Asgard Awakening 2

by Blaise Corvin

  Rakshasas had retractable claws, and this one had run his filthy hands across Beth’s body, randomly unsheathing a claw here and there to hurt her. She winced, but stood strong, saying something else. Trav guessed she’d begged for Vekko’s life again, and the Rakshasa had responded by casually pointing and blasting a hole through the youth’s chest.

  Beth’s scream echoed through the slums, and she’d whipped forward like a spring, attacking the Rakshasa with a metal nail hidden in her hand. The creature had been so much taller than her, she’d needed to jump, but the monster had casually grabbed her by the wrist. Held with bone-crushing force, Beth dropped the knife and dangled her in the air while she ineffectively punched and kicked.

  But she must have quickly realized her struggles were pointless. And in that moment, when her attack had failed, protecting Vekko had failed, and she had no other options left, Beth had looked over the beast’s shoulder where Trav had been hiding. Her eyes had grown soft, and she’d offered a quirk of the mouth, likely her way of saying goodbye. She’d begun to silently mouth something when the beast began to lower her and she gasped in pain.

  Once she was back on the ground, the Rakshasa had unsheathed his claws and grabbed Beth on one shoulder to steady her. Then with surgical precision, made cuts in her shoulder before slowly ripping her arm off. The Kin had grinned sadistically, and stepped back to avoid the majority of the blood from ruining his fancy robes. Beth fainted, going limp, but the Rakshasa had briefly glowed, using some sort of magic, and Beth’s eyes snapped open again.

  Then the screaming started in earnest. The Kin noble had pulled off Beth’s limbs like a child might pull the legs off an insect, keeping her conscious through the entire ordeal. He’d hissed at all the noise, and torn off Beth’s jaw before kicking her body into a gutter. The other Kin in the procession had panted or giggled.

  Beth was still making panting screams, still kept conscious by the monster’s magic, and the Rakshasa had crouched before reaching down and almost daintily plucking out her tongue. The stricken, once-beautiful woman had begun gurgling, choking as she died.

  As Beth had bled out, Trav thrashed, clenching his teeth so tightly his entire head hurt. His eyes were wide, and tears mixed with the dirt he was lying in to coat his beard with mud. The two old timers in his hiding spot kept hands on him, trying desperately to restrain him. They whispered calming words, fear in their voices. One of them had also been crying.

  There was no way two frail slaves could have actually restrained Trav if he really wanted to break free, but he warred with himself inside. If he left his hiding place and ran forward, he’d die too, and likely the slaves he was hiding with. Hell, maybe a large number of other slaves would also be killed. While the rank-and-file Kin were instructed not to kill slaves and waste resources, the nobility didn’t seem to care.

  The moment seemed to stretch, as Trav’s rational mind slowly won out over his other emotions. Grief and despair warred with logic, and logic won. Trav had never felt so cowardly or useless in his entire life. He never knew he could despise a single creature so much, or want anything dead with every fiber of his being. Something new rose in Trav, something dark.

  The Voice had spoken then. “Vengeance,” it intoned.

  Then suddenly the Rakshasa had cocked a head and bellowed out a laugh. The monster turned, and his eyes glowed as he projected his voice. “I have not felt this level of bloodlust in a long time, especially from a slave! You are a slave right, hiding one?” Then he’d turned and looked directly in Trav’s direction with cruel, yellow eyes.

  “My Lord, shall we search that area?” asked one of the guards, a huge, rhinoceros-looking monster.

  “No, I forbid it. If the hiding one chooses to keep hiding, let them. When you live to be as old as I am, some mystery adds excitement to life.” Then the hateful creature had raised his voice further. “Whoever you are, staring at me with such hate, please come find me one day...or not. The reality is that if you are a slave, you will likely die here, and I will continue being a leader of this glorious country. You are nothing, and I am eternal. But making enemies keeps one’s existence interesting, don’t you agree? I will introduce myself for you. I am called Lord Kraachias, one of the rulers of Kyvendi.”

  He’d continued, “But I will not assume, no, you may be an old enemy after all, not a new one. One thing I do not need to assume is that you are weak. If not, you would be acting now, not cowering, merely directing hatred and killing intent at me. Only the weak hate from the shadows, yes? I will continue to invite my enemies to come find me, but most seem to ignore my offer. I wonder why that is?”

  The feline monster had apparently amused himself, and he chuckled as he walked away, his procession following him. Some of the other Kin had also laughed, mostly nervously, but as soon as the Rakshasa had been out of sight, they’d glared around, obviously planning to find whoever Kraachias had been talking to. Some other slaves had quickly moved Trav then, hiding him somewhere else, but he had barely noticed.

  As he was carried, he sobbed. His rational mind knew there’d been nothing he could do, but he’d felt weak, powerless, and despite the look he’d seen in her eyes before she’d died, he felt like he’d failed Beth. One of the worst parts of the whole scene was how Kraachias had walked away, blood on his expensive robes, tail swishing, already forgetting the human woman he’d murdered. He’d almost instantly focused on something else. Killing Beth had been nothing to him, like a brief distraction.

  Blood had rushed to Trav’s ears, and grief fell on his shoulders like a ton of stone, so much that he barely even registered people talking to him. He was alone again on Asgard. Beth was gone, and he’d been powerless, powerless and pathetic. All his human strength and immunity to the emberstone had been nothing compared to the weakest Kin, much less a Rakshasa.

  The rest of that day had been a blur.

  The next day, after he’d learned that Beth’s body had been burned with the trash, he’d vowed to do whatever he could to one day escape the mines, and to kill Kraachias. The fire in his belly had kept him going, driving him to keep trying. Sometimes, he’d resented the other slaves, grown frustrated that he felt obligated to save them when he’d just wanted vengeance or death, but Beth’s memory had stopped him. She’d been practical, but had also had a huge heart—it had been one of the things he’d loved about her.

  But he had to believe he had time. After all, the mines weren’t physically breaking him, and he didn’t seem to be aging anymore. He just needed to figure out how to find some power, and to use all the damn rune magic in his head.

  ***

  Trav came back to the present and stared at the distant Rakshasa with murder in his heart. This one had tiny wings, and was dark, shaggy. Its cruel, toothy smile looked familiar, though. “Not today, motherfucker,” snarled Trav. “I’m not a slave anymore, and you may not be the asshole I need to kill, but you’ll do for a replacement.”

  Deep down, he knew that he should be escaping, not picking a fight, but seeing this Rakshasa had brought everything rushing back. The day his wife had been murdered, he’d lain in the dirt like a dog, doing nothing while Beth had been tortured. How had he ignored all the dead humans in Faith, and in the field? The nightmare wasn’t over. Now he was watching a Rakshasa kill people again, but this time, he refused to just run away.

  “For Beth,” he snarled, and stealthily moved down the wall from his perch. He thought, If you know you’re planning to do something stupid, it’s best to do it loud. Trav still planned to evade the invaders in Faith, and he was going to give the Kin in the field one hell of a surprise.

  For the first time he’d been on Asgard, Trav actually had the opportunity to hurt one of the Rakshasa bastards. This was something he had to do.

  Chapter 7

  Trav crouched behind a shed, eyeballing the trio of Kin in the field in the distance. He’d managed to sneak through Faith to this point, but the entire area behind him was rapidly filling with enemy Kin. He’
d also heard a new commotion a few minutes ago. For all he knew, they’d found the Dacith that Trav had fried and were looking for him.

  He steadied himself and stilled his thoughts, inventorying his magic, and reviewing his available power. Despite being furious and fully intending to rip the Rakshasa apart if he could, Trav had to reluctantly admit the monster might still be too much for him. If so, he had magical ways to escape, but they were risky and might kill him more quickly than the monsters would. It would be a while before Trav would be able to reliably and safely teleport. Once he started a fight, he’d be committed unless things got truly desperate. Picking a fight with one of the ruling-class monsters of this Kin country might be suicidal.

  Then again, while just running might be less risky, it wouldn’t be much safer overall. He would still need to cross a wide open field with enemies roaming around, likely looking for escapees just like him. Killing the Kin in the field might actually give him his best chance of survival in this situation. His anger was in agreement with his rational mind, now he just needed to figure out the best way to initiate a fight.

  Trav ran through his permanent upgrades and available magic. After his marriage with Tiffany, he’d gained about two bars of power, bringing him up to a total of twelve. Of that, he had seven bars tied up in permanent abilities that he’d placed on his body. These upgrades included his first, two-bar upgrade, “Overall Strength,” then Ventrilomagic, Air Scribing, a magic shield, and two bars in a focus and renewal ability.

  So he had a total of five free bars of power, and he’d used up about one of them so far since he’d woken up, leaving four bars of power to fight with. Could be better, but not bad, he thought.

  Despite being mad as hell, ready to tear a Rakshasa apart, the mines had taught Trav to be thoughtful and ruthless. He used a stick to carefully measure the wall of the shed he was standing behind, moving up to the side and lying down so he would be harder to spot as he began scribing rune equations with Hex into the wall facing the field. Pausing midway through, he used the stick again to aim his rune equations before continuing. If everything went well, hopefully he wouldn’t need to use this, but if he was going down, he wanted to kill these fuckers for sure.

  Trav worked quickly and efficiently before rolling back to concealment. From there, he inscribed the back side of the shed, using a stick to aim this part too, and connected it to the front. Now two sides of the sheds were covered in magical sigils, glyphs, and runes. He hadn’t invested any serious power into the binding rune equation yet, just tethered himself to it. The fact that he’d physically scribed it meant he could activate it at long distances, but it would still take about a bar of power to use.

  This thing would pack a very serious wallop.

  Then it was time to use magic to strengthen himself, which was one reason he’d wanted to keep bars of power available instead of just investing in permanent upgrades. He touched Hex to his chest, announcing, “Strength, Speed, Toughness.” Tingles spread through his body as the magic took effect. Powering these limited-time abilities had used up almost one full bar of power.

  Before this, as best Trav could figure, he’d had the strength of about four full-grown human men. Now, for about a half hour, his physical abilities had been doubled. He felt strong as a bear, fast as a cheetah, and durable as an action movie star.

  All his preparations complete, he let the rage come back full force, letting it warm his blood. There was no other reason to wait around or hide, so Trav started forward, trying to run at a crouch. He doubted that shuffling like this across the field would fool any Kin, but he had to try. When he figured it was impossible to hide anymore, he stood up straight, holding his spear to the side.

  His plan was to use the Kins’ and specifically the Rakshasa’s pride and bestial nature against them. Seeing an unbowed human ready to fight might make the monsters curious or foolish enough to let him close with them. Trav’s breathing picked up and he readied himself to dodge, or to evade death with pure reflexes. He checked to make sure that his natural, low-level magical shield was still intact.

  As it turned out, none of his caution had been necessary. All three Kin were looking in a different direction, chuckling as they threw rocks with superhuman strength at fleeing Faithful. One of the Rakshasa’s cronies, a big, dinosaur-looking thing, was also using some sort of magical weapon. If any of the Faithful got too close to the tree line, the magical weapon engulfed them in fire.

  Trav blinked as the three didn’t even turn, then he shrugged, walking forward until he was in range and smiling evilly. “Chain lightning,” he growled.

  Electricity burst from Hex, slamming into one of the Kin, the third one that looked like a huge, scaled anteater. The lightning arced to the other two Kin, but not much else happened. Instead of being blown off their feet and wounded like the Dacith had, they just kind of stood still with their backs stiffened. One tried to turn but it seemed the electricity had locked all the Church soldiers’ muscles.

  This close, Trav could see what they were all wearing and carrying in far more detail. The dinosaur-looking thing had been using a weapon that looked like a wand, and allowed it to throw exploding balls of fire. This Kin was bipedal, and wore heavy armor made of leather and plates of metal. The anteater had a bow at its feet, and Trav distantly wondered how it even used the weapon, considering its huge claws, until he saw the archery release on its wrist.

  A crossbow had been in the Rakshasa’s hand, but as Trav watched, the weapon fell as the Kin released it. Like other Rakshasa that Trav had seen before, this one wore a longsword over his dark armor.

  None of the Kin seemed particularly damaged by the magical attack, and they all began turning at once.

  Trav began getting a bad feeling, kind of a murmur at the back of his anger. Suddenly, the memory of Beth’s death came back to him, but not just the brutality of it. He remembered the obvious fear that had been on the faces of the Kin following Kraachias the Rakshasa. Trav pointed Hex and again said, “Chain lightning.” Even as the lance of electricity jumped out to his enemies, he also cast, “Explosion.” A geyser of dirt tore upward between the anteater and the Rakshasa. “Explosion!” he thundered, as he both inscribed and detonated another rune trap between the Rakshasa and the dinosaur Kin.

  This time, the three hadn’t been unscathed. The dinosaur and the anteater Kin were blown off their feet, but the Rakshasa was only lifted before settling back again. After staring into Trav’s eyes, he cocked his head and said, “I’ll take this one.”

  “My Lord!” The anteater got to his feet and bowed low. “Please let us protect you!”

  “Fine job you’ve done so far,” grunted the Rakshasa. Then the beast flexed his claws and gave Trav a considering look, all cold and calculating.

  “This slave is using magic!”

  “Obviously.”

  This was not going how Trav had expected, so he pointed Hex again and commanded, “Chain lightning!” He showed his teeth in satisfaction as the two lesser Kin screamed and fell back this time, smoking. The lightning had kicked up some dust too. Then his face fell as the dust settled and the Rakshasa was revealed with a pale magical shield, standing with his arms crossed.

  “Are you finished now, human?” asked the creature. The feline Kin eyed Hex. “That seems to be a valuable weapon. I think you should give it to me before I kill you slowly.” The Kin drew his longsword in a practiced motion.

  “Don’t you mean give it to you or you’ll kill me slowly?”

  “No,” said the Kin, and with no warning, he sprang forward, swinging his sword down diagonally.

  Trav met the attack with his spear, parrying the blade to one side, which turned out to be a lucky choice. The force of the strike made his hands vibrate, and the incredible slash still came uncomfortably close to hitting him. Trav was normally stronger than the lowest-level Kin now, and he’d buffed himself, but he’d grossly underestimated this Rakshasa.

  The seven-foot-tall, powerful Kin twisted an
d attacked again, obviously an experienced swordsman. Very little dynamic motion had been lost, and the cut was delivered directly at Trav’s chest. He desperately blocked the attack, and his shoulders were hammered by the shock of the blow. His spear was almost driven back into his chest, and the Kin’s longsword came close to Trav’s shoulder as he was thrown back.

  “That must be a very, very good weapon,” purred the Rakshasa. He was eyeballing Trav’s spear, and began stalking forward with a toothy grin. The longsword lashed out, lightning quick, and Trav parried, but it had been a feint. The Rakshasa darted forward, other hand extended.

  As he back-pedaled, Trav quickly called the fallen Hex into his hand, pointed forward and said, “Back gust!” A gale of wind sprang up directly ahead of him and slightly upward, blowing him back forty feet. “Soften,” he said, pointing at the ground. His feet hit hard, but it felt like landing on a trampoline. It took a second to get his balance and he glared at the Kin. This time it was the Rakshasa’s turn to be surprised that Trav had evaded the grab.

  In the distant town, Trav could still hear people dying, or being chased, and he tuned it out. Part of him was much more bothered than he would have imagined that the Faithful were being killed, but there wasn’t much he could do about it. In fact, he was beginning to wonder if he might have picked a fight he couldn’t win. All of his righteous anger from before was being slowly replaced with fear.

  Being a god or not, this feels like I might get my ass kicked, thought Trav. Beth, what would you say? This whole thing was pretty selfish of me, huh? Probably cocky at least. I shouldn’t have charged in without any information. Trav’s eyes glinted, and he grimaced.

  Hex came up, and he shouted, “Explosion!” This time, when the earth fountained upward, the Rakshasa wasn’t hit. The beast had already moved to the side and crouched down to avoid the majority of the blast. Trav didn’t wait for his enemy to recover, yelling, “Scatter fire!” From where Hex pointed, a cone of white-hot cinders exploded outward, the attack’s range was barely further than his distance to the Rakshasa.