Darkness and Hellfire

Chapter 56 Damned If You Do,

Isaac and Shamsha were both utterly infuriated at each other, for rather obvious reasons, but even so they made sure to stay out of Lenna’s aura. Neither of them wanted to be subjected to such a thing though neither of them noticed the other’s wariness to be near her once her aura had been fully unleashed.

The reasons why the Lord of Darkness and the Lord of Undeath were so vexed by one another were simple. Isaac couldn’t kill the skeleton no matter how hard he hit him because the old Reality Shields would quickly be replaced by new ones. He had the idea of melting through one with his mana like he had before but the damned skeleton kept exploding and throwing him around. As soon as Isaac lost contact with the shield it would vanish and a new one would take its place.

Shamsha couldn’t pin down the damned human and the death-shadow monster in living flesh wouldn’t stay down no matter how hard he hit it. Finally Shamsha decided to do something both risky and self destructive. His skeletons would just have to be caught in the crossfire. “I HAVE HAD ENOUGH OF YOU HUMAN!” Shamsha roared and the air around him vibrated with the power of his summoned voice and magical intent to speak. Both Isaac and Lenna almost staggered from the impact of his voice both physically and magically. “BEFORE ELF, DWARF, AND MAN THERE WAS LIFE BEYOND IMAGINING! IN A TIME WHEN DRAGONS WERE BUT A LINK IN THE CHAIN OF EXISTENCE! BEFORE BALANCE WAS STRUCK ONLY CHAOS RULED! IN A TIME LIKE THIS, GIA HERSELF PROCLAIMED! ‘LET THE STARS FALL AND START THE WORLD ANEW!’” Shamsha bellowed while he tried to fight off Isaac’s continuous assault.

Above the castle, at the ceiling of the cavern, a dozen blazing orange, red, and violet portals opened. The portals were stable and ringed with runic letters describing the reset of the world in the language of the gods. The air shook and the temperature spiked as a dozen blazing boulders the size of the Celestial Dawn started to fall through the portals. They picked up speed as they went until they slammed into the ground of the cavern all around Shamsha.

Isaac and Lenna both sprinted towards Shamsha. Lenna tried her best to reign in her aura as she ran and Isaac sucked Kahtesh’s remains into the void so the remains of the dragon wouldn’t be ground to dust by the falling sky. Shamsha whirled around to face him. “AWAY WITH YOU!” He roared but only had enough time to hold his hands out in Isaac’s direction before Lenna and Isaac both slammed into him from different directions. They both clamped down on Shamsha, before he could explode and throw them away, so he wouldn’t be able to teleport away without taking them with him. Little did they know that Shamsha had never bothered to learn a short range teleportation spell. In his youth he had thought that it took the joy out of traveling. At that moment he regretted that decision greatly, not that it would have mattered because of the pair clinging to him.

Meteors slammed down all around them. The castle exploded into a billion chunks of stone. Alexander’s beacon was eviscerated. Hundreds of skeletons were removed from existence. Shamsha’s portal was destabilized and exploded out in a wave of mana, not that anyone could feel it through the falling stars. The ground under them broke and bounced which tossed them all into the air. Shamsha hadn’t realized that he had been pushed to the ground until that moment. Apparently Isaac had been attacking him from above and in the face so much that Shamsha had naturally recoiled away in the downward direction enough for his feet to touch the ground.

Everything around them was filled with exploding stone and a primal fire formed from a meteor shower. Isaac and Lenna were both hit by exploding chunks of stone but none of the meteors had landed directly on top of them. After what felt like an eternity, but was actually only five seconds of the hells coming to the Innerworld, it was over. Stone was still falling from the explosions but the meteors were gone and only craters and dust remained.

“What… the fuck… was that?” Isaac asked before he was abruptly blown away from Shamsha in another thunderous explosion. Isaac had relaxed too early and had forgotten about their actual opponent during what felt like the end of the world.

Lenna had maintained her grip on the skeleton who now sagged in her hands. It was then that she noticed that she was actually holding onto the skeleton directly. The Reality Shields were gone. Shamsha’s robes were also full of holes and all of his buttons were noticeably missing material in the shape of spell sigils, specifically the ones for Reality Shield and Thunder Wave.

“damn it all…” Shamsha spoke. His volume was so low it was hard for Isaac to hear him. Lenna couldn’t hear him at all because her ears were ringing from the chunks of stone that rattled her helmet with her head still inside it.

“Are you finally out of mana, you mad bastard?” Isaac questioned and approached the downed skeleton.

“may dri’el smite you and curse you until the end of time.” Shamsha swore at him.

“I’ll make sure to punch him in the nose next time I see him.” Isaac shot back and punched Shamsha in the chest instead. Isaac reached through one of the gaping holes in Shamsha’s robes and clutched a glowing red, violet, and black gem. Isaac planted his boot on Shamsha’s chest and readied himself to rip out the gem. “Any last words?”

“the skeletons will run free after i die.” Shamsha said. “and i really do hate you, isaac wexler, lord of all that is dark.” He finished and Isaac ripped the gem out of Shamsha’s torso with a nod. Isaac turned and slammed it onto the ground with as much force as he could muster but it didn’t break, it simply lodged itself into the churned up stone ground.

“Shit.” He swore and turned to Lenna. “How do we break it?”

—

Lenny was crouched on the top of the clocktower overlooking the walls of his city. No one without true dark vision, from a potion or a person like Lenna, had any chance of seeing him. He had chosen a cloak that perfectly matched red dust stained treated pine that capped the tower. He could hardly see half of the city through the smoke and blazing backdrop of war. Not a single spell was thrown from the walls because every single mage that could cast Wall of Flames had already done so at the base of the stone city walls. Any mage that couldn’t had already burned through their mana pools hours ago. Celeste had taken a large chunk of the skeleton army out but it was soon made very clear that losing a thousand skeletons meant nothing to the rest of the horde.

“I wasn’t expecting something like this so soon after the last near city ending experience.” A woman’s voice said from right behind him. Lenny hadn’t noticed her arrival so he already knew who it was.

“Me neither, Teach.” Lenny replied to Marie. “How’s the ducal family?”

“Sera and Lucius are ready to leave but waiting until an outcome has been decided.” Marie explained. “They don’t want to leave if they don’t have to. Izen will die here one day, he is just waiting to find out if it will be today or not.”

“What about you and the Guild Master?” Lenny questioned.

Marie stared at him for a long moment before answering: “He’ll die here with his brother-in-law. Those two are both too stubborn for anything else. As for me, I’ll keep Sera and Lucius safe, just like I always have.”

Lenny nodded grimly. It was an awful position that Marie was in. She couldn’t be next to her lover while he was fighting for the city because she had people that she had sworn to protect. Even if Marie decided to go help the frontline for a time, she would be forced to be the first one to retreat so she would have enough time to make an escape with the duchess and heir. “Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.” Lenny whispered to himself.

Marie didn’t respond right away but simply let the silence hang as they watched the balance of the battle. “You as well, right?” Marie eventually asked him.

Lenny nodded again. “Yeah. I want to be down there but the boss has said, far too many times, that I am the most useful when no one knows who I am.” He explained.

Marie walked over to him and sat down on the ledge he was crouching on. Her golden hair was a stark contrast to her black clothes and cloak. “Here.” She said and handed Lenny her choker. It was made of a black fabric that looked almost like it had been woven from thousands of tiny slivers of black leather that had been formed into strings. It was covered in platinum threaded runic engravings. “Put this on.”

Lenny eyed it with curiosity but did as he was told. The magnetic iron clasps didn’t quite reach the whole way around his neck. “Uh, Teach, it’s too small.”

“Just give it a minute.” Marie replied. “Once it’s sized itself to fit you, put on that goofy mask of yours and go help my boyfriend.”

“But how will I hide my identity? I take it this is supposed to do something?” Lenny wondered.

“Once it is ready, say the following words: ‘A perplexing voice always amazes a quiet jay before Thiokeenaxi’s end.’” Marie told him. “It will make your voice forgettable to everyone who hears it. Because it is magic enacted on you and not them it should protect you from someone like Fable remembering your voice.” She explained. “That doesn’t mean he won’t remember your posture or gear though, so be careful.”