Book 3 - chapter 123 (Patreon)

Across the battlefield, the two sides threw all they had left at one another in a display of Blessed madness. Man fought man in bursts of light, and the very air vibrated with the heat of a hundred unique powers used not to craft or build, but to do something so wasteful as the death of kin. A crow flew above it all, watching with its black eyes.

One burst of light briefly overtook the others. A flash of orange fire in the south lit the night sky. War was the death of many, but to a scarce few it was an opportunity.

The crow croaked in anxiety and swooped downward. The connection to its master was still there, but fire was the weakness of those who relied too much on regeneration. Buttons cut through clouds of soot on wings of pristine feathers.

Its wings shot out wide, ripping against the toxic air to decelerate. The fire still roared, reaching far toward the sky and coming from someone within. It tore at the structures of metal, pulsing like a beating heart and searing Buttons' feathers.

Three of the black-wearing hunters cowered at the edge of the fire, shielding their eyes from the flames of divinity filled with the simple and crude name of the world’s newest Blaze.

Elenya the Red, the intent sharp and unbending, so unlike the Wretch's name that made the shadows curl and twitch.

Buttons let out a loud caw, smothered by the roar of flames. The aven landed on an abandoned war machine. Then, a figure burst out of the flames. The white giant, seared and bloodied, still stood. A few cracks ran down the tank of glass bolted to his back, but the pale skin had once again protected him. The only true wound the Gulschak carried was the hole in his stomach where a bolt had been dislodged, leaving a bleeding gash.

Buttons reached for the connection to its master with another caw. It let out a croak of surprise as Wretch acknowledged the bond. Buttons tilted its head at the emotion of its master:

Joy.

Another pulse of fire, and finally the roaring flames collapsed inward. The pale giant wheezed and coughed as two figures became visible in the orange flames.

Wretch, seared to a crisp, still had one hand clutched around Elenya’s shoulder. His mouth moved, whispering words of praise and grounding whatever inner turmoil the ascension brought with it. He would not let her lose control at this stage. He needed her.

The flames retreated into the girl's chest like a maelstrom of yellow and red, taking with them the very heat of the air. She fell to her knees, and Buttons launched forward, soaring to finally perch on Wretch’s burnt shoulder.

Buttons let out a caw of frustration at its master's folly and pecked with its beak against the charred skin now free of fur.

Wretch turned his head, the skin so burned as to crack at the movement. He wore a smile.

He turned his eyes back to Elenya. “There you are, Elenya. Now you’ve caught up to me.” His voice was coarse like gravel.

Elenya exhaled, and finally her eyes opened wide.

“You disappoint. The strongest among you can no longer fight!” Karthal roared and pounced, his naked feet rushing across the scorched earth, seizing the moment Wretch’s body needed to heal. “Ascending in battle, what imprudence!”

Wretch’s snout moved again. “Show him the Flame of War. I'm sure that's the one you carry. Show the world the only thing people like you and me are good for.”

Wretch fell to his knees, and Buttons cawed in worry. His skin cracked and churned as large plates of blackened, charred skin fell to the ground.

“The battle has turned in my favor. Blessed be the father’s will.” Karthal roared as his fist cracked through the air. Elenya trailed her eyes wearily from Wretch before her to Karthal’s shooting fist. Then her eyes lit with fire.

She moved.

Muscles, skin, and nerves infused with divine fire. She had no weapon, but what did such things mean to those who had climbed as far as they had? The air cracked, and a wind swept over the battlefield.

Elenya’s open palms wrapped around Karthal’s fist barely a few feet from Wretch's head, the latter larger than the other. Karthal’s veins rushed with green energy, and shades of red danced along Elenya’s, both of their muscles bulging. She’d caught up, but in a sense she was already ahead.

“You think to outmatch me in strength, newborn?” Karthal said as his tank churned and the acid secreted from his skin sizzled against Elenya’s hands.

Her face, however, was a mask. “No,” she said simply.

A pivot of her body, and her leg cracked against the giant’s abdomen. The breath escaped the giant. The pale man gritted his teeth and retaliated with a string of strikes. Elenya weaved through the attack. The battle of Blazes had turned into a brawl. Elenya dodged under a hook and unleashed a final uppercut to the giant’s chin that sent him stumbling back.

The Gulschak was stronger, even faster. But whatever sheltered environment he’d grown from was nothing compared to the experience of a killer cultivated in the filth and strife of Nov Yanosk.

She pushed the giant back little by little, newfound strength and speed allowing her skill in battle to flourish. The Gulschak struggled to keep up the offense and at the same time protect the leaking wound in his stomach.

Blood dripped onto the ground, and if one looked closely, a quiver passed through the crimson liquid. It crawled, moving as if alive toward Elenya’s feet.

“Blood, typical of a War-Flame,” Karthal laughed. “But your control is unpracticed. Tell me its stipulations!”

Elenya launched a final strike that Karthal blocked with an open palm. The impact was violent enough to move the air around them. “Blood shed in battle is yours. Enough will transform you.”

Karthal sneered. “How unfortunate you burned it all away. Say, would you lay down your malice and take my hand in marriage? I could improve you. Hmm, yes, here it comes. Inspiration.”

“No,” Elenya answered with another flurry of attacks.

“Bahh,” Karthal said, backpedaling and blocking, but each of Elenya’s strikes sizzled against his acid-coated skin. “What a waste. But I’ll give it my all then. Shame, I almost wished to see this transformation you speak of.”

“I think that can be arranged,” came a voice.

Wretch crouched on a destroyed war machine to the side, watching the battle. His skin still moved to heal the last of the burns, and a furious bird cawed by his neck.

“Some help maybe?” Elenya called. “He’s not bleeding enough.”

“You’re doing fine. But you see, I had to rush here when Buttons found you,” Wretch said. “The labor of my own ascension could not keep up, so I gave them a simple command: follow me.”

Karthal’s engine roared on his back, and he grew faster, the veins threatening to burst. He pushed Elenya back, finally going on the offensive. “As if a few more rats would make a difference!”

“We’ll see,” Wretch said, crouched to the side. “Oh, here they come just now. Don’t you hear?”

Both Elenya and Karthal froze at his words. It was true. Below the distant chorus of thundering strikes from the war itself, something grew closer. A wave of skittering bodies, the sound of claws scratching against metal.

All three turned to the north, but only Wretch wore a smile. “Here come those willing to bleed in battle. Use it, Elenya, and learn your new Blessings.”

A wave washed over the closest war machine, a tide of fur, claw, and brittle bones, so numerous they might as well have been liquid. Ten thousand chattering maws driven mad by the command of their prophet.

Karthal’s tank wheezed, then he moved. He charged Elenya, but Wretch could smell cowardice. The giant roared in a ferocious display, his name echoing through the pipes and destroyed machines around them.

Elenya met him head-on with clenched fists clad in blood. At the last moment, Karthal pivoted and bolted to the side.

Predictable, Wretch thought. The tide of rats ripped at the earth as they moved to encircle the man. But the rats were slow compared to a Blaze. Wretch appeared in a flash, both swords held to the sides. Maw opened in a grin and eyes blazing with fire. If Karthal wanted to escape, it would have to be through him.

The giant froze, a bead of sweat rolling down his forehead. He couldn’t. The fear must have overpowered him for only a moment, but that was enough for the rats to complete the encirclement, washing over Wretch’s grinning form.

Karthal turned. A Blessed forged in optimal conditions stared down one that was made through strife and blood. Elenya glared at the giant where they stood in the circle of vermin that roiled and moved like a tide of gray.

“I yield,” Karthal said grimly. But Elenya didn’t answer. Something ripped through the swarm and whizzed through the air. She caught it in one hand.

The black cross, previously lost to her, was returned. She let her finger travel down its length, then spun it around her form.

“Give it your all!” Wretch called from deep within the swarm. With those words, the rats flowed forward with a chorus of screams, and Karthal answered with a roar of desperation. The two Blazes crashed against one another as the tide moved to swallow them both.

The two Blazes clashed once more. Bones snapped. Thuds and cuts came from the blur of bodies. Rats died by the hundreds simply by being close to the battle. They crawled to envelop Karthal whole and bury deep in his one open wound. The Gulschak didn’t let them. They were simple rats after all, and their warm blood flowed onto the burnt mud beneath. Wretch watched it all, and when the blood had flowed enough, he pulled back the swarm.

The rats pulled back to form an encirclement once more. Karthal still stood, but a dozen blemishes marked his skin. His breath wheezed, a hand still protecting his wounded abdomen. There he stood, encircled and wounded, torn little by little, slowly demolished like the fortress of Voska in the distance.

Elenya held the spear frozen in a striking pose, but beneath the two, so many rats lay dying as to carpet the entire ground. The small ones had no chance of piercing the giant’s defenses, but they could bleed.

“That is enough, isn't it. Show us,” Wretch called from the sideline.

Elenya didn’t need the command. The blood of vermin flowed across the ground, droplets coalescing into streams that darted up Elenya’s legs, coating her entire form and seeping into her very skin.

Her eyes crackled with spent power, and her red hair changed from red to white. A scarce few words escaped her.

“War-form.”

The blood on her white skin turned into a glowing crimson, but her red hair changed into a stark white, clean and unblemished.

She took a step and blurred forward. In a split second, she was on him. The spear cracked against the white skin with enough force to move the air. Karthal threw himself at Elenya with the strength of a cornered beast. But his opponent simply moved.

It didn’t take long. For a Blaze, this man was weak, too reliant on his defenses in Wretch’s estimation. Elenya’s spear shot forward. As before, Karthal defended his wounded stomach. But Elenya wasn’t like before.

Her spear thudded against the white skin. And pierced through. It dug through the man’s neck, spraying blood that all flowed to Elenya.

“Please,” Karthal gurgled as he fell to his knees. But this was war between kin. And neither side had ever shown the other mercy.

Elenya poised herself to deliver the final strike. But a shadow shot from the wall of rats. Two glinting daggers. Karthal didn’t see them coming.

Wretch’s two blades pierced the man’s eyes, digging into his skull and taking the man’s life in one swift attack. “I need his skin, for what is to come,” Wretch said simply.

Elenya wheezed and placed a knee on the ground. Her white hair moved and changed back to its vibrant red while the blood disappeared from her pale and bruised skin. “You tested me? You could have ended it way sooner had you wished.”

Wretch ripped the two blades from the eyesockets of the quivering giant. The Gulschak fell to the ground with a thud, his engine giving a final gurgle before growing quiet.

He licked the gore of the metal, consuming another prey to add its form to those available to him. To his mind’s eye, Karthal stepped into the light of his flame, joining the many who had been so unfortunate as to meet him. “He was nothing against the two of us. I broke through in the midst of battle. Why would it be any different for you?”

Wretch reached down the dead man’s throat all the way to his elbow, digging through the man's soft interior. With a sudden jank, he pulled something from within. A glowing rock that shone fiercely. “Do you mind?”

Elenya shook her head, and Wretch pulled the fire from the coal. The flame darted greedily into him.

Coal's of worthy prey: 2

The rats that remained roiled impatiently, but still they let a group of three through. The hunters under Elenya pushed through the mass of furred bodies with loud shouts. Wretch didn’t know them, and Buttons landed on his shoulder to caw victoriously.

The scout was wounded, missing his left arm, and the shoulder of the bald woman was disfigured by a grisly wound. Still, the three ran forward with weapons raised. Embers, Wretch thought, nothing but children.

“Captain!” Mitya roared, slashing the air to stave off the hissing rats.

The trio froze as they saw Wretch and Elenya, the latter with one knee on the ground. Their opponent, dead before them.

The trio threw themselves onto Elenya as if to shield her with their own bodies. The one who had previously held a crossbow quickly took stock of her wounds. “You’ve got a cracked rib, no mistake about it. And Mitya even lost an arm.”

“It’s going to cost a fortune to heal!” the one-armed man spat as he pulled Elenya off the ground, her arm over his shoulder.

Wretch looked at the four hunters, many thoughts fighting for his attention. A blast and a cry pulled him to the present. In the haze to the north, Voska still burned, and to the northwest, a porcelain abomination the size of several city blocks fought against the hands of the Saint. The war would end tonight, and with it opportunities would evaporate.

He turned his eyes back to the hunters, who were discussing something loudly.

“Elenya,” Wretch rumbled.

The trio of hunters froze. Perhaps it was something in his voice, or now that relief had settled in, they thought him a threat. Were they wrong?

“You know what this means...” Wretch said, his snout sniffing the air. The hunters all carried the toxins of Nov Yanosk and its industries nestled between spires. Home. But not for him. “They kept the truth from us. How to ascend. Edmund, he could have lived. But they denied him. They let us die. The Saint used us.”

"We can't remain as hunters after what they did." He took a step forward, gesturing towards her underlings. "Leave them, and come with me."