Unbound
Chapter Eight Hundred And Seventy Seven – 877

The Vessels of both gods darted away from him, but Felix wasn’t aiming at them.

He focused on the city below.

Fungal Horrors, shadowbeasts, and strange misshapen monstrosities moved among the waves. Many had unique names, but Felix didn’t care to learn them—in the Empire of the Fiend, they were called only one thing.

"Intruders!” he growled. “This place is mine!"

With a snap of ethereal jaws, everything within a thousand feet vanished into his maw.

Power rolled through Felix and he immediately siphoned it into Sovereign of Flesh, which consumed his Essence at breakneck speed to heal his god-given wounds.

Too Quick For Your Own Good, Nevarre! Noctis bellowed from her faceless chasm. Umbral Sculpting!

Shadow poured from her unnatural limbs, flowing outward like a liquid that sprouted, then cut itself off, sprouting into monsters. Below, the land beyond the walls were filled with their varied forms, each twice the size of a Human. They screeched and rushed the fortifications.

Felix mustered his Will again, but crimson lightning blasted into his back. He grunted and spun away from its onslaught—just in time to see the claws of shadow that dropped atop of him. He lifted his arms, blocking the attacks of some sort of wasp-scorpion, while winged apes bludgeoned him with their cudgel-like limbs.

“You’re all just a distraction!” He swiped his talons through their slick forms, rupturing their Bodies with a roar. Just as quickly as they were obliterated however, more congealed from the brooding sky, emerging as shadows between the rain.

Sovereign of Flesh.

Stolen power poured through his channels, raging across his flesh until his Body obeyed his shaped Intent. Dark scales sprouted, thickening across his chest and arms as he doubled in size and weight. Knight-like and brutal, he manifested midnight black armored plates whose joints and seams were filled with a red-gold incandescence. His claws extended into talons, slashing through the umbral nightmares, rending shadow flesh with every swipe as his face was covered by a featureless black helm.

How Pretty You Shine, False King.

The faceless goddess slammed herself into him, bashing him upward until the lower branches of the Spirit Tree. The thick appendages dimpled with the impact, too strong to break, but the goddess’ power could not be denied.

You Do Not Deserve The Light!

The leaves of Atlantes shook as if under a gale as shadowbeasts swarmed his location. Malformed and agile, they were custom made to rend and tear. Felix summoned the lightning, flitting among Atlantes’ branches, but the shadows were always there. Their mutable forms countered his speed with a strange fluidness that sought out the cracks in his armor with every strike.

Felix booted them through the skull and chest, ripping his way through just in time to see the faceless serpent that Noctis dwelled within, fading into transparency.

"Vessel's not too good, is it?" He asked with a grin that he knew she couldn't see, but at least she could feel the pitch of his Spirit.

It Is A Pity, her voice said, emanating from the thickening darkness beneath the leaves. My Shadows Are Too Weak To Contain Even A Sliver Of My Might. But Worry Not, Nevarre. What They Lack In Capacity, They Make Up For In Number.

A ripple of bloody obsidian split the world, and a huge snout framed by a mess of curling tusks emerged from within it. The shadowbeast spread its inky wings wide, lightning crashing around its Body, before its face collapsed into an endless hole, leaving only the tusks to jut out from the cavernous abscess.

She’s gonna keep body-jumping.I need to kill all of them at once to stop her.

You Are Distracted!

The Rotted Lion dropped upon him, smashing him in the back and driving him downward toward the earth. Felix grasped inward, sounding Sonata of Dominance. Fire shaped between his fingers as he reached back and snagged the beast's fur.

“Get bent!”

Yyero's malformed Vessel ignited, burning in a blaze across his head and chest. The Rotted Lion roared in pain. You Dare!

Felix bared his teeth and dug his talons into the muscle beneath. Sovereign of Flesh!

His power skidded across the Vessel's body, unable to grasp much at all. That brown and bronze aura protected it—a mantle that rebuffed his Will.

But not all of it.

Minor wounds split open across the Rotted Lion and Felix wasted no time. He drove his hands into the rents, talons extended, before tearing outward. Ichor sprayed across the sky, so thick and dark they were like new wings. Yyero roared, his voice choked not with pain but fury. Each wound sprouted with fungal rot, blooming into a wild appendage that slammed Felix straight into the chest.

Like a rocket, he was blasted to the earth, smashing into the ground just outside the walls of Elderthrone. He cratered the ground, crushing Fungal Horrors and shadowbeasts alike with the sheer pressure of his impact.

Damn it. Felix stood up, stone crumbling around him. Dirt and spores drifted in the air like smoke. Those Vessels can hit.

Puppets of decay and night raced toward him, varied feet pounding the drenched and rutted earth. He stood in a No Man’s Land just beyond the city walls, where hunks of ice, boulders, and baked stumps were between him and the horde.

Sonata of Dominance!

Fire answered his call, spinning around him as he summoned an inferno. Everything within forty yards of his position died, scorched to ash.

“Blasted by the Burning Eye!” someone cried.

"It's the Fiend!"

"The Emperor! He's here!"

Other voices took up the chant as Felix climbed from the crater. The Legion lined the wall just beyond the edge of his blazing inferno. Felix let the song of it subside to a distant hum and eyed them all. They looked exhausted and battered. Thousands lined the Fiendstone walls, now splattered with dark ichor and patches of charred fungus.

Further down the line, around the corner from his position, he heard more fighting. There, more monsters were besieging his city. He looked back up, trying to find the gods.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

This won’t end until they’re both dead. I gotta—

"Your Highness, look out!" someone cried.

He turned. Waves of Fungal Horrors and shadowbeasts had emerged from the dark forest beneath the lashing acid rain. They’re twisted forms were lit only by the glow of his Fiendstone walls and the crash of crimson lightning across the skies. The shadowbeasts screamed, bellowing in a rage he had no doubt was an echo of their masters, while the Fungal Horrors said not a word, only charged.

Manifestation of the Coronach!

Felix’s power rolled outward, spreading over the fields as far as he could see.

Status condition: A Crisis Of Faith Failed.

He wasn't surprised. The creatures charging him weren't sapient enough to have Wills of their own. They were empty puppets, immune to his debuff. But then, reducing their Will with Crisis of Faith wasn’t the point.

A surprised shout came up from the wall as a brilliant red-gold light bloomed among every member of the Legion within range. Thousands of them shone in the dark as a deep, echoing chorus shook the battlements.

Status Condition: Rallying Cry.

Doubles Regeneration For All Allies In Range For Five Minutes. Reduced Chance Of Frightened Status By 80%.

Manifestation of the Coronach is level 85!

The power spread outward, Rallying Cry moving across his populace like a wave of red-gold light. The skill had a range that was only determined by his will and intent, and both of his were mighty for he was the emperor and this was his city.

Rallying Cry, Really? Yyero landed on the ground, exploding earth into the air. Legionnaires on the walls were blasted back by the shockwave, and Felix’s shaped flames tore through the onrushing horde. Yyero, however, stood unaffected by his power. A Pathetic Salve For A Mortal Wound. Let Me Show You The True Use Of Power.

Blightweave!

Waves of dark entropy emanated from the Rotted Lion, dripping from his wings and spreading like corruption through the air, earth, and every piece of living material. The ground sprouted with fungal growths while trees twisted and rotted away, tumbling into clumps of fetid fertilizer. More Horrors rose from the ground, breeding out of the Blightweave, but the worst were those that were already present. Entropic energy filled those monstrosities, swelling them in size as their mushroom flesh expanded, splitting into gilled ridges as they grew second heads and barbed tails covered in rotted fangs. Claws the size of wagons burst from the ends of arms long enough to reach the tops of the city walls. Dozens of them grew twice the size of the tallest of Humans, topping Felix by several feet as they charged forward, lashing out. Their strikes screamed through the air, forcing Felix to dodge back as they blasted furrows out of the earth.

Sovereign of Flesh! His skill skittered off the Horrors. They weren't made of flesh.

Yyero laughed. Try Again, Unbound.

“Try us instead!” A cry was taken up from the wall. Loquis, the half-orc captain stood front and center, a spear raised up. "Legion! Show them what we're made of!"

"Earthshaker Stomp!"

A row of mithril-armored soldiers leaped from the wall, dropping from the sky like bombs. They hit the earth with a calamitous crash, and the Horrors fell over as the earth was upset, staggering them all.

"Bonebreaker!"

A second group leapt beyond the first, each of them conjuring weapons of brilliant blue-white light before swinging them down in a devastating overhead smash. The shadowbeasts and Horrors at the forefront were shattered, their Bodies split wide open by the mighty blow.

“Piercing Crescent!”

A forward slash gleaming with blue-white light tore through space Bonebreaker cleared, passing among the horde like a shockwave. The swords of dozens of Legionnaires dripped with liquid Mana before a second Crescent was unleashed.

Loquis lifted his hand into the air, followed by nearly a hundred others, all of them robed in blue and cowled in deep purple.

“Stormlance!”

A crackling spear of lightning shot out from the Arclights, hitting the shadowbeasts before jumping outward into those around them. The monsters were tossed back, the horde broken. All save the biggest and most empowered by Yyero—those surged forward.

Felix met them himself.

Sovereign of Flesh, though he could not touch their hide, could alter his own. His hands and claws expanded upon his already massive body, slashing until they were twice the size of great swords. Felix swung his arms, slashing through the mighty Fungal Abominations. Claws and overlong limbs were severed in quick succession, their bodies toppling like wet cordwood. He snapped the teeth of his Empyrean Embrace and they all vanished, swallowed in an instant as he cleared the entire field of the dead.

Much to his surprise, Yyero had vanished as well.

Felix looked up, watching the retreating speck of the Rotted Lion. More monsters mustered in the forest, growing once again just out of range. He turned back to the wall and the soldiers that were already clambering back through the gates.

"Your Highness," Loquis shouted from atop the wall. "We can handle things here! Go!"

Felix rose on tendrils of lightning and retracted his helm with a flick of his Will. He smiled at the man. "I'll leave it to you then, Captain. Defend the city.”

“Aye sir!”

Adamant Discord!

He shot upward on a bolt of lightning, leaving the Legion behind…and honing in on the speck of vile bronze light that was the God of Rot.

Up there, well beyond the range of any of the defenders of his city, Yyero and Noctis were unleashing their power. Shadows froze buildings and streets before entropic bombs tore apart walls and structures with equal ease. People screamed, crying out as they fled and bled.

“Enough!” Felix intercepted their strikes, slamming both of his enlarged claws into the Vessels and forcing them to cut off their Skills. He tried once again to bite through their Vessels, but Yyero and Noctis danced away from him in another ripple of crimson shadow. They vanished before appearing a dozen yards away, dropping more of their might upon his city.

Half of a residential block exploded, blossoming with sprawling rot while wood and stone were shredded and frozen in equal measure.

“Your fight is with me!” Felix shaped fire and light at the both of them, but they dodged it easily.

Poor Emperor. Noctis’ voice was sickeningly sweet, but thunder roared behind it. Did You Think You Were Safe Behind These Walls? Did You Think That We Would Leave You Alone To Plot And Grow In Strength Before You Came For Your Unbound Brethren?

Shame On You For Not Moving Faster, Yyero chided. For Licking Your Wounds Instead Of Pressing Your Advantage. You ate a god, Felix! They both cut across him, slicing into his Body in the back and front. Felix bit back his screams. Now You're Letting Mere Journeymen And Adepts Fight Your Battles Down Below.

Felix sped forward on tethers of lightning, claws tearing through the Rotten Lion and severing one of its fungal limbs. He spun, kicking off air he shaped solid and redirected himself into a leap. Shadowbeasts split into smoking ichor—until he was seized across the chest by that winged ape. Claws tore into his scales before he severed the goddess’ arms and fell out of the sky once more.

The Child Has Always Been A Coward, Noctis said as lightning arrested Felix’s fall. Running Away From True Strength, Taking In The Corruption Of A Primordial When He Had The Might Of A God In His Hands. A God He Betrayed With His Accursed Teeth!

Sonata of—!

Shadowflay!

Crimson lightning flashed downward as Noctis struck. Razor-sharp tendrils of darkness lashed out at him from her newest Vessel, accompanied by bloody lightning that sliced through his armored flesh with incredible ease. Wounds sprouted across his chest, arms, and legs, each of them pouring with dark blood that tumbled from between his fingers.

Stratus condition: Shadow Ichor.

All Wounds Bleed Heavily, Rapidly Draining Health From Target.

Duration: Ten Seconds.

Sovereign of Flesh, Felix flared his power as his body fought off the effects, burning essence to heal him, but not nearly fast enough. Yyero spread his jaws before seizing his left arm.

Carrion Nova!

A blast of decay ripped outward, hurling Felix from the Vessel's jaws. Flesh was peeled from the bones of his arm.

Felix fell back, crackling with Adamant Discord as he fought to right himself in the sky. His Body was strong, and Sovereign of Flesh fought to restore him, but his entire left arm had been ripped to the bone. Agony pierced through him—Mind, Spirit, and Body—shaking him beyond his core, to the very depths of his foundations. Shockwaves rippled through him, chiming as opalescent stone cried out and his core space clenched.

Fiendforge slipped his grasp.