Firesign 1 - Wage Slave Rebellion (42 page)

Captain Ankt grunted and flew at the cultist leader from behind, ramming into him shoulder-first. The enemy leader tossed him aside, and then staggered as multiple spells struck him. Mazik dove at him again, a glowing hand extended. “
Mazik Missiles!
”

Multiple bolts of mana leapt from Mazik’s hand, slamming into the True Head Cultist and exploding, again and again and again.

The True Head Cultist emerged from the conflagration, spent mana arcing across his barriers. His fine black robes were in tatters, its sequins scattered, its gems blackened, and its feathers burned down to sad little stubs. He flexed his hands. His arms too were finally visible, his charred sleeves revealing muscular arms that rippled with sacred symbols carved into his flesh.

He looked around. He had sacrificed two-thirds of the remaining captives, but it was not enough.

“Fine. We’ll do it your way,” said the True Head Cultist. He took a deep breath, leaned back, and spread his arms wide. “
Children of Amougourest! Come to me!
”

All across the battlefield, cultists disengaged and sprinted toward their besieged leader, each one zeroing in on him despite the darkness and the chaos. The city’s defenders were battered away by the tide.

“Get him! We can’t let him get away!” yelled Captain Ankt as the True Head Cultist disappeared. Spells converged on every centimeter of ground near where the cultist leader was last seen, and at least one struck him, pitching him back into visibility.

That’s when the True Head Cultist decided to dispense with the subtlety. Gathering energy in his legs with a few muttered words, he burst across the sand with speed he never exhibited before. Spells went wide as the True Head Cultist sprinted back to the middle of the arena. All the cultists turned to meet him there, except for the aku, which continued their rampage uninterrupted.

Captain Ankt cursed as Gavi jogged over to him and helped him up.

“Don’t help me! Kill
him!
” said Captain Ankt, jabbing a finger at the True Head Cultist.

“I think you vastly overestimate my abilities,” said Gavi.

While the city’s defenders were delayed by the two aku, the True Head Cultist came to a stop in the middle of the arena, back at the center of the magickal array where it all began. Around him were all of the cultists who could break free.

The True Head Cultist looked at his people. Their dissatisfaction and rage at being so close and yet denied was palpable. The True Head Cultist nodded. They all knew what had to be done.

“My brothers and sisters,” said the cultist leader softly, keeping his voice even to mask his guilt. “We require more sacrifices.”

The kneeling cultists immediately lowered their heads, baring their necks.

The True Head Cultist hung his head as well, giving every indication of regret. Then he raised the reforged blade up high, mana streaming behind it.

The city’s defenders watched in horror as the mana around the True Head Cultist grew brighter and darker, deep black and purple swirling and intersecting like two dragons locked in battle. All around the True Head Cultist his followers fell, their blood spilling onto the trampled sand.

“He’s killing his own people…” said Gavi.

The aku and the other cultists pulled away, and the city’s defenders let them, too transfixed by the horrific show. A thin line of light slashed across a line of cultists, and they all toppled, crashing noiselessly onto a cushion of bodies. Now the plume of mana around the True Head Cultist began to swirl, its colors mixing like a tornado spinning upward. Great arcs of power shot out like bolts of lightning, sending sand and rock flying as they scythed across the stands. The pulsing runes around the arena beat faster and changed, the night glowing blood red as the eldritch symbols burned.

The True Head Cultist stood in the eye of the storm as his remaining brethren were pushed away by the energy that swirled around him.

“We should probably do something about this!” said Gavi. She started to charge, but stopped. The surviving cultists, including Crimson, Savage, and the two aku, stood between them and the cultist leader.

“Agreed,” said Mazik. He took a deep breath. “Everyone,
let’s nuke this bitch!
”

Spells flew toward the True Head Cultist from the Houkian lines. Many of them were caught on Crimson’s barriers, but the ones that got past splashed into the cloud of mana, disappearing before they ever reached their target. The True Head Cultist ignored them, still casting.

WHOOMPFH!
Wind and sound pulsed outward like air displaced by an atomic blast. The pressure drove the cultists to the ground, but the city’s defenders were far enough away to escape most of its effects.

The True Head Cultist clapped his hands together, and all across the battlefield the corpses of those whose throats he had slit were pulled toward him like metal filings to a magnet. They piled up at his knees, his waist, to the top of his chest. Corpses flew from the Gate of Shame like they were being tugged by marionette strings, defenders diving out of the way of the ballistic cadavers. Still chanting, the True Head Cultist’s eyes rolled back in his head as his words spewed out faster and faster. Bodies roiled and clung to him, pushing him higher. Slowly, he began to rise into the air.

“Keep attacking, we’re getting close!” said Mazik as he unleashed spell after spell, each one getting closer to the cultist leader before it dissipated. The True Head Cultist disappeared as the corpses crawled over him and swallowed him whole.

All across the Houkian lines, guards, soldiers, and adventurers attacked the growing monstrosity with everything they had. The remaining cultists rose to meet them. The two sides crashed into each other like opposing tides, both of them threatening to drag the other down into the crushing depths. With the cultists thinned by mass sacrifice, the battle should have been in the city’s favor, but it was not. With the two aku still active, the city’s defenders were punished dearly for any progress, and made little.

The bodies near the top of the pulsating mass of dead flesh rolled away, and the True Head Cultist’s face reappeared. His skin was now stretched and purple, and his eyes had morphed into protruding red orbs that spun in his flayed sockets like broken gimbals.

“YOu SH-aLL nOt iM- pEDe—!” he yelled, spittle spraying from his cracked lips as he took a great, heaving breath, “—tHE Ri-IsE OF mY—
YOUR
LORD!!”

The True Head Cultist’s eyes spun in their sockets like lottery balls, moving so fast they threatened to scorch the sides of his face. Then they disappeared completely, and what was once the True Head Cultist spoke, softly at first. “you sh-ALl not … im-PEDe … YOU shaLL NOT
IN
TER
FERE
—WITH
M
Y
R
I
SE
!!
”

“Gah!” yelled Mazik as the face roiled and stretched, its nose and mouth growing to uncomfortable proportions. “Kill it! Kill it with fire!”

“Isn’t that your job?” asked Raedren as he smacked an enemy with his staff.

“Working on it!” said Mazik as he hit a cultist in the face, mana building within him for another spell.

KRA-KOOOM!
A thunderclap swept across the arena. Everyone clapped their hands over their ears and waited for the horrible noise to pass. When it had, everyone looked up.

A massive figure towered over the arena. Standing over three stories tall, nearly as tall as The Pit itself, it looked similar to the aku rampaging around its feet, with its broad shoulders and long arms that pulled it forward until it loomed over the mortals below like a collapsing building. Mana crackled along its burnished purple skin, cooking the air and crawling across the ground, incinerating not just everything it touched, but everything
near
what it touched. Its thick skull swung around, its red eyes spinning until they snapped into place, bringing the world into focus. A toothy grin split its face.

“
I
AM
R
EBORN!
” roared the colossus, its otherworldly voice oscillating disconcertingly as the sound climbed out of the arena and bounced off distant buildings, rattling windows for blocks around and outright shattering ones nearby. The cloud of mana around the monster was beginning to disperse as it looked around.

“Okay, that’s not good,” said Mazik, slowly backing away. Everyone was doing the same, from confusion more than fear. The fear hadn’t sunk in yet.

“What do we do now?” asked Gavi.

“I don’t know,” said Mazik.

“
AH
, THERE YOU ARE!
” said the gigantic being. Everyone around the trio scattered as the creature turned to face them.

“Not good not good not good!” said Mazik as the immense being sucked in a huge breath, a spinning ball of mana appearing in front of its cracked lips. Barrier after barrier appeared in front of the panicking trio—and then the monster exhaled.

A blast of pure mana shot out, lighting up the night sky. The ground erupted as it struck, pillars of sand rocketing into the air and melting under the onslaught.

The mana cleared, and Mazik, Gavi, and Raedren staggered to their knees. They stood in the middle of a miniature wasteland. Everything around them had been obliterated outright.

The immense being sniffed, and then pointed at the trio. Without warning another beam of mana shot out and slammed into the reeling adventurers, and exploded. The ground cracked, fissures opening up beneath their feet, and then it collapsed. The chaotic magicks ripped through the magickally tempered steel that lined the arena floor and dumped the trio into the Catacombs below. The explosions continued as the beam scythed through the underground tunnels, cutting down to the bottom level and burying the falling adventurers with everything above.

The giant lobbed another sphere of mana into the hole. It exploded, the ground bucking as the mana hollowed out the Catacombs.

The creature, standing taller than most buildings and rippling with muscles as big as a herd of cows, tossed its head back and roared. “
Y
ES!!
F
EEL THE
P
OWER OF THE
G
REAT
A
MOUGOUREST!!
I
AM
REBORN
!!!
”

Major Rur waved her sword. “
Fall back! FAAALL BACK!!
”

*      *      *

Where once the Catacombs were a warren of tunnels, now they were a cavern. Over a third of the tunnels had caved in after Amougourest’s second spell ripped through them, sending the upper floor collapsing onto the bottom, only for the rampaging god’s third spell to incinerate much of the rubble as it fell. What was left was a giant empty space surrounded by ruined tunnels, like a bombed office building that looked as if a bite had been taken out of it.

Rocks continued to fall from the ceiling as the Catacombs’ condition continued to decay. In one of the rooms on the edge of the blast crater, a pile of rubble shifted. There was a groan, and then the heavy rubble fell away as a figure pulled itself upright.

“Zaxat whult pit ret,” said Mazik as dust showered off his clothing. He rubbed his jaw, and there was a loud
snap
as he popped it back into place. His eyes crossed. “Kztaagh.”

“Ugh…” said Gavi. She tried to roll off Raedren, but Mazik’s legs had her pinned down. She tried to kick him off, but her legs were too weak to move.

“Am I dead yet?” asked Raedren as he stared up at a shattered ceiling. His glasses had finally cracked. “Because I feel like it.”

“No,” said Mazik. He took stock of his injuries. His collarbone, his left wrist, probably a rib or two…. He winced. “Not yet, at least.”

“Ah,” said Raedren. He sat up. “Damn.”

Mazik groaned as he collapsed off Gavi and Raedren, and then groaned again as pain shot through his everything. “Ugh. How the hell are we still alive?”

The scene played through each of their minds. The second blast had come, and Raedren’s last-second barrier combined with Mazik tackling them had saved them from instant death. Then the floor collapsed, and the spell was less intense as they fell—that was probably thanks to the m-tempered plates, since it took an astronomical amount of mana to break them—and as soon as they landed Raedren grabbed them and rolled away, narrowly saving them from the third blast.

Mazik grit his teeth as he tried to push himself to his feet. He got as far as his knees. “Guh. Fuck me.”

Raedren closed his eyes and mumbled the only spell he cared about right now. His entire body began to glow light green, and soon, the pain began to subside. He sighed in relief.

Gavi rose to her knees, thanking the gods—and more specifically, Raedren—that she wasn’t as dead as she should have been. She rubbed her throbbing back as she looked at the newly created cavern around them, and then up. It was oddly quiet above, where the night sky was shining down. Not silent, but not as noisy as it should have been.

Mazik crawled over to Gavi and crumpled beside her. He joined her in looking up at the night sky. Far above, the stars glittered like the sequins that had once decorated the True Head Cultist’s robes, before they were damaged, and before he changed.

“What the fuck do we do?”

*      *      *

Major Rur dove out of the way as Amougourest leaned down. As the god’s torso drew closer to the ground, mana flowed out from its body like waves from a meteor impact just offshore. Acrid smoke wafted across the battlefield, and flesh and cloth were incinerated. Major Rur scrambled away as the line of fire reached for her, mana licking at her heels as she dodged around a similarly fleeing cultist.

The great deity crouched down, its elbows resting on its knees as it peered at all the scurrying mortals below it. Major Rur picked herself up and, like everybody else, stopped and stared back at the god. It seemed silly to run when it was this close, its massive bulk blotting out the sky.