The Elder Demon's Dilemma (Realm of Arkon, Book 9) Read online

  I shook my head in wonder at how neatly it all came together. It was clear as day by now that one of the Ancients was presently making his way here. The bastards had somehow learned that here was the phylactery of a creature capable of hurting them, and had decided to neutralize the threat before it became a problem. Moreover, they knew that the Winged Lord was helpless in his current state, otherwise all three of them would be coming. It was with this knowledge that the Goddess of Luck had placed her implausible bet. Only that wasn't at all necessary. I wouldn't run from this fight even if I hadn't given any vows. Perhaps the whole thing had been orchestrated simply to show me the purposed point of attack, and to secure the agreement with Providence. Sata couldn't know whether my death would be final, same as I couldn't know that the Ancients' magic cannot be remedied with potions or scrolls. But none of that mattered! My bloodline would die with me, and that was a pity, but Max and Alyona would surely have kids, and I'd happily settle for them naming one of them "Roman."

  I smiled at the mental image of a horned lion cub, and that was when the final piece of the puzzle fell into place. "Even your death may remedy the situation." Those had been Sata's words during our last and only meeting. What did it mean? Simple. In order to rescue the Winged Lord Phallet, all I had to do was wound any one of the Ancients. Indeed, I wouldn't be be able kill them if I myself were dead. What could any player do against a monster more powerful than the combined might of all the gods of this world? And yet, the System didn't give impossible quests, which meant the titan was going down! I would make sure to hurt the bastard, if only just once - and that would set off into motion whatever needed to happen for the rest of them to follow suit. You'd better look after my nieces and nephews, Sata. Moreover, I was now certain beyond doubt that this would also liberate Jaelitte, seeing as the beast would essentially die by my hand. And that was a relief - I'd hate to have to pass into the Flame as an oathbreaker.

  Life is good, I smiled at the moon hovering over the castle. Death wasn't so bad a prospect when it wasn't pointless. And I would make sure that it wasn't.

  Once inside the keep, we took the staircase to the second floor, then went down a wide hallway to the reception hall, its walls bedecked with paintings.

  A small crowd was already gathered, maybe two dozen or so. And sure, why would a local of any kind of authority miss the visit of such unusual guests, especially given that they were due to leave in the morning?

  All the chatter faded as we entered the hall. Sitting at the head of an n-shaped table, the baron rose to his feet to utter a greeting, but the words apparently got stuck in his throat. My appearance must be truly striking indeed.

  "Is something the matter, prince?" he spoke after a ten-second pause.

  "Everything is the matter!" I replied, giving him a hard stare. "This castle is going to be attacked by an Ancient God, one of those who are marching on the Great Forest. He will have an army of the transformed with them. Start evacuating your people at once! I would advise you to leave as well, but something tells me you're not going to listen."

  A deathly silence followed, punctuated only by the ticking of the wall-mounted dwarven clock. The baron sighed without averting his eyes, then slowly lowered himself into his chair.

  "Do you mind sharing where you're getting your information, prince?" he asked quietly.

  "Fair enough." I walked forward, took the seat that was offered to me, and proceeded to recount everything I knew. I spoke about Sata's request, about the Winged Lord, and about the direction of the expected attack, omitting only my connection to the Goddess of Luck and my deductions on Phallet's liberation. I didn't want to fill anyone with false hopes. Though I would do everything required of me, I was unlikely to live to see the fruits of my efforts.

  The condensed story took no more than five minutes. Having finished, I poured myself a goblet of wine, took a few sips, and fell silent.

  Ulrich was the first to break the ensuing silence. With a shake of the head, he took a look around the table, and proceeded to speak - slowly and emphatically.

  "You heard the prince! Farat, move the ballistas from the northern to the southern wall. The Ancient God would be coming up from the direction of Darkaan. Hans, Ward, round up and evacuate all the children and everyone we can't use for defense. Farat, pick up enchanted arrow points from Kyram, then start boiling tar."

  He turned toward me. "You're right prince - we're not going anywhere! Duke Kyarhat and the king have assigned us to defend the southern border, and defend it we shall. I won't pretend to hope that the garrison can survive against a god, but perhaps our deaths will in some way help those who had left for the Great Forest."

  The baron rose again, turned his head left, then right, and bellowed.

  "Dismissed! Kyram, come see me before you head out. I will issue ten gold pieces for every person leaving."

  I nodded my approval. The soldiers ought to be secure in the knowledge that their families won't lack for anything. Ten gold pieces per head should last a long time - assuming they're able to get away.

  I felt a hand touch my wrist. It was Vaessa. "Just don't tell me you don't have a plan. I'm not that gullible."

  Much to my surprise, I saw not a hint of alarm on the faces of my people. Bonbon was chewing as always, apparently no more perturbed by the news than a bear might be by the sight of a traffic light hanging off a tree. Reece was examining the art on the walls with great interest, and Raena was whispering something to Masyanya while sneaking him glances. The only ones who were even looking at me were Donut, Vaessa and Kan.

  "Well, how should I put this..." I pushed my goblet away as I looked back at Vaessa. "You could say that I have a plan, but at this point it's built on hot air and conjecture."

  The necromancer's daughter smiled at that. "More often than not, your hot air proves harder than the strongest steel. So, what are we doing?"

  "You're going to sleep," I got up, fixed the scabbard at my waist, and nodded at the wall clock. "The Ancient won't attack before noon. Kan, coordinate with the baron about our spots on the walls. As for me, I'll pay a visit to Sata's shrine - there are questions I'm hoping to find answers to. We'll talk again in the morning."

  I pushed the chair back in, nodded to everyone present, and made for the exit at an unhurried pace.

  The castle's shrine was maybe one tenth the size of the one at Sata's temple in Vynnern. Which made sense - a castle was no city, and every inch of this local land was worth its weight in gold. More importantly, this was the exact shrine that I had seen in that fateful vision. The same low iron-wrought enclosure, the same black-and-white marble walls, the same trimmed flowerbeds framing the same portico with the bas-relief of a fox wrapping its feet with its tail. At that moment in the vision we had already been acquainted with the shrine. No need to mess with the future. Not yet, anyway.

  The gate creaked open. I walked down the path of black-and-white slabs, then pulled on the handle of a rectangular double-leaf door.

  Temples and shrines in Arkon were kept open save for the most extraordinary times. And today seemed to be a perfectly ordinary night.

  A soft scent of perfume tickled my nostrils as I stepped across the threshold, ending up in a small, poorly-lit room. Wooden benches lining the walls, ogival windows, a massive marble altar - the shrine's interior hardly differed from that of the temple in Vynnern. Only the ten-foot-tall statue of Sata towering over the altar was completely different. The goddess stood half-turned to entrance, an expression of deep contemplation on her face. Her left hand was bent at the elbow and level to her chest; her right stretched back, open-palmed, as if the goddess was calling for someone unseen.

  To the left of the altar stood a tall, wiry old man with a neatly trimmed beard. His colorless eyes shone with puzzlement.

  "Good evening!" I offered a polite greeting.

  The old man sized me up and down with a penetrating gaze.

  "Greetings, demon," he spoke with a pleasant timbre. "I admit, I never expecte
d to meet one of your kind. I am Yllam, the caretaker of this shrine to the best of my modest-"

  He didn't finish his sentence. As his eyes fell on my earring, he froze for a moment, then jerked, his eyes flaring up with a green sorcerous color. As expected. And exactly the reason for which I came here.

  "Take her hand," the old man muttered in a dry, listless voice.

  Oh, but this was something new. With a shrug, I rounded the altar, then slipped my hand into that of the bronze sculpture, half-expecting what was to come. The next moment, the dim magic lanterns on the front wall began to rock, then blazed with a vivid blue color as the floor moved under my feet.

  A sharp pain shot through the small of my back as a stench of rotting leaves filled the room. I leaned against the trunk of a felled tree to keep my balance, then wiped the tears from my eyes as I tried to figure out where the hell I ended up this time.

  Hart! A few more of these light shows and I'll go blind. Of course, all my bitching and moaning meant diddly-squat to the System that kept sending me this place or that. It took another ten seconds for my vision to fully return, and I was able to finally take a look around.

  Looking down on me from all sides were the yellow-red crowns of tall sprawling trees. Underfoot lay a thick carpet of rotting leaves, bordered by a black pool with splashing silver fish. The half-decayed tree trunk behind me was fully covered with mushrooms, their slightly inverted caps so brightly red that one could mistake the trees for being aflame from a great enough distance. I was standing in the middle of an autumn forest, and I hadn't the slightest clue how I got here.

  But before I could indulge in conjectures, the air in front of me began scintillating, and she appeared out of the formed cloud. Sata. She wore the same outfit as during our first encounter: leather half-boots, shorts, black sleeveless waistcoat. Everything else, however, was starkly different. The translucent shape and the lifeless expression on her face suggested that the goddess herself wasn't anywhere near here. The realization that this was a holographic projection helped to settle any burgeoning emotions.

  "You have come..." she said in a familiar throaty voice, her lips barely moving as she looked right past me. "Don't say anything. I can't hear you anyway."

  Why the charade, then? Why couldn't you just send a message through the old man? I leaned back against the felled tree trunk, thinking.

  "One of the Ancient Gods is on his way here," Sata continued. "I'm sorry for not warning you earlier - I myself have only found out when it was too late. But I'm warning you now, and I insist that you don't take the fight! I cannot bear any more sacrifices... There is no possible way you can win this battle, and so you are released from your vow!"

  Keep dreaming, kitty cat, I chuckled to myself. The goddess must not have been aware of my sword, nor of the phylactery of the Winged Lord of Lemuria. So let those be a pleasant surprise for her.

  "I have placed these messages in all my temples, so I'm hoping that you'll visit at least one of them." The goddess' projection took a step forward, and her eyes focused on me at last.

  "I haven't told you the most important thing yet. Your friend... You can still-"

  The image blinked suddenly, much like the screen of an early-generation visor. Sata was still talking, but the sound was completely gone. The trunks of trees began to bend in the most fantastical way as the carpet of leaves underfoot spun and swirled into a vortex.

  "What?! I can still what?!" I bellowed as the forest flickered before finally disappearing for good.

  In the next moment, I was hanging in the air, several hundred yards above ground, looking down on an enormous army of the transformed crawling across the boundless steppe. Heavy and light cavalry, heavy infantry, archers... Seventy or so thousand Darkaanese spanning over a mile from end to end. And in the vanguard, stepping heavily on the ground that blazed with black flame, was Vaepar.

  Hart! Wasn't the last time enough for you?!

  The Ancient God's dirty-gray figure was shrouded in the dark film of a protective force field. As he walked, the ground before him burned a hundred yards out, yet dealt no damage to the transformed army. At level one thousand forty eight and nine hundred eighty billion HP, this was a walking death sentence for this whole realm.

  There was no doubt that the bastard was headed to Rayne. Ulrich's castle bordered the forest only to the north, so the titan would be spotted well in advance, but what good would it do? What would a garrison two hundred strong do against seventy thousand Darkaanese and this thirty-five-foot mongrel? He was taller than the castle walls! So what am I still doing here?! And what about Max? Sata must have lost all hope to dare try and tell me what could not be told. Alas, such tricks didn't work with the System. So now what? What was it I could still do for him? Sata may have released me from my vow, but I hadn't released myself! Max... I hoped beyond hope that he would survive this war. As for me, I wasn't going to leave this world until I yanked Phallet from his phylactery so he could smash this horned bastard into oblivion!

  Just then, Vaepar threw up his grotesque head. Our eyes met, and my consciousness faded to black.

  Chapter 3

  The bright disk the afternoon sun peeked out from behind the clouds, irradiating the snowy mountaintops, glinting off the tips of lances of the army formed up in the valley, and lending a soft golden glow to the nearest hills. Having changed directions, the wind had picked up the dampness and aromas of swamp grass.

  "How are you doing?" Max looked away from the two colossal shapes on the horizon, and at Alyona sitting by the fire.

  "Me? I'm all right. But I'd feel much better if I were there, with the rest of them," the girl shrugged as she motioned at the right flank of the formed army.

  Max frowned. "Let's not start that again. Ellanca wasn't even given the option to be here - she stayed behind in Syruan."

  "OK, so we're pregnant. Big deal!"

  "Alyona..." Max sighed, then hung his head wearily.

  "All right, all right, don't get upset. I understand everything, but it doesn't mean I have to feel good about it."

  You could clearly see that his bride was no less nervous than he was. Then again, how could anyone stay calm after seeing the enemy appear on the horizon? To say nothing of them being level 1080 and boasting nearly two trillion HP between the two of them!

  The titans moved at an almost leisurely pace, rocking heavily from side to side - as inexorable as death itself. The transformed army on their left flank was covered by a cloud of dust stretching to the very horizon. The whole thing made for quite a spectacle, but the gods fighting on their side were yet to react. And when divine beings the likes of Kirana, Alak and Loaetia are calm, what are regular mortals to do but follow their lead?

  Any reasoned analysis of the situation would dismiss what was happening as surrealism at best, or delirium at worst. According to Donut, the number of players who had merited seeing a live god in all the history of the game wouldn't amount to more than a few thousand. Yet here was their player army, ten-thousand strong with two more on the way. And the craziest thing was that these gods were set to fight like ordinary players - split into two groups with a couple of tanks and three healers. The very notion of it was mind-bending, but you probably couldn't do it any other way in a world that was nevertheless governed by the game's laws. Max recalled Roman's account of Lilit soaring over the valley and destroying the entire undead army besieging the castle in a matter of minutes. Alas, there would be no such aerial miracles on this day. Not until the titans were dead, at least. The list of gods fighting on their side was nothing if not impressive. Kirana, Alak, Myrt, Setara, Loaetia, Ingvar, and several more that Max wasn't quite as familiar with: Mara, the Keeper of Secrets and Guide to the Gray Frontier, Neima, the Goddess of Life and Patron of the Druids, Dylanneus, the Hunter God, and Amerys, the Patron of Forest Spirits. After Max's buff, the HP of each god had risen to nearly one hundred billion, and their total mana reserve had quadrupled, likewise the pace of HP regeneration in combat granted t
o all defenders of the Great Forest.

  Max glanced over the army formed up on the heath, and felt a tiny spark of hope grab hold deep within. They were going to face two titans, not three. Could they best the enemy after all? Would they be able to cheat death on this day? No. The young man shook his head, chasing away the delusion. He couldn't afford to nurse any hope at all - he would need all of his force of will to take the final step. He had already decided on it, and he had no intentions of backing out!

  "Snap out of it!"

  Max flinched, his vision focusing on Alyona who was shaking him by the shoulders.

  "Sorry, got lost in my thoughts," he smiled at his wife.

  "What were you thinking about?" Alyona inquired, her tone tinged with suspicion.

  Max fished out his pipe from inventory and lit up - all to buy time to fake an answer to a question he had no answers for.

  "Well... We haven't discussed names for the kids. And if something were to happen to me today..."

  "Don't even think that!" Alyona didn't let him finish. "Everything that could have happened to you, already did."

  "Men are notorious hypochondriacs," Max smiled indulgently. "Still, let's brainstorm some names now?"

  The young woman sized him up and down with a frown, still suspicious.

  "Just you try stepping one foot off of this hill! Did you forget Kirana's orders?"

  "Alyona!" Max gave an exasperated sigh.

  "Besides, what's there to brainstorm? The boys will be Roman and Max..."

  "And the girls? Hope, Faith and Joy?"

  "As if!" Alyona scoffed. "Sata, Loaetia and Kirana - the three goddesses that have impacted our lives the most. An incentive to pay closer attention to their namesakes."