“Ciara, Earthman,” the Emperor said. “Give her to me now, or the others die.”
Here at the end, I realized that I was False Champion. A Failed Champion. No matter what decision I made, the Mananymphs would die.
But then the Mana Gem flashed red and I suddenly heard Ciara’s voice whispering inside my thoughts.
Are you sure about this? I asked her silently, in my thoughts.
“Trust me, Earthman,” was the response.
“Alright,” I said, holding up my hands in surrender. “I yield, alright? Just let the Mananymphs go.”
“A wise decision,” the Emperor responded. “I’ll release them as soon as Ciara is back in my possession. Call out to her. Bring her here at once.”
I sighed. “She’s already here,” I said. I got back up on my feet.
The Emperor cocked an eyebrow. “I’d advise against trying to fool me, Earthman,” he said.
I shook my head. “I’m not,” I said. “Ciara wanted to find me another Gaia Gem to defeat you. She didn’t have time to locate one…so she created one.”
He scowled quizzically, but said nothing.
I held up the Soulguard and showed off the glimmering lights of the Mana Gem. “Ciara used her own essence to create this,” I said. “This is the Mana Gem. It’s more powerful than any other Gaia Gem or Gaia Stone. She sacrificed herself to forge this gem. She resides inside of it.”
The Emperor’s face softened, if only slightly. “Ah, you’re telling the truth,” he said. He licked his wrinkled old lips.
I nodded. “Release the Mananymphs and send your darkrealm horde back to hell,” I said. “Then the gem is yours.”
The Emperor considered this for less than a second, then grunted. He snapped his fingers and the darkrealm horde vanished. Of course, I had no confidence that he actually banished them. It was more likely that he simply cast an invisibility spell upon them.
A second later, he released the Mananymphs. He thrust out his hand out, palm outstretched, with a greedy smile on his face. “The gem,” he said.
I held up the Soulguard, staring right into the Emperor’s greedy eyes, then levitated the Mana Gem out of the groove under the knuckles. I sent it through the air, toward his bootleg Soulguard.
He grinned his wicked grin right before he accepted the gem into his fake Soulguard. Clearly, he hadn’t been intending on keeping his word.
If he had it his way, he’d use the Mana Gem to wipe out me, the Mananymphs, and every last trace of the rebellion. Then he’d send his beasts south, to finish off the civilians in Silverton and Homehold.
Yeah, that was what he intended to do.
Me and Ciara had other plans.
When the Mana Gem locked into his gauntlet, his wicked grin widened as he sensed his coming victory.
But that grin didn’t last long.
The moment the gem was locked into the groove, the Emperor’s eyes grew wide in terror. “No!” he shouted, as the rainbow-colored energy from the Mana Gem shot throughout his old, weathered body.
He clawed at the Mana Gem, trying in vain to remove it, but Ciara wouldn’t let him. I shielded my eyes as the Mana Gem consumed his body, inch by painful inch.
“NO!” he shouted again, but now his voice had taken on a dark, otherworldly tone.
His wrinkled face sloughed off, revealing a hideous half-demonic, half-insectoid visage. Tendrils and tentacles and arachnid legs burst out of his body and he became a monstrous, writhing lump of pain and hatred.
In his desperation, he tried hacking off his hand, anything to remove the Mana Gem from his body, but it was too late.
Cracks ripped across him, with blinding light spilling out like walking right up to the sun and looking at it with a naked eye.
The Emperor threw back his monstrous, insectoid head and opened his wet, gaping maw to scream, but now, nothing came out.
The light consumed him. When it faded, he was gone, and the Mana Gem fell harmlessly to the ground.
At that, the veil of invisibility magic that he’d cast over the darkrealm horde fell away. The beasts looked on in shock at the smoking, charred patch of grass where their master had stood mere seconds ago.
I drew the Mana Gem back into the Soulguard and turned to the horde. The magic of the Mana Gem rippled and flowed around me as I wielded its power. The horde let up a fearful, monstrous shriek as I clenched the Soulguard into a fist and unleashed a wave of rainbow fire.
They turned to run, but they never had a chance.
The glimmering multicolored wave of fire roared across their army, vaporizing every last one of them. Even the demon knights and seraphs fell, as they no longer had a link to the Emperor to bolster their strength.
However, when the last trace of the darkrealm horde vanished in the rainbow fire, I saw that the war wasn’t over quite yet. They were emerging from the northern road just as the smoke cleared. Thousands of them, with that many more on the road behind them.
The first advance force of the Imperial Legion loyalists had arrived.
Pandora appeared next to me. “We can take them,” she growled.
I glared at the loyalists, falling into formation several hundred yards to the north. “I know we will,” I said. I smiled. “But we won’t have to.”
The loyalists held their line in place as I walked toward them. The Mananymphs were walking alongside me. I stared into the loyalists’ awestruck faces as the United Rebel Front marched out behind us. Red-Hands, Silverton and Homehold troops, orcs and elves and forest folk large and small.
A wave of fear shot through the loyalists, even as they began to draw their swords.
I gestured for my friends to halt, then I closed the rest of the distance, with only the Mananymphs along with me.
“Your Emperor is dead,” I shouted to them. “You’re in free territory now. You men are free now. Go home in peace, with no fear of reprisal against your families.
One rat-faced knight stepped to the fore. He scowled at us. “We’re Empire men ‘til the end, ain’t we boys!” he shouted, obviously expecting his men to roar in response.
There was a roar, alright. A roar from our side.
We shouted as family, as a united force. Men and women, orcs and mer from disparate corners of the realm. We shouted as one, and I shouted along with them, holding up the fiery rainbow glow of the Mana Gem upon the Soulguard.
The loyalists tossed their weapons into the grass and fled.
As I watched the loyalists scamper off, the Mananymphs joined me.
Layla came first. She looked back at the charred patch of soil where the Emperor had been vaporized. She grinned, tapped into her green magic, and made a bright patch of flowers sprout over the charred earth.
Esmerelda came to me next. I wasn’t sure where she’d gotten it, but she’d already poured herself a glass of red wine. She laughed and took a drink.
Bella shed her white, illusory seraph armor. Clad now in just her kimono, she giggled as the loyalists fled into the distance.
Sephara was there, gripping her spear in her fists. “I’d have stuck this in the Emperor’s crotch if you’d just given me the chance, idiot Earthman,” she said, giggling, then thrust her spear into the spoil.
Pandora was the last to join us. She kicked off her leather assassin’s outfit, revealing the kimono beneath it. She beat her fairy wings and took off into the sky, flying in loops and circles.
Esmerelda shot off a harmless fire-and-lightning spell that exploded into a wave of fireworks overhead.
Behind us, the United Rebel Front cheered and embraced each other.
Because we’d done it. We’d won.
The war was finally over.
Chapter Thirty
Though the war was over, there were still plenty of headaches waiting for us.
Rather than take any time off after our victory at Woodkeep Village, we headed north, to the former Imperial territories. Most of the commoners were thrilled to see us. Few, if any of the smallfolk had any
love for the Empire, and they were more than happy to hear that the Emperor had died.
Erhoff, who was voted by his Red-Hand soldiers to become the leader of their entire army, had various divisions remain behind in these various cities and towns to keep the peace until new local governments could be formed.
“I’ll send only the most trustworthy of my men to take on this task,” he said. “I won’t risk having any of the corruption that existed under the Imperial Legion.”
When we reached Pearlton, the wealthiest city in the former Empire other than the Imperial City itself, he decided that the city was complex enough to require two interim governors.
To the shock of us all, he chose Robbin and Piper. When the young squires heard this, they just about died from nervousness.
“Surely, Master Erhoff, you’ve made a mistake!” Piper shouted.
“I don’t know about this…” Robbin added.
“Well from what I heard of it, you two young men spent years squiring and serving Duke Gladios, or am I wrong?” Erhoff asked.
I laughed, because now I saw what he was doing.
“Aye, we did,” Robbin said.
“Yes, since we were only lads,” Piper added.
“And Duke Gladios was an honorable man who held the commonfolk close to his heart,” Erhoff said. “In Pearlton, which is wealthy almost beyond measure, there are going to be profiteers and business cutthroats looking to consolidate their wealth. You two will take a division of Red-Hands, along with the wisdom gleaned from Duke Gladios, and make sure no corruption takes root.”
When we finally reached the Imperial City, we got an uproarious applause as we strode through the massive city gates.
The commoners cheered and threw confetti from their windows, showering us as they partied in the streets.
Sir Lucien, who’d come from Homehold to assist me, laughed at the sight. “I always thought the day we’d cross these gates would be a damn bloody one,” the old knight said. “This certainly isn’t how I envisioned it.”
“Aye,” Duke Elfblood, who’d also come along, chimed in. “This war could have been a hell of a lot bloodier.”
Coming down the street behind us was Greenbeard and his contingent of spriggans, fairies, and other forest folk. Our healers tended to the burns Greenbeard suffered during the final battle, and now, he was as healthy as he’d ever been.
Indeed, I thought it was the diversity of my allies that made the commoners in the Imperial City so awestruck. For all of their lives, their former Emperor had hissed at them to be fearful of orcs, wood elves, and forest folk, not to mention anyone who might breathe a word that could be construed as sympathetic to the rebellion.
Of course, there were many Imperial City citizens who would continue to be fearful of the strange alliance that comprised the United Rebel Front, but I didn’t think it would take them too long to come around.
Eventually, we reached the Imperial Castle. It was a sprawling series of fortresses and towers, with some towers so tall that I got a strange sense of vertigo when I looked up at them. With all my lieutenants and Mananymphs at my side, Pandora stood in the middle of us, then instantly teleported us into the Emperor’s throne room at the very top of the tallest spire.
The throne room was beautiful for sure, but the Emperor had been such a wicked bastard that the place actually stunk of ill intent.
Sephara pinched her nostrils shut. “This room needs a good scrubbing,” she scowled.
Pandora grinned. “You’ve got that right,” she said.
Sir Lucien, clad in his impressive silver armor, strode up to the tall staircase that led to the Emperor’s towering throne. Though he didn’t say it, one look in his old, wise eyes let me know precisely what he was thinking.
There was peace in the realm, yeah…but how long would it last? Though the United Rebel Front had routed the Empire, the collapse of the previous regime would give plenty of go-getters and would-be-dictators all the reason they needed to seek power.
Between old Imperial Legion officers and generals who would still hold considerable sway over their men and the various magical entities that populated the realm, there was no question that, with enough time, this realm would turn into a powder keg.
Someone had to take power.
One by one, all my Mananymphs and lieutenants turned toward the throne, and I knew at once that they were all sharing my concerns.
“So,” I said. “Somebody’s going to have to take the big chair.”
Duke Elfblood nodded. “The Emperor’s death will create a huge power vacuum,” she said. “Indeed, I’m sure that, as we speak, various power-players across the realm are scheming and peddling influence.”
Gorrok grunted. “This worries me, as well,” the old orc said. “Though we’ve found friends in the rebellion, the anti-orcish sentiment among much of the realm’s population could endanger my people. I fear that the orc tribes in the south may face new harassment…or perhaps even enslavement. After all, many powerful wizards and mages must have taken notice about the advantages the Necromancer’s forces had when my people remained under his control.”
Pandora frowned as she stared up at the throne. “Aye, and I’m sure there are plenty of villains and cutthroats in the realm who’d love to claim a Mananymph for their own, just as the Emperor and the Necromancer had in the past.”
Sir Lucien nodded in agreement. “Plus, our good friend Erhoff was right when he mentioned the moneyed classes that are no doubt scheming to seize power,” the old knight said. “After all, the wealthy nobility were the most loyal of all the Emperor’s citizens. I fear many of them will be hostile to the new government.”
“And I’m sure the wealthy city folk will have no trouble buying loyalty and influence,” Layla said. “That’s one part of city life that I haven’t missed.”
“I hate to say it, but I don’t disagree with a thing any of you have said,” I said as I looked at the huge empty chair looming above me. “Back where I’m from, people vote for their leaders, but I don’t know if this realm is ready for that just yet. While I’d prefer to make this realm a democracy, for now, at least, we need someone strong and fair to rule over this new kingdom.”
At that, Pandora looked back at me and smiled. Sephara did the same. The rest of the Mananymphs followed suit, along with my lieutenants.
“No,” I said.
Duke Elfblood went to the window in the throne room that overlooked the streets below. “Listen to the people, Gamelord,” she said, then threw the window open.
Far down below, in the crowded streets packed with people cheering and partying, the commoners were chanting my name.
“They want you to lead them, idiot Earthman,” Sephara said, then rolled her eyes sarcastically. “Though I can’t imagine why…”
*****
I was standing in a dressing room down in the bowels of the castle. Back when the Emperor was still alive, I heard rumors that he’d spend hours back here, making his makeup artists break their backs trying to make him look young or fashionable.
When those very same artists – who’d hated the Emperor, I learned – tried to do the same with me, I merely waved them off.
“I don’t need makeup,” I grumbled.
They offered me a beautiful – and very expensive – robe woven from gold and silver to go along with the new crown they tried putting on my head.
“Nope and nope,” I said.
“But you’re our new Emperor-to-be!” the head makeup artist said.
“Yeah, so melt that shit down, sell off all the jewels, and use it to pay for a party for all the poor and working-class people in the city,” I said. “Because this Earthman ain’t about that ostentatious life.”
“As you command, your grace,” she said.
“And don’t call me ‘your grace’ either,” I said. “Earthman is fine.”
She walked off giggling with the rest of the makeup artists. I saw Pandora standing in the doorway behind me.
“What’s wrong, Earthman?” she asked. “After all the battles you’ve won, after all the creatures and wicked beasts that you’ve slayed, are you actually intimidated by this?”
I laughed. “It’s not that I’m intimidated. It’s that this just isn’t my style.”
Sir Lucien appeared next to Pandora, just in time to hear that last part. “You’ll get comfortable with the role, Earthman, just as I did in Homehold,” he said. “Cheers to the new Emperor!” Sir Lucien said, then downed a goblet of wine and left us alone.
Pandora smiled as she watched the old knight walk away, smiling from ear to ear. “He’s done a fantastic job in Homehold, from what I’ve heard.”
“Yeah?” I asked.
She nodded. “I hear the people there couldn’t be happier,” she said. “They say he’s as wise, as just, and as amicable as Duke Gladios had been.”
“Hm,” I said, then scratched my chin.
*****
I’ll skip the boring parts. There was a coronation ceremony. The entire city came out. Bella even conjured up a bunch of her eagles and projected visions of the proceedings to all the cities in the former Empire.
Speaking of which, one of my first duties was to figure out what the hell we were going to call this kingdom now. “Fuck it,” I shrugged as I sat awkwardly atop my throne. “Tell the commoners to submit suggestions, then we’ll have them vote on it.”
The Mananymphs were by my side for the entire ceremony, all of them looking beautiful as always. However, they all looked just as bored as I did, Pandora most of all.
“These royalty parties are tiresome affairs,” she whispered.
“Tell me about it,” I answered. “I’m fucking dying for a drink.”
Of course, I’d only have to suffer the mind-numbing duties of being a political leader for a short time, because as always, I had a plan in mind.
When the whole shebang was over and I was sitting back in my throne room with my lieutenants and various political advisors, I hushed the small crowd with a simple wave of my armored fist.
As I did this, the Mana Gem pulsed excitedly with Ciara’s red aura. Now that we practically shared a soul, she knew precisely what I was planning to do.
Monstergirl Quest Book Three Page 23
