So, something had gone slightly wrong.
Not the part where I lay against the wall with three punctures in my void armor and the rest of it wrecked. That was easily fixed and hardly a nuisance.
Not the part where my stone tablet had survived four consecutive human punches. Clay golems were not meant to endure that well. But for as perplexing as that was, who cared?
My only problem was to figure out how to possibly satisfy that human.
The clay plates on my body were almost all repaired. I cast the whole armor away and tried to get up, only to slip up a bit. Okay, my stone tablet was probably damaged after all. Just fine. A moment to summon the iron plates again and there I was, good as new.
I stumbled out of the wooden cabin. Time for me to reajust a bit.
"Calisle." I called. "Where is the human?"
He was still wearing the amber pendant and, as such, I should have been able to track his movements. But while I could tell he was still somewhere on the Parao, where on the ship was far harder to pinpoint, let alone perceive what he was doing.
The mocking voice answered me from below.
"May it be that your prey has escaped you?" And he chuckled. "You will find him at the stern."
The second castle. The priestess.
The door opened on the hallway and already I could sense that the mood had shifted. The music was gone, the perfumes damaged by a stench of death.
"Know that were that bird to fall, the words of Hashal will be mine."
"Sure, whatever."
Of course, the human was favored to win. But I also knew not to underestimate the bird monster. Any accident and the wounded teenager risked a brutal death.
After which I would be the one to reduce her and the whole ship to cinders.
But for now I had to stumble my way into the corridor, carpets muffling my steps. And I had not gone far when the whole ship shook and cracked.
The ground tilted.
"Oh, I may have skipped a detail." The mocking voice slipped in.
Heavy bells started to ring all over the Parao. Monsters rushed from its bowels, up and toward the threat. They couldn't tell if it was me or something else but since I was going up myself, they passed me by without much attention.
Up the stairs and on the deck to see a giant snake ensnaring the vessel.
Muasin...
This was her magical trace, her essence, but what was trying to crack the ship in two was rather an elemental. Either way it was absurd. That snake was still in chains, bound by the human...
Oh no. No he would not have.
"He ordered the snake to destroy the ship, didn't he."
"And now, which will you stop? Or will you let the both of them rampage?"
The answer came the moment I could spy on the pendant again.
Because the human was reaching the first castle and from there the friction that had kept him out of reach receded.
He was massacring everyone on his glorious path. As monsters came out to meet the threat they fell on him, saw the human tear their own apart and engaged him with zeal, only to join the carcasses.
One of them still held in his hand I recognized.
But he dropped it, crossed the first castle to the second and entered the priestess' cabin.
She was waiting for him, the scepter held behind her back, one leg raised.
I was engaging the elemental outside. But for all the power I had, any exertion risked breaking the tablet further and so I limited myself to smashing it with a warhammer. More than enough for the spirit to loosened its grip on the central hull.
It unwound and slid on the deck, over the centerline superstructure and to the other side to crack a mast.
In the cabin, the priestess watched the human approach.
"Where is Kaele?" She asked.
"He would not stay down." He cracked his fingers.
First lesson, enemies never waited on you. Second lesson, that bird monster was light and fast. Flurry! He was barely able to block the claws tearing at his flesh, felt the scepter's pole hit his belly with enough shock to stun him an instant.
Then the same pole his behind his knee and send him down.
She spun and whipped his head with enough strength to have him bounce off when he hit the floor, right on a magic circle that flared. Impale!
But the human dodged it and got back up, only a bit dizzy for all that trade.
"Lively!" He joked, his fists ready. "My turn now."
While the stern castle shattered, I was still busy pursuing the elemental that was now assailing the starboard hull. My warhammer fell on its head, cracking both of them only to see the beast slam me and throw me back on the deck.
That wasn't just the snake's potency. Through the chains, that was the human speaking.
So much for holding back.
Around us the whole rigging was crumbling down, sails breaking into sandy rain. The ship listed to the right until the keel on that side broke off completely.
Fine.
I sat on the floorboards and started to chant.
And while I did, the human was trying to catch the bird that was dancing around him and still lashing at him from all sides.
He could block well enough, but struggled to parry, let alone dodge, and kept missing his attacks. Or was he biding his time? Either way her attacks could hardly dent him.
They finally met each other when his fist got blocked by the priestess' scepter.
"Learn all you want." She muttered. "You will remain ignorant."
"Oh I'm sure you are just brimming with wisdom!"
Hit! A jab had her pushed back two steps. Hit! Another punch bloodied her garnments. Hit! She had pierced his chest and nearly got to his heart.
Before she could exploit it, one more jab had the feathers on her head blackened and she stumbled backward, reeling.
"You know everything better and everyone has to do things your way! And when it doesn't work you just find a scapegoat and keep going! I bet this ride is a ton of fun for you!"
"Enjoy the realm while you can."
He charged her, hit with a force that had a large part of the stern castles crumble. But she had dodged already and now the fog was catching him.
Moonlight fell on the Parao. Rays of light by the dozens hitting the monsters and making them glow. My chant was complete but I would maintain the ritual for as long as needed.
"He is still standing." The birdy voice escaped the mist.
A second and she fell on him like a ghost, slashed his back and retreated. The wound, like all others, simply subsided, vanished quickly to leave only his dark skin pristine.
He thought he had found her shade, hit and watched the fog scatter in his punch's trail, only for the bird monster to leap on his side and plunge the talons from her hands and feet into his flesh. Her beak went for his neck, only missed by a bit before he threw her back.
By now the elemental was getting shredded.
A crowd of monsters so far overwhelmed, picked off to be devoured, had now taken the best of it and dug on its rings, tore the elemental matter to the point of shattering the whole mass. This was the breaking point. It shrieked and vanished.
With this I could get up and end the fight at the stern. But I was only standing for two seconds when I crumbled back down.
Ah. My stone tablet. No telling how bad it was, actually.
The monsters around, humanoid or otherwise, wanted to help me but I pushed them away. A golem that could not move by itself was useless.
As for why both of them back there were not fighting in earnest, I could only guess.
The human was holding back. No matter how badly the wounds he received could look, he was actually doing mighty fine and could have blasted the whole stern, his enemy included.
The priestess had yet to use any totem or ritual. She too was focused purely on defense and so their clashes sought only to hold the other in check.
When the elemental fell, that balance changed.
In a renewed attack, the human blocked the scepter, time and again, fell back and dodged her claws, only to walk into a new magic circle. Paralysis! It hardly affected him, but enough for her pummel him.
His whole body got covered with gashes, stunned by the scepter's hits before she went for his heart again, pierced the chest and this time clutched it!
Only to scream and let go.
The snake, still chained, had clutched her and bit her arm.
She let go of her scepter, staggered and fell on her knees. The serpent only let go when she was about to go limp and crumble. Over her the teenager caught her head by the feathers and dragged her back up.
Hit. Hit. Hit. He was using her as a punching ball.
"I should have done that a long time ago!" He rejoiced.
She still found the strength to catch his arm, got punched once more and fell to the ground. He crouched to pick her back up, his hand covering her bloodied face.
"With this, your rule of torment is over!"
The bird in his clutch started to giggle. A weak, joyful giggle. Throughout it all her eyes had stayed warded and now, she sounded mad.
"You idiot!" I yelled.
I was still stumbling toward the wreck that had become the Parao's stern. He could not see me through the mist that engulfed them both but my voice was carrying just fine.
"You just condemned a thousand monsters to starve in the desert! Wherever you bring that crowd will be too depleted to welcome them! Rule of torment? Wait to see what happens to the stranded!"
He looked in my direction, then back at the bird in his hand.
"Last words?"
She was still giggling, almost mocking now. Like a little girl. That's when he noticed her feathers cracking under his fingers. Her face breaking into pieces, same as chalk.
Her beak still managed to utter: "Long live the tyrant."
And she was gone.
Without her, the mist quickly dissipated, leaving the human and his new snake pet to turn toward me. And me, the void armor in brilliant silver, struggling to stay standing.
I had many, many things to tell that fool but my mind was too scrambled to even try.
So he talked first: "Man, don't make such a long face!" He mocked. "Monsters cross the desert all the time, it's no big deal!"
No. No, actually, monsters did not cross the desert. If he knew anything about magic, and the drain, he would have understood that. But I didn't feel like giving him a basic lesson.
Rather, I let him crow.
He picked the amber pendant at his neck and called the skeletal wyvern: "Eh, Boney? You said you wanted to kill all humans, right? How about you give me a ride?"
No voice answered him, but after a few seconds the ground warped and a skull large as a house emerged. The whole beast climbed the stern to reach his caller.
He brought his sole wing to his face and answered.
"Very well, little lamb. Let us see if you truly have the embers of a lion."
The beast brought forth its paws and, between the claws, formed a sphere for the human to climb to. He turned back to me before doing so. The snake hissing, fighting the chains at his side.
"How about it, Kaele? I am going to kill the Earth! You'll see, it will be better for everyone!"
And since I would not answer, he shrugged and jumped in the sphere, to be dragged away.
"See you!"
I stood immobile long after he was gone.