Drake or ‘Sticksies’ when on Quest focused inward. Deep and silent breaths. Meditation as taught to him by the Young Master Dragon Eagle herself.
Cultivation seemed cool, but he was too old to start over.
It had taken a long time to get to his level. He had experienced many terrible things. Almost died more times than he could count.
Nope.
He was satisfied with his Level 45 in Spellspear. He was less satisfied in having averaged one level every two years over the last decade.
Then again, less dangerous stuff was sort of a necessity now that he and his wife had a small child with another on the way.
Jayde had been pissed to find out her pregnancy meant she couldn’t go on this Quest. Magic punching evil religious types was right up her alley.
Perhaps another reason cultivation wasn’t for him was his inability to clear his mind of all thoughts.
He opened one eye to squint at the hushed argument between the youngest members of their team.
Rand and Emma or ‘Randy Potter’ and ‘Emmione’ on Quest— they really needed to revoke Jayde’s role as codename giver— huddled in the center of the mid-sized warehouse over several rune-engraved stones.
The rest of the team was outside just in case the enemy managed to notice the magic at work and decided to investigate.
Javier, Iria’s lanky second, watched the young wizards intently. The rest of her band and hopefully plenty of local fighters should’ve been on their way.
Drake stood with a groan.
Lotus position was hard. He really needed to stretch more. The old guys always warned him about the need as he aged. Closing in on his thirties meant that he was going to be one of them soon.
“Are you doing it right?” Rand said for the tenth time since Emma had started setting up the fixed portal.
“If you don’t know the answer to that keep your mouth shut!” she hissed.
Concentration sweat dotted her forehead.
Drake could barely see the mana flow from the surrounding environment into Emma. Then from her into the stones.
“Those stones already have juice,” Javier said quietly so as not to distract.
“The Vatican’s got some kind of demon magic blocking it off. They’ll need more even with all the distractions we’ve got planned.”
“We’ll hit the gate if we see the red flare. Just like we discussed.”
Javier chewed on the toothpick in his mouth.
“This portal thing go both ways?”
“Not this one. Exit only, so forget about that idea.”
Javier raised a brow, but said nothing.
“Go away, Rand!” Emma snapped.
The young man rolled his eyes and sauntered over.
“Magic wand guns?” he nodded at the thin length of wood in the holsters at Javier’s hips and in the bandoleers across his chest.
“Yup.”
“Cool… we can make wands too.”
“Good for you.”
“Those look way cooler though,” Rand nodded sagely.
Silence.
“Can you change the spell? I can sorta see fire and oil,” Rand squinted.
“Got a lot of questions, kid,” Javier said evenly. “Tell you what. How bout a trade? I’ll tell you all about my wands and you tell me what’s up with that booklet,” he pointed at the small book hanging off a thin chain at Rand’s belt.
“My spellbook?”
“Yup.”
The book was the size of an old paperback, though much thinner.
Its cover had intricate designs stitched in thread that seemed to glow if you looked at it from the corner of the eye. It definitely glowed to the eyes of most mage-types.
“Is that… you… firing off spells?” Javier raised a brow.
“Yup. Battle Wizard Level—” Rand cleared his throat. “Over Level 30.”
“Nice save, kid,” Drake snorted.
“Figured 40 was the minimum for attacking the Church,” Javier said. “But I’m not asking, so don’t think about it,” he warned.
“I wasn’t going to ask about your class,” Rand crossed his arms.
“I’ll tell you if you tell me what kind of clothes and armor you’ve got on.”
Threnium metal as thin as tin foil provided the same level of protection as inch-thick steel plate. Thin strands of the stuff woven into cloth made it cut-proof against baseline weaponry wielded with baseline strength. Magic and Skills degraded that down to cut-resistant. The more powerful the former two the weaker the resistance.
Naturally, it didn’t provide the same resistance to the transfer of force hence the enchantments.
In essence, they were as damage resistant as a tank-type wearing a double-thickness padded gambeson underneath steel plate a few inches thick while being weighed down a little less than an old soldier from the pre-spires era.
“Sorry that’s classified,” Drake cut in.
Rand had looked like he was seriously considering the trade.
“Done,” Emma huffed.
The glowing stones spun in a large circle on the floor.
Faster they went as they rose up to waist high.
The circle tilted from horizontal to vertical.
Drake flinched from the bright flash.
He blinked away the spots in his vision.
“You people better be right about the demon bastards not catching any of that.”
Javier had his hands on his wands.
The stones were now gathered in a loose pile on the cold concrete.
Emma marched up to Javier, craning her head back to look him in the eyes.
“Don’t move them. Don’t touch them. Don’t try to put mana in them. Don’t try to draw the mana out of them,” she stabbed her finger at the stones with each command. “Don’t step into the circle.”
Javier eyed the scorched circle she had burned into the concrete.
“What’ll happen if someone does.”
“Injury or death depending on personal durability.”
“Okay,” Javier shrugged. “So, we’ll know we’ve got people coming our way when it does that spinning light show thing,” he nodded. “Hmm… we won’t know who’s coming through though. Like that portal you took us through.”
“This one is different. It’s more powerful. You’ll be able to see through to the other side.”
“If it isn’t the prisoners or us feel free to blast away,” Drake said.
“Then I guess you’re going in,” Javier nodded, holding out a hand. “Luck to us all and those unjustly treated. May their vengeance be true and swift.”
“Yeah, may it be… uh… bloody for the evil guys,” Rand said.
Drake shook it.
Followed by Rand and Emma.
“C’mon, kids, time to hurry up and wait some more.”
They followed him out of the warehouse.
The team gathered around their tactical leader.
The dark faceplate of Blackstar’s helmet turned translucent, almost as clear as day.
“Comms check.”
One by one they sounded off.
The voices were crystal clear in Drake’s ears.
Threnosh-made helmets were truly awesome.
Tactical HUD.
Multiple vision modes.
Environmental seal with a powerful filtration system that could handle most natural or human made chemical weapons. Magical ones made that dicier, but that was why they had counterspell capable members.
Emma as the primary.
Rand as the secondary.
Drake was mildly surprised that the former hadn’t put her wizard hat over her helmet. It was a wizard baseball cap for the latter, but both had been overly dismayed when they had first learned that no, they could not wear their wizard head gear for this Quest.
Honestly, he would’ve allowed it. They were enchanted after all, but Blackstar was kind of a hard ass and she had deemed the Threnosh-made helmet superior to the hats.
Thus, the hats went into their bags.
“Gear check.”
Rand tested Drake’s chest and backplate.
He returned the favor.
Each quickly and efficiently checked their loadouts.
Weapons, magic items and most importantly portal stones.
“Alright. We’re ready for this. We know our parts. We’ve drilled this a dozen times.”
Mindscape training was both awesome and terrible.
For the former they had run through the exact scenario they were about to enter with fidelity that was indistinguishable from reality. There was nothing like feeling like you died for real to hammer it into your brain.
For the latter, well, the feeling of dying for real was some real trauma-type shit and that wasn’t accounting for the brain fog and fatigue afterward.
Weeks of training had been compressed into a single day.
Coming out of it had been disorienting to say the least.
The real had felt fake because the fake had felt real.
Maybe that’s why they had been laid up the following day with the worst fatigue and brain fog ever.
Drake could barely remember what that recovery day had been like. It was as though it hadn’t been real. Sleep, eat, piss, sometimes shit. That was all he had the energy to do. Maybe not even that. He had vague memories of the spoon floating on its own to deliver food into his mouth. Hell, he wasn’t even sure that he had chewed on his own.
“Signal incoming,” Howard grunted.
Drake looked up and triggered visual magnification.
A blazing meteor streaked down from the heavens.
A distant boom reached his ears. Followed by another, then another. More of them. Louder and closer together.
The meteor struck somewhere in Vatican City.
“Brace!” Blackstar barked over the thunderous crash
Drake crouched low and covered his head.
The earth rumbled.
The shockwave washed over them, bowling the weaker ones over despite Rynnen standing in front of the wave like a bulwark.
Decades of dust and debris from long abandoned buildings and streets swirled around them.
Visibility would’ve been close to nothing without the Threnosh-made helmets.
“Sticksies, go!”
He broke into a sprint, pulling a hand-sized spear from one of the many pouches of holding on his belt.
The dust storm concealed his presence, but he trusted Cal to keep him hidden.
It could’ve been the clearest, brightest day or he could’ve had a bright spotlight on him in the darkest night and none of the enemy would’ve so much as looked in his direction.
He hurled the tiny spear.
The Skill-enhanced throw zipped over the wall, hundreds of yards into the sky.
Thanks to a different Skill he knew exactly where it was without having to keep an eye on it.
Spear Teleport.
This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it
He vanished with a soft pop.
One moment standing on cobblestones.
The next falling from a great height.
The dome of Saint Peter’s Basilica stood out, highlighted by the HUD.
Large and imposing, it grew even larger as he rushed to meet it.
He located the building separated by perfectly-maintained lawns to the east.
Some kind of palace where they used to do all the administration and governance for Vatican City.
That hadn’t changed from the pre-spires days.
There was just a lot more depraved demon-worshiping rituals and the attached debasement and cruel treatment of innocent people.
He chanced a quick glance to the square on the west side of the basilica.
Yup.
A smoking crater and a figure that blazed like the sun in thermal vision.
However, his role had nothing to do with that, so he located the target window in the government palace.
A second mini spear punched through so fast that it burned a hole rather than shatter the ornate glass.
A soft pop and he landed hard on booted feet. He rolled forward to disperse the impact.
The laws of physics could be bent, but not entirely broken.
At least by him.
Maybe at Level 50?
The hallway was empty at this late hour.
There were patrols, but the distraction out in the square would draw everyone’s attention.
Cal was also helping to keep the team unnoticeable.
That help, however, would stop when it came time for Cal to fight the demon.
Drake tossed a one-time portal stone on the cold, artful tiles.
Rynnen came through first, running to the end of the hallway behind a huge, rectangular shield made out of tank armor.
Yeah… it was like that.
He had seen Cal pull it out of an actual tank’s side with a thought.
The assault rifle was standard issue aside from what the ranger’s darkly-dubbed their ‘war crimes’ rounds. And if there was anyone deserving of burning phosphorus shot into their chests it was demon-corrupted priests.
The rest of the team came through.
“Randy Potter, get those eyes out!” Blackstar barked.
The thin spellbook at Rand’s hip fluttered up to his hands like a bird on a leash.
Drake had to rethink that.
Birds didn’t tend to have leashes as a natural part of their existence.
It would’ve been an outside context problem for the poor things.
The analogy needed work.
Rand found the page with his wizard eyes spell and cast with a whisper.
Ethereal copies emerged from the young man’s real eyes.
Ten pairs floated in every direction through walls, the floor and ceiling.
They already knew where they needed to go.
Down into the necropolis where the majority of the prisoners were kept for sleep and torture.
“Patrols are mostly clearing out,” Rand’s head and eyes darted wildly in seemingly random directions.
What was really creepy was how each eye sometimes swiveled independently.
“Distraction’s working,” Howard grunted.
“Okay, we’re clear to go to Point 1,” Rand shook his head with a wince.
“Don’t puke,” Emma warned.
“Moving!” Blackstar barked.
Rynnen took the lead.
The rest followed with Drake bringing up the rear.
Point 1 was an empty office.
Rynnen kicked the ornate wooden desk to the side, clearing space.
“Clear on every floor,” Rand said.
“Emmione,” Blackstar gestured.
Emma’s spellbook was more elegant than Rand’s, resembling a fancy diary.
Though, Drake wouldn’t admit that was what it looked like to him.
The spellbook glowed and daintily floated into Emma’s hands. It didn’t flap aggressively like Rand’s.
Drake wanted to call it a floating flower, but did flowers float?
In water, sure, but in air?
Emma’s spell ate a large circle all the way down several floors and into the necropolis several dozen feet below ground level.
The original necropolis was located underneath the basilica, but the demon had expanded it.
Rynnen dropped through first.
Howard went next.
The rest followed after Emma cast slow fall on them.
The first thing one noticed when visiting a demon’s subterranean domain without the benefit of protection was the smell.
Then one noticed the sounds of human agony.
It echoed off the rough-hewn cavern surfaces.
Rand cursed, dropping to his knees with his eyes squeezed shut.
“Potter?”
“Sorry, Leader Blackstar… um…” Rand shook his head. “I brought some of my eyes down here, but something squished them as soon as they went underground.”
“Wonder what could’ve done that,” Howard grunted.
“Double time to Point 2!” Blackstar snapped.
Point 2 was a large cavern that served as a hub with multiple tunnels leading out to the torture chambers and prisoner cells in the newer section of the necropolis.
“Can’t tell with all the screaming,” Blackstar scowled. “Howard?”
“Fuck… okay, give me a second,” the bearded man’s faceplate slid up and he took a strong whiff. “Smells like blood, piss, shit and demon from every tunnel.”
“What do you think? Ambush here. Defeat the guards. Then rescue,” Blackstar said.
“You’re the boss,” Howard shrugged. “Sounds like a good plan as any.”
So said, he used sharp, thick, claw-like fingernails to scale the rocky wall and perch on the overhang over the largest tunnel opening.
“Randy Potter!”
“Yes, ma’am?”
“Delayed spells on those tunnels,” Blackstar pointed toward two openings to their 3 o’clock. “Keeping in mind the enclosed environment.”
“No explosions,” Emma whispered.
“I know that!” Rand snapped. “This is my world now,” he whispered.
“Emmione!”
Emma saluted.
“In the tunnel we came from. Cast concealment on the two of us and stay back. Be ready to support. You too, Randy Potter.”
Rynnen and Blackstar took up a position near the tunnel at 9 o’clock.
“Sticksies,” she called back. “Pick your spots. Get to their backline if the opportunity presents itself.”
Drake joined Emma.
She thumbed through her spellbook with shaking hands.
“We practiced this, like, fifty times,” he said.
“I thought that was basically the real thing, but it’s different when it’s really real.”
“Hey, you know your spells inside and out. Don’t over think it. Just let it flow.”
“I don’t want to screw up and get someone killed or hurt.”
“Who’s screwing up now?” Rand skidded to a stop.
An almost manic grin spread across his face.
“Faceplate.”
“Right, sorry, Sticksies,” Rand darkened it with a cybernetic thought.
“No one’s screwing up,” he regarded the young wizards.
“Yeah, what’s the big deal, Emmione,” Rand shook his head. “We’ve been in battles before.”
“Not with demon people.”
“I don’t know, marauders and cannibals seemed pretty demonic to me,” Rand shrugged.
“Confidence is fine. Over confidence will get you killed,” he warned.
“Yeah. This is a real demon. The one from Florida we’ve been practicing against was fake.”
A sobering thought.
Though it had been fake, it certainly had felt real at the time.
A stomp was putting it lightly.
Drake still had nightmares about that pale, pink demon and how it ate his flesh one thin slice at a time.
“Listen. This demon is being handled. We just have to deal with its worshipers. Remember, we wouldn’t be here if we couldn’t handle it.”
“Good talk, now shut up and get ready,” Howard’s voice whispered through the comms.
----------------------------------------
Eron floated above his crater.
He wore the same armor and helmet as the rest of the team.
Not that he needed to.
It was merely a good opportunity to test its limits in a real combat scenario.
Test. Test. Radio Telepathy check.
Cal’s voice in his head.
Radio Telepathy, he thought back, seems redundant.
I’ve got to differentiate it. This is strictly communicating just like over a radio.
That’s just what the root words of telepathy means.
Technically—
Which is the best kind of correct.
Sigh.
Bro, did you just say ‘sigh’ or was that an actual sigh?
Why not both?
Weird, but whatever. How’s everyone doing?
Where they’re supposed to be within margin of error.
The demon?
Doing as planned. It’s withdrawn from its lair into its favorite host.
Poor bastard.
Don’t feel so bad for him. He wasn’t a good dude in the first place and he made his choice.
Still… it’s a gruesome fate.
To normal people. To him it’s like getting off constantly.
Yeah, I don’t want to alarm you, but I am filling a little tingle in my loins… so to speak.
‘Tingle’ and ‘loins’ together aren’t what I want to hear from you. Hold on, give me a second. It’s reaching out to you. Trying to slither its hooks into your crotch… so to speak.
The second passed.
The tingle vanished.
Thanks, dude. So… uh… demon of lust…
In the broader sense. Not solely of carnal lust, but includes things like lust for dominance, sadism, power, material wealth, practically anything you can think of.
Yeah, I’m going to throw it back to you. Don’t want to hear the words ‘carnal lust’ with any of that… so to speak.
Speaking of which, it’s time.
Yeah, I can see and hear them coming. So, have you decided yet? Any of these demon-touched priests worth saving?
Silence.
I can knockout the least terrible ones for you ethically questionable rehabilitation program…
They’re too far gone and the demon will suck them dry to save itself.
“I guess they made their choice, even if some of them can’t see that little prefix in front of their classes,” he shrugged. “Go get it. I’ll join you after I’m done out here.”
He floated higher over the crater he had created in the middle of Saint Peter’s Square.
An idle thought entered his mind.
Hopefully, the automatic repair system was still in place.
He suspected that it would be something taken away in the transition.
If the tutorial phase was truly over then it made sense that helpful aids would be removed.
Things like food and supplies automatically re-stocking.
He hoped not.
That would be very bad.
A round plinked off his faceplate.
The high-velocity rifle bullet left a dark smudge.
He caught the deformed bullet before it fell and threw it through the sniper’s scope.
Shooters took up positions at the windows of the various buildings near the square.
Bullets peppered him like a light drizzle.
He caught a few and returned them to their senders, silencing those guns.
More demon-touched men came swarming out of the buildings and the basilica itself.
They took cover behind scattered barricades set to protect the ancient church and ones closer to the square.
Bullets struck him from behind.
The guards on the wall had finally noticed.
His gaze turned towards the basilica’s high dome where his brother was about to enter.
Cal wasn’t taking any chances with the demon, which meant that there was no more hiding for Eron.
Which was the plan anyways.
Be the big, bright distraction.
He opened his faceplate and a new sun flared to life, turning night into day.
Intense solar rays scoured the square of demon-corrupted filth.
Demon-corrupted priests chanted hymns and prayers.
Twisting what was meant to be holy into depravity.
Shields of corrupted faith proved no barrier to the harsh glare of sins revealed.
A cadre pooled their efforts to call down a yellow beam of light from the heavens to smite him.
The perversion of what should’ve been holy brought a faint twist of nausea in his gut.
His hands blurred, catching dozens of bullets.
He showered the priests in leaden hail.
A shield flared to life, protecting them.
The moment’s reprieve was just that, for there was no shield to block his terrible gaze.
All left of the cadre was a cloud of ash in the wind.
He noticed it then.
The demon-corrupted men’s shadows.
The silhouette’s were twisted, misshapen. Horns, tails, tentacles, teeth, too many limbs.
“Begone foul demon!” an old man in fancy robes and an even fancier hat strode forward surrounded by heavily armored men.
“Oh, this should be good,” Eron floated closer, ignoring the constant barrage of bullets and spells. His armor had been shredded in the first minute and he was down to his skintight compression pants and long-sleeved shirt. He pulled the remnants of his helmet off and crushed it into a small ball, which he sent through the building to his left.
The screams of the dead and the dying were inaudible to all but him over the thunderous explosions of fireballs, sizzling beams of unholy rays and sustained retorts of automatic weapons fire.
“You are powerless before the name of our lord!” the old man intoned.
“You a demon-corrupted cardinal or something?” Eron came to a halt a dozen feet away and above the man and his escort. “Here to surrender?”
A rocket-propelled grenade streaked out of a distant window to his left. He caught it in one hand and let the explosion wash over him with a smile.
“You’re a cardinal, right? You’ve got a red hat and a stole? Cardinal for the color, like the bird. So, molest any kids today? No wait. It’s much, much worse than that now, isn’t it?”
“Remove your foul presence from this holy place!” the old man swished one of those incense-burning things in one hand while holding a crucifix-topped staff in the other.
“I must confess. I’m a terrible Catholic. It has been…” he counted years on his fingers, making several complete circuits, “at least thirty-five, forty years since I last went to Mass, let alone confession. Shit, was Confirmation the last time I was in a Church? Nah, I think there was a couple of weddings and funerals after that. Anyways, I’m a terrible Catholic. I don’t remember what that incense meteor hammer thing is called. And I’ve killed a bunch of you already. Gonna kill the demon pope. Gonna wreck the Vatican, obviously,” he gestured to the crater in the middle of the square.
“Silence! If you will not leave of your own free will then be compelled under the pain of God’s holy judgment!”
The smoke came to life, stretching out to chomp Eron in its demonic visage.
He clapped, blowing it away, yet it persisted, forming once again.
“Our Father, who art in heaven…”
Eron felt sick.
Say what you will about the Church, but the worst parts about it were always just the people and the organization.
To hear the Lord’s Prayer coming out of a demon-corrupted cardinal…
“You can’t even tell, can you? Don’t you see it when you look at your sheet. You’re not just a cardinal anymore. You’re a demon-corrupted cardinal.”
“The lies of Satan will find no purchase. Our faith shields us,” the demon-corrupted cardinal’s head bodyguard drew a straight sword and held it aloft. “My Sword of Faith will strike you down!”
The mundane steel sword grew into an impossibly large one of nausea-inducing yellow light.
It crashed into Eron’s chest, knocking him back several dozen feet into the ground.
“Well…” Eron looked at the slice in his compression shirt and the angry red welt on his skin. “I learned something new today.”
The demonic cloud reached for him with grasping claws.
The bodyguards rushed him with over-sized, glowing weapons of faith.
He was supposed to stretch things out, draw everyone to him so that Cal could fight the demon and the team could safely rescue the prisoners in the dungeons.
Still, there was a fine line between confidence and arrogance.
He turned the demon-corrupted cardinal and bodyguards into ash with a sustained look.
The old man must’ve been higher level and probably had a tight bond with the demon to make him even more powerful because he lasted longer than a few seconds.
“Done and dusted,” he sighed, floating higher into the air back toward the center of the square to be a bright, shining light for all the demon’s men to see.