The moving truck’s engine hummed as Alfredo, Laura and a few others followed Seth, running beside the truck. They climbed the black tarmac that curved through the surrounding countryside up to the surrounding rain-soaked hills. Morning broke over the distant peaks in soft grays as it tried to pierce the layers of clouds. The rain hadn’t stopped for a solid month at this point. Alfredo’s family farm had been drowned out by the swelling Tulare River, as the once emptied lake basin filled and the dormant lake, reborn.
“Culo, who’s stronger you or the Sage?”
Ernesto called from the front seat to Seth. Ernesto was Seth’s oldest friend. They had known each other since elementary school days and had gone to the army together when they graduated.
“That’s difficult to say.” Seth responded after a few moments, “No, I’m sure he’d be able to win.”
That was something Alfredo didn’t really believe. He had seen Seth take down a minotaur that picked up a truck as if it were nothing with a single blow. How could someone be stronger than that?
“You sure? He looks weak.”
“I’m sure.” Seth said nearly instantly, “You guys will see him fight in the future, so you’ll see. He’s one of the top ten in the world for a reason.”
“Is he really? If you say so, culo.”
“He really is.”
Armed military patrols swarmed the roads, and once more Laura told them the story of them hunting down the traitor Lawrence Able. They didn’t ask about our weapons; knowing that they would be needed to subdue him. Alfredo saw someone he had recognized from the news as one of the chosen in the corps; William, ‘the Strategist,’ as he had come to call himself. His mind, apparently, was brilliant, and with his strategies, he and the legendary American Chosen who had killed an apostle, Oak were able to conquer dives up to level 70 recently. He had watched the videos on war-efra and it was exciting stuff. More exciting than the Strategist’s usual stuff, by far. Seeing Oak’s strength in real-time was something awe-inspiring. Lately, Alfredo had been using it as a motivating factor for his workouts. He wondered who would win; Seth, or Oak. His money would be on Oak in that fight.
While looking at the military, he noticed that their patrols brushed against the compounds of the Order of the White. Why weren’t they doing anything about them? That was a question posed a couple weeks back during a Q&A panel with the current leader of the Icarian corps in this area a couple days back; Colonel Ortega.
Ortega gave an impassioned speech about how the Freedom of Religion was a fundamental right given to all Americans, and how monstrous it was that the person asking the question even brought up the idea that the military would use its force to quell a religious organization just because they worshiped a different god than them. The reporter was supposedly fired from her position the day after. It was a sentiment Alfredo could get behind. He took an oath to defend the US Constitution; however, how were they not aware of the things that the cult was doing? Capturing humans selling them into slavery, and organizing attacks on US soil? Maybe the rain blocked the surveillance drones. That had to be the answer. Though the rumors spread to the Corps, they brushed them off as, ‘rumors and speculation,’ or, 'conspiracy theories,' and never acted on them. If they knew, they would. Alfredo was sure of that.
It took twenty minutes of driving to get to the compound, and once there, they got out of the truck. Seth vanished in thin air, while Laura, Alfredo, and Ernesto searched the house thoroughly.
Within Efra, Seth landed lithely on the pile of bodies that he had tossed in the night before after the conflict, into a spacious room. It must have been used as a studio of some sort. Chunks of white marble stood half-carved in the middle of the room. Ancient canvas hung on ancient frames; faded paints bled off in colorful rivulets that pooled and dried in the spaces between the stone bricks of the floor. Light peered through the pierced thatched roof in places.
“What’s the goal here?”
He asked out loud. A frosty wind formed in front of him.
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“Kill the priest,” came the message written on the ice crystals that vanished just as quickly as they appeared.
Easy. He drew his blade pushed through the door on the other side of the room, and emerged within a cordoned-off plaza in the middle of a great city. White walled, stone buildings surrounded him on every side as the stone street beneath him stretched for miles beyond the fogwall that stood about a dozen and a half feet from his location on either side of him down the one-lane street. Over the row of houses in front of him, there was a large white steepled belfry of what would, presumably be, a temple. That was, perhaps, where the Priest would be.
An arrow struck the wall beside his right temple and embedded itself in the stone. A moment later it exploded and sent him reeling to the left. Another arrow embedded into the stone beside his head. He pushed with his arm and rolled away before it exploded again. He caught the glint of the next arrow as it sailed through the air from the belfry of the temple. Wind mana picked up behind the arrow as Seth stepped out of the way, and turned the arrow toward him. A magic archer? Using the flat of his blade, Seth knocked the arrow to the ground. As soon as it touched the ground, its head exploded into a small fireball.
Seth ducked behind the row of buildings to move out of sight of the archer, but the sound of approaching hooves on stone let him know that he wouldn’t be able to catch his breath for long. Soon, two platoons of satyrs flanked him as they came down either side of the street, but he was expecting this the moment the archer began to attack.
“Ullr; father of snowfall and of hoarfrost, lend thy breath to my blade.”
He swung upwards through the air to his left. A wave of frost exploded out of the ground in a straight line until it collided with the first creature it came into contact with. The white frost encased the creature and formed a brief barrier as he sprinted to the right.
The lead satyr for the right platoon stabbed forward with his spear. Seth knocked the point away and stabbed forward. The point of his longsword slid into the creature’s throat and poked through the other side.
“Thou servants of the Boreal winds, howl.”
A blast of cold air exploded the satyr’s head from the neck up. The blast of wind continued in a 6-foot cone that spat shards of ice in a shotgun blast into the face of the creature directly behind it. It fell backward — its face shredded to high heavens, and its red blood pooled on the white stone. Seth launched himself forward as the spearman at the front fell and slashed down ward; cleaving the horn head of the next satyr in two. He pushed through it with a raised elbow as the satyr behind the third dead one swung a heavy axe into Seth’s flank. The axe caught against the chainmail armor, and though he felt a bit of bruising, there wasn’t anything deeper than that. Seth swung his sword horizontally and separated the creature’s head from its body. It collapsed onto its knees and then fell forward. Two satyrs charged at him; the first carried a longsword, and the second a short sword and shield. For the first, he parried the creature’s downward stroke and struck a krumphau on top of the satyr’s head. It only did enough damage to stun it, but Seth followed through with a forward kick that sent it to the ground.
The short sword wielder stabbed forward, and Seth retreated a step, causing the satyr to overextend. Seth swung a downward stroke, and the satyr raised its shield and caught the blade with the rim of its shield. In response, Seth shifted his grip and stabbed forward. The blade slid through the wood and ran through the satyr’s slitted eye. It fell forward as Seth drew it out, and was finished off with a blow to its neck.
The sound of hooves neared him from behind. He turned around.
“Ullr; father of snowfall and of hoarfrost, lend thy breath to my blade.”
He chanted before slashing upward. Ice encases another one of the creatures and blocks those behind it, and Seth stabs forward into the chest of the longsword-carrying satyr, just now beginning to push itself off the ground. One side was done. He turned on his heel and sprung forward into a downward slash through the shoulder of the first he came across; separating its arm from its body. Left alone, it would bleed out before the battle’s finished. For now, it was busy trying to reattach its arm by pressing the severed arm into the nub.
A downward swing of a battleaxe emerges from behind the frozen satyr. Seth catches the swing with the flat of his blade and pushes it aside before grabbing hold of his own blade near the point and jamming it into the creature’s face. It staggers back; bright red blood pouring out of the new wound created below its left eye, while Seth runs the red-tinged blade up into its stomach. It jolts forward and with a horrid, rattling groan, collapses.
An arrow hits the wall of ice beside him and explodes a moment later, sending a chunk of white falling down at him. He stepped out of the way and ducked back out of the view of the belfry; and pushed his back against the wall to catch his breath. The smell of copper mixed with the salt in the air.