Fortress Al-Mir

Arkk drew back his bowstring, not bothering to aim. The second he had enough power behind the arrow, he released it. He didn’t watch where it went, assuming it would hit something in the mass of monsters, and instead pulled out another arrow, drew it back, and let it go as fast as he could.

It seemed as if Ilya had gotten the rest of the village to flee. There were no other humans around. The goblins and orcs were not fighting anyone, free to pillage and plunder as much as they wanted. None of the homes were smoking ruins yet, thankfully. It was more like they were searching for people than properly looting the place. Arkk wondered if the orcs had deliberately warned the goblins against wanton destruction, wanting to go through undamaged homes for plunder before setting fire to everything.

“Electro Deus,” Arkk shouted after releasing another arrow. Blue-white lightning struck a goblin in the face.

Goblins were a diminutive species. Most barely came up to Arkk’s knees. Their skin tone ranged from light brown to a near-luminous green. With natural weapons in the form of razor claws and nasty, sharp teeth, having one anywhere nearby was liable to result in a loss of fingers, limbs, or worse. Of particular morbid interest at the moment, however, were their eyes. Disproportionately large for their heads, they were a sickly yellow color with dark black pupils.

The eyes of the goblin Arkk hit exploded into dark viscera as dark black smoke bellowed from its nostrils and ears. The goblin collapsed instantly, body wracked by seizures, never having had a chance to scream.

Feeling the tingle of magic still in his fingertips, Arkk pushed through more power, not needing the incantation again for repeated casts. A second bolt tore another goblin off the ground, flinging it into a crowd and knocking several over. A pair of goblins, touching each other, started smoking as a third bolt struck one of them. The next bolt Arkk fired off hit a sword. The goblin holding it panicked, thrashing around and striking its fellows as smoke wafted from the sword’s grip and the goblin’s hand. Arkk’s fifth bolt of lightning hit a goblin square in the chest but only made it yelp and stagger.

Arkk gasped for breath, feeling like he had just run through half the Cursed Forest again. Chest heaving, he forced himself to draw another arrow. The goblins were sprinting toward him now.

Tendrils erupted from his oversized shadow, grasping the front two goblins by the legs. Picking them up into the air, the dripping tendrils slammed the goblins back down onto more goblins, crushing bone and killing several. Arkk used the extra space to loose five arrows in rapid succession, each striking a goblin in the chest.

One goblin jumped into the air, forcing Arkk to leap to the side as it came down on him.

His shadow remained where it was. At the spot where Arkk had been standing, a gaping maw appeared in the ground. The goblin in the air saw and started to cry out, only for its cry to abruptly cut off as it vanished into a field of stars behind the teeth.

The maw snapped shut, leaving just an oily surface, interrupted only by those burning gold eyes.

Arkk turned and launched an arrow toward a screeching goblin, not having any time to ask what happened to that other one. Even if he did have the time to question Vezta, he wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

Spotting an orc coming up the dirt path toward the plaza, Arkk threw out his hand. “Electro Deus,” he shouted.

Much like the first goblin, the orc didn’t stand a chance. The orc flew backward, leaving an arcing trail of viscera from his eyes and mouth. Aside from some seizures on the ground when he landed, the orc didn’t move again.

Two more lightning bolts felled goblins before Arkk stopped again, exhaustion creeping up. “Vezta,” he called, nocking an arrow. “I thought you said I had a lot of magical power. Shouldn’t I be able to cast more than a handful of spells at once?”

Although Arkk hadn’t seen him fight, the spellcaster that visited the village certainly sounded as if he could cast a great many more spells during his stories.

A mouth opened in the ground not far from Arkk. “The [HEART] is constantly consuming a portion of your power. It will return that power as you claim territory and gather minions, but you should still be able to cast more than you are now. Your problem might be that you have too much power. Or, at least, you seem more able to unleash a wide breadth of power at once. Imagine it as a lake emptied by a roaring river rather than a narrow brook.” Vezta ate another goblin without even pausing her sentence. “Try moderating yourself. Be the brook, not the river.”

“I have no idea how to do that,” Arkk said as his arrow sliced through the shoulder of a goblin before hitting another straight in its open mouth. “I have never cast a spell like this before twenty minutes ago.”

“Something to practice, I suppose,” Vezta said as a tendril erupted from the ground behind Arkk just in time to swipe aside the bolt of a crossbow.

Following the trajectory of the bolt back, he spotted yet another orc. There had been a small lull in the wave of monsters attacking him for a short time there, but it looked like more and more were taking notice.

Not enough, however. He could see a black cloud of smoke rising from one of the most distant dwellings. He and Vezta might be able to handle any that came near, but there were just too many. They would have the entire village burn down before he managed to rout them.

“Electro Deus,” he shouted, launching a bolt at the orc before it could crank its crossbow back for a second attempt.

Rather than fire another lightning bolt at a goblin, which Vezta had started consuming with disturbing efficiency, Arkk raised his hand over his head. He had to force magic through his fingertips. The spell did not like not having a target. Yet, at a certain point, the spell couldn’t stop itself. The magic overflowed, launching a bolt skyward. This one was powerful enough to create a deafening crack of thunder echoing over the village as a cloud overhead violently dispersed into thin wisps that spread out over the sky.

Again, Arkk felt like he had just run a minor marathon. Although he was gasping for breath, he was quite thankful that the ringing in his ears faded quickly enough. It let him catch the tail end of something Vezta had said.

“What was that?” Arkk asked between breaths.

“I said, ‘you missed,’ in an incredulous tone of voice. Quite an impressive miss, admittedly, but not in a good way, Master.”

Arkk straightened his back, reaching for more arrows. He was starting to run out. Even if every single arrow killed a monster, he would run out long before taking out even a quarter of this army. This was every arrow John had too.

“I was trying to draw attention,” Arkk said, taking a slight moment more to aim, wanting to make the most of every arrow he had left. “Get all the monsters here so they aren’t wrecking the rest of the village.”

Vezta’s golden eyes turned down the long path leading from the plaza toward the rest of the village. “Well, I dare say that you succeeded,” she said. “Are you sure that was wise? I am not omnipotent, Master.”

Following her eyes, Arkk faltered. He had thought there were a lot of monsters between him and the church. Now, however, there was a veritable tide of goblins rushing up the path. Orcs, lording over them at over three times their height, shouted orders or battle cries. Several brandished large axes, swords, and pikes. A few more wielded crossbows. He only counted a dozen orcs, meaning there were still almost two dozen left if Ilya’s count had been accurate. Still, he stumbled back at the sight.

This was what he wanted. Clenching his fists, Arkk steadied himself and nocked another arrow. “Arkk,” he said.

“Sorry?”

“My name.” Arkk loosed an arrow, aimed at an orc approaching from the path up the hill. It hit the orc in the chest, but that only seemed to make him mad. The orc let out a vicious roar, raising a spike-covered cudgel. “Arkk. I don’t think I introduced myself before.”

The humanoid form of Vezta stepped out of Arkk’s peripheral vision. Her appearance made him jump slightly, but she merely offered a deep bow. “Vezta,” she said. “I look forward to serving you properly.”

“If we survive this,” Arkk mumbled. “Electro Deus,” he shouted, trying to focus on not pushing quite as much magic as he fired off a series of bolts at the approaching horde. He managed to fell eight goblins and a pair of orcs before feeling that exhaustion creeping up on him again.

Vezta’s tendrils were sweeping through the approaching crowd without pause now, taking out twice as many as he was. She wasn’t killing them anymore, at least not outright. There were just too many. But sweeping the front line into the horde of goblins behind probably wound up with several skewered on their comrade’s weapons. Her physical body remained near him, almost uncomfortably close, though she did not get in the way of him drawing back the bowstring.

Still, this was going to be an unsuitable position in short order.

“The church,” Arkk said. “It has strong, stone walls. The doorways and windows will limit how many monsters can approach at once.”

“No!” Vezta’s shout made him jolt, filled with a fear that she had lacked even while calling him out for drawing the attention of all the monsters with that lightning bolt.

“No?”

“Entering consecrated ground bearing the regalia of the Almighty Glory, Heart of Gold, and Holy Light is a recipe for disaster.”

“What? Why?”

“They would not take kindly to our presence.”

“Who?”

“I just said.” Vezta grabbed hold of Arkk’s shoulders, leaning up against him as he targeted an orc with a bolt of lightning. “I promise. I won’t fail you. If I have upset you in any way, tell me and I will correct whatever I did. Please, we can fight these monsters off without going to them.”

Arkk tried to shove her aside to grab at another arrow from his sack. Vezta pulled him down, just in time for him to watch a crossbow bolt sail through the air where he had been. She set him back upright, using several tendrils to support his body until he was back on his feet, then stepped aside, allowing him access to his arrows once again.

He had no idea what she was talking about. Almighty Glory? Heart of Gold? Holy Light? Only the last made any sense, with this being a Church of the Light, but Arkk had never heard it phrased that way before. None of the sermons conducted by the Abbess mentioned any of the names Vezta was worried about. The Abbess prayed to the Light for healing and protection. It was a type of magic that not everyone could make use of. Arkk had tried, once upon a time. It hadn’t blown up, but it hadn’t done anything else either.

“We’ll talk about this, later.” Arkk narrowed his eyes, focusing on an orc. “I’ll focus on the orcs. Kill as many goblins as you can… as horrifically as you can. We don’t need to kill them all. We just need to rout them.”

How many had they killed so far? Thirty? Fifty? More? Was it even that much? He honestly wasn’t sure, but he was surprised that they hadn’t routed already.

It was because there were only two of them. Even with as many deaths as there had been, the monsters saw a single human—Vezta had only emerged physically recently. With as many of them as there were, a single human didn’t stand a chance in their eyes.

If there were more of Arkk and Vezta… If the villagers had stayed…

No, they might have been killed before he returned. Fleeing was the correct choice.

But if there were more of them…

“Electro Deus,” Arkk said, frying two orcs.

The orcs would be the ones to call for retreat. It was unlikely that the goblins would flee on their own. He couldn’t kill all of the orcs unless they were also going to kill all the goblins.

Vezta, despite her efforts, was already starting to slip. Goblins were getting closer to Arkk than they had been before now. Not quite to the point of reaching him, but with the horde pressing in on all sides…

“Slave Natum,” Arkk said, waving his hand. Vezta had only taught him three spells. Lightning Strike, Possession, and Create Lesser Servant.

The final of the three spells nearly made Arkk vomit. Not because of magic expenditure, although that spell had taken a lot out of him, but because of what formed on the ground in front of him.

Vezta had a certain grace to her, even with her absurd number of eyes, tentacles thrashing wildly, and maws swallowing up goblins left and right. She was elegant and poised, calm and collected. That carried through even in the movements of her unnatural extremities.

The terrible sight gave Arkk pause. A shapeless congeries of bubbling flesh, putrid slime, forming and popping eyeballs, and ugly, maw-tipped tendrils snapped into existence between him and the tide of goblins. It was small. Barely larger than a goblin.

While it used its maw-tipped tendrils to snap at a nearby goblin, it didn’t last long. The horde descended on it with vicious fervor, tearing it apart as quickly as it came. Arkk felt it die. The magic used in its construction came flowing back to him.

Bolstered by the brief abundance of excess magic, Arkk shouted, “Electro Deus,” and fired a full ten bolts of lightning.

“Sorry,” Vezta said. “Should have mentioned. Those things are useless for combat.”

“Can you make more of yourself?”

“There is only one [Self]/[Vezta].”

“Can you make it appear like there are more of you? Several bodies?”

Vezta slowly shook her head, looking casual despite tearing a goblin apart with her bare hands. “I can reform this body if it suffers damage, but it is my only body.”

“Damn,” Arkk hissed as he drew a dagger and slammed it through the forehead of a goblin that got too close. Reaching over his shoulder, he grasped three arrows. The last three. He sent them out one at a time as fast as he could, then tossed the bow aside. “Electro Deus!”

Not quite recovered from his recent casting, he managed four bolts before they fizzled out.

Slashing at the throat of another goblin, he bent and picked up its dropped sword. Not all the goblins had swords, most used nothing but their claws and teeth. It wasn’t a particularly good sword either, barely long enough to count as a dagger. Still, it was something.

Arkk swept the blades through any goblin that managed to get past Vezta. He fired off bolts of lightning whenever he felt able, but the orcs must have realized that he was targeting them. None were showing themselves. Perhaps they had decided to flee on their own, leaving the horde of goblins to cover their retreat. He wasn’t sure. He barely had time to think between strikes.

One goblin knocked into him, sending him to the ground. He stabbed it through its ear, killing it instantly, but a second goblin latched onto his arm and bit down. He cried out in pain. Vezta was already moving toward him, only to stop and crush the skull of a goblin closer to her. She turned away, attacking another goblin.

Before Arkk could even think of her actions as abandoning him, an arrow punched straight through the skull of the goblin clamped onto his arm. It continued out the other side, hitting another goblin in the chest before it could pounce on him.

Arrow after arrow rained down, striking the goblins closest to Arkk.

He craned his head to see where they were coming from.

Despite the pain in his arm, he couldn’t help but let out a joyous laugh. “Ilya!”

The elf stood atop the Baron’s manor’s roof, silver eyes gleaming in the distance. Her arm moved in a blur, launching arrows so fast it was like one steady stream of death for the goblins. She wasn’t the only one there. Five others were on the roof, including the carpenter’s young apprentice. They weren’t aiming anywhere near Arkk, however, likely not wanting to hit him on accident.

More of the villagers were down in the manor gardens, beating down any goblins that dared to approach the archers. They didn’t advance out into the tide, but Arkk couldn’t blame them for that.

Forcing himself to sit up, Arkk shouted, “Electro Deus!” He launched as many lightning bolts as he could, frying goblin after goblin and buying room for Vezta to continue her slaughter.

A horn sounded somewhere in the distance.

Not every goblin turned toward it. Some were too enraptured in their bloodlust. But the majority took that as the signal to fall back. They turned, scampering away from the village. Vezta made short work of the ones who failed to heed the call for retreat, leaving Arkk to flop back down onto the unusually soft ground. He laughed, panting heavily as he cradled his arm.

“We did it?”

Vezta approached, looming over him with a faint smile on her face. “It seems your goal has been accomplished.”

Arkk didn’t bother fighting the grin on his face, but it did slowly fade as he started thinking more. “For now. How many escaped? They may try again in the future.”

“Might I suggest returning to the [HEART] and—”

Vezta staggered back with the bolt of a crossbow sticking out from her chest. Black tar dripped from the end of the bolt, falling to the ground.

Arkk bolted upright. “Vezta?” he shouted, forgetting his wound as he grabbed her shoulders.

She didn’t seem all that concerned. “Rude,” she said, yanking the bolt from her chest. Her fingers, also dripping the slime that seemed to comprise her entire body, rubbed at the wound. When she pulled away, there was no sign that she had been hit at all.

Looking back to the manor, Arkk noted the villagers standing about, looking wary rather than celebratory. Only Ilya was approaching.

She did not look happy.

“I don’t suppose you can look a little more human-like?” Arkk whispered. “Just to put them a little more at ease.”

“The things I do for my Master,” Vezta said with a faux-exasperated sigh.

The shadows on the ground started drawing back toward her, leaving the ground untouched. Arkk would have expected more goblin bodies in the immediate area, but… had Vezta eaten them all? She didn’t look any larger. As the shadows vanished entirely, so too did the tendrils emerging from her dress. A pair of elegant yet heavy boots appeared in their place.

Her dark violet skin and hair didn’t change. Neither did the eyes on her person, though if they didn’t blink, perhaps they would look more like part of her dress than actual eyes. Vezta clasped her hands in front of her and took a step back, moving just behind and to the side of Arkk. Not hiding behind him, but taking up a subservient position.

Just in time for Ilya to stop in front of them.

“What—” the elf started, eyes flicking between them, then around the carnage littering the plaza. Angry as she was, she didn’t seem to know quite what to say. “Saw the lightning bolt. A few of us turned back. And now we find… what? Just what?”

Arkk imagined he would have said the same thing in her position. “It’s a long story,” he said, keeping his hand clamped on his arm.

Ilya’s sharp eyes didn’t miss that. Her face softened as she said, “You’re injured.”

“Goblin bite.”

Ilya grimaced. “That’s going to rot your arm off..”

Vezta took a half-step forward, still remaining behind Arkk. “If you would like, Master, I would be pleased to cleanse your wound.”

“Master,” Ilya repeated, face wrinkling in distaste. Her eyes shifted to Vezta, where they stayed for a long moment. “What have you done, Arkk? What have you done?”

Arkk raised his eyebrows. Unfortunately, he didn’t have a good answer for her.

Vezta took his silence as consent to tend to his injury. She reached out, black slime dripping from her fingers. It didn’t fix the gnarled flesh as it had with her arrow wound, but it was soothing in much the same way as the ointment the Abbess had applied earlier. The bleeding seemed to stop as well.

Offering her a small smile, he looked back to Ilya. Answering her question, he said, “I saved the village?”

Ilya stared for a long moment before letting out a clipped laugh. It didn’t sound like a particularly happy laugh, but Arkk would take it over her angry face any day. “If only that were all,” she mumbled, glancing back to the Baron’s manor. “We need to make sure there aren’t any stragglers,” she said, louder. “Keep your monster on a leash and don’t go anywhere. We need to talk.”

“It’s never good when a girl says that.”

“Like you have any experience.” She turned away, but paused and looked back, momentary smile gone. “I’m serious. You’ve…” Her eyes flicked to Vezta. “Don’t go anywhere.”

With that, she stalked off.

Arkk slumped. There wasn’t any pain in his arm, thanks to Vezta, but it didn’t look good. And he was so tired. Exhausted from fighting and casting spells. His sleep, lucky though he was to have had it at all, hadn’t been the best. And he had been running all last evening. He wanted nothing more than to just lean back and close his eyes.

“Are you alright? That bolt…” Arkk mumbled, closing his eyes while standing. “If you hadn’t been able to heal like that.”

“I was skewered by numerous goblin swords as well. I do not claim to be invulnerable but it will take more than that to down me.”

“Still…”

“Rest now. Know that I shall protect you to the best of my ability.”

“Don’t hurt the villagers.”

“I am a [SERVANT]. I exist to assist you in your desires. If you do not desire harm to the villagers, they have nothing to fear from me.”

“Thank you, Vezta,” Arkk said, leaning against her. “You saved my village.”

“Your desire saved it.”

“No, I’m serious. Thank you.” Arkk opened his eyes, meeting her black and gold eyes. “If there is anything I can do…”

Vezta pressed her lips together, then nodded slowly. “Become a master truly worthy of my services. That is all I ask.”

“I’ll do my best.”