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Throne Hunters Book 3, Chapter 6
🕑 Added 2024-09-17 13:38:11 +0000 UTC“Nessa!”
Arrows were raining down on Harald as he stared at the collapsed tent. Blocks of stone lay about his fallen companion, with one massive block having crushed her leg. She was attempting to claw free, but was trapped amidst large bulky objects that were now covered by the canvas.
The Shield of Valor appeared just above him, and he heard the thunk of arrows hitting it.
What to do?
Time seemed to slow.
Sam was screaming his name from the archway that led back into the wall. The eerie goblinoid in the tower was nocking another of his cannister arrows, his hatchet-like face pulled into a self-satisfied grin. Shouts were sounding from below, hobgoblins emerging into view as they surrounded Nessa, glancing up and raising shields as they pointed blades at her.
This was his fault.
He’d pushed for this attack.
Nessa was about to die for his ambition.
His folly.
Dark Vigor exploded across his body, enveloping him in nightmarish flames as hellish energy suffused him, granting him +2 to all physical stats.
Goldchops.
The twin golden hatchets materialized around him even as he hopped forward and over the edge, out into space, into the void. The wind whipped around him, his stomach plastered itself up against his ribs, and the tents and ground came rushing, screaming up.
At the last second he evoked Umbral Aegis, and shadows writhed and tore themselves free of the dark corners to enmesh him with the power of the abyss. Cloaked from head to toe in absolute blackness, he hit the ground at the edge of the collapsed tent, sinking into a crouch before rising, Abyssal Attunement enveloping the Dawnblade as he raised the Amulet of the Hobgoblin King.
He didn’t know what he was going to do.
Had no plan.
But he was going to do something.
He held the Goldchops at the ready, intent on leveraging his unnatural authority with the hobbos to get him and Nessa out of there.
Only to freeze.
Nessa had pushed herself up to sitting, her left leg still trapped under the huge chunk of ragged masonry, her face bathed in sweat and pallid as she stared at him, eyes wide and blank with shock.
A blade was at her neck.
A pale-skinned hobgoblin had stepped out of a side tent to loom over her, and his sickly grin was wise and cunning and suffused with twisted delight.
“Surrender,” said the hobgoblin, his tongue made intelligible by the amulet. “Or your bitch dies.”
Other hobgoblins pressed in on all sides, blades in hand, bows raised and with the fletching of their arrows drawn back to their cheeks.
But the one with a blade to Nessa was unlike the rest. Not massive and brutish like Barko, he was slender, his skin pale as milk, his eye a searing blue. His physiognomy was the same, his features, his wing-like ears, but he appeared sickly in comparison to his fellows, hunched and svelte. A tattered robe of gold fell from his shoulders, and he wore a golden pauldron over one shoulder. One of his eyes was stitched closed, an old wound, and his fangs were almost translucent, slender like cat’s teeth and bristling in his maw like some deep sea horror.
The Goldchops were practically vibrating beside him, so eager were they to leap into action. He could feel his twin Thrones roaring as they fed his Aegis, as they powered his abyssal blade, as they allowed Dark Vigor to give him wings.
His Thrones couldn’t feed them for long.
So Harald grinned, feeling feral and on edge, and dismissed all his Abilities.
“Relax,” he called out. “I have a proposal for you. One you’ll like.”
“Harald,” rasped Nessa. “Get the hell out of here.”
“You’re in no place to give proposals.” The pale hobgoblin pressed his scimitar against Nessa’s throat. “Drop your weapons and lie on the floor, hands behind your back.”
“You don’t crave sport?” Harald raised his voice and looked around the gathered hobgoblins. “What do you have to fear? You’re in your place of power. Are you so cowardly you won’t even listen to my proposition?”
The amulet flashed, and the hobgoblins clustered around them grew restless, grumbling and eyeing their leader.
Who sneered, revealing his awful fangs. “Very well. If you insist. What do you propose, dead man?”
“A simple contest. Me against all of you. You don’t harm my friend if I kill you all.”
For a moment there was stunned silence, and then the leader’s high-pitched laughter set off all of his warriors, whose hearty guffaws filled the air.
Harald kept his smile in place, never looking away from the hobbo.
“Your stupid bravery is notable,” allowed the leader when the laughter died down. “But there’s no need for any of my warriors to die. You are defeated.”
“Coward.” Harald said the word pleasantly. “You don’t trust the strength of your fighters. You fear for your life, even now. You look in my eyes and see death. You see the abyss. I am but one man, and still you fear me.” Harald turned about again. “Your leader is a coward! He doesn’t know the meaning of honor or glory! He is a backstabber, and would use a fallen, helpless victim to gain his victories!”
The amulet boosted his Presence by +6, and Harald’s words lashed the gathered hobgoblins, whose humor died as they considered their leader.
“This is nonsense!” rasped the one-eyed hobbo. “Shut your mouth or I slit her throat!”
“Coward,” said Harald, forcing himself to sound contemptuously amused. “Who here would relish cutting me down in fair combat? Who here is strong and brave? Who here might be more deserving of consideration as the next hobgoblin leader?” Harald kept pitching his voice to grow over the rising tide of shouts. “Who here would like to claim this amulet of mine, and challenge your cowardly boss for supremacy?”
A hobgoblin pushed free of the ranks. His armor was daubed black with a red skull painted on his breastplate, and he loomed as massive as Barko, his visage twisted by a singular scar that wrapped from his left temple to the right corner of his mouth. “If you fear the human, Wirmas, then I will kill him in a fair combat.”
Shouts of approval sounded from the crowd.
“No,” cried another, shoving his way to the fore. This hobgoblin was gaunt and tall, his rust-red skin pocked by old disease. “I, Vorbas the Vulture, will claim his skull.”
More shouts sounded, more champions offering themselves.
Wirmas, blade yet to Nessa’s throat, smiled, but Harald wasn’t fooled. The hobbo was furious. “Let us not be poor hosts,” he shouted over the clamor. “This human thinks he can defeat us all? Then let him fight us all. I’ll indulge his desire for a swift death.”
Wirmas had no choice. To let one champion duel Harald would be to anoint his successor.
Harald grinned and gave a mocking bow. “Then I suggest the following. You, Wirmas the Coward, stand with Nessa at the back of the courtyard. Your warriors shall face me, and I will cut my way through them to kill you. You will swear by your honor to fight me if I reach you, and not cut Nessa’s throat in a fit of petulant rage. Agreed?”
Laughter came from the ranks, but it was a bloodthirsty, maddened sound, the joy of warriors about to unleash violence upon an amusing foe.
Wirmas inclined his head. “You have chosen the form of your destruction. Far be it from me to prevent your suicide. I shall await you by my throne. You, you, and you, lift the rock from this human’s leg. Carry her with me.”
Hobgoblins moved forward to heave the block of masonry aside. Nessa let out a scream and then passed out. Her leg was shattered, bloodied, and if it wasn’t healed soon she’d probably die.
The sight of it caused Harald’s stomach to turn, but he squashed the revulsion and horror.
Instead, he made his way through the hobgoblin ranks, trying to get a sense of how many he’d have to fight. Thirty? Forty?
The hobgoblins were friendly, patting him on the shoulder and calling out jokes as he went. He felt himself almost an honorary member of their gang, but it was of course a farce.
He was the pig going to the slaughter, and they loved him for giving them sport.
Harald made his way to the front of the courtyard, passing under the awnings of tents. The encampment was a permanent one, most of the tents little more than raised tarps over bedding, chests, tables, and dining areas. Here and there campfires burned under iron funnels whose tin chimneys guided the smoke out into the air above.
At the back of the courtyard were a broad set of steps that led up to the third level and where his friends were gathered. Vic, Sam, and Kársek had descended halfway, panicked and wide-eyed, and when Harald emerged they descended the rest.
“What the hell is going on?” demanded Vic. “Why are you alive? Where’s Nessa?”
“They have her. I’m going to free her.”
Sam grabbed his arm. “You’re mad. How? What?!”
“I made a deal.” Harald unshouldered his pack and set it down. “If I kill all of the hobgoblins, they’ll let her go free, by dint of being too dead to stop me.”
Vic’s laugh was almost hysterical. “You know your dying won’t do anything for her?”
“I will fight with you,” said Kársek firmly. “My Rune will be of much help.”
“Just me,” said Harald. “If we break the terms, their leader will cut Nessa’s throat before we can get close.”
“Harry, Harry, he’ll cut her throat the moment you do.”
“I know. But he’ll hold off as long as possible. I riled up his warriors. If he acts scared, they’ll turn on him. This way I’ll have the best chance to get close and kill him before he can with Demonic Edge.”
“Harald!” Sam shook him. “You can’t kill forty hobgoblins! What kind of stupid plan is this?”
Harald cupped the nape of her neck and pressed his brow against her own, closing his eyes for a moment as he drew strength from her Beacon of Hope. With Sam here everything felt possible, everything felt calm and solid and good.
“Trust me,” he whispered. “Can you do that?”
“I…” When he opened his eyes he saw that hers were full of tears. “Harald. Don’t do this.”
He smiled. “Trust me?”
“I…” But while she couldn’t answer, she released his arm.
“Harald.” Vic sounded like he didn’t know whether to laugh or scream. “This is so far beyond the pale that I don’t even know what to say. Forty hobgoblins? Even with the Goldchops you’ll be cut down before you get anywhere close to her.”
“I have to try. I’ve set my mind to it.” Harald’s smile was grim.
The hobgoblins were forming up some ten yards away. There were enough of them that they made a wall, a genuine mob big enough that he couldn’t make out the ones at the back.
And somewhere behind them all was hidden Nessa.
Kársek’s brow was furrowed, but he summoned the rune hammer, rested its huge head against the lowest step, and placed his hands over the pommel. “I will wait here. When you die, I shall see to it that I kill as many of the remaining hobgoblins as I can.”
“I appreciate that,” said Harald. He felt light, loose, half-mad. “Sam, you think you can watch my flank with your Shield?”
Sam nodded.
“And let’s see how powerful your new regeneration ability is, yeah? Don’t get so close that you draw attention, but I’d appreciate your making sure it’s working on me.” Harald’s smile felt half-feral. “I’ve a hunch I’m going to need it.”
“You, Human!” The huge hobgoblin with black-painted armor pointed his serrated sword at Harald. “Enough with the talking! We’re losing our patience! Come over here and die like a good little lamb.”
Harald took a deep breath.
This was it.
And there was only way he was going to be able to see this through. “And Sam?”
Her voice was small. “Yes, Harald?”
“I’m going to need you to tamp down your Beacon of Hope.”
Her eyes narrowed in confusion, and then widened as she somehow managed to look even less happy.
Harald turned to face the hobgoblins.
“Good luck, old man,” said Vic, voice torn. “Give them hell.”
Harald summoned his stats for one last check.
Strength: 11
Dexterity: 11
Constitution: 12
He summoned the Goldchops. They appeared on either side of him, imbuing him with power and speed, and their presence gave him immeasurable comfort. Bobbing gently as if floating on a tide, they hung ready to fling themselves forward and destroy.
His stats changed to reflect their summoning:
Strength: 13
Dexterity: 13
Constitution: 12
Dark Vigor came next, and gray smoky flames coursed over his body, hellish might and potency pouring into him from whatever dark place the Demon Seed summoned such might. He felt himself grow lighter on his feet, agile, and even stronger than before.
Strength: 15
Dexterity: 15
Constitution: 14
It was good, but it wouldn’t be enough. So he crouched down, unfasted the leather straps, then rose to his feet with the Helm of Wrath in his hands. He dismissed the amulet from his Cosmos, so that it lay against his chest, inert, and forged a connection to the helm instead.
“Harald -!” Sam’s protest cut off as she no doubt realized what he was up against.
“Cut the Beacon,” he said, not looking back at her, not wanting to meet her eyes. “And be ready to stop me when you have to. Vic, don’t hold back.”
“I won’t,” said Vic, voice flinty with barely repressed emotion.
The hobgoblins were growing restive, muttering amongst each other, but the way Harald was staring at them kept them in place.
He clearly wasn’t running away.
Harald raised the horrific helm and pulled it on. The inside was molded with dozens of tiny spikes, and these sank into his scalp, the pain sudden, but before Harald could react, the helm merged with him, bonded with his soul, and then he couldn’t breathe.
Might. Sheer, unadulterated strength flowed into his body, filling him with fire. His muscles swelled, grew taut, and his eyes widened as his whole body strained to contain the vigor, the riotous, endless, all-consuming power.
Strength: 20
Dexterity: 15
Constitution: 17
He felt himself begin to grow, bones strain, joints popping, his armor growing taut across his shoulders. It was too much magic, his body couldn’t absorb it without responding.
Harald still couldn’t breathe.
For behind that impossible strength came a murderous passion, a need to destroy, to get his hands on those fucking hobgoblins and tear them apart, limb from limb.
And that’s when the Beacon cut off, and Harald was left with nothing but frothing fury.
Sheer.
Bloody-minded.
Fury.
Harald screamed and ran at the horde of hobgoblins, who flinched at the vehemency of his charge, the Goldchops streaking out directly ahead. They were far faster than he, and buried themselves in the first hobgoblin faces to burst through their skulls and explode out the backs of their heads.
Harald’s Dawnblade turned jet black even as the Aching Depths dropped, the Passive reflexive, and then he hit the front line.
The hobgoblins were creatures of discipline and order, prone to straight ranks, but seeing a lone human come screaming toward them they laughed and surged forward to meet him, and in so doing fucked themselves.
Harald swung the Dawnblade at the foremost hobbo, the giant, black-armored monster, and Strength 20 did the rest.
He’d never wielded such might, and only the Dawnblade’s Artifact status prevented it from shattering as he clove clear through the hobbo’s axe and hit the side of his shoulder, cutting through flesh and deep into bone and lifting the giant off his feet. At such strength the sword became more of a club, and the hobbo was flung into the next one as Harald tore the blade back out and hammered the hilt into the face of the second foe, caving in the architecture of his skull.
But Harald wasn’t just strong now.
He was fast.
And he swayed back under a scything swing, dropping to his knees and surging back up to knock the weapon aside and grab the hobgoblin, wrapping his arm around his neck and swinging him around so that a thrust took the monster in the gut.
Harald shoved the hobbo aside, trapping the third’s weapon and punched the surprised hobbo in the face, exploding his skull.
Someone tackled him from behind, lifting him off the ground and plowing him into the crowd of monsters. Everywhere were blades and eyes, shouts, screams, laughter from those in the back who hadn’t yet caught on to what was happening.
Harald went down, and in turning broke an arm, hit the flagstones, caught sight of a dagger strapped to a boot and tore it free, stabbed it into the boot, pinning the foot to the ground, punched the knee and buckled it, then shoved the hobgoblin off him and surged up to throw himself into another, bending the hobbo over his shoulder as he felt the monster’s hips shatter.
They plowed through a tent pole and hit a table, splinters everywhere. Hobgoblins were shoving at each other, trying to get at him. Harald swung the Dawnblade, hewing off a leg, and a Goldchop flew by and punched through a chest.
Up Harald leaped only to duck a swing, come under it and punch the hobbo straight in the breastplate, folding iron around his fist as he sank the blow straight through the broad sternum, then he turned just as another descended from a leap to swing its axe at him, cleaving through the canvas of the tent.
Harald jumped into the descending arc, and wrested the weapon free. They landed, rolled, and slammed into a forest of legs. Harald tore the axe away and screaming, swung it through the legs, hobbos leaping back, cursing, and then Harald leaped up again.
The Dawnblade was gone.
Harald ducked aside, swayed back from a thrust, felt something punch into his shoulder but felt no pain. He spun, but hobbos were closing in all around him like a fist so he leaped up onto a table and ran its length only to immediately dive off it straight into another, riding the hobbo to the ground and pulping his head into paste as he rolled off and came up into a gut punch that broke the enemy’s fist as Harald cupped the back of his neck and brought his brow smashing down into the monster’s face.
Blood, brains, broken teeth, and he grabbed the hobbo’s arm and swung him like a club, the dead monster’s legs leaving the ground as he flew up and around and into a pack of charging monsters, leveling them all.
A blade on the ground. Harald scooped it up, threw it. The sword hit a hobbo’s shoulder, spun him around, and then the tarp fell down to smother Harald as someone cut out a tentpole.
Harald grabbed fistfuls and shredded it, climbed free, ran up the struggling mass of covered bodies and dropped atop them to just pound his fists down again and again, pulping and breaking and causing the tarp to darken with blood.
There was a flash and a cannister arrow hit the ground a yard to his left and detonated.
Harald was lifted off the ground and hurled sidelong through the air to hit a wall of crates. Wood shattered and he bounced off it to hit the ground and roll, his head reeling, blood everywhere, but he came up more by reflex than anything else and took a punch to the face that rocked his head but didn’t drop him.
Head snapping back, he caught the next swing, ducked under it and came up with his arm around the hobbo’s neck, crunched it dead and spun around, tearing a dagger from its belt and hammer fisting it into the abdomen of another hobbo coming at him, who bent over his arm and then flipped into a somersault to land on its back, screaming.
Blue light was mingling with his own dark flames, and the power of the Aching Depths was everywhere, drowning his enemies in doubt and fear.
Harald flung himself at the closest, batting aside his sword with the flat of his hand and pounding his elbow across the hobbo’s face, sending the monster spinning away then dropped to his knees under another swing, punching the monster in the knee and then the crotch, causing things to burst.
He came up as something hit him across the back, an entire table, and he went down under shattered planks and splinters to bounce back up. Arrows rained down, but Harald threw himself aside, slid on blood, failed to get up.
A hobbo reared into view, blade drawn back to cut him in half but a Goldchop burst out his face and Harald ducked under the collapsing body to stagger upright.
Something was wrong with his left arm, it wouldn’t move, and his stomach was cut open. The blue light was burning bright across the wounds, but they were purely visual, the pain was gone, all he felt was a desire for more blood, for carnage, for death, for destruction, to feel the rage of his enemies turn to fear, to see the whites of their eyes as they realized what he was, what they had unleashed in their midst, and by then it was far, far too late for them.
Harald cast around, gasping, sobbing for breath, saw that the floor was strewn now with corpses, but the remaining crowd was parting as a new figure approached, an orc so bloated and huge he seemed three-wide, and in his hands he held a staff from whose iron-capped head extended a massive chain that terminated in a mess of axe-heads joined at the shaft, and this he swung about him so that the flail caused the air to moan.
Harald backed away, not out of fear but timing his approach, and then dove forward as the flail whirled by and plowed into the orc. Normally he’d have bounced off the huge monster’s bloated belly, but this time he lifted the monster right up off its feet and charged into the crowd, crushing its body into a corpse with his bear hug and then he threw it upon the gaping hobbos, reeled back, and caught sight of the dropped weapon.
The blue fire had healed his left arm just enough.
Strength compensated for the weakness.
“Yes,” he hissed, and snatched up the haft. It was nearly too wide for him to close his hands around, but his Strength of 20 removed that problem and he began swinging it about himself, the barrel-sized flail head dragging around him across the floor and then lifting up as Harald’s whole body swayed from side to side.
Someone was screaming hoarse, panicked commands in hobgoblin to no avail.
The huge flail rose to chest height and Harald waded into the remaining hobgoblins.
Swords, arms, chests, bodies were swept aside, threshed like grain, and blood misted the air, spattered Harald’s face, hot and coppery. Harald kept swinging the staff whose entire length now was flexing as it sought to keep the massive chain from shattering it in half.
Each body that Harald threshed felt like a minor resistance, but between the weight of the flail head and his own Strength nothing could stop its path, and the hobbos died and died and died.
An arrow sank into Harald’s shoulder, causing his left arm to go weak. He lost his grip on the staff, which went out long, held now only by his right hand and between staff and arm and chain it extended some twenty feet.
Harald leaned all the way back, rotating on his heels as he went around and around, the flail taking out tent poles, crates, tables, hobgoblins, lifting bodies from the ground and hurling them away.
There.
A white hobgoblin.
Gaping, horrified, blade at a prone woman’s neck.
Harald screamed as he fought to keep his bloody grip on the haft and at the last second released it and the haft and chain and flail head flew through the air to slam cross-wise into the pallid hobgoblin’s neck, lifting him right off his feet.
Gasping, near blinded by blood, Harald reeled around, seeking new prey.
There. Clustered at the edge of the courtyard, five hobgoblins remained pressed against the wall, shields and blades raised, eyes wide in horror.
Harald screamed and charged them, snatching up a fallen bench as he went with one hand as the hobbos screamed right back, a sound of pure panic, but then a cannister arrow missed Harald by a foot, hit the flagstones a few yards to his side and exploded, lifting Harald again off his feet and throwing him away.
He hit the ground, rolled, lay there blinking, head ringing, but the Helm of Wrath gave him no surcease, allowed him no respite, so he clawed his way back up to standing and saw both Goldchops finish the job, flying through the group of five and eviscerating their prey.
Who next?
Feral, bestial, drenched in gore, Harald swung around. There, on the steps, a human woman, a male, a dwarf.
Prey.
But he looked up, instinct guiding him, and saw the eerie goblin leaning right out the tower window and aiming another cannister at him.
Harald grinned up at the monster who blanched and drew back, for some reason discomfited by the sight.
Harald ran through the tower entrance and tore up the stairs. No furniture, nothing but empty rooms stacked atop each other. Panting, spitting blood, he sprinted up to the second floor, then burst out into the third.
The goblinoid was ready, arrow nocked, and loosed just as Harald came racing out the archway.
But Harald was ready, too, and dropped onto his back at full speed, slamming down, helm clanging against the flagstones as his head bounced and the cannister flew past him to destroy the back of the stairwell.
Flames burst out from behind him as Harald leaped to his feet. His body reeled, barely acceding to his demands, and then he saw the goblinoid and that was all that mattered. He screamed and sprinted at the monster, who cast aside his bow and drew a great curved knife.
Harald ducked the swing, wrapped an arm around the monster’s waist and drove him out the window, both of them bursting out into the air above the gore-soaked courtyard below.
The goblinoid screamed, Harald laughed, and they plunged down toward the last remaining tent to smash through it and hit the ground and then everything went dark.
Comments
SAB
Badass chapter. Recommended background while reading: https://youtu.be/N-r8JDJ_CMs?si=uZJeQ-ahj6S-OUGD
Fleetpanda
Amazing chapters! Noticed: ‘Veogrim the Red, who was deposed by his cousin, Anvorg’. From the story Veogrim deposed Anvorg, not the other way around. I’m willing to bet he leveled. Wonder what he got this time
Hailhound
Last chapter was awesome, in the biblical sense of the world, but in some ways I liked this chapter even more. A scene like that deserved some serious processing afterward, and all the characters just shrugging it off would have been cheap.
Lorenz
Wow this story just keeps getting better. Can’t wait to see the progress killing all those hobgoblins does for Harald’s stats. Good stuff Phil!
E
Loving this. I know you said you might bump it up to 3 chapters a week. Still planning on it?
Taylor
He had better wake up to a serious list of stat upgrades after that
ShivaMcTimber
TYFTC! The demon seed must be positively smug right now.
Acoga
This story is so good. I wonder if Harald leveled?
Dual.
Damn nice chap, tftc
Fast Lance
That was intense, wow
