Oblivion's Peril

by M. H. Johnson

  He sensed a flood of enemy reinforcements, the ground shaking as battle-mech after battle-mech approached the boundary of his first domain.

  It was then that he sensed Elise herself, roaring her defiance, furious words somehow resonating through the slowly regenerating force field.

  "Here are the heads of your black knights, Blackenthorp bastards! Your would-be Overlord is dead! Your clan walks the Path of Kings no longer, yet you still declared the red! Marcus will not be pleased if his reserves get themselves killed here, when your only priority should be defending your city! Our power is back on. Your efforts at sabotage have failed! Even now, we are happily telling all the other players on the board how vulnerable you fools are to attack!"

  Shouts of defiance before cooler heads prevailed.

  Then one pilot, furious, perhaps, at having been taunted and defeated, dared to aim his autocannons at the force field, firing for all he was worth.

  Remarkably, it held. Even as the field grew brilliant with ricocheting streams of energy arcing back and killing handfuls of enemy infantry, Val felt the field begin to bend and warp. Though the power was finally coming back on line, it would take time before the protective field crackled with the potency of an entire regiment. Time they didn’t have.

  In a panic, Val knew there was only one thing he could do.

  The facility was an extension of him, and PRM blazed through every fiber of his being. He wondered if it could somehow protect the facility as well.

  Save verse cataclysmic failure made! It's fitting that you resonate so well with this lab, Val, it has almost as many dark secrets as you do! EM Mastery successfully utilized! Highblood shields boosted 20%! 20% of enemy damage channeled into reserves! Cost to manipulate in such a fashion at your level of skill: 100 Mana + 100 Psion per minute! Good luck holding this for more than a handful of minutes, Val!

  But hold it Val must as first one, then a second, then a third battle-mech began firing at the shield until their cannons began to overheat, pouring every ounce of power they had at besting the shield so they could butcher everyone within. Val groaned as he felt the strain, as if the autocannons were striking him personally.

  50 hit points damage and Light Wound suffered! Save to maintain focus made! It seems like this body-mind communion flows both ways, Val!

  Even then Val realized that had power not been cut off for so long, had the shields had a chance to recharge back to full strength, it could ward off dozens of battle-mechs, at least for a time. But now, drained, defeated, sabotaged on all sides, Val feared that he and the shield were both about to collapse. And then a miracle occurred. A miracle in the form of a girl he loved fiercely, pushing against unspeakable pain as her face lit in a rictus of a smile and she embraced the one act that could save them all.

  "Titan's Blast!" Julia screamed, enduring unthinkable pain a second time as a massive ball of tungsten carbide screamed through the air before erupting in a roar of superheated shrapnel and plasma. The glistening battle-mech of chrome and steel promising death to everyone within the compound was instantly turned into a roaring inferno of twisted metal and plastic, smashing back into what were now screaming, milling troops, dozens crushed by the shattered mech, scores more perforated by countless armor-piercing shards of tungsten carbide slicing through the air, or set ablaze by the inconceivably hot plasma incinerating so many. The luckiest were sent flying back from the shock wave released from the blast, surviving by the narrowest of margins, or at least allowed the mercy of a quick death.

  And Julia wasn't done. "Titan's Blast!" she screamed once more before slumping to the ground, writhing in pain as a second chrome sentinel exploded like a tin can torn apart by shotgun pellets, the shattered husk sent flying back, turning scores of soldiers advancing from behind into crimson smears, the resulting fire and death too much for the troops laying siege to endure.

  Morale was shattered. The entire massive contingent of Blackenthorp forces, including the remaining battle-mechs, fell into a panicked retreat, all of them desperate to escape the terrible mage able to effortlessly arc battle magics over the force field they had failed to penetrate, shredding them with fire, shrapnel, and death.

  Minds blank with desperate terror, they had no idea that their nemesis had already collapsed in pain and exhaustion.

  And Val could spare not a moment longer for the girl he loved so fiercely, praying a wounded Elise would keep Julia safe, all his attention immediately pulled into the dying facility once more.

  In, out. Val continued to breathe, to heal, to understand. The facility, its miraculous array of miracles and torments, containing far more secrets about his origin that he could possibly have dreamed. Time had lost all sense of meaning while he had been communing with the facility. He was only aware that hours had passed by the time he felt it safe to reclaim himself once more.

  Light pierced his skull when he opened his eyes again at last, stumbling to the ground, feeling cool air wash over him, Elise and Christine both looking at him with something close to awe.

  Congratulations! You have done the unthinkable! Fusing your own soul to a doomed laboratory of epic underground proportions, experimenting with forbidden technologies, forging horrors and wonders undreamed, and one of those horrors is you! Were you yourself not a product of this lab, the critical failure would have destroyed you utterly! But in this case, the metaphor is just a bit too close for comfort, isn't it, Val? You really are this lab. This lab really is you.

  Congratulations! This research facility is the size of several dozen rejuvenation centers. Your critical success has allowed you to repair the entire structure! You have achieved Rank 3 in Creation, Manipulation, and Transformation!

  EM Mastery is now Rank 2!

  Congratulations! You have learned your first Overlord Ritual. Overlord rituals are among the most potent of magics that can shape or restore entire territories! But there is a cost. Territory points will be permanently invested!

  Overlord Ritual - Halcyon Restoration learned! Whenever you purchase or claim a new territory that once held facilities or wonders of interest, you can invest territory points to bend fate itself to your calling! Secrets once lost will be discovered once more! You can rescue any imperiled system even moments before imminent destruction! Alternatively, you can restore 2 Tiers worth of a ruined wonder's properties or destroyed facility's ranks per point spent. Only territory points derived from said territory or territories connected by geography or gates can be used for this purpose! Who knows what lost wonders you might discover? - Equivalent level (There is no equivalent! This is an Overlord Ritual, Val. 1 point would have rescued your beloved Ava's Arboriums. 2 points would have freed the southern dwarves from Time's Paradox. 3 points would have brought Arilius Battleborn's entire city back to perfect working order, Silbion reserves filled, automatons properly serving their masters once more. You're walking the Path of Kings, Val!)

  Val shuddered, awed and horrified by all that he was learning about his potential, and himself. Fighting to keep from sinking into exhausted slumber, he focused on his friends. "How are we?"

  Christine beamed. Elise was standing once more and assisting with Val's still comatose friends and seemed to be in communication with whoever was running things outside the lab. Val cringed to see Christine looking more tired than ever, even in the short time he had been distracted. "We are luckier than I could possibly have hoped for. Not only is power restored, but our defenses are now back online. All the Blackenthorp cowards that beheld my daughter's glorious counterattack have long since fled." She flashed a cold smile. "I even permitted all the surviving invaders to leave, upon their oath never to return. There has been enough death this day, I think, and we must husband our own forces as carefully as possible, for I have no doubt this is but one of many threats we will have to face in the upcoming months."

  There was something about Christine's gaze. "How long was I... gone?" Val asked.

  Christine's smile only grew. "Four hours, Val. A miracle of s
tabilization and repair in only four hours."

  Val blinked, dizzy with fatigue. "Four hours?"

  Christine nodded. "And I can't tell you how incredibly grateful I am. Had you not stabilized things..." She shuddered, her shudder turning into a wracking cough. "It would not have been pretty, dearest Val."

  Val slowly nodded. "I know."

  Christine paled and trembled as she caught his gaze.

  He did not look away.

  Knowing that she now knew that he knew everything. Everything about the horrors below, and the miracles she had wrought. Monstrous perversions of ethical science, and the only reason why Val, his siblings, and the girl he loved even lived.

  Though she trembled still, Christine lifted her chin. "At least you understand, Valor Hunter. Hate me if you will... but at least you understand."

  Val lowered his gaze. "If I were to call you a mad scientist, if I were to say the ends never justified the means, my old mentor would laugh in my face. And he'd be right. Your research is horrific. And it must continue."

  Christine nodded. "Our race is dying, Val. Fools so willing to throw each other's lives away may refuse to accept it, but infertility is accelerating. I think perhaps this is the Fermi Paradox. The more complex an organization gets..."

  "The harder it is to replicate. And with the complexity of magic and psionics..."

  Christine nodded. "And you have both gifts. You and my daughter both! My experiments worked, Val. They worked!"

  "I am not an experiment!" Val roared, choking back his rage, a flash of heat he hadn't expected. "I'm a person. One who risked his life to save you. To save all of you! I nearly died trying to save my home, and you monsters are still winning!"

  Christine glared. "Monsters? You are one of us, Val. And how much blood is on your hands? Blood we will always be grateful for you shedding! Do you honestly think it ends here, Overlord Valor? Your struggles have just begun!"

  Dead silence. Elise's gaze grew haunted as Christine crumpled in a ragged series of coughs.

  "Poor Val," Elise whispered. "Here we are, dying of plague, and even if you pull through, soon all of Jordia's contenders will be coming for you. Even now I sense the potential of your soul blazing like an ancient king. And for all that shadows are your gift, you are Dauda. You must never be caught unawares. Your foes could kill you instantly. Ever the dagger, never the shield."

  Elise turned, glaring at her mother. "I can sense enough of what happened, just gazing into his soul, Mother! Maintaining multiple experiments with hyper-infused Silbion? Never mind the Cyborgian Hiveminds or the horrors on floor 13! We could have gone the way of the Charpentiers!"

  Christine's eyes flashed. Exhausted and sick as she was, Elise still flinched under that glare. "My experiments are necessary. More than you know. More than just rejuvenation is at stake. If it weren't for my willingness to embrace the forbidden, you would have no sister, and your savior would have never been born! Your lover would be dead, and Tytus would still be ruling Jordia with an iron fist, no doubt using you as his pleasure slave even now! Without research like mine, Psionicists will become extinct in just a few thousand years. And if those damned Blackenthorps had actually managed to take our heads, we would still have our vengeance. For horrific death would have been their ultimate reward!"

  Elise paled, gazing at her hastily bandaged stump, nodding bitterly, wiping away tears with her one remaining hand. "You're right, Mother. Gods help me, you’re right. I tasted the minds of those hirelings. They intended no survivors. They were embracing the most barbaric of rites. If they could butcher us all in a single night, history will consider us unworthy of the blood running through our veins. Even so, only a corrupt council caught up in a war of succession would ever permit such literal translation of our civilization’s founding precepts.”

  Christine gave a tired nod. "I know some of the things I've done are unspeakable. But to dare this!”

  Val nodded. "You're right. It counts as a Dark Secret. We can't let anyone know about the Forbidden Techniques, or they'll use them as a pretext to destroy us. But it's the only reason why we are a level 5 and not a level 3 research facility. Without accepting the cost of biological battle, we'd suffer a significant reduction in generated research, and be denied our annual chance of rejuvenation and genetic engineering breakthroughs as well. I don't know how you managed to roll both a critical success and failure when it came to boosting my friends, but now they're on record as being enhanced, and over half the facility is now infected with the backlash!"

  Elise blinked. "What the hell are you talking about, Val? This isn't some damned game!"

  Christine chuckled softly. "Don't you get it, Elise? For him, it is. At least, in a sense. You know the dark secret of our kind, able to feed upon the limitless potential of all our foes, seizing the endless potential of their destinies, their knowledge, all they ever were or could have been, to forge stronger futures for ourselves."

  An exhausted Elise squeezed her eyes shut. "I know that's a fundament of our religion, I know you forged him to be able to control his own growth, but Val is treating this like a game!"

  "It's not religion, it's a fact!" Christine snapped. "This is the heart of what we spoke of the other day. What are games, but a way of codifying growth and skill? Your younger sister has the arcane powers of a Highmage, and she is only 19! She is a child who can cast battle-mech killing spells with a shout! Being forged of two worlds with two different universal reference points, she was able not only to fully seize the power of the dozens she killed as casually as if she were playing a computer game with her friends, she was able to triangulate exactly how she wanted to empower herself and grow. And the way she does that is by visualizing hyper-reality within an artificial matrix. In short, as if she were a character in her own game!"

  Elise turned to Val, her beautiful violet eyes widening as if she beheld a monster. "Valor... I see your character sheet. You and my sister really shape your realities to mirror a computer game? And the universe, for some reason, actually talks to you? Gods, Val, what are you?"

  Val grimaced, having deliberately opened himself up to her probing gaze. "I don't think this is any game. For me, this is reality. I can just, somehow, shape it to my will. At least with the 7 character points I earn every time I level."

  Christine nodded. "Seven is quite remarkable. Julia receives 5, and the Terran apes who can resonate between our realms only receive 3 or 4 points per level. Even that gives them an incredible advantage over any other mercenary that can never envision 'leveling up.'" She caught Val's gaze. "My apologies, Val. I meant to say our Terran friends."

  Val forced himself to his feet, gazing at Elise, her eyes filled with sudden concern. "Julia. We have to take care of her. She almost killed herself trying to save us!"

  "Already done, Val. She's sleeping comfortably even now. Frankly, you look exhausted. I think it's time for you to rest."

  Val wanted to fight it but knew he would soon give in, knowing he was running out of time. "Elise. Drive me to the crash site."

  Her eyes widened at this.

  "No time to argue!" Val said. "Tell Gregor to use the alchemy tome to look for a Cure-all formula. Have a gardener pick whatever herbs he needs while you and I go back to the ship and grab the alchemy set there." He flashed a tired smile. "We both know it's probably the most sophisticated alchemy set in the northern hemisphere. While you’re driving, I'll take a nap."

  "But Val..."

  Val shook his head. "Look at your mother. She's dying. That dark mocking voice in my head was just taunting me with it. My healing potions somehow saved my friends. My PRM skill is maxed. It's infused my cells with so much power that only my mind gets tired. I can run for hours, and my cells regenerate almost supernaturally fast, so I don't think I'll get sick. But pretty much everyone else is fair game. Just look at your mom, Elise, you know it's true."

  Elise blinked, gazing at her mother with anxious eyes. Val stumbled, feeling the roaring darkness of too long deferred
sleep wash over him. And it was Sten of all people who helped him up. "He's right. Why are we arguing? Come on, love. Let's get to the veli."

  Christine's eyes widened at Sten's sudden appearance. "You risk your life coming in here, son-in-law."

  Sten winked. "That may be true, but I got a bad feeling that we're all dead unless we get that alchemy set here and whip up a miracle. Blackenthorp’s men are fleeing in the opposite direction as the crash site, so we have that going for us, and poor Gregor's in a frustrated huff that your equipment is so modernized that he can't adapt anything for a more arcane interpretation of the healing arts. I'm guessing we have nothing like a top-of-the-line alchemy set we wouldn't need to trek through the desert to get?"

  Val shook his head, already sensing that this was so, some part of his mind now understanding the territory and the lab he was Soul-linked to just as well as the childhood home he might never see again.

  "Unfortunately we do not have what your dear companion needs for his elixirs," Christine said. “I would recommend that you and my daughter make haste, with my blessings.”

  Val wanted to come along, knew he should come along, but was somehow on the floor, feeling himself slip away on soft clouds of comfort, though he knew howling screams were waiting for him, just a nightmare away.

  The last thing he felt was Sten's comradely squeeze of his shoulder. "Don't worry, we got this, Val. You just get some rest."

  He wanted to protest, to come along, but he had already been claimed by night’s irresistible embrace.

  17

  Val's crackling blade of death screamed through the ether, attempting to blast through the bind of the massive giant before him, skull still bubbling where Val's blade had just caressed his opponent's head. Only this time he had thought to pivot and twist his torso when Augustus sought to disembowel him, Psiblade only vaporizing flesh and muscle, Val's organs otherwise intact.