It was madness inside the Invigilator’s office. A warzone. Riven and Viriya went deep within as they looked for Wenster, and passed too many spots that had been a battlefield moments ago. Most of the walls had broken, the floor littered with debris everywhere. Little fires had caught on curtains and rugs, and blood streaked everything with crimson marks. And so many bodies. Corpses crowded the halls and rooms, both Rennervation and Ascension, and a few from different Demesnes too, all torn from life by this conflict that went so far beyond any of them. So far beyond their reach to affect any of it personally.
How in the world could they let themselves fight and die in the name of two people who had no intentions of getting their hands dirty? Two people who didn’t even know them? Didn’t they have any family they had left behind, people who loved them, would miss them, would wail and cry and feel as though their lives had been shattered by these senseless deaths?
Riven could barely fathom dying for his own damned father.
“Up ahead,” Viriya cautioned as she stopped, pulling him back with her against the wall.
Riven thought they had reached Wenster, but when he peeked beyond the wall with Viriya, all he saw were soldiers shooting at each other from behind cover. The room was larger than most like a smaller hall reserved for some special purpose. Boxes and crates were piled near either ends, and the soldiers were using those as cover.
“We’re going to help them, right?” Riven asked.
Viriya looked like that was the last thing she wanted to do, but she gave a tight nod. “I want you to sneak up to the loyalists and tell them to stop shooting. I’ll take care of the enemy.”
Riven could have been the one to take care of the soldiers instead, but it was best to not waste time on pointless arguments. So all he did was nod. “Good luck.”
Viriya nodded before sneaking away, her footfalls light as a feather and her profile kept low so that none of the soldiers saw her move. Riven let her get ahead a bit, then shuffled out in the same manner. The loyalists turned to him with looks of surprise.
“Essentier Morell?” one of them asked.
Riven looked through them all and didn’t find anyone he recognized. But it seemed he was still known. That would have to do for now. “You need to stop firing on the soldiers over there.”
“Will you be taking care of them instead, sir?” asked the same soldier who had addressed Riven. The insignia on his shoulder indicated he was a lieutenant.
“No not me. But there’s another Essentier who didn’t take kindly to the treatment we’ve received so far and has asked us to relax while she deals with those unruly sots over there.”
The Lieutenant broke into an easy grin. He looked tired from his exertions, and waved at the troops under his command. “You heard the man. Cease fire.”
It seemed the Lieutenant’s official order was all the soldiers had been waiting for. They withdrew their rifles a little too quickly and settled down with relieved smiles, backs pressed against the crate and boxes. What had seeing so many of their comrades dead taken out of them? What hope had they held of getting out of this mire alive?
The firing from the other stopped as well. They all waited, Riven wishing that he could peek over the boxes. Too bad they’d likely shoot at him as soon as a single strand of his hair was visible.
They didn’t have to wait for long. A bright green flash went up, followed by several shouts and curses. Guns fired, the green light weaving around as though Viriya was drunk. It didn’t even last a minute. The green light went out, and there was nothing but silence.
Silencing his doubts, Riven stood up. No one fired. A good sign. He walked over to the other side, the Rennervation loyalists following warily with their rifles held at the ready. Riven trusted Viriya and he didn’t really expect her to have gotten hurt or anything, but he couldn’t help letting out a little relieved breath. Quiet though, so that Viriya didn’t hear.
“They’re all dead!” the Lieutenant said, doing nothing to hide the incredulity in his voice.
“Of course.” Riven’s smile was manufactured. The bodies lying there had died in ways he didn’t think was normally possible, all of them pierced by broken rods that still glowed green. How had Viriya Locked the rods to them from a distance?
“We don’t have time to waste,” Viriya said, ever the pragmatist. “Do any of you know where the command centre is?”
“I thought you knew the way?” Riven asked.
She ignored him, staring at the Lieutenant in expectation. The man nodded after a moment, his face a little pale despite knowing he and his troops were now safe.
“I can send someone to lead you there, Essentier,” he said, “but my fight isn’t over yet.”
Viriya nodded. “I understand. All I need are directions, not necessarily a guide.”
The Lieutenant considered for a moment, then looked over at a young woman. She came over, and like her leader, she didn’t bother hiding her true feelings. Her face screamed out her resignation and her resentment at being picked for guide duty. “This is Corporal Carom. She’ll get you to where they’re carrying out their defence from. Thank you for your help, but we’ll take your leave now.”
Viriya only nodded back. The Lieutenant jogged away, the Rennervation soldiers following quickly in his heels. All except Corporal Carom.
“Er,” she said, clearly feeling quite out of depth. “I th—I mean, we suspect the Ascension bastards have taken up residence in this little meeting room the Invigilator kept for very private affairs. I’ll take you there.”
“How do you know they’re there?” Viriya asked.
“One of our spies told us. When the Ascension people took it over, they used a lot of our people before they settled in. Cleaners, orderlies, technicians, carpenters, and so on. It was easy to slip in a spy and learn most of what we needed to know.”
“All right. Lead the way then.”
Corporal Carom looked only too happy to do so. Riven could understand the sentiment, though he wasn’t so sure he could appreciate meeting up with Wenster again. His hands itched where he held his sword, the point trailing near the ground. Wenster was a brute, and it had taken everything Riven could throw at him to even get in a decent shot at killing him off. And even then Riven had run out of Sept.
Things would be different with Viriya along with him. Though the thought of how exactly made him wary.
Carom seemed to know her way through the main buildings of the Invigilator’s office. Her steps were never unsure and she never paused once as she took them through thin corridors, past rooms that hadn’t been used in a long time, up a narrow staircase that had to have been reserved for secret clandestine affairs.
“How do you know your way through this place?” Riven asked after Carom pulled aside a curtain and through the door hidden behind it.
“I used to work as one of the Invigilator’s personal guards. Knowing every path anyone could take is part of the job description.” She smiled a little. “I never thought it would be helpful for something like this.”
They evaded more fighting. Once or twice, they came across a site that was awash in blood or dotted with bodies, but otherwise, they didn’t encounter anywhere near as much as Riven and Viriya had on their own. Carom would have made an excellent tour guide for the Invigilator’s office.
“We need to be quieter from here on out,” the Corporal said.
True to her words, Carom began sneaking. She took the stairs and went into the side corridor, at which point she fell to the ground and started crawling forwards. Riven and Viriya both hesitated for a moment, but Carom hissed at them to join, and they relented.
It became evident why. Up ahead, the corridor opened out to a walkway that spanned over a hall. They had to keep themselves low, or some errant guard might spot them by looking up.
“That’s where he must be,” Carom said as she paused near the head of the walkway.
Riven peeked over Viriya. They were all pressed so close together, Viriya squirmed as Riven had to nudge himself over her to get a look. It was uncomfortable for him too, and quite embarrassing, but such were the times they lived in.
Apart from the missing glass dome, this hall was little different from the one with the glass dome they had started this whole debacle in. It had one beginning—the wide stairs at the front—and one end—the dark double-doors that led to that private meeting room. As expected, there were Ascension guards, though thankfully none of them had the presence of mind to look at the walkway.
“Look, someone’s coming,” Carom said.
She was staring at the staircase, and Riven flowed her gaze to see a wounded soldier hurrying towards the doors of the private room as fast as his legs could carry him. A soldier on guard accosted him, and the two went in.
“Wonder what he has,” Riven said.
“Probably reports on the battle,” Carom guessed. “Or more likely, a report about a specific fight, given his condition. One that probably didn’t go as well as it could have for his side.”
The soldier came out all too soon. Riven only caught the bare glint of his set face, before he ran off the way he had come.
Riven turned back to stare at the doors to the private meeting room that had closed again. “How do we get in? Please don’t tell me we start a ruckus and barge our way inside.”
Viriya glared at him, though it might have been more for his weight resting on her than his question. “Why, you like sneaking around like a thief?”
“I like not wasting my Sept.”
She snorted. “You need to use it more efficiently if dealing with a few guards turns into a waste.”
“I was fighting the acting-Invigilator.”
“Fine. I’ll kill them. You can jump in when their leader pops in.”
Riven stared at her. He was too close. Awfully so. Enough that his neck was growing warm again, but he didn’t move. It wasn’t just the casual way she had disregarded the guards’ lives, nor her insistence on glaring at him as though he really should have gotten off her by now, but she hadn’t even bothered to know who they were facing. “Do you even know this leader’s name?”
“It’s Wen—”
Riven shot Corporal Carom a look that made her shut up quite quickly.
“Do you, Riven?” Viriya shot back.
“I do.”
“What is it?”
“His name’s Wenster. And don’t tell me you know it now too because that wasn’t what I meant.”
Viriya shook her head. “You’re wrong. His name’s Soon-To-be-A-Corpse.”
With those brave words, Viriya elbowed Riven off her and charged down the corridor.
“Is she always like that?” Carom asked.
Riven got up, placing his hand on his sword and his gun. Of course they were there. He just still had to be sure because everything was about to go to shit, no doubt. “Pretty much.”
#
Subtlety wasn’t one of Viriya’s strong suits. After all, who drops in on a warzone with bombardment? So it wasn’t surprising in the least that Riven only caught up to Viriya because she had stopped to start shooting.
The first bullet cracked out like a whip. A distant soldier crumpled to the ground, dead. Immediate high alert. Someone screamed, most soldiers bringing out their guns and pointing them upwards, though still unable to find the exact source of the gunfire.
All of which gave Viriya ample time to get more shots away.
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Her aim was impeccable. Even at the distance of several score yards between her and the nearest Ascension soldier, and armed with little better than an unfamiliar pistol, she brought down man after woman after man, not pausing to rest between each shot. She missed once, only once, but didn’t pause then either. Only shifted her aim by a hairsbreadth. Then next shot took the cowering soldier right in the neck. Viriya finally stopped shooting when she clicked the trigger but no golden-green bullet came flying out. Her magazine was empty.
Which signalled the soldiers to return fire to their hearts’ content. Riven had no idea what she would have done to protect herself had he not been here, but he was here. With a little focus, Riven threw out his Essence, blocking every bullet that came in her general direction.
His shield cracked at every impact. Riven made sure his Essence was a little closer so that every bullet clinked down to the walkaway after falling from the cracks they had left in his golden barricade. He’d collect them later. Free Sept was hard to come by these days.
“I’m ready,” Viriya said.
Riven nodded. He focused on the feeling of safety to pull his Essence, and Viriya fired. Return fire whizzed past them as the still-standing soldiers cowered and fell back at Viriya’s renewed onslaught. For all that it looked as though she didn’t care where her bullets hit, Viriya wasn’t firing willy-nilly. She picked her target, aimed carefully after taking into consideration their potential movement, then fired. All calculated, and all done in a second.
When another bullet passed by close enough to make Riven flinch, he moved to Viriya’s right. He was being useless. Riven looked down into the hallway too, trying to pick one of the soldiers who Viriya wasn’t aiming at.
There! A man had his rifle aimed straight at Viriya. Pesky little soldier. Riven focused, sending golden lines flying straight at him to form a shield around his head. He fell back, the rifle dropping to the ground and firing off another unintended shot. The soldier hammered against the golden orb but to no avail. In moments, he’d lost all the air he’d taken, the blue in his face visible despite the heavy tinge of gold. He collapsed to the ground.
Thank the Scions, Riven hadn’t been shot while he was focusing.
When one of the soldiers aimed at Riven, he had already brought his gun. The soldier still got away the first shot, but it didn’t matter. Riven’s shield was there to stop the bullet. He fired his own after dropping his shield, and the soldier fell with blood spurting from his shoulder. No need to worry about losing Sept. The bullets Riven fired were dead Sept ones after all.
Riven and Viriya repeated the procedure, switching between shielding while reloading and firing away. The soldiers died under their combined assault, and they suffered nothing. Though sadly, it didn’t go on for long. They had gone through at least half the ones guarding the hall when the door to the private meeting room burst open.
“What is the meaning of this?” For all his trouble, Wenster only got a bullet in his chest. Good old Viriya, never missing a chance to shoot someone.
Unfortunately, Wenster was using his Essence, the blue fire lighting him up from the inside as though he was a paper lantern. He was in his hulking form, and though there was dark red hole left by Viriya’s bullet, now slowly glowing greener, Riven doubted he’d been seriously hurt.
“That was too easy wasn’t it?” Viriya asked.
Riven sighed. “I really wish it wasn’t.”
Wenster had frozen at the shot to his chest, looking down at the wound with his lone eye. The one Riven had taken out was wrapped in a dark rag that went around his whole head. Then he stared up, locating Riven and Viriya on the walkway. “Can I kindly request that you two come down so I can kill you more easily?”
“Why don’t you come up over here?” she yelled back. It probably sounded fine for Wenster and the rest of them on the hall floor, but this close, Riven’s ears cringed. Scions, Viriya could be loud when she wanted.
Wenster only laughed. “Fine, it seems you want me to pull you own from there.”
He charged forward, feet thumping like a giant’s footfalls.
“Careful,” Riven quickly said to Viriya. “He can change forms thanks to his Essence.”
Even as he said, Wenster did his best to demonstrate. The brute took a few steps in his hulking form as he dug out Viriya’s bullet from the shallow wound on his chest. He threw it away. Wenster crouched on his haunches like a cat about to pounce, then jumped, his Essence flickering within him to turn him into his skeletal form just before he launched himself.
“Holy shit!” was all Viriya manged to get out before she dived to the left.
Riven only shrieked as he did the same.
Wenster had reformed into the hulking figure as he was shooting through the air, and Viriya had understood the implications. The Firstmarked crashed into the walkway with his Essence still glowing inside him, and the whole thing shattered into two. Riven and Viriya’s half caved in and leaned towards the hall’s floor, and they slid down. Scrabbling didn’t help. Riven screamed as he tried this best to hold onto something but the tiled walkway was too damn smooth.
Thankfully, he had his Essence. As soon as they went airborne, Riven focused and drew his golden shield around himself and Viriya. The impact didn’t hurt them in the least.
“Ah, so annoying,” Wenster said. “Your Essence is a nuisance, Morell.”
“Not as much as you, you damn oaf,” Riven replied.
He noted that they were surrounded by soldiers, so removing his shield was an awful idea at best. Wenster approached as fast as his bulk would allow, which wasn’t much. Riven had seen snails move faster. But he knew that was a deception. Even in that form, Wenster could move fast enough to hit strong and hard.
There wasn’t any time to formulate any plans with Viriya. Wenster’s Essence flared within him again, and he turned into his skeletal form. Then he charged.
“Cover me,” Viriya said as she rushed forward to meet him, one fist glittering starry green.
Riven caught a brief flash of a blade in Wenster’s hand, though the Firstmarked was moving too fast for either of them to notice. He gasped. Hadn’t Wenster used his knife to strike Riven while he was in his skeletal form? “Viriya, wait!”
She didn’t listen. Damn it. Viriya was going to get herself killed. Riven had only survived because his Essence had protected him and the force of Wenster’s blows had been weak. The combined momentum hadn’t been enough. But Viriya had no such clue. She had charged in with nothing but her Essence to stop Wenster. Stupid Viriya was going to die.
No time to mope about it. The soldiers around Riven started shooting though not directly at him. Cover me, Viriya had said. So he did, focusing to throw his golden lines at her. His shield cropped up on her right, a shimmering plate the size of the Office gates warding off the bullets. But that left her open on the right. Thank the Scions, none of those bullets hit her.
Worst of all, it left Riven wide open too. Not that he was going to give them much of a chance to shoot at him.
Riven dived to the left, pulling out his sword to strike at the ones who had nothing stopping them from shooting at Viriya. Well, nothing yet at least. They had to deal with him now. His first swing took off a man’s hand, the follow-up thrust pinning a woman to the wall behind her, then several whacks and jabs at the next soldier who thought using his rifle like a club was a good idea against a Coral sword. Riven made short work of him.
They started to refocus on him now, guns aimed at his fleeting feet and marauding hands. No shooting though. Not while he kept rushing through them like a scythe through wheat. Their bullets would go astray and they were liable to hit their own.
It became harder when too many of them died. Riven had come in like a whirlwind with sharp edges, tearing through them with honed ease. He was having difficulty not slipping in the blood, his attention pulled between the splashes of warm crimson, the still-living that he had to kill, and the shield he was still hoping to keep up beside Viriya.
But now that so many had fallen, the soldiers started shooting.
The first few bullets missed of course. Riven was moving too fast, never pausing even to catch a breath. Too dangerous. Then the soldiers started getting better at predicting his movements. Riven used one wary soldier as a shield, and when he fell, he charged forward into the gaggle that was firing their rifles at him. He had dived with his head-on rush so he pulled on his Essence around himself, recreating his golden armour. Riven had looked over for a fraction of a second before that—Viriya was fighting fist-to-fist with Wenster and the soldiers on the right had stopped shooting in fear of hitting their leader. That wouldn’t last long once Wenster changed and they figured out bullets weren’t going to harm his hulking form.
All Riven needed was a few moments. As expected, the soldiers still alive fired at him. The bullets cracked into his armour, some lodging in the fractures while the rest clinked away, but he didn’t pause. He had no time to make sure his armour was fine.
Riven jumped in amongst them, swinging his sword. It was a massacre just as with the other soldiers.
This close, they couldn’t use their rifles. When Riven focused on one, the others tried to fall back and fire as soon as their comrade fell. Interesting strategy but they underestimated how fast Riven was. Or at least, how fast Riven could dispatch them once he was near enough. Their close-quarters defensive capabilities were non-existent at best. Soon as he was within their guard, Riven found next to no resistance when he stabbed or sliced, piercing their hearts or taking off a limb with little difficulty.
The remaining soldiers fell like puppets whose strings Riven had cut away. In moments, he was standing alone, sheathed in warm blood and surrounded by corpses.
A bullet shot in from some other angle and Riven staggered back though his Essence protected him from suffering any damage. He turned, breathing heavily after his exertions, keeping the pressure flowing to keep his Essence strong and alive. No rest for the wicked. Or for the responsible.
“You want to die too?” Riven yelled to the soldiers.
They didn’t reply, except with more bullets. None of them got past his Essence armour.
Since the fight between Viriya and Wenster ensured that the other soldiers couldn’t take out Viriya, they refocused on Riven. He was all too happy to oblige. Riven charged forward. Had those soldiers written their wills, if that was something soldiers did before taking up their firearms? They could die at any moment, couldn’t they? But the brief, intrusive thought was swept away in the rising tide of his brain as the bloodlust swilled like a sloshing wine, just as dark and just as enticing.
Screw Viriya’s warnings to use his Sept carefully. Riven had enemies to kill.
It wasn’t any harder killing these ones than it had been on the left. In fact, by the time Riven stood still after making sure they were all dead—he had to stab several through the heart after they fell, clutching the stumps of their limbs or trying to cover up enormous gashes—only one thought remained. These poor sots had thrown their life away for nothing.
A little farther off, Viriya was still trying to beat back Wenster, though she was falling back now. Wenster was too fast, even for her. Little cuts had opened up on her shoulder and her arms, and her leg had a gory hole oozing blood. She wasn’t going to last long like that.
Even as Riven watched, Wenster stabbed forward with the knife in his hand. Viriya blocked it just barely, then threw a return punch. It didn’t hit him. He was too fast, dodging quickly to one side. Riven’s eyes widened. None of Viriya’s hits had struck true, given not a single spot of green glimmered anywhere on Wenster.
But maybe her falling back and appearing hurt was part of an act. A rock sailed in out of nowhere and struck Wenster in the head, and he went dizzy for a second. If that had been Carom, Riven got no time to check. All Viriya needed was a second. She kicked out and Wenster lost his balance, giving her the perfect opportunity to ram her glowing green fist into his guts. Green swept over Wenster as he right himself and struck back with his own punch. Viriya staggered back, doing her best to keep her balance.
Wenster looked to attack again, but he went flying back. There was a tiny spot of green at the lower end of the broken walkways and the Firstmarked flew back towards it, the jagged end sure to stab right through him.
Then his Essence flashed bright within him. His form grew and he struck the walkway with enough force to make it crack, the whole left half of it falling from where it was attached and crashing down onto the ground. Rocks and stones flew everywhere, a cloud of dust shrouding the whole area in gloom.
Riven swallowed. “Is he dead?”
“Beats me,” Viriya said. Her voce was shaky, as though she had sacrificed even her ability to speak to win against Wenster. “We’re about to find out.”
They did. The cloud of dust shifted, the debris cracking and splintering with the heavy sound of shattering mountains. For all Riven wanted to be done with it, his luck was having none of that. Wenster stepped out, his blue Essence still lighting up his innards, his whole body more or less undamaged from the landslide of debris.
Wenster cracked the joints in his neck by twisting his head from side to side. “Well, that was fun. It’s rare I meet an offensive-based Essentier. But it’s fun. So rare do I get the chance to test out the full extent of my Essence’s many forms.”
Many, he said. Many, not two. No, Riven had only seen the emaciated form and the giant form. Wenster had to be bluffing.
He stepped forward, glowing blue from within like a cloth-covered lamp. His figure was shifting, changing into a form Riven hadn’t seen yet. For a moment, he imagined Wenster turning into some amorphous blob that was immune to anything they could do to hurt it, but the Firstmarked remained humanoid. Just… mismatched. His arms and legs had become thick as trunks but his body still remained thin enough. It was exceedingly strange seeing his uniform hang loose on his frame but stretched to their limit on his limbs.
Wenster yelled, then charged at Viriya. Fast. Holy Scions, he was too damn fast, moving at a pace that nearly matched his emaciated form. And those pole-like limbs would hit with a strength that would nearly match his hulking form too, no doubt.
How in the world would Viriya, or Riven for that matter, survive?
Viriya tried to dodging away, and she evaded his rush. But Wenster rounded on her too quickly. She got a shot away with her gun, but he stopped it with a blurring block by his arm. His other hand shot out and grabbed Viriya by the neck, lifting her bodily up. She struggled in his grip, kicking out and trying to shoot at his head again, but his enormous hand close around her pistol. With a little squeeze, he crushed it. Viriya clicked on the trigger but nothing happened. The gun was done for.
Riven could shoot, could charge in and swing his sword. Stab the big, misshapen bastard in his back and try to find a way to make the brute let her go. He’d be too slow though. Viriya’s neck was being crushed to nothing. It wasn’t like Riven could slice of Wenster’s hands like he’d done to those soldiers.
So he focused. He drew on his pressure, letting the golden lines of his Essence fly at Viriya, focusing it onto a single point on her, letting it coagulate there. Just a little longer and he’d be ready.
There was the tiniest shift in Wenster’s stance. His lone eye had spotted Riven, and having understood what was going on, his grip must have grown tighter. Viriya struggled harder, hitting the Firstmarked with everything she had. Not that any of it worked. She just had to hang on a little longer. Riven would be done soon.
Wenster raised an arm to end it immediately. Shit. Riven needed to get his act together for Viriya’s sake. He focused harder, throwing out more Essence and screw what she said about using it efficiently.
Viriya was done dying. For just a second, she went limp in Wenster’s grip, and Riven froze. No. No way could she be—
With a choked shout, she threw two bullets. One bounced off Wenster’s head, leaving a glowing green bruise, and the other high up in the air. When had she taken them out of her ruined gun? Her choking stopped as Wenster looked far too surprised again. The Firstmarked started to rise in the air. The length of his hold on Viriya decreased as his arms bent in surprise, his grip on her loosening by merely a hairsbreadth.
More than enough for Viriya to ram both of her fists down on his arms with an ear-piercing yell and force herself out of his death grip. Riven shouted in triumph as well. She landed on the ground and staggered back, green eyes glaring utter hatred at the still-rising Wenster.
Who stopped rising, then fell. The bullet Viriya had thrown up had descended again after it had finished its rise.
Wenster shouted and charged in. Viriya was still too groggy to react, and she was about to be swamped by that glowing blue monster. It was all up to Riven now. He focused but there was no need to throw up too much more Essence. He had already done that. Those little bits of gold on Viriya glowed like she had adorned herself with tiny suns.
Too fast. Wenster was still too fast. He struck Viriya with a trunk-like arm, and she went flying to the wall, crashing in and gong down a pile of rubble. Fuck.
“Viriya!” Riven shouted. “Viriya!”
Wenster laughed. “That’s one pest down.” He turned to face Riven. “Now for the next.”
Riven and Wenster faced each other, Riven’s heart thundering with a storm of emotion. Viriya couldn’t be dead, right? He had pulled on so much Essence to protect her. All he needed to do was dig through the rubble once he was done dealing with this brute.
But there was a shift in the debris. They both looked over to see Viriya pull herself out from under the chunks of the broken wall. She was fine. Completely unhurt from the collision with the wall, glowing radiant as one of the Scion’s Chosen descended from the heavens.
Viriya was wearing Riven’s Essence armour, and she looked ready to use it in battle. She looked ready to end this once and for all.