The Forsaken Hero

Until this point, smaller offensives and companies had harried the Last Light Company. With their overwhelming power, they shut down every attempt to take the chasm easily, but the pressure mounted as both enemy powers began eying them hungrily.

”Korra, handle the demons! I’ll rally the other side!” Bethiv cried, lofting his sword high.

Korra nodded. ”On it. Give me a few tanks and mages, and they won’t break through.”

Bethiv spared her a glance, then shook his head and muttered, ”Tanks? Heroes sure are strange.”

The terminology still confused me, but Soltair and Alex spoke that way, too. From what I’d gathered, it was wording from my previous world, though the exact connotation still evaded me. Fortunately, Bethiv seemed to understand and sent a dozen sixth-level soldiers to support her. Half of them wore mage robes, while the others were the most heavily armed knights and soldiers of the army.

The rest he took toward the far end of the chasm, effectively splitting the Last Light Company to defend the only entrances to the chasm. Our enemies could technically leap over the edge, plummeting the three hundred feet to the chasm bottom, but the walls were jagged with jutting bicycles, and the chasm continued on below the Core Chamber entrance. A misplaced leap would leave one plummeting into the darkness of the lower levels of the gate, a fall that would prove deadly to anything weaker than fifth-level.

Of the two battle groups, Korra’s was by far the weaker. The entrance to the winding path leading to the chasm’s bottom was thin and narrow, broken up by ice formations reminiscent of frozen ramparts. Gith and several other archers took positions behind the natural structures, knocking arrows and readying sixth-level magical techniques. Below them and blocking the entrance, Korra stood before close to ten knights, Luxxa among them. The living wall of armor and steel was supported by the mages, led by Jenna. She’d gained some respect amongst her peers once she learned soul casting, though I noticed many of the women in the army still held her in some disdain.

No sooner had they taken position than the demons came into view, crawling through the shattered tundra like a flood. The ground smoked and smoldered at their coming, melting beneath Gayron’s aura.

The demon horde slowed to a stop as the Apostle of Fire raised a hand. He strode out before them, still wearing his demon visage, his aura slowly growing to envelop the empty space between the armies.

”It’s been a while,” he said in a conversational tone, eying Korra disdainfully.

Korra’s shoulder rose and fell as she took a deep breath. Her hands tightened into fists, water curling around her forearms, and she stepped forward. ”Why are you here?”

Gayron snorted, a puff of flame escaping his snake-like nostrils. ”Why? Isn’t it normal for us to defend our gates? But you, on the other hand...why are a bunch of filth like you traipsing around my gate?”

”Your gate?” Korra raised an eyebrow. ”I’m afraid you no longer possess the qualifications to say that. But I’ll tell you what, I’m expecting a real hug from Xiviyah later, so I’m in a rather good mood right now. I’ll let you off easy. Leave now, and I’ll let your insults against her slide. Otherwise,” her lips curled in a vicious grin, ”Are you sure you can risk damaging your soul again?”

A small thrill danced through me, and I felt unconsciously at my side, running my hands painlessly over the sunpurge. How long had it been since I’d actually been able to give someone a real hug?

The flames flared around Gayron, but Korra just grinned at him, safe from the heat behind one of her arts. The demon’s claws scraped against his palms as he clenched his fists but controlled his temper enough to reply.

”So she is here, after all. I assume she’s beyond you in the Core Chamber?”

Korra frowned but remained silent, smoothing a lock of brown hair behind her ear.

Gayron’s scaly face curled up in a smile. ”I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re attempting to do, but I’m going to enjoy breaking her one scream at a time. She could burn in the hells for an eternity and still not suffer enough for the torment she inflicted on me. To think a bitch like her is–”

”That’s enough,” Korra snapped. ”If you think I’ll let you lay a claw on her head, you’re full of shit. Don’t forget, you already lost once.” She stepped forward and fell into a fighting stance, a water dragon curling down her bicep and onto her forearm. ”Why’d you have to go and ruin my mood like that? You could have walked away,” she said, shaking her head. Then, her eyes flashed, finally showing the anger trapped within. ”Jenna, now!”

Gayron’s smirk froze as a tremendous mass of mana erupted from Jenna and the other mages standing behind Korra. They’d been ready to act, and the moment she spoke, they launched their spell.

”Thunder Squall!” Jenna cried, speaking for the other four mages participating in the spell. I’d never heard of such a spell, but judging from the titanic amount of mana and the size of the six magic circles, it was a group spell.

As the spell finished, a magic circle spanning the entire length of the chasm spun open above the assembled demon horde. The white, puffy snow clouds that characterized the ceiling of the gate turned dark and ominous, lit from within by constant flashes of lightning. The low growl of thunder was all the demons had to warn them before a hundred bolts of lightning fell from the sky.

Infernal shrieks erupted from the horde as lightning crawled through their ranks. Each bolt carried the strength of a fifth-circle spell, yet the rain seemed endless. After the first wave of lightning, another fell, and then another. Deafening peels of thunder shook the tundra, overwhelming even the death screams of the demons caught up in the magic.

The towering evolved blade demons attracted the storm’s fury like the fifty-foot lightning rods they were. One, a sixth-level monstrosity made of a thousand battle axes, staggered through the horde, chased by bolt after bolt. Its spindly feet, outfitted with crescent axe heads made for hewing down enemy infantry with each step, proved their lethality among the lesser scions of the horde. Others like it stumbled and fell, overwhelmed by the sheer number of lightning bolts.

Chaos rained amongst the demons as the spell continued far longer than it should have. I glanced at Jenna and the other mages, my tail stiffening as I found their souls still bound to the spell, sustaining it with their mana. My scalp tingled as I rubbed my horn, overwhelmed by the implications of the magic. How was a spell like this balanced? Sure, it took five sixth-level mages to cast, but if they really could sustain it for any length of time, what kind of army could survive the thunderous hell that followed? Even the sixth-level demons were starting to fall!

The weakness of such powerful magic was soon revealed as Gayron shook himself from his stupor. His long, spiked tail lashed with anger, seeming to propel him forward in a forceful lunge. His claws erupted with flames as his body swelled nearly double its size. Korra left a crater in the ice as she kicked off the ground, surrounding herself with a soft, watery aura that bore the strength of the Canyon Crawler’s defensive matrix.

The two collided in a storm of fire and water, a seventh-level magical technique versus a sixth-level art. Gayron’s power was a seething mass of fire and smoke, seeming to blot out the sky, but Korra sliced right through it. Though the apostle’s technique was significantly stronger, it lacked the density and concentrated power of an art.

Her fist connected with Gayron’s scaly chest in an explosion of steam of mana, obscuring them from view. A moment later, the demon flew out of the cloud and slammed into the ground, sliding almost a hundred feet back and creating a deep gouge in the earth. The charging demons stuttered at the sight of their leader thrown back by one weaker than himself and even halted entirely as Korra dropped out of the crowd, landing lightly on her feet like a cat.

The Lightning Squall growled another round of thunder and rained lightning into the horde. Another handful of evolved demons and a hundred scions staggered and fell, their blackened corpses sparking with lingering electricity.

”Whose next?” Korra asked, crossing her arms and looking down at the demons arrogantly.

More thunder emphasized her words, but before the demons broke, Gayron struggled from the trench his fall formed. The armored scales protecting his chest were bent and broken, blood leaking between the cracks, and small ribbons of water mana clung to his body, weakening and slowing him. But his eyes were as a blacksmith’s fire, filled with enough hatred and fury I shrank away, forgetting for a moment I wasn’t even present on the tundra above.

”You little slut! How dare you!” he roared, ”Kill her first, then I want those mages dead!”

The demons rallied at his words, and their charge resumed. In less than a second, the strongest remaining evolved demons crashed against the Last Light Company, and the battle began in earnest. Most of the blade demons had been killed by the falling lightning, but the others were no less ferocious, if relatively smaller.

Luxxa met the first creature to approach, catching its five-foot claw on her shield. The impact rang like a broken bell, buckling her to one knee and sending a shimmer of force radiating outward in a shockwave.

But even as it brought its other hand down, her sword was already moving. With a low shout, Luxxa drove the point of her sword up into its stomach, piercing its scales with a fourth-level magical art. Her sword seemed no more than a needle against the demon’s immense size, but the magical art erupted in a volcano of Sun Magic, blowing out the other side. It screamed in agony as it fell backyard, clutching at the hole in its torso wider than its hand.

”Hold the line!” she shouted, lunging to halt another demon’s charge, ”For the Oracle!”