Amazon Apocalypse 4: Chapter 1 (Patreon)

“I promise this’ll be a lovely date night, you three.” I waved my companions forward as heaved the last of the three necromancers into the back of my truck. We’d clean the bodies up later. For now, I wanted to take the tied-up prisoners where they could be interrogated for their secrets. Secrets that would explain how they’d figured out where my farmhouse was and how they’d figured out how to wait in ambush for our return.

Bridget hopped up next to me, claiming the passenger seat of my truck. She flashed me a brilliant smile, all blonde hair, sharp eyes, and a playful, wolf-like grin.

“A date night sounds lovely, Carter.”

Her actions stirred my two other companions into action.

Myrina, my childhood best friend and our resident Amazonian warrior, was the second to hop into the truck. With a booted foot, she pinned a squirming necromancer to the truck bed.

“Easy for you to say, Bridget!” Myrina replied. “I’m getting the jitters here. You wouldn't like an Amazonian who's gone hysterical!”

“As your old boss, Bridget, I order you to help us drag Carter to the bedroom for a pleasant night in!” Sakura said as she hopped up next to Myrina. One of the three necromancers reached for the knife tied to her hip, and Sakura wasn’t shy about bending his wrist back until cracking bones echoed through the air.

“Oh, hush now, girls. You’ll love a night out,” I waved off their concerns.

“Think about how much worse Cyra must feel right now! She just got married, and now she’s all alone in her castle thanks to a terribly rude surprise ambush that pulled her husband-to-be away.”

I chuckled. “I’m sure she’s clearing up that little misunderstanding herself right now. Hopefully, Dramonar didn’t cause too many problems for her. As soon as we take care of these Naga and necromancers, we’ll have to double back around and help her tidy the Samhain territories and run smoothly again.”

“I don’t know if Cyra wants to clear up the misunderstanding. We all know how long she’s been looking for a decent boyfriend...” Bridget held a hand over her mouth, barely concealing a smile.

“Well, I’ll have to visit her as soon as we can teleport back.” Someday the System will let us travel back and forth from here to Themyscira with no restrictions at all. But as of now there were still some restrictions on the time I could spend off world. Not much though, and diminishing with every integration.

Eventually, Myrina and Sakura accepted we were going to have a date night, whether they wanted it or not. Nobody wanted to spend a cozy night in a house full of dead bodies and prisoners in the basement. Spending the night in our apartment in Crownhill would give the mannequin puppets some time to clean the place up.

Once we neared the city, I hit an unlucky bird with Share Curse, and we entered the city. Between that and summoning Sharky to patrol the area around our farmhouse, I was pretty sure we should have minimal monster attacks during our date night.

People waved to us and opened the outer barricade, which was looking more impressive than it had before. Still, I couldn’t help but feel like it would look even more impressive with big medieval style walls, complete with a ditch and ramparts. Maybe if I got more concrete for my puppet mannequins, they could make it happen. They should be nearly done walling off the Torchdragon and Golem shards by now.

The city felt quite empty, with most of our forces still camped out on Themyscira. The System would eventually teleport most of them home since they were denizens of a newly integrated world, but the Amazonian recruits would have to come here the hard way. For now, they could have their downtime. I was certain our Amazonian recruits would enjoy some time at home, and our human fighters would benefit from seeing a society living with the System for generations instead of the short few months we’d had with it back on Earth.

“Is that a restaurant open I see over there?” I asked as I eyed an establishment.

“Looks like. That used to be the Elysium Palace. One of my friends used to work there as a waitress before the integration. It was a very fancy place, and my friend used to come home with at least a grand in tips every night,” Bridget stared at the fancy establishment, clearly curious about what was inside.

“My father and I ate out there every time he was in town,” Sakura said. “Everything comes on a silver platter, and the deserts are shaped into these cute little hearts.”

“Bah...” Myrina waved her hand. “When I was competing in the tournament on Themyscira, mother took me to a place where the plates were made of solid gold, every table was on its own floor, and each group had a personal musician.”

Bridget laughed. “For a moment there, I nearly forgot we’re driving around with two rich girls.”

“Don’t worry. I’m sure I can afford it.” I dropped the girls off to get us a table. Meanwhile, I doubled back to drop off our prisoners for interrogation. Truthfully, I didn’t expect these three to know much more than the one I’d previously captured had already shared with us. But I’d already told these three that they’d get to live if they helped clean up the mess they’d made, and I was a man of my word. Once they were safe and secure with Terrance, I found my companions and sat down.

Appetizers had already been served, and from the way the girls were eating, I would have thought Bridget was the one with the wealthy upbringing. She carefully nibbled at each dish with the refined look of an experienced chef. Meanwhile, Myrina and Sakura were piling their plates high and lifting them to their faces until their entire contents slid down their throats.

The portions were massive and made of monster meat rather than anything more traditional. It wasn’t as good as what Bridget made, but she’d cooked so much already to get our army back on their feet that I would have felt bad having her cook again for us. The large portions were no doubt a necessity these days now that most people with the money to eat here got enough exercise every day to kill an Olympic athlete. Running as fast as a car for hours on end and jumping around to fight giant monsters had a way of shrinking the waistline.

Once Myrina and Sakura had eaten enough food to stop inhaling it as soon as it appeared, we chatted about various topics. The talk of kids, when I got my bloodline had us thinking a bit longer term than any of us, had been prepared for, and we suddenly had to renovate our house thanks to the damages from getting ambushed. We were nearly comfortable when a siren sounded in the distance.

Suddenly, Margaret’s voice sounded from speakers.

“Incoming enemy presence detected! Stay calm. All militia report to the west gates. This is not a drill. I repeat, this is not a drill. All militia, report to the west gates!”

We dropped our knives, forks, and plates.

“Right in the middle of the desert...” Myrina grumbled as she stood.

“Who dares disturb our date night?” Sakura cracked her knuckles.

I frowned. Normally, Share Curse was pretty effective at keeping monsters from being lured in by my curse. Had that bird already gotten far enough away? Even if it had, how had something snuck past Sharky?

We sprinted to the walls while most of the civilians took shelter inside the various shelters. There was some sort of System in place for events like this, but since I wasn’t a full-time resident of Crownhill, I wasn’t sure what the System was.

We reported to the wall, where the militia looked a lot more scarce than I was used to. Over two-thirds of our army was still on Themyscira, so that was no surprise. There were a few sighs of relief when we appeared. I went straight to Margaret, who was on the wall with some of our human scouts. While not as good as the Amazonian scouts, they’d learned a lot and been leveling up fast.

“So what’s the story?” I asked.

“Carter, I wasn’t aware you were back. Perhaps we didn’t need to sound the alarms after all.” Margaret gestured to the area outside the western barricade. “I’m afraid this is worse than the usual monster attack. We’ve seen numerous Naga and Undead warbands wandering the area outside the city. They’ve been looking for something, but now they’re banding together to attack us.”

“Ah...” I realized what was happening. I should have guessed as much when I found an ambush waiting for me. Even if the Naga and Undead had been told of a farmhouse where they could ambush me, they’d still need to find the place. The party I’d killed probably hadn’t been the only war party our enemies had sent out.

“I suspect our enemies know most of our forces are off-world. I should have guessed they’d pick now as the best time to strike.”

I looked out, and my supernaturally sharp eyes pierced the tree-lined shadows to pick out the individual enemies marching toward us. There were about fifteen Naga Warpriests, three times that in Naga Warriors, and about twenty necromancers, each controlling ten to fifteen undead. Most of them were mid-D-Grade, though most of the undead were far on the lower side. In short, this was an army coming for us, and one far stronger than the Chaos Lycans that had nearly taken the walls so recently.

“What do we do?” a militiaman asked nervously. To my surprise, it was Reginald. He was my smith, and I hadn’t known he even had a combat class. I thought he was one of those crafters who focused exclusively on his job. Perhaps he’d been leveling up his race so he could evolve.

I rested a hand on Reginald’s shoulder. “You guys don’t need to do anything. The girls and I will take care of this lot.”

“They’ll pay for ruining date night!” Sakura hefted her war club high overhead as crimson light swirled around it.

“All I see is a bunch of feeble D-Grades! Pathetic!” Myrina shook her head even though she’d been a feeble D-Grade herself just the day prior.

“You sure?” Margaret asked skeptically.

I grinned. “I’m C-Grade. So is Myrina. I don’t think anybody on this shard really knows what that means yet. Well, watch and learn.”

I jumped off the walls and rushed to the enemy position. Behind me, I heard my companions yell their own battle cries. Just before the enemy spotted me, I used Shadowrealm Stride to slip past their front ranks. I emerged in the middle of the densest group of undead, then cast Eldrich Blight and Soulchain Nexus. Then I reached for the Divine Seal Galbatorix had given me to deal with the undead back on Themiscyra. Before I could even get a second blow in, all but the strongest undead crumbled to ash. Compared to the guys Morgathor created, these undead were nothing special.

Three Naga warriors rushed me. I waved Arcane Blade at them, slipping past their defenses to chop through snake-like tails or withered reptilian arms. The gesture was almost casual, and done with a certainty that my blows would disable them before they could even raise their weapons against me. I sensed spells shooting toward my back, and I cast Mana Bolt in retaliation before I even turned around.

The spells collided with Arcane Blade as I used it to block, but I could resummon the magic sword in the blink of an eye, so its loss was no big deal. My Mana Bolts, on the other hand, each dealt critical hits to three necromancers, killing all of them instantly.

“So slow...” I muttered.

I still hadn’t adjusted to fighting at C-Grade, especially with my new class and bloodline. The difference between us had grown from me being moderately better to an unfathomable chasm. Like I was a professional boxer put in the ring against a group of middle schoolers. If not for the fact that these necromancers and Naga would have slaughtered everyone back in town, I probably would have felt bad about killing them all. But they’d made their hostile intent clear, and for that, they’d earned no mercy from me.

The Naga Warpriests erected a shield while the necromancers fired spells through it. They were targeting Bridget and Sakura, since they were the only two members of our group that weren’t C-Grade.

I thought I was going to do something about that, but Myrina was already on top of it.

“Fight me, you ugly snakes!” Myrina yelled as she swatted away necromancer spells like knocking flies out of the air.

Bridget and Sakura fought more conservatively behind her, darting out for quick strikes here and there. They could put down any enemy on their own, but they still had to be careful not to get swarmed.

I leveled an open palm at the Naga Warpriest’s shield and activated Void Cannon. A sphere of black and purple power shot out from my hand and struck the barrier, causing an explosion that completely shattered it. Both Naga and Necromancers were dazed and confused. A moment later, I appeared in the middle of their group using Shadowrealm Stride, and with one swift motion, disemboweled three of them and beheaded two more. To them, it probably looked like I’d teleported into the middle of them all.

One of the Naga Warpriests finally reacted in time and caught my Arcane Blade in the crook of his shield. I dispelled the magical weapon, and he stumbled forward. Then, with the sheer strength of stats, grabbed his snake-like head with my hands and twisted. I’d intended to break his neck, but with my newfound strength as a C-Grade, the head popped right off and tumbled to the ground.

“Huh. Not nearly as tough as I remembered...” I tossed the head aside. My hands were already messy, so I punched another Naga. He blocked with his bronze shield, but my fist punched right through the bronze plate and carried through into the stomach of the Naga wielding the shield. Fist in his guts, I cast Arcane Blade again and swept it upward with a flick, killing the Naga Warpriest.

I slipped into the Shadowrealm again as others closed in on my position, then reappeared to unleash a hail of spellfire.

Less than thirty seconds after the fighting began, I knew it was already over. More than half the army remained, but I’d already spread my Corrupting Marks to enough of them that they were finished.

“Detonate,” I muttered, and as one, my Corrupting Marks exploded.

Bridget, Myrina, and Sakura were soon coated in a wave of bloody gore as all the enemies surrounding them exploded from the inside out.

They stood there a moment, blinking away blood and guts.

“Well... date night is definitely ruined...” Sakura grumbled.

<Note>
Here we go again! Chapter 1 once more. Honestly, I think I like writing chapter 1's more than I like writing epilogues.

My current target is Mon-Wed-Fri for posts. That's 3 per week, until things settle down for me.