Chapter 124

Edda raised her sword, realized it wasn't necessary, then lowered it slowly. What could she do in a battlefield between Gods and men? Probably be grateful that she was close to a God's champion who was on her side. The Legions of Binoria ignored her, they couldn't even take into account the woman walking with trembling strides over torn corpses in the wake of a naked maniac who was ripping their Legions apart. Here she strode over a dismembered vambraced arm, still attached to a chunk of armored shoulder. How did he even tear this off? There lay a head lacking a nose and eyes, tongue absently lapping beneath the hole where a fist had been driven through to the back of the skull, the tongue giving its last jerks of movement to mimic life before settling fully into the role of a corpse. There a Legionnaire dragged himself away, seeking to escape the realm and drop into oblivion, behind him trailed his intestines and a look of bewilderment on his face no doubt spoke of his surprise as to where his legs were.

Luminous magenta bathed Rehny's skin as he worked his way deeper into the Legion ranks towards where Vayin Vigon was. His pink hair danced upon his head and his muscles rippled beneath smooth skin with every movement. His movement was poetry in motion, everything felt right from the placing of his naked foot to the lifting of an arm. He is dancing. Edda concluded. She watched him duck low, avoiding a blade to the head and grab at the attacking Legionnaire’s leg. Rehny swung the man around and used him as a battering ram to fend of the encroaching Binorians. The man wailed helplessly as his body was used as a weapon, bludgeoning his fellow Legionnaires, he was spun around and around and brought down upon swords, shields and bodies alike. After a while his screams died out as unconsciousness (or death) delivered its loving embrace, a safe haven from the reality that all that he was had been reduced to a mere literal weapon in the hands of a God's champion.

A God's champion? Edda wondered at that. Vayin Vigon was Meena's champion yet he'd never displayed such abilities in the field of battle. Any cut or scrape Rehny received was immediately healed by the purple-pink flame bathing his body and his momentum seemed to increase with every life he took. That strength! She watched as Rehny flung the man's shattered and limp body into a wall of Legionnaires, bringing twelve of them down. He stretched out his hands and beckoned for the Binorians to advance on him once more and Edda stole a glance at his butt as she neared where he stood in a ring of corpses. If Rehny is a God's champion then which God is it?

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I feel it all. Rehny could see the purple ropes, tied to all their legs. Some on the right leg, others on the left. He could see the pulsating pink light traveling the length of the purple ropes and with each death the rope cut itself free of the dead and the pink light travelling the length of the cut rope spilled out only to rise towards him and bath his body in a magenta flame. Unimaginable power coursed through his veins with every fell Legionnaire... And so did pain.

Endless, depthless pain. The pain of loss, a pain he was all too familiar with. Somewhere out there the cut rope was still connected to someone else and that person still fed it their love without knowing their beloved was no more. But though their minds did not know, their souls definitely did and with each spill of the pink light Rehny tasted the anguish of a severed soul. He wanted to scream, to curl into a ball upon the killing field and weep for the question of love and its lack of an answer. The emotional pain was too much, though he fed on it he could not bring himself to revel in it. But he couldn't afford to walk away, Vayin took his life and brought this burden upon him. He had to take his life in return and to do so, he needed to feed on love so as to be strong enough to face him.

He watched as the Legions between him and Vayin Vigon regrouped, he gave them the time to do so, his magenta eyes surveying the look of horror on their faces. He was naked and bathed in blood, he faintly remembered slapping a man's head off and that had resulted in a shower of blood and a memory of a woman called Jesna whose pain of loss now traveled the length of his body in a pink light as her lover's blood paints his chest. He beckoned towards the Legions, begging them to advance so he could get this over with.

What has become of me? He wondered as he watched a trembling Legionnaire approach with a sword that shook in his grip.

You have been Goddess kissed. Answered a sweet voice in his mind, a voice he'd heard once before as he lounged at the gates of death.

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The pain, Rehny thought. Can you stop it? It was taking all his strength not to crumple under the weight of anguish. He was aware of the tears trickling down his cheeks.

You gave me love, Rehny, and I am love. You gave all that I am to me and so I exist purely because of you and because Love cannot die, thus was your life returned to you. We are one and with time you shall learn how to bear the pain.

"That's bullshit." Rehny said out loud and the Legionnaire approaching jumped back. "I didn't want this! You could have just left me dead, away from all this but noooo. Now I have to come back and suffer a thousand fold what I suffered in my previous life! What kind of justice is this? And once I kill Vayin Vigon for that meager satisfaction? What then for me? An eternity upon the realm just suffering?" All around him the scared looks morphed into quizzical ones.

You cannot kill Meena's champion.

"WHAT?" Rehny screamed.

I know her, she wages a war indirectly against me. Kill her champion and that war will be direct, many will suffer and your anguish will be ten fold.

Rehny threw up his arms. "What am I doing here then?"

"Rehny?" He felt a hand upon his back that was quickly withdrawn. He turned to face Edda, wide eyed and scared. "You're talking to yourself."

Rehny saw her bite her lower lip under his glare before shyly looking away. He wondered at that but more at what he was to do regarding Vayin Vigon. What do I do?

The Legions started advancing once more, taking his voiced one sided dialogue as cue to attack the insane naked man. Rehny brought himself before Edda and balled his fingers into fists. What do I do...Nyawe?

The Kolotian, the champion of chaos. He is tethered with shared love, reach out and feed it with our touch, deliver healing and... Madness.

"What?" Rehny asked aloud.

Wake him with pain.

A Legionnaire neared but before he lunged Rehny grabbed the man's neck and slammed his head into his helm. Shattering it and the skull beneath. Rehny took the sword from the man's dying grip and flung the body aside as if it were a rug. He grabbed the hilt with both hands and raised it in a Form of Rage. "Clear off my path, my rage is for your King not you." The Legionnaires before him employed a Form of Grind, a challenge to Rage. "Fools." Rehny declared and charged.

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Vayin Vigon grabbed the half spear running through his arm and yanked it out, he flexed his fingers and found them all functional. The Jojoh Meena already rushed to heal the wound, it had been long since he'd needed to channel the blessing of the Goddess and use it for healing. He observed the direction the spears kept coming from and then turned his gaze to the distance where someone's head flew into the air, arcing blood. Screams came from that side where a magenta glow was apparent, and blood rose into the air as if in a dance to compliment the screams. Another Champion was approaching. He turned his eyes to the Kolotian, lying immobile with a broken arm and shattered knee. An easy kill if that damn Champion of Nielda would let him get close enough.

"Goddess, who approaches?" Vayin Vigon asked. Silence answered him. He frowned and scratched at the back of his head. "You abandon me at this time?" His tone was accusatory. "What will the realm think of you if I meet my end upon this battlefield?"

I'm thinking, Selarch darling.

"About what?" Vayin asked. He was aware of the Legionnaires around him uneasily shifting their weight from foot to foot as the magenta glow neared and the screams heightened. Now a Legionnaire split in half sailed through the air.

If you die here by Nyawe's hand we'll just use Leba for vengeance. But yes, that vengeance will be justified, the war I truly seek, the other Gods won't interfere, it would be my right.

"But your image-"

Imagine the image I shall have once you, through Leba, avenge your death! Binoria would renew their worship with even greater vigor! Ovek darling this plan is simply sublime!

"I AM NOT OVEK!" Vayin shouted just as four Legionnaires dropped to the ground as Rehny appeared naked and bathed in blood into the clearing around Vayin Vigon and Ishar. The fourth Legionnaire had a sword plunged into his mouth and Rehny walked passed him with a woman trailing in his wake. The Legionnaires behind the duo were hesitant to engage Rehny even though he had his back to them.

"We were all of us barbarians upon the realm once, do you remember Meena?" Vayin whispered as he watched Rehny approach. "That day I killed ten men on my own, men who worshipped savagery just as my people did. When the chief took me before the clan to declare me a hero of savages you remember how I drove that dagger into his heart and declared myself the hero of order?" I remember.

"Do you remember coming into my tent that night? Naked with blessing. The first time I saw you, saw a Goddess."

I remember.

"What did you promise as I danced for you beneath the moon?"

Meena didn't answer and Vayin watched as Rehny came to a stop next to Ishar's body.