Hundar ducked under my spear, I had been forced to abandon using Clarent against the god due to his immunity to lightning damage. The god was bleeding, golden blood sizzling on the ground, isolated and alone and cut off from escape I was certain of his death. Guinevere struck forwards and her sword dug into Hundar’s side he struck at her, but she blocked, the strength of the god barely drove her back a few feet across the ground as she activated her skills and her new armor came into play.
The irradiating fire of Exar’kun burned the god reducing his defenses and we cut him again and again slowly brining him down by a death of a thousand cuts. His death would be soon now, there wasn’t even a way for him to teleport out.
One of my vassals died, then another.
Not one of my soldiers around me had perished my only other vassals within range where hidden deep within the mountain where they should have been safe. I froze for a moment, another vassal died. They weren’t warriors, those vassals, they were the wives and children of those who fought with me most of them weren’t even above Mortal rank. Another vassal died. My daughter was hidden among those vassals, she was in danger.
I dropped the Duelist’s Dome without a second thought.
“Aurora is in danger,” I told Guinevere.
Guinevere’s eyes flashed with fear and rage.
Champions in heavy armor rushed towards me.
“Go get her,” Guinevere told me. “We’ll hold them off.”
I closed my eyes for a moment looking through the eyes of one of my angels who had been sent to guard the women and children. Seeing the location, I teleported down into the bowels of the mountain. A golden behemoth stood before me.
“Killing innocents,” I growled. “How the righteous knight has fallen.”
“There are no innocents who serve you,” Arthur said the azure light of Excalibur lighting the darkness. “They were freed from their Dominion there is no justification for their service to you now.”
He slashed at me and Clarent blocked the two blades screaming as they made contact with each other.
“I saw the ashes of the Ancient Forest,” I scoffed. “You didn’t give up chasing them or forgive them for what they did when they were ‘enslaved’ by me. I’m your enemy you can at least give me the curtesy of honesty.” I felt my rage rising within me.
“They were punished for what they did to Camelot,” Arthur said. “I killed the Necromancer there you know, he tried to use the bodies of my people you slew to fuel his strength. I have to thank him you know; he gave me the perfect weapon to defeat you.”
I surged forwards but suddenly felt weaker as Shadow of Judgement began to receive interference as my rage, justified by the actions of the man before me began to fade.
Arthur laughed. “You think anger is your strength, let me show you just how weak you are.”
You are being affected by the ability Righteous Zen, for every second you remain enraged, and your opponent is calm you lose 2% of your Might, Speed, Endurance and Toughness.
This was a major problem. Shadow of Judgement required my rage to function properly as did Wrathful Meditation without those I would fully feel the agony of battle and wouldn’t be able to increase my attributes with the wounds I inflicted. Plus, could I even stop the rage, could I push it aside?
I would have to hope my other stat boosts and Shadow of Judgement would outpace and keep up with the stat loss. The screaming of Clarent and Excalibur echoed through the caverns, I saw the bodies of my vassals and felt the rage in me only strengthen even as it literally weakened me.
Arthur was somewhere in that hulking shell of armor, but he’d grown much more accustomed to this enchanted mech-suit and it had adjusted to him and his abilities.
“Face me Mordred,” Arthur challenged.
You have been given a Challenge, refusing the challenge will increase the damage dealt to you by the challenger by x10 for the next hour, reduce your Toughness Attribute by 25% and give you vulnerability to Holy damage. If you accept the challenge, you can only attack the target. Any attack that you make that strikes another target will break the challenge resulting in the above penalties occurring. If any allied creature that jumps into assist you will break the challenge resulting in you being penalized, any rival creature that assist the challenger will break the Challenge with no ill effect towards you; third party interference will have no effect.
Accept Challenge?
Yes/No
“Yes,” I said, accepting the duel.
I could almost feel the satisfaction coming off Arthur but I had tricks he hadn’t seen before.
Voidra, your up, I said.
Voidra’s appeared in her Herald form floating to the roof of the chasm. Silver lightning forked out against his armor, the ground liquified under his feet and boulders crashed into him. Thick mist rose up all around us and he could no longer see. I continued to weaken but Arthur was forced to operate entirely on his hearing and Perception abilities that did not rely on sight.
“Guinevere’s going to die you know,” Arthur said, I could tell he was trying to stoke the flames of my rage, but I realized that I could break his ability to lower my attributes.
“Sore about the loss of one of your harems whores?” I asked. “What was her name again Arrissa?”
“Ammerila,” Arthur growled.
“You wanted to fuck your own cousin and got mad you couldn’t so now your going to kill her,” I said with a mocking laugh. “You have a lot in common with the nobles we used to have in my world.”
Our blades clashed together again as he spun just in time to block the strike of Clarent and my spear and sword. He stepped back and slashed at me but I slid back and ducked under this blade.
“You can’t enrage me, Mordred,” Arthur said.
“You found inner peace?” I asked with another laugh. “How many corpses did you have to step over to find that? How many hundreds of my people? How many thousands of your own?”
Our weapons met again.
“It was It was YOUR fault they died,” Arthur growled.
“Screw yourself, Arthur,” I spat. “You’re supposed to represent duelists and honor, you should have died with honor in that duel but you let the rules be broken for you and as a result of what I said would happen if your cheated, your people died.”
Arthur struck at me with a furious salvo of blows. His zen wasn’t broken but I could tell I was close.
“Don’t you dare try to put those deaths at my feet,” he snarled.
“Your hands are already stained with them,” I stated. “You couldn’t save the people of Camelot, you couldn’t save Kay, you couldn't save Ammerila; just as you cannot save the god and champions you have led to their death.”
His zen broke, my attributes didn’t jump back to what they had been but they were no longer decreasing. Excalibur rained down on me as Arthur began to charge forwards his attacks relentlessly as I held my ground. The ground cracked under my feet as Arthur, unable to move me moved the very earth.
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My back cracked the mountainside as I flew through the air as the force of Arthur’s attack launched me from the powdered stone where I had been standing. I rolled to the side as the blade of Excalibur cut into the stone by my head. A twinge of amusement passed through me; Arthur had mocked me for finding strength in my anger yet here he was turning to the metaphorical dark side.
Ares was organizing the retreat of the non-combatants that were in the caverns, but they were moving at a snail’s pace compared to what me and Arthur were moving at. I couldn’t quit the battle and rejoin Guinevere above. Even after breaking his Righteous Zen Arthur still wasn’t out of tricks to counter me; I had to admit I was impressed with Arthur’s dedication to being my nemesis. While he was the perfect counter to me, he had to have lost so much versatility in order to follow his single-minded pursuit of seeing me dead.
“Your obsession with me is somewhat flattering,” I said blocking an attack with Clarent and spinning around to spear into the back join of Arthur’s mech suit.
“You would try to remake reality in your image,” Arthur said. “You are the greatest threat my world has ever known.”
“Your world is ruled by gods who think of people like ants,” I said. “Law gods too not just the ones of Chaos, they are all the same; just like their Champions and you’re the worst of all of them.”
Arthur slammed the hilt of Excalibur into my head, ringing my helmet as he spun about. His speed and strength were growing with each moment and slowly but inevitably surpassing my own thanks to his cheat dueling ability. Still it wasn’t enough, I couldn’t read his face but I knew his body must have been undergoing incredible stress; just because his ability let his attributes increase far beyond what they were didn’t mean his body was designed to handle it. I didn’t just have incredible attributes from my abilities but there was also the attribute gains I had from my artifacts and the sacrifices I had received pushing my them far past what my rank was supposed to have.
With every second Arthur became a little more powerful than me and his body broke down a little more and brought him closer to killing himself. Arthur had said he would die if it meant killing me and it looked like me might get his wish. I needed to damage a lot of enemies to heal if I was to outlast him, fortunetly I had a way to be in two places at once.
Voidra head to the surface and help Guinevere, I said. I need to inflict a lot of wounds to regenerate faster and outpace Arthur’s attributes.
His attributes will just rise even further, Karnen pointed out.
I’m counting on it, I said remembering when I had first come to this world and using the Speed boost on my boots nearly gave me a heart attack. If they keep going up he’ll either have to drop the ability or his body will tear itself apart.
Voidra disappeared as she phased through the stone of the mountain to the battlefield above.
Arthur and I continued to fight, there was a spike in my strength as my physical attributes began to jump as Voidra acted as an extension of my arm inflicting wounds on my behalf. The duel between me and Arthur turned into a pendulum as I was stronger than him for a moment then he would surpass me only to fall behind again. Arthur’s movements began shakier and erratic as his will began to be the only thing holding him together.
10 rank points gained split, between surviving contributors.
The first Champion since Voidra had joined the battle died.
12 rank points gained, split between surviving contributors.
Another Champion died quickly.
13 rank points gained, split between surviving contributors.
And another went down.
9 rank points gained, split between surviving contributors.
Ability Gained, Endless Swarm, Rank 1: You summon a 5x5ft swarm of flies that inflict Black Death on contact with a living creature. The swarm can range out a mile from you before it disappears.
Cost:
500 mana
Casting Time:
1 minute
Upgrade this ability to increase the size and range of the swarm and its various effects. Each rank of this ability increases your Mind and Power by 1.
I dismissed the notification for the ability gain and pressed on my attack against Arthur. I wasn’t focused on beating him with martial might, I just needed to outlast him.
Hundar is fleeing, Voidra informed me.
It was unfortunate that we wouldn’t be able to kill the god but at least Andar would get his kill. Arthur paused no doubt receiving a similar message about the god fleeing the field. His shoulders sagged as he stepped back.
“You shouldn’t have pushed me to this,” Arthur growled.
An item appeared in his hand out of some dimensional storage, and he smashed it on the ground. A cloud of red mist flowed out from the impact point and washed over me.
You have been afflicted with Bloodline Curse; your own blood has been used to create this curse. Anyone with your blood will suffer a Mortal wound per second taking Severe damage, this curse was made with your own blood and as such cannot be cleansed but will spread until your entire bloodline has been extinguished.
My first thought was not for myself but Aurora. I disappeared from in front of Arthur as I appeared next to Aurora. A shell of earth rose up around us but the red mist began to seep through and head towards her. Panic filled me overriding every other thought, I grabbed Aurora and teleported again appearing above ground next to Guinevere.
“Bloodline Curse,” I said gasping the words out, I’d never heard of such a thing before, but Guinevere’s face paled when I said the words.
Aurora started crying as the shock of being snatched out of her crib finally caught up to her. The curse hadn’t hit her but I had a feeling even leaving into the Mortal Realm wouldn’t save her from its reach.
“Time Suspension,” Guinevere said and Aurora froze her face locked in place her body surrounded by an aura like TV static. “What happened?”
“Arthur broke something on the ground,” I said wincing as blood began spilling from all my pores. How long will this last?”
“Until your dead,” Guinevere said her voice nearly breaking. “How could he… that kind of magic was forbidden even by the gods millennia ago, to use that curse is unforgivable.” She clutched Aurora to her tears running down her face. “I don’t know how to fix this that suspension will only last for a few days and as soon as it breaks...”
Notifications were scrolling past my vision, but I ignored the warnings about the lethal damage I was taking and how close I was to death. If I lived but my daughter, didn’t it wouldn’t matter, it would mean I had failed utterly as a father. I had to find something, anything to save her.
I can help her, said a soft feminine voice.
Guinevere and my heads jerked up as the voice spoke, a white semi-transparent floated before us.
“Who are you?” Guinevere aske her hand tightening on her sword.
It has been awhile since we spoke, daughter of winter, the spirit said. But I told you we would meet again one day and now your need is great.
I suddenly recognized the voice. “You were the spirit the magi created to oversee their trial in the Under Lands.”
It is as you say, the spirit agreed inclining the spectral outline of their head. Much has changed with you since then; you have averted the fate I saw for you but some things have still come to pass.
“You foresaw this?” Guinevere asked her fists clenching.
I foresaw its possibility, the spirit answered.
“What can you do for her?” I asked.
I can act much as the Void spirit inside you does, the spirit answered. If I bond with her soul I will be able to extend the time of the suspension giving you the time to do what you have too.
“What is that?” Guinevere asked wiping away her tears. “You can’t out heal a bloodline curse.”
You can, Mordred already possess the means, it grows all around you, the spirit said.
I looked at the silver trees growing around us. “Will you damage my daughters soul?” I asked putting the pieces together.
I will not but you will have to trust in me, you have no other choice, the spirit said.
“What does she mean?” Guinevere asked me.
“The fruit of these trees can heal depending on the strength of the blood sacrificed to them,” I said.
“to out heal a bloodline curse would require incredibly powerful blood, someone at demigod rank at least,” Guinevere said.
“No,” I said. “It will probably take someone at god rank.”
---
Arthur sagged against the wall in his armor. Mordred had disappeared but the Bloodline Curse would take him eventually. Lancelot smashed through a wall and knelt next to him, he took one of his arms and dragged him away, smashing an orb to the ground a portal opened before them and they stumbled through. Arthur sagged to the ground and the panel of his Atlas Armor opened.
Arthur almost fell out of the mechanized armor his body soaked in blood every muscle twitching. He screamed as the light nearly blinded him from his super enhanced Perception. The burning of his soul threatened to combust his body and he curled in on himself. It was hours before he could stand again or speak.
“Is he dead?” Lancelot asked.
“He will be,” Arthur breathed out wheezily.
“Will be?” Lancelot asked his brow furrowing.
“I had….” Arthur said stopping as he was forced to take a drink to satiate his thirst. “I had to use a bloodline curse.”
Lancelot took a step back. “You did what?”
“It was the only way,” Arthur snapped.
“Arthur that magic was forbidden by the gods!” Lancelot hissed.
“I said I would do whatever it would take,” Arthur said. “If that meant means going against the gods I’ll do even that.”
“Arthur…” Lancelot said his face ashen.
“Enough!” Arthur snapped it’s already done.
“Guinevere had his child,” Lancelot said. “Your own blood as well.”
“It was necessary,” Arthur said his shoulders sagging.
“We’re done,” Lancelot said. “I agreed to help you against Mordred because I believed you that he was the greatest threat against our world; but I’m not going to help you become even worse than him.”
Lancelot turned his back on his oldest friend and walked away Arthur tried to stand up and follow him but he didn’t even have the strength to speak anymore.