by Eric Vall
His words were self-serving. He’d begged for my mercy, and when I denied him, he switched tactics. My brother may have been the god of truth and honesty, but he could still be deceptive toward me if he really wanted to. That’s exactly what he was doing now, he wanted to trick me into setting him free. He may have had sympathy for the mortals our father wanted to kill, but Otia still saw me as dirty and an abomination for associating and loving my women.
I would set him free but not in the way that he wanted. I wasn’t going to let Otia go, nor was I going to kill him and let him escape into the spirit realm as many others had.
“Please, brother,” Otia pressed on as tears welled up in his eyes. “Allow me this, let me exact revenge alongside you and your army…and your women.”
He pleaded with me, but I knew his true intentions were not to help me in the end at all. The last bit of his sentence was added on almost like an afterthought, and I knew he had no intent to protect my women or my people out on the battlefield. His promises were empty, and if this was how he wanted to play, then so were mine.
My plan was simple and deceiving him wouldn’t be hard, he was the one strung up by chains and at my mercy. I hated Otia just as much as I hated my father and mother still in the heavens. They’d scorned me, betrayed me and thrown me out of my rightful place. Otia’s backtracking words and pleas for help were empty and hollow, but I had to put on my own façade to make this believable.
“I’ll let you fight with us, brother,” I stated as I took one step toward him with the God Slayer raised. “As long as you swear to all the god’s in the heavens that you will stand beside us and fight with us.”
“I do,” Otia stated as he bowed his head.
“No,” I chuckled darkly as I shook my head. “I want you to make a holy pact that you’ll stand by us and fight with us.”
My voice was a deep growl as I spoke to him, and his eyes narrowed on my face. I was a lot stronger than I was the last time he’d seen me, and he felt my probing hands in his mind. I could read every thought, every memory, and every deception. Otia gritted his teeth and suppressed the powers that pulled him back from the inside out.
“I swear, by the powers given to me by birth in the heavens and those things holy that I will stand by you and protect your women with all of my might and strength,” Otia gasped as sweat dripped down from his hairline to his cheeks and he blinked his golden eyes. “There, happy? Now let me down.”
I glanced over at Morrigan, not at her specifically but at her left hand where the soul stone glowed red hot. The elven woman hadn’t noticed it yet, but she would once the metal encasing it heated to the point of burning her cool flesh. My brother, the god of truth and honesty, had finally learned how to lie. And were I any other god, I may have even been convinced.
I knew what I wanted to do with him and how I would control him. He’d promised his life to me even if he were lying, and I’d make sure that he went through with his word.
I flipped the God Slayer in my hand and felt my dark power fluctuate through it. The haft thrummed under my hands as I pushed all of my energy into it. I kept my eyes on Otia while I concentrated then slashed out with the blades. There was a loud clatter as all four of the chains broke at once as four orbs of black energy smashed into them.
Otia dropped to the floor with his head down as he breathed in hard. He was thin, a lot thinner than I remembered, but it didn’t seem that he’d been in this dungeon for very long at all. The place wasn’t large or thought out like my own or many other deities. It also looked like barely any people had attempted to pillage the dungeon, if any at all. Maybe it was before the dungeon was so close to Galencia and the Holy Order were unbothered by the presence of gods nearby.
I let go of the God Slayer with my right hand and slammed it out with tensed fingers. Otia froze, and I forced him stiffly to his feet. His honey-colored eyes glared at me as he set his jaw, and I felt laughter bubble up in the pit of my belly.
“Master, what are you doing?” Haruhi shouted as she grabbed onto my arm. “He promised to help us!”
“He lied,” Morrigan stated in her emotionless voice as she held out the glowing soul stone for the sage to see.
“H-he can’t! Can he?” the librarian asked as she looked up into my face with wide, hazel eyes. “He’s the god of honesty, he can’t tell lies.”
“How’d you do it, Otia?” I questioned as I stepped closer to my younger brother. “You tricked your true nature somehow, and you thought I wouldn’t be able to tell.”
“Fuck you, Kazama,” Otia spat out through clenched teeth. “Fuck you and your band of whores. Your women will never be able to enter into the heavens as they are now.”
My eyes narrowed on his face as I drank in his appearance. He looked nothing like the brother I remembered and in a way, it pleased me. Otia was thin and skeletal just like Athar, but my brother’s body wasn’t as scarred as the other god’s. I was more intrigued by what he’d said than the way he looked and I tilted my head at him as I suppressed the anger growing in my belly.
The soul stone hadn’t glowed, so what he said was true: My women couldn’t travel to the heavens in their mortal forms.
I didn’t know how he knew this fact, but I did know that he wouldn’t tell me if I asked.
There was one way to find out, though.
I grinned wickedly as I dove into his mind. I searched into the deepest reaches of his subconscious, he attempted to pull away from me but I pushed deeper into his brain.
When I found what I was looking for, I laughed coldly. It was true, my women couldn’t enter into the heavens as they were now but there was an elegant work around. I’d seen it within his mind, coming from the mouth of my cursed father, and it made me giddy. My women couldn’t enter through the sanctum in their mortal bodies but there was one sure way to bring them along with me. It was simple and one of the things my women had asked for when first meeting me.
I would have to implant my seed into my fertile women and create a holy child within them. The baby, once inside of my minion’s body, would transfer power and allow them to enter into the heavens as if they were gods themselves. All of my minions had asked for children in the beginning, and now I would give all of them what they wanted.
I pulled away from Otia’s mind and held the God Slayer tightly in one hand. I wasn’t going to kill him, no, but I was going to use him to my own devices whether he liked it or not. He’d given me the information I needed, and he was no longer useful to me.
“What are you going to do then? Kill me? Then do it, I’m not scared of you, I’ve never been scared of you, you dirty mortal-lover!” my little brother shouted, but I remained calm on the outside as I tightened my hand in the air.
“Silence,” I growled, and Otia took a gasp for air as he clawed at his neck.
Otia’s voice stopped as my power closed off his throat. The god choked for air, and his face turned a shade of bright red. My hands turned into claws in the air as I imagined my hand wrapping around his windpipe. I clenched my fingers and ripped my hand backward. The meat of his throat split with a loud wet squelch and a long strip of flesh ripped free and fell to the floor. I strode forward and glared down at his removed larynx and squashed the useless organ under my heel.
I looked deeply into my brother’s eyes as slammed the God Slayer down into the floor and let go of it. The weapon stood freely, and I pulled my hand away from it as I summoned up the power of the regeneration god. I placed both hands out in front of me as Otia attempted to scream, but without his larynx, he couldn’t make a sound.
I closed my eyes and breathed in deeply as I pulled both my arms backward. I listened to the sounds of breaking bones and tearing flesh as if it were a symphony. These were the only sounds that came from Otia, not from his mouth but from him being relieved of his arms. I slammed my eyes open as scarlet blood poured from the place where his extremities used to be.
Otia’s body writhed with pain as his wide, golden eyes met mi
ne. The power of the regeneration god flooded up my arm into my outstretched hands, and I lay them upon the stumps gushing blood. The wounds immediately healed over, and I placed a single hand over Otia’s destroyed throat. The wounds healed and rippled with scar tissue before my eyes, and I couldn’t help but smirk at my little brother.
“Call my women whores again, Otia,” I cackled as I came even closer to him. “That’s right, you don’t have the ability to speak anymore.”
My two minions were absolutely silent as I stepped behind Otia and forced him forward toward them. When he stood in front of them, I forced him to his knees and pushed his head down in a deep, respectful bow. I placed my hand flat against his bare back and breathed in deeply. I felt the rise and fall of his power within him like waves, and finally, when it reached my hand, I ripped it free.
I held the gilded sphere in my hand and stared down at it as Otia slumped forward in pain. I smiled down at him as he took belabored breaths, he’d become what he despised the most. Without his power within his body, he was no longer a god and therefore, nothing more than a mortal, and I would place his useless body among the frontlines of our attack once it came.
I stepped around his useless, empty shell and moved toward my women with the orb still in my hand. I knew exactly what I wanted to do with his power and how I would use it to my aid. I cupped the golden orb in my hand and split it in two. I stood in front of my minions and brought the orbs close to their bodies. I waited and watched, then suddenly the one I offered to Haruhi shot from my hands and made a beeline for her waist.
I nodded knowingly as the halved orb split once more and settled into the sage’s revolvers. Haruhi blinked in surprise as she unholstered one and examined its surface. At first, it looked as if nothing had changed, but then I saw it. The flint was gone, and so was the pan for the black powder. The librarian blinked once then looked at me confused, but I sensed the difference.
“Fire at will,” I stated as I stepped out of her way and gestured toward the open space around us.
Haruhi lifted the gun, closed one eye, and concentrated on one of the hanging lengths of chain. She pulled the trigger and just as I suspected, a golden bullet whizzed from the barrel and hit its target perfectly. One of the chain links exploded, and the length dropped to the floor with clinking sounds.
“Again,” I stated, and Haruhi nodded as she aimed again.
This time she fired off two shots, and two more gilt bullets flew from the barrel. The first bullet hit the chain, and the length dropped to the floor and the second hit higher up.
“It no longer needs flint or powder,” I smiled down at her as she looked awestruck. “No more making bullets either.”
“Really?” Haruhi gasped as she turned the pistols over in her hands. “That’s amazing! All from Otia’s power?”
“Yes, you’ll never have to reload bullets, black powder, or flint again.” I smiled as I ruffled her hair.
I turned back to Morrigan, and this time, one smaller orb rose from the larger sphere I cupped into my hand. The orb shot through the air and absorbed into the bow the elf carried on her back. The surface glowed for a second then returned to normal. We didn’t have to test the bow out, it would simply make the magical effects of the elven bow stronger than ever.
It was set in stone now, I would have to impregnate them when they were fertile before we entered through the sanctum. The action wouldn’t be a problem, since I knew that my children were a dream for all of my women, but the logistics posed more problems afterward. I would have to find a way to protect them and my unborn children at the same time. The blessed weapons would help, but I had to be sure that they would survive the upcoming battle. My minions were the most precious things to me in my life, and I had to make sure that they lived on alongside me.
“How will we bring him along with us?” Morrigan asked as she looked over to Otia’s broken body, and my brother glared back. “We can’t force him to walk along with us, especially if you leave, Master, he may try to run away.”
I thought about it for a minute and concluded that what Morrigan said was true. I couldn’t force Otia along with them if I went to aid my other minion’s, but Haruhi spoke before I could.
“Oh, here!” the sage cried as she bent down slightly, lifted her skirt and revealed a thick belt on her thigh.
It held the spare bullets she used for the revolvers, but she didn’t need them anymore with the augmentation to the weapons. The librarian slipped it off and hurried over to where Otia still knelt. Haruhi tied the thick leather belt around Otia’s neck, and my brother grunted loudly in response as he tried to evade her hands. The sage lashed it around his neck then reached for the hanging strap of her pack. The sage hooked the strap around the belt like a leash and tugged on it until Otia slowly rose to his feet.
Haruhi dragged my helpless brother over to our group, and he glared at me with eyes filled with hate. He deserved this, and I would make sure that he died a bloody and painful death as a mortal for all the things he’d put me through. He was the sole reason I was thrown from the heavens, and this was a punishment befitting him.
With Otia taken care of, there was only one thing left to do. The sacred items were hidden here somewhere, the last two that would create the holy weapon that the Holy Order and the heavens wanted. We had all the pieces in our hands, and once we had these last ones, we’d have the coveted weapon. I would use it against the heavens and the Holy Order and then destroy them both.
Otia’s treasure was easy to find, he didn’t have much, which made it clearer that he hadn’t been in the dungeon for very long. In fact, there were only two tiny chests hidden in a far corner of the room, almost like the gods had placed them here for safekeeping. I knelt beside one with Morrigan on the other side, and we flipped them open at the same time. Within were two pieces of metal that glinted in the dim light. I could tell from the detail that they were forged by the gods, and the jewels pressed into the metal were not of this earth.
The pieces that we lifted out looked like attachments to the staff Heijing had given us, but we couldn’t be certain yet. Each piece had massive curved blades that glinted and flashed as we examined them. I could feel the thrum of god’s magic behind them and knew that they would aid us in the fight against our enemies. I wondered what type of damage the weapon could do once all of them came together, but I would have to wait to find out.
Morrigan stood with the item in her hands and offered it to me. I placed both of them in my void pocket to give to Rana because the fox held all the other pieces. I felt their added weight for a moment in the pocket then it was gone as I turned and listened to a far off noise. Like before, my other minions didn’t hear it, but this time, I was for sure that it was Rana’s voice calling out to me. It was perfect timing, but from the fox’s voice, she sounded frightened and in need of my help.
“I must go,” I stated to my minions, and they nodded solemnly.
“What should we do?” Haruhi asked worriedly.
“Stash Otia’s powerless body in the tunnels, sneak back into the city in your disguises, and go to the docks,” I instructed them as I prepared for the journey across time and space to my other minions. “When you see the Tamarisch and Tintagal battleships on the horizon, I want you and Morrigan to take out as many people of Galencia that you can before suspicion arises. Wait for the army, and when they’re gathered here, I will return with the others. Is that understood?”
“Yes, Master,” Morrigan uttered as she bowed her head.
“Yes, we’ll do as you ask,” Haruhi nodded as she took my hands in hers. “Please be safe, Master.”
“I will, I promise,” I smiled as I stroked both of their cheeks and they leaned into my touch. “Be safe, I would say watch out for Otia, but it doesn’t matter, he’s mortal now and can’t do anything.”
I laughed in my brother’s face, and all he could do was glare back. I turned away from them, closed my eyes, and breathed in deeply through my nostrils. I felt my e
ssence leave my avatar and a shadow slave step into the place I left behind. I traveled through time and space to reach my other minions, and they passed through my fingers like tiny grains of sand. Before long, I felt the shadow slave my women named bob step out of the way for my massive presence, and I settled into the flesh of my second avatar.
When I opened my eyes, the sky above was gray and clouded over with thunderclouds. Violent wind whipped my hair around and rattled the bare, dead tree branches overhead. I stood in front of all of my women with the God Slayer drawn, and the three blades glinted in the dim light.
Sprawled ahead of us was a massive fortress with blood-red flags whipping overhead with a yellow eye emblazoned on the fabric. In the distance, I could make out the shapes of creatures waiting outside with their weapons drawn. This was the place that Tuzakeur hid Rana’s family, and we were about to enter inside and rescue them.
“Master?” the redhead called worriedly. “Are you there? Please, we need you.”
I turned my head and locked eyes with the fox. Relief washed over her features, and she grabbed onto me in a tight embrace.
“Thank the gods,” Rana whispered into my chest. “There’s too many for us even with Heijing.”
I glanced over the fox’s shoulder and saw that the Qianlong was already in her dragon form. Her icy blue eyes were trained on the stronghold and shifted to take in all the enemies waiting outside. I let my arms drop from around the fox, but left a firm hand on her shoulder as I looked deeply into her anxious eyes.
“Rana,” I stated in a firm, booming voice. “Let’s go get your family back.”
Chapter Eighteen
Thunder roared across the sky as I gripped the God Slayer in my hand. Tuzakeur’s fortress towered above us, and I felt the beating hearts of not only Rana’s family within but also the beasts that waited for us. There weren’t many mercenaries inside, but they were highly trained and ready for battle at any second. The few creatures that lumbered outside of the fortress were massive, green creatures, and as we moved closer, I could see that they were heavily armored orcs.
