Nox Brews Stories
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104. A Battle On Two Fronts
🕑 Added 2025-09-13 15:21:37 +0000 UTCLukas let the clones enter the building first. They used the same roof entrance as during their previous infiltration. The party intended to enter through the ground floor, as there were too many of them to go unnoticed, especially since both mages had prepared spells to assist with their infiltration. Bright and noisy weren’t ideal when stealth was of utmost importance. He waited until Haima and Xander had noisily rushed into the ground-floor workshop, giving any souls on the first floor time to react.
A pair of men exited one of the offices and raced down the stairs. The door to the ritual room remained closed, arcane energies leaking through it. It seemed someone had gone to great efforts to seal the building with wards and enchantments, but had done so poorly, suggesting they were a novice or not exceptionally talented.
Eins and Zwei got to keep their roles for the time being, but lost their security guard. Lukas resummoned him as a Stormtrooper with Thunderstorm’s Eye and sent him in after the Stalker, who had Alter Metal Mass. He went in last after the pair gave him the all clear. Arcane Scan highlighted two powerful magical signatures that didn’t belong to the party. One came from below and matched the Void entity. The other was from the ritual room. The latter pulsed, growing stronger with each passing moment.
“No time to waste, boss,” the Stormtrooper whispered, creating Lightningfire spheres. He did so faster than Lukas and wrapped them in sound magic before they could make any noise.
“Agreed.” The stalker took off at full speed, using enhanced Haste, and threw himself into the door. It exploded in a cloud of dust and splinters under the force of a maximum weight clone moving at high velocities. Screams and shouts sounded from within. Someone called for help, but the floor below was already much louder.
The Stormtrooper followed, launching the Lightningfire spheres as soon as he was through the cracked doorframe. The projectiles exploded noisily on contact, and Lukas could see the flashes even from around the corner. He waited until the clones had engaged the unknown enemy before he entered, covered in Shade’s Mantle, channeling Silencing Shadows and also simultaneously using Psychic Protection.
While on the roof, the clones had called it overkill, but he was glad to have the last spell active. Things were as he predicted. A tear in reality hung at the center of the ritual circle, and five of Reistein’s citizens lay unconscious, chained to the floor around it. Something squirmed in the deep black at the center, and looking directly at it or the clawing, endless darkness didn’t give Lukas a headache.
One of the faces on the floor was familiar; it was the old man who had waved at Leisel during their approach to Reistein. A fleshy slug dropped out of the rift and squirmed toward him. Lukas ensured it didn’t reach its destination. An electrified Shadowsteel needle shot from his hand, skewering the creature to the floor. More like it followed and suffered the same fate.
Meanwhile, the clones were locked in battle with five individuals, two of whom looked barely old enough to be teenagers. They slung spells and used feats of strength far greater than what one would expect from ordinary civilians.
A little girl had picked up an armoire twice her size and swung it at the Stalker like it weighed nothing at all. Another kept the Stormtrooper busy with rapid bolts of energy. They alternated between red and purple, and thick, clawing black bordered all of them. Unnatural energies flared around the five, and they all matched the rift in the middle. Unlike usual centers of magic, these didn’t radiate from the head, chest, or torso. Instead, the centers were around the neck.
When the rain of slugs turned into a flood, Lukas switched to Stormfire—it was still faster to form than the other varieties and launched them at the rift while the clones continued to combat the two ritualists. The remaining three stood catatonic, chanting as magic flowed from their necks into the ritual circle.
One slug managed to slither out of the range of Lukas’s attacks and made it to the old man. It slithered up his arm and disappeared behind his shoulder. The man shot upright, eyes widening and darting to Lukas. When he moved, still concealed by all of his spells, the man followed him. A scream burst from his lips, and he rushed at Lukas. Stormfire exploded on the man’s head, leaving only surface burns. He stumbled but didn’t stop. Inhumanely wide eyes glared as he charged.
The slugs are controlling and enhancing them.
Lukas let the man get within six feet of him before releasing a sonic blast. The force of the explosion knocked the hostile off his feet and sent him flying across the room. The man crashed into the wall where it met the dome and exploded like a balloon, leaving a splatter of blood and viscera behind. It was the first time Lukas had used the Sonic Shotgun spell. It was potent, but had a high chance of harming friendlies. If not for the layer of sound energy covering Lukas’s ears, he was sure the spell would’ve deafened him.
There is no saving people infected by the Void.
A Shadow Lance imbued with storm energy formed in front of Lukas. He launched the projectile without bothering to make it spin, aiming the arm-long Shadowsteel spike at the girl wielding the armoire. It surprised him that the Stalker had failed to destroy it despite having Alter Metal Mass. Lukas’s attack pierced her neck, but surprisingly was unable to take her head off. However, the girl collapsed when the storm energy discharged with a thunderous boom, tearing flesh and bathing her in tendrils of dancing lightning.
“Take out the slugs in their necks!” Lukas announced, glancing at the rift that had lost a fifth of its length. “Start with the ritualists.”
Slugs had continued to flood out of the rift while Lukas took out the old man and the girl. They had reached two of the four remaining victims. He called forth Stormfire and released it indiscriminately, spraying it at the slugs and victims simultaneously. The lightning fried them all. It seemed the enhanced durability, strength, and magical powers didn’t come until parasite and host completed their bonding process.
“Boss!” The Stormtrooper exclaimed, launching all of his Lightningfire spheres at his opponent. “Slugs on me.”
“Dispel yourself then,” Lukas replied, annoyed at the clone’s failure. Then he saw the balls of electric blue disappear just before striking their target. They weren’t collapsing or losing stability. Instead, he sensed their arcane signature fade from reality altogether.
Slugs had started to climb the Stalker too, but he had encased himself in Shadowsteel. The clone had also entered the ritual room with a high-mass Steel Weave. It made him slow but significantly increased his defences. Lightning occasionally discharged from his body, frying off the clones.
Why didn’t the other fucker think of that?
Nothing made sense. He had never seen the clones behave so incompetently before. Lukas was about to curse them out when realization hit. They no longer had Psychic Protection active. Blinding headaches and cries from beyond the rift were likely messing with their decision-making.
No slugs were coming for Lukas. The other ritualists hadn’t seen through the magic concealing him. So, he replaced the Stormtrooper and took a step back, no longer engaging in the fight. He would’ve loved to protect the two remaining victims of the ritual, but it was a waste of time and magic. If Lukas didn’t shut down the rift, things were going to spiral out of control, and the slugs would flood the settlement.
First, he launched a charged Shadow Lance at one of the remaining ritualists. The projectile disappeared. After the first of them died, the rest had developed a Void barrier, which was likely sending everything into the endless beyond. Lukas’s senses told him the source wasn’t the slugs on their necks. It was the ritual.
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The enemies on the ground floor fell with surprising ease. Morph didn’t have great expectations of the civilian fighters to begin with. They had enhanced strength and durability, but not much to boast about besides the two qualities. It took him a few hits to take them down before he ended up decapitating one, and it didn’t get back up. His eyes widened when he understood.
“Body snatchers!” He yelled, skewering an arm-long fleshy creature that squirmed off the dead man and shot toward him. He immediately thickened the skin on his back and added additional segmented bone plates along his spine. “Take out their necks and protect your own. These people have slugs controlling them.”
All party members swiftly adapted. It started with Haima. His weapon lost girth, stone, and ice retreating up his arm. It solidified on the limb, across the shoulders, and all along the spine like a gladiator’s armor. Spikes extended from the armor, radiating a chilling aura. Frost-covered slugs fell from his back.
Flukas, who cast spells nearby, discharged storm energy enveloping himself and the clones. The Shade’s Mantle covered pair watched his back while prying open the trapdoor to the basement. It seemed the defences had intensified since their last visit.
Neither Xander nor Leisel put in much effort into protecting themselves. The first released a thick cloud of steam. Faint red glowed through his skin afterward. Anything that crawled onto him was likely to get cooked in an instant. Meanwhile, the air around Leisel seemed to ripple. Her clothes danced, and Morph identified it as her seismic magic. She was likely vibrating herself at a rate that prevented the slugs from climbing her.
Mira’s defense was the flashiest. It seemed El-Prime’s ritual had done wonders. Her fortifications were no longer stationary. Silver armor grew over her torso, and similarly colored flames sprouted from along the spine.
So this is what it's like to be among experienced combatants. They make the hunt candidates in Iskander, guard members, and high-ranking Grey Rats look pathetic in comparison. Then again, most people around there didn’t have all of their shards, and I dealt with primarily tier twos.
Only Haima and Mira were tier-two adventurers and had unawakened pillars. The rest of them were significantly stronger. Xander refused to reveal much, but Morph was sure the man was a tier four, much like Leisel.
“Sneak!” Morph roared. “Have a golem warn the auditor. He needs to know about the slugs.”
“They’re working on the door,” Flukas protested. “Can’t stop now.” He grunted, firing a Shadowfire sphere at a clump of people trying to burst through one of the doors at the back of the building. “Haima! I can take care of myself. Warn them. We need the slugs contained and reinforcements out!”
The man didn’t protest, charging through the growing crowd.
The number of people in the building was far more than the town was supposed to house. A lot of the people looked like they were supposed to be dead. They had chunks of their chest, abdomen, or both missing, and fleshy masses had grown to replace the missing bits. Morph wasn’t sure if Flukas had infused the projectile with fear. If he had, they had no effect. The screaming and furious attackers didn’t slow or falter. They squirmed past each other as wispy, smoky flames clung to them. Their movements slowed, and frost spread across their body, but they kept coming.
Initially, Morph was supposed to protect Mira and Xander Leisel unless the party leader instructed otherwise. However, the two mages were clumped together and had no trouble keeping hostiles away. So, he rushed to Flukas when it looked like he was about to be overwhelmed.
A sonic blast erupted from Morph in a focused cone, knocking aside the swarm on the verge of overwhelming his fellow clone. As a Spellweaver, Flukas had the means to repel them, but it was a risk better not taken. They couldn’t afford to have him fall with El-Prime busy. It sounded like things were starting to get chaotic on the floor above, but no one had the time to investigate.
“I got it open!” Flukas announced. The trapdoor burst open, and he fired a trio of Lightningfires through the opening. Inhumane voices screeched below. If not for Psychic Protection, it would’ve left Morph with a headache. He had kept it active while fighting, mostly using Biomancy and Shadowsteel weapons made to look like bone. “There are more of them below.”
The rest of the party moved from the chokepoint they were protecting to the trapdoor, mowing through the mass of seemingly revived dead. Morph wondered whether the body-snatched individuals were retrieving corpses from the mountains or pulling them out from the river for the slugs to possess. It was a decent method for growing an army.
A hulking specimen—a man almost tall enough to be a giant and just as wide—barrelled toward Flukas and the trapdoor. Xander was still too far and unlikely to leave his charge, so Morph rushed to intervene. He launched the Shadowsteel weapons attached to his arm and meant to look like bone blades at the creature. One impaled an arm while the other got the chest. He didn’t slow. The projectiles exploded a moment later, taking off the limb and a chunk of the chest.
Fleshy tentacles squirmed out of the half-decayed body, patching the wounds and replacing the damaged limb with something so alien that Morph was unsure how to describe it. He tried something El-Prime had theorized possible, but the clone hadn’t yet put into practice. It was no challenge given their Shaping talents and endless practice sessions. All the immobile corpses also gave him plenty of biomass for use.
Tissue melted and moved up Morph’s legs like the infamous blob from one of El-Prime’s favorite horror films: The Thing. The biomass wrapped around Morph, forming itself into a massive exo-armor of flesh, bone, and sinew. Bone and Shadowsteel sprouted from the shoulders and arms, turning them into lethal weapons. He added black knuckle claws to the mix because there was far more bone than he knew what to do with.
A single punch to the chest halted the charging hulk. A low kick brought him to his knees. Then Morph decapitated him with a spike.
“Haima and I will stay up here with Morph—”
“No!” The clone protested, laughing as he took out three body-snatched people with a single swipe, crushing heads and spines with the blow. “I can hold this spot on our own. Worst case scenario, I clog it with all the biomass and flee below.”
“Are you sure?” Leisel asked, releasing the spell she’d spent quite some time casting. Spikes burst from the ground in a wide circle around the party, overturning work stations, impaling foes, and creating a protective wall. “I’m happy to stay.”
“I’ve got this!” Morph replied, absorbing a freshly made corpse and turning all the bone he contained into a massive projectile. He fired it at another group coming through the bottleneck that Leisel, Mira, and Xander were protecting. “The thing below feels like a Void Lord, and it's going to take you all of you to take it down. Besides, I’m having too much fun up here and can’t cut loose with you so close.”
The party leader didn’t protest further.
“You’re a true warrior,” Xander said, smacking Morph’s back, unbothered by the blood and gore that splattered him. “My offer stands.”
“What offer?” Leisel frowned as the shieldbearer leaped through the trapdoor.
“Aquila wants to poach me because I’m so talented,” Morph replied, before returning his focus to repelling the swarm of incoming foes. “Can you please descend so I can go back to feeling like a god?”
“We’re going to talk about this later,” the woman grumbled before descending.
Mira didn’t go down straight away. Her eyes glowed silver as she gathered power. “Don’t die, alright? Xander is right. You’re fun and far too skilled for this guild. You’ll be better off with us.” The woman released her spell, and walls rose around them, creating an easy-to-defend bottleneck around the trapdoor. “Your abilities are grotesque and terrifying, but I still like you.”
“Great.” Morph sighed once she descended after Flukas. He looked at the two clones waiting to bring up the rear. “Does the girl not realize she just limited my range of movement?”
The Stormtrooper shrugged.
“Be nice,” the Stalker said. “I like her better for El-Prime than Leisel. She’s fun and nice.”
“Far too innocent for him,” Morph stated, growing a gigantic bone spear to help guard the bottle neck.
“I think she’ll win him over,” the Stormtrooper told his fellow clones. “Hell, I think she’s halfway succeeded.”
The shadow-wrapped pair descended as Morph coated the spear in Shadowsteel and electrified it. There was no one around to watch, and he could finally cut loose. It was time to have fun.
Comments
Vastenova
Thanks for the chapter!
Ben Bass
TYFTC! It is nice to see Morph almost becoming their own individual, who just happens to be a clone, rather than the other flavors of clones. Now this is where Morph can really push himself and learn, with no one watching and a valid threat so he can really let loose and experiment with things. Now let's see how everyone does against the Void Lord, and how Lukas does against the ritual upstairs!
BubblyGhost
Haha, Morph is definitely my favorite clone so far
Marquess
3 chapters in 24 hours is crazy work. See you on Monday!
1N7L68E
“Take out the necks and protect (their) own. These people have slugs controlling them.”=(your/you're)
1N7L68E
"That Lightning occasionally discharged from his body, frying off the (clones.)" =(slugs)
