Immersion World

by Max Jager

  "Does Adamus know?" Mendelen asked.

  As soon as he spoke he heard Adamus's voice behind him. "Does Adamus know what?"

  "I'm going to fight alongside the humans on the front lines" Alicia replied.

  "Alicia." Admar started

  "Princess Alicia." Alicia countered. "You can't tell me not to, I am the higher authority and I can handle myself perfectly fine. I can help more on the battlefield, and we need all the help we can get. We lost enough people, I'm making sure this rift gets closed so we don't lose anyone else. And you won't stop me."

  "Alicia, I'm not going to try stopping you . I already knew you were planning this and I know it's a fruitless effort to try stopping you." Adamus stated. "But I will be sending Suki as a bodyguard, she has fought alongside the humans before and should be able to work well with them. I am also sending Lillith with you, I know how close you two are and I know she won't leave your side even if you tell her to. You won't risk her life, and she won't let you risk yours."

  "You know?!" Both Alicia and Lillith both blurted out in shock. Their faces turned a light shade of red. Suki and Lillith had just arrived and Lillith was partially hiding behind Suki. Adamus was two steps ahead of Alicia, and had already given them the orders to accompany the princess.

  "Well of course." Adamus replied. "You two have been together since you were very little. You've built a very powerful friendship." Both Alicia and Lillith looked relieved as he said that.

  Estellese chuckled "He's clueless." She shook her head. "Not a surprise though." She quietly added.

  "What do you mean?" Mendelen asked.

  Mendelen's response made her quietly laugh again "Nothing" Estellese replied.

  "Hey! Don't forget me!" Pex called out as she flew down from the floating buildings above. She landed on the ground beside Estellese.

  "Hey Pex." Estellese replied "You sure you want to come with us? It's very dangerous."

  Pex nodded "I'm sure. I wouldn't be a very good friend if I didn't have your back, you're sticking your neck out for me and my city. Plus, you're one of us now." She said as she gestured to Estellese's wings.

  "Thanks Pex, we can use all the help we can get." Estellese replied.

  Alicia turned to the Alphas "Well, since everyone is here let's get out there and get in position. Kaden can you get us there quickly?"

  Kaden nodded and focused, his signet ring emitted a faint glow and a portal opened in front of him. The portal was oval shaped and about seven feet tall, while being four feet wide. It was mostly black with swirling red and purple colors. "After you" Kaden said with a bow and a gesture to the portal.

  Everyone walked through the portal, although Estellese couldn't help but to roll her eyes and shake her head. Once they stepped through they instantly came out the other end of the portal, which was on the battlefield, just on the edge of the time-freezing spell. A few feet away the demons and fairies were still frozen in time, in the middle of a massive battle.

  As everyone exited the portal on the battlefield they suddenly snapped back to their normal sizes, which caused almost everyone to stumble. Alicia, Mendelen, and Suki all fell over, and Lillith looked like she almost threw up.

  "Oh. I didn't think of that." Pex chimed in, now that everyone was back to normal she could no longer stand beside the others and instead perched herself on Estellese's shoulder. "Try not to teleport in or out of Altia, the sudden change in size may be disorientating. That's why the spells on the city change your size slowly, not instantly."

  "It's a bit late to tell us that." Kaden laughed.

  Once everyone had regained their bearings, the group sat down in a small circle to wait for the armies to arrive. Suki and Kaden were not a part of the circle, they were both on their own further away from everyone else. Their distance from the main group said a lot.

  Within the group they made small talk while they waited, it was mostly Estellese talking to Alicia, Lillith, and Pex, sharing stories about their friends and their lives. Within a couple hours the army was gathered, ready, and moving in on the battlefield. Everyone stood up, then Kaden and Suki moved over to stand with the group, as they all prepared for the spell to finally end.

  "Any second now, get ready guys." Alicia started. "I will be taking the lead from here on out, brace yourselves. As soon as the spell ends all the spells that were cast are suddenly going to activate. Kaden prepare our portal."

  Kaden nodded and opened one portal in front of the group, then waited and watched the battlefield closely. The air was tense, he could see the elves lining up at the edge of the spell surrounding the battlefield, and the fairies were hovering just above, all preparing spells and waiting for their moment to strike.

  Then, the battlefield suddenly exploded to life again. Everything began moving, spells were being flung in every direction, bolts of lightning, torrents of water, explosions, harsh winds and boulders began flying everywhere once again. Then, the earth shook as a roar bellowed throughout the island, sending shivers down everyone's spines. The fallen abyssal demon was waiting on the other side of the rift for this moment. As soon as the spell ended it began climbing out of the rift once again, infuriated even more then before now that it had been killed once and forced to stand in front of the rift for weeks waiting for another chance. As soon as its massive head rose out of the rift all the fairies hovering over the battlefield opened fire on the beast's face. With it's first breath of fresh air from the surface world, it was also met with hundreds upon hundreds of attacks bombarding it and forcing it back into the rift.

  As the fairies flying above the battlefield worked hard to suppress the abyssal demon and keep it inside the rift, the elves swiftly moved through the battlefield, cutting down the demons that still remained after the last battle. Under Adamus's command the elven soldiers were tearing through the demons who hadn't known they were frozen in time for two weeks. The elves were moving through the battlefield under their invisibility domes, seeking out the greater and pure demons and assassinating them as quickly and swiftly as possible. Since the demons didn't know the elves were here, they weren't prepared to defend themselves from such attacks. By the time word got around the entire battlefield that the elves were here, they would have lost a large portion of their leaders and stronger demons, leaving most of their ranks disorganized and fragile.

  As soon as the battlefield came to life again, Kaden opened the other portal next to the rift and the group rushed through it as quickly as they could. As easy as that, they were all beside the rift again where Zanath and Lillith immediately got to work on setting up the machine. Pex rushed over to stand on Lillith's shoulder and projected a dome-shaped barrier around the three of them and the machine to keep stray attacks from hitting it. Alicia, Suki, Kaden, Estellese, and Mendelen all took defensive positions around the machine. All the pieces were falling into place.

  The remaining demons on the battlefield thought the machine was broken, and the abyssal demon was blocking the entire rift in his own attempt to get out due to how giant he was, preventing other demons who knew better from getting through. The machine was set up and turned on without any interference by the demons, and right away the rift began shrinking again.

  The abyssal demon was trying over and over again to climb out of the rift and back onto the surface, but every time it tried it was met with another barrage of hundreds of magical attacks that pushed it right back down. The beast reached its four arms out and placed them on the ground around the rift to pull itself out, but as soon as it did Alicia activated her armor piercing enchantment on her sword and immediately went after the demon's arm. With a few slashes she severed its arm, the fairies took out the other three arms, and the demon was forced back again. But this battle was far from over, as soon as the abyssal demon noticed the rift was shrinking again it let out a deafening scream of pure rage.

  Once the demon had regrown its arms, it reached its arms back out of the rift again, but this time they were carrying other demons. The abyssal de
mon dropped several greater demons, along with a few pure demons and many normal and lesser demons. The protection of being within the abyssal demon's hands kept them safe from the barrage of attacks from the fairies. These demons split into two groups, each group had one order. The first group was to shoot down the fairies above the rift, and the second was to hunt down and destroy the machine again. The rift was huge, the size of a large lake. The demons would have to search for the machine, but with their superhuman speed that wouldn't take long. The group sent to hunt down the machine split into two groups to search the area faster.

  Alicia spotted two groups of demons moving in on the machine, some from the north and some from the south. The northern group had three greater demons and three lesser demons; the southern group had one greater demon, two pure demons, and three lesser demons. "Suki and Estell, cover the southern side. Don't let them pass you. Mendelen and Kaden, you're with me on the northern side. Lillith and Zanath, stay close to the machine and give cover fire to both sides as best as you can. Pex, stay on the machine and keep the barrier up." She then turned and began running towards the northern demons. Everyone else followed her orders and began going to where they were supposed to be.

  As Alicia ran towards the northern demons, running slower so the humans could keep up, she noticed Mendelen by her side but not Kaden. She stopped for a moment to look around, but Kaden was nowhere to be found. "Where is Kaden?" She asked Mendelen.

  Mendelen looked around, then sighed. "I don't know, he was never one to follow orders. He always did his own thing." He shook his head.

  Alicia rolled her eyes "I had a hunch he'd be useless." As she spoke the demons ahead of them began firing off a volley of ranged attacks. Ice shards, fireballs, and those energy-sapping black orbs. As soon as Alicia saw them she shouted out "Cover me!"

  Mendelen quickly ran in front of Alicia and activated his new dark undershield spell. Suddenly there was a large black circle on the ground with Mendelen standing in the center, the circle moved with him as he closed in on the demons. Any fireballs or black-orbs that passed over the black circle disappeared into thin air. The ice spikes and shards lost a lot of velocity, and the demons could no longer control the ice, but they did not disappear. Mendelen just kept his shield up and the ice attacks were nothing more than normal ice without their magical properties, and they all shattered on contact with his shield or his armor. With this immunity to their ranged attacks the two of them closed in on the demons quickly.

  Two of the greater demons pulled back and began focusing on trying to dispel Mendelen' anti-magic shield, since the shield was an Aether: Black Magic spell and the demons were also well versed in the element. The third greater demon created an ice dome around the other two to keep them protected from other attacks while they focused on taking down Mendelen' spell.

  As Alicia and Mendelen approached the demons the three lesser demons moved in to block their path. As soon as they were within striking range the first lesser demon threw a kick at Mendelen' shield with its superhuman strength. As the kick connected with the shield Mendelen was thrown backwards, and the undershield was pulled backwards with him, leaving Alicia outside of the spell's protection. As soon as she was no longer in the anti-magic zone the three lesser demons spewed flames out of their mouths, like flamethrowers, at her. It was very clear that they knew who she was, and that she was their target, they didn't care much about Mendelen nor did they consider him a threat.

  As soon as she saw the flames Alicia used her superhuman speed to quickly move backwards and away from the flames, moving back to the safety of Mendelen' anti-magic zone. Suddenly two of the demons dropped dead. The one on the left took a bullet to the head and the one on the right met the same fate by an arrow. With the flames obscuring their vision they hadn't seen the attacks coming.

  As soon as the two lesser demons went down Alicia saw her chance and darted at the remaining lesser demon. Mendelen followed behind her but could not keep up with her speed and was quickly falling behind. The demon threw a quick barrage of ice spikes at Alicia as she charged at it, but the ice spikes just shattered on contact with her light plate armor. It may have looked like her armor was thin, delicate and just to look fancy with all the gold and gem embellishments on it, but it was much more durable than it appeared. It wasn't going to be so easily pierced by ice, even if it is magically sharp ice.

  The lesser demon jumped back to avoid a slash from Alicia's sword and immediately summoned an ice whip into its free hand. It lashed out at Alicia with the whip, wrapping it around around her arm. But now that Alicia was out of the anti-magic zone she could use her sword's enchantments. She activated the armor piercing enchantment and cut clean through the ice whip as if it were paper, immediately freeing herself from the lesser demon's grasp.

  It was strange, the greater demon that was outside the dome wasn't attacking. What was it doing this whole time? Alicia had expected this fight to be much harder. She turned her head to glance at the greater demon only to be surprised by what she saw. It was dead. Someone had sliced its head in two.

  Alicia didn't have time to think to figure out what happened, she had to turn her attention back to the fight in front of her because the lesser demon was already preparing a new attack. It had turned its arm into a giant ice-arm with sharp claws instead of fingers. It immediately tried to use its giant ice arm to grab and pin Alicia to the ground, but Alicia was too fast. She quickly sidestepped the first swipe of the arm and used the piercing enchantment on her sword to cut off the ice-hand.

  As soon as the giant ice-hand was severed the demon took control over it with its ice magic and began moving it separately from the arm. The demon swung the remainder of the giant ice-arm at Alicia to try and bludgeon her with it while the giant ice-hand levitated off the ground behind her and went to try and grab her again. Although before the hand could grab her Mendelen moved to stand beside it. As soon as the ice-hand was within his anti-magic zone it fell to the ground and the demon could no longer control it. In a surprising feat of agility Alicia sprang four feet into the air and flipped herself up and over the ice arm as it was swung at her. But as soon as she was above it the entire arm shattered, and the ice shards all flew up at her and began freezing themselves onto her armor. Each piece sticking more ice to her armor, trying to encase her in ice while she was in mid-air and unable to move. The larger ice shards that struck her armor first were holding her in the air and preventing her from coming back down to the ground.

  Alicia was too high up for Mendelen to reach, the only way he could stop this would be by putting the lesser demon inside his anti-magic zone to stop it from casting the spell. He was quick to move in on the lesser demon, but as he moved away from the ice-hand the hand immediately sprang back up into the air and grabbed onto Alicia. Ice mages were the bane of agility based fighters like Alicia, once her ability to dodge and evade was taken away from her she was a sitting duck, unable to fight back. Mendelen slashed his sword at the demon's head as soon as he was in range, but the demon was quick to block his attack with its own sword and shoved the armored man backwards. However, once Mendelen was close to the demon the anti-magic zone around Mendelen blocked the demon's spell. Alicia, and the ice that was encasing most of her body, fell back to the ground and some of the ice shattered off her. Although, based on the gasp of pain when she hit the ground it was clear she was a little injured from the fall.

  Mendelen regained his balance quickly and took a stab at the demon's chest, forcing the lesser demon to sidestep the blade. The demon was about to throw another kick at Mendelen when out of nowhere an arrow struck it in the side of the head and the creature lifelessly fell to the ground. With a quick glance back at the others Mendelen could see that Lillith was already working on helping get the ice off Alicia and was trying to heal her minor injuries. Alicia was not accustomed to fighting on her own like this, Mendelen was fighting by her side but he couldn't do anything to help her should she need assistance. She was used to being surrou
nded by elven soldiers who could have gotten her out of that situation easily, but on this battlefield she was almost completely on her own.

  Then the worst case scenario happened. The ice dome protecting the two other greater demons shattered revealing the two greater demons inside. One of them had a massive, charged up black spiked sphere in its hands, the same massively destructive spell that had destroyed the machine and scientists at the first rift back near the elven village, but this one was even stronger. The other was focusing on something. As soon as the ice dome shattered Mendelen' dark undershield spell fizzled out, the other greater demon had forcibly taken control of it and shut the spell down. It may have been Mendelen' spell, but the demon was a master of Aether: Black magic and Mendelen just knew one spell, the difference in skill was far too great for Mendelen' spell to resist the demon's control. Once the spell-shield was gone and no longer threatened to just cancel the entire spell, the demon gave its ally the ok to fire the spell and the massive black sphere was hurled straight at the machine.

  Mendelen saw the sphere and didn't know what to do, that thing was going to explode and he knew that the explosion would be far too powerful for Pex's barrier to block. And even if he had a way of blocking it right here, like Suki's shield, the massive collateral damage that spell dealt last time would still destroy the machine, or at the very least badly wound everyone here. His mind was racing through ideas trying to find one that could stop the attack, as he watched it flying at incredible speeds towards the machine. But he had nothing that could stop that, the demons had once again won the strategic part of the battle. Their plan was flawless and left nothing unaccounted for, the demons knew they could do nothing to stop this.