The temperature around me plunged to -50 C, and the magic began to thrum actively as a new Note sang through the manasphere. The Maga over there knew of the Sublime Chord, but didn’t have the influence with it that I did. I reached out and tapped the ley lines of this world, and they Sang.
The sky was painted with lines of dark colors, streaming back and forth around and between the many Pyramids. They were starting to weaken and disperse, and I clenched my fist. Towering pure Notes rose for the skies as that magic went crystalline taut.
With a crackle like bones lining up, those dispersing threads rematerialized and strengthened themselves, linking all these Pyramids up totally and completely, binding them into that Formation despite the wishes of their masters.
I felt twoscore titanic Wills crash into my control. They were implacable, eternal, absolute in their arrogance and confidence, trying to chase away the mere human attempting to defy their power.
They broke on my Concentration like glass shattering on steel, including the massive effort from the thing sitting on its carved throne over there like the boss of all it surveyed.
I rotated my fist. “They are coming down!” I stated mercilessly.
The bands of darkness in the air shattered with a hollow POK that was as loud as thunder. At the same time, the Pyramids hovering about all wobbled, and immediately began to fall as they shut off, their power flows completely discombobulated.
Including the one in the middle over there.
“You mind if I-?” I asked Sama, before the falling Pyramids could hit the ground.
She just grinned, watching them coming down with meteoric speed, clearly unperturbed as shouts rose all around, knowing they wouldn’t crash. “Oh, go right ahead. We’ll reduce the rest.”
I Rode the Light over in that direction, and was standing in the air fifty feet away when the Pyramid slammed down.
It should have made a pit, crashed, and broken apart at the impact. Instead, the majority of its momentum vented out, and it rumbled as it set down heavily, jarringly, but completely intact. The buildings on the hillside below it were crushed flat as it gouged out the side of the hill, forming a completely flat area for it to land on as it did so, and a massive dust cloud started to swirl into the air... before I forcibly sent it all right back down to the ground.
The tzizimitl ruler was bounced around on its Throne, which I noted seemed to have been carved from the marrowmelded ribs of some truly titanic creatures, and ornamented with the skulls of things the size of the greatest Jotuns or bigger.
It was definitely rather put off as it nearly bounced off its seat of power, and had to clutch it and recenter itself as its ride finally ground to a halt, having carved off a side of the sloped hill higher than the top of its Pyramid itself before stopping.
It looked at me, and energies flashed between us.
I absolutely ignored its eyebeams of fire and negative energy, corroding anything they hit to tinder for the flames to burn to nothingness.
I had undergone the Ritual of the Fiery Heart, and flame couldn’t affect me. I was also a full Heavenbound, and the negative energies of Death held no fear for me, either. There was nothing thanoptic about its attack, so it might as well have been sending spitballs my way.
On the other hand, my Fastcast Chained Item Dispel smacked into its Throne, and all the very powerful defenses on it and its own Accoutrements were instantly and completely neutralized as the silver crackles of the spell danced all over it, stripping the tzizimitl leader of its Artificed protections.
Then Silver Light punched through the clouds above, and the Shards following up slammed into it.
I didn’t bother for a Sun or Positive energy bias, going straight for Force, Holiness, and Primal power. These things had some influence over pure positive or negative energy.
Coruscant Rays, eight of them, drove down in parallel into its bony chest and lit off.
I was spending from Valence, Mortus Dius was flaring like a sun, and I blew off Heartsong for Might of Thunder, trashed an alchemical Firebomb, Channel-boosted some Holy Water for the Acidic component, and, because I could, I added some Soulfire extras that shouldn’t have worked on this world.
Each Ray was 23d8 Topped off, +150%, at +9 per die, and +36d6+140+ of Kickers each.
It was a big hit, about 10k base damage, and I think I crit with those shots to its eye sockets. About equivalent to a Pyramid falling out of the sky on your head.
The undead idiot making such a big fat target of itself on its Throne didn’t look like it quite believed it when all the Health Qi it had left after its Throne shut off evaporated, and what it had left wasn’t enough to deal with a Spellwarped Major Shards spell with all the Smites and Theurgic add-ons I could muster in the short term.
The vivic explosion blew past me as this ages-old thing was annihilated by overdone vivic damage, which took the opportunity to blow through its Throne, all brimming with leashed necromantic powers, and feed on that, too.
That secondary explosion blew out five hundred feet past me; tore apart the middle of its Pyramid and all the undead packed within it, as well as the necromantic power sources; and then blew all that stuff apart, too. The cascading explosions of powerful undead and powerful necrotech Going Away Forever vented up towards the sky in a bright fountain of sparkling vivus, a geyser of heavy unwhite flame, before falling slowly and grandly back towards the ground.
I distinctly felt the distant attention of Amazonia get a lot more focused at such an instant and intense feast. The vivus poured down past me like water, and the unseen influence of the Land below drank it all in greedily, while the shattered Pyramid itself was burning like a massive vivic bonfire.
I could already see the Land opening up beneath it, like lips parting wide to suck down a fine treat...
The other tzizimitl stumbling out of their Pyramids, and indeed, most of the greater undead accompanying them, could also feel the horrifyingly powerful presence of the Land, no doubt in the same manner as humans on the deck of a sinking ship would gaze upon a massive school of sharks around them with jaws gaping open in the middle of a feeding frenzy.
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
Then they saw the teeth of those jaws: thousands upon thousands of vivic Weapons coming their way very, very urgently, and the first spells were already ranging ahead from hundreds of Casters to open the way.
Undead streamed out, clutching Wandguns to shoot back at the puny living creatures with Rays of necroic energy... which did a whole lot of nothing to a bunch of Seven+ Nulls with the Caster Level of One to Three those Toys had. Minimum Caster Level efficiency goldweight cost-controlling bean-counters strike again...
The hordes of the living crashed into the undead like a burning tide, while very intense energies exploded over the more powerful of the latter. Terribly strong and accurate lines of light were impacting the tzizimitl and preventing them from unloading their powerful spells, leaving them with merely their eyebeams and breath attacks to fall back on... both of which weren’t going to stop what was coming.
I saw Sama run up through the air at 200 mph on misting soles and slam into the skull of her target, pitching the fifty-foot skeleton right over backwards as she rode it down, steel-hard neckbones flying in all directions as she hewed it through before it could hit the ground.
Over thataway, Briggs just bounced up for altitude, and the echo of his Hammer reached all the way over here as he literally knocked the disbelieving skull off his target’s neck in one blow. Triple damage charge bonus to a One-Striking Sage of the Hammer, sure enough...
Smiting Shots from the King of America; a bloody Sword in the hands of the Queen of Ireland; celestial fire and Force and other energies all dipped fat in the wells of Spell Penetration so that they could land on and affect things that normally would be immune to Casters of their Levels. The attackers knew what they needed, and what they needed to do.
Once their Casting ability was shut down, the tzizimitl were meat on the plate to all those vivic Weapons at +X and higher coming for them to beat them down. Swarming and hacking, flanking with the ease of lots of practice and experience, the powerful undead were surrounded and relieved of their existences, while nonstop volleys of magic were streaming all around to wipe out the weakest, finish the wounded, stop any other Casters, and block any powerful spells that did get off, those last often done by more Warlocks who had wandered down here to contribute.
I saw Legion at full Titan-size, nearly as tall as one of these skeletons, effortlessly tear one right off of its feet with six hands blazing with multiple fires of Wrath, and simply pull and rip the thing apart with main strength, sending blazing bones scattering everywhere. Their massive Tails didn’t even come into play...
With a blur of motion, they covered half a mile in under six seconds with massive strides suitable for a Gargantuan lightfooter with wings. The next tzizimitl in line could only gape at them coming as they arrived and smashed into it with lots of Titanic mass and far too much momentum, crushing the undead creature back into its own Pyramid, and in an explosion of Wrath destroyed what remained intact of its body after it did so.
Huh. Sole would be so jealous. Legion wasn’t even bothering to draw their Sword. Six fists imbued with 16d6 of Wrathfire each seemed to be doing the job just fine, and I didn’t even want to know what their Strength was at that size. With Titanic Stature effects, it would scale proportionately to their human size, and even more...
Here’s eighteen or so tons slamming into you at 400 mph. Enjoy!
The planet’s foremost defender was bloody apparent to me, but I could see that Sama and Briggs were undeterred. After all, they were only Twelves, and Legion was clocking a full Twentyish. The two of them had a long way to go. Consuming things was a nice way for a very rapid power-up, but definitely had its downsides in other ways, and there was nothing that said you couldn’t catch up to someone like that if you were committed.
These undead, powerful as they were, were total idiots, meat on the plate for raw Karma. I wondered what had motivated them to attack, and realized it just wasn’t that important for now.
They had come, they had gotten their asses kicked, and now they were Karma and raw materials for Dreadskulls.
Life was fair.
I considered something, and found myself smirking.
They just might have been misinformed by reputable sources, and tricked into attacking... just before I arrived here. Someone in Silver might just have arranged such things to give the bastards a fatal blow, taking advantage of the timing only He would know about.
So, not idiots. Smart things terribly and mistakenly fooled and misinformed, to disastrous consequences. After all, they could have just moved their fleet somewhere else faster than an entire army of Nulls locking down space could redeploy...
Yeah, that fit the narrative better. They were probably thinking they could bring in servants of some kind here, where there was no King, and the local population couldn’t stop them. They didn’t realize that there really was a global effort here ready to go against invaders, all centered on Briggs and Legion, it looked like, with the other Kings and Queens aiding them.
I just inquired if anyone needed back-up, flitted over to where a Champion of Valus was heading up an attack with a flicker of effort, and I added some casual firepower to his advance, cracking the enemy line open so Heavenbound and Champions could storm in and do to the undead what they did best.
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“I have something for you.”
I lifted an eyebrow as Sama brought a gold-enruned Baneskull out of her pack. It was half-warped, with the echoes of spatial and psychic power around it, a feeling of despair and malevolence that even conversion to a crystalline state couldn’t change.
The two sets of canines were also telling.
I accepted it from her, felt the Aura, and nodded slowly. “A Hag, and a Pseudonatural. What about her?”
“First, can you confirm if she’s the Rantha Cursemother?” I blinked at that, but Divination was still my strongest magic set, and this was still Seeing the Now. It was simply a matter of Detect Curse at VIII or higher, something totally useless for general purposes, but Wizards live for niche spells, doncha know?
“Yes,” I told this Sama, studying it and matching it to the remnants of the Curse-brand on her face and neck. “The line has been severed, but the residuals are still there. Your Curse definitely descended from here.”
She exhaled thoughtfully. “Okay, that should mean that the first Rantha was her Hagdaughter, right? And so there should be one of us on whatever world that came from... and I’ve the feeling she kicked Grandmother’s arse, too.”
“Huh.” Well, she had a point. Born of the Soil VI was enough to determine place of origin, even if it was in another dimension. I had to retrieve that spell out of my Ring, as it was totally niche, but interested as I was, that was fine. I kept a few Valences clear for just such reasons.
Sama was basically monitoring the looting of the Pyramids. The necrotech lift engines were being preserved for study if possible, hopefully to inspire something they could make work with more standard energies for some truly large airships.
As for the copious amount of gold and other precious things largely used as pointless ornamentation, the Patterns were already out and Burning it all, as well as the magical Gear carried by the undead. No widespread attempt was made to preserve any of the alien items for use, although some were being saved for careful study if there was no threat judged to be coming from them at all.
A stream of dimensional coordinates rose out of the spell, with spatial coordinates on top of that. If I followed the former, I could then follow the latter right to her birthplace, if I so desired.
“I have the world coordinates.” I /dumped them to her Visual File, and she nodded. “I’ll investigate in the future,” I promised her. “It seems not far off from Terra-Luna, so I might be able to get there with a Plane Shift via Heaven. I will keep you posted on what I find.”
And I had the distinct impression that such was why I was here at all... other than potentially setting up dimensional links, communication, and maybe possible trade with another planet, especially an alternate Earth that had been victimized by The Thing...
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Six days later...
I clutched the Tome of the Creation Clause to my chest as the Pyramid powered up, ready to send me on my way, back along the path once opened by that destroyed Death Arch over there.
How I was going to present this to the gods was going to be an interesting question, but I would get it done. It looked like a duty had fallen to mortal forces greater than anything we could imagine, and we were going to need some help...