But now that she was past that ordeal, Phon found herself face to face with the coffin, and it certainly defied all of her expectations. It looked out of this world, and maybe it was. It had that same odd metallic sheen that Jaid’s sword had, and all those relics Roque and Rishaki wouldn’t shut up about lately. Maybe this coffin really was a relic of the old world.
To Phon, it looked like a hexagonal cylinder but with smoother edges, kind of like a giant, stubby pencil. She could make no sense of the patterns engraved all over it, but vermillion light traced around the engravings endlessly. The coffin itself had wheels on the bottom that the soldiers had been using to push it, but it looked like it was possibly motorized for the occupant to move it herself if needed.
But none of that was the weird part. Around the base of the coffin were six fibrous and interwoven braids that looked almost like tentacles. The braids were slithering out from the coffin and were linked to the six soldiers on guard duty. It was attached to the back of their necks, looking like the fibers from the braid had fused with their nervous systems. Vermillion light was pumping through the braids, meeting with the soldiers' own light, each a different color that must have been their personal auras.
That explained everything, why Izma couldn’t be teleported. Instead of rooting herself to the ground like Drim did, the Fiend was rooting herself to other people by fusing their auras together. Under normal circumstances, maybe Phon could teleport them all at once as one big group. It’d be difficult, but should be manageable. In this situation, though—impossible. Trying to grab a single aura alone was hard enough.
The way forward was obvious, at the fundamental level at least. She needed to weaken or remove the auras connected to Izma. That meant defeating all six of them, or possibly even killing them. She had no problem with that, but these didn’t look like chumps. They were all Lessers, and they all already looked beefy and strong. There was no telling how big of a buff they were getting by being connected to Izma’s aura directly.
Perhaps she’d have better luck trying to sever the connection. Phon didn’t think too hard on it and just went for it, flinging one of her shields towards a braid. Buzzsaw blades sprouted along the edge of the shield and whirred. To Phon’s surprise, it cut right through like it was nothing. The part of the braid that was attached to the obelisk writhed as if it was in pain, but the color still flowed through. The part that was attached to the soldier withered and crumbled to ash.
Phon hadn’t expected it to be so easy. It confused her more than anything, but she wasn’t about to leave an advantage unexploited. Before the guards could fully understand the situation, Phon ran a quick lap around the coffin, severing each braid as she went. Her enemies didn’t make it too easy, so she had to keep her other shield at the ready to block point-blank shots as she sprinted.
Still, it was over in a flash. Phon completed the lap in seconds, counting the braids as she severed them. 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. Wait… 7? She stopped in her tracks, using the coffin as a barrier from the guards to think for a moment. There had only been six braids, right? So why was there a seventh? She looked ahead, and there was an eight and ninth, too.
Phon severed the seventh but didn’t go anywhere this time. She watched it writhe as she saw before, but what she hadn’t seen was it recovering a second later and desperately lashing back to the soldier it disconnected from. In a blink, they were fused again. To be certain, she had Phonscience try to tug away Izma, but she had no luck—fully rooted once more.
So Phon had to be faster, much faster, but she was also out of time. All six guards had swarmed her, and the soldiers that she’d juked past earlier were closing in and taking aim. Thankfully, Phonscience had never let go of her piece, so she plopped it down back in the HQ tactical room. Deborah nearly fell out of her seat, jumping from her boss’ sudden reappearance.
Phon went and laid down again, but not to dive back into her own consciousness, just to ruminate in her own thoughts. It didn’t take long before she jerked up and spoke into her earpiece. “Listen up. It’s time to take out this Fiend. Everyone but Itsy and Niloy, start making your way towards the front gate. I’ll give more details soon, but try not to be too obvious about it.”
“You other two, you’re doing great, keep it up. In fact, if you could draw even more attention to the north side, that would help a lot.”
“Aight!” Itsy didn’t really need more reason then that. “Been smackin’ ‘em ‘round with muh truck, and that’s been workin’ great so far. But think I’d get more attention if I started hitting these people with other people? Just pick ‘em up and swing ‘em like a bat.”
If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.
“Well, try it and see what happens,” Phon saw no reason to dissuade her. She then had Phonscience teleport two regular annoyances into the room. Kaizu didn’t look too shabby. She was on her—Phon had lost count—latest prison sentence and had likely been doing her background checks this entire time.
Chorus on the other hand was a right mess—a right exaggerated mess. They had changed themselves into a worn-out prisoner’s uniform, one that the Fiends For Hire certainly hadn’t given them. They were allowed to wear whatever they wanted in their holding cell, but Chorus was always something of a method actor. Even their wardrobe had been turned into a small round chest that they were treating like a ball and chain.
“How do you already have great footage of this?” Phon glanced at what Chorus was viewing on their phone—the war outside—and then she ran her hand down her face in vexation since they weren’t supposed to be able to control their camera orbs for the time being.
“Artists will always find a way to persevere despite their circumstances,” Chorus smirked at her.
“Whatever,” Phon was over it already. “I have a task for you two. If you pull it off, I’ll commute your sentences immediately.”
◆◆◆
Once everyone else was in position, Phon teleported back to Tize, using him as her anchor once more. But instead of rushing her way back to Izma, she fought her way instead, taking out as many soldiers as possible along the way to grab attention. Phon wanted them to know that she was coming.
They tried their best to stop her, they really did, but now she was on the warpath. Victory was in sight, so her motivation and confidence were bursting, but she tried her best to not let herself get too cocky. Finally, she made it back to the coffin and stared face-to-face with one of the guards as if she was provoking them.
And it worked. They stepped forward, readying their gun as if they were preparing for a proper showdown. Sadly, Phon wouldn’t be giving them the pleasure today.
“Now!” she called into her ear piece, and then rushed past the guard, blocking their incoming shots with her shield. The other whirling circle of metal sliced through the air, severing the braid for the final time. Like before, the vermillion fibers writhed, but the guard didn’t seem too worried about the prospect, likely expecting it to play out the same as it had before.
But then all the other braids severed too.
A shot from Tize’s sniper rifle a good distance away, a knife thrown by Mallea, Nachi’s polearm arcing out of nowhere—that was three more severed and they never saw it coming. The last two were taken out up close and personal by Feyj and Gatrim. The two nobles had been rushed in by Gatrim’s dash, and then they precisely pierced their respective braids. All six were down in the blink of an eye, but they only had a few breaths at most to do something about it.
Kaizu suddenly appeared on the top of the coffin. She whipped out both of her daggers and slid them into the creases of the coffin. She then jumped down, pulling the daggers with her weight and as much strength as possible to cut through the large bolts on the side of the coffin that were keeping it closed.
The six sides of the coffin fell outwards after that, like blooming petals of a flower. But the inside wasn’t quite as beautiful—a ragged middle-aged woman in a track suit that looked like they hadn’t showered in who knows how long. She had been sitting in a comfy chair, watching something on a laptop without a care in the world. Now she cared, she really cared about how open and exposed she was, fraught with danger all around.
“Hmm, possibly an unpolished gem. I’m envisioning the potential,” Chorus appeared just as suddenly. “But it will have to wait. You’ll have to come with me for now, my dear.” They launched their chain, sending their wardrobe towards Izma that swallowed her whole. “One coffin to another, I doubt she’ll be as disturbed as most.”
Phon noticed immediately that the air had shifted around them. Something had clearly changed. The confidence that the CP soldiers had been brimming with suddenly shattered. Phon was about to test if the buff was completely gone by attacking one of the guards, but she never got the chance. Feyj and Gatrim had already taken them all out.
“Alright everyone, spread out and mop them up!” Phon ordered into the earpiece before moving herself back to the Headquarters building, but she remained above ground this time. There was quite a considerable amount of pockets she could teleport to now—sizeable chunks of the Central Peace army defeated already.
Phon readied her shields for a fight, but very few of the soldiers even noticed her. Their guns were pointed up at the sky, but they were hesitating to fire. The woman’s eyes drifted and she found Xard flying around. She hadn’t even noticed he’d moved since the mental fog was still so dense. He blasted down a ray of energy, sweeping it around and sending soldiers flying like he was power-washing a dirty surface.
The fact that he was here meant he must have defeated his Fiend whose name Phon still hadn’t bothered to look up yet. There was still no sign of Kada or Drim, so they must have been occupied doing their jobs keeping Laurim and Jaid busy. Things were going well, shockingly well. If nothing else crazy happened, maybe they’d actually get through this unscathed.
And then the ground shook. And then the world shook. Everyone’s eyes, Fiend and Soldier alike, drifted over to one of the nearby mountains. It was cracking, causing an intense rumbling to ring in their ears. And then the mountain exploded.