I stood at the highest point of Avalon watching as the red star approached. The defenses for the city had been put in place and the civilians were hidden in deep bunkers protected by warded gates and a network of traps. It was time to fight Arthur on my home turf again, but no blood curse would save him this time.
Your Divine Realm is being invaded by Selsera, Goddess of Massacres and Carnage. Time until divine manifestation: 10 seconds.
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“No! No! No!” I raged.
The red light of the approaching star was getting closer and closer, and I was being invaded by a rival deity at the worst possible time.
Across the planes a portal opened, and a red mist seeped out of it. My eyes focused and telescoped my vision on Selsera as she appeared. This was the one Champion of Kalesa ever to win the game and become a god. She was drenched in thick red blood and carried two swords that resembled long cleavers, and she was covered in scales from head to neck. I was unsure if those scales were natural or some sort of armor. To my mind she resembled a character from a video game, by which I mean she wore even less armor and clothing than I did.
“I already have a fight scheduled for today,” I said my voice echoing across the forest of silver trees. “I’d appreciate if you’d leave and come back later.”
“I’d love to interloper,” Selsera said rolling her shoulders. “But you’ve embarrassed my Pantheon long enough, Kalesa should have just killed you herself but….” She sighed. “Sometimes you have to get dirty yourself.”
She laughed madly and I had to wonder just how sane this goddess was; considering she was the goddess of Massacres and Carnage I’d put her pretty far at the end of that spectrum. She charged towards me her swords scythed around her but the trees she cut through remained unchanged, the strength of the forest greater than the strength of the goddess.
I flashed forwards leveling Clarent at Selsera and utilized Clarent’s Roar. The goddess teleported to the side, but I tracked her movement with the beam of scarlet energy. Selsera blocked the energy with her twin swords, her feet sliding back. World Forge altered the land around us trying to suck the goddess into an iron earthen embrace. Voidra emerged from my spirit to fly high above and rain down stone daggers, each weighing more than a house, crashed into her.
Thunder echoed across the city as silver lightning forked across the goddess’ body as Voidra utilized her sorceress might to aid in the battle. Selsera blurred forwards phasing through attacks and bringing her swords down multiple directions on me. I was able to hold my ground this time against a god. The difference between our rank tiers not the gulf it had been the last time I’d fought a god. While I was able to stand my ground, I did not go unscathed.
The wounds she inflicted bled a dark red ichor which was concerning because I didn’t even have blood anymore after my mutations. The blood burned as it dripped down my skin as some abilities of hers turned it to acid. I could feel it also turn to poison in my veins but my near immunity to that damage type let me fight on and my immunity to pain letting me ignore the agony it would no doubt normally have caused her victims.
Selsera began to teleport around me, attack from behind but my cloak blocked those strikes and my foresight let me continuously track her. She launched attacks from afar and began rampaging through the city. Traps went off impaling her with spears, melting the stone beneath her feet with solar flames. I grit my teeth with frustration while those traps were helping in the fight against her they were intended for Arthur.
I persued Selsera through the city our weapons repeatedly slicing and ripping through the other. She seemed to notice my annoyance as she destroyed traps and the warmachines I had set up and began doing it on purpose wrecking the defenses I’d prepared against Arthur. The battle dragged on as we left a trail of blood behind us as she seemed to search the city growing more annoyed as time passes as she failed to find whatever she was looking for.
“Where are your people?” Selsera asked. “I would have liked to meet the heretics, how did you hide them so fast?”
“Like I said,” I answered. “I’ve already got a partner for this dance slot.”
Selsera stepped back. “What could you be waiting for here? No other god would have stepped in to take my spot to be the one to put you down.”
“I’m not afraid of you,” I told her flatly. “You won’t be the first god I’ve killed.”
“So confident,” Selsera purred. “Arthur still lives then? We weren’t sure.”
“Lives may be a bit to generous a term,” I said with a shrug. “The System rewarded me for his death but I know he will be here this day.”
The momentary pause in our battle was enough for Guinevere to get into position. The goddess blocked the strike of her sword, but I was on her in an instant activating one of the traps near us. The goddess tried to teleport away but all teleportation, even my own, was blocked in the area. Clarent ripped through scale and bone in the instant she was off balance expecting to be teleported to safety and I took off her right arm just above the elbow.
Guinevere slashed at her neck ripping through scales and I rammed my spear, swords and claws through her chest and pulled ripping her body apart. Selsera’s body began to glow as some sort of ability activated to prevent her death. I activated World Forge and crushed the golden energy drinking in the divine essence and destroying it.
Selsera died.
“Like I said…not my first goddess I’ve killed,” I told the corpse.
3,500 rank points gained, split between surviving contributors
The blood of the goddess was drained away as the roots of the silver trees around us drank it in. The sound like that of a rushing wind through the boughs of the trees sounded as they shivered drinking in the divine essence growing in size and the forest expanded. Just like it had when they had drank the blood of Viviane the Forest of Sacrifice grew out wider and wider in a massive exponentially increasing forest around the base of Avalon.
Banishment of the Heretic, Rank: 1; Master of your realm you decide who can remain in your presence and exile the sinner to damnation. You banish up to 1 creature you touch to specific point in space that you know of within 100 miles of your location. The target cannot move beyond 10 miles from that location for the next 1 day by any means of travel
Ability Cost:
5000 mana
Casting Speed:
Instantaneous
Rank up this ability to increase the range, duration target is exiled, and conditions they are placed under for duration. Each rank up increases your Mind and Spirit attribute by 1.
I looked over the ability briefly considering its applications before pushing the notification to the side. I reached out with Force of will and the two cleaver-like swords snapped into my hands as I examined their properties. They were surprisingly heavy and reading their description revealed why.
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Death & Mayhem, Type: Twin-Dual Blades, Rarity: Artifact S: Forged by Selsera from the blood and armor of a thousand heroes who fought against her. The properties of these blades only work when wielded and used together.
* Gain 50 temporary Might, Speed, Endurance and Toughness for every creature you kill, lasts for 10 seconds unless refreshed by another kill.
* Swords bypass 1 level of hardness for every 10 creatures it has killed within the past 10 seconds unless refreshed by another kill.
* Inflicts Extreme Bleed damage on hit.
* When wielded you gain 10x attack speed (gains an additional +.1% percent attack speed per kill made within the last minute unless refreshed by another kill).
This weapon can only be destroyed by a god.
Durability:
N/A
Weight:
4000lbs
I smiled as I looked over the first bit of genuinely good loot I’d gotten in a while it also explained Selsera’s behavior during the fight. I suspected based on her divine powers that they operated like my Black Rage had requiring her to kill vast amounts of creatures to dramatically increase her power; without access to my vassals to kill she’d been operating at half power. While others would have to sacrifice the weapons, they used before in order to take advantage of these I with Void Asura could make good use of them. I put aside my spear. Janus had served me well, but it was only a Tier I artifact and was vastly outstripped by these swords.
Before I could properly celebrate or theorize how to use my new ability and swords a red light cast itself over the city reflecting off the silver leaves of the Forest of Sacrifice making the entire city appear to be bathed in blood. I looked to the east, or at least in my head what I referred to as east since there were no polls in the Void.
A ship that looked like it came from a cross between Lovecraft and sci-fi sailed towards us, its engines radiating an ominous red glow that traveled over the entire hull of the ship. I scanned the ship for any weapon emplacements and was not disappointed with what I saw. Whether or not the weapons were functional didn’t matter were functional didn’t matter.
Voidra rejoined my spirit and red lightning filled the black cloud around me as my sandals lifted off the ground.
Now, I telepathically sent out the command.
Doors within the mountain opened and my angels descended out of the Star of the Void where they had been hiding. My vassals, sequestered in waiting, now manned the siege equipment and war machines. Ballista bolts fired with the force and speed of railguns. The enemy around the hull of the ship reacted like an invisible shield deflecting the shots. The ship didn’t slow down intent on ramming straight into the city. I stretched out my hands using Force of Will and gripped the ship, it resisted me but I arrested its movement. The scream of its engines rang through the air as it strained against my will. Veins pulsed in my neck and forehead as the ship continued to drift forward inch by inch under a continuous bombardment by my forces.
Creatures swarmed off the ship flying through the air like wraiths. When one of them got close enough for me to identify I didn’t like what I saw.
Entropy Demon: *&@#% Rank: ??? Error! *#@$@#
Anything the System didn’t consider natural and couldn’t recognize was a threat, after all, that was how the System viewed most of my shenanigans. The ship drifted before it scraped against the side of Avalon crushing buildings beneath its bulk before grinding to a halt.
The Void Angels and the Entropy Demons met, the demons wielded no weapons, fighting only with claw like appendages against the swords of my angels. Immediately I sensed the danger of these demons. For the most part my angels were immortal, even if their bodies were destroyed, I could just create another for their soul to inhabit. However, there had been times when beings like the Ancients had been able to devour and destroy them. The power in the demon’s claws could only be described as soul killing, they could permanently destroy not just my angels but any creature they slayed, even me. This knowledge didn’t fill me with fear, my newfound semi-immortality within the Void was still too new for me to have grown to really on it.
I needed to destroy Arthur before my angels were eradicated. My sandals landed on the deck of the ship, and I felt my Ethereal energy clash with the red energy of entropy as it tried to wither me to nothing. The ship was no mere hunk of metal, it was alive. Not like a person but like ancient tree, a will deep inside it but has no mind of its own to guide it. But there was a mind there, someone behind the helm of the abomination. Arthur.
The heavy clang of metal on metal sounded as Arthur’s hulking armored figure appeared and he charged me from across the deck. I raised Clarent and activated Clarent’s Roar. The energy bathed across his torso melting his armor, but he just ploughed through it somehow planting his feet and preventing his body from being rag dolled across the ship.
Excalibur met the crossed blades of my new swords and my Gauntlet sword punched forward with my claws rending the molten metal of his breastplate to dig through to the body beneath.
“No escape from me this time,” Arthur growled.
“If that isn’t the pot calling the kettle black,” I responded. “You’ve fled more times than me.”
The time for words ended as we clashed with blades and abilities. Arthur’s divinely given abilities fired off one after the other with his own mixed in.
“Face me!” Arthur challenged and I dismissed the notification before it even fully formed just accepting it.
Arthur’s power grew as his stat rose and I expected to see the telling signs of his soul going over the limit his body could handle when his attributes rose beyond what his body could handle. The battle raged on as I ripped off chunks of his armor but Arthur gave no signs of the usual discomfort as we fought on. I ducked her his sword ripping open his breastplate and looked within ready to rip his flesh open.
A lifeless skeleton sat in the mech suit, I stabbed forwards my fingers digging through the eye socket and nose ripping if off the spine as I gripped it like a bowling ball. Arthur knocked me back giving me a visage wound across my torso as his armor continued to move. I crushed the skull in my hand and nothing happened.
“You stripped me of my flesh,” Arthur snarled. “Robbed me of touch, taste and smell.”
“I tried to kill you, same as you,” I said feeling my familiar irritation towards Arthur. “Stop playing the victim.”
I landed attack after attack on Arthur as I tried to think of how to destroy him. His armor regenerated with each passing second and even when I ripped off pieces of metal nothing happened to Arthur’s mass as new metal just manifested. The red energy suffusing him had weird effects on all his powers and I felt what it was like to fight me. My Ethereal energy let me power my abilities far beyond what they should have been able to do and Arthur was doing something similar with his new signature energy.
Four fight was devolving into a battle of attrition, and I began to realize it wouldn’t actually decided by him or me but our armies. I flew off getting space as I surveyed my army and the current state of the battle and inwardly cursed. The Entropy Demons were slowly graining ground even as they lost numbers. I was confident we would eventually win but the losses would be heavy. I could beat Arthur, kill him once and for all this time but… I was the god of sacrifice and heroes but that didn’t mean I sacrificed my heroes.
I was the sacrifice and right now that meant sacrificing the burning desire to have my revenge and extinguish his existence and save my people instead. Arthur flew towards me but I cut off my flight dropping down under the swing of Excalibur and landing on the deck of his ship. He followed his armor slowly repairing the damage I’d done to it returning to pristine condition.
Arthur swung his sword in a heavy two-handed grip, his speed unbelievable as he piggybacked off my attributes with the use of his challenge ability. Given time I was sure I could kill him but that wasn’t the plan, and I wasn’t willing to pay the price. I took a hit, nearly losing my head as I slipped past his guard. My hand gripped his breastplate, and another touched the hull of his ship.
“Banishment of the Heretic,” I said as I formed a portal behind him looking out of the Void into reality.
I used my Ethereal Energy to manipulate the ability and the concept of distance as I cast Arthur out of my realm and back into the physical world.
“No!” Arthur roared.
His body and the ship began to flicker in and out of the Void before vanishing. While I hadn’t meant to banish the Entropy Demons, whatever link they had with Arthur dragged them away with him too. I had banished him back to his word, the gods had created that abomination, let them deal with him.
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Arthur felt his ship enter real air and he reached out with his will pulling up as it sped towards the earth. The ship prow rose up at it sank through the air as its engines adjusted to real atmosphere as opposed to whatever passed for air in the Void. The prow of the ship plunged a layer of rock and earth, metal shrieking before it leveled out.
Arthur made the sound of breath being sucked in longing to taste the air. The rage grew as that simple joy was denied to him. He looked at where Mordred had sent him and his body trembled. The ruins of the great city of Camelot. This was where his greatest failure had occurred. He turned his back on the haunted ruins the ship began to move but hit a wall as he was unable to move more than the ten miles. He raged like a trapped animal thrashing in a trap.
Slowly, very slowly, Arthur began to calm as began to plot and plan. We walked through the bowls of his ship followed by the Entropy Demons as he planned how to destroy Mordred.
A presence disturbed him as a portal opened and a god appeared before him as he turned around.
“You failed,” Kalesa stated bluntly.
“For now,” Arthur responded turning his back on her. “I will succeeed, Mordred cannot escape me forever.”
“We chose you to destroy an abomination not become one,” Kalesa spat. “You are defiled, you are no longer worthy of being our servant. I will take back my gifts.”
“No,” Arthur said. “You can’t, I’m not done yet.”
“I am your goddess, I can do as I want,” Kalesa said.
She reached out with her will and took her the blessing she had bestowed upon him. The blessing reentered her but it was not alone. A layer of red energy coated it and Kalesa began to scream. Arthur turned around and wrapped his gauntlet around her neck the red energy spreading across her body as the void based energy poisoned and ravaged the goddess’ flesh and soul.
“You are not my goddess,” Arthur growled. “Mordred killed my goddess, and I will have my vengeance.”
Kalesa screamed and thrashed in his grip, but her death was already sealed as the energy in her veins and soul destroyed her. She withered to dust blowing away in Arthur’s grip leaving behind only her weapons as power flooded into his body.