Disembarked (Patreon)

[Announcement : I've been crazy overwhelmed with work (thanks to a string of resignations at my office) lately, so I'm announcing 20 July 2022 to be on break. I'll let the current stockpile of chapters to post as I've already scheduled them, and the posting break after that. Effectively I'll stop writing for a week and focus on my work, and you guys will see the effects 3 weeks down the road]

Year 211  - Edna’s POV

***

Lumoof was in bad shape, Edna knew when Aeon said it would take for him a few days to recover. The patriarch of the Treeologies was almost never out for a few days, so what transpired didn’t seem good.

Yet, she had a feeling it wasn’t all that bad.

“Edna, get ready. Stella’s giving us the location now.” The sky told them the general direction. The riftgate opened so high up in the sky, and what followed was a streak of light that burned through the sky.

The demon king had somehow opened it’s rift way up in the sky, and was on track to-

A sudden shockwave of magic rippled through the air.

Everyone felt the explosion, especially those on the Northern parts of the Eastern Continent. It landed so strongly that a huge burst of wind temporarily destabilised the regular weather patterns.

Her skin felt a little tickled at the sensation of the unstable magic within the swirling winds, and she waited briefly for it to settle. Edna tapped the teleportation scroll, and chanted the coordinates. “Alright. Let’s go.”

She wondered whether it world work, but then she smiled when the stored magic from within the scroll activated. She felt it tug, and they were teleported about half a day’s distance away from the impact site, on what was once a beautiful natural beach.

Instead, her eyes saw a vast charred crater, and at the center, a demon king that looked burnt and glowed. It’s magical energies felt unsure, and that was when Edna knew something was wrong.

“Aeon, the demon king looks like it’s been through something.” Magical communications still worked, and Edna quickly went through her preparations.

The massive demon king was visibly injured from the impact, it’s outer shell charred and twisted, and Edna felt unusual magical energies radiating from many parts, as if some of it’s magic from travelling through the land between worlds had not been completely removed.

There were smaller explosions, and the demon king seemed to reel from the impact.

“What the hell is happening?” Roon asked, but he was getting ready..

“I don’t know, but we should attack. Hit it while it’s weak.”

The heroes clearly thought the same. They arrived no later than Edna, and began their attack after a short minute. This was an advantage, and they were not going to waste it.

Edna took out javelins made of anti-mana glass, loaded with as many non-magical enchantments the central continent’s blacksmiths and weavers could fit. Then she popped a few elixirs, and felt her strength surge through her blood and muscles.

There were ‘better’ magical equivalents, but this was what they have to work with.

The heroes’ first wave of attacks landed with a loud explosion, and a smaller shockwave. Every explosion was physical, they felt it in the air, as the shockwave passed through their body.

She sometimes had dreams of these shockwaves. Or maybe nightmares. Moments when she thought about fighting demon kings. She took a breath, and those thoughts faded.

She focused on the giant before them.

The demon king was huge, and the heroes’ attacks only took out chunks of its massive outer shell. From afar, the heroes were explosive fire ants, trying to kill an injured giant tortoise.

The heroes tried magic, and magic seemed to work.

Then, the demon king opened one of it’s undamaged eyes. For a brief moment, Edna felt magic around them ‘attempt’ drain away, but then just as suddenly, it was interrupted. The demon king jerked, and seemed to ‘cough’, if such a thing was possible for the demon king.

Instead, they saw green streaks appearing throughout the demon king’s body, and it felt strange, familiar. It pulsed in resistance, and for a moment, Edna felt like it was ‘fighting’ the demon king.

What was Lumoof and Aeon doing back on the Sandworld? Aeon’s attempts to inject it with his ‘seed’ actually succeeded?

“Aeon, is that you?” Edna asked. There was no reply.

“What are we seeing, exactly?” Roon asked through their shared magical network, which thankfully wasn’t drained away. “It wasn’t like this when we saw it down there.”

“I have no idea.” Edna said as she approached the massive body and hacked at it. It didn’t do anything, but their attacks hardly hurt.

The magical suppression aura from the demon king seemed weak, and unstable. There were sudden periods when magic was suppressed, and then, periods when it wasn’t.

The heroes clearly figured it out, as Edna watched them time their magical attacks during the gaps.

Those magical attacks exploded on it’s massive shell, and more of it were blown off. Edna, realising that her attacks were still not that useful, decided to retreat and provide defense for her peers.

Most of the attacks from the demon king seemed to be physical, as it launched rocks and massive boulders at extremely high speeds. With magic not fully suppressed, it wasn’t a problem for her magical shields to block, and when magic was suppressed, she could easily manifest skill-based shields to divert the attacks.

For a moment, it all seemed to be going well.

Roon and Johann clearly looked uncomfortable, but they didn’t say a word. Edna knew something was wrong, and her peers knew it too.

She noticed it when they fired their attacks a little slower, and kept their eyes looking. Johann’s companion beasts also stopped attacking, and focused on watching.

Edna sighed, and decided to ask. “Aeon, do you feel anything?” She inwardly cursed, and felt Lumoof’s absence from the battle.

“My magical sensors are detecting ripples from the battle. Is everything alright?”

“I don’t know. It looks like it’s going according to plan.” Edna got in position and felt one of the large rocks smash into her shield.

Roon was the first to notice it, when they saw the crumbled chunks turn to sand. Dark, dirt-like but very clearly sand. Black sands.

The demon king’s residual energies were still uncertain, and one magical explosion ripped the shell in half. It cracked open, and then, smaller demons emerged. In the hundreds and thousands, they were the lizards they’ve fought.

“Ah darn. Mobs.” Roon cursed, but somehow it relieved their tension. Fighting the demon king was always stressful, and they could really use Lumoof’s calming presence. The mobs died easily, their anti-magic energies had been weakened.

Alka didn’t wasn’t in the plan for the battle, since his focus had been magical bombs. So, the initial plan mostly assumed magical bombs would be useless, but from the heroes’ attack, that wasn’t true. They still packed a punch.

Then, the air around the demon king started to swirl, and the black sands started to form a barrier around the demon king.

Giant wurms made of rock and sand surged out of the ground.

“Is it me, or is this a little easy?” Roon cursed as his anti-magic glass arrow punched through the giant wurm’s body.

At the same time, the demon king roared.

Johann rolled his eyes. “You had to fucking say it.”

“I couldn’t keep it in forever.” Roon quipped as he took cover behind Edna’s shield. “The tension was getting to me.”

Acid began to pour out of the demon king’s body, and this time, the anti-magical energies in the land really surged. They felt like they were back on the Sandworld once more. The thick acid flooded the crater.

The heroes lost their ability to fly, as the antimagical energies jammed their magical movement. “Oh dear.” Prabu and Colette cursed as they felt some of their magical attacks drain away.

Their fireballs got smaller as it travelled above the acid-filled crater, their lightning bolts seemed to shrink and weaken.

The demon king essentially made a moat, A crater-lake of antimagic acid around it’s main body.

“This is all your fault.” Johann said, but his attacks increased in frequency. He fired more of the glass arrows, but they seemed to do nothing.

Roon just rolled his eyes. “It’s a fucking coincidence. We all knew this was going to happen one way or another.”

Edna just smirked, as they retreated up the crater to the rim. “Well, boys, there’s a lake between us and the demon king. Ideas?”

“We need to drain this acid away. We can just knock a hole in the crater’s rim and acid should be able to flow out.” Roon said.

Edna nodded. “Agreed.”

The heroes stood on the rim and launched their ranged skills, but with their arsenal of skills restricted by the anti-magic lake and the large distance to its large body, the rate of damage was easily halved.

“Alright.” Roon nodded and pinged Alka. “Alka, we need earthbusting bombs here.”

“Got it.”

The skies suddenly flashed, as multiple projectiles flew their way. The bombs detonated on the rim of the crater, and even though some of it’s effectiveness was drained away, it achieved it’s goal. The crater-lake started to leak, and the acid started to flow out into the city.

“Stella! We need a portal! We need some platforms.”

A black void portal emerged a distance away. Stella couldn’t activate it close to the crater, but Aeon’s roots began to shift the earth around them. A few platforms of rocks emerged throughout the crater, but before any larger space could be created, the demon king’s mouth opened.

The very presence of Aeon’s roots seemed to cause the demon king to roar and then it blasted acid towards the direction of Stella’s portal.

“How’d it know?” Stella asked. The portal forcefully closed when acid smashed into it.

Roon shook his head. “I think Aeon’s been bugging it so much on its homeworld that it remembered Aeon’s presence.”

Edna smirked. “You’re saying Aeon irritated the demon king.”

“Is that not what Aeon did?” The acid flowed slowly out of the crater, and the heroes moved closer to attack on the platform.

The heroes closed in and attacked with all their might. Then, the demon king’s body cracked apart, and then.. It split

“Uh.” They pointed, as they saw the demon king crack apart, and transform into five smaller demon kings. “I hate split-body demon kings.”

It roared, and attempted to open a rift. But then, one of the split-bodies was covered with green streaks and it glowed. The rift collapsed before it could open. Edna once again felt that familiar presence, and wondered...

Had Aeon somehow corrupted the demon king?

***

The heroes engaged the split bodies, and honestly, they were not exceptional. They were tough, but relative to Sabnoc or Akkila, this was probably a whole grade weaker.

It almost seemed like it was under the effect of some kind of weakening effect, so, when they successfully destroyed two of the split bodies, they eventually focused on the third one.

The crater-lake was half-drained, and that meant their spells’ effectiveness had recovered somewhat. It was odd that the anti-magical properties were contained within the liquid, instead of it’s main body.

The third and fourth split body was destroyed a while later, again, without any particularly unique gimmicks. It seemed to rely on it’s high strength and toughness, but beyond that, the heroes took them down.

Down to it’s fifth body, it roared, and then the acid started to float. The heroes attacked it relentlessly, and they hoped to interrupt the transformation.

And they did.

It cracked and then, just as it’s outer shell vanished, it revealed a round black-green crystal.

The heroes knew what it was, and immediately teleported away. Everyone else warped away, except for Edna.

Edna felt a pulse from the crystal, filled with dense anti-magical qualities. It was good that the heroes warped out at first sight. If they get caught in the pulse, they wouldn’t be able to leave, or defend themselves from the explosion.

She activated her [Duty Beyond Life and Death]. Edna sped ahead and went as close as possible to the black green crystal. She had a javelin made of anti-mana glass and stabbed it. It cracked the crystal and then she felt the crystal pulsed.

The glass crystal glowed as it absorbed mana, then it cracked.

She took out a few more, and stabbed it in again. Each of the anti-magic glass javelins sucked mana out of the crystal, and interfered with whatever reaction that happened within it. It was amazing how these glass weapons seemed to work better than Aeon’s vines in some way.

The green-black crystal pulsed weakly.

And then, with a whimper, stopped.

[Demon King Busihir was defeated]

Edna smiled, and gave the all clear once there was no explosion for ten minutes.

“Stella. Portal, please.”

A void portal swirled open right next to the green-black crystal, and Aeon’s roots surged out. It wrapped itself around the crystal like a hungry octopus consuming its prey, and once it had a good grip, pulled it through the portal.

The air was still filled with the anti-magic qualities. Edna began to check the other destroyed bodies, and noticed it had begun its transformation into daemolite.

Yet her eyes were drawn to the remains of the body with black-and-green streaks. It wasn’t transforming into daemolite. As she got close, and investigated, it really felt like Aeon’s energies, and her mind began to speculate whether Aeon’s constant magical harassment during its gestation period interfered with its development.

“Aeon, we should look at this too.”

A void portal appeared next to her, and again, roots and vines pulled the remains through.

A demon king was slain once more. Honestly, it felt like a chore, and Edna wondered whether this was how Aeon felt. It had seen so many generations of demon kings, and participated in so many of its’ conflicts.

This was a tiring, tiring chore.

***

[REPEAT. Announcement : I've been crazy overwhelmed with work (thanks to a string of resignations at my office) lately, so I'm announcing 20 July 2022 to be on break. I'll let the current stockpile of chapters to post as scheduled, and the posting break after that]