the targets were, the word of power barely took any mana out of him compared to what it would take to remove someone like Lenna, Edward, Marie, or Fable. Shamesh had finally almost run out of mana though so he was forced to use a weaker spell on the final two fleeing bandits. “Stars of doom, heed my call.” He spoke and raised both hands. Four marbles of every color imaginable formed above each hand and then shot out towards their intended targets. Each orb found its mark causing the final two fleeing bandits to drop in a heap as tiny chunks of them were removed. Chunks specifically located in their back, right behind their core. In a matter of moments, the entire bandit stick up had been reduced to half a dozen cowed men and women. Men and women that could boast of survival in the face of the Lord of Darkness and his Lady of Hellfire.
Isaac let his power fade as he appeared in his physical shadow’s shadow. He touched Shamesh’s shoulder. “Rest and recharge.” He ordered his retainer. “And while you do, finish off the two you crippled and collect anything on their persons worth at least a gold piece, unless it is coins, grab all of those.” He added quietly and covered Shamesh in shadows so he would vanish from sight.
“Right away, my Lord.” Shamesh replied and began following his orders.
Isaac turned to see utter chaos. Lenna’s fire had left a scorch mark two feet wide down the entire length of the caravan. Three horses and one person had fainted. Five bandits were sitting on their hands in front of Lenna with a pile of small weapons between them. Every wagon driver was trying to either calm or awaken their horses. All of the horses that hadn’t fainted were going absolutely crazy as their senses started to come back to them in pieces. It appeared that Isaac had underestimated the effect the presence his death flames had on the horses. The man that had fainted was just weak but mana sensitive. Isaac walked towards Lenna casually. “Animals spook too easily up here.” He told her as he approached.
“You have been macro and micro dosing the animals in Safeharbor for months. These belong in the light.” Lenna stated as she gazed down at the figures in front of her. In truth, she could hardly see them. She had to squint incredibly hard just to see through the brightness enough to make out that there were five of them. The parasol helped but only marginally. The ground itself was too bright from the direct noontime sunlight.
“I think that went well, all things considered.” Isaac commented.
“Isaac, did you just jinx us?” Lenna questioned calmly.
“No, I def-” Isaac stopped in the middle of a word as a sound rang out across the trees. It was a deep and throaty howling roar. It sounded like a tornado or a pipe organ left out in a windstorm. It was a siren of might, magic, majesty, and mortality. What really caught Isaac’s attention though was not the physical sound but the magical one that he felt tickle his core. He had finally heard it for himself. It appeared that something had answered the call of Isaac’s massive outpouring of mana. He finally had his first Outerworld legendary opponent. It was finally going to be time for a battle of dragons.