Conquest Of The Fallen: Dark Dominions

"The Old gods are fierce, wrathful. But they did not wipe out the ancient ones in a hail of fire."

Damnamenaeus ended his tale about his origins of faith in the forsaken patheon of Eldoria in this manner. It was fifteen minutes since they had first met this [Arcane Order] druid and Rafel was liking his presence so far.

After he had withdrawn the scroll Indira gave him and handed it over Damnamenaeus, the man had given it a quick look before clicking his fingers. And the entire thing had vanished in a flash. Rafel had guessed they would come back to it later.

At the moment, Damnamenaeus was riding on the mammoth ox with Khalifa. He clutched to the Hijabi whenever the animal rocked.n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

Rafel had an amused smile when Khalifa cut eyes at him. The girl was too uptight. She needed a man's arms around her, for godssake. This was good. They were coming up to the stronghold of Zaftig's camp, and Rafel could already see watch-tower guards mounting up archers. Only this time their arrows were fucking cannon guns.

"Nice." Ravenna looked it over.

"Well, that's not what we heard." Khalifa took the Supreme Druid back to his earlier statement. "The Old gods are hated for a reason, even after the hundreds of years since it happened. I mean it can't all be a lie. A firestorm is a pretty harsh way to go. The history books describe it as a nuclear singularity. It wiped out the Old world."

Damnamenaeus laughed to Khalifa's quoting; he still clutched to her like a darned quilt.

"I am a Historian. Don't quote texts at me. In the Script of Avalon—which is faerie-written mind you, it details the abhorrent hail of that era as man-made. The firestorm you call it, but really; a coagulation of [Consequence]: which is adverse reaction of magic by the way, that vortexed into something way beyond control.

"The ancients were just desperate for somewhere to blame their ills. The Old gods were never the enemy. And they aren't now."

Khalifa scrunched up her nose, her lips thinning, clearly having a crisis of faith. Rafel just listened to them go on, as he eyed the tower guards of Zaftig's camp—who eyed the approaching company right back.

"How old are you anyway?"

"I am an Immortal." Damnamenaeus returned. "Go figure."

"Ugh! Now I remember why I hate druids." Khalifa pushed her ox forward faster. She bit her tongue on this last part. "Braggart pricks."

It was a good thing no one who could read minds currently traveling in the company, did. Because then the Hijabi ladyguard would have to explain to an S-rank [1st Order] mage why she was referring to him as a penis. Damnamenaeus was not bald; he still had the brown locks of his youth. Wiry with streaks of white in immortality, sure, but still, hair.

Why then did she compare him to a phallus?

Druids never got metaphors. Funny story there.

"HALT YOUR STRIDES!"

The caravan of weary travelers rolled to a stop at the thunderous salute. Everyone from Khalifa's end to the Guide raised their heads. The booming order carried on the wind. And they followed it to the belchy, bobbing throat of a captain on the watchtower. He stood straighter than the spire beside him.

Khalifa cleared her throat loudly. "Ideas? Anyone? Or am I the only one seeing the dozens of cannon heads pointed at us?"

No one in the company shifted gaze, but they were all awaiting instruction from Rafel. He didn't give one. In fact, his stare reflected boredom. Corazón surmised that this wasn't good, for the watchtower and its guards. 'Don't hold up guns to the head of the Apollyon, if you don't plan on fucking using it.'

"DECLARE YOURSELVES!" The captain announced. He boomed into a silver Ogre-horn that amplified his voice ten hundred times, bringing it clear across the sands between them. The distance from the company's position to the walls of Zaftig's camp was run-able. A single leap with his [Kangaroo Mutant] ability and Rafel would be over the battlements—and the tower guards would be fucked.

But he wanted Zaftig's help. That started with trust. And trust started with not bringing down his camp's walls like fucking Jericho.

So Israfel held back.

"Uh... Sire, are we going to say something?" The thin Guide called shakily from the back.

Rafel held up a hand. "Still your heart, Bacca. Their cannons shall not find relief in your bodies." And to Damnamenaeus he turned next. His leopard eyes fixed on the druid riding the back of Khalifa, her ox at his side. He said to the learned Magus, "Look alive, sorcerer."

Just at the moment of his words, an abrupt order left the mouth of the captain. Thus he commanded his archers, "I have no patience for fools. This is our camp. The crest of Lord Zaftig. Stronghold of the Third Desert Triumvirate. LOOSE!"

Arrows—like a splintered flash of one gigantic lightning came hurtling out of the sky.

It poured down, the silvered tips sparkling in the quick darkness encroaching the country. It the far reaches of the Badlands, it was already night.

"Now, Damnamenaeus!" Israfel boomed.

Somehow, his own baritone rang louder than the captain and his horn. His voice was the growl of a timber wolf. Ten feet from the arrows finding clean piercings in the flesh of the company, the Druid raised his hands and beckoned to their circle runes of elemental magic. The fingers of Damnamenaeus electrified, charging with eerie blue sparks. The clouds above the entire camp, from where Israfel's company stood, to the watchtowers, went blacker than normal night.

Cold winds blew across the deserts terrain.

Shrizz. Shrizz. Shrizz. The gales howled.

A [Plate Of Malevolence] erupted above them, blasting into the air: a solidified pentagon nimbus. The arrows instead met with it. And it liquefied them all. It exploded the arrowheads, turning hooks of silver to mere dust. Fragments of the archers cannons: bullet-arrows with detonators at their heads, instead crashed to the [Plate Of Malevolence] which Damnamenaeus summoned.

The guns stopped firing. The archers fell back. In sixty seconds, the discharge of cannons were nothing more than blackened stains the shape of tears on the sands.

Damnamenaeus dropped his hands. The glowing pentagon fizzed out. The sky cleared, but not so much. It was full night now.

Aside Israfel and the Magus, the rest in the company had the same smitten looks on their faces as those of the watchguards high on the walls of the stronghold. Khalifa did actually turn back in the saddle they shared to give the brown-haired Historian another once-over. She made two doubletakes. They were all like: "What the fuck?!"

Rafel gazed straight ahead, saying without moving the perch of his gilded eyes, "wonderfully done, sorcerer."

He then lifted his voice to answer the captain of the watchtowers summons, to which he had before ignored. Rafel spoke thus: "if we were invaders, your walls will be but grass we'd trample over." He paused a second to let this sink in. "Now, let down your FUCKING GATES!"

On the crest of the stronghold, the captain was weakened. He had just bore witness to the manifestation of a [Bhután Shield].

The [Plate Of Malevolence] was Divine. A god-level Influence.

Yet, he had watched this man's wizard toss it like a mere [Apparition Cloak]. How much more the man himself?

"LET IT DOWN!" The captain charged his guards immediately.

A minute later, as the company rode under the steel gates of the stronghold, marching their caravan of tired asses in a straight calvary, Khalifa said softly to Rafel. "How did you know the Druid would come through?" Rafel breathed easily. "I didn't."

"What? Then wh—"

"I trusted instead his capability as a man. His ego as a wizard. . .to prove to the watchguards of this place that we are the ones calling the shots." Rafel smiled. They were inside the fort now, cantering along cobblestones of Zaftig's camp as Deathlie soldiers stared from the sides. "Just look at them," said Rafel, "you can taste their fear. Had we submitted to an inquisition when their captain declared for one, we would be all but hounded by intimidating stares now. But look at them almost bow before us now.

"We have the upper hand. And they'll be fucking eager to hear what we have to say now." He ended.

"Wow! Damn. No wonder you've got three freaking girlfriends!" Khalifa didn't intend to say this aloud, but she did. She was in awe of this man. The Lord of Rebels. Kingslayer. And Champion of Hel before all that.

The camp was vast, structured like a cross between a Roman legionnaire war-keep and a small Victorian town. They cantered on straight as the Guide suddenly found his voice—adrenaline-wise—and began regaling them all to his own personal history lesson on the Lord of the camp.

"Zaftig fancies himself as King. He calls this place the Brass Capital of the Continent. I guess in a way it is; this stronghold is the single most prominent and private-owned exporter of ores and rare metals. Leave the gold and jewels to Grone. Zaftig is the King of Copper, Nickel, and Brass. And every other fucking [mage metal] with no name.

"If it stores mana and sparkles in the night, he's got it."

Rafel entered [nominal space] for a quick second.

"We'll definitely need him on our side, Peitho."

His system spoke back in her lush syllables:

[Has he got any other choice?]

And Rafel smiled.

Before the largest Ironstone dome of the camp, a short man in flowing blue robes stood. He had a cane and the widest fucking smile.

But more than that, a lovely sixteen-year old at his side.

"Hail!" He introduced. "I am Zaftig, warden of this humble desert stronghold. My close associates just call me Lord Zaf—" Rafel was sure no one called him that; he listened anyway. "... but seeing you now, in person, Rebel Lord, I am sure we can be friends. Please, you must be tired from your journey, this is my daughter, Hosanna. She'll show you to your quarters."

He passed a hand to the angelic pixie at his side, and before Zaftig even finished speaking, Rafel and his company were already very, very grateful for Hosanna.

"—and once again, friends, welcome to my home: Caer Mullhen." The Skullrider King pulled his navy robes about his short self. His stature was not impish, but not imposing either.

"Oh, Caer Mullhen?" Khalifa said. "Is that what this place is called?"

Zaftig ignored her frank question. But Rafel wasn't looking at him either. He and his harem were rather looking at the lovely, quiet form beside.

Hosanna, he inferred.

What gospel name?