Death's Mantle: A Dark Fantasy GameLit Novel

by Harmon Cooper

  It was something he’d wanted to test, and now that he was in a place to test it, he simply took a seat in the waiting room, the two crows taking off. His smartphone out, Lucian turned it sideways, their video feeds appearing with the split down the middle.

  Figuring he could use a slightly larger device, Lucian morphed his into a foldable smartphone to give him additional viewing space.

  “That’s much better,” he said as his crows made their way to the wards. And just as he had predicted, his creations were also able to see people’s dates of death.

  It was when one of his crows passed a doctor who was living past his date of death that Lucian truly got to test his creation. This would be his second crow, on the screen on the right, and as it passed the doctor it stopped, turning to the man and tagging him.

  Name: Martin Chao

  Date of Birth: 03/14/1964

  Date of Death: 08/06/2019

  Lucian looked up, a schematic of the crow’s path materializing before him. He noted the doctor’s general location, now outlined in red.

  Mentally taking control over the crow, or at least that was what it felt like, Lucian turned back to the doctor as the man stepped into his office, Lucian’s crow following him in.

  He noted the peach-colored parasite attached to the back of the doctor’s neck, the rest of its body hidden by the doctor’s white lab coat.

  An eye rose off the creature’s thorax, spotting the crow.

  “Get out of there,” Lucian whispered as his creation pressed back through the door, exiting the room.

  The parasites could clearly see his crows, but it was unlikely that they would be fast enough to act upon it. If they did, he could just create another one, even if he had an affinity for the first that he had made.

  This gave Lucian a new idea.

  As his other crow continued to search the wards for targets, Lucian sent the crow back into the room, where he found the doctor relaxing, his hands behind his head.

  “Attack,” Lucian whispered.

  His crow tore through the doctor’s lab coat, right into the body of the parasite. After a quick breath, Lucian focused completely on what was happening in the room.

  He was the crow now, able to dodge the parasite’s tentacles, the creature shaking wildly as his crow tore through its body again. Blood splattered against the wall and Lucian turned upwards, narrowly missing sharp claws that tore through the drapes.

  He opened his eyes, watching the video feed again, willing the crow to take his power and kill the parasite.

  His spherical creation was now moving faster than Lucian had seen it move before. It dodged stingers, claws, even acidic spit that melted through the floor.

  He drove it into the creature’s body again and again until the parasite finally died, and a light filled the room.

  “Shit, yes,” Lucian whispered, his stats appeared before him.

  He sent the crow on its way, ideas coming to him on how he could really exploit the system with this ability.

  It would definitely be something he could test later, but for today, and for right now, especially after what he had seen go down with his brother, Lucian had the urge to hunt.

  Lucian stepped into a hallway, his fully automatic carbine with its zero-point energy field manipulator at the ready, the curls of his cape lifting up behind them as his two crows shot forward.

  They zipped into the first room on the left and blasted back to the hallway. A clear tentacle tore through the door in hot pursuit, the plane of existence changing and the background suddenly tangible.

  The creature grew, parts of it bulging out of the wall, another patient’s room also exploding outward as its creature came alive. The two parasites meshed together, their skin clear with red on the inside. Lucian was already firing his carbine in the time it took them to merge.

  His bullets tore through one of the tentacles, awaking yet another parasite on the opposite side of the hallway, giving him three opponents.

  This parasite broke out of the wall, sending debris into the air as Lucian toggled to his energy field manipulator and latched onto it. He slammed a portion of its body into the parasite on the left.

  Lucian tossed the gun aside, his weapon dematerializing in an instant as his plasma blowtorch came into his hands. He pulled the lever back and unleashed a beam of thermal energy, his cape fighting off the tentacles and stingers trying to get him.

  Zipping through the air, his crows looked for angles to attack the vertical eyes on the parasites’ backs. They were fast, and soon the first parasite went down, the second quickly following the first.

  As Lucian continued to battle tentacles, his crows focused on the parasite on the right, easily able to take it out as he distracted the creature.

  The energy swelled around Lucian as his stats appeared before him:

  “Here we go,” he said as he made his way down the hallway, the light flickering above him, the ground wet with the blood of parasites.

  He took a left and a right, coming to more rooms.

  An idea came to him.

  Lucian’s cape and hood lifted off him, swirling in the air next to him. He peeked into the room on the left where he saw a man trying to write in his journal, his hand a little shaky. The clear white parasite attached to the man was pulsing, little feelers curling in the air, their tips red.

  Lucian looked to his crows, and then to his cape, motioning them into the room.

  His cape swelled to twice its size, immediately engulfing the parasite, the plane of existence changing as the parasite tried to slam the cape into the wall.

  Lucian’s cape managed to grab the parasite and stop its tentacles and stingers from protecting its back, exposing its vertical eye, allowing his crow to kill it instantly.

  The energy spiraled into Lucian.

  His cape and hood resettled on his body as Lucian’s crows returned to him.

  The first crow he created moved toward the end of the hallway, Lucian following behind it. He came to the next floor and equipped his scythe, his cape swirling around him.

  An extension of the idea he’d had earlier came to Lucian.

  He handed his scythe to his cape, the black material forming a clawed hand and taking it from him.

  “You know what to do?”

  The cape’s hood nodded.

  With his crows leading the way, the cape took off into a room on the left and Lucian turned his attention to a room on the right.

  He looked closely at the woman sitting on her bed, not noticing anything about her other than the fact that she was going to die in the next ten years.

  He was just turning to the action when a tentacle tore out of the window he’d just been looking in. It wrapped around Lucian’s throat and slammed him into the door.

  Lucian’s claws formed as he tried to pull the tentacle off of his neck, his fingers digging into the parasite.

  But the tentacle only grew in size.

  Lucian’s Glock appeared in his hand and he lifted it behind him, firing the entire magazine into the door. The creature let up for just a second, giving Lucian the time he needed to go for his lava sword.

  And not a moment too soon either as two tentacles tore out of the wall to his left, followed by a red stinger, the parasite inside hissing and squealing as Lucian began to cut through its appendages.

  A burst of light behind him signified that his cape and his crows had taken out the other parasite.

  The three returned to Lucian and launched into action again, his cape using his scythe to sever a muscled white and red arm that was crawling out of the room. Lucian’s Glock reformed in his hand and he took out the arm crawling toward him.

  A blob of something blue and sticky slammed into Lucian, tossing him to the opposite wall. A tentacle slapped on top of him, wrapping around his neck again and lifting Lucian into the air.

  He went upside down, planting his feet on the ceiling and struggling to get the tentacle off his neck.

  Lucian’s crow shot
right through the parasite’s limb, severing it, allowing him to equip his carbine, which he fired into the other room.

  His magazine finished, he tossed it aside and another one materialized. Lucian clicked it into place and fired again.

  Lucian’s cape spun into the room before he could unload his magazine. It held the demon bug, allowing for Lucian’s crow to take out its vertical eye.

  The parasite died, Lucian still upside down, his carbine aimed at the room with its partially blown out wall, smoke billowing into the air.

  “Fuck,” he whispered, his crows now hovering before him. “You guys are awesome; I’m going to give you some brothers and sisters soon.”

  Lucian dropped to the ground, righting himself.

  His cape returned to him and he stopped it. “Actually, let’s keep you separated for the time being,” he told it, “and hold onto the scythe as well.”

  Lucian’s stats appeared before him.

  He continued down the hallway, following his crows as they zipped around the corner and into a gathering area. He stopped in front of a door with keycard-only access and dipped his head in, where he found six patients and a nurse.

  Lucian pondered for a moment how he could do this and make it quick. If he killed all six, he would get fifteen SP, which would be sweet as hell. And he knew he could do it too, especially if they were in pairs, or possibly groups of up to three.

  But six all at once?

  That was going to take some strategy.

  He equipped his grenade launcher with its cylinder magazine and nodded for his crows and his cape to gather around him. “We’re going to go in blazing. I’ll create a distraction in the center of the room; your goal is to focus on one target at a time and kill it. Only come help me if I truly look like I need help. Let me be the distraction; you three be the assassins.”

  His cape nodded, and his two crows twitched, letting him know they understood his instructions.

  Lucian took a few steps back, realizing that the explosion to follow was going to be quite large, not that he couldn’t handle it.

  He triggered his weapon, firing three of the grenades into the center of the room in front of him, each grenade disappearing through the door. Once they exploded, everything became real. The explosion rang in his ears, as his cape and crows took off, the cape flourishing Lucian’s scythe.

  Lucian kicked into the room with his carbine in one hand and his lava sword in the other, firing and swiping at tentacles and stingers. One wrapped around his leg; Lucian sliced through it, coming back up with a round of bullets as a muscled tentacle took shape in the corner of the room, two parasites merging together.

  Everything was burning, smoke rising off the tables and the ground, the parasites hissing and screeching.

  Lucian stepped into the air and avoided one of the parasite’s sharp blades, his focus on the muscled tentacle forming. He reached it, driving his lava sword in and firing his carbine behind him at the same time.

  Going upside down, Lucian equipped his plasma blowtorch and cut through the muscled tentacle in the corner of the room, an inferno raging all around him as more plumes of blue fire rose into the air.

  He saw a flash in the corner as his crows and his cape took out another one of the parasites, energy pouring into him.

  A blackened stinger tore out of the front of his body before Lucian could react, the parasite hooking him from behind.

  It lifted him to the ceiling and slammed Lucian into the floor, everything going black and red.

  Lucian’s claws formed as he tried to fight off more tentacles coming for him.

  Cutting them down didn’t seem to work.

  Still pinned by the stinger sticking out of his chest, Lucian conjured blue fireball daggers from his hands.

  Another flash of light and another. Two more of the parasites went down, meaning that there were three left.

  His hands on the stinger, Lucian started to push it through his body, the wound expanding until he reached its tip. Lucian severed the stinger and dropped a grenade at his feet.

  He exploded forward, his legs blown off, a huge gaping wound in his chest as his torso slapped into a table, and slipped right under it.

  “Fuck…” Lucian whispered as the wound began to heal on his chest, his thighs and legs reforming.

  More tentacles came toward him, pulling Lucian out from beneath the table. A flash of light told Lucian that his cape and crows had moved onto the final, conjoined parasite.

  Lucian started swiping the tentacles away, and once his legs were reformed and he was able to use his feet, another tentacle slapped him in the face, pressing into his mouth, nose, and eyes.

  He bit down, severing the limb and spitting a piece of it out.

  His Glocks reformed in his hands and he blindly unloaded two magazines at the conjoined parasite in front of him. He tossed his guns to the side and yanked at the tentacles wrapped around his face, pulling their feelers from his nose and eye sockets.

  His eyes still punctured and healing, Lucian equipped his plasma blowtorch again, pulling the lever back and spraying thermal energy in the general direction of the giant parasite.

  More screaming, more hissing, and just as Lucian’s vision returned, his cape and crows took out the conjoined parasite.

  “Damn,” Lucian said as he fell to his knees. his cape returned to him, wrapping around his shoulders, his hood falling over his head. “That was crazy…”

  A beer appeared in his hand and Lucian popped the top off, taking a long drag from it. He went for another pull, breathing heavily now as his body healed, as his eyesight solidified.

  His stats flashed in front of him, and Lucian saw that he had definitely grown more powerful.

  Sti

  “Hell yes,” he said, cheersing his crows.

  It was risky going after so many at once, and it would have to be something he did more cautiously.

  He finished his beer and was going for another when a golden portal opened in front of him.

  Danira stepped out, her large, futuristic rifle aimed at Lucian.

  “I thought I would find you here,” she said, a grin taking shape on her face.

  “It’s not what it looks like.” Lucian waved his beer at the fires raging all around him, the blood splattered across the wall, the shattered glass, the parasite carcasses, utter destruction everywhere he looked. “Maybe it is what it looks like.”

  “It’s time we handled this,” Danira said, her weapon charging.

  After a deep sigh, Lucian tossed his beer over his shoulder. “I was afraid you’d say that.”

  Chapter Twenty: Life and Death

  Lucian’s cape shot off his shoulders, pulling Danira to the ground, her shot going wide and striking the ceiling.

  Golden armor formed on her body, pressing out of the cape and tearing it to shreds. The armor continued to spread up Danira’s body until it formed a facemask with sharpened ends as she fired her energy weapon at Lucian.

  The pieces of his cape trailed after him as he narrowly got behind a pillar in the room, which took the brunt of her attack. His cape reattached to his body, morphing back into its normal shape as he pressed off the wall, fire sword in one hand, his Glock in the other.

  Lucian swung at Danira.

  The angel stopped the blade with the butt of her weapon and pushed him backward, her gun morphing into the same golden sword she’d used back in his brother’s backyard.

  “Tell me where you took him!” he roared, unloading his magazine at Life.

  Danira came around with a kick that connected with his chin, sending Lucian sideways, where he pressed off the wall again as if it were a trampoline.

  He launched himself forward, swinging his lava sword through the air, Danira again meeting it with her own blade.

  Lucian landed and spun, throwing his sword at her as his scythe appeared.

  He tossed it to his right, his cape zipping off his body and taking the scythe, the ends of its dark fabric cutting through t
he air as his crows flew past.

  Lucian’s carbine materialized in his hands.

  He toggled the weapon to the energy field manipulator and fired a beam that attached to Danira’s body, allowing him to slam her into the wall.

  Her blade morphed back into a gun and she tried to fire at him, only to be slammed into the wall again, the angel struggling to break free. Her white wings kicked up feathers as he slammed her repeatedly.

  One of his crows blasted toward her, and Danira batted it away with her golden gauntlet.

  “There’s plenty where this came from,” Lucian said as he continued to slam her into the wall, all of her shots going wide.

  His cape flew into action, digging the scythe into Danira’s side.

  The weapon actually tore through her armor, something that surprised Life as she struggled to break free from Lucian’s grasp.

  And before she could reform her armor, his second crow flew into the open wound.

  Danira stopped struggling for a moment, staring at Lucian with hatred in her eyes.

  “You can’t kill me,” she said. “Not like this.”

  “I don’t want to kill you.”

  “Get this thing out of my body…”

  “How did you find me?”

  “Get this thing out of my body!” she cried. Lucian watched as her armor bulged, his crow moving around inside her.

  “It’s explosive, you know,” he lied, while simultaneously thinking that would be a great modification to add to a future creation.

  “You can’t kill me.” She bared her teeth, a halo forming around her head.

  “I don’t want to kill you; I want to talk to you. Talk to me, and I will recall my creation.”

  “I’ll talk,” she said, glaring at him through her sharp golden helmet. It started to ripple back, revealing her face, her blonde hair spilling out, blue paint over her eyes.

  “This will only take a minute,” he said. “If you call any of your friends, you know what will happen.”

  “You cannot kill me,” she told him again.