Master Fred’s Vaccine beeped at him as we were Infusing. He picked up the phone and studied the message.
ONE OF THE QUENCH TEAMS FOUND A HENGE SITE, BUT WERE CHASED AWAY BY DEFENDERS, he reported, and flicked up the holo of the standing Menhirs, all scorched black and partially melted in ways that weren’t exactly natural. At the center of the circle of stones was a remarkably controlled lava pool.
“Well, would you look at that,” I said lazily. “Firesworn Druids serving the Firezone’s Lord. Don’t you just love it when the Druids swap loyalties to the Elements instead of the Land?”
“Yes. It gives all sorts of excuses to get rid of the heathen bastards,” The Mick said piously.
“You’d make a good Druid of the Brown,” I noted, and he actually blinked at me. “You can already turn into bats, rats, and a wolf, and you’re attuned to blood, and animal life with it. I think you’d be a remarkable Druid.”
“Their choice of attire would conflict with my religious sensibilities,” The Mick sniffed. “I’ve been a wee bit careful of who I offer my blandishments to these days, lass.”
“No, No, I figured you for one of those happy oblivious Valusar types, caught up in your personal quest above all else.” The way his face twitched was amusing. “Sure, He’s portrayed as a big, boisterous oaf, but Valus is the Eternal Quester, and one thing you learn about strong men is that when they get serious, they get very serious, indeed.” The Storm Knight definitely had a grim side to Him, as he was quite renowned for his temper, and was the most renowned hunter of monsters for the gods.
The Mick’s Patron of Uskvar only had a grim side, so there was that.
“Ach, not even going to try to make a case for Mitharn Mastery?” The Mick complained promptly, tapping his immaculate white duds.
“That’s an individual statement, not an affection for the White,” I sniffed back. “Valus is all about the individual statement. A Mitharn would be working and organizing with others on a Quest. I’ve not heard a word from you about your personal goals, meaning they are yours and yours alone.
“Valus’ heart is big enough that He’ll shoulder the quests of others and help out, but He keeps His own to himself, and basically never asks for help. If people help Him, it’s because they pile in and do so, not because He asks.”
The Mick made an odd face, part smile, part grimace. “And ye cannae help out w’out knowing what t’ be helping with...”
“You’ve been carrying around a grudge for longer than Master Fred or I have been alive. Yes, we’re young pups. But, if you think we can’t understand what it means to have something really dark and bad dominate your whole life, I think you’re just being an idiot.”
He opened his mouth and closed it, looking at us both. Me, Shroudborn, Cursed, and tied to the Haze that was glooming the whole planet; Master Fred, Heavenbound and Doomed to Hell because of one bad decision, Hellscarred and mute and his soul seared and in pain all the time.
“A right tragic lot we are, are we not?” he half-laughed, eyeing us two. “And I’m the most miserable of the lot, for I could choose to walk away from it, and cannae, even after what ye’ve done fer I, whilst the two of ye...”
Master Fred was going to Hell, and I was tied to the Shroud. In the end, neither of us were going to have Good ends. But that didn’t mean we couldn’t make something Good of it before then.
“Share when you are ready to share. Revenge is going to be cold and lonely and empty whether you complete it yourself or with others... they’ve already gotten theirs. I think it comes down to making the leap between them getting what they deserve, and you doing it by your own hands, while ensuring no one else gets there first.
“It’s going to take some trust, and some faith, both of which I know you keep very near and dear to your heart. Take your time. We’re dealing with big, profound issues and missions on our end. I think we can understand and empathize with something more personal.”
SMALL THINGS ARE SO MUCH EASIER TO ACTUALLY DO SOMETHING ABOUT, Master Fred flamed, and the golden fires even seemed to sigh for him.
The Mick looked at the Badge burning in the Infusion Pattern in front of him, and thought about things he’d not pondered deeply in a very long time...
-------
Master Fred’s fingers were burning hell-red as he drove them into the side of the menhir, getting a grip on the volcanic stone. Hot white light burned through the I-Ching patterns on his forearms as he lifted calmly, three bars each boosting his Might by +4, easily quintupling his lifting ability.
His Might was already post-30 from his Heavy Gravity training. The multi-ton block of stone was heaved over casually and collapsed heavily, breaking the formation of the Wards protecting this place, and causing a violent blast of disjointed magic to crackle out and explode everywhere as their protections were disrupted.
Lots of men in dark leathers and robes, some dyed crimson, often with flame motifs, went tumbling as the feedback washed over them.
“No! Nooooo!” a scruffy-looking guy in firenewt-hide leathers screamed out, watching all their work go to nothing, and then down at the ground underneath him and his Druid and Firebound buddies... which had suddenly begun to crack and glow alarmingly fast.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
Master Fred smoothly Rode the Light a good fifty yards back as the shocked Firesworn and Firebound who had just been sent twitching and falling from their Henge going offline tried to get away in time.
The bound fumarole beneath the henge, once reduced to but a lava pool, came back up with a great deal of excitement, and the whole area lifted right off the ground as it did so. The entire sect of Fireservants was suddenly airborne in a lava plume that raised quite the blast towards the sky as it let go.
Thankfully, released fire magic wasn’t actually as explosive as a true eruption that would go in all directions. The pillar of fire did go several hundred feet up, hapless fools being burned and pummeled and breathing in some nasty shit as it did, but a Ward Wall was enough to block the falling debris that scattered in all directions as we watched the show, and it deflected the shockwave of dust and fire around and past us.
“Ye’re right, that did save us a lot of time and effort,” The Mick observed, watching burned forms flailing weakly as they fell from the sky. They’d survived the heat, sure enough, but the pummeling of the stone and lava, and the poisonous gases, not so much, and now they had to deal with coming down out of the sky while barely conscious and getting rained on by rocks and molten stone. “Always a pisser having to kill people with a clear conscience. Nice to just hoist them on their own petard.”
I lifted my hand, three Darts in play, and fired, zip zip zip! Cold streaks of light extended out, hit three figures whose bodies had warped and shifted to winged forms trying to dodge the rain of stone and flee.
Struck by the frozen Darts, they naturally went tumbling and didn’t quite get away, wings frozen and unable to keep them aloft.
“Sometimes brute force is just the easiest answer,” I replied easily. Yeah, I probably could have messily pounded through their defenses in a big show of power and expended Valences, all the while enduring their counterattacks with a Minor Wardglobe to eat all their III and lower Valences.
But why? The menhirs weren’t arranged to deal with someone simply lifting one out of place. Yeah, they could have bounced an artillery shell, but a living being just heaving one over wasn’t prevented.
Too bad, so sad.
We all zipped out to find our targets, avoiding the scattered rocks and hot ash falling from above. Yes, we were all aware Druids had healing magic.
Hey, mine ended up looking what seemed to be the leader. Faux Seven, by his aura, gasping and just getting out his first healing spell as I popped up next to him.
I kicked him in the jaw; he grunted and went rolling over sideways, clearly not ready or willing to fight.
“You, you!” he glared at me, abandoning any Casting and pointing his hand at me, worked with the claws of firebats for ornamentation. “The Lord of Fire will learn of this! He will have his vengeance!”
Clavus swept up between his legs as he was getting to his feet. His eyes crossed as he sat back down abruptly.
“The Land says fuck-all to your Firelord,” I replied kindly. “It also doesn’t have any remorse for its children who abandon their mother to pay homage to an alien thing.” He was going to say something else when I smashed him across the temple and his skull shattered badly, vivus exploding over the side of it as he died.
Being able to kill traitors to the planet came with the job. I didn’t like killing humans, but I had too much experience with too many too wrapped up in getting power over all else, and fuck the rest to hesitate when it was time.
The Cultivator Rebellion, the Dagon infiltrations, the various True God insurrections... they had all sucked. People trying to survive, people wanting power, people wanting to believe; all of them easy prey in one form or another to madness that turned them against their own kind, against the world, against any notion of morality.
I could replicate his face with a Holo, and taking his fingerprints took literally a second, so records would find out who he was. He wasn’t wearing his death tags, unsurprisingly, and I just watched as the vivus spread over him like fresh tinder and ate him and his leathers away.
We had no way of knowing if we got the entire Circle, of course, and we likely had not. Any survivors could be a nuisance, so tracking associates was a thing.
But, since our end goal was the Firelord itself anyways, I wasn’t too concerned about it. Pop it, and these Druids and Firebound were going to have no direction, and seriously start questioning their life choices. Working for a Burning Undead thing was definitely not a wise career move, but there are fools, and then there are fools...
But hey, it all fell under the ‘irreconcilable religious conflict’ laws, and there would be no prosecution to speak of. Even other Druids would kill these guys; Firesworn Druids had their place, but serving an undead creature or its servants was not it. Undead were about as unnatural as it got.
Renewal’s gift to me had been Archsorcerer/4, doubling my base IV Slots. The Feat had been Extra Spell Slot IV, and Constitution Mastery/4 had finished it off. My total number of Valences was rising rapidly, and my recharge mechanic was already in place.
If I had it figured right, the next few days were going to drive me to Faux Ten Sorcerer. More Slots just made it easier to cast Buffs multiple times and still be able to renew them, now that I had IV’s to use.
That would just drive a whole bunch of Theurgies and similar stuff, so there were going to be Class Level after Class Levels of stuff to take. I could only sigh and go along with it.
The idea of Casting at Eleven and Ten while still a Six was still rocking me with the implications. It blew past the Second Ceiling like it was nothing. But nobody had known...
I was pretty sure that the 4-Level limit on Theurgic Level boosts was an absolute, or the system would have kept piling them on Wizard, because why not? It would have been a crazy way to work on both the Foundation and the Pillar, skirting the requirements of both.
I was going to start working on additional Protection with Einz, getting that function to +III over the next three weeks, and then... we’d see about making him truly intelligent.
We were going to circle the nearest volcano, clear everything off the landscape, and then see what was protecting it, while other teams fought any reinforcements edging in behind and trying to reclaim the land.
We didn’t have to do it this way. Just generic mass slaughter would slowly push back the edges of the Firezone, but this was a way to remove a Node’s influence, and rapidly get some ground back.
Once we cleared the caldera, I’d go back to the first Node, and get that Hallowed and set up for production if possible. That was way too much free fire mana being left around and not put to use!
I finished vivisizing all the dead, stripping them of anything useful, and Master Fred sent the information off on Vaccine for the authorities to dig up information on and investigate further.
Nobody liked rogue Firesworn, and these people had been fighting and annoying teams trying to clear the Charland for some time. They just hadn’t been prepared to deal with someone who could kill them as quickly as I could...