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

by David Burke

  The queen simply nodded without saying anything more. Kyle turned and nodded at his team, looking at Skrug as he jumped down from the wall, and started running towards the site of the duel. He leapt in a single bound across the fifty-foot rip in the ground left from Kyle’s attack the day before.

  When he reached the designated spot, there was a throne of bones set up and the necromancer sitting on it. The team watched from the wall. Each of them extended their senses as far as they could to take in everything. Gilthan even leapt up into the air to fly high overhead to keep an eye out for sneak attacks from vampires.

  The necromancer sneered and said, “Last chance to give me what is mine.”

  Kyle bared his teeth and growled at the much smaller man.

  “Oh well, I had hoped for something more enlightening than a grunt from a supposed god. It will be just as well that you are put down.”

  Then the necromancer raised his hand and spears of bone flew from his fingertips. Each one reached six feet in length before they were cut down by Kyle. He swung a long-handled axe which gleamed with magical power. Then it went back and forth like that. The necromancer summoned undead monstrosities. He blasted waves of decay or rays of necrotic energy.

  Kyle allowed the necrotic energy to strike him and didn’t seem to be hurt by it. The decay was matched by his own regeneration and he proved more than able to handle it. When a massive skeleton compiled from the bones of fallen trolls was summoned up from the ground, Kyle growled again.

  The skeleton swung jagged claws at his head, but Kyle pushed off his back foot and slammed an armored shoulder into the creature’s bony chest. Then followed up with a blow from his axe. It sheared an arm away, but a wave of the necromancer’s hand reattached the appendage.

  They went back and forth like that for a while. Kyle was far too fast for the troll skeleton to strike him. Equally though, all the wounds which Kyle caused were repaired by almost as quickly as they were made by the necromancer’s power. Throughout it all, Kyle kicked, punched, head-butted, and swung his axe, but never called upon his essence other than to strengthen his body.

  The necromancer grew more and more dismissive. “I would have expected more from a so-called god. Didn’t you ever learn how to use that death splinter you stole from me? You are little better than a bar room brawler.”

  If the words bothered Kyle, he gave no sign. Nor did he offer any reply other than another wicked slash with his axe.

  This seemed to frustrate the necromancer all the more. “Fine. He was wrong. You are nothing to fear. Let’s put an end to this charade.”

  The troll skeleton started to fall apart under Kyle’s onslaught, but the necromancer had stopped repairing it. Instead, his hand was held out and suddenly, six warriors erupted up from the ground. Each of them wielded a sickle shaped black sword. They were over seven feet tall with a greenish gray skin and bulging muscles.

  From the wall there were gasps. The word betrayal was uttered more than once. Queen Khepri’s advisor muttered, “I can’t sense them. It’s like they are devoid of essence.”

  The queen glared and the man. “Quiet! This is when things will get good.” Then she looked overhead in the direction of the sea, which was miles away.

  Kyle faced the orc like warriors stoically, but the battle soon became one sided. He was a match in speed for any of them. His strength was great enough to push them back with his blows, but he couldn’t hope to keep up with all of them. The necromancer had stepped back while the six mysterious warriors cut into Kyle.

  Each wound caused by those shimmering black blades seemed to drain some of the life out of him. He managed to take the head off of one of the orcs, who fell to the ground with a black ooze leaking from its now headless body. But going out all for that strike cost him.

  Kyle cried out in pain as his hamstring was severed and he collapsed to his knees. Another hooked blade caught him in the shoulder and nearly removed an arm. A final one cut his throat wide open. He fell backwards as green blood pumped out of his throat.

  In the distance and far overhead, a roar like thunder sounded. A single word could be heard in it, “Nooooo.”

  Then the air shifted around them as a massive body hurtled through the sky diving for the scene of the battle. All the warriors upon the wall were silent and trembling, unsure what was happening. The zombie army was beating their weapons together with a clacking sound at the apparent victory of their master, who, in turn, was laughing manically.

  Most everyone, including Queen Khepri and Lash, looked up to find the source of the roar. Whatever Khepri saw made her eyes wide for a moment, then she looked back at Skrug, who stood near her on the wall. Lash gasped and said, “Skylar.”

  That one word was enough to cause Skrug to look up into the sky. He had likely been the only one fixated on watching Kyle. His eyes had never left that battle, and the stone of the wall under his feet had started to show signs of cracking from how hard he was pushing his feet down into it.

  Then they all saw a massive black scaled dragon descend from the clouds. Great gouts of flame shout out of her mouth and the orc-like creatures were forced back from Kyle’s bleeding form. The dragon’s front claws were extended, and she grabbed onto Kyle as gently as she could without completely losing the momentum of her dive. Then she was beating her wings, causing a dust storm beneath her as she pulled up from the ground.

  “Don’t worry, master. I have you.”

  During all the chaos, Skrug leapt through the air. He flew like a rocket propelled at the creatures who had just struck Kyle down. When he landed in their midst, it was with titanic force. The dust storm had kept the creatures from seeing Skrug’s approach. This Skrug was a different one, though. He rode the wave of broken earth caused by his impact.

  A great axe appeared in his hands and cut another of the creatures in half. While He called upon the earth essence around him and rock exploded up in spears to pierce the remaining orcs. Then, as the dust cleared, the necromancer cried out, “What treachery is this.”

  Skrug snapped back, “You are one to talk. This was supposed to be a duel but when you couldn’t win, you called upon your six allies.”

  “Bah, those were just monsters that I summoned with my essence. Not all of us wave sharpened pieces of metal around. Some of us actually use true power to fight with,” the necromancer replied.

  His eyes were suddenly drawn to the green blood covering the ground where Kyle had fallen. Then he looked back at Skrug again. “Oh, very tricky. You sent a decoy.”

  Skrug’s form shimmered and suddenly, where the massive troll had been, the war god now stood. “It took you long enough to figure it out. I just wanted to see if you were actually going to play fairly. But you couldn’t even beat one of my companions. How are you possibly going to beat a god?”

  “It won’t matter. The void wants you gone more than anything.” Then he pointed over at the six orcs.

  Kyle’s eyes followed them. He wondered if he should call them void-orcs because they were definitely something like void wraiths but given a physical form made from the soil of Verden but stripped of all the vitality of earth essence which had initially run through it. Even now, they were piecing themselves back together. He hadn’t really expected them to be kept down by some rocks.

  The only one that wasn’t moving was the one he had cut in half when he first landed. Of course, that cut had been far more than a physical attack. It had been imbued with the destructive force of his war essence and had shattered whatever connection the void had formed with the orc shell.

  “Maybe. Five of them may be a lot to fight at once, but then again, I am the war god. Either way, you won’t be around to see it.” Then Kyle shouted out, “Take him, but non-lethal.”

  A purple flash followed, and an oval opened in the air behind the necromancer. He couldn’t react fast enough to respond to Kierra’s demi-god reactions. Her space essence gave her already fast movements an unearthly look as though she flickered from one spot
to the next rather than merely crossing the space.

  Kierra’s claws sunk into the man’s shoulders and in an explosion of gore, she ripped off both his arms. Then she cut his throat, but was careful only to sever his vocal cords. Her strikes were so precise and so quick that he didn’t make a sound. Her elbow to his temple cracked his skull, knocking him unconscious. Before he had even hit the ground, she had wrapped his wounds in sky essence to hold the blood inside him. Her alpha wanted him helpless, not dead.

  The five void orcs were all, but they still seemed ready to fight. Kyle drew in all his power and his aura made the air around him ripple like a heat distortion.

  One of the void orcs groaned, “So it is an ascended.”

  Another chimed in, “You mean descended.”

  The third said, “For it has fallen further from the purity of oblivion.”

  Just as the fourth one began to say something, Kyle cut them off. “The choir act is amusing enough, but let’s just get this over with. I still need to go check on my friend that you cut up.”

  Then Kyle shouted upward to no one in particular, “Pay attention.” As the words left his mouth, he was in motion. His body was layered in earth essence for strength and protection while his weapon glowed with a deadly combination of war and justice essence. He struck out at the void wraiths with blows that cut across dimensions.

  The attacks were physical, spiritual, and more, as he assaulted multiple planes of reality in one instant. He had deduced that the void wraiths needed to form some type of connection with existence in order to continue operating on Verden. The one he had fought before had been weak, but he had beaten it. Now he was stronger. This void wraith had split its power into six orc forms. He could only guess why.

  But at the end of the day, he didn’t care. None of them were strong enough for fast enough to avoid his blows. One by one, he chopped them down. Their obsidian swords, which drain essence, hit only his earthen armor while he removed their ability to exist inside his universe.

  As each piece was cut down, the whole became weaker. By the time he struck the last one, it was already starting to fade from view.

  Kierra knelt down. “You are truly great, alpha. I present this one as you asked.” Then she tossed over the incapacitated human.

  “Thank you, but now you need to grab Lash and go save Skrug. That dragon is named Skylar and once she realizes Raina covered Skrug in an illusion to look like me, she may very well eat him. And we want both of them alive and on our team.”

  “Gilthan is already engaged with her to protect Skrug, alpha.”

  Kyle looked up and saw a smaller blue dragon battling the massive black one. If he wasn’t mistaken, Gilthan’s dragon form had grown larger, but he still wasn’t as big as the powerful elder wurm. “No, obey me. She will recognize Lash, but the rest of you will just confuse her.”

  Kierra tilted her head to expose her neck and said, “As you wish, alpha.” Then she teleported away with a flash of purple space essence.

  Kyle looked down at the ruined remains of the necromancer. Once upon a time, he might have felt sympathy for this man. He had striven for greatness, but overreached what he was capable of. He could respect the drive for power, but not when it caused death and suffering to those under Kyle’s protection. Even worse, he had believed the lies of the void. That was the enemy of all.

  So, without mercy, Kyle placed his hand upon the necromancer’s blood covered chest. With a great tug of essence, he pulled out the two death splinters that were inside the man. His body dissolved into dust. He likely had been sustaining his life past its natural duration with essence and, not that it was all pulled out of him, he was returned to the dust he had come from.

  The two splinters tried to fly off, but Kyle wrapped them in his own essence. “No you don’t. You belong to me now.”

  He pulled again, and the splinters merged into him. His world exploded in pain as he tried to integrate both of them at once. He formed connections with other aspects of death. Decay and breakdown was the natural order of this universe. He could respect that now, even if he sought to defy it himself. And death was also a reward for the weary.

  As he bonded the two splinters to himself, he felt himself change. So much of Dod’s power was fighting to remake him. But he knew himself too well now. He was happy for the first time in ways he had never known were missing. The love of good women and friends he was proud to fight by, as well as a world worth fighting for. He was going to remake all of this, and that began now. Kyle knew this was a declaration of war, but he still went forward and made the other two death splinters into parts of himself.

  Chapter 32–A Date with Death

  The pain of forcing the splinters to merge with him was still gnawing at his chest as he felt her appear. Kyle had felt brief tremors for some time, but Dod had always been careful and slow. She used to like to say that she was inevitable and didn’t have to rush. Now, though, she was here for him.

  A part of his mind reached out briefly to see if his companions were okay, and it appeared that they were still confronting Skylar, but he couldn’t focus on that. Dod might be greatly weakened, but she still wore the mantle of the death goddess and had done so for many thousands of years. He would be a fool to take her lightly.

  “That fool claimed you stole from him, when in reality it is my property that you have taken.”

  “You probably shouldn’t have left them lying about then, Dod.”

  “Don’t be smug. You don’t have Krig’s power. He was always arrogant, even before he became a champion. You see, my memories of him go back much further than you can comprehend, but he could back it up. You can not,” Dod said slowly.

  “Perhaps, but you will have to pay to play. If you were confident of my weakness, you would have already attacked me weeks ago.”

  “Bah, I just let you do the work for me. You didn’t expect me to run my own errands, did you?” She asked with a laugh.

  “Pretend all you want. The one thing that you can’t deny is what I just fought. Those were children of the void. So whether you want to say Krig was right or just call me by my new name, you must see the need for us to work together,” Kyle said. He held out the slimmest of hopes that she would listen to reason.

  If he had been Krig, he simply would have attacked her, but she was correct. He was still only controlling about 50% of Krig’s mantle, whereas she was a death goddess in control of her entire mantle. The wounds Krig had caused her and the loss of her scythe weakened her, but he had to assume she was still stronger than he was.

  “Fine, they were children of the void. But a few of them don’t mean anything. Even you were able to defeat the ones you have encountered. We aren’t going to give up the luxuries we have earned for ourselves just because you or Krig, before you were running around screaming that the sky is falling. In fact, I can’t help but wonder if this particular insanity isn’t a flaw of the war mantle, since you inherited both,” Dod said.

  Suddenly, it hit him like a ton of bricks. He knew why this would never work. He knew why the gods would never listen. He still had to extend the offer, but each of them was going to slap his hand back. They had ceased being cultivators.

  Cultivators were those who strove to better themselves. The other gods believed that, upon ascending to divine status, they had reached the pinnacle. They believed there was nothing more to do, so they stopped striving. Oh sure, they were powerful. And sure, they could still channel the surrounding energy, but cultivation was not just about moving energy from one spot to another. It was about growing.

  “If you will work with me to convince the other gods of this threat, I will return your splinters to you,” Kyle said.

  “Bah, you can’t bargain with…” Dod began.

  But as soon as she rejected his offer, Kyle moved. He knew this from baseball, and Krig knew it from war. Every level of him knew that hesitation was death and victory came to the decisive. So he attacked. It was what Krig had done during his last b
attle in Dod’s realm, the abyss. She still hadn’t learned the lesson, though.

  His axe shifted into a spear. His mind and he rammed it into her center. The two of them locked hands and their wills began to battle one another. Pulses of power exploded out of them. The air around them burst into flame and the ground was ripped around. Cascading waves of power erupted out, each one traveling further than the one before them.

  Kyle was oblivious to the damage they were causing around them. He didn’t see as the lich and vampire officers began to pull the undead army back. Nor did he notice when Queen Khepri ordered an evacuation of Nargossa.

  Minute by minute, the battle continued on. Each wave of destruction scoured another few meters and soon the destruction was nearing the walls of the city. Still, Kyle was unaware. His entire focus was required for this battle, and he was still losing. She was cold and implacable. She was a foe who fought with the inevitability of death. She never rushed, she never pushed too fast, but slowly ate away at his power.