Krox Rises

by Chris Fox

  Her revenge would be glorious.

  Nebiat cocked the great spear back to throw it, and Krox’s elation surged with him. He too craved the death she was about to inflict.

  Sudden agony roiled through her, a multi-layered wrongness as vital parts of her body ceased to function. Were she a mortal, she would have wagered that someone had just slid a dagger into her kidney. The pain, if it could be called pain, was acute.

  “What—is happening?” She gasped as she sought a way to peer inside herself and find the cause of the disturbance.

  In forging the body you have, you have rendered yourself vulnerable. You cannot perceive inside the confines of your own vessel. Not as we could using my previous form. I do not know what is causing the damage, but the weapon was either created by Inura or Nefarius. Either way, I can feel it pillaging our magic, growing stronger as it tears us apart.

  “Can it kill us?” Nebiat felt the first stab of real fear since she’d learned that Krox intended to absorb her.

  Another wave of pain washed through her, this time closer to the chest.

  Not if we flee.

  Nebiat considered that. No, not yet. She would not abandon this battle, not while Voria lived. She would never have a better chance.

  52

  Hound of Xal

  Aran had never experienced the level of power, and of control, he felt while flying Talon. He guided the ancient ship through a forest of miniature galaxies, winding through Krox’s body as he sought the pulsing void magic that had been stolen from Xal.

  They flew in relative silence, with an exhausted Bord lounging against the wall, Rhea sleeping next to him. Neither was in any condition to fight, which meant they were screwed if they needed to defend themselves.

  Kezia had stepped into Bord’s matrix, as asked. She might lack his defensive capabilities, but her water magic could still prove useful, even if she was inexperienced at piloting. It beat having an empty matrix.

  “I wish Nara was here,” Kezia murmured under her breath. It was loud enough for Crewes, evidently.

  “You know what?” The sergeant said quietly. “I do too. We’re in the shit, and no offense, sir, but you ain’t a true mage.”

  “None taken. I miss her too.” Aran guided them around a nebula, and smiled when he saw what lay beyond. “There it is, Sergeant.”

  A pulsing ball of liquid purple, darker than a heart wound and larger than any star, hovered in the black. Veins of dark energy flowed off the orb, and power pulsed away in a rhythmic heartbeat, snaking off into the vast distance that was the rest of Krox.

  “That thing looks important.” Crewes gave a slow smile. “Would be a real shame if something bad were to happen to it. I bet Krox would just love having his appendix burst.”

  “Yup, a real shame.” Aran answered the sergeant’s smile with one of his own. “Watch this.”

  He tapped the void sigil on all three rings, then poured as much strength as he could into the matrix. Dark waves of magic disappeared into the deck, one after another, until the entire vessel began to shake.

  Aran seized the arms of his command chair, and gritted his teeth as he channeled the spell. A tendril of negative energy shot from the Talon’s spellcannon, lancing into the pulsing ball. After a moment the pulsing stopped. The veins were suddenly sucked inward, as if subjected to tremendous gravity.

  The entire orb shrank to a fraction of its size, all that void energy compressed into a tiny ball. Then it shot back towards the Talon at alarming speed.

  “Uh, sir, is this part of the plan?” Crewes’s voice was tinged with panic as the orb slammed into the ship.

  “Trust me, Sergeant.” Aran braced himself against the matrix’s command chair, grateful he no longer had to deal with a standard stabilizing ring.

  The massive ball of void magic slammed into the Talon, and rippled through every part of the ship. Darkness shrouded everything as the entire vessel filled with liquid magic, the blood of Xal, the most potent concentration of void still in existence, so far as Aran knew.

  Icy pain shot through every neuron as magic flooded into him, drawn by the strange ability he’d received from Xal. Aran found he could manage the flow, and even distribute it, but he had to do so quickly.

  He couldn’t take it all. There was too much remaining, and he didn’t dare give any of his friends more of the magic. Even if they were okay with it, and Rhea at the very least wouldn’t be, it might kill them.

  And then it occurred to him.

  He sent a flow to Narlifex, which barely touched the reservoir still remaining. The rest, he gave to the Talon, fusing the vast void energy into the ship itself, empowering it just as he had his other weapons. The ship eagerly drank the energy, and he felt the Talon growing larger, and changing in shape and hue, as it absorbed the vast majority of the magic that had been stolen from Xal.

  The ringing in his ears finally faded, and Crewes’s gravelly voice broke the silence. “Let’s never do that again, okay? I feel like someone just crammed their arm up my tailpipe, and left behind a bowling ball.”

  Aran took several deep breaths, and overlaid the Talon’s senses over his own once more. The awareness he sensed was deeper now, but still seemed to lack the ability to speak directly to him.

  The area around him hadn’t changed, other than the removal of Xal’s heart blood. No dragons came roaring after them. No flood of Ifrit came sailing in.

  “I’ve got bad news, Sergeant.” Aran poured a little void into the ship, and spun it around as he scanned Krox’s interior, searching.

  “What’s that, sir?” Crewes leaned over the edge of his command chair to look at Aran.

  “We’re going to do it again, right now. I mean, since we’re here, might as well take some fire magic, right?”

  Aran flew the Talon in a straight line, accelerating as he crossed the distance toward the largest star inside of Krox. It was a pulsing, red ball, fiery tendrils flowing out around it in long, slender neurons that snaked through much of Krox’s interior.

  “All right, sir,” Crewes growled. “Let’s give this asshole a heart attack then. I’m all about getting more fire magic.”

  Aran sucked in a deep breath and gritted his teeth. He tapped all three void sigils, and then duplicated the spell he’d used on Xal’s blood. A tendril of negative energy shot into the heart.

  That area of the sun darkened perceptively, for a moment at least, then the heart returned to full strength, and a flaming orb shot from where the bolt had struck. The fire magic streaked into the Talon, a massive amount, and yet still a tiny sliver of what the heart could offer.

  The flame crashed through the vessel, and it took everything Aran had to channel it so that it didn’t cook the interior of the ship. He struggled desperately to dump an equal slice into everyone, and then sent the rest into the Talon, which drank the fire as eagerly as it had the void.

  Again the ship grew larger, inside and out. Aran didn’t know everything the magic had done, but their destroyer was looking a whole lot more like a full cruiser, almost a third the size of the Wyrm Hunter.

  When the moment passed Aran was left panting, sweat dripping down his face. He looked around the bridge. “Everyone okay?”

  “Peachy, sir,” Bord croaked from the couch along the side of the wall. “But if you could let me off before you do that again, that would be great.”

  “Heads up, sir.” The sergeant’s urgency brought Aran back to the moment, and he observed the area using the Talon’s senses.

  “Oh, crap.” Now a tide of Ifrit were surging toward them. The divine equivalent of white blood cells, maybe. “Looks like the locals finally found us.”

  Thousands upon thousands of miniature stars rose from the heart, and began streaking in their direction. These ones were smaller than those attacking the shield outside, but that didn’t make them any less lethal.

  “Let’s get the depths out of here,” Aran roared. “Hang on!”

  He poured void into the ship, and they s
treaked through a nebula, then down between the spiral arms of another galaxy. Behind him came an endless line of Ifrit, all bent on their destruction. Thankfully, the newly enhanced Talon was quickly outdistancing their pursuers. Not quickly enough for his comfort, though.

  Aran poured more void into the ship, “Come on, girl. Find us a way out of here.”

  They wound further and further down into the body, but the number of stellar phenomena made it impossible to guess their location. Somewhere below the waist, maybe, but above the legs.

  “Sir, why don’t we just make a hole?” Crewes suggested.

  “Looks like we may have to. Everyone add a share of fire, please.” Aran tapped the fire sigil on each ring, and watched as Kezia and Crewes did the same. The Talon’s hull burst into nuclear flame, as hot as a star’s deepest internals. “Okay, time to make a new orifice.”

  Aran poured still more void into the drive, increasing their mass and velocity as they rocketed toward Krox’s rear side. The Talon slammed into the membrane, Krox’s skin, but the enormous heat melted through it, and they burst through, back into open space.

  Spirit magic sprayed into space from the wound they’d created, a tiny cut when considered against the whole of Krox. That was just fine. They’d gotten out.

  Now it was time to finish this.

  The Talon twisted through the battle with impossible speed, easily avoiding the few Ifrit who attempted to attack them. Aran brought the vessel around high, and took a good look at the Krox fleet. Judging from the damage around the tree, some of them must have made it inside, but there was no sign of them now. The shield was in place, and the world seemed safe.

  The surviving Ternus fleet, twelve of the black ships, had gathered into a tight ball directly above the shield. A few Shayan vessels dotted their ranks. Were those really the only survivors? There wasn’t a single conventional warship, and Aran’s anxiety rose like bile when he realized there was no sign of the Hunter. Maybe she’d made it to safety under the shield.

  The few survivors were surrounded by Ifrit and Wyrms, each taking pot shots with their acidic breath or fire bolts. The Krox were working hard to form a blockade, and every Ternus or Shayan ship that approached the shield was quickly overwhelmed.

  “Let’s give them a hand. Sergeant, Kezia, bring that new fire magic online please. Pour as much as you can into the ship.” Aran tapped all three fire sigils, then poured a healthy dose of magic into the Talon.

  Kezia did the same, orange-white flame rolling out of her into the deck. “This is amazing. I’ve always missed it when you fookers got fire. Finally! I can burn things, just like you, Sarge.”

  “Yep.” Crewes grinned at her like a proud father. He’d also tapped the sigils, but the torrent of flame coming from him dwarfed what was coming from Aran or Kez. Of course, Crewes had been to three fire Catalysts now, and was likely one of the strongest wielders in the sector.

  Aran gathered the boundless flame into the spellcannon, and was pleasantly surprised to see that the Talon had automatically augmented the spell with the internal reserves it had gathered from inside Krox. He unleashed the spell, and could only gawk when a three-kilometer-wide fire bolt swept through the Krox ranks.

  Every Wyrm it touched was incinerated, their smoking forms tumbling to the ground like broken kindling. The spell destroyed over a dozen in total, opening a gap for the Ternus defenders.

  The Ifrit were unharmed by the beam, and quickly swarmed in to fill that gap. That wouldn’t do.

  This part was, unfortunately, all on him. Aran tapped each void sigil, and poured enormous strength into the ship. This was his aspect now, like it or not. He was of the void, but being so made him enormously strong. More than any mortal had a right to be.

  The void magic pooled in the cannon, until Aran couldn’t give any more. He gave an inarticulate cry of rage as he released the spell, channeling all of his hatred for the Krox, and everything they’d done. The cannon vomited a beam of pure void, easily a kilometer wide, which disintegrated everything in its path. Ifrit and Wyrm alike simply ceased to exist, widening the gap they’d created beneath the Ternus fleet.

  Now it was enough for them to get safely beneath the shield.

  “Crewes, get a message out to the Ternus fleet. I want every one of those black ships to attack Krox directly. Shayan vessels, get to safety beneath the shield.”

  Even a god must have felt the amount of magic they’d stolen. If the Inuran ships started taking more, then maybe, just maybe, the god would retreat.

  53

  Aftermath

  Voria had watched every possibility play out a trillion times. She knew that she was going to die if she saved her world, and yet there seemed to be no better alternative. She simply could not live with allowing Nebiat to destroy her people.

  Her heart shattered alongside the great tree itself, and fragments rained down over the endless fields she had whiled away her afternoons watching from her quarters in the Temple of Enlightenment.

  She would not let this stand, and if this was to be her final act she would let it be a memorable one.

  Voria raised the Spellship and aimed its blazing tip like a staff. She funneled her magic through the weapon, mildly surprised when the staff answered by supplying an equal quantity, thronging out of her followers in a vast divine song.

  The magic felt endless, maybe even endless enough to subdue this tragedy. Time seemed to slow as the fragments of the tree rained toward the few desperate survivors below. Voria arrested their momentum, and drew them together in a swirling mass of life and water.

  She remembered the vision of Shaya creating the tree in the first place, her attempt to imprison the great spear Worldender. The very spear that Nebiat had stolen, and now raised in a killing throw. Shaya had made something good with her death, and Voria would too.

  The magic coalesced into the exact form of the tree Voria had grown up knowing, the symbol of her people emblazoned on every flag, and every ship. Its roots grew deep into the world, filling the cavern where Shaya’s body had lain.

  Voria gave it more magic.

  The energies rippled outward from the tree, washing across the endless fields, in an ever-expanding ring that raced across mountains, craters, and valleys. In its wake it brought life. Trees, and flowers, and lakes, and even oceans swept across the planet, as the atmosphere spread above them.

  It covered not only the sanctuary Voria had created for her people, but the entire world. Life bloomed so strong, and vibrant, and diverse, that it no longer depended upon the tree. Clouds gathered, swirling and dancing, and bringing rain to parts that had never felt its touch. The magic seeped into the world itself, transforming Shaya into a lush, forested moon.

  Finally, Voria replaced the shield, sheltering as much of the area as she could.

  A fitting end for her short divinity.

  Voria twisted to face Nebiat, to witness the fate she’d seen countless times, the fate that she’d embraced. Nebiat cocked her arm back to throw, but before she could complete the motion her cosmic body spasmed. A grimace passed across her face, and then her hand dropped to her midsection.

  A moment later a tiny flaming ball shot out of Nebiat’s rear, as if she were…

  “You can say it,” Shaya prompted.

  “I’m not dignifying that with a response.” Voria studied the flaming projectile. Was that…the Talon? It was larger now, and darker in color.

  “Oh, come on.” Shaya rolled her eyes. “A flaming ship just shot out of a god’s ass. Are we really pretending that didn’t just happen?”

  A smile bloomed and something lightened within Voria. “I’m more eager to see where the ‘flaming projectile’ is going.”

  The Talon began belching immensely powerful spells, easily fifth level if she were to classify them. Perhaps sixth. Everything they touched simply died, and the Talon didn’t lack for more spells. It kept casting, and tore through the enemy ranks in a storm of blazing death.

  The vessel single-ha
ndedly created a gap around their Ternus allies, allowing the wedge-shaped ships to fan out and begin their counterattack on Nebiat herself.

  The angry goddess had finally recovered, perhaps because the Talon was no longer lodged inside her. Nebiat brought down two of her arms, and fired twin flaming beams of acidic flame at the approaching ships. The magic swam as if alive, hungrily approaching the doomed vessels.

  Voria spun out possibilities, and tried to decide whether preserving the present was worth mortgaging the future. If she saved those ships, they would be a problem. But without victory here, there was no future.

  Voria swung her blazing staff down, and deflected both pillars of flame, shunting them off into space toward the sun. The unholy ships unleashed hungry, seeking tendrils, latching onto Nebiat’s body, and greedily draining pulses of spirit.

  A large vessel, black, but tinged with scarlet, streaked toward Nebiat, and she realized she was seeing the Talon. It had grown far larger, which was clear seeing it pass by the Ternus fleet. And it had grown far more deadly.

  The familiar glow of a disintegrate built in the Talon’s spellcannon, then lanced into Nebiat’s chest. That part of her body swirled into a billion particles, and then dissolved, just as parts of Voria had done when she’d been hit by the acid flame.

  The dark god’s body rippled, and the horrible wound healed, but Voria felt the cost of it. And the sickly pulses of spirit magic were still flowing into the black ships, weakening Nebiat further.

  Nebiat’s hateful gaze settled on Voria, twin suns focusing all their attention on her. She held Worldender aloft, not to throw, but merely to brandish. “I have what I came for. I will see you again, old friend. It pleases me that you have followed me into godhood. If it takes centuries I will be the death of everything you love.”

  And then she was gone. The system was suddenly bereft of her immense power and the chaos Nebiat had wrought. Only a few Ifrit remained, and the remaining Wyrms were scuttling for the planet’s umbral shadow as quickly as they could.