Dragon Heart: Land of The Enemy. LitRPG Wuxia Series: Book 8

by Kirill Klevanski

  “H ow do I get out-”

  Hadjar abruptly stopped talking. The artificial world around him collapsed and he realized that he was now inside his own soul. The wind was playing with his hair and the blades of the tall, green grass. The sun was shining in the azure sky and white clouds were moving lazily across it. That familiar hill with the tree where the Quetzal had built its nest was where it had always been. Opposite it stood the stone where Traves had once sat. He still couldn’t get used to the fact that he was no longer there.

  Another stone appeared next to that one. An old man, wearing a robe and holding a staff in his hands, was sitting on it.

  “You can’t be here,” Hadjar hissed. “The elven poison should’ve locked you up and-”

  “It did,” the first Darkhan interrupted. “You’re just seeing a mirage that I created in order to teach you.”

  “Why should I bother learning anything from you? I accepted your Inheritance. That should be enough.”

  “You probably don’t know anything about how this really works. Well, that’s not surprising. People ruled by beasts and their vassals are obviously going to be ignorant.”

  Hadjar wasn’t listening to the old man’s mockery. He was still trying to process the information that the Black General, even if it was just a projection of him, had managed to worm his way into his soul.

  “When you accept an Inheritance, you make a pact with its Creator,” the old man explained. “The pact binds you, forcing you to keep learning from that Inheritance until you’ve either replaced it with your own or learned everything there is to be learned from it.”

  “How do I know you’re not just making all of this up?”

  “Try going back to the physical world.”

  Hadjar shot him a hateful glare, closed his eyes, and focused on the physical world. He imagined himself ascending in order to reach it. As he’d suspected, his path to it wasn’t blocked. He smiled triumphantly but then grimaced the moment he was within arm’s reach of his goal. He was suddenly feverish, similar to how a cultivator felt whenever they were close to breaking an oath. No one had found a way to simply ignore the laws of the Heavens and the Earth yet.

  “How was your trip?” The old man sneered.

  “Fucking hell!” Hadjar swore. “Am I trapped inside my own soul now?”

  “That’s the price of an Inheritance. You have to learn it. What’s the point of accepting it if you don’t use it, right? Pride and laziness can ruin everything that one has achieved throughout their life. You’d be wise to remember that, my descendant.”

  Hadjar didn’t answer him.

  “I am a man of my word, though. You came here for the Technique I taught Erhard. I’ll teach it to you. And as for the rest… you really don’t want to go there. The sum total of my knowledge is beyond the understanding of even a Nameless.”

  It finally dawned on Hadjar why exactly the first Darkhan had actually forced him to accept his Inheritance: if he could devour his soul and occupy his body right now, he would have to start from the very beginning. Instead, it would be much easier to take over if he had something familiar to work with. He was grooming Hadjar to be his vessel. He wasn’t violating the terms of the Inheritance pact, but he wasn’t granting Hadjar access to all his secrets, either. Unless, of course, he could reach the Nameless level. Which, given the warped state of his soul, would be impossible.

  “Let’s start.” The first Darkhan slammed his staff against the stone. “I call this Technique the ‘Sword of Four Strikes’. Master it, and your opponents won’t be able to survive more than three of your attacks. Let’s start with the weakest and simplest one. You have neither the power nor the understanding of the Sword necessary for more than that. Only the First Strike — the ‘Flying Sword’ — doesn’t require the energy capacity of a Spirit Knight or mastery over the mysteries of the Weapon Kingdom. Use that for now. Once you’re ready, I’ll show you the others.”

  Hadjar was about to ask how he could use this Technique if he didn’t know anything about it other than its name when a flood of information seeped into his mind: the knowledge required to use this powerful Technique, the first stage of which was already at the Imperial level, was now his. It penetrated every cell of his body, sinking in deep and granting him the ability to use the ‘First Strike: Flying Sword’.

  The knowledge settled inside his energy body as well. He now knew how to manipulate his energy in order to activate the Technique, how to use its power correctly, how to channel it through his sword, how to imbue it with mysteries, and even how to move his blade correctly for maximum effect.

  In the span of a second, he’d learned and understood a Technique that, in normal circumstances, would’ve taken him at least six months to master so completely. Such was the power of an Inheritance. That was why everyone sought them out. It was the easiest and fastest way to gain power. So easy and fast, in fact, that it was more like cheating than learning.

  “Now go away.”

  Hadjar was thrown out of his soul world.

  Standing on the crumbling cliff made up of fossilized skeletons, he heard the echoes of the crashing waves.

  “Did I forget to mention that my Palace of Space has been drawing power from the Demon gates all this time? I’d run if I were you. Without the Palace to contain them, the gates will open up again.”

  Hadjar remembered the stories about the Demon gates that he’d heard in the Wastelands. He wanted to swear, but didn’t have the time. The space around him changed again and he realized that he was now on the hill where that damned stone had once stood. It had been split in half, which meant that all those who’d left it had received their gifts already.

  The bodies of dozens of cultivators lay on the sand around him. They looked like puppets that had been destroyed by an evil child. He recognized some of them.

  “Darkhan!” A loud roar rang out.

  Hadjar dodged an axe that struck the spot where he’d just been standing, creating a large crater in the dried ground. He looked at Galkhad and the nobles lined up behind him. A dozen more surviving cultivators appeared from all around them.

  He was the only survivor of the Eternal Mountain clan. The two archers were also alive, and so was Theia, but she was also the last remaining member of House Geran. The Dinos siblings were shaking their heads, trying to make sense of everything.

  Taking advantage of the fact that the giant was still in shock, Hadjar looked around. He spotted Einen sitting on the sand and holding a bloodied Dora in his arms. She looked terrible, but she was still breathing.

  “I’ll kill you, Hadjar Darkhan,” Galkhad growled.

  “Now’s not a good time.” He came over to Einen, who seemed rather shaken. He was cradling Dora and mumbling to himself. “We have to leave, my friend.”

  “You-”

  “Everyone needs to leave right now!” Hadjar shouted. “We need to reach the Fort and send a signal to Dahanatan.”

  “What... are you... talking about?” Anise managed to rasp out.

  “The Wastelands will soon be overrun by a demonic horde.”

  The other cultivators were about to laugh at him when the hill they were standing on shook and the ground crumbled. A pillar of bright, scarlet energy surged into the sky.

  “Oh shit!” Hadjar cursed. “It’s too late-”

  Something soft poked him in the back. He turned around and buried his hands in Azrea’s white fur. Behind the tigress stood several dozen other felines. Instead of fur, they had bone plates.

  “Good girl,” he whispered.

  Chapter 732

  “H ow is she?”

  “The healer says that she needs to be transported to Dahanatan, to her aunt. Otherwise… She has maybe two, three days left at most.”

  Einen exited the infirmary and sat down next to Hadjar. Here, in the center square of the Fort, they looked like a single island of calm in the middle of a raging storm. Soldiers, urged on by their officers, scurried around like ants, carrying supplies t
o and fro. Some of them were busy preparing the old cannons on the western ramparts for use.

  These mighty weapons and the tall walls below them, now smudged and weakened by the hand of time, had been placed here for one purpose — to defend the Fort from demons.

  Of course, all the former glory of the fortification had long since waned. The soldiers, most of whom were practitioners on the verge of becoming true cultivators, and the officers — Heaven Soldiers — had less combat experience and training than their predecessors. The size of the garrison itself was also vastly inferior when compared to the hundred thousand soldiers that had once been stationed here. The current garrison of twenty-five thousand soldiers was but a pitiful drop when compared to the sea that would soon crash into these walls.

  Back when he’d first come to the Fort, Hadjar had thought it strange that a fortification located almost in the heart of the country looked far more impressive than those located directly on the border with Lascan. By the looks of it, it would be able to withstand at least ten shots from a proper battleship without repair or support from the engineers.

  The thousands of years of peace granted to the Wastelands by Erhard, who’d locked the Demon gates with his Master’s artifact, had been enough to make people forget about the past.

  “They didn’t believe you?” Einen sighed.

  His hands were shaking slightly and his eyes were focused on the ground. He didn’t close them, which was unusual for him. The soldiers scurrying past, rattling their armor and smelling of fear, stopped every now and then to stare at him.

  “Would you have believed it?” Hadjar chuckled.

  When they and the nobles, covered in the dust and dirt of the Wastelands, had stumbled into the fort, they’d been called mad. Only after they’d all made a blood oath had the Fort’s General believed them. He was a Lord at the initial stage. On a real frontier, he would’ve been a senior officer at best, not a General. Here, where the battles only took place between the disciples of ‘The Holy Sky’ School to which the Wastelands belonged, it was enough.

  One of the soldiers who was too busy gawking at the islander’s eyes tripped and dropped a barrel of gunpowder. It fell with a crash, spilling its contents everywhere.

  “You clumsy bastard!” The officer who was supervising the transfer of the cargo up to the wall yelled at him.

  “Sir! I’m sorry, sir!” The soldier bowed.

  “Apologize to your forefathers when you see them!”

  The officer slapped the soldier hard and sent him off to the warehouse to get another barrel. He then turned toward the two friends.

  His look was a mixture of fear and hatred. He was only a Heaven Soldier and feared all these disciples that could easily kill him. He also hated them even more than the messengers who never brought any good news.

  Cursing, he urged on the soldiers who were carrying the barrels up to the walls. The rest of the soldiers were stacking cannonballs into neat pyramids, placing barrels of special resin, which, if set on fire, could melt through stone, on the battlements, cleaning rot and dust from huge crossbows and attaching hooks to them, and preparing explosives made from spare storage crystals taken from various sky ships.

  “Officer,” Hadjar called out. “Do you need any help?”

  “You’ve already helped enough,” he hissed, turned around, and carried on with his business.

  Hadjar couldn’t blame the man. A person who’d lived all their life in comfort and was then suddenly forced to deal with the realization that they might die tomorrow could only be scared. The officer was so scared that he kept glancing over his shoulder at the sky port.

  The ancient hieroglyphs still hung over the Wastelands, preventing anyone from flying over them. Because of that, the battleship and the three military frigates had to be moored above the Fort, unable to leave the sky port.

  Shooting over the Fort was a dangerous idea that the local General was smart enough not to try. Instead, hundreds of soldiers descended from the ship in neat rows, carrying with them cannons two or three times smaller than the ancient beasts atop the walls.

  “How is she?”

  The Dinos siblings came into view from around the corner. Galkhad was with them. Everyone who’d brought back the bad news was shunned and hated.

  “Stable so far,” Einen said. “But if we don’t take her to Dahanatan soon, she won’t last longer than three days.”

  Tom swore. He was pale and haggard. Hadjar hoped that he’d matured a little over the course of his restless evening.

  Neither the islander nor Hadjar blamed Tom for the incident. The aristocrat had just taken advantage of the situation. Their vow had applied only to the Wastelands. The artificial world inside the spatial artifact hadn’t been part of the Wastelands. All of them understood that quite well.

  The rest had been a result of Dora’s own choice.

  Hadjar and Einen had seen enough misery in their lives. They weren’t like these soldiers and officers. They weren’t looking for someone to blame for their misfortune. Sometimes, life just wasn’t fair.

  “I thought as much,” Tom said and turned to Galkhad. “Are you with us?”

  The giant thought it over for a moment, then exhaled.

  “I am.”

  Hadjar looked skeptically at the trio. Anise looked away. She stood a little closer to Galkhad than her brother. Well... Everyone had sought solace last night. Hadjar felt absolutely nothing about it. He thought of Anise as just a good friend. He’d fought side by side with her, and would be glad to do so again, but he wouldn’t mind fighting against her, either. Curse this wretched world of martial arts…

  “What are you planning?” Hadjar asked, narrowing his eyes at them.

  “We’ll steal Dora’s boat.” Tom grinned.

  Hadjar coughed. By the General’s order, all the ships had been magically bound to prevent a mutiny due to all the panic. And, of course, to keep the unsuspecting reinforcements — the forty thousand cultivators that had recently arrived back from the Wastelands — inside the Fort.

  “I feel the need to remind you, honorable junior heir of the Predatory Blades clan, that what you’re suggesting is treason.”

  Tom spat.

  “I don’t take orders from a miserable General.”

  “Why would you do that?” Hadjar asked and sighed wearily.

  “We are doing that,” Anise said, her voice a little shaky. Dora was her closest and probably only friend. “We’ll use boosters and bring Dora back to Dahanatan. We’ll save her life and ask her father for backup in the process.”

  “My father will also send his fleet,” Galkhad said.

  “And the Head of our clan as well,” Tom added.

  “If you forgot or were too busy to hear about it last night, I’ll remind you: the General has already sent a letter to the Minister of Warfare. He refused to recall the army on the eastern front and send it here, which is quite reasonable. If we move our forces away from the east, Lascan will immediately take advantage of the situation and send two armies west. The forces we have right now are enough to destroy ten times as many demons as there are currently in the Wastelands.”

  “But they’ll only get here in four days! Didn’t you hear your friend? Dora won’t survive for that long!”

  Einen jerked.

  “You-”

  Hadjar’s words were drowned out by the low cry of a bugle.

  “They’re coming!” one of the soldiers shouted from the wall and was almost immediately hit with a fireball.

  Turning the poor man into a handful of ashes, it whizzed over their heads and exploded right as it struck the tower of the sky port. Thousands of fireballs streaked across the sky, turning it into a riot of red and gold.

  The demons were here.

  Chapter 733

  H adjar felt a chill run down his spine and a sense of uneasiness settle in the pit of his stomach. The moment the sky had been painted red, the General had given a belated order. Hundreds of storage devices in the center o
f the fort had powered up the magic hieroglyph. It shone with a bright light and now covered the fort with a defensive dome.

  However, by the time the shield had formed, hundreds of fireballs had reached them. They’d struck the walls and scattered flames all across the ground, turning any unfortunate soul standing in their way to ashes. Bales of hay and wooden structures had caught on fire, adding to the chaos. But that wasn’t the end of it. The ashes swelled grotesquely and vomited out terrible creatures ranging in size from three to five feet. They resembled jackals, but walked upright and had human eyes that glowed scarlet. They were clad in bone armor and wielded bone daggers.

  “Soldiers! Ready-”

  The rest of the order was cut off by gurgling and coughing. One of the demons had leapt through the air and sunk its teeth into the officer’s neck.

  Hadjar had never seen a creature tear through Heaven level armor and the flesh of a Heaven Soldier so easily. Wasting no time, the jackal demon jumped off its victim and rushed straight at a group of soldiers.

  The entire fort was plunged into chaos.

  The disciples saw flames devouring the walls of the infirmary and cried out in horror.

  “Oh no! Dora!” Hadjar shouted. He summoned his Call and the Black Blade as he ran. “Get to the infirmary! Hurry up!”

  The Dinos siblings, Galkhad, and Einen rushed inside as well. The latter turned around at the door and saw his friend standing in front of dozens of small jackal demons. They opened their fanged maws and growled at him.

  “Einen, go!” Hadjar cried.

  “But-”

  “I’ll cover you!” He slashed through the air with his sword and sent out a black crescent of energy. “Hurry up!”

  Einen nodded and rushed into the infirmary. The only intact staircase inside led from it up to the sky port. If a fight had already begun brewing inside, Hadjar couldn’t sense it. He hoped that the four of them, even carrying a wounded Dora, would be able to break through to the port.

  All he had to do was make sure to cover their retreat.

  He took up a defensive stance and blocked the entrance to the infirmary. The hundreds of demons easily tore through the soldiers guarding the approach to it. The only remaining resistance was a small group of novice cultivators.