XXVII.

Heretic

Serenity. It was peaceful. Bright. There was chatter all around the busy streets of the Calamon market, and people squirming past them in every direction. It was ordinary day. A calm day.

"Cedric. Cedric!" Faunia snapped her fingers.

He shook his head in surprise, like being roused from a dream. His hair had only grown a little since he shaved his head. His beard was mere stubble.

"Spacing out?"

"Sorry. Something caught my attention." He turned back to her. He'd been staring at one of the vendors, selling all sorts of things. A thought had crossed his mind of Greslock. There was still so much he owed the damn ogre for.

Faunia approached him and placed another sack in his hand, complementing the three other brown sacks he was already holding.

"My arms are getting tired." he said. "They'll give out, soon."

"And my legs are getting tired. But I'm doing all of the shopping, so you'll do all of the carrying."

"That hardly seems fair. And did it never occur to you that I'm the one who makes it that we can afford to shop?"

She rolled her eyes and turned away. He thought he saw a glimpse of a smile on her face.

His own lips curled slightly.

"Oh, a book vendor!" she proclaimed and ran toward a less busy shop.

Cedric kept up at half her pace. "You can read?"

"You can't?"

He shrugged. "I know a few words. Not anything more than that."

Then her smile became a full grin. "Would you like to learn?"

But their serenity was cut off by a sudden buzz. A constant, consistent buzz. The crowd thinned out around him. The shops vanished into obscuring mist. Stars emerged in the sky, and beneath the black at their feet.

His heavy bags were replaced with a heavier sword. Or, his arms really had given out. They could barely manage to hold the thing upright.

Click.

Click.

Click.

Punctual, drawn-out footsteps.

A figure moved in the mist. He held out a long polearm, a long curved blade at the end... A scythe.

Kogar.

Cedric became cloaked beneath the red armor of Serkukan. Black horns began to bulge from his forehead.

I WON'T LET YOU TAKE THIS AWAY FROM ME.

X

Cedric's agony was not short lived. The red flame engulfed him and seared flesh from bone. He was barely gripping to his sanity, or rather, Okella and Tirolith were doing their best to preserve it while they could. Serkukan was draining that red energy from the star as fast as his body could accept it.

A palm axe fell from above. Cedric slammed shut his eyes, though it was hard to tell that they were even open, now.

BOOM!

It stuck into his spine first, and then exploded in searing distress. But his body persevered. Red flesh filled in the impact. The damage was undone by new, achingly powerful muscle. His face and limbs began to recoup…

And the red light faded.

The hulking God of Fire Serkukan stood reborn amidst the ash of the blast. His black horns spanned six perplexing paces each. His flesh was a horrid amalgamation of Cedric’s pale and Serkukan’s crimson, blending seamlessly as it swelled and grew into his pristine daemon form. Soon, all would be crimson.

Jirtu nodded at the visage. “It wasn’t just being held here. Kogar has been refueling it from the blood of distant stars. Then that explains why he didn’t just consume it to begin with. So too does it explain Vekzul's absence.”

Ivalie looked on in bemusement. He placed his staff against uneven cobbles.

“You’ve the spell ready? On her call.”

“I know.”

Rykaedi would have smiled, were her face capable of it. |Serkukan has been returned to us! Tens of thousands of years, all for this moment!|

The daemon roared out with much pent-up ferocity. The world shook.

|They’ll hear that from Alisa to Kylinstrom. They’ll know his voice! What glee it fills me with to witness such a monumental occasion!|

Serkukan’s arms came up. The muscles grew tense.

|Oh? What’s this?|

He was fighting something; something inside of him was tearing him up. He clawed at his own chest…

|It’s Cedric, isn’t it? The boy’s found a shred of life in that vessel. No matter, he’ll be consumed all the same.|

"Hemah?" Rykaedi called from atop the edge of the Petalfall. "Hemah, darling, it's time to relax!"

Kogar crushed the ground beside her as he landed. "She doesn't heed your call. He's got the star."

Kogar's eyes darted between them.

Cedric had already fallen to a stray platform in a burning red glow. Hemah had failed.

×Due to Okella's betrayal. And due to Ithlo's theft.×

He aimed his palm at the platform.

×One bolt.×

His armor glistened as a blast of pure energy shot from his hand.

Rykaedi tilted her head back slightly. The bolt missed.

"Should have practiced your aim, love." she laughed.

×You bitch. You planned this—you're still fucking with me.×

Kogar leapt into the air. His two-tone wings sprung from his back.

×I'll kill him myself.×

Kogar rushed the beast. His scythe glistened in his hand. He neared with a heavy swing.

This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

“GRAAAH!" was his own cry. Something leapt out of the hole Serkukan had dug in his chest and grasped Kogar's throat. Something red—something white.

|How fascinating!|

Rykaedi clapped. She began to jump up and down like a jubilant child.

|There he is! The one who killed Algirak!|

|The Heretic!|

The demon fell with a dramatic crash against the stone. Cedric had won their dispute—leaving a new figure in his wake. |Somehow. He's bested the God of Fire himself!|

Red flesh cloaked beneath a white coat. A white crown. A drip of water from the hands.

|Four of them in one—even better than last time!|

He gripped Kogar's throat.

Kogar sliced his hand upward. Even the side of his palm was sharp enough to cleave through the Heretic's arm and release him. And then—

×Everlasting.×

—Three thousand more cuts laid into the Heretic's body, all in the span of a second.

Then came Okella, her tendrils lashing out frantically with a thousand slices in return.

Kogar spun his scythe to deflect as many as he could—some broke his skin. His blood dripped into the air and hovered. The Heretic rushed forward. The blood speckled his white cloak. His crimson face was contorted like a daemon.

CRNCH!

A fist shattered Kogar's armor. The Heretic rushed in with a flurry more.

Kogar instantly warped atop a platform some twenty paces away, and above. He brandished his scythe.

"Now, you die."

Hemah, again. A golden axe dropped toward him like a bolt.

The Heretic caught it in his offhand. He spun it, launched it back up…

BOOM!

A direct hit. Hemah was dropped from the sky.

Kogar's brows furrowed.

"Such precision. As expected of the War God, himself."

He snapped his fingers. That would begin The Twelve's rush.

Vekzul was first to Cedric's fore in a blink.

A flurry of blows. But the Heretic made light of blocking them. The gears were spinning at an unthinkable speed.

Then he darted around Vekzul and spun a kick.

KRNCH!

Shards scattered from the red crystalline armor. Vekzul fell into the pit.

Throkos was into the air on oily black wings. He thrust his hand out with a spell.

The air between them sparkled in prismatic color—(Redirection!)

Throkos spun out of the air and landed on the platform beside Ivalié and Jirtu.

"Get ready." he hissed.

Ivalié's staff began to glow.

Rykaedi would have licked her lips, if she had lips or a tongue to work with.

|Do it, Cedric!|

He threw his hands outward together, turning to Kogar. He channeled Dyosius…

A hiss, first. His palms began to steam and glow.

And a prismatic ray of color blasted out.

It was too fast for Kogar, who could only brace his scythe before himself to avoid the severity of the blast. It continued, burned and scalded Kogar's flesh even from a distance, even as his scythe took the energy head-on.

When the color finally faded, he looked to his melted and warped weapon, then cast it aside into the abyss.

×How quaint. Everlasting.×

The gears in Cedric's chest began to spin even faster. But it wasn't enough—Everlasting was faster even than frozen time.

Hemah clawed her way back up from a platform. Her helm was shattered to reveal her burning eyes, eyes filled to the brim with sunlight. The platform began to melt at her gaze…

She thrust into the air—

Kogar was behind Cedric. He launched his fist.

KRRRRCH!

A spray of blood scattered onto the cobbles. His fist had gone right through the boy's chest.

The gears shattered and fell apart.

He threw his other hand out behind himself. A long, pointed blade sprung out from his wrist.

The Heretic wailed out in agony, a hellish roar unlike any that a man could produce.

Kogar's eyes widened.

×The Moment... ended?×

The demon spun and laid a devastating punch into Kogar's face. Kogar stumbled into a defensive stance, his feet scraped the edge of their small platform.

And then Cedric flurried forward with a spray of powerful blows. He was still roaring out. His chest was reassembling itself.

×Tirolith!×

But the blows continued. He couldn't regain his footing. His nose broke, his cheeks broke, all of his teeth shattered. Blood drooled out from everywhere and covered his blinded eyes and leaked into his mouth.

Then the sunlight began. Hemah was in the sky—her helm had melted and allowed agonizing sunlight to pour over all of them.

Kogar and the Heretic both flinched. The pain was excruciating.

×You fucking imbecile... I'll...×

He used the opportunity to jump backward, he leapt onto his glistening wings and flew away, back toward Rykaedi.

"Ivalié!" Rykaedi bellowed.

The man nodded from his own platform. His spell was cast.

Chains shot out of the sky in four corners. They grabbed Kogar's arms and legs and pulled them taut.

"Now, Cedric!" Rykaedi cupped her hands around her mouth to shout. "Again!"

The Heretic looked back and forth between them in confusion.

Kogar hissed through his grit teeth, "This… all along, this was to be a public execution. All along, you planned to kill me."

He clenched his fists tightly.

"Then my hesitation dies."

And the Petal lit up in ley…

"Tartys, awaken."

|Tartys hasn't answered for two eras—he won't do it now.|

Cedric put his palms forward. They began to glow.

|Yes… yes!|

"Redirection." was Kogar's only utterance before it should have ripped through his body.

Fsssssssh!

A horrible hiss. The melting of an Etherian. Esera turned to ash. The damage done by Dyosius would be far more devastating than anything they could do with their hands, or their abilities.

Cedric's red flesh was no more. The ray had hit. But not Kogar.

He collapsed to his knees, first. He gasped and gagged, but no more could he draw a breath. He looked down—his lungs were hit. His whole torso was a crater.

Red steam fell from the wound. It seemed to rise from the pouring blood like smoke.

And then, down went the rest of his body.

|Oh—pity.|

Then the sky darkened.

All turned to look.

The horrid, gradient sky had become one dark void.

And then it opened up into the Eye of Tartys. Bright blue all around, filled with black cracks and steaks. A catlike pupil stared down from above. It shifted left and right as though scanning the ensemble.

|Oh. Fuck.|

And Kogar's face, for the first time in decades, became a sinister, genuine smile.

END VOL. 2