Chapter 181 (RE-WRITTEN as of 9/24) (Patreon)

Chapter 181

The huge African guy that’d first dove into the fray was covered in shallow cuts and large bruises, but he stood tall and limped over to where Riven was panting. Holding out a hand of friendship, he bowed his head in appreciation. “Thank you for doing what others would not. You are a good man. What is your name?”

The man’s voice had a thick accent, Nigerian maybe – but Riven couldn’t be sure.

Riven gingerly collected the hatchet from the corpse at his feet, casually smiled, and took the man’s handshake with a nod of thanks. He had to look up just slightly in order to meet the man’s eyes even though Riven himself was over six feet tall. “Riven. My name is Riven… what’s yours?”

“FEARRRRRR MEEEEEEEE!!!!!”

The dancing spider was hopping up and down on its six hind legs while wiggling its front ones up in the air and gnashing its teeth. Athela was chittering loudly as she did it: bouncing around, moving her butt up and down, and hissing every couple seconds while decorating herself with the innards of the men she’d killed. She was wearing a head-dress made of intestines, and all Riven could do was look away and pretend not to know her.

“Hakim.” The man said with a small smile, releasing Riven’s bloody hand without a second thought. “You were very brave. Is that your pet?"

“Nope. I don’t know her.”

“Are you sure about that?”

“Uh… Yes. I mean, no. Ok she’s mine. Don’t call her a pet though, she doesn’t seem to like it.”

“Should I call her a demon then? Identifying her says she’s a level 3 Blood Weaver demon.”

Riven gave the spider a sideways glance. “You guessed it.”

***

Riven was quite enjoying himself, hands behind his head as he was strung along for a joyride unlike anything he’d experienced before.

Wind whipped Allie’s face and her hood violently flapped due to the speed they were going.  Tyranus’s wings beat slowly but powerfully, each time sending them forward with another small increase to their speed for but a moment.  Mountains had turned to sprawling forests, forests had turned to plains, and the coastline was reached soon thereafter before making an abrupt change from south to southwest as they followed the beach.

“How are you doing down there!?” Allie screamed through the coms over the roar of wind as the sun began to set on the horizon.

Riven whooped loudly and gave two thumbs up, being strung along by a long, thick cord of wretched snare that he’d used to connect himself to the dragon instead of sitting directly behind her.  The snare had held easily, and it was almost as if they’d decided to go inner-tubing - where Tyranus was the boat, and the wretched snare was the rope pulling the inner-tube behind.  That and they were high up in the sky soaring through clouds, versus being on a lake.

It was slightly more intense than the normal version.  Even Jackal was enjoying the ride, sending pulses of excitement through its connection to Riven while it remained latched to Riven’s back

“Ah man… Athela would love this kind of joyride.”  Riven sadly smiled, but dismissed the emotion soon after.  She’d be back.  Her soul was already forming, but the spunk she always brought to the party was sorely missed.  He’d probably cry like a little girl when she finally did get back, and if he did she’d no doubt make fun of him.

The snare he’d attached himself to was firmly secured around his waist.  The thick heavy gluttony-infused armor, Chalgathi’s 5 piece set that’d now turned into the item ‘Messenger’, was much more indifferent to the experience than Riven or Jackal were.  The red feathers down the center of the helmet occasionally swayed back and forth, and the eye sockets in his horned vampiric pauldrons flared whenever a nearby bird passed.  Sometimes even the maw along the front of his breastplate rumbled and hissed, but it wasn’t anything other than grumbling about wasting time as they hadn’t killed anything in quite a while now.  Messenger was becoming impatient.

But the coastline was truly a sight to behold, especially from this far up.  With the sun setting, brilliant orange, red, and yellow hues lit up the horizon like a painted masterpiece.  Allie had to avoid the sight by keeping her hood down, but Riven’s armor gave him the ability to watch without being afflicted with the vampiric debuff pertaining to sunlight.  So watch he did, as he was dragged along far behind the huge drake and his sister with a relaxed sigh.  He even started to doze off after another hour of it being like this, until he heard a sharp cry from in front.

“RIVEN!  LOOK!”

He yawned, blinked, and squinted - looking down the coast and then out to sea.  His eyes widened in shock, and Allie’s drake Tyranus came to a slower drifting flight while adjusting their trajectory more inland to ride the outskirts of the catastrophe that no doubt awaited them.

There was indeed a city, but a large portion of it burned with ongoing explosions that could be seen even from here.

Thousands of airships, the details of which were hard to distinguish from this distance, soared through the sky.  But it did look like they were firing on the city at this distance.  Far more land forces had accumulated too, having encompassed the city perimeter entirely as it laid siege.  Then, further out too sea, there was more commotion as more of the airships were being engaged by what looked like huge krakens along with various creatures flinging magics up from the depths.

Were those merpeople?

Wasn’t this supposed to be a human city?

Drawing himself up along the long rope of his wretched snare, he clambered back onto the drake and sat behind his sister while they flew closer.

“What’s the plan?” Allie asked over her shoulder while Riven stared out towards the ongoing battle.  “Just a scouting mission, right?  No commitments?  We don’t know how strong these invaders are supposed to be, but if there are only 5 of them and they’re supposed to conquer the planet…”

“They’re likely far stronger than the natives, yes.” Riven said solemnly.  He gestured to a group of hills to the north of the city just on the outskirts of the battle.  “Let’s land there.  We can leave Tyranus and go on foot, we’ll be less likely to be noticed that way.  Tyranus is huge.”

“Eh…” Allie trailed off, obviously not liking the idea.  “I mean, yeah… He is.  But I think you should stay with him.  Stay as my backup in case I need it, you’ll be close by and I can do the scouting myself.”

“Why?” Riven asked rather curiously.

Allie chuckled.  “Because you’re too much of a hero for your own good.  If I go in there and see innocent people dying, I’ll stick to the plan and not endanger us to help them.  You on the other hand?  You’d go guns blazing.  Even if you are rank 5 on this planet’s leaderboard, that doesn’t mean the invaders won’t stack up to you.  We need to know how strong they are first and we need to be smart about it before you get yourself killed.  In the end, that’s the smarter thing to do even from a saving-people perspective - because if you die, you won’t be able to save anyone else later on.  And yes, if it looks like we can help the natives without risking our lives then by all means you can go agro on their sorry ass.  Agreed?”

“No, absolutely not.  I’m going in with you, don’t be stupid.  Now let’s see about where we can park this baddie… We have a battlefield to explore.”

***

They landed without issue, touching down inbetween two large hills that only barely hid Tyranus’s large frame when he intentionally laid down.  The creature was massive, but thankfully he was more than ok with taking a rest break after the long flight.

Allie hopped off, hitting the ground with a thud before she was landed on with an *UMPH* when Riven intentionally plopped down onto her.  “You fucking cuck!  Get off of me!”

Riven cackled and violently ruffled up her hair to the screeches and protests of his little sister before getting up and lending a hand.  “I just have to remind you who’s big bro from time to time, miss queen bee.”

“God damned turd nugget…” Allie grumbled, taking his arm and pulling herself up to her feet with a humph - then brushing her bone armor off.  “Alright - so, wanna escort me to the border of the fight?”

Riven paused, then nodded.  “Sure.  But I’m coming in with you no matter whether you like it or not.  I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if you got killed in there, and we don’t know how strong these guys are.”

“No I’m sure, you’ll start world war 3 up in this bitch if you follow me.  I guarantee there are things in there where you wouldn’t be able to just stand by, and it’s important we do that.  Frankly I’m more ruthless than you are and it’ll be something I can live with, whereas you won’t be able to do that.”  She gave him a playful nudge on the shoulder where one of his large pauldrons was.

Riven, however, was adamant.  “I will literally fucking drag you back to the necropolis and go in myself if I have to argue my point about coming inside to make sure you’re ok.  Got it?”

“Bleh.  FINE!  Just keep your head on your shoulders and don’t go killing things just to play hero, ok!?”

With that she turned heel and walked away, through the crevice between hills and to the right - where the sounds of magics, gunfire, and distant explosions could be heard a few miles away.

Riven glanced down at his boots, then up to Tyranus.  The undead, skeletal drake only stared back, probably not even knowing that it’d been Riven who’d been responsible for killing the previous inhabitant of that body.  “We’re gona take a walk.  Catch ya later big guy.  Stay hidden.”

The drake only grunted with a flare of teal flames out its nostrils, closing its eyes and curling up with a yawn.

Pulling out Jackal in its weapon form, Riven went to follow his sister - who was waiting around the bend at a distance.

The space they traveled was truly flatlands, rolling fields of grass and wildflowers with only scattered trees all the way to the coastline where a raging battle was ensuing.  Missiles flying through the air in both directions - both magical and mechanical.  Barriers and shields of various shorts behind barricades on either side of the quarantined city would flare and deflect oncoming barrage - but it was apparent that the aggressors had the upper hand due to the airships raining down hell throughout the city from a much higher point.

The only reason why this city likely hadn’t been bombarded into dust already was twofold by Riven’s guess.  One, what was the point of taking a city if you didn’t want to leave SOMETHING intact to lay claim to.  Two, the ocean was in an uproar where creatures and what were probably merpeople had begun shooting down the airships these invaders had brought.  Rippensire had thus been engaged on two fronts.  The airships themselves were for the mostpart very big, thick, bulky things made of metal and what he assumed to be flesh - looking almost like upside-down turtle shells with attached cannons sprouting out their bottoms.

“It’ll be tough getting inside at this angle.  Airships are landing on the coastal edge of the city where Rippenvire looks to be in control.”  He pointed over the army surrounding the city, past the northern front lines of combat towards what appeared to be large transport versions of the vampiric airships on the southern side.  “Looks like they’ve set up a temporary headquarters that way.  That’s where we’ll probably be able to observe the most valuable information.”

“Remember no unnecessary risks.”  Allie chided with a growl.

“We’re about to walk into a city full of hostiles, potentially from both sides as they won’t know whose side we are on.”  Riven shot back with a raised eyebrow.  “You got any stealth spells?”

“No.”

“Then we do our best without them.  Lets…”  Riven’s words paused as he caught sight of two small children racing across the plains in their direction.  They’d somehow gotten past the battlefield and were crying, screaming, and running for their lives from a group of two six-legged dog creatures and their masters in black uniforms just as one child fell.  The other, a little boy, tried to pick the little girl who’d fallen up - only to have his head ripped apart by the dog a second later.

Riven’s eyes narrowed and his grip clenched.  “Mother fuckers.”

“Oh, god DAMN it Riven!  This is EXACTLY what I was talking about!”

***

“RUN, CHILDREN!  DON’T LOOK BACK!”

Sister Anita’s voice echoed in Sara’s ears, and she wept.  The old woman had tried to fight the bad, red-eyed men off with a kitchen knife and her cain.  But they’d eaten her, Sister Anita had been too weak - and her screams and sobs haunted Sara’s mind while the little girl raced as fast as she could into the foothills outside the city.  Their orphanage was somewhat displaced from the rest because the nuns had believed it would be good for the children to experience nature - and the governor had even supplied them with guards to fend off animal attacks.

But animals hadn’t been the only things that’d attacked that day.  It’d been far worse.

Though there were those mean dogs that’d eaten Sara’s friends.  They were still probably chasing her, and the thought scared her so much that she covered her face with Teddy to stop herself from seeing as she sobbed and sobbed and sobbed.

Her flip flops rapidly snapped against the bottoms of her feet, and her pink short tore on a bush when she tripped and fell - screaming to land shoulder-first onto the hard dirt beneath.

Her friend, Sam, quickly caught up and huffed to try and pick her up.  “SARA GO!  WE CAN’T STAY HERE, THEY’LL EAT US TOO!”

But Sara was too scared to move.  Instead of getting up, she covered her face and just continued to cry and shake despite him trying to tug her to her feet.  It was hopeless, the bad men and evil dogs were almost here.

And a moment later Sam’s scream right next to her was abruptly silenced when the snarling of a hound and and ripping sounds caused Sara to hold Teddy even more tightly against her face.  She didn’t want to see it.  She didn’t want to see what’d come to eat her.  She was so scared, and her short blonde hair was abruptly cached in warm liquid - from where she didn’t know.

She felt hot breath on her cheek, and heard the panting of an animal  along with the deep chuckle of an approaching man.

“She’s burying her head in a toy!  That’s hilarious!”  One of the bad man cackled to another of his comrades.  “It’s even kind of cute!  Too bad they said we have to feed the dogs this way, but they’ve gotta eat too.  Have at it…”

The man’s voice trailed off, and a deep chill settled over Sara’s body.

The dog abruptly yelped, and there was another splash of warm fluid - this time covering her legs.  The hot breath went away though, and so did the panting.

But Sara did not move.

She could not move.

She was just too scared.

***

Riven glared at the five vampires chasing the children and their…. What exactly were these things?

[Tiki Hound, Level 32]

Well whatever the fuck Tiki Hounds were, they were ugly little shits.  The remaining beast he hadn’t already killed was essentially a 6-legged dog, with a mouth that opened in 3 directions a lot like the sand wyrms in the ‘Dune’ movies did.  The maw produced squirming, writhing tentacle-like appendages that came out of its hissing throats as the creature backed up - obviously sensing the danger and not wanting to engage since he arrived.

“So much for subterfuge.”  Allie followed to stand beside Riven with a sigh, casually examining the oncoming vampires behind the hound.

If all the enemies Rippenvire was composed of were like this, then Rippenvire was essentially an army of steampunk vampires.  Another group following behind the first that’d come with the hound also sported similar dogs, but their various pets had warped versions of machines inserted into their bodies, and Riven had already seen them cutting down the defenders systematically at a distance.

Riven shifted his thoughts back to the present, turning his glowing crimson eyes to the sobbing little girl burying her head in her teddy bear - with her little dead friend next to her.  If he wasn’t so shocked at the complete brutality of it all, he’d likely have already killed the vampires who’d chased her down along with their strange tiki dogs.  He thought he’d been bad, but this?

He knew he was being hypocritical.  He was sure he’d killed children when he’d wiped out that city in the canyons, but it’d been detached and it was very quick.  This felt very real, it was far more brutal than a purging fire - they were feeding these kids to their animals.

It made him physically sick to think about.

As he was thinking, the five other vampires just stared - awestruck at his and his sister’s presence.  One of them even knelt before them, and he was soon joined by a second and a third.  Each of them wore styled dark coats with buttons and top hats, along with various mechanical gadgets infused with unholy, blood, death, and shadow powers of various sorts.  Riven also felt various types of ‘Machine’ pillar influence as well.  Though he was less attuned to the latter, it was still unmistakably Machine Pillar after having spent so much time in Chicago.  They also wore different shades of tinted goggles, but their eyes were still unmistakable red.   Though their eyes also didn’t glow like his, and instead of a bright crimson they were rather dull in color.  Perhaps another breed of vampire?

[Lesser Vampire, Restrainer, Level 62]

[Lesser Vampire, Restrainer, Level 75]

[Lesser Vampire, Animal Tamer, Level 41]

“My apologies… I didn’t realize the nobility had sent one of their sions to the field…” One of the restrainers hesitantly stated, taking a step back to reach for a pirate-style pistol and eyeing the black spear-staff that pulsed with writhing streams of blood along its surface.  “I do not mean offense.  If you wish to take that one as your own meal, or as a meal for your companion, then do so - but this is a sanctioned war effort.  Killing us or our charged hounds needlessly will be punishable, even for a sion such as yourself.  The council demands results, and infighting is prohibited.  You know this.”

Riven’s glare was interrupted by a blink.

Oh.  So that’s what it was.  He’d almost forgotten - he was a pureblood, as was Allie.  That’s why this man likely thought them to be sions of Rippenvire’s elite.

He merely shook his head, with pools of blood beginning to swirl around him as the ground started to freeze over for dozens of yards in all directions.  “Oh no.  I do believe you’ve got this all wrong.  I’m not from Rippenvire.  I’m a native, and I’m about to tear you guys a new asshole.  I don’t use lube.”

The ground shook with power, causing the others to fall back in confusion, and black lightning tore through Jackal as he twirled the staff around to point at the oncoming invaders.  “Prepare yourselves.”