by Eric Vall
I couldn’t help laughing at the situation while Deya flailed her legs in midair to get free, and Aurora chuckled, too, as she lit a cluster of spiders on fire.
“Let’s just kill these guys,” Cayla said as she bounced on her toes, and her deadly grin was more eager than usual. “We’ll worry about our allies once the streets run red with the blood of our enemies.”
I eyed the way she clutched her rifle against her chest, and as I recognized the protective stance Aurora had taken beside me as well, I nodded.
“Have at it, ladies.”
Then I let Deya loose again, and she pounced onto the back of the next chupacabra to hack at his skull repeatedly while I turned my attention to the elves running at mach speed toward Shoshanne.
I guessed they were possessed by their grimy tunics and sallow cheeks, but they also moved even faster than the unpossessed versions, so I swiftly took the three of them out while Cayla killed two haggard looking mages at my back.
Shoshanne sent me a flirty smirk as she suffocated a charging chupacabra and five possessed elves for me all at once, and while I dropped four more elves into the ground before they reached Aurora, I kept shooting down our enemies as best I could.
It was hard to discern how many minions the Master sent, though, now that my allies were here to confuse the situation, but I worked my way around the brawl taking place in the lanes while I carefully scanned for any possessed stares. The beasties were easiest to pick off since I’d learned to recognize the Master’s stranger recruits, but then I saw a flock of hairy red bats with four-foot wingspans swoop into the trees, and I had to sigh.
Apparently, the Master was still increasing his numbers, so I added the endless surprises in his arsenal to my list of things currently working against me. Then I ground my jaw while I shot the bats down as they dove at my allies, and when their vibrant pink innards splattered the homes, Aurora did a double take.
“What was that?” the half-elf shouted while she severed the head of my next attacker.
“No idea,” I sighed. “Just kill anyone you don’t recognize so I can get to my burgers.”
“Don’t worry, Mason,” Deya panted as she climbed off a gutted mage, “we’ll take care of this!”
Then my women and I made our way across Falmount in a deadly swarm while I killed their attackers and they killed mine, and even though this was an effective strategy, I decided it was a good thing we’d be more spread out for the upcoming ambushes.
Having to maneuver my shots up and over my women while they wove around me got to be more difficult than just defending myself, but every time I suggested we fan out, they only lashed out at our enemies with twice as much zeal.
Eventually, I realized they thought I was somehow unimpressed, and I decided to keep my mouth shut for everyone’s sake.
By this point, my women’s mommy demons were on such high alert, most of them stopped bothering with their guns, and they went apeshit slicing necks open and gouging out eyeballs with their blades instead. It was concerning how many times they had to stop each other from killing the wrong creatures since they were so caught up in the moment, but there were more than a few times I almost shot my own ogres just because their swinging arms came too close to my women.
Still, focusing on protecting my family helped me ignore a lot of things.
Like the huge red bats I watched tear a stone wall down with their fangs, or the fact that my first offensive attack might fall apart over the allies I’d gathered to achieve it.
So, I leaned into the chaos and let my daddy demon destroy the Master’s forces in bulk, and I grinned a little when I noticed Deya was at peak stabbing performance today. The beautiful elf was so pissed off at everyone who jumped at me that she didn’t even go invisible for this battle, and I was slightly confused when the sight of her baring her teeth while she gutted a chupacabra ended up turning me on.
I figured it was probably just because she kept screeching my name now and then between her Elvish threats, but that didn’t explain why her blood-splattered belly bump kept drawing my eye whenever I had to reload my pistol.
Shoshanne giggled when she caught me checking out my bloody elf between shots, and she had an adorable blush on her cheeks as she hurled five shuriken into the treetops to kill another flock of bats.
“You better look at me like that when I’m pregnant,” the healer murmured over her shoulder as she suffocated an Ignis Mage.
“What makes you so sure you’re not?” I challenged, and when I caught the Aer Mage against me, I slid my palm to her belly as I tucked a kiss into her curls.
Shoshanne was beet red when she met my gaze, and I sent her a roguish grin as I heard her heart racing at the thought.
Then I killed the two elves prowling ahead of us before I turned to take down a herd of chupacabra, but Aurora was in such a cruel mood, she decided to burn the whole herd from the inside out rather than taking the standard approach. I raised my eyebrows at the sinister grin she wore while their leathery skin split open and bubbled away, and Aurora left their twitching bodies in the dirt as she hurled two daggers at my next attackers.
Cayla’s ruthless chuckle kept catching my notice more than anything, though, and the princess was more than hyped up now that she finally had an opportunity to break in her AR-15. She’d been posted at my left flank ever since we headed into the streets, and the only time she’d stopped pulling the trigger was when she needed to reload. The rapid-fire crack of her rifle beside me was oddly comforting as she pivoted with me to take down any minion who tried to sneak up on us, and thanks to her unparalleled aim, she was able to pick off the possessed beings while narrowly missing our allies.
Then I saw a few dwarves bludgeoning the heads of possessed mages, though, and I realized the day actually wasn’t going to shit as much as I thought.
The elven warriors were so swift on their feet, they could trip ogres and hurl daggers at our enemies at the same time, and even though Grot was chucking my mages up onto roofs, he managed to squash spiders under his massive green feet while he went. The boiling tar didn’t seem to bother him in the slightest, either, and he crushed chupacabra skulls with one hand while he knocked every dwarf he passed into the trees with the other.
So, I decided to take this as half a win while I fired a slew of lightning-laced bullets toward the station, and as crackling bolts of lightning shot along the tracks, the incoming spiders began frying as they were caught in the electric blue web.
By now, Deya was absolutely covered in blood as she dove between my legs to finish off a limping mage, and Aurora had slaughtered everyone between us and the tracks while Cayla cleared all of Magehill without any help. Shoshanne was mostly watching my blind spots for me while I scanned my surroundings, but even though I was running out of minions to kill, the tumult of ogre war cries and Dwarvish curses wasn’t dying down.
It was getting louder, so I stumbled out of the lane to get to higher ground, and my women joined me on a stone ledge while they caught their breath and wiped blood off their blades. From the looks of it, only a few possessed creatures were still holding their own, but my allies continued raging their way through the streets, so it was hard to tell where we were at with this attack.
“I think we got most of them,” I hollered above the din.
Aurora squinted through the crowds while she lit a cluster of fleeing spiders on fire, but I could tell she was just as confused as me.
“I have no idea,” Aurora huffed. “Are those our mages on the roofs? They look too grimy… ”
“They’re ours,” Cayla assured her. “They’re just dirty from being kicked around a bit.”
“This is such bullshit,” I muttered as I tore my hand through my hair.
“We can do this,” Aurora insisted. “Get the generals to help out, and we’ll sort it out in no time.”
The half-elf tried to catch Haragh by his collar to yank him out of the mass, but since he was busy grappling with one of Grot’s women, Aurora ju
st ended up falling off the ledge. Shoshanne shrieked as she quickly pulled my half-elf out of the fray, and Deya did her best to kick a few elves in their backs while she scolded them in Elvish.
When I saw Kurna trying to strangle a dwarf who kept punching him in the groin, though, I had a feeling my generals weren’t going to be providing much help, and Cayla shook her head while she scanned the streets with a calculating look.
“Mason, this might be out of our hands,” the princess decided. “They’re too far gone.”
“No, we just need to remain calm and get creative,” I said as I watched two of my mages clock an elf on the head with the butts of their pistols. “This is still my town, and we’re still leading this fight. If we can find a way to… ”
I furrowed my brow as I saw Taru throttling my allies in the middle of the throng, and an elf had her by her braid as he and three others tried to take her down.
“Hey!” I belted, and I dove straight into the crowd to catch one of the elves by his tunic. “That’s my fucking sister!”
Then I planted my fist in his face, and I thought I heard my women yelling my name, but as I wrestled with three elves at once and almost got flattened by an ogre, I felt a satisfied grin twitch at the corners of my lips.
That’s when I really processed the grunts and growls around me, and I realized this was probably the closest this realm would ever get to moshing.
And I could really use a thorough mosh, even if this one was a bit more violent than usual.
So, I grinned even more as I punched elves and lunged onto ogres’ backs, and I did my best to collide with as many bodies as possible just because it made me feel better. Suddenly, all my frustrations from the last day channeled themselves into my fists, and it seemed like my allies were in the same place as me while they threw each other down the street and crashed into porch railings.
Haragh and I almost decked each other twice in all the confusion, but we chuckled and carried on our own ways both times, and I could have sworn I caught a glimpse of Pindor out there before he took a boot to the face.
Several of my mages were leaping down from the roofs now to tear the elves’ hair out, but I could tell which ones lost their horses yesterday by the colorful slurs they threw around while they took to biting their anger out. Any time an ogre let out a furious roar over the assaults, the dwarves roared right back, and they formed small troops to ram their helms into the beasts’ legs as my mages went flying.
Within minutes, I lost track of everything while I pummeled my allies and got my ass beat in return, but to everyone’s credit, we were mostly not trying to kill each other.
I was proud to know they’d heeded my orders to some degree, but then the whole brawl came to a screeching stop as rapid fire suddenly broke out in the lanes.
Everyone hit the ground as tree bark went flying all over the place, and when I gaped up from the dirt, I found Cayla posted on the stone ledge while she emptied her AR-15 into the trees above our heads. As soon as she finished her last round, she leveled us all with a deadly glare, and I instinctively hid my face so she might not see me in the middle of all of this.
The second she spoke, though, I knew we were in deep shit.
“Everyone has ten seconds to get the fuck out of my streets!” the princess ordered in a lethal tone, and just to make sure we took her seriously, the woman grabbed another magazine from her belt and loaded up.
Then ogres, elves, mages, and dwarves flattened each other in their effort to flee the scene, and I managed to scramble out of the way before I was trampled underfoot. The ogres tore through branches and brambles on their way to the northern woods, and the elves leapt straight over my moat to get to their barracks faster. Most of my mages all-out sprinted to try and beat the dwarves to the pubs, but some just limped to their homes as fast as they could manage.
I couldn’t help chuckling as I fought to catch my breath and watched the lanes empty in under a minute, but when I turned around, my four women stood in a line at my back with crossed arms and disapproving frowns.
Well, except for Aurora. She was curiously flushed while she dragged her eyes from my split lip to the flecks of blood on my shirt.
So, I tried for a charming grin, but my lip wasn’t healed enough for that yet, and since Cayla had me locked in with her icy stare, I promptly swiped the blood from my face before I fixed my hair a bit.
“Sorry about that,” I mumbled as I tore the last scraps of my sleeve off.
“What happened to remaining calm?” Cayla cocked a brow. “A good cop wouldn’t strangle his ogres and kick dwarves in their helms.”
“Yeah, well, a bad cop isn’t supposed to open fire on crowds with a semi-automatic rifle,” I countered. “That’s a whole different role.”
“It is?”
“Yes,” I sighed. “You were almost there, though. The threat you made with the ten seconds was very bad cop. Gunning us down before that… not so much.”
“I’ll work on it,” the princess muttered, “but what happened to you?”
“Yeah, you never beat up your allies,” Shoshanne pointed out. “Are you feeling okay?”
“I honestly feel great,” I snorted. “I think we all needed that. Plus, this is a positive development if you think about it. Just look at how effective our armies are as a collective. We may have been kicking each other’s asses, but we still killed off the Master’s minions, right?”
“I think the five of us killed most of them,” Deya corrected, “but the last dozen or so got caught up in the fight at the end.”
“And how many casualties on our side?” I asked as I broadly gestured to the bloody streets. “None.”
“Well, you should still be setting a better example,” Cayla informed me, and she turned to Aurora for support.
The half-elf was too busy eyeing my exposed biceps, though, and it took a firm elbow to her ribs to get her attention. “Oh! Um… yes. What she said.”
Cayla rolled her eyes, but Alfred was coming our way now, and he carefully stepped over a decapitated body while he straightened his apron.
“Another thirty minutes has passed, sir,” the butler informed me.
“Shit!” Cayla gasped. “We have to be at Serin station!”
“Go,” I urged. “You ladies can take Bobbie, I’ll finish the ammunition, and by the time you’re done with your soldiers, we’ll be ready to begin organizing our platoons.”
“You’ll be able to handle the allies on your own?” Cayla checked.
“I’m sure they’ve worked out most of their frustrations by now,” I chuckled.
“Okay, but I need to put on something more general appropriate before we leave,” the princess decided as she strapped her AR-15 on her shoulder.
My other women hurried after her to clean the blood off themselves, and since the street was deserted, I turned to the nearest house and rapped on the door.
Then I instructed the ruffled mages inside to get a few crews together, and once they split off, half the mages dragged corpses from the streets to my moat for the eels while the other half repaired the damage those bats had caused to the town.
“It appears your battle went well, sir,” Alfred mused while we headed home.
“It did, for the most part,” I snorted. “I don’t suppose you’ve made any headway on those burgers?”
“The patties will not be a problem,” Alfred assured me, “however, I am unclear as to what the speckles on the bun are.”
“Ah, those are called sesame seeds, but if we can’t make it work, they’re not essential,” I replied as we entered the house.
“Everything is essential when death is on the line, sir,” the butler informed me. “Will billius seeds work just as well?”
“I have no idea what those are,” I admitted, “but let’s take a look.”
I followed Alfred to the kitchen as the smell of freshly ground garlic drifted through the hall, and I grinned when I found the counters neatly lined with nearly every ingredient I�
�d referenced in my instructions. There were four different pouches of seeds open beside the sketch, too, and it looked like Alfred had been trying to compare the shape of each kind to the drawing.
After nibbling on the choice of seeds for a moment, we both decided the billius seeds would improve the overall texture of the burger without affecting the taste too much.
“I can’t thank you enough for this,” I sighed as Alfred promptly returned to kneading his dough.
“No need, sir,” the butler assured me. “It is my life’s work to ensure you are capable of performing your duties, and I have never let a man down in that regard.”
I nodded in appreciation. “Damn, Alfred. If that’s how you feel, then I can definitely meet you halfway. While the women are gone, I’m gonna work nonstop to finish the last of my automatons. Could you send any of my generals to the atrium when they stop by? I’m expecting to touch base with them about our rosters soon.”
“Certainly, sir,” Alfred replied.
I grinned as I headed back down the hall, and with my first burger in ages so close I could almost taste it, I had a bit of a bounce in my step again. Alfred’s unwavering dedication seemed to have refueled my own, too, and a renewed sense of purpose spread through my chest as I found a more deliberate stride.
Then I turned the corner, though, and a hand shot out and caught me by my vest before I tumbled into a storage closet.
I squinted through the darkness at the shelving that stretched from floor to ceiling, but when I heard the door shut behind me, I whipped around to see Aurora with a seductive grin on her lips.
“You’re having sex with me right now,” the half-elf informed me as she dropped her skirt, and I cursed under my breath because just like the princess, she had nothing on underneath today.
“Aurora, you’re killing me,” I groaned as I backed away. “I thought we agreed--”
I tripped on a crate of vegetables in my haste, and I barely managed to catch the contents of a nearby shelf before it could all crash to the floor.
“We have time,” the half-elf murmured while she closed in. “Cayla’s changing her clothes, and I need to feel you inside me, Mason. I can’t wait a whole day, not after I watched you beat up those ogres with your bare hands. You just lunged at them like some rugged, wild, sex god--”
