Book of The Dead

“Uhhh, Dove?”

“Yes?”

“There is a giant monster that looks like it wants to trample my guts into the ground standing in front of the rift.”

“Yeah, they do that. Both of those. They stand around the rift, and trample your guts into the ground.”

“You’ve seen this thing before?” Tyron hissed.

“What? No, of course not. I’ve never seen any monsters from this particular rift before. But there’s almost always some big ass thing trampling around right next to the rift.”

The beast turned its head to Tyron and suddenly, his army of skeletons had never felt quite so small. Covered in dense, white fur, the monster’s skull jutted forward just above its small, burning red eyes. Air steamed from its fang-lined maw, flanked on either side by huge curved tusks formed of pure rime.

“Yeah… you’ll probably need to kill that. Or distract it.”

“You didn’t think you should tell me about this?”

“Honestly? I didn’t think the rift would be large enough to let a prick like this get through. I fucked up. Sorry about that.”

Tyron growled under his breath, but restrained his anger. There wasn’t any point getting angry at Dove, especially since he was only hours away from a proper death.

How in the name of the Abyss am I supposed to deal with something this big?

Only skeletons with spears and swords would be able to damage it by thrusting through that thick fur, but if they got close, they’d be reduced to powder in a blink. His archers probably couldn’t scratch it. An arrow through the eye may be effective, but it would be almost impossible to make the hit. Of his revenants, only the Slayer would be of any use, though the others could distract it if they were fast enough to avoid it. Ghosts may be effective, he would have to try.

As for his magick…. Death’s Grasp wasn’t going to hold something this size, and magick bolts would be little more than irritating to it. It was possible he could restrain it with Suppress Mind, but a kin this strong… that would be a risk.

Distract it and look for an opportunity. Preserve as much of my force as I can.

There was no other viable plan. With a mental command, he sent his revenants forward, along with the spirits. The rest of the undead pulled back to protect the archers, who shifted to a better angle for targeting the monster’s face.

Tyron placed himself between the two groups. He didn’t want to draw the monster to his vulnerable skeletons, but it was a risk to expose himself.

The frozen-mammoth reacted as the burning skeletons drew closer. It appeared reluctant to separate from the rift, but with opponents drawing near, rage overtook it. The kin trumpeted in fury and smashed the ground beneath its massive feet before it rumbled forward, swinging its massive head, sweeping the ground with tusks of ice.

Arrows shot through the air to shatter against the monster’s face. No damage appeared to be done, but the beast was even further enraged. With every bellow, hot mist filled the air around the mammoth’s face.

Even being twenty metres away, the presence of the kin was overwhelming.

If I could turn that into an undead….

The thought was tempting, but so far, he’d not been offered the ability to make anything non-human into a minion. It was definitely possible, Arihnan the Black had at the very least undead horses within his horde, with garbled descriptions of other undead constructs. Something like this would be a spectacular servant. Likely it would suck his magick dry in half a second, but still….

Magick bolts crackled in his hands and he flung them at the monster as it completed its charge. His slayer revenant had neatly rolled to the side. Quick and deadly, his servant had slashed out as it rose, cutting a shallow wound on one of the beast’s legs.

The spells did little, thudding into the creature’s hide and barely staggering it, but at least the mammoth became distracted from his other revenants.

Not blessed with the combat skills of their compatriot, the other three had been far more clumsy in their dodge. Two were able to get out of the way, but the third had been smacked by a tusk and sent tumbling, bones rattling against the stone.

Two burning red eyes turned on Tyron and he swallowed heavily. Before the monster could charge again, his ghosts finally crossed the distance and dove inside the massive beast.

No doubt the rift-kin was exceptionally resistant to cold and frost, the thick white fur attested to that, but what about cold that came from within its flesh? Unlike the ice kin, this beast was a creature of flesh and blood on the inside.

As they whispered with ghastly delight, the ghosts fluttered within the mammoth, who immediately trumpeted in alarm and pain, rearing back and thrashing wildly.

Two more magick bolts and a scattering of arrows clattered into its head as it came back down, but the monster barely noticed. Desperate to escape the bitter cold of the spirits, the mammoth charged blindly, rolling its head and flailing with its tusks as it went.

Tyron did his best to get out of the way, but wasn’t quick enough to avoid a tusk sweeping into his side. Air left his lungs in a whoosh as his chest was compressed by the force. The next thing he knew, he was airborne, then crashing down onto a blessedly flat section of rock.

“Oww shit,” he wheezed.

“What the fuck was that?” Dove hollered from his waist. “Was I upside down?”

“Shut up,” Tyron ground out as he forced his wobbly legs under him. His side ached fiercely as he pulled in a shaky breath.

His bone armour had saved him there, absorbing some of the force from the hit as well as the landing. If not, he might have shattered his ribcage, constitution be damned.

Blood and Bone, that thing is strong! I can’t afford to let this drag out. If I can hold it still for ten seconds, I can kill it.

The mammoth’s rage-filled charge had done what it wanted, getting it clear of his ghosts who now drifted along behind it, trying to catch up. The beast clearly hadn’t enjoyed having the ghosts inside it; with a little more time, they might be able to inflict real damage.

With the beginnings of a plan forming, he ordered his revenants forward. The four undead charged from separate angles, but held back whenever the mammoth faced them directly. They only needed to delay.

Tyron raised his hands and began to cast Death Blades. The now familiar spell had become almost second nature since he had first learned it, and he made no errors despite working at such speed.

With the force of his mysteries behind them, his words and magick resonated in the air like the ring of a bell. When the final syllable was spoken, the weapons of his undead became tainted with black power.

It was difficult to manoeuvre his undead into position around the constantly shifting mammoth. Every time a revenant ran forward, it would swing around and try to destroy it with the force of its tusks, and the constant shifting meant he needed to adjust his skeletons. With their painfully slow drifting speed, the ghosts were even worse. If they made contact with the beast, they might spook it into another wild charge.

Ten seconds. He gave himself a window of ten seconds only. It might not be possible to hold for that long, but he would do his best.

For the following minute, he engaged in this strange dance, trying to keep his revenants alive and put the rest of his undead in position to strike as the rift-kin raged. In the end, he lost a revenant when it drew too close. The trunk snaked out and caught it around the ankle as the undead tried to retreat. After it fell to the ground, the mammoth leapt forward and stomped it flat in an instant.

Dammit! I’ll do it now!

The loss of one of his best minions turned into a fortuitous opportunity as the massive creature took precious seconds to right itself after its lunge, giving him time to position his skeletons and ghosts as he prepared his spell.

Suppress Mind!

Tyron’s mind had grown strong as he had travelled, very strong, but he had never tested himself against a rift-kin this powerful. The weaker kin he had used this spell against had squirmed in his grip; mindless and filled with rage, they had been unable to escape his vice grip on their minds.

As his spell took hold, Tyron felt as if he had been slammed in the head with a sledgehammer. Immense and boiling with elemental fury, comparing the mammoth to those smaller insectile creatures of Nagrathyr was like comparing a candle to a hearthfire. Desperate to maintain control, he rallied and brought his will to bear against the beast, wrapping his thoughts around it and forcing it to stand still.

At least, trying to.

Despite his best efforts, the monster fought back, resisting his control, but it had slowed considerably. Skeletons charged forward, weapons flickering with black light, alongside the ghosts who drifted through the air, whispering their cruel intentions.

Although he felt as if his head would split open, Tyron pushed harder, imposed himself against that thoughtless, fiery rage. As if he were containing a blast within his hands, he felt scorched as the mammoth bucked and crashed against him, but he held it, just barely.

Swords and spears sank deep into the creature’s side a second before the ghosts arrived and pushed themselves within the beast.

The pain sparked the monster to even greater heights of fury and Tyron grit his teeth until blood ran down his chin, trying to hold it in place. After eight seconds, his hold broke and the huge monster reared back, before it crashed to its side, dead.

“Hole-eeeee-fuck, kid. Nice work!”

Tyron spat the blood in his mouth onto the ground and coughed.

“No problem.”

“Stop jerking yourself off and let’s get a good look at that rift. No time to waste. Another one of those fuckers could come through any second.”

“Right.”

Tyron shook off the malaise that gripped him and arranged his minions between himself and the rift before he gazed at it properly for the first time.

At first, all that happened was that his eyes hurt. The warping effect that occurred around the rift was at its strongest here, and looking directly at the source was difficult to say the least. Eventually, his mind pieced together what he was seeing and he gasped in shock.

It wasn’t that large, perhaps only ten metres across, a whirling vortex of magick and light that seemed to tear reality at its edge. He could almost feel his realm being broken as the rift swirled, chewing away at his world one tiny piece at a time.

He was reluctant to do this part. Once he’d examined the rift, he would have checked off the final item on his list with Dove. Once they returned, he would have to honour his promise and free his friend.

Tyron stilled his thoughts and focused on the magick that Dove had taught him. As promised, the ocular enhancement spell had been complicated and carried tremendous risk. Failure during the cast could lead to permanently damaged vision, or blindness, or worse.

As his skeletons protected him, Tryon quickly constructed the spell, making sure he made no mistakes along the way. Dove grumbled quietly about ‘gifted shitheads’ and ‘genius scumbags,’ but the young Mage ignored him. Instead, he chose to stare at the rift.

Dove’s eye enhancement spell allowed him to ‘see’, in a limited sense, magick and its movement. This allowed him to examine the remnants of rituals after they’d been cast, or view the magickal properties of objects by looking at them, or track down sources of Arcane energy.

In this case, Tyron used the spell to stare at one of the sources of magick in the realm directly.

Viewed through the green lenses produced by the spell, the rift blazed in his eyes, bright as a sun. Energy poured from it constantly and into this world, even before the rift had fully formed. What’s more, he could see beyond it, into the realm on the other side. Unsurprisingly, it appeared like an icy, desolate wasteland, teeming with kin desperate to find a way out.

Taking it all in strained him. Sparks of pain lit within his eyes and he was forced to squint.

“Dove? What am I looking for?”

“You should see the magick flowing out of it.”

“I can see it alright.”

“Basically, you’re seeing if that’s a steady flow or erratic. When the amount of Arcane energy coming through the rift is increasing or decreasing in an unsustainable way, it’ll cause eddies and disruptions, like someone tossing a brick in a stream. This rift should be expanding, which means more magick over time, but as long as it’s gradual and controlled, we don’t have to worry about another break.”

Tyron examined it as best he could. He wasn’t an expert, but it seemed to be fine. There wasn’t anything like what Dove described, the magick flow was steady as a drum beat.

“Looks fine to me,” he said finally, letting the spell lapse as he sighed with exhaustion. “I can’t believe how much energy is coming through it.”

“That’s nothing. You should see just how saturated it is on the other side. It’s like crack for Mages. If you can tap it, you can cast some seriously funky shit. I contracted both my most powerful Astrals beyond the rift, since I could supercharge the ritual on that side.”

“Couldn’t you do the same over here with enough materials?”

“Yes, but I wasn’t fucking rich, was I? Over there, the magick is free. Now stop yammering. You need a sleep and I need to die. Let’s get down the mountain and get this show on the road.”