"Remember Pemberton. Get the hell out of there if you need to. Abandon the position and retreat. You're too valuable to end up on a spit."
"I appreciate the sentiment, Captain, and I assure you that I do not intend to get spitted."
I held out my hand to him, and he hesitated before clasping mine. "I hope you have a grixy vacation, Imp."
"Thank you, Captain. I do hope that I don't get one."
With that, he waddled over to the table and took his seat. I looked back at Mum and shook my head. "Mum, c'mon, man. There's nothing in there that's going to help at this hour. Just put it away."
"Thank you, Master, but I know my expertise and my role in this battle. Until one of you needs to be dragged away, I'm going to keep reading. I'm sure there's something here that can help. I wrote the damn thing, I should know."
In my gang, I learned that different men prepare for fights differently. The toughest bastard that I knew, a guy so tough he had the club's logo tattooed on the white of his eye, would have to pee a dozen times on our way into a fight. He got stabbed in the back one time and didn't realize the knife was still there until he got home and tried to take off his shirt. Mum was a reader.
I nodded to Elanthe, who was furiously rubbing her eyes. Poor thing looked like she'd spent the whole night crying. I went over to speak with her, but Noctura blocked my attempts to approach with her head. Okay, no problem. The mare probably knew better than I what she needed.
I took my position at the center of the bridge. Calista was supposed to stand to my left so that she could act as a weapon on my shield side. I couldn't understand where she'd gone, given how excited she'd been at this 'athletic challenge'. I started to stew about her absence as I scratched Boots behind the ears, and was downright mad by the time she jogged up next to me.
"What do you think, My Lord?"
I turned and nearly spat acid in her face in the form of a reply until I saw what she'd done.
"Pemberton tried to return it, but I got it back just in time." She pirouetted on one foot and showed off the chainmail bikini, worn over her usual workout clothes. "Elanthe gave me the idea, so I get to wear it, and I still have a full range of motion. Where she got the wide-brimmed hat with the ostrich feather, I have no idea, but if I didn't miss my bet, it fell into the 'accessories' category of the catalog.
Light help me, I wanted to smack her upside the head for making me wait, but in the end, she showed and showed on time. I'm glad her weapon finally arrived overnight as well. A wickedly curved and pointed sword that might look scarier than it actually was, was probably not the best weapon in a knock-down, drag-out fight, but if it could hack off a limb, then she could use whatever she wanted. I prayed that Elanthe would stick to the plan and never draw hers.
I turned back to look at what we were going to face. We were so dead.
* * *
Pemberton sat as still as Krag behind his desk. Krag had moved to sit directly to his left, having switched at some point when nobody was looking. It was a party trick that never got old. At least with Krag there, he knew that his first indication that he was a dead imp wouldn't be when he saw his own headless body flop to the ground.
He knew that his role was performative. He knew it was simply to set up the legal challenges they'd go through in the unlikely event that Chuck both lost and survived. If that happened, then Mum's patchwork of personal protection contracts might yet pull some sort of victory out of this shambles.
It didn't make Vorghammul any less intimidating.
"Ah, Vorghammul the Destroyer. I presume you've brought sufficient gold for the toll. Excellent. I see that your party has grown. I hope you brought sufficient to cover the overage, as well." He began speaking when the demon was still twenty yards away, presuming that to be a sufficient distance to finish his sentence and bolt before a finger could be laid on him.
He was wrong.
Vorghammul had Pemberton lifted by the front of his shirt in the blink of an eye and had his axe reared back, ready to let it taste the imp's neck. But he couldn't. He couldn't because Krag held both his arms fixed in place.
Vorghammul turned and looked at the gargoyle and smiled. "So you decided to wake up, eh? Let's see what you're really made of."
* * *
"Captain! Captain! I found it!" Mum's voice came from behind me, but I ignored it.
The action at the end of the bridge had been so fast that I didn't actually follow what happened. One second, Vorghammul was striding towards Pemberton with violence in his eyes; the next, he was frozen in place, a stone hand locked around each arm. I ran towards the end of the bridge, though I was not sure what I would do when I got there. I stopped in my tracks before I did.
Krag unfolded.
That's the only word for it. What I'd taken for a three-foot statue sitting motionless beside Pemberton's desk began to unfold. Stone wings expanded up and out, emerging from nowhere, pulling themselves into reality like a magician yanking a scarf from his hand. One threw a shadow across my office manager's face from which I swear, I could see the color draining out of his sallow, grey skin. Krag's torso broadened and thickened, rising above two mountains of legs. All accompanied by the sound of grinding granite.
He kept growing.
Thirty feet. Easy. Maybe more. Four arms, each thick as tree trunks, each ending in talons that could gut a horse, unfolded and flexed. His entire body was a wall of carved muscle, every ridge and valley defined in dark grey stone. Cracks ran through him like battle scars, and his eyes—those warm amber eyes—ignited with light that gave the oncoming demons a second shadow. He was a great-grandaddy of a gargoyle. I probably ended up with him because cathedrals kept collapsing under his weight.
The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.
Vorghammul, seven feet of muscle and malice, looked like a child in Krag's grip. What had passed for a smile on his face was replaced by a look of shock. He dropped Pemberton.
The gargoyle's head swiveled down. His blunt snout opened.
The roar that came out shook the earth—it hit me nearly as hard as His Darkness' laugh. I felt it in my chest, in my bones, a sound that promised violence and death. Birds exploded from the trees and fled. I hoped it hadn't shattered the cottages' windows. Godzilla would have been proud.
The demon warband froze mid-charge. A horde of demons, each one a nightmare made flesh, stopped like someone had yanked their strings. Some had weapons raised. Others were mid-stride. All of them locked in place, staring at the thing that used to be a three-foot statue.
Pemberton vanished. One second, he was scrambling backward from his desk; the next, he was just gone. Smart bastard. I hoped he'd enjoy his vacation.
Calista grabbed my shoulder with desperate strength. She clung to my side, her breath coming in sharp gasps, eyes wide as saucers. Liquid splashed across my boots. I glanced down. A puddle spread from where she stood, her legs trembling. I barely had enough presence of mind to avoid doing the same. Krag was brakking terrifying, and he was on my side.
Boots, my hellhound of impeccable breeding, tucked his tail and bolted. Smoke trails marked his retreat back down the road. He didn't even slow down as he passed the cottage, his whimpering audible even over the ringing in my ears from Krag's roar. Tengen watched as he flew by, tail wrapped around her feet as if nothing had happened.
Vorghammul hung in Krag's grip, still as death.
* * *
Henry pressed his cheek against the damp earth, fingers wrapped around Nathaniel's wrist, while Lief breathed too loudly beside them. The underbrush scratched at their faces, but none of them moved. They'd been here since midnight, cramped and cold, waiting. Henry thought himself lucky to witness two battles within a week.
"There." Nathaniel's whisper cut through the dawn. "Movement."
The forest erupted. Demons—actual demons—poured from the treeline like wasps from a kicked hive. Henry counted ten, twenty, thirty before his mind refused the numbers.
"Holy Light preserve us," Lief breathed.
At the bridge, the tiny imp in the suit settled behind his desk like this was business hours. The gargoyle statue stood beside him, motionless stone.
"Why isn't Sir Chuck running? The big one's distracted by the midget. This is his chance to bolt. He's completely outnumbered." Henry couldn't look away from the horde. "By the Light! Did you see how fast that one moved?"
The statue moved. Stone ground against stone as the three-foot guardian became something else—something massive with four arms and wings that blocked the sun.
The roar that followed emptied the three's reserves of courage.
"RUN!" Nathaniel scrambled backward through the brush.
Henry ran, Lief crashing through the undergrowth beside him—all three boys sprinting blind toward the village while behind them something ancient and terrible prepared for war.
* * *
I've seen fights start between two motorcycle clubs. One minute, everything seems fine, then someone shoves someone else, and within seconds, everyone is swinging. This happened faster. When you're fighting monsters with no sense of self-preservation, things get crazy quickly. I hadn't thought about that.
Krag had demons crawling over him like fire ants in seconds. One moment, he was flexing and scaring the grix out of me and everyone else, and the next second, he had demons clinging to his arms, legs, back, wings, and head. It made me think of King Kong swatting at biplanes, until the first demon got past him.
It was an insect-thing, looking somewhat like a brown praying mantis with human-like arms instead of praying mantis arm-thingies. Sue me, I don't know what they're called, and right then I didn't care much. I readied myself to take the charge on my shield and smash him back with my mace. He didn't hit nearly as hard as Gashi, but it was still enough to knock me clean on my ass.
Calista was there, though, and pierced its head with a clean thrust, making it go down for the count. I was stunned to see that she was now wearing a full chainmail shirt and a skirt that reached down to her knees. I guess it turns out that Hell doesn't want its succubi chopped into bits in battle, and the absurd bikini could spontaneously transform into something useful. She grabbed my armor by the collar and hauled me back onto my feet.
"Where'd you learn to do that?"
"Six and a half years of combat training—one two-week mandatory course and seventeen electives. A girl's got to stay in shape, you know?"
I didn't, and I didn't care either, as the next one was on its way. This one was humanoid, though with three legs about two feet long and a torso the same length but somewhat barrel-like. It spun its way towards me as it rotated through its legs and swung its whip-like arms at me with every twist. Those arms skated across my shield with a metal-on-metal ring, and I for damn sure didn't want to find out how much they'd hurt if they hit me. I thrust my shield forward and then spun my body around after it, delivering a backhanded smash with my mace to its body, which was rewarded with an explosion of green goo. He deflated like a balloon as his goo leaked out. Two down.
I looked at the end of the bridge to see five get past Krag simultaneously. I couldn't see him at all anymore; there were so many bodies on top of him. A trident whizzed past my ear reminding me that I didn't have time to help him anyway. I only figured out too late that the trident wasn't meant to hit me as much as get me to move away from Calista. It worked.
* * *
Irina lay on Stefania's sofa, eyes swollen from crying, when heavy footsteps thundered up the porch. The door burst open without a knock.
Father Yaqub stumbled inside, cassock askew, hair standing in wild tufts. Sleep crusted the corners of his eyes.
"Is it true?" His voice cracked. "I got word that Ignatz—"
"Gone." Stefania pressed a cup of tea into Irina's hands. "Peacefully, in his sleep."
Yaqub crossed the room and dropped to his knees beside the sofa. He took Irina's free hand between both of his.
"Such a loss for you." His thumb traced circles over her knuckles. "Such a loss for all of us in Thornwell."
Irina managed a nod. Words stuck in her throat.
"He served the village for decades," Yaqub continued. "Guided us through famine, flood, that terrible winter when the wolves—"
A terrible roar split the morning air.
Not an animal. Not human. Something ancient, massive, and wrong shook the teacups on their saucers and sent Stefania's cat bolting under the bed.
The three of them froze. Irina's tea sloshed over the rim, scalding her fingers.
Stefania moved first, crossing to the window. "That came from the south. The bridge."
No further sounds came from that direction, but flocks of birds shot towards them.
Irina met Yaqub's eyes. The priest had gone pale, but his jaw set firm.
"You'd better go ring the church bell, Yaqub." She pushed herself upright, setting down the cup with steady hands. "You need to alert the town. I can wait."
He rose without argument, already moving toward the door.
"Wait." Stefania caught his sleeve. "Stay at the chapel. I'll send the women and children to you. If the militia fails, your faith will be all they have left to defend them. I pray that your holy ground is strong enough."
"Light, forgive me, I shouldn't have doubted him. I didn't realize…"
"Water under the bridge now, Father. Ring the bell like your life depends on it. All hope isn't yet lost." Stefania released him.
Yaqub ran. He lost a sandal on the way but didn't slow down to recover it.
From her porch, Stefania watched him sprint toward the church, cassock flapping. She imagined she could hear the sounds of yelling on the wind, even as her confused and sleep neighbors began appearing at their front doors.
Ignatz was gone, the demons had in fact come, and only one paladin and his household staff stood between them and Thornwell.
[Psychological] [Cultivation] [Crafting] [Smart MC] [School life]
Synopsis (Click to Expand)
To transcend the heavens, one must first forge the ladder.
He is a Cultivator who values volume over speed.
He is a Chronicler who will not stop at the sky.