Death: Genesis

“It was a trap,” Eveline said in Zeke’s mind as he stared out across the battlefield. His people were hard-pressed, being attacked from three sides, but they were holding their own. Or they would have been if it weren’t for four figures dominating the fight.

They were all knights, wearing bulky sets of shining armor, and they were each over level ninety. Currently, they were engaged in a match against Talia, Pudge, and Silik, with an entire squad of Inashi as backup, and they were winning. Pudge was in the best shape, but even he’d taken more than a few grievous wounds. The same was true of Talia, whose arm looked as if it was barely hanging on by the tendons. Silik was the worst off, his shield having been shattered and he moved with a significant limp. The Inashi were largely unharmed, but in the few seconds since Zeke had been watching, he’d seen that their attacks were largely ineffective.

“I have to step in,” he said to the spirit in his mind.

Eveline agreed, adding, “Don’t hold back. These people are dangerous.”

That much was obvious, but Zeke had no intention of unleashing his most damaging attack. If he loosed [Wrath of Annihilation], it would kill the four knights, but it would also destroy his own army. There was no way they could retreat quickly enough to save themselves.

Still, just because he didn’t want to use [Wrath of Annihilation], he was far from defenseless. So, without further ado, he adopted his titanic form, noting that in the past few weeks, it had grown even larger than it had been when he’d first gotten the skill. That was curious, because he hadn’t even tried to upgrade it. Regardless, he was at least five feet taller than before, and far broader as well. With his cracked torso that spewed smoke and fire, he must have cut a very intimidating figure.

He stepped forward, and the ground shook beneath his feet. The moment he entered the fray, a dozen attacks came his way, but they’d all originated with regular soldiers, none of whom could even begin to meet his level of power. The skills – mostly radiant beams of sunlight that should have scorched him to ash – hit him without even leaving a mark.

Zeke didn’t break his stride, only attacking when one of the regular soldiers were too stupid to get out of his way. Despite their weakness, he refused to pull his punches, and when he attacked, he crushed them utterly with Voromir. More than one were sent skipping across the battlefield, already dead and broken.

He bulled his way through until he reached the melee. Once there, he targeted the man who’d been fighting Pudge. He didn’t rush in like a barbarian, though. Instead, he used [Eye of Reckoning], sending a beam of pure hellfire and destruction to spear through the man’s chest.

Or that was what Zeke expected. Instead, his efforts were far less effective. The man was sent tumbling backwards with a smoking crater in his chest, but he was not cut in half like Zeke had hoped. Whatever the case, that got everyone’s attention, and Zeke shouted, “Retreat. I’ll handle these.”

“But we can –”

Zeke cut Talia off. “I said I’ve got this.”

She clearly didn’t like that, but given that she was practically dead on her feet – as were Zeke’s other most powerful allies – she didn’t argue. Miraculously, the Knights let them flee, and one of them even gave Talia’s retreating form a slight smirk. Zeke intended to wipe that smile off the woman’s face.

The man Zeke had hit with [Eye of Reckoning] picked himself up. Like all the others, he wore the bulky armor of the Knights of the Radiant Host, but he carried a huge cudgel that had been banded with what looked like iron. Thick studs protruded from the bat-like weapon. The man himself looked fit to use it, too. He was at least seven feet tall, with thick muscles and a neck that was so thick that it made his head look like it sat directly atop his shoulders.

The others’ body types weren’t so extreme, though they all looked extremely formidable. Their levels supported that notion. Zeke cycled through them, using [Inspect] on each one:

Karag Morn – Level 94

Stepin Rano – Level 90

Marian Kaza – Level 91

Noa Li – Level 92

All above level ninety, with the largest – Karag Morn – only a level behind Zeke. Even if he hadn’t seen the results of their dismantling of Pudge and the others, Zeke would have recognized their strength. Not for the first time, he wished he’d have been there when the battle had begun. If so, then a few hundred of his soldiers might have survived. Instead, he’d been back in the Crimson Tower, working on his plans for final skill upgrades. He knew it would be a while before he accessed the pit and descended to the next circle, but he was well aware that skill-crafting wasn’t something that could be accomplished overnight – especially when he was changing Framework-granted skills.

Even so, he knew he should have been there for the battle.

“Don’t beat yourself up,” Eveline said as Zeke stepped forward. “You couldn’t have known this was coming.”

Her words were fair enough, but they did nothing to assuage the guilt flowing through Zeke’s mind. Because he knew that he’d chosen to sit the battle out because he’d found the last few to be incredibly boring and boundlessly frustrating. The past couple of months, they’d pursued the Radiant Host across the Muk’ti Plains and into a much more forested region. The terrain had made chasing their forces that much more difficult, and they’d been completely unable to corner the Radiant Host’s armies. That meant that pitched battles were few and far between, and the ones they had fought were mere delaying tactics meant to help with the strategic retreat.

What made it even worse was that Zeke and the others knew what was happening. The Radiant Host was a much more nimble and better organized force. Zeke could move incredibly quickly alone, but because it took time to move the others – even if all he did was summon a portal – they could never get themselves in position before the enemy was gone.

Thinking it would be much the same situation this time around, Zeke had eschewed attending the current battle. That had been a mistake that had gotten kobolds killed and nearly resulted in his companions’ defeat.

If one of them had died…

“Don’t think about it,” Eveline said.

“Monster,” growled Karag. “We wondered when you would show your despicable face.”

“From where I’m standing,” Zeke said, looking down on them from his height of nearly thirty-five feet. “You’re the monsters, killing innocent people and enslaving anyone who isn’t human.”

“You speak?!” declared Noa Li, who was the smallest among them. She was perhaps five feet tall, with the compact body of a gymnast. She carried a pair of swords, while the other two members of their group were armed with spears and shields.

“I do,” Zeke rumbled.

“This changes nothing!” Karag declared.

He stepped forward, and the other three spread out, clearly intending to encircle Zeke. He didn’t move. In fact, the longer they took to attack, the better. His army had already been winning the battle, and now that Silik, Talia, and Pudge had returned to their ranks – even injured – the momentum had begun to shift even further. In minutes, the fight would be over.

And selfishly, he wanted to know whether or not he could take whatever damage they could dish out. The last time he’d been pushed to the brink had been against the necromantic vessel, and that unimaginably powerful creature had been the size of a skyscraper. It had very nearly destroyed him, and more than anything, Zeke wanted to know if that was a special circumstance or if other people in that level range were capable of doing the same thing.

“You know they won’t be,” Eveline said.

“Need to be sure,” he said in his own mind. “I need to know where I am in my development.”

Indeed, if he couldn’t take care of these four Knights, then there was no way he could survive a descent to the next circle. He wasn’t even sure if he could live through a trek through hell. No – if he failed against the Knights, he would need to go back to the drawing board and rethink the evolution of his skill. Maybe he would even take a few years to ensure that he’d eked every last ounce of power out of the realm.

But that was a last resort.

For now, he would fight. To that end, he hefted Voromir and used [Storm of Hammers]. Immediately, a whirlwind of ethereal hammers bloomed into being. Even as those weapons slammed into the Knights, one by one, the enemy reacted. Karag launched himself at Zeke, hefting his huge cudgel while the others came at him from the sides and the back. They were knocked off course by the flying hammers, but the skill wasn’t powerful enough to take them out of the fight.

For that, he used [Hell Geyser], stomping on the ground and sending a trail of destruction racing across the field to erupt beneath the feet of the lowest-level combatant. Stepin Rano barely covered three feet before he was bathed in an explosion of roiling earth and hellfire. He screamed, his armor melting in an instant, but he kept coming, his spear held out in front of him, and he passed out of the pillar of flame.

Only to meet Zeke’s hammer right to the face.

It was odd, finally fighting regular sized people, especially in his titan form. He was so much bigger than them that it felt a bit like fighting infants. Of course, these people were strong enough that he couldn’t just stomp them to death, so he needed to maintain his discipline. Fortunately, he hadn’t been idle over the past few months, and when he swung his hammer, he did so with perfect technique.

The uppercut blow hit the unlucky Stepin Rano directly in the chest. His breastplate crumpled, and then, his entire body was turned to mush by the sheer force of the impact. Less than an instant later, his boneless form, held together only by what was left of his armor, went sailing across the battlefield. It didn’t land for half a mile, and only then because it was slowed by a tree trunk.

Zeke didn’t need to feel the influx of kill energy to know that he’d killed the Knight.

The other three stopped in their tracks, horrified by what they’d just seen.

“Retreat!” cried the now-terrified Karag.

The other two didn’t need to be told twice, and they raced away in different directions. Meanwhile, Karag continued his charge, fully intending to meet Zeke and slow him down.

“Not going to happen,” Zeke muttered, using [Shifting Sands]. Time slowed, and he slipped into the earth. A moment later, he was racing across the battlefield toward one of the fleeing Knights. Marian, if he remembered correctly.

In any case, he erupted from the ground, wrapped his hand around her stunned body, and squeezed. She tried to activate some sort of defensive skill, but it was entirely incapable of standing up to his power. A golden shield enveloped her, but it shattered after only a moment. Her body came next.

It was like squishing a bug in his fist. Distasteful, but not even difficult enough to merit significant thought. He tossed the broken form of the dead Knight to the side, then used [Shifting Sands] again. At one point, the skill had been subject to a significant cooldown, meaning that he couldn’t simply chain it back-to-back. However, as he’d leveled, those restrictions had loosened to the point that he could use it three times without rest. After that, it would take a few minutes for the skill to become usable again.

But normally, that was enough.

He slipped through the earth, and when he surfaced, he killed the third knight in much the same manner as he’d killed poor Marian. Vaguely, Zeke was aware that many of the other Knights had taken notice of what he’d done to their champions, and they’d responded with horrified screams, but he didn’t dwell on that. Fear from his enemies was both expected and desired.

Finally, he faced off against Karag, who’d gone completely red in the face. The Knight spat, “You killed them!”

“It’s war,” Zeke responded calmly. “That’s what happens.”

“W-what are you?” the big knight demanded.

Zeke didn’t answer. In a few minutes, Karag would be dead anyway, so any conversation was completely pointless. Instead, he stepped forward, raising his hammer as he readied himself to finish the battle.