The New Dark Lord: Book 3- Chapter 25 (Patreon)

Mafari was Archmagus of Magira, wielder of magics beyond the comprehension of most and, perhaps, the single most potent mortal being in his entire world. And yet even he felt a stab of twisting nervousness as he made his way for the audience. It was, he thought, quite natural. A hundred years ago, he had been young. Two hundred years ago the creature he intended to meet now had been old. Mafari was likely the more powerful of them, but in every other capacity he was outmatched.

It never ceased to amaze him, the lifespan of elves. Nor to concern.

King Magnia awaited Mafari upon a great throne hewn of dark wood and encrusted with vibrant amber seemingly of every colour there was. He was, perhaps without exaggeration, the most beautiful being Mafari had ever laid eyes upon. His face beyond mere human notions of handsomeness, bearing some primal magnetism that threatened to leave him breathless. Not sexual, not sexual at all- to call it that felt somehow reductive and crude- merely…Aesthetic.

“Good evening.” He nodded to the king. The king nodded back. Neither of them fully deferred, neither was contemptuous. Mafari appreciated that. So many monarchs of the human world thought themselves above Magira’s Archmagus. He was willing to tolerate their delusion, to leave their self-deception intact, but it was still…Irksome.

He was pleased to be doing without it here.

“Young Mafari.” The elf greeted him, showing about as much respect as could be expected from him for any human. “It has been some time, what brings you to my realm?”

“You know already, I suspect.” Mafari noted, scrutinising the elf’s features. He saw nothing to betray a secret, emotion or sentiment regarding that. As per usual. The older a being got, the more their face seemed to crystallize in place. The less penetrable any deception they wove into it would grow. Mafari was not used to being the disadvantaged one in matters of age and history. 

He did not much care for it. 

“The distortion.” King Magnia sighed. “We have sensed it too, of course, such a powerful thing, so…Untempered. It does not belong in the hands of your kind.”

“Or yours.” Mafari noted. “Drop the pretenses, Magnia, we both know the myth of elven infallibility was killed when so many of your people joined the first Dark Lord.”

Magnia smiled. Some among his species were easily irritated when egos got pricked, he had always found the experience novel and interesting. Mafari suspected a king grew more tired of its absence than the rest of his kind. 

“A fair point, and once again it seems danger has emerged in the lands of that…Renegade.”

“Renegade.” Mafari replied, feeling his temper grow uncharacteristically hot. “That almost seems like too much credit, I’ve seen his kind a hundred times before. Hedge wizardry and ego is not a substitute for true arcane knowledge.”

Magnia’s lip curled.

“You know, between the two of us we could control the continent itself.” He began.

“I do know.” Mafari replied evenly. “You told me as much a decade ago.”

“And I am telling you again now.” The elf pressed. “It is even more true now than it was then, if anything. What is stopping us?”

Mafari couldn’t help but smile. The days of Magnia equalling his power, let alone exceeding it, felt so easy to recall that he almost overlooked their passing. 

“The fact that I do not need you to do that.” He sighed. 

Magnia didn’t bristle this time either, though Mafari wondered how much closer the elf king had come. 

“You want assistance on closing the distortion.” He affirmed. “I can provide it. But I will do so along with a warning, do not underestimate this danger.”

Mafari met his eye. 

“I appreciate your warning.” He replied. Both of them knew, though, that he would not be deterred, and Mafari himself was certain there was no great danger here. The world had long-since run out of threats for a caster of his capacity. “Now, your aid with the distortion?”

Magnia sighed lightly, nodding. 

“Very well.”

He spoke, and Mafari listened. He enjoyed the rare experience of learning something in the ways of magic. The days of his power falling short of Magnia’s were long past, but the difference in experience between them was still measured in centuries. One day he intended to know more than any other. But it would take a hundred thousand more conversations like this one, he suspected, before that day was upon him.

When the king had finished, and Mafari committed the meat of all his words to memory, they parted with a respectful nod to the other. Mafari’s magic caressed the air ahead and pulled it apart, his portal widened before him.

For all his power, this was not something he had ever managed himself. Even now. Mafari could rend space only by borrowing the might of his Patron, and each time he did their whisper grew louder at the back of his mind. Magi had been driven to insanity by channeling such powers.

But no Archmagi. No true Archmagus, at least. He stepped through and felt himself dislodge from the world, then impress his substance back into it elsewhere. The cool walls of the Dark Lord’s castle greeted him. Littered with sprayed viscera, surrounding a mangled carpet of human carcases.

Mafari’s rage was not long in coming.

“Get out.” Said the figure at the end of the room, tall and covered in black armour. His face was unhelmed, eyes dark and level. Mafari had heard enough descriptions of the Dark Lord to recognise him at a glance. 

“Did you do this?” He asked the man. 

“Get out.” He replied, ignoring Mafari’s question. It seemed there would be no dialogue with him. That suited Mafari just fine. 

His magic leapt out, tore open the air. Another portal was born, this one linking the world’s one side to its other. Most thought the world was flat, even feared sailing off its edge if they strayed too far from the centre. Mafari had travelled enough to know better. The land beneath him was a great sphere, spinning at impossible speeds as it rotated about the sun. Everything fell towards its centre. 

On one side of that centre, the spinning left the land moving in opposite direction to the other. Each on their own mustered impossible speeds. By taking an object directly from one side of the world, it would maintain that velocity as it emerged on the other. And so Mafari’s enemy was struck by the volley of boulders as they spun and screamed through the air.

They drove him into the wall, made it shiver. Mafari watched with some satisfaction for all of a moment as more and more projectiles exploded against their targets. Then the Dark Lord forced his way up. 

With one swing, his mace cleared the air of them. Actually sent a wind blasting through the room, disturbing its currents enough to send Mafari’s projectiles off-kilter. Another swing sent Mafari himself stumbling, and he was already leaping across the room before the next came. 

Mafari had never seen anything move even half so fast as him. Not Swick the Swift, not the Rangers of Kaltan. Nothing. His shield was barely up in time to meet the falling mace, and when it did there was nothing but a shattering of hardened energy before the weapon burst through. Mafari’s portal carried him across the room, letting him avoid the swing by milliseconds as he called on another.

This time, he linked his portal to the depths of a searing volcano and let the magma explode outwards- pressurised by its own great mass and shooting free with a hungry viciousness as the portal alleviated compression. The Dark Lord disappeared beneath glowing molten sludge. Then emerged from it almost unhurt.

Magma was sent flying in all directions, glowing, spitting globules of hot death splashing around and cooling where they hit. Some fell upon the floor, others on the corpses. Those that found bodies instead of stone quickly cooked the tissue and filled the room with an acrid stench of searing flesh. It seemed a kitchen, now, was to be Mafari’s battlefield.

And every moment he remained in it left him more certain that he was the meat upon its chopping block. The Dark Lord continued after him, butcher’s weapon ready. He swung through the air again, and this time a Demon burst into it.

It was a minor thing compared to some Mafari had seen, but potent enough to cleave through the sheet of magma he washed it with, and shrug off the breaking of boulders against it. The room’s sound was consumed as impact rang out powerfully enough to consume all else. 

Then the Demon hit Mafari’s shield, clawed at it, began forcing its way in. The Dark Lord leapt high, came down with another swing. His heart raced, mind whirred, life flashed before him as every instinct he had all rang out as one;

He was going to die. This fight was beyond him, it would have been beyond two of him. Mafari was outmatched.

Mafari’s newest portal formed up just in time for him to fall back into it, earning him one final glimpse of the Dark Lord’s mace smashing into the ground he’d just occupied. It came apart. Stone exploding upwards, outwards. Breaking like dried bread each direction a dozen yards out. He landed, rolled back and willed the portal closed just an instant before his enemy could follow him through.

Gasping, groaning, Mafari slowly forced his way up. He was panting, hands trembling for the first time since…He couldn’t remember. He was scared. An alien sensation, assassinating his reason and enfeebling his wits.

“I did warn you.”

Behind Mafari, standing now, Magnia looked down at him with a suitably knowing, imperious stare. He wondered whether that was something that came naturally with the centuries, or if the elf had practiced it. 

“Not well enough.” Mafari growled, stumbling only a moment as he finished rising. He’d not been hit, not even once, but his entire body ached. Skin sore where the Dark Lord had battered it with shockwaves, bones throbbing from pressure differentials. It was a magus’ curse to always feel his body’s fragility compared to the power of his mind. 

“Well enough for most, you can consider this a lesson.”

Yes. Mafari thought. And had I died rather than escaping to learn it, you could have considered yourself the most powerful living being in this world.

Second most powerful now, of course. Assuming the Dark Lord was still a living mortal. He shivered. 

“You can consider it a lesson too.” Mafari frowned. “You didn’t bank on this being the Dark Lord’s power, you would have considered the notion as ridiculous as I. You…Hm.”

He realised it in a rush. Mafari had been Magnia’s test subject, the bait used to lure out the Dark Lord’s true power and gauge it personally. Doubtless he’d been watching the whole battle, somehow. Doubtless he’d learned more from it than even Mafari.

That much was obvious, because beneath his veneer of confidence the elven king seemed frightened.

“I see the centuries have not dulled your mind, old friend.” He replied. “Yes, you are correct. And we are in more danger than either of us knew.”

Mafari did not ask Magnia to share his knowledge, he knew it wouldn’t happen. Not even now. Not if a dozen more Dark Lords emerged to join the first two. The elves had never done anything for humanity, leaving them to blindly flounder alone as they stumbled through the dark tides of magic. That much would never change.

But circumstances did, and Mafari no longer had the luxury of holding old grudges for slights long-made. If he and Magnia did not combine their strengths, they would die alone. That made the decision no decision at all.

“Very well.” He answered. 

Perhaps one Dark Lord would have left room for old grudges to fester. Two certainly did not.