Revenge of the Sorcerer King 2 - 28

Good Morning Everyone!

Chapter 28

Alessa

We rested for a while mainly since it felt like no matter what we did, we would just get lost even worse. In the meantime, I had checked my status and knew that Deldrach and Husskan were still alive. They were likely in the same situation as us, completely lost in the mountains. I really wasn’t too worried about them. Their skill alone made them a greater threat than most of my Familia.

“What I don’t understand,” Jade said suddenly. “Is how it is moving us around.”

“What do you mean?” I asked sitting up to look at her.

“Well, we’ve obviously come much further than we’ve actually walked right?” She tossed a rock into the mist and we barely heard the sound of it hitting the ground far in the distance. “You would think we would feel some magic, or mana at the very least. All I feel is as if there was a blanket over me.”

I leaned forward realizing that she was right. It didn’t make sense. Teleportation was already a bygone magic as Oberon had already proved. I had a hard time believing that orcs might have retained the ability to manipulate space like that. There had to be something we were missing.

“Maybe it is messing with our senses?” I suggested as I tried taking a few steps while focusing on each step. Sadly, everything felt normal to the point it was almost odd in its own right. I tried everything I could think of, feeling the ground, listening, sniffing. Everything said I was in the middle of a snowstorm in the upper reaches of a mountain.

Without being able to transform, we couldn’t get to a place that would allow us to get our bearings. I stopped mid-step as I got an idea. I rushed over to Jade. “When I tell you, try to transform.”

She only stared at me for a second before she stood up and moved to a relatively flat area. I held my hands out and concentrated on creating a barrier to block the mist from around her. When I couldn’t get it to form from pure mana, a result of my own negligence in training, I created a dome of ice to sort of hold the shape of the barrier for me, much like when I made my armor.

“Now!”

Jade nodded then screwed up her face. I felt her mana surge around her as her body started to bulge. With a burst of shadows and the crunching of bones, Jade managed to transform into her Roc form. Once I was sure the transformation was complete, I dropped the shell.

“There is a pressure on me, but now that I… am transformed. I can resist it well enough,” she sent to me telepathically. I nodded my understanding. It would probably be best not to take too long.

“Leave Bones for now. If you can carry both me and Jecht, do so. Let us get out of this mess,” I said mentally ordering Bones to find some place to hide. I would call for him once we dealt with whatever was causing the mist. The wind surged around me as Jade flapped gaining some height before her talons wrapped around me. With a few more gusts, we were soon several dozen meters over the ground.

The mist appeared to be encompassing the entire mountain like we suspected. Jade had to fly to a decent height before it thinned enough for us to even gauge where we were. I had taken the time to memorize the mountain line while we were approaching from the capital. If I was right, we were much further into the mountains that should have been possible with how much we traveled.

As we looked around, I spotted a spot that was clear of the death storm. Clear was pushing it. It looked like whatever was there was doing its best to hold it back, but even in the period of a few minutes that we watched, the clearing shrank visibly.

“I have a feeling that’s our target,” I sent to Jade.

“Do you want me to head there?” I could feel, not fear, but hesitation coming from Jade. Whatever or whoever was over there was strong enough to create a spell that washed over the entire mountain.

I closed my eyes and concentrated. I had mentally communicated with Oberon before. Now that I was out of the mist, I was sure I could do the same, but this time I wanted something that would survive us going back into the mists. A sort of beacon that he could follow.

Pouring more mana than I wanted, I finally felt a hair line thick connection snap into existence. The line was thin for only a second before it was flood with mana that let it grow much thicker and was soon as thick as a man’s wrist.

“I knew you were well,” Oberon’s voice suddenly said in my mind.

“A little mist isn’t going to bother me,” I joked then did my best to send the sight I was seeing to him. “Are you seeing this?”

“Yes. Looks like we’ve found the hunter.”

“I’m going to land next to it while maintaining this connection. Will you be able to follow it through the mists?”

“Who do you think you’re talking to girl?” Oberon asked smugly.

“Right. How long?”

He made a sound of consideration before he answered. “I’d say six hours. You’re quite up the mountain. Even with the link, I’ll be guiding all the undead as well.”

“Then we’ll wait for you,” I sent then sort of tuned out the link to refocus on the sky around me. With the link set up like this, if I didn’t guard my thoughts, they would all find their way to Oberon. While that probably wouldn’t be a problem, I had called him old man earlier. It might rub him the wrong way. I tapped Jade’s talon. “Head for the clearing! Try to skim the mist so we can get close. Oberon said it would be six or so hours before he would arrive.”

Rather than reply or send me a telepathic message, she cawed before beating her wings and flying toward the clearing. With her size it would take us minutes to reach the spot. Meaning we would have to avoid being found by any sort of guards or patrols. Frankly, I was worried that the mists acted like a blanket view for whoever was controlling them, but that was a worry I would have to confront later.

We were about a minute out when I felt more than saw something start to stalk us from below. It was staying in the mists, but there was a hostility directed toward me or rather, Jade that was unmistakable. Jecht yelped and before I could do anything, there was an outburst of mist as a large body exploded from directly beneath us.

I threw a fireball at the thing not caring that it might give us away. It exploded against a feathered wing and I ground my teeth when I saw what it was. With six wings, and at least three times the size it was a Greater Roc. The damn thing must have thought Jade was trying to take its territory. Roc’s had a decent magic resistance and if it was flying the deadly snow couldn’t affect it continuously. I quickly sent the information to Jade as she banked hard to avoid the giant beast.

The situation soon turned into a game of cat and mouse as the thing chased us through the skies. Being smaller, Jade was nimbler than the Greater Roc, but a single flag of its wings would usually make up for any distance that we put between us. Jecht and I weren’t helping matters, with our weight holding Jade back.

I would have ordered her to drop Jecht, but being only newly turned, the drop could kill even a vampire. I quickly thought through what we could do, but with magic having little affect, our options were limited. “Head up. Get us out of the mists so I can transform!” I ordered. I didn’t get a confirmation, only the direction the wind was coming changed as we suddenly flew up.

Neither of us would be able to put up a solid enough barrier to hold back the mist’s disruptive ability, so we had to get away completely. The air grew both freezing and thin, even for a vampire as we burst out of the dark clouds that made up Oberon’s spell. Jade twisted and I kicked off her talon, using every bit of my strength. I gained another couple hundred meters.

With a thought, I began the transformation process to shift to my phoenix form. The Greater Roc burst through the storm and collided with the still recovering Jade. My kick had pushed her a good distance back toward the clouds. The two tore at each other, causing blood of black and red coloring to rain down around them.

I managed to finish my change before I hit the clouds and sent out a cry. The Greater Roc turned toward me less injured than I would have expected. It must have seen me as a new challenger or at least an actual threat, as it dropped Jade how had managed to hold on to Jecht and the two started falling back to the ground.

I flared my black flames around my wings and spread them to their full length. I wasn’t sure what level this monster was to be able to survive not only the death snow, but the bewildering affect of the mists, not to mention a tussle with a transformed vampire, but I was about to find out.

We stared each other down, before we charged through the air at each other. Never of us banked before it was too late. We slammed into each other with a loud boom. I brought my talons up and around to slice at the bottom of the monster, while it did the same. I soon felt like I was sword fighting in mid-air.

Sparks flew as our talons collided, but neither of us gave ground… sky. I tried to use my flames to burn his wings, but like the fireball from earlier, nothing of note happened. The exchanged continued for several minutes before we had to break away or risk falling through the clouds.

We both gained altitude before staring each other down. I made the first move, flapping hard then angling like an arrow to use my beak to attack. The air snapped around me, I accelerated fast enough to almost blink right in front of the Roc.

I guessed being a bird monster all your life made you a tad bit better at aerial combat, as it didn’t even miss a beat and dropped easily out of the way of my attack. I corrected my flight and came around, but the Roc was already on me, his talons digging into my back. I screamed in pain, the most pain I’d felt in a long time, and rolled to bring my talons up. The Roc just flapped his massive wings and took some distance.

My back sore, I corrected again and came around to face the bird. There was nothing to do, I was too easily out manevuared by this veteran of the skies. I stared him down considering my next move. I doubted I could get away easily. He had already proven to be just as fast as I was.

The Roc didn’t give me time to think and rushed me again. If flying wasn’t going to give me an advantage then I needed something else. The Roc collided with me, but this time I locked my talons with his and wrapped my larger wings around him. He struggled, but I only needed to hold him for a few seconds.

With an almost explosion of ink like shadows, my form twisted and warped around the Roc several more times. With a hiss, my snake form bit down on the roc without hesitation and the poison flooded his veins. The Roc’s struggle renewed as the tables suddenly turned, but it was too late, I had too strong a grip on him.

We fell gaining speed with the air whipping around us. It wasn’t long before the ground met us with an explosion of debris and dust. A fall from several thousand meters instantly killed the already weakened Roc, while I was certain that every bone in my body was now broken.

I had never in my entire life felt such pain, even when the Goddess was trying to kill me. I felt like there was a knife stabbing every centimeter of my body, which in my snake form was a lot of body to feel pain. My one saving grace was that my jaws were still locked on the dead Roc. I used what little strength I had left to pull in as much blood as I could before the world went black around me.

Oberon

I looked around at my undead army and started to laugh. A great laugh that echoed through the mountains around us. I quickly weaved a connection spell with all the undead and fused Alessa’s link with it. Now all the undead would be able to follow it.

“Death’s bell has rung for someone in the mountains, but he can’t find them. Let’s make sure he finds his way!” I shouted with glee and the undead began roaring and moaning. As one, the entire army started marching forward. I left only a small detachment of a few thousand back to guard the vampires and their food. I would have like to bring them, but I couldn’t bind the link to them, and the humans would all just die in the snow.

I waved my hand and cast a few protection spells on the carriage before having Maya get in. That was the only mortal that I refused to let out of my sight. After that, my guard and I summoned our mounts and joined the march. I would be joining the battle at the front this time. I wanted to drive my sword through the person that was causing this delay personally.

Thinking about it, I quickly sent for Irgire and Ted to join Maya in the carriage. Ted might have some resistance to the death mana thanks to his work with the undead, but if he absorbed too much than he would die. Another lich might be nice to add to the collection, but there were still things that I needed a mortal necromancer to test.

Irgire might be half dragon, but even dragons couldn’t handle too much death mana. It was safer just to have him stay in the carriage, plus it would serve as an extra protection. A carriage in the middle of an army was always a juicy target.

Moving through the mists, I found it interesting that the direction from Alessa was moving quite rapidly. It was staying in a general area, but if I didn’t know any better, I would say she was fighting something in the sky. Knowing the girl, she might have encountered a dragon, or a greater monster.

It lasted for another hour or so before the link settled at a much lower altitude. She wasn’t reply to me, but since the link was still established, I knew she was alive. I mustered the undead to hurry, but even with the path shown to us, the mountains were not an easy environment to travel through. I half considered taking a small force ahead, but if there were a large number of orcs, then it would serve to have the army.

Five hours on the dot, we reached the location of the link. From here, I could sense the large-scale magic being worked a few kilometers further into the mountains. What concerned me, what that I found a mummified Greater Roc with a prone Alessa lying on top of the corpse. Next to them was a not quite mummified, but almost there, smaller Roc and a black wolf that was also skin and bones.

“Helena. You should fetch some of the blood crystals that the girl left with you.”

“I was just thinking the same thing,” she replied rushing off toward one of the carriages. She was only gone a few seconds and returned with an armful of the red crystals. She used heat magic to melt them and fed one each to the Roc and the wolf before she used all the rest on Alessa.

I was glad to see them all twitch after being fed the blood. Though the wolf was new, I could see the magic binding him to the girl. It took several minutes, before the Roc came to first. She shifted out of her transformation, and while still looking a bit gaunt, had returned to relatively full health.

“Is she… Is my mistress… alright,” she demanded as she crawled over to Alessa.

“She’ll be fine child. She absorbed more than enough blood to make a full recovery,” Helena replied patting Jade’s head like an elder. Considering she had the body of a child, it just felt odd to watch.

The wolf came awake just as Alessa stirred. She sat up carefully, looking like she was testing every part of her body before she moved it. Judging from the crater in the ground, I wagered she’d killed or got close to killing the monster in the air then fell. I wouldn’t be surprised if she broke every bone in her body given the height she was fighting at a few hours ago.

“I don’t plan on doing that again,” Alessa said finally as she dropped back down to the ground. Jade was hugging her without caring about appearance, but since the girl was allowing it, I figured it didn’t matter.

I hopped down from my mount and walked over to her. “You have to love aerial combat. I remember a time I was thrown from the back of a griffin in the middle of a battle. If I hadn’t mastered my wind magic a few days before, I might not be standing here.”

The girls laughed while Jade helped Alessa to her feet. “Still a bit ginger, but I’m good.”

I clapped my hands and grinned sinisterly. “Excellent. Now let us deal with the root of our problems.”

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