Chapter 285 - Death of a Kingdom (Patreon)

Suddenly, the battlefield disappeared, replaced by the ruined square with which he was already familiar. Here and there, he saw evidence of the ancient battle – cracked paving stones, shattered walls of the surrounding buildings, and a few scattered and forgotten bones, primarily. However, Zeke only had eyes for the giant statue at the center of the plaza, and seemingly, it was of the same mind.

The bronze statue’s inscrutable gaze bore into him, seemingly dissecting everything that made Zeke an individual. If it weren’t for the overwhelming pressure – that was only a fraction of what he’d felt in the vision, but still overbearing enough to make his bones creak in protest – Zeke would almost have been able to convince himself that it was just a mundane, if beautifully crafted, statue.

Of course, he knew that wasn’t the case, and for a variety of reasons. Not least among them was that pressure, but it really came down to one, simple thing: it had moved from the plinth and was kneeling before him as if it was studying a curious oddity.

Had it moved during the vision? Or after? Zeke had difficulty even remembering, his mind was so fuzzy. But one thing he knew beyond doubt was that this statue could squash him like an insect, which rankled Zeke’s nerves and upended his pride. For the first time in a long time, he felt helpless.

Sure, he’d been afraid of the blood wraith – any sane person would. But it had still felt like an enemy he could fight. He’d probably lose, but that was okay. That’s how battle went. However, when faced by the mountainous presence before him, Zeke felt small, insignificant, and helpless, as if all the hardship he’d endured counted for nothing. It was galling.

But what was he going to do against something like the huge statue? Even in its weakened state, it was far more powerful than the other golems he’d fought. And he sensed that if he tried to use the same tactic of absorbing the motivating spirit, he’d burst from the sheer difference in power.

And this was just a sliver of what he’d felt in the vision, which he suspected had been further diluted so he could endure. That told Zeke that, for reasons he couldn’t quite understand, the statue had wanted him to see the dwarven battle. That meant that it wanted something from him.

Even as a cold shiver went up his spine, Zeke straightened his back and threw back his shoulders before looking the statue in one eye. Then, he asked, “Why did you show me the battle?”

“You are not a dwarf,” the enormous golem rumbled, its voice so low-pitched that Zeke felt it in his organs. “Yet, you feel…you are suffused with earthen mana. Your soul is unfamiliar. What are you?”

Zeke considered lying. After all, he knew that being a cambion was likely to cause trouble if people knew about it. But he hesitated before calling himself human. Not only did it feel wrong in a way he couldn’t quite understand – like his entire being rejected the idea of categorizing himself as a lesser being – but it would almost certainly backfire. The golem wasn’t just stronger than him; it was on level that reminded him of Oberon or the sibling tree deities. Certainly, he knew that the golem wasn’t on that level, but its power had something of the same flavor. Defying that would be a mistake.

“I am a cambion,” Zeke said. “A fusion between demon and human, with traits of both.”

It was a simple explanation, but one that felt inadequate. The race had always felt like it was more than the sum of its parts, so describing it in such a way, while not inaccurate, was far from the whole story.

“Demon,” the golem spat, the first real sign of emotion it had displayed since the vision had ended. “You are a warlock, then? No – you have a core of earth that would have been the pride of any dwarf. Not just earth, though. There is more. Metal. And…gravity, perhaps? No corruption…”

“It’s just my race,” Zeke said, trying to keep a quiver out of his voice. He was afraid, certainly, but the tremble in his body had nothing to do with something so mundane. Instead, it was the effect of being in the presence of something so much more powerful than him. It was almost like his body was struggling to hold itself together.

And this was just from whatever sliver of the dwarven king’s soul had survived. It was enough to send another shiver up Zeke’s spine.

“It doesn’t have anything to do with my class,” Zeke continued.

“Tell me how this is possible.”

It wasn’t a request. Rather, it was a command, and Zeke couldn’t bring himself to resist the natural urge to obey. Nor did he see any reason to conceal his past.  Not to something like the statue, which clearly hadn’t been visited by anything but golems for some time. Maybe not since the end of the battle he’d witnessed.

So, without much reason not to, Zeke told his story. He chose to start from the very beginning, and before he knew it, the words were spilling out of him almost of their own accord. He didn’t hold anything back. In fact, he wasn’t even sure if he could stop the flow once it had started, and over the next half hour, he told the golem how he’d died and been reincarnated, recounted his time in the troll caves, and how he’d finally emerged into the Mortal Plane.

After that, he talked about bonding Pudge and meeting Abby, about the state of the Radiant Isles, focusing on how the portal had been abandoned and turned to demonic purposes. That seemed to anger the golem, so Zeke quickly moved on to his encounters with Micayne.

“A true lich on the Mortal Plane? I didn’t think that was possible,” the golem rumbled. “Dangerous. Very dangerous. If such an entity were allowed to ascend, it could be catastrophic.”

“Why?”

“There are liches on the Eternal Realm,” explained the golem. “Even the least powerful among them can be annoying. But the truly strong are terrifying. This…Micayne…he would have been stronger than any of them. Given time to grow into his potential, there is no limit to what he could have done.”

“Good thing he’s dead, then,” Zeke stated. Now, it was beginning to make sense why Aja had intervened and pushed Abby into killing the necromancer. He’d been strong before, but if he’d undergone a transition similar to the one Zeke had experienced upon gaining a class, he would have become a horrifying opponent.

Certainly, there were plenty of people in the Eternal Realm who could deal with such a threat. But Zeke suspected that most were too focused on their own paths to worry about such things. On top of that, Zeke expected that this new world was an enormous place, which underlined just how easily someone like Micayne could hide. By the time anyone realized what kind of threat he posed, he would have grown too powerful to easily oppose.

It had happened on the Radiant Isles, and it would have happened again.

But that didn’t excuse what Abby had done. Perhaps she’d felt she had no choice but to act, but that didn’t make her dishonesty any easier to stomach. No – she had proven just how untrustworthy she was, and while Zeke understood why she’d done it – a combination of wanting to prove herself and because the goal was righteous – that didn’t mean he could ever trust her again.

It was better that he’d decided to cut ties.

Zeke went on to explain the rest of his adventures, paying special attention to his transition into the demon realm that had transformed him into a cambion. Finally, he described the last leg of his journey through the Radiant Isles, ending with his ascension.

“And that’s when I got the {Arcane Colossus} class,” he said. “I haven’t really had much of a chance to explore what it means, but I know it’s supposed to have something to do with earth, gravity, and metals.”

“Ah.”

That was not the response Zeke had hoped for, especially after detailing his entire history. Still, he wasn’t quite ready to demand anything from the golem.

“Tell me,” continued the giant statue. “How did you deal with my golems?”

Zeke ran his hand through his hair. “I…I absorbed the earth spirits,” he admitted. Again, he’d considered lying – after all, it seemed clear that those spirits were the souls of the dwarves who had died in the battle – but he didn’t think it would go over well with the former king. “One of them attacked me, and I figured out that I could activate one of my skills to absorb their energy.”

“Why are you in the mine? Have the soulless ones been defeated?”

Zeke shook his head, saying, “No. They’re still around. But…they’re just…I don’t know. They seem wrong. Like, they’re alive, but something’s missing.”

Zeke had felt that from the very beginning, but until recently, he hadn’t been able to put a finger on what was wrong. Now, in retrospect, it seemed obvious. The dwarves in the city above were the result of whatever Dainn had done.

“My brother,” the statue said, shaking its own head in a combination of disgust and dejection. “He had good intentions. I know that. Evil was not always in his soul. However, even the stoutest heart can be corrupted, never more so than when one is equipped with the best intentions. We were beset by a terrible foe. Once, we had been allies with the ice elves, but they turned on us, suddenly and with viciousness that suggested long-held enmity. Slowly, we were pushed back, and with each step, we surrendered more of our ancestral lands. Finally, we were forced to retreat into Min Ferilik, our most ancient stronghold. Still, we were losing. The ice elves were strong, and our defeat was inevitable.

“Dainn was always the clever one, ever searching for a better way to do things,” the former king continued, his rumbling voice beset by sorrow. “He dove into his research, convinced that there was a way out of our predicament, and in his search, he veered into the taboo. He knew it was dangerous, and that I would not approve. Still, he was driven, and after years – during which, the ice elves continued to assail us from all sides – his research bore fruit. I remember when he came to me, claiming he had found the solution to our problems. He was so excited. So was I, though my emotions were tinged with a caution he did not feel. Still, I gave him the materials he needed, thinking he was constructing a weapon of some sort.”

The statue adopted a faraway look, then added, “He was not.”

“He built a portal, didn’t he?” Zeke said.

The statue shook its head. “When I saw what he had created, I tried to close it,” the former king stated. “But he protected it with the entirety of his power. More, he and his followers had already been corrupted. It had spread throughout the stronghold, infecting thousands, many of whom were our most powerful warriors. They pushed us back to the First City.”

The statue gestured to the ruins. “The most ancient seat of our power,” he went on. “Nothing but dust and rubble, now.”

“I…I’m sorry,” said Zeke.

“You saw the final of hundreds of conflicts in a civil war that spanned years,” the statue said. “When the dust settled, the corrupted ones were victorious, though they had lost their leader. Thus, my kingdom fell.”

“Why are you telling me this?” asked Zeke.

“What else should I do? I regret so many things,” said the former king. “I am tied to this place, and with each passing day, I grow weaker. Soon, I shall truly perish. I merely thought it best if someone remembered our story.”

“W-what about the souls of your people?” Zeke asked. He was incredibly uncomfortable, knowing that he hadn’t just absorbed normal earth spirits, but rather the disembodied souls of the king’s greatest warriors.

“Think nothing of it, young cambion,” the king responded. “Those spirits, they had long since lost anything that made them dwarves. They became true earth spirits. Unthinking. The only solace was that, once it happened, they felt no more pain.”

“I see,” was Zeke’s lame response. It felt inadequate, but he didn’t know what else to say. A running theme for the conversation, it seemed.

“I have but one request for you,” the king said.

“What is it?” asked Zeke. He already knew that if the king asked him to overthrow the stone dwarves, he would refuse. Not only did such a thing seem impossible, given his current level of power, but he wasn’t even sure it was the right thing. The stone dwarves may have been soulless – or not; he had no way of knowing for sure – but exterminating them felt wrong to Zeke.

“Kill me as you killed the others,” the king requested. “If you leave me here, I will slowly slip away. It may take centuries, but it will happen. When it does, I will become a mindless spirit – perhaps a true elemental – driven by nothing but instinct. I have lost everything. My brother. My kingdom. My body. With every passing minute, I feel more isolated and alone. Please, end my suffering.”

Zeke didn’t really want to do it.

It wasn’t that he had any issues with killing – he really didn’t, and he’d left a mountain of corpses in his wake to prove it. However, doing so in this situation just didn’t sit well with him. But what was he going to do? He got the impression that if he refused, he wouldn’t be allowed to leave the ruins of the First City.

There was also the question of how he might manage to kill such a formidable entity. Never mind that the huge statue was entirely undamaged, which meant he had no way of latching onto its soul. Could he even absorb so much energy? And if so, what would it do to him?

But again, it didn’t seem like he had much of a choice.

So, Zeke said, “I’ll try, but there are two problems. One, I don’t know how to get to your spirit, and –”

The statue’s hand blurred, and a second later, a huge gash had appeared in its chest. Out of it spilled golden light, but Zeke could see that wound already closing.

“Please hurry.”

Zeke shook his head, then responded, “It might be too much for me to handle. If it does, I’ll break away. I’m not killing myself for you.”

“That is acceptable.”

With that, Zeke stepped forward and leaped upon the golem’s chest. The closer he came to the rent in the metallic skin, the more pressure he felt. But Zeke was nothing if not persistent, so he kept going until he dipped his hand into the golden light, only to flinch away, screaming in pain.

It felt like dipping his soul into molten lava, only worse. And the agony wasn’t just limited to his ephemeral self. Rather, it had affected his flesh as well, stripping away muscle and skin until nothing but bone remained. Curiously, Zeke felt that he could still flex his fingers, regardless of the lack of flesh.

Taking a deep breath, he activated [Metallurgical Repair] before plunging his hand back into the thick, golden light. The moment his skill-encased hand made contact, a flood of energy rushed into him. Instantly, his hand was rebuilt back to perfection, only to have its flesh stripped away a moment later.

Zeke gritted his teeth. After killing dozens of bronze golems, he was well used to being ripped apart only to be rebuilt. This was different. Worse. But he endeavored to endure.

So, he pushed his hand further into the gaping wound.

It was a mistake.

The once intangible energy latched onto his hand and yanked, pulling him through the wound and into the entire body of the golem. In an instant, everything burned. His soul. His body. His very thoughts. It was all set aflame by that golden energy, which ripped through him without the slightest difficulty.

More through instinct and habit, Zeke continued pulling on his skill, dragging more earthen energy through it than ever before. But it wasn’t enough. And even though the skill, powered by the overbearing energy of the king’s soul as it was, mended his body almost instantaneously, that tiny delay made all the difference.

With every passing second, the skill fell further behind. And his body paid the price.

Zeke pulled harder – his mind completely overcome by sheer survival instinct – but it was never enough. The dwarven king’s soul was just too much.

Still, Zeke couldn’t even fathom giving in. His indomitable spirit had seen him through other seemingly impossible situations, and it refused to surrender now. So, with every bit of strength, stubbornness, and the power of his own soul, Zeke pulled on the skill.

But no matter what he did, it wasn’t enough. He was still losing ground.

Then, almost as if he’d passed a threshold, everything changed. Suddenly, the energy that, only a second before, had felt so destructive, almost felt comforting. It was still overbearing, and it threatened to overwhelm him with sheer power, but it was missing the bite it had once possessed.

Even so, Zeke knew he wasn’t even close to finishing his task, so he bent his will towards enduring the mountainous pressure of the dwarven king’s soul.