With horses given to them by the defenders, all seven of set off at top speed toward the monster. It didn’t take long for the dirt road to soften beneath their hoofs and before they’d covered half the distance to the dreaded Xzxyth, Emeryn closed her eyes and hardened the earth in front of them. How she kept up with the speed of the horses, Sarien didn’t know.
They rode in silence, keeping low in their saddles to avoid the rhinn. An unnecessary precaution, it turned out. The rhinn didn’t even glance at their racing horses. All they could do was struggle against the seemingly endless number of tentacles, some of which reanimated their dead brethren. Their forces were severely diminished and Sarien didn’t see a single pyromancer left among the soldiers. They’d all either perished or escaped. No rhinn waypoints opened up either.
Goslin directed them straight through the battle. Screams of pain and terror rang out all around them as they galloped past panicked rhinn and over the dead. The din of metal striking against metal filled the air. The rhinn attacked the Xzxyth’s tentacles in large, unorganized numbers, but it was painfully clear the rhinn would not be able to defeat the Xzxyth. Their greatest asset, their numbers, meant little when each dead rhinn rose as a reanimated corpse.
Tentacles came for Goslin, but he used his obsidian black shield to block the attack. When the tentacles struck, they burst apart. How such a thing was possible, Sarien didn’t know, but he couldn’t help but think of the hundreds of rhinn who died in the creation of the shield.
Sarien rode in the center, behind Emeryn, and with his left flank protected by Kax. The madman swung his swords wildly from horseback, cutting into rhinn, tentacles, and the dead with equal fervor. He laughed and laughed as they rode, his smiled pulled wide in maniacal joy.
Tomford rode on Sarien’s right, followed by Heylien. Lana fell behind, clutching her daggers, a look of uncertainty on her face.
Sarien knew that Daisy had chased after them but the dog couldn’t keep up with the horses this time. Hopefully, he’d return to the gate to wait for their return.
“Sarien!” Goslin shouted from up at the front. “Whatever happens, you continue on! Don’t stop for any reason, you hear?”
Sarien gritted his teeth and winced, but eventually nodded. Goslin was right. Only he could send the Xzxyth away.
When the group started getting close to the monster, dead rhinn appeared in front of their horses.
Did the Xzxyth understand what they were trying to do? Did it sense them as a threat?
Goslin trampled through, the dead falling under the hooves of his horse, but he soon became tangled in the tentacles. Sarien watched as Goslin dropped and quickly got back to his feet, his sword in one hand and the shield in his other. He struck at the tentacles, severing the connections that allowed the beast to manipulate the dead.
“Goslin!” Lana shouted. Sarien looked up and caught sight of her soaring through the air to land beside their leader. With a dagger in each hand, she slashed at the dead who still stood, then danced around them and severed their connection to the creature. The Xzxyth screeched, a deafening sound.
“You go on!” Goslin shouted. Both he and Lana turned and ran for the main body of the Xzxyth. Sarien spurred his horse on until he came up alongside Emeryn. The others followed. Sarien couldn’t allow Emeryn to lead, not when she was focused on keeping the slick ground in front of them from becoming their largest obstacle.
“Incoming!” Kax screamed. Sarien glanced over his shoulder in time to see a tentacle as huge as a house slam down on them. Sarien was thrown from his horse and quickly scrambled to his hands and knees. His spear lay right beside him, and he grabbed it and used the shaft as support to push himself to his feet. The horses took the brunt of the damage and all of them lay still in the mud.
Goslin and Lana caught up to them and pulled everyone to their feet. Miraculously, they’d all made it through the attack alive. Tomford was already healing Heylien’s leg and Emeryn’s head, one hand outstretched to each. Kax stood, seemingly unhurt. He hadn’t even lost the grip on his swords as he was tossed through the air.
Goslin pointed up. “It’s coming again!” The large tentacle arched down from directly above them, and they scrambled to the sides to avoid being hit. It thudded into the ground between them with enough force to shake the earth. Sarien stuck his spear in the wet mud to stay on his feet. Then, he pulled it out and thrust it into the huge limb, but the Xzxyth didn’t even seem to register the attack.
“I’ll deal with this!” Kax yelled. He leapt up, stabbing the tentacle with a dagger, using it to climb up the large mass. Sarien wouldn’t have thought the surface of the tentacle would support Kax’s weight without him being pulled inside the gelatinous mass, but perhaps the size of it required a more solid form.
“Wait for me!” Lana shouted. She jumped, a gust of wind catching her, as she flew to the top of the tentacle. “Keep running!” she shouted. “We’ll try to stop this!”
Sarien couldn’t see over the tentacle but knew that the dead were getting closer. Very few living rhinn still fought, and those who did were of no help to Sarien and his group. He ran toward the Xzxyth’s main body.
“How do you like the adventuring life?” Goslin yelled, a smile on his face despite being covered in mud and sweat.
“Kind of missing horseshit right now!” Sarien yelled back. They laughed despite their dire circumstances, and a surge of energy kept Sarien on his feet. He felt the ground beneath them solidify. The tentacle rose into the sky with Lana and Kax still running along it, and they soon appeared only as dark spots in the distance.
They fought their way through another group of dead rhinn, then came upon a sight that made Sarien sick to his stomach. Thousands of dead rhinn marched straight into the Xzxyth’s body, ready to be fed upon. The main body opened up for each one, swallowing them. They dead stood silently, all waiting to be fed to this creature from another world.
Sarien screamed as he rammed his spear through the chest of a rhinn, dropping it from the tentacle controlling it. There were so many of them, and they all turned as one to face the small group as they approached.
“There’s too many of them,” Heylien grunted, as he knocked an arrow and struck one of the rhinn in the chest.
“Any ideas, Gos?” Tomford asked. His unarmed combat wasn’t able to do much against the dead. Broken bones and crushed skulls did little to dissuade them.
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
Emeryn pulled up walls of earth to protect their flanks, but stopped when the huge tentacle came for them. It started out as a powerful downward arc, but then twitched and fell with less force behind it. The huge tentacle crushed more rhinn than Sarien could count as it fell clean away from the main body.
Kax and Lana came hurtling through the air, both of them screaming at the top of their lungs. They struck smaller tentacles on the way down, as if hitting branches when falling from a tree. Kax landed on the ground with a hard thud. Lana used wind to dampen her own fall, but it was far from enough. She cried out as Tomford healed her mangled legs.
Lana stood, carefully testing her legs before facing Kax, bewildered. “Didn’t think to stand on part of the tentacle that wasn’t going to fall.”
“What would be the fun in that?” Kax asked, brushing off his rhinn leather armor. He waved at Tomford dismissively. “I’m fine.”
“How can you be fine?” Emeryn asked, “You just dropped from the sky.”
He shrugged.
“Focus!” Goslin shouted. “They’re coming. All of them!”
A whole army of dead rhinn approached, along with hundreds of smaller tentacles stretching in every direction. They’d angered the beast. The huge tentacle they’d severed was one of several, but the only one on the side where they were approaching. The Xzxyth rotated slowly before them, and they had a small window of opportunity before another huge tentacle could reach them.
“We have to get to the main body before it turns,” Sarien said.
“How are we supposed to get through that?” Tomford asked, pointing at the dead rhinn and smaller tentacles coming for them.
“Let’s just mow through them,” Kax suggested.
“That won’t work,” Goslin said.
Heylien looked at the surrounding battlefield, shaking his head.
“Sarien, can you do something?” Lana asked.
He shook his head. “My black flame won’t do anything to it and we’re still not close enough for me to use my white flame.” Sarien also knew he needed to conserve all his energy to transport the Xzxyth away from this world.
“I might be able to do something,” Emeryn said.
Goslin took her hand. “You’ve done so much already. Are you sure?”
“I’m sure,” she replied, smiling up at him. “Get ready to run. I’m not going to be any more use after this. Leave me behind.”
“I can’t leave you!” Goslin shouted. He turned and cut through a dead rhinn. They were running out of time.
“You’ll just have to trust me, Princeling,” Emeryn said, a playful smile on her lips.
He bent down and kissed her. “You know I trust you.”
“Then go,” she said, putting her one hand on his chest and pushing him away. “Before it’s too late.”
Emeryn seated herself in the mud and closed her eyes. Before the rest of the group had even started running, the ground shook. It opened and spewed mud in all directions as two tall walls grew from the earth to create a corridor all the way to the Xzxyth.
Emeryn fell unconscious, slumping to the ground. Sarien and Goslin ran side by side down the earthen path she created and the rest of the group followed. Kax soon overtook them and began cutting into the reanimated rhinn soldiers that still blocked their way. When the rest of the group caught up to Kax, they made quick work of the slow-moving enemies.
Without a roof, they were still vulnerable to attacks from above, and the larger tentacles slammed into the walls. A few cracked and crumbled, but the walls kept the creature at bay long enough for the group to pass.
They were nearly at the base of the enormous Xzxyth. This close, Sarien and the others were in the shadow of the beast. He knew it would devour everything on the continent if he didn’t stop it now.
The earthen walls didn’t reach all the way to the Xzxyth, and they once again found themselves surrounded by dead rhinn. Lana ran out into the mass of incoming dead bodies, a whirlwind with her daggers they just weren’t fast enough to catch. Heylien swore and tossed his bow aside in disgust after not being able to damage neither the beast nor the dead.
“Here!” Sarien yelled, throwing his spear to the archer. “You can put this to better use!”
Kax cut off a tentacle as it swung to strike at their legs and Goslin parried another one with the dark metal shield blowing it apart. More kept coming, relentless in their attacks.
“Sarien!” Goslin yelled. “If you’re going to do something, now is the time!” He turned back in time to see a tentacle coming, but not in time to stop it. With its sharp tip, it thrust and burrowed deep into his thigh. Goslin screamed in pain, swung his sword and cut it clean off. Tomford rushed over and pulled the wriggling tentacle free. Sarien saw a bloody, gaping hole in his friend’s thigh, but turned to face the Xzxyth. Tomford would heal Goslin. He’d be fine. They would all be fine. As long as he could figure out how to remove this malevolent creature from their world.
The sounds of battle behind him faded away as he reached out and touched the surface of the Xzxyth. Sarien’s left hand slid right into its soft body. He felt no pain.
“I can do this,” Sarien whispered, accessing the white flame inside him. He brought it out into the palm of his hand and felt the beast tremble. With the luison, he’d imagined a place to send it. A lone spot of land surrounded by a vast sea. He understood now that he’d willed the dog-like monster to another world. This was the key. Will.
He closed his eyes and stoked the white flame until it burned bright and cold inside the Xzxyth. Sarien made it larger, then larger yet. It grew to a size far beyond anything he’d imagined before. When he felt that the flame was large enough, Sarien made the white flame and the Xzxyth one. Putting the two together in his mind made sense. Felt right. Now all he’d have to do was think of a place where he could send the beast, a world far from his own.
Ben popped into his mind. The happy and content boy who wanted nothing more than to skip his chores and go for a ride. Ben, who was no longer his friend, but something else entirely when Sarien accidentally connected him to another world to let something take advantage and slip through. Remembering now, Sarien could still taste the vicious nature of the world he’d touched in desperation. That’s where he would send the Xzxyth. An evil creature for an evil world.
“Goodbye,” he whispered, and formed the images and thoughts needed to assert his will over the white flame.
A tentacle whipped out of nowhere and pierced Sarien’s right arm, just below the shoulder. He screamed in pain and cracks fractured along the walls of his concentration. Another tentacle punched through his thigh and yet another wrapped itself around his midsection, pulling him forward into the monster’s body. Sarien resisted despite his bleeding limbs. Hands grabbed him from behind trying to pull him free, but it was no use. The tentacle in his arms pushed clean through, then wrapped itself around his body, adding to the already excruciating pain. Sarien’s mind reeled, but he desperately clung to the image he’d formed.
The hands holding him lost their grip. Sarien was pulled into the Xzxyth’s embrace. His body felt cold from the loss of blood. He wouldn’t have much longer. All that mattered now was that he completed his task.
Strangely enough, he found that he could breathe inside the creature despite feeling like he was submerged under water. Opening his eyes, he saw dead rhinn bodies disintegrating as they were slowly being digested. The horror washed over him, but the dead bodies were not the worst of it. He saw a tentacle swimming toward him.
He didn’t have long now. Sarien closed his eyes, clawing desperately for the calm he’d held just moments before. Ben. The evil inside him. A sense of the world it came from.
He felt the tentacle’s tip burrow inside the center of his chest. With it came pain, terrible pain. Sarien gritted his teeth. He was so close. Couldn’t give up now. His mind was flooded with new sensations as if he was connected to the Xzxyth.
Hunger. Such terrible hunger.
He felt the tentacle bore deeper. Creeping inevitable death.
Then something pressed up against his stomach and hips. A quick sharp sound came with the new sensation, and the burrowing stopped. Sarien recognized that sound. A bark? He opened his eyes, dazed by the pain.
Daisy? The dog stood with his paws on Sarien, holding the tentacle clamped tight in its jaws. It gave Sarien a look as if to say, “Go on then.”
A powerful sense of tranquility emanated from the dog and Sarien refocused.
Sarien closed his eyes and stoked his white flame. He felt it wrap around the Xzxyth, from its huge tentacles to the ones controlling the dead rhinn. The white flame even wrapped itself around the tentacles piercing Sarien’s arm, leg, and chest.
A small smile played across Sarien’s lips as he asserted his will and sent the beast to a world far from his own, to a place where it could no longer harm his friends.