Alix abandoned the guitar in a rage as he headed back outside to see what was going on, furious that he had been interrupted at the last second. What the hell did the hounds mean by an army?
Ajugor met him at the front door with several of the hounds at his feet, energetic boulders of excitement.
“What’s going on? Has the Imperator returned?” Alix asked, rushing to the steps that led up to the top of the wall for a look, but there was no sight of anyone coming up the path.
“It isn’t an Imperator,” Ajugor replied, following him up the wall and then turning to look into the woods. “The hounds aren’t able to speak like you and I, but they wouldn’t have coming running so wildly if it wasn’t serious. I only know that there are many of them, and they should be considered dangerous. I sent a gargoyle to have a look.”
Just then the gargoyle returned, slamming down on the wall with such force Alix was worried it was about to crumble beneath them.
“Demons are coming,” the gargoyle bellowed, the only tone of voice the gargoyles seemed to possess.
At any other time, Alix would have thought that was a good thing, but with the way the gargoyles were acting, he wasn’t sure what to think. The only thing he knew for sure was that his day was already ruined.
Tifayn, the gargoyles say there is an army of demons approaching. Come to the wall, Alix called to Tifayn through the ring. If there was anyone that could stop his head from spinning and tell him what he should do, it was her.
Tifayn must have sprinted because she arrived in under a minute. By then, the sound of crashing could be heard coming through the trees, like a distant landslide of bodies rushing towards them.
“Demons? Are you sure?” Tifayn demanded of the gargoyles as soon as she arrived, jumping swiftly up the steps.
“That is the only way to describe them. They stand as tall as I, but hooved and black scaled, with burning horns and red eyes,” the gargoyle that had been sent to have a look replied.
Tifayn cursed with a word Alix had never heard before, but there was no doubt in his mind that it was a foul one, and then her face went ashen.
“What’s wrong?” Alix asked, wondering how things could possibly get any worse.
“Remember I told you that I was not the only demon that turned into their unbound form? And that I felt a presence calling to me? I had a dream about it as I was recovering, but I thought it was just that. The Demon Lord called to all demons to march on the Darknight, and it sounds like none of them, apart from me, were able to resist that command.”
“What the hell are they coming here for? I thought they didn’t want anything to do with me?”
“They are unbound, Alix, their worst aspects unleashed. I was the only one that managed to regain my senses. The Demon Lord is coming to stop you from doing the same to the rest of them. It is something none of us have experienced before, so we have no knowledge on how to control it. It is a feeling of power that is overwhelming, but with that power comes some downsides, one of which is the loss of rational thought. All they are thinking about now is how to keep their power, and the only way to do that is to destroy you so that it can’t be taken from them.”
Alix had a few choice curses of his own before he managed to calm down enough to think straight himself. “How the hell am I supposed to fight an army of demons? Is that what I’m supposed to do? I might as well just chuck myself off the cliff now and be done with it because there’s no way I’m a match for even a single demon by myself. The only reason I managed to save you was because Ajugor had the Nullblade.” Alix suddenly wished he had thought to take the sword with him from the vault, but it had felt too dangerous to keep around.
Tifayn seemed lost for words herself. There would be no talking with the demons, which left only a fight, or more likely defending themselves as best they could. In between curses he scrolled through his library of spells. There were plenty that sounded like they could do a lot of damage, but he wasn’t confident enough in their use to stop them causing just as much harm to Tifayn and the others.
“Maybe it would be best if you went inside. If things start getting crazy out here I don’t want you getting caught in the middle of it,” Alix said as he stared into the woods, trying to spot the first sign of the approaching wave. He could almost feel the ill-intent speeding towards him.
“Don’t you dare suggest something so ridiculous again. We will need all the help we can get to withstand their assault, mine included. You forget, I am more experienced with a blade than any other here, apart from Mr Bones probably.”
“I need to get the Nullblade then. That worked before, and I don’t have any other ideas, but I don’t know what use it will be. They aren’t going to just let me go around and rebind them. I might be able to hit one or two, if I’m lucky, before they crush me, but I don’t really want to put my claim of immortality to the test.”
Just then Mr Bones appeared on the wall. “If you are heading to the vault, perhaps I could you ask you to acquire something for me. There is a long thin box by the wall, just inside the door.”
Alix didn’t have time to ask questions, so he nodded his agreement and quickly left the wall. He rushed through the castles hallways until he reached the freshly restored stone steps that led down to the vault. It was a long way down so he forced himself to slow his pace. The last thing he needed was a nasty fall.
Lights bloomed along his path, as they did everywhere with the restored lighting system. The hush in the chamber below was jarring compared to the chaos that was brewing above. It only took him a few moments to reach the vault, but with the thought of an army approaching, it felt like it took an eternity.
As he ran, he thought that his idea at using the Nullblade against all the demons might not be so ridiculous. Was there some way he could increase his speed, or slow the demons down? There hadn’t been anything like that in Spellgenesis, but he thought there might be a few glyphs he could combine together to create something that might do the job. He didn’t have time to practise until he unlocked a spell so he would have to be sure it worked the first time. He gave a passing thought to the more destructive spells in the book, but thought against it. There was just as much chance that they would harm his own meagre forces and that was something he couldn’t afford to risk, at least not yet. Alix didn’t want to have to hurt anyone unless it was necessary. If nothing else worked, he would get everyone to retreat to the vault, have the gargoyles destroy the stairs, and then test out Firestorm on the demons.
Alix opened the vault and retrieved the Nullblade from the box he had thrown it in for safekeeping. It was too dangerous to leave around on the floor unsheathed. He almost forgot about the box Mr Bones had asked him to retrieve as glyphs flew through his head, but he spotted the box by the door as he was leaving. It was a lot larger than he had expected, forcing him to absorb the two swords into his inventory, too unwieldy to carry. He needed his hands free for another task anyway.
Some paper quickly crafted from Fibre appeared in his hands, along with a pencil to draw with. It was a challenge to draw perfect circles as he walked, but the spell circle didn’t need to be perfect to unlock the spell. Still, each attempt resulted in either a spell unlocking that was of no use, or nothing happening at all. He left a trail of balled up paper scraps as he ran. Finally on his last piece of paper, his notification bell went and he saw a spell had unlocked that sounded promising. He didn’t have time to practise longer anyway. As he had climbed, the roaring had built, which erupted into a crescendo of braying howls as he stepped out of the castle.
By the time he returned to the wall with the sword, the Dark Elves had gathered, with their warhammers drawn, which was something he hadn’t expected. There was no reason for them to risk their lives for him, but he was glad to see them anyway. The skeletons that had weapons had appeared as well, summoned by Mr Bones. Alix wished he had spent more time crafting weapons for the skeletons, the only army he had at his disposal, but as it was they had nothing but the rusty blades they had been entombed with. He suddenly felt like he had been wasting his time with his stupid projects. What use was an amp against a hoard of murderous demons?
Alix was about to ask what was going on as he reached the landing where he had left Tifayn, but the answer was staring him in the face. As far as he could see, demonic shapes stood within the shadows of the trees. One that he assumed to be a female, from the scaled protrusions on her chest, stepped forward and called out to him at his arrival, somehow recognising who he was instantly even with the bond broken.
“Darknight!” she yelled with the voice of an erupting volcano, pointing her massive sword towards him, and then the rest of the demons charged the wall. A unit rushed the gate with a battering ram while others emerged from the woods with crude ladders. All of them carried weapons longer than Alix was tall.
Alix barely had any time to react. Tifayn, Mr Bones and Ajugor turned to him, awaiting his next command. He drew out the box Mr Bones had asked for and handed it over.
Mr Bones quickly took the box and laid it down on the ground. He unlatched it, and drew out a sword that would have been impressive in its size, if he wasn’t staring down hundreds of others twice the size pointing at him. It made his own sword look like a butter knife in comparison. It had to be one of the most wicked looking blades he had ever laid eyes on before, the sword of item you would only unlock as end-game content. As he focussed on it, a name appeared in the air above it.
Mishlachtvhar, the First Blade.
With sword in hand, Mr Bones ran off down the wall to meet the ladders, wielding the massive blade with ease. The skeletons rallied to the sight of the sword of the first Darknight. The Dark Elves realised they would have to take the fight to the ramparts and followed behind, after a few brief moments watching the spectacle with awe.
Tifayn still looked like she couldn’t believe what was happening. They had thought to get the Demons on their side eventually, but now here they were, at their gates in force, determined to see them all dead.
With incredible speed, the demons reached the wall and raised their ladders, slamming them against the ramparts. Moving with furious speed, they leapt up the ladders towards the waiting blades. Alix felt a bottomless pit open in his stomach as he compared the two forces. The skeletons and the Dark Elves were going to be swatted aside like flies. The demons threw themselves against the wall of warhammers in a fearless black wave, only to meet the unyielding skeletons beyond, led by Mr Bones. Mishlachtvhar tore through the first demon, cutting him cleanly in half. The Dark Elves rallied at the sight that the demons could be defeated, but the demons showed no sign that the death of one of their own meant anything to them.
Alix opened his Magic menu and quickly scrolled through all the new spells he had unlocked. Timestill was the most recent, but as he didn’t know how long the effects would last, he looked for one that he had read about in Spellgenesis to complement it. It was going to cost him a lot of mana, but he had no choice. He tapped Timestill, followed quickly by Swiftfoot, a spell to help him move faster.
A wave rippled through the air around him. The first change he noticed was the sudden lack of sound. He was left with nothing but the sound of blood rushing through his veins. He looked around and saw that the demons had stopped mid stride. Some were falling from the ramparts with grievous wounds from Mr Bones. One of the ladders was falling backwards from a push by the Dark Elves. They weren’t a match for the demons size, but they made up for it with their strength, honed for generations under the mountain.
Alix could have stood there for hours marvelling at the frozen sights, but as he studied the fight around him, he started to imagine that he could notice slight movements and the weight of what he had to do suddenly hit him. He turned to the closest ladder and took a step towards it, and in an instant he arrived above it, looking down at the angry demonic faces.
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Making sure not to hit the Dark Elves in the middle of pushing it away from the wall, he took out the Nullblade and held it towards the closest demon. He touched the blade to the black scaled flesh and a ripple of light washed over the demon. The change didn’t happen as quickly as it had with Tifayn, but he was sure that it was working. When time resumed its normal flow, the demon would soon return to his bound form.
Alix took out his own ladder and placed it beside the other. Climbing down, he tapped each demon he passed, and then moved his ladder along the wall and did the same with the ones there. It probably only took him thirty minutes to cover all of the demons on the ladders, but it felt like days before he turned to face the rest of them. He would have to make sure he didn’t miss any, but they didn’t show any sign of rank or order.
Slipping in between the large demons, he tried his best to hit them all. It probably took him longer than it should have, as he tapped each of them twice to make sure he hadn’t missed any, although he was sure the Dark Elves, skeletons and gargoyles between them could handle at least one or two themselves.
By the time he reached the woods, he was already feeling tired. It was still early in the day, but the initial rush of adrenaline had faded as he realised his plan was working. He tried not to think what would happen if the spells wore off too soon. Alix shook his head and downed a quick tonic to clear away his anxiety. He was already noticing the small movements among the fighting; blades cutting deeper, demons moving forward, some closer to hitting the ground.
Alix sped into the woods, heading towards the one that seemed to command them. It almost looked like her eyes turned to glare at him with furious fire as he approached. He half expected the spell to have no effect on her, but the same ripple of light bloomed on her scales as the Nullblade forcefully slapped her exposed leg.
Once he was a few rows deep, he realised just how many demons there were. Hundreds more lurked between the trees, all with fierce weapons, and as he moved deeper in he spotted enough supplies for a lengthy siege. It looked like they had expected greater resistance.
The Swiftfoot spell ran out first, but by then he felt like he didn’t need it anymore. It was more of a hindrance than a help in the tight confines. Half the time he felt like he had sped past half a dozen demons and had to backtrack. Then time began to speed up. There were still dozens of demons left, and the exhaustion was growing. He pushed through it, tracking the demons all over the mountain.
A demon sluggishly turned at his arrival and Alix almost speared him with the Nullblade instead of tapping him. He managed to pull back the blade, leaving a cut that slowly oozed blood. Alix began to run. He couldn’t decide if it was lucky or not that all of the demons began to turn towards him, showing him which ones he still needed to reach.
Swords swung at him, but he was already gone by the time they passed. He reached the final demon and tapped him with the Nullblade. The demon instantly began to shrink, scales dissolving and horns retreating into thick hair.
There were no more demons left in sight, but Alix no longer had the strength to continue on anyway. If he had missed any, the others would have to deal with them. He sank to his knees and fell into the soft undergrowth. Just before the darkness overcame him, his notification bell went.
* Title Unlocked: Chronomancer.
It appeared to Tifayn as if Alix suddenly vanished into thin air. The sounds of fighting were replaced just as quickly by the yells of pain and surprise. In a wave staring by the ladders on the wall, the demons began to revert to their bound forms. Half of the demons looked around in confusion, while the other half collapsed to the ground, interspersed with the wounded and the dead.
“Where is Alix?” Tifayn called to Mr Bones and the gargoyles. They had better abilities to find him than she did.
Once the pair realised the demons were no longer fighting, Mr Bones said something to Ajugor and the gargoyle took off into the forest. He returned a few moments later with an unconscious Alix.
“He is alright, he is just asleep,” Ajugor said to Tifayn.
“Get him inside. I will deal with the demons,” Tifayn said, heading towards the closest ladder. In her bound form she now recognised their leader, and Tifayn had words for her. Mr Bones ordered the other gargoyles and Dark Elves to remove the demons weapons and then accompanied her with the skeletons.
Alix awoke two days later. Tifayn stirred at his movements, rolling over and pressing her naked body against his own.
“Alix, thank the Aether you are alright,” Tifayn said, staring down at him as if she had expected him to wake up blind or with one leg.
“Hmm?” Alix replied, distracted by the skin against his own. It took him a few moments to remember everything that had happened. “What happened with the demons? Is everyone alright?” he asked when the memories came back to him.
“Ajugor found you collapsed in the woods with a bunch of demons surrounding you. He said they seemed concerned about you but he got you out of there as soon as he could anyway,” Tifayn replied. When she realised that he was alright, she turned away from him and slipped out of bed.
“Tifayn, what aren’t you telling me?” Alix asked. He could tell something was wrong with the way she was acting. Now that she had seen he was alright, she refused to meet his eye.
“You are going to find out sooner or later so I might as well be the one to tell you. The Demon Lord…she is my sister.” Tifayn said as she dressed.
Alix processed the words in silence for a few moments, but in truth, he found that he didn’t care who the Demon Lord was. All he cared about was that they had been stopped. “That doesn’t matter Tifayn. I just want to know if everyone is fine.”
Tifayn finally turned to look at him once she was dressed. There was no more reason for Alix to stay in bed, he felt fully rested, so he rose from bed himself and dressed in the pile of clothes that had been neatly folded nearby.
“A few of the Dark Elves are injured, but I think they will all recover, especially with a few of your potions. What did you do anyway? What were you doing out in the forest?”
“I came up with a new spell which let me slow down time long enough to rebind all the Demons with the Nullblade. I just wish I had acted sooner so that no one was injured in the first place. What about the demons?”
“Twice as many Demons are dead, mostly from Mr Bones blade, but they bloody deserved it. It is hard not to blame my sister, but I feel like if she had more sense, she wouldn’t have done something so stupid. Are you not angry with her? She could have destroyed everything we have worked towards.”
“She is just as much to blame for her actions as you are for what you did at Mortlake. Are you saying that you were able to control yourself back then?”
Tifayn turned away again, refusing to answer his question. There had to be another reason for Tifayn’s thoughts, some history Alix wasn’t aware of. She should have been glad that he found a way to avoid having to kill her sister, or that she had been unable to kill him. He felt like he wasn’t about to get an answer from her any time soon so he changed course.
“Where is she? I would like to speak with her,” Alix asked, shocking Tifayn enough that she finally turned to look at him again.
“She is in the dungeon. With her locked up, the other demons aren’t putting up a fight. They are still outside the walls, but they peacefully made camp, once they all woke up. None of them have tried to gain entry inside the walls.”
Alix checked his map and noticed a concentration of skeletons deep within the castle. Mr Bones was with them. He would have to ask him about his sword, Mishlachtvhar. Alix thought the skeletons lost most of their Darknight powers once they died, but Mr Bones seemed to have powers that the others lacked. How many other Darknight weapons were stored in the vault? If he could arm the skeletons with the ones they had originally crafted in life, he would have quite an army at his disposal. He had no thoughts of conquest, only the security and stability of a peaceful nights rest.
Alix made his way down to the dungeon, and Tifayn followed. He hadn’t been to that part of the castle before, so it took him a few moments to find the correct path, but he finally managed to find the group of skeletons guarding the single occupied cell in the deep, cold chamber.
The cell, even with its freshly cast iron bars, wouldn’t have done much to contain the girl in her unbound form, but bound as she was, it was impenetrable. Mr Bones still held his impressive sword, point down on the stones in front of the cell, ready to swing at a moment’s notice.
“My lord, I am glad to see you awake,” Mr Bones said at his arrival. He didn’t take his gaze off of the demon sitting calmly behind the bars.
Alix nodded at the skeletons, but he quickly turned his focus to the demon.
“What are your intentions?” Alix asked simply. A name appeared in the air above her.
Alowyn. Demon Lord. Lv 192.
“I…hate that I am here,” Alowyn replied, first staring daggers at Tifayn, and then her eyes turned to Alix, as if drawn by a magnet. One of them was noticeably swollen, as if she had been punched hard in the face. “I wanted to kill you before, but now I just want to get as far away from you as I can. I hate myself for saying it,” Alowyn spat, her calm demeanour vanishing.
Alix understood what she was talking about. The bond had been restored to them, and in his presence she was feeling it stronger than ever. The words were being dragged from her against her will, but she was telling the truth.
“I will let you leave if you wish. I will not abuse the bond, but I would ask that you don’t do anything like this again, and also that any that wish to remain do so. I won’t lie, I can do with all the help I can get.”
“I will make sure to ask them,” Alowyn said through gritted teeth. Her words sounded sincere, but her eyes were still filled with contempt.
“Is she going to cause us any more trouble?” Alix asked Tifayn.
“She will not. She no longer has the ability to command the demons,” Tifayn replied, clenching her fists as she stared at her sister.
“Good, that’s the last thing we need with a baby on the way.” Alowyn’s eyes shot in his direction and went wide. Then her skin turned ashen. She suddenly looked like she expected to be executed at any moment. “Let her out,” Alix continued, “We don’t want the demons thinking we mean them any more trouble either. The sooner this is all behind us the better.”
Mr Bones hesitated for a moment, but then he withdrew a heavy key from his pocket and unlocked the cell. Alowyn refused to step out so Alix left them to it, hoping she would relax with him gone. Tifayn looked like she wanted to stay and give her sister another beating, but she chose to follow Alix instead.
“I don’t think that was a good idea,” Tifayn said once they were back in the castle proper.
“I trust you if you say she isn’t going to cause us any trouble. With the bond restored, everything should be fine.”
“Her murderous intent is gone, but she will still try and fight the bond.”
“That’s why I said she could leave. I don’t want anyone here that doesn’t want to be.”
Alix went to check on the wounded while Alowyn decided what she was going to do. Some of the injuries that had been caused to the demons, that they could have shrugged off in their unbound forms, had turned into grievous wounds. He crafted as many Perfect Healing Potions as he could, but they required a large amount of ingredients. His stock was entirely depleted by the time he had seen to all of them.
Alowyn appeared later, once Mr Bones had assured her that Alix was far away in his rooms. Mr Bones followed her, to make sure she lived up to the promise she had made. Mr Bones relayed everything to him as it happened.
“The Darknight will let us leave,” Alowyn said, spreading the word among the demons. “He has also said that any that wish to remain here can do so.” Then she retreated to the furthest corner of the grounds, where boxy tents had been erected.
The demons stayed for several days while the worst of the wounded were given time to heal, and they were all given time to decide what to do. Most of them were still reeling over their transformation. They were only now beginning to realise what had happened to them and many were ashamed at their actions. Their feelings were only amplified by the newly restored bond and proximity to the Darknight.
Alowyn refused to speak with Alix, but she insisted on speaking with Tifayn. She apologised profusely for bringing an army to the gates of her pregnant sister, but she had thought Tifayn was dead when she could no longer sense her. Alowyn thought the Darknight had killed her, but when word spread that he had saved her instead, the demons began to say that maybe Alix was stronger than previous Darknights. The respect the other demons began to show for him infuriated her, but there was nothing she could do about it.
Alix tried to speak with some of the demons, but in their transformation they had lost all their clothing. They didn’t seem to care but Alix found it difficult to focus on the conversation. Tifayn had given Alowyn some of her clothes as they were the same size, but there wasn’t enough for all of them.
“Are all of the demons here then?” Alix asked Tifayn when they were alone. “I thought there would be more of them.”
“None of them could have resisted Alowyn’s command so it has to be. There would be more of us, if we had more land to grow, but Keravia is only a small place. It is not quite barren, but it is hard enough land that no others wished to claim it. Still, I don’t think they all wish to abandon it. We have had to fight hard for even that little.”
In the end, around a hundred of the demons chose to stay, while the others packed up and began the journey back to Keravia. It would take them longer than it had before with their new bodies. They had marched relentlessly, from almost the moment they became unbound. They were resilient though. Tifayn wasn’t worried about them.
They left early, leaving Alix to decide what to do with the ones that remained. He hadn’t expected so many to stay, but Tifayn told him that they were impressed by the power he had shown and they respected that more than anything. He didn’t have to spend much time thinking of a solution. The castle would be able to accommodate them all eventually, but they would have to increase the scale of the restoration tenfold first. At least he had more manpower to get on with it.
With most of the tents having been taken by the army, they got to work cutting down trees to build themselves a small village. They also began work on a second line of defences outside the wall to stop any other army from approaching it as easily as they had. While the work continued, Alix got to crafting them all clothing, calling them in one at a time, learning their names, and filling up the dots on his map.
Alix wanted to continue his training, but Brant refused to leave his room with the demons camped out in the grounds. He was even more wary of them than the Dark Elves. Tifayn was one thing he said, and he never would have believed she was a demon if he hadn’t seen her unbound, but a hundred of them was quite another. Their weapons had been returned to them so that they could carry out their work. With the bond back, he trusted them to have them, even if Brant begged him to reconsider. If it came to it, he could force them to return them.
Instead he focussed on his magic. Chronomancer had unlocked an interesting ability. It let him appear to teleport a step in any direction by slowing time around him for a second. His mana capacity had also drastically increased, as had his level, the number almost reaching his age. Once he reached it, it would become harder to level up.
When he finally had a moment to relax, he returned to his guitar and turned on the amp. The air was filled with a hum of anticipation. He slowly began to play the opening notes of his favourite song, fine tuning the dials on guitar and amp. Then he cranked up the fuzz and let loose.