Weland looked at the fog. It had expanded from where Bedivere and Erec had encountered it. It wasn’t expanding fast enough to be immediately visible, but it was still growing.
“Careful, we don’t know how dangerous it is,” Merlin said. Weland had to agree there.
“Think you can dispel it?” Weland asked.
“Can you?” Merlin shot back.
“Definitely not,” Weland confessed. “I don’t have the sort of magic to do that without knowing what it is and how it works.”
Merlin’s hand rose. And then Weland’s head wailed with agony. His Archive had just been rather forcibly shut down. He must have winced given the way Merlin smirked. “Sorry, my aim was a little wide,” She said. “”Let me try and focus just on the fog. Absolute Cancel.”
The fog vanished for several hundred feet in front of Merlin. But it didn’t dispel the entire bank. It stretched still as far as the eye could see left to right. “I can dispel it, but even I’d tire before getting to the heart of it like that,” Merlin confessed.
“Perhaps you should teach Weland that spell, and see how he does with it,” Selene suggested.
Merlin’s face soured a bit, and Selene smirked. It was a spell he wanted to learn, but Weland didn’t expect much to come of the comment here and now. He didn’t think that Merlin knew about his Archive per se, but she had included him in the effect intentionally because she didn’t want him observing more than she had to allow.
“It would make this Horned King easier to deal with,” Weland noted with a shrug. He could see the look passing between Arthur and Merlin. He had saved both of their lives, it had obviously won him some trust with Arthur, but Merlin still seemed unwilling to trust him.
“Fine. I’ll do my best, though it’s not something one can just learn by seeing it once,” Merlin said. “But I’ll cast it again slowly, and give you what instructions I can during.”
“Wait, one moment,” Weland said. “I have something that should help me learn.” If she was willing to display trust… he’d show a bit of his own hand. Trust should be reciprocated.
Besides he was going to have to call his Archive anyway to analyze the fog, and if he made a show of it maybe she’d not realize it was able to run through the link she’d dispelled, and that she’d missed the main body of the magic.
It was all flash, pomp, and useless motion and a waste of magical energy on light and darkness magic to hide the real sorcery being worked. A bit of misdirection and sleight of hand of magical forces, which Weland hoped would work to mislead Merlin. And then his Archive appeared. It wasn’t the full system, but it was a large, ‘computer bank’ from it; a hard-light machine easily twice as tall and more times as broad as a man. “I was going to need to create a magical-observation archive for the fog anyway. It can observe your spell as well, and it should be able to provide me a much more detailed set of instructions for how to copy it.”
Merlin looked at the construct. “You’re going to have to tell me more about how you made this sometime… fair is fair after all.”
“Of course. I’ll try. It’s not something that’s too easy to create, but you’ve got a talent for magic.”
Still, of all the spells in this world, Absolute Cancel was the one Weland coveted the most. It was the spell that could remove so many obstacles from his path. It might not match the Disjunction of Mordenkainen, but until he went to the world of Gygax he’d have to settle for it. His Archive recorded everything as Merlin repeated the feat of washing away part of the fog.
And then he turned his Archive to studying the fog, before looking back at Selene. “Darling, could you give me a roar to eat?” He said with a shit-eating grin.
He had to wait a bit for her to change from her truly human form to her form from her birth world, and then she roared. And he swallowed the destructive lunar light, absorbing its power and using it to supercharge his Absolute Cancel.
The fog vanished for miles on end. And even at the far edges it could be seen breaking apart. For a moment Weland was congratulating himself, looking about and seeing the dissipated fog. Then he noticed that Merlin was looking at something else.
“That castle should be just ruins,” She said, pointing forward to a castle in the distance.
Arthur blinked looking at it. “I remember those ruins, but what were their importance?”
“It was the castle of Vortigern. He was the king over the lands surrounding Camelot, and more, before Uther. Vortigern the Tyrant.”
“And if his castle is back, does that mean he is the Horned King?” Arthur asked.
“It’s possible. He wasn’t associated with horns before. It was his red wyrm which he was associated with previously.”
“The bodies are gone,” Bedivere said, looking in the cleared village. Not a single corpse in sight. And for a moment everyone went quiet.
Weland was feeling guilty. The village before them - maybe a hundred people - were all dead because he’d chosen this challenge. Of course they’d have died when the Coffin of Eternal Darkness was opened. So really all he did was kill them a year, maybe 2 early. But he doubted they’d forgive that. And it was only 100 points. What would he do with that 100 points worth their lives?
But it wasn’t just 100 points. He had been tasked to be entertaining. Playing by the existing script and just rolling over things wouldn’t be entertaining. There’s a reason that Superman vs the Joker - or Batman - always involves either massive amounts of plot induced stupidity, out of character decisions by Superman, and sheer dumb luck, or massively powering them up. Millar’s the Dark Knight Returns had to do all four, and depower Superman too. Because watching Superman steamroll them in an instant wasn’t entertaining.
Weland reminded himself that he wasn’t making these choices for 100 points, but for all of them. And that all of them might be the fate of his world.
He was stirred from his considerations by Selene’s hand on his shoulders. Merlin and the others were discussing the meaning of it, though they had seemingly come to a consensus that given the dead from the village had attacked Bedivere, the dead had risen and were walking.
“It sounds like the vampire clan,” Merlin mused. “First one attacked Diane, and now the dead are walking. We have to be careful, and we should make our move at dawn.”
“If they’re killing my people out of that castle, shouldn’t we deal with it now?” Arthur asked, looking at Merlin.
“I’ll deal with it,” Weland said. “I should be able to find a spell to protect me from the poison and then…”
“I’m doing it,” Selene said. “I’m immortal, you’re not. I can handle it.”
“My magic power can disperse the poisonous power of the fog, I will go. Alone or with you,” Bedivere declared.
“It’s my kingdom under threat,” Arthur said. “Place a spell to protect me from the fog and I will go with you.”
“No,” Weland said. “You’re the king. The kingdom needs you. I can handle this on my own.”
“I’m the king,” Arthur said. “And that means it is my business and my duty to handle. They want the King of Distortion, and I will make sure they learn that he will protect his people.”
“If you’re the king of distortion, that’s all the more reason not to give you to them. If you’re the target let me handle them first, your majesty,” Weland said.
“If you can combat the fog, I can go,” Arthur said.
“It’s a battle. If I need to go all out I can’t be assured I can keep you safe, my liege,” Weland answered.
“I need to face real challenges if I am to ever unlock my magical power,” Arthur said.
Weland grimaced. He didn’t like this. Keeping Arthur alive was on his to do list. Bringing him into battle against some Chaos spawned distortion with unknown powers was not. But if it could help awaken Arthur’s full power so he was able to use Excalibur safely, or just strong enough to deal with the demons alone…
“Arthur, you don’t know how dangerous Vortigern was,” Merlin said.
“All the more reason to go. If he ruled Camelot before Uther, I should face him king to king,” Arthur stated.
There was a moment of uncomfortable silence. And then Merlin caved, and Weland knew he would have to as well. Merlin could bring herself and the others unless he put some heavy effort into stopping her. Better to have them close where he could watch over them, than to not know where they were when they circumvented his attempts to keep them from following.
“We need a plan, and intelligence,” Weland said, lifting up a silver key. “Selene, willing to test your resistance to the fog, and if my magic does anything to help mitigate it?”
Weland would have preferred some old school, D&D, Scry and Die tactics. Appear in the midst of the enemy’s fortress, and loose an immediate, overwhelming assault.
Arthur vetoed it to talk. He wanted to know how, why, and how to prevent further such disasters. Weland’s territory was spread about them, creating a barrier even as they appeared. There were 4 major presences in the room.
The first Bedivere was familiar with. The woman was - once again - clad in black armor, Galerides’s head on her shoulders. The other three were less familiar figures. One was a goateed man in red armor, a widow’s peak, and hair greying at the temples. A large sword sat on his waist, his gauntleted hand having instantly moved to it. One was perhaps the horned king, for he alone among them had a pair of horns rising from his forehead, and he alone among them sat on a throne. He bore no flesh on his body, but was a skeleton; his bones connected not by physical bonds but by some sorcerous power. He wore fine and rich robes, blue light shining from the eye sockets of his skull. Coupled with the large, black cauldron that sat in the room, billowing the fog of death, Weland could identify him. Arawn the Horned King of… … He couldn’t remember the Disney film. But he was in Welsh legend as the lord of the Otherworld. Arawn, king of the land of the dead.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
Weland recognized the fourth as well. Only one hand was covered with a gauntlet, the only armor he wore. He had a 12-gauge double barreled Remington in a shoulder holster. S-Mart's top-of-the-line. And he had a chin that couldn’t be denied. Bruce Campbell… No… Ashley “the King” Williams. The Chosen One of the Prophecy, foretold in the Necronomicon.
“Not fair,” Weland spat out before he could stop himself. A dullahan, a Disney villain, and Ash Williams. They didn’t even make sense as a group. And what was the connection and who was in charge? Bedivere’s story implied the Horned King, and it looked that way.
There were looks being directed towards Weland, but Arthur was stepping forward, his hand resting on Chrysoar, the sword Weland had forged for him. “You requested an audience with the king of Camelot, well he is here, state your petition.”
The man in the red armor glared at Arthur, while the other three looked at each other.
“I requested the head of the king of distortion. If you are not here to give it to me, then I will take it off of his shoulders, and I care nothing else for you, child-king,” the skeleton hissed, as he rose to his feet, and pointed towards Weland. “If you intend to give me my prize, I would have expected chains. Not that I think any of you could chain my foe.”
“You promised me the head of Uther’s heir,” the man in the red armor.
“Calm, Vortigern, you shall have it,” the skeleton said. “Kill him at your leisure, and Ash, Crom, kill the king of distortion so that nothing can stand in our w…”
The Horned King’s head fell from his neck as Weland appeared one foot on his throne. “Whatever you choose to call me, I’m not that easy to kill.” Even as he did it he realized that he was acting suspiciously like he was trying to hide something. But he had done it from reflex. When someone started ordering your deaths, you didn’t let him finish.
There was a moment of stunned silence, before Vortigern stepped casually over the Horned King’s head and moved towards King Arthur. “The usurper is mine, I don’t care about the rest.”
“Make sure not to damage the heads of the girls, they might just be the one I’m looking for,” the dullahan said from Gallerides’s mouth.
Weland was somewhat distracted. He could feel energy seeping through his Territory Armor, a pain growing in his leg, as the hand of the Horned King grasped around his ankle. Decapitation apparently meant little to the skeletal lord. It made him howl in pain, the flesh on his decaying as the magic wormed its way through his barrier.
“Someone get my head back on my body already,” the skeleton hissed out.
The strong chinned, individual Weland had identified as Ash, looked at him. “Not till you start talking with some respect.”
And then the walking dead entered the throne room en masse.
Selene sighed. There wasn’t a plan here, at all. Weland had jumped the gun on the attack, just because the Horned King was ordering their deaths, and his attempt at ending things decisively had managed to end nothing at all.
The woman with a man’s head was striking at her. In her truly human form Galerides was a threat. But as a dragon using a spell to appear human, he had been nothing to her. And this scythe wielder was little more.
But Weland’s scream of pain had her more worried. She knew how good his protective barrier was. If the Horned King had casually penetrated it then he was a deadly danger. And Selene did not feel she had the time to play with this girl before her.
Her hand rose and yellow-cream fire burst from it towards the dullahan. Darkness was wrapping around the dullahan protectively, but Selene was more powerful than her. The lunar flames burst through the darkness, and as the dullahan attempted to retreat - leaping, flipping, and moving with superhuman speed and agility - the flames followed incessantly.
Selene took note of the battlefield quickly. Weland and the giantess were fighting the Horned King, but a shot in the back from the gun of the blue shirted man had just brought the giant to her knees. Bedivere was fighting him, but his aura had faded and the poison was evidently affecting him. Merlin was holding back the undead that were rushing towards the center of the room. And King Arthur was fighting the man in red armor, and seemed to have the upper hand in their sword fight.
Her magic wrapped around Bedivere in an instant and removed him from the area. If the magic that had been protecting him from the poison was dispelled he was worse than useless to them. The question was how it had been.
And then she created an explosion of energy against the horned king, blasting him back and away. She was about to step into that conflict when she felt a scythe strike at her neck. The darkness cut, but it did not cut deep. Even in this form and this world she was a dragon, and she was resistant to such magic.
Still it seemed she hadn’t dealt with her dance partner yet.
Weland didn’t like this melee. He wasn’t worried about Selene, or even Merlin. Selene could handle herself here. Merlin was a big girl. Diane, Bedivere, and Arthur, however, were people who he needed to concern himself with.
Bedivere had vanished, even as Diane had fallen from a shot by Ash. Ash scared him. The Horned King was a death god and a big bad evil guy, the villain of the story. He lost in the end to the power of friendship, love, and self-sacrifice. The dullahan was a death god, and a fairy. Vortigern was a minor figure of Arthurian lore who had ballooned in popularity recently as a villain before Arthur’s rise to rule Camelot.
Ash was the hero of his story, and a man with more plot armor than you could shake a stick at. He survived Marvel Zombies by being a dumb ass, and pulled one over on Doctor Doom. Unless it was his evil clone, but even then he was someone made to fight a hero and push him to the limits of his plot armor, and he just kept coming back to do it again and again. Bad Ash would be a relief, but he still triggered a sense of worry in Weland that even the skeleton before him didn’t.
And if he was here the Necronomicon Ex Mortis might be and that book was bad news.
And with Bedivere gone, there was no one keeping Ash occupied. His healing magic had Diane back on her feet after the shot from behind. “Keep the king occupied, I’ll deal with Ash,” Weland said, disappearing and appearing mid sword thrust towards Ash. The man was lucky, and his dimwits worked miraculously well under pressure, but he shouldn’t be able to keep up with Weland’s level of swordsmanship or speed.
Ash’s metal hand grasped his sword before it could skewer his stomach. “Sneaky,” Ash said and squeezed, crumbling the blade of the sword. “Guess you’re my new dance partner.”
Weland’s territory wrapped around Ash’s body, only to shatter at the moment of contact. It was a disorienting feeling for a half instant, and then a metal fist hit his jaw and Weland could feel it break as he spat out a broken tooth, and a mouthful of blood. He’d not had a punch hurt like that since he’d bought up his magic power. He felt brought down to mortal.
“Why do you fight with them?” He asked, eying Ash warily from a distance. That punch had dispelled his territory armor, and scrambled his connection to his Archive. It’d even forced him from his faux human form into the shape of a fairy. It meant more magical power, and an easier flow, but he’d hoped not to need it.
“Why not? They know how to treat a hero right, and the babes are pretty good.”
“So you’re Evil Ash right?”
Ash quirked an eyebrow. And then he lifted his shotgun and fired from the hip. It was a single fast motion, not hesitating to quip until after. “Good, bad, I’m the guy with the gun”
A fairy might have dodged with ease, as they could hear human hearts. But Ash’s heart was absolutely silent; perhaps due to the same force which unmade Weland’s Territory the moment it came in contact with him. And with his Archive dismantled, recovering from a blow to the head, Weland’s reaction was slowed just a fraction too much.
Horologium shattered as the buckshot struck him. The Celestial Spirit had appeared - as per his contract - when Weland needed protection most. But the timespace magic which formed the protective field of the clock, shattered and broke at the shot, and his body took the impact only for Weland to feel the magic opening his gate forced closed.
He floated, naked after the Horologium’s emergency teleportation, and Ash looked at him and then looked away. “Oh god my eyes, I don’t want to see that!”
Weland teleported, and breathed, a roar of light shooting out towards Ash’s back. Only to break against it. “None of your magic will work, sorcerer,” Ash said with a grin. “You see the Necronomicon foretold your coming and knew just what I’d need to deal with it.”
Weland wanted to curse. Instead he teleported. It was a cowardly decision but he had to leave the battlefield for a moment. Just long enough to do two things. He needed his Archive, and he needed Enif’s Celestial Spirit Dress. Without them he wasn’t keeping up with this Ash’s reflexes and avoiding being shot no matter how fast he teleported. He restored his status cleansing healing magic as well; the poison in the mist was eating at him and had been since Ash had punched him. It’d cancelled all his magic every bit as thoroughly as Merlin had.
When he returned Diane was missing, Selene was fighting the Horned King, and Merlin was bleeding where buckshot had torn through her stomach, her voluptuous body reduced to that of a child, and Evil Ash was standing over her, his gun pointed towards her head. “Shame, I was hoping to leave you alive. But kids don’t do it for me. Got to live unencumbered.”
She disappeared from his grasp, and he spun. He didn’t fire at where she’d appeared, though, but at Weland, forcing him to teleport at speed. Already another shot was firing at his new location. And another. And another. Weland couldn’t do more than teleport, moving constantly to stay one instant ahead of a deadly shot; if his magically reinforced toughness didn’t stop a punch he didn’t expect it to stop a bullet.
And then he was gone. Far further this time. Completely gone from the castle. He was back on the hill overlooking Camelot he’d first appeared on when he entered the world, and he smiled.
The explosion shocked everyone. Evil Ash had been taking shots at Weland, attempting to kill the King of Distortion with one. He knew he just needed one good shot, but the fat-headed, ugly fairy-chibi had been appearing and disappearing with a speed that was quite frankly disgusting. Holes were forming in the walls of the throne room from the spray of fire.
The Horned King was dealing with Selene. She’d defeated Crona it seemed, and now she was pushing him hard. His death magic was slowly weakening the immortal life within her, but there was just so much of it. And her own power was something else. She’d completely destroyed his right humerus, his left fibula and tibia, shattered his pelvis, reduced four ribs to dust, and he was missing 3 vertebrae. At this rate he’d need Ash to bail him out.
Merlin was bleeding badly from a wound to her stomach. She’d tried rapid teleportation and magic to assault the blue-shirted man with the boomstick. He’d shot her as she’d appeared and her magic had failed. It’d taken a moment for the pain and disorientation to clear, and for her to teleport away. She needed a good opening to teleport Arthur away and then she could flee. They could regroup with Diane where she’d moved her after it became clear the poison was eating into her.
And Arthur and Vortigern continued their duel, swords clashing as they fought. Arthur was slowly but surely gaining the upper hand.
And then there was a flash of light. Immediately after a shockwave hit them all, sending them flying into the walls of the castle. Except Evil Ash. The shockwave came from directly over his head. Then there was an explosion of flesh and blood and finally rock as something passed through him already ionizing, only to hit the ground like an asteroid.
And then Weland, still in his fairy shape appeared amidst the devastation. “Hail to the king.”
Weland’s eyes quickly took in what was happening. Merlin was dying. That was problem one. Everyone else - and the black cauldron - had been blasted apart for the moment. He didn’t see Diane, and the dullahan was in multiple pieces. Merlin came first, the poison was obviously affecting her, and she was bleeding profusely.
It would take too long to get her back to full fighting strength, or even conscious, but Weland could keep her from dying and get her back to Camelot quickly.
The others were rising to their feet. Or foot in the case of the Horned King, who awkwardly rose on one leg. He didn’t do more than that, as Selene’s hand rose and with it a swirl of magical energy which crushed him.
The Horned King was dealt with, and that left only Vortigern. The red-clad knight looked about himself, his eyes shifting from one foe to another. And then he scowled and raised his hand. “Come to me my wurm,” He said, intoning the words in a regal, authoritative manner.
And the ground exploded, the castle crumbling as a massive, red serpentine dragon rose up. The wurm hadn’t been directly beneath the castle, but as it rose the ground rose with it, and one of the castle’s walls simply fell away. Even there in the center and the throne room, with the damage from before, the shaking of the ground made portions of the roof and the wall collapse towards them. Each of them had their own way to avoid it, but by the time it had finished they were no longer fighting inside of a castle, but amidst its ruins, and a great, red, snake was rising over them. Its head alone was the size of the entire castle and its body stretched for what looked like hundreds of meters if not more than a thousand.
Dirt streamed from its body, and it opened its mouth, breathing in and unleashing a blazing fire towards Arthur, Selene, and Weland.
Weland stepped forward and inhaled. He couldn’t consume all of the flames, there was simply too great a mass of them, but he breathed deep and the dragon’s fires did not touch the trio. Instead he felt his power restoring and resurging, as he roared back a surge of water striking through the dragon’s mouth and head.
It fell, and Vortigern froze, before Weland’s magic pulled him in, teleporting him, locked in a block of Weland’s territory, in front of Arthur. The battle had been won. The only thing left to do was to put a lid on the cauldron.