7.9 - Expansion (Patreon)

PSA: An edit has been made to the previous chapter. Near where Taylor first grabbed onto Armsmaster's Halberd after he stabbed Sophia.

7.9 - Expansion

Taylor

There was no slow build up, no prodding or testing. Halsin and Armsmaster just rushed at each other. Two trains on the same track going full speed. 

Halsin transformed mid charge, the massive elf transforming into an even more massive bear, towering at what must’ve been ten feet tall as it reared up and came crashing down.

Armsmaster’s halberd whipped out, carving a line across Halsin’s chest as that paw came down with a horrid crash of rending steel. I saw the bear shining with green healing energies, regenerating through the damage as he pressed forward, brute forcing his way through Armsmaster’s answering strikes. 

It was a straight up slugging match the Tinker would lose and he recognized it by the second exchange, jump boots activating to gain some distance.

Halsin wouldn’t let him.

The bear vanished, a striking serpent lunging through the air, mouth extended before transforming again just before the fangs struck the metal into a gorilla, the massive ape carrying the momentum of the snake’s lunge to grab hold of Armsmaster in a grapple, one arm holding the halberd at bay, the two of them crashing into the ground and tumbling down the cliffside towards the heart of the grove with a tremendous cacophony of bashing metal and roaring silverback!

I turned my attention back to Sophia, even as the rest of my awareness once more expanded to the battlefield beyond. 

Most of my phase spiders were injured; and from what I could see, most of the tieflings and druids too. Some grievously.

As my hands pressed onto Sophia’s chest and stomach with green healing I identified the wounded, marked them and in an instant, as many phase spiders as I felt I could spare leapt onto them. Most screamed, horrified and frightened, and feebly tried to fight back with punches, kicks and wild hacking before I had my spiders teleport them back, to the rear, where Shadowheart and Nettie were already rushing to heal them, to get them back into the fight. 

Sophia’s wet breathing rasped through her, she swallowed down mouthfuls of blood, her eyes wide open, staring up at the sky like she was only just realizing how close she came to dying. 

She pawed at my shoulder, grasped at it, fabric bunching up under her fingers. “I’m going, I’m going!” I reassured, trying to keep her calm, or maybe keep both of us calm, watching as the horrid, gaping red hole that was her chest, sternum and stomach slowly reknit itself. 

I made the phase spiders keep transporting wounded from the front, but the more that were transported, the thinner the line became. 

Goblins slipped past, not many, but enough; three rushed up the tall spiralling crag that was Astarion’s perch; I even heard him shouting ‘Fuck off!’

But even more rushing through the lines in a maddened frenzy, no doubt looking to be the first to breach the heart of the grove itself. I recommitted the spiders to the fight, hoping the wounded would heal and rush back into the fray to hold the line. But I could hear Shadowheart and Nettie talking to each other through my bugs, I caught the words ‘Prioritize’ amidst the hissing of the rain.

The two spiders I had next to me I ran over towards Lae’zel and Karlach and with twin flashes of blue both women were gone.

“Heal!” Sophia rasped out. 

“I’m fucking healing!” I snapped!

But Sophia shook her head, gasping out the words like they weighed ten pounds each. “You’re bleeding!”

I shook my head, “I’m fine!” I said.

I didn’t notice the pulsing, throbbing pain growing along the back of my skull.

—

Madison

When the spiders appeared with wounded men and women, screaming in panic, Madison herself screamed in fright. She had not been expecting spiders or screaming, bleeding people!

But then, after the initial alarm and drawing of weapons Shadowheart and Nettie immediately rushed to work, hands glowing with healing magic, Alfira hurrying to help as Madison followed her example. Guex, Ikaron and Emma actually hurried to try and sort out the other wounded into rows, dragging them so Shadowheart and Nettie could get to them like they were in an assembly line. 

More blue flashes, more wounded, Madison counted thirteen before Nettie barked an order- “Hold his arm!”

She did, grabbing the wrist and planting her knee on his shoulder and forearm to hold the limb outstretched. A sword or an axe had cut deep into the bicep and she watched Nettie’s magic forming flesh and muscles and tendons right before her eyes. 

Two more flashes of bright, powder blue, and this time, Madison felt Shadowheart’s alarm.

“Lady!” The half elf gasped, standing and rushing to Madison’s left.

And she looks.

Lae’zel and Karlach are there and Madison’s horror almost makes her want to throw up outright.

Her hands fly to her mouth, holding in a gasp-

“Madison!” Nettie snaps, and her hands return, pressing down and holding the Druid’s arm until Nettie is done and then running over as fast as she can.

Her magic is already almost exhausted from the small amount of healing she’s done already and still she tries to dredge up more, feeling herself scraping off whatever wisps of mana are left in her as green sputters and dies along her fingertips.

Lae’zel coughs blood, Emma casts the prestidigitation cantrip to wipe the blood off, keep it clean, let Shadowheart see what she’s dealing with.

“What happened!?” The half elf demanded, sweat beginning to bead at her brow.

“Armored… warrior.” Lae’zel hisses. “Never seen anything like it.”

The Gith, now breathing easier than she was before, peels off the crushed and ruined breastplate, leaving her in the equivalent of a sports bra, and Shadowheart takes that as confirmation that she can run to Karlach.

The Tiefling woman is still burning, as Shadowheart hisses in pain as she rolls Karlach onto her back and this time, Madison can’t stop the gorge from rising, and even Emma steps back, eyes wide in horror.

The side of Karlach’s face looks like misshapen, shattered meat, bone fragments are sticking out of her jaw, cheek and skull, and her eye is a ruin.

Madison doesn’t even know if she’s breathing.

Shadowheart’s face scrunches up in determination. “Nettie! I need you!” She calls.

“Soon as I can!” Her druid contemporary barks back

Shadowheart’s hands flow with magic, the strain on her face is plain to see. Madison watches Karlach. For a heart stopping moment, it doesn’t look like anything is happening. Healing can’t heal the dead. 

Madison’s heart sinks.

And then, then Karlach groans, her voice sounds worse than she looks, her one good eye flutters open and closed, the iris swimming in its socket. 

“It’s ok! It’s ok!” Madison’s voice is a tremulous, tiny thing, almost lost in the hiss of the rain and the howl of the winds. She reaches for Karlach’s hand and the heat still rolling off the woman stops her before she can. Tieflings and Druids that are now healed rush past them, running to get back into the fight. Lae’zel grunts as she stands and Nettie is suddenly at Karlach’s other side.

There are more blue flashes, and Madison looks around to the other wounded but Emma is already moving, looking over each of the new arrivals and grabbing various healing potions of different potency to hand to them, keeping Nettie and Shadowheart’s efforts focused. 

—

Wyll

Wyll roared as he slashed with his sword. The blow was high, it lacked form, structure, more a desperate hacking than a real slash but it did the job; the Ogre’s throat peeled open like an overripe fruit, red blood spraying out of the gash in a torrent.

There were no cheers, there was no time. Gale coated the ropes and chains and ladders with grease using one spell, and lit the whole thing in a whooshing conflagration with another, goblins screamed and howled as they burned. 

Wyll took the moment to breathe, his eyes scanning the battlefield. He had no idea what had happened with that armored monster that tore down the gate; in the chaos and bedlam he barely even knew if anyone beyond this wall was even still alive. 

More Goblins came, Zevlor roared again, shining blade held high, the hellrider slashed and hacked and Wyll was right beside him. Weapon and spells danced in his hand, more blood spattered his face, one hobgoblin charged at him with an axe raised and Wyll dodged it with practiced eased before answering with a vicious headbut, the horns atop his skull bashing into the tall monster’s face and nose.

Gale’s spells froze the ground at goblins’ feet, shunted arrows aside, shut down the spells of the Booyaghs but they could not keep this up forever. Something had to give.

“WYLL!” 

Gale’s voice reached him, Wyll turned and found the Wizard pointing with his staff, Wyll tracked the gesture, eyes going wide. 

—

Durge

He’s hacked, clawed and savaged his way through the press of bodies. Corpse after corpse left as a paved path of bloody ruin behind him. 

His limbs ache, his muscles throb, his breath burns a line of fire down his throat by the time he’s standing in front of the Drow and her two drow bodyguards. 

His magic is almost gone. The frenzy of souls, while far and away more than the Goblins in its totality… he doesn’t have the reserves to call so many, and they’re beginning to fade out of corporeality as enemy magic and Goblin swords hack and tear at them.

Hebert’s spiders form a desperate ring around him, just four now; he hadn’t noticed when he lost six.

And Durge has to chuckle quietly as he realizes very, very abruptly, the odds are far and away not in his favor. 

The Drow woman roars as she leaps off the high rock she was standing on, mace glowing white-gold in the blackness, as it came down on his head.

The two drow are right at her back, one with twin crossbows, the other with twin swords. 

He backs away, barely avoiding the crushing blow that would have caved his head in. 

He swings that goblin cleaver and the woman’s shield batters it aside with such force his hand hurts as the impact rings up the length of the blade. 

The one with the crossbows fires and Durge can’t dodge the bolts, so he doesn’t try; he minimizes the damage, bringing his arm up, iron heads piercing straight through his forearm and wrist, bursting out of the other side, red staining his robes. 

The other tries to come in along his right, twin blades flashing silver in the rain.

Durge smiles. 

Don’t get close to a lightning wielder in the rain.

He doesn’t dodge, doesn’t lean back, he steps into the swing, shoulder checking the startled drow, the two blades slicing into his chest and back but the blows had reached him too soon, before they’d built up any real speed or cutting power.

His good hand whipped forward, darting fast as a shocking grasp, a cantrip, danced along his fingers.

The drow was soaked. Cantrip or not the lightning made him dance.

The man jerked and spasmed; Durge could hear the scream trapped in his lips that could not open properly with the contractions.

The lightning leapt from him, to the rain, onto Durge himself, it sparkled and jumped and made pretty lights that cast long shadows on the drow’s furious eyes. He was in pain, but he thought he’d survive. Thought ‘It’s just a cantrip.’

He was wrong.

Durge saw those eyes go wide, and the terror there was real as the Dragonborn opened his maw wide and then clamped down on the drow warrior’s skull.

Teeth bit down, and the man began to scream in truth now, frantic, panicked. Durge’s jaw clenched tight. 

Something crunched, and there was a sudden give.

The body went slack.

The blow that struck him in the ribs knocked him back, sent him sliding across the slick and muddied ground, the Drow woman charging at him, rushing forward as Durge fell to one knee, grasping at what must’ve been broken or bruised ribs. 

He opened his mouth and breathed out a freezing cold Dragonbreath point blank in the woman’s face.

He heard her roar in pain, reeling, the other loading his crossbow bolts again and letting loose only for Durge to dive to the side, just barely avoiding two more bolts.

He panted as he lay in the mud, the four phase spiders desperately trying to hold back the goblins, hobgoblins and whatever else was trying to overwhelm him.

That was good… it meant Hebert was still alive…

Still… how to kill this one…

He seems to be rather limited in options.

Then, with a sudden shrieking cry, energy lanced through the air, piercing the Drow crossbowman, while a similar lance was shunted aside by the Drow woman, and then, Wyll and Gale were there, descending from above with featherfall, interposing themselves between the Drow woman and Durge himself.

He wanted to say something clever, to taunt her, goad her. But he couldn’t think of anything with his blood pounding through his temples and his ribs making breathing harder.

So he just stood up, forcing his feet back under him.

He didn’t realize he was still smiling.

He’d never stopped.

—

Taylor

As soon as I was satisfied Sophia wasn’t gonna drop dead I moved to stand and all at once the vertigo hit me. Down became up, up became left and my whole body swayed before I fell and the vomit that rose up I couldn’t have stopped even if I realized it was coming.

The gunk coated the floor, and I could see flecks of red, more droplets dripping out of my nose, and my eyes were tinged with red.

“Hebert!” Sophia grabbed my arm. “Heal yourself, you twiggy bitch! You’re bleeding out of your fucking eyes!”

Wait… what?

My hand reached up, fingers trembling, I dabbed at my eyes and saw that yes, my fingers came away red.

The pounding in my skull built up to a pressure, like a valve had been sealed shut and the blood was pooling in my skull with no way to escape.

I felt the connection, that link to Armsmaster, throbbing, pulsing, pounding. I focused and my vision swam. Something was blocking it, a dam on a river and flashes burst behind my eyelids.

Armsmaster’s halberd carving through flesh, armor rent, similar pain in his skull.

Whatever was happening it was hurting both of us.

I wasn’t sure if he was winning or losing.

So I decided to make sure he lost. 

I reached for my tadpole and felt it clench. The pain bored through my skull like someone pressed a drill through my forehead! 

The world went black and I fell face down into the mud.

“HEBERT!”

—

Sophia

“HEBERT!”

The thin girl hit the mud with a splat, her whole body beginning to convulse as Sophia cursed.

“Fuck!” She shouted, grabbing hold of the twiggy bitch as she spasmed and jerked, limbs spasming in grotesque contortions! “STUPID BITCH! YOU’RE CONTROLLING HALF THE FIGHTERS!” She cursed! Hebert’s spiders were… fucking hell they were the backbone of this whole defense as far as she could tell.

She grabbed hold of Hebert’s wrist and hauled her up onto her shoulders in a fireman’s carry, practically sprinting up the hill towards Shadowheart and Nettie. They had to fix Hebert before everyone fucking died!

Her chest hurt as she ran and she prayed there wasn’t internal bleeding, the phantom pain of being impaled felt like it nearly made all the strength just crumble away and out of her body as she shuddered. But she grit her teeth, pulled her balls out of her bitch purse, and kept fucking moving!

Emma noticed her first. 

“Soph-” The redhead stopped, just stopped dead, eyes going wide, fixed on Hebert.

Sophia rushed past her and was relieved as she saw that Karlach, who Shadowheart was kneeling next to, was breathing.

“What happened!?”

Shadowheart sounded exhausted. Not good. Healing wasn’t like Panacea back home. She couldn’t do it endlessly.

“Don’t know.” Sophia confessed, setting Taylor down, Madison, Nettie and Shadowheart crowding around her. “Started bleeding. Eyes, nose, ears. Then she just fell over!”

There was a sudden flash of blue and Sophia jumped. 

A Phase spider just teleported someone.

Sophia stared.

Another flash of blue. Another wounded.

“She’s still awake.” Shadowheart declared, hands moving over Hebert’s body before settling on her head.

Shadowheart’s eyes widened a split second before she screamed in pain.

Shadowheart’s hands flew towards her own head, and Sophia was just about to ask what the hell was wrong when Shadowheart’s tadpole opened up.

And suddenly, all she knew was pain.

All she could hear was the voice.

OBEY!

—

Durge

She was good, as she deflected Gale’s spells, threatened to overwhelm Wyll at close range and avoided Durge’s attempts to seize openings with the grace of a woman that had been fighting for centuries and knew how to win.

Even if he hadn’t been exhausted when he arrived… it might not have been a fight he could win anyway.

Gale was tiring now, his magic nearly depleted, as was Wyll. The woman was a Paladin, healing magics were keeping her fresh and in the fight. They needed to end this before she simply outlasted them.

OBEY!

The voice came from behind his eyelids. It came as a roar, it came as a command from the Gods themselves. It came with pain. With slivers of needle like agony under his skin. It came with his body falling to the floor, it came with fury and malice and it was impossible to resist.

He tried. But he felt the battle being lost, the shores of his mind eroding under relentless, implacable tides of psionic impossibility.

Wyll and Gale fell to their knees, the Drow woman too. Others, goblins and bug bears and more screamed as blood burst from their ears. They clawed at their eyes in maddened frenzy, tearing at themselves until they literally killed themselves in their own lunacy!

His eyes shut, and for a brief, timeless instant he could see… two beings. Titanic in scale, impossible in power. Clashing, fighting. The energies they unleashed could sunder worlds. Contesting each other. Breaking and shattering each other on a thousand forms of reality.

And then, with a lurch, there was a flash of gold behind his eyes, and the pain vanished like morning mist.

The Drow woman’s eyes cleared, blinking.

Durge pounced.

His arm, the one still with the crossbow bolts impaling it came crashing down on her before she fully recovered. The bolt head sticking out of his wrist punched into the side of her neck with a sickening wet squelch. He brought it down a second, then a third time, blood bursting out of her wound in a gush of arterial blood.

Then the mace came crashing into the underside of his jaw.

Bones broke, teeth bit into his own tongue, he went flying off his feet, vision swimming as he crashed into the blood drenched mud. 

He wasn’t certain he could get back up.

The paladin clutched at her wounded neck, healing magic already shining on her hands. 

But the words she said. It was enough. 

“RETREAT!” She screeched, stumbling away, red coating her hands, side and the snowy white of her hair. “FALL BACK!”

—

Sophia

Sophia… cried.

The pain that washed over her took her straight back. Back to Steven. Back to Behemoth. Back to every horror and pain she’d ever known.

But worse, it took her back, back to that terror filled moment just seconds ago when Armsmaster was standing over her. That instant where she couldn’t breathe, where her own blood was gushing out of her, splashing back down like liquid magma on her own face. That window of time where her chest jerked and no air would come, and she tried to move her arms but they wouldn’t listen.

She could see it all, see it as though it were happening right now all over again.

OBEY!

She was ready to. Ready to obey anything as long as it took her away from this one singular horror.

And she felt it. Felt its tendrils creeping into her mind. Felt it coiling around her.

Then- Gold.

Something flashed. Hovering like a lantern in the dark, it shined like a sun as it hovered between all of them and the pain vanished immediately. Like it’d never been there.

The glow faded and Sophia saw… something. She didn’t have a word for it. It looked like someone threw several diamond shapes into a blender and decided it would have all the corners it wanted. 

Runes with that same gold glow shined on its surface and then the thing fell straight into Shadowheart’s dazed lap.

“That…” Lae’zel hissed, grasping at her head as if trying to physically push the headache away. “Is a Githyanki relic… Why do you have it!?”

Sophia coughed, hand fumbling like a drunk before she managed to get her depth perception back and grab Shadowheart. “Heal now, argue about random bullshit later. Need Hebert’s spiders!”

Shadowheart hesitated, and Sophia remembered that the instant Shadowheart had touched Hebert’s skull, that’s when the pain came.

And now that she noticed she could feel her tadpole squirm and the psionic energies that were pulsing out of Taylor’s mind felt like there were a million psychic bombs going off in there. 

Fuck.

“Asleep-” Shadowheart finally said, swallowing thickly. “We have to put her to sleep!”

—

Halsin

The warrior was good.

One of the best Halsin had ever seen.

And in three hundred and fifty seven years of life he had seen a great many warriors.

Every blow Halsin managed to land was answered in kind with that impossibly sharp and unbreakable polearm. And every time Halsin fought for too long in one form the warrior adapted almost perfectly in his engagement. Were it not for his magic healing the wounds as soon as they were made he suspected he would be dead thrice over by now.

And even now, Halsin could feel the strain on his magic reserves. He was getting tired, and the warrior’s armor, though damaged and sparking in places, was holding strong still. 

Their battle had taken them to the heart of the Grove, sheets of rain and lightning falling around them. 

The Warrior stood, both hands on his weapon, that visor cracked but still glowing blue.

Halsin’s magic flowed into the Grove.

And the Grove, the heart of Sylvanus’ realm in these lands, the bedrock of druidic power, the leyline from which all his power came from, answered.

Roots with the strength of mythril erupted from the ground. The armored warrior tried to activate his boots of flame but the twisting wood caught him by the ankle and held him fast.

Tethers reached up from the world below, grasping and coiling around the warrior’s shoulders, neck, arms and legs, binding him right on the spot where the Idol of Sylvanus had been placed for Kagha’s Rite of Thorns.

The warrior ripped free his left arm holding the halberd, and with a mighty cry heaved it forward, the counterweight extending with a cable as the axe head came down on Halsin’s head.

The druid stepped aside, the axe head bit deep into the earth and Halsin stomped on it, his full weight pressing down and holding it there as the Archdruid raised both hands towards the rumbling sky.

The heavens answered and lightning fell, a thunderous crack ripping the skies open to send pure cascading forks of energy into Halsin’s hands.

He roared and brought both fists down with all his prodigious magical and physical might into the halberd and finally, shattered the impossibly durable weapon into a million shards, its black slivers looking like starlight across the heart of the grove.

Halsin’s body shifted, transforming once again into the form of a Jaguar.

Four powerful limbs and corded muscle had him closing the distance in an eyeblink and the warrior, bound as he was, was still dangerous, proving it in the next moment as his left arm pulled, tearing free in a burst of strength, trying to catch Halsin by the throat.

The Archdruid transformed into something he couldn’t grasp, the feline neck replaced with the front leg of a rearing horse, Halsin wheeling around to deliver a mule kick that crashed into the warrior’s chestplate with a shattering of metal and delicate devices that dinged and pinged as they struck the gnarled roots below them.

The man didn’t scream, couldn’t, no air in his lungs, but the pain was real, his whole body tensing, going rigid in his binds. 

But the warrior answered even now, two cables bursting out of his forearms to dig into the rocky faces of the statues that surrounded them and heaving.

The statues broke, toppling over like great trees, threatening to crush Halsin beneath their weight only for the Archdruid to transform again. Contorting between the falling idols with the million legs of the giant centipede.

He coiled and his many legs bit down like hooks, finding the gaps and cracks in the armor, like fingers and Halsin began to pull. 

The warrior struggled, against the roots, against Halsin himself.

The archdruid could see blood flowing from his nose and mouth now, he could feel psionic energies pressing in on the man’s mind, and still he fought.

With a buckling tug, something finally gave, something came loose and with a rip Halsin tore off whole sheets of impossibly strong metal to send it sailing across the heart of the sanctuary.

Exposed cabling sparked and fizzled. Halsin transformed one final time into the powerful silverback, an ironwood stake clenched in his mighty fist as he brought it straight down.

Halsin felt it then, the moment something finally pierced, the moment it found flesh, got through the armor.

The warrior coughed, blood coating his lips and staining his teeth.

Halsin didn’t let go of the wooden stake, he channeled magic through the sacred wood, lightning crackled along his eyes. He roared, fangs snapping with forks of electricity as well. The skies rumbled, ready to unleash Sylvanus’ fury one more time.

“STOP!”

Halsin’s gaze snapped over towards the voice, finding Hess emerging in her shadowform from the cliffs above.

The girl was pale, she was frightened, he could see that but still she opened her mouth and spoke. “D-don’t… You can't kill him!”