Arthur moved back removing his helmet to wipe the sweat off his brow he couldn’t take down Mordred in a straight up fight. Luckily they’d prepared for this, all the stops had been taken out for this and ancient weapons laid in vaults for days like this had been dragged back into the daylight. Arthur rushed back towards their camp.
Prepare the Atlas armor, he said through the mental link they established before the battle.
He dashed forwards the screams od dead and dying and the clash of metal fading. He rushed into the central command tent. It didn’t look like much, but appearance were deceiving. Arthur threw Excalibur into the ground where it jutted from the ground like a cross. He jumped forwards and sat in the pilot seat. Attendants rushed to close him in as he closed his eyes laid his head back against the back of the seat. A vice clamped around his skull as something entered his mind.
Arthur opened his eyes, but he didn’t see out of his own eyes instead looking out the visor of the Atlas armor. He pushed up, feeling the armor adjust as it used his attributes to empower itself taking and amplifying them ten-fold. Arthur flexed his fingers, the metal joints moving as naturally as his own flesh and blood. He reached down and touched the hilt of Excalibur.
The armor connected with the weapon and the sword enlarged fitting into the hand of the titanic armor. Attendants scattered as Arthur ripped the tent out of his way as he charged back towards the battlefield. The use of Atlas armor had been banned in war for centuries by treaties signed by his ancestors it was to destructive as could be seen as his footsteps cratered the earth. It was also prohibitively expensive to run requiring rare mana crystals to operate.
Thud! Thud! People turned and scattered as he approached. A black giant stood in the breach of the wall stemming the tide of soldiers. They all moved to the side as Arthur charged in.
“Mordred! Face me!” Arthur shouted his voice echoing across the battlefield amplified by the armor.
“A mech suit?” Mordred asked. “Are you serious?”
Arthur swung Excalibur down. The two were eye to eye one made of steel the others of shadow and flesh.
---
Having accepted the duel, I dodged the swing stabbing forward with Janus and Clarent. Clarent sparked across the armor, but the rune inscribed glowing metal didn’t even seem phased.
“So, this is new,” I said conversationally narrowly avoiding taking a knee to the chest.
“You don’t get it yet, do you?” Arthur asked.
The hilt of Excalibur striking across Mordred’s helm. Mordred responded by headbutting the Atlas armor the force of it staggered Arthur back but didn’t have much effect besides that.
“You think your special but there have been hundreds of people like you,” Arthur sneered. “It doesn’t matter what fancy powers you have the world is united against YOU.”
“It’s always felt like that,” I said with a shrug.
“There is no where you can go, no place you can hide, no one to protect you from what is coming,” Arthur said. “You can kill me, but it still won’t change anything. More will step up and won’t give you a night’s rest until you are dead. But I’m not going to let anyone take the satisfaction of being the one to kill you away from me. Gravitational Forces.”
I grimaced as the weight of the sky fell on me. I pushed eather through my limbs, but I couldn’t push that to hard or I’d risk putting my body into a mini-coma. I needed an immediate burst of strength and there was an easy way for me to get that. A roar escaped by throat as I used Voice of the Chasm and Helheim’s Scream to drive Arthur back.
I dashed passed him into the ranks of his army. “Jericoh’s Fall,” I said.
While not as effective on people as buildings I had another target in mind for this. The ice we were all standing on began to crack and shatter. It was forty feet thick, but the fractures passed all the way through, and everyone’s footing was now treacherous. Arthur tripped behind me as the ice gave in under his right leg.
I turned around to attack the vulnerable Arthur, but his allies jumped in to buy him time to get back to his feet. Lancelot hit me and I staggered back. I looked at him seeing the wooden replacements for his limbs.
“You’d think you would have learned your lesson,” I said.
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“I don’t break so easily,” Lancelot said.
“Oh yes you do,” I said. “It’s not the first time either, remember your sister and the accident in the dungeon.”
Lancelot froze.
“I’ve seen you Lancelot,” I said. “I know you inside and out, I’ve played with your soul and seen things you hide even from yourself.”
That was all bullshit, but I had caught glimpses of his past while sifting through some of his memories.
Lancelot took a step back. I ignored the arrows digging into my skin to take a moment to lean down in front of him.
“Time to run,” I said.
Something broke within him and he turned and ran.
“Now,” I said coldly looking at the rest of the champions. “Who’s next?”
---
Arthur pushed up the ice, breaking more and more as he tried to push his way out of it.
“Having trouble?” a disdainful feminine voice asked.
Arthur looked up seeing Guinevere standing there. Her armor was stained crimson up to the elbow and knee. Her face was covered but despite covering every inch of her the armor couldn’t hide the feeling of aw and beauty she emanated.
“Our father is dead because of you,” Arthur said.
“He may have sired me but he was never my father,” Guinevere said shaking her head. “So you brought that war machine out of storage, I assume your having the others also assembled?”
“You don’t have to side with him,” Arthur said. “You can surrender, no harm will come to you or your baby. You can live out the rest of your days in estate in Camelot. I will not force you into any marriage…”
“and what about my child?” Guinevere asked. “I’m not an idiot Arthur I know what happens to the children of Chaos Spawn, they’re married off to keep to empower the royal line. Will my son or daughter have to marry one of your children?”
“No that’s…” Arthur protested.
“I thought the world of you once,” Guinevere said. “I don’t think I ever loved you but I believed in you.”
“Guinevere I…” Arthur tried to interrupt.
“I thought you wanted to change the world,” Guinevere continued raising her sword. “Now I see you just want to keep it the same.”
Guinevere blocked the strike of two daggers as she whirled as Ammerila stepped out of her shadow.
“Step back bitch,” Ammerila said.
“You do have a way of inspiring women to follow you,” Guinevere said knocking back the Assassin. “Or maybe they just lack a brain.”
Ammerila launched into an attack her daggers slashing and stabbing as she teleported behind and next to Guinevere again and again. Guinevere couldn’t foresee her movements but that wasn’t necessary. She fell into the rhythm taught to her since she was a child.
“Ice Flash,” she said.
She teleported only five feet leaving behind a chilling slow effect behind her. Ammerila had just teleported into it, she was only slowed for a fraction of a second, but it was enough. Guinevere rammed her sword through her chest.
“No!” Arthur screamed.
Ammerila gasped and slid off her sword her blood spreading across the ice.
“This is war brother,” Guinevere said her voice dispassionate. “Keep coming after me and Mordred and this won’t be the last lover who dies before your eyes.”
“I’m going to kill you,” Arthur growled.
“Maybe,” Guinevere said she dropped an object to the ground. “but it won’t be today.”
She took to the air and the object shattered. Arthur’s grip on the ice slipped and he disappeared under the ice. He cursed his inability to fly but he couldn’t use all his abilities in the Atlas armor without some lengthy modifications to it. He sank the weight of the armor preventing him from being able to swim as he sank into the darkness of the lake.
---
Thorned vines ripped themselves out of the ground and stabbed into my flesh. The druid like champion dodged the thrust of my spear as she summoned more plants from the earth to attack me. I lunged forwards propelling myself with my legs and hands like some sort of mutated eight limbed gorilla. She screamed as my void limbs snapped out.
“Hell’s Talons,” I snarled.
My claws slashed through her skin and I grabbed her thrashing legs holding them tight as my legs in half and I finally got a reward from the system.
Ability Gained! Sacrificial Tree (Rank 1): Nature and bloodshed have been linked since the first humanoid walked upon the land, those who shed blood are revered by those less powerful. You plant up to 1 seedling which grows into a tree, when watered with the blood of a sacrifice the tree grows empowering you with the some of the energy gathered from the tree. You gain a +1 bonus to each attribute for every creature sacrificed to water your sapling. This bonus to attributes is removed if the tree is cut down.
Cast Time
1 hour*
Mana Cost
1000
This wasn’t a combat ability so I pushed it out of my mind it sounded like it could be powerful but it was a long term planning power rather than a short term I’m in the middle of battle and about to die kind of power. Speaking of which I was in the middle of battle and about to die.
A sword cleaved into my thigh punching through armored skin. I’d killed two champions so far and at least a few thousand soldiers but it didn’t matter. There was so damn many that whenever I’d focus one of them down they’d teleport away and someone else fresh would jump in. They weren’t as good as me but it didn’t matter because there was so many of them.
We’ve gotten everyone into the forest, Jeriah informed me over the link.
Finally, I growled. Guinevere, we’re leaving.
I teleported away leaving the champions hounding me behind. I shrunk down to my regular size and started running across the ground. Guinevere flew and dropped by my side. We ran through the camp and jumped down a tunnel. I sealed it behind us as we sped down the tunnel. We slid down a sloped tunnel then ran climbing up stairs popping up in the forest ten miles deep into the forest. My vassals and their families were all moving as we beat a hasty retreat.
I was uneasy, while we had escaped, in retrospect there was no way I could have held the fortress. The problem was I playing with a losing hand and had just given up one of my Aces.