The Long Road to Karn (Realm of Arkon, Book 5)

by Akella, G.

  Enough was enough! Yes, sure, my reputation with them was unfriendly, but had their two-hundred-and-eighty-year-long nap completely rotted their gray matter? For me, the situation was a win-win: either they stop me right here, or they make a sizable dent in the castle garrison in an otherwise suicidal breakout attempt. The first theory proved to be the correct one.

  "Wait, demon, we're not done yet," Kan Shyom spoke calmly behind my back as a wall of stone materialized out of thin air, blocking my way. I turned around and peered at the knight, arms folded over my chest.

  "What else do you want?" I arched a sardonic brow.

  "You are insolent, demon," the knight put his palm on the hilt of his sword, his expression unchanged. "Do you think you're immortal? If so, you are wrong. The fact that the monsieur honored you by making you his apprentice means absolutely nothing for me and my people. You are here, and your army is outside the castle gates..."

  "Are you seriously threatening me?" I smirked, peering into his eyes while displaying above my head, one by one, all the achievements and titles I had amassed over my five months in the game, and watching in satisfaction as the faces of the knights and mages encircling me grew long and tense.

  Your reputation has increased! Knights of the Order of the Red Flame relate to you with respect.

  Your reputation has increased! Fighters of the Blue Salamanders squad are neutral to you.

  "Ingvar's captain!" Kan shook his head in shock, staggering backwards. "Why didn't you say anything right away?!"

  The knight-commander was justifiably surprised that I belonged to the same order as he, seeing as normally you could see the markings on fellow members' faces. But not me—thanks to the White Dragon's blood, I had become something that defied categorization.

  "What's the point? It doesn't change the fact that I need to capture this castle, and you need to get back to the plane above! And nobody can lead you back to Karn but me."

  "What say we let bygones be bygones?" Saverus raised his hands in a conciliatory gesture. "You said that you only have information about the first fragment of the portal scroll?"

  "Right. The second fragment, or at least the information about it, is stored in Ahriman's private library." I proceeded to recount the story of the Twice Cursed God's vault.

  "And you hope to gain entrance into the private library of Alcmehn's Overlord?"

  "I made it here, didn't I?" I shrugged. "I'll get there, too. One way or another."

  "Well, in that case..." taking a step forward, the knight-commander handed me a sword wrapped in runecloth, and a jewelry box shimmering in the magic lamplight. "Take this, earl. Monsieur bid us to give this to whoever would come in his stead. Don't think ill of us, demon. And thank you."

  You've completed the quest: Duty Calls III.

  You have gained a level! Current level: 199.

  You have 1 talent point to allocate.

  Class bonus: +1 to intellect; +1 to spirit.

  You have 3 stat points to allocate.

  You received: Silver Tear, truesilver case.

  You have gained a level!

  …

  You have gained a level!

  …

  You have gained a level! Current level: 210.

  You have 12 talent points to allocate.

  Class bonus: +1 to intellect; +1 to spirit.

  You have 36 stat points to allocate.

  I nodded to Kan Shyom while putting the jewelry case away to be dealt with later. With a mental command I put the Power of the Elements enchantment onto the action bar, and, bracing myself for a psychic attack, gripped the sword hilt with my right hand. Nothing happened. With a sigh of relief, I set to inspecting its stats.

  Silver Tear.

  Sword: one-handed.

  Durability: 16,788/20,000.

  Epic scalable.

  No minimum level.

  Damage: 1050-1260.

  +210 to strength,

  +105 to vigor.

  +210 to constitution,

  +5.25% to critical hit chance with a physical attack.

  +100% to damage dealt to Great Essences.

  Weight: 10 lbs.

  With Ice Blade, the damage came out to 21,976.5-26,371.8!!! And that wasn't factoring in crits or bonuses to attacking undead! Holy shit! For a blade this badass, it would've been worth it to go through everything all over again! I should be putting down level 200 undead with only a few hits!

  A sudden pain shot up through my arm, and the sword's hilt as if melded to my palm. "Hart!" I growled, trying to unclench my hand, but to no avail. The pain intensified with every second, though my HP bar wasn't moving at all.

  Your Toughness skill has increased to 54%.

  Bitch! The rage unleashed from the depths of my psyche halted momentarily the onrushing nightmare. Gripping the hilt with a spiteful fury, I cast Personal Weapon Enchanting with the Power of the Elements V on the weapon. The last thing I saw before the world disappeared in a crimson flash was Saverus' flabbergasted face...

  Chapter 2

  The last drops in the clepsydra of the Great Celestial Dragon... Once they ran out, the majestic creature would cease to exist. But these very moments would also witness his greatest Triumph, one that would be worth dying for. He had been waiting for this day for half a millennium, and it had finally come. His mighty silver wings spread majestically, Phallet the Winged Lord, the third son of Ul'khem the Uniter, God-Emperor of Shallat, the great continent of Lemuria, was flying in the direction of the green woodland ocean. There, where the united sentient races of that realm, led by their still-feeble gods, were fighting for their right to exist. Where the earth was melting under the blows of the Ancients, and thousand-year-old trees were turning to ashes in an instant. His sense of duty was leading him there. It was he, after all, who had cast those beasts into that young world—fledging, even, by Shallat's standards.

  The Winged Lords, also known as kellasae, had arrived in Lemuria from Atrea as that realm was collapsing, and immediately engaged in battle the three titans Valeph, Vaepar and Halephos—the dark masters of Shallat and their many followers. The war would last for fifty seven years, reshaping the continent which had already seen hundreds of epic battles beyond recognition. By the end of the war, four sentient races had passed into oblivion, and many more would have followed over the coming centuries had it not been for Kau Sagen decorporealizing Halephos at the expense of his own life. The key to the three titans' power was their unity, and with their brother dead, Vaepar and Valeph could no longer oppose Kohen Shi and their Winged Lords. It would take his father, God-Emperor Ul'khem, nearly a thousand years following that momentous battle to subjugate and unite the remnants of peoples and tribes scattered throughout the Great Continent, while eradicating the merest mention of Lemuria's Ancient Gods. Hundreds of temples were effaced; thousands of books, scrolls and manuscripts describing the great and terrible deeds of the three titans were turned to ashes; tens of thousands of their followers, refusing to recognize the new authority, were put to death by cleansing flame. But in the end, peace and prosperity finally returned to the Great Continent.

  Alas, nothing lasts forever under the stars, even those drawn by the Celestial Dragon. Three and a half thousand years after the Ancients' defeat in Shallat, coastal cities were set ablaze yet again, viciously attacked by the rebelling Kohenites from the island archipelago to the south, about a day's flight from the Great Continent. Nobody could guess what would possess a race of pirates and peaceful merchants to such a suicidal uprising, but upon arriving to Killeheret, the Empire's capital, the scouts reported that the rebels had made an alliance with the Dairrietes from the jungle-covered continent of Hoouli to the south, whose shamans had managed to bring the three Ancient Gods back to Lemuria.

  Two sunrises later he would fulfill his duty before his father and before the realm that had become their home, leading the united northern and eastern armies to intercept the monsters that had returned from the void. And in another seven, his host att
acked the Ancients in the ghastly Saa-ka Valley, some four hundred miles off the coast. He lost his entire army on that day, but fulfilled his destiny nonetheless. The Dairrietes who had summoned the Ancients had erred in their calculations, for the winged lords had gathered sufficient Power in the three and a half millennia that had passed. Weakened by the battle, the titans were pulled into the cyclopean spatial rift created by him, Phallet, woven from the blood of hundreds of thousands of Kohen Shi that had perished. He knew that the spell would drain all of his vitality, that he too would pass into the void upon its completion. And his father, who, on the day of the battle, led an all-out assault on the Kohenite Archipelago and on Tarienne, the Dairriete capital, knew that as well. What no one could predict, however, was where this spatial rift would dump the Ancients...

  In another moment he would correct the wrong he had unwittingly made one-and-a-half thousand years ago in that burgeoning realm. He couldn't have attacked the three brothers head on—the forces were too uneven. All he could have done was wait, prepare, cultivate his strength, and employ seers and mediums to relay a warning to select gods and rulers regarding the looming threat. And now that day had come! Having captured the southern part of the continent that the locals called Karn, the titans had finally crawled out of their lairs and set out westward toward a source of Power concealed amid the coastal mountains.

  One quick attack and the threat to this world would be finished at last! Phallet cut a hairpin turn and, putting up a mental shield, flew a mere dozen yards from the ground. What did he care for all these sentients, their weakling gods and inexperienced rulers? The Celestial Dragon held within his paw the scales upon which lay all the karmic deeds of every being that called the boundless creation home, and he didn't want to pass into the void with such a burden of guilt. After all, neither he nor the gods of this world knew what lay beyond the pall of oblivion. That, which he could never do in the realm that had become his family's new home, he would be able to in this one. Sure, his power wasn't anywhere near that of his grandfather who had sacrificed himself to ensure victory over the three titans nearly four thousand years ago, but in this world, with its astonishing concentration of magic, he could repeat the feat of his great ancestor. By focusing his assault on one of the Ancients, already constrained by the local deities' attacks, he would drag him into the eternal void, letting the denizens of this realm do the rest. All he would need was a mere ten heartbeats...

  It was pandemonium all around: the din of battle, the screams of creatures being consumed by ravenous flames, the groaning of burning trees, the ground rupturing... And Power emanating from the forest—a veritable deluge of Power! Detectable only in the Astral, Phallet soared high above the battlefield and looked down. Roaring helplessly half a mile to his right was Valeph, bound in midair by the collective magic of three gods and a century of mages; not far from him Halephos was fighting off two foes at once—a local god in a light mantle and a winged woman; ignoring a torrent of elven arrows, an army of the transformed was advancing on human and dwarven legions bristling with pikes; off to the side, Vaepar was using his horns to try and crush the defense of a warrior clad in armor resplendent in the setting sun. The locals gods were proving to be more capable than he had anticipated, but they wouldn't last much longer despite their desperation—not one of the titans was even wounded, whereas losses among their allies were mounting.

  It was time! A silver shadow fell on Vaepar's back, as Phallet smashed through the monster's bone armor with his paws, releasing the Power of his blood accumulated over half a millennium. The Astral exploded from the howl of the wounded beast. The Power that escaped the titan's wound disintegrated the small army of the transformed in the vicinity, and hurled back his armored foe. His defense incinerated in the flame of the Winged Lord of Lemuria's blood, the Ancient God staggered and began to inch backward.

  Everything in creation has an antithesis and a reflection. It wasn't by accident that the Celestial Dragon had brought them to Lemuria—the blood of the Winged Lords was deadly poison for the Ancients, and the only substance capable of easily breaching their defenses. His grandfather had realized as much on the fiftieth day of that great war... Driving hazy images away from his fading consciousness as his life force departed his body in waves, Phallet smiled. For the first time in five hundred years since his appearance in this world. The heavily wounded god shuddered, his feet wobbling. Three more heartbeats!... Just then, Valeph and Halephos sprang away from their opponents and pounced on the Winged Lord while pouring liberal portions of their own life force into their dying sibling.

  The titans' counterattack was fearsome, as Phallet was literally swept off the monster's back and hurled nearly a quarter mile to the side. The Ancients struck with raw Power, sacrificing defense and mowing down the back rows of their own army that had been swarming the human and dwarven legions. Damnation! He'd thought he would easily endure their counter strike. Idiot! It wasn't only his magical potential that had risen in this realm—the Ancients had become stronger, too! Grinding his teeth in despair, he could only watch as the titans, deprived of their defenses, began backing away under the renewed offensive of the local gods. The armies of dwarves and humans were now pressing, their knights in silver armor mopping up the remains of the dark army's cohorts. And so he looked on, whispering an ardent prayer: "Finish them..." He could not help them at this point, his Astral projection nearly fully erased, his energy barely enough for the flight back to the refuge he'd set up in the humans' border territories. And when the gods eschewed the pursuit of the retreating Ancients, he realized with sorrow that this realm was doomed. It wasn't in the Ancients' nature to forget—and they wouldn't forget this battle. The human, elven and dwarven races were destined for total extinction. And the remaining races of this world would be... transformed.

  Sitting on the gray stone slabs of his haven, he kept scouring for any kind of solution to the situation. He couldn't rely on the local gods uniting and moving on Darkaan, having gotten to know them all too well over the past five centuries. Should he wrap himself up in a restorative cocoon? But this realm didn't have eight thousand years—he would awaken amid its ruins, helpless before the titans ruling the continent. Nor could he return to Lemuria for as long as those with whom he'd entered the spatial rift were still breathing. He knew the price for casting that fateful spell five hundred years ago, but surely there was a reason the Celestial Dragon had kept him alive? Having reached a decision at last, Phallet lumbered in the corner of the cell that was now his home, and picked up a chunk of dark metal. Black steel—a special material at once most durable and most sensitive to magic. The sentients of this world deemed the sword to be the weapon of warriors... Then let it be so. The metal began to shift in his hands, elongating into the shape of a sword and changing color from black to silver. Phallet knew that the chance of somebody appearing in this realm who could discern his message was rapidly dwindling to zero, but he was willing to make that wager. If only because he had no other wager to make.

  The kellas sighed and closed his eyes for a moment. A series of images came flashing before his mind's eye: the white-as-snow castle perched atop a cliff, his father's stern features, the mocking looks of his two sisters and brothers. His solitude had made him old... With a chuckle, the Winged Lord drove the sword into his chest. As the blade's metal drank his blood greedily, he suddenly saw the dark bulk of the castle, its burgundy towers soaring up from the corners... The sword fell to the stone slabs a moment later, the clanging noise echoing and tumbling along the stone corridors, abandoned by humans centuries ago. And then there was silence.

  "Look at this beauty, Kyam," a warrior in violet plate armor picked a sword up off the floor. After demonstrating it to a mage following behind, he turned his head and bellowed. "Serko! Get over here, gods damn it!"

  "Yes, commander?" a young black-haired youth with an ugly deep scar running across his face emerged from an arched passage.

  "What is the meaning of this ratshit?
Why didn't anyone collect this sooner?" Lars nodded at the blade in his hands. "Or are you all blind?"

  "There were no swords here before," the young man frowned. "I searched this room myself—it was empty like all the rest."

  "Wait," putting his hand on his friend's shoulder, Altus showed the black-haired warrior the door. "Go on with your search—the champion and I need to talk."

  "I've spoiled them rotten," the knight shook his head, his eyes fixed on the silvery blade. "Soon they'll be seeing nothing but broads and booze."

  "Only your squad has got just as many women as men," Altus smirked, "but enough about that." Looking around the room, its walls set with large stones, and turned his eyes to the warrior.

  "Don't you find it odd that in the past few thousand years no vermin made a home in these ruins? And that the hilt of this sword is made of the same black iron as the blade? You do realize how much this metal costs?"

  "Well, you're the expert when it comes to figuring out vermin behavior," Lars chuckled. "As for the hilt, it's possible that a few millennia ago black iron wasn't quite as valuable as it is today. Or do you think the master that had crafted this wonder had another purpose?"

  "These ruins are steeped in a strange kind of magic that I can't quite identify," Altus frowned. "And this sword..." the mage traced his finger carefully along the blade. "There's something else there besides the metal of the gods. Quite strange, indeed. But I suppose asking you to leave the sword here would be futile?"