Igor Level 84 Vampiric Mesmer
Igor smacked his lips in anticipation, not bothering to rub away the drool that ran down his chin mingling with the sticky brown bandages that covered every inch of his face.
The life energy emanating from this tiny Faction was delicious. Behind this pitiful storm and one of those laughable piles of stone the cattle seemed so fond of, something bright burned. It felt old and somehow, at the same time, it expressed a vibrancy that Igor had never tasted.
He hadn’t salivated like this since the Hunger first graced the Bloodwells at their nation's heart. Only a few of Father's favorite children had been allowed to drink from the newly enriched treasure and Igor had not been one of them.
On that day, Igor had watched salivating as that fat pig Dimitrov had guzzled from the ruby fount flecked with squirming succulent darkness. Aside from his eldest, Father had chosen two others to partake, having already taken his fill, of course. At first, Igor thought there must be some mistake, no one had been as faithful as him in carrying out his Father’s will! But as he stood there watching the two others approach the Bloodwell an insatiable desire had welled up, gnawing up from the pit of his stomach and battering his already tenuous hold on sanity.
He leaped from his kneeling position at the entrance of the caverns, ravenous and desperate enough to risk everything for a taste of the new power flowing from the wells. A multi-octave cacophony issued from his raw throat as he used Maddening Screech to draw the favored pair's attention toward him. Once they each met his eyes, he knew he had them. They would not be as susceptible as blood bags, but Igor had not risen to this rank by accident.
He stacked Mesmerize and Enrage, draining all of his mana and half his health as he overcharged both of them with Blood Sacrifice.
Anastasiya and Ivan froze mid-crouch, their faces a rictus of hatred and rage as they were caught in the power of his gaze. He could not hold them for long, but he poured all of his starved ambition into his Will and mentally thundered his command.
‘DEVOUR EACH OTHER’
They responded immediately, claws and fangs flashing before the dark ichor of Blood Essence began to splatter all over the cave. Not wanting to waste a second, Igor shot forward making use of every bit of his blood-empowered body to reach the Bloodwells and their sensuous whisperings of new dark power.
Then He was there.
Igor hadn’t even made it halfway before Father intervened. He stood before Igor, holding his two squabbling children by the necks. His pale sinuous form, flanked by two dark grey wings formed of perfect grey flesh and beautiful angular bones seemed to fill the whole cavern. His eyes twinkled feverishly, shining yellow with new flecks of black wriggling like tiny worms around his pupils. Igor both hated him for his power and loved him for his beauty.
Those eyes seized Igor’s soul and would have stilled any mortal creature's beating heart as his voice exploded into Igor’s mind.
“You dare defy me in my place of power?” the voice raked Igor’s mind with pain, even as he shuddered in ecstasy at his master's attention. Attention that had killed many of his lesser brethren. But in this, madness gave him strength, and the gnawing hole that was his soul cried out for the new power the wells offered, even in the face of his destruction.
“Benevolent Father, Drinker of Souls, have you not taught us that there are but two laws?” Igor mewed in terror, hating his voice and the weakness of his position before the others. Demetrov’s beady dark eyes danced with mirth between the endless folds of fat that framed his brow.
“I must drink from the Bloodwell Father! I have proven my power over these two. I beg of you, allow me this honor, I will not fail you!” Igor cried, bowing deeply to the Patriarch of the Horde and biting his lip in urgent need as dark-flecked blood continued to gush up from the Wells just beyond his Father’s talons.
A rich velvety laughter filled the room as the Patriarch tossed aside the other two, and opened his arms wide.
“I applaud your ambition. Truly I do, but we cannot allow such an act go unpunished… now can we?” he asked, his posture one of a loving father inviting his child into a warm embrace.
“I will allow you to drink… but you will pay my price.”
Igor straightened and was unable to restrain the moan of horror that slipped from his throat. Still gripped in Father’s mental grasp, he moved forward until he was a breath away from the Prime Dirge of the Twilight Lands.
His eyes rolled in his sockets as the visible striations of Father's muscular form parted in hundreds of places to display salivating mouths bristling with needle-like teeth.
It is said that the screaming was heard by every member of the Horde in the planes, and had lasted over an hour.
Igor’s eye twitched at the memory, and he unconsciously shifted one of the flesh bandages a shaman had given him to staunch some of the endless bleeding. The wounds had not healed, even weeks later, and if he did not constantly feed, the bleeding debuff would slowly kill him. But none of it mattered to Igor now, he had been rewarded richly for his boldness.
At the first achingly sweet swallow of the ruby liquid, he had felt his power begin to grow horrendously. His Intelligence had doubled while his Wisdom had been reduced to almost nothing. Yet the Hunger had not left him without a way to regain mana. It had gifted him a new Ability, Mana Siphon. Now he could draw the Mana from any target creature's blood, giving him an endless supply as long as he was willing to take it from those around him. The cattle that surrounded him, pathetic in their weakness were now his new Mana well. Igor abandoned Wisdom as he gave himself completely over to the laws of Hunger and Power.
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His sopping wet bandages continued to weep dark ichor down the sides of his face as his eyes shone with insatiable red hunger. His new power demanded to be fed, and it keened from the back of his mind as he used his Mesmeric Sight to watch the defenders run up and down the wall in preparation for an assault.
First, they would use this new little morsel of a nation to cull the weak from the Horde. Then the strong would remain, rewarded with the chance to crack open this egg and enjoy the gooey softness of this prize. The Pretenders to the east would do nothing unless pressed, holding back like the weaklings they were. The fools thought that the Horde had given up on its conquest of their lands. They didn't know that it would only be days until they saw the light of Father’s teachings and joined the Hunger.
Then all would join Father on his glorious crusade to finally crush the disgusting Bloodless who had hidden away in their precious city for far too long.
‘Run little piggies!’ He thought gleefully, as the snacks continued to prepare themself for the meal up on their pile of stones.
‘We will fatten you on our weakest, as has always been done. Then the butcher will come calling, and rip apart your pitiful force, sinew, and joint. And while King-Piggy Demetrov is gorging himself, I will find the source of this sweet burning power, and swallow it whole.’
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Aurelia Level 12 Priestess of Origin’s Flame
Aurelia could barely stand, yet somehow she found the strength to continue, shuffling over to the next pile of javelin tips and arrowheads that the smiths had been producing night and day. Just yesterday, she had been called to the forge compound to cast Fiery Will on another exhausted group, giving them the ability to press on.
The Ability allowed the target to ignore one Debuff for twenty-four hours, and the smiths as well as many of the other essential laborers had been requesting it whenever she was free to clear their Exhaustion.
It was no longer a matter of taking full advantage of the huge skill-leveling bonus. By now, everyone knew what was coming, and anyone who could contribute, did. Even the rest of the orphans had taken to running meals from the cafetorium to the different labor groups.
‘The rest of the orphans…’ She thought hesitantly. She hadn’t really seen them much since that night she had snuck away. But she knew that they were working as hard as anyone to prepare for what was coming. All of them had lost their homes and families, and they would do everything they could to keep that from happening again.
She was the oldest now, and it was up to her to lead by example!
The Flame had chosen her for a reason. Or at least that is what she kept telling herself as she struggled to follow Erash’s vague instructions in her new class. Her training had been a whirlwind of urgent needs and long repetitive hours of casting, giving her no time to process her new, more mature state.
She had purified hundreds of soldiers from Corruption, healed four times that many injured and now she was casting Ignus’ Blessing on as many projectiles as possible to give their under-leveled forces a fighting chance against the new superior enemy.
The High Priestess could bless thousands of weapons at once with such a simple Ability and she had, but now she was completely spent, and there were still more instruments of war being produced. Lady Erash had exhausted herself unleashing that storm... gods, it had been terrifying to watch it build above them, pulling wind from the mountains and water from the river as Lord Hiro and Lady Erash invested it with all the Will and Mana they could muster in partnership with the Land.
They had said it would slow the enemy's approach to the wall and kill hundreds of combatants in the process. Perhaps one day she would be capable of such incredible feats of faith and power. Until then, she had blessings to bestow.
Early on, they had found that a simple iron tip on a spear or arrow blessed with Aurelia’s Ability would reproduce a weaker version of Mr. Tillman's powerful fire strike. So they had filled every moment she wasn’t needed somewhere else with blessing duty.
She cast again, imbuing another pile of twenty iron heads with Origin’s power. Her lower lip trembled at the burning in her throat and the aching in her arms. Twenty blue sparks shot from her hands, and settled into the iron of her targets. They each took on an almost invisible bluish sheen in response and the blessing would last for over a week. As the Ability finished, her arms dropped and she bit her lip to still its trembling, doggedly moving over to the next pile.
All around her, workers shouted, preparing last-minute logistics to make sure those on the wall were well supplied. Commanders shouted out instructions to formations of new soldiers whose feet shuffled nervously in place. All present stole glances up at the wall, waiting. Then the alarm call began to echo, as spotters up on the cliffs marked the approach of the enemy.
The storm was spent and the enemy was almost upon them. The Boon would be over in a few hours, and then the sickening creatures would come. She suppressed a shiver as she lifted her hands to bless another batch.
Before she could begin, a notification popped up and she scanned it carefully, still not entirely used to having access to something that had been years away only a few weeks ago.
Congratulations! You have spent your entire mana pool on blessings objects over forty-eight times in twenty-four hours. For your effort, you have earned the Title: [Bestower of Providence]
[Bestower of Providence]
You have pushed your mind and body far past its young threshold to channel a deity’s power for the protection of your people. This has imbued your call on Origin’s power with a unique significance.
+100% on the effectiveness of your blessings on objects. You gain .01% of any experience earned with the use of an object you have blessed.
Aurelia had to read it a few more times to understand its implications, but it finally sank in. Not only would her work here be even more effective, but it would allow her to grow faster, and she had to grow as fast as she could if she was going to protect the others.
“I was chosen for a reason.” She muttered stubbornly under her breath as she lifted her arms above the next pile and began to cast with renewed passion.