War God for Hire- Mercenary: A Reincarnation, Cultivation, Litrpg Adventure

by David Burke

  His first thought was to take her to Nyda for healing, but this wasn’t about healing. If it had been caught sooner, they might have been able to cut out the infected tissue and then simply heal her body. But the corruption had wormed its way all the way down into her essence channels.

  Kyle tried to talk to her, in order to keep her awake while another part of his mind was fighting a desperate battle to pull her back from the brink. He was worried about what would happen if she slipped into unconsciousness. “Why didn’t you wait for me to help you?”

  She coughed up some blood, and a wad of black phlegm came up with it. “I wanted to protect these people.” Each sentence seemed to be a strain for her. “Once I found the monsters, I couldn’t let them escape.”

  “They would only claim more victims,” she gasped.

  “But why these people? What made them so important to protect? Don’t you know how important you are to the entire city? How important you are to me?”

  “It’s because of you.”

  Kyle was taken back by her answer. “What?”

  “When I was a little girl, Krig saved me from the slums. He didn’t have to, but he saw potential in me.”

  She put a hand on top of his. “I know you aren’t Krig…you are so much more.” She smiled. “When I look at you, I see the same drive that he had, but I see that you care about the people, and not just the ones who can become warriors.”

  Another wad of phlegm splattered over their hands, as he held hers above her chest. Her coughing was getting worse, so Kyle said, “Take it easy. Don’t strain too much.”

  But he was the one who was straining. He was straining, and he was losing her. The war god couldn’t lose, but he was losing this battle. The corruption had spread too far into her; her own body was feeding it. She was destroying herself from the inside out.

  That was when a thought occurred to him.

  It was the Life Essence in her mortal body that was destroying her. She was too frail, too corruptible—even after all the enhancements he had made to her body. He scanned himself and saw that his constructed body had destroyed any bit of the corruption which touched him. So that was the answer.

  He would have to make Maire a new body. He focused on her face as he was going to ask her permission, but realized she was already too far gone and had slipped into unconsciousness. Oh well, better to ask forgiveness than permission. He would have to rebuild her.

  Kyle used his Soul Shepherd ability and reached in to gently ease her soul out of its ruined housing. It was frighteningly easy to manipulate her soul—frightening, because of how eager it was to respond to his call. She was one of his chosen and would have ended up on his home plane if she died. But even more than that, with his divine splinter in her body, her soul was as clay in his hands, ready to be molded into whatever he wished.

  Kyle grit his teeth. That was what he swore he’d never become. Free will was too important to him. So, he pulled her soul free of her body without altering it in any way. It was now just a wisp, floating freely in the air above her body. He absentmindedly wondered if she could see her corporeal form laying beneath her now.

  Then, Kyle realized he had another problem. He didn’t want to have to reinsert his divine splinter into a new body. It was too inefficient—she would lose all the hard work they’d put into her mastering it again. But he saw another way.

  He pulled the divine splinter out with his Soul Shepherd skill. It was effectively a piece of his own soul, but as an ascended being, his soul was so much… well, it was so much more, for lack of a better term.

  As both souls were both incorporeal energy, Kyle began to fuse Marie’s being with the divine splinter. It was so obvious; he was surprised he hadn’t thought of this before. This was what made demi-gods different from those who simply ingested a divine splinter.

  There was a greater risk, of course, because their very soul could be destroyed if the splinter was ever taken from them. But it made the bond a permanent one and significantly increased their control over the essence type bound to the splinter.

  Every other time, using his Soul Shepherd skill had always taken a great effort, leaving him exhausted, it now felt easy. The union of divine splinter and Marie’s soul was seamless and together, they became something more. As the process completed, Kyle looked down at her corrupted body and channeled a tight combination of War and Death Essence into it. He watched it disintegrate before his eyes and blow away as dust on the wind.

  Then, from his intimate memory of body, he began to form a new one for her. This would be a constructed body, like his, made of pure essence given form. Kyle cultivated and drew in the surrounding essence to accelerate the creation.

  It was then, that he noticed a disturbance in the essence around them as he drew it in to cultivate. There was a black hole in the flow of energy around him, and there was only one thing he knew of that did that. But he couldn’t stop now, so he pushed as hard as he could—he just hoped it would be enough.

  Inch by inch, he reformed Marie’s body. No longer did she need lungs, or a heart, though he created them so she wouldn’t come to, and freak out. She was a pure construct. He could have made any alterations to her that he wanted at that point. Larger breasts? More junk in the trunk? But no, he wanted her to be just as she was before.

  She would already be far stronger and more durable than a mortal could be. He did, however, create a digestive system for her, just like his own. Eating was still a pleasure—even when you didn’t have to eat to survive. And he made sure she had a fully functioning reproductive tract. Who knew what the future held—he wanted this to give her more options, not to take them away from her.

  Just as he pushed her soul back towards this new body, he felt the essence gathered around him tremble and collapse. He stood up and wasn’t able to make sure that her soul had properly attached to the construct.

  This enemy couldn’t be ignored, though.

  Chapter 27 - Identity

  Shadows pooled until they took form and a creature stood before Kyle. Its rasping voice let out a hiss, “So fascinating.”

  “What is?” Kyle had no interest in speaking with one of these things, but he had to buy Marie more time to awaken.

  “This process of creation… it is so… filthy. Not like the purity of oblivion.”

  “I was only healing her. Your undead minions did quite the number on her,” Kyle replied.

  “Oh, they aren’t my minions. No more than the necromancer and his hordes are minions of my brother, who is with them.”

  That caught Kyle off guard. He’d assumed that this void wraith was the same one Gilthan had seen with the necromancer's army.

  The creature seemed to realize that. “Oh,” it cackled, “you didn’t know that there were more than one of us? There always will be. We are legion. But no, I say they aren’t minions because they are more like tools. An antibiotic which we are using to eradicate the plague of existence.”

  Kyle saw Marie’s hand twitching. It was time to get her out of here.

  The wraith continued, “All the same, it was interesting to see the birth of a new cultivator. You have learned how to make them without them first learning the path themselves. It is fascinating, but has no place in oblivion. Of course, nothing does.”

  Kyle helped Marie stand up. She seemed to be struggling to get her bearings, which made sense given what had just happened to her. “Run back to the guild. I will defeat this enemy and then meet you there. We have a great deal to talk about.”

  He had worried that she would resist, but thankfully, Marie obeyed without question and streaked away.

  “You know there is no place that is safe. Soon this city shall be overrun with the fragments of the broken south and then the army of undead will swallow this place whole. Each battle drains your power but strengthens ours. This is why you cultivators have always been destined to lose. The void is inevitable. Or wait, perhaps you prefer the term ‘god’ now.
Though, from what I can tell, ‘godling’ is more appropriate.”

  “I’m enough of a god to finish you off,” Kyle growled.

  “Perhaps, perhaps not, though it doesn’t matter. Oblivion is the end of all things. Either I shall prevail here and, in the end, rejoin the void, or you shall defeat me and I shall rejoin the void. It is fitting, I suppose, since you were the one who pulled me out of the void.”

  Kyle started to ask for an explanation, but then he realized what it was talking about. He remembered feeling something he hadn’t immediately recognized when he’d pierced the void to send Hilde to her home plane. Words were wasted on a creature like this. Its entire purpose was to break down all that existed.

  The problem was, Kyle remembered all too well how these things fought. They absorbed essence and were almost impossible to affect physically unless you first bound them with essence. Aekor may have been monsters, but these were the monsters behind the monsters. Which left him wondering if he could defeat a void wraith without having attained his full godhood.

  Millions of cultivators had been killed by these creatures when they’d first appeared. Then, on top of that, nearly a thousand champions had died. The void wraiths could only be defeated by groups of champions working together—and even then, it was hit and miss. It was only after ascending to godhood, that the defenders had been able to actually push back the void, if only temporarily.

  But then again, Kyle was more than just an ascended champion, bound to one concept of essence. He made a snap decision. There would be no going back if he did this, but there was also no going back if he fell here. So, he absorbed Hav’s pendant into himself.

  He stripped it of her touch and absorbed the sea essence in it, making it his own. As he did so, he realized what it had been all along. It was one of Hav’s divine splinters. In that moment, he understood just how much she had gambled, seeking to gain control of him. If you gamble, though, you have to be willing to lose.

  Kyle made it his own. Power surged through him again as he took on the status of a demi-god of the sea. Yet even that wasn’t enough. He pushed all his essence together and his aura roared free.

  He immediately felt divine eyes turned towards him. He didn’t have time to sort out who might be paying attention. If this thing was right, then they’d soon have more guests knocking at the door and he needed to return this thing to the void before it summoned any reinforcements.

  The creature’s manifestation in this physical plane surged forward at him. It was fast, but after releasing his aura, Kyle was faster. He might not have fully attained his mantle, but he was using more than half of it now.

  The wraith made a wide, sweeping attack at his head, but Kyle pivoted around it. He channeled War Essence into his weapon as he struck with the pure intent of destruction. For a brief moment, he worried about what there might be that he could destroy.

  The void wraith, by its very nature, was a contradiction. It was the servant of the void, but could nothingness truly exist? How could it claim to be part of nothingness, yet still have its own discrete existence?

  It was that existence which he attacked. As soon as his blade contacted the void wraith, time froze around him. Kyle couldn’t describe exactly what was happening. He wasn’t moving, but the fight raged back and forth between them. A surge of his essence was consumed, but he simply gathered more.

  The titanic forces going back and forth between them could shatter buildings. The overflow started to scorch the surrounding earth. The stone streets began to bubble as excess energy was released as heat, but still, neither of them moved. They were locked in a pocket of reality where time passed differently.

  He heard whispers in his ear. “Join me. You can be my hand as I once offered your kind before. Together, we can bring order to all that exists. Chaos will end and only stillness will remain. You will know power beyond anything you have understood before.”

  Kyle didn’t answer. As much as he wanted to snap off a witty reply, his entire focus was locked in this struggle. He sent spears of earth at it. Wind that could rip flesh from bones cut into it. The blazing light of justice seared it, seeking to judge its unworthiness, and the icy claws of death sought to end it. All of this occurred while he battered the void wraith with the essential properties of war; cutting, bashing, piercing, he blasted all of these at the creature.

  Still, the voice hissed at him. “You cultivate existence but neglect the other side of the coin. What if you could cultivate the void? Matter needs anti-matter, light needs darkness, love needs hate, chaos needs order, and existence needs oblivion. I alone can teach this to you.”

  Kyle fought on, but a seed of doubt sprouted within him. Was there something more that he had missed? Would it be possible for him to cultivate the void? If he could, then he would truly become the greatest of the gods. The void appeared to know it needed him to balance its own oblivion.

  Perhaps he could use this power. His mind reached out to try to fathom the depths of the void. He would need to make a connection with the concept of nothingness if he were going to be learn how to cultivate it.

  The voice cackled again, “Some gifts cannot be seized, fool, only bestowed.”

  That was one thing Kyle just couldn’t accept. He might live or die by his own might, but he’d never one for handouts. Guidance and advice wee one thing, but to be told he had to be given this power? That meant it wasn’t something he believed in.

  His silent refusal was noted, and the power of the void wraith flared.

  Kyle felt as though all the light in the world was draining from his sight. He was being crushed into an infinitesimally small ball. But he fought back. He maintained a clear idea of who he was. His identity was the answer to oblivion.

  But who was he? A man? A god? The god of war?

  He didn’t like any of those terms. He was Kyle. He was himself, and he would wield all the powers of essence. He felt like once again he was glimpsing something far larger than himself, yet he couldn’t quite manage to wrap his brain around it.

  It was a fundamental understanding of reality that he was struggling to understand.

  He simply knew that he wanted to be more than war. He would not sell himself to any one concept. He might have been playing the role of a gladiator, an adventurer, and now a mercenary, but none of those things were him. He wielded the spiritual powers of reality in death and justice, and equally, the powers of the elements. Yet beyond all that, he knew there was more.

  With that, he opened himself up and raw essence like a torrent of burning ice coursed through him and scoured away the void wraith’s hold. The creature shrieked before this power and shriveled up.

  With an anti-climactic pop, it was gone. Gone from Verden. Gone from existence.

  Kyle felt the flow of time rush around him like a river again as the pocket dimension he had been fighting in exploded. But what he saw baffled him. All over the city, there were tents set up. He could hear the moans of the wounded and groups of soldiers in strange uniforms walked up and down the streets. Many of the buildings showed scorch marks or partially collapsed roofs.

  It looked like Nargossa had gone through hell and was now little more than a refugee camp. His senses felt greatly expanded, more than they ever had been before. Thankfully, he was able to identify every part of his team. Kyle soared into the sky and a few seconds later landed in the training grounds behind the guild hall.

  The hall itself showed signs of having been attacked and there were guards all over the place: inside the training grounds, on high walls that had been built up around the complex, even on the roof. The next thing he noticed was that the guild hall itself was about four times as large as he remembered it. It looked like some of the plans he recalled Meeka laying out for their eventual expansion.

  No sooner did he land on the roof, than guards were rushing at him. Spears were thrust at him, and he was impressed by their reaction time, for mortals that is. He almost swept his blade thr
ough all of them, before he realized that they each bore the symbol of the guild, a stylized version of his own hammer, on their breast.

  Instead of harming them, he allowed a small burst of Sky Essence to blast them back. Then, he unleashed his aura, or at least a part of it. The guards all fell to the ground. One of their officers managed to raise his head. “Is that you, M’lord? Have you returned?”

  It took a second, but Kyle finally recognized the man. It was the trainer who he’d nicknamed Moe. But now the man now sported a wicked looking scar across his face.

  “Moe?”

  “Tis I, M’lord. The high priestess insisted you would return, as did all the other Chosen.”

  Kyle could almost hear the capital ‘C’ in chosen. Apparently, something very bizarre had happened during his battle with the void wraith.

  “You say I have returned, but I was here only this morning. I would have come back from the Governor’s mansion sooner, but I had to stop to rescue Marie from a swarm of ghouls,” Kyle said. “Then, I was further detained fighting an ancient enemy.”