Elsewhere on Planet Earth.
“God. Damn. It.”
Eron was on a tight schedule.
World Events kept popping up.
It was like the spires was a kid that just learned what that word meant and couldn’t stop using it in every sentence.
In just the last couple of days the North Atlantic kraken-thing became the South Atlantic kraken-thing and bounced off of Florida— Richellia— and the girl dragon. Imagine that. Over a hundred year’s old and still considered a girl in dragon years.
Apparently, it was an epic battle down the entire coast before they managed to drive it away.
He had watched a bit before he had forgotten to tuck his glasses away in his pouch of holding before zooming down to deal with a thing somewhere over the real South Atlantic. Burned the stupid thing off his face.
Last he knew the kraken-thing was headed into the Gulf of Mexico.
It was on his to do list, but first…
There had been a brief flash of some pretty powerful energy over in Africa.
He didn’t have time to figure out exactly where, he just went to the fertile valley surrounded by mountains.
“Oh shit!”
Dinosaur riders, but with high-tech stuff.
He took a split-second to take it all in, focusing on the most important bits as the outworld invaders stood like statues in his heightened state of perception.
There appeared to be three varieties: small, medium and large.
Small was about the size of those ridable ponies people that lived in the mountains used.
Medium was a bit bigger than those huge horses.
Large was an elephant.
They all sorta looked like those raptors in that ancient movie about dinosaurs.
Except, feathery and really colorful.
Lots of sharp teeth.
Long arms with clawed… fingers?
What were those supposed to be called?
Paws didn’t sound right?
What were lizard hands and feet called? Fingers? Toes?
Were these dinosaurs even lizards?
Shit… probably couldn’t even call them ‘dinosaurs’… unless…
Some of them were geared up in camouflaged armor and saddles?
One of the large ones had what were obviously weapons mounted on its back, sides and on its chest.
The weapons smelled like burning. He could see the power packs. Feel them radiating power. Fortunately, not radiation.
Right.
Time to do the thing.
He flew over to the guys that looked to be in charge judging by the gesticulating.
“On behalf of the Planet Earth. I welcome you. What are your intentions?”
The gust of wind his sudden appearance brought rocked them back.
Weapon barrels snapped to him.
Tiny energy cells surged.
He smelled the ozone build.
“I come in peace.” He raised open hands. Hopefully, that wasn’t a threat display. Some people could shoot stuff from their hands after all. “Universal translation system working, right?”
“Don’t move!” one of the short, fuzzy outworld invaders said.
Weird dudes.
The tallest came up to about his stomach, while the shortest wouldn’t even reach his waist. So, somewhere between 3 and 4 feet tall.
They looked delicate.
Thin-boned. Wiry muscled.
The crude exoskeleton that reminded him of an ancient video game probably helped make up the strength deficiency. Odd, that they appeared to have laser guns, yet their exoskeleton tech was just a little ahead of where humanity was before the spires fucked them over.
Then there was whatever they did to control the dinos.
A lot of glowing lights on the dino helmets.
Cybernetic mind control?
Maybe not… not all the dinos were geared up and none of them looked to be hungry for the bite-sized, fuzzy, green-ish people.
Eron regarded the speaker’s pudgy features. Big eyes, weird nose, like three pairs of nostril slits running from eyes to top of the mouth. Teeth looked like his. So, not predatory. That was a plus.
Five spindly fingers.
Boots, so he coudn’t tell how their feet situation was.
“Not moving.”
The fuzzy little dude swallowed the lump in his…
Eron realized he didn’t know the gender situation.
He quickly glanced at the others.
Still couldn’t tell.
… their throat.
“Are you a God of this world?” the fuzzy little person said with a tremor in their voice.
“Absolutely not. Gods don’t exist. What I am is a person. Just like you.”
He didn’t know their expressions, but they looked skeptical. Or that was him projecting.
“Listen… I’m kind of busy. Lots of World Events.”
They nodded at that.
So, they must be getting them too, despite being recent arrivals.
“You wouldn’t happen to have the ability to deal with some of those, would you?”
The fuzzy little person he took for the leader shook their head. Those big ears flapped like a—
Nope. He mentally corrected himself. Don’t compare sapient species to animals. It’s a dick move.
“Alright. No problem. Seems like a lot to ask. So, I’ll just ask you this. What are your intentions on my world?”
The fuzzy little people practically shivered.
The dinos regarded him intently with their slitted eyes and sharp teeth. They didn’t look pleased. Wary at his strength, but not afraid.
He wondered if those helmets could scan the energy in his body.
Then again, only morons wouldn’t take a guy that suddenly flew into their midst seriously.
The fuzzy little leader person looked to be grappling with a dilemma.
“Alright, yeah, I don’t have time for this right now. There’s a kraken-thing with portal abilities— anyways, if you’re here to start new lives that’s fine. Totally cool. Just… no conquering or any sort of fighting with my people, the natives, also no fighting with any other sapient outworlders, like you guys. Obviously, you can defend yourself if attacked. But none of that manufacturing consent false flag crap. I will find out. So,” he regarded the valley, “you’ve got encounter challenges and spawn zones, it looks like you’ve got the tech to figure out what’s safe to eat and what not. Let’s say just stay in this valley for now. Someone will eventually drop by for all that diplomacy stuff. Any questions?”
The fuzzy little leader shook their head quickly.
“Cool… one last thing,” Eron regarded the dinos. “Are they, uh, sapient?”
The beeping in his ear piece grew insistent.
“Damn it! Hold on to that thought. Uh, just to let you know, someone might be interested in purchasing one. If they aren’t sapient of course.”
He zoomed into the sky.
Waited to get enough distance before going well past hypersonic.
The air burned as he streaked into orbit then back down again in seconds.
The tight parabolic arc was the fastest way to traverse the globe. Especially, if it was rotating his way.
He landed somewhere in Mexico.
The Yucatan Peninsula to be a bit more exact.
The bluff overlooked the ocean.
It was a long way down the cliff side to the jagged rocks and pounding waves.
A few palm trees dotted the grassy bluff with the jungle getting a bit denser several hundred meters down.
It was mostly quiet, except for the wind, the waves and the heavy buzzing drone coming from the jungle.
Monster corpses everywhere.
Along with a handful of people glaring up at him.
He knew the biggest dude.
Met him briefly after that slaver stomping in Florida… Richellia… technically, the New American Republic at the time. That shitstain of a nation that hadn’t lasted a decade. Even that was too long.
Should’ve killed that fuck sooner. Before they had made those collars and hid behind enslaved human shields.
“Yo, big guy,” he threw Tlaloc a head nod as he landed next to the towering mass of bronze-skinned muscle. “You getting swole-er?” he patted the bicep bigger than his head.
Tlaloc grunted.
“Haven’t seen you in a while. How long has it been?”
“7 years. You’re assistance with the Camazotz was appreciated,” he said through grit teeth.
“Oh yeah, fuck that guy, right?”
Fuck the guy, indeed.
The Camazotz, to be clear, hadn’t been the same as the Bat People.
The latter were cool and pretty chill. They lived in caves and ate the mushrooms, root vegetables and insects they farmed.
The former was something else that, admittedly, resembled the Bat People in a superficial physical sense. However, it was a monster. Big as house that ate anything. The more sapient the better. It healed its wounds by bathing in blood. The more sapient the better. Its sonic screeches had disintegrated people nearly instantaneously and had made him deaf for a day.
Plus, it could fly.
Tlaloc and his fighters, the ones that could tangle with it without instantly dying, had struggled to keep up with it.
It was fair and accurate to say that Eron had saved their asses.
Sometimes it was tough for prideful sorts to admit that they couldn’t handle everything.
Styles made fights, after all.
Cal said that a lot.
“So… what’s your plan? Whatever you need, I’ve got you.”
“The kraken has been weakened. Your brother’s website says that it has been fighting from the moment it arrived. First against sea monsters and fishmen in the deep ocean, then with Richellia, the Cubans bombarded it with their artillery before they were destroyed.”
The artillery, not the Cubans, at least not the ones manning the artillery.
The kraken had a terrifyingly long reach thanks to its portal magic, but get far enough away from the coast and a person was safe from it.
The problem for Tlaloc was that Cancun and a few smaller settlements were on the coast.
It had been hard enough to keep them protected from the regular ocean monsters and occasional fishmen raid without the massive kraken bearing down like a hurricane.
It was a doubled-edged sword, living on the coast.
Eron understood the benefits.
From time immemorial people lived on the water because of food and trade, though the latter didn’t really apply much in this modern age when they could trade through the spires. It was nice cutting out the middle men. Pure profit for the seller and no mark ups for the buyer.
Regardless, the kraken was on the way.
“We will draw its attention and destroy it. Do what you will,” Tlaloc said.
“Okay… great… I do hate being told what to do.”
“I know.”
“Good man! Stay swole!” he patted the bicep and wandered away to bother the others in Tlaloc’s crew.
They sorta styled themselves after the ancient gods of the region.
Aztec? Mayan? Those round-headed dudes?
Eron wasn’t well versed in the mythology.
They were a decently powerful bunch.
Though none were close to Tlaloc.
No magic weapons of dubious origin to fill them with god-like power.
“Cool wings!” he said to a small group of eagle warriors and eagle knights.
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He’d put the odds at fifty-fifty that the magus had made those broad wings of black, grey and white feathers on their harnesses.
“Love the sword-club! Cuts and bashes!”
They had a weird name that he didn’t trust himself to pronounce properly. They were a thick wooden club shaped like those paddles closeted fraternity-types used to spank their bare asses with for ‘fun’ back in ancient times. For the record he had never tried to join one. Too homo-erotic for him. Not that there was anything wrong with that. His stance had always been they should’ve just been honest about their inner truth rather than go homophobic in the attempt to deny.
Regardless, the sword-clubs also had razor-sharp bits of obsidian glued on the edges.
He had seen them cleave monster heads right off.
They also had those spear-thrower things.
The rest of their gear really went in on the eagle motif.
Steel helmet shaped like an eagle’s head. Lightweight breastplate in steel scales shaped like feathers. Same with their vambraces and greaves. Colorful feathers liberally sprinkled over it all to complete the ensemble. He could feel the enchantments all over them. Decent.
They nodded respectfully, but remained silent.
He ambled over to the werejaguar next.
Admittedly, he wasn’t a huge fan of the wild animal-thropes.
The domestic ones were fine.
It was a control issue.
Which was why it was a bit surprising that the woman had already transformed into her full werejaguar form.
Almost ten feet tall of thick, stout muscles all wrapped up in that spotted pelt.
Wait? Was it disrespectful to call it that?
“Hey! How’s it going?”
The werejaguar grunted.
Good self control.
He decided she was alright.
Took a lot of power and control to be confident in transforming well before the battle.
He couldn’t tell who she was specifically.
Cal had all those secret files and Eron sometimes reviewed them when there was time.
He did have a pretty good memory when he wanted to.
“Looking forward to making some calamari with you!”
She blew out a gust of hot air in his face.
Was that a chuckle?
He’d take it as such.
Thus, he sauntered over to a couple of young men and women.
They were lightly armored. Enchanted gear.
The thing that stood out to them were their bolas.
Also enchanted. Hard to break. More importantly, they plunged the person or monster they bound into pitch black night.
“Keep your distance. Pick your shots. Maybe focus on using your guns first.”
Yeah… some of these kids weren’t going to be much help against the kraken.
He made his way through the rest, debating on whether or not to tell Tlaloc that he should send most of them back to wherever the artillery was hidden in the jungle. That’d make him a bit of hypocrite, but it would prevent wasted lives.
The last person he visited was deeper in the jungle a few hundred meters past the tree line.
The bee guy had a file on account of being higher level.
One would think beekeeper wasn’t a good combat class, but here they were.
A few dozen hives had been set up in the jungle.
The man stood hidden by a protective swarm.
“Yo! Just wanted to say hi!” he yelled over the deafening drone.
The bees buzzed around him like a man-sized snake checking to see if he was a threat or food.
He saw every detail in each individual bee. Their bee-eyes, snapping mandibles, fuzzy little legs and thoraxes, the stinger.
The man waved and the bees moved away to take the shape of a large hand giving a thumb’s up.
Eron returned it.
“Good luck!”
Shit… now he was going to feel bad about the bees dying.
Just goes to show that almost anything could be dangerous at a high level.
Granted the man wasn’t just a beekeeper. His class had something to do with the mythical god of bees.
At least, Eron hoped he was mythical.
Those other so-called gods? Tlaloc’s axe and powers? Any number of other strange and powerful items that appeared embedded in stone on mountain tops or in lakes?
Questions had been raised.
And the potential answers as more evidence appeared weren’t good.
“Let’s have some, uh, honey after…”
Was that offensive?
The bees and the keeper didn’t seem mad.
In fact they formed a large bee hand that waved.
Eron flew over to Tlaloc.
He could see for miles all the way to the horizon thanks to their elevated position. He’d have to fly up to see farther, but it looked like a large stretch of ocean was boiling.
“Not long now.” He pulled the Threnosh-made helmet from his bag of holding. “Hey, dude, you should put yours on.”
Tlaloc had a similar helmet, just larger, on the ground next to him.
“So we can coordinate quicker.”
Tlaloc’s fighters didn’t have the full, tricked out helmet. They had to make do with the glasses and the ear pieces. Though not all appeared to be willing adopters of the system.
“Listen, I don’t really like wearing it either.”
The helmet always got destroyed whenever he got in a real fight. It took time to go get a replacement. Time better spent on killing monsters and saving people.
“But, we can communicate and mark targets a lot easier. Your army back there is hooked up to the Omninet, right?”
Tlaloc grunted then put his helmet on.
“Yes, contemptible person.”
“Great. Then I’m going to fly over to that thing and start marking some targets. That way you can start firing at max range. I might be even able to help the shells and missiles— you have missiles, right?”
Tlaloc’s eyes narrowed.
Strictly speaking the composition of their armaments wasn’t shared knowledge.
“Everyone’s got missiles.”
“Yes. A few.”
“Great! You should probably start with those. I’ll pull it to the surface. Oh and,” he marked fighters with his HUD and shared it with Tlaloc’s, “not telling you what to do, but I believe these would do better back with your artillery. They’re in range of that thing’s tentacles and they’re going to need all the help they can get to not die instantly. Plus, I know you do your water platform trick, but from the vids I’ve watched, they’re not going to be fast enough. Stick with those that can fly or move with superhuman speed and agility if you really need them to level. Otherwise, I’d suggest you pull everyone back. Those tentacles aren’t going to be easy to deal with. Plenty of levels there. But leave the up close stuff to you and me. Just a thought.”
“Those were many thoughts, contemptible person.”
“And salient.”
With that he zoomed into the sky.
Didn’t wait to get far enough to break the sound barrier.
Tlaloc barely budged while the closest fighters had to steady each other as the shockwave nearly shoved them to the ground.
“Bro? You there?” he opened a channel to his oldest brother.
“What?”
“Busy?”
“Kinda.”
“Shit… my bad.”
“It’s fine. Need anything?”
“Nah, just about to put the kraken-thing to calamari death. Hey? The magus is probably going to want parts right?”
“Yeah, but that’s a low priority. You can’t waste time on harvesting with all the crap going on.”
“Yeah, okay, if I see anything that seems highly magical, like organs or something I’ll grab it. I’m guessing you’re cool with leaving the rest with the Mexicans?”
“That’s fine. We’ve got trade agreements.”
“Oh, shit. That’s right. I forgot. Met a new species in Africa. I’ll upload the pertinent info later.”
“Okay, great, listen. I’ll head over and help if I get done here first. Close to the main raper… I think. This clone-son bullshit is bullshit.”
“Oh… that guy. Hey, before you kill him find out if he gave himself that name or if it was given to him.”
“What does it matter?”
“It’ll reveal character.”
“He’ll be dead.”
“Yeah, but there’s more of him out there, right?”
“I’ll just take it from his brain.”
“Awesome! I’m going to try to make this kraken thing die quick. I lost track of Vukylokyr— teleporting bastard—”
“I’ve asked Ms. Teacher if she can track him. The satellites can’t. His spellcasting is too good, apparently. She said she can, but she has to be careful or she’ll reveal herself.”
“Dude. She just needs to drop that whole hiding teacher shit. Tell her to go all archwizard on that fucker. Unless it’s all just talk.”
“It’s fine for now. You’ve kept Vukylokyr from stopping in one place long enough to do stuff.”
“Which I’m not doing right now.”
“I know. Everyone with Omninet access knows to throw out the alert if they spot him. A lot of false alarms, but better that than the alternative.”
“He’s mine. I’ll— oops. Sorry. Got to go. Good luck with the raper.”
“Same with the kraken. Don’t get eaten.”
“Don’t get… raped… I guess.”
“Ha. Ha. Thanks. I’d worry more about you. What with all the tentacles of varying sizes.”
“Gonna clench my cheeks more than usual.”
Eron cut the call.
The ocean below was a seething, boiling mass across several miles.
Monsters lacked the self-preservation instincts of natural creatures. Even the smarter ones that could think on a sapient level couldn’t deny the need to kill for long.
Thus, monsters attacked the kraken despite the futility.
Too large, too many tentacles and too many smaller monsters attached to the largest tentacles hundreds of meters long and thicker than the oldest sequoia trees.
It was creepy, disgusting and horrifying.
Thin tendrils emerged from the dark gray-blue flesh to ensnare monsters by the dozen, dragging them inside.
The end result was a monster or person attached to the tendrils coming out to fight for the kraken with what appeared to be some semblance of the skill and Skills they had in life.
They weren’t alive. Not really. Higher brain functions had ceased. Their organs and body kept functioning by the kraken’s tendrils embedded deep inside.
Cal had made sure of it when the kraken had first breached in the North Atlantic.
Otherwise, he would’ve placed the intelligent monster higher on the list.
Still… there was a staggering number of sapient species attached to those tendrils among the staggering number of monsters.
“How many worlds?”
Eron flew into action.
The kraken and monsters slowed.
He sped through the tentacles, ripping people from the tendrils.
He focused on the humans, the Earthians and any that looked like they might be one.
There where several young men and women in cerulean scale armor wielding dragontooth weapons. Their faces had been ravaged beyond the point of recognizability. Indeed, it appeared that the kraken didn’t care or was incapable of preserving the exposed soft tissue.
They didn’t have the time to fight him before he ripped the tendrils from the tentacle.
He had over a hundred, carrying them by the tendrils attached to their dying bodies.
Their hearts quickly stopped beating as he flew them back to land.
“What are you doing?” Tlaloc said over the comms.
“One second.”
More like five.
It took two more trips before he couldn’t see any more Earthians enslaved to the kraken’s tentacles.
He hadn’t exactly done the most tactically sound thing.
Families deserved the chance to bury their loved ones and gain closure. It wouldn’t be fair if he could provide that and didn’t. Hope was the worse when there was none. Better they knew than think there was still a chance.
Fortunately, fate seemed to reward his mission of mercy.
The kraken didn’t like losing its thralls.
Eron, unintentionally, had pulled it to the surface.
It’s great gray-blue bulk compared favorably to several of those super container ships put together.
Tentacles whipped up at him.
Thin ones as thick as his thigh filled the sky with cracks as they lashed out.
The largest ones only looked slow as they attempted to bring their thralls in range.
Natural projectiles, like spines and sharp bones bounced off him.
Spells from the hands of outworlder species he had never seen before filled the air with fire and choking clouds of caustic mist. A Skill failed to steal the light from his eyes.
Eron decided he didn’t care what Cal had said about them.
If they were casting spells and using Skills then there was still a small part of the person trapped in there for who knew how long.
They deserved freedom.
He checked his HUD.
The red line continued to grow close.
Estimated range for the kraken’s portals was about the same as the max range for Tlaloc’s artillery guns.
“Marking main tentacles. Shoot those missiles whenever.”
The man grunted over the comms.
The sound of the rocket ignitions cut through the rest of the noise.
The trick was to focus on what you wanted to hear. Helped avoid getting overwhelmed by the thrashing in the water of all the monsters snarling and screaming as they tried to tear into the tough gray-blue hide while being killed in the hundreds.
Sure was a lot of monsters in the ocean.
Things slowed down.
The missiles cut through the air at about the same speed as the smaller tentacles.
They left a watery arc in their wake as they rose to—
“Damn it.”
He did a quick eyeball calculation and retracted his faceplate.
Another negative of the helmets and glasses.
They got in the way.
Solar fire lanced out from his eyes, carving through the tentacles before they could whip the missiles out of the air.
Two out of the three struck their targets.
The third just missed.
Fire and smoke surrounded the bellowing kraken.
He caught a baleful glare from an eye the size of a backyard pool as the giant monster turned to dunk the flames.
Two large tentacles hung loosely by scraps of white meat and gray-blue skin. Just as thick as expected.
He cut them the rest of the way off with a look.
“SunnyD isn’t the only thing with solar energy.” He chuckled, then sighed.
Kind of lame when no one was around to laugh.
He thought of his daughter.
She used to laugh at all his jokes.
Now she sorta chuckled and didn’t make eye contact.
Soon it’d just be the eye-rolling.
After that? Well… all he had to look forward to was a teenage girl’s boundless capacity for contempt.
Time went too fast.
Ironic, since everything around him was barely moving.
He put the faceplate back down with thought.
Targets were still marked.
The large tentacles mostly.
The body was hard to miss.
A satellite was overhead, so he didn’t need to keep everything in front of his helmet to maintain targeting for the others.
The red line was almost—
Booms from the jungle a few miles away reached his ears.
Explosive shells rained down as he flew around them like they were immobile trees.
The ones that looked like they were going to miss received a helpful push.
Those way off target he grabbed and threw at the kraken.
More fire, more smoke.
“Great job, everyone!”
Yup, he had access to all the channels. Even ones they thought were secure. Didn’t even have to be the ones through the Omninet. Radio, infrared, didn’t matter. If it was a mechanical means of communication the helmet could tap into it.
“Zero misses! Keep it coming!”
The kraken still wasn’t in portal range and he decided to keep it that way.
He flew down and grabbed a hold of a fin? A wing?
Whatever it was… it was thick.
He had to dig his gloved fingers into the rubbery surface one hand on top and the other under, stretching his arms to the limit.
The ocean frothed around him as he lifted and pulled, flying a few dozen feet above the surface.
The size of the kraken was such that most of it was still underwater.
Stupid monsters leapt at him, forcing him to explode them with kicks.
The distraction was just enough for tentacles to whip him off.
Sonic booms cracked the sky as tentacles wrapped him up in darkness.
They pulled him somewhere. He only needed one guess.
He was just about to break free when a sudden thought occurred to him.
What was the quickest way to kill a giant monster?
Destroy vital organs, obviously.
And if he wanted to try that then inside was the best side to be on.
The helmet lasted surprisingly long as he was ground against countless hard and probably magical beaks in the kraken’s mouth. Good thing he had stashed his magic bags and pouches back on land. No way they would’ve survived the journey.
It was taking too long, so he flew straight past its giant main beak mouth right into its gullet.
The kraken’s throat passage was as wide as a freeway and not the tiny 4-lane ones, but the ridiculous ones back in California. 8-lanes minimum.
Monsters, some whole and still alive, swam in the rapid river of sea water flowing down.
One large monster, a mix between a shark and an octopus, the sharktopus, clung to the fleshy side of the passage with its tentacles. It climbed and proceeded to start chewing down.
Not two seconds later, the flesh parted in several dozen places.
Tendril-connected thralls emerged to do battle with the sharktopus.
Fifth? Sixth grossest experience?
He ignored the battle below and listened for a heart beat.
Found several identical sounds and headed for the closest one, flying through flesh, swimming through blood and other fluids.
Don’t open your mouth.
He repeated the words like a mantra as he went deeper into the kraken.