Oddly getting mauled by a snow lion, even a ghostly one wasn’t that big of an issue. Sure, it was having a massive cat trying to murder me, but I knew the drill with that. I straightened my fingers and slammed them into the things spectral throat.
It vanished as its windpipe crunched. I dodged another ethereal lion, and stomped its head a split second before it touched the ground. It faded instantly on impact. I stepped into a third cat’s swipe, avoiding the claws and punting its head off. It dissolved before it could sail too far away.
While swatting two more ghost kitties out of the sky I looked for Grond. “How is this not interfering?”
Grond all but leered at me as his eyes blazed gold. “I am just providing MP to a follower… well, I also adjusted her connection to me, shifted the beast aspects within her. I am as surprised as you that changed her scale. Odd that it didn’t reset her level.”
Rachel hit me with a truly brutal shoulder check. I was knocked flying. Depending on how you look at it, I was lucky. While Rachel was now way faster and a hell of a lot stronger, she was not used to it. So what should have been her tackling me and presumably mauling me, instead put me on the edge of the ever growing cloud of phantom felines materializing around her.
“Sunit, call the duel!” I shouted, totally not panicking. I was completely stoic.
“Can’t.” Sunit said calmly, even as he lobbed a wheel of fire at Grond. “He hasn’t broken any rules.”
Oh good, the Ref is just for show. Okay, that is not fair to Sunit. He was putting in more than a modest effort to kill Grond. Sunit had some neat tricks, actually. In the space of maybe three seconds, Sunit threw the wheel of fire, shot a bow, stabbed with a spear, swung a mace, and blocked with a staff.
Grond kept his eyes glowing, and seemed to be determined to avoid damage instead of murdering. He wove out of the way of Sunit’s attacks, bending in inhuman ways. No, seriously, he folded like a ferret. He did fling a knife eventually.
I would like to have helped but Rachel was still attacking me. Apparently, she was the type to take godlike upgrades in stride. She bounded on all fours, pounced and slammed her hand down on my head. I wasn’t going to speculate on her weight, it wasn’t nearly enough to justify the results. My feet crushed through the ice all the way to my knees. It felt like a train collided with my head. The armor absorbed the impact but the second layer cracked and shattered.
On reflex I willed a Craft check to happen. Two columns of ice erupted from the ground: the first slammed into my chest, stopping me from toppling forward. No broken knees today. The second found itself between Rachel’s fist and my face. Her uppercut shattered the ice but was deflected just enough that I didn’t get my shit rocked.
I turned the Craft skill back to full free use. Things were getting rough. Letting reality bend around me wasn’t going to make it worse. Instantly all the ice in a massive circle around me turned to frigid water. I was waist deep in the bone chilling liquid. That meant Rachel and her ghost cats were… swimming. They hated that. The physics of ghost cats was put on the bottom of the list of shit I needed to figure out.
Today was about more fun times with Craft skill. Another successful check and an inch-thick layer of solid ice formed over about 80% of the diameter of the pool. I then pushed with everything I had and pushed the grinding wheel toward the edge.
This was a lot more violent than you may guess. Rachel and a good number of the phantom felines were momentarily trapped in the ice. Then it slid toward the edge. The spoon dull blade of the ice sheet slammed into a good dozen more of the ghost kitties, then pincered them into the solid wall of the pool. The ice sheet chipped and sharpened as it fractured… then it started cutting the damned cats in half. Fuck ‘em.
The phantom cats screamed as they were crushed and bifurcated. They faded as the sheet blade smeared them across the ice. Now normally horrifying violence in general is upsetting to me. That said this was happening to Snow Lions, and was therefore justified, if not encouraged.
Rachel, as she drifted toward the edge, had a moment’s terror flash in her eyes.
I hesitated a split second before she hit the edge. This was probably a mistake. Rachel, given that moment’s thought, managed to slip free of the ice. She submerged herself before potentially being cut in half. I had just enough time to regret my action when she erupted from the ice. She hit me hard. With one hand she seized the collar of my cloak. The other collided with my stomach.
Holy shit. Somehow despite neither cracking my armor nor dealing damage to me, it was so much force that it both knocked the wind out of me and nearly forced me to vomit.
It also launched me thirty fucking feet into the air, somersaulting. I took a brief moment to consider my situation, then bitch about it, and then do something about it.
An Acrobatics check let me turn the free fall into a controlled landing. Before I even realized I was doing it, I Dodged a phantom snow lion pounce. I basically hopped over it, then as a counter attack I jammed a thumb into its eye. The second my feet hit the ground I swung the cat like a club. The impact scattered three more, and caused my impromptu weapon and its targets to fade.
Rachel was about to hit again. Rather than deal with her I dodged another ghost cat and then another and a third. These small steps put me out of Rachel's reach. But not her out of mine.
Attack… Successful
Rachel Blum takes 3 damage.
My fist dropped on Rachel’s head like a ton of bricks. The damage was trash, but it did bounce her off the ice like she was basketball.
Notice check… Successful
For the faintest fraction of a second I saw two things. The first were the fragile but oppressive interconnected stands of the domain. They formed a spider web of power manifested as golden gossamer. The second was a more substantial golden thread connecting Rachel to Grond. This thread blazed with power, and was clearly burning.
And then I couldn’t see the damned things again. It is a lot like looking at the specks on a windshield. You probably shouldn’t do it while things are coming at you.
Oh yeah, Rachel is trying to kill me. Again, rather than fight her, I used the horde of cats to bait her out. This isn’t cowardice, it is strategy.
On paper the capacity to spam a seemingly endless stream of murderous snow lions sounded like an overpowered ability, but in practice the cats seemed to be a Snow Lions Pride in attributes. Super dangerous for most people, but I was able to basically use them as a ladder and satisfying punching bag.
Rachel once again missed my face with her claws by a hair's width. My boot collided with her stomach and launched her into the air. The optics of that may not have been great. Our relative size differences did make that look like an adult punting a tween but I knew the difference.
A Craft check turned the snow she was about to land on into hardened and spiked ice.
Rachel’s feet and hands were bloody now. That was kinda fucked. The me enjoying her injuries bit, not the injuries themselves. The injuries are really just causality. You are stabbed after you get stabbed.
I took a risk to check on Sunit. He wasn’t making headway against Grond. Why was no one helping him?
That is when I heard the screaming. Why were there spiders here? What asshole brought spiders. Probably Gond. The domain was swarming with terrifying spiders. These things were absurdly large. The smallest ones were about the size of a pony. Basically these were modestly above-average Australian-sized spiders.
Willpower Check… Successful.
Thank you Willpower. Good job beating back the existential horror boiling from within.
Oh shit these monsters were trying to capture people. A spider would toss a bundle of web over a victim and would then reel the poor soul in. My guess this would result in them doing… spider stuff to them.
No more fucking around.
You have activated Voice of the Titan
“Rachel, is Grond your god?” My words hit her like a car.
She staggered backwards, she saw the mobs and Grond. She also saw her soldiers, hesitating, “Help the civilians!”
“Know your place, bitch!” Grond bellowed. “Time to let nature take its course.” The power radiating through the connection changed subtly. Whatever help he was providing to stave off her Instability was apparently done.
Eyes bulging Rachel buckled. She clawed at her chest as more phantom cats spawned. Those damn things then charged everyone but me.
Grond truly was evil. He made me resent not being targeted by snow lions. Douchebag.
Seriously, how was this not interference? I had just enough time to wonder where Angelica and Brunhilda were when something on the other side of town exploded. Something bad was happening. Once again, I had no idea what was going on.
I tossed the Stay-Bal inhaler to Rachel. Then I took a chance. Immediately after manifesting a new layer of Ablative Shell, I crafted it into a chain, and then cleaved through dozens of the ghosts. Second Craft check turned the area around Rachel into a spiked hell: this reduced the flow of them but quite stop it.
That wasn’t really the point though.
“This way!” I called out to the panicked people. “Fall back to the gap in the wall.” Speaking this way cut through the din, but bled power from me. Imagine day three on no sleep levels of tiredness.
Spine shot one of the Spiders and screamed, his voice only cracking a little, “Help is on the way! Just hold on!” He dropped the cellphone in his hand to draw a knife. He ducked through the crowd and cut a man free before stabbing a leaping spider in the face.
The crowd was becoming a mixed bag. A small portion was panicking completely and just running in a random direction. The spiders were rounding most of them up. A similar number were competently fighting back against the spiders, trouble was most weren’t exactly armed well. It seemed people had shown up for an afternoon of casual bloodsport, not thinking to simply be constantly armed.
Sure the domain protected them, but the spiders were clearly planning to pull people out of its effect. My guess is they would then murder them, almost certainly in terrible ways. Bilbo help us all.
In an odd twist of luck, the Chimera Soldiers were ready for this. What they lacked in perspective they certainly did make up for with extreme violence. I will admit I was beginning to undervalue guns. That said, watching a coordinated group of professionals gun down hundreds of mobs did make a case for them. I did also see one unfortunate individual attack a ghost cat. They simply exploded in a wave of gore as a flash of golden erupted around them.
This duel was becoming a liability.
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“Rachel, surrender!” I instructed.
Rachel was sucking Stay-Bal with every breath. Her body was warping, twisting into a mess of tumors and bone.
She was defenseless. It is like the world was handing me an excuse. If I didn’t do something the fucking cats would push people back into the spiders. Anyone that tried to defend themselves from it would face the wrath of the Domain.
Instead I tried something stupid.
Notice check… Successful
There was the thread. I seized it, wrenched with everything I had.
This bond between Grond and Rachel was not the same as a domain. While it was not as broad in effect as the domain it was extremely robust in comparison. Rather than snap and break, it simply pulled taught.
Grond had tried to side step an attack from Sunit, but this surprise lack of mobility held him still. Sunit didn’t need a second chance. He smashed Grond in the neck with his mace before stabbing his stomach with a spear, and Sunit finished his attack with another wheel of fire.
Outside of his domain Grond took some actual damage. Half his face was a burnt-out mess. The look of fear on what remained… I enjoyed it more than was likely healthy. Get him, Sunit!
Rather than deal with Sunit, Grond glared at me. He pulled and almost ripped me off my feet.
And that is how I found myself in a nightmarish tug-o-war. Me on one side being swarmed by an ever-growing swarm of Snow Lions, and Grond on the other getting savaged by a spiritually engaged follower of the war goddess.
My armor shattered, my flesh tore. Blood rained. I simply pulled, one hand hold at a time. My health was dropping upsettingly fast. Sunit just kept stabbing. I mean, it was something to behold, watching a man work through a lifetime of anger issues by relentlessly harming Grond. The healing process is beautiful or Sunit was just trying to do a murder.
“You can’t beat me,” Grond roared. There was more than a hint of desperation in his voice.
“Probably not.” I admitted. It felt like my throat was full of shattered glass. “Lola, help me kill Grond! He is attacking your people!” I should have thought of that sooner and at least tried.
Attack from Phantom Lion belonging to Rachel Blum Successful
You take 2 damage
HP: 38/420
You are immune to Time Slow
“I should kill you, Grond,” Lola said. Her voice was calm but the indignation was barely hidden.
“You know you won’t. Gods don’t fight gods,” Grond sneered.
“You are fighting a Titan Spawn, my guest, at one of my holy sites. If you so much as put a toe into my realm I would be honor bound to kill you. Destroy your essence.” Lola placed a hand on my shoulder. “The decision is yours Doug, pull him in or let him go.”
Craft check… Successful
You have made anchor points.
Ice engulfed my legs and I hoisted.
Screaming in rage, he leaned back and hooked his hand into the ice.
Grond was powerful. Hell he was a god, little g be damned. It was a bit surprising when I realized… I was stronger. That realization was met with the equal realization that I was literally pulling him by the metaphysical concept of his bond with his followers. Cognitive dissonance I guess.
I still managed to pull him ever closer to the edge of the domain
“Fuck this,” Grond growled. With his free hand he clawed out a chunk of his torso. The connection pulled slack. And then a moment later struck me like snake
New Achievement!
Idolatry?
You are now someone's god. That is quite the trick considering you are not a god. This unlocks the Bless, Boon, Bane, Commune, and Sever Skills
Reward:
Let’s see if you survive the next twenty-four hours. Gods do not normally allow Idolaters to exist.
Warning your follower is near death!
Grant your scale to resist Instability Condition through Bless:
Yes/No?
I selected Yes and immediately felt an odd pull through the bond. It wasn’t painful, or even uncomfortable, but it was present and obvious.
Grond vanished. Time crashed back into motion. The damned ghost cat immediately stopped eating me. I do not plan to forgive them. My hatred for Snow Lions remains. I will have my vengeance.
Warning your follower is low on MP!
Grant them 40 MP per second: Yes/No?
Fuck no.
The cats all vanished. I did not mist them. I really do need to write that dog lover’s manifesto.
“What the hell is happening? Why are you listed as one of my gods?” Rachel demanded. She was still on her knees cradling her right arm. It was still twisted and seemed useless.
“Get up, people need us,” I probably should turn off Voice of the Titan but having it cut through all the pandamonium was just too useful. Side note: people screaming was a haunting noise.
“Look behind you,” Rachel managed.
Sweet Perth, that was a lot of aggressive arachnids. Literally thousands of spiders were coming from the west.
“Are you going to do something?” I asked Lola.
“You’ve done more than enough already,” She smiled and pointed.
Yep, a good ten thousand spider mobs were scuttling toward us. That seemed like a bad thing, because it was. I am pretty good at dealing with being outnumbered but that was beyond me.
Then I saw them. I had made incorrect assumptions about the goblins.
Yeah, the village we encountered hadn’t been high tech, but I am not sure if it was a permanent shelter or what it was for. I had assumed that the goblins weren’t all that advanced technologically.
This was incorrect.
Don’t get me wrong, they weren’t exactly driving spaceships, but they had trucks. Trucks with pintle mounted guns. That said, the majority of the little green men -and women- that piled out of trucks were firing crossbows. Not sure why. Probably some bullshit related to the system. One had a flamethrower. Another had a rocket… missile launcher.
Another assumption about the goblins I freely admit was wrong, as I had assumed the goblins weren’t organized. That was way off base. This initial assault from the goblins had 100 trucks hit from the North, 50 swing around on the West, and an additional 50 swooping around to the South. Each truck had about twenty goblins pile out and unload on the spider mobs.
This was orchestrated and coordinated. What easily could have been a clusterfuck resulting in people shooting at their friends was instead an efficient killing field. Someone had figured out how to deploy more than 4,000 goblins in the space of minutes. That’s some hardcore logistics. That isn’t an accident.
“You’re the Titan Spawn, Doug, correct?” a small red goblin asked me.
“Yeah, why are you red?” I asked the little goblin wrapped in the pelt of a Snow Lion. Something about him was inherently likeable.
His determined expression was tinted with a look of concern that I was an idiot. “Not important. Join my party.”
“What?” I managed. Funny how despite my voice radiating cosmic power still sounded hapless.
Join the Party of Philip Spindle-Bite: Yes/No?
Might as well, the last name had earned at least the benefit of the doubt. I hit Tes.
After reading a prompt. Philip pulled a phone out of his pocket, “Do it.”
Congratulations!
Your party has cleared Rage Wolf Dungeon.
Reward:
Dread Wolf Axe.
Note: an ally would like to trade.
Trade offer:
Rob Shiv offers 1x Upgrade.
You offer: Friendly designation to all Goblins in the Alliance of Green.
Accept: Yes/No?
I hit ‘Yes. Everything was suddenly moving at lightspeed, but I had a good feeling…
You have received an upgrade
1x item in your possession will be upgraded to Divine scale.
66,000 friendly beings will receive the benefits of an Upgrade.
Effect applied in:
5…
4…
3…
2…
Please select item to Upgrade
Not wanting to waste time I just selected that axe I just got. It was that or the underwear. It transformed into Sun & Moon Eater Axes. Not important. A lot of people were side-eying the goblins. Something stupid was imminent. I had to step in.
“Leave the Goblins! They are players! Kill the mobs! Kill the spiders.” My voice boomed over the roar of chaos. Something in my throat tore and blood erupted in the back of my mouth. I would have tried to swallow it but the muscle wouldn’t move. Ironically that let the blood slide down faster than if I tried to swallow.
Voice of the Titan Deactivated.
That is probably for the best.
I needed to be careful. I was low on health.
You are no longer Baneridden
Titanic Regeneration plus 38 hit points.
HP: 76/420
Oh, hello Health Regen. I missed you. Please don’t go away again. I am not smart enough to survive without you.
A spider tried to… do spider stuff to me. I really don’t know how they predate. I think it was about to tackle me. But it exploded in a squall of gore and golden light.
I gazed at Lola, baffled.
She shrugged, “The duel isn’t over.”
Well that pissed me off. Rather than say something I would regret, I squashed some more spiders. A quick check on Rachel and I found her protecting her soldiers, specifically the ones I beat the shit out of. To their credit they were doing work driving back the spiders and protecting people. Hell, the Sergeant literally ripped a kid out of the jaws of a bigger-than-normal spider.
Good luck with the nightmares, kid.
Seth was standing at Lola’s side. They were speaking, and somehow I couldn’t hear them.
Things wound down eventually. Being in a domain that prevents you from dying does skew things into your favor. I also suspected Grond may have jumped the gun a bit. The Mob Rush was still a bit over a day away.
A shiver that had nothing to do with the cold ran up my spine. I should ignore the cold again… God dammit I am an idiot. I think. Best not fuck with that right yet.
“What’s next, Doug?” Rachel asked.
She looked like hell. Her right arm was this twisted hooked claw. The left side of her face was swollen from the impact. She was also favoring her left leg.
“Could you just fucking talk?” I managed my voice still in tatters.
“Talk! Talk! That’s all you keep saying. What is there to say? He betrayed me! He abandoned me!” Rachel didn’t seem interested in listening.
To hell with it. Time to just be honest, “No, You feel betrayed, and you feel abandoned.”
Rachel reeled back. She blinked not quite believing I said that, “Fuck you.”
“Listen, Please!” I gasped. “Seth was a shitty dad, and that made you feel hurt. That doesn’t mean the pain isn’t real but instead that you control its source. None of us get to control the situations we are in but we can control our choices.”
Rachel gaped at me for a long time, “What the hell does that mean?”
I gestured vaguely to the general destruction around us, “We are too powerful to put our feelings ahead of people’s lives. Otherwise we will be monsters.”
Rachel stared at her mutated arm, “Stop pretending that you aren’t just going to force me to do what you want.”
I almost shouted. After taking a breath I managed, “There is a difference between taking away your choice, and not allowing you to kill whoever you want."
“I am not going to stop hating him,” Rachel said almost quietly
“I am not asking you to…” language just couldn’t convey the truth. I -the Titan- spent years hating his parents. He carried that weight for so long. It wasn’t so much that he let that go, but slowly year over year his focus changed. I can still remember the day Kate was born. She had been a breach birth. So, she was born by Cesarean section. I can still remember holding her. Kate stopped screaming for a short moment and gazed into my eyes.
Words fail. Yeah, Love is a word. It means different things to different people, but for me and the Titan in that moment it meant everything that came before, every petty grudge or ‘righteous’ anger ceased to matter. The only feeling possible in that moment was love. That manifested as a profound instant of peace, and a sense of wonder to see what the future held.
It was just a moment though. I could hear the nurse, “Doctor, before we close, you need to look at this.”
Willpower check… Successful
Emotional state remains in control
Note: Repeated rolls will increase the difficulty.
Commune check… Successful
I felt the memories flow through our connection. I realized Rachel was experiencing the memories. She didn’t seem that moved, “That ended badly.”
“True,” I admitted, “But I would do everything over again, repeat every choice, just to get back to the worst moment. Can you say the same?”
“No,” Rachel admitted. “What do we do now?’
“What do you want to do?” I asked.
Rachel was quiet for a long, long time, “I don’t know.” Watched the smoke rise from the east side of town. Rachel flexed the crooked fingers on her right hand. “... I yield, I will hold to the orders of Authority. Keep him away from me.” She whistled as she pointed with her left hand, “Move like you have a purpose. We are putting out fires.”
Everyone was staring at me. Wounded people cried out in agony. Mob corpses were scattered everywhere.
Hurray… peace prevailed.
I looked down to talk to Philip and found two small figures covered in Snow Lion fur. One was a strangely red goblin, the other was a snow lion. It stared into my eyes for a moment before biting my knee.