Aster Fall 45: Iceblood Curses (Patreon)

The talismans struck the mangled corpses across the plaza, sizzling as the pale blood on them gleamed with an eerie, blue light. There had been twenty three monsters, but there were five times that many chunks of them in the plaza now.

The bone shards ripped into the corpses and then kept going, tearing out the far side in a splatter of blood and viscera. When they emerged, they were slightly larger than before. They spun up into the air and then immediately shot toward another corpse chunk, doing the same thing again.

Like a nest of angry blue wasps, they burrowed through each chunk of flesh and erupted again, as their size continued to grow. Whatever the shamans were doing, it looked like it didn’t matter that their forces had died.

Perhaps it had been their plan all along.

Guardian, stand and face the enemies of your world.

The star’s cool words rang through Sam’s mind, calming some of the spinning chaos that was his senses. His head felt like a wagon had run over it. He reached reflexively for his essence and the snow, pulling crystal flame and a flurry of ice around him.

His reaction was slow and the shamans had time to finish the ritual they were doing. The talismans ripped through the last of the corpses and flew back to their owners, three or four heading to each of them.

The bone shards had started out the size of a coin, but now they were giant disks, each the size of a knight’s shield. They were pale blue and white, their surfaces covered in a swirling, dark script.

They rotated around the Icebloods like hunting hawks circling their masters and then they dove in, their shapes transforming. On the shaman to the front, the first talisman melted, transforming into bone armor that covered the Outsider from head to foot like a rippling carapace. The helm was some type of monster with wide mandibles. The Iceblood’s eyes were dark pits beneath it.

The second disk transformed into a large bone shield like a ribcage, a spine extending down its back, and the third turned into a long spear taller than the Outsider with a wicked, sharp point. The black inscriptions on the talismans flickered with a red glow, lighting up with a stench of blood and decay.

Two of the Outsiders had a fourth talisman disk, which turned to a spiked wheel of bone that spun around each of them, the edges blurring with a savage red light.

Somehow, they’d turned the deaths of the monsters into their own power.

Sam managed to slam a healing scroll onto his chest as they were occupied with the talismans. He managed to roll to the side just as those two spiked wheels spun through the air, cutting through where he’d been lying an instant before.

Hsksakshsskksk.

The wheels hissed passed with a sound like ghosts cursing the living, their spines tearing at the wind. The flames around him burned away at the energy with a sizzling eruption and then the snow was there, dulling the sound of the blades passing as it began to freeze them, but then the blades were past.

Between the trap and the shield he’d thrown up, he was nearly out of essence. He threw himself into another awkward roll as he grabbed a handful of auras from his storage and combusted them all at once.

His essence surged back to 100, but the time it took to combust the auras let the bone wheels curve around as they headed for him again. At the same time, the six Icebloods weren’t hesitating.

Their spears were raised in their hands as they began chanting, their voices harsh and crackling. Red and blue swirls of essence gathered around them, forming into spells that shot in Sam’s direction.

There was a blast of impressions as the spells hit the edge of his aura, identifying the attacks as curses, poison, darkness, and more.

Sam growled with anger as he flung himself to the side again, the bone wheels shearing through the air over his head. A wash of crystal flame pushed him farther away, but he was too slow to avoid the mass of spells that struck all over the area.

As they reached him, a shimmering, blue crystal shield appeared as the Ring of Crystal Field activated. The curses landed against it, sizzling with corrosive energy as swirls of darkness bubbled up from the blue essence and venom etched its way across the surface, boiling with spite.

The shield eroded like a sandcastle in the tide, but it took the spells with it, their energy fizzling out in crystalline flickers. The barrier withstood the assault, but it was as thin as an eggshell by the time Sam got out of the way.

The bone wheels curved around toward him at the same time as the Icebloods attacked again. Two of them raised their spears, surrounding them in a pale blue energy as they hurled them in his direction.

Wrath boiled through his blood as his essence resonated through the constellation. His battle aura flared out around him as his talons lengthened and he threw himself to his feet, the cloak of translucent sapphire flame streaming out behind him.

He stared toward his enemies and the approaching attacks, his shoulders straight and face hard. Crystal flame and Ice energy surged around him in waves as he pulled on it with all his might.

He turned toward the bone wheels, which were the closest, all of his strength pouring into the flame around his talons and his speed as he slashed out at them. He met the spinning blades in a shearing wave of crystal flame that blasted out around him.

He ripped four cutting lines through the first blade, feeling a hint of dark resistance from the inscriptions before he burnt through them and his talons dug in. The bone wheel shattered into explosive fragments that flew outward, crashing against his shield as he spun.

Even with his speed, he wasn’t quite fast enough to get the second blade. Its spiked edges tore at his left arm like a saw, grinding against the crystal aura that defended his skin. Then it broke through, tearing a long, ugly gash down his arm.

His aura fused back together a moment later, restoring the shield, as flames boiled up from his skin, purging the wound and sealing it. He pushed the injury aside, reaching out with a snarl as he grabbed at the bone wheel that had just struck him.

Before it could fly away, he slashed through it with both hands, shattering it into a dozen flying shards.

At the same time, a spear struck his left shoulder. Its speed dropped as it shattered his shield, but it still managed to stab him with a burst of sizzling venom that started to corrode his muscles. There was a dark cloud of a curse around the spear point as well, but it burned away as it encountered the flames that sprang out of his skin.

Before he consciously thought about it, he was moving again. He ripped the spear from his shoulder and broke it across his knee in a surge of anger. Then he charged at the shamans with the two halves gripped in his hands.

A wall of bones sprang up in front of him, spinning knobs of broken spines, femurs, and shattered finger bones like tiny arrows flying through the air. The bones struck the shield that was tight against his skin, knocking him to the left and right as he forced through it.

A spiral of crystal flame surged around him, scorching the bone spear in his hand black. He raised the spear halves as he leapt toward the shamans, the point and a jagged edge pointed straight at them.

The one in front brought his bone shield around, holding it in front of himself as he continued to chant, the spear in his free hand rising, but at that moment, Sam crashed down into him, the spear points leading the way.

Crystal flame surged as he stabbed the spear half into the Outsider’s shield, knocking it to the side, and he spun around to the right. His foot lashed out, kicking the Iceblood’s knee, and then the spear in his right hand came around, stabbing through the opening.

The broken spear tore through the Outsider’s abdomen in a gout of blue blood and he ripped it free, stabbing again and again. His free hand came around, bringing the other half of the spear with it, and he roared as he raised them both into the air.

The Outsider had already collapsed to the ground as Sam drove the spear halves down, impaling it to the snow below. He left the spear there as he spun toward the other five, but his anger had made him delay.

One of the Icebloods in the back stepped forward, its spear ripping through the abdomen of its ally in front. The other shaman’s mouth opened in a pained scream as it tried to jerk free and then froze up from the pain.

The attacker ripped the spear free, tossing it aside as he drove his hands into the wound, tearing out a stream of pale blue essence that pooled in his hands. It gathered that energy into a sphere and turned toward Sam, its fanged grin widening.

There wasn’t a trace of remorse in its expression for killing its ally.

The other four Icebloods pulled away from that one, keeping themselves at a distance, but there was no surprise among them that he could make out. If anything, the twisted expression of the one to the right looked envious.

A sizzling cloud of pale blue smoke rose up from one of them and headed for Sam, along with a streak of acidic yellow lightning and a ghostly, clawed hand with yellowish-black nails that tore toward him.

The murderer stepped forward, twisting the essence between its hands like a skein of yarn as it transformed it into a miniature version of the other Iceblood, a tiny captured soul. It breathed a cloud of reddish energy on it and then threw it toward Sam.

A sense of heavy threat came with it, as well as a sense of twisted life and blood. It felt like the tiny soul was something that would warp whatever living thing it touched.

Sam darted to the side, an Essence Shield springing up between him and the oncoming attacks. The curses struck the shield with a resounding crackle, like acid eating into stone, and stuck to it as they began to burn. Essence drained out of him and into the shield as he kept it up.

Then the soul curse struck, the tiny red-tainted soul floating through his shield slowly, as if it were pushing through mud. He could feel the energy around it warping where it touched, like a hot iron against glass.

He locked a portion of essence into the shield, breaking the connection to him as he evaded again. The shield wouldn’t last for long like that, but he didn’t need it to. He sprinted toward the Iceblood who was controlling the soul, another shield springing into existence between him and the others.

He had to take out this one first. If he did, that strange curse should go with it.

His essence was tumbling again after absorbing all of the blows, and he drew on the elements around him for support as he slammed into the Outsider, tearing his talons across its abdomen as he dug into the ridges of the bone armor there.

The Outsider tried to bring its shield around to block, but it wasn’t as fast as him. Its strength was in curses. Sam’s talons sank into the bone and started to burn through at the same time as its shield slammed into his side.

He grunted as he braced his feet against the snow, his elbow hammering into the shield to block. He drove his talons deeper, tearing into the bone and ripping it aside. Then his talons sank into the skin below and he twisted them, ripping them free from the Outsider’s side. A gout of pale blue blood boiled out, along with shards of tangled intestines.

The Outsider let out a cry like a strangled serpent, its voice choking off in its throat. The strength pushing the shield against him weakened. Sam’s elbow slammed into the shield, knocking it aside as he tore his hands back the other way and then up, eviscerating the Outsider.

At the same time, he felt a boiling, acidic energy rip along his back, eroding the shield there as it splashed over his skin. A spear stabbed through the edge of his right thigh, making him stagger, and then another stabbed into his left side below his ribs and sank inches deep.

He spasmed, his talons grasping the prey...the Outsider...in front of him, and he let out a roar as he spun away from the strikes. But he didn’t forget about his enemy.

As he jerked himself to the side, he tore his talons across its throat and grabbed onto its arm and leg, dragging it with him. His spin continued and he lifted the dying Outsider into the air and hurled it at the other four.

The shield he’d left in the air was already failing under the impact of the curses. Now, it shattered to crystalline fragments as the Outsider flew through it and slammed into the group on the other side.

The shamans staggered, collapsing backward as the body struck them, and in that pause Sam pulled another five auras from his storage, combusting them as he pushed fatigue out of his mind and moved back, a spiral of crystal flame surging up around him. Crystal flame sealed over the wounds in his skin, the flames hardening into a bandage.

Where he’d been standing a moment before, the red-hued soul curse collapsed into motes of curling light as the Outsider who’d created it died.

As the crystal flame condensed around him, he pulled the snow and loose stone in the area close. Using the elements took less essence than some of his other attacks, once he got them moving.

A whirlwind began to swirl around the area, the edges turning to icy blades as he stared across the space at the four remaining shamans. He poured out more essence, feeling a crackle of pain through his meridians and a resonant echo through his essence that reverberated with the elements around him.

Wind, Ice, Stone...those were the concepts here at the peak of Sun’s Rest, and they whirled around him in a building storm. Moment by moment, more currents of Wind were pulled in by the expanding energy, intensifying the Ice blades and whipping the chunks of rock around him faster.

Loose rubble shook free from the plaza, floating up with a cloud of snow and shards of ice as it joined into the storm.

“You...!” One of the Outsiders stumbled as it looked at the storm and then at Sam, its sunken, white eyes widening. For the first time, it spoke in an intelligible way. The words weren’t clear, but somehow its meaning was as the essence constellation in his blood echoed.

“Elemental Lord!” Another Outsider trembled with fear and fury as he looked at Sam, his actions halting. It wasn’t clear which emotion was stronger in him as his face twisted, the mottled white streaks across his pale blue skin flushing paler.

“How could...” Another of the Outsiders muttered, looking between Sam and the whirlwind. His long, yellow-white hair normally reached his ankles, but now the knotted strands were flying behind his head, whipping in the swirling storm.

“The Goddess of Shattered Skies has long been missing!” A third Outsider roared in anger, his hands rising into the air as he prepared to leap at Sam. “How could you have her power? She left no descendants! How do you have her lineage?!”

Almost as quickly as they were surprised, the four pulled themselves together, their oversized hands rising as they prepared new curses. Streaks of bilious yellow curled around them like a plague fog, along with a crackling black lightning that began to spread along the spear that one of them still held.

Sam ignored them, his thoughts fixed on battle as he poured more essence into the whirlwind. He didn’t care what they thought of his essence. They were invaders in his world.

He staggered slightly as he pulled more elements around him. The injuries he’d taken weren’t light. He could feel seeping pain burning through his veins, warring with the crystal flame. Whatever curses they’d used, it would take him a little while to deal with them.

Time he didn’t have.

The storm spun higher, forming a crystalline white and blue funnel around him that flickered with frozen flames. It was nearly fifty feet high now, a wall of tumbling ice and shards of stone, but his view of the Outsiders was perfectly clear.

“Die.”

His response to their confusion was as simple as the blade of a scythe.

Most of his essence poured into the storm, balancing the elements there as he intensified it again, and then he attacked. The whirlwind swept out in front of him, crashing toward the four Icebloods like a massive, storm-tossed wave.

Their curses struck the whipping ice blades and shattered as the empowered elements tore them to pieces. The funnel spun over the four of them, catching them up in spinning blades that ripped away at their bone armor and forms.

Stones crushed their limbs, ice blades sliced into them with a shower of blue blood, and the hurricane force battered them into shapeless masses, slamming them into the ground and then into buildings as it blew them away.

Then the wind tore the pieces apart, howling with a high-pitched rage as it slammed into the other side of the plaza before it began to die down, as Sam staggered on his feet, but the only thing left of the Icebloods was scattered chunks across the stones.

There was only a word drifting in his ears, a final shout from one of the shamans before he’d been torn away by the storm:

“False...!”

The whirlwind faded away, but so did Sam, wobbling on his feet until he slumped over, falling to one knee as he caught himself on a hand.

The venom and curses from the shamans’ attacks was like burning lead in his veins, chewing at him as he wobbled and fell over, his cheek against the cold snow. Everything felt heavy and hot.

The Guardian Star’s voice was a distant, silver thread echoing in his mind, rousing him just enough that he fumbled a healing scroll out of his belt pouch, gripping it in a numb hand.

Then he drifted off against the snow.