Path of Stars, Ch 15: Strength of an Artificer (Patreon)

Aboard the Gilded Scroll Merchant Ship

Naia was looking out the window of her family’s merchant ship at the fierce battle behind them. Her small hands were gripped tightly around the burnished wood that made up the window ledge as she tried not to tremble. Unless something happened to save them, she was worried that they would all be eaten soon.

Until now, nothing had ever threatened their ship like this. Their ship was battered and fleeing, and a handful of those huge beasts were still chasing them. The hull of the ship was scored with their claw marks and even deeper scars from where the humanoid monsters’ magic had landed.

A streak of silver and blue light had just appeared in the distance, and she was trying to figure out what it was and how it related to the battle that left her terrified. There was something enchanting about the silver light, like a flare of hope when she’d thought everything was falling apart, and she stared at it with all of her attention, willing it to come closer, just like she sometimes wished on a passing comet or a flickering star in the distance.

Unlike most merchant vessels, hers was a family ship. She had turned nine that year and everything she’d known in her life was here. The view of the Void out the window was as familiar to her as grass swaying in the breeze was to a child born on the plains.

She knew the major currents of the Chaos Wild in the systems that their ship traveled and she could name them all by color and intensity. She was quick to answer her mother’s questions about elemental combinations and her father’s quizzes about the elemental winds and tides that they used for navigation. She could explain which tides were best for sailing in each season of the year as well as either of her older brothers, and they had several decades on her. The Wild was a familiar presence in her life.

What she had never seen before was a battle like this one. Beasts attacked them from time to time, and bandits as well, but their ship was strong and they had half a dozen guards to protect them, as well as her parents and brothers, and they were even stronger than the guards. Most days, she attended to her studies and played on the ship, protected behind the shield that kept the chaos winds away.

Some might have said it was no life for a child to be exposed to that type of danger with only the ship’s shield for defense, but she wouldn’t have it any other way. To her, the Void was beautiful, an endless expanse of color and magic that was always changing and eternal. It left her breathless and made every day something new.

She glanced toward the silver and blue streak, which was shooting through the Void faster than any comet she’d ever seen, and then looked at the handful of beasts chasing them. In the distance, the fight between their two passengers and those monsters was still going on. It made her grip the window more tightly.

When they’d come here, it had been a normal day. They had been traveling through the Green Aurora system with a regular shipment of luxury goods on the same route they took every year, but this time they’d also taken those two passengers: an old man and a young woman who wanted to collect ore.

Passengers were rare, but she had seen some of them over the last few years, so there wasn’t anything too strange about that. She liked asking them where they were from. Her parents might have hesitated to take normal passengers on this leg, since it was a long and desolate section of their route that was often plagued by bandits, but since they were Wild Spirits, they’d agreed easily.

Everyone knew that Wild Spirits were good luck in the Chaos Wild and having them on your ship meant your journey would be blessed. Unfortunately, it hadn’t turned out that way.

When they’d arrived in the system, the beasts and those three monsters had suddenly attacked them with no explanation. One moment, they’d been traveling as normal and then that horde had suddenly appeared from behind a concealment spell.

Their ship had been caught up in the initial attack and thrown across the region. Its shield was nearly shattered. One of their guards had been thrown overboard and his personal wards had broken. The chaos winds and the beasts had competed to see who could tear him apart first. His screams had been soundless in the Void, but the splashes of red blood went everywhere. The memory made her shudder.

She tightened her grip on the window ledge until her nails dug into the golden wood and she felt the thrum of the ship’s enchantments pushing back. There were too many beasts and something didn’t happen soon, their passengers were going to die.

She didn’t want that to happen, partly because she’d never seen Wild Spirits before. They were rare and amazing. They were also nice. They’d treated everyone well on the ship and they’d told them to run when the monsters appeared, right before they jumped off to fight.

If they hadn't pulled away the attackers’ attention, it was unlikely any of them would have survived. Perhaps that was how they had blessed their ship. Who knew what would have happened otherwise.

She didn’t know why, but she felt like if that silver and blue streak could reach them in time, everything would be alright. She focused on the stars in the distance as she closed her eyes and wished for it to travel faster. When she opened her eyes again, her attention was locked on it. Almost as if it heard her, it looked like it was speeding up.

The streak suddenly leapt closer, like it was taking a step across the distance.  It resolved into an ocean of sapphire and silver flames. At the center, she could see a towering golden figure with curved horns and broad shoulders, as well as a naga that was about half as big right behind him.

Naia’s eyes widened as she stared at the figures inside. Stories her parents told her before bed flickered through her mind as her mouth fell open.

The newcomer was as tall as a giant and he was striding through the Void in a path of flames. His shoulders were as wide as the heavens, his horns were so high they looked like they could sweep moons out of their path, and his eyes were burning like two silver stars judging the damned. From horn to foot, he was at least as tall as their ship, and he looked even bigger than the sun in the distance.

As soon as she saw him, Naia’s spirit trembled as a burst of wonder erupted in her heart. To a nine-year-old girl, there was no doubt about who he was or why he’d come. She pointed at him as she turned and shouted over her shoulder, her voice soaring like a flute across the room.

“Mom, look! An Astral Titan is here to save us! And there’s a naga following him!”

*****

In the Void

Elemental winds heavy with Wood energy whipped across Sam’s body as he raced toward the Wild Spirits. He pulled Sleset along with him as the naga chanted a series of building spells. At the same time, currents of astral ice poured out from Sam in roaring waves that were filled with shining runes.

All around them, a whirlwind of bright ice began to build, spinning as it reacted with the energy of the Chaos Wild. It grew larger until he was surrounded by an enormous storm of twisting power.

He was approaching the battle swiftly, but the route carried him past the small merchant ship that was trying to flee. It was made from some light golden wood and it looked like it had once been an elite vessel with one large and two smaller masts that gave it an elegant and streamlined appearance, but the damage across its hull was severe. Gaping holes had been torn into the lower decks and part of the upper railing and one mast was shattered. Trails of blood were scattered across the rear deck.

Strangely, as he looked at the ship, he noticed a small face pressed to one of the windows. It was a little girl that reminded him of Altey, except she was even younger. Her hair was pulled back in a neat braid with a blue ribbon. When she saw him, her eyes went wide and she turned to shout something across the room.

He hadn’t thought much about the ship until then, but seeing her made him feel a burst of sympathy for the people on board. At the same time, he also caught sight of the closest beasts that were chasing after the vessel. There were three of the pythons and two lizards following right behind it. A quick analysis grabbed the details of each type.

Crystal Fang Python. Level 301.

Shadowscale Lizard. Level 304.

Strangely, the beasts weren’t Outsiders. Their essence was low, marking their origin from the Borderlands, but they were a type he hadn’t seen before. Somehow, the Outsiders must have enslaved them.

Without hesitating, Sam gathered a dozen sparks of astral flames into his right hand and infused them with a flood of essence. The sparks tumbled wildly as they grew larger until there were a dozen spheres rotating around his hand. Bands of shining runes flickered as they turned into sapphire cores at the center of each sphere.

With a flick of his hand, he sent the spell hurtling toward the beasts. They were so intent on the ship that at first they didn’t notice the attack coming their way, nor how the spheres sought them out, with at least two heading for each of them. A second later, twelve lightning bolts shattered the silence of the Void.

The lightning wove a deadly web between the beasts, tearing through their bodies as it arced from limb to limb and left a trail of crackling flames behind. The pythons’ crystalline fangs shone silver as they absorbed the lightning and then exploded, adding flying shards to the mix. Claws and scales from the lizards joined them, tearing away from their bodies as the lightning writhed beneath their skin. A moment later, the five beasts were reduced to charred and shredded corpses.

The little merchant ship and the girl on it were safe for now, but they needed to get farther away, so as Sam passed the ship, he gathered a swirling wind in his hand that drew on the local chaos winds. He sent it at their sails, giving them a shove toward the horizon.

They would have to look after themselves now. Then he pushed the ship out of his mind as he continued, his attention locked on the Wild Spirits.

His attack had gotten the attention of the Crimson Soul Wraith, who was frowning as she looked his way. The Wild Spirit priestess was also looking in his direction, but she only had time to glance over her shoulder before she was pulled back to the battle. She was trying to support the golems and her guardian, but she had to be running low on mana by now.

He wasn’t being subtle in his approach, so he needed to act while he still had a bit of surprise on his side. A chain of Ice runes appeared around his hands in spiraling blue-white bands. The edges of each glittered with frozen crystals of astral ice.

The runes were similar to the sequence for First Snow that the Ice Sylph Raelia had taught him so long ago, but they were far more complex. In his studies over the years, he’d mastered what she’d taught him and taken it further, combining it with his own insights into the Void and Astral Ice. Woven around the First Snow were runes for void, star, chain, and storm, as well as more subtle things.

As he brought his hands together, the runes shot outward like frozen chains into the swirling storm of astral ice around him. The crystalline currents roared as the strength of the storm turned into a furious river of ice that headed for the battle ahead of him.

He was still a little distance away from the Wild Spirits, but the ice swept through the Void in an instant, carving a great tidal wave of frozen space through the horde of beasts.

A dozen of the beasts were caught directly in it and frozen into crystalline statues that shimmered in the light of the green star. The other two dozen attacking the Wild Spirits weren’t hit as hard, but many of them were left coated in ice, their claws and scales frozen in a hard layer of shining frost.

In that instant, Sam reached the Wild Spirits and took up a position to their left. Two of the scrolls that were hanging in the air around him erupted into defensive shields of silver flame as he sent them between the Wild Spirits and the beasts on the far side.

Beside him, Sleset finished casting the spells he’d been preparing. Chains of icy green sigils left his hands as they flew toward the beasts around them. His spells looked jagged and sinuous, like serpent fangs carved in the air, and they glimmered with traces of frozen venom. A dark green web spread outward from the naga, trapping half a dozen of the beasts in a tightening web.

Sleset had reached Level 308 after all of their hunting, but with his evolution to Silver Naga, he was far more ferocious than the beasts. Another spell he’d prepared on the way lashed out immediately after the frozen web, taking the form of six hissing green spears that sliced toward the beasts he’d trapped.

The spears crackled with power as they stabbed through the beasts’ hide and scales, tearing into their bodies and out the far side. Dark streaks of venom spread outward from the wounds, sending the beasts into writhing convulsions as frost spread across their skin and their bodies swelled.

There was no time for him to prepare another spell, so Sleset drew his curved blades with all four arms, his muscles swelling as he let out a hissing roar of challenge. He took up a defensive position in front of Sam, between him and the remaining beasts.

Their entrance was filled with explosive fury and nearly half of the attacking beasts were slain in an instant, which was enough to make the two Wild Spirits turn toward them in shock.

Proving that he wasn’t completely distracted, however, the old man’s spear lashed outward, taking advantage of the opportunity to eviscerate a python that was lashing out at him, and then it swept back into a guard position.

One to one, he was far stronger than these beasts, but his face was pale and it looked like he was standing only through willpower. Beneath his mangled armor, the right side of his body was covered in streams of light green blood. It had soaked his clothes and was drifting away in the Void, leaving ribbons of green droplets all around.

With a gesture from the woman, the golems shifted their defenses, surging toward the far side to face the remaining beasts. The help gave their side a moment to breathe.

“Who are you?!” the knight shouted with a hoarse growl. The shield in his left hand shifted toward Sam and Sleset as he stepped backward, bringing himself into line with the golems and placing himself squarely between them and the priestess he was protecting.

“An Astral Titan?” The priestess’s voice carried like a bright silver bell, but there was a tone of confusion in it. “How is that possible? I thought all of your kind was long gone.”

“A...Titan?” The knight coughed hard, his shoulders shaking as he wobbled in place. Flecks of blood appeared on his lips as he tried to hold himself upright. Now that he had a moment to stand still, his wounds were catching up with him, but his struggle to suppress them was just as clear. He turned to look at Sam, his eyes widening as he took in the horns and Sam’s height, and realization struck. “Then by the old alliance, we plead for sanctuary and protection!”

With that, the knight’s eyes rolled up into his head and he collapsed like a sail that had lost the wind, falling in a boneless heap. Before he could drift away on the wind, however, a wave of light green energy from the priestess wrapped around him, pulling him back toward her.

Sam wanted to immediately ask her the questions on his mind, but unfortunately, that was the moment the three Outsiders in the distance chose to act.

Sam’s arrival had surprised them, but there were still half of the beasts left and the demons had another dozen with them. The Crimson Soul Wraith’s eyes shone as bright as blood as she slashed her claws through the air and sent the remaining beasts surging forward. At the same time, the beasts that were still alive renewed their attack.

Half a dozen pythons lashed through the air toward Sam and Sleset and a dozen lizards charged at the golems, heading for the gap in the line where the knight had fallen. Behind them, the reinforcements were swiftly approaching.

Sam glanced at the knight and then at the priestess who had gathered the old man into her arms. Her expression was strained as she looked down at him and then at the oncoming beasts, but a silver-green healing spell was flowing around her hands as she pressed it to the man’s wounds. All she had the energy to spare was a command to the golems as she ordered them to tighten their line.

Being this close to the woman made Sam realize how tall he really was now. She was perhaps a little under six feet tall, but she didn’t even come up to his knee. Even Sleset towered over her and the golems, standing at more than three times their height with his tail curled under him.

The beasts were a more normal size relative to him, but there wasn’t time to dwell on the thought as he turned toward the closest ones and unleashed the spells he’d channeled into his bracers. He didn’t hold back.

Scorching streaks of crystal flame cut through the Void like flares from a sun as a field of sapphire spears blasted through the pythons, shattering their scales and leaving their bodies twisted. As the spell was still shining, a dozen brilliant meteors tore through its wake and headed for the lizards on the other side.

Explosions blasted outward in rippling waves that overlapped and created chaotic vortexes of energy that clashed with the elemental winds, giving rise to sudden explosions as the Wood element in the wind fed the flames, stoking them higher into towering pillars three hundred feet tall that stretched like a giant’s causeway into the distance.

The flames eagerly consumed the energy and when they finally faded, the wave of beasts was a charred ruin. Instead of paying attention to them, Sam glanced at the golems and stepped in front of them, putting himself between their side and the Outsiders.

The new beasts had more time to prepare their attack, which gave them a chance to show off their racial abilities. Half of them were pythons and the other half were lizards. The pythons were surrounded by a bright white aura that rippled like liquid, but the edges of it sizzled with sharp red flecks.

As they flickered forward, streaks of that white aura corroded the corpses that were scattered around, causing them to crumble like they were being eaten away by acid. As one passed a lizard corpse, its aura struck outward like it had a mind of its own. The red flecks turned into crimson fangs as a spectral python head appeared and bit down. Beneath that bite, the lizard’s corpse twisted as it shrank. A trail of white dust flew away from where the fangs landed.

The lizards next to the pythons were no less dangerous. They were nearly invisible, their shadowy scales fading into the Void, but their yellow claws and fangs were shining more brightly than ever. They floated through the Void like ghosts. Where their claws passed, there was a low wail like a crying spirit.

Sleset was chanting another spell as he watched them approach, but he was also holding tightly to his blades, ready to lash out if anything got close. His expression was grim. The silver patterns he’d gained from the blood oath glowed in bright slashes all across his scales, especially the lightning bolts on his cheeks and the silver half crown on his skull, giving him a look of fierce nobility.

Sam’s summoned bracers were gone and streaks of flame were curling along his skin from the exertion of getting here so quickly, but he still had ten objects floating around him and most of his essence. So far, he’d managed to take out some of the trash in the fight and take a stand with the Wild Spirits, but they weren’t safe.

The real fight would be when those demons intervened.

Before the beasts could arrive, he grabbed two of the artifacts hanging around him and hurled them forward. One was a bright red crystal that pulsed like a heart and the other was a silver scroll covered in runes. Both of the artifacts flared with brilliant light as they shot forward.

As they sped toward the beasts, time hung still for a moment.

All of his efforts over the past months to create items gave him the ability to fight well beyond the limits of his essence pool, and it left him with a strong appreciation for his class as an Astral Artificer. He pulled another half dozen items from his cloak and tossed them into the air, his attention focused on the demons in the distance.

Then the artifacts reached the beasts. The red crystal sought out the half dozen pythons. It spun in the air as it flew, suddenly growing larger as runes flared across its surface. Golden bands of sigils burned at the corners and then shot across the surface like flames taking to dry pine needles.

Along those golden lines, the artifact fractured into a thousand shards. Each of them was a spear ten feet long and a few inches wide with a flaming bright point on the end. They formed a wall of death hundreds of feet wide as they tore through the incoming pack in an explosion of fire.

The pythons tried to evade, but they weren’t fast enough to change their trajectory. Their auras resisted the spears for a moment, sizzling as they corroded the first few that struck them, but then they were caught up in the full force of the blast. A moment later, there was nothing but a rain of white scales and chunks of muscle left behind.

On the other side of the field, the silver scroll soared toward the lizards. It also grew larger, extending until it was a hundred feet tall and half that wide. The runes on it glowed a brilliant sapphire as they grew more intense, until suddenly the scroll crumbled away and only the runes were left in the air.

The runes linked together into a vast net that swept forward. It was a little slower than the other artifact, which gave the lizards a chance to spread out as they tried to escape, but it still managed to capture four of them in lines of crackling frost. Their bodies turned brittle and white as their blood froze and their skin fractured into jagged chasms.

A moment later, the trapped lizards shattered into dust as the web shrank. It spiraled in tightly and then exploded, leaving only a field of scattered ice crystals behind.

It wasn’t quite as effective as the other artifact had been, but Sleset was waiting for the two lizards that made it through and the golems lunged forward at the same time. The naga was twice the height of the beasts and he waded between them like a graceful wind as he bent and sliced, twisting around like a dancer.

Beside him, the golems held their shields high as they boxed the lizards in and drove them back, stabbing with their great spears. It only took an instant before the lizards joined the rest of the beasts in death.

Sam stared across the Void at the three Outsiders as Sleset and the golems quickly returned to his side, and then he turned his head to speak to the priestess. The woman was cradling the old man in her arms and her face was pale. Her vivid green eyes met Sam’s as she looked up at him.

He was struck to the heart again by her resemblance to Asenya. It made him want to protect her and demand answers at the same time.

“Why are these trespassers after you?” He couldn’t stop the questions as they tumbled out of his mouth. “Why do you look like the World Forger?”

“The World Forger?” The woman’s eyes went large as she stared at Sam, but she looked so surprised by the question that she wasn’t sure what to say. “You know...no, wait, you knew her, my ancestor Asenya? You’re an Astral Titan, right, so of course you would have...but it’s been millions of years. Why would...is that why these monsters are chasing us?

"Nevermind! Please, just help us! Forgive my family’s faults over the last years. Before that, we always honored the alliance! Don’t let the shame of a few destroy us!”

Even as she spoke, the Outsiders began to move.

The Crimson Soul Wraith had been observing the battle with her attention locked onto Sam, her gaze never leaving, but now she narrowed her eyes. He could feel her presence like a bloody sword pressing down on his shoulders, her emotions somehow conveyed across the distance.

There had been trepidation that kept her from acting when she saw him arrive, but now something else was taking over. Her emotions were changing as hunger and rage took the place of fear. The echoing beat of her heart passed through the space between them, drawing him to look into her eyes.

Unconsciously and half out of curiosity, he pulled his attention away from the Wild Spirit as he looked at the soul wraith. Her eyes expanded like twin red suns as he fell into them. The world all around him changed to blood red plains tossed by a forlorn black wind that wailed with need.

The demand for essence, for something to sate the hunger, raged everywhere like a maddening storm. Howling echoes of voices rose from the grass and the wind, all of them screaming. They were like needles stabbing into his mind and throat, piercing him to the bone.

The hunger woke something in his blood that he had suppressed for a long time, the old call to consume other sources of essence around him. A lot of his essence had been gained from Outsiders and it wasn’t fully converted. Under the pressure of the soul wraith’s ability, it awoke with a fury.

A huge roar built in Sam’s chest as he bared his fangs and growled, his hand reaching outward as if to grab at the soul wraith. He wanted to tear her apart from limb to limb, rip the essence out of her and swallow it, hold her body above the plains and roar with victory as he was covered in blood and tears. Tactics and thoughts of how to use his abilities fled his mind.

All he wanted to do was seize her and rend her to pieces.

His eyes tinted from silver to crimson and his body began to swell as Titan’s Wrath activated on its own. His muscles bulged as his size increased and his aura roared madly. He turned, his legs bending as he prepared to lunge forward and grab the soul wraith.

But at that moment, a small and graceful palm landed on his chest. It was only a feather against his skin, but it hit with the impact of a mountain crashing into his soul.

“Calm.”

It felt like he was flung backward for a thousand feet as he was slammed back to his senses. The Void spun around him in streaks of red and black that faded away, changing to silver and green and then to the flowing elemental winds that brushed over his face.

The smell of jasmine and something cool and pure drifted across his senses as the hand moved away from his chest. It was glowing softly with a silver-green light. He followed it back to the owner, only to see the priestess’s face had become even more pale. It looked like she was going to pass out at any moment.

Her brilliant eyes were fixed on his and a trace of a smile tugged at the corner of her mouth, but she looked too tired to move any more than that.

In the distance, the soul wraith snarled as her features warped. She had been pretty in a pale and thin way, but now her mouth stretched as fangs too large for her jaw protruded and a long black tongue stretched out.

He could still feel her hunger, but it was a distant thing now, held back by a thin current of peaceful green energy. In that moment of meeting, he knew that she’d been afraid of him when he appeared, which was why she’d held back, but now that her ability had struck him, she’d taken his measure.

It didn’t matter that it had failed.

If he’d been a fully mature Titan, she would have run for her life or died on the spot, but he wasn’t and she knew it. She might not know how he’d come here or why, but his essence made him much too tempting to pass up. Her desire was what he’d felt on those blood red plains and she’d decided it was worth the risk.

She slashed her hand through the air as she said something in a commanding tone to the two other Outsiders. The two giants let out a low growl and slammed their hands together, and their skin turned bright red. Then they began to grow.

They’d been about ten feet tall before, but in an instant they were twice that height, and then twice that again, until each of them towered forty feet into the air. They were as broad across the shoulder as a wagon, their bodies burly with muscles that were carved from blood-red stone, and their features became as rugged as a cliff. Their foreheads were large and bony, protecting their eyes, and their hands were the size of wagon wheels as they clenched them into fists and raced forward.

Behind them, the soul wraith had taken on a horrifying appearance as dark skeletal wings branched out from her back and her bones elongated, making her ten feet tall and gaunt. The claws on her hands were a foot long and made from white serrated bone. Her eyes blazed so brightly with red fury that only her tongue was visible near them as a black line whipping from side to side.

With a flap of her wings, she soared into the air and followed the giants forward, heading directly for Sam. Her fangs were bared wide in a mad rictus of desire.