Commissar Igor Lukevich was quite disappointed when it was announced to him that he will be sent to Rebel zone to catch Elias Findegan and bring him to justice. A pathetic little rebel squad that failed again and again against Republic’s might. But now, looking at the fort the rebel leader was residing he could barely constrain his joy among his soldiers. Not because of the rebels but because of the abandoned isolated fort - it was actually a cover for military research facility, notable for its ground-breaking inventions.
Lukevich had ambition, willpower and, most importantly, background of a low-life commoner, an important aspect in Republic which wanted to remove all forms of aristocracy and inequality, or at least claimed to do so. And now, in a stroke of luck, he found the means to even faster promotion - capturing or killing Elias Findegan and co. would cement his way to the top. He unsheathed his saber, pointing it at the fort.
“All units, forward! Surround the fort and bring me their heads!”
***
First he felt a mixture of energy and liquid bubbling in his chest. Nothing new, he thought to himself as this happened on monthly basis. This time, however, it started spreading to his limbs and head. First his arms and legs, which seemed to him like they were heavy as stone felt lighter as energy kept pouring in them and he could again feel touch. Then a stream of liquids started moving towards his head, into his brain, nose, eyes and ears, awaking his long forgotten senses. He took a deep breath through mouth and nose, only to suck up piles of dust on his armor and he started coughing it up. His eyelids were the last one to receive liquid and they slowly opened up, as his eyes haven’t experienced light for gods know how long. His vision was blurry at first, only seeing a small flickering reddish light,that shone brightly in an otherwise dark room, but as liquid filled his eyes, he recognized various forms and shapes of objects and finally, to his surprise, a bipedal being in black hoodie in front of him,with torch in his hand. He gazed at him with his blue shining eyes with great interest, as he seemed familiar to him, but couldn’t remember why. The hooded being looked at him in utter horror from below, too afraid to move. He constantly turned his head to a small hole in the wall and talked to someone on the other side.
-“A-Aleks! It’s alive!”
“Elias, calm down. Don’t make any drastic moves and slowly get back through the hole.”
“Is he afraid of me? Why is he standing here? Have I seen his kind before?”
He moved his upper body forward, to inspect him closer, but t
“Swords. Tools for killing. I remember them. They are used by-”
His trail of thought suddenly stopped as he realized what kind of beings were in front of him. His blue eyes became crimson red as anger and resentment started flowing from his center, speeding up his revival.
“Human!” he shouted, rising from his chair with his fists clenched. Elias dropped the torch and dashed for the hole, crawling through with Aleks pulling him by his hands.
“What the hell, Eli?! What is hiding in th-”
The wall in front of them bursted with impact, sending both Aleks and Elias flying back to the other side of armory. Rocks and bricks flew on all sides, and a huge cloud of dust filled the room. Elias got up first and pulled Aleks up, looking for any way of escape.
“The sewer system!” Aleks exclaimed, but to his horror, the hole was now covered by a chunk of stone wall.
“We can only fight now, Aleks. Get the crossbows.”
The sound of heavy steps became louder and louder as the tall, menacing figure approached them. His dark red, ancient armor was ornamented with many jagged spikes and skulls of various creatures. His helmet was particularly menacing, with two horns protruding from the top. with a visor that hides most of his skeletal visage, save for the glowing red pinpoints that serve as his eyes. His hands were skeletal with the right hand missing few fingers, so he had to wield his battle axe as best as he could with his left.
“What do we even aim for!?”
“Let’s try with the eyes.”
Aleks aimed for the left while Elias aimed for the right eye. The arrows flew and hit the both eyes, making them go dark and the golem stopped with his head facing the ground. Elias started jumping out of pure joy, while Aleks wiped the sweat from his forehead thanking the gods for help.
-“Hahahaha, hell yeah! Did you see that, Aleks?!”
“The best shot I ever made. Dear gods, I can’t believe that actually work-”
To their horror, Golem raised his head and a small red flame appeared in his dead eyes that burned the arrows to ash.
-“Pathetic.” said golem mockingly as he marched again with his axe raised high, ready to crush his cornered prey. Both stood in the corner paralyzed by realization hat this is their end.
“I guess you were right, Eli. Gods really do like to play with us.”
Elias said nothing, anxiously waiting for the final blow to end his misery.
“FIRE IN THE HOLE!”
“Hmmm?”Golem turned around to see who was shouting behind him, only to get hit by projectile in the face that engulfed his upper half of body in flames and pushed him to the side, making the way to exit clear. On the exit stood Roxana with small rocket launcher, reloading it with firework rockets. Aleks and Elias immediately took the chance and ran beside motionless golem.
“Roxana, run! We have to get out of here while we have the chance.”
“Wait, I still have another rocket! We can obliterate that thing, just give me time!”
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Roxana aimed for the head again and pulled the trigger. The rocket flew right towards golem’s head but in the last moment seemingly dead golem swiftly moved his head aside, dodging the rocket entirely and instead landing on the wooden rackets, setting them on fire that started spreading throughout whole room.
Golem turned to the running trio, with his visor blown out, revealing a hideous half-burned skeletal face with damaged jaw and his eyes burned more brightly than ever.
-“P-P-P-Pathetic.”
***
Commissar Lukevich observed the wildfire that spread through the fort with great interest. The fire was obviously caused by the rebels, he concluded, but why? Why destroy such a great arsenal of weapons and equipment, and even worse put an entire fort to blaze? A sound of footsteps of his adjutants behind him interrupted his train of thought.
“Sir commissar, shouldn’t we do something about this? "
Lukevich felt he had no choice but to get in and save as much equipment as possible. There was a possibility for an ambush but in his calculations the loss of a few dozen men to get a technological edge over other nation was worth it.
-“Get the hooks and ropes. We’ll scale the walls, crush the rebel squad and retrieve military equipment inside. Go!”
“Yes, sir commissar!” answered the adjutants in unison and returned to their units, leading them towards crumbling walls.
***
Elias, Aleks and Roxana ran across courtyard, turning once in a while to see if golem was still following them, only to see the menacing red pair of eyes that showed determination in his pursuit. Although he seemed near indestructible, golem’s speed was quite slow compared to the trio who rushed for the nearby gates.
“Wait!” Elias suddenly stopped “Where’s Mendy?!”
“She left half an hour ago.”
“What do you mean she left?! Where? Why-”
“Not now!” Roxanna snapped, “I’ll explain once we’re out of here!”
“Um, guys…” Aleks pointed towards fort walls which were now overrun by men in familiar grey-green uniforms and pith helmets, armed with sabers and crossbows, while there were few among them in full armor from head to toe, armed with maces and clubs.
The trio looked around themselves, trying to find some way out, but most towers had already been seized while the golem behind them finally made his way to courtyard.
-“What now?” asked Roxana
“We can’t hide anymore, we can only try break out.” The question is - in which direction? said Aleks while looking at the golem that was moving ever closer “I think we should try to face the guardsmen. That thing over there seems way too resilient.”
-“No, there’s to many of them right now for us three.” countered Roxanna, while she took out from her bag two iron ball-shaped bombs with long fuses, “we can distract that thing with these and try to escape through the small southern gates.”
“No, that’s way too dangerous. It would be better to use those against guardsmen.”
“I already said there’s too many of them Aleks !And they even have elite Champions!”
“Even a hundred of them is better than that thing! You hit that giant with flammable rocket and it took it like nothing!”
“But look how slow it is! We can throw it out of balance with these bombs just like with rocket and then run beside it.”
“I said no! We have bigger chances against regular humans! Give me the bombs!”
“Since when are you leader? Don’t boss me around! I’ll make my back with or without your help!”
“Dammit Roxana! We’ll all die because of you!”
-“GET DOWN!” Elias shouted and pulled both Aleks and Roxana to the ground as the hail of arrows flew over them. Elias stood and angrily pulled them both up.
“There is no escape right? So why don’t we let them fight out while we wait in the keep?”
Both Roxana and Aleks nodded in agreement. Elias took his bow and arrows, Aleks unsheathed saber and shield and Roxanna took her two throwing axes, all three charging at the guardsmen that managed to enter the courtyard. Roxana attacked lightly armored guardsmen, hacking and slashing her way forward, while Aleks fought the heavily armored Commoner’s Champions, parrying their hits with shield and then slicing their throats, all the while Elias fired at those guardsmen on the walls who were trying to enter courtyard. As the final guardsmen fell dead, the northern gates were opened by two Champions, letting in dozens of more guardsmen. The trio ran for the keep followed by the guardsmen and the golem, but as they entered the keep, arrows from guardsmen and golem’s heavy footsteps stopped. Both sides stood still at first, but as soon as Elias closed and locked the gates, the screams of horror outside grew louder and louder.
***
“Even more humans?”, he thought to himself, raising his axe and swing it down below, cutting dozen of them and making entire ground soaked with blood, “Fine, I’ll deal with you first.”
Arrow volleys flew into his face, but they did barely any damage, only managing to frustrate him even more. The Champions fared better, hitting him with their maces in the holes of his armor, breaking a few pipes in his legs and body that carried glowing blue liquid. This considerably slowed his movements down, but his axe strikes were still too strong for Champions to parry and would easily cut through their thick armor.
“Pathetic. Give me some real fight!!” his booming voice made all guardsmen back away, trembling with fear at the sight of this blood-soaked giant.
“Too easy.” , he thought to himself, but regretted it immediately as something metal stabbed him in the back, neck and broken arm and started pulling him back, causing him to lose balance and he fell to the ground.
-“Now! Attack him while he’s hooked!” shouted one of them with a green cap with golden star, charging with others. He felt stabs all over his body, while the one remaining Champion who survived previous carnage, hit him with his mace in the face again and again. His vision became darker with each hit and his whole body was getting colder as the liquid from his limbs leaked outside. The short human with a green cap walked to him across his chest, pointing his saber at him with a wide grin, with another human, taler and in green coat following him.
“Sir commissar, it’s still too dangerous!”
“Quit whining and send your men to capture the keep.”
“Y-Yes, sir commissar”
“I knew our ancestors were capable of making great instruments of war, but to make something so formidable as you, my friend… what even are you?”
He fought with all his might to get off the ground but the weight off hooks and humans made it impossible and they even managed to pen his hand and take his axe from him.
“You would’ve made an excellent soldier of Republic, " commissar continued “but unfortunately you seem too wild to be of use in war. But rest assured, we’ll make a good use of your body.”
“Pathetic”,
“Excuse me?”
He let out a mighty roar of pain as new wave of liquid spread to his limbs, making his body burn like he was on fire. His eyes that were seemingly extinguished, became blindingly bright and his limbs started struggling against hooks again with renewed strength. Soldiers moved back in panic, but commissars stern look was enough to stop them from running.
-“Back to your positions immediately! He’s already half-dead so just finish him at once-”
Before commissar could finish his sentence, he broke the hook on his right hand and grabbed the commissar by the throat and threw him at the group of soldiers who were holding hooks that were attached to his legs.
-“Don’t let him get his axe back!”
But even without it, he was still able to crush them with his bare hand and even stomp them. Panic spread quickly among guardsmen as piles of their crushed comrades formed around him and he fought with even greater speed and brutality. Spears, arrows, maces, even the hand grenades - nothing seemed to slow him down, let alone hurt him. In fact he was already in great pain from that sudden explosion of liquid inside him and the pain they inflicted on him made him go berserk on everything around him, all the while fire from armory spread throughout fort and building inside slowly crumbled. After an hour of carnage, screams of horror and pain finally stopped. Beside few mans and last gasps of a few remaining guardsmen, everything was silent. But he felt that something or rather someone was missing here, as his lust for vengeance wasn’t satisfied yet.
But then, something caught his eye.
A faint movement in the distance, almost undetectable among the piles of corpses around him. There, amidst the wreckage and bodies, a lone figure was desperately trying to crawl away.
The commissar.
The golem smiled and started walking towards him, his gaze fixed upon lone survivor who desperately tried to crawl away from him.
-“Pathetic.”