54 How to End a Legend (1/2)

Kessiah murmured, “No, that’s impossible. Why would you want him to?”

A giant set of pincers raised out of the ground and clamped onto my waist. A giant beetle with armored plates all over it rose out of the ground and dashed towards the house. Like chunking a sack of flour, the beetle tossed me through the window.

I flew before smashing into the window. Bits of drywall snapped along with the shattered glass panes. I tackled into the floor, tearing through a few planks of wood. As I glanced up, Kessiah had her hands on her hips while Torix crossed his arms.

Torix mouthed, “Shame on you, disciple.”

Kessiah shook her head, “And here I thought you were trustworthy. Tsk, tsk, tsk.”

I stood up, lunging up off one knee while Torix glanced his eyes at Kessiah,

“As trustworthy as a snake.”

I rolled my eyes,

“Alright guys, you got to admit you were both being suspicious. Besides that, what did you mean by exile?”

Kessiah propped her weight onto one hip, “You remember the sentinels?”

“Uh, yeah.”

Kessiah opened her arms, “You remember how they’re level 5000 with spears that tear through dimensions?”

“That’s a hard thing to forget.”

“Who knows, you might find a way. Any who, those spears aren’t all that good for cutting people. Sentinels will grab you, slice a hole in the fabric of space time, and chunk you in there.”

I frowned, “So in other words, they exile you.”

“Bingo.”

Torix nodded, “You’ve been there before. Whenever we opened the portal using the ancient ruins in BloodHollow. Who was it…Ah yes, Baldag-Ruhl I believe. He is the maker of that rift. You were put within it.”

I nodded, “Yeah. I remember it being utterly terrifying, meeting Etorhma and everything.”

Torix raised a palm to me,

“But you see, we now know you can survive exposure to the dimensional energy within the eldritch’s dimemsion. You can survive the exile.”

I shrugged, “I mean we only put my arm in there. Shoving all of me in there is a big step.”

“Etorhma pulled you through the portal, and you lived. That is more than enough proof. Your armor prevents you from dying. Yawm on the other hand, we don’t know if he will or not.”

Kessiah placed a hand on my shoulder,

“You can pull Yawm into the eldritch dimension with you. So, what do you say?”

I brushed her arm off,

“Fuck no.”

Kessiah frowned,

“Well, I wouldn’t wanna go in either, but we don’t really have any other way of killing Yawm. You and Althea are going to struggle to get over level 1500, even with doubled experience. That’s nowhere near enough to defeat Dakhma, let alone Yawm or Ajax.”

I sighed, raising both hands, “Here’s the thing. Why not just use a ghoul or something you summoned Torix?”

“The issue with using one of my summons comes with how the sentinel’s spears are designed. Think of them as enemy specific. They are designed to destroy eldritch, and to be able to allow the sentinel’s to travel. My minions, while not actually eldritch, are registered as eldritch.”

I raised an eyebrow, “How do you know that?”

“Because the dumbass tried capturing one once.”

Torix frowned, “An entire army of minions disintegrate in seconds.” Torix sighed, “You’ll be able to sustain yourself within the dimension as well. My minions disintegrate into mana when exposed to the eldritch’s domain.”

“Man…Fuck. Gah, that sucks. Like, that really, really sucks.”

Torix nodded his head, “Indeed it does. I’m sorry the burden of this task belongs to you. The fortunate piece of this puzzle is that you have time. Time to forge yourself into a warrior that even Yawm may fear.”

I leaned onto my knees, breathing out for a moment. Despite how insane the plan sounded, defeating Yawm by whittling away his entire army of followers sounded even more insane. Yawm had so many strengths, beating him in direct combat may not even be possible. Using this kind of cunning would work well by comparison.

Besides, I didn’t want to spend the next 50 years reaching Yawm’s level.

I banged my fists into my knees, the force of the strikes breaking the planks of wood further. My dexterity and heightened senses let me disperse the force better. Otherwise I’d fall through the floor. I lifted myself up,

“Alright, I’ll do it. I have a better option though.”

Torix raised an eyebrow, “And what might that be?”

“We kill one of the followers, get sentinel rights from Schema, then use the spear they give us.”

Kessiah leaned back, her lips pursed, “Heh, I guess we could do that.”

Torix cupped his chin, “Indeed we could. We could then send each of his other followers to random worlds or dimensions. That would leave Yawm all alone, ripe for the taking.”

I opened my arms, “I know right? I’m a genius.”

Torix lifted out his hand and thumped my nose. With my armor reinforcing my flesh, Torix’s finger clanged against the skin and bone. Torix pulled his finger back,

“What in the name of Schema is that?”

I tapped my head with my gauntlet. A dull clang let out like a piece of metal covered in playdough. I grinned,

“The armor reinforces my bones and muscles. That’s why my damage resistance is up to 98%.”

Kessiah walked over. She put her thumb into her mouth, biting down through her skin. Blood leaked down her hand before she wiped it onto her index finger. She walked over and flicked me. My head swung back like I was impacted by a sledgehammer. She grinned,

“I’ve got a few new tricks up my sleeve.”

I frowned, “What the fuck was that?”

Torix frowned, “Hemomancy. The process of using blood for magic.”

“What the fuck? Where was that when you fought Dakhma?”

Kessiah glanced down, her face harsh. She grimaced, “I didn’t want to use it.”

I spread my hands, “What, why?”

Torix shook his head, “It’s long and complicated. We’ll speak with you later.”

She placed a hand on his shoulder, “Enough of that. He isn’t some kid you took under your wing anymore. He’s one of us. The guys going into a different dimension for Schema’s sake. The least I can do is explain.”

She glanced back at me, “Uh, well…” She let her hand off Torix, letting her arms flop on her sides,

“I’ll get to the point. I had a daughter. She was very…talented in hemomancy. Most of my family was. The thing is, hemomancy is tough to control. Once the spell has been cast, it will draw however much blood it needs from you. Even if you die, it will continue draining you to a dry husk.”

I frowned, “Did your daughter mess up a spell?”

Kessiah shook her head, “No. Another one of her classmates did during a demonstration. The way it works is the spell will drain you of blood till you die. If it still needs mana, it will take on hosts until it has enough to complete itself. Her classmate overexerted herself and died. The spell kept draining blood from her classmates.”

Kessiah stopped talking for a moment. She took a breath, “And my daughter, being the brave little girl she was, tried to help her classmates. She ended up stopping it from draining the entire room. But…”

Kessiah closed her eyes. A moment passed again, and she opened them, “The spell cast and destroyed the entire portion of the space shuttle. Everyone died. Everyone.”

I glanced at the broken planks beneath me. A long, awkward silence passed the room. It was a suffocating sort of silence, one of those kinds of silences that makes the air heavy and makes you wish you were somewhere else.

Torix interrupted that silence, “The greatest tragedy is for a parent to outlive their child.” He placed a hand on her shoulder. Kessiah shook her head, and as if the gloom was never there, she shrugged,

“And that’s why I haven’t done any hemomancy since. It’s dumb, childish even. I couldn’t bring myself to do it until after you saved me from Dakhma. Made me realize this isn’t some game. I can’t be a spoiled kid and not do something just because it’s unpleasant.”

A sad, slight grin traced her lips, “If I keep living in the past, I’ll never have a future.”

She took a step forward, ruffling the hair on my head.

“Come on big man. We got a mission we need to finish. You need the dungeon cores right? You gained a few levels.”

I glanced at Torix. He was pokerfaced, so I just turned back to her,

“Uh. Yeah. I forgot to mention it, but one of my trees lets me get more dungeon cores. I need, I don’t know…at least ten.”

Kessiah nodded, unzipping the gray knapsack at her side. Pulling out the ring and opened the starry sky portal. Reaching her hands into it, she pulled out five dungeon cores. She handed them to me before reaching into the portal and taking out a few more.

The cores sunk into my armor on contact, notifications popping up in the corner of my vision. It took a total of seventeen cores before my armor ceased absorbing them. Torix sighed,

“This is a fortune’s worth of cores. I hope you’re willing to pay that debt in time.”

I picked up a dungeon core from the floor, the black sphere surrounded in red clanking onto the floor. It bounced off my armor, no longer sinking in once I hit my dungeon core cap. I glanced at it,

“I think hopping into that dimension will suffice.”

I handed the core back to Kessiah, “Thanks for all the cores. I’ll put them to good use, I assure you.”