Like the hand of Gaos, they burst through the door, spilling out onto an ornate rug lining the entry corridor. Trenton had balled himself together to avoid injury, but it only slightly helped, his body bouncing off of the ground at weird angles, somehow managing to slam into a side wall where he lay for a moment, collecting his senses.
“You good?” Karfice said, leaning over Trenton, offering him a hand which he took graciously.
“I’ll be alright,” Trenton replied.
From the other side of the room Garrote grunted, slowly rising to his feet with his one arm, “Yeah, I’m fine. Thanks for asking. Just leave the cripple to see to his own,” he said, little trickles of blood dotting the ground below him.
“I don’t really know you that well. It felt awkward to ask,” Karfice shrugged.
“Of course. How silly of me,” Garrote rolled his eyes. “We’ll work on it.”
From the other end of the corridor, they heard bangs and shouting as hundreds of salamanders surged towards them, brandishing swords and spells of every variety. It was easily double or triple the number of salamanders they had out in the courtyard, far beyond an overwhelming force. They couldn’t hope to hold out against such a large mass. They’d have to retreat, find a new point of entry. Garrote was already visibly exhausted from his earlier cast, so it wasn’t like they could just fly over them again, especially without the open space of the outdoor environment. Then, just as Trenton moved to grab Garrote and Karfice, a long stream of lighting flashed through the massive hole they had just made in the front wall. In the blink of an eye, Yusadel was in the midst of the hoard, balancing above one of the salamanders with a single hand.
“Chain,” Yusadel said, his single spoken word carrying an unbelievable wealth of power. The salamander Yusadel was holding onto exploded in a spray of lightning bolts, which chained from salamander to salamander, enveloping the whole mass in the scorching flashes of a bright blue brilliance. It was far beyond any cast Trenton had ever seen before, perhaps similar in sheer power to the spell Leo had cast back at the petrichor complex, just more focused, less destructive. One by one they dropped to the ground, no longer burdened with the plague of life.
“Come on! It’s not far!” Yusadel said, waiting for them to catch up to him before they started their way through the palace.
“You took a little while out there,” Trenton noted as they ran. “Wasn’t it supposed to be weaker guards?”
“It was, but it seems they’ve made some renovations. Most of the soldiers weren't anything impressive, but they had a handful of their stronger ones scattered around. They gave me more trouble than I’d antici-” Yusadel said, pausing to dart forward and slice through a stray group of salamanders, spilling their guts without hesitation, “-pated. It should be fine, but we might run into the king's personal guard sooner than I thought. If I have to leave you alone for any reason, just do your best to go upwards. The kings ‘chamber’ is at the very top of the palace, a big open pavilion where all the nobles party.”
“That sounds pretty easy,” Garrote said as they bounded up a staircase. “This whole place doesn’t seem that well guarded, honestly,” Garrote held out his hand without even bothering to look, blasting a random salamander waiting at the top of stairs into one of the side walls, crushing its body instantly.
“It’s probably because of the party,” Karfice said, raising a massive ice wall to block off a small army of salamander’s attempting to make their way into the main path via a sideroom. “They seem a little disorganized. They’re fighting like a horde of insects rather than soldiers, no strategy, just numbers and strength.”
“Focus,” Trenton said, swinging his hammer over his head in a sideways arc to catch a salamander dropping from the ceiling. Its body slammed into Karfice’s ice wall, landing with a satisfying crunch.
“You’re right, it does feel a little easy. Keep your guard up. It’s just a little further now. Follow close,” Yusadel said, bursting through a massive steel door which hung slightly open in front of them.
But just as he entered the room, he stopped, Trenton, Garrote, and Karfice piling up behind him. The room wasn’t anything special, a sizable space decorated with marble statues and paintings. But sitting at the other end, guarding what looked to be the final staircase, was a white salamander clad in fancy regalia, his presence pressing against them with vile intent.
“Are you done with your little temper tantrum?” the lizard called out, its voice deep and smooth, his tone relaxed–bored.
“Kaverus,” Yusadel said, his face teeming with a rage unbeknownst to them.
“Do I know you?” Kaverus said, scrunching my face.
“11 years ago you took everything from me, killed everyone I knew like they were animals”
“11 years ago…” Kaverus seemed to think about it. “That’s right. I remember now. You were that little boy that broke in with those miscreants so long ago. Like they were animals…well, weren't they? Nothing more than insects crawling where they didn’t belong. I will say, though, to their credit, their corpses made wonderful decorations. I remember we took their heads off before we burned the bodies, hung them up in his holiness's private quarters. They’re still there, even. Wonderful what chronurgy is capable of. Do you want to see them? They’ve still got that last look of agony they had when I first gutted them, their pain immortalized forever.”
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
“I’m going to kill you.”
Karfice pulled Garrote and Trenton back as the two of them burst towards each other, their blades clashing in a wild flurry, neither seeming to have an upper hand one way or another. On one hand, Yusadel’s lighting arced all around them, making the whole battlefield a landmine for his opponent. On the other hand, the salamander wasn’t even using magic, relying only on his presence and sword skill. If he was holding back, it wasn’t safe to say Yusadel could win.
“This way,” Karfice said, pulling Trenton and Garrote around the fray, making towards the staircase.
“Did you think I’d forgotten about you?” Kaverus said, suddenly appearing before them, his blade poised to strike. But Yusadel was just one step quicker. At the same time that Kaverus moved, so too did Yusadel, his radiant body gleaming next to them, his eyes alight with furry.
“Not this time,” Yusadel spat out, slamming his foot into Kaverus’s stomach, sending him flying through the wall of the building, Yusadel disappearing after him.
“That takes care of that,” Karfice said, removing his hand from his left breast.
“Just a little further,” Trenton said, grabbing Karfice and Garrote, his mind raging anew with the thought of the salamander emperor so close.
He dragged the both of them up the stairs, Garrote trying to keep himself from hitting the ground, and Karfice letting himself be dragged freely. It was a long and ominous staircase, spare torches lining the walls their only source of light, but it didn’t matter. Trenton didn’t need to see. He knew intuitively exactly where he needed to go, his steps sure and heavy.
Trenton smashed through the final door at the top of the landing, his body overflowing with secular strength. He dropped Karfice and Garrote, his eyes adjusting to the sudden wave of light washing over them. Just as Yusadel had described, the entire top area was one massive, ornate pavilion dotted with pillars. All around them, Salamander’s dressed in fancy robes froze, their celebrations halted by the sudden intruders barling through, servants holding platters screaming for their life, the live band stopping the music entirely.. At the far end, Trenton could see a massive black salamander easily 10 feet tall sitting on a plush bed being attended to by dozens of servants, Blithe seated just next to him wreathed in jewels and gold. Blithe, at the very least, looked to be in good spirits, about as blithesome as ever. But what Trenton specifically focused on was Millie.
In the center of the gathering, Millie was cowering in a pool of own blood, her whole body ravaged with dozens of lashes, her wails easily heard over the bustle of the remaining salamanders scrambling to get away. Next to her, a salamander stood holding a whip, cracking it against Millie’s back just as they entered. Millie screamed in pain. She tried to crawl away from the man, but a chain attached to her foot stopped her, the salamander raising the whip again in response.
“PLEASE! I CAN’T! I’M SORRY!” Millie cried out, the salamander holding the whip not caring in the slightest.
In normal circumstances, Trenton held himself together pretty well, knowing better than to let himself go, knowing better than to let himself rage. He couldn’t let it happen again, he couldn’t do it again. He would sooner die than let himself lose control again, or so he told himself. Now, however, faced with the sins of the world laid bare, he no longer cared. Just like so long ago, he succumbed to his own will, the throbbing pain of his wounded shoulder simply disappearing. He could feel it, the intoxicating power coursing through his body, the promise in the back of his mind that everything would be alright if he just let go. There was only one thought that still broke through the fog, one thought that trumped all others.
Kill
The whole palace was made of stone to use, but it wasn’t nearly enough. He needed more, rock sourced from the foundations of the ground as far down as he could reach. Trenton didn’t even need to issue the command, didn't bother, because it understood exactly what he wanted, what he needed. In this moment, the very earth itself yielded to Trenton’s desire, bending to his will as if it were no more than a leaf in a mighty hurricane. It didn’t matter how far from him it was, how impossible it would be for his magic to reach it. It would yield to him. He demanded it.
-Zenith Cast: Spear of Gasal-
Just as the salamander lifted the whip back above its head to strike Millie again, the palace began to shake, everyone but Trenton thrown violently to the ground. Many miles below them, the earth churned, one colossal pillar of stone easily thousands of feet wide tunneling through the entire temple bottom to top–a pillar of stone which pierced the very heavens themselves. In an instant, the right half of the temple simply disappeared, replaced instead by a wall of sheer stone rising another mile into the sky every single second. The salamander holding the whip didn’t even exist anymore, his body obliterated so utterly on impact that no traces remained that he had ever even existed in the first place. To everyone remaining it felt as if the world was ending, the explosive sound emanating from the pillar instantly bursting everyone’s eardrums.
Calmly, as the world continued to tremble, Trenton walked forward towards the emperor, his eyes gleaming with a dazzling yellow light, his skin covered in green and brown tattoos. But as he continued forward, the tattoos didn’t remain stable as they had before, back when they’d fought the adiathan. The tattoos shifted position and color, cycling from their base state to thick gray lines, then to decorative black stripes which seemed to gouge channels into his flesh, his eyes shining brighter and brighter by the second. Then, when his body could carve channels no further, his skin began to crack and blister, revealing a radiant mix of red and orange just beneath his skin, power in physical form which literally pooled out of his body and into the black channels. Trenton wasn’t simply losing control, he was giving it up, succumbing to the unyielding storm within his own body.
Suddenly, in the last moment’s of his consciousness, when the Gasallian spear had just finished moving, Trenton saw Leo wrapped around him, tears streaming from his eyes. It didn’t make sense. Why was he there? Everything was under control. Treton was handling it. It didn’t make sense. Trenton tried desperately to refocus on the world around him, to see what was really happening, but he couldn’t, his panic losing to something not quite himself.
“I PROMISED HIM! I PROMISED WALIBELD YOU WOULDN’T! EVEN IF IT COST MY LIFE! I CAN’T LET YOU! NOT AGAIN!” Leo screamed, his body radiating with a power Trenton had never felt from him before. “WITH EVERYTHING I HAVE LEFT, MIND, BODY, AND SOUL!”
-Zenith Cast: Inferno-