TYRAM
When it was over with Tyram couldn't even see the bandit anymore, just a deep gouge in the dirt from where Tyram was standing all the way to somewhere way off in the fields. When there was no movement for a few moments Tyram let himself relax. His arm was painfully numb, pins and needles and deadness, and it prickled in protest as he put his sword away and returned to Andry and Aurina.
“Is she okay?” he asked.
“I'm fine,” Aurina said, sitting up. “And so is Booky.”
“Booky?” Tyram asked, staring up at the heavily armed and armored snail. It had righted itself, and one of the heads was nuzzling Aurina like a loyal horse.
“Well I was going to name him Bucephalus,” Aurina said, “but that's a lot to say, and besides look he's all cute and stuff I had to shorten it to Booky.”
“Yeah,” Andry said. “Great. I know about you and naming the pets, we've been through all that a long time ago. I want to know where he came from!”
“Well obviously he's the snail!” Aurina said. “Well, both of the snails. I tried to tell you before! When Tyram got hit he dropped the snail regalia, and I picked it up, and it started vibrating when I got it near the snail. And then when we were running through the fields we kind of ran into the other snail.”
“You just randomly met up with him?” Andry asked.
“No I mean we crashed,” Aurina corrected him. “And then the regalia kind of flashed, and...”
“I've heard of things like this,” Tyram said. “My sword is sort of similar. Some Regalias can produce sub-regalias. People usually forge them into equipment, but Jarlo must have made a couple of weaker ones and put them in his snails. Then when you crashed, they were already infused with auram and the Snail Regalia...combined them. Sorry that's as detailed as I can get with my guess I'm not an expert in auram mechanics, I just use the things.”
The two knights looked at the enormous two headed snail rubbing both its foreheads lovingly against beautiful village girl.
“I mean it seems happy,” Andry said.
“And we need a ride back into town,” Tyram shrugged.
“We can sort it out later,” Andry said. “Right now we've got to...”
He was cut of by a noise. A series of tamping, clattering footsteps approaching from the direction of the deep gouge Tyram's sword strike had left in the earth. They turned to see Zwiebel stomping towards them.
For once, he had not come out of the attack unscathed. His helmet had a crack across it, and the belly of his armor had a deep, deep gash. Some blood was seeping out of that gash, and his armor wasn't crackling with power anymore, but it did grind every so often as the layered plates tried to spin and caught each other on their bent, broken edges. It was impossible to see an expression in the floating eye discs above the blank onion helmet, but somehow the bandit radiated a cold, unyielding fury.
“THAT!” Zwiebel shrieked across the fields, “HURT!”
“I can't do a strike like that again,” Tyram said. “Not for a while.”
“It's okay,” Andry said. “I've got this now.”
“I HAVEN'T BEEN HURT,” Zwiebel shrieked, “SINCE I GOT THE ONION REGALIA!!!”
Andry stepped into the bandit's path, cracking his knuckles and grinning.
“You are one creepy guy,” Andry said. “I think I'm going to enjoy this.”
“I'LL KILL YOU!!!” Zwiebel shrieked, running at Andry and swinging his mace. The mace still crackled with power but Andry caught it by the handle. He kicked the bandit in the stomach, sending Zwiebel stumbling back without his weapon. Andry tossed the mace aside as Zwiebel let out an inarticulate scream of fury, his hands clutched like claws. He rushed at Andry but the lion warrior ducked under the blows. He grabbed the belly of Zweibel's armor, shoving one fist deep into the fissure in the Onion Regalia's armor.
“W-what are you doing?” Zwiebel asked. “Stop that!”
“Thing about sound is,” Andry said, “if something can keep it out, it's usually pretty good at keeping it in too. And you like to brag about how soundproof your Regalia is, so...”
“No wait!” Zwiebel said desperately. “Wait, we can talk about this we can talk about this weEEEEEE~!”
And then Zwiebel's scream was lost in the deafening roar from Andry's regalia. It exploded into the onion armor and bounced around inside until the Regalia shattered into pieces, dissipating into pure auram and leaving behind nothing the broken body of a pudgy faced bandit with a scraggily, unkempt beard lying lifelessly in a field.
“Sorry,” Andry said. “That was a pretty powerful Regalia, but it might be banged up too badly to recover.”
The destruction of a Regalia or the death of it's user could cause a backlash that broke the condensed auram in the user's body forming the core of the Regalia. Normally it would have to be both, since anything that wrecked an auram that badly was likely to kill the user too, but with auram and Regalia there were always exceptions. It took Tyram a moment to catch up with what Andry had said though, he'd found his eyes locked on the body as the armor faded away in floating sparkles, wondering if being glad it was too dark to see what the blast had done to Zwiebel counted as cowardice.
“Not a problem,'” Tyram said, shaking his head clear. “We're not collecting them or anything, it just isn't good to leave them lying around.”
“Yeah,” Andry said. “He was so proud of it too. He said it was a relic from the Ruin Wars. It must have belonged to a real Knight once.”
The laugh started as a small chuckle but it grew, like an orchestra warming up from a few quiet notes to a thundering crescendo. Andry's deep, throaty laughter echoed over fields.
“I've lost completely haven't I?” Andry said. “We have to fight them now, they're already attacking the town. And besides...if you'd been hitting me as hard as you were hitting Zwiebel, you'd have taken me down no problem. Wouldn't you?”
“Andry,” Tyram said, not sure how to respond. “I...”
“It's okay,” Andry said. “I get it. And I'm sorry. To both of you. You were right.”
“You'll come and help?” Aurina said hopefully.
“I said it already didn't I?” Andry said. “I have to, now. I still say all this about Knights and heroes is nonsense, and there's no way I'm coming along on any kind of idiotic quest, but maybe this really is a fight worth having. So for fighting the bandits, and just for that, I'm in.”
“Then we should get going,” Tyram said. “If he was telling the truth we don't have much time.”
“But we do have a very fast mount!” Aurina said, proudly patting Booky's shell. “And now it's even big enough for three. So what are we waiting for?”
???? [The Old Man]
Somewhere far away, an old man lay dying.
Never before had so much energy been involved in a death, but then again there might never have been an old man like this before. His skin was weathered with age but still stretched tight across his powerful, muscular frame. He was broad shouldered and long limbed. His face was a craggy mess, with tubes up the nose and breathing mask over his mouth, and yet his blue eyes still burned. His hair, white as snow, still grew down the back of his neck, even if the top of his face was bald and bare and mottled with sun and liver spots. His beard, just as white, flowed over his chest. If he had been standing he would have been at least nine feet tall.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
But he wasn't standing. He lay in a bed set in the exact center of a room made of cold, sterile metal, his mattress the only softness to be seen. But not the only furnishing. The tubes inserted all over his body—no limb was spared the poking pumping needles of their embrace—could be traced out to dozens upon dozens of machines that beeped and whirred and hummed, tirelessly straining to keep the bed's occupant alive for one minute longer.
The man was not alone in the room. Four figures—not as impressive, not as powerful and tall, but still radiating a sense of lethal danger—stood at the corners of the bed. They wore wide hats and heavy cloaks, so that all anyone could see is that this one was tall, this one short, that one thin, the other fat. They stared outward at the doctors and nurses, who ran between the machines, maintaining them, checking dials, and doing all the things to keep the man alive that a machine couldn't be trusted to do on its own.
The room was a deep, recessed pit. Above guards walked, casually carrying their guns, circling the man in the bed like sharks. Because unlike the four men by the bed, they were not his guards. Or to be more accurate, they were his jailers. The whole building had been designed—well, it was hard to classify. If it was a hospital, he was the only patient. If it was a prison, he was the only inmate. In the end it was a building for him. To keep him alive, and to keep him contained, and they were none too certain they could do either.
No. They were uncertain if they could, should he decide to leave, keep him contained. They knew very well—and so did he—that they were never going to keep him alive. Not for much longer. And, he was sure, they would be more than happy to see him gone. But he would give them that satisfaction not one second earlier than god decreed they should have it, and even then he planned to spit in god's eye. And when he got to hell, the devil's too.
He was looking forward to it.
One of the machines closest to the bed chirped, and a screen extended on a robotic arm. Like an ancient whale rising from the depths the old man's hand lifted from the mattress and pressed a button on the side rail of the bed. The screen flashed until the dancing lights coalesced into the image of Jalgoz, Big Brother Sloth.
“Oh it's you boy!” the old man said with a smile. There was a raspiness to his voice, but it hadn't lost any of its depth or power. It was the rumbling of aged boulders, the slow collapse of a once mighty city into ruins, proud and defiant even as it crumbled into the sea.
“Grandfather,” Jalgoz said. “I have bad news. Jarlo went out to collect the taxes, but there were Knights at one of the villages. They killed him, grandfather.”
“What?” The old man snapped. The single word was like a mountain breaking, and his blue eyes hardened to a violent edge. The doctors and nurses stopped their work, stepping away from the bed and staring at it in horror. The guards walking above froze, every muscle tight, ready for battle as they leveled their weapons on the ancient ruin in the bed below them. The cloaked figures on the corners of the bed tensed as well, ready to respond if the guards should dare to try and actually restrain their prisoner. The tense moment drew out, time flattening under the stress of it, until the old man laughed. The laughed turned into an ugly, hacking cough and the room tensed again, wondering if this was it, if the old man was going to die at last, but the coughing settled and he rested his head back on the bed.
“Oh, I do love doing that,” the old man chuckled. “I don't get a chance to scare them like that much anymore. Shame about Jarlo, of course, but the whole idea is for you boys to toughen up. I've still got three grandchildren left, right?”
“Yes grandfather,” Jalgoz said. “Jurgo's here at the base, and Jayban is on his way back.”
“Then you three can make them pay,” the old man said flatly.
“I've already sent some of my best men to take care of it,” Jalgoz said. “I need to make an example of that town anyway. It's been getting more and more insolent lately. They've rallied some of the other villages into rebelling.”
“Good boy,” the old man said. “Resisting the urge to take revenge yourself. You've got a crew, use it. I'm proud of you boy. Of course if it doesn't work...”
“Then we'll take care of them ourselves,” Jargoz said. “But I can't believe a few wandering knights would be enough to handle everything we've got.”
“Good by,” the old man said. “That's what it's all about. Learning to stand for yourselves. If you'd called asking for my help I really would have gotten out of this bed and come over, just to crack your fool heads!”
“I just thought you should be told about Jarlo,” Jalgoz said. “I know you got high hopes for us, Grandfather.”
“Good,” the old man sighed. “Good. I need to sleep now, boy. I'm old. Tell me how it goes while I get some rest.”
And the old man's eyes closed in sleep but—to the frustration and disappointment of a world that built a building just to keep him contained—not in death.
Not yet.
VERRO
“We got incoming!” one of the guards on the towers called down. “We got lots and lots of incoming! From the northwest!”
“Alright everybody!” Chaddim shouted through a megaphone someone had dug up. “We've gone over this! Everyone get to your places!”
The villagers moved into action. They were not a well oiled machine. Most of them had never served in anything like a military. But they weren't a disorganized mob either. There were those among them who had served in militaries, who had served on distant worlds and fought in the battles that ended the last age and gave birth to the new one.
The bandits weren't using much in the way of strategy themselves. They had arrived at a small, circular fort. They had greater numbers and more experience killing, not to mention better equipment. But a bandit gang isn't the same as an organized military either so they were ready to keep their strategy simple—the enemy had a wall, the bandits wanted it, and they intended to claim it.
The bandits came piled into trucks and jeeps. Some of those trucks and jeeps mounted weapons. They had exactly one tank, evidently being used as a command vehicle. Standing on top of the turret was a short man with his Regalia active. It was spiky, golden armor made of several oddly shaped plates, separated by an inch or so of some kind of webbing on all sides. Every plate had at least one smooth, curved spike sticking out of it.
The knights in town, minus Rimni who no one had been able to find, stood on the wall with Chaddim as the bandits pulled up and unloaded from their vehicles.
“You know him?” Verro asked the village mayor who'd somehow found himself a general.
“Kaddo,” Chaddim said. “I don't know his abilities. But they say he's tough.”
“Do you think he will attempt to bargain for peace?” J'vann asked.
“No,” Verro said. “They're bringing that cannon up to bear. There won't be any pleasantries. But if they're going to play it like that...”
Verro raised his hands and conjured a bow and arrow of pure auram. He caught Kaddo by surprise, and the short bandit leaped away at the last second. The glowing auram arrow fired straight into the tank's barrel, exploding and destroying the entire turret when it hit. Kaddo leaped nimbly away from the explosion, shouted something at his men, and the mob of bandits headed for the wall.
“Fire!” Chaddo shouted, and the men on the walls began firing any gun they had into the oncoming crowd. Bandits fell, clutching bloody wounds. The gunshots focused on any of them that were carrying what looked like ladders or rams. For more general destruction the makeshift siege weapons built from farming equipment lobbed heavy slugs or hastily made explosives into the horde of bandits charging the wall.
The wall was a story or two tall. Not so high up they couldn't see the men fall, broken and bleeding, clutching wounds or ruined limbs. And with his eyesight, Verro could see it in perfectly exquisite detail. And it wasn't as if the defenders got off scott free. Every so often a man would fall from the wall, bleeding and screaming, and add himself to the carnage below even as others on the wall rushed to fill the holes.
He'd seen it before. Looking down the wall he saw Sasha's face was blank, impassive, he imagined she'd be much the same stalking a deer through the brush. Fann didn't seem to care at all. J'vann looked more agitated, but from the little time he'd known the Verdant Knight that was more because of the loss of life in general than the horror of the battle.
“I wish we could intervene,” J'vann said, confirming Verro's suspicions.
“Your job is to handle anyone with a regalia,” Chaddim said. “There's at least one out there, maybe more. They're not even in danger of getting a ladder up yet. If there's a breach in the wall, or someone with regalia starts making a ruckus, then you move.”
“Verro...” Shasha said.
“I know,” Verro told her, scanning the battlefied. “I'm looking.” He forced himself to look past the carnage, to seek out the real dangers, the heavy weapons or the Regalia holders. His eyes settled on Kaddo. He stood surrounded by the corpses of his own men. They looked...withered. Wrinkled. Dead. His armor was glowing now, light bursting from the gaps between the scales.
“Hey!” Verro said, raising his bow. “Kaddo's gonna try something! He-”
There was an enormous explosion.
From inside the wall.
Verro instinctively fired the arrow. It might have saved his life. It definitely saved Chaddim's. The sphere of condensed auram Kaddo fired from his fingertips had been meant to rip the wall open under the knights, and without a Regalia the elderly villager would have never stood a chance. As it was it was, with Kaddo's aim ruined as he flinched from Verro's shot, things were half as bad. The glowing ball of energy ripped a hole in the wall a few yards to the right of where they stood, sending the defenders flying up into the air and crashing down on the rubble. With a bellow of triumph the bandits surged for the breach.
And then there was another explosion. From insidethe wall.
In a moment of absolute confusion Verro turned towards the rooftops, scanning for what could have caused the blast. Something finally caught his eye, a tiny silver bolt streaking through the air. He fired an arrow at it and the silver bolt exploded, high above the town.
“I've got them!” Verro said. “There's someone up there! I don't know if he has a hover pack or what, but he's got a ranged Regalia like mine! I'll handle him, the rest of you...hey, where'd Fann go?”
“No time to think about it!” Sasha said. “You take care of the flier, we'll go fill the breach! Fann probably found Rimni and they're having a tea party or something, deal with it later!”