A tiny foot, like a baby’s compared to his massive one, kicked him in the ankle.
The stomp landed next to the dragon follower child’s head.
To her credit she had never closed her eyes.
She pulled a dragon claw sickle from her belt and scored a thin line of blood through his thick, thunderhorn leather boot.
He stomped again, but the child went sliding across the floor.
A little monkey scampered up his back.
Small, but strong legs wrapped around his neck, while an armored elbow landed downward blows on his head.
Pick breaks the ice—
“Damn, harder than iron.”
—failed.
Python constricts the piglet… also failed.
“You again?” he grabbed at the tiny old woman in the fancy armor. “I will pry you from that shell like a crab. You will tell me where you received it before I grant you the release of death.”
She scampered up his arm like a tiny rodent up a tree.
Armored legs wrapped around his bicep, while arms wrapped around his giant one.
She grunted, trying to pull his arm straight.
“I always enjoy discovering that combat techniques are shared across worlds. I suppose it’s a matter of physiology. There are only so many effective ones that can be performed by our kind. Sadly, you are too weak.”
He flexed his bicep to mock her.
His one arm held more strength than she could leverage with her entire body.
Still, she was a lot stronger than she looked.
He shook her off like the annoying rodent she was, sending her into the interior of the building.
Three children and one old woman.
Which to remove first?
He spat golden blood on broken tiles.
The closest one.
She with the cauterized hole in her shoulder.
“You would’ve been treated honorably as a hostage. Dependent upon your empress’ behavior, of course. However, seeing that she sends children to their deaths, perhaps you would’ve ended up in the same place at the end.”
“Shut up!”
He blocked the blast of plasma with the gorgon shield.
“Weakened. Is that the extent of your ‘phoenix’ flames?”
“My flame is eternal!” she shrieked.
“It always is,” he snorted.
“Burn!”
“Annoying children!”
The last two swooped in spraying him with plasma.
They breached the limits of his endurance.
Skin burned.
A flick of the wrist sent his blade into the downed child’s leg pinning it to the floor.
He thrust his free hand toward one of the flying children like an angry raptor claw.
“Sesre’s Talons.”
A giant, disembodied inhuman hand materialized, lashing out.
Red for rage.
Red for war.
Red for what they birthed.
The spell wrapped around the burning child like she was a wriggling rodent.
Grip tightened.
Claws pierced.
Child screamed.
He slammed her into one of the small grassy lawns.
It ignited on impact.
Her eyes blazed, mouth open in a wordless scream.
“Foolish ch—”
He barely raised his shield in time to block the vomit of plasma she expelled.
Plasma splashed against his back.
“Die!” the other wounded child shrieked.
Plasma bathed him from above.
He relinquished the talons to send them after the last remaining flying child.
She soared, dipping, ducking, diving with the conjured talons on her tail, all the while pouring an endless stream of plasma.
He spun, trying to keep the gorgon shield between him and the child.
“Enough of this,” he grit his teeth and dismissed the talons. “Heads of the Hydra!”
Seven ethereal heads spewed from his open mouth.
They grew in size as they snaked out on long, sinuous necks.
The reptilian heads roared and sprayed venom at the flying child.
She snarled, flaring her power.
Venom turned to steam in an instant.
The heads vanished.
He cast magic shields, but set them horizontally, rising into the air like a set of stairs.
Great bounding steps carried him to the flying child.
He leapt above her.
“Juggernaut’s Charge!”
He shot through the child’s plasma blast behind the gorgon shield.
Her arms snapped at the impact.
He was the hammer. The floor was the anvil. The child was the red hot ingot.
Plasma blasted him off the child at the last possible instant.
She still crashed into the floor, but she was saved from being smashed.
The three children had combined their waning strength.
They poured everything they had left as he rose to his feet.
His skin blistered.
His cracked armor glowed.
Even the gorgon shield had reached its limits.
The pouches of holding on his belt exploded.
Various liquids evaporated almost instantly.
Knives and various tools shattered.
The child with broken arms screamed a torrent of plasma from her mouth and eyes to join with the others.
A magic shield stemmed the tide for a moment before it shattered.
He replaced it with three layers.
The heat was unbearable.
The only things on him that hadn’t been affected were the straps holding his armor and shield in place and that was because they had been made from the skin of a lava snake.
He caught erratic movement out of the corner of his eye.
The dragonscale-clad child hobbled toward him, leaning on her poleaxe.
Blood dribbled down the broken cerulean scales of her chestplate.
She lifted the front of her dragon-shaped helm to reveal her face.
Bruised and bloodied, she glared daggers.
He dismissed the non-existent threat.
She opened her mouth.
“Breath of the Ocean Dragon!”
Who was foolish now?
Dark water spewed forth in a roiling wave that crashed across the floor.
Cold from the ocean depths washed over him.
He stood tall against the waves.
A great cliff upon which the ocean itself could break against for a thousand years with no effect.
It brought instant relief.
A cold shower on a hot day.
The cracks on his armor suddenly spread.
A most disconcerting sound.
Like stepping on a frozen lake.
“Hammer breaks the stone… Yahhh!”
A primal scream.
A mighty blow.
His chestplate shattered.
The enchantment contained within failed.
The explosion threw him and the tiny old woman many meters from each other.
She attacked a mere moment later with a flying kick that he barely blocked with the heavily-damaged gorgon shield.
He imagined he could hear a small scream from the fearsome head.
He reached out for the old woman, but she flipped away.
It had been a feint.
He wanted her at a distance.
He hurled his shield.
She fell to her back, used her feet to kick the shield into the sky.
The subsequent explosion shattered every remaining window and sent them all flying.
He was slow to rise, but he beat them all.
The dragonscale-clad child remained flat on her back.
Only one phoenix child remained conscious.
The old woman was the only other one still standing.
“I am the herald of true war and you, old woman, children, thought to bring me low!” he laughed with a bravado he didn’t feel. “I am destruction! I am devastation! Your best has merely ruined my clothing,” he sneered. “For that you will die—”
The air above him shimmered and rippled.
A crackling tear slowly formed like in ripping cloth.
Portal.
He thrust a hand toward it, trying to counter the spell.
The construction was perfect. Beyond even his ability.
“Finally!” the old woman snapped. “Took you long enough. ‘Just get the kid out of there’, you said. ‘Let them fight’, you said. Peh!” she retracted her faceplate to spit. “What? Don’t you talk back to me, girl. Young ones these days, no respect. I don’t care. Everyone almost died. So? Magical interference? Excuses!
“Who are you talking to, you withered crone!” he snarled.
“You’ll find out, Herald of War,” she snorted. “Such arrogance, such regret.”
Before he could say a word an inexorable force grabbed him, squeezing painfully tight, and pulled him into the portal.
“Stupid children,” Grandmother muttered as she hurried to put the first aid kit tucked behind her back to use. “Yes, yes, stupid computer! I read the instructions. Triage this, triage that. I know how that goes. At least the fire stops the bleeding. You little chicks better learn your lesson. War is no place for children. And stop wriggling! Bad for tenderized organs!”
----------------------------------------
“I’m so sorry, sir, but there was magical interference and and and I just couldn’t get it to stick, it was like trying to draw on a fish,” Cammi stammered.
“Camster, not your fault,” Cal said.
This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.
“But but but,” she lowered her voice, “they died. Kids died.”
“I know, but it wasn’t your fault. It was this guy’s fault,” he gestured toward the immobile Eidolon of Sesre laying at their feet.
The giant of a man glared up at him.
“As promised, Herd Mother Brusalia. I give you one of the architects of your suffering.”
Hooves thundered into the grass, sending tremors across the entire field.
They had gathered in a large park.
The nearby spire was visible and ringed with armed people.
People, in this case meant a sapient species in the form of a minotaur mixed with a centaur.
Mythological creatures, which odds suggested probably actually existed somewhere out in the multiverse.
The People were very real.
He stood in the middle of a ring of giants with Cammi.
Their shadows gave the two of them shade from the bright sun.
The heat from their bodies warmed the cool late fall air for the young wizard. Didn’t do much for him.
The herd mother’s voice was deep and rich.
“You’ve delivered two,” she kicked the Eidolon of Suiteonem’s head toward the Eidolon of Sesre.
His eyes bulged with rage.
“The Eidolon of Ekra will be ash and feathers soon.”
“The body thief?”
“Being dealt with.”
“And the last?”
“She entered the spire. I expect it’s to begin the mobilization of their real army. They don’t need your people anymore.”
“We knew this. That our time was a rapidly burning candle, but what choice did we have. They took the prime of her herd, men and women, to fight in their wars across the worlds. Leaving us, the old and the young. They promised we’d be safe. Hostage to the obedience of our prime ones.”
“Bad luck. They would’ve kept to the letter of their promise. Granted, they would’ve drafted your young ones into their armies when they came of age. But my home being a Terminus World changed plans, spurred them on.”
“The colonial rush. This is known to our people,” Herd Mother Brusalia said. “They sacrificed us.”
“I can give you a safe space. We can formalize a treaty later when under less desperate conditions.”
“We’d trade a known master for one unknown.”
“That is the risk. Remain and fight. You’ll surely die between what’s coming and what’s in front of you. The Phoenix Dynasty will not hold back. I’ve bargained for this short window to get your people out of here before things escalate.”
“Our children and grandfathers are still fighting. We will not leave a single soul.”
“Call them back. As for those that can’t make it, I’ll take care of them.”
She leaned forward. Her breath was hot, like standing in front of smoker.
Her face was an inhuman mix of human and bovine.
Those sharp horns could easily take an eye or two.
But he didn’t see that.
He saw a being that wasn’t much different from him.
Her eyes were tired from bearing the deaths of hundreds of old and young.
Her herd was less than a thousand now.
“What choice do we have? You swore safety, but what worth are words when they swore on their Gods?”
“I swear on myself.”
“Certain death or uncertain death? What a choice to make.”
“Unlike the fake gods, I’m not going to make it for you.”
“You can take us against our will, yet you won’t?”
“Yes on both.”
“You’d let us die if we so decided? When you could bind us to your service?”
“No binds, no service. I give freely. All I expect is peaceful coexistence and I suspect that is what your people also want.”
“I’d accept, but I know the body thief. I’m certain it is among us and I cannot agree when it means that it will be allowed to spread to another land.”
“I promise that is the least of your concerns. In fact,” he pointed.
Three of the herd rose up into the air.
They kicked and struggled.
Begged and threatened.
Cries of treachery went out across the herd.
A mother cried for her son.
A son cried for his mother.
“Silence!” Herd Mother Brusalia bellowed. “Explain yourself or be trampled!” she demanded.
“I’m sorry. You know that it’s too late once the parasite gets to the brain.” He gestured.
Gray skin and fur burst open to reveal black chitin.
The herd stomped in collective dismay.
“Eidolon of Sunothi!”
He crushed them.
“Don’t let the parts fall on—”
The herd mother’s words fell away when he ripped the eidolons into nothing.
“Shamans!” she cried. “Does it still live?”
They chanted.
A long, tense moment passed.
“Nothing. We find nothing,” the oldest shaman said.
“One of it remains, but not for long,” he said.
“We will trust for we have nothing left. Your prisoner?” she gestured toward the Eidolon of Sesre.
“Not mine. Yours.”
“You will hold him?”
“If that’s what you want.”
“You don’t need him for information?”
“Nope.”
“Then we have an agreement. The horns will sound. The herd will converge here. We will trust.”
“I’ll do my best to fulfill my part,” he nodded, extending a hand that was swallowed up by hers.
The herd mother bellowed.
The cry was echoed across the herd.
He grabbed Cammi and flew up into the sky.
“Don’t look.”
Her face twisted as an involuntary shiver ran up her back.
“I can’t even see anything if I wanted to.” She peered through her glasses before making a decision and taking them off.
“Good call, best not to see something like that when you have the choice. Portal back to base. Be ready in case Howard’s team needs backup. I’ll be flying the herd out of here, so remind everyone to be careful. There won’t be any last minute emergency saves until I get back in the area.”
The herd expended years of gathering rage and pain on the Eidolon of Sesre.
Thundering hooves trampled him into the grass until all that remained was a golden smear.
----------------------------------------
The weird smell had hit Howard in the face three blocks before he got to the nondescript office building.
The pleasant ocean scent from the bay visible in the distance had been instantly wiped out.
“Found it,” he said into the comms. “Proceeding,” he drew his fancy alien pistol before climbing through a broken window.
He carefully placed an emergency portal stone in the middle of the room.
Some kind of office going by the desks and cubicles.
Good to know they had those things in China too.
His boots sounded way too loud to his ears.
Sure, he had an animal’s ears, but so did the eidolon.
Hopefully, the boss was right and it was in the middle of splitting off bits of itself to spread around.
The boss had been hunting down and killing all the nasty parasites across the country over the last month.
This was the last one.
Probably the original.
Unless the original was on another world, which was horrifying to think about, but nothing he could do about it in that case.
He could only kill what was in front of him.
The scent trail led him to a large, walk-in storage closest.
Office supplies and human skin hung up like suits in a rich man’s closet.
What the fuck!
The skin suits were covered in a clear slime.
The source of the smell.
Sweet and sour at the same time and way too good.
He tasted sour candy.
Damn… he didn’t like that mental image.
He wasn’t going to look at candy the same way for a long time.
“I’ve got a lock on the portal stone.” Teddy Bear’s voice came crystal clear over the comms.
“How’s the scrying coming along? Would be nice to know where it is so I can stop creeping around like the poor bastard that gets got in a horror movie.”
“Sorry, er, negative. Interference. We know it has good senses. Maybe you can set a trap?”
“Huh? You’re not so useless after all, kid. Thanks.”
“Wait? I was use—”
Howard tossed an incendiary grenade into the closet and hurried down the corridor to wait around the corner.
Burning its wardrobe should send it running. Make it careless.
He heard the skittering before he saw the black chitin flash through the door on the other end.
The targeting system linking pistol to helmet beeped.
He squeezed the trigger.
The viral round magnetically accelerated to the speed of sound with a loud bang.
It struck center mass, plunging through black chitin before expelling its contents.
The liquid in the bullet expanded to about six inches in diameter breaking down everything inside into nothing.
Fuck if he knew how it worked. Something about it being like a virus, but not really cause it didn’t last past the six inch sphere.
So, no risk of contamination beyond that. Just don’t accidentally shoot yourself or within six inches of yourself.
The Eidolon of Sunothi.
Fancy name for an insect.
Fine, humanoid insect.
He didn’t want to be speciest, but the fucker ate people from inside then wore their skin like a suit and pretended to be the person.
Like that poor bastard Cal found at the port.
Dude had a wife and little kids.
He was dead cause of the insectoid fucker.
Wife a widow.
Kids without their daddy.
“Ain’t fair.”
The eidolon staggered, but kept moving despite having a big hole in its chest.
“Shit…”
The viral rounds were so expensive that he only had ten total. Five in the pistol and five in the toughest armory safe all the way back in California.
He considered his other guns, the axe, the mace, the knives.
Better not take dumb risks.
He squeezed another viral round into its mouth-mandibles.
No face eidolon dropped to the floor and twitched.
“Serviced, mother fucker!”
He lobbed an alchemical acid bomb just to be sure.
Santi made the good stuff.
Black chitin didn’t take long to turn into black goo.
“Target is down,” he said into the comms.
“Cool, I mean, copy. Interference is down,” Teddy Bear said. “Be careful.”
“Yeah, I know.” He kept his eyes on the sizzling remains.
They weren’t exactly sure how it made its little parasites.
Best to be extra careful.
Only guaranteed way to spot the things was the boss and he was doing a cattle drive.
Shit!
He tamped down on that shit.
Didn’t want to be a speciest.
It was like his therapists said.
He had to be willing to see that the problem existed before he could fix it.
It was a whole process thing.
Just had to trust it even if it involved taking kids like those two wizards into a war zone.
He supposed he couldn’t blame the boss for doing that.
Their Ms. Teacher had specifically requested for the boss to do that.
Howard had watched the magical talking bird message she had sent.
----------------------------------------
Phoenix Dynasty soldiers mined the area beyond the spire’s safe zone.
Cal dropped down near the Phoenix Empress.
Her elite guard reacted like bees when a bear attacked the hive for sweet honey.
“Don’t move!”
“Raise your hands!”
“Get on the ground!”
Contradictory orders bombarded him from all direction.
The empress’s face looked as if it was carved from marble. Only her beating heart betrayed surprise.
Despite all the safeguards from dozens of spells and Skills from her bodyguards, none had detected his presence.
She waved her guards away.
They turned as one, leaving her and Cal inside a ringed circle bristling with weapons.
“In less than thirty minutes you’ve removed every single invader from my city. Even their dead. And despite having a thousand pairs of eyes watching, none of them can tell me how you did it. Not my oracles, nor my best scouts. Not hundreds of cameras, mundane and magical. Not even Three-eyed Shang.”
“It got a little cloudy.” He pointed to the sky and the sparse cloud cover. “Plus, there’s the whole fog of war thing.”
“No matter. I consider that portion of our bargain fulfilled. Now, about the eidolons? I understand you didn’t take any prisoner.”
“Two are golden smears somewhere around here. There’s nothing left of another. If you wanted prisoners then you shouldn’t have burned the winged one to ashes.”
“My brother and son killed that one. He deserved a measure of vengeance. The aliens killed two of my nieces and maimed two others. My brother is understandably upset.”
“Kids don’t belong in war.”
“This world is war. Monsters, humans, aliens. The spires made it so. Those that lived have learned valuable lessons.”
“And that is?”
“The invincibility of youth doesn’t exist. That there will always be someone stronger. That their mother and father won’t always be around to protect them. Pick one. There are dozens more.”
“Lesson through trauma. From my experience those stick the best. The downside is that traumatized children make traumatized adults. And that isn’t good for them and those around them.”
“You’d raise soft children that will break the first time they face overwhelming adversity and thus you waste decades of resources put into their upbringing.”
“I’d raise children, not weapons.”
“Weapons are what is needed in this world.”
“Disagree… I’d like to add something to our bargain.”
The empress’ gazed hardened.
“An ally that shifts his mood like a flower in the wind is no ally.”
“It won’t cost you anything. Your nieces. The ones maimed. I can get them fitted with prosthetics. Magitech. Custom made. Or if they’re willing to wait, it might be possible for their limbs to be regrown.”
“I accept, however, let them go without for a few months. They need to suffer the loss to rise above it and become stronger for the experience.”
“For a phoenix that’s cold.”
She gave him a mirthless smile.
“I am an empress as well as the phoenix. To rule is to put aside sentimentality.”
“So, you don’t care about prosthetics for all your soldiers and cultivators that lost limbs?”
“I’d accept a free gift, but I suspect your generosity only extends to those like us. The ones that stand above.”
“True, in part. You’d have to pay for materials and labor. Alternatively, I can broker a deal between you and the prosthetic makers. They may be willing to teach.”
“I will consider it.”
“Okay. I believe that concludes our agreement. As for the future—”
“I won’t commit at this time. I’m inclined to maintain my position regardless of any additional enticements. Neither my brother, nor I can be made available for these worldwide Quests of yours. We can’t leave. The skirmish with the eidolons made that clear. However, I will allow the children and my master cultivators to join you pending the needs of my empire. It will be valuable experience.”
“Understood.” He floated off the ground.
“You won’t join the fight?”
“That wasn’t included in the initial deal. I believe I’ve given you all the intel you need to get a jump on their real army. So, good luck. I’m counting on you to hold them here.”
“Don’t doubt our ability. Not even stone can withstand our flames.”
“What was that you were saying about overconfidence?”
She laughed.
“We’ve mined around the spires you said they’d arrive through. I’ve positioned full forces from the north here in Shenzhen as well as pulled them from Hong Kong to the south. The eidolons made a mistake in coming through here. They’re trapped by my armies to the north and south. By the ocean to the east and west.”
“They had no way to tell where they’d emerge. I suggest you find a way to monitor all the spires in your territory because I can’t.”
“Such isn’t your place.”
“Unless there’s an emergency situation the next time we speak will be to arrange your nieces’ trip to get their treatment. I’d be willing to transport a diplomatic team for negotiation purposes. Let’s say, keep it under ten people. I’ll turn a blind eye to spies, but no assassins or saboteur-types allowed.”
“That’s acceptable.”
“Good luck again and don’t underestimate the Stone Lords. They’ll fight more like our modern military than old style.”
“I know. I’ve read your scouting report. Had my finest military minds go over them multiple times. We’re prepared for what’s coming.”
He departed with a wave and flew straight to their warehouse base.