Chapter 74
Days without food: 4.
“You know,” Clara said through the mouth of Avvinik as we approached the line of kaiju guarding the smoking entrance to Medina. “If this were real life, some people might consider this the ultimate dick move.”
Rain poured. Lightning crashed across the sky.
I grunted. “If they really think that, then they haven’t been paying attention. I’d like to think I’ve been true to the spirit of the game.”
“Hardly,” Clara said. “How many times have we switched sides now?”
“This game is about healing,” I said. “That’s what we’re doing. You can’t sew a wound closed without putting stitches into both sides.”
Avvinik made a noise that might’ve been a laugh. “That’s some bullshit a grandma would post on Facebook. This game is about giant monsters and chopping people up.”
I snorted. “That too.”
I had hoped that Baal would turn into his secondary form, that of a “fallen angel,” and we could get to Medina much more quickly. But for whatever reason, the game decided a slow, deliberate march from the rift, across the hinterland, and through the forest was the most dramatic way to storm the gates of heaven.
If the demon didn’t hurry his ass up, I’d get to the literal heavenly gates before he would. I didn’t know if my meat body’s water needs were being met. Dehydration would kill me a hell of a lot faster than starvation would. Four days. If my body didn’t have water, my situation was already dire.
Over the past 24 hours, my body was giving me subtle signs that something wasn’t quite right. I would turn my head, and the world would spin. I’d have to blink a few times to stop it. Everything paused for a hair of a second, and then the scene would catch up, reminding me of old-school latency. It had only happened a handful of times, but it had happened twice in the past hour. Clara reported she was having the same issues.
“I don’t see Moritasgus. Or Orthrus,” Clara said. We were in direct control of the Shrill and Avvinik, standing at the edge of the forest, staring at the menacing forms of our former allies.
I couldn’t check their locations while driving, but several hours earlier, Orthrus remained at his respawn area, which wasn’t too far away. Moritasgus had disappeared not long after I’d lost control, and I assumed Jenk had him buried somewhere.
Behind the line of guardians, people streamed out of the city, heading toward the relative safety of Neo-Austin. I knew people were also pouring into Necroshire and a few of the other still-standing towns, such as Yelm. Everything is coming full circle.
Not everyone fled, though. The sundered set everything they had onto the field, including a pair of giant, howitzer-like guns I’d never seen before. Flying attack craft circled above the city. The radiants, who were without a guardian but were otherwise at full strength, marched onto the field, thousands of them armed with glowing staffs and flaming swords that seemed unaffected by the driving rain. A smattering of all the other races took to the field, though it seemed for most of them, their loyalties were torn. Most likely didn’t know what the hell was going on.
We had been forced to kill Colo Colo about an hour earlier. The slug kaiju had gotten herself bogged down in the forest and was inching her way toward Medina when Clara, Banksy, and I caught up to her. According to Clara, the giant guardian was potentially the strongest one if you followed the shade gremlin path. Last season Jenk had played the steam and technology-based race and had been required to build a giant mech to house the otherwise-squishy guardian. With a little bit of work, the slug rat had become an absolute marvel to behold.
But without an active shade gremlin character, Colo Colo was mostly useless. We set upon the floundering kaiju and took her out in only a couple minutes. Clara had popped her massive balloons, I’d ripped off the plates of armor, and Banksy had burrowed into her, splattering blood, guts, and half-formed rat monsters all over the forest. It was the second time in a week the slug had died by being eaten from the inside out. Banksy was now a hair’s breadth from level 50.
I sighed, gazing at the army that spread before us. Every lung-attached mouth in my body blew out a stream of breath. Trees cracked and tumbled over.
I had hoped to do this with minimal violence, but the game gods really seemed committed to making this a spectacle. I sighed again. This time it sounded like a war bellow.
I counted 14 guardians facing us, all spread out upon the still-smoldering battlefield in front of Medina’s gates. The missing kaiju were the aforementioned badger and two-headed wolf, both under Jenk’s control; the Opera, who Clara still controlled; and Paskunji, who still lay dead at the rift.
The rift, incidentally, had closed up and healed the moment Baal and his host of remaining demons had crossed over. Unlike last time, where the healing had created a rocky ridge, the entrance had smashed together and then sunk in. A caldera had formed, slowly filling with molten rock from an unseen source. It hissed and sizzled as the pouring rain pounded onto it.
The lake seemed to be growing, spilling into this world. It was still expanding when we’d marched away. It would have covered Paskunji by now. In time, I suspected the lava would encompass this entire world.
It is truly the end of days.
Baal and his host were currently crashing through the forest behind us, and they’d be here in minutes.
Clara and I hadn’t been idle the past 48 hours. We’d been working non-stop to make sure this gambit worked. Yesterday, I’d risked teleporting into Medina to get to the worm surgeon mausoleum.
The worm surgeon neighborhood was in ruins when I arrived. The entire poor section of the city had turned into a war zone. Most had fled and were hiding outside of the city. The fighters remained. The battle-hardened veterans of the Charnel siege had fortified the block, pushing back against daily attacks from sundered and radiants. They were holding their own, but it was only because the two races hadn’t made a concerted effort to expel them from the city.
I had to run and fight my way to the mausoleum. I’d been forced to activate my Invulnerability, ruining my chance to use it in the coming battle. And even then I’d almost died when a groundling mech broke through a building and grabbed me. I’d jammed my flame thrower under the blast shield and roasted the driver alive before moving on. Bodies littered the streets. Humans fought humans. Demons fought demons. The whole town was pure anarchy.
Once I finally arrived, I told Fiona all that had happened, and I told her my plan.
I was expecting her to react with horror, but she did not.
“What do you want from us?” she had asked.
“Help evacuate the innocent from the city,” I said. “And then take all the fighters you can muster, and meet us at the temple.”
“The temple is in ruins,” she’d said. “I’m pretty sure it was your familiar who trashed it, or don’t you remember?”
“It’s only half ruined,” I said. “Don’t worry, we’ll get the rest tomorrow.”
***
Guardian Epsilon floated directly over the battlefield. Bubilas the wasp kaiju was the only other flying guardian, and she floated right next to him.
Behind me, Baal rumbled. Taurisians and zippers emerged from the trees.
Bubilas buzzed forward, her enormous wings scattering debris across the battlefield. Below her, the radiants struggled to remain in formation. The guardian brought her massive stinger up, and it glowed. A blast of wind shot forth, and the smaller demons scattered back into the woods, being swept away like pawns off a chessboard.
“Ah, shit,” I said.
I was worried about that. Bubilas had just used a special attack, probably her 5-minute strike. Normally, the guardians didn’t use any of their specials unless they were under direct control.
But now that the guardians were our opponents, it appeared the system had removed that restriction. Of course it had.
“You’re gonna have to do it,” Clara said.
“I promised Fron
z I’d let… holy fuck!”
The wasp exploded out of the sky as Baal’s meteor flail smashed into it. The wasp rocketed backward, falling into the city and bowling over buildings as she tumbled and splattered against the streets of Medina.
Baal roared and burst into the field, emerging west of us. A host of fifty-foot minor hell guardians screamed as they rushed toward the defenders.
The sundered war machines went to work. Blue and red energy pulses poured out of the hundreds of flying tanks as they lumbered through the air.
The twin howitzers fired, the sound terrifyingly loud. One struck Baal directly in the chest, and he staggered back, almost falling. The second blasted a wide swath of forest, creating a crater a quarter-mile wide. A dozen minor hell guardians were simply gone.
Holy shit. If we had access to those things, we’d have finished this game months ago.
Duke: Banksy.
Banksy: I felt them. They will be dealt with.
The guardians attacked. Most turned toward Baal. But a few also turned their attention on us. Bast, Tem, Warble, and the octopus-like Kanaloa roared and shrieked as they barreled in our direction.
“Okay, we have four on the line,” I said. “Time to run.”
Beside me, Avvinik tensed. We needed to kite the monsters into the city, which meant we had to go around them, and we had to keep them alive. I needed at least two of them to survive for this to work.
“Who are we picking,” Clara asked.
“Bast and the beetle one.”
Above, Epsilon burst higher into the sky, unleashing a sonic boom the shook the battlefield. The robot kaiju started to transform as he rocketed upward. He disappeared into the clouds before I could see what he was doing.
Baal, extra pissed-off at having a hole blown into his chest started spinning his flail in a circle. It helicoptered over both Avvinik and me, forming a circle of flames in the sky. Sundered airships, who had been feebly shooting at Baal, scattered away. They started falling like hail.
At this point, the radiants realized that standing on the ground between two armies of kaiju was a terrible idea. Their orderly formation, already blown into disarray by the wings of the wasp guardian, descended into an absolute panic.
That panic doubled the moment Banksy pulled one of his signature moves, rocketing out of the ground and scrapping the two howitzers. My pet looked to the sky and cast Descending Angel on the sundered cars. Nothing happened. Apparently it didn’t work against technology-based vehicles.
Banksy dove back into the earth before he could get attacked.
I cast Xura, hoping the odd charm spell would have some sort of effect on the approaching guardians. It didn’t faze them, but the radiant’s retreat was suddenly much more orderly. Many were trampled underfoot by the charging behemoths. I still didn’t know what the damn spell did. It was almost like it made them temporarily drop acid or something.
I popped out of direct control, yelled at the Shrill to run like hell toward the temple, and I set my respawn to Bast. I cast Recall.
Entering Bast – Player Base. Restricted area. Access granted by brand.
I waved away the rest of the notifications as I rolled into Anatoly’s apartment.
I burst through the apartment, kicking open the front door and diving into the intestine.
Bast’s interior roiled like a barrel spinning down a hill. I hit the surface, crunching several of the crabs who’d given me my first experience points. I shot out with my hook, attaching to the surface of the intestine as the crabs attempted to swarm. The feeble bites barely tickled me as I shrugged them off. I retracted, pulling myself up. I pulled my Epiviper and fired, not bothering to waste soul points on an incision. I jumped into the first artery I could find and then rode the vessels into the lion’s head. I popped out into the small chamber, looking around.
Small, humanoid parasites infested the sinus cavity just below the kaiju’s brain. I’d never seen this kind before. They seemed somewhat intelligent. The small, hobbit-like things wore armor made of bones and leather. One of them gibbered at me, raising a spear.
I didn’t have time to adjust my Antiparasitic. If I just cast it, it’d kill everything in the lion, which would result in the monster being much stronger. I didn’t want him stronger.
Instead, I used my pulse rifle. I made short work of the monsters as the world all around us shook.
Finally alone, I opened my pack and pulled out the small wax disk. I placed it on the ground, and without wasting any more time, I cast Evocation.
I only needed Evocation level 1 for this particular demon, and he came easily, popping into existence on the center of the evoking plate. The plates were much easier to use than just pouring the salt onto the ground. One simply had to scratch the sigil out in the wax. The damn things were expensive, though, and they didn’t last as long as the salt if they weren’t placed in containers. The demon took the form of a glowing crow, who screeched loudly and angrily in surprise. Bast shook again, this time violently.
Don’t kill him, goddamnit. I need him alive.
“What is this? What is the meaning of this?” the angry bird screamed. He turned in the dark chamber, his eyes widening when he saw me. He glowed brighter then charged, attempting to skewer me with his beak. He was stopped by the invisible wall binding him.
Earl Raum
Rank 35 in the demonic hierarchy. A vassal of King Beleth.
May be evoked to steal, open locks, and can identify parts for steam-based automatons. Requires Evocation level 1.
Has three forms: A Crow, a Human Radiant, or a Crown Gargoyle.
Christ, rank 35. When I had purchased the sigil from the shop, he was rank 50-something. The demons were dropping like flies.
“Okay, no time to chat,” I said. “I have another one of these things to plant, and this was the easier of the two. The next one will be a real bitch, so listen up. I don’t need you for any of the crap you normally do.”
The crow demon paused his tirade to look at me, bewildered.
I pointed my Epiviper up at the ceiling, and I fired. Bone chipped away. I fired a second time, and a larger chunk of bone fell to the floor, revealing the beige, fleshy membrane that encased the brain. Bundles of nerves and lymphatic vessels snaked across the outside of the membrane like white, fatty electrical cables. Smoke filled the chamber. I waved it away.
“See that bundle of nerves right there? You’re going to fly up there and cut them in two for me. But you gotta wait for the signal. Got it? Get the signal, complete the task, and you’re free.”
“Wait,” the crow said. “Where the hell are we? And what will the signal be?”
“The signal will come in the form of a small, screeching bat.”
***
Gusion the baboon-like demon threw handfuls of his own poop at me as I set my regen back to my home base and hit Recall.
I’d had to waste the Shrill’s 5-hour attack—Hypnos—on getting Tem to pass out in order to get in here. He wouldn’t be out for much longer. Outside, Avvinik still grappled with Kanaloa, the octopus kaiju of the leechers. It was the only one of the four who hadn’t succumbed to my sleep spell. The octopus kaiju had cast a terrible spell that caused the Shrill to start smacking himself in the face and trying to dig out his own eyeballs. He was in the process of pulling out one of his larger eyes when I returned from Bast. I’d cast my Soothe talent, which negated the psionic attack. Meanwhile, Tem the beetle blasted Avvinik with a fireball while Bast slammed the panther to the ground in a whirling, ferocious special attack. I’d been forced to knock all of them out. All except the octopus.
The fire-breathing stag beetle had a completely different interior system than any other biological kaiju I’d been in so far. I had no idea how to kill him easily from the inside. The invertebrate didn’t have a traditional brain as far as I could tell, and in the precious minutes I had, I didn’t have time to figure out what made the thing tick. It didn’t have blood, and I couldn’t use my BloodBorne skill
. The majority of the bug’s larger cavities were filled with a gooey substance called hemolymph. So instead, I crawled to the back of the fire-breathing beetle’s head, burrowed through the chitin until I found an empty space, and I placed the demon in there. I cast Diagnosis, and I learned the long, snake-like heart muscle was just about the most important organ. It ran the length of the beetle’s body, where a spine would be on a mammal. In addition, other mysterious organs surrounded the area, including something that was like a brain, but not quite. Hopefully I had it covered. I left the baboon a gun and asked him to “fuck up as much shit as you can when you get the signal.”
He did not like the idea, but he reluctantly agreed to the contract, which caused the seal to fade away. And that allowed him enough movement to throw his poop at me.
Entering the Shrill – Player Base.
I sighed with relief as I instantly popped back into my living room. I was afraid Recall wouldn’t work now that everyone had crossed over what remained of the wall and into the city. One couldn’t normally use movement-based skills within Medina. But all those protections were now gone, lost with the shield.
I entered the cockpit, strapped in, and reinitiated direct control in time to watch Epsilon’s attack.
Five smaller Epsilons rocketed from the heavens and slammed into Baal from above. He’d broken apart. The machines were still huge, each a couple hundred feet long. The force of the attack staggered the demon lord. He looked like a person beset by angry, mechanical babies. One of the five epsilons had a drill for a head, and he started penetrating the demon’s side. Another shot electrical charges. A third appeared to be attempting to inject some sort of liquid into the demon.
I watched in horror as Baal went crashing to the ground.
Damn it, Fronz, I thought. Where the hell are you? I couldn’t open up my guardian menu while I was in direct control. I was going to have to jump out to assist.
But then, a mini Epsilon went hurtling through the air. It skidded and crashed against the ground before zipping away, trailing sparks. Then a second did the same.
Kaiju- Battlefield Surgeon Page 57
