tbmare
patreon
Chapter 46 - Massacre Part 1
🕑 Added 2023-07-24 18:39:49 +0000 UTCThe first thing that Ultaf felt was pain. Immense, horrendous, stabbing pain. He looked down, where his hands should have been there, ready to conjure blasts of intense pressure like his grandfather had taught him.
Instead a feeling of despair flooded through him.
I can’t feel my hands. I can’t feel my hands.
They weren’t broken, yet utterly unmoving. His body was fine, not an inch of dirt or crease on his very immaculate robes, yet it refused to obey his commands. The moment the vagrant released his hands, his body fell back, like a stringless marionette, collapsing into the chair behind.
Ultaf screamed. No sounds came out. That was the second thing the aeromancer realized. His windpipe was being crushed. He started choking for air. Trying to claw at his throat using his hands that just would not rise up. The third and last thing was the vagrant. He had been on the other side of the table, and now, he was there, directly in front of him, gazing down at his panicked stare.
By Wind, he didn’t even have fractals on. And the wards disrupted outward lifeforce activity. So how?
“I have paralyzed you, for now. In case you’re wondering, it’s just an example of what I’m going to put you through if you don’t tell me exactly where Zuken Banksi is.”
Ultaf frantically tried to remember his name amidst the ocean of agony he was under. He called upon lifeforce, but it could only help so far beyond keeping him alive. Worse, it was flaring his nerves, adding to his misery.
The smile on the man — no, the monster’s face grew.
“Ah, right,” he said. “I almost forgot. You can’t speak properly. At least until your lifeforce heals you back. Which should take days, unless I’m wrong. But then there’s the chance that you might say or do something annoying in which case I might just start damaging some of your nerves. And by some, I mean like… half. Oh rest assured, I’ll keep the main places intact. Just your arms and legs. It can be really hard to avoid your heart and spine, but I think I can manage a decent job. Wouldn’t you agree?”
Ultaf tried to speak, but only gurgles escaped him.
“Shit,” said the vagrant. “That must have been the damage to the windpipe. Or perhaps nerve damage? Grandpa told me so many times to take that anatomy course in school. For fuck’s sake, I even audited the damn thing. But noo! I’mma be a lawyer! Then again, lawyers don’t go around electrocuting others like a professional hitman, do they? You know how the saying goes… Man proposes, God disposes and all that…”
Ultaf almost wet himself in fear. Who was this madman, speaking all this gibberish? And what did he want with him? And — and where were the guards? Why weren’t they here already? They should have sensed the mana —
Wait. Mana? He couldn’t have done it using mana. His fractals were with the guards outside. Then… lifeforce? How did he outdo the wards? Someone must have sensed something! Anything! He desperately tried to move his hand towards the table. All he needed to do was press a little button and all the guards would be there, raining down on this bastard. But he couldn’t. He — he needed to shout! He needed to shout!
“GHHH!” A pathetic grunt escaped his throat, and Ultaf fell back limply as his nerves flared, tearing through his mind. His throat felt like someone had shoved a brick through it. But that was worth it. His guards had to have heard it. They’d come! They’d all come. They’ll surround this bastard and absolutely butcher him and —
Nothing.
No one was coming. Ultaf tried to divert his lifeforce into his auditory receptors. It hurt like crazy but—
Still nothing.
Wait. What was going on? Why weren’t they coming? WHY WEREN’T THEY COMING? COULDN’T THEY HEAR HIS SCREAMS? COULDN’T THEY HEAR THIS —
“Urk!”
Ultaf looked down in horror at his chest, where the stranger had just poked him with a finger.
“Don’t bother wasting your breath on screaming. You don’t exactly have much left. That poke I just gave you shattered a rib right above your left lung. Just one little push and it will puncture the lung, and you’ll probably have a minute or two before you suffocate and your heart stops, assuming you don’t die of the pain first.” The monster paused and gave Ultaf a very friendly smile, which filled him up with fresh horror. “Unless I poke you again, at which point, your right lung will be punctured, and bury the broken ribs into your heart. You have exactly one minute before I do that.”
The clinical and polite, friendly tone in which his words had been delivered chilled him to the core.
“But you can’t speak, can you? And you look idiotic enough to try screaming for help even if you could talk. I guess in that case, you’ll just have to think. See, Elena here,” the man animatedly gestured, “is an expert Obscuror. You know what those are, right? Don’t know how she does it, but we all have our talents, don’t we? Yours is, I think, idiocy.”
“Can idiocy even be a talent?” Olfric Bergott asked from behind. Ultaf would have thought that the man was just being a condescending bastard, but the confusion in his eyes spoke a different picture.
“Eh, who knows? The world’s a big place. Now, Idiot here is going to open his mind wide to Elena and let her see whatever she wants, isn’t he, Idiot?”
Ultaf shook his head vigorously. He watched with growing dread as the girl, no, the changeling, walked up to him, noticed the slight hesitation in her gait. She wasn’t used to working like this, or rather, working with the stranger. Same for Ultaf. Whoever this stranger, this vagrant was — he wasn’t working for them. They were working for him!
How had he failed to notice the difference?
The changeling crossed her arms across her chest, her fingers paused in a particular hand gesture, before she uncrossed them, both hands parallel to each other. Despite the simplicity, Ultaf had a growing foreboding sensation that some kind of lock was opening, and whatever was coming out was something out of this world.
“Shokan!”
Something fairly anthropoidal with a squid-like head and large bright, iridescent blue eyes appeared in front of him and then his world exploded in agony. Blood erupted out of his nose and lips and his vision faded to darkness.
….
….
….
Ultaf stirred awake. He was still sprawled across his chair, a feeling of utter violation rising out of his very soul. His body felt like one big bruise. Lifeforce was rushing through his body, healing him, but he had a long, long way before he could even fight back. Or speak for that matter. At least he could still use mana. If only he could focus some wind mana into his hands…
Wait.
His hands. Why wasn’t he feeling mana rushing through him? His kami…
His kami? Why wasn’t he feeling the connection to it? Sigrun? What happened to it?
“This is just a waste of space,” said the vagrant, “Wind Creation, Wind Manipulation, Pressure… all of this is just fucking Level-2. Is this really the kami of the Lord of Shimizu clan? I had expected at least something in Level-3s. All this time I was expecting a warrior and instead I got a loudmouthed politician. At least he isn’t pot-bellied and perpetuating the stereotype.”
“Why would he be pot-bellied?” asked Elena.
Ultaf couldn’t hold himself back any longer, and opened his eyes, and what he saw…
Froze him..
Above him, chained by strange ethereal chains arising out of the stranger, was his kami Sigrun. The ethereal wind-type marid was screeching and trying to escape in vain, but the shackles would not let it get away. Ultaf greedily tried to raise his hand, but not a single finger obeyed his commands.
“Are you going to kill it?” asked Bergott.
“This poor thing? No. It’s probably pissed off at having a weakling for a host. No, I’ll just let it go.”
Empty gurgles escaped his throat as Ultaf watched with flabbergasted eyes as his kami vanished into the air, a translucent ripple being the only sign of its passage. This — this monster had snatched his Sigrun away from him! Him. Ultaf Shimizu. Lord of Shimizu Clan!
An impotent rage surged through him like a wave breaking down at the shore. He’d make him pay! He’d make him pay horribly! Bergott, the changeling, Banksi, all of them would die horrifying deaths, but this stranger, this… this Lukas Aguilar would suffer. He’d tear his entrails out and force him to feed on it. His punishment would be legendary. He’d kill him slowly and painfully until he’d beg him for mercy and then —
“Oh look, you’re awake!” said Aguilar cheerfully. “Good for you. Elena knows where to find Zuken so they’ll be off doing that. Guess that leaves you and me.”
It was the absolutely polite, friendly tone, Ultaf decided. It was like listening to someone simply making conversation with an old friend he had not met in a while. It told him that if this Aguilar wanted to kill him, he’d be done with no fuss whatsoever, not unlike squishing an ant.
“So, uh, the guards,” asked Bergott. “Why aren’t they coming to help him?”
“Occlusion bubble,” said Aguilar. “And Elena might have allayed them a little. Just enough to keep them distracted while we talk.” he turned to Elena. “Where are the wardstones?”
“Dungeons. They surround the Well,” she said. “They’re used to power both the wards and the rift. If you can destabilize them then…”
“The entire system cascades to one massive failure,,” Aguilar muttered. “How are you going to get to Zuken?”
The changeling smirked, and walked up to the left end of the room, and pressed her palm on the mirror and pressed. Ultaf stared in horror as his secret escape door opened, revealing his private elevator system.
“Awesome,” said Aguilar. “Get Zuken out. Contact Solana if you need help. Or wait for my signal. Whichever comes first.”
“What’s the signal?” asked Bergott.
Aguilar smirked. “Don’t worry. When it hits, you’ll feel it.”
“What are you scheming?” The changeling frowned and shook her head. “Never mind. I don’t want to know.” She looked at the door. “We’re going to need a distraction though. Too many guards otherwise.”
“We’re going to need a distraction,” said Bergott.
“Distractions,,” said Aguilar, looking at Ultaf, filling him up with fresh horror,“are a sort of specialty of mine.”
And then before Ultaf could realize what was happening, the monster grabbed him by his collar and hurled him out of the office like so much trash. He gasped and whimpered as he landed with terrific force, and then bounced, flipped, skidded and rolled nearly twenty feet. The first snap was merely surprising. By the fifth, he was becoming alarmed, wondering if he would even survive the day. His body smashed against the wall on the other end, and Ultaf fell, belching out blood all over the floor.
His only saving grace was that he was outside, and the majority of the guards were now rushing towards Aguilar to kill him. He heard the Guard captain yell, ordering his men to take down the vagrant like the worthless piece of trash he was.
Multiple pressure orbs, as well wind blades and a fireball smashed into the intruder, exploded with a thunderous detonation followed by an explosion that all but blinded Ultaf. But that was nothing compared to the feeling of triumph coursing through him. No doubt the vagrant had died a horrible…..
Death?
Ultaf blinked.
Standing between the man and the attacks was an offending layer of shiny metal, easily fifteen feet high, and covering the entire doorway. Its surface rippled into undulating formations, and looked absolutely no worse for wear.
The wind blades ricocheted against it.
The pressure blasts and fireballs exploded against it, yielding no results.
The warriors barged into it, only to be thrown back.
The swords shattered against it.
And all through it, the metal wall remained, fluttering like a curtain, keeping its protectorate safe.
“What is that layer?” asked a guard. “Did we get the bastard?”
“Oh, I assure you,” came Aguilar’s voice from the other side. “The bastard is quite safe and sound.”
Ultaf watched with widened eyes as the curtain cleaved from the middle, allowing him to walk through. He looked utterly dispassionate, as if oblivious of the danger around him. No, it was like he truly believed he truly wasn’t in any danger here. Ultaf wondered how a single man, bereft of fractals, could ever be so foolish.
No matter. It would only bring his end faster.
“Redirection of force,” said the vagrant. “Nifty thing isn’t it? Why the sheer number of applications—”
“DIE!” roared one of Ultaf’s warrior personnel, rushing at him with a greatsword. The vagrant casually grabbed his hand mid-swing, and the next moment, a headless body fell upon the floor, the head rolling all the way to where Ultaf lay fallen.
Aguilar threw the sword away, and looked down at the decapitated man with a scowl.
He’s playing with them, Ultaf realized with horror. Aguilar had thrown him away, just so that he could ravage through the resistance his guards provided, and then claim him again. Like an igriott playing with its prey.
“Seriously, what’s wrong with you? Don’t you know it’s bad manners to interrupt someone while they’re talking?”
Ultaf blinked.
“Whatever,” sighed the monster, pulling a handkerchief and wiping his hands of the splattered blood. He raised his left hand, and the lockers on the side wall blasted open, the fractals flying into his hands. He threw a pair at Bergott who was behind him, and proceeded to wear the other one himself.
“Say, fellas. What do you think about a ceasefire? I really just want to get Zuken Banksi out of here, so it’s really for the best if you cooperate. That way you don’t have to fight me, and I don’t have to kill you. And trust me, I should be really be going, so if you’d kindly —”
“KILL HIM!” roared a soldier.
Aguilar sighed. “This really doesn’t need to be that difficult. But fine. You asked for it.”
He barked out something in a foreign tongue that Ultaf couldn’t understand, the chamber exploded, followed by an earth-shattering detonation. By the time vision returned to Ultaf in blotches of rearranging colour, it was already too late.
What….. He thought as an icy feeling settled within his chest. What by Amaterasu is that demon?
The vast chamber lay in shatters. The ornate pillars, the enchanted walls, everything had crashed. And in the epicenter of the blast, a colossal black form loomed. Taller than the eye could see. And it was still being formed.
Its jaws were metal. Its flesh as black as the accursed shadows themselves. Horns sprouted out of its crown like demented protrusions. Blood red eyes glaring out of its sunken sockets. The light in them was something maddeningly primordial.
Slowly, the demented beast’s full form came into clarity. It took a single step, and the floor gave away, the enchanted stone shattering at the wake of this beast’s power, the slabs rising up like upturned coffins, ready to swallow every single living being above it.
Another step.
Ultaf saw its reptilian form, with a tail thicker than three bremetans huddled together.
It lifted its maw and roared.
One moment, there was nothing. Next, violence permeated the air. The sound was loud — an inept description, as those closest to it instantly dropped unconscious with blood trickling down their eyes and noses. Ultaf did not fare any better, and felt his heart throb against his broken ribs and his body shake as sharp needles ran across his skin, with a hammerblow of pressure slamming into his face.
Whatever remained of his guards now stood rooted in shock. Their attention was riveted at the beast, but Ultaf only had eyes for the lone figure standing next to the massive destroyer, small and seemingly inconsequential compared to the giant next to him. It didn’t help that there were a dozen guards lying on the floor, their bodies charred to a husk and their kami exploding out of them and escaping into the very air itself.
The reptilian being moved, and then all around him the guards began to die.
....
....
....
Unlike Ultaf, Olfric Bergott was familiar with Lukas Aguilar and his ability to pull miracles out of his pockets. Granted, most of it was from seeing him in combat against the anomaly guardian, and more recently, from Maude’s tales of Lukas’s accomplishments. Even Tanya had talked about what the Outsider had unleashed in the borderland they had been stranded on. Though Olfric was no wiser about how Lukas’s powers worked, he at least had an idea of what he could do.
So when he saw Lukas hurl Ultaf out of the room like so much dead meat, with guards pouring into the room like flies swooping at the smell of honey, Olfric knew he had to duck.
The former Bergott heir grabbed Elena and hurled himself to the ground.
The guards attacking him held no such compunction. They were elite warriors, spiritists, and monster tamers. They were part of one of the most powerful brigades in the Empire, and did not have the flexibility to understand what was about to happen even as it was happening. They rushed towards the door, mana swirling in their bodies as they prepared for the assault.
Until the first of many got decapitated without so much as a word from Lukas.
And then the world around them shattered, as the black metallic thing that Aguilar called Blob… erupted, forming into that nightmarish beast. Olfric couldn’t even see the head from his vantage point, but its muscles were so massive and corded that they bordered on the grotesque, exuding an aura of sheer, mindless, impossible power. Its two hindlimbs ended in a massive tail, which tore Ultaf’s office apart with a single flick, before it moved forward.
It was like watching an earthquake or standing in front of an oncoming hurricane, frozen in fear and awe by the unimaginable destructive potential and the prospect of certain death.
A monster? No, this was a destroyer. A being wholly specialized for the obliteration of life. It had no purpose but to choose a target and attack, attack, attack with relentless fury and unstoppable force until that target was nothing but wet meat inside its massive jaws, and then to choose another target, and another, and another, until there was nothing around it but blood and gore and death.
Like moths rushing to a flame, scores of guards rushed in from all directions. They were met with the sight of this ginormous beast and a single man standing next to it, looking utterly lackadaisical as he welcomed them with a smile.
“Tanya told me you were a disagreeable lot,” Lukas said, and Olfric heard the annoyance in his tone. “I was really trying to keep you alive. But that’s fine I guess. Blob, feel free to indulge yourself. Except for… that one,” he indicated the Lord of Shimizu that lay crumpled on the floor. “That one’s mine.”
“Uh, Lukas,” he asked tentatively, “how many do you think… we need to kill before they surrender?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Aguilar, “probably no one.”
As he spoke those words, he instinctively redirected a pressure burst aimed for his head back to its caster. The man fell to the ground in a spray of blood and two unequal halves.
Olfric blinked.
“Okay,” Lukas sighed. “Potentially everyone.”
….
….
….
A single slap of the tail brought the walls down. The guards jerked and twisted, firing elemental attacks as the demonic beast found them. Blood fountained into the air. Limbs were torn from shoulders and hips. Bodies crumpled, then came apart as giant openings larger than the size of their heads formed on their bodies, the rest of their organs slipping through them and splattering all over the floor.
Olfric stared at it. His stunned mind had finally started to process information in detail. The giant beast striding unflappably through the chamber, tearing down droves of soldiers with the air of a wolf hunting rabbits was one of Lukas’s creations, crafted at the spur of the moment and brought into existence to do his bidding. It shouldn’t have been possible to create sentience out of nothing, but he supposed nobody had told Aguilar that.
Suddenly, Zuken’s musings about Lukas Aguilar being an actual demigod began to make a lot more sense. And if he really was one then —
He was interrupted by a distressingly strong hand slapping him across his face.
“... Elena?” He muttered, flabbergasted.
“Sorry. I called your name four times and you didn’t react. Someone must have done a number on you,” she said, rubbing her palm. “And you did one on me, damn. What;’s your face made of, iron? I felt like I was slapping a metal door.”
“I always knew you were a hands-on kind of girl, Elena,” said Lukas, grinning and utterly ignoring the fact that they were cornered by enemies inside an warded enemy fortress.
Elena stuck out her tongue. More maturely, she turned to Olfric. “We need to find Zuken. Let him deal with them.”
Olfric blinked. Elena had it backward. It was the soldiers that would have to deal with Aguilar, not the reverse.
“Yes,” he said, “let’s go.”
Comments
J Cooke
Beautiful carnage!
