Beo acted first. He was trapped against the wall sitting down. From his legs began to grow a density of energy crystals. With two solid kicks, the crystals shot out like vicious tendrils mounted to the ground — they ran as a sheering force towards the sorcerers.
The large man took the hit directly; his leg was only slightly wounded. The woman lifted herself three feet in the air with levitation and missed the blow.
Eravan sent out a bullet of fire at the woman, a flow of heat so pointed and narrow that was easily dodged. But the stream of fire spread out vertically like a fan, and that fan sent out small missiles of heat and light.
The large man raised his arm before the woman who was being scorched. His arms put out an air-rattling pressure, and the flame field was swallowed by the air itself.
The large man did not wait. He turned and chose a mage to charge. He ran incredibly fast and slid across the ground with every step he landed. In a mere second, he was lifting Kanos into the air by the clothing on his chest.
Kanos reeled back the blade of Anoak and slashed it down with all his strength. The blade lurched into the large man’s arm; its metal edge embedded halfway through and rested on the bone itself.
The large man’s eyes reeled. He did not expect such a hit. His arm could neither release Kanos or do much else.
Kanos pulled his blade loose. The large man raised his other hand and sent loose a burst of energy strong enough to remove a head.
Kanos swung the blade of Anoak so hard it struck the man’s other wrist and sheered his massive fist right off.
Beo howled, “Well, there goes your game, big guy.” He saw the woman fleeing but sent loose a rage of crystalized energy toward her back. The woman’s head turned around its axis and stared at Beo as his energy shredded the flesh and bone of her spine.
The woman was suspended in the air by the frozen energy. It looked a spectacle. The large man turned his head and wept, but he could not heave, as Kanos sent his blade into the depth of the man’s lower throat.
Finally, the large hand let go. As Kanos fell to his feet, the blade withdrew, and the large man died standing up, his massive body locked, somehow, with no need to fall.
Eravan stood amazed at what unfolded. Kanos said, “We are at the right place. Those two beasts were involved with the death of my kin.”
“How do you know,” said Eravan.
“I am released more and more with every one of them I kill.”
The three men ran to the back room of the café. They found an empty room.
“They have told the others,” said Beo.
The three men planned to flee the city. “We are simply outmatched in such a place,” said Eravan.
Kanos found it difficult to let go, “I feel them near, and there are so few left.”
The men paused and could not determine a way forward. Kanos said to them both, “I have no need to leave here with my life. I am on a one-way road to get my vengeance. I will have their blood tonight.”
19.
The Provang Province had seen much conflict, especially in recent times. It was a massive wooden city under remote governance of a neighboring land. Magic was deep-set already, and there were magi of many kinds lurking about. Some with no affiliation or allegiance. Some who were neither mage or sorcerer. But, Provang had its share of beasts.
Kanos, Eravan, and Beo understood the terrible odds and felt they had to leave the building quickly. They opened a double doorway that seemed to lead outside. The doors they opened were the wrong choice.
The building was being surrounded by tall, slim beasts on the lower floor. The beasts had vague faces and strong, taut limbs.
The mages assumed no way was clear. They began to slaughter everything they saw. The conjured beasts were fierce, quite capable of slaying mages. Their long, pale faces looked hungry. Eravan spread out a half acre of fire, and the beasts succumbed to the scorching melt.
Beo found it easy to take heads with tiers of crystals. He sent out neck-high razors of crystalline force and the dumb beasts walked into their destruction.
Kanos swung his blade high and wide. He slaughtered creatures one by one and, with some added effort, two by two.
The three mages made pudding out of a seemingly endless crowd.
Eravan yelled out, “We must isolate the conjurer. We must find the stronghold of the cult.”
When the pale creatures were nearly extinguished, short squat black creatures began to follow. These creatures took fire more readily, but Beo’s crystals cracked their deep blue shells. Kanos caught sight of people on the rooftops of nearby buildings. He shaved his way through the beasts and found a solid building side. With five quick holds on window frames and beams, he was up on the roof. With seven steps, he was upon the conjurer who was surrounded by five other magi.
As Kanos swung the blade of Anoak, he sensed the conjurer’s defense was weak. His own energy felt the air around the five magi. Kanos realized they were immature adepts and could pose no threat. He swung his blade so wide it sheered the conjurer’s screaming head. With another swing, two magi went down squealing with pain. Another swing took the leg off another.
Kanos grabbed the two remaining magi by their robes and threw them off the roof. His rage was fuming. The magi tried to rise up on their broken legs to run. As they ran, the three mages followed.
Down the street, around the bend, the shattered magi clamored, leaning on building walls. Eravan shot horrible arches of fire to motivate the magi forward. Kanos ran from one roof to the next as his powerful energy let him leap across the roof gaps.
Among a darkening town, the mages were being led to a five-story building, the one building that was well lit from every window.
The two limping magi screamed and cried as they made it to the doorway. They pounded on the wooden door, which opened by itself.
The three mages slowly approached the open doorway. The warm yellow light flowed out into the street, an invitation that could not be ignored.
Beo hollered to the mages, “They know we’re here.” Eravan agreed. For an instant, Kanos stared at both men directly. He nodded and turned straight toward the door. He plodded in one determined step at a time.
With every step, Kanos knew his death was near.
Eravan remained at the entry door and began to pour his magic toward the building walls directly. An ancient chant rolled loosely from his tongue, “Ayo Brikna Ayo Nya, Avo Nya Tamania.” His staff was suspended in air and leaned at a 45-degree angle, pointed at the building’s walls. Eravan was flowing massive amounts of energy towards the walls to try to break the protection spells.
Kanos cleared the first floor and watched the broken-legged magi drag themselves up the stairs crying. Eravan was outside still, his whole body lifted off the ground a full foot, and his body was leaning in a 45-degree angle beside his floating staff — the torrent of energy was deep and protruding. Great subtle spirals of orange light could be seen phasing in and out as Eravan chanted and used his life force to combat the spell weaved by a dozen magi. His voice grew deep and cutting, and an echo began to sheer the air.
Beo had no move left but to follow Kanos in the door. As fierce as he was, he realized he was following a suicidal man into a battle of unknown magnitude.
Kanos tread up the stairs one by one, knowing a blast would strike him at any moment. Seeing the struggling magi crawling up the stairs made him resolute and hungry, as each twang of their pain struck against a string of his own suffering.
Beo realized Kanos would need an extreme amount of help. He followed but with distance between them, so they would not be struck down with the same attack.
Kanos plodded up the stairs to the second floor, and the two busted magi found their servant friends. There were a dozen weak magi with eyes wide open; they gathered in the main room. The busted magi clamored among them and stopped moving. They all began to beg for their lives.
Kanos yelled out with a voice too full to be human, “Where is your master? Why
don’t you slaves go upstairs?”
The magi cried and moaned, not knowing their future. One woman yelled out, “We don’t go upstairs; the punishment is death.”
Kanos’ eyes lit up — the darkness within them shined with a yellow light. “What lay up there?” He loomed over the cowering magi.
A magus said, “I’m… I’m more afraid of them than you. That’s how bad it is.”
Kanos swung his blade across the crowd, and half the magi spurted blood. The other half shirked in horror. Another swing of the blade put fatal wounds across all the others. He turned toward the next staircase and left behind a terrible pile of bloody fallen magi that squirmed and squealed.
Beo could not believe what he just saw. The efficiency and bloodlust of Kanos in battle was more than any warrior of sword and shield was ever proclaimed to have. He realized it would take a swordsman twenty hits to do what Kanos did in two strikes.
Beo didn’t know what dying magi where capable of, so he sent a flow of crystals that simply mauled their squirming mass into irreversible damage.
Kanos plod up the stairs to the third floor. There was a beast of burden waiting, a fat wide demon with a mouth hung open so large it could eat a table. Beo was behind him, and the two mages prepared to fight the abominable beast.
The creature was of dim violet skin, and its golden eyes were shifty and terrifying.
Kanos began to charge, but Beo was wary. He sent out a screaming spire of crystals that grew like an endless javelin. It pierced the beast quite easily, but the creature seemed not to mind. Its open mouth expanded even further, and its entire body pushed forward like a tunnel cleaner pushing through the room.
Kanos realized the beast was created to devour things. He looked behind him and saw they were enclosed by a wall of stone that took the place of the open stairway. There was a spell in place to close them in the room.
The large beast moved forward steadily, and Beo continued to shoot spires of crystalized energy. The beast was impaled by half a dozen spires, then a half dozen more. Kanos stood firm, unsure of what attack should follow.
Beo sent out a net of crystals that unfurled against the ground and redirected above — so there was a tongue of crystals that impeded the beast by pressing up against the roof of its gaping mouth.
Kanos surged with direction. He ran across Beo’s crystals and slammed into the unfurled tongue. The beast could not close its mouth but, with great pressure, challenged the crystal growth.
Beo sent out spires that exploded the eyes of the beast, one by one.
Kanos used the blade of Anoak like a sickening device of slaughter.
He brutally traced the inside of the creature’s mouth, and with severe strength, he sawed at the flesh. In ten seconds, Kanos worked the whole circumference of the demon’s mouth. The entire lip and jaw and all the teeth sloped off the beast, as a ring of mouthy flesh flopped hard against the ground.
The beast was subjugated and brought to stillness. It’s body barely pulsed. Its quivering flesh moved not by life, but by what magic remained. They saw the creature was not a conjured beast at all and knew it was a demon of Avios.
Kanos yelled, “These spellbinders work with demons.”
Beo nodded, “Can we handle more?”
Kanos yelled, “I will take them all.”
Beo understood his deep unshaken will. He sent upward a violent spire of widely curling crystals that burst through the ceiling and unleashed an opening to the fourth building floor.
Kanos leapt up and grabbed the severed beams. He pulled himself up into the room above. He saw a vastly sprawling snare of sticky black substance. Kanos looked at this film and knew something bad was about to happen. He yelled at Beo to stay down.
Beo saw the mass around the room that Kanos stood in. He didn’t know what magic made such stuff.
Kanos held his breath as the elastic goo sheered itself from the walls and slapped around his whole body. He was under attack by a sorcerer’s trap.
The blade of Anoak sheered through the black material. The material quickly mended, refilling each void cut.
Beo saw that Kanos would be suffocated as he hung from the ceiling like an oily black cocoon. From below Beo’s feet, his crystals grew — Beo sent himself upward through the fourth-floor hole. He saw the sorcerer with bright red hair; his long blue cloak flowed as he maintained his spell that flailed around Kanos.
The sorcerer sent out a black boom of energy that seemed to suck the light out of the air. The energy moved toward Beo and shattered the crystals from below his feet.
As Beo fell, he shot a spire of crystalized energy that impaled and anchored to the outer wall of the building. Beo pulled himself up his own crystals with his own hands.
The sorcerer let loose another dark boom of energy. Beo laughed desperately as he threw out a sweeping fan of crystals that thudded against the strike.
Kanos had a moment to cut free his other hand. He reached out and yanked Beo up to his feet. Beo sunk in with everything he had and hissed, “ Beyo Ess Mioaaaah,” as he leaned forward and sent out both arms at once. A screaming spiral of crystals pounded the sorcerer so hard his long red hair was sheered, as was the flesh from his chest, face, and arms.
Kanos felt the snare around him weaken, and he leaped across the hole in the floor and with a staggered step, managed to keep his feet. As he met the sorcerer, he raised the blade of Anoak and sent it straight down into the top of his skull. The loud sound ‘SHHHHNNNK’ was all that could be heard as the sorcerer’s brain made its last thought, swept in total fear — the life faded from his eyes.
Kanos firmly shook the blade, and the sorcerer slid slowly down; his body lifeless fell onto the feet of Kanos.
Kanos looked to Beo and pointed up. Beo sent loose an upward explosion of crystals, and the fifth floor was violently pierced with the sound of a crashing explosion. The beam and rafter began to collapse. As the two prepared to ascend, they saw the smoke rising at once.
Without a word, Kanos and Beo knew that Eravan had broken the spell on the wooden building walls. He ignited the whole lower floor of the building, giving the cultists a short timer.
As Eravan was down below, still at the front door, his arms waved into such broad motions, and voluminous mountains of flame spread with every wave. There were people watching from afar, but no one in the Provang dared to step toward a full attack against a well-known cult. To the onlookers, it appeared that Eravan took on the spellbinders all by himself. The people merely watched as the rolling flames converted a feared house of magic into a demon sepulcher.
Kanos and Beo knew that forward movement led a more fearsome battle. Whatever lay in the floor above would either flee or fight to the brutal death.
Beo sent a spire of crystals upward, which Kanos grabbed and climbed in just a few swift motions.
The fifth floor was a single massive room. Kanos saw an alter against the far wall. Behind the alter was a wide-bodied demon that stood as a man would stand. It wore a white robe with a single red stripe down the middle. The beast had graying hair and a mouth two feet wide. It gazed at Kanos much like a man would gaze.
Beside the beast were others: a swordsman, a woman with a spear, and man wrapped in black from head to toe, and another beastly looking man who clearly was a sorcerer.
Kanos realized the cult was driven by demons — he wondered if the beast could have been a man long ago. The sorcerer that stood beside him might have been a spellbinder powered by the demon man. Kanos stepped forward as Beo raised himself up as well.
Kanos’ eyes were primal as he yelled, “I have come to slay you all.”
The beast laughed, and its voice echoed loudly, powered deeper than a human could speak.
It sent out a bellowing sound, and the sound moved through the air like a spell — the energy was sickening, and it shook Kanos to the core as each wave hit.
Beo raised a shield of energy around them both. It took much power as it was not his strength. The effects of
the demon’s voice could not reach them any longer.
The warriors around the alter took off running. The swordsman arrived first, and he swung a dark gray, longsword at Kanos.
Kanos didn’t have to think when he swung his dagger and diverted the sword. The swordsman’s charge ran stupidly forward. Kanos stuck his arm out and caught him with an unwavering choke.
Kanos squeezed and turned the man sideways against the ground as he threw the swordsman down. Beo sent out a needle-like spire that pierced the man’s brain and left him twitching in death.
The woman with the spear was too smart to make a blind charge. She swung the spear meticulously, and Kanos met each attempt to pierce with his own blade.
The woman took on the motive of a fierce warrior. Kanos did not feel she was a battlemage like he was. She did not have the same exaction and power, yet she was an incredible warrior. Her narrowed eyes caught every move.
The man in black charged slowly from the right, and Beo directed his needles in that direction.
The woman with the spear was proving an ample match. Every time Kanos got close to overtaking her, she seemed to rebound with excessive might.
Kanos looked up in an instant and saw the sorcerer standing near the demon. The sorcerer was pushing out magic. The magic was bound to the woman.
Kanos saw the sorcerer was infusing the woman somehow. Each push of magic made her veracity surge — but there were limits and pauses.
Kanos endured the onslaught for a minute longer.
The man in black was impossible to hit. Beo reached his limit with needle attempts. He began to draw deeper pulls to send out new origin crystals. He was shaking the air violently around the man in black. He was also forced to shift energy from his own shield.
The man in black waited for that very moment, and with two steps was upon Beo, sending out open-hand palm attacks. The attacks were as strong as the punch of three men at once. Beo took a pounding against his ribs.
Kanos’ quick read of the woman was clear. She hit a lull of supercharged energy, and Kanos lunged out his blade. The woman easily dodged the lunge. Kanos pulled back his blade with all his might and caught the barb of the spearhead. The spear was yanked straight out of the woman’s hands. Kanos moved in around her and pulled his arm around her head. He stared in the eyes of the sorcerer who gave her power. Then he leaned over hard and used his own chin and arm to snap the woman’s neck.
Mages of Avios 2. Battlemage Page 6
